The following six chapters will be devoted to an examination of the question of the authenticity of the books of the Bible. I shall attempt to show that the greater portion of these books, including the most important ones, are not authentic--were not written by the authors claimed, nor at the time claimed; that they are anonymous documents, written or compiled for the most part at a later age than that in which their reputed authors are supposed to have lived. CHAPTER VI. THE PENTATEUCH. The first five books of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy--collectively called the Pentateuch--are the most important books of the Old Testament. The three great Semitic religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Mohammedanism, are all, to a great extent, based upon them. These books, orthodox Christians affirm, were written by Moses at least 1,450 years before the Christian era. "This sacred code," says Dr. Adam Clarke, "Moses delivered complete to the Hebrews sometime before his death." In modern versions of the Bible, Genesis is styled the First Book of Moses; Exodus, the Second Book of Moses; Leviticus, the Third Book of Moses; Numbers, the Fourth Book of Moses, and Deuteronomy, the Fifth Book of Moses. Their very high authority rests upon the supposed fact of their Mosaic authorship and great antiquity. To disprove these--to show that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses, nor at this early age, but centuries later by unknown writers--is to largely impair, if not entirely destroy, its authority as a religious oracle. And this is what modern criticism has done. Arguments for Mosaic Authorship. The following passage is the chief argument relied upon to prove the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch: "And it came to pass, that when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites, which bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying, Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee" (Deut. xxxi, 24-26). This was written for a purpose. Its sequel appears in 2 Kings. During the reign of Josiah, Hilkiah the high priest discovered a "book of the law" in the temple. "And Hilkiah the high priest said unto Shaphan the scribe, I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord" (2 Kings xxii, 8). This book was the book of Deuteronomy, written, not in the time of Moses, but in the time of Josiah, more than eight centuries later. Hilkiah needed the book and he "found" it. It was written by him or for him. Holland's great critic, Dr. Kuenen, says: "There is no room to doubt that the book was written with a view to the use that Hilkiah made of it" (Kuenen's Hexateuch, p. 215).