light of the ideas which determined it. Dr. Driver writes:
"The institution of the Levirate-marriage, it is probable, originated in a state of society in which the constituent units were, more largely than with us, not single families, but groups of related families, or joint family groups. In primitive and semi-primitive societies women do not possess independent rights, they are treated as part of the property of the family to which they belong. A married woman, upon the death of her husband, passes consequently, with her children and her late husband's estate, to the new head of the family, who assumes in relation to them the same rights and duties which the husband had: he holds towards them the joint position of guardian and owner; and this brings with it as a corollary the right to treat the widow as his wife. And it is the brother who thus becomes the deceased man's heir, because, from his age and position, he is (as a rule) the person who is best fitted to be the new head of the family and the guardian of its interests and rights."[1]
The Hebrew institution, then is not to be separated from its place in the general history of human civilisation; nor are we under any reasonable necessity to read into it any other notions than those which that place suggests. It emerges in the Old Testament like a piece
- ↑ See "Deuteronomy," p. 284 [International Critical Commentary.]
