Tabernacle in the Wilderness 25 which Moses made in the wilderness and the altar of burnt offering were at that time in the high place at Gibeon. What ever of uncertainty, therefore, or lack of positive indication, may exist as connected with the passages we have quoted from Kings, there is no such uncertainty or lack of positive ness here in Chronicles. On the contrary, these two books, which give us quite an amount of information respecting the Tabernacle, are always, or at least generally, very clear and positive; and on this account, it might be added, the state ments made in Chronicles have sometimes been taken as a kind of guide to the study of the Tabernacle history in general. But here again the critics make their appearance, and are “all up in arms” against any use to be made of these two books of Chronicles for determining a matter of ancient history. Of all the untrustworthy historical literature to be found in the Old Testament there is nothing quite so bad, so the critics tell us, as is in general Chronicles; and Wellhausen goes so far as to say that one special purpose served by these two books is that they show how an author may use his original sources with such freedom as to make them say about what he pleases, or anything according to his own ideas. (See Proleg., Eng. trans., p. 49.) So also Graf, DeWette, and others, have very energetically attacked the credibility of these two books. But over against all that is said by the critics as to the Chronicler’s lack of veracity and his violent dealing with his sources, we will simply, or first, put the testimony of one of the higher critics themselves. I t is what Dillman, who in point of learning and reliability is acknowledged to be among the very foremost of all the critics, says with regard to this very matter in hand: “It is now recognized,” affirms that eminent critic, “that the Chron icler has worked according to sources, and there can be no talk, with regard to him, of fabrications or misrepresentations of the history.” So also Dr. Orr observes that there is no reason for doubting “the perfect good faith” of the author of
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