INTRODUCTION.

1. Title, Author, Scope, &c.

THE designation given in our version to the second book of the Pentateuch, viz. ‘Exodus,' is derived directly from the Greek sodos, exodos, varying only by the Latinised termination us for os. The import of the term is that of going forth, emigration, departure, and is significant of the principal event recorded in it, to wit, the departure of the children of Israel from Egypt. According to Hebrew usage, though no where in the text itself, it is called 7 veëlleh shemoth, and these are the names, from the initial words of the book. This phrase, however, is sometimes abbreviated by the Jewish writers to the simple term w shemoth, the names.

That the authorship of this book is rightly ascribed to Moses, is proved by the arguments which go to ascertain the entire Pentateuch as the production of his hand. These are so fully detailed in our Introduction to Genesis, that it will be unnecessary to repeat them here. But we have in addition still more explicit evidence on this point. Moses testifies of himself, Ex. 24. 4, that he 'wrote all the words of the Lord,' commanded him on a certain occasion, which words are contained in this book. Our Savior, also, when citing, Mark 12. 26, a certain passage from this book, calls it 'the book of Moses.' And again, Luke 20. 37, he says, 'Now that the dead are raised, even Moses showed at the bush.' It is moreover to be observed that the books of the Old Testament are spoken of in the New, Luke 15. 31, as divided into two grand classes, 'Moses and the proph ets,' and in v. 16, 'the law and the prophets;' so that all the Scriptures, besides 'the prophets,' were written by Moses; in other words, the four books of the 'law' were written by him. There remains, therefore, no room for doubt that Moses wrote the book of Exodus, and if any thing more were necessary to establish its canonical character, it would be found in the fact mentioned by Rivet, that twenty-five passages are quoted from it by Christ and his Apostles in express terms, and nineteen as to the sense.

As to the general scope of the book, it is plainly to preserve the memorial of the great facts of the national history of Israel in its earlier periods, to wit, their deliverance from Egypt, the kindness and faithfulness of God in their subsequent preservation in the wilderness, the delivery of the Law, and the establishment of a new and peculiar system of worship. All the particulars connected with these several events are given in the fullest and most interesting detail, and in such a manner as to compel in the reader the recognition of an overruling Providence at every step of the narration. There is perhaps no book in the Bible that records

such an illustrious series of miracles, or that keeps the divine agency so con stantly before the mind's eye. Nor are the moral lessons which it teaches lessprominent and striking. We find the Apostle Paul, 1 Cor. 10. 11, after having adverted to the course of Israel's experience as a nation, immediately adding, 'Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples; and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.' No sooner had he adverted to their privileges than he describes their chastisements, as inflicted to the intent that we should not so imitate their sin, as to provoke a visitation of the same vengeance. Indeed their whole history forms one grand prediction and outline of human redemption, and of the lot of the church. In the servitude of Israel we behold a lively image of the bondage to sin and Satan in which the unregenerate are held captive. In the deliverance from Egypt is foreshown their redemption from this horrid thraldom; and the journey through the wilderness is a graphic program of a Christian's journey through life to his final inheritance in the heavenly Canaan. So also, without minute specification, the manna of which the Israelites ate, and the rock of which they drank, as well as the brazen serpent by which they were healed, were severally typical of corresponding particulars under the Christian economy. Add to this, that under the sacrifices, and ceremonial service of the Mosaic institute, were described the distinguishing features of the more spiritual worship of the Gospel.

It is necessary to bear in mind, if we would adequately understand the drift of the peculiar institutions which we find prescribed in the pages of this book, that the grand design of Heaven was to form the Israelites into a distinct and independent people, and to unite them in one great political and ecclesiastical body of whom Jehovah himself was to be the ackowledged head, constituting what is familiarly known as the Jewish Theocracy. But upon this unique kind of polity, which never had a parallel in the case of any other nation on earth, we have reserved a more extended train of remark in the Introduction to the Second Volume of this work, where the reader will find the whole subject amply discussed.

§ 2. Time occupied by the History, Divisions, &c.

The period embraced by the history will be seen from the following computation:

From death of Joseph to birth of Moses,
From birth of Moses to departure from Egypt,
From departure from Egypt to Tabernacle erected,

Years.

60

81

1

142

Some make the period from the death of Joseph to the birth of Moses' to be 63 years, which will increase the sum total to 145 years, but the difference is too slight to make it necessary to state the grounds of either calculation. It is to be observed, however, that nearly the whole book is occupied in the detail of the events which occurred in the last year of the period above mentioned.

According to the Jewish arrangement this book is divided into eleven 1948 parashoth, or larger divisions, and twenty 7 siderim, or smaller divisions

In our Bibles it is divided into forty chapters, which, according to the different subjects treated, may be classified as follows:

I. The oppression of the Israelites in Egypt, ch. 1.

II. The birth and early life of Moses, ch. 2.

III. The legation of Moses, ch. 3, 4. 1—29.

IV. The mission of Moses, and the infliction of the first eight plagues,

ch. 4. 29-10. 21.

V. The institution of the Passover, ch. 12. 1-21.

VI. The conclusion of the ten plagues, ch. 10. 21—12. 21—31.

VII. The exodus, ch. 12. 31-37, and 40-42.

VIII. The wanderings in the wilderness, from Rameses in Egypt to Mount
Sinai, ch. 12. 37-40 to ch. 19. 1, 2.

IX. Moses called up into the mount, and the preparation of the people
for the renewing of the Covenant, ch. 19.

X. The moral law delivered, ch. 20.

XI. The judicial and ceremonial law delivered, ch. 21–31.

XII. The idolatry of the Israelites, and their punishment with the re-
newal of the Covenant, ch. 32-34.

XIII. The offerings for and the construction of the tabernacle, ch. 35-39.
XIV. The tabernacle erected, and covered by the cloud of the divine
Presence, ch. 40.

§ 3. Commentators.

Throughout the great mass of biblical criticism and exposition embodied in our own and foreign languages, there are comparatively few works devoted to the book of Exodus alone; nor is it always from these that the student or commentator can expect to derive the most valuable aid. For the most part, the commentaries which embrace either the whole Scriptures, or extended portions of them, are the store-houses from whence the materials of exegetical illustration are to be sought. Of these the Critici Sacri, the Synopsis of Pool, the Scholia of Rosenmuller, the Annotations of Leclerc, Ainsworth, and Patrick, will always hold the chief rank in the estimation of the scholar, next to the Ancient Versions and Targums contained in Walton's Polyglot. These accordingly have been always at hand, as a constant tribunal of reference, through every stage of the progress of the present work. But it is obvious at a glance, that so vast is the variety of subjects necessarily brought under review in the course of this book, that no one class of authorities will by any means suffice for its adequate elucidation. Philology, Geography, Antiquities, History, Architecture, the arts of Sculpture, Engraving, Dyeing, Weaving, Embroidering, to say nothing of the peculiar system of Law, Jurisprudence, and Worship, enjoined upon the Israelites, all prefer their claims for more or less of illustration at the hands of him who assumes the task of expounding in order the chapters of Exodus. It would scarcely be possible, therefore, to enumerate all the works which have gone to constitute the apparatus for the present undertaking, without citing the entire list of biblical helps appended to the Introduction to the Notes on Genesis, besides a great multitude of others which are there omitted. In fact, we know of no book in the Bible

that demands so great a diversity of material for its exposition as the second book of the Pentateuch. How far the various and voluminous sources of information, to which the author has had access, have been made available to his grand purpose in the execution of the present work, is a question that awaits the decision of his readers. A very minute specification might invite a more critical comparison, and present a more palpable contrast, between his advantages and his achievement, than would redound to the credit of his work. At the same time, he cannot in candor confess to any conscious lack of effort to do the utmost justice to every part of his self-imposed labor-if that may be called a labor, which has proved, from beginning to end, an unfailing source of pleasure.

The following catalogue is not given as complete, but merely as indicating, in addition to those already specified, the most important collateral aids to a full critical and ethical developement of the sense of this remarkable book.

I. Jewish and Christiano-Rabbinical Commentators.

R. SALOMONIS JARCHI, dicti RASCHI, Commentarius Hebraicus, in quinque Libros Mosis, Latine versus atque Notis Critics ae philologicis illustratus a JOH. FREDERICO BREITHAUPTO. Gothæ, 1713. 4to.

Jarchi, or Raschi, as he is usually called from combining, according to Hebrew usage, the three initial letters of his name (), is generally placed by the Jews at the head of their commentators. They call him the great light and 'the holy mouth,' from the value attached to his learned comments on the Law and the Prophets. These I have found occasionally to contain some happy verbal criticisms, and in the account of the construction of the tabernacle, in par ticular, his remarks are plain, common-sense, and valuable; but in the main he indulges in the characteristic silly conceits of the Rabbins, and his style, with all the aid it derives from Breithaupt's excellent notes and paraphrases, is so ob scure as to render him of little service to one who cares not for words without meaning. He was a native of Troyes in Champagne, and died, A. D. 1180.

R. ISAACI ABARBANELIS Commentarius in Pentateuchum Mosis, curâ Henrici J. Van Banshuisen. Hanoviæ, 1710. Folio.

Rabbi Abarbanel, or Abravanel, as the name is sometimes written, was a Portuguese Jew, who flourished in the fifteenth century, and wrote commentaries on the Pentateuch, the whole of the Prophets, and some other books of Scripture. He also is highly esteemed by his countrymen, and though an exceedingly bitter enemy of Christianity, yet Father Simon says of him, 'We may, in my opinion, reap more advantage in Scripture-translation from R. Isaac Abravanel, than from any other Jew. He has written in an elegant and perspicuous style, although he is too copious and sometimes affects rhetoric more than strict fidelity to the sacred text. As the volume abovementioned came into my hands only at a very advanced stage of my own work, I have been unable to make any direct use of it. Through the medium of Rosenmuller and Cartwright, however, his remarks have occasionally found their way into my Notes.

CHRISTOPHORI CARTWRIGHT Electa Targumico-Rabbinica; sive Annotationes in Exodum ex triplici Targum. Lond. 1653. 8vo.

This is a valuable work, purely critical, made up almost entirely of materials drawn from the Rabbinical commentaries and the Chaldee and other ancient versions. It is used much oftener than quoted by Rosenmuller.

AINSWORTH'S (H.) Annotations upon the Second Book of Moses, called Exodus. Lond. 1639. Fol.

This is the second part of the author's invaluable work on the Pentateuch. It is rich in pertinent citations from Jewish sources, and in that kind of verbal criticism which consists in laying open the usus loquendi of the original is entirely without a parallel.

LIGHTFOOT'S Handful of Gleanings out of the Book of Exodus. Works (Pitman's Ed. in 13 vols.), Vol. II. p. 351–409.

1

This is a collection of remarks critical, chronological, historical, and talmudical upon detached portions of Exodus. As in all Lightfoot's works, some of his observations are of considerable value, others of very little.

II. Christian Commentators.

WILLETT'S Hexapla in Exodum; that is, a sixfold commentary upon the Book of Exodus, according to the Method propounded in the Hexapla upon Genesis. Lond. 1608. Folio.

A voluminous and tedious Commentary, but not without its value, especially as embodying and usually confuting the interpretations of the Romanists. He compares also the various versions and deduces doctrinal and moral inferences.

RIVETI'S (ANDR.) Opera Theologica. Rotterdam, 1651. 2 Tom. Folio.

The first of these huge volumes contains the author's Exercitations on Genesis and Exodus. They are very elaborate and generally judicious, but marked with the prolixity of the seventeenth century. At the present day they are merely commentaries for commentators.

HOPKINS' (WM.) Corrected Translation of Exodus, with Notes critical and explanatory. Lond. 1784. 4to.

Said to be a work of little value.

III. Miscellaneous and Illustrative Works.

PICTORIAL BIBLE with Wood-cuts and Original Notes. Lond. 1836-8. 3 vols. Roy. 8vo.

For a character of this very valuable work see the Preface to my Notes on Genesis. The Pictorial History of Palestine,' now in course of publication by the same author, is a work of similar character, and abounding with rich materials for illustrating the Old Testament history.

BUDDICOM'S Christian Exodus, or the Deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, practically considered in a series of Discourses. Lond. 1839. 2 vols. 12mo.

BAHR's Symbolik des Mosaischen Cultus (Symbolism of the Mosaic Worship). Heidelb. 1837-9. 8vo.

An exceedingly curious and valuable work, entering into the most profound researches respecting the symbolical character of the Tabernacle and Temple ritual.

GRAVES' (RICH.) Lectures on the Four Last Books of the Pentateuch. Lond. 1815, 2 vols. 8vo.

FABER'S (G. S.) Hora Mosaicæ; or a Dissertation on the Credibility and Theology of the Pentateuch. Lond. 1818. 2 vols. 8vo.

The leading object of this work is to establish the authenticity of the Pentateuch, by pointing out the coincidence of its facts and statements with the remains of profane antiquity, and their connexion with Christianity. It is a pro duction of great value to the biblical student.