OF BABYLONIAN CONCEPTIONS ON JEWISH THOUGHT. 321 



have also to be accounted for, and we must endeavour to discover 

 the most likely theory to explain the correspondences. It is 

 impossible that Babylon copied from Genesis, and equally impossible 

 that Genesis copied from Babylon, in view of the purity of the 

 former, and the impurity of the latter. It is hardly likely, or even 

 credible that the Jews copied from their captors, and so late as the 

 exile, especially when other nations had their records of creation 

 centuries before. Why may not both records have come from the 

 same primaeval source, with Genesis preserved in its purity by means 

 of the divine superintendence associated with Abraham and his 

 descendants There is no insuperable difficulty against Abraham 

 having brought the story from his Babylonian home. As to the 

 fundamental differences, how is it that the Babylon story starts with 

 the chaos of Genesis i, 2, and has nothing corresponding to the 

 sublime statement of Genesis i, 1 1 How is it, too, that there are no 

 ethnic traditions after Babel ? 



3. On p. 302 it is said that the great difference between the 

 Babylonian and Genesis story is that the former was mainly poly- 

 theistic and the latter monotheistic. True, but the cause of this 

 great difference needs to be emphasized. How are we to account 

 for a man in Palestine writing as a monotheist amidst the polytheism 

 of all the surrounding nations 1 Is not divine inspiration required 

 here 1 



4. While it is not fair to attribute to Archdeacon Potter an 

 endorsement of Eerdmanns' view that polytheism originally dominated 

 all the narratives of Genesis, and that this is still apparent in some 

 passages, it would have been well if some definite criticism of the 

 view had been concluded, because we know how tenaciously the 

 Jews clung to their monotheism and how they scorned every form 

 of polytheism. It is difiicult to understand how any trace of 

 polytheism could have been allowed to remain in the Genesis 

 narrative in view of the Jewish belief in that book as part of their 

 sacred scriptures. 



5. The note on p. 303 quoting the Eev. H. T. Knight is a familiar 

 illustration of the misconception of the Critical School as to David's 

 exile and its consequences. A reference to Robertson's Early 

 Religion of Israel^ written twenty-five years ago, ought to have been 

 sufficient to show that David did not conceive himself when outside 

 Palestine as in a land belonging to other gods. 



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