equality of government by God Himself, as opposed to the gov ernment by priests or kings. It was, indeed, Religious in its highest sense, as appeared afterwards in the nation. the time of David, compatible both with regal and sacerdotal rule; but, in the first instance, it excluded all rule, except the simplest forms which the freedom of desert life could furnish. The assembly of all the tribes in the armed congregation, the chieftains or elders of the various tribes as established by Jethro, were the constituent elements of the primitive Hebrew commonwealth, in its ordinary social relations, But in its highest aspect, it was distinguished from. the other nations of antiquity by its comparative absence of caste, by its equality of religious relations. An hereditary priesthood, it is true, was established, after the manner of Egypt, in the tribe of Levi, in the family of Aaron. But it was a subse- Subordinaquent' appendage to the fundamental pre- priesthood. 1 Some eminent divines have supposed that the Levitical ritual was an after-growth of the Mosaic system, necessitated or suggested by the incapacity of the Israelites to retain the higher and simpler doctrine of the Divine Unity, as proved by their return to the worship of the Heliopolitan calf under the sanction of the brother of Moses himself. There is no direct statement of this connection in the sacred narrative: but there are indirect indications of it, sufficient to give some color to such an explanation The event itself, as we have seen, is described as a crisis in the life of Moses, almost equal to that in which he received his first call. In an agony of vexation and disappointment he destroyed the monument of his first revelation (Ex. xxxiv. 19). He threw tion of the up his sacred mission (ib. 32). He craved and he received a new and special revelation of the attributes of God to console him (ib. xxxiii. 18). A fresh start was made in his career (ib. xxxiv. 29). His relation with his countrymen henceforth became more awful and mysterious (ib. 32-35). In point of fact, the greater part of the details of the Levitical system were subsequent to this catastrophe. The institution of the Levitical tribe grew directly out of it (ib. xxxii. 28). And the inferiority of this part of the system to the rest is expressly stated in the Prophets, and expressly connected with the idolatrous tendencies of the nation "Wherefore I gave them "statutes that were not good, and "judgments whereby they should not “live” (Ezek. xx. 25). cepts, to the first declaration of the religion in its hereditary functions, in its sacred dress, in its minute regulations, rather a part of the mechanism of the religion, than its animating spirit. The Levitical caste never corresponded to what we should call "the clergy." The fact that the Levites were collected in single cities is of itself a fatal objection to so regarding them. They never claimed or were intended to govern the nation. They hardly claimed even to teach. Levi was not the ruling tribe, even though the two great leaders belonged to it; its consecration dated from no essential ordinance of the Law, but from the sudden emergency which arose out of the apostasy at the time of the molten calf. Aaron, though the head of that tribe, and the founder of the sacerdotal family, was not the ruling spirit of the people. He was but the weaker erring helpmate of Moses, who was the Guide, the Prophet, but not the Priest. We shall see how, like the equality of the primitive Christian Church, this first development of Israelite independence gradually passed into other forms, — to what disorders it gave rise when every man did what was right in his own eyes, and there was no king in Israel; how, as in the case of the Christian Church of later times, all the complicated relations of state and of hierarchy afterwards sprang up within the framework of a society at its beginning so simple. But the twin truths, which seem incorporated with the very localities of Sinai, the Unseen Ruler in the thick clouds on the top of the awful Mountain, and the sacredness of the whole congregation as it lay spread over the level Plain beneath, were never lost 1 Michaelis, Laws of Moses, art. 52. to the Jewish Church, and have been the constant springs of religious freedom and responsibility to the Christian Church. Even at the very outset of the Revelation was announced the great principle- the Gospel, as it has been well called,' of the Mosaic dispensation-so new to the nation of slaves, who had hitherto seen truth only through the long vista of mystical emblems and sacred incorporations. "Thus "shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the "children of Israel; Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, "and brought you unto Myself. Now therefore, if 66 66 ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My cove“nant, then shall ye be a peculiar treasure unto Me "above all people; for all the earth is Mine. And ye "shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and a holy "nation." "2 "Ye shall be holy, for I am holy."8 Inspiration, communion with God, in the case of the Pagan religions, was for the most part con- Universalfined to sacred families or local oracles; in ity of prophetic the case of the Mussulman religion, was con- inspiration. fined to its first founder and his sacred volume. But in the case of Israel it extended to the whole nation. The history of Israel, from Moses downwards, is not the history of an inspired book or an inspired order, but of an inspired people. When Joshua, in his youthful zeal, entreated Moses to forbid the prophesying of Eldad and Medad, because they remained in the camp, Moses answered: "Enviest thou for my "sake? Would that all the Lord's people were proph"ets, and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them!" In different forms and in different degrees 1 Ewald, Geschichte, ii. 126. 2 Ex. xix. 3-6. 3 Lev. xix. 2. 4 Num. xi. 26-30. that noble wish was fulfilled. The acts of the hero, the songs of the poet, the skill of the artificer, Samson's strength, the music of David, the architecture of Bezaleel and Solomon, are all ascribed to the inspiration of the Divine Spirit. It was not a holy tribe, but holy men of every tribe that spake as they were moved, carried to and fro, out of themselves, by the Spirit of God. The Prophets, of whom this might be said in the strictest sense, were confined to no family or caste, station or sex. They rose, indeed, above their countrymen, their words were to their countrymen, in a peculiar sense, the words of God. But they were to be found everywhere. Like the springs of their own land, there was no hill or valley where the prophetic gift might not be expected to break forth. Miriam and Deborah, no less than Moses and Barak; in Judah and in Ephraim, no less than in Levi; in Tekoah and Tishbe, and, as the climax of all, in Nazareth, no less than in Shiloh or Jerusalem, God's present counsel might be looked for. By this constant attitude of expectation, if one may so call it, the ears of the whole nation were kept open for the intimations of the Divine Ruler under whom they lived. None knew beforehand who would be called. As Strabo well says, in his description of the Mosaic dispensation which I have before quoted, "all might expect to receive the gift of good dreams" for themselves or their people, "all who lived temper"ately and justly, those always and those only." In the dead of night, as to Samuel; in the plough. ing of the field, as to Elisha; in the gathering of the sycamore figs, as to Amos; the call might come. Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth," was to be the ready and constant answer. And thus, even in 66 66 66 its first establishment, the Theocracy, in its true sense, contained the warrant for its complete development. Moses was but the beginning; he was not, he could not be the end. The light on his countenance faded away, and had to be again and again rekindled in the presence of the Unseen. But his appearance, his character, his teaching, accustomed, familiarized the nation to this mode of revelation; and it would be at their peril, and against the whole spirit of the education received from him, if they refused to receive its later manifestations, from whatever quarter. "The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet, from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like "unto me. Unto him shall ye hearken." The same event, it has been truly remarked, never repeats itself in history. Yet a like event in one age is always a preparation for a like event in another, especially when the first event is one which involves the principle of the second. Moses, the expounder of the Theocracy, the founder of the Hebrew Prophets, the interpreter between God on Mount Sinai and Israel in the plain below, was the necessary forerunner, because the imperfect likeness, of the Last Prophet of the last generation of the Jewish theocracy. In the fullest sense might it be said to that generation: "There is one that accuseth you, even Moses, "in whom ye trust; for had ye believed Moses, ye would "have believed Me; but if ye believe not his writings, how "will ye believe My words?"1 III. There was another point in the Revelation of Sinai not less permanent, and equally charac- Te Law. teristic. We speak of it as a revelation of "Religion." But this was not the name by which it was known 1 John v. 45-47. |