dents for prose. Such poetry must have been inspired by a divine art; such imagination and fancy must have been inflamed and at the same time tempered and subdued by a divine breath.

The poem describes the origin and development of sin in the family of Adam, in the descendants of Cain, in the human race, in the family of Noah, in the builders of Babel. The wrath of God comes upon sin in several catastrophes of judgment. But redemption is never absent. The promise to the woman's seed opens up the path of Messianic prophecy, which the prophet traces in its stages of divine revelation, so that human sin is overwhelmed and destroyed in the progress of redemption. Sin and Redemption are the master words of his entire history. We see them unfolding in the patriarchal story, in the exodus, and the wanderings, and the conquest. Yahweh, the personal God and Saviour, is ever with His people to guide and to bless. This prophet is the brightest and best narrator in the Bible. His stories never tire us, for they ever touch the secret springs of our heart's emotions.

A writer of a similar spirit tells the story of David, of his sins and sorrows and restoration, and traces the history of the kingdom of redemption in his seed.

Matthew is an evangelist of a similar spirit -the favourite among the Gospels. He is the evangelist of the Messianic promise, of the kingdom of redemption, and of the conflict of sin and grace.

The history of sin and of redemption in these biblical historians is unique. Sin, indeed, is everywhere in the world. Other histories cover it over. These histories expose it. And yet Israel was not the greatest sinner among the nations. If his sins are more patent, are more in the light of history, it is because he has ever been a penitent sinner. Deceitful Abraham, crafty Jacob, choleric Moses, wilful Saul, passionate David, voluptuous Solomon, hasty Peter, doubting Thomas, heresy-hunting Paul,- these are not the chief of sinners. Their counterparts are to be found in all ages and all over the world. We see them every day in our streets. They are not distinguished above other men as sinners; but they are distin

guished as repenting sinners, the discoverers of the divine forgiveness of sin, the banner-bearers of redemption, the trophies of divine grace. No other history but Biblical History gives us such a history of redemption, an unfolding of the grace of God, from the first promise of the ancient epic, through all the intricate variety of Messianic prophecy and fulfilment, until we see the Redeemer ascend to heaven, the son of woman, the second Adam, the serpent-bruiser, victor over sin and death, to reign on a throne of grace as the world's Redeemer.

3. Divine Fatherly Discipline

The fifth book of the Hexateuch is called Deuteronomy, on the ancient Hellenistic theory that it was a repetition of the law. Its legislation is represented in the narratives of the book of Kings, rather, as the Instruction or the Covenant. This legislation is embedded in narratives that assume the oratorical form. They have a character of their own; they are of a distinct type from the narratives thus far considered. The same writer is largely responsible for the history of the Conquest of Canaan. A writer of the same type has touched up the history in the books of Samuel and Kings. This writer has the conception of the Fatherhood of God, and from this point of view he estimates the history of God's people. The whole history is a discipline, a training of the child Israel by his father God. The love of the Father and His tender compassion are grandly conceived, and the sin of the nation is a violation of the parental relation. The ideal life of God's people is a life of love to the Heavenly Father. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by the word that issues from the mouth of God. The divine instruction, the holy guidance, is what the child needs for life, growth, and prosperity. All blessedness is summed up in loving God and serving Him with the whole heart. All curses will come upon those who forsake Him and refuse His instruction and guidance. God is Judge as well as Father, and this discipline is to end in an ultimate judgment that will award the blessings and curses that have been earned. The Deuteronomist judges the whole history of

Israel from this point of view, and regards it as determined by the disciplining love of God.

ment.

The Gospel of John is of the same type, in the New TestaIt is the gospel of light and life and love. The love of God, displayed throughout Biblical History, reaches its climax in that love which gave the only begotten Son for the salvation of the world. The life that was in the words of the Old Covenant was intensified in the words of Jesus, which are spirit and life; it entered the world and dwelt among us as the Incarnate Word, the light of the world, and the true life for mankind. The Biblical History is thus a history of the fatherly love of God. We shall not deny that other histories. display the love of God, and that all mankind share in the heavenly discipline. But it was left for the biblical histories to discern that love, and to describe it as the quickening breath of history.

4. The Sovereignty of the Holy God

The priestly historian takes the most comprehensive view of Biblical History. He begins with an ancient poem describing the creation of the world. This stately lyric, in six pentameter strophes, paints the wondrous drama of the six days' work in which the Sovereign of the universe, by word of command, summons His host into being, and out of primitive chaos organizes a beautiful and orderly whole. The sovereignty of God and the supremacy of law and order are the most striking features of this story of creation.1 I doubt if there is any other passage of the Bible that has attracted such universal attention and been the centre of such world-wide contest from the earliest times. Here Biblical History comes into contact with physical science in all its sections, with philosophy, with the history of ancient nations, as well as with theology. I shall not attempt to discuss the numberless questions that spring into our minds in connection with the first chapter of Genesis. I shall only remark that if one takes it as a lyric poem, and interprets it in the same way as we are accustomed

1 Briggs, The Bible, the Church, and the Reason, pp. 283 seq. See pp. 380 seq. for the pentameter.

to interpret the psalms of creation1 and the poetic descriptions of the creation in Hebrew Prophecy 2 and Hebrew Wisdom, the most of the difficulties will pass away; and the greater part of the contest with science, philosophy, and archæology will

cease.

It is plain that the poem does not teach creation out of nothing. Its scope is to describe the bringing of beauty and order and organism out of primitive chaos. It is clear that the poem makes the Word and Spirit of God the agents of creation, and these are just as suitable to the conception of development in six stages as to the conception of an indefinite number of distinct originations out of nothing.

The order of creation should not trouble us; for the poet is giving us six scenes in the Act of Creation, six pictures of the general order of the development of nature. It is not necessary to suppose that there was a wide gap between these pictures, and that there was no overlapping. When God said, "Let light come into being," He did not continue saying these words. for twenty-four hours, or a century or more. Divine speech is instantaneous. The effect of His saying may go on forever, but His word is a flash of light. God did no more speaking on the second day than on the first, no more on the sixth than on the third. The poet certainly does not tell us that God spake a creative word for every object of creation, or even for every species or genus. He, who in His divine conception is above the limits of time and space and circumstance, who grasps in one conception the whole frame of universal nature, with one word, or one breath, or a thought, might have called the universe into being. The poem of the Creation conceives God as speaking six creative words, in order thus to paint the six pictures of creation in an orderly manner. The poet does not propose to comprehend in his representation all the forces and forms and methods of the work of God.

Take it as it is, it is a lyric poem of wonderful power and beauty. Science has not yet reached a point when it can tell the story of creation so well.

The story of creation is set forth

in the legends and myths of many nations. The Babylonian

1 Pss. 33, 104.

2 Is. 4012 seq., 4424.

8 Prov. 8, Job 38.

4 Gen. 18.

poem gives us the best ethnic representation. But all these ethnic conceptions are discoloured by mythological fancies and grotesque speculations. Compared with the best of them, the Biblical Poem is pure and simple and grand. A divine touch is in its sketchings. A Divine Spirit hovered over the mind. of the poet to bring order and beauty out of his crude and tossing speculations, no less than He did over the primitive chaos of the world itself.

The priestly historian gives another ancient poem of the Deluge, which also is marked by the same general characteristics of the sovereignty of God and the supremacy of law, that we have seen in the poem of the Creation. He connects these and his other histories by a well-arranged table of genealogies, giving us the line of mankind from Adam through the centuries of the holy race. He conceives of God as a holy God, and of man as created in the image of the holy God, with sovereignty over the earth. It is sin against the divine majesty that involves the catastrophe of the deluge. This historian traces the history of Israel in a series of divine covenants with Noah, Abraham, Jacob, and Moses. These involve the government of God and the service of a holy people. The constitution of a holy law and holy institutions is his highest delight. God's people must be a holy people, as God their Lord is holy, and all their approaches to Him must be in well-ordered forms of sanctity. The entire history of the exodus and the conquest is conceived from this point of view.

The Chronicler is an author of kindred spirit. He describes the history of the kingdom until the exile, and judges of it from the point of view of the holy law of God. He also gives us an account of the restoration and establishment of the holy people in the Holy Land, under the priestly rule and the holy law. And here he brings his history to an end.

A writer of similar spirit in the New Testament is Luke. He also begins his genealogy with Adam. He also gives a later unfolding of the history in the story of the planting of

Christianity among Jews and Gentiles. He also has a pro

found sense of the sovereignty of God, the work of the Divine Spirit, and the ideal of holiness.