But the Christian has still stronger reasons for believing in the genuineness and divine origin of the Pentateuch. He has the testimony of the Son of God and His inspired apostles. And here it is to be observed, in the first place, that our Lord and His apostles speak of the Pentateuch in the language common to the Jews in all times, as “The Law.” Sometimes this expression was used of the Old Testament. But when spoken of in connection with the other portions as, “The Law and the Prophets,” or, “The Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms," it means the five books attributed to Moses. In the next place it is to be noted, that our Lord, the evangelists, and the apostles regard the Law as a divine revelation, and therefore possessing a divine authority. By Luke (2:23, 24, 39), it is called “The law of the Lord.” Paul (Rom. 7:22) calls it “The law of God,” He also teaches that obedience to the law gives life, transgression entails death (Rom. 7:7-11: compare Gal. 3:10). Again, when St. Paul cites the words of the Pentateuch, he ascribes them to God; for example, “God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them,” (2 Cor. 6:16, compared with Lev. 26:11, 12).
The whole system of New Testament doctrine concerning salvation, the guilt of man, the curse of the law, and redemption by the blood of Christ, rests upon the supposition that the Law is a divine revelation. In like manner the whole argument of the Epistle to the Hebrews concerning Christ's priesthood, the nature of His atonement, the typification of the gospel in Levitical ordinances, necessarily presupposes the divine origin of the Law (Heb. 8:5; 10:1, &c.). Our Lord also ascribes divine authority to the Law. He refers to it as the highest authority (Matt. 12:5, and Luke 10:25, 26), and speaks of its precepts as “The commandments of God” (Matt. 15:3). According to our Lord's teaching, the Law is so entirely divine, that “it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away, than for one jot or tittle of the law to fail” (Luke 16:16, 17), and therefore is to be violated by none (Matt. 5:19), “Whosoever shall break (or, weaken the authority, λύσῃ) of one of the least of these commandments, and shall teach men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whosoever shall do and teach them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” To assert the divine authority of the Law more strongly, is impossible.
In the third place, it is to be observed, that our Lord and His apostles taught that the Pentateuch was given by Moses, that he was the penman and wrote the laws as given him by God. Thus the word “Moses” is frequently put instead of “the Law.” So Luke says (24:27), “Beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” Again, our Lord says (Luke 16:29), “They have Moses and the prophets—if they hear not Moses and the prophets.” In these places the name of Moses is put for what Moses wrote, as “the prophets” for their writings. Still stronger is what the Lord says (John 7:19), “Did not Moses give you the law?” In Luke 2:22, and Acts 15:5, it is called “The Law of Moses.” Our Lord Himself says, “All things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses” (compare Acts 28:23, and 13:39).
No doubt it may, however, be said that the Pentateuch is called Moses and the Law of Moses, because it contains the history and some commands of Moses, on which was based the subsequent legislation; but that these expressions do not necessarily imply that Moses wrote the books. But the New Testament goes farther, and states distinctly that the books were written by Moses. In Matt. 22:24 the Jews said to our Lord, “Moses said;” in John 8:5, “Moses in the law commanded us;” again in Mark 12:19, and in Luke 20:28, “Moses wrote unto us.” The Lord, in His reply, confirms this opinion as to the authorship of the law, saying, “Have ye not read in the book of Moses?” (Mark 12:26). In the parallel passage (Luke 20:37), our Lord says, “Now that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush, when he called Jehovah the God of Abraham,” &c. Moses can only be said to call God by that title by being the historian of what God had called Himself. The historian calls God the God of Abraham.
Moses therefore was the historian; and therefore our Lord says to the Jews (Mark 7:10), “Moses said, Honor thy father and mother,” and again, when speaking of divorce (Mark 10:5), “For the hardness of your heart, he wrote you this precept;” and, in like manner (John 5:46, 47), “Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me; for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?” (Compare John 1:45, 46; Acts 3:22). James says in like manner, “Moses is read in the synagogue every Sabbath day” (Acts 15:21), Paul says (Rom. 10:5), “Moses writeth (γράϕει) the righteousness of the law,” referring to Lev. 18:5. It is evident therefore that our Lord and His apostles regarded the Pentateuch as the law of Moses, the book of Moses as the writings of Moses.
Fourthly, it appears also that they received the history which that book contains as true and authentic, the miraculous and supernatural as well as that which is according to the common course of nature. Thus in Mark 10:9 the Lord refers to the creation of Adam and Eve as historically true, and on the words of Adam founds His own command” What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” In Matt. 24:37 He refers to the deluge, the destruction of the world, and the preservation of Noah; in Luke 17:32, to the fire and brimstone which destroyed Sodom and the cities of the plain, and the transformation of Lot's wife into a pillar of salt. So He refers to the appearance of God in the burning bush; the miraculous effect of looking at the brazen serpent; and the miraculous supply of manna as typical of Himself, where the comparison necessarily implies the truth of the fact (John 3:14; 6:49-51). Stephen repeats almost word for word the history of Abraham's miraculous call, the birth of Isaac, Jacob, and the twelve Patriarchs, the miraculous circumstances of the Exodus, and the giving of the Law (Acts 7).
Furthermore Paul compares the first and last Adam, and refers to the creation of the former from the dust of the earth (1 Cor. 15:21, 47, &c.), and to the creation of the woman (1 Cor. 11:7-9). He also refers to the temptation by the serpent, and the transgression of the woman, as real history (2 Cor. 11:3; 1 Tim. 2:13, 14); and in Rom. 5:12 he founds an argument upon the fact that death entered by sin. In Rom. 4:19 he refers to the miraculous conception and birth of Isaac, and in 9:10-13, to the election of Jacob and the rejection of Esau, as true history. He makes the Passover the ground of an exhortation to holiness (1 Cor. 5:7, 8) and presses upon the attention of the Corinthians (10:1-3) the passage through the Red Sea, the guidance of the pillar and cloud, as well as the miraculous supply of water; and upon that most miraculous trait in the history of the manna, that he that had gathered much had nothing over, and he that had gathered little had no lack, he founds directions respecting the exercise of charity (2 Cor. 8:15). In 1 Cor. 10:8 he refers to Baal Peor; and in 2 Cor. 3:13, to the miraculous glory in the countenance of Moses. He evidently receives the whole as inspired, authentic, and authoritative; holy, just, and good; a schoolmaster unto Christ; when the one object of his life, to preach justification by faith without the law, would naturally have led him to depreciate its authority, if he had not been instructed by the Spirit to receive it as a divine revelation.
Again, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chap. 11, reference is plainly made to the Mosaic history from Cain and Abel to the passage of the Red Sea, as well as to the circumstances of awe and majesty under which the Law was given (chap. 12:18-21); to the wanderings and death of the rebellious Israelites (chap. 3:7-19), and the early institution of the Sabbath.
St. James, it is clear, refers to the offering of Isaac (2:21); and St. Peter points to the example of Sarah (1 Peter 3:6), to the deliverance of Noah (2 Peter 2:5, 9, 15); the destruction of Sodom; and the dumb ass rebuking the madness of the prophet.
These direct references, not now to speak of the numberless allusions to the Pentateuch in all the writings of the New Testament, prove that Christ, and the apostles to whom He gave the Spirit to guide them into all truth, did not accommodate themselves to the popular belief of the Jews; but knew, and heartily believed in, the truth, the divine origin and Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. Christ's omniscience and the working of the Spirit of Truth in the apostles are sufficient warrant for the faith of every Christian man. Whether he can solve difficulties or not, he has the infallible testimony of Christ and His inspired apostles, and that is an answer to all objectors. He feels that he cannot reject the Pentateuch without renouncing his faith in his Savior. Christ Himself has stated the indissoluble connection between faith in the Pentateuch and faith in Himself. “If ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?”
Bishop Colenso has proved in his own person the truth of the Savior's appeal. He first rejects the Pentateuch; he then robs Christ of His Deity, by denying His Omniscience. According to him, Christ's knowledge as to “the authorship and age of the different portions of the Pentateuch” did not “surpass that of the most pious and learned of His nation." In perfect consistency with these sentiments, when he rejects Moses and the Pentateuch, he does not ask us in order to fill up the aching void, to fall back upon Christ and the Gospels, but upon the theology of the Sikh Gooroos, and other heathen, “who had no Pentateuch or Bible to teach” them. And this is in fact the drift of the new theology, to bring us back to scientific heathenism. Bishop Colenso has spoken out what others have been mumbling in dark sentences. But whilst it is possible to contrast the condition of Christendom with that of the Hindus, the Chinese of the present day, or the great nations of classical antiquity—the republic of Moses with the republic of Plato—the power of Christ's doctrine with the effects of the teaching of Socrates—we think it more agreeable to reason, as well as to piety, to refuse the new heathenizing theories; to abide by the old catholic doctrine, and hold fast the faith once delivered to the saints. [We are indebted to the late pious and learned Alexander 11I'Caul, D.D. for this masterly refutation of these shallow attacks borrowed from German sources by deluded Englishmen, as apposite to-day as more than forty years ago in his Examination of Bp. Colenso's Difficulties (London, Bivingtons, Waterloo Place).—Ed. B.T.]