soul, conceived as the image of the body in which it once dwelt, is of no
little importance. For it is well known that the same term was employed to
denote the gods of the heathen, who were thought to have definite
quasi-corporeal forms and to be as much real entities as any other
Elohim.[30] The difference which was supposed to exist {142} between the
different Elohim was one of degree, not one of kind. Elohim was, in logical
terminology, the genus of which ghosts, Chemosh, Dagon, Baal, and Jahveh
were species. The Israelite believed Jahveh to be immeasurably superior to
all other kinds of Elohim. The inscription on the Moabite stone shows that
King Mesa held Chemosh to be, as unquestionably, the superior of Jahveh.
But if Jahveh was thus supposed to differ only in degree from the
undoubtedly zoomorphic or anthropomorphic "gods of the nations," why is it
to be assumed that he also was not thought of as having a human shape? It
is possible for those who forget that the time of the great prophetic
writers is at least as remote from that of Saul as our day is from that of
Queen Elizabeth, to insist upon interpreting the gross notions current in
the earlier age and among the mass of the people by the refined conceptions
promulgated by a few select spirits centuries later. But if we take the
language constantly used concerning the Deity in the books of Genesis,
Exodus, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, or Kings, in its natural sense (and I am
aware of no valid reason which can be given for taking it in any other
sense), there cannot, to my mind, be a doubt that Jahveh was conceived by
those from whom the substance of these books is mainly derived, to possess
the appearance and the intellectual and moral attributes of a man; and,
indeed, of a man of just that type with which the Israelites were familiar
in their stronger and intellectually abler rulers and leaders. In a
well-known passage of Genesis (i. 27) Elohim is said to {143} have "created
man in his own image, in the image of Elohim created he him." It is "man"
who is here said to be the image of Elohim--not man's soul alone, still
less his "reason," but the whole man. It is obvious that for those who
called a manlike ghost Elohim, there could be no difficulty in conceiving
any other Elohim under the same aspect. And if there could be any doubt on
this subject, surely it cannot stand in the face of what we find in the
fifth chapter, where, immediately after a repetition of the statement that
"Elohim created man, in the likeness of Elohim made he him," it is said
that Adam begat Seth "in his own likeness, after his image." Does this mean
that Seth resembled Adam only in a spiritual and figurative sense? And if
that interpretation of the third verse of the fifth chapter of Genesis is
absurd, why does it become reasonable in the first verse of the same
chapter?
But let us go further. Is not the Jahveh who "walks in the garden in the
cool of the day"; from whom one may hope to "hide oneself among the trees";
of whom it is expressly said that "Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and
seventy of the elders of Israel," saw the Elohim of Israel (Exod. xxiv.
9-11); and that, although the seeing Jahveh was understood to be a high
crime and misdemeanour, worthy of death, under ordinary circumstances, yet,
for this once, he "laid not his hand on the nobles of Israel"; "that they
beheld Elohim and did eat and drink"; and that afterwards Moses saw his
back (Exod. xxxiii. 23)--is not this Deity conceived as manlike in form?
{144} Again, is not the Jahveh who eats with Abraham under the oaks at
Mamre, who is pleased with the "sweet savour" of Noah's sacrifice, to whom
sacrifices are said to be "food"[31]--is not this Deity depicted as
possessed of human appetites? If this were not the current Israelitish idea
of Jahveh even in the eighth century B.C., where is the point of Isaiah's
scathing admonitions to his countrymen: "To what purpose is the multitude
of your sacrifices unto me? saith Jahveh: I am full of the burnt-offerings
of rams and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of
bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats" (Isa. i. 11). Or of Micah's inquiry,
"Will Jahveh be pleased with thousands of rams or with ten thousands of
rivers of oil?" (vi. 7). And in the innumerable passages in which Jahveh is
said to be jealous of other gods, to be angry, to be appeased, and to
repent; in which he is represented as casting off Saul because the king
does not quite literally execute a command of the most ruthless severity;
or as smiting Uzzah to death because the unfortunate man thoughtlessly, but
naturally enough, put out his hand to stay the ark from falling--can any
one deny that the old Israelites conceived Jahveh not only in the image of
a man, but in that of a changeable, irritable, and, occasionally, violent
man? There appears to me, then, to be no reason to doubt that the notion of
likeness to man, which was indubitably held of the {145} ghost Elohim, was
carried out consistently throughout the whole series of Elohim, and that
Jahveh-Elohim was thought of as a being of the same substantially human
nature as the rest, only immeasurably more powerful for good and for evil.
The absence of any real distinction between the Elohim of different ranks
is further clearly illustrated by the corresponding absence of any sharp
delimitation between the various kinds of people who serve as the media of
communication between them and men. The agents through whom the lower
Elohim are consulted are called necromancers, wizards, and diviners, and
are looked down upon by the prophets and priests of the higher Elohim; but
the "seer" connects the two, and they are all alike in their essential
characters of media. The wise woman of Endor was believed by others, and, I
have little doubt, believed herself, to be able to "bring up" whom she
would from Sheol, and to be inspired, whether in virtue of actual
possession by the evoked Elohim, or otherwise, with a knowledge of hidden
things. I am unable to see that Saul's servant took any really different
view of Samuel's powers, though he may have believed that he obtained them
by the grace of the higher Elohim. For when Saul fails to find his father's
asses, his servant says to him--
Behold, there is in this city a man of Elohim, and he is a man that is
held in honour; all that he saith cometh surely to pass: now let us go
thither; peradventure he can tell us concerning our journey whereon we
go. Then said Saul to his servant, But behold if we go, what shall we
bring the man? for the bread is spent in our vessels and there is not a
present to {146} bring to the man of Elohim. What have we? And the
servant answered Saul again and said, Behold I have in my hand the
fourth part of a shekel of silver: that will I give to the man of
Elohim to tell us our way. (Beforetime in Israel when a man went to
inquire of Elohim, then he said, Come and let us go to the Seer: for he
that is now called a Prophet was beforetime called a Seer[32]) (1 Sam.
ix. 6-10).
In fact, when, shortly afterwards, Saul accidentally meets Samuel, he says,
"Tell me, I pray thee, where the Seer's house is." Samuel answers, "I am
the Seer." Immediately afterwards Samuel informs Saul that the asses are
found, though how he obtained his knowledge of the fact is not stated. It
will be observed that Samuel is not spoken of here as, in any special
sense, a seer or prophet of Jahveh, but as a "man of Elohim"--that is to
say, a seer having access to the "spiritual powers," just as the wise woman
of Endor might have been said to be a "woman of Elohim"--and the narrator's
or editor's explanatory note seems to indicate that "Prophet" is merely a
name, introduced later than the time of Samuel, for a superior kind of
"Seer," or "man of Elohim."[33]
Another very instructive passage shows that Samuel was not only considered
to be diviner, seer, and prophet in one, but that he was also, to all
intents and purposes, priest of Jahveh--though, {147} according to his
biographer, he was not a member of the tribe of Levi. At the outset of
their acquaintance, Samuel says to Saul, "Go up before me into the high
place," where, as the young maidens of the city had just before told Saul,
the Seer was going, "for the people will not eat till he come, because he
doth bless the sacrifice" (1 Sam. x. 12). The use of the word "bless"
here--as if Samuel were not going to sacrifice, but only to offer a
blessing or thanksgiving--is curious. But that Samuel really acted as
priest seems plain from what follows. For he not only asks Saul to share in
the customary sacrificial feast, but he disposes in Saul's favour of that
portion of the victim which the Levitical legislation, doubtless embodying
old customs, recognises as the priest's special property.[34]
Although particular persons adopted the profession of media between men and
Elohim, there was no limitation of the power, in the view of ancient
Israel, to any special class of the population. Saul inquires of Jahveh and
builds him altars on his own account; and in the very remarkable story told
in the {148} fourteenth chapter of the first book of Samuel (v. 37-46),
Saul appears to conduct the whole process of divination, although he has a
priest at his elbow. David seems to do the same.
Moreover, Elohim constantly appear in dreams--which in old Israel did not
mean that, as we should say, the subject of the appearance "dreamed he saw
the spirit"; but that he veritably saw the Elohim which, as a soul, visited
his soul while his body was asleep. And, in the course of the history of
Israel, Jahveh himself thus appears to all sorts of persons, non-Israelites
as well as Israelites. Again, the Elohim possess, or inspire, people
against their will, as in the case of Saul and Saul's messengers, and then
these people prophesy--that is to say, "rave"--and exhibit the ungoverned
gestures attributed by a later age to possession by malignant spirits.
Apart from other evidence to be adduced by and by, the history of ancient
demonology and of modern revivalism does not permit me to doubt that the
accounts of these phenomena given in the history of Saul may be perfectly
historical.
In the ritual practices, of which evidence is to be found in the books of
Judges and Samuel, the chief part is played by sacrifices, usually burnt
offerings. Whenever the aid of the Elohim of Israel is sought, or thanks
are considered due to him, an altar is built, and oxen, sheep, and goats
are slaughtered and offered up. Sometimes the entire victim is burnt as a
holocaust; more frequently only certain parts, notably the fat about the
kidneys, are burnt on the {149} altar. The rest is properly cooked; and,
after the reservation of a part for the priest, is made the foundation of a
joyous banquet, in which the sacrificer, his family, and such guests as he
thinks fit to invite, participate.[35] Elohim was supposed to share in the
feast, and it has been already shown that that which was set apart on the
altar, or consumed by fire, was spoken of as the food of Elohim, who was
thought to be influenced by the costliness, or by the pleasant smell, of
the sacrifice in favour of the sacrificer.
All this bears out the view that, in the mind of the old Israelite, there
was no difference, save one of degree, between one Elohim and another. It
is true that there is but little direct evidence to show that the old
Israelites shared the widespread belief of their own, and indeed of all
times, that the spirits of the dead not only continue to exist, but are
capable of a ghostly kind of feeding and are grateful for such aliment as
can be assimilated by their attenuated substance, and even for clothes,
ornaments, and weapons.[36] That they were familiar with this doctrine in
the time of the captivity is suggested by the well-known reference of
Ezekiel (xxxii. 27) to the "mighty that are fallen of the uncircumcised,
which {150} are gone down to [Sheol] hell with their weapons of war, and
have laid their swords under their heads." Perhaps there is a still earlier
allusion in the "giving of food for the dead" spoken of in Deuteronomy
(xxvi. 14).[37]
It must be remembered that the literature of the old Israelites, as it lies
before us, has been subjected to the revisal of strictly monotheistic
editors, violently opposed to all kinds of idolatry, who are not likely to
have selected from the materials at their disposal any obvious evidence,
either of the practice under discussion, or of that ancestor-worship which
is so closely related to it, for preservation in the permanent records of
their people.
The mysterious objects known as _Teraphim_, which are occasionally
mentioned in Judges, Samuel, and elsewhere, however, can hardly be
interpreted otherwise than as indications of the existence both of
ancestor-worship and of image-worship in old Israel. {151} The teraphim
were certainly images of family gods, and, as such, in all probability
represented deceased ancestors. Laban indignantly demands of his
son-in-law, "Wherefore hast thou stolen my Elohim?" which Rachel, who must
be assumed to have worshipped Jacob's God, Jahveh, had carried off,
obviously because she, like her father, believed in their divinity. It is
not suggested that Jacob was in any way scandalised by the idolatrous
practices of his favourite wife, whatever he may have thought of her
honesty when the truth came to light; for the teraphim seem to have
remained in his camp, at least until he "hid" his strange gods "under the
oak that was by Shechem" (Gen. xxxv. 4). And indeed it is open to question
if he got rid of them then, for the subsequent history of Israel renders it
more than doubtful whether the teraphim were regarded as "strange gods"
even as late as the eighth century B.C.
The writer of the books of Samuel takes it quite as a matter of course that
Michal, daughter of one royal Jahveh worshipper and wife of the servant of
Jahveh _par excellence_, the pious David, should have her teraphim handy,
in her and David's chamber, when she dresses them up in their bed into a
simulation of her husband, for the purpose of deceiving her father's
messengers. Even one of the early prophets, Hosea, when he threatens that
the children of Israel shall abide many days without "ephod or teraphim"
(iii. 4), appears to regard both as equally proper appurtenances of the
suspended worship of Jahveh, and equally certain to be restored when that
is resumed. {152} When we further take into consideration that only in the
reign of Hezekiah was the brazen serpent, preserved in the temple and
believed to be the work of Moses, destroyed, and the practice of offering
incense to it, that is, worshipping it, abolished--that Jeroboam could set
up "calves of gold" for Israel to worship, with apparently none but a
political object, and certainly with no notion of creating a schism among
the worshippers of Jahveh, or of repelling the men of Judah from his
standard--it seems obvious, either that the Israelites of the tenth and
eleventh centuries B.C. knew not the second commandment, or that they
construed it merely as part of the prohibition to worship any supreme god
other than Jahveh, which precedes it.
In seeking for information about the teraphim, I lighted upon the following
passage in the valuable article on that subject by Archdeacon Farrar, in
Kitto's _Cyclopaedia of Biblical Literature_, which is so much to the
purpose of my argument, that I venture to quote it in full:--
The main and certain results of this review are that the teraphim were
rude human images; that the use of them was an antique Aramaic custom;
that there is reason to suppose them to have been images of deceased
ancestors; that they were consulted oracularly; that they were not
confined to Jews; that their use continued down to the latest period of
Jewish history; and lastly, that although the enlightened prophets and
strictest later kings regarded them as idolatrous, the priests were
much less averse to such images, and their cult was not considered in
any way repugnant to the pious worship of Elohim, nay, even to the
worship of him "under the awful title of Jehovah." In fact, they
involved _a monotheistic idolatry very different indeed from {153}
polytheism_; and the tolerance of them by priests, as compared with the
denunciation of them by the prophets, offers a close analogy to the
views of the Roman Catholics respecting pictures and images as compared
with the views of Protestants. It was against this use of idolatrous
symbols and emblems in a monotheistic worship that the _second_
commandment was directed, whereas the first is aimed against the graver
sin of direct polytheism. But the whole history of Israel shows how
utterly and how early the law must have fallen into desuetude. The
worship of the golden calf and of the calves at Dan and Bethel, against
which, so far as we know, neither Elijah nor Elisha said a single word;
the tolerance of high places, teraphim and betylia; the offering of
incense for centuries to the brazen serpent destroyed by Hezekiah; the
occasional glimpses of the most startling irregularities sanctioned
apparently even in the temple worship itself, prove most decisively
that a pure monotheism and an independence of symbols was the result of
a slow and painful course of God's disciplinal dealings among the
noblest thinkers of a single nation, and not, as is so constantly and
erroneously urged, the instinct of the whole Semitic race; in other
words, one single branch of the Semites was under God's providence
_educated_ into pure monotheism only by centuries of misfortune and
series of inspired men (vol. iii. p. 986).
It appears to me that the researches of the anthropologist lead him to
conclusions identical in substance, if not in terms, with those here
enunciated as the result of a careful study of the same subject from a
totally different point of view.
There is abundant evidence in the books of Samuel and elsewhere that an
article of dress termed an _ephod_ was supposed to have a peculiar efficacy
in enabling the wearer to exercise divination by means of Jahveh-Elohim.
Great and long continued have been the disputes as to the exact nature of
the ephod--whether it always means something to wear, or {154} whether it
sometimes means an image. But the probabilities are that it usually
signifies a kind of waistcoat or broad zone, with shoulder-straps, which
the person who "inquired of Jahveh" put on. In 1 Samuel xxiii. 2 David
appears to have inquired without an ephod, for Abiathar the priest is said
to have "come down with an ephod in his hand" only subsequently. And then
David asks for it before inquiring of Jahveh whether the men of Keilah
would betray him or not. David's action is obviously divination pure and
simple; and it is curious that he seems to have worn the ephod himself and
not to have employed Abiathar as a medium. How the answer was given is not
clear, though the probability is that it was obtained by casting lots. The
_Urim_ and _Thummim_ seem to have been two such lots of a peculiarly sacred
character, which were carried in the pocket of the high priest's
"breastplate." This last was worn along with the ephod.
With the exception of one passage (1 Sam. xiv. 18) the ark is ignored in
the history of Saul. But in this place the Septuagint reads "ephod" for
ark, while in 1 Chronicles xiii. 3 David says that "we sought not unto it
[the ark] in the days of Saul." Nor does Samuel seem to have paid any
regard to the ark after its return from Philistia; though, in his
childhood, he is said to have slept in "the temple of Jahveh, where the ark
of Elohim was" (1 Sam. iii. 3), at Shiloh, and there to have been the seer
of the earliest apparitions vouchsafed to him by Jahveh. The space between
the cherubim or winged images on the {155} canopy or cover (_Kapporeth_) of
this holy chest was held to be the special seat of Jahveh--the place
selected for a temporary residence of the Supreme Elohim who had, after
Aaron and Phineas, Eli and his sons for priests and seers. And, when the
ark was carried to the camp at Eben-ezer, there can be no doubt that the
Israelites, no less than the Philistines, held that "Elohim is come into
the camp" (iv. 7), and that the one, as much as the other, conceived that
the Israelites had summoned to their aid a powerful ally in "these (or
this) mighty Elohim"--elsewhere called Jahve-Sabaoth, the Jahveh of Hosts.
If the "temple" at Shiloh was the pentateuchal tabernacle, as is suggested
by the name of "tent of meeting" given to it in 1 Samuel ii. 22, it was
essentially a large tent, though constituted of very expensive and ornate
materials; if, on the other hand, it was a different edifice, there can be
little doubt that this "house of Jahveh" was built on the model of an
ordinary house of the time. But there is not the slightest evidence that,
during the reign of Saul, any greater importance attached to this seat of
the cult of Jahveh than to others. Sanctuaries, and "high places" for
sacrifice, were scattered all over the country from Dan to Beersheba. And,
as Samuel is said to have gone up to one of these high places to bless the
sacrifice, it may be taken for tolerably certain that he knew nothing of
the Levitical laws which severely condemn the high places and those who
sacrifice away from the sanctuary hallowed by the presence of the ark.
There is no evidence that, during the time of the {156} Judges and of
Samuel, any one occupied the position of the high priest of later days. And
persons who were neither priests nor Levites sacrificed and divined or
"inquired of Jahveh," when they pleased and where they pleased, without the
least indication that they, or any one else in Israel at that time, knew
they were doing wrong. There is no allusion to any special observance of
the Sabbath; and the references to circumcision are indirect.
Such are the chief articles of the theological creed of the old Israelites,
which are made known to us by the direct evidence of the ancient record to
which we have had recourse, and they are as remarkable for that which they
contain as for that which is absent from them. They reveal a firm
conviction that, when death takes place, a something termed a soul or
spirit leaves the body and continues to exist in Sheol for a period of
indefinite duration, even though there is no proof of any belief in
absolute immortality; that such spirits can return to earth to possess and
inspire the living; that they are, in appearance and in disposition,
likenesses of the men to whom they belonged, but that, as spirits, they
have larger powers and are freer from physical limitations; that they thus
form a group among a number of kinds of spiritual existences known as
Elohim, of whom Jahveh, the national God of Israel, is one; that,
consistently with this view, Jahveh was conceived as a sort of spirit,
human in aspect and in senses, and with many human passions, but with
immensely greater intelligence and power than any {157} other Elohim,
whether human or divine. Further, the evidence proves that this belief was
the basis of the Jahveh-worship to which Samuel and his followers were
devoted; that there is strong reason for believing, and none for doubting,
that idolatry, in the shape of the worship of the family gods or teraphim,
was practised by sincere and devout Jahveh-worshippers; that the ark, with
its protective tent or tabernacle, was regarded as a specially, but by no
means exclusively, favoured sanctuary of Jahveh; that the ephod appears to
have had a particular value for those who desired to divine by the help of
Jahveh; and that divination by lots was practised before Jahveh. On the
other hand, there is not the slightest evidence of any belief in
retribution after death, but the contrary; ritual obligations have at least
as strong sanction as moral; there are clear indications that some of the
most stringent of the Levitical laws were unknown even to Samuel; priests
often appear to be superseded by laymen, even in the performance of
sacrifices and divination; and no line of demarcation can be drawn between
necromancer, wizard, seer, prophet, and priest, each of whom is regarded,
like all the rest, as a medium of communication between the world of Elohim
and that of living men.