[59] Lev. 24. 15; Num. 9. 10; 15. 35; 27. 8; 36. 8.
And this is confirmed by the fact that in some cases the same laws are referred to both in Leviticus, (near the beginning) and in Deuteronomy (at the end) of the forty years in the Desert, but with slight differences between them. And these exactly correspond to such a difference in date. One instance, that referring to the slaughter of animals, has been already alluded to. Another has to do with the animals, which might, and might not, be eaten. Leviticus includes among the former, several kinds of locusts, and among the latter the mouse, weasel, and lizard; all of which Deuteronomy omits.
Clearly then, when Leviticus was written, the people were in the desert, and there was a lack of animal food, which might tempt them to eat locusts or mice; but when Deuteronomy was written, animal food was plentiful, and laws as to these were quite unnecessary.
In each of these cases, then, and there are others like them, the differences must be due either to the various laws dating from the times they profess to, when all is plain and consistent; or else to the carefully planned work of some late writer, who was trying in this way to pretend that they did.
Still more important is the fact that in several places stress is laid on the people's personal knowledge of the events referred to; e.g., 'The Lord made not this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day.'[60] And what is more, this personal knowledge is often appealed to as a special reason for obeying the laws.[61] For instance, 'I speak not with your children which have not known, and which have not seen the chastisement of the Lord, ... but your eyes have seen all the great work of the Lord which He did. Therefore shall ye keep all the commandments,' etc. Plainly this would have had no force in later times; indeed it would have provided an excuse for not obeying the laws, since the people of those days had no personal knowledge of the events referred to. And we may ask, is it likely that a late author, who falsely ascribed his laws to Moses, in order to get them obeyed, should yet put into the mouth of Moses himself an excuse for not obeying them?
[60] Deut. 5. 3; 24. 9, 18, 22; 25. 17.
[61] Deut. 11. 2-8; 4. 3-15; 29. 2-9.
Moreover, combined with this assumed personal knowledge on the part of the people there is a clear indication of personal authority on the part of the writer. The later prophets always speak in God's name, and such expressions as Thus saith the Lord, Hear ye the word of the Lord, are extremely common, occurring altogether over 800 times. But in the laws of the Pentateuch nothing of the kind is found. They are delivered by Moses in his own name, often with the simple words, I command thee, which occur thirty times in Deuteronomy. And, of course, if the laws are genuine, there is nothing surprising in this, as Moses had been the great leader of the people, for forty years; but a late author would scarcely have adopted a style so different from that of all the other prophets.
(3.) Their wording.
Lastly we must consider the wording of the laws; and this also is strongly in favour of a contemporary origin. Thus, as many as sixteen of them, which have special reference to Canaan, begin with some such phrase as when ye be come into the land of Canaan,[62] which plainly supposes that the people were not there already. And the same may be said of numerous other laws, which the people are told to obey when they enter into Canaan; or are even urged to obey in order that they may enter in, both of which again, imply that they were not there already.[63] While several of the laws refer to the camp, and sometimes to tents, in such a way as to show that when they were written, the people were still living in a camp.[64]