The oracles of God : a popular introduction to the Old Testament scriptures for the use of Bible students

Part One Old Testament

SAMUEL A. MARTIN, D. D.

Professor of Philosophy in Lafayette College

All Rights Reserved

MADE IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Preface

The purpose of this book Is to supply the need of a convenient popular introduction to the books of the Old Testament, for the use of Bible Classes, and the general reader.

It is intended for popular use, and therefore avoids technical methods and critical discussion, but on the other hand, it is positive, and I hope not merely superficial in its presentation of the messages given by inspiraton for our learning.

The extent of the work has been regulated by the aim to give as much as can be fairly well considered by a class in about fifty lessons.

It is presumed that the reader is tolerably familiar with the narratives of Scripture and the books most generally used for devotional reading.

No one can be too familiar with the contents of these Scriptures, but it is quite possible to have our knowledge so detached and ill arranged that we get confused and vague impressions of the whole, — possible to not see the woods for the trees. If this book helps to give a true perspective, and an harmonious view of the great redemption which is revealed in the Holy Bible, it will not have been written in vain.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. The Bible — Introduction 9

II. Creation 20

CHAPTER I "The Law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul"

THIS collection of books which we call the Bible occupies a place in our modern life that is entirely unique. They have profoundly influenced our development in civilization in every feature. They have molded our social order, dominated our ethics and formed our religion. Their teaching has permeated every institution, and to some degree affected the life of every civilized people in the world.

No other books can be compared to these either in the extent or force of the influence exerted on the race. They contain such a treasury of spiritual truth, and such a galaxy of beautiful ideals as could not be duplicated from all the literature of the world besides; and their teaching is so intimately associated with our civilization that a fair knowledge of their contents is absolutely necessary to an understanding of our history, or morals, or art, or literature.

On the first glance at these books we notice three features in which they differ from all other books that we read in our homes or study in our schools. First: they are of foreign origin, an importation, and not the product of our traditional culture.

Our civilization, as a whole, is an Aryan civilization. It is the product of the Indo-European race, originating in prehistoric times and coming down to us through Greece and Rome and Modern Europe. It has developed from age to age, and has been modified by various influences from without, but it has never lost its continuity. It is, as it has always been, a body of tradition, — manners and customs, habits of thought, and modes of conduct — handed down from father to son, from generation to generation for thousands of years.

At a definite date, some nineteen hundred years ago, there came into this stream of traditional culture a new current from another source, originating with another race, developed to full maturity along other lines and under different conditions; and this current has blended with the original stream of our civilization and produced our modern world. The channel by which this current came to us is the Bible.

The Bible is the record of those revelations which at sundry times and divers manners God gave to the descendants of Abraham — the Hebrew race.

In the development of the human race, God assigned to different nations special tasks by which they achieved renown and made their contributions to the general welfare. Greece, for example, was "the mother of Arts and Eloquence." Rome, the world's instructor in politics and jurisprudence; and Israel was the great priest nation, "to whom were committed the oracles of God." "Salvation is of the Jews," and the story of that salvation is in their sacred scriptures which we call the Bible. The culture symbolized by the Muses who dwelt by "Mt. Parnassus and the sparkling Helicon" is a great inheritance, which was formed by our fathers and handed down to us, but greater yet is that which comes to us from old Mt. Sinai and from Calvary, by the page of sacred scripture and the fervent words of prophets and apostles who wrote "that we might believe that Jesus was the Christ of God, and that believing we might have life through his name."

Second: the Bible is of peculiar authorship. We call it a book, and so it is, for it has a unity of purpose, a constant point of view and a consistency of teaching that binds all parts

THE BIBLE— INTRODUCTION n

in harmony and gives a cumulative force to all its contents, so that we do well to call it all a book — one book — the book. Yet it is the w^ork of many authors; its composition w^as extended over many generations — nearly sixteen hundred years. It reflects the features of a great variety of outw^ard circumstances, and has the marks of many stages of civilization. Its literary form is varied in every possible w^ay: it consists of history and poetry, philosophy and story, drama and parable, and precept and visions. Every phase of life is portrayed on its pages. It is the most realistic of books, yet contains the loftiest ideals. It is the most profound in its doctrine and the simplest in its style.

While we do well to call it a book, we also do well to remember that it is a library, a collection of independent volumes bound together in the perfect unity of a common purpose and a consistent doctrine. Our word Bible by its etymology very fitly illustrates this diversity and unity. Bible is derived from /?t/?Atov, a library or collection of books, from yStySAoe, a book. Our Bible consists of sixty-six small volumes so intimately joined in harmony of contents as to be fitly called a book — the book.

The third peculiar feature of these books is their marvelous revelation of spiritual truth not otherwise discovered to the human mind. This quality we call inspiration; and by this term we mean that the men who wrote these books had some peculiar illumination in spiritual things, by which they were enabled to see and to appreciate the things of the spirit, and to open them to our understanding.

It is not easy to define exactly what this inspiration is, nor to apprehend distinctly how this influence of God's Spirit differed from that which is, to some degree, the privilege of all spiritually minded men; nor is it necessary to our present purpose that we should define it, or explore the problems of psychology involved.

We are here concerned only with the facts which are abundantly attested by induction from our own experiences and observation. Somehow the contents of these books do find our conscience, do appeal to what we recognize as noblest and highest in our nature, do satisfy our instincts of justice and mercy, approve themselves to our judgment and stand the test of time and experience as no other books have done, or approached.

The doctrine of infallibility rests on the simple fact that the teaching of these books has never failed. As Gamaliel shrewdly observed of the teaching of the apostles, **If this doctrine be of men it will come to nought, but if it be of God, you can do nothing against it." And now, some nineteen centuries after those words were uttered, we fling the same bold challenge to the world; Wherein have these books failed? Which one of all their promises has ever been broken? or what hope they offered been made ashamed? In view of these facts it seems quite within the bounds of simple history and common sense to speak of these books as the words of men who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost; and to regard this Bible as the very word of God.

The word of God it is in very truth; but this assertion must be used with intelligence. It means that the teaching of the Bible is from God, and true as God is true. But it does not mean, as some men carelessly assume, that everything recorded here is true and to be commended. It does not mean that ''Bible words" and "Bible characters" have some peculiar sancity because they are reported in these sacred pages. "Skin for skin. Yea all that a man hath will he give for his life" are words of the Bible, that is, they are recorded there as the utterance of Satan in the Book of Job, but the whole of that book is a demonstration of their utter falsity. The sins of David are faithfully recorded, but we are not left in doubt as to God's hatred of sin.

It is important also to remember that our interpretation of this record may be in error, and that our mistakes must not be charged against the Scriptures, even though such mistakes come down to us with all the authority of godly men and goodly scholarship. Mistakes do not become correct by growing old, nor falsehood grow less false by being long accounted true. The church may well continue to regard the Bible as the only infallible rule of faith and conduct until it fails in some respect of this high office; and to speak of it as the work of inspiration, so long as it stands so well distinguished from all other books in its spiritual teaching.

The list of books to be included in the Bible, and to be accounted parts of Holy Scripture is called the canon; and the selection of these books is spoken of as the formation of the canon. We do not know just where, nor how, nor by whom the canon of the Old Testament was formed, but sometime before the coming of our Lord the canon of the Old Testament was settled and contained the books, and only those, which we include today. The canon of the New Testament was completed during the life time of the apostles of our Lord, and was generally recognized and accepted early in the second century. The books included in the canon are as follows —

Old Testament: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, I and II Samuel, I and II Kings, I and II Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obediah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi.

New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, I and II Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, I and II Thessalonians, I and II Timothy, Titus. Philemon, Hebrews, James, I and II Peter, I, II and III John, Jude, Revelations.

All the books of the Bible were written long before the invention of printing, and copies of them were made by hand and therefore liable to slight errors of transcription. The most ancient manuscripts of the Old Testament date from the year 916 A. D., and the oldest of the New Testament from about 331. These manuscripts show a great number of discrepancies, though for the most part these are minor and insignificant differences. The work of comparing these manuscripts and translations, and quotations made from Scripture by early writers, so as to determine as exactly as possible the original text, is called textual or lower criticism. So great has been the care in the transcription, and so profound the reverence for the very words of the sacred books, that we have been able to determine the original readings with much greater certainty than we have of any classical book of antiquity or even of mediaeval literature; and we may be confident that we have, to all intents and purposes, the very words of the men who wrote as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. The whole Bible has been translated into some five hundred diflFerent languages, and certain portions of it into many more. And every year adds to the list of translations and revisions of these versions.

The work of higher criticism is to determine the date, authorship, and mode of composition of the various books. The chief questions of higher criticism are, first, the genuineness of the book; that is whether, the book, as we have it, is the work of the author to whom it is attributed. For example, is the book called the Epistle of Paul to the Romans really the work of Paul. Second, the integrity of the book; is it all by the same author, or has it been revised or added to by later writers. Third, the date of the books and the circumstances of their composition, and. Fourth, the mode of their composition; whether original with the supposed author or merely compiled by him from earlier writings, and if so, what sources did he draw on for his matter.

For the past half century there has been much activity in the field of higher criticism, and many radical theories have been advanced as to the date and authorship of some of the books; for example, the Penteteuch in its present form is considered by many to be a much later book than was formerly supposed ; and, instead of being written by Moses, was the composition of some writer or writers of much later date who compiled these books **by piecing together verbatim extracts from older documents, making various changes and additions." The Book of Isaiah is thought by many to be the work of at least two authors. Isaiah, the son of Amos, probably writing chapters l-xxxix, and someone else, at a much later date, composing the remainder, chapters xl-lxvi. Others divide the book into three sections and consider each of these as a collection of separate prophecies by different authors.

The whole field of higher criticism has been, and still is, a field of controversy, and no satisfactory concensus of opinion has been reached with regard to many of its problems. It is a most interesting field, and the discussion of its problems has contributed greatly to our knowledge of these books, but most, if not all, of its problems are of secondary importance, inasmuch as the value of the books depends but slightly on our knowledge of their authorship, or date, or mode of composition. Indeed some of the most edifying books of the Bible, — as for example the Book of Job and many of the Psalms, are of unknown origin. It is the character of the book that proves the author's inspiration, and not the author that implies the character of the book.

The varied contents of these books may be classified in any way that logic or convenience may suggest, but it is important that some order and method be followed that will present the matter in some clear form, easily held in memory. One convenient method of such classification is to start with the conception of the Bible as a record of revelations, given at sundry times and in divers manners, and then make these times and manners the basis of our system of presenting the whole. This scheme would give us such heads as, The Revelation of God in his work of Creation, The Revelation given in parable and allegory, The Revelation in Types and Symbols. The Revelations of Prophecy, of Poetry, of History, Biography, and Philosophy. The chronological order of the books and the development of doctrine must be considered also, for the force and value of any revelation will depend to some degree upon the time and order of its coming.

A few words of explanation here may be helpful to an understanding of just what we are to look for under each of these heads.

Creation: The story of creation given in the Bible is very brief, though it covers an enormous period of time. It touches on a great variety of subjects, but its purpose is very simple and specific. It is not a treatise on geology or biology or physics or any other science. Whatsoever of interest it may contain on such subjects is altogether incidental. The purpose of the whole story is to reveal to us our place in the universe, our relation to God and to the world we dwell in. It defines our peculiar position as a part of the material creation and yet superior to it; formed of the dust and to dust returning, yet raised far above all material things by our spiritual life, — the breath of God by which we become living souls.

Every workman is known by his work. The Creator is revealed by Creation. Not fully of course, but to some degree what we are to believe concerning Grod is made known by his work of creation. All science is but the discovery of God's work of creation; this brief sketch of the beginning of things is of inestimable value in giving us the right point of view, and enabling us to form a right conception of tb? relation of the world to God.

Parable and Allegory: It is Impossible to convey truth from mind to mind by words, unless both minds already have the same ideas associated w^ith the words. There is no natural or necessary connection between any idea and the sound used to denote it. The only way in which new ideas may be expressed, new thoughts revealed, is by some kind of allegory — some presentation to the senses or imagination of objects or actions that are in some way analogous to the spiritual object or idea. Such symbols are necessary to the revelation of all things that cannot be seen or handled. Hence the fundamental notions of moral and religious truth are taught in parables or allegory or symbolic acts and objects. Thus the story of man's first disobedience is told in the allegory of "that forbidden tree whose mortal taste brought death into the world and all our woe," and our Lord taught what *'the Kingdom is like" by many parables.

Types and Symbols: These are but the more elaborate and systematic form of teaching by analogy, "by meats and drinks and divers washings," which were the "shadows" of spiritual truth. The whole ritual of the Old Testament was a religious drama, a pantomime, in which the acts and objects used in worship represented the eternal principles of spiritual truth; and the sacraments and ordinances of the New Testament are but "sensible signs" by which the knowledge and benefits of redemption are represented.

Prophecy and Poetry: But such symbols must be interpreted, supplemented and expounded. This is the work of the prophet and the poet. The prophet is God's spokesman ; to speak for God is his office. Both the prophet and the poet are seers, their function is to see the truth in its fullness and its beauty, and to body forth their visions and insight and foresight, so that all may see and know and appreciate the truth they saw.

History: Truth is never so clearly seen as when presented in concrete form — tried out and exemplified in the actual life of men. The record of experience Is history. A very large part of the Bible is history — a faithful record of what men have done, revealing the laws of God in their actual operation, and teaching in the most unquestionable way the everlasting principle that what a man soweth that shall he also reap. Biography is but the more profound and intimate form of history — revealing the inner side of the same exeperlences whose outer side Is history.

Philosophy Is the explanation of phenomena. It is the process of reflection by which the mind discovers the meaning of the facts of life. As when the Psalmist — Ps. VIII — observed the fact of God's goodness to so small and Insignificant a creature as man, he reflected that man's greatness was to be measured not by his physical or material bulk or power, but by his spiritual nature — his angelic likeness, his overlordship and dominion over all creation. So the Book of Job, the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and much of the prophetic books reveal, not the mere facts of experience, but the meaning of the facts. Philosophy above all other forms of revelation teaches the wisdom of God, and shows the sweet reasonableness of his dealings with us.

These "divers manners" of revelation are not separate nor independent, but rather various elements that combine to set forth truth in its fulness and beauty. They may be compared to the form and color and fragrance which are features of the flower, or to the light and shade and movement of the living world viewed from some point of vantage. So the story of creation, the symbols and the prophecies, the poetry and history and philosophy reveal the same truth, eternal truth, God's truth. These varied forms of revelation come with varied effect upon the same person. Some forms address themselves especially to our intellect, others rather to our emotions, or our artistic sense, and others are more effective to move our will to action. But each and all are directed to us, to each of us, to every phase and faculty of our being, and the wonder of it is that these revelations never fail. They never contradict our reason ; they awake responsive voices in our conscience; they evoke our admiration, and elevate our hopes and aspiration. Verily, their inspiring source, The Holy Spirit, "knew what is in man."

Chapter II Creation

"The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof The world and they that dwell therein For He hath founded it upon the seas And established it upon the floods"

IN the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." This is the whole story of the origin of the visible universe; the present constitution of the v^orld dates from this beginning.

What was before that date we know not. How long ago it was, or how long after any other event we cannot tell ; nor why God, at that time, brought the heavens and the earth into being.

But two facts are here revealed; first, that God is the sole source and author of all things; by the word of his power they came and continue to be: second, the present order, the heavens and earth, came into being at a definite time, a time, very long ago, before which they did not exist, and after which they did.

But the act of creation involved much more than the bringing of matter into being. We may not think of the material world as ever having been an inert mass. From the beginning, in its very nature, every atom was endowed with marvelous and varied energies. All the properties of matter, such as weight and size or taste or color are the manifestations of some energy or power; and all these energies act according to some definite and changeless order. These modes and limits of activity we call the laws of nature. The force of gravity, of chemical affinity, of motion, light and heat and every other

CREATION 2t

quality or attribute of matter is due to energies which are from the beginning.

All science and philosophy is but the discovery of what has been since the day when God made the heavens and the earth.

All human skill cannot give to matter or to spirit a single property, or change by one hair's breadth the laws by which their various activities are ordered.

In the beginning the world was made, equipped, endowed and constituted, and that constitution has never been revised. Each atom is by no means the simple, passive, inert bit of matter that we used to think it, but an active agent capable of great variety of energies, more complex in its structure, and more varied in its powers than any machine that man has yet devised.

Then life with its mysterious power to appropriate and use the material substances, to build up the complicated organisms in which it dwells, and by which it performs its functions, and brings forth fruit after its kind, and so perpetuates itself, gives to the earth its beauty and its joy.

So comprehensive is the work of God's creation, which he did in the beginning.

From the beginning the heavens and the earth was a going concern, full of intense activity and ceaseless energy, regulated by immutable decrees and ordered by the most exact and comprehensive laws, which remain to this day as absolute and universal as at first.

To every atom and to every star, to every force and quality God said, as he said to the sea, "Hitherto shalt thou come and no further, and here shall thy proud waves be stayed."

But this world so completely constituted and well ordered was yet undeveloped. It is described as "waste and void." Modern science pictured it as a "fire-mist, tempestuous, lifeless and unorganized."

The process of development, as well as the initial act of creation is ascribed to God. "The Spirit of God brooded over the face of the waters." As a bird incubates the eggs in the nest, so the spirit of God presides over the evolutions of the universe.

The order of development is briefly noted under six great periods, or "days", and the order of events is given as they would appear from the point of view of the earth.

First; light appears, and the distinction of day and night. Second, the firmament, or open space between the clouds above and the waters below. Third, the land appears in places and the ocean gathers in the lower portions of the globe. Third, life appears, and species of plants spring from the ground. Fourth, the sun and heavenly bodies appear, and the seasons are marked. Fifth, animal life in sea and land, "great sea monsters, and every winged fowl after its kind." Sixth, the higher forms of animal life appear, and last of all, man is formed as the crowning work of this long series, and to him is given "dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth."

This outline has been elaborated and filled out in greater detail by the discoveries of science, but not a line has been changed or found in error.

It is a marvelous revelation of the order of the world's development, which, though written many centuries before the same truths were discovered by the light of science, could not be better told today.

"The footprints of the Creator" enable us to read in the rocks the self-same story that we find upon the page of Scripture, so far as the order of creation is concerned, and thus fortify our faith in the assurance that the scripture is to be believed when it adds the testimony, which the rocks cannot so clearly give, that all this is the work of a personal and loving God. It is not the work of blind and insensate forces, working under laws that chanced to be, but the orderly evolution of

CREATION a^

a cosmic universe directed by intelligence and inspired by affection. "And God saw everything that he had made and behold it was very good." This is the act of a personal God. Physical forces, impersonal energy or "a creative impetus" has no power to recognize the beauty or excellence of its work. To call creation good implies a different and higher quality than any that the physical world possesses. It also implies more than intelligence; it implies what we call feeling, emotion or affection.

Still more clearly is the love of God revealed in the declaration that when sentient creatures — creatures that are capable of pain and pleasure — arrive, God blessed them — , gave them happiness, according to their nature and capacity. Rocks and seas and sky cannot be blessed — cannot experience joy or satisfaction, but living creatures of the higher orders can; and we read with interest that when this stage of evolution is reached God blessed them. So the animate world is full of happiness, of singing birds and playing youngsters, of contented flocks in green pastures and lizards basking in the sun.

When man arrives we read again, "God blessed them," and, furthermore, that he gave man the special blessing of "dominion over all the earth." Thus man was, in a manner, taken into partnership with God, made a creator, within the limits of his place a power, and given opportunity for growth in wisdom and nobility of soul by the exercise of reason and the bearing of responsibility.

Man is the crown of creation. This brief story is important chiefly in this that it reveals to us our place and our relations.

The greatest revelation given here is that man was made in the image of God. Indeed this is the greatest revelation ever made, — the most important truth in all the world. It is the basis of our hope of immortality. It is the pledge of God's unfailing care, and the reasonable ground of every spiritual aspiration.

Man's place in the order of the universe is entirely unique. His relation to the material world is close and necessary. From the dust we came and to the dust we go; the beasts of the field are in very truth our "little brothers," and, like them, we are nourished and sustained by the products of the soil. All our intellectual activities, and even our emotions and affections are conditioned by our physical frame.

By the special organs of sight and hearing and the other senses we gain knowledge of the world we live in, and by our nerves and brain the soul performs its functions. We are indeed fearfully and wonderfully made, a marvelous organism, "a harp of a thousand strings." So that men looking only on this instrument — this astonishing brain and nerve and muscular mechanism — are sometimes overwhelmed with admiration of it, and attribute everything to the machinery by which it is accomplished. But back of the brain, above the nervous system, in and through and over all these is that spirit which God gave when he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and he became a living soul.