ter of fact that, among a large portion of mankind,
ancestor-worship is more or less thrown into the background either by
such cosmic deities, or by tribal gods of uncertain origin, who have
been raised to eminence by the superiority in warfare, or otherwise, of
their worshippers.

Among certain nations, the polytheistic theology, thus constituted, has
become modified by the selection of some one cosmic or tribal god, as
the only god to whom worship is due on the part of that nation (though
it is by no means denied that other nations have a right to worship
other gods), and thus results a worship of one God--_monolatry,_ as
Wellhausen calls it--which is very different from genuine monotheism.
[27] In ancestral sciotheism, and in this _monolatry,_ the ethical
code, often of a very high order, comes into closer relation with the
theological creed. Morality is taken under the patronage of the god or
gods, who reward all morally good conduct and punish all morally evil
conduct in this world or the next. At the same time, however, they
are conceived to be thoroughly human, and they visit any shadow of
disrespect to themselves, shown by disobedience to their commands, or by
delay, or carelessness, in carrying them out, as severely as any breach
of the moral laws. Piety means minute attention to the due performance
of all sacred rites, and covers any number of lapses in morality, just
as cruelty, treachery, murder, and adultery did not bar David's claim to
the title of the man after God's own heart among the Israelites; crimes
against men may be expiated, but blasphemy against the gods is an
unpardonable sin. Men forgive all injuries but those which touch their
self-esteem; and they make their gods after their own likeness, in their
own image make they them.

It is in the category of monolatry that I conceive the theology of the
old Israelites must be ranged. They were polytheists, in so far as they
admitted the existence of other Elohim of divine rank beside Jahveh;
they differed from ordinary polytheists, in so far as they believed
that Jahveh was the supreme god and the one proper object of their own
national worship. But it will doubtless be objected that I have been
building up a fictitious Israelitic theology on the foundation of the
recorded habits and customs of the people, when they had lapsed from
the ordinances of their great lawgiver and prophet Moses, and that my
conclusions may be good for the perverts to Canaan