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Dr. Thornton may suppose that the 600 chariots are as likely to be an error 
in number as the other 
Mr. Edwards. — He did not say so. 
Mr. Reddie. — No ; but it is just as likely 
The Chairman.— I think he said the very reverse. 
Dr. Rigg. — He said that was not too great. 
, Mr. Reddie. — Well, he conceded this to me, sotto voce 
The Chairman.— He says that these 600 were exceedingly probable ; that 
there was no difficulty in that. 
Dr. Rigg. — No more than in the war-chariots in the other case. 
Mr. Reddie.— Well, be that as it may, I leave it to him to answer. There 
is, I think, less weight in Dr. Thornton’s objection about the sacrifices. 
Granting that there may be some exaggeration in the numbers of the sheep 
and oxen sacrificed, I do not think it follows that they were all offered in the 
Temple. One or two might be offered there, and in that way you get over 
the difficulty as to the size of Solomon’s Temple. If you consider that the 
whole of its interior was overlaid with gold, it could not have been a very 
extensive building, without almost accepting the immense quantities of gold 
to which Dr. Thornton objects 
Mr. Row.— But the Mosaic institutions positively required that the sacri- 
fice should be made in the Temple. 
Mr. Reddie. — Yes ; in the court of the Temple, but not in the Temple 
itself, or literally, in the presence of all the people. That argument has been 
used against Dr. Colenso already. A certain number were there— a general 
turn-out of the people— what we should call “all London” in popular lan- 
guage. In the third paragraph of the paper, Dr. Thornton refers to the 
word rahia\ as given by the Septuagint, with the meaning of something 
solid, instead of “ extension.” But in the margin of our English Bibles we 
have “ expansion ” put for it, and that is better 
Mr. Row.— Dr. Payne Smith has adopted the word “ expanse ” in his new 
translation of the first chapter. 
Mr. Reddie.— One other difficulty Dr. Thornton has made more of than 
he need — the getting rid of the quantities of the bodies that were slain. I 
quite admit that the numbers given are probably largely exaggerated, but in 
the case of the pestilence which cut off thousands of the people, and in other 
cases, the Jews would naturally resort to cremation, or burning the bodies. 
They would not allow a pestilence to arise from the collection of dead bodies. 
There is only one other point which arose in the discussion which I should 
like to notice. I would ask whether, in the discrepancy which Mr. Titcomb 
points out between the period of the J udges and the building of the Temple, 
St. Paul’s statement might not refer to the dispensation of the Judges and 
not mean the time during which they reigned ? 
Mr. Titcomb.— No ; he speaks distinctly of the Judges until the time of 
Samuel and the prophets. He makes it quite clear. 
Mr. Reddie.— This is what I mean ; that there was no prophet 
Mr. Titcomb. — He says there were 450 years. 
