The Anti-Slavery Examiner
Chapter 37 : Israelites and Strangers belonged indiscriminately to _each_ cla.s.s of the servants, t

Israelites and Strangers belonged indiscriminately to _each_ cla.s.s of the servants, the _bought_ and the _hired_. That those in the former cla.s.s, whether Jews or Strangers, rose to honors and authority in the family circle, which were not conferred on _hired_ servants, has been shown. It should be added, however, that in the enjoyment of privileges, merely _political_, the hired servants from the _Israelites_, were more favored than even the bought servants from the _Strangers_. No one from the Strangers, however wealthy or highly endowed, was eligible to the highest office, nor could he own the soil. This last disability seems to have been one reason for the different periods of service required of the two cla.s.ses of bought servants. The Israelite was to serve six years--the Stranger until the jubilee. As the Strangers could not own the soil, nor houses, except within walled towns, they would naturally attach themselves to Israelitish families. Those who were wealthy, or skilled in manufactures, instead of becoming servants would need servants for their own use, and as inducements for the Strangers to become servants to the Israelites, were greater than persons of their own nation could hold out to them, these wealthy Strangers would naturally procure the poorer Israelites for servants. Lev. xxv. 47. In a word, such was the political condition of the Strangers, that the Jewish polity offered a virtual bounty, to such as would become permanent servants, and thus secure those privileges already enumerated, and for their children in the second generation a permanent inheritance. Ezek.

xlvii. 21-23. None but the monied aristocracy would be likely to decline such offers. On the other hand, the Israelites, owning all the soil, and an inheritance of land being a sacred possession, to hold it free of inc.u.mbrance was with every Israelite, a delicate point, both of family honor and personal character. 1 Kings xxi. 3. Hence, to forego the control of one's inheritance, after the division of the paternal domain, or to be kept out of it after having acceded to it, was a burden grievous to be borne. To mitigate as much as possible such a calamity, the law released the Israelitish servant at the end of six[A] years; as, during that time--if of the first cla.s.s--the part.i.tion of the patrimonial land might have taken place or, if of the second, enough money might have been earned to disenc.u.mber his estate, and thus he might a.s.sume his station as a lord of the soil. If neither contingency had occurred, then after another six years the opportunity was again offered, and so on, until the jubilee. So while strong motives urged the Israelite to discontinue his service as soon as the exigency had pa.s.sed which made him a servant, every consideration impelled the _Stranger_ to _prolong_ his term of service;[B] and the same kindness which dictated the law of six years' service for the Israelite, a.s.signed as the general rule, a much longer period to the Gentile servant, who had every inducement to protract the term. It should be borne in mind, that adult Jews ordinarily became servants, only as a temporary expedient to relieve themselves from embarra.s.sment, and ceased to be such when that object was effected. The poverty that forced them to it was a calamity, and their service was either a means of relief, or a measure of prevention; not pursued as a permanent business, but resorted to on emergencies--a sort of episode in the main scope of their lives. Whereas with the Stranger, it was a _permanent employment_, pursued both as a _means_ of bettering their own condition, and that of their posterity, and as an _end_ for its own sake, conferring on them privileges, and a social estimation not otherwise attainable.

[Footnote A: Another reason for protracting the service until the seventh year, seems to have been the coincidence of that period with other arrangements, in the Jewish economy. Its pecuniary responsibilities, social relations, and general internal structure, were _graduated_ upon a septennial scale. Besides, as those Israelites who had become servants through poverty, would not sell themselves, till other expedients to recruit their finances had failed--(Lev. xxv.

35)--their _becoming servants_ proclaimed such a state of their affairs, as demanded the labor of a _course of years_ fully to reinstate them.]

[Footnote B: The Stranger had the same inducements to prefer a long term of service that those have who cannot own land, to prefer a long _lease_.]

We see from the foregoing, why servants purchased from the heathen, are called by way of distinction, _the_ servants, (not _bondmen_,) 1. They followed it as a _permanent business_. 2. Their term of service was _much longer_ than that of the other cla.s.s. 3. As a cla.s.s, they doubtless greatly outnumbered the Israelitish servants. 4. All the Strangers that dwelt in the land were _tributaries_, required to pay an annual tax to the government, either in money, or in public service, (called a _"tribute of bond-service;"_) in other words, all the Strangers were _national servants_, to the Israelites, and the same Hebrew word used to designate _individual_ servants, equally designates _national_ servants or tributaries. 2 Sam. viii. 2, 6, 14; 2 Chron.

viii. 7-9; Deut, xx. 11; 2 Sam. x. 19; 1 Kings ix. 21, 22; 1 Kings iv.

21; Gen. xxvii. 29. The same word is applied to the Israelites, when they paid tribute to other nations. 2 Kings xvii. 3.; Judg. iii. 8, 14; Gen. xlix. 15. Another distinction between the Jewish and Gentile bought servants, was in their _kinds_ of service. The servants from the Strangers were properly the _domestics_, or household servants, employed in all family work, in offices of personal attendance, and in such mechanical labor, as was required by increasing wants and needed repairs. The Jewish bought servants seem almost exclusively _agricultural_. Besides being better fitted for it by previous habits, agriculture, and the tending of cattle, were regarded by the Israelites as the most honorable of all occupations. After Saul was elected king, and escorted to Gibeah, the next report of him is, "_And behold Saul came after the herd out of the field_." 1 Sam. xi. 5. Elisha "was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen." 1 Kings xix. 19. King Uzziah "loved husbandry." 2 Chron. xxvi. 10. Gideon _was "thres.h.i.+ng wheat"_ when called to lead the host against the Midianites. Judg. vi. 11. The superior honorableness of agriculture is shown, in that it was protected and supported by the fundamental law of the theocracy--G.o.d indicating it as the chief prop of the government. The Israelites were like permanent fixtures on their soil, so did they cling to it. To be agriculturists on their own patrimonial inheritances, was with them the grand claim to honorable estimation. When Ahab proposed to Naboth that he should sell him his vineyard, king though he was, he might well have antic.i.p.ated from an Israelitish freeholder, just such an indignant burst as that which his proposal drew forth, "And Naboth said to Ahab, the Lord forbid it me that I should give the inheritance of my fathers unto thee." 1 Kings xxi. 2, 3. Agriculture being pre-eminently a _Jewish_ employment, to a.s.sign a native Israelite to other employments as a business, was to break up his habits, do violence to cherished predilections, and put him to a kind of labor in which he had no skill, and which he deemed degrading.[C] In short, it was in the earlier ages of the Mosaic system, practically to _unjew_ him, a hards.h.i.+p and a rigor grievous to be borne, as it annihilated a visible distinction between the descendants of Abraham and the Strangers. _To guard this and another fundamental distinction_, G.o.d inst.i.tuted the regulation, "If thy brother that dwelleth by thee be waxen poor, and be sold unto thee, thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bond-servant." In other words, thou shalt not put him to servant's work--to the business, and into the condition of domestics. In the Persian version it is translated, "Thou shalt not a.s.sign to him the work of _servitude_." In the Septuagint, "He shall not serve thee with the service of a _domestic_." In the Syriac, "Thou shalt not employ him after the manner of servants." In the Samaritan, "Thou shalt not require him to serve in the service of a servant." In the Targum of Onkelos, "He shall not serve thee with the service of a household servant." In the Targum of Jonathan, "Thou shalt not cause him to serve according to the usages of the servitude of servants."[D] The meaning of the pa.s.sage is, _thou shalt not a.s.sign him to the same grade, nor put him to the same service, with permanent domestics._ The remainder of the regulation is--_"But as an hired servant and as a sojourner shall he be with thee."_ Hired servants were not incorporated into the families of their masters; they still retained their own family organization, without the surrender of any domestic privilege, honor, or authority; and this, even though they resided under the same roof with their master. The same substantially may be said of the sojourner though he was not the owner of the land which he cultivated, and of course had not the control of an inheritance, yet he was not in a condition that implied subjection to him whose land he tilled, or that demanded the surrender of any _right_, or exacted from him any homage, or stamped him with any inferiority; unless, it be supposed that a degree of inferiority would naturally attach to a state of _dependence_ however qualified. While bought servants were a.s.sociated with their master's families at meals, at the Pa.s.sover, and at other family festivals, hired servants and sojourners were not. Ex. xii. 44, 45; Lev. xxii. 10, 11.

Hired servants were not subject to the authority of their masters in any such sense as the master's wife, children, and bought servants. Hence the only form of oppressing hired servants spoken of in the Scriptures as practicable to masters, is that of _keeping back their wages._ To have taken away such privileges in the case under consideration, would have been pre-eminent "_rigor_;" for it was not a servant born in the house of a master, nor a minor, whose minority had been sold by the father, neither was it one who had not yet acceded to his inheritance, nor finally, one who had received the _a.s.signment_ of his inheritance, but was working off from it an inc.u.mbrance, before entering upon its possession and control. But it was that of _the head of a family_, who had known better days, now reduced to poverty, forced to relinquish the loved inheritance of his fathers, with the competence and respectful consideration its possession secured to him, and to be indebted to a neighbor for shelter, sustenance, and employment. So sad a reverse, might well claim sympathy; but one consolation cheers him in the house of his pilgrimage; he is an _Israelite--Abraham is his father_ and now in his calamity he clings closer than ever, to the distinction conferred by his birth-right. To rob him of this, were "the unkindest cut of all."

To have a.s.signed him to a grade of service filled only by those whose permanent business was serving, would have been to "rule over him with"

peculiar "rigor." "Thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bond-servant," or literally, _thou shalt not serve thyself with him, with the service of a servant_, guaranties his political privileges, and a kind and grade of service comporting with his character and relations as an Israelite. And "as a _hired_ servant, and as a sojourner shall he be with thee," secures to him his family organization, the respect and authority due to its head, and the general consideration resulting from such a station. Being already in possession of his inheritance, and the head of a household, the law so arranged the conditions of his service as to _alleviate_ as much as possible the calamity which had reduced him from independence and authority, to penury and subjection. The import of the command which concludes this topic in the forty-third verse, ("Thou shalt not rule over him with rigor,") is manifestly this, you shall not disregard those differences in previous a.s.sociations, station, authority, and political privileges, upon which this regulation is based; for to hold this cla.s.s of servants _irrespective_ of these distinctions, and annihilating them, is to "rule with rigor." The same command is repeated in the forty-sixth verse, and applied to the distinction between servants of Jewish, and those of Gentile extraction, and forbids the overlooking of distinctive Jewish peculiarities, the disregard of which would be _rigorous_ in the extreme.[E] The construction commonly put upon the phrase "rule with rigor," and the inference drawn from it, have an air vastly oracular. It is interpreted to mean, "you shall not make him a chattel, and strip him of legal protection, nor force him to work without pay." The inference is like unto it, viz., since the command forbade such outrages upon the Israelites, it permitted and commissioned their infliction upon the Strangers. Such impious and shallow smattering captivates scoffers and libertines; its flippancy and blasphemy, and the strong scent of its loose-reined license works like a charm upon them. What boots it to reason against such rampant affinities! In Ex. i. 13, it is said that the Egyptians, "made the children of Israel to _serve_ with rigor." This rigor is affirmed of the _amount of labor_ extorted and the _mode_ of the exaction. The expression "serve with rigor," is never applied to the service of servants under the Mosaic system. The phrase, "thou shall not RULE over him with rigor," does not prohibit unreasonable exactions of labor, nor inflictions of cruelty. Such were provided against otherwise.

But it forbids confounding the distinctions between a Jew and a Stranger, by a.s.signing the former to the same grade of service, for the same term of time and under the same political disabilities as the latter.

[Footnote C: The Babylonish captivity seems to have greatly modified Jewish usage in this respect. Before that event, their cities were comparatively small, and few were engaged in mechanical or mercantile employments. Afterward their cities enlarged apace and trades multiplied.]

[Footnote D: Jarchi's comment on "Thou shalt not compel him to serve as a bond-servant" is, "The Hebrew servant is not to be required to do any thing which is accounted degrading--such as all offices of personal attendance, as loosing his master's shoe-latchet, bringing him water to wash his hands and feet, waiting on him at table, dressing him, carrying things to and from the bath. The Hebrew servant is to work with his master as a son or brother, in the business of his farm, or other labor, until his legal release."]

[Footnote E: The disabilities of the Strangers, which were distinctions, based on a different national descent, and important to the preservation of nation characteristics, and a national wors.h.i.+p, did not at all affect their _social_ estimation. They were regarded according to their character and worth as _persons_, irrespective of their foreign origin, employments and political condition.]

We are now prepared to review at a glance, the condition of the different cla.s.ses of servants, with the modifications peculiar to each.

In the possession of all fundamental rights, all cla.s.ses of servants were on an absolute equality, all were equally protected by law in their persons, character, property and social relations; all were voluntary, all were compensated for their labor, and released from it nearly one half of the days in each year; all were furnished with stated instruction; none in either cla.s.s were in any sense articles of property, all were regarded as _men_, with the rights, interests, hopes and destinies of _men_. In all these respects, _all_ cla.s.ses of servants among the Israelites, formed but ONE CLa.s.s. The _different_ cla.s.ses, and the differences in _each_ cla.s.s, were, 1. _Hired Servants_. This cla.s.s consisted both of Israelites and Strangers. Their employments were different. The _Israelite_ was an agricultural servant. The Stranger was a _domestic_ and _personal_ servant, and in some instances _mechanical_; both were occasional and temporary. Both lived in their own families, their wages were _money_, and they were paid when their work was done.

2. _Bought Servants_, (including those "born in the house.") This cla.s.s also, consisted of Israelites and Strangers, the same difference in their kinds of employment as noticed before. Both were paid in advance,[A] and neither was temporary. The Israelitish servant, with the exception of the _freeholder_, completed his term in six years. The Stranger was a permanent servant, continuing until the jubilee. A marked distinction obtained also between different cla.s.ses of _Jewish_ bought servants. Ordinarily, they were merged in their master's family, and, like his wife and children, subject to his authority; (and, like them, protected by law from its abuse.) But the _freeholder_ was an exception; his family relations and authority remained unaffected, nor was he subjected as an inferior to the control of his master, though dependent on him for employment.

[Footnote A: The payment _in advance_, doubtless lessened the price of the purchase; the servant thus having the use of the money, and the master a.s.suming all the risks of life, and health for labor; at the expiration of the six years' contract, the master having suffered no loss from the risk incurred at the making of it, was obliged by law to release the servant with a liberal gratuity. The reason a.s.signed for this is, "he hath been worth a double hired servant unto thee in serving thee six years," as if it had been said, as you have experienced no loss from the risks of life, and ability to labor, incurred in the purchase, and which lessened the price, and as, by being your servant for six years, he has saved you the time and trouble of looking up and hiring laborers on emergencies, therefore, "thou shalt furnish him liberally,"

&c. This gratuity at the close of the service shews the _principle_ of the relation; _equivalent_ for value received. ]

It should be kept in mind, that _both_ cla.s.ses of servants, the Israelite and the Stranger, not only enjoyed _equal, natural and religious rights_, but _all the civil and political privileges_ enjoyed by those of their own people who were _not_ servants. They also shared in common with them the political disabilities which appertained to all Strangers, whether servants of Jewish masters, or masters of Jewish servants. Further, the disabilities of the servants from the Strangers were exclusively _political_ and _national_. 1. They, in common with all Strangers, could not own the soil. 2. They were ineligible to civil offices. 3. They were a.s.signed to employments less honorable than those in which Israelitish servants engaged; agriculture being regarded as fundamental to the existence of the state, other employments were in less repute, and deemed _unjewish_.

Finally, the Strangers, whether servants or masters, were all protected equally with the descendants of Abraham. In respect to political privileges, their condition was much like that of unnaturalized foreigners in the United States; whatever their wealth or intelligence, or moral principle, or love for our inst.i.tutions, they can neither go to the ballot-box, nor own the soil, nor be eligible to office. Let a native American, be suddenly bereft of these privileges, and loaded with the disabilities of an alien, and what to the foreigner would be a light matter, to _him_, would be the severity of _rigor_. The recent condition of the Jews and Catholics in England, is another ill.u.s.tration.

Rothschild, the late banker, though the richest private citizen in the world, and perhaps master of scores of English servants, who sued for the smallest crumbs of his favor, was, as a subject of the government, inferior to the lowest among them. Suppose an Englishman of the Established Church, were by law deprived of power to own the soil, of eligibility to office and of the electoral franchise, would Englishmen think it a misapplication of language, if it were said, the government "rules over him with rigor?" And yet his person, property, reputation, conscience, all his social relations, the disposal of his time, the right of locomotion at pleasure, and of natural liberty in all respects, are just as much protected by law as the Lord Chancellor's.

FINALLY.--As the Mosaic system was a great compound type, rife with meaning in doctrine and duty; the practical power of the whole, depended upon the exact observance of those distinctions and relations which const.i.tuted its significancy. Hence, the care to preserve inviolate the distinction between a _descendant of Abraham_ and a _Stranger_, even when the Stranger was a proselyte, had gone through the initiatory ordinances, entered the congregation, and become incorporated with the Israelites by family alliance. The regulation laid down in Ex. xxi. 2-6, is an ill.u.s.tration. In this case, the Israelitish servant, whose term expired in six years, married one of his master's _permanent female domestics_; but her marriage did not release her master from _his_ part of the contract for her whole term of service, nor from his legal obligation to support and educate her children. Neither did it do away that distinction, which marked her national descent by a specific _grade_ and _term_ of service, nor impair her obligation to fulfil _her_ part of the contract. Her relations as a permanent domestic grew out of a distinction guarded with great care throughout the Mosaic system. To render it void, would have been to divide the system against itself.

This G.o.d would not tolerate. Nor, on the other hand, would he permit the master to throw off the responsibility of instructing her children, nor the care and expense of their helpless infancy and rearing. He was bound to support and educate them, and all her children born afterwards during her term of service. The whole arrangement beautifully ill.u.s.trates that wise and tender regard for the interests of all the parties concerned, which arrays the Mosaic system in robes of glory, and causes it to s.h.i.+ne as the sun in the kingdom of our Father.[B] By this law, the children had secured to them a mother's tender care. If the husband loved his wife and children, he could compel his master to keep him, whether he had any occasion for his services or not. If he did not love them, to be rid of him was a blessing; and in that case, the regulation would prove an act for the relief of an afflicted family. It is not by any means to be inferred, that the release of the servant in the seventh year, either absolved him from the obligations of marriage, or shut him out from the society of his family. He could doubtless procure a service at no great distance from them, and might often do it, to get higher wages, or a kind of employment better suited to his taste and skill. The great number of days on which the law released servants from regular labor, would enable him to spend much more time with his family, than can be spent by most of the agents of our benevolent societies with _their_ families, or by many merchants, editors, artists, &c., whose daily business is in New York, while their families reside from ten to one hundred miles in the country.

[Footnote B: Whoever profoundly studies the Mosaic Inst.i.tutes with a teachable and reverential spirit, will feel the truth and power of that solemn appeal and interrogatory of G.o.d to his people Israel, when he had made an end of setting before them all his statutes and ordinances.

"What nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments SO RIGHTEOUS, as _all_ this law which I set before you this day." Deut. iv.

8.]

We conclude this inquiry by touching upon an objection, which, though not formally stated, has been already set aside by the tenor of the foregoing argument. It is this,--"The slavery of the Canaanites by the Israelites, was appointed by G.o.d as a commutation of the punishment of death denounced against them for their sins."[A] If the absurdity of a sentence consigning persons to death, and at the same time to perpetual slavery, did not sufficiently laugh at itself; it would be small self-denial, in a case so tempting, to make up the deficiency by a general contribution. Only _one_ statute was ever given respecting the disposition to be made of the inhabitants of Canaan. If the sentence of death was p.r.o.nounced against them, and afterwards _commuted_, when?

where? by whom? and in what terms was the commutation, and where is it recorded? Grant, for argument's sake, that all the Canaanites were sentenced to unconditional extermination; how can a right to _enslave_ them, be drawn from such premises? The punishment of death is one of the highest recognitions of man's moral nature possible. It proclaims him rational, accountable, guilty, deserving death for having done his utmost to cheapen human life, when the proof of its priceless worth lived in his own nature. But to make him a _slave_, cheapens to nothing _universal human nature_, and instead of healing a wound, gives a death-stab. What! repair an injury to rational being in the robbery of one of its rights, not only by robbing it of all, but by annihilating their _foundation_, the everlasting distinction between persons and things? To make a man a chattel, is not the _punishment_, but the _annihilation_ of a _human_ being, and, so far as it goes, of _all_ human beings. This commutation of the punishment of death, into perpetual slavery, what a fortunate discovery! Alas! for the honor of Deity, if commentators had not manned the forlorn hope, and by a timely movement rescued the Divine character, at the very crisis of its fate, from the perilous position in which inspiration had carelessly left it!

Here a question arises of sufficient importance for a separate dissertation; but must for the present be disposed of in a few paragraphs. WERE THE CANAANITES SENTENCED BY G.o.d TO INDIVIDUAL AND UNCONDITIONAL EXTERMINATION? As the limits of this inquiry forbid our giving all the grounds of dissent from commonly received opinions, the suggestions made, will be thrown out merely as QUERIES, rather than laid down as _doctrines_. The directions as to the disposal of the Canaanites, are mainly in the following pa.s.sages, Ex. xxiii. 23-33; x.x.xiv. 11; Deut. vii. 16-24; ix. 3; x.x.xi. 3-5. In these verses, the Israelites are commanded to "destroy the Canaanites," to "drive out,"

"consume," "utterly overthrow," "put out," "dispossess them," &c. Did these commands enjoin the unconditional and universal destruction of the _individuals_, or merely of the _body politic_? The word _haram_, to destroy, signifies _national_, as well as individual destruction; the destruction of _political_ existence, equally with _personal_; of governmental organization, equally with the lives of the subjects.

Besides, if we interpret the words destroy, consume, overthrow, &c., to mean _personal_ destruction, what meaning shall we give to the expressions, "drive out before thee," "cast out before thee," "expel,"

"put out," "dispossess," &c., which are used in the same and in parallel pa.s.sages? In addition to those quoted above, see Josh. iii. 10; xvii.

18; xxiii. 5; xxiv. 18; Judg. i. 20, 29-35; vi. 9. "I will _destroy_ all the people to whom thou shalt come, and I will make all thine enemies _turn their backs unto thee_." Ex. xxiii. 27. Here "_all their enemies_"

were to _turn their backs_, and "_all the people_" to be "_destroyed_."

Does this mean that G.o.d would let all their _enemies_ escape, but kill their _friends_, or that he would _first_ kill "all the people" and THEN make them "turn their backs," an army of runaway corpses? In Josh. xxiv.

8, G.o.d says, speaking of the Amorites, "I _destroyed_ them from before you." In the 18th verse of the same chapter, it is said, "The Lord _drave out_ from before us all the people, even the Amorites which dwelt in the land." In Num. x.x.xii. 39, we are told that "the children of Machir the son of Mana.s.seh, went to Gilead, and took it, and _dispossessed_ the Amorite which was in it." If these commands required the destruction of all the _individuals,_ the Mosaic law was at war with itself, for directions as to the treatment of native residents form a large part of it. See Lev. xix. 34; xxv. 35, 36; xxiv. 22.; Ex. xxiii.

9; xxii. 21; Deut. i. 16, 17; x. 17, 19; xxvii. 19. We find, also, that provision was made for them in the cities of refuge, Num. x.x.xv. 15,--the gleanings of the harvest and vintage were theirs, Lev. xix. 9, 10; xxiii. 22;--the blessings of the Sabbath, Ex. xx. 10;--the privilege of offering sacrifices secured, Lev. xxii. 18; and stated religious instruction provided for them. Deut. x.x.xi. 9, 12. Now does this same law require the _individual extermination_ of those whose lives and interests it thus protects? These laws were given to the Israelites, long _before_ they entered Canaan; and they must have inferred from them, that a mult.i.tude of the inhabitants of the land were to _continue in it_, under their government. Again Joshua was selected as the leader of Israel to execute G.o.d's threatenings upon Canaan. He had no discretionary power. G.o.d's commands were his official instructions.

Going beyond them would have been usurpation; refusing to carry them out, rebellion and treason. Saul was rejected from being king for disobeying G.o.d's commands in a single instance. Now if G.o.d commanded the individual destruction of all the Canaanites Joshua disobeyed him in every instance. For at his death, the Israelites still "_dwelt among them_," and each nation is mentioned by name. Judg. i. 27-36, and yet we are told that Joshua "left nothing undone of all that the Lord commanded Moses;" and that he "took all that land." Josh. xi. 15-22. Also, that "there _stood not a man_ of _all_ their enemies before them." Josh. xxi.

44. How can this be if the command to destroy, destroy utterly, &c., enjoined _individual_ extermination, and the command to drive out, unconditional expulsion from the country, rather than their expulsion from the _possession_ or _owners.h.i.+p_ of it, as the lords of the soil?

That the latter is the true sense to be attached to those terms, we argue, further from the fact that the same terms are employed by G.o.d to describe the punishment which he would inflict upon the Israelites if they served other G.o.ds. "Ye shall utterly perish," "be utterly destroyed," "consumed," &c., are some of them.--See Deut. iv. 20; viii.

19, 20.[B] Josh. xxiii. 12, 13-16; 1. Sam. xii. 25. The Israelites _did_ serve other G.o.ds, and Jehovah _did_ execute upon them his threatenings--and thus himself _interpreted_ these threatenings. He subverted their _government_, dispossessed them of their land, divested them of national power, and made them _tributaries_, but did not _exterminate_ them. He "destroyed them utterly" as an independent body politic, but not as individuals. Mult.i.tudes of the Canaanites were slain, but not a case can be found in which one was either killed or expelled who _acquiesced_ in the transfer of the territory, and its sovereignty, from the inhabitants of the land to the Israelites. Witness the case of Rahab and her kindred, and that of the Gibeonites.[C] The Canaanites knew of the miracles wrought for the Israelites; and that their land had been transferred to them as a judgment for their sins.

Josh. ii. 9-11; ix. 9, 10, 24. Many of them were awed by these wonders, and made no resistance. Others defied G.o.d and came out to battle. These last occupied the fortified cities, were the most inveterate heathen--the aristocracy of idolatry, the kings, the n.o.bility and gentry, the priests, with their crowds of satellites, and retainers that aided in idolatrous rites, and the military forces, with the chief profligates of both s.e.xes. Many facts corroborate the general position.

Witness that command (Deut. xxiii. 15, 16,) which, not only prohibited the surrender of the fugitive servant to his master, but required the Israelites to receive him with kindness, permit him to dwell where he pleased, and to protect and cherish him. Whenever any servant, even a Canaanite, fled from his master to the Israelites, Jehovah, so far from commanding them to _kill_ him, straitly charged them, "He shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which _he_ shall choose--in one of thy gates where it liketh _him_ best--thou shalt not oppress him."

Deut. xxiii. 16. The Canaanitish servant by thus fleeing to the Israelites, submitted himself as a dutiful subject to their national government, and pledged his allegiance. Suppose _all_ the Canaanites had thus submitted themselves to the Jewish theocracy, and conformed to the requirements of the Mosaic inst.i.tutes, would not _all_ have been spared upon the same principle that _one_ was? Again, look at the mult.i.tude of _tributaries_ in the midst of Israel, and that too, after they had "waxed strong," and the uttermost nations quaked at the terror of their name--the Canaanites, Philistines and others, who became proselytes--as the Nethenims, Uriah the Hitt.i.te--Rahab, who married one of the princes of Judah--Jether, an Ishmaelite, who married Abigail the sister of David and was the father of Amasa, the captain of the host of Israel. Comp. 1 Chron. ii. 17, with 2 Sam. xvii. 25.--Ittai--the six hundred Gitt.i.tes, David's body guard. 2. Sam xv. 18, 21. Obededom the Gitt.i.te, adopted into the tribe of Levi. Comp. 2 Sam. vi. 10, 11, with 1 Chron. xv. 18, and xxvi. 4, 5--Jaziz, and Obil. 1 Chron, xxvii. 30, 31. Jephunneh the Kenezite, Josh. xiv. 6, and father of Caleb a ruler of the tribe of Judah. Numb. xiii. 2, 6--the Kenites registered in the genealogies of the tribe of Judah, Judg. i. 16; 1 Chron. ii. 55, and the one hundred and fifty thousand Canaanites, employed by Solomon in the building of the Temple.[D] Besides, the greatest miracle on record, was wrought to save a portion of those very Canaanites, and for the destruction of those who would exterminate them. Josh. x. 12-14. Further--the terms employed in the directions regulating the disposal of the Canaanites, such as "drive out," "put out," "cast out," "expel," "dispossess," &c., seem used interchangeably with "consume," "destroy," "overthrow," &c., and thus indicate the sense in which the latter words are used. As an ill.u.s.tration of the meaning generally attached to these and similar terms, we refer to the history of the Amalekites. "I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven." Ex. xvii. 14. "Thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it." Deut. xxv. 19. "Smite Amalek and _utterly destroy_ all that they have, and spare them not, but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep." 1 Sam. xv. 2, 3. "Saul smote the Amalekites, and he took Agag the king of the Amalekites, alive and UTTERLY DESTROYED ALL THE PEOPLE with the edge of the sword." Verses 7, 8. In verse 20, Saul says, "I have brought Agag, the king of Amalek, and have _utterly destroyed_ the Amalekites." In 1 Sam. x.x.x. 1, 2, we find the Amalekites marching an army into Israel, and sweeping everything before them--and this in about eighteen years after they had all been "UTTERLY DESTROYED!" In 1 Kings ii. 15-17, is another ill.u.s.tration. We are informed that Joab remained in Edom six months with all Israel, "until he had _cut off every male_" in Edom. In the next verse we learn that Hadad and "certain Edomites" were not slain. Deut. xx. 16, 17, will probably be quoted against the preceding view. We argue that the command in these verses, did not include all the individuals of the Canaanitish nations, but only the inhabitants of the _cities_, (and even those conditionally,) because, only the inhabitants of _cities_ are specified--"of the _cities_ of these people thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth." Cities then, as now, were pest-houses of vice, they reeked with abominations little practised in the country. On this account, their influence would be far more perilous to the Israelites than that of the country. Besides, they were the centres of idolatry--there were the temples and altars, and idols, and priests, without number. Even their buildings, streets, and public walks were so many visibilities of idolatry. The reason a.s.signed in the 18th verse for exterminating them, strengthens the idea--"that they teach you not to do after all the abominations which they have done unto their G.o.ds." This would be a reason for exterminating all the nations and individuals _around_ them, as all were idolaters; but G.o.d commanded them, in certain cases, to spare the inhabitants. Contact with _any_ of them would be perilous--with the inhabitants of the _cities_ peculiarly, and of the _Canaanitish_ cities pre-eminently so. The 10th and 11th verses contain the general rule prescribing the method in which cities were to be summoned to surrender. They were first to receive the offer of peace--if it was accepted, the inhabitants became _tributaries_--but if they came out against Israel in battle, the _men_ were to be killed, and the woman and little ones saved alive. The 15th verse restricts this lenient treatment to the inhabitants of the cities _afar off_. The 16th directs as to the disposal of the inhabitants of the Canaanitish cities. They were to save alive "nothing that breathed." The common mistake has been, in supposing that the command in the 15th verse refers to the _whole system of directions preceding,_ commencing with the 10th, whereas it manifestly refers only to the _inflictions_ specified in the 12th, 13th, and, 14th, making a distinction between those _Canaanitish_ cities that _fought_, and the cities _afar off_ that fought--in one case destroying the males and females, and in the other, the _males_ only. The offer of peace, and the _conditional preservation_, were as really guarantied to _Canaanitish_ cities as to others. Their inhabitants were not to be exterminated unless they came out against Israel in battle. Whatever be the import of the commands respecting the disposition to be made of the Canaanites, all admit the fact that the Israelites did _not_ utterly exterminate them. Now, if entire and unconditional extermination was the command of G.o.d, it was _never_ obeyed by the Israelites, consequently the truth of G.o.d stood pledged to consign _them_ to the same doom which he had p.r.o.nounced upon the Canaanites, but which they had refused to visit upon them. "If ye will not drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall come to pa.s.s that * * _I shall do unto you as I thought to do unto them_." Num. x.x.xiii. 55, 56. As the Israelites were not exterminated, we infer that G.o.d did not p.r.o.nounce _that_ doom upon them; and as he _did_ p.r.o.nounce upon them the _same_ doom, whatever it was, which they should _refuse_ to visit upon the Canaanites, it follows that the doom of unconditional _extermination_ was _not_ p.r.o.nounced against the Canaanites. But let us settle this question by the "law and the testimony." "There was not a city that made peace with the children of Israel save the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon; all others they took in battle. For it was of the Lord to harden their hearts, that they should COME OUT AGAINST ISRAEL IN BATTLE, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favor, but that he might destroy them, as the Lord commanded Moses." Josh. xi. 19.

20. That is, if they had _not_ come out against Israel in battle, they would have had "favor" shown them, and would not have been "_destroyed utterly_." The great design was to _transfer the territory_ of the Canaanites to the Israelites, and along with it, _absolute sovereignty in every respect_; to annihilate their political organizations, civil polity, and jurisprudence, and their system of religion, with all its rights and appendages; and to subst.i.tute therefor, a pure theocracy, administered by Jehovah, with the Israelites as His representatives and agents. In a word the people were to be _denationalized,_ their political existence annihilated, their idol temples, altars, groves, images, pictures, and heathen rites destroyed, and themselves put under tribute. Those who resisted the execution of Jehovah's purpose were to be killed, while those who quietly submitted to it were to be spared.

All had the choice of these alternatives, either free egress out of the land;[E] or acquiescence in the decree, with life and residence as tributaries, under the protection of the government; or resistance to the execution of the decree, with death. "_And it shall come to pa.s.s, if they will diligently learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name, the Lord liveth, as they taught my people to swear by Baal;_ THEN SHALL THEY BE BUILT IN THE MIDST OF MY PEOPLE."

[Footnote A: In the prophecy, Gen. ix. 25, the subjection of the Canaanites as a conquered people rendering tribute to other nations, is foretold by inspiration. The fulfilment of this prediction, seems to have commenced in the subjection of the Canaanites to the Israelites as tributaries. If the Israelites had exterminated them, as the objector a.s.serts they were commanded to do; the prediction would have been _falsified_.]

[Footnote B: These two verses are so explicit we quote them entire--"And it shall be if thou do at all forget the Lord they G.o.d and walk after other G.o.ds and serve them, and wors.h.i.+p them, I testify against you this day that ye shall surely _perish_, as the nations which the Lord destroyed before your face, _so_ shall ye perish." The following pa.s.sages are, if possible still more explicit--"The Lord shall send upon thee cursing, vexation and rebuke in all that thou settest thine hand unto for to do, until thou be _destroyed_, and until thou perish quickly." "The Lord shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee until he have _consumed_ thee." "They (the 'sword,' 'blasting,' &c.) shall pursue thee until thou _perish_." "From heaven shall it come down upon thee until thou be _destroyed_." "All these curses shall come upon thee till thou be _destroyed_." "He shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck until he have _destroyed_ thee." "The Lord shall bring a nation against thee, a nation of fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old, nor show favor to the young, * * until he have _destroyed_ thee."

All these, with other similar threatenings of _destruction_, are contained in the twenty-eighth chapter of Deut. See verses 20-25, 45, 48, 51. In the _same_ chapter G.o.d declares that as a punishment for the same transgressions, the Israelites shall "be _removed_ into all the kingdoms of the earth," thus showing that the terms employed in the other verses, "destroy," "perish," "perish quickly," "consume," &c., instead of signifying utter, personal destruction doubtless meant their destruction as an independent nation. In Josh. xxiv. 8, 18, "destroyed"

and "drave out," are used synonymously.]

[Footnote C: Perhaps it will be objected, that the preservation of the Gibeonites, and of Rahab and her kindred, was a violation of the command of G.o.d. We answer, if it had been, we might expect some such intimation.

If G.o.d had straitly commanded them to _exterminate all the Canaanites_, their pledge to save them alive, was neither a repeal of the statute, nor absolution for the breach of it. If _unconditional destruction_ was the import of the command, would G.o.d have permitted such an act to pa.s.s without rebuke? Would he have established such a precedent when Israel had hardly pa.s.sed the threshold of Canaan, and was then striking the first blow of a half century war? What if they _had_ pa.s.sed their word to Rahab and the Gibeonites? Was that more binding than G.o.d's command?

So Saul seems to have pa.s.sed _his_ word to Agag; yet Samuel hewed him in pieces, because in saving his life, Saul had violated G.o.d's command.

When Saul sought to slay the Gibeonites in "his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah," G.o.d sent upon Israel a three years' famine for it.

When David inquired of them what atonement he should make, they say, "The man that devised against us, that we should be destroyed from _remaining in any of the coast of Israel_, let seven of his sons be delivered," &c. 2 Sam. xxi. 1-6.]

[Footnote D: If the Canaanites were devoted by G.o.d to unconditional extermination, to have employed them in the erection of the temple,--what was it but the climax of impiety? As well might they pollute its altars with swine's flesh or make their sons pa.s.s through the fire to Moloch.]

[Footnote E: Suppose all the Canaanitish nations had abandoned their territory at the tidings of Israel's approach, did G.o.d's command require the Israelites to chase them to ends of the earth, and hunt them out, until every Canaanite was destroyed? It is too preposterous for belief, and yet it follows legitimately from that construction, which interprets the terms "consume," "destroy," "destroy utterly," &c. to mean unconditional, individual extermination.]

[The original design of the preceding Inquiry embraced a much wider range of topics. It was soon found, however, that to fill up the outline would be to make a volume. Much of the foregoing has therefore been thrown into a mere series of _indices_, to trains of thought and cla.s.ses of proof, which, however limited or imperfect, may perhaps, afford some facilities to those who have little leisure for protracted investigation.]

NO. 5.