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5. The Egyptians mourned for Jacob, according to the above passage, seventy days. In verse 4 it is said: "And when the days of his mourning were past," &c. In verses 10 and 11: "And they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond Jordan, and mourned there with a great and very sore lamentation; and he made a mourning for his father seven days, and the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning in the floor of Atad, and said, This is a grievous mourning to the Egyptians; wherefore the name of it was called Abel Mizraim (mourning of Egypt)." The classical writers also show that the Egyptians appointed for themselves a very solemn mourning for the dead, especially for those of high rank. Herodotus1 says: "Lamentations and funerals were celebrated. When a man died in a house, that is, one of rank, all the females of his family co

tion of which Diodorus speaks,) held so inferior a place. But Creuzer, to whom Bähr accedes, has attempted to prove that the explanation which is most in accordance with the facts in the case, is inconsistent with the words. "Ego si quaeris," he says in Comment. upon Herodotus, p. 45, "vereor ut hae explicationes conciliari queunt cum verbis Herodoti, qui quidem h. 1. diserte dicit rapixevovoi Xiroq, quod posterius vocabulum cogitando videtur repeti debere cum ad sequens κρύψαντες, tum ad ταρικεύειν, ita ut rapıkevɛi h. 1. proprie salitionem videatur significare." According to Creuzer, therefore, we must translate: "When this is done, they lay it in natron and leave it therein 70 days, but they are not allowed to salt it longer." But this interpretation is not admissible, much less then necessary. With κρύψαντες, λίτρῳ cannot be implied, for the dead body was not put into the natron, but that was applied to it. Tapikɛve without Xirpy can the more appropriately be taken in a general sense, since it is always so used in what precedes and follows. Compare c. 85: outw is τὴν ταρίχευσιν κομίζουσι, c. 86 : ὧδε τὰ σπουδαιότατα ταριχεύουσι, e. 89 : τὰς δὲ γυναῖκας τῶν ἐπιφανέων ἀνδρῶν, ἐπεὰν τελευτήσωσι, ου παραυτίκα διδοῦσι ταριχεύειν,-οὕτω παραδιδοῦσι τοῖς ταριχεύουσι. Compare upon the meaning of rapixεve, primarily to salt and then to embalm in general, Creuzer, p. 10 seq.; Heyne p. 81. We must translate : "When this is done, they embalm it in natron, having concealed it (in all) 70 days; but it is not permitted to embalm it longer." The expression "having concealed it 70 days," refers to the whole time in which the dead body was removed from the view of the relatives, and was under the operation of the embalmers. The phrase "they are not allowed to embalm it longer," is explained by the remark, that to the rapixevois the treatment with natron also belonged, which began after the embalming in its more limited senso was at an end, and continued until the burial, or to the end of the mourning.

'B. 2. c. 85.

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vering their faces with mud, and leaving the body in the house, ran through the streets, girded up, and striking their bare breasts and uttering loud lamentations. All their female relations joined them. The men beat their breasts in like manner, and also girded up their dress." Diodorus1 says: any one dies among them, all his relatives and friends cover their heads with mud, and go about the streets with loud lamentations, until the body is buried. In the meantime, they neither use baths, nor even take wine, or any other than common food; they also do not put on beautiful garments." The same author gives an account of the lamentation of the Egyptians on the death of a king. Men and women, to the number of 200 or 300, went around in companies, sung twice every day the funeral dirge, honoured him with eulogies, and repeated the virtues of the dead. In the meantime, they neither taste meat nor wheaten bread, and abstained from wine, and every species of sumptuousness. No one used the bath or ointments or a soft bed, but every one was full of the deepest sorrow, as if a beloved child had died, and spent the prescribed time in sorrow. Meanwhile everything which pertained to the burial was made ready, and on the last day they placed the coffin which contained the body before the entrance of the tomb," &c.2 The monuments also show how violent and solemn the lamentation was among the Egyptians. Many of the ceremonies of mourning have been transmitted even to the modern Egyptians.4

In chap. 1. 4, we read: "And when the days of his mourning (the mourning for Israel) were past, Joseph spake unto the house of Pharaoh, saying, If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh," &c. It is worthy of remark here, that Joseph makes not his request directly to the king, but has recourse to the house of Pharaoh, while at other times he goes directly to Pharaoh; and even his brothers and his father were brought before Pharaoh, so that the fact cannot be explained on the ground of the hatred of the Egyptians to strangers. The correct explanation is as follows: It belongs to the Egyptian sense

1 B. 1. c. 91.

Diod. B. 1. c. 72.

* See the Representation of a mourning scene, from Thebes, in Wilkinson, Vol. I. p. 286.

4

Heyne, p. 81, and De Chabrol, Essai s. les moeurs des habitans modernes de l'Egypt. Descr. t. 18. p. 180.

of propriety to go with shorn head and beard, and only so is it allowed to appear before the king. Compare chap. xli. 14, where Joseph shaved himself and changed his garments before he went to Pharaoh, and the remarks upon that passage above.1 But while mourning, they were not permitted to shave. Herodotus 2 says: "Among other nations it is the custom in mourning for the relatives to shear the head, but the Egyptians, when an individual dies, leave the hair which was before cut off, to grow both upon the head and chin." Such peculiar customs are especially suited to fix the opinion with regard to the relation of the Pentateuch to Egypt.

In chap. 1. 7 and 8, it is said: "And Joseph went up to bury his father; and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of the house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt. And all the house of Joseph and his brethren," &c. "The custom of funeral trains," says Rosellini,3" was peculiar to all periods, and to all the provinces of Egypt. We see the representations of funeral processions in the oldest tombs at Eilethyas, and similar ones are delineated in those of Saqqarah and Gizeh; we also find others of a like nature in the Theban tombs, which belong to the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth dynasties." When we behold the representations of the processions for the dead upon the monuments, we seem to see the funeral train of Jacob.4 The distinction between the elders of the house of Pharaoh, his courtofficers, and the elders of the land of Egypt, the state-officers, is also worthy of notice. According to other accounts, the court of the Egyptian king was made up of the sons of the most distinguished priests; those called Nomarchs and Toparchs by the Greeks belonged to the state-officers.

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In chap. 1. 26, it is said, "And Joseph died,—and they embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt." Compare with this what Herodotus says: "Now the relatives take away the body, and make a wooden image in the shape of a man, and place the body in it. When it is thus inclosed, they place it in the apartment for the dead, setting it upright against the wall." A doubt with regard to the Egyptian knowledge of the author might be awakened by the fact, that he permits Joseph to be placed in a

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wooden sarcophagus,' while one of stone would be expected. But a closer examination shows that this expression is directly in favour of the credibility of the Pentateuch; coffins made of wood in Egypt, as indeed the passage already quoted from Herodotus shows, were the common ones, and those of basalt a rare exception; and in the case of Joseph, his order that the children of Israel should at a future time carry his bones with them to Canaan, furnishes a separate reason for giving the preference to wood rather than stone. Besides, the custom of putting the dead in sarcophagi was by no means a general one, only rich and distinguished persons received this honour. Compare Heyne,3 and notice that the Egyptian knowledge of the author appears here, since he permits Joseph to be a sharer in this honour that belongs to those who are highly esteemed.

1 The Hebrew word 717 designates such a one. Plutarch employs the entirely synonymous word λápvag the same thing to designate. See Zoega de Obeliscis, p. 330.

"Sarcophagi," says Heyne, p. 86,

:

cr e basalte rarissimi et ditissimorum fere plerique e sycamoro, (compare upon the Sycamore wood as the common material of coffins for the dead, Creuzer Comm., Herod. p. 61,) ad formam corporis facti, ex uno caudice dimidiato, ut altera pars pro capuli fundo, altera pro tegumine sit; alii e pluribus asseribus coassati." Compare upon the quality of coffins for the dead, Rosellini II. 3. p. 344. But the most copious collections upon wood, as the very common material of the Egyptian sarcophagi, are found in Zoega, p. 317; latissime autem patere videmus consuetudinem mortuos includere in arcas oblongas cadaveris staturae accommodatas, et sic sub terram condere, aut in sepulcro reponere super solo exstructo, aut vero basi suffultas collocare sub divo. Ligni ad hoc usus frequentissimus; eoque Aegyptii ut plurimum contenti fuisse videntur, dum et sycomorus arbor, ejus regionis incola, materiem praeberet diuturnae durationis, et loca ubi condere solebant cadavera ab aëre atque humore ita essent praeclusa, ut quodvis lignum in iis perdurare potuisse videatur. Ideoque non alias quam ligneas arcas commemorat Herodotus. The same author says, p. 333: Intelligimus et hinc in magno honore apud Aegyptios fuisse arcas ligneas cum arte factas et pulcre exornatas dum ipsum Osiridem hujusmodi conditorio delusum et captum inque eo sepultum traderent; quare et regum cadavera ligneo loculo intra lapideum inclusa fuisse conjicio. The coffin of king Mycerinus, discovered in the year 1837 in the third pyramid of Memphis, is of sycamore wood. Compare Lenormant, Eclaircissemens s. le Cercuil du Roi Mycerinus, p. 4, Paris 1839.

De sarcophago olim ita tradi solebat acsi omne mumiae sarcophago conditae essent; atqui paucissimae ei inclusae sunt nec nisi in quas major impensa facta. Compare Maillet in Rosenm., A. u. N. M. Th. I. S. 257.

At the close of this chapter, we would also call attention to the wonderful change in the spirit of the Egyptian people, which appears in the narrative of the Pentateuch. Abraham found an easy entrance into Egypt and a friendly reception, and no distinction between him and the Egyptians is manifested. In the time of Joseph the spirit of the Egyptian people had acquired a more decided character; already are the shepherds an abomination, and Joseph must be freed from the ignominy of his origin by an alliance with the daughter of a priest of the highest rank. But still that such an alliance is possible, shows that the repulsive severity of the Egyptians against strangers had not yet reached its greatest height. The manner in which Pharaoh answers the request of Joseph for the admission of his family into Egypt, proves the same thing. But just at the beginning of the Exodus, we see the hatred and contempt of the Egyptians against all foreigners, and their strong national egotism, which is so conspicuous in the circumstance, that the term man is used exclusively for their people, designating them as of the highest rank. Every one mnst confess that this gradual development is perfectly in accordance with nature, and that the representation of the Pentateuch carries with it the proof of its authenticity and credibility.

APPENDIX TO CHAPTER I.

BY THE EDITOR.

As the theory of a gradual spirit of exclusiveness, having grown spontaneously up among the Egyptian people, is contrary to all historical experience, it is to be regretted that the author should not have more closely examined the nature of the proofs which he has adduced in its support. Had he done so, it is probable that he would have altered or modified his views, for, when closely investigated, his authorities will be found to indicate an inference directly contrary to that which he has adduced. But in truth, the learned author adopted this hypothesis in order to support another equally unfounded. It is therefore advisable to examine both together; and having already done so in a popular periodical, the Editor

'Salvolini Campagne de Rhamsés, Paris, 1835, p. 261.

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