It is true that several celebrated church fathers have had the prudence to turn all these tales into allegory, like the Jews, and Philo in especial. Popes still more prudent desired to prevent the translation of these books into the everyday tongue, for fear men should be led to pass judgment on what was upheld for their adoration.
One ought surely to conclude that those who perfectly understand this work should tolerate those who do not understand it, for if these latter do not understand it, it is not their fault; also those who do not understand it should tolerate those who understand it most fully.
Savants, too full of their knowledge, have claimed that Moses could not possibly have written the book of Genesis. One of their reasons is that in the story of Abraham, the patriarch pays for his wife's funeral plot in coined money, and that the king of Gerare gives a thousand pieces of silver to Sarah when he returns her, after having stolen her for her beauty in the seventy-fifth year of her age. They say that, having consulted authorities, they find that there was no coined money in those days. But it is quite clear that this is pure chicane on their part, since the Church has always believed most firmly that Moses did write the Pentateuch. They strengthen all the doubts raised by the disciples of Aben-Hesra and Baruch Spinoza. The physician Astruc, father-in-law of the comptroller-general Silhouette, in his book, now very rare, entitled "Conjectures on Genesis," adds new objections, unsolvable to human wisdom; but not to humble submissive piety. The savants dare to contradict every line, the simple revere every line. Guard against falling into the misfortune of trusting our human reason, be contrite in heart and in spirit.
"And Abraham said that Sarah was his sister, and the king of Gerare took her to him." We confess, as we have said in our essay on Abraham, that Sarah was then ninety years old; that she had already been kidnapped by one King of Egypt; and that a king of this same desert Gerare later kidnapped the wife of Abraham's son Isaac. We have also spoken of the servant Agar, by whom Abraham had a son, and of how Abraham treated them both. One knows what delight unbelievers take in these stories; with what supercilious smiles they consider them; how they set the story of Abimelech and this same wife of Abraham's (Sarah) whom he passed off as his sister, above the "1001 nights" and also that of another Abimelech in love with Rebecca, whom Isaac also passed off as his sister. One can not too often reiterate that the fault of all these studious critics lies in their persistent endeavour to bring all these things into accord with our feeble reason and to judge ancient Arabs as they would judge the French court or the English.
"The soul of Sichem, son of King Hemor, cleaved to the soul of Dinah, and he charmed his sadness with her tender caresses, and he went to Hemor his father, and said unto him: Give me this woman for wife." Here the savants are even more refractory. What! a king's son marry a vagabond's daughter, Jacob her father loaded with presents! The king receives into his city these wandering robbers, called patriarchs; he has the incredible and incomprehensible kindness to get himself circumcised, he and his son, his court and his people, in order to condescend to the superstition of this little tribe which did not own a half league of land! And what reward do our holy patriarchs make him for such astonishing kindness? They wait the day when the wound of circumcision ordinarily produces a fever. Then Simeon and Levi run throughout the city, daggers in hand; they massacre the king, the prince, his son, and all the inhabitants. The horror of this St. Bartholemew is only diminished by its impossibility. It is a shocking romance but it is obviously a ridiculous romance: It is impossible that two men could have killed a whole nation. One might suffer some inconvenience from one's excerpted foreskin, but one would defend oneself against two scoundrels, one would assemble, surround them, finish them off as they deserved.
But there is one more impossible statement: by an exact supputation of date, we find that Dinah, daughter of Jacob, was at this time no more than three years of age; even if one tries to accommodate the chronology, she could not have been more than five: it is this that causes complaint. People say: What sort of a book is this? The book of a reprobate people, a book for so long unknown to all the earth, a book where right, reason and decent custom are outraged on every page, and which we have presented us as irrefutable, holy, dictated by God himself? Is it not an impiety to believe it? Is it not the dementia of cannibals to persecute sensible, modest men who do not believe it?
To which we reply: The Church says she believes it. Copyists may have introduced revolting absurdities into reverend stories. Only the Holy Church can be judge of such matters. The profane should be led by her wisdom. These absurdities, these pretended horrors do not affect the basis of our religion. Where would men be if the cult of virtue depended on what happened long ago to Sichem and little Dinah?
"Behold the Kings who reigned in the land of Edom, before the children of Israel had a king."
Behold another famous passage, another stone which doth hinder our feet. It is this passage which determined the great Newton, the pious and sage Samuel Clarke, the deeply philosophical Bolingbroke, the learned Leclerc, the savant Frêret, and a great number of other scholars to argue that Moses could not have been the author of Genesis.
We do indeed confess that these words could only have been written at a time when the Jews had kings.