SgG2 promotes the presence of an active chemokine-receptor complex

“wrote it in a book, and laid it up before the Lord. Literally, in the book.

Possibly this important chapter [concerning the kingdom] was added to

‘the book of the law’ kept by the side of the ark ‘before the Lord’.”

Kirkpatrick, The First Book of Samuel ¹⁹ This seems certain. Samuel inserted the rules concerning kingship into the Law of Moses — the books which were preserved in the sleeves of the Ark (see also Deuteronomy 31:26). It is evident that the Law did not contain the rules of the kingdom prior to Samuel. Note that when the people clamored for a king in Samuel’s day, they presented no appeal to the Law of Moses for support. Samuel himself was upset by the mere suggestion of having a king.

Had the rules concerning the kingdom been already within the Book of Deuteronomy, there would have been no need for Samuel to express displeasure.

“This narrative [in the book of Samuel] shows no indication of the law in Deuteronomy [concerning the kingdom] having been known in fact, either to Samuel, or to the people who demanded of him a king: Had such been the case, it is incredible either that Samuel would have resisted the application of the people as he is represented as doing, or, that the people should not have appealed to the law, as a sufficient justification for their request.”

Samuel Driver, Commentary on Deuteronomy ²⁰ Samuel took to himself the authority to write out the rules concerning the kingdom and he placed them in “the book which was laid up before the Lord.” This example of Samuel gave Ezra even further historical precedent for adding a few editorial remarks to the Law of God in his time.

Ezra Adds Final Touches

One more example will show Ezra to be the most important editor of the Old Testament. At the end of Deuteronomy we find some remarks concerning the death of Moses. “So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab but no man knows of his sepulchre unto this day” (Deuteronomy 34:5–6).

It is hardly possible for Moses to have recorded his own death and then, in some curious prophecy, tell later people that his burial place was unknown “unto this day.” These are clearly editorial remarks added by Ezra at the final canonization, proof that the editor could be none other than Ezra is found in Deuteronomy 34:10. “And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face.” It was promised in Deuteronomy 18:15–19 that there would arise a major prophet like unto Moses in power and authority. That prophet was to be so great that his words would be like those of Moses.

But of all the prophets who preceded Ezra, not one of them was the lawgiver (like Moses) or the maker of the New Covenant with Israel as a new Moses. So Ezra was informing his readers in his time through this editorial comment that none of the earlier prophets (such as Isaiah, Jeremiah or Ezekiel) was the prophet ordained to be like Moses. Ezra, the compiler of the Hebrew Bible, directed the Jewish people in the 5th century B.C.E. to look forward to a future time for the coming of the great prophet. The Jewish people in the time of Jesus were doing just that (John 6:14 and 7:40), and Christians came to believe that the prophet was Christ.

It should be remembered that even after Ezra’s death, some later members of the Great Assembly (the authorized supreme religious court of the nation) carried the genealogical tables of important priestly families down to the time of Alexander the Great. ²¹

Lost Books of the Old Testament

In conclusion, let us notice some books which are mentioned in the Old Testament but are not found in the pages of our Bible.

“The Book of the Wars of the Lord” (Numbers 21:14)

“The Book of Jasher” (Joshua 10:13; 2 Samuel 1:18)

“The Book of the Acts of Solomon” (1 Kings 11:14)

“The book of Nathan the Prophet” (1 Chronicles 29:29)

“The Book of Gad the Seer” (1 Chronicles 29:29

“The Prophecy of Ahijah the Shiloite” (2 Chronicles 9:29

“The Visions of Iddo the Seer” (2 Chronicles 9:29)

“The Book of Shemiah the Prophet” (2 Chronicles 12:15)

“The Book of Jehu the Son of Hanani” (2 Chronicles 20:34)

“The Sayings of Hosai” (2 Chronicles 33:19)

Do these “lost books” belong in the sacred canon of the Old Testament? They do not. Ezra in the Book of Chronicles referred to the last seven of these ten books, and it was he who was responsible for canonizing the complete Old Testament. He mentioned these historical documents to support the truth of what he wrote in the Book of Chronicles, but he did not include any of them as a part of divine scripture. Had he wanted them in the canon, he could easily have placed one or all of them within the divine collection. He did not.

These were simple books of history that contained truthful records of the past (much like First Maccabees in the Apocrypha), but Ezra did not accord them with divine status. This is significant. If Ezra did not reckon them as canonical, neither should anyone else who respects the office of Ezra and the Great Assembly. This is the case with all other books mentioned in the Old Testament and not found within the present biblical canon.

1 See P.J. Wiseman’s short and excellent book Ancient Records and the Structure of Genesis (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1985).

2 Note that 72 is 3 x 24 and this number must have carried some relationship to the arranged schedule of singing the psalms by the twenty-four priestly courses.

3 Joseph Jacobs, “Triennial Cycle,” Jewish Encyclopedia, vol. XII, pp. 255–256 and at http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=327&letter=T.

4 For more information on the design and purpose of the Book of Psalms, see my further study in Appendix One.

5 See Appendix Two for more information concerning the Book of Proverbs. See also the article “Joseph in Egypt” at http://www.askelm.com/news/n040501.htm.

6 Louis Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, vol. VI (Philadelphia, 1908–38), p. 368.

7 Babylonian Talmud, Baba Bathra, 15a. See the website at www.come-and-hear.com/bababathra/bababathra_15.html.

8 Brown, Driver & Briggs, Hebrew Lexicon, p. 305.

9 E.W. Bullinger, “The Songs of Degrees,” in Things to Come, XIII (1907), p. 112.

10 E.W. Bullinger, “Notes to the Structure, Page 826,” in the Companion Bible, p. 827.

These notes refer to the outline on the Fifth or Deuteronomy Book from Psalm 107 to 150 from the previous page. The quote relates specifically to the degree psalms 120 to 134. See also Bullinger, “The Song of the Degrees,” Appendix 67, Companion Bible, pp.

97–99, and James William Thirtle, Old Testament Problems (London: Henry Frowde, 1907).

11 Ferrar Fenton, The Holy Bible in Modern English: Translated Direct from the Original Hebrew, Chaldee and Greek Languages ... With introductions and critical notes (London:

S. W. Partridge & co. 1903), p. 217.

12 Recall that the Book of Kingdoms is now divided into our two books of Samuel and two books of Kings.

13 Moses Stuart, Critical History and Defence of the Old Testament Canon (London: G.

Routledge, 1849), p. 170.

14 Babylonian Talmud, Baba Bathra, 15a. See the text at www.come-and-hear.com/bababathra/bababathra_15.html.

15 See both Josephus, Antiquities, X.78 and Babylonian Talmud, Baba Bathra, 15a, at www.come-and-hear.com/bababathra/bababathra_15.html.

16 For more information on this important matter, see Appendix One. This, again, shows an authorization of scripture by Jeremiah.

17 Jeremiah was a priest and his father (Jeremiah 1:1, and 2 Kings chapters 22–23; 2 Chronicles chapters 34–35). Jeremiah was granted favor with Nebuchednezzar

(Jeremiah 39:11–12) and the command was given for the captain of the Babylonian army to give to Jeremiah anything he wanted. It is reasonable to presume that preservation of the Temple writings would have been of greatest importance to Jeremiah. DWS

18 See “Daniel,” in Lange’s Commentary, vol. 13 (New York: Scribner, 1877), pp. 59, 61.

19 A.F. Kirkpatrick, The First Book of Samuel, vol. IX, Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1891), p. 112.

20 Samuel R. Driver, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Deuteronomy, 3rd ed.

International Critical Commentary (Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, 1895), p. 213.

21 Nehemiah 12:11, 22; Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews XI.7,2 ¶302.

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