“ ‘_And the skin of the bullock, and all his flesh, with his head,
and with his legs, and his inwards, and his dung, even the whole
bullock, shall he (the Priest) carry forth without the camp, unto
a clean place, where the ashes are poured out, and burn him on the
wood with fire. Where the ashes are poured out there shall he be
burned_’—(_Lev._, iv. 11, 12).
“We have seen that the whole population of Israel at the exodus
may be reckoned at two millions. Now we cannot well allow for a
_living_ man, with room for his cooking, sleeping, and other
necessaries and conveniences of life, less than three times the
space required for a _dead_ one in his grave.... Let us allow,
however, for each person on the average three times 6 feet by 2
feet, the size of a coffin for a full-grown man,—that is, let us
allow for each person 36 square feet or 4 square yards. Then it
follows that ... the camp must have covered, the people being
crowded as thickly as possible, an area of 8,000,000 square yards,
or more than 1652 acres of ground.
“Upon this very moderate estimate, then (which in truth is far
within the mark), we must imagine a vast encampment of this
extent, swarming with people, more than _a mile and a half across_
in each direction, with the tabernacle in the centre.... Thus the
refuse of these sacrifices would have had to be carried by the
priest himself (Aaron, Eleazar, or Ithamar,—there were no others)
a distance of three-quarters of a mile....
“But how huge does this difficulty become, if, instead of taking
the excessively cramped area of 1652 acres, less than _three
square miles_, for such a camp as this, we take the more
reasonable allowance of Scott, who says, ‘this encampment is
computed to have formed a moveable city of _twelve miles square_,
that is, about the size of London itself,’—as it well might be,
considering that the population was as large as that of London,
and that in the Hebrew tents there were no first, second, third,
and fourth stories, no crowded garrets and underground cellars. In
that case the offal of these sacrifices would have had to be
carried by Aaron himself, or one of his sons, a distance of six
miles.... In fact, we have to imagine the priest having himself to
carry, on his back, on foot, from St. Paul’s to the outskirts of
the metropolis, the ‘skin, and flesh, and head, and legs, and
inwards, and dung, even the whole bullock’.... This supposition
involves, of course, an absurdity. But it is our duty to look
plain facts in the face”—(Part i. pp. 38-40).
We agree with Dr. Colenso that this is a “huge difficulty”, and that the
duties of the priest, as described by him, involve a manifest absurdity.
But we contend that the duties of the priest, as described by him, are not
to be found in the Pentateuch; that _all the circumstances_ which
constitute the difficulty and the absurdity are simply _additions of his
own_. This is indeed a serious charge against a writer who represents
himself to the public as an earnest and conscientious searcher after
truth. But we hope to satisfy our readers that it is a plain and obvious
fact; and it is our duty, as Dr. Colenso truly tells us, “to look plain
facts in the face”.
It is evident that the whole weight of the objection consists in this:
that, according to the sacred narrative, the priest is commanded, first,
to carry the bullock _himself_; secondly, to carry it _on his back_;
thirdly, in doing so, to _go on foot_. Now there is not the faintest
insinuation in any text Dr. Colenso has produced, nor, we may add, in any
text the Pentateuch contains, that the priest should _go on foot_, or that
he should carry the bullock _on his back_. These two ideas are to be found
only in the fanciful and rather irreverent gloss of Dr. Colenso.
Neither is it commanded in the sacred text that the priest should
_himself_ carry the bullock out of the camp. Even in the English
translation there is nothing to imply that he might not, for this duty,
employ the service of his attendant Levites. It is said, indeed, “he shall
carry forth the bullock without the camp”. But by the common use of
language we may impute to a person, as his own, the act which he does by
the agency of another. Thus a minister of state is said to write a letter,
when the letter is written at his direction by his secretary. In the
Fourth Book of _Kings_ it is recorded of Nabuchodonosor that “_he carried
away all Jerusalem_, and all the princes, and all the valiant men of the
army, to the number of ten thousand, into captivity:... and the judges of
the land he carried into captivity from Jerusalem into Babylon. And all
the strong men, seven thousand, and the artificers and the smiths a
thousand”, etc.—(IV. _Kings_, xxiv. 14-16). No one dreams of any
difficulty in a sentence like this. Yet, if we admit the Colenso system of
interpretation, the difficulty is insuperable, because the _meaning of the
sentence_ is, that Nabuchodonosor _himself_ carried that immense multitude
_on his back_ from Jerusalem to Babylon.
If we now turn to the Hebrew text we shall find that it is still less
favourable to Dr. Colenso and his “huge difficulty”. The word והוציא
(vehotzi), which is there used, literally means _and he shall cause [it]
to go forth_, that is to say, _he shall have it removed_. This will be at
once admitted by every biblical scholar, and can be made intelligible
without much difficulty to the general reader. In the Hebrew language
there are several forms of the same verb, sometimes called conjugations,
each of which has a meaning peculiar to itself. The primitive form is
_kal_; and the _hiphil_ form “denotes the _causing_ or _permitting_ of the
action, signified by the primitive _kal_”.(5) For example: קדש (kadash) in
_kal_ signifies _to be holy_; in _hiphil_, _to cause to be holy_, _to
sanctify_; נטה (natah) in _kal_ means _to bow_; in _hiphil_, _to cause to
bow_, _to bend_. Now, in the passage quoted by Dr. Colenso the word והוציא
is the _hiphil_ form of יצא (yatza), _to go forth_; it therefore means
literally _to cause to go forth_.(6) We need scarcely remark that the
priest would comply with this injunction whether he himself in person
removed the bullock, or whether he employed the Levites to do it; whether
he carried it on his back, according to the ridiculous paraphrase of Dr.
Colenso, or removed it in wagons provided for the purpose.
And now that our paper approaches to a close, it may be asked what is the
result of our labours, and what has been gained to the cause of truth by
all the minute and tedious details through which we have conducted our
readers? It seems to us that we have directly answered two of Dr.
Colenso’s arguments, and that we have moreover established indirectly a
strong presumption against all the rest. Let us put a case to our readers.
A jeweller exhibits for sale a string of pearls. He demands a very high
price, but he pledges his word of honour that the pearls are of the rarest
quality and of the highest excellence. A casual passer-by is attracted by
the glittering gems. He enters the shop; he listens with eager credulity
to the earnest protestations of the merchant; but he hesitates when the
price is named. At this critical moment a friend arrives, who is happily
somewhat versed in jewellery. He selects one or two pearls from the
string, and after a brief inspection clearly shows, not merely that the
price is far beyond their value, but that they are not pearls at all. What
would be thought of the merchant who had offered them for sale? Who would
frequent his shop? Who would believe the other pearls to be genuine on the
strength of his protestations? It may be indeed that he is not a swindler;
but if he is an honest man, he is certainly a very indifferent judge of
his business.
Now what this jeweller is in a matter of commerce, such, as it seems to
us, has Dr. Colenso been proved to be in a matter of infinitely greater
moment. He comes before the world with the prestige of a great name and of
a high position. He earnestly announces that he has made a great
discovery, and that he is forced by his conscience to speak out his mind.
He offers to the public an attractive array of brilliant and plausible
arguments; and in return he asks us to surrender the inestimable treasure
of Christian faith. At first we are bewildered and perplexed by the
novelty and variety of his arguments; but after a little we summon up
courage; we select two or three from the number, and these we submit to a
minute and careful analysis. We find that they are miserably defective and
utterly inconclusive. Facts are misrepresented, the meaning of language is
perverted, the principles of sound reasoning are disregarded. May we not
then fairly infer that Dr. Colenso’s earnest protestations of sincerity
and good intention afford a very insufficient guarantee for the accuracy
of his statements and the stability of his arguments? We do not say that
he is dishonest; but we do say that he has proved himself a very
incompetent authority.