to last for ever? But in truth seasons of the deepest extremity, such as the Egyptian bondage of the Israelites, are the only times when man learns clearly to recognise the infinite might of the hidden powers of the spirit, and with no other weapons than the intangible and invisible armour of his soul to struggle out from the deepest despair to the purest elevation;' as Job, the true heroic exemplar of the striving people of Israel, has no prospect of a happy turn in his fate, until in the deepest extremity of his soul, he springs up from his despair, as if at the touch of an angel's wing, and becomes conscious of the might and eternity of his spirit, and of the true God, its eternal refuge.2 b.) The second truth presupposed in the fundamental idea is, that to the human spirit, rightly apprehended, the Divine Spirit -the God who created the world and works in it-is truly kindred, but infinitely superior; and that thus the real God is purely spirit, and yet at the same time calls to himself and seeks to deliver his image and noblest creature, man: thus vanishes the Egyptian and all other heathen polytheism, and the strictest opposition to it becomes possible.

c.) But, finally, it is not these two propositions by themselves which will bring the true deliverance; rather, he only who with his own spirit enters into this Eternal Spirit, and thereby becomes inwardly a new spiritual (prophetic) man, is truly delivered by the Divine grace, preventing him, and calling him to itself. And thus springs up that great fundamental thought that only the pure spiritual God is the true Redeemer of all those who desire to be no more estranged from him; a thought which first arose in Egypt under Moses; then, as above detailed, was sealed by the wondrous rescue at the Red Sea; and afterwards became the foundation stone of the whole community of Israel, as well as the sole vivifying impulse of all devotion, and the profoundest idea contained in all the books of the Old Testament.

In fact this fundamental thought, the corner-stone of every true religion, is a doctrine which bore within it power to unhinge the ancient world. He whose spirit finds its true place in the Eternal Spirit, in that act receives an infinite power, which raises him above the world and time, and suffers him to find rest only

No prophet has seized this idea with greater clearness than Hosea, the great prophet of love; who lays the greatest stress on the fact that in times of old Jahve found his people at the very moment of their deepest distress in the terrible desert, and brought them up as his own child; but now when they had become faithless to him, he was driving

them back into the same desert, there to find their God again; Hos. ii. 16 [14], ix. 10, xi. 1, 3, xiii. 3, 4; compare (from about the same period) Deut. xxxii. 10, and (from a later period) Jer. ii. 2 sqq., xxxi. 2, sqq.; Ez. xvi. 4 sqq.; Is. liv. 6.

2 See the article in Zeller's Theologische Jahrbücher for 1843, p. 711 sqq.

where the most blessed contentment dwells in union with an unfailing zeal to participate in the divine energy. Heathenism depends essentially upon the slowness of the human mind to recognise and hold fast divine truth in its purity; a slowness which having once crept in extends more and more, and knows no end but in utter destruction. But with that fundamental thought of God the Deliverer, there arise within the human soul at once the ability and the courage to recognise all the truth of the Divine Spirit who confronts it, and to open itself to his living influence. And this is a life which, when once it has struck vigorous root among men, can never again perish, but advances with ever multiplying fruits. Thus even here, in this earliest time, there arises an infinite truth, which, developing itself further, could not fail in the end to overthrow all heathendom and usher in our modern age. But whereas among all the other nations there was not as yet one individual who grasped that thought, or was willing to take it alone for his guide, here it not only exerts a living force over Moses, but becomes at the same time the possession and the innermost life of a whole people. Here then we perceive in its germ that which made the history of the ancient people of Israel truly a world-history: that while among other nations that torpidity of soul, Paganism, was assuming more and more rigid forms, until it became quite incurable by the few scattered spirits among them who looked deeper and attempted bolder things, among the Israelites, even in a relatively very early time, and before the heathenish tendencies in them could be fully unfolded, that freedom and boldness of spirit grew up, which, after once beholding the purity and power of the divine light, can never wholly weary of turning towards it a longer and fuller gaze.

How deep and firm was the hold of this primary idea on the national mind is nowhere more clearly shown than in the fact that the whole narrative of the departure from Egypt, as it shaped itself in the thought of the Israelites (see Exod. i.-xv.), is virtually nothing but a history of the true Deliverance. For the contents of that narrative are essentially this :-the spiritual God can truly deliver only when the divine truth respecting deliverance is present (through the true Prophet, for example, as its instrument), and the man or nation, hearing it, has at the decisive moment the right obedience and faith. And as the Israelites began their new course with this consciousness of the true deliverance, and thus beheld in that history the birth of their own higher life; the record of it also

must be the brightest mirror of the spiritual truth of deliverance, the type of every similar struggle for deliverance, and consequently of all real salvation. If, however, it is the later prophetical Narrators that give the grandest and most powerful descriptions of the event, it is because in the course of centuries the community had learnt to recognise more and more deeply the truth which thus lay at the root of their own existence. And we may well affirm that this great First Prophet and his work-the true deliverance through Jahve-first found a completely worthy and satisfactory delineator in the culminating period of the renewed prophetical power in Israel, that is in the ninth and eighth centuries.

But the more clearly this primary thought is seen to be infinite in its nature, the less can we expect it to receive at once a pure and perfect embodiment in any human being. For there is always a wide interval between the first germination of a truth and its highest development. Even purely intellectual truths (of mere science) are at first rather gazed at with surprise than viewed in their whole bearing and carried out to all their consequences. But a truth of purely religious nature-even the highest of that whole sphere -may by the light of its own necessity be at once perceived quite correctly with the spiritual eye, and men may begin to strive to live in it and to receive it more and more fully; and yet what a long course must be gone through before it is so fully developed even in a single heart, that the whole life serves to illustrate its beauty, and thus becomes its perfect exponent to others! Undoubtedly this is its true destiny, to attain which, without or even against the will of any individual men, is part of its essence and life; for every truth which has once arisen by its intrinsic power maintains its ground, and in spite of all obstacles advances to its goal. In this sense that ancient Mosaic age includes within it the Messianic, that is the Christian; not as comprehended by distinct consciousness or direct effort, but as realised through the inherent germinating force of the fundamental idea which here arose, and in its own time necessarily led to it. Thus every great movement in the history of the world appears as a link connecting two others in an immeasurable chain; distinctly closing some earlier vast development of human life upon the earth, and silently introducing a fresh evolution. While Jahveism' advances towards its goal in overthrowing Heathenism, it yet

We purposely adopt the term Jahveism as the antithesis to Christianity, rather than Mosaism, which according to p. 455 sq. is less appropriate.

embraces within itself, although at first scarcely visible even in the dimmest outline, a new goal, and therefore an end of its development; as Christianity again closes Mosaism, but at the same time foreshadows the end of its own history, and therein the commencement of a new one. But on this very account we cannot hold too firmly that the mighty and revolutionising thought with which Jahveism entered the world, at first appeared in it, not fully and completely realised, but merely foreshadowed and expected. And if this holds true of Jahveism during its whole course, it must be especially true of its early commencement, before it had developed itself, and thus begun to discern more clearly the goal which it was approaching, and to strive more strenuously for its attainment. There in that primeval time under Moses, did the infinite Truth cast its first bright beam upon the earth; and this beam penetrated so deeply into one portion of mankind that they would never suffer it to be taken from them again. But the dawning truth was yet too vast for one individual, and the whole series of centuries passed until Christ, before that one arrived in whom it became flesh and blood. For this reason those narratives are of such great value which show that not only the exalted brother and sister of Moses, Aaron and Miriam, but even the great Prophet and founder of the congregation himself, sometimes, although but seldom and exceptionally, failed to keep pure his faith in the spiritual God, and therefore could not be regarded as the perfect exemplar of Jahveism.' Thus, when that religion would present an historical example of the highest faith, it had to go back to the sacred period of the Patriarchal world, to Abraham (p. 288 sqq.); although, as Abraham properly belongs to a different religious development, this is not entirely satisfactory.

2) But here, where we perceive the limit which confines the new Jahve-religion at its very origin, we discover also distinct bounds within which the fundamental thought must restrict itself in order to maintain its own existence. Thus are produced a number of fixed forms, in which Jahveism henceforth appears; like earthly bodies which it can imbue with its own spirit.

a.) As this fundamental thought at first presents itself to man only as an intellectual idea, it comes to him in the form of a mere demand upon him-as a stern must,' requiring him to seek the spiritual God and no other. Had this thought been perfectly fulfilled in but one exemplar and become flesh and blood in him, that one, as a member of the community, 1 Num. xii., xx. 1–13, 23, 24, xxvii. 12–14.

would have at once become the true and eternal type of all, and thus the head of that community: and the thought having been thus distinctly realised in history, this realisation in one on behalf of all would impart to all the blessed trust and the ennobling faith, that they might become like him and be perfect themselves. But that one perfect type being wanting, thought and aspiration are ever carried back directly to him who only commands and compels-the pure spiritual God with his strict demands on man. Jahveism, therefore, in its further development, necessarily becomes the religion of the Divine demands on man, and therefore of Law. From this limitation Jahveism made immense efforts to break free, during the time of its freest development and most spiritual elevation—the age of the great Prophets; but without success, since every religion that remains, as it did, an essentially prophetical one is of necessity one of direct Divine command. So that when this characteristic of Jahveism had culminated during the third and last age of its existence, the New Testament was unquestionably right in placing the religion of the Old Testament chiefly under the category of Law.

Examining more closely the separate ideas which may be contained in this, we can distinguish the following three points. Not only the fundamental thought, but also every other purely spiritual or divine truth here forces itself directly or immediately upon us, because prophecy in its highest development becomes the mightiest instrument of spiritual activity. So here the eternally true God is always first foreboded, felt, apprehended by man immediately. He alone in his whole infinity stands over against man; and man knows and desires him alone to be his only Lord and God absolutely immediately, with no intervening medium. But then, secondly, this Immediateness naturally entails the use of Force, whereby the truth presses itself upon us, and must rule over us. Thirdly and lastly, then, the truth which thus comes to man will soon come to appear a mere externally imposed rigid Law, when once it is long established and the mere necessity of its observance is alone remembered. These three characteristics, which are present in greater or less degree, are shown by the progress of history to be the greatest dangers that the true religion has to surmount in order to supply the defects which cling to it from the

Prophets who call the people themselves as witnesses of the truth of their words, as Isaiah i. 18; Jer. ii. 31, and the Deuteronomist, who (xxx. 11 sqq.) shows how easy the Law really is for man,

and how nearly it concerns him, are already preparing the transition to Christianity, i. e. to a religion which regards the Divine will as not utterly extraneous and opposed to the human.