some phenomena which require attentive consideration. 'Jehovah, when Thou wentest out of Seir, When Thou marchedst out of the field of Edom, The earth trembled, and the heavens dropped, 441. Here we have a plain reference to the story, at all events, of the Exodus and the giving of the Law under Sinai, if not to the actual record of that story, which is now in our hands. And in this passage, as well as throughout the song, the word Jehovah is familiarly used. It is important, therefore, to determine, if we can, in what age this people, Ps.lxviii. In Thy marching in the wilderness, Before Elohim, Song was really written. It professes, v.4, Sing to Elohim, sing praise to His Name. of course, to be the Song actually v.7, Elohim, in Thy going out before Thy uttered by Deborah and Barak;' though the very fact, that the two are joined together in singing it, rather v.8, The earth trembled, the heavens too dropped, militates against the notion of its genuineness, and seems to indicate, at all events, that it is an artistic composition, and not the unpremeditated effusion of the moment of triumph.. 442. And, certainly, there are parts of the Song, which appear, at first sight, to imply that it was composed at a very early date, perhaps in the age to which its contents refer, and not later, at all events, than the days of Samuel. (i) Judah is not mentioned at all, which seems to correspond to a time before David's accession to the throne,-before even the 30,000 men of Judah followed the standard of Saul, 1S.xi.8. (ii) Levi is not named, nor is there any reference whatever, throughout the Song, to the Priesthood or the Sanctuary. This also corresponds to a time, earlier than the days of David, in whose reign the Levites, after the bringing up of the Ark, were called into greater activity, and into a more prominent position, than they appear to have occupied during the time of the Judges, the Levites, as a body, being never once mentioned throughout the whole book of Judges. (iii) The expression in v.10, Ye that ride on white asses,' suits the same early time; but then, as such asses or mules were used by chief persons, 18.xxv.20,2S.xvi.2,xvii.23, xix.26,2S.xiii. 29,1K.i.33,38,44, down even to the time of Solomon, this argument cannot be regarded as a proof of the great antiquity of the Song. 443. On the other hand, we must observe (i) The song is thoroughly Jehovistic as regards the use of the Divine Name (E.2,J.13): and it is inconceivable that, if the word Jeho That Sinai before Elohim, the Elohim of v.12, with Thou hast led captivity captive, 444. From the above it seems to be certain that either the Psalmist was acquainted with the Song of Deborah, and borrowed expressions from it, or that the writer of that song drew his ideas from the Psalms of David. Which, then, of these two poems was first written? We reply, without hesitation, the Psalm. For it is far more probable that a later writer may have changed Elohim into Jehovah, than that the Psalmist-as we believe, David-should have changed Jehovah, the covenantname of the God of Israel, into Elohim: more especially in the last clause, in which he has actually written before Elohim, the Elohim of Israel,' where the other, has before Jehovah, the Elohim of Israel.' 445. If any say, the Psalm was, perhaps, written at a very late date, when pious men for some reason refrained from using the name Jehovah (414), and therefore the Jehovah of Ju.v.5 has been changed into Elohim, we answer that this supposition is at Psalmist does use the name Jehovah, once negatived by the fact that the three times, and does not refrain from using it altogether. It is, therefore, | with Jehovah, but evidently belongs to most unlikely that he would change the formula, 'Jehovah, the Elohim of Israel,' into Elohim, the Elohim of Israel.' He might have written the latter originally in the case supposed; but it is very unlikely that he would have modified the other form, if he actually had it before him. 446. Besides which, v.7,8, of the Psalm are manifestly part of the context. Our argument, therefore, is this. Of the two phrases, 'Elohim, the Elohim of Israel,' and 'Jehovah, the Elohim of Israel,' it seems certain that the former was the original expression, and that the latter was derived from it. But the former belongs to the Psalm, which was, consequently, older than the Song. a man living in the time when this passage was written, which is shown, by the expression unto this day,' to have been a considerably later time than that of the event in question, that is, than the time of Samuel. 449. Then we read, 'when Samuel was old, he made his sons judges over Israel; now the name of his firstborn was Joel, and the name of his second, Abiah,' viii.1,2. It is certainly remarkable that the name of Samuel's first-born son should be Joel, which Gesenius explains to mean, Jehovah is Elohim,' and which, in fact, is merely a contraction of the compound name, Jehovah-Elohim. This suits singularly with our view that Samuel was introducing—or, at all events, commending-the new name, at the very time when his son had this name given to him. The name of Samuel's second son was Abiah, i.e. 'Jehovah is my father.' Then we find Abiel, ix.1; but Aphiah in the same verse is not compounded with Jehovah. There is an appearance also in the Song of an expansion of the words of the Psalm; thus the expressions 'from Seir,' 'from the field of Edom,' of the Song, seem equivalent to the simple words, in the wilderness,' of the Psalmist; and so also the phrases 'The clouds also dropped water,' 'The moun-Jehovah gave,' the son of Saul, xiii.2. tains melted,' are merely amplifications of the older language. 447. We conclude, then, that the 'Song of Deborah' was written after Ps.lxviii, that is, after the middle part of David's life, perhaps towards the close of it, two or three centuries after the time of Barak and Deborah, by a writer who, except in the free use of the word Jehovah, has produced an admirable imitation of an ancient song, a Lay of Ancient Israel,' and thrown himself thoroughly into the spirit of the age which he describes. CHAPTER XVII. THE JEHOVISTIC NAMES IN THE BOOKS OF SAMUEL. 448. We now pass on to the First Book of Samuel. Here, throughout the first chapters, we do not meet with a single name compounded with Jehovah; though we find Elkanah and Elihu, i.1, Samuel, ii.18, Eleazar, vii.1. In vi.18 we read 450. We next meet with Jonathan, Now Saul himself was a young man ix.2, when he sought his father's asses, and first made acquaintance personally with Samuel; and at that time Samuel was old, and had already made his sons judges over Israel, viii.1,2. Hence the Name Jehovah had been published certainly, judging only from their names, for twenty or thirty years at least; and there is no reason why Saul's son should not have borne a name compounded with it, after the example of the Prophet's two sons. This is said, supposing that Jonathan was already grown up, to be a youth of, at least, seventeen or eighteen, when he was placed in command of a thousand of his father's troops, xiii.2, two years after Saul came to the throne. 451. But even if he had been then only seventeen years old, (which we can hardly suppose), he would have been twenty-five at the birth of David, and fifty-five, when he fell at Gilboa, and when David, aged thirty, mourned 'which stone remaineth in the field of Joshua over him thus:the Bethshemite unto this day;'— 'I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonawhere the name Joshua is compounded than; very pleasant hast thou been unto me; 452. In fact, the chronology of the earlier part of Saul's life is very confused and uncertain. The account in 18.ix, of Saul's first meeting with Samuel, would seem to imply that he was then but a young man, who could not have had a son fourteen years old. Nor is it possible to read the account of the death of Saul, and the words of David's lamentation over him,— 'Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their deaths they were not divided; they were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions,' 2S.i.23 -and believe that Saul was then about seventy-five years old, (as he must have been if Jonathan was fifty-five,) and that he was about seventy, when he hunted David in the wilderness. 453. It seems plain, then, that the account of Jonathan's exploit in 1S. xiii.2, &c. must refer to a much later part of Saul's life than it there appears to do. And now there is nothing to prevent our supposing that Saul was really a young man, when he had his first interview with Samuel, as the story throughout seems to imply, and, probably, unmarried. If, however, we suppose that Jonathan was born after Saul's intimacy with the Prophet,perhaps, even after he had come to the throne,---we shall have Jonathan and David more nearly contemporaries, and it will be much more natural and probable that David should have married Jonathan's sister Michal. In that case, it would be easy to account for the name of Jonathan having been given to Saul's eldest son, after Saul's communications with Samuel,-more especially since Saul himself had 'prophesied' amidst the company of Prophets, x.10, in other words, had joined in chanting their Psalms, in which, most probably, the Name itself, Jehovah, occurred. of Ahiah, the son of Ahitub, Ichabod's brother,' xiv.3. Ichabod, we are told, was born at a time when all Israel already knew that Samuel was established to be a Prophet of Jehovah,' iv.20,-when, therefore, Samuel was grown up to manhood. We have no Ahitub was than his brother; but we means of knowing how much older may assume that he was not much older, and was, consequently, in the generation junior to that of Samuel,— of about the same age, in fact, as Samuel's own sons. From the close relations, in which Samuel lived with Eli and his family, it can scarcely be doubted that both Ahitub and Ichabod, after their parents' death, came much under his influence,-probably were trained up by himself. Thus it is easy to account for Ahitub also giving to his son a name compounded with the new word Jehovah, and a name which has a strange resemblance to that of Samuel's younger son. was Abiah, Jehovah is my father'; this is Ahiah or, rather, Akhiah, 'Jehovah is my brother,'-for, strange as it may appear, this seems to be the only meaning that can be assigned to the word. That 455. After this we meet with Eliab, xvi.6, and Adriel, xviii.19: and then we have Joab, xxvi.6, son of Zeruiah, David's sister, 1Ch.ii.16, both of which names are compounded with Jehovah. Supposing Zeruiah to have been even ten years older than her youngest brother, David, still, at the time of her birth, Samuel's two sons, with the sacred Name mixed up in their names, were already old enough to have been set as judges over Israel. And, if her name contained Jehovah, it is natural enough that her son's should contain it. He may, in fact, have been called Joab in imitation of his uncle's name Eliab. 456. In 2Samuel we have several names compounded with Jehovah. We find fourteen compounded with El, viz. Phaltiel, iii.15,-four of David's sons, Elishua, v.15, Elishama, Eliada, Eliphalet, v.16,-Ammiel, xvii.27, Eleazar, xxiii.9, Kabzeel, the name of a place, v.20. Asahel and Elhanan, v.24, Elika, v.25, 454. We next meet with the name | Eliahba, v.32, Eliphelet and Eliam, v.34, But there are also eleven names com- common use, and with the very pur pounded with Jehovah, viz. Adonijah and Shephatiah, David's fourth and fifth sons, iii.4, Jedidiah, a name given to Solomon, xii.25, Jonadab, David's nephew, xiii.3, Jonathan, the son of Abiathar, xv.27, Benaiah, Jehoiada, and Jehoshaphat, xx.23,24, another Benaiah, xxiii.30, Jonathan, v.32, and Uriah the Hittite, v.39. These seem all to have been younger men than David, and of about the same age as his eldest son, except Jehoiada, the father of Benaiah, who may have been about the age of David. pose of commending it to popular acceptation, must have been written during, or shortly before, the earlier part of David's life, when that word was only occasionally employed by him. Hence we may, with very good reason, abide by our supposition that they were written, very probably by the hand, or, at least, under the direction, and certainly in the time of SAMUEL. 460. And so writes HARTMANN, Historisch-Kritische Forschungen, p. 157:If all these phenomena lead us to assume a mutual relation between Phoenicia and Pales ideas. If this conjecture is well-founded, then this name, at the earliest, can only have been transplanted into the religious language of the Israelites, in the age of David. 461. HENGSTENBERG, i.277, disposes of the above important point, in a note as follows: 457. Thus we see that, in the time tine in reference to religion, it cannot be deemed improbable to assume that the name of David's manhood, it was not an un- Jehovah was derived from the same source, usual thing for parents to give their but was stamped with a peculiar, sacred, meanchildren names compounded with Je-ing, through its connection with the holiest hovah. Since, therefore, wherever lists of names occur in the Pentateuch, we do not find a single name of this kind (except, as before, Joshua and Jochebed), it would seem that the author or authors, to whom such lists are due, could hardly have lived in a much later age than this. On the other hand, since, in David's earlier Psalms, nay, even in his last words,' we have had clear evidence, as it seems to us, that the name Jehovah was, at the time of his writing, not in such free popular use as the name Elohim, we infer that all the Jehovistic portions of the Pentateuch were written after the time of David, or, at least, not before the latter part of his life. 458. Thus, then, even if it were conceivable that Moses should have written a story, about matters in which he was personally concerned, involving such contradictions, exaggerations, and impossibilities, as we have already had before us, yet the fact above noticed would alone be decisive against such a supposition. The great body of the Pentateuch, and all the other historical books which follow it, could not have been compiled until the Name Jehovah was in common popular use, and that, as we believe, was not till after, at all events, the middle of David's reign. 459. Whereas, on the other hand, the Elohistic portions of the Pentateuch, which appear to have been composed, when the Name Jehovah was not in of his scheme of the first ' Rise of Jehovahism' 'What VON BOHLEN has adduced, in favour in the days of David and Solomon, scarcely deserves the name of argument (!). He appeals to Proper Names compounded with Jehovah, which first came into use contemporaneously with, or else after, the days of David. Every one immediately thinks of Joshua; and VON BOHLEN does not forget, but naturally avails called Hoshea. This is, indeed, correct; but, himself of, the fact, that he was originally if the name of Joshua was not a product of the Mosaic age, if it had not been given him, as the Pentateuch informs us, by Moses himself, how did it obtain universal acceptance among the people? It would be carrying mythical notions to an extravagant length to maintain that the nation had never retained the right name of their distinguished commander-in-chief, that he received a new name in the age of David or Solomon.' Ans. According to our view, Joshua was popularised, that it ever did obtain universal 'Yet let us now turn from what the author thought to that which escaped him, who so often asserted without examining, and that with inconceivable confidence. No small number of Proper Names, in the times preceding Jehovah. Thus Jochebed the mother of Moses, whose name certainly was not (?) of later David, are compounded at the beginning with same footing, which have an abbreviated Je formation, Joash, the father of Gideon, Jo- | it, including the account of the Exodus tham, Gideon's youngest son, Jonathan, Priest of the Danites in the time of the Judges, itself, or rather, as we shall see, the another Jonathan, 1Ch.ii.32, and so several first scanty sketch of it, were written more [but only in the Chronicles.] Besides four hundred years, at least, after the these, there are those names that stand on the supposed time of the Exodus, three hovah at the end, as Moriah, Ahijah, the son hundred of which, according to the of Becher, the grandson of Benjamin [in story, passed amidst the stormy and Chronicles], Bithiah [in Chronicles], &c.' Ans. We have already considered all these disorderly period of the Judges, which instances, that of Jochebed (308), Joash and can only be compared with the worst Jotham, as well as Micah, not mentioned by times of Anglo-Saxon England. HENGSTENBERG (432), Jonathan (433-442), Moriah (chap. ix), and the Chronicler's names (309-312), and we have seen that not one of them really militates against our theory. 463. The chronology, indeed, of the Judges is, notoriously, very confused and contradictory; and it is quite possible that a much shorter space of time than three hundred years may really have elapsed since the movement took place, which, as we believe, lay at the basis of the Elohistic narrative. During that period, however, it seems very unlikely that any historical records were written, or, if written, were preserved, Later writers, Thus much, however, is correct, that names compounded with Jehovah become much more frequent from the time of Samuel. [This is true according to the more authentic history, but not according to the Chronicler, who makes them quite as numerous long before the time of Moses.] But this lends no support to VON BOHLEN's view, and is easily explicable from facts, which the accredited history presents to us. Owing to the prevalent view in Israel of the close correspondence of names and things, it could not be otherwise than that the power-preserved by whom? ful theocratic excitement in the times of Samuel and David would create a demand for the composition of Proper Names with the theocratic name of God, Jehovah, and, what at first proceeded from living reasons, would in aftertimes (which leant upon that period, so splendid both externally and internally) be adopted from standing usage. What an effect the state of the public mind has on names has been exemplified clearly among ourselves by the relation of names, in an age times. Since the Proper Names, compounded with Jehovah, had not yet had sufficient time to become naturalised, and since, in the period of the Judges, only a few living roots were in existence from which such names could be formed-[how can this be said, if there were so many names in the Mosaic age compounded with Elohim (303, 304) ?],-we might expect at all events, mention no historians of earlier date than Samuel, Nathan, and Gad; so that whoever wrote the Book of Judges wrote, most probably, from the mere legends and traditions of the people. of unbelief, to those of the preceding believing beforehand not to find them very numerous at that time.' Ans. But, according to the Chronicles, we do find them common enough from the time of Jacob downward. Setting aside, however, the Chronicler's statement as manifestly fictitious, we agree with HENGSTENBERG, (though looking at the matter from a very different point of view), that the powerful theocratic movement, in the times of Samuel,' did create a demand for such names,' which, according to our view, that same age originated; and thus we also believe with him that such names had not yet had sufficient time to become naturalised.' 462. We have thus something like firm ground to stand upon, as the result of this inquiry, and can at once account for many of the strange phenomena, which we observe in the Pentateuch. The earliest portions of 464. Thus, then, it is not necessary to suppose that the narrative of Samuel is a pure fiction, an invention of the Prophet's own imagination,-in short, merely a pious fraud.' It is very possible that there may have been, as we have said, floating about in the memories of the Hebrew tribes, many legendary stories of their ancestors, and of former great events in their history, -how they once fled in a large body out of Egypt, under an eminent leader, such as Moses,-how they had been led through that 'great and terrible wilderness,' had encamped under the dreadful Mount, with its blackened peaks and precipices, as if they had been burnt with fire (74),-how they had lost themselves in the dreary waste, and struggled on through great sufferings, and many died, but the rest fought their way at last into the land of Canaan, and made good their footing among the tribes which they found there, by whom they were called Hebrews, that is, people who had crossed' the Jordan, or, perhaps, the Euphrates. |