The Origin of the World According to Revelation and Science Part 21

[Footnote 6: The Feathered Serpent is perhaps the representative of the Dragon and Serpent in the Semitic version; but has not the same evil import, and his color gave sacredness to blue and green stones, as the turquois and emerald, both in North and South America, and perhaps also in Asia and Africa.]

[Footnote 7: I do not think it necessary to attach any value to the doubts of certain schools of criticism as to the Mosaic authors.h.i.+p of the Pentateuch. Whatever quibbles may be raised on isolated texts, no rational student can doubt that we have in these books a collection of authentic doc.u.ments of the Exodus. They are absolutely inexplicable on any other supposition.]

[Footnote 8: "Cosmos," Otte's translation.]

[Footnote 9: Hamilton, "Royal Preacher."]

[Footnote 10: Harvey, "Nereis Boreali Americana."]

[Footnote 11: Osburn, "Monumental History of Egypt."]

[Footnote 12: On this subject I may refer naturalists to the intimate acquaintance with animals and their habits, indicated by manner of their use as sacred emblems, and as symbols in hieroglyphic writing. Another ill.u.s.tration is afforded by the Mosaic narrative of the miracles and plagues connected with the exodus. The Egyptian king, on this occasion, consulted the _philosophers_ and _augurs_. These learned men evidently regarded the serpent-rod miracle as but a more skilful form of one of the tricks of serpent-charmers. They showed Pharaoh the possibility of reddening the Nile water by artificial means, or perhaps by the development of red algae in it. They explained the inroad of frogs on natural principles, probably referring to the immense abundance ordinarily of the ova and tadpoles of these creatures compared with that of the adults. But when the dust of the land became gnats ("lice" in our version), this was a phenomenon beyond their experience. Either the species was unknown to them, or its production out of the dry ground was an anomaly, or they knew that no larvae adequate to explain it had previously existed. In the case of this plague, therefore, comparatively insignificant and easily simulated, they honestly confessed--"This is the finger of G.o.d." No better evidence could be desired that the savans here opposed to Moses were men of high character and extensive observation. Many other facts of similar tendency might be cited both from Moses and the Egyptian monuments.]

[Footnote 13: That in Genesis, chap. ii.]

[Footnote 14: Kitto's Cyclopaedia, art. "Creation."]

[Footnote 15: Much that is very silly has been written as to the extent of the supposed "optical view" taken by the Hebrew writers; many worthy literary men appearing to suppose that _scientific_ views of nature must necessarily be different from those which we obtain by the evidence of our senses. The very contrary is the fact; and so long as any writers state correctly what they observe, without insisting on any fanciful hypotheses, science has no fault to find with them. What science most detests is the ignorant speculations of those who have not observed at all, or have observed imperfectly. It is a leading excellence of the Hebrew Scriptures that they state facts without giving any theories to account for them. It is, on the contrary, the circ.u.mstance that unscientific writers will not be content to be "optical," but must theorize, that spoils much of our modern literature, especially in its descriptions of nature.]

[Footnote 16: Prof. Hitchc.o.c.k.]

[Footnote 17: McCosh, "Typical Forms and Special Ends."]

[Footnote 18: I adopt that view of the date of Job which makes it precede the Exodus, because the religious ideas of the book are patriarchal, and it contains no allusions to the Hebrew history or inst.i.tutions. Were I to suggest an hypothesis as to its origin, it would be that it was written or found by Moses when in exile, and published among his countrymen in Egypt, to revive their monotheistic religion, and cheer them under the apparent desertion of their G.o.d and the evils of their bondage.]

[Footnote 19: Tyndall seems to hold this.]

[Footnote 20: Newton.]

[Footnote 21: John v., 17; Rom. viii., 22; Heb. i., 2; 2 Peter iii.]

[Footnote 22: Heb. i., 2.]

[Footnote 23: Eph. iii., 9.]

[Footnote 24: 1 Tim. i., 17.]

[Footnote 25: Eph. iv., 11.]

[Footnote 26: Job x.x.xviii. and x.x.xix.]

[Footnote 27: Romans i., 20.]

[Footnote 28: Essays on Theism.]

[Footnote 29: Herschel, Dissertation on the Study of Natural Philosophy; Maxwell, Lecture before the British a.s.sociation.]

[Footnote 30: Carpenter, "Human Physiology."]

[Footnote 31: Asah.]

[Footnote 32: McDonald, "Creation and the Fall."]

[Footnote 33: Literally, "ages" or "time-worlds," as they have been called.]

[Footnote 34: Genesis i., 8, 26-28.]

[Footnote 35: Job x.x.xviii., 37.]

[Footnote 36: Gen. i., 14; Deut. xvii., 3.]

[Footnote 37: Gen. xxviii., 17; Job xv., 15; Psa. ii., 4.]

[Footnote 38: Not "created," as some read. The verb is _kana_, not _bara_.]

[Footnote 39: The usual Septuagint rendering is _Abyssus_.]

[Footnote 40: Smith, "a.s.syrian Genesis." Bra.s.seur de Bourbourg's translation of the "Popol Vuh" of the ancient Central American Indians.]

[Footnote 41: It is impossible to avoid recognizing in the Greek Theogony, as it appears in Hesiod and the Orphic poems, an inextricable intermingling of a cosmogony akin to that of Moses with legendary stories of deceased ancestors; and this has, I must confess, always appeared to me to be a more rational way of accounting for it than its reference to mere nature-myths. Chaos, or s.p.a.ce, for the chaos of Hesiod differs from that of Ovid, came first, then Gaea, the earth, and Tartarus, or the lower world. Chaos gave birth to Erebos (identical with the Hebrew Ereb or Erev, evening) and Nyx, or night. These again give birth to Aether, the equivalent of the Hebrew expanse or firmament, and to Hemera, the day, and then the heavenly bodies were perfected. So far the legend is apparently based on some primitive history of creation, not essentially different from that of the Bible. But the Greek Theogony here skips suddenly to the human period; and under the fables of the marriage of Gaea and Uranos, and the t.i.tans, appears to present to us the antediluvian world, with its intermarriages of the sons of G.o.d and men, and its Nephelim or Giants, with their mechanic arts and their crimes. Beyond this, in Kronos and his three sons, and in the strange history of Zeus, the chief of these, we have a coa.r.s.e and fanciful version of the story of the family of Noah, the insult offered by Ham to his father, and the subsequent quarrels and dispersion of mankind. The Zeus of Homer appears to be the elder of the three, or j.a.pheth, the real father of the Greeks, according to the Bible; but in the time of Hesiod Zeus was the youngest, perhaps indicating that the wors.h.i.+p of the Egyptian Zeus, Ammon or Ham, had already supplanted among the Greeks that of their own ancestor. But it is curious that even in the Bible, though j.a.phet is said to be the greater, he is placed last in the lists.

After the introduction of Greek savans and literati to Egypt, about B.C.

660, they began to regard their own mythology from this point of view, though obliged to be reserved on the subject. The cosmology of Thales, the astronomy of Anaxagoras, and the history of Herodotus afford early evidence of this, and it abounds in later writers. I may refer the reader to Grote (History of Greece, vol. i.) for an able and agreeable summary of this subject; and may add that even the few coincidences above pointed out between Greek mythology and the Bible, independently of the mult.i.tudes of more doubtful character to be found in the older writers on this subject, appear very wonderful, when we consider that among the Greeks these vestiges of primitive religion, whether brought with them from the East or received from abroad, must have been handed down for a long time by oral tradition among the people; but obscure though they may be, the circ.u.mstance that some old writers have ridden the resemblances to death affords no excuse for the prevailing neglect of them in more modern times.]

[Footnote 42: Pages 21, 22, and 109, _supra_.]

[Footnote 43: The minor planets discovered in more recent times between Mars and Jupiter form an exception to this; but they are of little importance, and exceptional in other respects as well. To give their arrangement and the motions of the satellites of Ura.n.u.s, would require the further a.s.sumption of some unknown disturbing cause.]

[Footnote 44: Nichol's "Planetary System."]

[Footnote 45: Proctor's Lectures, etc.]

[Footnote 46: This translation is as literal as is consistent with the bold abruptness of the original. The last idea is that of a cylindrical seal rolling over clay, and leaving behind a beautiful impression where all before was a blank.]

[Footnote 47: Professor Dana thus sums up the various meanings of the word _day_ in Genesis: "_First_, in verse 5, the _light_ in general is called day, the darkness night. _Second_, in the same verse, _evening and morning_ make the first day, before the sun appears. _Third_, in verse 14, day stands for _twelve hours_, or the period of daylight, as dependent on the sun. _Fourth_, same verse, in the phrase "days and seasons," day stands for a period of _twenty-four hours_. _Fifth_, at the close of the account, in verse 4 of the second chapter, day means the _whole period of creation_. These uses are the same that we have in our own language."

Warring, in his book "The Miracle of To-day," has suggested that the Mosaic days are _epochal_ days, each considered as the close and culmination of a period. This is an ingenious suggestion, and very well coincides with the day-period theory as defended in the text.]

[Footnote 48: Psalm xc.]

[Footnote 49: It may be desirable to give here, in a slightly paraphrased version, but strictly in accordance with the views of the best expositors, the essential part of the pa.s.sage in Hebrews, chap.

iv.:

"For G.o.d hath spoken in a certain place" (Gen. ii., 2) of the seventh day in this wise--'And G.o.d did rest on the seventh day from all his works;' and in this place again--'They shall not enter into my rest'

(Psa. xcv., 11). Seeing, therefore, it still remaineth that some enter therein, and they to whom it (G.o.d's Sabbatism) was first proclaimed entered not in, because of disobedience (in the fall, and afterward in the sin of the Israelites in the desert), again he fixes a certain day, saying in David's writings, long after the time of Joshua--'To-day, if ye hear his voice, harden not your hearts.' For if Joshua had given them rest in Canaan, he would not afterward have spoken of another day. There is therefore yet reserved a keeping of a Sabbath for the people of G.o.d.

For he that is entered into his rest (that is, Jesus Christ, who has finished his work and entered into his rest in heaven), he himself also rested from his own works, as G.o.d did from his own. Let us therefore earnestly strive to enter into that rest."

It is evident that in this pa.s.sage G.o.d's Sabbatism, the rest intended for man in Eden and for Israel in Canaan, Christ's rest in heaven after finis.h.i.+ng his work, and the final heavenly rest of Christ's people, are all indefinite periods mutually related, and can not possibly be natural days.]

[Footnote 50: For the benefit of those who may value ancient authorities in such matters, and to show that such views may rationally be entertained independently of geology, I quote the following pa.s.sage from Origen: "Cuinam quaeso sensum habenti convenienter videbitur dictum, quod dies prima et secunda et tertia, in quibus et vespera nominatur, et mane, fuerint sine sole, et sine luna et sine stellis: prima autern dies sine coelo." So St. Augustine expressly states his belief that the creative days could not be of the ordinary kind: "Qui dies, cujusmodi sint, aut perdifficile n.o.bis, aut etiam impossibile est cogitare, quanto magis discere." Bede also remarks, "Forta.s.sis hic diei nomen, totius temporis nomen est, et omnia volumina seculorum hoc vocabulo includit."