“1. That various portions of the Levitical institutions, to which a Mosaic authorship is assigned in the Pentateuch, are of later date, having come into the form in which they are exhibited only by degrees, and in days long subsequent to the age of Moses. This is held to be established by discrepancies between different parts of Scripture, which are held to arise when the Mosaic origin is assumed.
“2. In particular, the Book of Deuteronomy, in portions of it which, _ex facie_, bear to be the record of utterances by Moses, makes reference to institutions and arrangements much later than his time.
“3. This is to be accounted for by assuming that some prophetic person, in later times, threw into this form a series of oracles, embracing at once Mosaic revelations, and modifications, or adaptations which were of later development; all together being thrown into the form of a declaration and testimony of Moses.
“4. That, viewed especially with reference to the literary conceptions and habits of that time and people, the method thus employed was legitimate, and was such as the divine Spirit might sanction and employ. It was designed to teach that the whole body of laws delivered were the fruit of the same seed, had received the same sanction, and were alike inspired by the Spirit which spake by Moses.
“5. The sub-committee do not understand the professor to mean that this involved any fraud upon those to whom the book was delivered. It was given and taken for what it was; however, it may subsequently have been misunderstood, in the professor’s view, in so far as it came to be believed to be an ordinary historical record of actual Mosaic utterances.”
The committee found themselves “obliged to regard this position with grave concern.” They did not feel willing to admit the force of the evidence which Professor Smith relied upon as establishing the non-Mosaic character of some of the Deuteronomic laws; and “the hypothesis of inspired personation applied to such a book as Deuteronomy” appeared to them “highly questionable in itself and in its consequences.” This is stating the case very mildly, especially as they go on to say that the so-called “explanations produced by Professor Smith in his statement have not relieved the apprehensions of the committee,” but, on the contrary, have rather served “to make more evident the stumbling-block for readers of the Bible arising from a theory which represents a book of Scripture as putting into the mouth of Moses regulations that are at variance with institutions which the same theory supposes him to have actually sanctioned.” This theory is “liable to objection and is fitted to create apprehension.” It ascribes to the author of the book “the use of a device which appears unworthy and inadmissible in connection with the divine inspiration and divine authority of such a book as Deuteronomy.”... “The admissions that the statements of the book regarding Moses are not true in the obvious sense will operate in the way of unsettling belief.” The committee are compelled to admit that the article is “of a dangerous and unsettling tendency.” Nevertheless, they declare that they cannot and will not exercise the rights and discharge the duties of their office by instituting a process against Professor Smith for heresy. He has written a most heretical, dangerous, and really blasphemous article, and has caused it to be published in a book of the highest character and of the most extensive circulation. But they have “a cordial sense of his great learning,” and he has been good enough to say that although he has proved that the Holy Spirit lied in certain portions of Deuteronomy, and lent himself to the perpetration of a fraud in other portions, still he can accept the book “as part of the inspired record of revelation, on the witness of our Lord and the _testimonium Spiritus Sancti_”—the testimony of the same Holy Spirit to whom he has imputed the crimes of falsehood and of fraud! Therefore they declare that they find no fault in Professor Smith other than that of being a little too free in the utterance of his opinions, and, accordingly, they decide to let him go.