If this direct verbal testimony had been absent, the entire structure of the scriptural books from Joshua to jVIalachi would have necessitatwl the same conclusion. These l)ooks never could have been written in their ex- isting form, unless by men familiarly conversant with the I'cntateuch. Thence are derived the ultimate prin- ciples which underlie the whole. They are united to it by a mass of reference so complex, intricate, and minute, as to constitute a study in itself. The grand monothe- ism which pervades the whole, the overruling I'rovi- dence which is evervwhere thrown into the foreground.
the national election of the Jew, and his relation to his forefathers in the perpetual covenant sealed between God and them, would all be inexplicable without this reference to the transactions of the past. Throughout the prophetical books especially the tone of thought and feeling, the language employed, the illustrations used, the accents of blended reproach, warning, and promise, the allusions to the past, and the predictions of the future, would be unintelligible to the student if the Pentateuch were not in his possession to interpret them. This is as true, and perhaps more forcibly evi- ' dent in regard to the N. T. and the teaching of our Lord and his apostles than it is in the O. T. and in the lan- guage of the prophets. The Pentateuch is the thread of gold which runs, now latent, now prominent, through- out the whole body of the Scriptures. Ketain it in its place, and the whole is united by a consistent purpose from end to end ; take it away, and all the rest of reve- lation becomes a mass of inextricable confusion. The recognition of this bearing of the authority of the Pen- tateuch on the authority of the other scriptural books is most necessary. Eor the purpose, however, of suc- cinctly stating the positive argument in favor of the authorship and divine authority of the five books of Moses, it is sufficient to trace the line of testimony down to the time of JIalachi, for here we find that firm footing in the acknowledged facts of profane history which enables us to close every avenue against the ob- jections of unbelief.
To take the facts of the books subsequent to the Pen- tateuch, and reduce them to anything like consistency, on the supposition that the Pentateuch itself is myth- ical, framing a connected and credible story out of them, is a task which bafHes all human ingenuity. The only alternative njjpears to be to make a clean sweep of the history altogether; but this is no sooner proposed to the mind than both the past and the present lift up their protest against it. The past forbids it, because at many points the history of the Jew has come into con- tact with the history of the other great nations of an- tiquity, and to destroy the one woidd involve the de- struction of the other likewise; for modern research has conclusively proved the harmony of sacred history with profane in a very considerable number of instances. The Mosaic authorship is expressly aflirmed by Hecata?us, Manetho, Lj'simachus, Tacitus, Juvenal, and Longimis. In regard to the Pentateuch itself, the Mosaic cosmog- ony, the scriptural account of the deluge, and the dis- persion of mankind at Babel receive confirmation from Berosus the Chakla>an; the ethnological list in Genesis is strong!}' corroborated by the Babylonian monuments; the account of the exodus, by the distorted narrative of Manetho the Egyptian. Coming to later times, the Jewish conquest of Canaan is confirmed by an ancient Phoenician inscription noticed by three old writers; Da- vid's con(iuest of Syria by two heathen Avriters of re- pute; the history of his relations with Hiram, king of Tyre, by Herodotus, Dius, and Blenander. Similar points of contact occur all down the history, till, in the period of the captivity, we emerge from the darkness of prehistoric times to the period of authentic history (see Kawlinson's Bnmpton Lectures and Ancient Mon- archies). If the Jewish history be all fabulous, what becomes of the profane? and how is it that the ancient Babylonian monuments, now yielding their precious stores of information to the diligence of modern iiuiui- ry, corroborate in so many points the statements of the sacred books. The two branches of history, the sacred and the profane, are so interwoven that the denial of the one must involve likewise the denial of the other. Say that the jiast history of the Jew before the times of the Ptolemies is a myth altogether, and the histon,' of the Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Assyrian must become at least equally apocryphal. Acknowledge the history to be true, and the truth of the history involves the divine authority of the Pentateuch which records it.
But the argument is at least equally strong when we
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trace the line of proof upward from the time of the Ptol- emies, ill regard to the existence of the Jewish Scrip- lures, as in regard to the facts of Jewish history. The still extant Septuagint proves the existence of the O.-T. Scriptures in their completed form at this date, and that they were universally received by the Jewish race as the authoritative and divinely inspired compositions of the authors to whom they are ascribed. The Penta- teuch, for instance, was implicitly received as being the work of Moses, and as supplying the divinely ordained platform on which the wliole superstructure of Jewish poiity and religion had been reared, and as the author- itative record of it. To cast a doubt on its genuineness and sacred authority would have been esteemed blas- phemy. The case is strengthened by the position held by the Pentateuch as the most ancient of their writings, and as underlying, so to speak, all the rest. For they were accepted not onlj' as existing from former times, but as the first of a long series of sacred books, united by a regular historical sequence with each other, and all of them received from the tradition of the preceding times. The supposition, therefore, that the Pentateuch is unhistorical does not end with tlie destruction of the sacred authority of the Mosaic books, but destroys the authority of all the rest of the O.-T. Scriptures likewise; for all these without exception are foimded on the au- thority of the Pentateuch, and tlie historic reality of the events recorded in it. Jf this is denied, either the later books must be considered part of the same imposture as that which produced the Pentateuch in its connected form ; or their authors must have knowingly endorsed and availed themselves of this imposture ; or, lastly, they must ignorantly have received human and imaginary compositions as veritable and divinely inspired history.