. The Mosaic Authorship of the Pentateuch 19 outside of Palestine was limited to prayer and the reading of Scriptures. But besides the lay sacrifices which were continued from the patriarchal times and guarded against perversion, there were two other classes of offerings established by statute; namely, those individual offerings which were brought to the “house of God” at the central place of worship and offered witji priestly assistance, and the national offerings described in Numbers 28ff. which were brought on behalf of the whole people and not of an individual. A failure to distinguish clearly between these three classes of sacrifices has led the crit ics into endless confusion, and error has arisen from their inability to understand legal terms and principles. The Pen tateuch is not mere literature, but it contains a legal code. It is a product of statesmanship consisting of three distinct elements which have always been recognized by lawgivers; namely, the civil, the moral, and the ceremonial, or what Wiener calls the “jural laws,” the “moral code” and “pro cedure.” The jural laws are those the infractions of which can be brought before a court, such as “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark.” But “Thou shalt love thy neigh bor as thyself” can be enforced only by public sentiment and Divine sanctions. The Book of Deuteronomy is largely oc cupied with the presentation of exhortations and motives, aiming to secure obedience to a higher moral code, and is in this largely followed by the prophets of the Old Dispensa tion and the preachers of the present day. The moral law sup plements the civil law. The ceremonial law consists of di rections to the priests for performing the various technical duties, and were of as little interest to the mass of people as are the legal and medical books of the present time. All these strata of the law were naturally and necessarily in ex istence at the same time. In putting them as successive strata, with the ceremonial law last, the critics have made an egre gious and misleading blunder.
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