Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LECTURE II. Yahweh and His Rivals. DID Yahweh have rivals ? Could there be gods who shared with Him the power over Israel, who with Him were venerated by Israel ? If we enquire of the law, it was not possible. The first commandment of the Decalogue runs, "Thou shalt have no other gods beside me," and v. 14 of the Yahwistic Decalogue, Exodus xxxiv., which is probably still older, " Thou shalt not worship any other god." But the existence of the commandment does not prove its observance. In close proximity to this prohibition in Exodus xxxiv. stand most impressive warnings to the Israelites against allowing themselves to be led into idolatry by the peoples whose land Yahweh is to give to Israel as a possession. This warning is repeated again and again in Deuteronomy, and at the end of the book the people are threatened with the severest penalties if they allow themselves to be led astray. This does not sound very encouraging when we reflect that these legal portions of the Pentateuch were written, notbefore the entrance into Canaan, but many centuries later, when Israel had behind it all the experiences which are represented in these passages as lying in the future. In point of fact, when we consult the historical books we find it stated that Israel disregarded all commandments and threw all warnings to the winds. As soon as the generation which had lived through the deliverance from Egypt was extinct, Israel forsook its God, Yahweh, and served the Baals, the gods of the peoples who dwelt round about (Judges ii. ii jf.). Yahweh reiterates this charge against the people to Samuel (i Sam. viii. 8); and if we ask the prophets, we are told by Ezekiel (ch. xx.) that Israel never ceased to serve idols in Egypt, in the wilderness, and in the Promised Land which Yahweh gave it as a poss...