The statement as to "Elοhistic and Jehovistic" sources of the Mosaic history (words which I hope my readers have never heard before, and very worthy of their German infidel source, and which they are happy if they never hear again) is without any other foundation than ignorance and the low German habits of criticism. I say, low habits. There is (at least in what I have seen) a plodding diligence, no doubt, to find out something which has the character of human learning, no matter what, but something which will make a book (which somebody else has not made); but then it has all a downward tendency, and never rises above a groveling pre-occupation with the external means of truth, or the spinning out their ideas of what ought to be. Take even Michaelis, a learned man and attractive by his modesty. When he comes to touch the interpretation of scripture, it is puerile to the last degree. A child who reads the scriptures with a little simple intelligence would smile at the wonders he finds out by Syriac and Hebrew (and, if Marsh is right, often a very slovenly use of them), and the working of his own mind. It is such naϊf nonsense, and brought out with such good faith, that it produces the kindly feeling one has for the foolish questions of a child which betray his innocence. The mind of God in the passage never seems to occur to him, though he believes scripture to be inspired. Now Jehovah and Elohim are always used each in its own proper sense: the latter as the Creator God, God in His own being as such; the former as made known to Israel, a personal name in which He dealt with Israel, and even with the world though they did not own Him. The appropriateness of each is always sensible to him who seizes the bearing of the passage in which it is used. When the relationship or work of God known in relationship to Israel is expressed, we have "Jehovah." When the account is simply historical, God (Elohim) is used. In some cases either would give, if not so perfect sense, yet very little different; since Jehovah is the true Elohim, and Elohim is Jehovah; and the use of Jehovah in these latter cases amounts to the writer having God as known to himself in his mind.
The Psalms notably show the different use of the two terms, as does the Book of Jonah. I will take a special example from the Psalms to show this-Psa. 14 and 53. These are very nearly the same; but in one Jehovah is used, in the other Elohim. In Psa. 14 Jehovah is used. Hence it says, "They were in great fear, for [Elohim-God Himself] God is in the generation of the righteous." The relationship, the consequence of this name Jehovah, is expressed in the presence of Elohim with the righteous in verse 6. "Ye have shamed the counsel of the poor, because Jehovah is his refuge." Now in Psa. 53 Elohim is used; it is the historical fact of what they were in the sight of Elohim. Hence we have, "There were they in great fear, where no fear was; for Elohim hath scattered the bones of him that encampeth against thee; thou hast put them to shame, because Elohim hath despised them." These psalms convey the same truths; but the thought of relationship prevails where Jehovah is used; whereas, where Elohim is used, we have the general result as regards the enemy.
Again, look at Jonah, where there is not and cannot be the smallest pretense of two accounts. The intercourse between Jonah and God is under the name Jehovah. When the seamen learn who his God is that he is running away from, they fear Jehovah, and call upon Jehovah. Where it is a general testimony of repentance in strangers (Jonah 3: g to the end), it is Elohim. And when we have the general supreme dealings of God with Jonah, to make Him show what He was with man as God, it is again Elohim. Now in Jonah this has peculiar force, because the relationship of Israel with Gentiles, and of Gentiles with Jehovah, is in question. It is the last public direct testimony of God to Gentiles before Christ. And this goodness of God to Gentiles is really what Jonah dreaded, as discrediting his message of judgment, which Jewish pride might like to see executed. (See Jonah 4:22And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil. (Jonah 4:2).) Hence on one side we have Gentiles brought, in the moment of judgment on the Israelite, to confess Jehovah; and on the other, God, as such, showing Himself good, the faithful Creator, who thought of those who could not distinguish between their right hand and their left, and even of the cattle. At the same time the proper relationship of Jehovah to His prophet, as such, is also fully maintained, and the word Jehovah, his God, more than once repeated.
Now here we have the elements of Jehovah's grace, and Elohim's true character and supremacy; what, in the nauseous systematizing of ignorance, is reduced to some imaginary documents, which none of them know anything about, but suppose. We have, I say, these two titles brought out in the clearest and most instructive way, as unfolding divine relationships for those who have the heart to delight in them, and justify that wisdom which is the joy of her children. The infidel must imagine and suppose some external cause, because he knows nothing of the real divine force of these things. And I would remark, that I am not here bringing an external proof of the truth of the Jewish system; but that, supposing its existence, the reason for the distinctive use of the words Jehovah and Elohim is fully given within the system itself-is consistent and appropriate. This the infidel ought to have seen or at least examined; because it is a part of the system he pretends to judge (and there are adequate proofs of its consistency within itself, which make his arguments perfectly futile): for what he finds imaginary reasons for is accounted for on the plainest principles of the system he is judging. For everyone can see that Jehovah was a proper name of God to Israel, and declared positively to be such, though the name of the one true supreme God. Now for the believer the use of the names of God carries blessed divine instruction with it, for all His names have a meaning: Almighty, Jehovah, Father, all have a sense to his soul. But it is not even rational to seek for a reason in imaginary causes, when the real reason lies within the system and makes a clearly stated and characteristic part of it. Now such is the difference between Jehovah and Elohim.