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Jos_6:3-6
We find this remarkable regard for the number seven not among the Hebrews only, but among all ancient people. It pervades all ancient literature, and is found among all nations. It seems to us impossible that universal regard for the number seven, evinced in every possible way, could have originated in other than primeval facts and ideas, common to all the races of man. It seems to us that the one great fact, in which all originated, is that of the creation in seven days—six days, so to speak, of labor, and the seventh of rest from completed work. This fact was once common to the knowledge of all mankind; and however it may have been eventually lost sight of among many of the nations into which they became divided, the institutions and ideas which the fact impressed while it was generally known, would remain among these nations. This universal regard for the number must have existed before the races, which trace their common origin to Adam, were dispersed abroad. But it is difficult to understand how a fact of revealed knowledge, anterior to, and beyond the scope of, human observation and experience, could alone have made this deep and abiding impression. We do not find it so. It is not the abstract knowledge of a great fact which establishes universal usages and makes ineradicable impressions—but it is by iteration, by frequency, by the idea being kept continually before the mind. Although, therefore, we make no question that the peculiar distinction assigned by all nations to the number seven, had its origin in the seventh day of completed creation, we are persuaded that this fact alone, without some institution which kept it constantly before the mind, and made it part of life’s pulsation, could not have been operative to the extent we witness. Such an institution is the Sabbath—an institution designed to commemorate the creation—and abundantly adequate, but not more than adequate, by its recurrence at short intervals, to produce a regard, so diffused and permanent, for the number seven. This is to us one strong proof that this institution of the seventh-day rest, did from the earliest times exist, and was not, as some have supposed, a merely Jewish institution. If the seventh-day Sabbath was observed from the time of man’s creation, an observance which made so large a part in his life adequately accounts for all those phenomena in regard to the number seven, which we witness. But if that institution had no existence, we are completely at a loss on the subject—we have nothing to say—nothing to conjecture.
But if this account be taken, the revival of the sabbatic institution among the Hebrews, and the distinctness with which the doctrine of creation was presented to their minds, after many other nations had lost sight of it, sufficiently explains the more prevalent regard and familiar use of the number seven, which we find among them. And this regard for that number was not among them a matter of mere habit—not a vain superstition—but was in many respects a matter of prescribed observance, with the apparent intention of strengthening the impression with regard to the creation, which the sabbatic institution itself was framed to produce.
These remarks are suggested by the very remarkable manner in which the number seven is produced in the account of the siege of Jericho. The city was to be compassed on seven successive days, and on the seventh day seven times; and the procession was to be headed by seven priests, bearing, the seven trumpets of rams’ horns. The progress during the six days, and the twofold production of the number seven on the seventh day, at the moment of whose consummation the work was completed, seem to involve a very distinct reference to the period of creation, and thence to seven as the number of completion—of perfect consummation. Seven was, in fact, in some sort, a sacred number, whence the solemnity of in oath is enhanced by connection therewith. Indeed, in the Hebrew language, as in the Sanskrit, the words for “an oath” and for “seven,” are the same. In the former language Sheba has that twofold meaning—hence the question, whether the name Beer-Sheba, where Abraham and Abimelech confirmed their covenant by a solemn oath, means “the well of the oath,” or “the well of seven,” or “seven wells.” If, in this remarkable instance, we dispense with the allusion in the name to the number seven, that number is still present, for before the oath was uttered Abraham set apart seven ewe lambs in so marked a manner as to attract the inquiries of the king, to whom the patriarch answered, “These seven ewe lambs shalt then take at my hand, that they may be a witness unto me that I have digged this well.” From this it appears that there was but one well, and seven lambs were set apart, not as one for each of seven wells, but because seven was a number appropriate to the solemnity of the occasion. We may therefore understand the name as “the well of the seven,” that is, of the seven lambs which confirmed the oath, or the “well of the oath,” from the oath itself, “because there they sware, both of them.” It seems to us that the two sevens merge into each other, and that both are included in the single designation. This connection is not peculiar to the Hebrews. We find it among the ancient Arabians, of whom we learn that when men pledged their faith by oath to each other, blood drawn from an incision near the mid-finger of the contracting parties, was sprinkled upon seven stones, placed between them, and while this was done, they called upon their gods. Note: Herodotus, iii. 8. So among the gifts with which Agamemnon proposed to seal a covenant of peace with Achilles, we find,
“Seven tripods unsullied yet with fire;” Note: Iliad, ix. 123.
and further on, seven female captives, skilled in domestic arts, the latter specially intended as an atonement-offering to the wrathful hero, for one of which he had been deprived. Even at the present day the number seven is curiously regarded in Germany in matters of evidence. Note: Grimm, Rechtsalterthum, pp. 807, 858. Nor is the number unknown to ourselves in matters of land and legal obligation, as in the term of seven years for leases of houses, for apprenticeships, for the transportation of criminals, and other matters of the kind.
In some of the sacrifices of Scripture we find also a prominent reference to the number seven. So Balaam erects seven altars, and offers a bullock and a ram on every altar. So when Asa reformed his kingdom and renewed the national covenant with God, seven thousand bullocks and seven thousand rams were offered unto the Lord at Jerusalem; and on a like occasion, king Hezekiah offered seven bullocks, seven rams, seven lambs, and seven he-goats, as a sin-offering for his kingdom. Here the reference to a fixed idea respecting the special fitness of the number seven is remarkably produced. Apart from that, he might have chosen twelve, as representing the tribes comprising the house of Israel, or two, if he had regard to only his own kingdom. But the large ideas connected with the number seven, and the veneration in which it was held, caused that to be regarded as the more appropriate and significant—the general fitness, of that number overpowering the special fitness of twelve or of two.
We may trace this connection further. The altar itself, at its original establishment, was to be consecrated for seven days to render it most holy. Note: Exo_29:37. 2Ch_7:9. A young animal was not held to be fit for sacrifice until it had remained seven days with its dam; and so likewise the male child among the Hebrews was, after seven days, that is, on the eighth day, consecrated to the Lord by circumcision. These instances seem designed to indicate that nothing, was considered perfect until the number seven had been completed. On the same basis we find the number seven involved in all the rites of uncleanness and purification. Whoever became defiled by various kinds of uncleanness from the living or from the dead, or from leprosy and other diseases, must spend seven days before his state of ceremonial purity could be recovered. As seven days was the period of uncleanness for contact with a corpse, so also was seven days the period of mourning for the dead. Note: Gen_50:10. 1Sa_31:13. 1Ch_10:12, etc. The number seven was, in other respects, connected with the idea of purification; or rather, as we apprehend throughout, of six as a process, and seven as the consummation. So the Syrian leper was directed to dip seven times in Jordan; and it was, no doubt, at the seventh plunge, that his leprosy departed from him.
With uncleanness and with sorrow is connected the idea of punishment, and in these also the number seven is reproduced. So the memorable words of Lamech: “If Cain shall be avenged seven-fold, surely Lamech seventy and seven.” And it is scarcely needful to remind the reader of the seven days of impending judgment at the deluge; of the seven Canaanitish nations consigned to the sword of Israel; of the death of David’s child on the seventh day; of the choice offered to him between seven years’ famine and three days’ pestilence; of Pharaoh’s seven lean kine, and seven stunted ears, as signs of seven years of famine; of the Lord’s delivering the Israelites into the hands of Midian seven years in punishment for their sins; of the seven “times” or years that passed over the Babylonish king in his bestial state. Look also at the seven apocalyptic plagues; the seven troubles named by Job; the seven things displeasing to God specified by the wise man. Pro_6:16.
In fact, time and space fail us to point out the most remarkable alone of the allusions to this number in the Scriptures, much less the parallels which may be found among the ideas and usages of ancient and modern nations. We must, however, call to mind the seven years’ release of bondmen under the law; and the seven-times-seven years’ general release of mortgaged lands. Then there are the seven locks of Samson in which his great strength lay; the ten times seven years of the Babylonish exile; the seven branches of the golden candlestick; and in the Apocalypse, the seven golden candlesticks, the seven churches, the seven seals, the seven trumpets, the seven vials, the beast with seven heads, the seven mountains, the seven kings, and the seven angels.