The Ephraimite history is not met again until the twentieth chapter of Genesis, the story of Abraham in Gerar.

And Abraham journeyed from thence toward the land of the South, and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur: and he sojourned in Gerar. And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister: and Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took Sarah. But God came to Abimelech in a dream of the night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man, because of the woman whom thou hast taken; for she is a man's wife. Now Abimelech had not come near her: and he said, Lord, wilt thou slay even a righteous nation? Said he not himself unto me, She is my sister? and she, even she herself said, He is my brother: in the integrity of my heart and the innocency of my hands have I done this. And God said unto him in the dream, Yea, I know that in the integrity of thy heart thou hast done this, and I also withheld thee from sinning against me: therefore suffered I thee not to touch her. Now therefore restore the man's wife; for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live: and if thou restore her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou, and all that are thine.

And Abimelech rose early in the morning, and called all his servants, and told all these things in their ears: and the men were sore afraid. Then Abimelech called Abraham, and said unto him, What hast thou done unto us? and wherein have I sinned against thee, that thou hast brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin? thou hast done deeds unto me that ought not to be done. And Abimelech said unto Abraham, What sawest thou, that thou hast done this thing? And Abraham said, Because I thought, Surely the fear of God is not in this place; and they will slay me for my wife's sake. And moreover she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife and it came to pass, when God caused me to wander from my father's house, that I said unto her, This is thy kindness which thou shalt show unto me: at every place whither we shall come, say of me, He is my brother. And Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and men-servants and women-servants, and gave them unto Abraham, and restored him Sarah his wife. And Abimelech said, Behold, my land is before thee: dwell where it pleaseth thee. And unto Sarah he said, Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver: behold, it is for thee a covering of the eyes to all that are with thee; and in respect of all thou art righted. And Abraham prayed unto God: and God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maid-servants; and they bare children. For Jehovah had fast closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah, Abraham's wife.

This narrative is commonly regarded as a variant of the very similar story of the Judean history, Genesis 12. It shows, perhaps, a slight ethical advance upon that account which indicated no consciousness that Abraham's conduct was discreditable. This writer makes it clear that Abraham's lie was only a half lie from our point of view, no less reprehensible, but possibly indicating in the narrator a slight advance upon the naïveté of the earlier writing. Another difference may be noted in God's method of communicating; here it is through a dream instead of by direct speech. This doubtless represents an advance upon the childlike ideas of the earlier historians and seems to be characteristic of the Ephraimite history.

In passing, it is of interest to note the writer's idea of a prophet, "He is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live." Obviously "prophet" is not used here in its ordinary English sense of predictor, but rather as indicating one who is in close and intimate relation with God. Such relations are not, however, incompatible with dishonest and unchivalrous conduct; the ethical ideals of the age are still very crude. Is it possible that there is a bit of sarcasm in the words of Abimelech to Sarah, "Behold I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver"? The word italicized is surely ironical from our point of view.

A considerable part of chapter 21 is ascribed to this document.1 This section affords another instance of the writer's avoidance of anthropomorphic pictures; an angel calls down from heaven, but God does not come down and speak in any bodily form. The narrative seeks to account for the name Beersheba, a place important later on in the story, but, in general, the Ephraimite narratives show less tendency to explain the origin of everything than the Judean exhibited.

The story of the offering of Isaac follows:

And it came to pass after these things, that God did prove Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham; and he said, Here am I. And he said Take now thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest, even Isaac, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of. And Abraham rose early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men

1 vv. 1 f., 6, 8-24, 27, 31.

with him, and Isaac his son; and he clave the wood for the burnt-offering, and rose up, and went unto the place of which God had told him. On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder; and we will worship, and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt-offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son; and he took in his hand the fire and the knife; and they went both of them together. And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold, the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt-offering? And Abraham said, God will provide himself the lamb for a burnt-offering, my son: so they went both of them together.

And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built the altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar, upon the wood. And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of Jehovah called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I. And he said, Lay not thy hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him; for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and, behold, behind him a ram caught in the thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt-offering in the stead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-jireh: as it is said to this day, In the mount of Jehovah it shall be provided. And the angel of Jehovah called unto Abraham a second time out of heaven, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith Jehovah, because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heavens, and as the sand which is upon the sea-shore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice. So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham dwelt at Beersheba.1

This is one of the best-told stories in the entire collection, as its perennial attractiveness would indicate, though it seems to lack something of the perfection of form that the best Judean stories possess; the movement seems just a little labored in comparison with those. But, it would be difficult to excel 1 Genesis 22 1-19.

in any selections from the Judean history the Ephraimite form of the Joseph stories.

And they laded their asses with their grain, and departed thence. And they came unto Jacob their father unto the land of Canaan, and told him all that had befallen them, saying, The man, the lord of the land, spake roughly with us, and took us for spies of the country. And we said unto him, We are true men; we are no spies: we are twelve brethren, sons of our father; one is not, and the youngest is this day with our father in the land of Canaan. And the man, the lord of the land, said unto us, Hereby shall I know that ye are true men: leave one of your brethren with me, and take grain for the famine of your houses, and go your way; and bring your youngest brother unto me: then shall I know that ye are no spies, but that ye are true men: so will I deliver you your brother, and ye shall traffic in the land.

And it came to pass as they emptied their sacks, that, behold, every man's bundle of money was in his sack and when they and their father saw their bundles of money, they were afraid. And their heart failed them, and they turned trembling one to another, saying, What is this that God hath done unto us? And Jacob their father said unto them, Me have ye bereaved of my children: Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away: all these things are against me. And Reuben spake unto his father, saying, Slay my two sons, if I bring him not to thee: deliver him into my hand, and I will bring him to thee again.1 The story of the finding of Moses is another of the most charming in this document.

And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months. And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch; and she put the child therein, and laid it in the flags by the river's brink. And his sister stood afar off, to know what would be done to him. And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river; and her maidens walked along by the riverside; and she saw the ark among the flags, and sent her handmaid to fetch it. And she opened it, and saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children. Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall I go and call thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the

1 Genesis 42 26, 29-35, 28b, 36-37

child for thee? And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, Go. And the maiden went and called the child's mother. And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it. And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses, and said, Because I drew him out of the water.1

The northern history was perhaps even more fond of embodying old poems than the southern. To it we owe the preservation of the Miriam and Deborah songs and the significant reference to the Book of the Wars of Yaweh. That the northern history had also its own version of the Balaam oracles was noticed in Chapter III.

Viewing the two histories in the large, the northern seems less imbued with the thought of the divine control of the course of events and the consequence of conduct than the Judean. The interest centres more in the " dominant personalities" and in "the methods by which they kept in touch with God." The stories are so well told that it is difficult to see where they fall short of the Judean narratives of Saul and David or of the ninth century history of the earlier times; but, usually, they lack the spontaneous charm and strength of these. It would seem that cold reflection has touched them just enough to spoil the perfect bloom.

If, on the other hand, one were to compare all the prose thus far considered with that of the later ages of Israel's literature, it would all become fused into one class, sharply distinguished from the later types. The Saul and David stories of the tenth century, the great Judean history of the ninth, the earliest narratives of Northern Israel in the latter half of the ninth, the Elijah stories, written near the close of that century, and the great Ephraimite history of antiquity, all belong to the creative age of prophetic narration. During these two centuries of prose writing, the stories, whether they concerned the nearer or more remote past, were still close to the mouth of the raconteur who tells a story for the sake of the story. Great conceptions may be embodied in the narratives, but they are not "sicklied o'er" with abstract reflection. The story as such still prevails.

* Sanders and Fowler, Outlines Biblical History and Literature, p. 46.