IS THE SO-CALLED PRIESTLY CODE " OF POST-EXILIC DATE? 79 



the AVav and the Life, has allowed His character and message 

 to be ol)scured by falsehood and forgery, and that for the truth 

 about Him He has left us to the researches of scholars who 

 do not, and cannot, agree among themselves as to what He 

 did or said. 



Discussion. 



Mr. Harold Wiener regretted that he had been so busy since 

 he had received his copy of Chancellor Lias' important paper that he 

 had had no time to examine into the details of his linguistic argu- 

 ment, but the opinions of the critics in this respect had undergone 

 great changes from time to time. For instance the word rcrusJi, 

 referred to on p. 69, occm-red in Genesis xiv, which had been 

 generally ascribed by the critics to post-exilic times, but a recent 

 critic, Sellin, now ascribed it to pre-Mosaic times ; the widest range 

 possible. But indeed the linguistic argument of the critics rested on 

 sand. Professor Eerdmans, the pupil and successor of Kuenen, 

 after prolonged study of it, had been forced to discard it altogether. 

 Inferences that had once been accepted as not mere theories, btit 

 immutable facts, were untenable, since the remains of Hebrew 

 literature were much too scanty to supply the means of dating 

 single words. 



But he would wish to turn from the argument drawn from 

 language and ask them to consider the substance of the Priestly 

 Code. Did it bear the marks of the post-exilic period, or lend itself 

 to late surroundings 1 The dress throughout was purely of the 

 desert life. It might be said that the originator of the Code tried 

 to project himself backwards into desert conditions, and give his laws 

 a desert setting, but if they looked beyond the mere phraseology, to 

 ascertain what was the heart of the Code, they found conspicuous 

 the duties of the Levites. One whole tribe was set apart for work 

 connected with the Sanctuary — he would not use the word 

 " tabernacle " as that was assuming the issue to some extent. The 

 chief duties of the Levites were to take down, pack up, carry from 

 place to place, and set up again the Sanctuary and its furniture. 

 What sort of relation had this to the circumstances of the men of 

 either the exilic or the post-exilic age 1 How could such laws possibly 

 apply to the second Temple 1 We must presume some degree of 

 intelligence in the forger of the Code, but if we lay aside 



