and e,en of the personal conduct of the great leader. From first to last he is never praised; once only (in the passage objected to) he is said to have come to be" very great in the sight of Pharaoh's servants" and the Egyptian people. His faults are set forth without any disguise or extenuation: his hastiness and unjustifiable violence in "slaying the Egyptian" ( eh. ii. 12); his foolish assumption of authority over his brethren (ib. 13); his timidity when he found that he was likely to be punished for his crime (ib. 14, 15); his un"'lll""illingness to undertake the mission which God assigned to him (eh. iv. 1-13); his neglect of the covenant of circumcision (ib. 24-26); his in-everent remonstrance when success did not attend his first application to Pharaoh ( eh. v. 22-24); and his want of self-control when on account of the sin of his people in worshipping the golden calf he "cast the Tables" -"'lll""I'itten by the finger of God-" out of his hands and brake them " (eh. xxxii. 19). Nothing is said of his possessing any remarkable ability. On the contrary, he is represented as insisting, over and over again, on his incompetency, on his want of eloquence (eh. iv. 10), his insignificance (" Who am I?" eh. iii. 11 ), and his inability to persuade even his own people (eh. iv. 1; vi. 12). No credit is assigned to him for anything that he does; for his bold and courageous behaviour before Pharaoh; for that organisation of the people which must have preceded the Exodus; 1 for his conduct of the march ; or for that faith which never wavered, even when he and his people were shut in between the irresistible host of Pharaoh and the waters of an apparently untraversable sea (eh. xiv. 13, 14). While it is in complete harmony with the general practice of the sacred writers, and with the spirit of true religion, that such reticence and such a dis- paraging tone should be employed by a writer respecting himself, it is quite inconceivable that either Joshua or any other companion of Moses should have written of him in this style. To his contemporaries, to those who had seen his miracles, and who owed their lives and liberties to his bold and successful guidance, Moses must have been a hero, a paladin, the :first, the greatest, and the most admirable of men. We may see what they thought of him by the words with which Deuteronomy closes-" There arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face, in all the signs and the wonders which the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh, and to all his servants, and to all his land, and in all that mighty hand, and in all the great terror which Moses showed in the sight of all Israel" (Deut. xxxiv. 10-12). If then the style and diction of Exodus, oombined with the knowledge which it exhibits both of Egypt and of the Sinaitic peninsula, indicate unmistakably for its author either Moses or one of the other leading Israelites of Moses' time, there cannot be any reasonable doubt towards 1 See the remarks of Canon Cook m the 'Speaker's Commentary,· vol. i. p. 805, "Note Q!I V 18" INTRODUCTION. XVll
which of the two theories the balance of the internal evidence inclines. It is simply inconceivable that one of those who looked up to Moses with the reverence and admiration that he must have inspired in hie followers, could have produced the unflattering portraiture which Exodus presents to us of one of the very greatest of men. It is, on the other hand, readily conceivable, and completely in accordance with what experience teaches of the thoughts and words of great saints concerning themselves, that Moses should have given such a representation of himself. The internal evidence is thus in harmony with the external. Both alike point to Moses as the author of this Book and of those which follow.
§ 5. CHRONOLOGY. The internal chronology of the Book of Exodus ie a matter of great simplicity, presenting only a single point of doubt or difficulty. This ie the question whether the Hebrew text of eh. xii. 40 ie to be regarded ae sound and genuine, or whether it ie to be corrected from the Samaritan version and the Septuagint. In the Hebrew text we read: "Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years;" or more literally, "Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, which they sojourned in Egypt, 1 was 430 years." But in the Septuagint the passage runs thus: "The sojourning of the children of Israel, which they sojourned in Egypt and in the land of Canaan, was 430 years ; " 2 and in the Samaritan thus : " The sojourning of the children of Israel and of their fathers, which they sojourned in the land of Canaan and in the land of Egypt, was 430 years." If the Hebrew text ie sound we must count 430 years from the descent of Jacob into Egypt to the Exodus; if it is corrupt, and to be corrected from the two ancient versions, the time of the sojourn will be reduced one-half, for it was a space of exactly 215 years from the entrance of Abraham into Canaan to the descent of Jacob into Egypt. 3 In favour of the short period it ie urged, fhst, that the genealogies contained in the Pentateuch, and especially the genealogy of Moses and Aaron (Ex. vi. 16-20), will not admit of the longer term; 4 and, secondly, 1 The verb e.nd the substantive used a.re cognate; a.nd the passage is correctly, as well as
literally, rendered by the LXX. : 71 8~ 1<arol1<11cris ro,v vliiiv 'I11pa¾,.\, ~v 1<arrp1<1111a.v ,, -yji Al-yJ,n-4>, • In some copies of the Septuagint (e.g. the Codex Alexandrinus) the read.ing is-" The sojourning of the children of Isre.el, which they and their fathers sojourned in Egypt and ir& the land of Canaan, was 430 yee.rs," which approaches to the Samaritan, but still differs from it. 3 From the entrance of Abraham into Can9.8.ll to the birth of Isaac was twenty-five yee.rs (Gen. xii. 4; xvii. 1, 21); from the birth of Isaac to that of Jacob was sixty yee.rs (ib. X..'tV 26). Jacob was 130 yee.rs old when he went into Egypt ( ib. xlvii. 9). But 25 + 60+ 130 = 215. • So Kennicott, Pool, Houbige.nt, Geddes, Morinus, Cappellus, Deyling, Koppen, Usher, M1trsham, Buddreus, Bengel, Knobel, Colenso, etc. The last-named writer, wbo has collated all the genealogies contained in the Pentateuch, has shown that they vary between four a.nd six names, tending thus, in some degree, to con.firm the estimate of four generations from Levi to Moses 0 xviii INTRODUCTION.