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THE REV. A. H. FINN ON 



shall choose." But the historical books are largely taken up with 

 records of how, from the Golden Calf at Sinai to the idolatries 

 of Manasseh and the successors of Josiah, the people were 

 unfaithful to even the most fundamental of these laws. That 

 might be more fitly described as a history of Hebrew irreligion. 



If, however, modern critics are right, the whole of this account 

 is utterly misleading. According to them, the history of Hebrew 

 rehgion was altogether different ; the Law was not given in 

 the Wilderness, but gradually grew up out of priestly oral 

 decisions or prophetic teaching, and many of its leading institu- 

 tions were due to priestly legislation of a late date ; the 

 Tabernacle never existed, and the Temple did not become the 

 sole Central Sanctuary till the time of Josiah. If that be true, 

 then the Old Testament is not at all a history of Hebrew rehgion 

 according to the facts, but only an account of what later writers 

 thought that history ought to have been. 



Since, then, we have here not a history of mankind in general, 

 nor a political history of Israel, nor a history of the Hebrew 

 rehgion, are we to give up the idea of any unity at all, and 

 look upon the whole as a chance collection of fragments having 

 no coherent plan or dominant idea ? 



There is one thread which runs throughout, and that is the 

 development of God's plan as revealed in His Promises. At 

 the outset there is the promise of the Seed of the woman who 

 should crush the serpent's head. By the catastrophe of the 

 Deluge, the fulfilment of this promise is narrowed down to the 

 family of Noah. That again is narrowed down to the Seed of 

 Abraham in whom all the famihes of the earth should be blessed ; 

 and that in turn is Hmited to the fine of Isaac and Jacob. In 

 Jacob's Blessing, there is a hint of a further limitation : not 

 among the descendants of the first-born Reuben, or of the fruit- 

 ful Joseph, or of Levi, but only in the royal lineage of Judah 

 is to be found the One to whom the obedience of peoples should 

 be, foreshadowing His kingly dignity. Later on there is the 

 promise of the Prophet like unto Moses whom the Lord would 

 know face to face. Still later on, it is the house and throne of 

 David that is to be estabhshed. The Psalter points forward 

 to the King whose Name shall endure for ever, the Lord of David 

 who is also a Priest after the order of Melchizedek. Isaiah 

 foretells the coming forth of the shoot out of the stock of Jesse, 

 the King to reign in righteousness, and portrays the suffering 

 Righteous Servant of the Lord. Jeremiah tells of the Righteous 



