What there was
of permanent official authority lay in the hands of the elders
and heads of houses; in time of war they commanded each his own
household force, and in peace they dispensed justice each within
his own circle. But this obviously imperfect and inefficient
form of government showed a growing tendency to break down just
in proportion to the magnitude of the tasks which the nation in
the course of its history was called upon to undertake. Appeal
to Jehovah was always in these circumstances resorted to; His
court was properly that of last resort, but the ordinary authorities
were so inadequate that it had often enough to be applied to.
Theocracy, if one may so say, arose as the complement of anarchy.
Actual and legal existence (in the modern sense) was predicable
only of each of the many clans; the unity of the nation was
realised in the first instance only through its religion. It was
out of the religion of Israel that the commonwealth of Israel
unfolded itself,--not a HOLY state, but THE state. And the state
continued to be, consciously, rooted in religion, which prevented
it from quitting or losing its rapport with the soil from which
it had originally sprung.
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