The name is absent

ι6         HEBREW LIFE AND CUSTOM

Shechemites ɪ has doubtless been modified in accordance
with later orthodoxy.² The reference to circumcision by
Jeremiah³-Which in the unqualified injunction ‘Be ye
circumcised to Jehovah ’ may show signs of modification
by a later hand in accordance with later orthodoxy—im-
plies that circumcision which is outward in the flesh is of
no avail.

Of the sport of youths there is little direct evidence. It
may be taken for granted, however, that truly marvellous
dexterity in the use of the sling was gained by many a
friendly contest.⁴ Similarly we cannot doubt that Asahel’s
fleetness of foot ≡ had been proved in many a race.

The story of Jacob’s wrestling and the device resorted to
by his opponent when the latter found himself unable to
gain the mastery,⁶ suggests definite wrestling rules, and
that it was not ‘ playing the game ’ to grip ‘ below the
belt^,.⁷ The training of youths for war by letting them slay
prisoners is suggested by Gideon’s bidding his elder son
slay Zebah and Zalmunna,⁸ and something of the nature
of a tournament seems to be implied by Abner’s proposal
to Joab that ‘ the young men should come and play before
them ’.°

A certain amount of betting is implied by the story of
Samson’s wager.¹⁰

MARRIAGE

There is no decisive evidence in the Hebrew Scriptures
as to the average age of a man at the time of his marriage.
The ages of the patriarchs when they married, as arrived at
by a combination of various passages of the Pentateuch,
can obviously not be used as a criterion. Few people will

* Gen. xxxiv.

¹ For a discussion of an historical incident underlying this story, see
Old Testament Essays, pp. 28-9, by the present author.

³ Jer. iv. 4.         ⁴ Judges xx. ι6 ; ɪ Sam. xvii. 40-51.

⁵ 2 Sam. ii. 18 ; cf. Jer. xii. 5.          ⁶ Gen. xxxii. 24.

’ Gen. xxxii. 25, 26; cf. Deut. xxv. ιι. ⁸ Judges viii. 20.

» 2 Sam. ii. 14.         ” Judges xiv. 12 ff. ; cf. Isa. xxxvi. 8.

AGE OF MARRIAGE            17

admit the probability that Rebekah, when her husband
Isaac was in extreme old ageɪ—Isaac is said to have lived to
the age of one hundred and eighty²—should have represen-
ted herself as weary of her life from anxiety lest her darling
sonjacob—bom when his father was sixty ɜ—should follow
the bad example of his twin brother Esau, who had married
when his father was a hundred years old, in taking to wife
a Hittite lady.⁴

Moses according to the correct translation of the Hebrew
text⁵ seems to have married soon after he arrived at man’s
estate.

It is implied that Nahlon and Chilion were still young
men when they died leaving widows.⁶

If we may accept the number given in 2 Sam. v. 4f. as
approximately correct and may suppose that Absalom was
bom in Hebron, he can scarcely have been much more
than twenty at the time of his death ; for Adonijah/ who,
according to what is evidently the true text of ɪ Kings i. 6,⁸
was not bom till after Absalom’s untimely death, was older
than Solomon,’ and therefore cannot have been much less
than twenty when David died. Yet for five years before his
death,¹⁰ Absalom had his own establishment,¹ ɪ and presum-
ably was married. Adonijah at the beginning of Solomon’s
reign was an applicant for the hand of Abishag. Hezekiah,
who was not the eldest son of Ahaz,¹² is said to have been
twenty-five years old when his father died at the age of

¹ Gen. xxvii. 2, 41.         ’ Gen. xxxv. 28.

³ Gen. xxv. 26.         ⁴ Gen. xxvii. 46.

⁵ Exod. ii.11. ‘ When Moses was grown up’ is a harmonizing
mistranslation. The correct rendering is, ‘ It came to pass in those
days that Moses grew up and went out’, &c. The rendering of the
English version is a dishonest attempt to harmonize Exod. ii with
Acts vii. 23.

⁶ Ruth i. 5, 9.

⁷ Adonijah, however, cannot have been bom at Hebron.

⁸ The correct text is undoubtedly *ιb^, (not iτ6').

⁹ i Kings ii. 22. ɪ⁰ 2 Sam. xiii. 20. ^xι ɪ Kings ii. 13.
^m See 2 Kings xvi. 3.

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