The Pulpit Commentary — Genesis — Section 10

religion, How con thoy claeh, seeing tliat truth muHt be truth, ancl that Goel reveul~ himself in the £nets of nature no less surely than he reveals himself in his word? If ' the clergy desire to enter into scientific controversies, first let them ncquire tl,e requisite knowledge, and then let them urge their viBwe in the press, or in places where they con be fairly met nnd criticised. The pulpit is not meant to be a place for doubtful disputations, but for the furtherance of the ends of revelation, which iA '' profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousnes~: that the man of God moy be perfect, throughly famished unto all good works." 1 The first nine chapters of Genesis nre singularly rich in moral and spiritual lessons. T11ey summarise the history of ot least 2000 years in the progress of mankind. In the pulpit, ot nny rote, we senrch them not for earthly wisdom, but for heavenly knowlecge. Of the physic11l truths which the finger of God has written on the star~ of heaven or carved upon the rocky tablets of the world; of the bands of Jnpiter, or tl1e ring of Saturn, or the snowy poles of Mars ; of the extinct monsters which once trampled the forests or tempested the seas-a child may now know more than was dreamt by the wisest man of old. But, on the other hand, the nations of the worlcl might hnve been saved from millenniums of error-not only from Fetish-worship nnd Devil-worship, but from Pantheism, and Atheism, and Polytheism, and Mani- cheism, and Materialism, ond forms of error compatible with the most advanced culture-by that single verse of Genesis, speaking calmly as a voice out of the depths of eternity: 11 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." /3. In the story of.the Creation the same truths are prominent, and the troths on which all may fix their thoughts are those of a loving Omnipotence and a glorious world. Similarly, .in the story of the Fall of Man, while it would be possible to raise any number of perplexities which are incapable of present solution, it would argue a singnlar blindness if we missed the truth. that the fall of Adam and Eve points the lesson of the fall of every man and woman brought into a sinful world. Be it a history or be it an allegory, we are in any case intended to read in it the causes of the loss of innocence, the certain consequences of retribution, and the Divine remedy for sin. And in the promise tci Eve of .that seed of the woman who should break the serpent's head we he/lr the first utterance of prophecy, and catch the first gleam of that light and hope:which was to brighten into the perfect day. Have we not here the_ great elements which run through the whole Bible-" law and prophecy; the denunciation of sin and the promise of pardon; the flame which consumes ancl the light which comforts ; " and is not this the whole of the covenant ? y. We find the same truths repeated, with striking variations, in the story of Cain; and then we see the origin, on the one hand, of polygamy and a godless civilisa- tion in the family of Lamech, and, on the other hand, of religious worship in the family of Seth. This salt of goodness was not, however, sufficient to save the world from moral corruption ; and in the narrative of the Deluge we read the great moral truth that there is a point at which nations can fill no fuller the cop of their iniquity -at which God's wroth against corruption must express itself in retributive justice. Yet here again we find the beautiful symbols of mercy and of safety-the saving nrk, the dove with the branch of olive plucked off in her mouth, the promise thnt Goel will no more smite every living thing; above all, the bow in the cloud as a pledge of mercy. With the fnmily of Noah the story of m11n begins afresh, anJ begins with on awful wnming against the curse of drunkenness; but the rainbow, which was made to him the sign of a new cov~nnnt, flashes and fades throughout 12Tim. iii. 16, 17,  the whole of Srriptnre, nnd e,·cn Rmid the often tenible visions of the Inst book of the Bihle we catch our Inst glimpse of it, spanning the throno of God, nnd 11 In ~ight like unto an emerald." 1 ,i. After the rem&rknble genealogy of 'hations in the tenth chapter of Genesis, and one glance at the first colossal empires of the East, we are told of the ruin of nn Jttcmpt to establish an universal dominion. That story of Babel is tho Divino sanc- tion of nationality. From that point, through forty chapters, the sacred historian lcnYes the history of the world to dwell on the records of three biographies. For not only is the individual life sacred to God, but those three patriarchs-Abrnho.m, Isaac, and Jacob-,vere the fathers of the chosen people. They lived peaceful and, for the most part, uneventful lives in their pastoral tents ; they were but men; they were not sinless; they sometimes fell into acts of cruelty, meanness, and deceit. But even with all their human wealn1esses they were men eminently good, and their one great distinguishing feature was faith in God. It is this which, more than any- thing else, differentiates one life from another. We are helped to grasp the lesson by the striking way in which each one of them is silently contrasted with another who has his good things in this life-Abraham with Lot, Isaac with Ishmael, Jacob with Esau. Few lessons are more instructive than those which spring from drawing out this contrast in its details and in its results. But the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews points out to us the grea1 lesson that it was faith which lit up their characters with every virtue and every grace ; it was like one sunbeam brightening jewels of many colours. • ,. It is needless to dwell on the rich symbolism of the historic narrative which runs through the remaining books of the Pentateuch. The burning bush, the plagues of Egypt, the drowning of Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea, Marah and Elim nnd Kibroth Hnttaavah, the darkness and splendour of Sinai, the pillar of cloud and fire, the smitten rock, the brazen serpent, the grand episode of Balaam, the zeal of Phinehas, the death of Moses, the doom to forty years of wandering in the wilder- ness, the conquest of Canaan-these nre events which arrest our attention, and we can hardly miss their lessons. It is different with the judicial, ceremonial, and political la.w of the Jews, which occupy so many chapters in these books, and aM too much neglected. They were intended to train Israel, and through Israel to train the world, in the knowledge of God as one God, as a Spirit, as eternal, as ever· near us, as a God of holiness and justice, and above all as a God of love. The one utterance rowid which the entire law of Moses may be said to cluster is that in Exod. xxxiv. 5-7, which is the great proclamation of the name of God after .tlie shameful apostasy of the people. The moral law-on the unequalled majesty nnd Divine originality of which we need not now dwell-was meant to reveal hie will, and the aim of the cere:rrwnial law was to habituate the people to the conception that they roust be holy as God is holy, and pure a8 he is pure, Thie is the one main object of all the laws about clean and unclean meats, intended to keep Israel as a separate people; and of the long chapter, about ceremonial uncleanness, which was mea.nt to Le a type of moral, mental, and spiritual uncleanness. This too was the meaning of all the ordinances of worship, which, like the laws of the fringes and the phylac~ teries, were meant to teach Israel that God was among them, and that therefore they must be pure in heart and obedient in life. If the student will carefully consider the thirteen long chapters <:£ the Book of Exodus which are occupied with detailq 1 Rev. iv. 3.  OENEHAL IN'l'RODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTA~lENT. xiii