CONFIRMED BY RECENT DISCOVERIES IN PALESTINE AND THE EAST. 145 



settled in the Holy Land. As regards the arguments which 

 some critics in these days have urged with respect to the 

 authorship of these earlier books of the Bible, the evidence goes 

 to show that whether they were written after the return from 

 Babylon, or just before it, or 500 years previously, they do contain 

 or quote from old documents. The ancient facts are there. 

 The question, with those who are interested in this "higher criti- 

 cism," is as to the structure of the books and as to the period and 

 the way in which they were built up. If they were written long 

 after the events, the writers would be sure to put in a great deal that 

 is true out of the ancient documents, but they would be very likely 

 to put in some erroneous thing too. Now it is curious that in the 

 book of Exodus you do not meet with the mention of iron, whereas it 

 speaks constantly of bronze ; and in the later books of the Jews 

 you find bronze and iron talked of very freely indeed ; and I 

 think that throws some light on the antiquity of the documents.* 



Perhaps I might mention that amongst the metals found at Tell- 

 el-Hesi there are lead and silver, metals often mentioned in Old 

 Testament books. The lead is exceedingly pure : the silver 

 appears to be ornamental, the bangle of a child perhaps, but there 

 is a good deal of copper in it and of gold also. 



There is one other point to which I will refer, and that is that 

 flint knives are spoken of in the Bible, and of course swords are 

 spoken of at various times. "We know there were bronze swords 

 antecedent to the period of Abraham, and certainly flint imple- 

 ments. That is also evident from Tel-el-Hesi. The flint knives 

 there are exceedingly numerous, and occur from the bottom right 

 up to the top of the mound of Tel-el-Hesi. They are of various 

 sizes, and the art seems to have been maintained for various 

 purposes long after bronze and iron were in common use.f 



* The late E,ev. F. W. Holland, M. A., referred to the use of flint knives 

 being common to this day in Egypt. {Transactions, Vol. xiv., p. 1.) — Ed. 



t Professor Flinders Petrie, D.C.L., remarks, March, 1896: — "The 

 whole evidence of actual remains in Egypt is entirely against any iron 

 having been there till 700 b.c." Up to the present, investigation would 

 seem to show that iron is not mentioned in any ancient Egyptian 

 inscription ; and, so far as one can judge, it came into Egypt from countries 

 to the north-east, in which research has proved that it was known in much 

 earlier times. — Ed, 



