Such precisely were the people who guarded and delivered to us the books of the Old Testament. Their religious, civil, and domestic practices, everywhere and at all times of their history, correspond so perfectly with what we read in any part of this volume that, even if portions of the Bible were lost, we should have the living tradition to witness to the omission, since we know that the life of the Hebrew was ever subject to the regulations of the law of Jehovah, which was to him the supreme expression of all that is great and good and wise. "Uniformity of belief and ritual practice," says the Protestant Geikie,[1]" was the one grand design of the founders of Judaism; the moulding the whole religious life of the nation to such a machine-like discipline as would make any variation from the customs of the past well-nigh impossible. A universal, death-like conservatism, permitting no change in successive ages, was established as the grand security for a separate national existence.... For this end, not only was that part of the Law which concerned the common life of the people--their sabbaths, feast-days, jubilees, offerings, sacrifices, tithes, the Temple and Synagogue worship, civil and criminal law, marriage, and the like--explained, commented on, and minutely ordered by the Rabbis, but also that portion of it which related only to the private duties of individuals in their daily religious life." And to this day the orthodox Jew observes the same rites and ceremonies which marked the service of his forefathers, whether in Judea or Samaria, on the banks of the Nile under the Ptolemies, at Babylon under the Seleucides, or at Niniveh under Nabuchodonoser. "What event of profane history," writes the Abbé Gainet, "can boast of an unbroken succession of 3,500 anniversaries such as those of which we have assurance in the history of the Jews?"[2]
[2] La Bible sans la Bible, vol. I., Etude préliminaire.
The argument of the last chapter leads us to another evidence which points to the historical authenticity of the Hebrew Bible. It is plain, even upon superficial examination of this book, that it contains, beside the severest penalties for sin, the most stinging accusations of infidelity against the people of God, and the most scorching rebukes of their crimes; it relates the transgressions of their kings and princes and priests; in short, it records everything which the Jewish nation and their rulers must have been anxious to keep silent, or to mitigate where it was necessary to write it down. Every reason of prudence and national self-love must have suggested to them to destroy such records where they existed, because they made their vaunted glory a story of everlasting shame. Compare this historical record of the Jewish people with the contemporary annals of the Assyrian, Persian, Greek, or Roman monarchs. These are full of extravagant laudations, of royal deeds of valor, of the splendor of their victories over other nations; whereas the statements of the Bible are simple, the narrative of heroic acts and signal divine favors is constantly mingled with incidents deeply self-humiliating for a race that called itself chosen of God above all the Gentiles. The Jews record numerous defeats, shameful treacheries, and errors of their most beloved kings. They rebel, they commit every crime forbidden by the Law; yet whilst they kill the prophets who charge them with ingratitude, they patiently suffer the record of it all to go into the books which they know will be read to all the people for their shame. They make no attempt to minimize or to excuse themselves to their children, however much they love the glory of Israel and the splendor of Jerusalem as the one nation and city worthy of the most exalted patriotic praise. Other nations made themselves a religion in harmony with their passions, so as to soothe the conscience. But the Jew finds a law of life given him in the great book of Moses. He may fall from his ideals, he may worship idols, but he never ceases to recognize that this is wrong because it is contrary to the law of Jehovah.