202 LECTURES AND ESSAYS [1868- 



without so much of the theological attitude, a thorough 

 historical understanding of the Old Testament is impossible, 

 while, on the other hand, we gladly admit that a theo 

 logical conception is good for nothing which violates the 

 fact and laws of history. From this side, too, the under 

 standing of prophecy has suffered much, especially at the 

 hands of the restored traditional exposition, which in 

 the Protestant Church, at least, has no right to claim the 

 name of Churchly. If Revelation is really Revelation, 

 not unintelligible dead communication, if the faith that 

 grasps it is to be a living faith, the human spirit must 

 be prepared for its reception ; and such a preparation 

 must obey the law of continuity. ... To seek the New 

 Testament fulfilment in the Old Testament preparation, 

 or to seek in the New Testament the fulfilment of every 

 single hope that grew up on the always limited Old Testa 

 ment ground, is to rob oneself of the possibility of gaining 

 a true insight into the wondrous course of Revelation.&quot; 



From this point, prophecy appears to Baur as the &quot; hope 

 and ever more and more distinct conception of the most 

 perfect religious relation, which developed itself out of the 

 consciousness of the insufficiency of the Old Testament 

 standpoint.&quot; But this development is no merely natural 

 one, but due to a new principle of life implanted by 

 revelation in the natural God-consciousness through the 

 medium of a pre-eminent personality. Thus Abraham is 

 to Baur the first recipient of the Divine revelation that is 

 peculiar to Israel. But this one creative impulse was not 

 enough. In Egypt, Israel must undergo a second birth, 

 not by mere natural development, but again through the 

 creative force of the personality of Moses. With Moses 

 appeared the Covenant and the Law, and from the Law 

 prophecy in the strict sense grew. Left to mere nature, 

 the Divine principles laid down in the Law must soon have 

 died out. But the prophets, who themselves were pene 

 trated with the truths of the Law, continually stirred up 

 the religious life of their countrymen by reassertion of the 

 principle of the Old Testament religion. In the discharge 

 of this task, they learned to know the imperfection as well 

 as the divineness of the Law, and so were led ever more 



