The Meeting-Place of Geology and History

by Sir John William Dawson

This being the state of the case, it becomes expedient to review our ideas of the ancient Hebrew records, from which our early, and perhaps crude, impressions of this event were derived, and to ascertain how much of our notions of the Deluge of Genesis may be fairly deduced from the record itself, and how much may be due to more or less correct interpretations, or to our own fancy. In connection with this we may also be able to obtain some guidance as to the value to be attached to the Hebrew document as a veritable and primitive record of the great catastrophe.

The key to the understanding of the early human history of Genesis lies in the story of the fall of man, and its sequel in the murder of Abel by his brother Cain, the beginning of that reign of violence which endures even to this day. From this arose the first division of the human race into hostile clans or tribes, the races of Cain and Seth, on which hinges the history, characteristics and fate of antediluvian man; and, as we shall see in the sequel, from this arose profound differences in religious beliefs, which have tinged the theology and superstitions of all subsequent times. Of course, in making this statement I refer to the history given in Genesis, without special reference to its intrinsic truth or credibility, but merely in relation to its interpretation in harmony with its own statements.

It is further evident that this tragic event must have occurred in that Tigro-Euphratean region which was the Biblical site of Eden [43] and that while the Sethite race presumably occupied the original home of Adam, and adhered to that form of religion which is expressed in the worship of Jahveh, the coming Redeemer and the expected 'Seed of the Woman,' the other race spread itself more widely, probably attained to a higher civilisation, in so far as art is concerned, in some of its divisions, and sank to a deeper barbarism in others, while it retained the original worship of God the Creator (Elohim). Hence the Sethite race is designated as the sons of Adam (Beni ha Adam), the true and legitimate children of the first man, and the Cainites as Beni Elohim, or sons of God. [44] The mixture of these races produced the godless, heaven-defying Nephelim, the Titans of the Old Testament, whose wickedness brought on the diluvial catastrophe. These half-breeds of the antediluvian time were in all probability the best developed, physically and perhaps mentally, of the men of their period; and but for the Deluge they might have become masters of the world.

[43] Modern Science in Bible Lands, chap. iv.

[44] That this is the true meaning of the expressions in Genesis vi. I cannot doubt. See discussion of the subject in the work cited in previous note.

This question of different races and religions before the Flood is, however, deserving of a little farther elucidation. The names Elohim and Jahveh are used conjointly throughout the Book of Genesis except in its first chapter, and their mode of occurrence cannot be explained merely on the theory of two documents pieced together by an editor. It has a deeper significance than this, and one which indicates a radical diversity between Elohists and Jahvists even in this early period. In the earliest part of the human history, as distinguished from the general record of creation, the two names are united in the compound Jahveh-Elohim, but immediately after the fall Eve is represented as attributing to, or identifying with, Jahveh alone the birth of her eldest son—'I have produced a man, the Jahveh,' and which may mean that she supposed Cain to be the promised manifestation of God as the Redeemer. Accordingly Cain and Abel are represented as offering sacrifice to Jahveh, and yet it is said in a verse which must be a part of the same document, that it was not till the time of Enos, a grandson of Adam, that men began to invoke the name of Jahveh. It would seem also that this invocation of Jahveh was peculiar to the Sethites, and that the Cainites were still worshippers of Elohim, the God of nature and creation, a fact which perhaps has relation to the so-called physical religion of some ancient peoples. Hence their title of Beni ha Elohim. Thus the division between the Cainite and Sethite races early became accentuated by a sectarian distinction as well. We may imagine that the Cainites, worshipping God as Creator, and ignoring that doctrine of a Redeemer which seemed confined to the rival race of Seth, were the deists of their time, and held a position which might, according to culture and circumstances, degenerate into a polytheistic nature-worship, or harden into an absolute materialism. On the other hand, the Sethites, recognised by the author of Genesis as the orthodox descendants of Adam, and invoking Jahveh, held to the promise of a coming Saviour, and to a deliverance from the effects of the Fall to be achieved by His means.

It is clear that, from the point of view of the author of Genesis, the chosen seed of Seth should have maintained their separation from a wicked world. Their failure to do this involves them in the wrath of Jahveh and renders the destruction of mankind necessary, and in this the whole Godhead under its combined aspects of Elohim and Jahveh takes a part. A similar view has caused the Chaldean narrator to invoke the aid of all the gods in his pantheon to effect the destruction of man.

These considerations farther throw light on the double character of the Deluge narrative in Genesis, which has induced those ingenious scholars who occupy themselves with analysis or disintegration of the Pentateuch to affirm two narratives, one Elohist and one Jahvist. [45] Whatever value may attach to this hypothesis, it is evident that if the history is thus made up of two documents it gains in value, since this would imply that the editor had at his disposal two chronicles embodying the observations of two narrators, possibly of different sects, if these differences were perpetuated in the postdiluvian world; and farther, that he is enabled to affirm that the catastrophe affected both the great races of men. It farther would imply that these early documents were used by the writer to produce his combined narrative almost without change of diction, so that they remain in their original form of the alleged testimony of eye-witnesses, a peculiarity which attaches also to the Chaldean version, as this purports to be in the form given by Hasisadra, the Chaldean Noah, himself. [46]

[45] See, for a very clear statement of these views, Professor Green in Hebraica, January 1889, along with Dr. Harper's résumé of the Pentateuchal criticism in the previous number.