than "Joseph's" interviews with his family; ' — indeed, the whole poem is a marvellous one, an episode which forms a grand termination to the book, I might almost say the epic, of Genesis.

In chap. xlix, (24,)—in the "prophecy of Jacob," is to be seen the reason why the name of the father of the "Messiah" must be must be "Foseph." "Jacob" says:"From thence," i.e. from "Joseph," "is the shepherd, the stone of Israel;" — i.e., according to the Rabbins, the Messiah. The later predominance of the great tribe of Yehudah or "Judah," over the other tribes, made it impossible that the Messiah should spring from either Ephraim or Manasseh, the two tribes supposed to represent "Joseph;" — he must be of the "royal" tribe of “Judah.” The only way, then, by which this bit of the "prophecy," that of his coming from "Foseph," could be "fulfilled," was, by a quibble, to make the name of his actual or earthly father," Joseph." Thus he could at once be of the "royal house" of David, and come from "Joseph."

This early "prophecy" certainly never meant to indicate "Judah,”—the fourth son of the despised or “hated" Leah, but Yoseph, the favorite and long the youngest son, one of the two youngest, the sons of the beloved and long-barren Rachel, -as the ancestor of the promised "Shepherd" or "Deliverer." Verse 10 has been incorrectly translated. The true reading is now conceded

1 See Brugsch," History of Egypt," also "Aus dem Orient," by same author, for the edict whereby Meneptah the First, a predecessor of him of the Exodus, invited the Shasu tribes on his border, who had theretofore been excluded by the fortified line of posts, and who may be supposed to include that remnant of the Hebrews represented in Genesis under the character of the family of Joseph, to enter Egypt and dwell in the Sethroitic nome, North-eastern Delta, the "Goshen" of Genesis, "under the protection of Pharaoh, who is a sun to all nations."

2 It is by no means clear, however, that these expressions really refer to the Messiah, or to "Christ;". on the contrary, they evidently refer to the "Deliverer" Yehoshua, Hoshea or "Joshua," who was of the tribe of "Ephraim,” (Num. xiii. 8,) and consequently descended from the favorite younger son of "Joseph." This is one of the many instances in which Jewish and Christian authors have, from an early period, wrested the plain meaning of Hebrew "prophecies," to make them applicable to the "Messiah," and to Yaishooa as the Messiah. I shall hereafter revert to "Joseph" as name of Christ's putative father.

to be, "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until THOU COME TO Shiloh ;"- that is, the rule or sceptre of Judah shall extend as far as to Shiloh, (Judg. xxi. 12, etc.,) a wellknown town or village in Shemuel's days. "And unto him," that is, unto Fudah, "shall the gathering of the people be," in other words, Judah shall be the most numerous of the tribes, which it was in David's and Solomon's times. This correction makes the subsequent verses, unintelligible if applied to the "Messiah," perfectly intelligible. "Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice vine; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes," etc., are obviously figures, (and very happy ones,) of the extreme fertility of the Judæan vineyards, the allotment of "Judah." It is equally plain that this part of the "prophecy" could not have been composed until after the settlement of the tribes in Palestine. The favorite incident of a younger son taking precedence of his elder brother, is once more repeated in "Jacob's" preference of "Ephraim" to "Manasseh."

It is very striking to observe the conformity to Egyptian customs indicated in chaps. xlix. and 1. "Joseph" divines with a cup as did the Egyptian priests, and the embalmment of, and mourning for, "Israel" and "Joseph" are strictly Egyptian.

The invitation into Egypt of the family of "Joseph" is probably an allegory of the real invitation by Meneptah I. to the Shasu tribes on the border, to settle in Egypt. This colonization disposed of the balance of the Hebrew nomads, re-uniting them in "Goshen."

CHAPTER XI.

THE HEBREWS IN EGYPT.- MOSHAI AND THE EXODUS.

THE second of the Hebrew sacred books, "Exodus," whether or no it be by the same compiler as "Genesis," certainly exhibits, at least to the point where the Hebrews. leave Egypt, a great falling-off in literary merit in comparison with the latter. Its chief characteristic is enor mous exaggeration of the scanty framework of facts about which the legendary envelope has incrusted itself; an exaggeration designed to magnify the importance of the Hebrew race.

Gen. xlvi. 26 says: "All the souls that came with Jacob into Egypt, which came out of his loins, besides Jacob's sons' wives, all the souls were threescore and six;"

(27) "And the sons of Joseph, which were born him in Egypt, were two souls: all the souls of the house of Facob, which came into Egypt, were threescore and ten.”

The favorite or sacred number, seventy, is made up by adding to the sixty-six children, grandchildren, and greatgrandchildren, (eleven sons, one daughter, forty-nine grandsons, four great-grandsons, and one granddaughter,) who "came out of Facob's loins" and entered Egypt with him, "Joseph" and his two sons, who were already there, and "Facob" himself, who may, perhaps, properly be numbered with the "house of Facob." But the "Exodus" compiler, in copying "Genesis," (and this copying, in itself, is some indication of another hand at work,) sets out with the obvious blunder of saying, (chap. i. 5,)

"All the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls," whereas the whole number of descendants of the three generations, including two who died in "Canaan," is seventy-one, of whom sixty-nine entered Egypt.

He next commits a preposterous exaggeration in verses 7. 8, 9, in making the offspring of these seventy people, in five or at most six generations, - (between "Kohath," one of the seventy, and "Moses" and "Aaron," whom he makes his grandsons, chap. vi. 18-20, there were only two generations,) - already, at Moses' birth, — outnum ber the population of Egypt, an empire, which, taking the low estimate of Lepsius, had already enjoyed a settled and historic civilization for twenty-five hundred years.

(7) "And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them.

(8) "Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph.

(9) "And he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we." Now the Egyptians at this time must have numbered many millions.'

We need not pause to inquire of the apologists by what miracle this incredible increase was effected; whether Yahve shortened the period of gestation of the Hebrew women, or enabled them to produce young in masses, like fish; but it will be well to examine other statements of the authors of "Genesis" and "Exodus," relative 'to Hebrew fertility, to see how they tally with this

one.

The number of the sons of Yahakobh's sons, given in Genesis, (xlvi. 8-27,) appears to be intended to comprise the whole number to which they were parents, whether born before or after the entry into Egypt. This is ren

Memphis and "hundred-gated Thebes" had long been built, and were little less than Babylon in size; many other large cities studded the valley of the Nile, which teemed with a dense agricultural population.

dered plain by the fact that ten sons are set down to "Benjamin,” as forming part of the seventy "souls of the house of Jacob, which came into Egypt." Yet "Benjamin" is described as a lad at the time of the entry into Egypt, (see speech of Yehudah, xliv. 18–34). His sons must therefore have been reckoned as still "in his loins," and thus coming with him into Egypt, though born after his arrival. No additional children are given to Reuben, Simeon, or Levi, in the Levite genealogy of the Exodus, Exod. vi. 14-25.

Two women are mentioned by name among the "seventy," (this number including Yahakobh in one account,including only his offspring in the other); two women only, to sixty-eight men. This suggests a Procrustes-like adjustment of the list to the needs of the sacred number seventy; this number was "all," we are told, that "came out of the loins of Jacob," "all the souls" of the "house of Jacob."

I

Yisrael himself has twelve sons and one daughter; in the second generation, "Reuben" has four sons; Simeon, six; Levi, three; Judah five, though he brings only three with him, two having been "killed" by Yahvè in "Canaan" because they "displeased" him; Issachar, four; Zebulun, three; Gad, seven; Asher, five children, including one daughter; Joseph, two sons; Benjamin, ten sons; Dan, one son, and Naphtali, four sons. Shaul is Simeon's son "by a Canaanitish woman ;" Pharez, Judah's illegitimate son by Tamar. Altogether fifty-four children in the second generation; - average to each family, four and a half. In the third generation, (see Levite genealogy,) Gershon has two sons; Kohath four sons, and

1 It has been suggested, with much probability, that this number, twelve, with an additional one, arose from a "sun-myth" of time-divisions ;- the solar year of thir teen lunar, twelve calendar months, and the heavens, with their twelve divisions of the Zodiacal signs; - which were metaphorically styled the "sons" of the "heavenfather," now become personified in Yisrael. Compare the figures under which the tribes are described in the "prophecy of Israel," with the several "signs." The myth came from Phoenicia with the name.