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"God, a mighty and a terrible, which regardeth not persons,

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nor taketh reward. He doth execute the judgment of the "fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him "food and raiment. Love ye therefore the stranger; for ye "were strangers in the land of Egypt. Thou shalt fear the Lord "thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, "and swear by his name. He is thy praise, and he is thy God, "that hath done for thee these great and terrible things which "thine eyes have seen. Thy fathers went down into Egypt with "threescore and ten persons: and now the Lord thy God hath "made thee as the stars of heaven for multitude. Therefore "shalt thou love the Lord thy God, and keep his charge, and "his statutes, and his judgments, and his commandments alway." Thus on a REVIEW of the topics we have discussed, it appears that the Jewish Law promulgated the great principles of moral duty in the Decalogue, with a solemnity suited to their high pre-eminence that it enjoined love to God with the most unceasing solicitude, and love to our neighbour, as extensively and forcibly, as the peculiar design of the Jewish economy, and the peculiar character of the Jewish people, would permit: that it impressed the deepest conviction of God's requiring, not mere external observances, but heartfelt piety, well regulated desires, and active benevolence: that it taught sacrifice could not obtain pardon without repentance, or repentance without reformation and restitution: that it described circumcision itself and by consequence, every other legal rite, as designed to typify and inculcate internal holiness, which alone could render men acceptable to God: that it represented the love of God as designed to act as a practical principle, stimulating to the constant and sincere cultivation of purity, mercy and truth: and that it enforced all these principles and precepts by sanctions the most likely to operate powerfully on minds unaccustomed to abstract speculations and remote views, even by temporal rewards and punishments; the assurance of which was confirmed from the immediate experience of similar rewards and punishments, dispensed to their enemies and to themselves, by that supernatural Power which had delivered the Hebrew nation out of Egypt, conducted them through the wilderness, planted them in the land of Canaan, regulated their government, distributed their possessions, and to which alone they could look to obtain new bless

ings, or secure those already enjoyed. From all this I derive another presumptive argument for the divine authority of the Mosaic Code; and I contend, that a moral system thus perfect, promulgated at so early a period, to such a people, and enforced by such sanctions as no human power could undertake to execute, strongly bespeaks a divine original.

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LECTURE III

The Penal Code of the Jewish Law conformable to its moral and religious system-Capital crimes-Idolatry, and the various crimes connected with it-Strict prohibition of human sacrifices-Supplementary sanctions, presupposing a special Providence-Jewish constitution a Theocracy-Severity against idolatry justified-Jewish Law prohibits all impurity-yet not unnaturally austere-Disobedience to parents how punished-Wisdom of the Mosaic Law, respecting murder and manslaughter-with respect to slavery and false witnesses-Principle of retaliation explained-Equity of punishment for the invasion of property-Mildness of Laws towards slaves-Form of trial-Consistence of the Religious and Penal Code.

EXODUS, xxi. 14.

"If a man come presumptuously upon his neighbour, to slay him with guile: thou shalt take him from mine altar, that he die. may

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In the last Lecture we reviewed the Moral Precepts of the Jewish Law, and the practical tendency of the Jewish Ritual; which appeared worthy of that divine original to which they are ascribed. But these religious commands and general principles of morality, however useful and important, could not alone be sufficient to form the character, and regulate the conduct of the nation, if unsupported by civil laws. And as the entire constitution of the Jews, civil and religious, was attributed to the same divine authority; in order to show it was not unworthy of such a sacred origin, it is necessary to examine how far the PENAL CODE* of the Jewish Law was conformable to the principles of its religious system, and the moral instructions of its Legislator.

In examining the Mosaic penal code, we find that at the head of its capital crimes was placed IDOLATRY. +Not only the act

* Consult on this subject Maimonides More Nevochim, Pars III. cap. xli.; and Spencer's Dissertatio de Theocratia Judaica, præcipue cap. vi. p. 204. + Vide Maimonides More Nevochim, cap. xxxii.

itself, but every attempt to seduce men to it, and every mode of conduct which presupposed or obviously led to it. Against this offence the strictest rigour was exercised: no partiality for the dearest relative was to induce concealment; no dignity to silence accusation; no multitude of offenders to deter from punishment. "If (says the Lawgiver) thy brother, the son of thy mother, or "thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy "friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, "Let us go and serve other gods; thou shat not consent unto "him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, "neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: but "thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him "to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. "And if thou shalt hear say in one of thy cities, Certain men, "the children of Belial, are gone out from among you, and "have withdrawn the inhabitants of their city, saying, Let us "go and serve other gods, then shall ye enquire, and ask dili'gently; and behold, if it be truth, and the thing certain, that "such abomination is wrought among you; thou shalt smite the "inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, destroying "it utterly, and all that is therein, and the cattle thereof, with "the edge of the sword. And thou shalt gather all the spoils "of it into the midst of the streets thereof; and shalt burn "with fire the city, and all the spoil thereof, every whit, for "the Lord thy God: and it shall be an heap for ever, it shall "never be built again.""

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One species of idolatry is marked with peculiar abhorrence, that of giving their seed unto Moloch, or burning their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods. This the Deity directs to be punished with death: if the punishment is neglected, he denounces that he will himself execute vengeance, as well on the offender, as on those who designedly suffered him to escape with impunity: thus MARKING WITH PECULIAR ABHORRENCE THE EXECRABLE CUSTOM OF HUMAN SACRIFICES,+ which, to the disgrace of reason and humanity, so long polluted the earth; even in nations and periods which we are accustomed to honour

* Deut. xiii. 6, &c.

+Vide Jewish Letters to Voltaire, Part III. Let. vi. Vol. II. p. 68; and Findlay's Answer to Voltaire, Part II. ch. ii. sect. vi. and vii. p. 137; and Doddridge, Lect. cxlviii. sect. 8.

with the epithets of enlightened and civilized.* Any imitation of such horrid rites in the worship of the true God, the Law thus expressly forbids: “When the Lord thy God shall cast out the "nations from before thee, take heed to thyself that thou en"quire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve "their gods? even so will I do likewise. Thou shalt not do so "unto the Lord thy God: for every abomination of the Lord “which he hateth, have they done unto their gods; for even "their sons and their daughters have they burnt in the fire to "their gods."+

On the same principle of preserving the allegiance due to the supreme Jehovah, resorting or pretending to resort to supernatural agency, in order to discover or to control future events, as it implied a dependence on inferior spirits, was a violation of allegiance to the true and only God, who declared himself the peculiar guardian of this people, ever ready to assist them in any distress, and communicate to them any necessary information as to futurity, when piously and humbly consulted according to the regulations‡ of his Law. Hence those who had (as they asserted or supposed) familiar spirits, those who practised enchantments or witchcraft, were to be punished with death.

On the same principle, the blasphemer, and the deliberate

* Vide supra, Part II. Lect. I. pp. 195, 196.

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+ Deut. xii. 29, &c.-Compare with this text the energy with which Jeremiah, vii. 29–34. reprobates the Jews for transgressing its prohibition: "The Lord," (says the Prophet) hath rejected and forsaken the generation "of his wrath; for the children of Judah have done evil in my sight, saith "the Lord: they have set their abominations in the house which is called "by my name, to pollute it. And they have built the high places of Tophet, "which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, TO BURN THEIR SONS AND હૈદ THEIR DAUGHTERS IN THE FIRE; WHICH I COMMANDED THEM NOT, NEITHER ་་ CAME IT INTO MY HEART. Therefore behold, the days come, saith the Lord, "that it shall no more be called Tophet, nor the valley of the son of Hinnom, "but the valley of slaughter: for they shall bury in Tophet till there be no "place. And the carcases of this people shall be meat for the fowls of the "heaven, and for the beasts of the earth; and none shall fray them away. "Then will I cause to cease from the city of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride: for the land shall be desolate." Yet, notwithstanding the direct prohibition of the legislator, the condemnation of the Prophet, and the interposition of Providence to punish the offering of human sacrifices, infidel writers, particularly Voltaire, have had the hardihood to charge the Mosaic Law with demanding, or at least permitting them. How unreasonably, vide the works referred to in the last note. ‡ Vide Numbers ix. 7 and 8, and xxvii. 21. compared with Joshua, ix. 14, Judges, i. 1. and 2 Sam. v. 23. And consult Lowman on the Civil Government of the Hebrews, ch. xi.; and Spencer's Dissertatio Septima de Urim et Thummim.

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