The Divine Origin of Revelation

In the preceding chapter we have demonstrated the credibility of the documents that embody the Christian Revelation. This Revelation appeared at a definite time in the history of the human race. Where did it come from?

The Vatican Council defines: “The same holy Mother Church holds and teaches … that it pleased His [i.e., God’s] wisdom and bounty to reveal Himself and the eternal decrees of His will to mankind by another and supernatural way, as the Apostle says: ‘God, having spoken on divers occasions and in many ways in times past to the fathers by the prophets, last of all, in these days, hath spoken to us by His Son.’¹1Heb. I, 1 sq. … Further, this supernatural revelation, according to the universal belief of the Church, declared by the sacred Synod of Trent, is contained in the written books and unwritten traditions which, received by the Apostles from the mouth of Christ Himself, or from the Apostles themselves, by the dictation of the Holy Spirit, transmitted, as it were, from hand to hand, have come down even to us.”²2“[Ecclesia docet] … placuisse eius [sc. Dei] sapientiae et bonitati, alia eaque supernaturali via se ipsum ac aeterna voluntatis suae decreta humano generi revelare dicente Apostolo: ‘Multifariam multisque modis olim Deus loquens patribus in Prophetis: novissime diebus istis locutus est nobis in filio.’ Haec porro supernaturalis revelatio, secundum universalis Ecclesiae fidem, a sancta Tridentina Synodo declaratam, continetur in libris scriptis et sine scripto traditionibus.”—Sess. III, c. 2 (Denzinger-Bannwart-Umberg, n. 1785–1787).

This does not mean, of course, that revelation is something altogether novel. As the supernatural in general adapts itself to nature and raises it to higher perfection, so the religious content of revelation may start from laws, forms of worship, and customs belonging wholly to the domain of natural religion, inform them with a new spirit, and make them subservient to the supernatural end of man.

It will be our task in this chapter of our treatise to demonstrate the supernatural, divine origin of the religious truths inculcated in the Old and New Testaments. We shall do so by means of the internal and external criteria of revelation.

§ I. Divine Origin of the Old Testament

We maintain that the religion of the Old Testament had its origin in divine revelation.

A religion which is distinguished for its truth, purity, and sublimity, and the divine origin of which is confirmed by miracles and prophecies, must have its source in divine revelation. Now this is the case with the religion of the Old Testament. Therefore, the religion of the Old Testament has its source in divine revelation.

A. The Religious Teaching of the Old Testament

1. The religion of the Old Testament, from Genesis to the Second Book of Machabees inclusively, is purely Monotheistic. It is true that, favored by the natural inclination of the people, the worship of false gods repeatedly became a peril to Jewish Monotheism. However, idolatry never displaced the true faith, but invariably made way before the opposition of the prophets. Monotheism is met with also outside the Old Testament; but it is either less clearly defined, as among certain primitive nations of the present time, or was of short duration, as in the days of Lao-tse in China.³3See Vol. I of this Handbook, pp. 102 sq.

Yahweh, the one God of the Old Testament, created the world, Heaven and earth, out of nothing. This concept of creation in its pure and unequivocal form can be found nowhere among the pagan nations or philosophers of antiquity, with possibly one exception, that of Lao-tse.

The Jewish belief in creation was intimately bound up with a belief in Providence and the divine government of the world. This latter dogma is also found in some of the pagan religions, but a uniform and definite government of the universe is impossible under paganism because the gods themselves are necessarily subject to Fate and, in consequence of their conflicting interests, disturb, nay, cross one another in their activities. Among the Israelites, on the other hand, Yahweh governs the world and mankind with unlimited power and absolute freedom.

2. To the belief of the Jews in God corresponded their worship of Him. The religious cult of Israel is a symbol of the nation’s absolute submission to Yahweh. This is most clearly manifested in the sacrifices of the Old Law. The offering of valuable gifts is an indication of that perfect subjection which man owes to God as his supreme Lord, while the smaller gifts remind him that, in offering sacrifices, the main thing is not the external ceremony, but the interior sentiment of humility and obedience.

That the Jewish forms of worship can be paralleled in some respects among the pagan nations of the Orient, proves with what care local conditions and the character and traditions of nations were taken into account in the institution of religious worship, but it does not justify the conclusion that Jewish and pagan religious practices were of equal value. The few points of resemblance between them are more than offset by important differences. Superstition, magic, and sorcery, which permeate the whole religious fabric of Babylonia and Egypt, are absent in Israel, where the use of oracles was strictly forbidden,⁴4Deut. XVIII, 10 sq.; 1 Kings XXVIII, 3, 9. and the religious rites without exception bear the stamp of noble simplicity, purity, and truth.

3. Closely bound up with dogma and religious worship is morality. The moral code of the Old Testament is based upon the dogmatic teaching of Moses and the prophets as well as upon the moral law of nature. While it is in some respects inferior to that of the New Testament, the ethical teaching of the Old Testament far transcends that of all pagan religions.

The kernel of Old Testament morality is the commandment of the love of God, supplemented by that of the love of neighbor. The law, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,”⁵5Lev. XIX, 18. which was utterly unknown to the pagan religions, exercised a restraining influence upon the Mosaic code. Thus the lex talionis: “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” which is also found in the Codex of Hammurapi, is softened by the permission to exact a pecuniary fine in cases where there was no question of murder. A clear-cut distinction is drawn between murder and manslaughter, and the right of seeking an asylum is conceded to those guilty of the latter. “Thus, while the ancient Semitic custom of exacting revenge for bloodshed is retained, it is shorn of its most objectionable feature. … All in all: while other laws of antiquity contain occasional humane traits, we nowhere find such a noble spirit of humanity penetrating the whole moral code, as it does among the Israelites.”⁶6N. Peters, Die Religion des Alten Testamentes in Esser-Mausbach, Religion, Christentum, Kirche, Vol. II, 3rd ed., pp. 85 sq.

In the Ten Commandments the precept of charity is separated into its principal constituents and applied to definite conditions. Aside from the Third Commandment, the whole Decalogue is essentially the simple expression of the moral law of nature. Hence, it need not surprise us if we find similar laws among pagan nations. “But what raises the commandments of the second table above all the parallel laws of other religions, is the prohibition of coveting the wife or property of one’s neighbor.”⁷7Op. cit., p. 91.

Some of the Mosaic precepts concerning food and personal cleanliness also have their parallels among the pagan nations, more especially among those related to Israel. It is, of course, possible that these precepts may have originated in an ancient belief in demons rather than in “natural repugnance and hygienic considerations”;⁸8Op. cit., p. 94. but the religion of the Old Testament ennobled them and gave them a higher meaning by transforming them into means of spiritual purification.

Between the famous Code of Hammurapi and the Mosaic law there are a number of essential differences, which may be briefly described as follows: (1) In the Mosaic law the element of responsibility before God is clearly emphasized, whereas this fundamental religious motive is absent from the Code of Hammurapi, even though several gods are invoked in its introduction. (2) Concupiscence is nowhere forbidden in the Code of Hammurapi, whereas at the head of the Mosaic law we find several commandments beginning with the words, “Thou shalt not covet.” (3) The law of Moses pays due regard to the love which a man owes to his neighbor and opposes selfishness by extremely humane provisions concerning the payment of debts, the treatment of slaves, the protection of widows and orphans, hospitality toward strangers, etc.; whereas the Code of Hammurapi hardly ever rises beyond the level of strict legality. (4) The law of the Old Testament includes precepts for the limitation of wealth, whereas the Code of Hammurapi has nothing of the kind, but allows everyone to obtain permanent possession of the land of his neighbor. (5) The Mosaic law proscribes the practice of keeping prostitutes in the Temple, while the Code of Hammurapi contains detailed provisions with regard to the rights and duties of this class of women. (6) The penal laws of the Pentateuch are, on the whole, milder than those of the Codex Hammurapi, more especially in regard to the transgression of property rights; in no less than thirty-four cases, among which are several that to us seem rather trivial, the Code of Hammurapi inflicts the death penalty. Human life is far more highly valued in the law of Moses.⁹9J. Nikel, Das Alte Testament im Lichte der orientalischen Forschungen (Biblische Zeitfragen, 2. Folge, 7: Moses und sein Werk), 4th ed., Münster, 1921, pp. 31 sq.

The religion of the Old Testament, therefore, in its essential features, is not only free from contradiction, but so completely transcends all the extra-Biblical religions in purity and perfection that natural causes cannot explain the difference. Hence we may infer, if not with full certainty, then at least with a high degree of probability, that the religion of Israel had a supernatural and divine origin. In this conclusion we are confirmed by the unconvincingness of the objections raised against our thesis.

Objections Refuted

It is first of all objected that some of the doctrines, provisions, and occurrences peculiar to the Old Testament religion are of such a nature as to impair, nay, to offset entirely its purity and perfection. Attention is called to the selfishness, repentance, anger, and hatred attributed to Yahweh, to the cruelty with which He punishes trivial offenses, to the way in which He hardened the heart of Pharaoh and rewarded the mendacity of the Egyptian midwives. It is charged against the religion of Israel that Abraham and Jephte with divine approval sacrificed human beings, while in other passages of the Old Testament all sacrifices are rejected as worthless. The polygamous practices of the Patriarchs, the sexual life of David and Solomon, the marriage of the Prophet Osee, are said to be incompatible with the alleged purity of the Old Testament religion. The same objection is raised against the deception of Pharao, the spoliation of the Egyptians before the Exodus, the extermination of the inhabitants of Chanaan by the Jews, and the terrible threats contained in some of the Psalms.

Refutation.—The alleged selfishness of Yahweh, in claiming man’s whole love¹⁰10Deut. VI, 5. and describing Himself as “a jealous God,”¹¹11Deut. VI, 15. is merely a necessary consequence of the divine nature. God would contradict His own essence if He, who is the highest good and final goal of all creation, in whose possession alone man can find the full perfection of his nature, did not demand absolute submission from His creatures.

In ascribing to God human passions, such as anger and repentance,¹²12Ex. IV, 14; Gen. VI, 6. the Old Testament employs figurative language and accommodates itself to the anthropomorphic notions of an unlearned people. Doctrinally it inculcates the immutability of God¹³13Num. XXIII, 19. and expressly declares that He “is not a man that he should repent.”¹⁴141 Kings XV, 29. This declaration is all the more remarkable since, a few verses ahead,¹⁵151 Kings XV, 11. God Himself is quoted as saying: “It repenteth me that I have made Saul king.” The same rule must be applied to the texts which appear to deny the divine attribute of omnipresence,¹⁶16Gen. XI, 5. since other texts leave no doubt whatever that the Israelites believed God to be everywhere.¹⁷17Ps. CXXXVIII, 8 sqq.; Am. IX, 2 sqq.

The accusation that God was excessively cruel in the punishment of minor offences is based mainly on Gen. II, 17: “Of the tree of knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat; for in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt die the death.” This accusation is based on the hypothesis that the death penalty was threatened in punishment for an offense which per se concerned a matter of very small importance. But it was really a test of loyalty, and the penalty was inflicted for an act of wilful disobedience towards a clearly recognized divine command. Therein lay the gravity of the sin of our First Parents. That God, when He gave this command, foresaw the transgression, yet did nothing to prevent it, must not be interpreted as a sign of cruelty. To do so would be to declare the creation of rational beings endowed with free will as contrary to the essence of God and therefore impossible. God must demand submission from every rational creature endowed with free will, while, on the other hand, freedom necessarily implies liberty to disobey.

In the light of the teaching of the Pentateuch, and of the Old Testament in general, on the holiness of God and His hatred of sin, the statement that He hardened the heart of Pharaoh and of other sinners¹⁸18Cfr. Ex. IV, 21; XIV, 17; Is. VI, 9 sq.; Prov. XVI, 4. cannot be interpreted in the sense that He positively caused these men to resist His commandments. To influence the human will in this manner would be contrary to the very essence of divine holiness, and also of divine wisdom, for it would have been anything but wise on the part of God if He had ordered Pharaoh to release the Israelites and at the same time positively moved the King’s will in the opposite direction, thus making it impossible for him to obey the divine command. Hence, the resistance of Pharaoh and other sinners mentioned in the passages under discussion must be understood as taking place with divine tolerance. God did not cause, but permitted Pharaoh to resist. If the king’s act is represented as an act of God, the purpose manifestly is to call attention to the fact that God is the first and universal cause of all being and action, who ordains all things, even though they are made to serve an evil purpose. At the same time the Old Testament teaches just as positively that every sin is a free-will act. In the opinion of the Old Testament hagiographers, which is confirmed by rational reflection—both factors, the universal causality of God and the free will of man, co-operate in the commission of sin.

As regards the attitude of Yahweh toward the Egyptian midwives,¹⁹19Ex. I, 15 sqq. there is no reason to interpret His treatment of these women as a reward for their deceit. For it is not certain that the answer they gave to Pharaoh (namely, that the Hebrew women were skilled in obstetrics, and gave birth to their babies before the Egyptian midwives could reach them),²⁰20Ex. I, 19. was false, while, on the other hand, the Bible expressly says that these midwives were prospered “because they feared God.”²¹21Ex. I, 21.

God’s command to Abraham to offer his only-begotten son as a holocaust²²22Gen. XXII, 2; cfr. Paffrath-Kean, Stock Charges against the Bible, St. Louis, 1927, pp. 110 sq. must not be interpreted as a command to slaughter a human being in any objectionable sense of the term, as would have been the case if the initiative to sacrifice Isaac had come from Abraham himself. God, who gave the command, is Lord over life and death, and can dispose of His creatures as He sees fit. Abraham was merely an instrument which God employed in much the same way as He employs the powers of nature when a storm or an earthquake demands human victims.

The sacrifice of Jephte²³23Judg. XI, 30 sqq. is of a different type. Jephte, according to all appearances, acted entirely of his own accord when he slew his daughter as a sacrifice to the Lord, having been neither commanded nor authorized to do so. But his was merely an individual case, involving a manifest transgression of the Mosaic law, which expressly forbade the Israelites to sacrifice their sons and daughters as a holocaust to Yahweh.²⁴24Deut. XII, 31; Jer. XIX, 3 sqq. The sacrifice of Jephte can claim no special importance because this man was by no means one of the leaders of the Jewish nation, but belonged to the common people. Some Old Testament scholars think that the actual killing of Jephte’s daughter is not beyond all reasonable doubt.

If God, through the mouth of the prophets,²⁵25Cfr. Am. V, 21 sqq.; Is. I, 11 sqq.; Jer. VI, 20. on several occasions reprobated the sacrifices which He Himself commanded through the law of Moses, the inconsistency is apparent rather than real. As the context in each instance shows, it is not the sacrifices as such that are censured, but the fact that they had deteriorated into purely external rites. The sacrifices which had been the living expression of inward devotion in the time of the Patriarchs and Judges, at this later period of Jewish history had become empty formalities without value or content. Some did not scruple to offer sacrifices to the Lord with a rebellious heart and blood-stained hands.²⁶26Is. I, 13 sqq. Hence, the warning of the Prophet Isaias²⁷27Is. I, 16 sq. to cleanse the heart of sin, to cease to do evil, and to learn to serve God in justice and charity. God’s refusal to accept the sacrifices of the Jews was calculated to recall that disloyal people to their senses and to cause them to restore the sacrificial worship of the Mosaic law to its pristine purity.

Polygamy among the Patriarchs and the Israelites in general was not a divine institution, but an abuse which God tolerated in order to prevent greater evils. Polygamy was widespread among the nations of the ancient East, and since it is not per se opposed to the natural law, God could tolerate it. He did so in view of the unfavorable disposition of the Jews. That He desired marriage to be monogamous is indicated by the way He instituted it in Paradise and by the fact that, at the time of the Deluge, when polygamy seemed desirable in the interest of a more rapid propagation of the human race, Noe and his sons had only one wife each. Polygamy was limited to a certain extent by the law of Moses,²⁸28Deut. XXIII, 1. which equalized the number of marriageable men and women, and thus provided a husband for every woman, and also by the provision that when Israel got a king, he should “not have many wives.”²⁹29Deut. XVII, 17; cfr. Paffrath-Kean, Stock Charges against the Bible, St. Louis, 1927, pp. 110 sq.

The married life of David and Solomon undeniably falls below the moral standard which one would expect of men who occupied such important positions in Israel. But the religion of the Old Testament cannot be justly blamed for the sexual aberrations of these two gifted rulers. Both David and Solomon simply transgressed the moral law, and their conduct, far from being approved by the official representatives of religion, is, on the contrary, severely rebuked and punished by them. The moral weakness of these two monarchs simply proves that God sometimes employs very defective instruments in the execution of His plans.

The divinely sanctioned marriage of the Prophet Osee with a harlot³⁰30Os. I, 1 sqq. was not an immoral relationship, but a regular matrimonial alliance. That the children of this union are termed “children of fornications” must be explained in the light of the ulterior purpose of the Prophet’s marriage, which was designed to be a symbol of the relation that should exist between Yahweh and the Jewish nation. God still loved His people, even though they had broken faith with Him and worshipped idols.³¹31Os. III, 1.

The demand which God caused to be addressed to Pharaoh, to let the Jews “go three days’ journey into the wilderness to sacrifice to the Lord,”³²32Ex. III, 18. was not, as has been charged, a fraudulent deception of the king, but “a means to reveal Pharaoh’s injustice and cruelty, which prevented the Jews from practicing their religion and to justify, from a purely human point of view, their departure from Egypt and the violent measures which they adopted in order to get away.”³³33S. Weber, Christliche Apologetik, p. 219.

The accusation that the Israelites robbed the Egyptians when they departed into the desert, is based on an inaccurate interpretation of the Hebrew and Greek text. The term commodare, employed by the Latin Vulgate,³⁴34“Ut commodarent eis.” (Ex. XII, 36). does not correspond either to the Hebrew word in the original text or to the Greek word χράω used by the Septuagint. The former term in the form here employed means “to give willingly,” and the latter, “to give, to concede.” This is the true sense of the passage which the Vulgate renders, “spoliaverunt Aegyptios” (the Hebrew text has: nizzēl = spoliavit). Nor can it be said that the translation of the Vulgate is incorrect; for the word spoliare in itself does not, like its Hebrew and Greek synonyms, necessarily mean “to rob, to take possession of something without a just claim,” but may also signify “to collect things belonging to another (as a fair booty) and taking them along.” That this is the sense in which the expression is used in Ex. XII, 36, follows from the immediately preceding phrase, “they gave willingly.”³⁵35Cfr. F. Hummelauer, S.J., Commentarius in Exodum et Leviticum, Paris, 1897, p. 126; Ign. Ottiger, S.J., Theologia Fundamentalis, Vol. I, pp. 393 sq. Hence, it is not necessary to attempt to justify the conduct of the Israelites by explaining that the property they took along with them was their own, which had been unjustly appropriated by the Egyptians, or that they left enough immovable property to indemnify their oppressors for what they took along, or that God, who is the absolute owner of all creation, simply transferred this property from the Egyptians to the Jews.

God commanded the Israelites “utterly to destroy” the inhabitants of Chanaan,³⁶36Ex. XXIII, 13; Deut. III, 2; Jos. VI, 2; XIII, 6; Judg. II, 1–4. whose country was to be their exclusive possession.³⁷37Gen. XII, 7; Ex. XXXIII, 1; Deut. XXXIV, 4. Therefore the Jews did not act either unjustly or cruelly when they exterminated the native tribes and took possession of the land. They merely performed their duty by obeying a divine command. Neither can God be justly charged with cruelty and injustice for giving them this command, for the “seven nations” which they were to displace, by their immoral life and the abominations of their idol worship, had fully deserved the severe punishment inflicted upon them.³⁸38Cfr. Lev. XVIII, 3, 6–24. The Old Testament expressly says that it was for this reason they were punished.³⁹39Gen. XV, 16; Wisd. XII, 3–6. On the “cruelties commanded in the Old Testament” see Paffrath-Kean, Stock Charges against the Bible, pp. 112 sqq. Fr. Kugler, S.J., rightly observes that, once the text is cleared of faulty translations, it is found that the Jews were comparatively mild in their treatment of their enemies. “We read of cruelties in Assyro-Babylonian history that would have been impossible among the Israelites. Merely to please the humors of a king, the jaws of a captive are bored through, a dog’s chain is fastened about his neck, and he is put into a cage. Or again, to gratify a passing royal whim, a victim is dragged in and skinned alive. Leafing further through history, we see a Roman emperor illuminating the imperial gardens with human torches and lightly strumming a lyre to the cracklings of human flesh. And, a little further still, we see the devout Roundhead spitting Irish babies on his spears, massacring helpless old women in the Bull Ring, fitting pitch-caps on the heads of promising boys. And, in the very latest chapter, we see men’s passions loose in the World War, and blood and carnage the order of the day. Are you amazed, then, that, under the circumstances, those Jews of long ago did not walk about with all the detachment of conscientious objectors? Man has traveled far on the road of civilization since that day; yet in the heat of war, how near he still is to those Jews in their unsubdued primitive passion!” (Paffrath-Kean, op. cit., pp. 114 sq.) Their fate resembled that of the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrha. Nor did God commit an injustice in taking the land from the Chanaanites and giving it to the Jews. For, apart from the fact that this measure was a just punishment, God, as the Creator and supreme Lord of the universe, undoubtedly has the right to take property away from one person or nation and give it to another according to His good pleasure.

The utter extermination of the native population of Chanaan was, moreover, intended as a means of preserving the national character of Israel and the purity of its religion. If this purpose was not attained, but, on the contrary, the Jewish people and their religion suffered great injury from their pagan environment, this was attributable to the fact that the divine command to destroy the inhabitants of the Promised Land had not been faithfully executed.⁴⁰40Cfr. Judg. II, 1–4.

The so-called imprecatory or “cursing” Psalms⁴¹41Ps. XVII, XXXIV, LI, LVIII, LXVIII, CVIII. are not the expression of purely human wrath and revenge. It is not any wrong suffered by himself that moves the psalmist to curse his enemies and wish them evil, but the conviction that his cause is the cause of God and therefore his enemies are God’s enemies. A burning zeal for God and His honor is the leitmotif of these hymns. God is holy and therefore must hate moral evil and demand that it be avenged, and so the imprecatory Psalms fiercely demand the destruction of all who oppose Him and who attempt to frustrate His designs. But God in His mercy offers forgiveness to the repentant sinners, and hence the imprecatory Psalms promise salvation and happiness to all who seek Him.⁴²42Ps. LXVIII, 33. It must, of course, be admitted that the “cursing” Psalms are not inspired by Christian charity. The truth is, as Fr. Hugh Pope observes, that these Psalms are essentially Jewish, and “must be read in the light of the Old Law which begot them; when once we start trying to read ‘the Law of Grace’ into the Law of Moses, we get into difficulties. The lex talionis was a reality for Israel as it was for Babylonia in the days of Hammurapi.”⁴³43Pope, The Catholic Student’s “Aids” to the Bible, Vol. I, London, 1913, p. 281. Cfr. N. Peters, Die Religion des Alten Testamentes in Esser-Mausbach, Religion, Christentum, Kirche, Vol. II, 5th ed., p. 89; J. A. Ryan in the Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. III, p. 593; M. Seisenberger, Practical Handbook for the Study of the Bible, revised ed., New York, 1925, p. 286.

For further reading, see page 344.

B. Miracles and Prophecies

The very substance of the Old Testament religion, as we have seen, permits us to conclude that it was of supernatural, divine origin. This conclusion, however, does not yield more than a degree of probability. Full certainty of the divine origin of that religion is obtained only through the miracles wrought and the prophecies perfectly fulfilled in its confirmation. We shall deal with these in two separate groups, of which the first comprises the miracles and prophecies of the early period of Jewish history up to the death of Moses, the second, those of the post-Mosaic era.

I. The Miracles and Prophecies of the Early Period to the Death of Moses

a) Miracles

The miracles of this period may be divided into two classes: (1) the theophanies reported in connection with primitive revelation, and (2) the miracles wrought by Moses in confirmation of his mission.

1. Theophanies

Genesis repeatedly⁴⁴44Cfr. Gen. II, III, VI, VIII, XV, XX, XXVIII. relates that God visibly appeared to men as lawgiver, judge, and prophet of future events. These apparitions served a twofold purpose: (1) they illustrated the Monotheistic concept of the Deity in a clear and easily intelligible fashion; (2) they revealed to man, in a manner entirely adapted to his understanding, that God had spoken to him.

The miraculous character of these apparitions is beyond doubt. For though the sensible perception of God can in no wise be compared with the supernatural, spiritual intuition of the Divine Essence, it nevertheless requires a special intervention on the part of the Almighty, whereby He enters into immediate visible communication with man.

The Old Testament theophanies must not be classed with the alleged apparitions of pagan gods, which rest upon polytheistic presuppositions, are rich in mythical traits, and, for the most part, betray, by the manner in which the gods are made to communicate with men, that they are not historical, but belong to the domain of poetry and legend.

2. The Miracles of Moses

The miracles of Moses are of two kinds. Some of them were wrought for the express purpose of confirming his supernatural mission. Others, like the passage of the Jews through the Red Sea or the miraculous provision of water in the desert, while also closely connected with the task God had entrusted to Moses, did not serve the express purpose of confirming his mission. For the sake of clearness and perspicuity we shall consider only the former class of miracles. For these to be regarded as evidence confirming the divine origin of the Old Testament religion, of which Moses was the founder, it must be shown: (a) that the signs wrought by Moses were intended to attest his divine mission; (b) that these signs transcended the known powers of nature, and (c) that they had God for their cause.

a) The signs wrought by Moses were intended to confirm his divine mission. These signs were: the transformation of a rod into a serpent, performed at Mount Horeb before the whole Jewish people,⁴⁵45Ex. IV, 1–5. in order that they might believe that Moses was sent by God; the appearance of leprosy on the hand of Moses and its equally sudden disparition;⁴⁶46Ex. IV, 6 sq. the turning of Aaron’s rod into a serpent before Pharaoh;⁴⁷47Ex. VII, 9 sqq. the ten plagues which Moses called down upon Egypt,⁴⁸48Ex. VII to XII, 30. and the punishment inflicted upon the leaders of the schism, Core, Dathan, and Abiron.⁴⁹49Num. XVI, 28 sqq.

That the two first-mentioned signs were intended to prove the supernatural mission of Moses is expressly stated by Holy Scripture itself.⁵⁰50Ex. IV, 1 sqq. Moses assures the Lord that the Israelites will not credit his assertion that he had a divine mission; God commands him to cast his rod upon the ground, and when he does so, the rod is turned into a serpent and the serpent turned back into a rod. Then Moses is told to put his hand into his bosom, and when he does so and brings it out, it is “leprous as snow.” Then God tells him to put it back again, and behold, the leprosy is gone. Thereupon God instructs Moses to work these miracles before the people and tells him that if they refuse to believe him on the strength of these two signs, he should take water from the river and pour it upon dry land, whereupon it will be turned into blood. Moses did as he was told, “and the people believed.”⁵¹51Ex. IV, 30 sq.

Then Moses went to Pharaoh and told him that the Lord God of Israel had sent him,⁵²52Ex. V, 1, 3. and performed similar signs in the royal presence.⁵³53Ex. VII, 9 sq., 17.

The case of the insurgents in the desert is still clearer, as the text shows: “Moses said: By this you shall know that the Lord hath sent me to do all the things that you see, and that I have not forged them out of my own head: If these men die the common death of men, and if they be visited with a plague, wherewith others also are wont to be visited, the Lord did not send me. But if the Lord do a new thing, and the earth opening her mouth swallow them down, and all things that belong to them, and they go down alive into hell, you shall know that they have blasphemed the Lord. And immediately as he had made an end of speaking, the earth broke asunder under their feet: and opening her mouth, devoured them with their tents and all their substance.”⁵⁴54Num. XVI, 28 sqq.

b) The signs wrought by Moses transcended the known powers of nature. This proposition needs no proof so far as the conversion of a rod into a serpent and the sudden healing of leprosy is concerned. The case is somewhat different with the ten plagues. These actually show some resemblance to natural phenomena which occur in Egypt as the result of the climate and the peculiar nature of the soil. But the manner in which the plagues came and went and were judged by the Egyptians, who were surely conversant with the conditions of their country, clearly indicates that these visitations were not ordinary phenomena of nature. Moses predicts the sequence in which they are to occur, and they happen exactly as foretold. He needs only to stretch out his hand, and the plague begins; he prays, and it stops. The land of Gessen, where the Israelites dwelt, was preserved from harm.⁵⁵55Ex. VIII, 22; IX, 26; X, 23. Only the first-born of the Egyptians were slain “in the passage of the Lord.”⁵⁶56Ex. XII. All this cannot be explained by the ordinary powers and laws of nature. Pharaoh and his advisers were well aware of this, for they called in the magicians, who were believed to command higher powers, expecting them to outdo Moses.⁵⁷57Ex. VII, 11 sq.

Nor can the destruction of Core and his fellow-conspirators be explained by natural means. The separation of these wicked men from the rest of the people by divine command, the prediction of their punishment, its peculiar nature and prompt infliction,⁵⁸58Num. XVI, 24 sqq. preclude the accidental co-operation of natural causes.

c) The signs wrought by Moses must be ascribed to divine causation. As the miracles performed by Moses exceeded the known powers of nature, their proper and ultimate cause must have been a spiritual power far transcending men and the material universe. Hence, they must have been wrought either by God or by some created spirit, good or evil. They cannot have been wrought by an evil spirit because their purpose was to convince the leaders and lawgivers of Israel that God had sent Moses to free the people from the oppression of the Egyptians and to instruct them in new doctrines and precepts. Since the evil spirits are constantly bent upon destroying religion and good morals, we cannot reasonably assume that they would employ their influence for the establishment and promotion of these factors. Moreover, if humanity was not to be delivered guiltlessly and irretrievably to the most grievous errors, God could not have permitted the devil to interfere when He revealed Himself to men.

We arrive at the same conclusion if we consider the opposition between Moses and the magicians. Moses appeared before Pharaoh as a messenger sent by God and as the bearer of a divine command. Pharaoh refused to acknowledge Yahweh and called in his sorcerers to prove that the Egyptian gods were more powerful.⁵⁹59Ex. V, 2; VII, 11 sqq. As a matter of fact they succeeded in imitating the three first signs;⁶⁰60Ex. VII, 11 sq., 22; VIII, 7. but their serpents were devoured by the serpent of Moses, and from the fourth sign onward they were no longer able to keep step with him in producing extraordinary phenomena, but frankly acknowledged their defeat, exclaiming: “This is the finger of God!”⁶¹61Ex. VIII, 18 sq. Thus they paid involuntary tribute to the truth. Under such circumstances, where Hebrew Monotheism and Egyptian magic stood face to face, and a solemn judgment was to be passed on the comparative value of the two religions, God could not possibly permit Satan by some diabolical sleight-of-hand to gain the victory over His ambassador.

Like the magicians, Pharaoh, too, regarded the God of the Hebrews as the author of the miracles wrought by Moses, since he repeatedly asked the latter to petition Yahweh to take the plagues away from Egypt.

To the testimony of the Egyptians is to be added that of the Israelites, who, in consequence of the miracles wrought by Moses, were so firmly convinced of his supernatural, divine mission that they followed him for forty years and willingly accepted from his hands innumerable laws and precepts, including such as imposed heavy burdens upon them, individually and as a nation.

Thus the supernatural mission of Moses as the lawgiver and principal founder of the Old Testament religion is placed beyond all doubt by the miracles which he wrought, and consequently that religion must be divine, for if God sent Moses to establish a religion, that religion must be His. But since Moses, the divinely-commissioned teacher of Israel, is our authority for the truths contained in the primitive revelation, upon which the religion of the Old Testament rests, the demonstration of the supernatural mission of Moses constitutes an argument for the divine origin of that religion.

b) Prophecies

The divine origin of the Old Testament religion is further confirmed by prophecies. These prophecies, like the miracles we have just examined, refer partly to the revelation preceding Moses, partly to that given through Moses himself. The former was given by God directly on the occasion of the theophanies mentioned above. Thus Noe received a prophecy about the beginning and course of the Deluge,⁶²62Gen. VI, VII. Abraham was informed in advance of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrha,⁶³63Gen. XVIII, 20 sqq. of the birth of Isaac,⁶⁴64Gen. XVII, 15 sqq., XVIII, 10. of the great number of his descendants,⁶⁵65Gen. XV, 4 sq. of the four hundred years’ servitude of the Israelites in Egypt,⁶⁶66Gen. XV, 13. and their final conquest of Chanaan.⁶⁷67Gen. XV, 14. All these prophecies came true. That they were genuine prophecies follows from the miraculous character of the first three events mentioned and from the fact that, in every instance, there was question of occurrences which depended upon the free will of God and of man. The divine origin of these prophecies is furthermore guaranteed by the authenticity of the theophanies.

Those prophecies which serve to support the divine origin of the Mosaic revelation and through it of the religion of the Old Testament in general, are related to that religion partly in an immediate and partly in a mediate manner.

To the former class belongs the prophecy pertaining to the Sabbatical year, namely, that every sixth year the soil would yield as much fruit as in three ordinary years, in order that the people should not suffer want in the seventh year, which they had to dedicate to God.⁶⁸68Lev. XXV, 21. The fulfilment of this prophecy can be seen from the fact that there is no record of a famine caused by the observation of the Sabbatical year among the Jews.⁶⁹69Cfr. Jos. XXIV, 31; XXI, 43. The lack of food in Bethsura during a “year of rest,” of which we read in the first Book of the Machabees,⁷⁰701 Mach. VI, 49, 53. is expressly attributed to the fact that the foreign soldiers who had besieged the city “had eaten the residue of all that which had been stored up.”⁷¹711 Mach. VI, 53. To this may be added the consideration that a nation which had never experienced the fulfilment of a divine promise would surely not have exposed itself again and again to the danger of famine, and Moses would not have instituted the Sabbatical year had he not been certain of its divine origin.

Moses could not have known the things he promised the people by natural means, as the crops of each sixth year depended upon the weather, and this in turn upon the free will of God. Consequently, the prediction with which we are dealing must be regarded as a prophecy in the strict sense of the term. It was given for the confirmation of the law laid down by God, in so far as its periodical fulfilment reminded the people of their obligation concerning the Sabbatical year, and at the same time enabled them to keep it.

Much the same can be said of the divine promise that the land would not be infested by enemies while the men of Israel were complying with their obligation of visiting the Temple three times each year, at the feasts of Easter, Pentecost, and the Tabernacles.⁷²72Ex. XXXIV, 24. Had this prophecy not been fulfilled, the celebration of the main holydays of the Jewish calendar would have become impossible, and some record of the fact would no doubt have reached us. Since this is not the case, and the matter is one of great religious importance, we may justly conclude that Israel was never molested by its enemies while it celebrated its great festivals.

As this fact depended entirely on the free decision of the enemies of Israel, Moses could not have foreseen it by natural means, and hence we are again dealing with a genuine prophecy, which, like the one mentioned above, by its annually recurring fulfilment constituted a standing confirmation of the law given through Moses.

Finally, there is the promise of the highest earthly blessings given to the Jewish nation if they would observe the law, and the threat of manifold curses if they would neglect God’s commandments.⁷³73Deut. XXVIII. In the latter case, the people together with their king were to be led into a strange country, where they were to “serve strange gods of wood and stone;”⁷⁴74Deut. XXVIII, 36 sq. their cities were to be besieged, and they were to eat the flesh of their own sons and daughters;⁷⁵75Deut. XXVIII, 52 sqq. the whole nation was to be deported to Egypt and sold into bondage.⁷⁶76Deut. XXVIII, 68. At the same time they were assured that God would have mercy on His people and lead them back into their own land as soon as they would “return to Him and obey His commandments.”⁷⁷77Deut. XXX, 2.

The fulfilment of these prophecies is attested by history. As long as Israel worshipped God and obeyed His laws—as under the leadership of Josue, David, Solomon, and a few other rulers from the Babylonian Captivity until the period of the Machabees—the people enjoyed peace and prosperity. But as soon as they turned away from God and neglected His service, they were visited by severe calamities. They had to serve strange nations,⁷⁸78Judg. III, 8, 2 sqq. were taken captive and led to Assyria,⁷⁹794 Kings XV, 29. Babylonia,⁸⁰804 Kings XXIV, 15; XXV, 7, 11. and Egypt,⁸¹814 Kings XXV, 26; cfr. Josephus Flavius, De Bello Iudaico, l. VI, c. 9, 2. and suffered such dire want during various sieges that parents literally devoured their own offspring.⁸²824 Kings VI, 28 sq.; Lam. IV, 10; Bar. II, 2 sq.; cfr. Josephus, l.c., VI, 3, 4. In like manner the prophecy of the nation’s return from captivity was fulfilled after the people had experienced a change of heart.⁸³831 Esdr. I; 2 Esdr. II.

These events Moses could not possibly have foreseen by natural means because they one and all depended upon free-will acts of God and men. Accidental fulfilment is excluded by the constant and in itself by no means necessary connection between the conduct of Israel and the consequences of that conduct during a period extending over fifteen hundred years. Consequently, the predictions of Moses bear all the earmarks of true prophecy.

The Mosaic prophecies confirm the divine origin of the Old Testament religion because God appears in them as the avenger who rewards obedience and punishes disobedience to the law.

In addition to the prophecies which are immediately connected with the religion of the Old Testament, there are a number of others that demonstrate the divine character of that religion indirectly, i. e., by showing that Moses had a supernatural, divine mission. We have already mentioned the Egyptian plagues and the punishment of Core, Dathan, and Abiron.

Moses, when he found the people murmuring against him and Aaron on the return of the spies from Chanaan, predicted that, with the exception of Josue and Caleb, not one of the men who were then over twenty years of age would enter the Promised Land, but all would die in the desert.⁸⁴84Num. XIV, 22–37; Deut. I, 35 sq. This prophecy was fulfilled to the letter,⁸⁵85Num. XXVI, 63 sqq. which proves that it was based upon divine revelation. For from his purely human knowledge Moses could not possibly have foreseen that among the many thousands of men who at that time had just attained their twentieth year, not a single one would live beyond the age of sixty. God Himself by this prophecy sustained the imperilled authority of Moses⁸⁶86Num. XIV, 4. and by striking the treacherous spies with sudden death,⁸⁷87Num. XIV, 36 sq. assured the people that the remainder of the threatened punishments would not fail to materialize if they persisted in their obstinacy.

Another prediction which bears all the earmarks of genuine prophecy is that referring to the manna. When the people in the desert complained of lack of food and vented their dissatisfaction upon their leader, Moses promised that God would send food from heaven on the following day. The promise was kept, and for forty years the Israelites were nourished with the miraculous bread which covered the face of the earth like hoar frost every morning with the exception of the Sabbath.⁸⁸88Ex. XVI, 14, 22 sqq. This bread, as its effects indicate, was not a natural food growing in the desert, but a supernatural gift of God,⁸⁹89Cfr. Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. IX, p. 604. and consequently Moses could not have had previous knowledge of its bestowal by natural means, but only through a special divine revelation, and hence the prediction he made with respect to it was a true prophecy, which the people justly regarded as a proof of his supernatural mission.

II. Miracles and Prophecies of the Post-Mosaic Period

Even after the death of Moses the religion of the Old Testament was confirmed and supported by frequent miracles and prophecies. This could not have been the case if God had not recognized it as His own work, for to assume that He could positively, by extraordinary demonstrations of power, confirm a religion falsely attributed to Him, would be incompatible with the divine veracity. The miracles and prophecies of the post-Mosaic period, therefore, constitute an indirect proof of the divine origin of the Old Testament religion. We shall briefly mention a few of them.

a) Miracles

The Book of Josue relates⁹⁰90Jos. III, 15 sq. that, when the Jews crossed the Jordan, “the waters that came down from above stood in one place, and swelling up like a mountain, were seen afar off from the city that is called Adom …; but those that were beneath, ran down into the sea of the wilderness (which now is called the Dead Sea) until they wholly failed.” The same book records that, after a siege of seven days, whilst the Israelites were marching for the seventh time around the city of Jericho, and the priests sounded the jubilee trumpets, as the Lord had commanded, the walls of the city collapsed.⁹¹91Jos. VI, 8 sqq. In view of the plain words of Scripture no natural explanation of these phenomena is possible. Nor can we assume that the devil had a hand in producing them, since both events served to confirm Josue as the divinely-appointed leader of Israel and the successor of Moses.⁹²92Jos. VI, 27. Hence, the phenomena in question were genuine miracles.

A similar case is narrated in the Book of Judges.⁹³93Judg. VI, 17. When Gedeon was called by God to deliver the Jewish nation, he asked for a sign by which he would be able to tell them that the call came from God. He was instructed to put a fleece of wool on the floor. He did so, and the fleece became first moist with dew, while all the ground around it was dry, and then the fleece remained dry while the ground round about was wet with dew. This phenomenon cannot be explained by purely natural causes, and diabolic intervention is excluded, since Gedeon, as the champion of the Israelitic religion and the destroyer of the altar of Baal,⁹⁴94Judg. VI, 27 sqq. was a friend of Yahweh. Therefore, the sign given to Gedeon was a true miracle wrought by God for the benefit of Israel and its religion.

The connection between miracle and religion is most clearly manifested in the sacrifice of the prophet Elias.⁹⁵953 Kings XVIII, 19 sqq. All Israel is assembled on Mount Carmel, where Elias, as the sole prophet of Yahweh, faces 450 priests of Baal. Each party has erected an altar and placed upon it a bullock for the sacrifice. A decision is to be made between Yahweh and Baal. He who sends fire from heaven to consume the sacrifice is to be recognized as the true God. The priests of Baal cried loudly all day, imploring their god to send fire to kindle the sacrificial flame on the altar. But there was no response. Towards evening, Elias told the people to pour water upon the burnt-offering and upon the wood piled upon his altar; the water ran about the altar and filled a trench which he had dug for the purpose. Then the prophet uttered a short prayer, and lo and behold! fire fell from heaven and consumed the holocaust, the wood, the stones, the dust, and even licked up the water that was in the trench. That this was not a natural fire is evident from its effects. The demons cannot have had a hand in causing it, since the miracle was calculated to destroy their influence, and God, who wished to preserve by all means the Monotheism of Israel, could not have remained inactive when that religion was in peril. The people, therefore, judged correctly when they regarded the fire from heaven as a miraculous manifestation of the power of Yahweh and a splendid justification of His cult.⁹⁶963 Kings XVIII, 39.

b) Prophecies

Josue predicted in great detail the passage of the Chosen People through the Jordan⁹⁷97Jos. III, 13. and the fall of the fortified city of Jericho.⁹⁸98Jos. VI, 5. The miraculous character of these two events is in itself a convincing argument that their prediction was a genuine prophecy, which, in its fulfilment, together with the miracle itself, served to confirm the divine origin of the Mosaic religion.⁹⁹99Jos. III, 7.

The Prophet Isaias announced to King Ezechias,¹⁰⁰1004 Kings XIX, 32 sqq. who had asked Yahweh to manifest Himself as the true God,¹⁰¹1014 Kings XIX, 19. that the Assyrian army would depart without harming the inhabitants of Jerusalem. The prediction was fulfilled. In the following night one hundred and eighty-five thousand men died in the camp of the Assyrians, and Sennacherib immediately departed for Ninive. This event could not have been foreseen or calculated by human means because the Assyrians had come to conquer the entire country and had advanced victoriously,¹⁰²1024 Kings XIX, 10 sqq. and no one could have predicted that a rapid and devastating spread of the plague would cause them to give up their plans and start for home. The fulfilment of the prophecy and the manifest supernatural divine protection of which it was a proof, were calculated to support the efforts of King Ezechias, which were directed towards the cultivation of the religious life of the people, and thus they furnish an indirect confirmation of the divinity of the Mosaic cult.

Micheas foretold the destruction of Samaria and Jerusalem¹⁰³103Mich. I, 1–8, 9–16. as a punishment for the sins of the people; he also predicted the Babylonian Captivity and the eventual return of the Jews to their native land.¹⁰⁴104Mich. II, 12; IV, 10. That this prediction must be regarded as a real prophecy is evidenced first by the considerable space of time intervening between the prophecy and its fulfilment and, secondly, by the fact that the events predicted were entirely dependent upon the free will of God and of men, and therefore could not be foreseen with certainty by any creature. Since the prophecies were given for the purpose of inducing the people to be faithful to the law of Moses, their fulfilment constitutes a supernatural confirmation of the divine origin of that law.¹⁰⁵105Cfr. Ign. Ottiger, Theologia Fundamentalis, Vol. I, pp. 372–379, 478–514.

For further reading, see page 345.