630 B7 MAIN UU-NHLF B ^ 5D5 ^10 Ube Tflntversit^ of Cbicaoo FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER THE HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN THE PRE-EXILIC PERIOD A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND LITERATURE IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (department or Semitic languages and uteratxtres) BY CAROLINE MAY BREYFOGLE Reprinted, in part, with additions, from The American Journal of Theology, Vol. XVI, No. 4 1912 Zbc tlniverstt^ of Cbicaoo FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER THE HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN THE PRE-EXILIC PERIOD A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND LITERATURE IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (department of SEMITIC LANGUAGES AND LITERATURES) BY CAROLINE MAY BREYFOGLE 'I Reprinted, in part, with additions, from The American JoxmNAL or Theology, Vol. XVI, No. 4 1912 SMCbc 67 Composed and Printed By TbeTUnlversity of Chicairo Pren Chicago, lUlnoU, U.S.A. CONTENTS PAGE I. The Sense of Sin as Uneasiness or Reproach Involved in the Breach of Custom I n. The Period of the Prophets Brings the Ftindamental Reconstruction of Attitudes and Habits and the Consciousness of Sin in the Social and Moral Realms 8 HL With the Closer Organization of Society Comes a Clearer Formula- tion of Details and a Confusion of Legal and Moral Guilt ... 14 Appendix A: The Basis of Yahwe's Connection with Law and Justice 20 Appendix B: The Content of the Mosaic Code 23 Appendix C: The New Element in the Deuteronomic Code .... 24 Appendix D : Bibliography ' • 27 270917 THE HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN THE PRE-EXILIC PERIOD CAROLINE M. BREYFOGLE Columbus, Ohio Any emotion so primitive, so genuine, so universal as that feeling of uneasiness called "sense of sin" is not something posited in life by conscience or by the arbitrary expression of commands; it must have developed in the "adjustment of habits to ends through the medium of a problematic, doubtful, and precarious situation."* This must have been the "ground-pattern upon which the present inteUigence and emotion are built"; and it is in an endeavor to trace this ground-pattern in the hfe of the Hebrew people that the present study is made. In early society, social sentiments were the product of the instinctive impulse of self-preservation and self-assertion and were developed through the formation of habits and customs and by the occurrence of crises and control. Once formed, custom indicated the method of achieving results, hence any breach of custom spelled misfortune, want of adjustment, conflict. When the misfortune was keen enough to awaken fear or when it involved the disapproval of the group offended, including in the group the spirits associated with the interests and value of the group, then the conflict of desire and fear within the individual produced the emotion or feeling called sense of sin. In other words, it was the feeling associated with evil, although evil as ethical wrong and evil as misfortune were not sharply differentiated as with us; that was bad which ' John Dewey, "The Interpretation of the Savage Mind," published in Thomas, Source Book for Social Origins, p. 185. 2 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY was bad for something. This is well illustrated in Arabia today, where the consciousness of sin is scarcely to be found among the ignorant without the accompaniment of misfortune, so that sin and misfortune are practically correlative terms.* Among the Hebrews, the earliest notion of sin is indicated by the use of the Hebrew J^tjH as lailure ot an action to achieve a n e nd or g oal inher ent in its own activity, when the failure involved some re? ^ TTr^jfiff^rHme- e.g., a seeking which does not find (Prov. 8:36;' Job 5:24,* both Kal), such a hastening with the feet that one misses the path and thus defeats all haste (Prov. 19 : 2) ,s making a certain tale of bricks each day and failing to do so when punish- ment and misfortime followed (Exod. 5:16, cf. 5:13, 14, 17, 19),'' failing in the intrigue for a throne when Ufe hung upon the issue (I Kings 1:21), failure in those services due from a butler and baker to a king (Gen., chap. 40, cf. 41 19), questioning as to the action in which the failure lies, as Abimelech of Abraham (Gen. 20:9, cf. » Samuel Ives Curtiss, Primitive Semitic Religion Today, p. 124. » Prov. 8:36, "^S^tjhl means failure in finding the object sought for, as shown by comparison with the parallel in verse 36a; "Whoso findeth me findeth life He that misseth the way wrongeth his own soul." rS (I Sam. 24:11). It is also the misfortune which overtook Lot (Gen. 19:19), the loss to Joseph of his golden cup (Gen. 44 : 4, cf. Gen. 50: 20), a loss enhanced by the divining use of the cup; and any misfortune in general; " shall e\'il befall a dty and the Lord hath not done it " (Amos 3 : 6, cf. Jer. 2:3; Neh. 1:3; Judg. 15:3; Ps. 90:15). "Behold this evil is of the Lord; why should I wait for the Lord any longer?" (n Kings 6:33, cf. Amos 9:4; Exod. 32:12). In the priestly law nb^tsr; and D*r5< denote both the trespass and the pajment which is to make good the trespass (Lev. 5:21-26; 6:19, 23; 19:21, 22; Num. 5:5-7; 6:12; 18:9; II Kings 12:17; I Sam. 6:3). In the early Hebrew community the pressing needs of Hfe were met as they arose; there was Httle co-ordination of interests, for ''tribal or social soHdarity was not so much a recognition of com- munity interests as a proof of the vagueness of man's ideas con- cerning the boundaries of his own selfhood."" His concepts of the natural forces were indefinite and incoherent Mke the concept of his own interests. Good and the means of its attainment were related in inconsequential and magical ways. Death, misfortune, disease were not the mechanical outworking of the natural forces but they were the punishment exacted by the ^Hful, animistic powers on the general principle of vengeance controlling human society. This confusion of thought was manifest both in the treat- ment of disease and in the half-physical, half-moral concept of sin as illustrated by the infection of clean and unclean. Unclean taboos were certain forbidden animals (Deut., chap. 14; Lev., chap 11; Gen. 8:20; 7:2; I Sam. 14:32 f.; Lev. 17:15; 22:8; Exod. 34:26), certain persons and things connected with birth (Exod. 19:15; 7 Ralph Barton Peny, The Moral Economy, p. 233. 4 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY Lev., chap. 12; 15:18; Deut. 23:11; I Sam. 20:26; 21:6; II Sam. 11:4), or with death (Num. 19:11-16; 31:19; 9:6-10; 5:2; Lev. chap. 21) and certain unclean diseases (Lev. 13:15; 22:1-6; Num. 19:11-16; II Kings 5:27). It is well known that these taboos connect with the two great taboos existent among early- tribes, those of food and of sex. The physical infection incurred was variously conceived as sin, disease, possession by an evil spirit, or misfortune. As in the early Babylonian reHgious Hterature, they are all one and the same thing; a half -physical, half -moral some- thing which has entered the body by magical or supernatural means,^ whether in retaHation for the act or whether because of a certain kinship between the evil spirit and the doer of the deed, is not always clear, as the use of the term "sons of Belial" indicates.' Thus, every patient was a sinner, the curing of sickness and the expiation of sin were identical (Lev 14 : 19&) , "morals were material- ized and nature was demoraHzed."" The law of uncleanness states : "They shall keep my charge lest they bear sin for it" (Lev. 22:9), sin being a bodily imperfection, as the great sin brought by Abra- ham's action upon Abimelech (Gen. 20:9,17, cf. 12:17; ^'^'^ in Gren. 26:10). It was the leprosy laid upon Miriam when she rebelled against Moses: "And Aaron said unto Moses, Oh my * Julian Morgenstem, The Doctrine of Sin in the Babylonian Religion, p. 6; Justus KSberle, Siinde und Gnade, pp. 6, 23; Fritz Bennewitz, Die Siinde im Alien Israel, p. 50; R. Campbell Thompson, Semitic Magic, p. 194. "Dass dieses Siindengefuhl fast regelmassig durch Erfahrung eines ausseren Leides ausgelost erscheint, dass Siindenvergebung und Wegnahme des ausseren Leides miteinander identifiziert werden d.h., dass die Vergebung in ausserer Wieder- herstellung eriebt sein will, dass kultische Siinden ebenso emst genommen werden wie schwere religios-sittliche Verfehlungen lasst diese Psalmen freilich hinter hochsten Ausserungen israelitischer Frommigkeit, wie sie z. B. in Psalm 73 zu Tage tritt um ein Betrachtliches zuriickstehen. Immerhin abcr pulsiert in ihnen ein kraftig religioses Leben und wir haben auf jeden Fall ein Recht, sie zu den edelsten Erzeugnissen auf dem Boden heidnischer Religiositat zu rechnen." — Bruno Baentsch, Monotheismus, p. 13- ' '^T • ■?~'i*? ^^ * ^^''^ ^^^ ^°^^ ^^^ ^^^ ^'^ ^^^ '^^ sinner (Judg. 20: 13, cf. 19: 22; Deut. 13:13; I Sam. 1:16; 2:12; 10:27; 11 Sam. 16:7; 20:1; I Kings 21:10). It indicates the voluntary disposition as does the word for folly blSJ (Gen. 34:7; Judg. 20:6, 10; 19:23; II Sam. 13:12, 13; I Sam. 25:25, cf. II Sam. 3:33, "Should Abner die as a fool dieth ? "). "Dewey and Tufts, Ethics, p. 458; L. T. Hobhouse, Morals in Evolution, II, 264 f. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN PRE-EXILIC PERIOD 5 Lord, lay not, I pray thee, sin upon us, for that we have done fool- ishly and for that we have sinned. Let her not, I pray thee, be as one dead of whom the flesh is half consumed when he cometh out of his mother's womb" (Num. 12:11-15). An epidemic was the sin brought by Aaron upon Israel (Exod. 32:2of., cf. 32:25 and Deut. 9:21), where death probably came to the guilty through drinking the magic water after the manner of the ordeal (Num. 5:23 f.), a remnant of the account being contained in 32:1-6, 15-20, 35. It is the plague of Egypt, the sin of all the nations that go not up to keep the feast; Saul's melanchoHa was a sign of im- purity within, "an evil spirit from the Lord." The half -physical, half-moral character of disease is shown by the plagues brought by Moses upon Egypt by the use of his wand and laid by the same magic means. In the period of the New Testament, this thought of epUepsy and insanity as demon possession still persists, the unclean spirits leaving the man to enter into the swine, bringing immediate destruction upon them. Perhaps the same confusion between sin and disease lay at the basis of Jesus' words to the sick of the palsy: "Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee" (Matt. 9:2, cf. Mark 2:5; Luke 5:20); to the bystanders at least it bore the implication of the cure of his disease. The half -physical conception of sin colors the description of it as "something alive, crouching like a wild beast, ready to spring upon one" (Gen. 4:7); "sure to find one out" (Num. 32:23); "to be drawn as by a cart rope" (Isa. 5 : 18); capable of lying dormant in the soul from birth to be awakened by law (Rom. 7:8); having energy and life of its own as in Eden (Gen., chap. 3). Sin, like disease, is cleansed by magic washings (II Kings 5:iof.; Lev. 13:6, 34 f.; 14:11-20; 16:26); by burnings (Num. 16:46; Isa. 6:8, cf. Ps. 6:1,2); by exorcism (I Kings 17:18, 21; II KLings 4:31-33); and by trans- ference by means of the scapegoat (Lev. 6:24 — 7:7; i6:2if.). The indefiniteness and scope of the notion of sin in this early period was due to the fact that man was an indefinite and incoherent aggregate of interests which had not yet assumed the form of even individual and commimity purpose." Whenever, for any reason, " "The moral feeling at this stage is not disengaged from a prudential dread of himian vengeance or of mysterious forces in which there is nothing peculiariy moral." — Hobhouse, n, 73. 6 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY a social custom vital to the life and welfare of the community became conscious of itself, it was formulated as the expression of the per- sonal will of the god or spirit. When Yahwe entered into his- torical relations with Israel as national God and Deliverer, he appeared as the protector of custom, law, and justice." (See Appendix A, p. 20.) Any breach of custom or law becomes, then, an act of disobe- dience, of rebeUion against God who avenges all such affronts to his holiness (Josh. 7:11; I Sam. 14 : 35 f ., 38 ; 15 : 24) . This is the pre- vailing conception of sin in the Old Testament founded upon the social mores, given supernatural sanction (I Sam. 15:22; Exod. 21:1; Deut. 4: 13, 14). In the national religion in which the con- ception of Yahwe was better co-ordinated and in which custom and taboo had more definitely and consciously outlined the approach to Yahwe, every breach of ritual was regarded as sin. Yahwe was to be approached under carefully prescribed conditions of ritual cleanness (Gen. 35:2; I Sam. 6:19 f.; 7:1), a quality not ethically conditioned but physically and ritually so, a quality attainable by a man (Gen. 35:2; Exod. iQiioff.), by an object (Exod. 30:37; I Kings 7:51; Lev. 17 : 10 ff.), or by a place (I Kings 8 : 64; Exod. 3:5), in equal degree, but which when attained efifectually bars its possessor from profane or common life. It really answers the pur- pose subserved by the later idea of property, separating by its infectious holiness everything belonging to Yahwe and his service.*' Any accidental or careless disregard of the divine sanctity reacted automatically upon the offender, as in the case of Uzzah and of the sons of Eli (I Sam. 2 : 12 f.). The fear of Yahwe (Gen. 31 : 53) was the restraining influence, a fear so real that a sin against the cult was more serious than moral sin; the distinction between clean and unclean was more important than that of good and bad. The earhest customs to come to consciousness were those relating to sex (Gen. 13:13; 18:20; 20:6; 34:7; 35:22, cf. 49:3; Judg. 19:23; 20:6-10, 12 f.; II Sam. 12:13; 13*12), to blood revenge (Gen. 4:10, 13-15, 23 ff.; 9:6; 42:22; Exod. 21:14; Judg., chap. 8; "0611.4:10 (J); 42:22 (E); 18:19; 31:49 f.; 38:1-10; 50:20; Exod. 18:15 flf.; chap. 20; 21:14; 22:20 £F.; chap. 34; I Sam. 20:42, cf. 20:23; H Sam. 21:1-3. « "Possession is not property; but when society recognizes one's rights to a thing and undertakes to protect him in that right, that is property." — Thomas N. Carver, "The Economic Basis of the Problem of Evil," Harvard Theological Review, 1, 107. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN PRE-EXILIC PERIOD 7 II Sam. 4:10-12), to hospitality^'' (Gen. 18:2 ff.; chap. 19; Judg. 19:23; I Sam. 25:39), and to property (Gen. 31:32; 44:9; Exod. 21:22-26; 22:2-17; II Sam. 12:1-7, 131 I Kings, chap. 21). An oath, vow, and ban were especially sacred in times of war or in national danger, their breach precipitating pestilence, famine, and defeat Qosh., chap. 7; Judg., chap. 11; I Sam., chap. 14; 15:14 ff., 21, 32 ff.). So direct and sure was the vengeance of Yahwe that it had the aspect of the automatic. And the " conception of inherent retribution following as an automatic consequence of the wrong act lies close to the permanent moral consciousness of mankind, closer than the alternative theory, that of pimishment ab extra, since it is in the moral order itself." ^^ No one can read the narrative of the dramatic discovery, condemnation, and elimination of the sin of Jonathan and Achan without noting the completeness with which the "consequences of the act are referred back to the original impulse and enter into the structure of consciousness."^^ Sin, then, has no fixed content, it is not to be judged by an absolute ethical standard, the essential thing is that it should function in the fulfilment or organization of an interest. The point is not the ethical value of the custom or taboo, it may be irrational or repellent to the modem; its connection with the life- processes of the group might be accidental, due to the limitations in the experience of man and to the confusion of intellectual cate- gories. Sometimes an absurd custom or an act, immoral by our standard, is "embedded in theUfe of the people, knit together with the whole body of memories and traditions, carrying as well as carried by the customs involved in the whole scheme of social life. It can be condemned only by showing how obsolete the situation is."^' Such, for example, are the sex cults prevalent in the Orient today, and such were the sex disabilities connected with the ownership of women current among the Hebrews during the Old ^ "In der Ausiibung des Gastrechts sah man ein Gottesgebot, in der Verletzung des Gastxechts wurde die Gottheit beleidigt. Die grauenvolle Art auf die der Mann der zu Tode geschandeten die Schandtat bekannt macht lasst uns die furchtbare Erregung nachfiihlen, die ihn durchzittert. Hos. 8 : 4." — Bennewitz, p. 1 17. « Hobhouse, I, 53. "> J. Dewey, unpublished lectures on the "Evolution of Morality." " Dewey, unpublished lectures. 8 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY Testament period. It is true that certain acts, such as murder, adultery, stealing, have been pretty generally condemned as destructive of social values, but it is just this human experience which proves them such. Even so, they have to be redefined and analyzed in every new social situation. The concept of adultery has varied through the ages in accordance with the sex of the party concerned. "Two crimes are acknowledged as shameful and sins among the Arabs: adultery and murder. But murder, when on a raid or in blood-revenge, is no murder." ^* In Israel it was a sin that David should number his people (II Sam,, chap. 24), but it was right that Jephthah should offer his daughter in payment of a vow (Judg. ii:34ff.), or that Abraham should sacrifice Isaac (Gen., chap. 22). "The habit of cleanhness is so ingrained into the Japanese character that in Shinto actual personal dirt is more than moral guilt. To be dirty is to be disrespectful to the gods."^' Here cleanliness has become an object of attention in itself, the social expression of the fulfilment of an interest. Per- sonal dirt creates, then, a moral situation just as a breach of taboo, a harmless thing in itself, was found to have done. II The period of the prophets brought the fundamental recon- struction of attitudes and habits, the occasion of change being emigration into new natural environment and conflict with a nation whose methods of warfare were more developed and whose civili- zation presented new needs, new desires, new ends. The read- justment issued at first in a disorder marked by the breaking-down of the old mores without a conscious adoption of the new — "every man did that which was right in his own eyes," by the use of indi- vidual wit and judgment. After the first stage of settlement and of local conquest, organization became the demand of the new fife both for internal order and for external conquest. With the suc- cessful wars of the king, treasures began to pour into the kingdom, followed by a rapid development of trade by land and by sea (I Kings 5:25; 9:265.; 10:11 f., 28 f.; Hos. 12:6; Isa. 30:6; I Kings 9:18, cf. II Chron. 8:9). That the rapid development produced conflict is shown by the rise of political parties and the ** Curtiss, p. 124. '» Quoted from Irving King, The Development of Religion, p. 112. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN PRE-EXILIC PERIOD 9 frequency of revolution each backed by a special interest. The importation of foreign goods, foreign ideas and manners also made luxury, self-indulgence, power, and wealth the great ends in life. In the scramble for these, class feeling and personal injustice displaced the old equahty and love of freedom (Amos 5:10-12; Hos. 4:2), which had been emphasized anew at the formation of the Northern Kingdom. Shameless exercise of power, inequality before the law, disregard of contract, and commercial fraud made social and economic questions difficult, the free, virtuous, and beautiful activities of life impossible for the poorer and weaker classes. Oppression and extortion marked the attitude of the one, the urgency and necessity of mere living characterized the other; the enjoyment and profits of trade had been appropriated by the one, the burdens of long and continuous war bore heavily upon the other; the rich were adding field to field (Isa. 5 :8 f.), the small landowners were being sold into slavery for debt; the oppressors were making good with the judges by bribes, the case of the weak was being thrown out of court; the rich were dissipating their Kves in feastings and frivolities and corrupting practices at the high places; the poor went naked and unfed. That really happened which has repeatedly happened in the progress of nations: the indi\ddual reacted more quickly than society was able to do, with the result that the individual best fitted to do so had survived in the struggle, those disadvantaged had gone to the wall. In north Israel, revolution had kept the balance by weakening the central government until commercial Hfe had developed a new group prin- ciple. Those who failed in the struggle fell into the inferior status of slave with the loss of dvil rights, such as the right to hold prop- erty (even their own wives and children — Exod. 21:4), right of marriage, and the right of personal freedom. Those who succeeded became leaders, masters, independent of the group, and serving or using the group at will. This disorganization of society incapaci- tated the government at the time when coherence and unity were necessary for the political salvation of the state. With no well- developed doctrine of rewards in a future life and with the burning sense of injustice on the part of the suffering poor, supplemented by the enervation of character resulting from the sudden attain- lO TEE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY ment of wealth on the part of the rich, there was no inspiring incentive for the common man to cope with an enemy whose num- bers, organization, and zeal had changed the map of the then known worid. During this period, the worship of Yahwe was enriched by the appropriation of the Canaanite high places with their mazzebahs, asherahs, and round of agricultural feasts and magic practices asso- ciated from time immemorial with Baal and his female complement. As a matter of fact, the forms of worship at the high places had the closest possible connection with the old Semitic forms found in Phoenicia, Arabia, and Babylonia^" and took their origin in the animistic concept of the Semites to whom the mutilations, dances, feasts, ecstasies, and sacred prostitutes connoted certain social values of fertihty, power, and well-being (I Kings 12:24; Amos 2:7; Hos. 4:13; Deut. 23:17, 18)." Reactionary movements ap- peared in the cult when Saul sought to suppress witchcraft and necromancy (I Sam. 28:9), when Jerubbaal threw down the altars of Baal (Judg. 6:25-31), and when Asa deposed the queen mother for making an image of Astarte (II Kings I5:i2f.). A definite change in attitude toward Baalism was registered in the reaction led by Elijah in which the exclusive principle resident in Yahwe gained historical embodiment. It was a conflict between the type represented by the desert and that represented by the new land of agriculture, of commercial and pohtical alliances: a conflict between registered values in symbols in which the concept of Yahwe as the god of war and of justice, the champion of the weak, the oppressed, the widow, the orphan, and the stranger, was welded with the concept of exclusiveness, just because both concepts were sufficiently vital to the needs of the situation to prevail. The prob- lems of life which pressed hardest upon the nation were no longer *» The Semitic material first gathered by Robertson Smith from literary sources has found abundant illustration both in the Semitic customs existent among the Arabs today and in the tablets brought to light by modem explorations. For the interpre- tation of Deut. 24:8 ff., see Schwally, KriegesalterthUmer, I, 81 fi. " The worship of Astarte, the goddess of fertility, was as characteristic of the Semitic race as its language. Cf. Dr. George A. Barton, A Sketch of Semitic Origins; Sellin, Tell Ta'annek, Wien, 1904; Bliss and Macalister, Excavations in Palestine igo2; Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement, 1904, pp. 229 ff. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN P RE-EXILIC PERIOD ii those connected with an animistic view of nature. The impas- sioned words of Amos, Hosea, and Micah ring with the enthusiasm of new values and the claim of new spiritual and fundamental necessities. Justice was the demand of the hour; to oppress the poor with violence and to retain the favor of Yahwe by providing a pilgrimage or a feast at the high places (Amos 2:8; 4:4; 5:52.; Hos. 6:1-3; 13:2 ff.; Isa. 1:21-23; 3:13 ff.) was repugnant to the moral sense of the prophet, and, we may well beheve, to the moral sense of others also. Ethical standards in commerce were gradually shaping themselves to meet the necessities of business enterprise. The need and value of honesty, veracity, just balances, and keeping faith are traceable in the prophets who studied the field and in numbers of proverbs culled from trade, such as "a false balan/:e is an abominarion to the Lord, but a jxist weight is his deUght" (Prov. ii:i; 16:11; 3:27, 29, 31; 10:4; 11:3,4,5; 22:1, 7, 22 f.). A trade like that of Solomon's with Egj^pt and the provinces in Asia Minor could not have been built up upon mere shrewdness in bargaining. The code of Hammurabi has a series of elaborate laws controlling trade by boat and caravan. It governs business relations between the merchant who is the principal and his agent who goes off to seek the market (§§101-7); it regulates warehouses (§§ 122-25), deposits of interest on money (§§49, 50, 100), debts (§§ 115-17), sales (§§ 35, 278-79), and hire (§228). Such laws in Israel would connect with those fixing responsibihty for loss in case of loan or guardianship (Exod. 22: 7-15)- The standard of purity for women had developed so that the demands of the cult at the high places had grown offensive to the better class of citizens (Gen. 38 : 20 f . ; Isa. 3 : 16 — 4 : i ; Hos. 2:1-13; 4:10-14; Deut. 23:18; IKings 14:24; 15:12^; II Kings 23:7), the natural elements being calculable in so far as to bring the fer- tility of the earth more or less under himian control. In other words, the cult at the high places had broken loose from life and was being developed as an end in itself, for true reUgion had left it behind as a survival of the outworn, a very obstacle to morals and to religion." It was like the sex cults of the Orient today which " Alfred Bertholet, Kommentar zu DeuteroTiomium, p. xiii. 12 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY are outworn and yet have never been reinterpreted into the life and thought of the people. The primary reUgious need of the times was the destruction of the high places and the extirpation of the animistic powers, a need which the priests must have felt as forcibly as the prophets. The prophet of the eighth century organized these indi- vidual interests into an interest of the community. He caught up the great values of his day, right and justice, and created a definite active attitude toward them upon the part of the community. No doubt the original incentive to this activity was given by the disaster threatening the state. Yahwe, the national god, was angry with his people; such serious misfortune awaited them that national sin was indicated. That sin would be found in the moral realm is not unique to the Hebrew prophet. A similar consciousness of injustice, dishonesty, violence, and oppression as sin is found in the Shur-pu tablets of Babylonia^^ and in the Egyptian Book of the Dead.^'* The unique thing in Israel is that our prophet connected moraHty with the element of ex- clusiveness; he conserved the internal and the external interests by welding the concept of a national god and that of a world god into an organic whole. To Amos the ritual ceremonies were not only evil but the cult as performed was hateful to Yahwe; it was no longer a means of communication between God and man. That more important to Yahwe is to do justice and to practice mercy and truth (Amos 5:21-24; Hos. 6:6, cf. 10:12; Isa. i:ii iff.; 29: 13; Mic. 6:6-8; Jer. 7:21-28). Commercial wrongs were not matters of business only, having no bearing upon religion ; they are of the greatest concern to God, more important than taboo or ritual. In other words, the moral issues have become so paramount that Amos swings the moral into the place heretofore assumed by the ritual and by this change of emphasis he conserves the new social values evolved and gives to the religion of Israel that unique ethical quahty which differentiates it from the religions of Phoeni- cia, Canaan, and Arabia. Hosea discerns the real character of the *3 H. Zimmem, Babylonische Busspsaitnen umschrieben, ubersetzt und erklSrt, 1885, and Babylonische Hymnen und Gebele, Leipzig, 1905. ** £. A. Budge, The Book of the Dead, London, 1898, 1901. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN P RE-EXILIC PERIOD 13 worship at the high places to be BaaUsm. Their idols (3:1; 4:17), images (8 : 4 f . ; 11:2; 13:2), the whole apparatus of the high places (4:8, 13!.; 8:11-13; 13:1), partake of the spirit of whoredom (1:2; 2:4-7; 4:11,12,15,18; 5:3,4,7; 6:10; 9:1; 11:7). Baal is the false lover who has led Israel astray, the representative of nature and the animistic, natural powers. With this allegory of marriage Hosea gets a purchase whereby he can oppose Yahwe to Baal and bring the consciousness of the moral laws to the common man. Not only is Yahwe different in character from Baal but true religion partakes of a mystic and pietistic character; it is an inner relation of faith, loyalty, and truth. Isaiah develops this rela- tionship to mean that every lack of confidence in Yahwe, every feeling of pride, haughtiness, and disbehef is sin (1:2; 2:6-22; 3:8-i6f.; 7:3; 10:6 ff., 15, 33 f.; 22:8-11; 31:7) against the holy and exalted Lord God of Hosts (Isa. 5:16; chap. 6; 30:18). A mere ecclesiastic insistence upon the exclusive principle resident in Yahwe would not have affected the people at large^^ had not the new movement in Yahwism been representative of the new social and ethical values. It was the concept of social justice that stirred the social judgment and will and that fused religion with moraHty into a union more organic than that existent among other oriental peoples. Israel did not come to the concept of monotheism by the way of speculation. Like beHef in the future state, the thought of Yahwe as a world god was the working rule for the solution of a practical difficulty. The interests of Israel, commercial and other- wise, had led her among the nations of the earth. The temple of Yahwe at Elephantine and Leontopolis and the custom of making contracts show that Yahwe, like the good mother of the modem home, had to cross the threshold of his own land in order to con- serve the welfare and interests of his children. Now that Canaan was the arena of the struggle for empire and now that her highest interests were identified with the estabhshment of the moral, these external and internal interests could be achieved only by a god able to cope with the world-forces outside of his own territory. For 's Cf. the ecclesiastic reform of Pharaoh Amenophis IV. — ^Adolf Erroan, Aegyp- tische Religion, Berlin, 1905, pp. 67-69. 14 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY while he was no longer indissolubly connected with Israel through physical kinship, he was indissolubly identified with her supreme interests. If he could not conserve these, he would be superseded as a god. But loss of nationahty did not necessarily involve the loss of Israel's supreme interests; disaster regarded as punishment would rather indicate its use as a corrective leading to heaHng and restoration. Thus the moraKzation of the national god and his identification with the world-god are the evolution of the same historic crises; they were the center of attention, of the national consciousness, at the same time. Once obtained, this concept of Yahwe would find support in all the activities heretofore ascribed to him; the fact that he was not identified with a symbol, that he was located in the heavens, and that he ruled over nature would strengthen the h5^othesis until, like a scientific theory, its truth was beHeved to have been demonstrable. The prophets, as the intellectual and religious leaders of the race, were the men of faith who tried to make Israel good by the elimination of evil, who taught the ultimate conservation of all values, through the acceptance of moral truth, promising that in the future "every man shall sit under his own vine and fig tree and none shall molest them or make them afraid." in The work of fusion, however, was not that of an hour or of a day. The public preaching of the prophet was followed by the formulation of the prophetic ideas in writing, the rewriting of the patriarchal stories, the interpretation of history from the new point of view, and the development of law as a standard of duty and of rights, for civil rights become effective only when enforced or redressed. In the pregnant phrase of Aristotle, the administration of justice is also its determination,^^ that is, its discovery and pro- mulgation. The conflict of interests that arose during the prophetic period could be settled only by the clearer formulation of legal details. As a matter of fact, "the fear of Yahwe" is no substitute for the courts. The Deuteronomists attempted to collect the laws which were effective in the community in their time and to modify * "The principles of legal justice are not due to crude legislation but to the con- tinuous and co-operative attempts at doing Justice in concrete cases. Principles are judgemade." — S. P. Mezes, Ethics, Descriptive and Explanatory, p. 306. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN PRE-EXILIC PERIOD 15 these in so far as the reform in the cult and the higher ideals of justice demanded (Deut. 30 : 1 1-14) .^ They preserved the traditions of the law in the various strata reaching back to the agricultural and nomadic period by the publication^^ of the new contributions as an essential part of the Mosaic code. (See Appendix B, p. 22.) Despite the fact that Deuteronomy is a compilation, it makes a substantial contribution to justice and reform. In the legal reform of the cult, the new Yahwism allied itself with all the reactionary forces in rehgion, with the assertion of monotheism against every- thing foreign, immoral, animistic, and BaaUstic. The extirpation of foreign cults (13 : 1-9; 17 : 2-7), asherahs and mazzebahs (16: i f.; 12:3; 7:5), mourning rites (14:1 f.), all kinds of divinations, magic (18 : 10 f.), and Moloch worship (12:31; 18: 10) are demanded with "sanguinary thoroughness.'"' The reform was ineffective in breaking up the popular use of idols as shown in the later books of the Old Testament and in the recent Aramaic finds in Egyptian excavations. 3° The moral did, however, gradually cast out the unethical, modif}dng or reinterpreting all the practices in which rehgion was formerly expressed, such as the covenant, circum- cision, clean and imclean. Thus the ciilt was removed as an obstacle to the higher reUgious development. Idolatry becomes, then, a breach of the law of Yahwe and an offense against the law of the state, to be pimished by the total destruction of the city or the individual practicing it. »^ Karl Steuemagel, Kommentar zu DaUeronomium, pp. x ff . ** It is manifest that the knowledge of law by the people would be one of the strongest elements in the maintenance of impartiality in judgment and in the uphold- ing of the innocent in their rights: cf. the purpose of publication avowed in the pro- logue to the code of Hammurabi: "That the great should not oppress the weak, to coimsel the widow and orphan, to render judgment and decide the decisions of the land and to succor the injured .... that the oppressed who has a suit to prosecute may come to my image, that of a royal king, and read my inscription and imderstand my precious words and may my stele elucidate his case" (cf. Deut. 31:9-13; 6:6-9, 20-25; 11:18-29). « G. F. Moore, Encyclopaedia Biblica, article "Deuteronomy," p. 1093. ^ "Man kann allenfalls fiinf Gotter aus den Papyri herauslesen; zwei, j5ho imd Herembethel sind bezeugt, xmd 'Anat-Bethel, 'Anat-Jaho und I§ima ( ?)-Bethel konnen als Gotter gedeutet werden (cf. Jer., chap. 44)." — Aramaische Papyrus und Osiraka aus Elephantine, bearbeitet von £d. Sachau, p. zzvi. i6 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY Public punishment,^^ originally reserved for acts shocking to public conscience (I Kings 21:9, 13, 21; Exod. 22:28, cf. Lev. 24: 10 ff., 16; Job 2:9), especially in times of community danger, such as war (Gen. 34:30; Judg., chap. 19, esp. vs. 30; Judg., chap. 20; Josh., chap. 7; Deut. 23:9 fif.; I Sam., chap. 14; II Sam. 21:51!.), now includes injury to the person (17:8-13, cf. 19:18; II Chron. 19:8-11), to the property, or to the reputation (22:13-21). (See Appendix C, p. 24.) Justice dispensed in order to force a settle- ment of quarrels or feuds grown dangerous to the community now attempts an impartial decision (16:18-20; 25:1; 27:25) between the rights and claims of different claimants .^^ Judgment by means of ordeal" or by the pronouncement of a magical decision has come to rest upon testimony as to the facts in the case (Deut. 19: 15-21; 17:6), the number and responsibiUty of the witnesses being fixed by law. "Although there was still a blur of justice and injustice, an undeniable effort was made to reaUze justice by overcoming fraud, bribery, and partiality." Life is to be protected instead of merely countenancing retaliation^'* (19 : 1-13 ; 21 : 1-9) ; rights are generally recognized which had been claimed only by individuals and enforced by superior strength (24:16, cf. Jer. 31:29; Ezek. 18:4). Great ideals of personal conduct were conceived, such as justice, good- will, loyalty, and love (10:18 — 11 :i). Character, the attitude or subjective disposition of a man, becomes the subject of moral judgment. The magico-animistic basis of obligation is discarded; duties and rights attach to members of society as such or are based upon the voluntary covenant with Yahwe and his demands in presence of the national danger. Thus a sentiment against the commission of certain social and religious crimes was growing at 3' "The bulk of acts which infringe the right of other men are not, strictly speak- ing, acts regarded as inherently wrong but as legitimate occasions for vengeance to be inflicted by the sufferer and his kinsfolk, if strong enough to do so." — Hobhouse, 11, 73- 3' For the establishment of justice between man and man, two things are requisite, an authoritative law on the one hand, and an authoritative tribunal on the other. J J "The survival of even one case of ordeal by holy water leaves no doubt as to the sense of the 'fountain of judgment' (En-mishpat) or 'waters of controversy' (Meribah), Gen. 14:7; Exod. 15:25, where Moses decided the cases too hard for the tribal judges." — W. R. Smith, The Religion of the Semites, pp. 179 ff. M Dewey and Tufts, chap, vi; Hobhouse, chap, iii and appendix to chap. iii. HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN PRE-EXILIC PERIOD 17 the very time when the captivity and the fall of Jerusalem, by prohibiting sacrifice and ritual, emphasized the moral values and the subjective disposition. Repentance, obedience, and recon- ciliation became the study of the exile with the purpose of putting away a lower past and readjusting Ufe to meet an ideal good. Responsibility for the stern enforcement of these laws with the fear of divine retribution created at last the sense of sin at their breach with the result scarcely anticipated by the prophets, that of fixing the will of Yahwe in a written law. Conduct came to be tested by a standard, by conformity to a hard and fast rule, rather than being a "matter of spirit and of constant reconstruction "^^ ^nd Uberation of spirit as Jeremiah (31 :3i, 34) and Jesus conceived it to be. Sin is a term used, then, for those acts contrary to the moral order of himian society, the punishment of which is gradually assumed by the courts and which is known to modern law as crime or tort. Sin, in this sense, is the infringement of individual interests upon the totality of interests, a refusal to recognize social duties and obligations. Just because the Jews became a religious body within a political state, a con- fusion of legal with moral guilt arose. The sense of sin at the breach of law became so great that a professional class of inter- preters of the law arose and the law finally displaced the cult as the center of Judaistic rehgion. At the same time that this dis- tinction of sin as an objective act was being emphasized, sin became also the disposition, attitude, or evil will back of the act. This element of ethical inwardness in the prophets was taken up by Christianity into the concept of the ''outgoing, objectifying, socially effective attitude of will which proved a man's motive or his sinfulness. "^^ In this study, then, the primitive meaning of sin "to miss the mark" is to fail in achieving an immediate or ulterior interest with reference to which action is performed. This identifies itself with a certain definite social feeUng aroused by the breach of custom and taboo, just because custom and taboo hedge about the con- spicuous points of failure. The authority of custom lay in its 35 Dewey and Tufts, Ethics, p. 103. 3* E. S. Ames, The Psychology of Religion, p. 189. l8 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY appeal to human experience ; its lack of finality in the interpretation of that experience as the work of magical and wilful natural powers and in the fact that no discrimination was made between moral and physical evils. The first human values to evolve were health, fertility, prosperity, victory in battle; the sense of sin was focused at the breach of those primitive customs which imperiled these values, such as the customs relating to sex, blood-revenge, hospi- taUty, and property, or at the breach of the ritual through which the mysterious will of Yahwe might be appeased. We have traced the growth of interest to include social justice, good will, and moral service. Perhaps the early control of nature by the Hebrews is discernible in their repudiation of the magical, animistic powers of fertility and in the ascription to Yahwe of control over the heavenly bodies (Gen. i:i6; 2:1; Judg. 5:20; Isa. 40:26; Job 38:7; Deut. 6: 19; Jer. 10: 2) and the change of seasons (Hos. 2 :8, 21 ; Isa. 1:3). Society formed and reformed its values according to the fimda- mental necessities of the environment and according to the ends and interests which it was called upon to sustain. Custom grew up to conserve these new interests and values and conscience devel- oped in determining the significance of new habits to society. All sin is sin against God, not so much because God is the protector of right as because he is a moral personality whose purpose is become the national purpose, that of a thoroughgoing establishment of the moral in Israel and the world. The conception of misfortune as punishment for sin has under- gone all the transformations characteristic of social justice. Origi- nally every misfortune was the punishment of Yahwe upon a sin against himself, be that sin intentional or accidental, known or unknown. At first, it was only a working rule representative of a crude sort of justice by a power which was impulsive, jealous, and vengeful. That was p"''^? which conformed to certain objec- tive standards, without regard to the ethical element in the case." Later, as the concept of justice developed away from the principle of revenge toward that of retribution, bringing back to the agent the evil consequences of his deed, the basis of judgment was more 3' Emil Kautzsch, Ueber die Derivate des Stammes pHS im AUtesiatnentlichen Sprachgebrauch, Tubingen, 1881. -tfT*' HEBREW SENSE OF SIN IN PRE-EXILIC PERIOD 19 carefully interrogated. As we have tried to show, it was in the struggle for legal and social justice and in the endeavor to conserve the highest interests of Israel that the prophets fused morality with reUgion and welded the national god with the world-god. Sin and punishment are not two heterogeneous things, but hang to- gether in the closest subjective relations, as Hosea and Jeremiah have shown. Sin is its own punishment. It, itself, separates from God. The history of Israel is worked through from this point of view, the rise and fall of nations are explained through the out- working of moral justice. Its application to the individual is more difficult, but practical difficulties did not disturb the faith in God nor the prestige of morality. For when the comparative fate of the individual was felt to be inexpHcable upon the basis of conduct, another world was posited in which justice might restore the balance of disturbed law by rewards and punishments after death. APPENDIX A The growth of law and justice is pretty closely connected in its several stages with the forms of social organization and in so far may be termed political. But political justice is based upon ethical justice, and no study in comparative ethics indicates more decisively the stage of moral develop- ment. In tribal society, two sources of redress are discernible, one public, the other private in character. The classification of public offenses by Stein- metz (M. Steinmetz, "Classification des types sociaux et catalogue des peuples," Annie sociologique, 1898-99, 165 f.) are witchcraft, incest, treason, and sacrilege. These were held to involve the community as a whole in misfortune and danger, the object of the community in exterminating the criminal being not so much the punishment of the man as the protection of the group from danger (Judg. 19:20; Jos. 7; I Sam. 28:9). For the redress of private wrongs primitive society had no adequate organization. All per- sonal wrongs were matters for private vengeance, although it was to the interest of the avenger to have public opinion on his side. Revenge or retaliation rested upon the solidarity of the kindred, since the blood-feud was retribution exercised by a family or clan upon a family or clan (Judg. 8 : 18 ff . ; II Sam. 3 : 27-30; 13:28, 32 ff.) at the cost to society of the permanency of the feud and the individual responsibility for crime. In many cases where a settle- ment of disputes by the elders or by the sheik is spoken of, it is merely sub- sidiary to self-help, the real basis of order being the blood-feud. Public intervention, in anticipation or mitigation of private redress, would de- pend upon the authority of the chief to maintain order and enforce punish- ment. Disputes might be settled by a palaver, as the settlement of the strife between the herdmen of Abram and those of Lot over the wells (Gen. 13 : 7 f.; 21:25-31; cf. Gen. 26:2off., 28, 32), by an organized duel, as that between David and Goliath, or by the prescription of a test wholly unrelated to the facts at issue as in the ordeal, the use of the curse or oath. These latter were conceived as an appeal to the judgment of God or to powers which take vengeance upon those who swear falsely (Exod. 18:13-26; I Kings 18:31 f.; Num. 11:16 ff.) and were probably in the hand of the priest (Num. 5:11 ff., 19). Israelite tradition regards the principle of revenge as Godgiven and carried it back to the beginnings of clan and family life when Cain was promised sevenfold vengeance for injury (Gen. 4:15; cf. 9:6); even Lamech's song bespeaks brutal revenge and yet a feeling of justice or right (Gen. 4:23 f.). Examples of vengeance may be multiplied throughout the history of Israel; Yahwe himself was a jealous God who practiced vengeance (Gen. 9:5; cf. II Sam. 21:1 ff.; Exod. 20:4-6), for an unavenged murder cried aloud to him for punishment (Gen. 4: 10), his altar did not protect the murderer (Exod. APPENDIX 21 21 : 14), and to him are referred the cases in which the bj^"*!! was too weak for protection Qudg. 9:20, 23 f., 56). This method of vengeance was gradually mitigated by th.^ jus talionis, "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" (Exod. 21:12 f., 24 f., 28 f.; Lev. 24:i9f.; Deut. 19:21; Num. 35:30 flf.). This, in turn was modified by compensation, until a sliding scale of payments appeared, determined both by the nature of the injury and the rank of the person injured (see especially the Code of Hammurabi, §§202-3, 218-20; cf. Deut. 22 : 28 f.; Exod. 21 : 30-36). Justice, as we understand it, the render- ing to each man his due as judged by an impartial authority, had not yet come into social practice and consciousness. Domestic justice did not excite the blood-feud and was, therefore, dealt with by the arbitrary justice of the family or the kin. It is not until the Deuteronomic period that family law becomes a recognized part of the code, the members of the family claiming the right of public justice. Now, although Yahwe protects and practices this method of revenge, it is none the less lacking in justice to the individual, since collect- ive responsibility is vicarious and it fails to distinguish between accident and design J It is not perfectly clear in the Old Testament whether excusable homicide is unintentional or unpremeditated (Exod. 21:13! ; Deut. 19:4- 6; Num. 35:15-24). In fact volition is so wholly disregarded that animals as well as men are to suffer vengeance (Gen. 9:5; Exod. 21:28; Lev. 20:15). Jus talionis, the law of the Old Testament, is revenge, revenge guided and limited by custom (Deut. 19: 12; Num. 35 : 12-25), in which the public opinion of the group and the protection of Yahwe are always forces to be reckoned with, but it is not justice. "It is only as an independent organ for the adjustment of disputes and the prevention of crime arises that the common good, private rights, and moral responsibility are bound together in a truly ethical deter- mination" (Hobhouse, Vol. I, chap. iii). Out of such a vital connection with the crude justice of tribal times developed the historical relations of Yahwe with law and public justice in Israel. His was the authority which main- tained order and enforced punishment. In his name were the blessings and curses pronounced upon Gerizim and Ebal (Deut. 27:15-28, 68). In his name was the code of laws promulgated, just as the Code of Hammurabi was given through and with the authority of the god Shammash. In addition to being some mysterious agency, Yahwe has become the personal leader and protector in whom dwells the supreme authority. APPENDIX B It is impossible to trace the content of the original Mosaic Law, The oldest Yahwistic collection (Exod., chap. 34) is composite in character, belong- ing partly to the nomadic period (Exod. 34:250, 256, 26), and partly to the agricultural stage (Exod. 34:21, 22, 23), but whether to the semi-agricultural of Kadesh is still an open question. The Elohistic collection of laws (Exod. 20:1 — 23:33) is also a composite writing not originally a part of E's history of the transaction at Horeb (so Kuenen, Wellhausen, Budde, Staerk, Holzinger, Baentsch, Moore). The Horeb debharim (20:22-26; 22:27-29; 23:10-16) is later than the corresponding Yahwistic debharim (Exod., chap. 34), lacking every reference to the cult of the nomadic religion (23 : 17-19 being an appendix from the hand of Rje), and contains a protest against the luxurious altars characteristic of the oflficial cult at the time of its composition (Exod. 20 : 24- 26). The MiSpatim (21:1 — 22:16) with additions (21:12, 15-17; 22:17-19) and an appendix of moral precepts (22:20-26; 23:1-3, 6-8) is the earliest collection of civil and moral laws. The material content goes back to the agricultural period (22:4 f.; 22:1, 6f.; 21:27 — 22:3; 22:4 f., 9-14) of crude morals (21:9; 22:16). In contrast to the Horeb and Sinai debharim, the Mispatim are civil customs, gradually builded out of the experiences and needs of the people, and are certainly pre-Deuteronomic (Bruno Baentsch, Einleitung zu Exodus-Levitus-Numeri, p. L). The problem of the date and origin of the Decalogue (Exod. 20:1-17) ^^Y be approached from two points of view: that of literary criticism and that of the content. Literary criticism has shown that the Decalogue with its inseparable narrative (Exod. 32:1 — ^33:2) belongs to E 2, a prophetic recension of E made after 722. The problem is not that of the prophetic origin of the moral nor the Mosaic formulation of the law. It is not that the Decalogue presents moral demands for the first time, but that the Decalogue presented these homely, customary requirements as the truest expression of the will of Yahwe, excluding at the same time from the compass of that will, the manifold requirements of the cult heretofore esteemed as the most important element of sacred revelation, both by the older traditions of J and E and by the popular practice. In our Decalogue, not only is the distinctly ethical realized with clear- ness and intensity, but it succeeds in directing conduct and organizing life. But the concrete in experience precedes the universal. Israelite law, like old English law, grew not so much through statutory law as through concrete judgments: "Thou shalt commit no murder" was preceded by the reign of blood-revenge, and could only have found expression during the attempt to suppress vengeance on the part of the state. It is a question in the Decalogue, not of rights but of right (Exod. 20:17; cf • Deut. 5:21; Rom. 7:7; cf . Kautzsch, APPENDIX 23 The Religion of Israel, D. B., p. 634). Therefore it exerted an influence outside of the borders of Israel and became in its New Testament interpreta- tion the common property of Christendom. See the discussion by Bnmo Baentsch, Einleitung zu Exodus-Levitus-Numeri, p. liii; Kotnmentar zu Exodus, pp. 177 f. APPENDIX C The content of the Deuteronomic laws may be compared with the older laws of the Old Testament by means of the convenient tables of Carpenter and Battersby (Hexateuch), where the new element is easily discernible. Aside from the ordinances having to do with worship, they treat of the family, of persons and animals, of property, of war, and of judgment and rule. The law concerning the family shows the extension of the conception of public offenses to include acts heretofore regarded as purely domestic matters. A. The man has the right to — (o) More than one wife (Deut. 21 : 15-17). (b) Concubines (21:10-14). (c) Unrestricted divorce (24: 1-4), with two exceptions: (i) In case of the seduction of a virgin and her forced marriage (22 : 28). (2) In case of the slander of his newly married wife (22: 13-21). (d) Remarriage after divorce, except in case of wife's second marriage and divorce (24:4). (e) Widow of eldest brother upon choice (25:5-10) when brethren dwell together. (/) Property rights in his daughter, if virgin when married (22 : 13-19, 29). The man is obligated to — (c) Recognize the rights of a rebellious son to public justice, thus cur- tailing his power of life and death over his son. (6) Acknowledge the primogeniture of a firstborn, son of a hated wife, by giving him a double portion. (c) Grant a seduced daughter the right of marriage. (d) Regard the reputation of a newly married wife. (e) Grant freedom to the widow rejected in the Levirate marriage. (/) Respect certain impedimenta to marriage. B. The rights of the woman are maintained to — (c) Her life, if forced when betrothed (22:25-27). (b) Marriage, if seduced when not betrothed (22:28). (c) Protection from slander by her husband (22 : 13-21). (d) Rights of a concubine, if a slave (22: 10-14). (e) Maintenance of son's rights of inheritance when a hated wife (21:15- 17). (J) Freedom in seventh year of servitude with gifts, when a slave (15:12- 18). The woman is obligated to — (a) Acceptance of a bill of divorce without payment of a dowry (24: 1-4). {b) Purity (21:10-14; 22:13-27; 22:5; 23:17). 34 APPENDIX 25 C. The rights of a son are maintained to — (a) Primogeniture (21:15-17). {b) A pubUc trial for life when undutiful (21 : 18-21). (c) Instruction in the law (6:6-9, 20-25; 11:19-21). The son is obligated to — (a) Honor his parents (5: 16). (6) Respect his father's wife and his own half-sister (27:20, 22). The arbitrary power of the head of the family is limited by the emergence of the individual with rights and obligations as over against the other members of this smallest social unit (24:16; of. II Kings 14:6). This shows growth in the authority of the court through the cases of offenses considered. Property was protected, originally, not because a thief should be punished, but because a feud, dangerous to the clan, would be started for its restitution. In the growing complexity of life indicated by the Deuteronomic law, the individual IsraeHte must — (a) Respect property: landmarks are not to be removed (19:17; 29:17); a brother's straying cattle are to be restored (22:1-4). (6) Respect the rights of the poor: a millstone is not to be taken in pledge (15:1-6); no right of entry allowable to get a pledge nor power to retain a garment over night (24:6, 10-13). (c) Respect the interests of debtors: usury not to be taken from the Hebrews, allowable from strangers (23:20); debts to be remitted to Hebrews at the end of seven years (15:1-4). {d) Regard the needs of the widow, orphan, and stranger: gleanings left for the poor (23:24; 24:9-22). Here belongs then, the social recognition of property rights with an attempt to protect such rights rather than to aid in avenging their loss. This is manifestly a development of the fimction of the court in the maintenance of order. With the evolution of social order and the growth of central authority, the redress of wrongs begins to take the form of an independent and impartial administration of justice (Hobhouse, 1,97). The Deuteronomic law, concerned with judgment and rule, makes for the attainment of justice by: A. Appointment of judges in every town by the people (16: 19). B. Right of appeal to a supreme court at Jerusalem in cases of questions concerning property or personal injury too difficult for decision (17:8- 13; cf. 1:9-18; II Chron. 19:8-11); the old practice of resort to the Elohim falls to the ground (Exod. 22:8). C. Method of trial: (o) The attempt of the judge to investigate the fact through witnesses (19:15-21). (6) Two or three witnesses are required for conviction (17:6). (c) The hands of witnesses are first upon a murderer in execution (17:6), thus assuming public responsibility in the case. 26 APPENDIX D. Forms of punishment: (o) Jus talionis is limited to false witness (19: 18-27; cf- Exod. 21 : 23-25). (6) Flogging may be practiced by the judge to the number of thirty-nine stripes (25:1-3). (c) Compensation for injury to property is fixed (22:19, 27; cf. Exod. 21:18; 22:16). (<:0 Trial before execution of death penalty for murder is made possible by the cities of refuge (19:12 f,; 21:21; 22:21). E. The legal principle includes: (o) The distinction between accidental and intentional murder (19:4-13). (6) The protection of life instead of abetting the avenger (19: 1-13; 21:1- 9). (c) The freedom and responsibility of the individual, "none to suffer for the crimes of another" (24:16; cf. Jer. 21:29; Ezek. 18:4). {d) Justice is a verdict based upon an impartial judgment (16:18-20; 25:1) without bribery (16:18-20; 27:25). (c) The extension of mercy to servants, whether Hebrew or non-Hebrew (24: 14), to strangers, widows, and to the fatherless (24: 17; 27 : 19). The authority of the chief or king is the pivot upon which the function of the court has changed from that of sup)ervising feuds to the maintenance of order and the enforcement of punishment. The execution of corporal punishment in the presence of the judge in Deuteronomy bears sufficient testimony to this growth of authority, for "no Arab sheik would inflict cor- poral punishment on a tribesman for fear of revenge" (W. Robertson Smith, Old Testament in the Jewish Church, p. 368). Hence the complaint of David when Joab took vengeance upon Abner that "I am this day weak, though anointed king: and these men, the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me" (II Sam. 3:385.). Since the earlier law (Exod., chap. 20), public justice has come to the task of discovering the facts in the case and of limiting the responsi- bility for a wrong to the individual perpetrator, having grown along two lines, in the extension of the conception of public offenses and in the mitigation of the blood-feud. Thus early Hebrew society, resting upon the ties of blood- kinship and the principle of force, moralized by ethical and religious influences into a principle of authority going back to Yahwe, whose representative the king is, finally exacted obedience as a right, owing its subjects in turn an ordered rule in the interest of individual freedom and moral responsibility. APPENDIX D Bibliography This Bibliography is not offered as exhaustive. It intends to be only fairly representative of the more recent literature on this special subject. I. CONCERNING THE PROBLEM OF THE SOCIAL, ETHICAL, AND RELIGIOUS EVOLUTION IN GENERAL Alexander, Samuel. Moral Order and Progress, 1891. Ames, Edward Scribner. The Psychology of Religious Experience, 1910. Carver, T. N. "The Economic Basis of the Problem of Evil." Harvard Theological Review, January, 1908. Cooley, C. H. Social Organization, 1909. D'Alviella, Goblet. "L'animisme et sa place dans revolution religieuse," Revue de Vhistoire des religions, LXI, 1910. Dewey, John. The Influence of Darwin on Philosophy, 1910; "The Evolu- tionary Method as Applied to Ethics," Philosophical Review, XI, 363-71. Dewey, John, and Tufts, J. H. Ethics, 1909. Hobhouse, Leonard T. Morals in Evolution, 1906. King, Irving. The Development of Religion, 1910. Kohler, J. "Recht und Volkerpsychologie," Politisch-anthropologische Revue, I, 385-90. McDougall, William. An Introduction to Social Psychology, 1908. Mead, George H. "The Philosophic Basis of Ethics," Philosophical Review, April, 1908. Moore, Addison W. Pragmatism and Its Critics, 1910. Miinsterberg, Hugo. Eternal Values, 1909. Perry, Ralph Barton. The Moral Economy, 1907. Pratt, J. B. Psychology of Religious Belief, 1907. Rashdall, Hastings. The Theory of Good and Evil, 1907. Ross, Edward A. Social Psychology, 1908. Royce, Josiah. The Philosophy of Loyalty, 1909. Schaub, Edward L. "The Consciousness of Sin," Harvard Theological Review, January, 1912. Sumner, WiUiam G. Folkways, 1906. Super, C. W. "Ethnic Morality," International Journal of Ethics, XXI (1908), 84. Tennant, F. R. The Sources of the Doctrines of the Fall and Original Sin, 1903. Tufts, J. H. "Recent Discussions of Moral Evolution," Harvard Theological Review, April, 191 2. 27 28 APPENDIX Westermarck, E. The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas, I, 1906; II, 1908. Wilde, Norman. " The Meaning of Evolution in Ethics," International Journal of Ethics, XDC, 265. Wright, Henry F. "Religion and Morality," International Journal of Ethics, XX, 1807. Wundt, W. Probleme der V olkerpsychologie, 191 1. n. CONCERNING THE CONCRETE SITUATION AMONG THE HEBREWS The Standard Commentaries, Histories, and Theologies of the Old Testa- ment. Adams, J. Israel's Ideas or Studies in Old Testament Theology, 19 10. Amram, D. W. "Retaliation and Compensation," JQR., 1911. Aubert, Alexandre. Les experiences religieuses et morales du prophUe Amos, 1911. Bade, William Ford. "Hebrew Moral Development," University of Cali- fornia Chronicle, Vol. XIII, No. I, 191 1; "Growth of Ethical Ideas in Old Testament Times," BW., XXXIII, 191 1. Baentsch, Bruno. Kommentar zur Exodus-Levitus-Numeri, 1903; Mono- theismus, 1906. Baethgen, Friedrick. Beitrdge zur semitischen Religions geschichte, 1888. Barton, G. A. A Sketch of Semitic Social Origins, 1902. Baudissen, Wolf Wilhelm, Graf, Studien zur semitischen Religions geschichte, 1876. Bennewitz, Fritz. Die SUnde im alten Israel, 1907. Bernard, J. H. Article "Sin," Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible, 1902. Bertholet, A. Die Stellung der Israeliten u. der Juden zu den Fremden, 1896. Bruce, William Stratton. The Ethics of the Old Testament, 1895. Budde, Karl. Religion of Israel to the Exile, 1899; Die biblische Urgeschichte, 1883. Buhl, Franz. Die sozialen Verhaltnisse der Israeliten, 1899. Burton, Ernest DeWitt, John Merlin Powis Smith, and Gerald B. Smith. Biblical Ideas of Atonement, 1909. Caspari, Wilhelm. Die Religion in dem assyrisch-babylonischen Busspsal- men, 1903. Cheyne, Thomas Kelly. Jewish Religious Life after the Exile, 1898; Origin and Religious Contents of the Psalter, 1892. Curtiss, S. J. Primitive Semitic Religion To-Day, 1902. Cornill, C. H. Israelitische V olksreligion und die Propheten, das Christentum, 1908. Clemen, Carl. Die christliche Lehre von der SUnde, 1897. Day, Edward. Social Life of the Hebrews, 1901. Drucker, A. P. The Culture of Ancient Israel, 191 1. APPENDIX 29 Duff, Archibald. Theology and Ethics of the Hebrews, 1902. Eiselen, Fr. C. "The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil," BW., XXXVI, loi; Prophecy and Prophets in Their Historical Relations, 1909. Foster, Gerhard. Das Mosdische Strafrecht, 1900. Frey, Johannes. Tod, Seelenglaube u. Seelenkult im alten Israel, 1898. Giesebrecht, Pr. "The Moral Level of the Old Testament Scriptures," AJT., 1907, p. 31. Griineisen, Carl. Ahnenkultus und die Urreligion Israels, 1900. Haller, M. Religion, Recht und Sitte in den Genesis-Sagen, ein Religions- geschichtlicher Versuch, 1905. Hehn, Johannes. Siinde und Erlosung, nach hiblischer u. babylonischer An- schauung, 1903. Herman, Joh. "Die soziale Predigt der Propheten," Bibl. Zeit- u. Streit- fragen, VI, S. 12, 34. Kautzsch, Emil. Article "Religion of Israel," Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible, V, 1904. Kleinert, P. Die Propheten Israels in sozialer Beziehung, 1905. Kirchner, Victor. "Subjekt imd Wesen der Siindenvergebung besonders auf der fruhesten Religionsstufe Israels," Theologische Studien u. Kritiken, 1905, S. 173. Kohler und Peiser. Atis dem babylonischen Rechtsleben, 1890. Koberle, Justus. "Die Bedeutung der Siindenvergebung im A.T.," Neue kirchl. Zeitschrift, 1905; Siinde und Gnade im religiosen Leben des Volkes Israel bis auf Christum, 1905. Konig, Ed. Geschichte der alttestamentlichen Religion, kritisch dargestellt, 191 2. Larson, George. Der Menschen Schuld u. Schicksal nach I Mose 2-3, 1908. Lagrange, Marie-Joseph. Etudes sur les religions semitiques, 1905. Lazarus, Moritz. The Ethics of Judaism, 1900. Lods, Ad. "La morale des prophetes" in Morales et religions: Etudes, Paris, 1909. Lehmaim-Haupt, C. F. Israel, seine Entmickelung im Rahmen der Welt- geschichte, 191 1. Lineham, J. "Sin and Sacrifice," International Journal of Ethics, October, 1905, p. 88. Lohr, M. Alttest. Religionsgeschichte, 1906. Loisy, A. The Religion of Israel, 1910. Lovejoy, Arthur O. "The Origins of Ethical Inwardness in Jewish Thought," AJT., XI, 228, 1907. Matthes, J. "Oorsprong en gevolgender Zonde volgens het Oude Testament," Theol. Tijdschrift, XXIV, 225; "Die Suhnegedanken bei den Sundopfer," ZAW., p. 97, 1903. Marti, Karl. Geschichte der israelitisclien Religion, 1907. Meinhold, Johannes. Studien zur israelitischen Religionsgeschichte, Der heilige Rest, 1903. 30 APPENDIX Morgenstem, Julian. The Doctrine of Sin in the Babylonian Religion, 1905. Oestreicher, Th. "Die Stellung des Gesetzes in der israelitischen Religions- geschichte," Rch., 191 1, S. 89. Orchard, W. E. The Evolution of Old Testament Religion, 1909. Orelli, Conrad von. "Einige alttestamentliche Pramissen zur neutesta- mentlichenVersohungslehre/'ZA'PF., 1884, Heft 1-6; Allgemeine Religions- gcschichte, I. Band, 191 1. Perrochet, A. U evolution religieuse en Israel, 1908. Pfeiffer, Franz. Die religios-sittliche Weltanschauung des Buches der SpriXche, 1897. Porter, F. C. "The Yefer-Hara, A Study in the Jewish Doctrine of Sin,'' Bih. and Sem. Studies by Members of the Biblical and Semitic Faculties of Yale, 1902. Riehm, Eduard C. Der Begrijff der Suhne im Alten Testament, 1876. Roy, H. Die V olksgemeinde und die Gemeinde der Frommen im Psalter, 1897. Schmoller, Otto. "Das Wesen der Siihne in der alttestamentlichen Opfer- thora," Theologische Studien u. Kritiken, 1891, S. 205. Schwally, Friedrich. Semitische Kriegsaltertilmer, 1901. Sellin, Ernst. Beitrdge zur israelitischen u. jiidischen Religions geschichte, I, II, (1896), 7. Slaby, J. "Siinde und Siindenstrafe sowie deren Nachlass im alten baby- lonischen Assyrien," BZ., 1910, S. 236, 339 Smend, Rudolf. Lehrbuch der alttestamentlichen Religions geschichte, 1899. Smith, Ch. E. "Ethics of the Mosaic Law," BS., April, 1909, p. 267. Smith, H. P. "The Hebrew View of Sin, ' AJT., XV, 525. Smith, J. M. P. The Day of Yahweh, 1901. Smith, W. Robertson. The Religion of the Semites, 2d ed., 1894; The Prophets of Israel, 1882. Staerk, Willy. "Die Gottlosen in den Psalmen," Theologische Studien u. Kritiken, 1897, S. 445; Siinde u. Gnade nach des Vorstellung des dlteren Judentums, besonders der Dichter der sag. Busspsalmen, 1905; Religion u. Politik im alten Israel, 1905. Stade, B. Biblische Theologie im Alten Testament, 1905. Stade u. Bertholet. Biblische Theologie des Alten Testaments, Vol. II, 191 1. Sternberg, G. Die Ethik des Deuteronomiums, 1908. Todd, J. C. Politics and Religion in Ancient Israel, an introduction to the study of the Old Testament, 1904. W'cllhausen, Julius. Reste des Arab-IIeidentums, 1897. Wiener, H. M. "Israel's Laws and Legal Precedents," BS., 1908, p. 97. Wiener, Max. Die Anschauungen der Propheten von der Sittlichkeit, I, 1909. Zimmern, Heinrich. Die babylonischen Busspsalmen, 1895. U.C. BERKELEY LIBRA iiiiiriiiiii CDE311SiD^