according to the mode furnished by it that the Jews under Ezra ordered their sacred community, and upon it are formed our conceptions of the Mosaic theocracy, with the tabernacle at its centre, the high priest at its head, the priests and Levites as its organs, the legitimate cultus as its regular function. It is precisely this Law, so called par exceIlence, that creates the difficulties out of which our problem rises, and it is only in connection with it that the great difference of opinion exists as to date. With regard to the Jehovistic document, all are happily agreed that, substantially at all events, in language, horizon, and other features, it dates from the golden age of Hebrew literature, to which the finest parts of Judges, Samuel, and Kings, and the oldest extant prophetical writings also belong,—the period of the kings and prophets which preceded the dissolution of the two Israelite kingdoms by the Assyrians. About the origin of Deuteronomy there is still less dispute; in all circles where appreciation of scientific results can be looked for at all, it is recognised that it was composed in the same age as that in which it was discovered, and that it was made the rule of Josiah's reformation, which took place about a generation before the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans. It is only in the case of the Priestly Code that opinions differ widely; for it tries hard to imitate the costume of the Mosaic period, and, with whatever success, to disguise its own. This is not nearly so much the case with Deuteronomy, which, in fact, allows the real situation (that of the period during which, Samaria having been destroyed, only the kingdom of Judah continued to subsist) to reveal itself very plainly through that which is assumed (xii.8, xix.8). And the Jehovist does not even pretend to being a Mosaic law of any kind; it aims at being a simple book of history; the distance between the present and the past spoken of is not concealed in the very least. It is here that all the marks are found which attracted the attention of Abenezra and afterwards of Spinoza, such as Gen. xii. 6 ("And the Canaanite was then in the land"), Gen.xxxvi.31 ("These are the kings who reigned in Edom before the children of Israel had a king"), Num. xii.6, 7, Deut. xxxiv.10 ("There arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses"). The Priestly Code, on the other hand, guards itself against all reference to later times and settled life in Canaan, which both in the Jehovistic Book of the Covenant (Exodus xxi.-xxiii.) and in Deuteronomy are the express basis of the legislation: it keeps itself carefully and strictly within the limits of the situation in the wilderness, for which in all seriousness it seeks to give the law. It has actually been successful, with its movable tabernacle, its wandering camp, and other archaic details, in so concealing the true date of its composition that its many serious inconsistencies with what we know, from other sources, of Hebrew antiquity previous to the exile, are only taken as proving that it lies far beyond all known history, and on account of its enormous antiquity can hardly be brought into any connection with it. It is the Priestly Code, then, that presents us with our problem.

3. The instinct was a sound one which led criticism for the time being to turn aside from the historical problem which had originally presented itself to De Wette, and afterwards had been more distinctly apprehended by George and Vatke, in order, in the first instance, to come to some sort of clear understanding as to the composition of the Pentateuch. But a mistake was committed when it was supposed that by a separation of the sources (in which operation attention was quite properly directed chiefly to Genesis) that great historical question had been incidentally answered. The fact was, that it had been merely put to sleep, and Graf has the credit of having, after a considerable interval, awakened it again. In doing so, indeed, he in turn laboured under the disadvantage of not knowing what success had been achieved in separating the sources, and thereby he became involved in a desperate and utterly untenable assumption. This assumption, however, had no necessary connection with his own hypothesis, and at once fell to the ground when the level to which Hupfeld brought the criticism of the text had been reached. Graf originally followed the older view, espoused by Tuch in particular, that in Genesis the Priestly Code, with its so obtrusively bare skeleton, is the "main stock," and that it is the Jehovist who supplements, and is therefore of course the later. But since, on the other hand, he regarded the ritual legislature of the middle books as much more recent than the work of the Jehovist, he was compelled to tear it asunder as best he could from its introduction in Genesis, and to separate the two halves of the Priestly Code by half a millennium. But Hupfeld had long before made it quite clear that the Jehovist is no mere supplementer, but the author of a perfectly independent work, and that the passages, such as Gen. xx.-xxii., usually cited as examples of the way in which the Jehovist worked over the "main stock," really proceed from quite another source,—the Elohist. Thus the stumbling-block of Graf had already been taken out of the way, and his path had been made clear by an unlooked-for ally. Following Kuenen's suggestion, he did not hesitate to take the helping-hand extended to him; he gave up his violent division of the Priestly Code, and then had no difficulty in deducing from the results which he had obtained with respect to the main legal portion similar consequences with regard to the narrative part in Genesis. /1/

*************************** 1. K. H. Graf, Die s. g. Grundschrift des Pentateucks, in Merx's Archiv (1869), pp. 466-477. As early as 1866 he had already expressed himself in a letter to Kuenen November 12) as follows:— "Vous me faites pressentir une solution de cette enigme…c'est que les parties elohistiques de la Genese seraient posterieures aux parties jehovistiques." Compare Kuenen, Theol. Tijdschrift (1870), p.412. Graf had also in this respect followed Reuss, who (ut supra, p. 24) says of himself: "Le cote faible de ma critique a ete que, a l'egard de tout ce qui ne rentrait pas dans les points enumeres ci-dessus, je restais dans l'orniere tracee par mes devanciers, admettant sans plus ample examen que le Pentateuque etait l'ouvrage de l'HISTORIEN elohiste, complete par l'HISTORIEN jehoviste, et ne me rendant pas compte de la maniere dont l'element legal, dont je m'etais occupe exclusivement, serait venu se joindre a l'element historique. ***************************

The foundations were now laid; it is Kuenen who has since done most for the further development of the hypothesis./2/

************************** 2. A. Kuenen, Die Godsdienst van Israel, Haarlem, 1869-70 (Eng. transl. Religion of Israel, 1874-5), and De priesterlijke Bestanddeelen van Pentateuch en Josua, in Theol. Tijdschr.(1870), pp. 391-426. **************************

The defenders of the prevailing opinion maintained their ground as well as they could, but from long possession had got somewhat settled on their lees. They raised against the assailants a series of objections, all of which, however, laboured more or less under the disadvantage that they rested upon the foundation which had already been shattered. Passages were quoted from Amos and Hosea as implying an acquaintance with the Priestly Code, but they were not such as could make any impression on those who were already persuaded that the latter was the more recent. Again it was asserted, and almost with violence, that the Priestly Code could not be later than Deuteronomy, and that the Deuteronomist actually had it before him. But the evidences of this proved extremely problematical, while, on the other hand, the dependence of Deuteronomy, as a whole, on the Jehovist came out with the utmost clearness. Appeal was made to the latest redaction of the