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The Fundamentals IV. IMPORTANCE OF THIS DISCUSSION
1. Whichever one is accepted by us, certain it is that an earnest discussion, such as we hope to effect, of the question above stated, is a matter of no little consequence. Such a discussion is important, first of all, because of the light which it will throw upon all the history of God’s first chosen people— the Israelites. It will at least tell us something about the kind of civilization this ancient people must have had; and more particularly will it tell us whether that civilization was, as the higher critics represent, one low down on the scale, or whether these Israelites had already made a good degree of progress in all the arts, disciplines, and branches of knowledge which usually belong to a moderately high state of civilization. Surely, then, there is at least some benefit to be derived from the study before us. . 2. But another advantage which will come from this same study is that it will help us to a solution of a somewhat curious, but yet important, historical problem; viz., whether as a matter of history the Temple preceded the Tabernacle, as the higher critics claim, and, therefore, that the Tabernacle must be regarded as only “a diminutive copy” of the Temple; or vice versa, whether, as is taught by the Bible, the Taber nacle went first, and hence that the Temple was in its construc tion patterned after the Tabernacle. To be sure, at first sight this does not appear to be a very important question; yet when the historical, literary and other connections involved in it are considered, it does after all become a question of no little sig nificance. 3. But the most determinative and therefore the most sig nificant interest we have in a discussion of the question as proposed, is the bearing which it has upon the truth or falsity of the higher criticism. As is known to persons conversant with that peculiar method of Bible study, one of its main contentions is that the whole Levitical or ceremonial law_
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