"When the author of the Pentateuch says that Moses wrote one
or more codes of law, that he wrote a song, that he recorded a
certain memorandum, it would appear that having specified such of
his materials as were written by Moses, he would have us infer that
the other materials came from other sources of information. But it
has been urged the other way; namely, that, because it is said that
Moses wrote the codes of the covenant and the Deuteronomic code,
he also wrote all the laws of the Pentateuch; that because he wrote
the song Deut. xxxii, he wrote all the other pieces of poetry in the
Pentateuch, that because he recorded the list of stations and the
memorial against Amalek, he recorded all the other historical events
of the Pentateuch. It is probable that no one would so argue did he
not suppose it was necessary to maintain the Mosaic authorship of
the Pentateuch at every cost" (Hexateuch, pp. 10, 11).
Again, it has been argued that Christ and some of the writers of the
New Testament recognize Moses as the author of the Pentateuch. Such
expressions as "the law of Moses," "the book of Moses," "Moses said,"
etc., occur a few times. These expressions are explained and this
argument answered by the following: 1. It is not denied by critics
that Moses was the legislator of the Jews and promulgated certain
laws. 2. An anonymous book is usually called after the leading
character of the book. 3. At this time the traditional theory of the
Mosaic authorship was generally accepted. Of Christ's mention of Moses,
Dr. Davidson says: "The venerable authority of Christ himself has no
proper bearing on the question."
Arguments Against Mosaic Authorship.
That the Pentateuch was not written by Moses, that it is an anonymous
work belonging to a later age, is clearly proven by the following:
1. There is no proof that Moses ever claimed to be the author of the
Pentateuch. There is nothing in the work, neither is there anything
outside of it, to indicate that he was its author.
2. The ancient Hebrews did not believe that he wrote it. Renan says:
"The opinion which attributes the composition of the Pentateuch to
Moses seems quite modern; it is very certain that the ancient Hebrews
never dreamed of regarding their legislator as their historian. The
ancient documents appeared to them absolutely impersonal, and they
attached to them no author's name" (History of Semitic Languages,
Book II., chapter i).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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