******************************************* 2.  That the author of the Priestly Code had before him the combination of the Sinai legislation of the Jehovist and Deuteronomy is shown further by the circumstance that he has both a legislation at Mount Sinai and a legislation in the Arboth Moah, and in addition to these one in the wilderness of Sinai. ********************************************

As from the literary point of view, so also from the historical, the Moses of the Jehovist appears more original than the Moses of the Priestly Code.  To prove this is, it is true, the aim of the entire present work:  yet it will not on that account be thought out of place if we take advantage of this convenient opportunity for a brief sketch and criticism of the conflicting historical views of Moses and his work in the two main sources of the Pentateuch.  According to the Priestly Code Moses is a religious founder and legislator, as we are accustomed to think of him.  He receives and promulgates the Torah, 1 perhaps not as a book—­though, when we

************************************** 1.  The law might accordingly be called Moses, as with the Ethiopians the Psalter is called David, **************************************

come to think of it, we can hardly represent the transaction to ourselves in any other way—­but certainly fixed and finished as an elaborate and minutely organised system, which comprises the sacred constitution of the congregation for all time to come.  The whole significance of Moses consists in the office of messenger which he holds as mediator of the law; what else he does is of no importance.  That the law is given once for all is the great event of the time, not that the people of Israel begins to appear on the stage of the world.  The people is there for the sake of the law, not the law for the sake of the people.  With the Jehovist, on the contrary, Moses’ work consists in this, that he delivers his people from the Egyptians and cares for it in every way in the wilderness.  In the prelude scene from his youth, when he smites the Egyptian and seeks to adjust the dispute of his brethren (Exodus ii. 11 seq.), his whole history is prefigured.  His care for the Israelites embraces both catering for their sustenance, and making and preserving peace and order among them (Numbers xi.).  The Torah is but a part of his activity, and proceeds from his more general office as the guardian of the young people, who has, as it were, to teach the fledgling to fly (Numbers xi. xii.).  According to Exodus xviii. his Torah is nothing but a giving of counsel, a finding the way out of complications and difficulties which had actually arisen.  Individuals bring their different cases before him; he pronounces judgment or gives advice, and in so doing teaches the people the way they should go.  Thus he is the beginner of the teaching of Jehovah which lives on after him in priest and prophet.  Here all is life and movement:  as Jehovah Himself,