periods between Abraham and the immigration of Jacob, and from thence to the Exodus as the sequel will show.

In proceeding to arrange more exactly in our tables the date of the famine and the administration of Joseph, we must limit ourselves to the 23 years of the sole reign, for the Pharaoh of Joseph was clearly sole monarch of Egypt. None indeed but a sovereign of this character could have raised a discreet Palestinian, the former slave of one of his chief officers, to the post of viceroy. Of these 23 years we must at all events claim 14 as the critical years, seven of plenty and seven of scarcity. Immediately after his happy interpretation of Pharaoh's dream, Joseph travelled through the country to make the necessary arrangements for establishing storehouses, and for laying up the quota which was taken from the people who had been blessed with an excess, or the fifth part of the harvest, which they were obliged to furnish at a stipulated price. Had a longer period intervened between the interpretation and its fulfilment, had not the extraordinarily favourable nature of the inundation at the ensuing solstice immediately verified the words of the gifted and prudent seer, the Pharaoh would not have intrusted him with so much power.

But which was the year of the Dream? Most probably the year of the accession, or the first year of the sole reign of Sesortosis I. The whole transaction is characteristic of a ruler who had just entered on the zenith of his power. The solemn dedication of the sovereign in the temple of Ptah at Memphis was probably connected with sleeping in the temple (Incubation), and certainly with some exciting religious ceremonies. It was more natural that he should have a foreboding dream then than at any other time. Assuming this to be the case, all the rest tallies. The whole narrative shows that the seven years of scarcity all occurred in

his reign. Towards the end of the second of these, Jacob went with all his family down into Egypt, and the Pharaoh who provided for them was clearly the same who made Joseph ruler throughout all the land, and honoured him as the saviour of the country, and the founder of the financial prosperity of Egypt.

Seventeen years after this Joseph is in a very different position. There is nothing more thoroughly historical than the description of the funeral procession which Joseph ordered for conveying the embalmed body of Jacob with great state from Goshen to Hebron. (Gen. 1.) He did not, however, personally request the Pharaoh's permission to make this solemn procession, nor for those who accompanied it to return into Egypt, but did it through some of his household. It is said (ver. 4, 5.): " And when the days of his mourning were past, Joseph spake unto the house of Pharaoh, saying, If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, Let me go up I pray thee and bury my father, and I will come again." This was not the language which Joseph would have used had he been "ruler over all the land of Egypt." He is a wealthy man, and in the enjoyment of high consideration, but far from being one "who stood before Pharaoh," as he is said to have done (xli. 46.); and far from going as the "alter ego" of the king throughout all Egypt to make all his arrangements with the fullest powers, he causes an unpretentious personal supplication to be made to the reigning sovereign through some of the courtiers, and begs a good word from them in his behalf, when he says, "If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak I pray you in the ears of Pharaoh."

According to our tables, Sesortosis I. became sole ruler in the year 2755. The year in which Jacob came into Egypt (the second year of famine), consequently, would be 2747 or 2746, the 9th or 10th year of his

If, therefore, we had a fixed date for the age of Joseph when, in that solemn world-important moment, he stood before the first Sesortosis in the first year of his reign, we should have a turning-point for the whole chronology of the Abrahamites, which perhaps might lead us up to the immigration of Abraham itself.

Now Scripture expressly tells us in narrating the wonderful effect which Joseph produced by the interpretation of Pharaoh's dream (xli. 46.):

"And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the land of Egypt."

He had consequently been from 12 to 13 years in the country, for he was sold thither when his brethren were tending their flocks in Sichem, and his father sent him to them (xxxvii. 12-36.). It would seem that he was thus sent immediately after he had been keeping the sheep in common with his brethren, as is implied in the narrative about his dreams (xxxvii. 5-11.). But the whole story is thus introduced (verse 2.):

"Joseph, being seventeen years old, was feeding the flocks with his brethren."

This brings us then to the year 2768. But Joseph's birth took place 30 years, at all events, before his elevation to power, consequently in or about the year 2785.

The year of his birth, again, is fixed by the thoroughly historical, though purely personal, account of Jacob's servitude with his maternal uncle Laban in Mesopotamia. We take this, therefore, as a startingpoint for computing the first period of Jewish history.

THE COMPUTATION OF THE

D.

PERIOD FROM THE IMMIGRATION OF ABRAHAM INTO CANAAN TO THE ENTRANCE OF JACOB INTO EGYPT.

I. THE HISTORICAL AND THE UNHISTORICAL DATES. THE METHOD
OF SOLVING THE CHRONOLOGY.

JACOB, as Scripture informs us, married Leah, the elder daughter of Laban, after a servitude of seven years, and a week afterwards her lovely and beloved sister Rachel, in consequence of which Jacob bound himself to overlook Laban's flocks for seven more years. It was in the last of these fourteen years that Rachel, after so many years of barrenness, bore him a son, Joseph, the twelfth child and the eleventh of the sons that Leah and the two handmaidens of his wives had borne him in the meantime. This date is very accurately laid down in the simple narrative (Gen. xxx. 25.):

"And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Jacob said unto Laban, Send me away, that I may go unto mine own place, and to my country."

Laban, however, persuaded him to stay, and inquired upon what terms he would serve him for a further period. The terms were agreed upon. They were advantageous to Laban, but Jacob became a rich man, which created ill humour and murmuring. Laban being ill-disposed towards him, Jacob fled away secretly with his wife and children and all that he had. Laban hastened after him, and a parley ensued between them, in the course of which Jacob said (xxxi. 41.):

"Thus have I been twenty years in thy house; I served thee fourteen years for thy two daughters, and six years for thy cattle."

It is very easy for complacent critics to say that these dates are mythical, whereas the only thing about the matter which looks mythical is our ignorance of the history of those times.

But how old was Jacob when he was sent, twenty years before, into Mesopotamia? He was evidently a grown-up man of about twenty years, certainly not much more or less. He was sent by his father to his maternal uncle, at the pressing desire of his mother. Rebecca could not bear the idea of his marrying one of the daughters of Heth, whom she abominated. (xxvii. 46., xxviii. 1, 2.) Jacob, upon his arrival, immediately made himself useful, like a resolute and powerful young man. (xxix. 8-10.)

Looking therefore at the after-connexion between this family history of Joseph and the early history of the Edomites (Esau, the elder brother, is also called Edom, and is the patriarch of that primeval race), in which the young suitor is a man of forty, and celebrates his nuptials with two sisters at about fifty, our calculation cannot be wrong above two or three years. But what signification it has in reference to the history of Esau, and the number forty which is connected with it, we shall see hereafter in the sequel.

Jacob must consequently have been born when his father was about six and thirty. For it can hardly be a historical fact, that Abraham, who was far advanced in years, and who might have expected his death every day after the birth of Isaac, and who had so earnestly and so long desired to see an heir of his body-it can hardly be historical that he should have lived to see this only son of his old age a man of forty, a time of life at which in Palestine men were commonly grandfathers. If we will only deal with the principal narrative in a