Crawford Toy: 4 books

The object of this volume is to describe the principal customs and ideas that underlie all public religion; the details are selected from a large mass of material, which is increasing in bulk year by year. References to the higher religions are introduced for the purpose of illustrating lines of progress...

It appears probable that primitive men endowed with their own qualities every seemingly active object in the world. Experience forced them to take note of the relations of all objects to themselves and to one another. The knowledge of the sequences of phenomena, so far as the latter are not regarded...

Written for young adult and older readers, this primer on the history of religion in Israel is a thorough yet concise, with an invaluable timeline of events and discussion questions for Sunday-school classrooms or book groups. Toy successfully introduces the reader to the Egyptians, Moses, David, Solomon, and many more important figures of Jewish history. 

The author examines the social basis of religion as well as the development of ideas of ethics, the concept of the kingdom of God, eschatology, and the relationship of Jesus to Christianity—nimbly sketching a general history of the period spanning “from the distinct legal organization of the Jewish people to the close of the New Testament canon.”