CHAPTER IV.

THE GENERAL AND SPECIAL COVENANTS OF GOD.

'And God said, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.... I am that I am.'-'Exod. iii. 6, 14.

In this chapter we have to advance some steps further in the evolution of the Scriptural declaration of covenant with God.' As yet we have simply considered how in the fundamental ideas involved in such covenant, and in their first illustration through the brief symbolic introduction to the regular history, written in the first chapters of Genesis, the revelation of God is undoubtedly complementary to Natural Theology, as bringing out the personality of a living God, and the true spirituality of man; and how at the same time, though as yet only under the simpler and less difficult aspects, it faces unflinchingly the dark mystery of evil, before which Natural Theology stands at bay-not silenced, indeed, but perplexed. In these considerations we stood at the first source of human history; now we have to trace the stream as it flows down, gradually widening and deepening, till it becomes the great flood, on which we ourselves are borne along.

Of the The glimpses

I. I may remark that here we enter at once on what claims to be a record of a true historic character. world before the Flood we have but the vaguest glimpses, just sufficient to show us that it was a

of the ante

diluvian

world in essence like our own, although different world. in some phases and conditions of its being. Still the narrative is symbolic, but symbolic under the simplicity of obvious

1 Such difference is, for example, implied in the longevity ascribed to the patriarchs. This is clearly described as historical. In our ignorance of the determining cause of

that victory of the forces of decay over those of reproduction, which we call old age or decrepitude, who can pronounce it incredible?

fact. We trace the full growth of sin in the murder of brother by brother-its root in sudden jealousy, striking deep into the soil of an ingrained selfishness-its penalty in that outcast loneliness from Nature, from man, and from God, which is the appropriate punishment of selfishness. We trace a gradual separation between the two classes of those who 'call on the name of the Lord,' and those who will not have Him to reign over them-Enoch or Noah the perfect type of the one, Cain or Lamech of the other. We note the profound wisdom, departing from the ordinary type of mythology, which distinguishes between material civilisation, whether of mechanical or fine art, and the moral progress of a religious life- the one belonging to the family of Cain, the other to the race of Seth. We read the record of the primeval existence of sacrifice, presenting itself (so to speak) as a matter of course, under its simplest form as a tribute of homage to the God who gives all-so remarkably corresponding with the universal extension of that strange rite in all its various forms, of which philosophic history has taken note. We find at last-perhaps from some supernatural admixture of evil 2-the story of an overspreading corruption, in which the probation of that old world came to a tragic end; and we hail the simple beauty of the declaration (for which philosophical abstractions would give but a poor exchange) that throughout that probation God's Spirit strove with man,' and that its fatal close repented the Lord God, and grieved Him at the heart.' In all this we certainly learn that in that ancient world God and man were still the same. But we learn no more. Thousands of years are noted but in a few scores of words. The Flood, so often paralleled in Scripture with the judgment day, rolls between us and them, and of the further shore we have but dim and shadowy outlines, of which we hardly know the full meaning. From these mere fancy would rejoice to weave a

2 I allude, of course, to Gen. vi. 1-6-the admixture of the sons of God' with the daughters of men.' Whatever be the difficulties of conception of such admixture, however much we may shrink from the grotesque fables which have been drawn

from this source by ancient interpreters, both language and context seem to imply the introduction of some supernatural element into the world, connected in its consequences with the final Judgment.

fabric of many-coloured legend. But with a reserve of fixed purpose the Scripture record passes them by. It is enough to see here in type the great principles of God's moral government. Our business is with the dispensation in which we live. History, properly so called, begins for us only when the great catastrophe of the Flood opens the new world.

The com

mencement history with

of regular

the Flood.

II. Accordingly it must be obvious to every thoughtful reader that with the story of the Flood the whole character of the Scriptural narrative changes. The story is told, indeed, with a simple and pathetic beauty, painting, as from the ark itself, the picture of a great convulsion under unknown forces of destruction- the windows of heaven opened, and the fountains of the great deep broken up.' But it is told with plain, almost prosaic, reality even of detail. It is the beginning of human history, curiously supported (as we know) by the traditions of almost every race, but admitting none of the fantastic additions which we find in these, in itself obviously no mere apologue or legend, but history, and as history claiming to be judged -in relation, if we will, both to the traditional histories of the peoples of the world, and the geological or physiological history written on the fabric of the world itself. There is clearly a fresh start taken when the Flood subsides, and the remnant come forth from the ark. A covenant' is given; a new blessing uttered; the old birthright of man in 'the image of God' renewed; the first roll of the peoples of the ancient world recited to us. From that time onward the historic thread is never broken, till it binds the whole world. to the feet of the exalted majesty of the Lord Jesus Christ. Laying hold of it as a clue of light in the darkness of antiquity, we may consider the first stages of the evolution of the great fundamental idea of the covenant of man with God.

Now from the very beginning we must be struck with

The traditional history in all the great families of mankind-hardly wanting, indeed, in any great ancient tradition except the Egyptian, and in the Chaldean standing out with most striking points of similarity to the Old Testament record bears

strong evidence to the reality of the Flood; the geological and physiological history to its partiality. The Scriptural narrative simply implies its universality in relation to the human race in its primeval habitation.

and special

Covenants with God.

a twofold aspect of that covenant, corresponding very reThe general markably to the twofold nature of man. It is at once special and universal; it belongs to the individual, yet in possessing it he is partly the representative, and partly the trustee, of the whole human race. Could it (we may ask) be otherwise? Each man is truly individual, always in his highest consciousness alone with the God on whom his life hangs; yet he is also a member of the great family of mankind, and an element in the greater system of the universe itself. Accordingly it is necessary to any conception of a living relation to God, which shall at once stir the heart and satisfy the intellect, that it shall first be realised by man in the little world of his own soul, and in the relations immediately connecting it with the outer life; and then that it shall be seen in its bearing on the great world without, widening out, like circles on a river, until it washes the shores of humanity on every side. To be a religion, it must satisfy the one condition; to be a philosophy, it must fulfil the other. Thus we see that in Natural Theology the moral witness of conscience and of the affections concentrates our thought on a God who is our God, in whom we ourselves 'live and move and have our being;' the witness of the intellect and the imagination diffuses it (so to speak) over the universe, and bids us identify with this our God the Supreme Power, on which the whole depends. Accordingly any revelation, which is to correspond to the whole needs and various thoughts of man, should certainly bring out the relation to God in this twofold aspect, contemplating it at once in the gathered rays of the revelation to the individual, and the diffused light of a universal revelation to all mankind.

Now this, be it noted, is precisely what the Bible does in respect of its great idea of covenant with God. First, in slight outline, in pale yet not indistinct colouring, it sketches it out as concerning all mankind, and filling the whole canvas of history. Next, it paints over this first outline, stroke by stroke, till the picture lives and breathes before us, the closer personal relation to God of a chosen man, a chosen family, a chosen nation; while at every point the universal conception is seen (so to speak) to form a half-luminous

background, on which the brighter painting stands out in softened beauty. The first glance is content to rest on the detailed figures of the foreground; the closer and more thoughtful observation sees that they are but salient parts of a mighty whole. So in a well-known picture the first glance shows us but one figure of an exalted majesty surrounded with glory; the next tells us that this glory is made up of a constellation of angel faces, surrounding the central figure with a living presence of the 'ten thousand times ten thousand,' who stand before the throne of God.

, with Noah.

III. We glance first at the original outline of a covenant universal to man; standing at the point, where the waters of the Flood have ebbed away, to leave bare for us The general the firm ground of the first plain record of human covenant history. Then for the first time the word 'covenant' is used, with all the peculiar characteristics of God's covenants very strongly marked upon it-its origination from His will, as declaring the eternal purpose, which is from the beginning; its perfect freedom and absoluteness, unconditioned by any action of man; yet its value to each man depending on the acceptance, by an intelligent and active faith, of what might otherwise be a mere regularity of law, hiding rather than manifesting the hand of the living God. With these characteristics thus plainly marked, it is set forth in application to all flesh, in all the various families by which the whole earth was to be overspread. That covenant in the very simplest language enunciates, as by the voice of God, three great laws, on which the whole fabric of human life rests.

manence.

(a) The law

It proclaims first the law of physical regularity and perThe flood shall no more destroy the earth; 'while the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day of physical and night shall not fail.' It proclaims this physical regularity. regularity, as all religion must proclaim it, to be the expression of a creative will; but it proclaims it as a covenant, that is, as a declaration of that will for the benefit of man, since only by the foresight and reliance on physical regularity can he be a fellow-worker with God.' They who have studied