Preface

By ‘The Representative Men of the Bible’ I mean the men of the Bible who represent phases of humanity irrespective of place and time; and I consider them only in those incidents in which they ave thus representative. I offer this volume by way of experimental instalment. I have exhibited but a single row of figures. Should the volume meet with acceptance, I may exhibit a second row contemporaneous with the first; and ultimately, I should like to extend the line into the New Testament. It is this anticipation of future work that explains the omissions in this volume. You may say, Why has /shmael been omitted from your chapter on Abraham, why have Aaron and Balaam been left out of your chapter on Moses? It is.because I have desired to give these a place on their own account and have wished to avoid repetition. These studies are not historical, they are not critical; they

are an analysis of the Portraits as we see vl PREFACE

them — without any attempt to inquire how or when they came. I have imagined myself in a studio, looking at the forms as delineated, and simply asking the question, What did the artist mean? Personally, I have no doubt as to the historical basis for the patriarchal life — not to speak of lives further down the stream. But I have been actuated in the meantime by the desire to find ground that is neutral to the two extremes — the Higher Criticism on the one hand and the Old Orthodoxy on the other. That common ground is the fact that the figures are now before us, and that, if there be a Revelation, it is through them, in the last result, that the Revelation must come. Here, for the present, hands may be joined, here, for the time, views may be united; and those who differ as to dates and origins can meet in the recognition of a spiritual beauty. I have sought to give the book a semi-devotional tone by closing each chapter with a short invocation or prayer.

G. M.

EDINBURGH, 1902.

On INGE GIN as