Character of the open pages of the Pentateuch relate the character of the laws of Moses with a minuteness of detail that leaves little, if anything, untold. The code, embracing 613 statutes, covers the entire re quirements of priesthood, community and indi vidual. While his training and early life in Egypt influenced in many ways his legislation, the distinctive features are vital, with their emphasis on a purer and more rational divine belief and their elements of a democracy after which later nations in certain respects have modeled their systems. Despite the elaborate forms of priesthood and sacrifices, concessions to a people not ready for a loftier attitude, from our 20th century point of view, although our later day civilization still needs balance wheels, and holds fast to signs, symbols, forms, ceremonies of its own, the essential truths of the Mosaic laws, its insistence on personal equality and personal morality, cannot be out grown. Its spirit of broad humanity, its con sideration for the old and the young, the slave and the enemy, the fruit tree and the animal creation, its health and food regulations full of suggestions to the modern physician and dietitian, all these show a wisdom in their author that accounts for his fame and the fact that so many of the Mosaic laws are still ob served by the great majority of the people to whose ancestors the code was given.
Moses in the It was to be ex pected that in course of time legends should arise as to the character of Moses and the vari ous episodes in his career. In rabbinical litera ture, these have assumed a variety, a grandeur and a poetical beauty that account for their hold on the imagination for centuries to our day. To the average English reader Rev. S. Baring Gould's 'Legends of the Patriarchs and Prophets' will be found stimulating. Dr. Ginz berg's 'Legends of the Jews,' with its ex haustive chapters, will satisfy the more critical reader, although there is no attempt to elaborate the stories which are narrated with sober exact ness. If it was denied the people to know his sepulchre and render him worthy post mortem honors, they had full license to draw upon their imagination and adorn the memory of so great a prophet, leader and law-maker by spinning the web of fairy tales in apt Orental fashion so dear to the Semitic mind and in which the Occidental no less delights even if he assumes a more worldly-wise air. These legends stretch over his entire history from birth to death and seek to interpret in their own imaginative way, which is often far from being forced or un natural, the scenes and incidents that he en counters, which so readily adapt themselves to the story-teller's mood as well as to the teach er's vision. It is not necessary in the limited
space at command to dwell at any length on the mass of legends so quotable and stimulating. The Hellenistic stories of Moses, if more limited, have a quaint interest of their own. The Mohammedan are obviously distortions or exaggerations of the rabbinical, although oc casionally the treatment is original. Moses plays a part, too, in apocalyptic literature.
Modern Critical View.— Since Astrue in 1753 published his view of the composite char acter of the book of Genesis, due, as he stated, to the use by Moses of certain documents in its elaboration, the critics have waged a long con tinued battle as to the question of authorship, which has its piquant features and is still being contested almost as hotly as a century ago. The fact, too, that a parallel to the story of the birth of Moses and his experience in the bulrushes of the Nile is found in the cuneiform library of Assurbanipal and told of Sargon, a Babylonian king who ruled, it is said, about 3800 ac., is not without its suggestions. The etymology of the name Moses, too, has given rise to much speculation, although the Biblical account has still its doughty defenders. However, what ever the criticisms as to name, authorship, date, whatever the differences in details, the preva lent opinion as to the man himself is one and the same, as a great historical figure, who added unity and strength to a nation, after setting it free, and under Providence, shaped its destinies and gave it the essentials of a religious and civil code of laws, which later ages developed. The verdict of the great ma jority of scholars from Wellhausen to Kittel, from Budde to McCurdy, from Corral! to Barton and Paton, is conclusive. Just as the story of the Exodus has been confirmed by modern investigation step by step on the long journey across the Desert, so the historical character of Moses stands out in clear relief after the fullest and most exacting analysis and research by the modern scholar and critic.
Bibliography.— Driver,