over, the creation of a fresh general term expressing the sense of gift at a relatively late period shows the vitality of the idea, which in turn was nourished by the use of a term that to the last carried its meaning on the surface. Whenever in later times the Jew sacrificed, he was consciously intending his sacrifice to be a gift to God. How it was received or used by the recipient, with what purpose it was given, are questions yet to be considered.

II

SACRIFICE AND SACRED OFFERINGS

ii

IN the last lecture I examined the extent to which what is called the gift theory of sacrifice had impressed itself on Hebrew terminology. I have now in further examination of the Hebrew theory and practice of sacred gifts to consider (1) the range of Hebrew sacred gifts, (2) the relation of these to the altar, and (3) the practice of commutation.

Sacred gifts consisted not exclusively, but predominantly, of food and food-material, of animals and vegetables, especially cereals. These gifts were given by men and received by God. But how was the reception of the gift by God conceived, what use was he thought to make of the food that was given him, of food which even in P God is represented as calling 'my food' (Num. 282, &c.)?

The great predominance of food in the sacred gifts even of later times may be traced back to an early stage of thought when the god was conceived as actually consuming human food. How far and how long this gross view survived in Hebrew popular thought it is difficult to say. In repudiating it, does the author of Ps. 50, which like other Asaphite Psalms is scarcely among the earliest, imply a belief that some of his Jewish contemporaries actually believed that Yahweh ate the flesh of bulls and drank the blood of goats, as the later author of the additions to Daniel certainly believed that the worshippers of Bel considered that Bel consumed the large quantities of meat, meal, and wine nightly placed upon his table? The authors of certain earlier passages in Hebrew literature seem themselves to express, or at least to be in close touch with an age that held, the belief that the god of the Hebrews like other gods derived sensuous pleasure from the food that was

offered to him, that like men he was made merry by wine, and that if he did not actually eat the flesh of the sacrifices, he yet smelt with satisfaction the fumes of the burning flesh? The Yahwist narrates that Yahweh smelt the soothing savour of Noah's burnt-offerings, Gen. 821 (cp. the repudiations in Lev. 2631, Am. 521), David in 1 Sam. 2619 is convinced that Yahweh smells the savour of sacred gifts, Jotham (Jud. 913) that gods like men are made happy with wine. Even if it seemed safe to look upon the terms used even in these passages as not intended literally, if here as unquestionably in later literature such as Ezekiel and P the terms were merely petrified expressions preserving the forms of once living but long dead beliefs, yet the close relation of the narrative of Noah's burnt-offerings to the Babylonian story of the sensuous enjoyment by the gods of the fragrant incense burnt for them by Noah's Babylonian counterpart leaves us in no doubt in what belief the expressions arose: some of the gifts made to the gods were regarded as being most directly and materially accepted by them for their own sensuous enjoyment, and this belief accounts not only for expressions but also for ritual, that endured long after the belief had been abandoned by the Jews. How, if at all, the expressions and ritual were explained in later times we need not here inquire. We are in touch through them with sacrificial animal victims regarded as gifts to God.

But much larger parts of the sacred gifts were treated very differently: these, too, were certainly regarded as given by man and received by God, yet not for his own use and sensuous enjoyment, but as assigned by God to human representatives or proxies-the priests, the poor, perhaps to some extent the offerer himself-for the satisfaction of their appetite. In practice this meant that these gifts or parts of gifts were actually and directly received and made use of by special classes of men ; whereas those parts of the gifts which were subject to ritual originating in the belief that the gods ate or smelt the savour of the sacrificial food were actually destroyed and used by

no one.

1. The range of Hebrew sacred gifts. A comprehensive list of Dp is given in Num. 188-32; the materials of which the consisted can be gathered principally from Lev. 1-7,

Num. 7 and 31. For the present purpose and under the reservations which I made in the last lecture, I will use sacra or 'sacred gifts' as the equivalent of Dp, and 'presents' for D", rendering the cognate verb by 'present': instead, therefore, of the R.V. phrase 'offer an oblation', I shall say 'present a present'.

The first seven chapters of Leviticus may be regarded as a guide to the presents that men were allowed or required to give to Yahweh, and the manner of their presentation. 'If any one of you', the law in Leviticus begins, 'would or has to present a present unto Yahweh, the present you present may consist of a head of kine or sheep or goats' (12); and, later in the same chapter, among birds, doves and pigeons are allowed (114). Some or all of these may be presented under the various forms of burnt-offering (13), peace-offerings (31, 6), sin-offerings (423 f., 28 f.), guilt-offerings (Num. 189). Presents of cereal food might consist of bread, which had to be unleavened if to be burnt on the altar, but might be, and under certain circumstances was, required to be leavened if presented at, but not burnt on, the altar (Lev. 212, 2317). Or the cereals might be presented in the form of merely parched grain (Lev. 214-16). What sacred presents might consist of is further shown by two of the narratives in P. Num. 7 contains a list of the p presented by the tribal princes: these consist of heavy silver dishes and bowls in addition to cereal and animal offerings; and Num. 3150 refers to a present presented by the officers in the successful battle against the Midianites in their turn: We have brought a present for Yahweh, each what he has got, a golden ornament, an armlet or a bracelet, a finger-ring, an ear-ring, or a necklace, to make propitiation for ourselves before Yahweh.

We can fill out this list by reference to the list in Num. 18 of obligatory or conditionally obligatory sacred gifts of the children of Israel which, according to the theory of this chapter, passed over as dues to the priests, to whom they certainly seem to have been paid in later Jewish practice. The herem, or the devoted thing, of this chapter (Num. 1814) may correspond in material, at least in part, to such presents as those of the princes at the dedication of the Temple, of the officers after the Midianite

war.

But the term is, in the context, vague. The two chief

additional materials of sacred gifts brought under our notice in this chapter are included under the references to the first-born, and to first-fruits. Under the first-born are included not only kine, sheep, goats, which we have already seen could be presented to Yahweh, but also the first-born of all animals owned by the Israelites and the first-born of men. The various methods of giving different classes of the first-born to God, I come to later. The presentation, however, of these first-born of men, or the first-born of domestic animals other than kine, sheep, or goats, was no longer made direct at the time of this law but by means of redemption; what was actually given to Yahweh was not the first-born, but a fixed sum of money per head. That is one important development to keep in view. At an earlier date there were alternative methods of redemption in the case of unclean animals, but neither consisted of a money payment: Yahweh had a right to the first-born of all animals owned by the Israelites, and consequently to that of the ass which was early domesticated, but the ass as being unclean could not be presented to Yahweh in the form of an offering of which portions should be burnt on the altar and the rest eaten. The early law (Ex. 1313, J) allows these two alternatives: either the ass may be redeemed by a young sheep or goat, which would be presented to Yahweh in the normal manner; or the ass is put out of existence by having its neck broken; it is thus removed from the use of men even though its presentation to Yahweh cannot be completed in the same way as that of a clean animal. This also is a detail to which we shall have occasion to return.

1

The materials covered by the terms first-fruits (ne and D) need a little more detailed consideration. The vegetable offerings that definitely and directly occur under the term ¡p are cereals; but the vegetable presents made to Yahweh were in reality a much wider class; they are referred to in the list of DMP in Num. 18 f., and were in themselves of much earlier origin than this priestly list; nor need we doubt that the further

1 The ass is obviously merely cited as a typical instance; at a later date Philo specifies as additional examples horses and camels (De Praem Sac. i, Yonge, iii. 205).