(/.) Moreover, that " law of Moses" was very burden- some in its ritual, in respect to both trouble and expense ; and no one could have introduced it, therebv in fact ac-
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complishing an unparalleled social revolution, if he had not had the support of overwhelming authority as the recognised messenger of Jehovah. Nor, when once estab- lished, could that legislation have been altered through- out successive ages by numberless nameless authors such as the critics have discovered.
(ff.) The prophetic passages, those of Closes himself, and those of Balaam, have puzzled the critics when at- tempting to fix a later date for them.
(/(.) A most tempting subject for any one who wishes to turn upon the critics is the irreconciluble diversity of the hypotheses which they have frmned, in spite of every imaginable advantage enjoyed by them — learning, leis- ure, mutual concert, and entire absence of any belief in the need of evidence for their endless suppositions. We noticed, at an early part of our argument, that there is a fundamental difference among them : much the great- er number believing, as we do, that Deuteronomy was composed later than the other four books, while a small minority, comprising some distinguished scholars, invert the relation of the two parts, assigning the higher an- tiquity to Deuteronomy, and considering the legislation in the preceding books to be developed from it. By both schools " the Deuteronomist" is regarded as a dif- ferent person from " the Elohist" and " the Jehovist" (or the older and younger Elohistic and Jehovistic writers, according to those critics who make each of these names represent a class rather than an individual), to whom is assigned the composition of almost the whole of the first four books and a small portion of history towards the close of the fifth. It would occupy too much space to reckon up the variety of opinions as to the number of these imaginary authors and the ages in which they respectively flourished : those who wish to see this prac- tice of making hj'potheses in its most extravagant and self-sufficient form may find it in the commencement of Ewald's History of the People of Israel. We wish, however, to remind our readers that these varieties in the hypotheses are not to be overlooked, as if they were mere differences of detail. To us, on the contrary, thej' appear to be essential or fatal defects in these critical schemes ; for when Jloses has been denied to be the au- thor, there is nothing on which to depend except critical sagacity ; and since this critical sagacity not unfrequent- ly contradicts itself, and is ever contradicting the sagac- ity of some other critic quite as much to be respected as the one we are studying at the time, it furnishes con- vincing evidence that it is itself an unsafe guide. The critics allege, indeed, that their testimony agrees in many points; and this is true, so long as they confine themselves to generalities, because they start from the same false principles, as to miracles, prophecy, etc. They do also agree in a great many particulars; but this is not wonderful, considering how they read one 'another's productions, compare them, and dovetail their state- ments together, altering and amending as often as they are charged with error or confusion, by one another or by those who adhere to the old opinion. We do not blame them for this procedure ; but it makes their agreement, so far as it goes, of very little worth as concurrent testimony.
{i.) There are gaps in "the fundamental document"' which need to be tilled up; and there are references in it to the so-called later or supplementary matter, which we therefore believe to be a composition as early as the other which they pronounce to be alone the original. Tlie individual proofs of this assertion we cannot here adduce ; antl indeed, as often as instances are given, some new critic starts up to make a different arrange- ment of the original and the supplementary matter which escapes from the objection charged upon the scheme of his predecessor — a process which is not so difficult after all, as nothing more is required than his own unsupported assertion.
It is to be retnembered, however, that a person may hold the common opinion that Moses ivrote the Pentateuch, and yet along with this may also hold (rightly or wrongly)
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that Iherf are elements in it which are not from the hand of Moses, hut which have come to be incorporated with it hy accidents to trhich all vertj ancient books ai'e liable. Thus there are various ways of dealing with near half a dozen dilHcuIties, such as the mention of Dan, or of the district called Ilavoth-jair "unto this day," or the testimony to the surpassing meekness of Moses, or the geographical and antiquarian statements in Deut. ii. If the mind of anj' one remains unsatisfied with the ex- planations offered, he has it in his power to cut the knot W'hich he is not able to untie. He may say that the general and direct evidence, on account of which he be- lieves Moses to be the author of the Pentateuch, is over- whelming; and in regard to these few incidental pas- sages which puzzle him, he may incline to consider them glosses or explanations thro\\'n in by some copj-ist or annotator, whether authorized or not, and he can imagine these removed without any serious alteration in the book, as it reverts preciselj' to the form in which he conceives it to have come from Moses. That unau- thorized copj-ists might make such changes is a notion for which parallels more or less satisfactory can be ad- duced; yet it might be preferable to think of an editor whose annotations or alterations were authoritative, and such an editor Ezra is supposed to have been by many who follow old Jewish traditions. How far the influ- ence of such an editor might alter the work is a matter for those to settle who embrace this opinion; certainly it ought not to be supposed to extend far, or they run the risk of virtually injuring their faith in Moses as the author. On the other hand, of course, those who adhere most strenuously to the old opinion deny that they are committed by their views to the absurdity of believing that Moses wrote the account of his own death and burial. There is a tradition in the Talmud that Joshua wrote the last eight verses of Deuteronomy ; although it is now more commonly supposed that the work of Moses ends at ch. xxxi, 23 (or even earlier, at verse 8 : Baumgarten says at ch. xxx, 20), and that Joshua, or whoever recorded these closing details, inserted the song and the blessing of Moses, along with the accounts of his final charge, his view of the Promised Land, his death, etc.