ing and grace through which God reveals himself to their souls.
Moreover, God selects certain persons, especially well qualified to
hear his voice; these he commissions as ambassadors to declare him and
his will to the people. The belief in this method of revelation is the
philosophical basis for the offices of the Christian preacher and the
Christian religious teacher. Once more, in his attempt to reach the
human heart God may dispense with all external means; he may and does
reveal himself by working directly upon and in the mind and spirit of
the individual. These are some of the "manners" in which God reveals
himself to his children to-day, and these are some of the means and
manners in which God made himself known during the Old Testament
dispensation. Then, as he does now, he revealed himself in nature, in
the events of history, in the ritual, and by direct impressions; and at
times he selected certain individuals to whom he might {15} make
himself known in all these various ways and who could transmit the
various revelations to others. The Old Testament contains records and
interpretations of these manifold revelations. It is self-evident that
when attempts were made to record these various manifestations of God
different kinds of literature must be used in order to express most
vividly the truth or truths gathered from the divine revelations. The
several kinds of literature, therefore, are the natural outgrowth of
the manifold modes of divine revelation. In the Old Testament five
kinds of literature may be distinguished: the prophetic, the wisdom,
the devotional, the legal or priestly, and the historical. In their
production four classes of religious workers who observed, interpreted,
and mediated the divine revelations, were active: the prophets, the
wise men, the priests (compare Jer. 18. 18), and the psalmists.

The prophetic literature owes its origin to prophetic activity. The
prophets towered above their contemporaries in purity of character,
strength of intellect, sincerity of purpose, intimacy of communion with
God, and illumination by the divine Spirit. As a result of these
qualifications they were able to understand truth hidden from the eyes
and minds of those who did not live in the same intimate fellowship
with Jehovah. Their high conceptions of the character of God enabled
{16} them to appreciate the divine ideals of righteousness, and they
sought with flaming enthusiasm to impress the t