The Fundamentals - 1910: Vol.9

16

The Fundamentals teristic of the writers to whom the various parts of the Pen­ tateuch are assigned are readily seen to be occasioned by the different objects aimed at in the portions from which the lists are made. Here, however, it is necessary to add that besides the E and J documents the critics suppose that Deuteronomy, which they designate “D”, is an independent literary production writ­ ten in the time of Josiah. Furthermore, the critics pretend to have discovered by their analysis another document which they call the Priestly Code and designate as “P”. This pro­ vides the groundwork of most of the narrative, and comprises the entire ceremonial portion of the law. This document, which, according to these critics did not come into existence till the time of Ezekiel, largely consists of special instructions to priests telling them how they were to perform the sacrifices and public ceremonials, and how they were to determine the character of contagious diseases and unsanitary conditions. Such instructions are necessarily made up largely of technical language such as is found in the libraries of lawyers and phy­ sicians, and it is easy enough to select from such literature a long list of words which are not to be found in contemporary literature dealing with the ordinary affairs of life and aiming directly at elevating the tone of morality and stimulating de­ votion to higher spiritual ends. Furthermore, an exhaustive examination (made by Chancellor Lias) of the entire list of words found in this P document attributed to the time of Ezekiel shows absolutely no indication of their belonging to an age later than that of Moses. The absurdity of the claims of the higher critics to having established the existence of different documents in the Pen­ tateuch by a literary analysis has been shown by a variety of examples. The late Professor C. M. Mead, the most influ­ ential of the American revisers of the translation of the Old Testament, in order to exhibit the fallacy of their procedure, took the Book of Romans and arbitrarily divided it into three

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