Chapter xviii., vv. 1 to 6. Some part of the previous history must be lost, as we have no account of Moses sending his wife back; on the contrary, in chap, iv., v. 20, we are told that he took both her and his two sons into Egypt.
Jethro gave his son-in-law very sensible advice, and the only matter of surprise is that Moses listened to it. Usually, priests of different religions snarl at one another like angry, half-fed curs, growling over a solitary bone, and if a priest of one sect (out of the ordinary course) offered good advice to another sect, it would probably be treated with neglect and contempt.
Chapter xix., w. 9, 11, 12, 13, 16, 18, and 19. In these verses we have an account of the meeting of Moses and God. If this had been in the book of Mormon or in the Koran, some Christian critic would have at once exclaimed, 'Why, this is all imposture! for these reasons—the man who led the people, and who wished to pretend that he was to have an interview with God, took very great pains to keep the people at a sufficient distance to prevent detection of his schemes; the trumpet sounding, the darkness, the thunder and lightning, are so many scenic appliances to give effect to the delusion. Perhaps the mount was a volcanic one, in which case the addition of the trumpet soundings completed the scene; and the secrecy observed as to all the transactions on the mount protected the man from exposure. How careful are the directions given to prevent any inquisitive straggler from getting sufficiently near to make a fatal discovery! But no man in his senses will believe that God blew a trumpet, or caused a trumpet to be blown, to announce his coming, and that he descended upon Sinai surrounded by fire and smoke. In all fabulous relations we find such things, but it is absurd to suppose that this refers to an Almighty and Infinite Deity. We are told in verse 20, 'The Lord came down upon Mount Sinai on the top of the mount, and the Lord called Moses up to the top of the mount, and Moses went up.' Can you require stronger evidence of the mythological character of your book? Your Omnipresent and Infinite Deity is pictured as standing on the top of a mountain, and calling to Moses, who was down below, to come up to him.
Verse 15. This is one of the verses which no amount of commentary can make intelligible: 'Come not at your wives.' Why not?
Chapter xx. The second verse of this chapter begins in the first person, 'I am the Lord,' and continues in the first person to verse 6, where it merges into the third person. Verse 5 is contradicted by Ezekiel, chap, xviii., v. 20, 2 Kings, chap, xiv., v. 6, and Deuteronomy, chap, xxiv., v. 16. This is as positive and distinct a specimen of contradiction as can be found anywhere. In the third commandment we are told that God is a jealous God, visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generations. In the other three texts, we are told that the child shall not be put to death for the father, but every man for his own sin. By the following contrast of the Fourth Commandment, as given in the second and fifth books of the Pentateuch, biblical students may judge how far they may rely on the reasons for closing the museums, mechanics' institutes and crystal palaces, and opening churches, chapels, and gin palaces on the seventh day, Chap. xx., vv. 8, 9, 10, 11.
8.—Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy.
9.—Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10.—But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gates:
11. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it.
DEUT. Chap, v., w. 12, 13, 14, 15.