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circle of ideas and practices in which adoption figures as an item of social importance. And when it is once thoroughly- realized that the earlier worship of Yahweh in Israel came within the field of primitive religion and life, the possibility of its adoption from an alien social group will not seem so strange. Our previous examination of kinship and religion has prepared us to understand this practice. The original form of organized society is that of a kin-group in which the god is a powerful member of the clan. But inasmuch as the theory of actual relationship does not cover the facts of social life, it is neces- sary to extend the bonds of blood kinship by legal fictions. Aliens are included by marriage or adoption, agreeing to act in all respects as members of the kindred to which they now become attached. This agreement, or covenant, involves worship of the god acknowledged by the receiving clan.
Not only is ancient thought familiar with the idea that a religion may be adopted, but many of the biblical writers assume that Yahweh and Israel became related as god and peo- ple in precisely this way. One of the documents in the Book of Joshua regards the ancestors of Israel up to the time of the Sinai covenant as having worshiped other gods than Yahweh, for it speaks of "the gods your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt" (Josh. 24:14). These expressions, "I^eyond the River and in Egypt," cover the entire ancestral history up to the time of the covenant. For, according to the traditions of Israel, their forefathers came from the Mesopotamian region, "beyond the River," i. e., the Euphrates, and afterward settled on the border of Egypt. So that when a biblical writer speaks of the gods which the fathers worshiped beyond the River and in Egypt, this is good evidence of a tradition that Yahweh was not worshiped before the Sinai period. To the same effect, the prophet Hosea, as quoted above, emphasizes the proposition, "I am Yahweh thy god from the land of Egypt" (Hos. 12:9). We should also bear in mind such expressions as, "And thou, Yahweh, became their god" (II Sam. 7:24), and, "I will take you to me for a people and I will be to you a god" (Exod. 6:7).
It is worth while to emphasize that the Sinai covenant
