Page:Keil and Delitzsch,Biblical commentary the old testament the pentateuch, trad James Martin, volume 1, 1885.djvu/1486

 the rulers of the congregation. We learn from Neh 8:18, that in Ezra's time they read in the book of the law every day from the first to the last day of the feast, from which we may see on the one hand, that the whole of the Thorah (or Pentateuch), from beginning to end, was not read; and on the other hand, by comparing the expression in Deu 31:18, “the book of the law of God,” with “the law,” in Deu 31:14, that the reading was not restricted to Deuteronomy: for, according to v. 14, they had already been reading in Leviticus (ch. 23) before the feast was held - an evident proof that Ezra the scribe did not regard the book of Deuteronomy like the critics of our day, as the true national law-book, an acquaintance with which was all that the people required. Moses did not fix upon the feast of Tabernacles of the sabbatical year as the time for reading the law, because it fell at the beginning of the year, as Schultz wrongly supposes, that the people might thereby be incited to occupy this year of entire rest in holy employment with the word and works of God. And the reading itself was nether intended to promote a more general acquaintance with the law on the part of the people, - an object which could not possibly have been secured by reading it once in seven years; nor was it merely to be a solemn promulgation and restoration of the law as the rule for the national life, for the purpose of removing any irregularities that might have found their way in the course of time into either the religious or the political life of the nation (Bähr, Symbol. ii. p. 603). To answer this end, it should have been connected with the Passover, the festival of Israel's birth. The reading stood rather in close connection with the idea of the festival itself; it was intended to quicken the soul with the law of the Lord, to refresh the heart, to enlighten the eyes, - in short, to offer the congregation the blessing of the law, which David celebrated from his own experience in Ps. 19:8-15,