A brief history of the father of the Jewish tribe will tend to
illustrate and indicate the character of the whole nation, as children
usually inherit the qualities of their parents.
1. We will first notice the great promise which Jehovah made to Abraham
with respect to the boundless extent of his future dominion. His
seed were to be as the dust of the earth or the sands of the sea for
multitude (Gen. xiii. 16). And how has this promise been fulfilled? Why,
after a faithful compliance with the command to "multiply and replenish
the earth" for more than three thousand years, his whole tribe only
numbers about six million souls, which is less than one in two hundred
of the entire population of the globe. It would take but a few handfuls
of dust to furnish the particles to represent the number, instead of all
the dust of the earth as promised or predicted.
2. Jehovah promised Abraham, in the second place, all the country "from
the river of Egypt to the great river,--the River Euphrates" (Gen. xv.
18). And yet, after the lapse of three thousand years, we do not find
many occupying a foot of it. Another failure to execute his promise.
3. "To thee will I give it [the promised land], and to thy seed for
ever" (Gen. xiii. 15). It will be observed here, that the title and
possession was to be perpetual,--to the end of the world, "_for ever_."
And yet it has been in the possession of other nations five or six
times; and now not many of the Lord's holy people can be found there.
Another signal failure.
4. Jehovah promised Abraham all the land "from the river of Egypt to
the River Euphrates;" but they have never had possession of the country
within two hundred miles of the river of Egypt (Nile). A writer quaintly
suggests that Jehovah could never have previously seen the country he
selected for his holy people, or he would not have chosen it; for all
modern travelers agree in describing it as being a poor, mountainous,
rocky, barren, and desolate country. One writer says, "It is a country
of rocks and mountains, stones, cliffs, bounded by vast, dreary, and
uninhabitable deserts." St. Jerome describes it as being "the refuse and
rubbish of nature." And this is the country, let it be remembered, that
Jehovah promised his people as the chosen spot of the earth. How little
he knew of geography!
5. Jehovah and Abraham appear to have been very intimate friends, as
they ate and slept together; and the "Judge of all the earth" was often
a guest in the little, narrow, mud-built hut of the patriarch to eat
veal, parched corn, and griddle-cakes with him, and have his feet washed
also by the old man (Gen. xviii. 18). From such circumstances it would
appear that Jehovah traveled over the country in the character of a
foot-pad or "tramp," and got into the mud occasionally. It is strange
that Christians can read their Bible without noticing this disparaging
caricature of their God.
6. Abraham's conduct towards his servant-girl Hagar is both I
disgraceful and inhuman, as he first destroyed her character and
virtue by criminal intimacy, and then turned her and her child into
the wilderness to starve (Gen. xxi.). Such conduct is certainly very
reprehensible.
7. And this is the man who is represented as being chosen by a God of
infinite wisdom, infinite purity, and infinite holiness, to stand at the
head of the moral regeneration and salvation of the whole human
race. Such a conception is derogatory to the divine character, and
demoralizing to those who read and believe it.
8. Among other immoral and disgraceful acts of "God's chosen servant,"
"the righteous patriarch," "the Holy man of God," was that of uttering
the most shameful and unblushing falsehood. He is charged with
intentional lying on two different occasions, in representing his wife
as being his sister,--once to Pharaoh, and once to King Abimelech; and
his wife indorsed \ his falsehood. (See Gen. chap. xii. and xx.)
9. And yet, in the face of all these immoral deeds, God is represented
as saying, "Abraham kept all my commands, all my statutes, and all my
laws." (See Gen. xxvi. 5.) Hence the inevitable conclusion that
Abraham was living up to the commands, statutes, and laws of God, while
committing these crimes and outrages upon humanity. What a moral, or
rather immoral lesson, is this to place before the heathen of foreign
countries, and the children of our own, who read the Bible! It must have
a tendency to demoralize them, and encourage them in the commission
of similar crimes, as certainly as they are beings endowed with human
frailties. Note these facts.
10. And we find other disgraceful, as well as incredible, deeds charged
to the father of "the faithful." The account of the surrender of his
manhood, and the obliteration of every impulse parental feeling required
to obtain his consent to butcher his son Isaac upon the altar, imparts
a humiliating moral lesson (Gent. xxii.). It matters not that he did not
commit the deed. He consented to do it, and was ready to do it;
which proves a state of mind calculated to make humanity shudder. The
New-Zealanders have been known to point the missionaries to this example
as a justification of their cruel practices of slaughtering human
beings. If a father in this age of civilization should do such a thing,
or even attempt it as Abraham did, he would be looked upon as a monster
in human shape, or perfectly insane, even if he should claim that God
called upon him to perform the act. It would have been infinitely better
to disobey such a God than to disobey and outrage every parental and
kindly im-pulse of his nature. But the case furnishes _prima-facie_
evidence that Abraham was under a religious delusion in supposing God
required the performance of such an inhuman deed. To assume that he did
would make him more of a demon than a God. Any man or woman is to be
pitied whose education has misled him or her, and blinded them so that
they can not see that the reading of a book teaching such lessons must
prove morally injurious to the mind.
11. The injunction on Abraham to slay his son is said to have been
imposed upon him to try his faith. His faith in what? I would ask.
Faith in his own humanity? faith in his love and affection for his
son? Nothing of the kind! but faith in his susceptibility of rendering
himself an inhuman monster. Let us suppose a father says to his son,
"Richard, I want you to draw a knife, and cut your brother Robert's
throat;" and afterwards explains the matter by telling him he issued
this order to try whether he would obey him. But his son would evince
more manhood, and a better moral character, by refusing to obey him. It
is much better to obey the dictates of conscience, humanity, and mercy,
than to obey a father or a God in a case like this.
12. And Jehovah is represented as saying, through an angel, "Now I know
that thou fearest God" (Gen. xxii. 12); equivalent to saying, "If I had
not tried this experiment, I should not have known any thing about it."
What blind mortals human beings can become, to suppose that a God of
infinite wisdom, who "searcheth the hearts of all men," must resort to
cruel and shocking experiments to find out the the state of their minds!
13. But the history of the case discloses the fact that it did not
effect the end desired,--that of proving Abraham's faith,--not in the
least, unless we assume that Abraham lied in the case. For he said
to the young men while on the road to the altar, "Abide here until we
[myself and son] go yonder and worship, and come again to you." Here is
evidence that Abraham knew he would bring his son back alive; that is,
that Isaac would return with him, or that he told a falsehood in order
to deceive. The reader can seize which horn of the dilemma he prefers.
If he knew what the issue of the case would be, it would, of course,
be no trial of his faith whatever. And yet Paul and other New-Testament
writers laud the act as being one of great merit and a proof of his
faith.
14. We must hasten on. We can only give a passing notice of a few other
acts of this illustrious patriarch, in whom "all the nations of the
earth were to be blessed." Jehovah is represented as saying to Abraham,
on a certain occasion, "I will go down now, and see whether they [the
Sodomites] have done according" to my desire. "If not, I will know"
(Gen. xviii. 21). This is one of several cases in which "the Judge of'
all the earth" is represented as abandoning the throne of heaven, and
coming down to learn what was going on below. What a contracted and
ignorant being was the Jewish Jehovah!
15. The mission of Jehovah at one time, when he called upon Abraham, was
to inform him that his gray-headed wife, approaching a hundred years,
was to be blessed with a son in her old age. Has it never occurred
to Bible admirers that this and other similar cases represented the
Almighty, whom "the heaven of heavens can not contain," as traveling
over the country in the character of a fortune-teller, notifying old
women that the laws of nature would be suspended long enough to allow
them to be blessed or cursed with the care and perplexity of children in
their old age?
16. It should be noticed that Abraham's God never reproved him for any
of his misdeeds; while, on the other hand, the heathen King Abimelech
called the man of God to account for his moral defects (Gen. xx.).
17. One of the most dishonorable acts recorded in the history of
Abraham's God was that of bringing a plague upon Pharaoh and his
household for receiving, Abaham's wife, when it was brought about wholly
through his treachery and misrepresentation, and when it appears that
Pharaoh treated her in the most respectful manner.
18. But, with all these moral stains upon the character of Abraham, it
becomes a pleasant task to record one good act in his life. He seems
to have presented the practical proof that he was a better man than
his God; for, when Jehovah threatened the destruction of Sodom for her
wickedness, Abraham remonstrated, and suggested that it would be an act
of injustice to destroy the righteous with the wicked. It appears
that this moral consideration had escaped the mind of Jehovah. What an
inconsiderate, reckless being Bible writers represent the Almighty as
being!
19. Abraham, according to his history, was a man of valor, and achieved
some great exploits. For instance, with the assistance of his regiment
of one hundred and eighteen servants, he chased at one time four great
kings, with their mighty hosts,--the King of Babylon, the King of
Persia, the King of Pontus, and the King of Nations (Gen. xiv.). He
drove them, we are told, more than a hundred miles, and recovered his
brother Lot from their grasp. A few such daring heroes could have put
down the American Rebellion without a battle.
20. We will only observe further, that this "true servant of the Lord"
was both a polygamist and an idolater; at least we have the authority
of the Jewish writer, Philo, for saying that his father was a maker of
images, and that Abraham worshiped them? Such is a brief outline of the
character of the man who is held up as an example for us to imitate, and
through whom "all the nations of the earth are to be blessed," and the
man who stands at the head of that nation through which, we are told,
a revelation has been given to the world which is to effect the moral
regeneration and salvation of the whole human race. Whether the means
are adapted to the ends, the reader is left to judge.
II. CHARACTER OF ISAAC.
1. In accordance with the adage, "Like father, like son," we find Isaac
carrying out the same spirit of fraud and deception practiced by his
father. When "the men of the plain asked him about his wife, he said,
she is my sister" (Gen. xxvi.); "and this man Isaac was another of the
faithful servants of the Lord."
2. If the statement is true that the Lord struck Ananias and Sapphira
with sudden death for telling a falsehood, as related in Acts v., the
question naturally arises, Why did Abraham and Isaac escape the
same fate, as they were guilty of the same sin? Why this partiality?
Manifestly, this is a bad lesson in morals.
III. CHARACTER OF JACOB, MORAL DEFECTS OF.
1. "Like father, like son," is again verified in the practical life of
Jacob. We find this patriarch excels, in moral defects, both his father
and his grandfather.
2. His conduct toward his brother Esau, in robbing him of his just and
inherited rights, is an act which stamps an eternal stigma upon his
character. When Jacob's father, old and blind, asked him, "Art thou
my son Esau?" he replied, "I am" (Gen. xxvii. 24), thus telling a
base falsehood, and deceiving his old father; and this deceptive and
underhanded act caused his brother "to cry an exceedingly bitter cry"
(Gen. xxvii. 34 ). What an unfeeling brother was this "true servant of
the Lord"!
It appears that Isaac and Jehovah both intended that Esau should inherit
the blessing; but Jacob outwitted them by the aid and connivance of his
mother. This is but a sample of the character and conduct of the family
throughout their whole history.
3. Jacob seems to have entertained very singular and selfish ideas in
regard to his religious obligation to serve and worship his God. He made
it entirely a question of bread and butter, or, rather, of bread and
raiment. He proposed to strike up a trade with Jehovah relative to
his future allegiance to his government, and to fix the terms of the
contract himself (Gen. xxviii.). He kindly and condescendingly told
Jehovah, that if he would provide him with food and raiment, and be his
constant companion in the future, "then shall the Lord be _my_ God, and
this _stone_ shall be _God's house_; and I will give _one-tenth_ to the
Lord of what he giveth me" (Gen. xxviii. 20). Here is the attempt to
drive a bargain with Jehovah on the _quid-pro-quo_ principle. We are
not informed how Jehovah appreciated this kindly offer. This is an
unfortunate omission, as every reader must feel interested in knowing
whether he accepted the proposition; and henceforth he whom "the heaven
of heavens can not contain" took up his abode in the patriarch's little
stone hut. We are led to infer, that, if Jehovah refused to accept his
terms, Jacob would henceforth refuse to be a subject of God's kingdom,
and thus bring him to grief. This is a sample of the childish conception
entertained by the whole Jewish nation of "the God of the universe," if
we may presume their God was any thing more than a family or national
deity.
4. The proneness of the Lord's holy people to falsify, and deceive is
well illustrated in the case of Laban, who, after Jacob had by a fair
contract, labored seven years for him for his daughter Rachel, would not
let him have her, but forced his older daughter Leah upon him; and, when
Jacob complained he told him he must serve seven years more if he got
Rachel; and his love for her prompted him to accept the terms. But he
seems not to have been well compensated for his fourteen long years of
toil for these two sisters. Their subsequent conduct indicates that he
"paid dear for the whistle;" and one month's labor ought to have paid
for both, even at ten cents a day, for they both turned out to be
failures. They were, however, a fair specimen of the race. Rachel stole
her father's images; and, when pursued and overtaken by him, she hid
them, and told him a falsehood to conceal the act. The circumstance of
her father _having_ images, and of her _stealing_ them, is an evidence
that both were idolaters (Gen. xxxi.).
5. It is easy to see, from the foregoing facts, from what source the
Jewish proclivity to idolatry and also to falsehood was derived. The
latter was practically manifested by four hundred prophets at one time.
It is true the Lord was charged with putting the lie in their mouths (1
Kings xxii. 22).
6. We are told, that, on a certain occasion, "the sons of Jacob answered
Shechem, and Hamor his father, deceitfully" (Gen. xxxiv. 13); by which
it appears the spirit or propensity to fraud and deception was still
transmitted to their posterity.