TH E X th C H A P T E R OF G E N E S I S .
“ Consilium igitur fuit tractatui de Paradiso pro appendice subnectere
breué expositionem decimi capitis Genèseos de humani generis propagatione
ex stirpe Nose. Ex qua non veteres modo sed et nouitios interpretes Jiorwn
ignoratione à sacri. Scriptoris scopo scope oberassepateret. . . . . Itaque hoc restat
vnicum, yt ad sacram anchoram hoc est ad Scripturam confugiamus : Quse
. non solum in genere docet omnes homines ex vnd semine esse editos, nempe ex
; Adamo in creatione, et post diluuium ex Noà et tribus "filiis, sed et recenset
nepotés Nose, et qui populi ex singulis ortum duxerint.”
(P h a l e g seu D e D is p e r s io n e Gentium e t Terrarum d iv is io n e facta in
adificatione turris Babel — auctore S am v e le B o c h a r t o : 1651.) 567
Preliminary Remarks.
Two centuries intervene, as well as many thousand miles of land
and water, between the completion of Bochakt’s unsurpassablelabors
and the seemingly-audacious resumption of his inquiries in the present
volume. The author oiGeographia Sacra would smile, with more
complacency perhaps than some of our readers, did he know that the
edifice raised by his enormous erudition, in old scholastic Belgium,
had been taken to pieces stone by stone ; and, after a scrutinizing,
but frugal, rejection of time-rotted superfluities, has been reverentially
rebuilt, in the piny-woods of Alabama, on' the rough, though beauteous,
shore of Mobile Bay.
It is with some regret that, in order'to compress their work into a
portable- tome, the authors lop away unsparingly the evidences of
studies, to which many months were conjointly and exclusively devoted
: but, at present, they must content themselves with the briefest
synopsis of results. Their references indicate the sourees-of all emendations
proposed—-by far the greater bulk of which (With the sole
exception of Mich^ lis’s criticisms of seventy years ago)568 arise from
discoveries made by living Egyptologists, Hebraists, Cunèatic-students,
( 466 >
and similar masters of Oriental lore. These references will establish,
that in the conscientious application of enlightened- learning to the
Hebrew Text of Xth Genesis, commentaries of the genuine English
evangelical school have ever played an insignificant part. Where the
latter sometimes happen to.be right, their facts are taken-generally
at second-hand, and mostly without acknowledgment—from Boehart ;;
and wherever, more frequently, they are wrong, they have, eijhjp
ignored his text or the very-accessible criticism of Continental archaeologists.
Of trivial value in themselves, such popular commentaries | |
■possess less weight in science; and, having wasted their own time in
hunting through dozens of them for anew fact or an original observation,
the authors will spare the reader’s by leaving them unmentioned.
__
i ( Priseorvm mendax commenta est fabula valum,
Sincerumque nihil, nil sine lahe fuit.
' Sordibus ex istis derisa el caUgihelucem
Eruere, humance non fuit artis opus.
. Desperatd aliis units tentare B o c h a b t v s
Ausus, et ignotas primus inire vim."
“ The ethnographic chart ¡»-contained in the tenth chapter of. Genesis, presents,” says
Dr Eadie “ a broad and interesting field of investigation, It carries ns hack to a dim and
remote e r a -w h e n colonization was rapid and extensive, and the princes of successive
bands of emigrants gave their names to the countries which they seized, occupied and
divided among their followers. This ancient record has not the aspect of a legend which
has arisen, no' one can tell how, and received amplification and adornment in the course of
ages. It is neither a confused nor an unintelligible statement. Its sobriety vouches for
its accuracy. ■ As, its genealogy is-free from extravagance, and as it presents facts without
the music and fiction of poetry, it must hot be. confounded with Grecian and Oriental mythe,
which, is so shadowy, contradictory and baseless - a region of grotesque and cloudy phantoms,
where Phylarchs are exalted into demigods, born of Nymph or Nereid, and claiming
some Stream or River for their sire. The founders of nations-appeal■, m such .fables as
giants of superhuman fo rm -o r , wandering and reckless outcasts and adventurers, exhibiting
in their nature a confused mixture of divine and Jraman attributes; and the very names
of Ouranos, Okeanos, Kronos, and Gaea, the occupants of this illusory cloud-land, prove
their legendary character. In this chapter there is, on the other hand, nothing that lifts
itself above vulgar humanity, nothing that might, nothing that did not happen m those distant
and primitive epochs/ The world must have be,en peopled by tribes th^t gave themselves
and their respective regions those several names which they have borne for so many
ages; and what certainly did thus occur, may have taken place in the method sketched in
these Mosaic annals. ■ No other account is more likely, or presents fewer difficulties ; and,
if yfe credit the inspiration of the writer of it, we shall not only receive it as authentic, but be
griiteful for the information which it contains. Modern ethnology does not contra ict l . i ' y
of the proper names occurring on. this roll remain unchanged, as the appellations o ra
and kingdoms. Others are found in the plural or dual number, proving that they bear a
personal and national reference {Gen. x. 13); and a third clsnte have that pecu iar
tion which, in Hebrew, signifies a sept or,tribe (x. 1 /).” 570 H
The abo\Plcholar-like definition of what Dr. Hales styles “ that
most venerable and valuable Geographical Chart, the tenth chapter of
Genesis,1571 indicates- the absolute impossibility of obtaining satisfactory