Further, the _penchant_ of later Judaism for statistics is carried
back to the earlier time, to which surveys and censuses were
repugnant in the extreme. In spite of 2Samuel xxiv., we are told
that under David enumerations both of the spiritual and of the
secular tribes were made again and again; so also under his
successors, as may be inferred partly from express statements
and partly from the precise statistics given as to the number
of men capable of bearing arms: in these cases the most astounding
figures are set down,--always, however, as resting on original
documents and accurate enumeration. In the statistical
information of Chronicles, then, so far as it relates to
pre-exilic antiquity, we have to do with artificial compositions.
It is possible, and occasionally demonstrable, that in these
some elements derived from tradition have been used. But it
is certain that quite as many have been simply invented; and
the combination of the elements--the point of chief importance--
dates, as both form and matter show, from the very latest period.
One might as well try to hear the grass growing as attempt to
derive from such a source as this a historical knowledge of
the conditions of ancient Israel.
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