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and "evolution" are indefinite, and may be made to cover as much dogmatism as the phrase "the will of God."

The problem before scientific students of the Bible is to find out and state the conditions under which this great but simple religion became the property of mankind. The best point of approach to this problem is afforded by the dramatic structure of the Bible. Explain the rise of the story of redemption from evil, and you "explain" the Bible, so far as it lends itself to scientific treatment. It should be emphasized in this connection that scientific research merely undertakes to discover facts, and to find out the relations between facts. It seeks to explain one fact in terms of some simpler fact. But it does not profess to turn facts inside out and explain them in a metaphysical, or absolute, sense. In other words, even if a given collection of facts be explained from the scientific point of view, the facts themselves, in last analysis, will still have a quality of mystery which eludes the scientific investigator. Many religious people have been alarmed by scientific discussion because they have not realized the limitations of science. On the other hand, many scientific investigators in the past have proceeded as if they were explaining the metaphysical essence of the universe when they were merely setting facts in order. But we have now entered a stage of intellectual progress in which the shortsightedness on both sides is being corrected by a wider vision.

Scientific study of the Bible carries us into the domain of sociology. We have seen that the Bible raises the subject of social institutions by its emphasis upon "justice," or "mishpat." As a matter of fact all the great moral struggles and questions in human history have derived their controlling impulses from social relationships. And since moral questions have this collective, or social, character, it follows that the Bible (being a moral fact above everything else) lends itself to sociological treatment. But what do we mean by the term “sociology”?

Sociology fixes attention upon the "social group."-We are not usually conscious of society as a fact in our lives. We go through the round of daily duties and experiences; and all the time we think of life in terms of private, personal, individual concerns. We do not deny that we belong to the nation, the state, the county, the city, or the village; but we accept the fact of social organization without fully realizing how it shapes and constrains our private lives. We concede readily enough that people fall into social groups; but then we ask "What of it?" We take society for granted, and then act as if we are entitled to ignore it, just as we ignore the air we breathe. The fact is, we are so thoroughly social that we discount the existence of society. We conform to social standards without pausing to estimate the full meaning of the standards themselves; and the moment we take the social mechanism, or group, as a definite object of attention, we at once feel that we are moving outside the common lines of thought. "The idea of the group as a means of interpretation," writes President George E. Vincent, "is emerging more clearly. Society is too vague and abstract a concept. It is useful for symbolic purposes and for generalized description, but to have any vividness of meaning it must be translated into more concrete terms." Thus it is that we find sociologists today shaping their discussions less in terms of "society" and more in terms of "groups."

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A good illustration of the group idea from a negative standpoint is found in the general disposition of Greek history. The Greeks never succeeded in forming a national social organization. Consequently, their history lacks the dramatic interest attaching to the fact of unity. The case is well stated by Professor Bury, as follows (italics ours):

To write the history of Greece at almost any period without dissipating the interest is a task of immense difficulty, as any one knows who 1 American Journal of Sociology, January, 1911, p. 469.

has tried, because there is no constant unity or fixed center to which the actions and aims of the numerous states can be subordinated or related. Even in the case of the Persian invasion, one of the few occasions on which most of the Greek cities were affected by a common interest, though acting in various ways and from various motives, it facilitated the task of the narrator to polarize the events of the campaigns by following the camp of the invader and describing them as a part of Persian history, though with Hellenic sympathy.1

In other words, the Greeks were never organized into a single social group, as the Romans or the Hebrews were. Consequently, it is more difficult to envisage Greek history than it is to see the outlines of Roman or Hebrew history. The original social mechanism of the ancient Greeks consisted of independent clan groups whose derivation went back to the nomadic period, and whose development worked out in the construction of small "city-states," such as Athens and Sparta. But these local groups never achieved any real, national unity.

Now, it is in relation to this "group idea" that our sociological study of the Bible takes form. The entire modern discussion and excitement about the Bible comes to an issue around the following simple question: How did the social group known as "the Hebrew nation" come into existence? In searching for the answer to this question we unexpectedly get light by the way upon the central problem of the Bible. We shall see that the origin of Bible religion can be treated to best effect in terms of sociology. This method of approach to the Bible is a logical application of modern results in historical and social science; and it opens before us the chapters of an intensely absorbing story.

We are about to enter a strange land. Like all new territory, it is a region full of surprises and paradoxes. The exploration of it is not only interesting, but rewarding in ways of which one little dreams when setting out on the journey. And when at last we come back to modern civilization, we 1 Bury, The Ancient Greek Historians (New York, 1909), pp. 22, 23.

shall have learned that while the Bible seems to be only an ancient book, it is really full of modern interest. We shall find that Bible-study is no mere delving into the dust of antiquity, but the cultivation of living questions of human life. As the student "observes the evolution of political and social life in Bible times and sees the consequent evolution of moral and religious ideals, it becomes perfectly natural for him to employ in the attempt to understand the life of his own day and generation those very principles which have proved to be fruitful in the understanding of the Bible. He is thus prepared in spirit to make a positive and efficient use of the help which social science and history furnish in the analysis and solution of our own moral problems.""

'Editorial, Biblical World (Chicago), October, 1909.

CHAPTER II

THE ORIGIN OF THE HEBREW NATION

How did the social group known as "the Hebrew nation" come into existence? This question resolves the study of the Bible into sociological terms. The subject, of course, lends itself to other forms of expression; but, for present purposes, the Bible is a matter of sociology. We want to know, if possible, just how the social mechanism called "the Hebrew nation" originated. Two answers to this question have been given; and the contrast between them produces a very deep impression.

The traditional view.-According to the more familiar view, the nation consisted of twelve tribes that were suddenly welded into a mighty social organism at Mount Sinai, in the desert of Arabia. The father of these clans, or tribes, was an Aramean patriarch, or sheikh, known as "Jacob-Israel." The nation which was here created was given a very elaborate, written constitution. According to this constitution, the people as a whole were to conduct religious services at one central meeting house, or church building. This was called "The Tent of Meeting," and was otherwise known as "The Tabernacle of Yahweh.' It was a portable sanctuary, to be carried about in the desert. It contained the one altar where sacrifices might legally be offered. It was the one church building where the services of religion might proceed. The Tent of Meeting was a virtual proclamation that here, in the wilderness of Arabia, a new social group had come into existence. The desert sanctuary was thus the central "A wandering Aramean was my father" (Deut. 26:5). See Am. Revised, margin. The Hebrew is "Aramean," not "Syrian."

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* See footnote in “Prefatory" (p. xiii) for discussion of the name "Yahweh."

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