tion, the chief portions of the earlier legislation. But such a hypothesis is devoid of all probability. For what writer in later times would ever have presumed, unless he were equal to Moses, to correct or supplement the Law of Moses? And if he were equal to Moses, why borrow his name (as Ewald supposes the Deuter- onomist to have done) in order to lend greater weight and sanction to his book? The truth is, those who make such a supposition import modern ideas into an- cient writings. They forget that what might be al- lowable in a modern writer of fiction would not have been tolerated in one who claimed to have a divine commission, who came forward as a prophet to rebuke and to reform the people. Which woidd be more weighty to win their obedience, "Thus saith Jehovah," or "Moses wrote all these words?" It has been ar- gued indeed that in thus assuming a feigned character the writer does no more than is done by the author of Ecclesiastes. He in like manner takes the name of Solomon that he may gain a better hearing for his words of wisdom. But the cases are not parallel. The Preacher only pretends to give an old man's view of life, as seen by one who had had a large experience and no common reputation for wisdom. Deuteronomy claims to be a law imposed on the highest authoritj-, and demanding implicit obedience. The first is a rec- ord of the struggles, disappointments, and victor}' of a human heart. The last is an absolute rule of life, to which nothing may be added, and from which nothing may be taken (iv, 2 ; xxxi, 1).
But, besides the fact that Deuteronomy claims to have been written by Moses, there is other evidence which establishes the great antiquity of the book,
(a) It is remarkable for its allusions to Egypt, which are just what would be expected supposing ]Moses to have been the author. It is a significant fact that Ewald, who will have it that Deuteronomy was written in the reign of Manasseh, is obliged to make his sup- posed autlior live in Egypt, in order to account plausi- bly for the acquaintance with Egyptian customs which is discernible in the book. Without insisting upon it that in such passages as iv, 15-18, or vi, 8, and xi, 18-20 (comp, Exod, xiii, IG), where the command is given to wear the law after the fashion of an amulet, or xxvii, 1-8, where writing on stones covered with plaster is mentioned, are probable references to Egyptian customs, we may point to more certain examples. In xx, 5 there is an allusion to Egyptian regulations in time of war; in xxv, 2, to the Egyptian bastinado; in xi, 10, to the Egyptian mode of irrigation. The references which Delitzsch sees in xxii, 5 to the custom of the Egyptian priests to hold solemn processions in the masks of different deities, and in viii, 9 to Egyptian mining operations, are by no means so certain. Again, among the curses threatened are the sicknesses of Egypt (xx viii, 00; comp. vii, 15). According to xxviii, 68, Egypt is the type of all the oppressors of Israel : "Kemember that thou wast a slave in the land of Egypt," is an expression which is several times made use of as a motive in enforcing the obligations of the book (v, 15; xxiv, 18,22; see the same appeal in Lev, xix, 34, a passage occurring in tlie remarkable section Lev, xvii-xx, which has so much affinity with Deuter- onomy). Lastly, references to the sojourning in Egypt are numerous : " We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt," etc. (vi, 21-23 ; sec also vii, 8, 18 ; xi, 3) ; and these oc- cur even in the laws, as in the law of the king (xvii, 16), which would be very extraordinary if the book had only been written in the time of Jlanassch.
(i) The phraseology of the book, and the archaisms found in it, stamp it as of the same age with the rest of the Pentateuch. The form Nin, instead of STI, for the feminine of the pronoun (which occurs in all 195 times in the Pentateuch), is found tliirty-six times in Deuteronomy. Nowhere do we meet with N"^!! in this book, thoui^h in the rest of the Pentateuch it occurs
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eleven times. In the same way, like the other books, Deuteronomy has "l^'3 of a maiden, instead of the fem- inine n"i"2, which is only used once (xxii, 19). It has also the third pers. pret. "^n, wliicli in prose occurs only in the Pentateuch (Ewald, Lehrbuch, § 142 b). The de- monstrative pronoun bXH (wliich, according to Ewald, § 183 (/, is characteristic of the Pentateuch) occurs in Deut. iv, 42; vii, 22; xix, 11, and nowhere else out of the books of Moses, except in the late book, 1 Chron. XX, 8, and the Aramaic Ezra, v, 15. The use of the T\ locale, which is comparatively rare in later writings, is common to Deuteronomy with the other books of the Pentateuch ; and so is the old and rare form of writing "XiJ"Gn, and the termination of the future in 'y\~. The last, according to KiJnig (.4.-7'. Stud. 2 Heft), is more common in the Pentateuch than in an\' other book: it occurs (ifty-eiglit times in Deuteronomy. Twice even in the preterite (viii, 3, Ki) a like termination presents itself; on the jieculiarity of which Ewald (§ 190 b, note) remarks, as being the original and fuller form. Other archaisms which are conmion to the whole five books are: the shortening of the Hiphil, rX"ib, i, 33; ^"Ovh, xxvi, 12, etc.; the use of X'np^mp, "to meet;" the construction of the passive with rtX of the object (for instance, xx, 8) ; the interchange of the older 3'Ii3 (xiv, 4) with the more usual i!333 ; the use of "1*127 (instead of "^2"), xvi, 16; xx, 13, a form which disap- pears altogether after the Pentateuch ; many ancient words, such as 3i::N;, D^ip^, -^yq (^ad, Exod. xiii, 12). Among these are some which occur besides only in the book of Joshua, or else in very late writers, like Ezekiel, who, as is always the case in the decay of a language, studiously imitated the oldest forms; some which are found afterwards only in poetry, as C^S^X (vii, 13; xxviii, 4, etc.) and Cpp, so cornmon in Deuteronomy. Again, this book lias a number of words which have an archaic character. Such are, ^p"in (fur the later bS'a), XJi: (instead of ?D); the old Canaanitish riiR'i*;- "XSri, " offspring of the flocks;" "j^liT"', which as a name of Israel is borrowed, Isa. xliv, 2; "TIil(i,41),"to act rashly;" :^^^p!^, "to be silent;" p''3"ri (xv, 14), "to give," lit. "to put like a collar on the neck;" 153"rif7, " to play the lord ;" iTItp, " sickness."