are dealing. The essence of the religion all through has been a Living Christ, and Christians point to His Presence as the secret of its vitality and seemingly exhaustless powers. If, then, the question be pressed-What precisely is this Christianity for which you claim Divine origin, and which you say is Divine Revelation-in precisely what does its content consist, and what proofs of its supernatural origin do you put forward in justification of so high a claim? we should answer in the words of the writer in the article 'Christianity' in Hastings' Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels where he is dealing with the essential character of Christianity and says:

'What we see in Christian history, as in the personal history of Christ upon earth, is the progressive development of a Divine Thought unfolding itself in spite of virulent opposition, under pressure of extreme difficulties, struggling against the misrepresentations of false friends and imprinting its likeness upon most unpromising and unsatisfactory material. When it first appeared on the earth, embodied in the Person and the Work, as well as the teaching of Jesus Christ, the Divine Idea shone with the brightness of a new sun in the spiritual firmament. It was not developed out of Judaism, the Jews were its bitterest opponents; it was not indebted to Greek philosophic thought or to Roman political science, though afterwards it made use of and powerfully influenced both; it had nothing in common with the current superstitions of Oriental religions; it did not owe its origin to some cunningly devised religious syncretism, such as was not uncommon at the time when Christianity began to infuse life into the declining Roman Empire. A new idea of God, of man, and of the true reconciliation of man to God, formed the core and nucleus of the new faith. In the earliest records this idea appears as the germ of a nascent religion, a sketch in outline which remains to be filled up. In the history of nineteen centuries its likeness is to be discerned only as an image reflected in a dimly burnished mirror, in a troubled and turbid pool. None the less the dominant idea remains; as St. Paul expresses it, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God is seen in a face-the face of Jesus Christ. Lecky, writing simply as a historian of European morals, describes it thus :

"It was reserved for Christianity to present to the world an ideal character, which through all the changes of eighteen

centuries has inspired the hearts of men with an impassioned love; has shown itself capable of acting in all ages, nations, temperaments, and conditions; has been not only the highest pattern of virtue but the strongest incentive to its practice; and has exercised so deep an influence that it may be truly said that the simple record of three short years of active life has done more to regenerate and to soften mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers and all the exhortations of moralists."' 'Whether the spectacle of an ideal human character alone has done this remains to be seen, but it is possible with care to distinguish between the glory of the Divine thought and the imperfect medium through which its light has filtered. We see truth manifested amidst crudities and insincerities, amidst falsehoods which are bad and half-truths which are often worse; a pure and lofty character struggling, mostly in vain, for adequate expression; a kingdom not come but coming, of which we cannot say "Lo here" or "Lo there," for it floats only in the midst of men as they move, in their hearts as they ponder and feel and hope-not as an achievement, not as a possession, but as a magnificent conception, an earnest longing, and a never fully attained, but ever to be attained, ideal.'

This could not be better put and it shews us at a glance the Christian religion as the supreme revelation of God Himself in human life in the Person of Jesus Christ, revealing in Himself the true goal of all human character, the Ideal Man, and proclaiming as the true goal of all human endeavour God's purpose-the Kingdom of Heaven, the community of the redeemed in Christ Jesus.

So to conclude, again in the words of this able writer:

'The secret of the power of Christianity lies in the conviction which it engenders that-granted the fundamental principles of Theism-God has Himself undertaken the cause of man; that He enters into man's weakness, feels with his sorrows, and, chiefly, that He bears the terrible burden of man's sins; all this being assured by the gift of His Son and the work which the Son Himself has accomplished and is still carrying on by His Spirit. The metaphysical nature of Christ's Person may not be capable of being adequately expressed in words; the full scope of His redeeming work may be variously understood and may be incapable of being condensed into a formula; while

Christians may widely differ as to the way in which the benefits of that work are best appropriated and realized and distributed by His Church in the world. But the essence of the religion lies in its conception of the spiritual needs of man, the ends for which he exists, his sin and failure to realise those ends; in its proclamation of Christ, the once dying and now ever living Lord as Himself the Way, through whom sin may be forgiven and failure remedied; and above all, in the moral and spiritual dynamic which is supplied by faith in the great Central Person of the whole religion, and the life in Him which is rendered possible for every believer by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.'

Such is the Christian Revelation, in word and in deed. Such is its essential content, and by that and its results in history it must be judged as to whether it derives from man or from God, whether it is from Heaven or one of earth's natural products.

In spite of all advance in philosophical speculation, experimental psychology, scientific discovery and increased knowledge in every department of human thought and life, we know of nothing at present to which men can point as a conclusive refutation of the Christian hypothesis. Christianity, then, to-day may submit its claims as a Divine Revelation with serene confidence to Gamaliel's test (Acts v 38) If this counsel or this work be of men, it will be overthrown but if it is of God, ye will not be able to overthrow them: lest haply ye be found even to be fighting against God.'

H. MAURICE RELTON.

ART. VII.-AKHNATON AND MOSES.

I. A History of Egypt. By J. H. BREASTED. Second edition. (London: Hodder and Stoughton. 1909.) 2. The Development of Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt. By the same. (London: Hodder and Stoughton. 1912.)

3. The Life and Times of Akhnaton Pharaoh of Egypt. By A. WEIGALL. (London: Thornton Butterworth. 1922.) 4. History of the Egyptian People. By E. A. WAllis Budge. (London: J. M. Dent and Sons. 1914.)

5. Tutankhamen. By Sir E. A. WALLIS BUDGE. (London: Martin, Hopkinson and Co. 1923.)

6. The Religion of Ancient Egypt. By W. M. FLINDERS PETRIE. (London: Constable.)

7. Egypt and the Old Testament. By T. E. PEET. (London: Hodder and Stoughton. 1922.)

And other Works.

IN what follows, it will be quite obvious that much superstructure stands on a very slender base. The events dealt with took place before the age of history-writing and in the very earliest years of civilization, and we are often left to guess of their nature more from after effects than from contemporary witness. All that we can hope to do is to frame a self-consistent theory to account for the few facts that have been ascertained and leave it to future discovery to contradict or modify any tentative conclusions so reached. In the present state of our knowledge, speculation is not only permissible but is the only way of progress. Imagination plays a large part in this present article, and the author's L intention is to provoke criticism and stimulate investigation rather than to set forth proved results for definite acceptance.

The exodus of the Israelites from Egypt was an event that made so little impression on the Egyptians themselves that hitherto not the slightest mention of it has been discovered in any ancient record outside the Bible. We are left therefore to take the narrative as it stands in the Old Testament and see where best it can be fitted into the known facts of Egyptian history as revealed by their numberless inscriptions on stone and papyrus.

The view that has obtained widespread acceptance is based on such a method. We learn from the Book of Exodus that the Israelites were enslaved and that their forced labour was used to build the store cities Pithom and Ramses. Ramses is evidently the name of the king who built, or rebuilt, this town, and of all the twelve Pharaohs of that name, Ramses II is the one who fits the bill most truly. Hence, it has been argued, the Pharaoh of the oppression was Ramses II and the Pharaoh of the Exodus must have been his successor Merenptah. This fixes the Exodus between 1225 B.C. and 1215 B.C. The date does not agree very well with the 480 years between Exodus and Solomon as given in Kings, but it would really be foolish to attach any great value to the numerical data of any ancient book. It is rather sad however to be obliged to postulate a fifty per cent. error in such a figure, and it can only be explained, if at all, in a document supposedly written not long after the close of the period to which it refers, by assuming that the text is totally unreliable as regards numbers (a by no means untenable hypothesis), or that the Book of Kings did not take shape until a very much later date than has been generally supposed (which also is a hypothesis to be reckoned with).

Moreover it is to be noticed that opponents of the Merenptah date who base their objection on the supposed accuracy of this figure in Kings entirely forget the other calculation three times mentioned in the Bible, whereby the sojourn in Egypt was 400 years in duration.1

The Book of Samuel (LXX) reduces the sojourn to 1 Gen. xv 13: 400 years. Ex. xii 40: 430 years. Acts vii 6: 400 years.