We have already said that one great object and purpose of the ceremonial law of Moses was to develop in the minds of the people the idea of holiness.  This is expressed (Lev. xix. 2), “Speak unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say unto them, Ye shall be holy; for I the Lord your God am holy.”

Another object of the ceremonial law was to surround the whole nation with an impenetrable hedge of peculiarities, and so to keep them separate from surrounding nations.  The ceremonial law was like a shell which protected the kernel within till it was ripe.  The ritual was the thorny husk, the theology and morality were the sacred included fruit.  In this point of view the strangest peculiarities of the ritual find an easy explanation.  The more strange they are, the better they serve their purpose.  These peculiarities produced bitter prejudice between the Jews and the surrounding nations.  Despised by their neighbors, they despised them again in turn; and this mutual contempt has produced the result desired.  The Jews, in the very heart of the world, surrounded by great nations far more powerful than themselves, conquered and overrun by Assyrians, Medes, Persians, Syrians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, have been more entirely separated from other nations than the Chinese or the people of Japan.  Dispersed as they are, they are still a distinct people, a nation within other nations.  Like drops of oil floating on the water but never mingling with it, so the Jews are found everywhere, floating drops of national life in the midst of other nationalities.  In Leviticus (xviii. 3) we find the command, “After the doings of the land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do; and after the doings of the land of Canaan, whither I bring you, shall ye not do; neither shall ye walk in their ordinances.”  They have not obeyed this command in its letter, but continue to obey its spirit in its unwritten continuation:  “After the doings of the English and French and Americans shall ye not do, nor walk in their ordinances, but shall still continue a peculiar people.”

Sec. 4.  David; or, Judaism as the personal Worship of a Father and friend.

Many disasters befell the Jews after their settlement in Palestine, which we should allude to were we writing the heads of their history rather than giving an account of their religion.  Among these were their long conflict with the Philistines, and their subjection by that people during twenty years.  The Philistines, it has been recently discovered, were not a Semitic nation, and were not in the land in the time of Moses.  They are not mentioned as a powerful people in the Pentateuch or the Book of Joshua, but suddenly appear as invaders in the time of the Judges, completely defeating and subduing the Canaanites along the shore.  In fact, the Philistines were probably an Indo-European or Aryan people, and their name is now believed to be the same as that of the Pelasgi.  They were probably a body of Pelasgi from the island of Crete, who, by successive invasions, overran Palestine, and gave their name to it.[357] They were finally reduced by David; and as his reign is the culminating period of Judaism, we will devote some space to his character and influence.