the end of the colloquy "the Lord went his way" (Gen. xviii. 20-33). So completely anthropomorphic is the conception of deity that, although the expression occurs only in a parable, it is not at variance with the mode in which he is usually spoken of when wine is said "to cheer God and man" (Judg. ix. 13). Evidently there was nothing shocking to the Hebrew mind in such an expression. And when they pictured their God as walking, talking, indignant, angry, repenting, jealous, showing himself to human beings, and generally indulging in the passions of mortals, it was perfectly easy to conceive that wine might exercise the same effect on him as it did on them.
No doubt the Hebrew mythology is free from all that class of stories in which a divine being is represented as making love to or cohabiting with women. Or, to speak more accurately, they never represent Jehovah himself as indulging in such amusements. There is a reminiscence of this form of myth in the statement that before the deluge the sons of God intermarried with the daughters of men (Gen. vi. 2); but their supreme Being was free at least from sexual passion. So far as it goes, this is well; but if I had to choose between a God who was somewhat licentious in his relations with mankind, and one who did not stick at deeds of bloodshed of the most outrageous character, I confess I should see no very powerful reason to prefer the latter.
That, in spite of all these drawbacks, there are some better elements in the Hebrew ideal I do not at all deny. The poetical description of God as a "still small voice" is both eloquent and spiritual; and the prayer of Solomon, with its admission that the heaven of heavens cannot contain the Infinite Power who is entreated to dwell in the Temple, is in many respects beautiful and admirable. So also the views of Jehovah attained and uttered by some of the prophets are far loftier than those generally expressed in the historical books. Many of the Psalms, again, are full of beauty in the manner in which they speak of him to whom they are addressed. In a nation so deeply religious as the Jews, and so much given to meditation on God, it was inevitable that the higher class of minds should conceive him more spiritually than the lower, and it is this class to whom we owe the poetical and prophetic writings. It
