Willis : Hebrew Law 
7 
What, if any, law did Moses and his under- judges apply in 
the decision of the first cases which came before them? They 
had not as yet, of course, made any law by the establishment 
of precedents. Did they decide cases without law? Or did 
they have some principles of law to which they looked when 
disputes were presented before them? The latter seems to 
have been the situation. Probably many new cases were pre- 
sented to them which involved points of law on which they 
could find no principles of law. For these they made new 
principles and these became precedents for the decision of 
later cases. The great part of Hebrew law undoubtedly grew 
up in this way. We shall refer to this later. But there seem 
to have been at least three sources of law upon which Moses 
and his associates drew for rules to help them decide cases 
which came before them. One was a brief code which Moses 
himself drew up. How brief this was and from what sources 
obtained it is impossible to say. Probably it included some 
form of ten commandments, or decalog; but whether, as he 
drew it up, it was in the form in which it is found in the 
Judaistic account , 26 or in the form in which it is found in the 
Ephramitic account , 27 or in some earlier form, it is impossible 
to say. Another source was Egyptian law, but to what extent 
this was drawn upon it also is impossible to say. The third 
source was the patriarchal system and the customs and tradi- 
tions of Semitic origin associated with it. In this system there 
was something with which the judges had to reckon whether 
they wished to or not, for it was a part of the very life of the 
people, or at least those who asserted their rights under it. 
For this reason a little more needs to be said about the patri- 
archal system. With the materials found in these three or 
more sources Moses began his monumental task of construct- 
ing the Hebrew substantive law — a task which he could only 
begin, but which for its final completion required over a thou- 
sand years of development thru judicial legislation, the growth 
of new customs, prophetical codification, and priestly modi- 
fication . 28 
26 20 Exod. 1-17. 
27 34 Exod. 14-28. 
28 The Hebrews were the youngest of the Semitic peoples, and as such inherited 
twenty centuries of earlier Semitic civilization. Their Semitic inheritance came thru 
their ancestors. Whatever customs and traditions they obtained in this way had to be 
taken into account by Moses when he began his work. 
But the influence of Semitic and other civilizations did not stop with the time of 
Moses. As the Hebrew people formed later contacts with other peoples they were fur- 
ther influenced by these peoples, and thus gained new customs and traditions. The 
influence of the Midianite Jethro is described in the eighteenth chapter of Exodus. Many 
