The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Chronicles — Section 418

workers in stono; not to hew, since the stones were already hewn when purchased, but to build-in this perhaps designedly following the example given in the building of the temple ~1 Kin~s vi. 7). IV. 'IHE ABPIBTANTB. 1. Scribes, who kept a record of the progress of, as well a11 the necessary accounts connected with, the work. 2. Officers, who served in different capacities under superiors. 8. Porters, who watched at the several gates of the temple while the work wa.e going on. LEBBONS. 1. The beauty of order. 2. The efficiency secured by division of labour. 3, The value of co-operation.-W. Vera. 14-28.-The book of the Law. I. THE FINDING OF THE BOOK, (Vers. 14, 15.) 1. The.finder. Hilkiah the priest (ver. 18), the high priest (ver. 9), the son of Shallum (1 Chron. vi. 13), the son of Zadok; not to be identified with either the father of Jeremiah (Jer. i. 1) or the father of Gemariah (Jer. x.xix. 3); and certainly to be distinguished from the father of Eliakim, Hezekiah's house-steward (Isa. xxil. 20). 2. The place. The temple (ver.15), though in what part is not stated (ver.14); perhaps the treasure-chest out or which Hilkiah was fetching gold to make cups and other vessels (Josephus,• Ant.,' x. 4. 2), but more probably the vicinity or the ark in the holy of holies. 3. The time. The eighteenth year of Josiah's reign, when he was in the middle of bis reformation work (ver. 8), and just before the celebration of the Pass- over (eh. x.xxv. 1)-a. circumstance calculated to suggest the presence of God's finger in the opportune discovery of a book which exercised so powerful an influence upon ths religious life of the nation at this critical juncture in its history; though the same circumstance has been used (Wellhausen, Kuenen, Ewald, Colenso, R. Smith, Cheyne) to support the theory that the book was now or shortly before for the first time written, by either Hilkiah himself, Jeremiah, or some other unknown prophet, as the legislative programme of the reforming party. 4. The book. (1) Deuteronomy alone (De W ette, Bohlen, Kuenen, etc.), or the original kernel thereof (Cheyne); maintained chiefly on these grounds: (a) 'l'he title of the book-" the book of the Law" (ver. 15), "a book of the Law of the Lord" (ver. 14)-a designation which appears to be reserved for the fifth alone of the so-called Mosaic books (Dent. xxviii. 61; xxx. 10 ; xxxi. 26). But it is likewise styled "the book of the covenant" (ver. 30); and this phrase occurs only in the second of the Pentateuchal books (Exod. xxiv. 7). Whence, by parity of reason- ing, the book found must have been the Book of Exodus alone. The probability, how- ever, is, that the volume contained both the second and the fifth books of Mo,es; in other words, that it was the whole Penta.tench. (b) The size of the book. As Shapha.n is said to have read it through at a. sitting (ver. 18), it is hardly likely to have been the whole Penta.tench, but may have been Deuieronomy. But the revised trans- lation, "therein" (ver. 8), has deprived this of the force it was formerly sup- posed to possess as an argument. (c) The teaching of the book. The principle of Josiah's reformation, which it is argued was based upon the book-the principle, viz., of the abolition of local sanctuaries and the centralization of worship in the temple at Jerusalem~orresponds exactly with the legislation of the Deuteronomic code, which declares the ln.w of one central altar, and forbids the erection of local sanctuaries (Deut. xii. 5-8). '£his, however, may be conceded without holding that Hilkia.h's Law-book contained nothing but Deuteronomy or the original draft thereof-unless, indeed, it bs assumed that Deuteronomy was only then for the first time written-against which stands the fact that tht1 law of the king (Deut. xvii. 18) appears to have been known and observed in the days of Jehoiada and Joash (eh. xxiii. 11; 2 Kings xi. 12). Besides, it is too readily assume<l that Josiah had no knowledge of the sinfulness of local sanctuaries and the imperative obligation of a central altar until he heard Hilkia.h's book read, and that from the hearing of that book he derived his impulse to destroy ths bee.then altars in Jerusalem, Judah, e.nd certain cities of Israel. As to the first, if Josiah had no acquaintance with the law of one altar, it would seem that Hezekiah had (2 Kings xviii. 4--6); while, wit.h reference to the second, the Book of Kings mdeed adopts the view here stated; but the Chronicler represents the finding of ths hook as having taken place after the purgation of the land (ver. 8). (d) The style of the b0ok. Ou the ground of certain linguistic resemblances between Deuteronomy i\nd Jeremiah, it is argued that the former must have been Hilkiah's book, and com:po,;ed  424 TRE SECOND BOOK OF THE CHRONICLES. [err. nxrv. 1-33.