BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME FROM THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF Slenrs W. Sage iSqi Ag AS U3? IP/ la^fiq^ 7673-2 DATE PyE ^<^ t>Ji, MAR], #1969 3 6096a J g^_n™ '^A f^ 196 MAY 1 g 969 MP ti«iTTT5gfirp :f2i 'ihi ni^ ', f97l ' ^m^S' PRINTED JN U.S.A. cornel. UniversiW Ubra^V pj 4581. A21 sermons mgjf,(!l|. SERMONS IN ACCENTS OB STUDIES IN THE HEBEEW TEXT A BOOK FOB PBEACHEBS AND STUDENTS BY Ebv. JOHN ADAMS, B.D. Inverkeilor AUTHOR OP "KINQLESS FOLK," "THE MOSAIC TABBBNACLB ' "THE MINOR prophets" EDINBURGH T. & T. CLAEK, 38 Geoegb Street 1906 '5; % %^ A. 1.c:i%\J^ THE ABEBDEEN UNIVERSITY PEEaS LIMITED PEEFACE The aim of the present volume ia to furnish a readable yet sufficiently accurate account of Hebrew Accentuation. It is an attempt, however imperfect, to illustrate to others, what the author has found in his own experience, that a working knowledge of accentual law no less than of Hebrew Syntax or of Septuagint Greek can frequently be turned to good account in the practical work of preaching. Hence the choice of the main title, " Sermons in Accents ". The phrase does not mean that the outstanding feature of the book is homiletical or expository. It suggests simply that the subject has been treated from the standpoint of the preacher, and that the technical results thus won at the desk can readily be utilised in the service of the pUlpit. The expository outline, in a word, is not the essential feature of the work; it is merely the spice to make it palatable. The sub-title, " Studies in the Hebrew Text," is slightly more ambitious. It expresses the iv Preface conviction that the preaching of the present is needing infused into it rather more of the Biblical element. It does not savour, as Scot- tish preaching used to do, of an intimate familiarity with the written word. In truth, we are reading too much about the Bible, and too little in it. Not, indeed, that one has any desire to revive the naive literalness of the handy concordance plan. That method is dead and cannot be revived. The term " faith," for instance, in Hab. ii. 4 does not mean the same thing as in Gal. iii. 11 ; and it serves no good purpose to write and preach as if it did. Bib- lical preaching means the preaching that is based on Biblical Theology, and this in turn presupposes a first-hand acquaintance with the text. But how is this to be attained ? How is the modern preacher to make sure that he is retailing week by week the fully verified results of Biblical exegesis ? Only in one way : he must get back to the ordinary Hebrew sources and verify the results for himself. If the cause of truth is to be safeguarded from the extravagance of a/yvcoaia, the preacher of the future must sit down and grapple with the minutiae of the text.^ ' If we mistake not, this is the one weakness in Dr. Orr's comprehensive and painstaking volume, The Problem of the Old Testament. One may read it from cover to cover Preface v It is to this twofold service that the present work is dedicated. It seeks to go back to the Hebrew sources, yet keeps in view the practical bearing of the subject — not souring the mind by unnecessary technicalities, but introducing as much of accentual and syntactical law as to whet the desire of the average student to know more. The measure of success which has attended these efforts must of course be appraised by others ; nevertheless the following statement by one who has made a special study of the subject, and who has read the volume in MS., may fitly close this prefatory note : "I have looked through your MS. and have read enough to show me (1) that you have well mastered the technical details involved, and (2) that you have succeeded admirably in making a clear and what one might call ' popular ' presentation of these details. (3) Your exhibition in each chapter of a text to be treated homiletically on the basis and never once feel the necessity of turning up a single Hebrew word. This is a grave, if not a fatal, flaw. The psychological moment may have arrived for leading a strong reaction against the prevailing school of Old Tes- tament criticism ; but if so it will have to be inaugurated and pressed home along another and very different line of attack. It will begin in the regular work of the Hebrew class, when the average student has been taught to prize and put to practical use the ordinary Masoretic Text. vi Preface of the accents is very happy in conception and in execution ; it cHnches your argument in a forcible and impressive manner. I cannot but commend your diligence in V70rking your subject and your ready style in presenting the fruits of your labours. I should hope that there are a sufficient number of our students of divinity and young ministers so much in earnest in the study of the Old Testament Scripture that your book would receive adequate recognition and acceptance." Note. — To meet the needs of the Hebrew student, a few blank pages have been inserted throughout the volume. Additional examples will constantly be met with in the course of his Hebrew studies ; and if he has got into the habit of noting these under their re- spective sections, the inserted leaves may be- come, not simply a record of his reading, but a valuable addition to the present text-book. {Of. p. 91, etc.) CONTENTS CHAPTEE I PAOB INTBODUCTION J (1) '^he value of the accents. (2) Literature. (3) Our motto. OHA-PTEE II The AcoKNTDATORa 15 (1) The Sopherim. (2) The Masoretes. (3) The punc- tuators. (4) A practical illustration. CHAPTEE III The AccentuaIi System 31 (1) Its extralinear character. (2) Its musioo-logical character. (3) The value of this fact in the prac- tical work of translation. CHAPTEE IV The DiFFEEBNT Kinds and Uses of the Accents . 47 (1) The poetical accents. (2) The marking of the tone. (8) Distinotives and connectives. CHAPTEE V The Main DiSTmcTiVBS 61 (1) Silluq. (2) Athnaoh. (3) S'golta. CHAPTEE VI The Minor Distinotives 77 (1) Their names. (2) Their position. (3) Their repe- tition in longer clauses. viii Contents CHAPTEE VII PAGE DlSTINCTIVBS OF LESS Dbgbee 93 (1) Pashta. (2) T'bhir. (3) Zarqa. CHAPTER VIII The Least Distinctives 107 (1) Their names. (2) Their position. (3) Three special texts for the preacher. CHAPTER IX Paseq 123 (1) Its position. (2) Its usages. (3) Two practical illustrations CHAPTER X The Main Distinctivbb (Poetical) .... 141 (1) Their names. (2) Their position. (3) Their musical character. CHAPTER XI The Minob Distinctives (Poetical) . . . 155 (1) R'bhia Mugrash. (2) D'ohi. (8) Sinnor. CHAPTER XII The Minor Distinctives (Continued) .... 173 (1) R'bhia. (2) Pazer and Paseq. APPENDIX Specimen Paqe foe Student's Note-book . . . 191 INDEX I List of the Hebrew Accents 194 INDEX II Scriptuee Passages 196 INDEX III List of Texts mobe fully Teeatbd fob the Pbeachbb 198 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION The late Professor Davidson's Outlines of He- brew "AGcentuation appeared as early as 1861, and the flavour ,(^f the opening paragraph is delicious. "Buxtorf, the younger, when intro- ducing a quarto of nearly five hundred pages on the accents and vowels, gracefully apologises for making so much noise about the point, to which the children of the mathematicians deny all magnitude. Some people may think any labour bestowed upon the accents ill-spent. But surely no labour is ill-spent which is spent upon the text of Scripture. And it must not be for- gotten that accents and vowels are of the same authority, both having sprung entire from the head of the Masorete, and whoso condemns the one condemns the other. No doubt those whose condemnation falls so ruinously upon the accents would dispense with the vowels as well. Would many of them feel the loss of dispensing with the consonants also ? " I 2 Sermons in Accents Probably not : and yet from another point of view they might have a desire to retain them in their service. The consonants are not unlike Sherlock Holmes' dancing men. You can move them about and re-arrange them in all conceivable combinations, until they mean anything or noth- ing ; and it would be a most serious loss to those of us who occasionally engage in this pastime, if there were no men left to dance. The accents and vowels, which form a kind of bodyguard around the Masoretic text, may be cut down without a pang in the fight for a purer standard ; but it is obvious that the consonants occupy a slightly dif- ferent position : one must leave something to fight about. And for his part, the present writer has no wish to see the fighting cease. He holds no brief to defend either the accents or the con- sonants. If the other criteria demand it, the consonantal text itself, no less than the dual system of punctuation, must give place to a more satisfactory reconstruction of the Hebrew ori- ginal. Indeed, in several of the examples ad- duced in the following pages this right of textual emendation as applied to the entire Masoretic material is frankly recognised and acted upon. We can have no hesitation in endorsing the conclusion of Canon Driver, that to some extent, at least, the study of Hebrew Grammar has been Introduction 3 artificially complicated by a 'corrupt text. " In some eases it is only the vocalisation, in others it is the consonantal text itself which appears to be at fault." ^ But what then ? The first duty of the student or of the preacher is not to get behind the Masoretic text, but to get back to the Hebrew text as we have it —to sift its history, weigh its problems, admire its diction, and assimilate its thought, and above all to use it week by week in the practical work of the ministry. For only then is he in a position to appreciate the labours of those who would lead him into the further field of textual emendation ; or what is of deeper interest, only then will he find in his pulpit preparation that expository preaching is an inspiration and a joy. 1. The Value of the Accents Historically and even exegetically the study of the accents needs no apology. They were part of the means adopted by the Masoretes for pre- serving the pronunciation of the text and the intonation of the Synagogue; and while they were essentially a musical system, they are fre- quently found to be of real service both in the sphere of grammar and of exegesis. " Some ac- quaintance with accents is indispensable to the ' Hebrew Tenses, p. viii. 4 Sermons in Accents Hebrew student," says Canon Driver, " not only for the single object, with a view to which this account of them has been inserted here, but upon more general grounds as well ; they frequently offer material assistance in unravelling the sense of a difficult passage ; and the best authorities continually appeal to them, on account of their bearing upon exegesis. Experience tells me how liable they are to be overlooked ; and the object of the present chapter is merely to smooth the way for those who may desire to pursue the sub- ject more thoroughly afterwards, or, for such as have not the time or inclination to do this, to lay down a few broad rules which may be of practical service." > Words are sometimes distinguished by the accents alone, as 'd-ri "shine" (Isa. Ix. 1), and 'o-T% "my light" (Ps. xxvii. 1), just as in Greek we have el/jiL and 6t/i.f, and in English, present and present. Similarly in Isa. liii. 7, we have a form of the verb which is either a perfect or a parti- ciple, according as we print it nQ7!S>3 (with Baer) or nj27b?3 (with Ginsburg). For the preacher, however, the main plea in behalf of a more accurate study of Hebrew accents has yet to be mentioned. They form part of a 1 Hebrew Tenses, p. 101. Introduction 5 preacher's apparatus in the practical work of ex- position. The way in which a passage is arranged accentually is sometimes the one hint necessary for suggesting a suitable division of the subject. There are sermons in accents. It may not be the first object of the present volume to show how sermons are to be found ; but we confidently assure the hard-driven sermon-maker that even from this point of view, he will not read through the following pages in vain. We offer him a full sheaf of expository outlines with ample sugges- tions as to where he can find more. Let him open, for instance, the Hebrew Bible at Gen. i. 1, and note the marvellous accuracy of the Masoretic notation. A considerable pause is placed on the first word, according to the rule that prepositions with their government at the beginning of a clause are generally marked off' by a disjunctive accent. This was the time when, and the place where, the great Artificer began the mighty task. " In the beginning — God cre- ated the heaven and the earth." The main pause, however, is placed on " Elohim," not simply for the sake of musical equilibrium, but because this is the one thought that illumines everything. The worker is always greater than his work. " In the beginning — Qod created ! the heaven and the earth." Finally, there are two stages in the work 6 Sermons in Accents and two beats in the music — the heaven first (as it ought to be) and the earth in subord- ination to it, and therefore both separated by a disjunctive accent, but wrought also into a finished whole (a cosmos) by the final domin- ating pause Silluq. So that the divisions of our subject are lying on the surface : — (1) The Time when, (2) The Worker, (3) The Work, — an arrangement which may be represented to eye and ear alike by being printed and read thus : — In the beginning — God created ! Tlie heaven, and the earth. Or the student may turn to one of the pro- phetical writings and read as in Hab. i. 1 : — The burden which he saw, Habakkuk the prophet. This is the order of the words as given in the Hebrew, and the subject-matter as thus arranged is full of interest for the preacher. The chief pause is placed on " saw," not simply to conserve the balance of the sentence, but because, in the estimation of the punctuator, " the vision and the faculty divine" was even more important than the thing revealed. This is the condition of all true prophesying in the name of the Lord. The prophet must be a seer or rapt gazer in the audi- Introduction 7 ence-chamber of Jehovah. Was it not so in the case of the great Exemplar ? " In the begianing was the Word, and the Word was with God" (TT/ao? TOP 0e6v). He was in the presence of, and ever turning towards (■n-p6<;) the central Majesty. In Godet's fine language, "To reveal God, one must know Him : to project Him outwardly one must have plunged into His bosom. The char- acter of revealer is therefore subordinate, even in the Logos, to a personal communion with God. He contemplates before reflecting, He receives before giving." On the other hand the genuine prophet does reflect. He is NaM no less than Ghozeh. He has a message to deliver to the men of his own generation. And therefore a second fairly strong pause is placed on "burden," the oracle or substance of Habakkuk's message. It is not to be true of him that " strongest minds are often those of whom the noisy world hears least ". He has the inspired utterance no less than the . open vision, the "accomplishment of verse," no less than the faculty divine : and it is his to turn round as the Lord's mouthpiece to speak to men what he has seen and heard. Hence a suitable division of our text would be : — (1) The method of revelation (nTIl). (2) The substance of revelation (t^toan). (3) The personal recipient (p''\^'2'n). 8 Berimoiis in Accents 2. Literature The student is sometimes advised to sell his Hebrew Bible, and buy the works of some worthy Puritan, who, as a modern preacher has dis- covered, has thoughts that breathe and words that burn like any other accepted author. We strongly urge him to do nothing of the kind. Those saintly men of a by -gone age did a splendid work in their own time, and we who have been enriched by their labours most gratefully revere their memory. But like the systems they repre- sented, they have had their day and ceased to be ; and the duty laid upon the new generation is not to sell the text-book of the Christian ministry, and go and purchase weapons that are fast be- coming antiquated; but to enter the armoury from which these were supplied and find suitable weapons for ourselves. If any books must be sold, let it be anything rather than the Hebrew Bible. Let it be the Puritans themselves which are relegated to the shelves of the second-hand bookseller, if by any means their vacated places may be filled by the following apparatus cri- ticus : — (1) The Baer and Belitzsch Texts, as far at least as these have been published — Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy have not as yet ap- peared. These should be bound separately and Introduction & interleaved, and while the student is still conver- sant with his Latin, a literal translation of the Introductions and Notes should be inscribed on the inserted leaves of each volume — a task which will form a splendid preparation for the sub- sequent study of the text. (2) Ginsburg's Introduction to the Hebrew Bible — a volume which is not only requisite for his own edition of the text, but has placed all Hebrew students under a debt of gratitude to the painstaking editor. (3) Wickes' standard work on the Hebrew Accents. This consists of two companion treat- ises which appeared in 1881 and 1887 respec- tively — the former dealing with the three so-called poetical books of the old Testament, and the latter with the twenty-one so-called prose books. For any one who desires to pursue the subject of Hebrew accents further, these two treatises are indispensable. Without them the present volume would never have been written. (4) The Old Testament in Greek, or Swete's edition of the Septuagint.^ Its short but scholarly introductions will furnish' the student with the necessary point of view for profiting by the various MS. readings grouped at the foot of each 1 See additional note, p. 13. 10 Sermons in Accents page. This " manual " edition is the best, as it is the latest of all the Septuagints. (5) Hatch's Essays in Biblical Greek. As a guide to the language of the LXX, and an intro- duction to some of its problems, this volume can be thoroughly recommended to the Old Testa- ment student. It is a work of sterling value and well worth the time one may spend upon it. (6) The following Articles in our new Bible Dictionaries should also be carefully studied. Nestle's excellent contribution on the " Septua- gint," and Strack's equally fine handling of the "Text of the Old Testament" in Hastings' Bible Bictiona/ry ; with F. C. Burkitt's "Text and Versions " in the Encyclopcedia Bihlica. But the main item in the student's working apparatus has yet to be noted. He should pre- pare a critical edition of certain portions of the Hebrew text for himself. To his other purchases he should add a dozen large note-books suit- able for this purpose ; and when he has an even- ing to spare he should address himself to the task of arrangement and pagination. Let him assign to each verse in the selected portion the two pages which face one another in the pre- viously arranged note-book. He may read, for instance, in Cheyne's admirable article on " Job" in the Bihlica that the opening words in vii. 20. Introduction 11 ought to be omitted as an interpolation : and as this happens to occur in one of the sections which he has set apart for special study, he turns up the page referred to and makes a note of the suggested emendation. He transcribes the He- brew at the top of the left-hand page, and the rendering of the LXX at the top of the page opposite ; and then comparing the two, he inserts the note in the space beneath. Nothing more may be added on this particular passage for some considerable time: but gradually in the course of his reading, one note after another finds its way into the allotted space, until at the close of several years of study it may read as at page 192 in the appendix. In this way the student has constructed for himself the best Index Rerum in the market. He has devised an efficient method for keeping a record of his reading, and is grad- ually producing a critical edition of the text — a work which to him, at least, will be in after years the most valuable book in his library. 3. Our Motto Our motto, then, is "back to the Hebrew text ". It is not enough to browse through vari- ous magazine articles, and retail at second or even at third hand the facts or fancies of others. We must get back to the ordinary Hebrew sources 12 Sermons in Accents and verify the results for ourselves. If need be, we must copy the devotion of the old Rabbis who did not scruple to burn the midnight oil in the prosecution of their studies. "Hananiah ben Hezekiah," says the Babylonian Talmud, " is of blessed memory, for but for him Ezekiel 'would have been declared apocryphal, because his words contradicted the words of the Law : three hun- dred jars of lamp oil were brought to him, and he sat in his garret and solved the contradic- tions." That is his example to Hebrew students to-day. Let them toil as he did at their Old Testament tasks. And they shall yet know something of the beauty of the language and the loftiness of the thought, when they have learned To scorn delights, and live laborious days. Additional Notes and Examples 13 A " larger" edition of The Old Testament in. Greek is now announced. It differs from the smaller or manual edition in providing a more extended appa/ratus aritiam. But since " the result confirms the substantial accuracy of the manual edition," the expositor will find, both in price and various readings, that the smaller work is sufiioiently comprehensive for his purpose. 14 Additional Notes and Examples CHAPTER II THE AOCENTUATORS The accents and vowels were introduced into the Hebrew Scriptures about the seventh century A.D. As this, however, is part of a larger question dealing with the preservation and history of the text, it may help us to appreciate the distinctive labours of the accentuators, if we cast a glance, however summary, at the previous history of the Sopherim. Indeed, the three main landmarks in this wider field of inquiry correspond to the three names — Sopherim, Masoretes and Punctu- ators ; and in order to place our subject in its proper historical setting, we may profitably assign one short section to each. 1. The Sopheeim A large part of the consonantal text was pro- bably in existence by the time of Ezra. The book of the " Law " especially, was the valued possession and accepted guide of the post-exilian church (Ezra vii. 6, Neh. viii. 1). But possession is only one thing. The revision of the text, and 15 16 Sermons in Accents its careful preservation against possible sources of corruption, was no less a service demanded by the Church of God, and a task to which the ablest scholars of the age might well apply their energies. It was this service that was undertaken by the Sopherim or scribes. They were the doctors and authorised interpreters of the Law, who, during the last centuries B.C. and at the beginning of the Christian era, toiled patiently at the " hedge " which was designed henceforth to enclose and preserve the sacred consonantal text. Accord- ing to the Talmud they were called Sopherim (□^"^D'iD = ypafifiareK) or " counters," because they counted all the letters and words in the various Hebrew documents. "Thus they said that the vav in pn2 (Lev. xi. 42), is the middle letter in the Pentateuch, that 'ttTTI m'M (Lev. x. 16) is the middle word, that Lev. xiii. 33 is the middle verse, that the y in "l^Q (Ps. Ixxx. 14) is the middle letter in the Psalter, and that Ps. Ixxviii. 36 is the middle verse." * But the fullest statement, respecting their activity and functions, is found in the Baby- lonian Talmud. We are there informed that the Sopherim fixed the pronunciation of words, ' See Ginsburg's Introduction, p. 69, which also gives the original. The Aceentuators 17 indicated various instances where vav conjunc- tive ought to be cancelled, specified a number of words which though not written are to be read, and vice versd, words which though present in the text, are nevertheless to be omitted in the reading— and then follows a list of examples illustrative of each.^ The whole passage suggests that the Sopherim were not merely copyists of the sacred writings but revisers and redactors ; and other evidence which may be culled from the LXX and from the Masorah points in the same direction. In fine, they did not scruple to exercise the right of textual emendation. A large part of their work consisted in removing indelicate expressions, anthropomorphisms, pro- fane phrases towards the Deity, the too frequent use of the Tetragrammaton — everything, in a word, which was calculated to offend pious souls when the sacred text was being read in the wor- ship of the Synagogue. They winced, for in- stance, at the expression in 1 Sam. iii. 13 that the sons of Eli had cursed or spoken against God (DTlbt^, LXX 0e6v), or the analogous allusion in Job vii. 20 where the patriarch expostulates saying, " Why hast thou set me as a mark for thee, so that I am a burden to thee ? ' 1 Ginsburg, p. 308. 2 18 Sermons in Accents (fi^ir, LXX eVt o-ot). These and similar ex- pressions seemed to contain too bold a statement ■when applied to the Holy One of Israel ; and therefore the words were emended by this guild of scholars, so as to convey a meaning that was less derogatory to the Deity. The term Qirr7t^ was changed to QhS, and "^"hi? to ibjT, and then the psb^sages read as in the R.V. that Eli's sons " did bring a curse upon themselves " and that Job ^id, " So that I am a burden to myself". Bm however extensive and thorough the work of the Sopherim may have been, it practically came to an end in the first century of our era. They had patiently sought to edit and preserve the sacred Hebrew writings, and so well had they succeeded in their efforts that the text we now possess, so far as the consonants are con- cerned, is substantially the same as that settled by these authoritative redactors. The extant Hebrew MSS. certainly give the consonants with great fidelity. Throughout the forty-eight chapters of Ezekiel, for instance, only sixteen real variations occur between a modern edition, based on Western MSS. and the St. Petersburg Codex of the Prophets, a recently discovered MS. of wholly eastern ancestry. Whatever may have been the case before the Christian era, very few The Accentuators 19 changes have been allowed since then to creep into the Hebrew text. So that the work of the Sopherim is still possessed by the Church in much the same form as it left the redactors' hands. The consonantal text was now finally settled, and passed over at the beginning of the Christian era into the safe keeping of 2. The Masoretes If it was the signal glory of the Sopherim to revise and finally settle the consonants of the Hebrew text, a similar honour fell to the lot of the Masoretes in introducing and perfecting the dual system of punctuation. They bequeathed to their successors a system of vowels and accents so complete, that it has preserved for all time the traditional pronunciation and musical recitation of the Sjmagogue. They were led to this in- vention by the exigencies of their position. So long as Hebrew was a living speech, the need was not felt of devising a system of visible vocalisa- tion. The consonants themselves provided a rough sketch of the language, and warmth and colour, i.e., the vowels and accents, could always be added from an intimate acquaintance with the vernacular and a familiar knowledge of the con- text. It was only when classical Hebrew was supplanted by Aramaic as the language of com- 20 Sermons in Accents mon life, and when Aramaic, in turn, gave place to Arabic as the result of the Mohammedan con- quest, that Jewish scholars felt that the task could no longer be evaded — the pronunciation and accentuation of their sacred books must be fixed and represented by suitable graphical signs. The precise date at which these signs were in- troduced cannot be determined with certainty. It may be fixed anywhere between the fifth and the eighth century A.D. It is not probable that the system sprang fully formed from the head of the Masorete. Beginning with a freer use of the vowel letters — the so-called matres lectiones, ''irrb^ — and borrowing, it may be, the diacritical point by which the Syriac punctuation had al- ready marked the chief pauses in the verse, the Hebrew system advanced to ever higher stages of efficiency, until at the close of the seventh century, it became the flexible and effective in- strument the punctuators found it to be. Rab- binical authorities, indeed, were inclined to view it in a different light. Ben-Asher, who lived in the early part of the tenth century, was of opinion that it ought to be assigned to the Sopherim and wise men who with Ezra at their head were sup- posed to have constituted the Great Synagogue. Others, with unique courage, were prepared to carry it a step further. They regarded it as coeval The Accentuators 21 with the language itself and communicated to Adam in Paradise ! But the silence of the Tal- mud on the subject of the punctuation, and Jerome's express testimony that neither vowels nor accents were found in the texts of his day, have long since satisfied scholars that it cannot have been earlier than the fifth century. Wickes is equally convinced that it could not have been later than the seventh. Direct historical notices fail us altogether, but we have various considera- tions that seem to point to this conclusion. Ben- Asher's opinion, already referred to, shows that in his age, the origin of the system was lost in obscurity. They knew as little about it as we do. But obviously a system, the origin of which is shrouded in the mists of the past, must be of much older date than the age in question. Be- sides, Ben-Asher himself was the last of a dis- tinguished family of Masoretes 'and punctuators whose genealogy can be traced back through five generations up to the latter half of the eighth century. It follows that the scheme of accents and vowels at which they laboured in succession must be older than the year 775, the date of their illustrious sire— Asher h^yn pTH- These and similar considerations point to the close of the seventh century as the most probable date for the origin of the system. And if we bear in mind 22 Sermons in Accents that the same period synchronises with the per- fecting of similar systems in the Syriac and Greek Churches, it may not seem so improbable an assumption after all. The age in large measure is a terra incognita to the Hebrew student ; but looking before and after, a general outline of the Masoretes' activity is not difficult to follow. They had accepted at the beginning the charge of the consonantal text ; and now a complete system of interpunctioh and musical notation having been wrought into its structure, they were handing it down combined with an extensive apparatus of other Masoretic material into the safe keeping of a third guild of scholars — the producers of all the extant Hebrew MSS., viz. : — 3. The Punctuators Unlike the Masoretes who had to invent the graphical signs, the functions of the punctuators were not to create, but simply to preserve the Masoretic labours. A glance at the facsimile of a Hebrew MS. like that shown at p. 625 of Ginsburg's Introduction, will help to indicate the extent of these labours, as well as the efficient way in which those painstaking scholars set about their task. In addition to the vowels and accents inserted in the text, there were also numerous Masoretic notes inscribed in the mar- The Accentuators 23 gin. Some of these notes refer to anomalies of vocalisation, or enumerate the various readings of the Q'ri and ITthibh. Others indicate the number of times certain words occur, as 1 = twice, and T^j^ = 134 times. Since these, however, are frequently elaborated into the figures of plants, animals, and other designs, the precise meaning of the annotation is not always easy to decipher. The brief and separate remarks found in the side margins of our copies are grouped under the common title, Masorah parva. The longer lists, with citation of passages, in- serted in the top and bottom margins of the same page are the Masorah magna. But as some of these larger lists were too lengthy for the margins of the page on which one of the peculiarities occurs, the Masoretes appended a considerable number of them at the end of different MSS. under the name Masorah finalis, the whole series forming part of that vast system of " marginal references " by which those earnest toilers at " the hedge " sought to preserve the integrity of the Masoretic standard. With this material lying before him, it was the first duty of the punctuator to furnish for his own use a model codex of the Scripture. This he did in accordance with the Masorah ; 24 Sermons in Accents compiling at the same time an independent collection of Masoretic rubrics to be used, as occasion offered, in the course of his professional labours. The first scholars who have produced such standard codices, and whose date we know, are the two Ben-Ashers, father and son, who laboured at Tiberias, and Ben-Naphtali, who flourished in Babylonia {cir. 890-940). Ben- Asher the younger, who has the credit of having fixed the pronunciation as we have it in our texts, was the compiler of a codex which still exists in the Jewish community of Aleppo. Ben- Naphtali, on the contrary, his textual rival, is known simply from the official lists which, trans- mitted to us in different MSS., exhibit the vari- ations of these two rival critics. The preparation of an ordinary Hebrew MS. is not difficult to follow. A copyist having been employed to produce a copy of the consonantal text, the punctuator sat down and revised it in the light of his model codex. And having satis- fied himself that the work was sufficiently well done, he furnished it with the Masoretic vowel- signs and accents, and added as much of the Masorahs, parva and magna, as the necessities of the case seemed to demand. The extent of these ' observations was regulated by various consid- | erations, by the space available, by the inclin- The AccentvMtors 25 ation of the punctuator, and chiefly by the honorarium offered by the man who ordered the copy. In this way the majority of our Hebrew MSS. came into existence. They were produced by professional punctuators who, induced by the terms offered by some wealthy patron, had under- taken the work. But the activity of these critics was not con- fined to the production of such MSS. If they continued to conserve the labours of the older Masoretes, they also led the way to the later theorists and grammarians. They composed treatises on the vocalic and accentual systems, and explained the rules of the Masorah. Allu- sion may be made to the treatise called in some MSS. Dikduke Ha-Teamim, or " The Grammar of the Accents''. It was first published in the Editio Princeps of the Rabbinical Bible by Felix Pratensis (Venice, 1517), where it is described in the heading as the compilation of Rabbi Ben- Asher. But despite the labours of Baer and. Strack (Leipzig, 1879), Ginsburg does not believe that Ben-Asher had anything to do with it. The rubrics therein contained represent portions of the Masorah which have been gradually developed from a period much earlier than Ben- Asher to a time much later than this textual critic. So that instead of the independent 26 Sermon^ in Accents treatise which its latest editors imagine it to have been, it is probably nothing more than a collection of sundry precepts and opinions propounded by different Masoretic schools. Be this as it may, the book is confessedly a product of the age when the principles of the Masorah were giving place to the ingenious speculations of later theorists. It may therefore be taken as an indication that the long-continued labours of the Masoretes were now approaching com- pletion, and that the history of the text, as a subject of further investigation, had entered the sphere of the grammarian. ^ 4. A Practical Illustration Allusion has been made to the Tiqqunim or emendations of the scribes, and the preacher will find a noteworthy example at Hab. i. 12. Accord- ing to the present Masoretic text and accents the whole verse may be arranged in the form of a tetrastich : — Art not thou from everlasting ? O Lord my God, mine Holy One, we shall not die : O Lord, thou hast ordained him for judgment ; And thou, O Rock, hast established him for correction. But the RV. has adopted a slightly different ar- ' In a second volume entitled Sermons in Syntax, the author hopes, in the near future, to continue this historical sketoli, The Accentuators 27 rangement. Following the division of the LXX, it has extended the introductory question to " mine Holy One," and placed the dichotomy there. " Art not thou I'rom everlasting, Lord my God, mine Holy One ? we shall not die." The R.V. however, has done more than this. It has furnished the key to another matter which may help to set the entire passage in a fresh light. Contrary to its usual practice, it has inserted the following note in the margin : " According to an ancient Jewish tradition, tJiou diest not". In other words, this is one of the emendations as- signed to the Sopherim. Instead of the original n^DD, which those devout scholars considered too bold an expression to apply to the Holy One of Israel, they introduced the 1st per. plur. Pl'\722 "we shall not die''; and thus taught the deeply significant truth that God's faithful rem- nant can never perish. Cf. the similar reassuring note in chap. ii. 4, that the righteous shall live in his faithfulness. What effect would this have on the general arrangement of the verse, and on the accentuation of the first couplet in particular ? With no change of subject at "thou diest not," there would be no necessity for placing a strong logical pause at " mine Holy One " ; and for the same reason the punctuator would have been left with a free hand 28 Sermons in Accents to conserve the musical equilibrium of Athnach's clause. He would have pointed the entire couplet from Athnach as a starting-point ; and thus at one stroke would have preserved the balance of the melody, the parallelism of the thought, and the deeper doctrine from which alone the immortality of the people can spring, viz., the eternity and immortality of Israel's God. ' Thus : — V^^ '^1'^: °"Ji?P ^^'^ ^'^/'H At J V; ': Art not thou from everlasting, O Jehovah ? My God, mine Holy One, thou shalt not die. The line of thought suggested by this emended text is sufEciently expressive. 1. The eternity, holiness and immortality of Israel's God (1st couplet). 2. The immortality and ideal holiness of Jehovah's people (2nd couplet). And the former is the pledge of the latter. " Because I live, ye shall live also " (John xiv. 19). Not even the dreaded invasion of the Chaldeans would be for destruction, but for correction. Out of that furnace of affliction the faithful remnant would yet be brought an inwardly holy church. The God of their fathers was not un- mindful of His covenant promise, and chastise- ment was but the proof of His love (c/. Heb. xii. 6). Additional Notes and Examples 29 For another example of the Tiqqunim of the Scribes see Hos. iv. 7. Not " Z will change i/ieir glory " (, , , DTIIS "^^P^V but "They have changed my glory ('^"l^^S 'I'l'lJ^n . . .) into shame ". This is in perfect harmony with the context. The entire verse, like the remainder of the paragraph, deals with the unfaithfulness of the priests. They had increased in number and in prestige under Jero- boam II. ; but the more they multiplied, the more they had sinned against the Lord. They had even battened upon the vices of the people. The sins were mainly these three : — 1. The forsaking of the law of God, or the neglecting of their intellectual trust (ver. 6). 2. Thriving upon the fines and sin-offerings of the wor- shippers, or living merrily on Israel's sin (ver. 8). 3. The outcome of both — the turning of God's glory, and therefore their own sacerdotal splendour, into shame. It required no divine act to cover them with infamy. They themselves had plunged into the abyss. 30 Additional Notes and Examples CHAPTER III THE ACCENTUAL SYST^EM One's first glance at a Hebrew Bible is any- thing but reassuring. Instead of shedding light ' on a difficult and unfamiliar script, the system of notation seems only to have made confusion worse confounded by sprinkling a formidable array of points and strokes all over the text. The graphical signs are certainly complex enough ; and one is apt to conclude that the cause of Hebrew study would have been better served, if the Rabbinical scholars of vocalic and accentual lore had never really existed. Natur- ally the Rabbis themselves were of a difierent opinion. So far from increasing the difficulties of the language, they thought they were making it easier, at least for beginners. The whole scheme was devised, not simply to conserve the integrity of the consonantal text, but also to assist the laity in the correct pronunciation of the words, and especially to meet the needs of children at school. "I was not allowed to 31 32 Sermons in Accents break up a Bible-verse," says R. Chananya, "ex- cept in the instruction of school-children." The Hebrew student, therefore, is not to be dis- couraged by his first glance at the accentual system. It was only food for babes. 1. Its Extralineab Character According to the Jewish view of the sacred writings, the consonants alone are to be regarded as Scripture. Even to this day nothing but the consonants are admitted into the rolls that are written out for use in the Synagogues. And therefore a priori no system of punctuation could be recognised, which would have involved an alteration of the traditional letters. It might take the form of a series of points and strokes, inserted below or above the Hebrew characters i.e., it might be infralinear like that of the Occidentals, or superlinear like that of the Orientals, but it must not make the graphical signs appear t)f equal value with the old letters, not by one jot or tittle must the Hebrew con- sonants be displaced. A single clause from Job xxxvi. 7 will help to illustrate this Jewish scruple. (1) The Palestinian pointing : — The Accentual System 33 (2) The Babylonian pointing: — The difference between these two systems lies more in the notation than in the pronunciation ; but both agree in this, that whatever be the time or order of their development, they have suc- ceeded in keeping intact the sacred consonantal text. The question of priority is not so easily settled. Dr. Wiekes is of opinion that the palm ought to be assigned to the Palestinian punctua- tion, inasmuch as the Babylonian system has all the appearance of being an unsuccessful attempt to improve upon the former. But Ginsburg maintains that the two notations were developed independently of each other ; and that it is simply a case of special pleading to argue that the superlinear pointing is not the product of the Babylonian school of Masoretes. In any case the superlinear system can be best studied in Strack's facsimile of the St. Petersburg Codex of the prophets of the date A.D. 916, or in a fourth MS. of the same Firkowitsch collection, containing the last chapters of the book of Job. Both MSS. were brought to light some sixty years ago by the researches of Abraham Firko- witsch, a Karaite Jew, in the synagogues of the Crimea. A specimen page of the Job Codex 3 34 Sermons in Accents may be found inserted as a frontispiece to Baer's Liber Jobi. Notable in this system is the absence of a sign for S'gol which is replaced by a or i. Furtive Pathach also is entirely awanting. The signs for the principal vowels are formed from the vowel letters, b^Ti, and the disjunctive accents, instead of the simple marks of the Palestinian system, are frequently represented by the initial letter of their Hebrew names, as a diminutive n for T'bhir, or a mutilated )i? for S'golta. In other respects it seems to be a modification of the Arabic system of representing the vowels — a fact which may help to explain the position of the signs above the letters. But while the originators of this system avoid some of the weak points of the Palestinian notation, as for instance, the confound- ing of Y'thibh with M'huppakh or Pashta with Azla, it nevertheless has been eclipsed by its western rival, and like the Eastern recension of the text generally, has passed out of practical use. For one thing, it is not so simple as the infra- linear system. The position of its vowel signs above the line brings them inconveniently into conflict with the superlinear accents. Its in- ability to distinguish Pathach and S'gol, and sometimes Pathach and Qametz ; or its use of the The Accentual System 35 same horizontal stroke (") to denote the different values of Raphe, vocal sheva and silent sheva, places it at a great disadvantage as compared with the infralinear pointing. And as no second method is required to compass the same task of vocalisation, the simpler and more convenient method has gradually gained the ascendency. Alike in its system of notation, and in its recension of the text, the Tiberian school of Masoretes has prevailed. 2. Its Musico-logigal Character A twofold purpose seems to have been served by the Hebrew accents. As signs of interpuncfcion they correspond in some measure with our stops, indicating as these do the grammatical and syn- tactical divisions of the verse. Yet since the verse had also to be read, no less than written, or chanted according to a particular mode of cantil- lation in use at the time, the accents came to ex- press the solemn recitation of the Synagogue, or the modulation of the living voice in the public reading of the Scripture. They combined logic and music. Obviously it is only the first element in the system that is of real consequence to us. The Jews themselves admit that its musical value has in large measure been lost. So that if we come to the subject desiring simply what is useful 36 Sermons in Aceents or practical in the scheme, the element of music will not bulk largely in our ultimate appreciation of the facts. It is not as an index to musical in- flexion, but solely as a guide to the meaning of the text, that the study of the accents is of positive service to the student of Biblical Hebrew. The practical aspect, however, is not every- thing. Historical, and even genealogical con- siderations may be of equal interest in the prosecution of such an inquiry. And if those writers are correct, who base the whole system in the traditional modulation of the Synagogue, we may have to write " musico-logical," and not vice versa, as the fitting designation of its de- velopment. That such a modulation really existed before the introduction of the graphical signs is evident from the testimony of the Tal- mud. The tradition in Megilla 3" traces it back even to the time of Ezra ; and Wickes believes that the opinion as thus expressed may not be so groundless as it looks. The mode of recita- tion may well have been one of the institutions established soon after Ezra's time for the more formal conduct of public worship. " From the Temple it would pass into the Synagogue. Arid perhaps Christ Himself made use of it, when reading from the prophet Isaiah (Luke iv. 17).'' But however interesting this speculation may The Accentual System 87 be, it is the logical value of the accents that con- stitutes their chief claim on our attention. Their very name is an evidence of this fact. Instead of the term nQ''3^i " melody,'' they are called n^pViP " senses or meanings" (from DJ^tD "to taste or perceive ") : that is, they are regarded as marks of sense, or signs of logical interpunction. In this signification, however, they are not abso- lute like our points. They do not indicate a complete and independent meaning like our period. It may take several Hebrew verses to form a complete logical period ; and on the other hand, several logical periods may be contained in one Hebrew verse. What it does imply is that the text was not only recited in the public wor- ship of the Synagogue, but recited in such a way as to bring out the meaning of the passage, and impress it on the minds of the hearers. The rise and fall of the modulation was to reflect the logical and syntactical relation of the words. Hence not only in the great pauses of the sense, but in the finer shades of distinction that characterise the language, the musical notation was all that was requisite for punctuating the text — the melody and the syntax coalesced. The melody, then, is not to be forgotten in our study of the accentual system. Certain except- 38 Sermons in Accents tional cases are not to be explained in any other way. For example, the greater distinctives are sometimes found with smaller distinctives immed- iately before them (Hos. vi. 10), though both logic and syntax demand a connective instead of a distinctive ; and many words appear with two accents or sometimes as many as three (Job. vi. 10), a phenomenon which can have no reference to logic. These and similar anomalies are to be explained by the musical character of the dec- lamation. It generally adapts itself to the logical and grammatical laws, but if for the sake of emphasis, or in order to preserve the particular form of composition known as Hebrew Parallel- ism, it occasionally deviates from the strict rules of syntax, this, in view of similar licences adopted in other languages, is just what might have been expected. Its purely musical character is some- times the dominating fact. 3. The Value of this Fact in the Practical Work of Translation Hebrew accentuation is therefore something more than our modern system of interpunction. It is not simply the accurate division of the written sense, but the visible representation of the living utterance. It is a sensuous oratory, intended for the eye instead of the ear, and can The Accentual System 39 express shades of meaning that are far beyond the compass of our more prosaic grammatical divisions. And yet it is just these finer shades of thought and feeling that give to the careful student the highest form of mental pleasure, and repay him for all the labour he has expended in the analysis of the text. They fill him with the joy of elevated thought. The bearing of this fact on the practical work of translation cannot be over-estimated. The following illustration, at least in substance, may be found at p. 49 of Professor Davidson's early Outlines : " In the house of Israel I have seen an horrible thing " (Hos. vi. 10). The translation as thus given may be accurate enough as a rendering of the unaccented Hebrew, but it is totally inadequate as a suitable expression of the Masoretic accents. These are nothing if not emphatic, but the solemnity and dignity that ought to be attributed to them are almost entirely awanting in this rendering. The chief accent within the clause is at Israel ; for the speaker is represented as lingering over the sacredness of the name, as if repelled by the thought that she, the chosen nation, could have been guilty of such a deed ! Then with a second fairly strong pause at seen, which we can only represent by a dash or similar device, the devout reader hesitates 40 SerTTioTis in Accents once more, as if afraid to utter the last solemn word — an horrible thing. So that in order to bring out the meaning of the living utterance, we must render in some such manner as the \ following : — \ In the house of Israel ! \ I have seen— an horrible thing. \ The general sense is obvious enough even Lq our English version, but who does not feel that the meaning is greatly enriched by an intelligent appreciation of the Masoretic notation ? It is granted, of course, that what we are now dealing with in the accentual system is simply the meaning of the text as understood by the Masoretes. And since it frequently resolves itself into a mere matter of taste as to what feeling or emphasis ought to be read into each passage, we may not always be able to agree with their judg- ment. Even in this case, however, we are not to do injustice to the value of their general conclu- sions. They belonged to a time when the idiom of the language was still a living speech ; and they were consequently in a better position for ap- praising the truth in this matter than any sub- sequent toilers in the field of Biblical exegesis. They may not have supplied in every case a satisfactory rendering of the logical and syntac- tical divisions, but in repeated instances they l^he Accentual Sy stein 41 have succeeded in fixing the sense in a far more effective way than our modem system of inter- punction. Turn, for instance, to Ps. xxxviii. 12. They also that seek after my life lay snares for me ; And they that seek my hurt speak mischievous things, And imagine deceits all the day long. Professor Duhm suggests another grouping of the clauses in this verse. By supplying "'Sj?' after "iflj^l which may easily have fallen out on account of the similarity, he would place the main logical pause at "hurt," and arrange the whole verse as a distich, consisting of two fairly equal and parallel lines. And they lay snares, who plot for my life and seek after my hurt : And they speak evil (against me) and murmur deceit all the day long. Yet in no wise is this an improvement on the generally accepted division. Not only is it at variance with the LXX, and with the Hebrew accents, but it obliterates the plain threefold division in the advance of the thought. The first two lines form an exact parallelism, dealing with hostility in act and hostiUty in speech — the main distinctive accent being retained to mark the close of both ; and then a third menlber is added, dealing with hostility in motive, either as 42 Sermons in Accents an expansion of the second line in the parellelism, or as the necessary explanation of the whole. It is the former of these alternatives which is suggested by the English punctuation, but the Hebrew accents are in favour of the latter. And there can be no question that the Hebrew point- ing is correct. Beneath the outward hostility of violence and calumny is found the inward plotting of deceit. On the other hand, Mai. iii. 17 is an instance where the Hebrew student may feel justified in exercising his own judgment, Tl^^ ''J^ ICJb^ TtV^D. In keeping with the parallel clause in verse 21 (in Heb.), there should have been a disjunctive accent on Hti^J^ ; and then we could have read as in the R.V. — " they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in the day that I do make, even a peculiar treasure". But the ac- centuator desired to emphasise the personal pronoun — "in the day that / do make" — and introduced the dichotomy at this point, even at the risk of confusing the syntax by placing a conjunctive accent on the verb. It is this con- fusion that is reproduced in the rendering of the A. v., where Plb^D is read as accusative after tltl^S^ — "in that day when I make up my jewels ". It is not the jewels however, that are The Accentual System 43 made up on that day. Even now they are God's purchased possession, and do not require to wait for the day of His appearing before they can be assured of their final destiny. It is the day, and not the jewels, that is the object of the verb ; and the idea seems to be that whether the faith- ful remnant be recognised as God's valued pro- perty here or not, the day approaches, the day which the Lord has appointed for the Messianic fulfilment, when they who fear the Lord and think upon His name shall be acknowledged before angels and men as His " peculiar treasure." nbnDj therefore, is not an accusative after nti^i^, as the Masoretic accents seem to suggest ; but is to be taken as exegetical of the former part of the verse, and translated " und sie sollen mew Sondereigen werden ".' The thought that fills the prophet's mind is the position and prospects of God's faithful remnant. (1) Their present standing in grace. (2) Their future standing in glory. And the two ideas may well stand side by side though they are but two aspects of one and the same divine fact — a covenant relation between 1 Wellhausen, who gives, however, a slightly difierent meaning to nXi^J^ ''3^^ "itZ^b^- 44 SermoTis in Accents Jehovah and His people which not even death shall be allowed to sever. "Unto you that fear my name shall the sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings ; and ye shall go forth and gambol as calves of the stall." Additional Notes and Examples 45 Another illustration of the more effective pointing of the Masoretes may be found at Isa. i. 21. Common editions, like Theile's, have Zaqeph on "judgment": but Baer and Ginsburg appeal to the best oodioes and editions for B'bhia. And rightly so ; for the word is subordinate to Tiphoha's clause, not to Silluq's. It ought to read : — How has become an harlot, The city that was faithful ! Full of judgment, righteousness used to lodge in her ; But now assassins. See further, Sermons in Syntax, chap. iii. 46 Additional Notes and Examples CHAPTER IV THE DIFFERENT KINDS AND USES OP THE ACCENTS The element of music referred to in the foregoing chapter may help us to explain three other facts connected with the accentual system. (1) The differences between the prose and the poetic ac- cents. (2) The circumstance that the accents in general are used to indicate the tone. (3) The no less significant feature that they consist of two separate classes, distinctives and connectives, or domini and servi, as the older grammarians used to style them — the former representing the main changes that dominate the verse, and the latter serving or preparing the way for these necessary fluctuations. Before we come to ex- amine the different graphical signs in detail, let us enumerate the salient points connected with these three facts. 1. The Poetical Accents As is well-known the three poetical books — Psalms, Proverbs, and Job — are distinguished by a 47 48 Sermons in Accents different accentuation from the twenty-one prose books. In some respects this is a simpler notation than the corresponding prose scheme. It has to do with much shorter P'suqim or verses, and therefore does not need to cope with so great a variety of clauses as in the ordinary notation. Yet if it be simpler in interpunction, it is richer in musical effect — having been designed by the Palestinian Rabbis to give a more impressive melody to the chanting of the three books. The Jewish Synagogue, indeed, was not alone in the adoption of such a system. A similar refinement in the cantillation of the Psalms was introduced into the Greek and Latin Churches. So that in view of this development in the liturgical service of the Church, the advent of a poetical accentua- tion to express the richer flow of the music is not to be regarded as anything anomalous. Music, not logic, is the key to the different modulation. Logically or syntactically, there was no necessity for its introduction. Books like the Song of Songs or Lamentations, and passages like the Blessing of Moses or the Song of Deborah are just as rich in poetic imagery as any part of the three books : and yet it was not considered necessary to accent these portions of Scripture according to this musical notation. Further, the same passages which are found in Different Kinds and Uses of Accents 49 one part of Scripture with the poetic accents, are found in other parts with the prose accents — showing that the latter were deemed of suffi- cient value to give the logical and syntactical relation of the words (c/. Psalms xviii., cv. 1-15, with 2 Sam. xxii., 1 Ohron. xvi. 8-22). And if additional proof were needed, it is found in the Babylonian system of accentuation, which had no separate notation for the three books at all. For instance, in Job xxxvi. 11, the greatest pause is at "serve him," and this, according to the poetical accentuation, is Olev'yored ; but in the superlinear pointing, as in the prose books generally, it is Athnach — the principal pausal accent within the verse. These facts seem to suggest that what we have in this system of notation is not a poetic accentuation as such ; but a musical refinement peculiar to the Tiberian school of Masoretes, and specially adapted to the shorter verses of Psalms, Proverbs and Job. Its one idea seems to have been to compensate for the shortness of the verse by a fuller and richer melody in the reading. Hence the con- clusion of Dr. Wickes may be accepted as probably correct, that the refinement in question was neither logical nor syntactical, but something of " a purely musical character ". 4 50 Sermons in Accents 2. The Marking op the Tone Bj tone or accent is meant the stress of the voice which falls generally on the last syllable of the word, as ^^N (Gen. i. 5). In certain cases it may fall on the penult, as in the s'golate nouns ^■^Nn, lyttJnn (verses 1, 4), and in certain verbal forms as "^QSi"! (ver. 3). Indeed, in most in- stances, a knowledge of the Hebrew grammar is all that is necessary for indicating the position of the tone syllable. For example, we write niDj3 as 2nd mase. perf., the light termination {to) not being sufficient to bear the weight of the accent ; but when we come to the use of vav consecutive with the perfect, and learn that it usually throws forward the accent on the ultima, we have to point the word as in Gen. vi. 14, i^"lD3l. A similar change, though in quite a diiferent direc- tion, is frequently met with in connection with vav consecutive with the imperfect. If circum- stances permit it, there is a retrocession of the tone to the penult, so that instead of the usual form of the imperfect fij'^a"; (Ex. xi. 1), we have the jussive form tr")a']T with the accent Darga on the open syllable (Deut. xxxiii. 27), cf. 1T3i^''1 Different Kinds and Uses of Accents 51 already referred to. Forms like S"^p')'1 t^^"!!*!! (Gen. i. 8, 21) with accent on the final syllable need occasion no surprise ; for the receding of the tone can only take place when the ultima is ori- ginally short, and when the penult which is to receive the tone is an open syllable. Failing these conditions, there is no appreciable change in the jussive form. These and similar details in the marking of the tone may be easily ascertained from a fairly accurate knowledge of grammar and syntax. But there are other peculiarities connected with the tone-syllable that are not ascertainable in this way. We must have recourse to the laws of Hebrew accentuation. One of these laws is a strong dislike to two accented syllables coming together, unless the former is suflSciently marked by a distinctive accent. Apart from this safe- guard the two accents are apt to clash or coalesce, and the full value of their respective melodies to be impaired or lost. Take, e.g., the phrase DJI? i^'^D^iT in Deut. xiv. 26. Here we have an instance of vav consecutive with the per- fect, and therefore like the examples already given the accent ought to be thrown forward on the ultima (cf. nnntol in the same verse). But since this would bring two accents into juxta- 52 Sermons in Accents position, and disturb the delicate harmony of the accentual system, it was allowed to remain on the penult, so as to provide a sufficient hiatus between the two. The same result was reached in another way. Instead of driving back the tone to the penul- tima, the accent of the former word was re- moved altogether by joining the two words by means of maqqeph, cf. ID^yri^^H") (Zech. ix. 10), and rTT'^nnS'jprn. (Ezek. xiv. 13). An- other illustration of the same usage is found in phrases like ]t^ij ny'"1 (Gen. iv. 2) that illustrates the former expedient, and "IDJ"'^!?!? (vi. 14), which exemplifies the latter. In both instances the collision of two accented syllables was successfully averted, and a peculiarity of Hebrew prosody explained by the laws of ac- centuation. It is but a slight modification of the same rule, when we meet with vav consecutive with the perfect in its pausal form. The tone is not thrown forward on the ultima, as in the examples quoted. On the contrary, the word being in pause, the voice seeks a more suitable resting-place on the syllable immediately before the tone, and having lengthened the vowel of Different Kirtds and Uses of Accents 53 this syllable by the weight of its own emphasis, it ■ allows the tone to revert to the penult, as rijntol (Deut. viii. 10), and '^ri^Sril (Judg. iv. 8). This usage is fairly uniform with the greater distinctives, Silluq andAthnach ; but it is also found with Zaqeph, Tiphcha, R'bhia, and Pashta: cf. ^it^^j^ and 13^y(Hos. vii. 11, 12). It is even found with D'chi, a comparatively weak accent in the poetical accentuation, as p'l^b^ (Job. ix. 20). In this case, the vowel of the accented syllable is not always lengthened as with the greater distinctives. The weaker accents may have the power of retaining the tone on the penult ; but they do not, at the same time, invariably lengthen the vowel on which the tone rests, cf. ''phbi^^ (Deut. ii. 28), and "'^t^i^^l. (Isa. Ixvi. 9). In fact, the Masoretic instinct which endowed the greater accents with such influence and weight, was not so confident and decided with respect to the minor dis- tinctives. One punctuator boldly retains the tone, and lengthens the vowel, even with so weak an accent as the poetical D'chi : but another hesitates, and does not lengthen the vowel with so strong a pausal accent as Zaqeph. Obviously it is not logic alone that explains so 54 Sermons in Accents ■ great a variety in the Masoretic notation. It is the subtle influence of an underlying melody. It is logic and melody combined. 3. DiSTINCTIVES AND CONNECTIVES Every Hebrew word, without exception, is supplied with an accent of _ some sort, and some- times with more than one — a fact which shows how much more elaborate the Hebrew notation is than our modern system of inter punction. It is a magnificent effort to reproduce the rhyth- mical or syntactical relation of each separate word. And as each word is separated from, or connected with, the word which immediately follows, it is marked in every instance by a dis- junctive or a conjunctive accent. The larger dis- tinctives indicate the great pauses in the verse, leaving the finer shades of meaning to be marked by the minor accents; while the different con- nectives come in between to prepare the way for these changes, or help the distinctives, major or minor, to fill out and regulate the sense. In short, if the disjunctive accents are the masters (domini) who rule or dominate the verse, the conjunctives are their loyal servants (servi) who assist them in their multifarious labours. In Hab. i. 3 we have the somewhat anomalous form, a double Mer'kha (y), which is neither dis- Different Kinds and Uses of Accents 55 junctive nor conjunctive, or perhaps is a com- bination of both. It • 1 Cf //. %. •- The E.V. renders, " and there is strife, and contention riseth up " — two distinct beats in the music, and two separate steps in the thought. This however, would require the accent T'bhir on the second word, as 1">1 (Theile), and not simply the double Mer'kha, as in Ginsburg, Baer and Wickes. The thought of the Masorete was deeper. He felt instinctively that the existence of strife and the rising up of contention were not two different steps in Israel's sin ; but one and the same picture of violence, which ought to be joined together, as "spoiling and violence'' in the previous clause. But why then not use the simple Mer'kha as conjunctive to Tiphcha, and place a minor distinctive on Tl^T ? For the ob- vious reason that while " strife and contention " make a common subject to " riseth up," they are also logically connected with the preceding verb, and ought to be accented as such. The term 1^"1, in other words, looks both before and after ; and while the disjunctive T'bhir is too strong to mark it, Mer'kha the conjunctive is too weak. The accentijator, therefore, introduced the hybrid 56 Sermons in Accents accent, a double Mer'kha to accomplish the end in view : and this, as most authorities agree, is simply a weakened T'bhir, or T'bhir and Mer'kha combined. Hence we may render approximately, " spoiling and violence are before me : and there is strife and contention that riseth up." Doubt- less the combination of a singular verb with a double or plural subject is a considerable licence : but the unity of thought between the two sub- stantives is a sufficient justification, just as we read in Jer. vi. 7 : " Violence and spoil is heard in her ' ; or in Paradise Lost : — For the mind and spirit remains Invincible. (Bk. I., 139.) With respect to the diiferent values of distinc- tives and connectives, the preacher will find an instructive illustration at Hab. ii. 4 : — This is the usual pointing, as in Theile and Baer, who place a disjunctive accent on faith and a conjunctive on just. And if the accentuator meant to emphasise " faith " as being in any sense the principle of life, he had no better means of accomplishing his object than by putting Tiphcha on nilDt"^. But was this the accentuator's mean- T ing? Or better still, was this the meaning of Different Kinds and Uses of Accents 57 Habakkuk? We scarcely think that it was. There is no word for " faith " as an active prin- ciple of life in the whole Hebrew language; though the term "believe" is derived from the same root as the present word.^ The expression njlQt^ is not fmth but faithfulness — a term equivalent to trustworthiness of character or honesty in conduct ; and therefore differing little from the cognate words integrity and righteous- ness. Cf. the marginal reading of the R.V. " th&gust shall live in his faithfulness ". Hence a different accentuation is proposed by Wickes and Ginsburg— n^n^, 'irii*):o«3. p'^'lTi.- Iii sup- port of this notation we have the rule that when the subject precedes, it is marked by a disjunctive accent : and Wickes maintains that he found the word so accented in the great majority of codices which he collated. The idea expressed by the prophet is not the contrast between unbelief and faith, but that between the fate of the wicked and the destiny of the just. Amid the storm- clouds that were gathering around the nation, the wicked would perish in the flames of his own kindling; but the just, the faithful remnant, would not die: they would live in and through the righteousness they had cultivated as their ' A. B. Davidson, in loco. 58 Sermons in Accents own; and this is the meaning of the emended accents :— But ihejust — in his faithfulness shall live. This then is the twofold answer given to the prophet's prayer. It has laid down a principle so vital that Habakkuk is told to write it upon a tablet, and hang it up before the people. (1) The fate of the wicked (first line). Arrogancy and unrighteousness are the nature of his sin, and no other doom is needed; these are the flames in which he and his ill-gotten gains shall ultimately perish. (2) The lot of the righteous (second line). After the dark storm-cloud has spent its fury and rolled away to the horizon, the faithful nu- cleus of God's Israel shall be left in possession of a fuller and richer life: and no other reward is needed ; " the just shall live in his faithfulness ". Additional Notes and Examples 59 On the anaooluthon of a singular verb with a plural sub- ject (p. 56) cf. J. H. Moulton's remarks on the "Pindaric" construction in his Grammar of New Testament Greek, Pro- legomena, p. 58. 60 Additional Notes, and Examples CHAPTER V THE MAIN DISTINCTIVES The first step in the accentuation of a piece of composition was the arranging of the text into a number of small divisions called P'suqim or ver- ses (p^DS " cut off"). They are not to be con- founded with our logical periods, though it may happen that the Hebrew verses and our English sentences are frequently coterminous. The ar- rangement is musical rather than logical, and numerous instances occur where the two systems are openly at variance. A passage like Gen. iii. 17-19 contains three distinct P'suqim, but only one logical period; whereas in ch. iv. 7, we have two logical periods in one Hebre,w verse. Logic- ally a connection may exist between two or more Hebrew verses, but musically and therefore ac- .centually no such connection exists. Each Pasuq or verse is to be taken and accented independently. 1. SiLLUQ (p'^hp) This is the greatest of all the distinctives and is placed under the last word in the verse. The 61 62 Sermons in Accents name signifies " cessation " or " close," and is well chosen to express the ever-recurring pause in the melody. Its position below the line may be taken as a kind of manual sign indicating the close of the cantillation. The hand of the teacher would rise and fall with the different accents, like the conductor's baton in a modern orchestra directing the rise and flow of the music. Compare the upraised finger for Zaqeph (-), the meandering direction of Sinnor (-), the backward inclination of D'chi (r) and the final pause, if not the sinking of the hand, in Silluq (T). The manual signs were thus reproduced, more or less, in the written ac- centuation. It was photographed phonography. The present accent is always accompanied by Soph Pasuq (•) " verse-end," but is not to be identified with it. The position of these two dots at the close of the verse shows that they have little or nothing to do with our present system of accentuation. They are a relic of an earlier and simpler notation in which a single point marked the division at Athnach, and two the close of the verse at Silluq. Thus : — This is the reason why a simple stroke was deemed sufficient for the final accent. The end of the The Main Bistinctives 63 verse was marked already by Soph Pasuq. Other- wise the greatest of all the distinetives would certainly have had a more prominent sign. With regard to the servant of Silluq, there is considerable diversity between the prosaic and the poetic books. In the prose accentuation it is always Mer'kha (N^I'^Q), as, Q^ari ]^B'h:^ (Gen. i. 2). The name is derived from the root ~yii4 in Hiphil, " to make long "; and therefore de- notes an accent that prolongs the modulation. But in the poetic accentuation Mer'kha is often replaced by Munach, especially when the tone is on the first syllable ; or when, through the law of transformation', Silluq is preceded by two or even by three servi (cf. Ps. i. 1, 6). Of course, if Sil- luq's clause be too short to admit a connective accent on the preceding word, or if the laws of accentuation demand a distinctive as a foretone to Silluq, the prose system introduces Tiphcha as the musical foretone, and the poetic notation the corresponding accent R'bhia mugrash, as: — : a^r:h a^^ r^i (Gen. i. 6). •It t 'It tJ" ^ ' : Tiin ■'SDn (Ps. xi. i5). There is but one connection in which this fore- tone fails. If a strong logical pause falls on the first word before Silluq, it may be marked by a 64 Sermons in Accents greater distinctive than Tiphcha ; and then there is no room for any additional accent, between them (Gen. i. 3). The five passages in which the Palestinian authorities have introduced Tiphcha on the same word with Silluq are quite excep- tional (c/. Hos. xi. 6). It is probably nothing more than a substitute for Metheg. 2. athnach (nirisi) The name is derived from a secondary form of TV\^, and means " that which causes to rest or pause". In the superlinear punctuation (Cod. Bab.) the form is -; but Wickes is of opinion that originally it was n, a compound sign made up of Silluq and Tiphcha. This would repre- sent Athnach as an intermediate accent, neither so strong as the former, nor so weak as the latter. Its position in the verse is anything but uni- form. In some instances it divides the verse into two fairly equal portions (Gen. i. 8); but at other times the division is so unequal that Athnach may appear on the first word of the verse (xxxiv. 31), or on the first word before Silluq (i. 3). What is the explanation of this variety ? The answer is found in various direc- tions ; but we may begin with what is known as Hebrew parallelism. Parallelismus mem- The Main Distinctives 65 brorum is the great formative principle of Hebrew composition, and is found in its simplest form in the couplet or distich of the poetical books. A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast : But the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel. Here the two lines balance one another in thought and in expression, and sometimes no other guide is needed for a satisfactory render- ing of the verse. Cf. Job iv. 6. According to A. B. Davidson's early volume on Job, it would puzzle Oedipus to drag any meaning from the rendering of the A.V. But when we note the principle of parallelism, and the position of Athnach as marking it, all is plain : — • Is not thy fear (of God) thy confidence, And thy hope the uprightness of thy ways ? The position of vav in the second line is no doubt peculiar, but not uncommon. Hope is placed first for the sake of emphasis, and then what is said of it is introduced by vav apodoseos (cf. xix. 23, xxiii. 12, etc.). The parallelism of members, however, is not always so simple as this. Indeed such verses would soon become wearisome by their mono- tony. The poets, therefore, and much more the prose writers, allow themselves the utmost 66 Sermons in Accents liberty in varying the form of the paralleHsm. Take, e.g., the triplet or tristich in Hebrew poetry : — As the cold of snow in the time of harvest, So is a faithful messenger to them that sent him ; For he refresheth the soul of his master. It is not possible to divide this verse into two equal sections. The parallelism is contained in the first two lines, and had these stood alone, the dichotomy would have come between them ; but a third line having been added to explain or qualify the second member, the CBssura was delayed until the main statement of the verse had been set before the hearer. In this way the position of Athnach is determined by the close of the parallelism. In other instances, the arrange- ment is quite different. The dichotomy is al- lowed to stand in the middle of the parallelism, and the additional statement prefixed or appended as a subordinate clause : — I will be as the dew unto Israel : He shall blossom as the lily, | And cast forth his roots as Lebanon. (Hos. xiv. 5.) But sometimes parallelismus memhrorum fails altogether as a guide to the division of the verse : and we must have recourse to some other principle of classification. As a rule, the position The Main Distinctives 67 of the dichotomy will be fixed by the main logical pause (cf. Gen. i. 7, Isa. i. 3, etc.). However, in a system of public recitation other considerations are allowed to exercise considerable influence, and sometimes for the sake of emphasis or musical equilibrium the logical divisions are ignored (Job X. 8). Thine hands have framed me and fashioned me | Together round about : yet thou dost destroy me. The balance of the verse is much better pre- served by this arrangement than by placing Athnach on the main pause. Similarly in Ps. ii. 6, parallelism and logic are of no real assistance in fixing the accentuation ; but we can gather the words into two groups according to their connection in sense and construction, and the dichotomy will come between them : — Yet have I set my King | On Zion, my holy hill. Examples of emphasis are found with sufficient frequency. Had these been awanting, indeed, we might well have questioned the taste of the ac- centuators. But as pointed out in Chap. I. the principle is already recognised in Gen. i. 1 : — In the beginning God created | The heaven, and the earth. Of. also Isa. xxviii. 16 : " Therefore thus saith the 68 Sermons in Accents Lord God, Behold I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, \ a tried stone, a precious corner stone of sure foundation : he that believeth shall not make haste " . The main logical pause is at sure founda- tion; for here the description of the stone laid in Zion ends, and the picture of unruffled con- fidence begins: and but for the principle of em- phatic pointing, the leading accent would have been placed there to mark the dichotomy. But centuries before the accentuators began their work the ordinary Jewish interpretation of the stone had found suitable expression in 1 Peter , ii. 6. It was none other than the long-promised Messiah. And as this was the thought that filled the mind of the Masorete, he transferred Athnach from the chief logical pause, and placed it on the term stone for the sake of emphasis. As remarked above, however, we are not shut up, in every case, to adopt the Masoretic accen- tuation. Each passage must be investigate on its own merits. Take, e.g., the pointing of Hab. i. 11 :— I I A.. * - I _• -I- _ .1 J- T Jt ». J A" t: \.-:~i- - ■) J- T JT The punctuator has placed the main dichotomy at □'tt^N, and with the present Masoretic text, it The Main Distinctives 69 is hard to see what else he could have done. The sense of the words, though not the rhythm of the verse, points to this verb as the only suitable position for the main logical pause. So that we may render, " Then he sweeps onwards as a blast, and passes through and becomes guilty : even he whose might is his God ". Yet any one can feel that in this arrangement the balance of the sen- tence has been sacrificed to the exigencies of the logic ; and if we add to this the anomalous position and form of 'It' which is taken as the demonstra- tive HT in the A.V., but as the relative "^ttJN in the RV., we are probably justified in concluding that the Masoretic text itself is not above suspicion. Adopting a remark of Graetz, who would compare this passage with Isa. xl. 31, Wellhausen has sug- gested the following emendation : — This certainly has the merit of restoring the rhythm to the verse, and furnishing a natural and intelligible meaning ; though even he admits that the diiHculties of the text are not yet satis- factorily surmounted, and that the appearance of It especially is not easily explained. But assum- ing some such emendation as the original form of the text, we might arrange it as follows : — to Sefmdns in Accents Then he gains new power and wing, And makes this his might to be his god. The servant of Athnach is always Munach (nj^n). It is also called "Shophar of rest" — the name referring to the shophar-class (:: - t), so named because of their fancied resemblance to the "IQitiJ, " trumpet," used by the Jews on certain festival days. Like Mer'kha before Silluq, Mun- ach may be replaced by Tiphcha on the first word before Athnach, if the requirements of the decla- mation demand a distinctive instead of a con- nective accent. And as in Silluq's case, so also in Athnach's, the Palestinian authorities have specified certain instances in which Tiphcha may appear on Athnach's word (c/. Jer. ii. 31). But here again the accentuation is quite anomalous; unless in these cases we can regard Tiphcha as a servant, or set it on one side as a substitute for Metheg. 3. S'GOLTA (^n^'iap) It is so named because of its resemblance to the vowel sign S'gol. Still the three points, as an accentual symbol, have a meaning of their own. They are to be viewed in relation to the The Main Distmctives 11 two points for Zaqeph and the single point for R'bhisi,. Musically and relatively, S'golta is a greater pausal accent than Zaqeph, as Zaqeph, in turn, is greater than R'bhia ; but as the connec- tion between them is musical rather than logical, they are only found in this relative gradation, when the length of the verse or the require- ments of the melody permit it (Gen. i. 7). As remarked in Chap. IV. the accents in general indicate the tone-syllable of the word; but in S'golta we have our first illustration of the so- called postpositives. Like Pashta, in the same verse, it is placed on the last consonant of the word, because, as suggested by the Grammarians, its three points in any other position would have been in danger of colliding with others that appear above the word, as lytbSn']. With the accent on the penult the postpositives are gener- ally repeated (at least in the Baer and Delitzsch texts), once on the final consonant as indicating the regular place of the accent, and once on the penult to mark the tone syllable (cf. V'^pyi and □""an in the passage quoted). There is but one slight exception to this rule. In a case like "IDi^^'l in Gen. xxviii. 13, the repetition of S'golta would again mix up the points with the 72 Sermons in Accents sign of Holem ; and therefore for the sake of clearness it is omitted. With respect to its pausal value there can be no question that S'golta is a subordinate accent in Athnach's clause. Gf. the passage already referred to. " And God made the firmament, (-) and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmanent : (^) and it was so." The relative value of these two pauses is suitably expressed in this verse by our comma and colon; and this is the relation, musical and logical, that exists between S'golta and Athnach. Like Zaqeph and R'bhia to be mentioned later, it is essentially subordinate to Athnach. The preacher will find a good example of these main divisions at Hab. iii. 2 : — O Lord, I have heard the report of thee, and am afraid : (— ) O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, In the midst of the years make it known ; (7-) In wrath remember mercy. In fixing the position of Athnach in this verse, the first line does not count. The prayer itself is contained in the last three lines, and as the second of the three is merely an expansion of the first, the main dichotomy comes at the close of both to separate the appeal for renewal from the The Main DiatiTictiveS 'tS additional cry for mercy. Hence Athnach is placed at "known," the greatest logical pause within the verse. Then the first line of the verse is prefixed to the prayer proper by means of S'golta ; and as this, in turn, has to be subdivided into two minor clauses, these are marked by R'bhia and Zarqa according to the regimen of S'golta's clause. The idea expressed by the prophet is the need of a divine manifestation — a solemn fiapav add. He has been brooding over the signal tokens of Jehovah's presence in the past history of his people — from the day they crossed the Red Sea to the time they entered, as an armed host, the land promised to their fathers. And the retro- spect fills him with awe. " Lord, I have heard the report of thee, and am afraid." Yet dreadful though these past revelations were, the man of God feels that a similar Weltkrisis is needed in the near future, if ever a new Israel, worthy of that past history, is to surmount and outlive the dark days of Jehoiakim. " Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years." In our own age, stir up Thy ancient might ; and even though it be a dies irae, let the nations know they are but men. Yea, in the midst of the years make Thyself known. [The LXX reads the reflective form of the verb, yvcoa0ri^ - etc. With two words in R'bhia's clause (and no more) the first is usually marked by Munach, but in a few cases the distinctive Gershayim is employed, especially if the words be long (c/. Ezek. xiii. 21). When the clause consists of three words (and no more) the usage varies. A minor pause may come on the first or second word before R'bhia, and is marked in either case by Geresh (Gen. i. 28, The Least Distinctives 113 Ex. xxxvi. 9). Yet since it was not always considered necessary to emphasise the dichotomy in so short a clause, the lighter melody of a ser- vos is frequently found in the first instance, and a servus with Paseq in the second (Gen. iv. 15, Ex. XX vi. 2). If there be more than three words in R'bhia's clause, the variety in the usage is in- creased. The main pause may now fall on the third, fourth or fifth word before R'bhia, or even beyond that limit, and the various parts of the extended sentence are arranged and accented accordingly. With the dichotomy on the third word before R'bhia the melody divides the honour between Geresh and Great T'lisha. With this difference, however, that if the former be em- ployed to mark the main dichotomy, it must be content with a Paseq to indicate a minor pause on the first or second word ; whereas if the main pause is denoted by Great T'lisha, the lighter division may enjoy the advantage of being more adequately represented by Geresh (c/. Gen. i. 29, Isa. vii. 4). A somewhat similar variation occurs with the main pause on the fourth word before R'bhia. It may be expressed by any one of the three accents Geresh, Great T'lisha or Pazer. Yet with this difference again that if Geresh be used to mark it, there is no other suitable distinctive 8 114' Sermons in Accents between Geresh and R'bhia than a light Paseq: whereas Great T'lisha or Pazer would have the additional advantage of being followed by Geresh itself (c/. Jon. i. 3, 2 Sam. xv. 6, Gen. xxvii. 36). Finally, when we come to the fifth word before R'bhia, or further, the usage becomes fairly uni- form. There are a few cases where Geresh appears on the fifth word, and Grfeat T'lisha is placed even on the sixth, but the regular divid- ing accent is now Pazer ^^an accent which may be repeated more than once according to the re- quirements of the dichotomy (2 Sam. iii. 21). That the same rules are applicable to the clauses governed by Pashta, T'bhir and Zarqa may be illustrated by Jer. xvii. 20, Isa. Ixvi. 19, Jer. xlix. 19, and Bible passim. In one par- ticular only is there a slight variation. When a minor pause is due on the first word before R'bhia, it is marked by Geresh as in the examples quoted; but this is not the case with the three lighter accents Pashta, T'bhir and Zarqa. As a rule, transformation takes place. Geresh is changed into the appropriate servus before these three accents ; and the rhythmical cadence at the close of the clause is purposely omitted (c/. Gen. xliii. 3, 2 Kings xxv. 21, Deut. xxx. 19). Still in all such cases of transformation the servi of Geresh remain, as if the accent in disappearing The Least Distinctives 115 from the .written page had left its influence behind it. Thus : — //nri"in"'T hii iySn nnb^ Tyi 3. Three Special Texts for the Preacher A good example of Pazer as a minor dichotomy in Geresh's clause is found at Mai. i. 6 : "A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master : if I then be a father, where is my honour ? and if I be a master, where is my fear ? " The main logical pause is placed at master ; for here the picture of filial reverence ends, and the solemn arraignment of Israel for irreverence begins. The weight of the logic, if not the balance of the melody, points to this as the only right position for Athnach. Then in Silluq's clause the prin- ciple of the dichotomy is continued. "If I be a father, where is my honour ? (Pazer) and if I, be a master, where is my fear ? (Geresh) saith the Lord of hosts (R'bhia) unto you, priests, that despise my name. (Zaqeph). And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name." Beginning at the close of the verse and working backwards, the first important pause is at " my name " ; for at this point the earnest appeal of Jehovah passes into the unbelieving rejoinder of the priests. This, therefore, is marked by 116 Sermons in Accents Zaqeph. Then as the next considerable division is on the fourth word before Zaqeph, it is rightly represented by R'bhia, in accordance with the rules of Zaqeph's clause. This leaves two other distinct beats between R'bhia and the beginning of the section, and these are marked by Geresh and Pazer according to the regimen of these accents. Finally, within these main divisions, and as helping to give tone and colour to the general outline, there are various minor details full of interest to the expositor (c/. the emphatic contrast between the saying of Jehovah and the saying of the priests, as reflected in the Paseq associated with "^QN and the Zaqeph Gadhol with Dn"1Qt^ ; and especially the unenviable notoriety given to the priests by the emphatic repetition of Pashta, aipriirT IDSb). The re- buke falls chiefly upon the priesthood, because instead of being penetrated with the holiest rever- ence for God, these ministers of the altar were mainly responsible for the disregard of Jehovah which had led to the decline of public worship. The whole verse is thus an earnest appeal for reverence in religion, and these are its natural divisions. (a) The beauty of reverence, as seen in the illustrations of son and servant. The Least Distinctives 117 (/3) The lack of this in Israel, who was both Jehovah's son and servant (Hos. xi. 1, Isa. xli. 8). (7) The cause of this declension traced to the priests, who were ready to ask in the insensi- bility of unbelief, "Wherein have we despised thy name ? " The pulpit and the pew stand or fall together. " Like people, like priest " has, as its counterpart, " Like priest, like people ". Zeph. iii. 17 is an illustration of K'bhia's clause, where it consists of these words and nothing more. In other respects the passage is interesting both in accents and grammar. In the A.V. it is ren- dered thus : " The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy, etc." This is in no sense an adequate rendering of the Hebrew accents. The main pause is not at "mighty," but at "save;" and therefore we must read as in the R.V. " The Lord thy God is in the midst of thee, a mighty one who will save, etc." It is doubtful, however, if even this translation gives the exact thought of the prophet. The term " save " is a frequentative imperfect, which is often used to form adjectival clauses descriptive of the subject of the preceding sentence, as in Hos. iv. 14, where we read of a people that doth not understand, i.e., an undis- cerning people; or in Isa. li. 12, where "man that shall die " = mortal man. So here : the 118 Sermons in Accents idea is not that at some future time the Holy One of Israel will deliver them from all their fears ; but that in all circumstances they possess an ever-present salvation, a mighty one who is strong enough to fortify against all evil — ein sieghafter Held (Wellhausen). Then in the second half of the verse we have three clauses governed by Silluq, Zaqeph and R'bhia, which, like three soundings of the un- fathomed love of God, tell us something of the depth and fulness of this covenant relationship. " He will rejoice over thee with joy, he will be silent in his love, he will joy over thee with singing." Israel was something more than Jehovah's son or servant (Mai. i. 6) : she was Jehovah's spouse — especially in Hosea ; and therefore like the lover who allows himself to be absorbed with quiet joy in the object of his affection, God's love for Israel is represented as too deep for speech — it is hushed into a silent ecstasy. He will rejoice over thee. Will not the converse be equally true that Israel will rejoice over Him ? His love is infinite, both in its height and depth. (a) Its height ; for He has drawn Israel to His side, that He may shelter and succour her by His " mighty " arm. {^) Its depth ; or the deep, silent fervour of that divine affection which seeks only to have The Least Distinctives 119 Israel near, that she may feel the throbbing of its heart. Will not the answer of Israel be ? — Thou hidden Love of God, whose height, Whose depth unfathomed, no man knows, I see from far Thy beauteous light, Inly I sigh for Thy repose : My heart is pained, nor can it be At rest till it finds rest in thee. Finally, in connection with the two T'lishas, we have a choice of readings in 1 Sam. ii. 24. Common editions, like Theile's, have the conjunc- tive accent (^j), whereas Baer and Ginsburg prefer the disjunctive (^3). There can be no question that the latter is correct. It emphasises the reasons, advanced by Eli, for his somewhat tardy expostulation with his sons. In order to give effect to an otherwise feeble remonstrance, a distinctive rather than a connective accent is required. "Nay, my sons; for it is no good report that I hear : ye make the Lord's people to transgress." The LXX translation, /jltj Sov- Xeveiv, points to the verb -|;^j; ("to serve") instead of "12J^ ("to transgress") : yet the Masoretic Text is much more expressive. Not to serve God in a sacred office is ominous enough ; but to pervert men, or cause the people of Jehovah to backslide, is not less so. It is a crime like that of Lucifer : — 120 Sermons in Accents Still, what's your hurt to mine, of doing hurt, Of hating, tempting, and so ruining ? This sword's hilt is the sharpest, and cuts through The hand that wields it.i Hence the evil wrought by Hophni and Phinehas was at least three things in one : — 1. A public scandal : Eli heard of their evil dealings from all the people (ver. 23). 2. A cause of stumbling to Israel : they made the Lord's people to transgress (ver. 24). 3. A sin against God : if a man sin against the Lord, who shall intreat for him ? (ver. 25). Dilatory, as he was, in reproof, the indulgent father had still a true insight into the character of moral evil. Beginning in the outer court of public morality, he tracks it into the holiest of all, that there, in the felt presence of the Eternal, the sinner may be constrained to cry, like a later psalmist — Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, And done that which is evil in thy sight. Ps. li. 4. In this case, however, expostulation was in vain. The sons refused to follow. ^ E. B. Browning. Additional Notes and Examples 121 122 Additional Notes and Examples CHAPTER IX Paseq The term " Paseq " is not found in any part of Scripture, but is derived from a post-biblical root signifying "to cut off" or "separate" It consists of a small perpendicular line placed between two words, as, llb^S ' D'^Hb^^ (Gen. i. 5) : and is of very frequent occurrence in the He- brew text, appearing no fewer than 95 times in Genesis alone. But it is not necessary to enter into all the distinctions that the gram- marian or accentuator has introduced in connec- tion with the sign. To say that the same collocation of symbols (i j) may be called L'gar- meh or Munach-Paseq, according as it appears before the accent R'bhia or not, may be of some interest to the Hebrew specialist, but it is of no practical value to the expositor of God's word. As foretone to R'bhia it may well have expressed a stronger melody than it does before any other accent ; but since this musical distinction (what- ever it was) can no longer be discovered by us, 123 124 Sermons in Accents the difference between the two names may safely be disregarded. The same remark applies to the distinction between great and small ShalsMleth (especially in the poetical books). It is called the former when it is accomrpanied by Paseq, as, ' "'"I'inai (Ps. vii. 6), I ins*'! (Amos. i. 2) ; but as we never speak of great Mer'kha, great Azla, etc., when these accents happen to be followed by the same sign, there is nothing to be gained by introducing a different nomenclature in the case of Shalsheleth. For practical purposes these superfine distinctions may be left on one side, and our attention directed simply to the position and usages of Paseq. 1. Its Position As already stated, it is inserted between two words in line with the Hebrew consonants, and not placed above or below the line like the other graphical signs. This raises the question whether it is to be regarded as an integral part of Hebrew accentuation. The generally accepted view is in- clined to answer this question in the affirmative. Paseq may not be classed along with the other accents, as if equal to them in every particular, but its influence is so inwoven with the texture of Hebrew composition, that it is useless to try Paseq 125 and unravel its ever-varying applications apart from the principles that regulate the present accentual system. It was remarked, for in- stance, at the beginning of Chap. VIII., that after the last of the distinctives had been placed in position, no fewer than five servi might be re- quired to complete the accentuation. But what if among these conjunctive accents there should occur one or more logical pauses ? Was there no available means of indicating their presence save through the invention of additional graphical signs ? There was. The punctuator could always introduce a sufficient pause in the reading by means of the simple sign Paseq. Cf. 2 Kings xviii. 14. Here we have a case of six servi being required at the commencement of the verse : and it is not difficult for any one who is not colour- blind or music-deaf to feel that at all the three places where Paseq is used, there is a measure of emphasis so pronounced that it de- mands something more than a conjunctive accent to mark it. Even our English version, with its far less flexible system of notation has had to punctuate it at two different places, in order to do justice to the reading. " Hezekiah King of Judah sent to the King of Assyria to Lachish, saying, I have sinned ; etc." Whether the ac- centuator invented the sign for this purpose, or 126 Sermons in Accents found it ready to his hand in the Hebrew text, is a minor consideration. What is important is, that it was now being used for the sake of giving effect to the reading : and this, from the stand- point of biblical exposition, is the one thing that gives meaning and value to the sign. Dr. Kennedy in his elaborate study, The Note-Line in Hebrew, has tried to turn the edge of this by propounding the thesis that Paseq has little or nothing to do with the principles of Hebrew accentuation. It was no more than a simple and primitive expedient for calling atten- tion to what the Sopherim or scribes considered a noteworthy reading. Just as we are ac- customed to insert sic at a point in a quotation which we do not care to alter, but which we strongly suspect of containing some error ; so did these early transcribers employ Paseq to mark the readings which they did not venture to cor- rect, though they entertained a strong suspicion of their incorrectness. The sign, therefore, con- sidered in itself, possessed no distinctively separ- ative force, but was simply a nota bene addressed to the eye of the reader reminding him that there was something anomalous or peculiar in the form or construction of the words. But this means that when we come to a passage like Deut. vii. 6, Paseq 127 and read " Thee hath the Lord chosen ( > "ini) to be to him a special people ; " and find the note-line inserted at the word " chosen," we are completely at a loss to account for it. For there is nothing anomalous or peculiar about the word in this text; and therefore the appearance of Paseq as an index to some irregularity is alto- gether inexplicable. Yet surely any one who has an ear for the music of spoken words, or spiritual instinct to feel the depth of meaning in this truly theocratic phrase, will not demur to any mark of emphasis by which the Masorete has thought fit to signalise the reading; but will rejoice that in the exposition of the divine message he has so valuable a guide to the understanding of the verse. The diflference between the two ways of re- garding Paseq is not so serious as it looks. The contention that it was introduced by the Sopherim in pre-Christian times, and that its origin and purpose were lost in the mists of the past, when the Masoretes came to invent the dual system of punctuation, may or may not be the true ex- planation of the fact ; but irrespective of this altogether, its present position in the Masoretic scheme must be investigated and valued inde- pendently. For what was the state of affairs when we come to the close of the seventh century 128 Sermons in Accents A.T>. 1 According to Dr. Kennedy the accentua- tors only made confusion worse confounded by accepting the note-line as they found it in the Hebrew text and working it into their own plan. They took account of the line "wherever it occurred, as if it were a factor to be considered in applying their system of signs" (p. 11). Here then is the precise diiference between the two modes of estimating Paseq. The one believes that it existed for centuries before the age of the accentuators, and that its original purpose and function having been forgotten or misunderstood, it was taken up and worked into the accentual system. The other, represented by Dr. Wickes, is equally convinced that the origin of the graphical sign came at the close of the accentual period, but was invented and utilised for the same purpose, viz. : to eke out the deficiencies of the accentual scheme. So that in either case, it is a factor to be reckoned with in Hebrew accentuation ; and the distinction between the two ways of appraising the value of Paseq is re- duced to a minimum. The result is that when both parties come to deal with passages like Job xiv. 19, 2 Kings v. 11, the one is as eager as the other to do justice to the emphatic character of the sign. Paaeq 129 (Even) stones the waters wear away. "But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought, he will surely come out to me '■ (i^'^^l N^;'. i 'hilf). Hence our for- mer statement regarding the origin and purpose of Paseq may be allowed to stand unaltered. It was used to indicate a slight pause between the words which, after the verse had been arranged musically, were found to be joined together by connective accents. In fine, it virtually changed the conjunctive accent with which it was asso- ciated into a minor disjunctive ; and proved itself, in the hands of the Masoretes, to be possessed of a distinctively separative force. 2. Its Usages Allusion has been made already to the chief use of this graphical sign. It was introduced for the sake of emphasis. All the other shades of meaning traceable in its various applications, are only so many varying aspects of this same central idea. In Dr. Wickes' language, "The examples under this head are suflBciently nume- rous, indeed so much so, that we may regard this emphatic use as the chief object of the ordinary Paseq". Take, for instance, the statement in 9 130 Sermons in Accents Josh, xxiii. 10. " One man of you shall chase a thousand : for (i ""S) the Lord your God, he it is that fighteth for you." This is one of the pas- sages which Dr. Kennedy finds exceptional and embarrassing; for why should the note-line appear before " the Lord your God," when there is nothing anomalous or peculiar in the construc- tion of the words ? The explanation is that Paseq does not occur with these words at all ; but with the particle ^3, and emphasises the basis of Joshua's confidence in the future success of Israel's cause. No foe would be able to with- stand the onset of their arms, for Jehovah, the God of battles, would be their champion. Even one man with God would be in the majority ; and a stone cast in His name would become a thunderbolt. In short, the human success in Athnach's clause is made dependent upon the divine co-operation in Silluq's; and Paseq is brought in to emphasise the connection. Who shall say, in view of this connection, that the instinct of the Masorete was at fault ? It was no more at fault than when he added in verse 12 : " Else (i ''S) if ye do in any wise go back . . . know for a certainty that the Lord your God will no more drive these nations from out of your sight ". It is like the rapier-thrust in Gen. Paseq 131 iv. *J : " If thou doest not well, sin coucheth at the door ". It is only a slight variation of the same principle when Paseq is used between two words which end and begin with the same letter, as '''^P .D"'^:;ity (Judg. i. 7), ^lyj i]a (Cant. iv. 12). Still the exceptions to this rule are so numerous that Dr. Wickes is led to the con- clusion that even in this position the failure of Paseq, and not its presence, is the leading characteristic. Of. ^I'inj^ 5?pi2J (1 Sam. xxiii. 11), on'? ^3«n-N'7 (1 Kings, xiii. 17). Con- sequently to speak of distinct pronunciation as the determining factor in these instances is not sufficient : it is distinctness of utterance plus logical or musical effect. The aecentuator desired to impress upon the words something of the con- viction he himself felt regarding their signi- ficance, and this element of emphasis is not to be overlooked when we come to analyse their teach- ing. Turn, for example, to the statement in Cant. iv. 12 :— A garden shut up is my sister, my bride ; A spring shut up, a fountain sealed. The LXX has Krjiro'i, a garden, in both clauses ; and we may probably have to read : — 132 Sermons in Accents It is no argument against this that the first 'j3 is marked by Paseq, whereas the second is left unaccented ; for the emphasis impressed upon the first clause has given sufficient prominence to the striking metaphor, and when once the nail has been driven home, it serves no good purpose to split the wood. One other variation of the same usage may be mentioned. Paseq is frequently employed (es- pecially in the poetical books) to conserve the sanctity of the Divine name. At every stage in the history of the text, this feeling of reverence has made itself felt. Even in the time of the Sopherim, as observed in Chap. II., it was allowed to modify the Hebrew consonants (1 Sam. iii. 13, Job vii. 20, etc.). In the later period of the Masoretes it exerted a similar influence in deter- mining the vowels. Gf. Isa. i. 12, where instead of the expression " to see my face," we are asked to read " to appear before me " (i.e., Hlt^^S for TTiN'lv). The former expression was deemed too anthropomorphic to apply to the Deity; and therefore despite the difiiculty of construing iJS Paseq 13S as aa accusative with the Niphal, the vocalisation was altered to suit their preconceived views (Ex. xxxiv. 24). And now the same feeling of scru- pulosity is to be allowed to influence Hebrew accentuation. By the use of what has been called Paseq euphemisticuTn the Divine name is to be safeguarded whenever it comes into proxi- mity with that which was not considered becom- ing. It was not thought seemly, for instance, to speak of the '' wicked " in the same breath with the name of the Deity ; and therefore when we come to passages like Ps. x. 13, cxxxix. 21, and read : — Wherefore doth the wicked contemn God ? Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee ? we must punctuate them as follows : — And in a similar manner if anything derogatory to the Divine being could not be emended other- wise, by rearrangement of the consonants or vowels, the difficulty could always be surmounted by the insertion of an euphemistic Paseq. Gf. Ps. xliv. 24. :— 134 Sermons in Accents Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord ? The ascription of sleep to the Holy One of Israel was not considered becoming by these devout scholars ; and the feeling of incongruity was duly marked by the insertion of the graphical sign : — "i^yi^ .]tt?''n naj? .nn^;^ Here again we have simply another appli- cation of the same principle which we have found so often in the accentual scheme. It was a system which addressed itself to the task of indicating the relation — logical or otherwise — of each word in the sentence ; and it could not be conceived as overlooking any shade of em- phasis that sought to find expression either in written symbol or in spoken word. It might be the depth of the thought, the weight of the melody, the fulness of the emotion or the throb of the moral sense, but in either case the tone or stress was not neglected. It was marked by Paseq ; and the sign as thus employed was the expression of a distinctively separative force. 3. Two Practical Illustrations " And God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him : male and female created he them" (Gen. i. 27). The main Paseq 135 logical pause is rightly placed at him,, for at this point the verse falls asunder into two parts, containing (a) man's relation to God, and (6) man's relation to woman. These are the two natural divisions of the verse. A minor dis- tinctive, Zaqeph, is then placed at image, divid- ing the clause of Athnach into the two members of a clearly expressed parallelism. This leaves Zaqeph's own clause to be subdivided at rnan by its musical foretone Pashta. Thus ; — What is the force of Paseq at Elohim? With a minor dichotomy on the first word before Pashta, we might expect a distinctive accent, like Geresh before R'bhia ; but as a rule, trans- formation takes place into the corresponding servus, and then the secution in Pashta's clause becomes Azla, M'huppakh, Pashta (c/. Gen. xliii. 3). What then is the significance of the sign Paseq ? It is the key to the whole passage. The text is not simply a description of the creation of man : it is a statement of the Divine idea in man's creation. From ver. 1 the name " Elo- him" has been carried, like a lamp, through the entire chapter, and every clause and phrase is illumined with its light. In the divine plan. 136 Sermons in Accents man was meant to be the head of all created things — creation's mouth-piece and nature's high priest (ver. 26) ; so that a threefold division is set before us in these two verses — (1) Man's relation to nature (ver. 26). (2) Man's relation to woman (ver. 27b). (3) Man's relation to God (ver. 27a). This is the divine idea in man's creation — an idea which is suitably expressed by the em- phatic Paseq : when man left the Creator's hand, he was at once a natural, a moral and a spirit- ual being. The preacher will find an equally interesting passage at Prov. iii. 11, 12. The ordinary point- ing at the beginning of ver. 12 is, "It^t^ ni^ '^3, but in various respects this is quite anomalous. It provides more than three servi for Athnach which is most unusual, and it points D^^ with S'gol which is only permissible when it is joined to the following word by Maqqeph. These diffi- culties prepare us for the pointing of Ben- Naphtali ("iti^NTlti^ ' "'S) which furnishes another instructive example of an emphatic Paseq : — My Son, despise not the chastening of the Lord : Neither be weary of his reproof : For whom the Lord loveth he reproveth ; Even as a father the son in whom he delighteth. Paseq l3? Thus interpreted, the change suggests a suitable line of exposition for dealing with the subject of divine discipline, viz. : the various reasons ad- vanced in these two verses for not despising the chastening of the Lord. (1) The making of the man. This is the precise meaning of the term "chastening". It means the removing of flaws or faults by the process of correction (chap. xxii. 15). If men would but consent to be made ! " whereas, behav- ing like children who struggle and scream while their mother washes and dresses them, they find they have to be washed and dressed notwithstand- ing, and with the more discomfort ; they may even have to find themselves set half-naked and but half -dried in a corner and ask to be finished "} (2) The aggravating of the discipline. Is this not the thought suggested by the term " re- proof " ? The ordinary voice of instruction has to give place to the more peremptory accents of rebuke : and the moulding and refining process has to be done all over again — a consideration which gives peculiar fitness to the term "' weary ". " Neither be weary of his reproof." (3) The verifying of a father's love. A father does not correct the faults of a servant as he ' Sir Oibbie. l38 Sermons in Accents corrects the faults of a child. He may be con- tent to get rid of the former, but, if possible, he has to make a man of the latter; and therefore he trains, counsels and disciplines him as such. The ills of life are no proof that the father has forgotten him : they are chastisement the proof of his love (c/. Heb. xii. 6). So that reading these three thoughts together, the man will not rebel against the refining and perfecting process. He will believe that a father's love knows best what is necessary for him; and having been brought to a right frame of mind by the discipline through which he has been passing, he will draw near to the divine footstool, like the child drawing near to his mother, and ask to be finished. This is the sum of the whole matter : love seeks the final perfecting of the man. Additional Motes and Examples 139 140 Additional I^oies and Hxampte^ CHAPTER X THE MAIN DISTINCTIVES (POETICAL) It was suggested in Chap. III. that the poetical accentuation was simply a refinement of the Palestinian Schools, introduced to secure a richer melody in the chanting of the three books. By means of a fuller intonation, they sought to compensate for the shortness of the verse, in Psalms, Proverbs, and Job. And this terseness in poetic composition explains another feature of the system. There was no necessity for the same number of minor distinctives as are found in the larger clauses of the twenty-one prose books. The main distinctives are much the same, in number and function ; but when we come to the sub-divisions, and note the accents which are used to mark them, the list is a good deal shorter than in the corresponding prose list. Instead of the three accents, Zaqeph, Tiphcha and R'bhia, we have to be content with two, R'bhia Mugrash which in some respects is the counterpart of Tiphcha, and simple R'bhia which 141 142 Sermons in Accents corresponds in great measure to its namesake in the prose accentuation. Then with regard to the hghter distinctives, Pashta, T'bhir and Zarqa, we have to be satisfied with two again — D'cM, which may be considered as discharging the functions of Pashta and T'bhir, and Sinnor which performs a similar duty in relation to Zarqa. Until in passing to the distinctives of least degree, Geresh, Pazer, and Great T'lisha, and comparing the accentual divisions in the three books, we find no more than one disjunctive, the accent Pazer, unless we add the various com- binations of Paseq, which frequently indicates, as in the prose books, a slight logical or musical pause. In fine, the prose accentuation requires no fewer than nine minor distinctives to accom- plish what the poetic system can achieve with five, or at the most six : so that there is some justification for the opinion that in several par- ticulars the poetic notation is the simpler of the two ; and that in any case, the two systems may be studied side by side. In the present instance, we limit our attention to the two lead- ing distinctives, Olev'yored and Athnach. 1. Their Names The term Athnach has been suflSciently ex- plained in Chap. V., but the name Olev'yored The Main Distinctives (Poetical) 143 (^l^'^l nb'iv) calls for some additional remark. It means the " ascending and descending " modu- lation. The upper sign is like M'huppakh, and is placed above and before the tone-syllable; so that if the tone be on the first syllable of the word, the M'huppakh is thrown back on the pre- vious word, as I'lEJ i;S|"^^ (Ps. iv. 7). But if the previous word be accented on the ultima, this retrocession of the sign cannot take place ; we must read rtriM "IttJ^I. (Job viii. 6). Even in this case, however, Baer makes no difference in his text — he points it n^N -ittJiT ; while his T Jt tt : ' treatment of NJ y\1^ (Ps. Ixxx. 15) is still more striking — he writes MJ * I'lttj. The servant to Olev'yored is Oalgal, a '' wheel " — a name which was probably suggested by its original circular form. But sometimes, for the sake of emphasis, a distinctive may be required on the first word before Olev'yored; and then, both in thought and in expression, the weight of the reading must not be overlooked in the fram- ing of the translation. Cf. Prov. xxiii. 35 : — They have stricken me, and I was not hurt ; They have beaten me, and I felt it not. Here the main pause before Olev'yored is on 144 Sermons in Accents hurt ; and as this is the second word before that accent, it is rightly marked by Sinnor. In this case however, the intervening word should have Galgal the ordinary servant to Olev'yored (c/. Ps. vii. 9). With this accentuation the two clauses would have been exactly parallel, the initial verbs being joined to the following by connective ac- cents. Thus : — • • T - • J ■ But this would have missed the thought already expressed by the well-chosen Hebrew verbs. (133 in the Hiphil means to smite by a single blow, as when Saul sought to pin David to the wall by one throw of his spear (1 Sam. xix. 10) ; whereas dSiI hasthefurther idea of smiting with a hammer (jl^TsSn), like the smith striking the anvil in Isa. xli. 7, or Jael driving home the tent-pin by repeated blows of her mallet (Jud. v. 26). To be smitten once by strong drink and not feel the wound is ominous enough : but there is a deeper degradation than that. The drunkard's path is downward. Everything is burned up in that liquid fire; until in a condition of moral imbecility he wails, " They have beaten me (over The Main Distinctives (Poetical) 145 and over again) and I felt it not : when shall I awake ? I will seek it yet again ". This is the full force of the distinptive R'bhia which the Masoretes have introduced instead of the servant Galgal. Both lexicon and music have been re- quisitioned to emphasise the truth that the wages of sin is death. 2. Their Position Olev'yored, in the poetic books, may be brought into comparison with S'golta in the prose. They agree in this, that if a strong pausal accent is required in addition to Athnach, it is marked in prose by S'golta, and in the three books by Olev'yored. But unlike S'golta, Olev' yored is not to be regarded as subordinate to Athnach. If both accents are required in the same verse, it is the former and not the latter which indicates the main dichotomy, as. Many sorrows shall be to the wicked : (j—^) But he that trustefch in the Lord, (— r-) Mercy shall compass him about. (Ps. xxxii. 10). Hence the prosaic and poetic systems may be compared thus : — :^ 1^ - -- ii,-<- ---} 10 146 SerTnons in Accents In both notations the verse was divided into two parts, and, one of the parts sub-divided by means of a subordinate accent : but while in the prose system it is the first section that is so dealt with, the poetic accentuation subdivides the second. There are many passages, of course, where Olev'yored does not appear at all. Owing to the shortness of the verses there was no need for the introduction of both accents : and in fact, within Psalms, Proverbs, and Job, Athnach marks the main dichotomy at least ten times as often as Olev'yored. The rule is that if the caesura falls on the first, second, or third word before Silluq, it is sufficiently well-marked by Athnach {of. the whole of Ps. ii., with the ex- ception of ver. 7). If it fall on the fourth or fifth, the usage fluctuates between Athnach and Olev'yored; but on the sixth word or further, the dichotomy is always marked by Olev'yored. In Ps. ii. 7, for instance, the main pause falls on the eighth word before Silluq ; and since another fairly strong pause falls between it and the close of the verse, it is accented and pointed accord- ingly. I will tell of the decree : (j-^) The Lord said unto me, Thou art my son ; ( ) This day have I begotten thee. The Main Distinctives (Poetical) 147 These general divisions are well illustrated by Ps. c. 3 — especially as read with the Q'ri ('^^) instead of the K'thibh {^^). Know ye that the Lord he is God : It is he that hath made us, and we are his ; We are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. The mere fact that they have been chosen of God and welded into a nation, was the historical and redemptive basis on which their kriowledge of Jehovah was to be settled. It was in this sense that He had rnade them, and called them into fellowship with Himself; and therefore they were His — they were His people and He was their God. The main pause is consequently placed at Ood ; for there the injunction to know Jehovah, as Elohim, ends, and the proof of His deity begins. In other words, the whole verse is a case of partial parallelism, in which the leading thought is expressed in the first two lines with the caesura between them : and then a third line has been added in order to expand the conclud- ing portion of the second member. Within these general divisions another fairly strong pause is placed on know and made, as if to emphasise the means by which the enjoyment of this com- munion is to be attained. It is by knowledge — the knowledge of the heart — that man comes to 148 Serrnons in Accents find his portion in Jehovah, and it is by a similar outputting of the divine energy — in knowing, choosing, making — that Jehovah comes to find His portion in His people (c/. the use of J^T "to know," in Gen. xviii. 19, Amos iii. 2). Hence the divisions of our subject are obvious. (1) The knowledge that finds a God. (2) The Divine working that finds a people. (3) The happy issue — a Shepherd and his flock. 3. Their Musical Character As might be expected from the more rhyth- mical accentuation of the three books, the pre- sence of the melody has a much greater influence in Psalms, Proverbs and Job than it has in the twenty-one prose books. The logical and syn- tactical divisions are far more frequently sacrificed to the claims of musical equilibrium. Especially is this the case when the dichotomy would fall after the first, or before the last word of the verse. It is shifted forwards or backwards to a more convenient resting-place, so as to preserve more adequately the balance of the modulation (cf. Job iv. 8). In his early volume on "Job," Professor Davidson was of opinion that the participles The Main Distinctives (Poetical) 149 ^ty"in and ^3^'Tt were not accusatives after "I have seen," but nominatives to the verb " to reap " ; and therefore ought to be rendered, as in the English version, " As I have seen, they that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, reap the same ". In the Cambridge Bihle, however, he is not so positive on this point ; and is prepared to admit that the words may also read, "When I saw those that ploughed iniquity and sowed trouble, they reaped it". In either case, the leading distinctive is not placed at " trouble," where the main logical pause requires it, but at "iniquity," so as to preserve the principle of musical equilibrium. The two expressions, to plough iniquity and to sow trouble are parallel to each other ; and are therefore suit- ably separated by the caesura. It is melody, how- ever, and not logic that has determined the ac- centuation. In order to exhibit parallelismus Tnembrorum the logical and syntactical division has had to give way. If it did not seem possible to the accentuators to change the position of the dichotomy — deterred, it may be, by the shortness of the verse or some similar consideration — they surmounted the difB- culty in another way. They marked the main logical pause by a minor distinctive. In place of Athnach which was too heavy an accent for the first word before Silluq they introduced R'bhia 150 Sermons in Accents Mugrash (Job iv. 1, Ps. xxxiv. 8), and instead of Olev'yored or Athnach at the beginning of the verse, especially after the addition of some super- scription, they used Paseq with Azla, or Pazer (Ps. XXV. 1, xxvi. 1). It did not seem consistent with the claims of the modulation to insert so strong an accent in these short verses ; and there- fore like the use of Zaqeph in Hab. i. 1, the dichotomy was sufficiently well-marked by one of the lighter accents. Hear instruction, and be wise, (B. Mugrash). And refuse it not (Prov. viii. 33). As a noteworthy illustration of the main distinc- tives see Ps. xlv. 5. The A.V. renders, "Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the King's enemies : whereby the people fall under thee ". This is a most inadequate rendering of the Maso- retic accentuation. The greatest pause is at , sharp ; for here the description of the conqueror ends, and the picture of the vanquished begins. It is therefore marked by Olev'yored. The next greatest pause is at thee, and the final stop at King, so that we ought to read as in the RV. :— Thine arrows are sharp : Peoples fall under thee ; In the heart of the enemies of the King. The Main Biatinctives {Poetical) 151 Does it need a strong imagination, asks Pro- fessor Davidson, to see a whole campaign here — the preparation, the conflict, the victory? A warrior stalking into the field with sharpened weapons, the same mowing down nations, and then the battlefield filled with slain, each with a well-aimed javelin in his heart. In Dr. Mac- laren's fine language, the conqueror has no allies. The canvas has no room for soldiers. The picture is like the Assyrian sculptures, in which the King stands erect and alone in his chariot, a giant in comparison with the tiny figures beneath him. Like Rameses in Pentaur's great battle- song, " he pierced the line of the foe : ... he was all alone, no other with him". And so thoroughly have the Masoretes entered into the spirit of this passage, that they have even dis- pensed with one of the commonest rules of their prosody, viz. : that under Athnach there must be a long and pausal vowel. In order to express the rapidity and almost terrified breathlessness with which the last two exclamations are uttered, they allow the verb ^73^. to appear with simple sheva. * The men who could paint a scene like this, with such delicacy and finish, are worth knowing. They were masters of their craft. 1 Davi(i8oii's Accentuation, p. 49, 152 Sermons in Accents Finally, in Ps. cii. 3, the LXX suggests a different grouping of the main distinctives as compared with the Masoretic Text. It reads : — Turn not thy face away from me : In the day of ray distress, incline thine ear unto rae ; In the day when I call upon thee, answer me speedily. For various reasons this arrangement is to be preferred. It not only discloses a marked anti- thesis between the two parts of the psalmist's prayer (the negative, " turn not," and the positive, "incline unto"); it shows also in the latter or positive portion a good example of progressive parallelism. The silent appeal of his distress rests, for an interval, in the equally silent atti- tude of Jehovah ; but ere long it breaks forth into the eloquence of a verbal entreaty, that the divine attitude may express itself in action, and that a speedy answer may be granted to his request. In the day of his distress he prays at least for three things : — 1. The divine nearness — (1st line). 2. The divine interest — (2nd Une). 3. The divine interposition — (3rd line). " In the day when I call, answer me speedily." AdditioTial Notes and Examples 153 154 Additional Notes and Examples CHAPTER XI THE MINOR DISTINCTIVES (POETICAL) In both systems of notation, and in compara- tively short verses, the main distinctive, as already noted, may not appear at all (c/. Job iii. 1-2). The prologue and epilogue of this dramatic poem are accented according to the ordinary prose system ; so that in these two verses the characteristics of the two parallel schemes are found side by side. In either case, the main dichotomy is sufficiently emphasised by one of the minor distinctives — by Zaqeph in the one instance, and R'bhia Mugrash in the other — a clear indication that however difi'erent the graphical signs may be, the same accentual law is operative in both. In the present section we shall limit our inquiry to the three minor dis- tinctives — R'bhia Mugrash, D'chi and Sinnor. 1. R'bhia Mugkash (©Sjp n) This accent has a two-fold graphical sign be- cause, in early times, it had probably a two-fold J55 156 Sermons in Accents modulation. The first part is a simple stroke, not unlike the Geresh of the prose accentuation, and placed above and on the right hand of the initial letter; while the second and more im- portant part is an ordinary R'bhia, which is used, like the accents generally, to indicate the tone- syllable. The resemblance to Geresh explains the meaning of the name, R'bhia Mugrash, i.e., R'bhia gereshed — the tiJ^^p being Pual participle of ty^J. Rabbinical writers, however, preferred the name Tiphcha, not simply because the stroke in question was probably nothing more than the Tiphcha-sign of the prose books transferred from below, but also and especially because R'bhia Mugrash occupies the same position before Silluq as Tiphcha does in the prose accentuation. Of. the first verse in Job's opening speech : — V It i, X J - X T : J : Here, R'bhia Mugrash marks the one dichotomy in Silluq's clause, and is preceded by its ordinary servus Mer'kha. But the verse is interesting in other respects, and is to be noted both from the side of grammar and accentuation. The A.V. renders the second line " the night in which it The Minor Distinctives (Poetical) 157 was said," as if IJib^ were a passive form of the verb like •i^'\i^ before Athnach ; but the R.V. has at once preserved the grammar of the word, and restored the poetry of the verse, by recog- nising Tlh'^h'n as personified, and reading "the night which said ". It was the night itself, and not any human herald of the event, that first announced the fact that a man child had been born into the world. The further distinction that the day refers to his birth, and the night to his conception, is a subtilty that may have attraction for some minds; but probably we ought to read with the LXX 'ISoii dpaev, " Behold a male," i.e., nsil instead of TT^h — an expression that has no reference to conception, but merely to fruitfulness. The one thought the patriarch wishes to express is not, that night played one part, and day another, in the earliest stages of his existence, but that under the parallelism or contrast of day and night, he seeks to give adequate expression to the cry, " Would God I had never been born ! " Perish the day wherein I was born, And the night which said. Behold a male. The student will also note in iS, iblt"^ an illus- tration of the rule that when two accented 158 Sermons in Accents syllables come together, the tone of the former is retracted to the penult to allow a sufficient hiatus between the two. The above is the usual position of Silluq's foretone ; and were it not for the law of trans- formation which exerts so powerful an influence in the three books, R'bhia Mugrash would be found in every instance where any kind of dich- otomy has entered into Silluq's clause. But its absence, and not its presence, is the leading char- acteristic. There is no lack of instances like Job iii. 4, where the musical foretone has been changed into a servus on the first word before Silluq : — ■ It T ; J XT v.- - : Here the final accent seems to be preceded by two servi — Tarcha and Munach — -but the Munach is really a transformed R'bhia Mugrash on the first word before Silluq ; and therefore the two servi have a closer affinity to one another than the Munach has to Silluq. The advantage of this transformation was that it gave a greater variety to the modulation of the three books. There is no question, however, that it mars, in no slight degree, the order and symmetry of the accentual system. In the reading The Minor Distinctives (Poetical) 159 of the clause, the dichotomy has to be reckoned with, whether expressed or not : so that wher- ever two or more servi are found before Silluq, a slight pause is to be made in the reading on the last servus before the final accent, as Ps. cxix. 86:— • 1":t • J T : '/iv They persecute me wrongfully, help thou me. On one condition only does the minor distinctive remain even on the first word before Silluq. If Silluq's own word is sufficiently long — if it con- tains two or more syllables before the tone, a sufficient interval exists between the two dis- tinctives, and the transformation of K'bhia Mug- rash into the corresponding servus does not take place. Cf. ; ipjij;^ hbV (Job iii. 10). Or for a practical illustration observe the closing words of Job xxiv. 13 : — These are of them that rebel against the light ; They know not the ways thereof, Nor abide in the paths thereof. Carey has referred with justice to John iii. 20, for while "the light" is 'best understood of the light of day, the implication is that the workers of iniquity love the darkness rather than the light because their deeds are evil. This agrees with 160 Sermons in Accents the LXX which frequently gives a paraphrase of the words instead of a literal translation. o^ov Se StKaio(rvv7]<; ovk ySeiaav. And they know not the way of righteousness. The passage, however, will repay careful study in other respects. The first word, "these," is emphatic, referring to the kind of men whom the speaker is about to describe — the murderer (v. 14), the adulterer (v. 15) and the robber (v. 16) ; and therefore it is marked by an emphatic Paseq. Again, the words accented by Olev'yored are given by Theile with Metheg and Maqqeph in- stead of Galgal; and Ginsburg, while omitting the Maqqeph, has retained the Metheg; but as Galgal is the ordinary servus of Olev'yored, Baer and Wickes have corrected it into "liN '^TltoSl. J ■• : v: Finally we have the important verb litZJ"' ac- cented by the minor distinctive R'bhia Mugrash : " They abide not in the paths thereof ". The sin of the rebels was practical infidelity. It was not simply the fruit of ignorance (second line), or unwillingness to recognise the ways of right- eousness ; but the unwillingness, in turn, was the outcome of evil practices, or the walking in the paths of wickedness. The tap-root was some- thing palpable. A wicked, careless life had led The Minor Distinctives {Poetical) 161 to a disposition which was reluctant to acknow- ledge the right ; and this again had issued in an attitude of open rebellion. Careless indifference, secret dislike, open hatred — these are the three stages in the natural history of ungodliness. What begins with practical infidelity ends at last with something far more solemn — the insolent and vindictive opposition of the braggart. 2. D'cHi ("ri'n) For the meaning of this name see Chap. VI. D'chi is simply the Tiphcha of the prose accentu- ation transferred to the first letter and made prepositive, in order to distinguish it from the conjunctive Tarcha which has the same form, but is placed under the tone. In position it occupies the same place in Athnach's clause as K'bhia Mugrash holds in Silluq's. It may be found on the first or second word before Athnach according to the rules of the dichotomy : but if the minor distinctive falls too near the tone of the greater accent, D'chi is transformed into the correspond- ing servus, just as in the case of R'bhia Mugrash. Thus we write : — DirrS^D irtzjn mw-p'^n (Job xx. 29), where D'chi is allowed to remain, because in 11 162 Sermons in Accents Athnach's word two or more syllables intervene between the two distinctives ; but : — 'T'N-DJT ^Vt-\ D-r^-p'^n (xxvil. 13), a case of transformation, because a sufficient hiatus does not exist before the final accent. In the latter case the melody is allowed to over- ride the logical division of the clause; The sense may require a disjunctive accent, but the melody does not permit it, as, Are not my days few ? Cease then. (Job X. 20). For an instructive study in connection with this accent, the preacher may turn to Job xiv. 1 : Man that is born of a woman Is of few days, and full of trouble. The term " man " is to the whole verse what the verse, in turn, is to the entire paragraph (vers. 1-6). The theme is mortality, its weakness, brevity and sorrow; and as this is pregnantly summarised in the first word D"IN (LXX ,/3/joto9), it is rightly placed at the head of the clause in a position of emphasis and marked by a dis- junctive accent. The main caesura is found at " woman " ; for while, at a first reading, the verse seems to consist of three parallel clauses in apposition to each other, it is not really so. It The Minor Distinctives (Poetical) 163 is only the last two clauses that can be described in this way : the first phrase, " born of a woman " being rather an adjectival clause belonging to the subject " man ". Hence it was a true instinct of the Masorete, which led him to mark this dis- tinction by the fixing of the main dichotomy — placing the human origin of man in the one half of the verse, and his leading characteristics in the second. (1) His Weakness^— " Born of a woman." In the higher teaching of the New Testament, that which is born of the flesh is flesh ; and thus we have the pathetic longing of ver. 4 : " Would that a clean thing could come out of an un- clean ! " But alas, the wish is its own answer : "There is none that doeth good, no, not one" (Ps. xiv. 3). (2) His Brevity — " Short of days." So ver. 2 : " He cometh forth like a flower and withereth ". We prefer the marginal reading hiy^ from hh'O, to wither, not simply because the idea of fading is most appropriate to a flower, but because the LXX read 7a|' (i^iireaav) from S33 to fade, which was probably the original reading (cf. Isa. xl. 7). 164 Sermons in Accents (3) His Sorrow—" Full of trouble." He was like the day-labourer working in the fields, and longing for the quiet of evening when he would gain a brief respite from his toil (vers. 5, 6). ^he hireling fulfils his day buoyed up by the thought of the evening hour of rest (c/. vii. 2) ; and the patriarch craves a similar relaxation. He hopes that in the evening of life he will be allowed a brief interval of well-earned rest, before he passes into the silent land from which there is no return. Woman-born, short-lived and sorrow-oppressed man ! " Dost thou open thine eye upon such an one, and bringest hiTn into judgment with thee ? " (ver. 3). Note the singular ^3^Sl without the plural yod ; and the LXX 'inb^ instead of ^ilN- An equally interesting example may be fouijd at Prov. iv. 3. Even the R.V. renders, " For I was a son unto my father"; but this fails to do justice to the emphatic pointing and position of the term " son " The LXX, no less than the Hebrew, suggests a much more forcible rendering : — uto? r^ap eyevofiTjv Kayw irarpl iiirrjKOO'i KCbl ayaTTCo/xevo^ iv Trpoaanrrp fJ-r]Tp6<;. A glance at the context will illustrate the nature of this emphasis, and justify the Masoretic in- The Minor bistinctivea (Poetical) l66 stinct which sipamped it with a distinctive accent. The whole paragraph (vers. 1-9) deals with the person and work of the religious teacher; and the delineation may be summarised as follows : — (i.) His pupils (vers. 1, 2); They are repre- sented as an entire class : ver. 1 being the only passage throughout the first nine chapters, where the phrase " my son " has been changed into the plural. Such a teacher may have no children of his own ; but if his heart has been touched by the humanising influence of heavenly wisdom, he will seek a class of spiritual children some- where else. It is not more natural for a star to shine or a flower to breathe its perfume, than it is for heaven-taught wisdom to impart itself to others : — Heaven doth with us as we with torches do, Not light them for themselves. (ii.) His own early training (ver. 3). This verse contains "a charming piece of autobio- graphy" (Horton). The teacher harks back to his own youth and early training, and indicates the character of those opening years as an ex- ample for his class. For as the order of the Hebrew words implies and as it is paraphrased in the LXX his youth had been characterised by filial reverence arid obedience (uttj^/coos) ; and as 166 Sermons in Accents it is the home-trained who are the advocates of home-training, he sought to make his own ex- perience a chaplet of grace for his pupils : — For a son was I to my father, Tender and only beloved in the sight of my mother. (iii.) His message (ver. 7). In the remainder of the paragraph (vers. 7-9) there is no precept inculcated save one : viz. : " get wisdom ". How is this ? Because {a) only one thing is needful. Heavenly wisdom, or Christian love, is the ful- filling of the whole law. Let there be the breathing of divine love into human souls, as in the recent wonderful movement in Wales, and it, will do more to solve our grave social problems than all the municipal or ecclesiastical schemes put together, (b) Only one thing will suffice. The temptations that assail the pupils may be very different from those that harassed the teacher in his youth ; and therefore the old rules are in large measure inadequate, and totally in- applicable to a new social environment. But what then ? The one thing needful is not the enforcing of special rules, which, like reins to the beast of burden, will influence the life by ex- ternal compulsion ; but the infusing of the old motive power of heavenly wisdoTn, and allowing the new generation to work out its own destiny The Minor bistinctives (P-oeticat) 167 with fear and trembling. In the one case you may grow fine ivy; but in the other you rear strong, sturdy trees that are able to support themselves by their own roots, and to provide, if need be, a support and shelter for others. Wisdom is the principal thing, therefore get wisdom, And with all thou hast gotten, get understanding. 3. SiNNOR (^132) The form of the graphical sign and the mean- ing of the name have been explained and illus- trated at p. 103. It was made postpositive to dis- tinguish it from the conjunctive Sinnorith which has the same form ; and when the word is ac- cented on the Penult the sign is repeated (es- pecially in the Baer and Delitzsch texts) to mark the position of the tone-syllable as V^I^O,. Like Zarqa before the prose S'golta, Sinnor is the ordinary dividing accent before Olev'yored. But unlike R'bhia Mugrash before Silluq, or D'chi before Athnach, Sinnor can never appear on the first word before the leading accent. If a minor dichotomy be due in that position, it is marked by Simple R'bhia, as n3t»''«T ""nibttJ ''2« (fs. iii. 6). The one position occupied by Sinnor is on the i^8 Sermons in Accents second word before Olev'yored, and may be followed by R'bhia, or the servant Galgal on the first. Of. Prov. xxiii. 35 at p. 143, or Ps, i. 3, where we read : — •jt " : - - V T I ■ • : T T : And he shall be like a tree planted by the streams of water. Both Baer and Ginsburg have pointed Job xxxix. 25 as an example of R'bhia in Athnach's clause. If accentual emendation, however, is justified anywhere it is justified in this passage. The main logical pause is at " Aha " ; for at this point the description of the war-horse, that mar- vellous creation of virility and fierceness, falls into the two halves of a clearly expressed paral- lelism. The third line has merely expanded in the form of a rather awkward Zeugma the con- cluding phrase of the second member. The LXX therefore has divided it thus : — aaX'jri'yyo'i Be a^jfiaivovcrrj^ Xeyei Evye • troppmdev Se 6er(f)pal,veTai k.t.X. But the LXX has done more than reproduce the correct punctuation: it has suggested a various reading which may help to relieve the Zeugma already referred to. Instead of D"'"lto Q^^^ " the thunder of the captains," it has read DiTl^. The Minor biaiinciives {Poetical) l6§ " with the leaping " (from the beginning of ver. 24). So that the proposal of Professor Duhm to read D''"lto '^% as the original text is not with- out a measure of plausibility, seeing that 5^"| is used in the same sense in ch. xxxvi. 33. In either case the main caesura must be placed at nNrt, and this, according to the rule of the dich- otomy is marked by Olev'yored. Indeed, as Dr. Wickes found in his collation of MSS., this is actually the reading adopted in various important codices — Olev'yored with its servant Galgal, and Sinnor with its ordinary servus Mer'kha. Hence we may correct and translate as follows : — n""!"" p'\rno'>i HNn -ipN'' ^suj ■'^-i At the loudness of the trumpet, he saith, Ahg, ! And from afar he snuffeth the battle, With the shouting of the leaders and the tumult. The servant of Sinnor is generally Mer'kha, but if the tone fall on any other syllable than the first, it becomes Munach, as D^r77S| Tilt in Ps. li. 17 :— The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit : A broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise. 170 Sermons in Accenis The position of Sinnor, and its servus, is suf- ficient to show that it is not the sacrifices as such, but the sacrifices of God, which are the real subject of the present paragraph. The thanks- giving conveyed in the peace offering, and the ascending flame of the burnt ofiering (ver. 16), will only rise to heaven when the sacrifice is arranged and presented by one who is already right with Jehovah. It follows that the true sacrifice is not the animal victim at all, but the man behind it — the spirit that has been broken by penitence and the heart that has been awed by forgiveness. Without these, aU other sacri- fices are vain ; and this includes not the animal victims alone, but many other offerings that are highly esteemed among men — leading the poet to exclaim in his Recessional : — The tumult and the shouting dies ; The captains and the kings depart : Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice, An humble and a contrite heart. Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet Lest we forget — lest we forget. — Kipling. Additional Motes and Examples 171 172 Additional Notes and MxampUs CHAPTER XII THE MINOR DISTINCTIVES (contmued) Job xxxvii. 23 is another passage which ought to be emended accentually. In Baer's text it reads — "A ■- -. t: ^ I J — And the A.V. renders " Touching the Almighty, we cannot find him out : he is excellent in power, and in judgment, and in plenty of justice : he will not afflict." But this is a most inade- quate rendering of the Masoretic accents. The principal dichotomy is rightly placed at " power " ; for here the description of the Deity, who is the real subject of the sentence, is separated into two parts, containing the two complementary attributes of almighty power and super-abound- ing righteousness. Not power alone, and not righteousness alone, but power and righteous- ness combined— a combination that has taken" Elihu back to his fundamental conception that " God is mighty, and despiseth not any " (xxxvi. 173 174 Sermons in Accents 5). The subject is placed first for the sake of emphasis, and therefore ought to be marked, not by a conjunctive accent, but by the disjunctive R'bhia, as in various MSS. collated by Dr. Wickes. Thus „ VO ''^ttj : so that we render, The Almighty ! we cannot find him out, who is great in power : And justice and fulness of righteousness he will not wrest. Therefore do men fear him, etc. Hence a natural division of our subject would be (1) The unmeasured compass of God's power. (2) The assured character of His justice. (3) Trusting where we cannot trace. In this concluding chapter we shall glance at the remaining distinctives in the poetic accentua- tion. 1. R'bhia For the meaning and form of this graphical sign see p. 80. It is simply the R'bhia of the prose notation, transferred to a somewhat similar position in the accentuation of the three books. In both systems it is introduced to meet the exigencies of longer clauses than those usually dealt with in ordinary composition. It is never found in Silluq's clause, where an additional dichotomy is generally marked by Paseq ; but The Minor Distinctives 175 both in Athnach's and in Olev'yored's clause it occurs with the utmost frequency. The rule in Athnach's clause is not difficult to follow. If the dichotomy falls on the second word before Athnach it is usually marked by D'chi, but in a few instances its place has been taken by R'bhia, either as a substitute for D'chi (Job xxiv. 24), or a8 an expedient for allowing D'chi to appear on the first word (xiii. 4). R'bhia's regular place is on the third word before Athnach (xxxix. 1); and should the dichotomy fall still further back — on the fourtn word or even on the fifth — the minor distinctive is repeated, as Job vii. 4 : — ' TV J- T • : - X : • : - T When I lie down, I say, When shall I arise ? but the night is long. Its position in Olev'yored's clause is equally simple. On the second word before Olev'yored the dichotomy is marked by Sinnor ; but in any other position, the accent chosen ia R'bhia — Little R'bhia (to use a distinction approved by Wickes) on the first word, and Great R'bhia on the third or further (Ps. i. 1). Hence the full secution of Olev'yored's clause would be Olev'- yored, Little R'bhia, Sinnor, Great R'bhia — 176 Sermons in Accents though the symmetry of this order is often marred by the law of transformation. Of. Ps. Ivi. 14, where great R'bhia has been replaced by Sinnor on the third word before Olev'yored, because, in this case, a sufficient interval would not have existed between Great and Little R'bhia. In connection with the accent R'bhia, the preacher will find an interesting passage in Job xiv. 7 : — The R.V. translates, " For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, etc.'' : but this does not do justice to the emphatic character of the Masoretic accentuation, -wh is nothing, if not emphatic, and as the main pause comes on " hope," dividing the whole verse into the three clauses of a tristich, the emphasis and arrangement ought not to be overlooked either in the printing or in the reading : thus — For a tree hath hope ; If it be cut down it will sprout again, And the tender branch thereof will not cease. . . . But man dieth, etc. (ver. 10). The contrast between the fall of a tree and the fate of a man is solemn enough in any connec- tion, but who does not feel that the hopelessness The Minor Bistinctives 177 and pathos are greatly increased by putting the first line categorically, and not hypothetically, as our Bible does ? It is this contrast which has left its mark on the entire paragraph (vers. 7-12). The subject is the total extinction of man's life in death, as contrasted with the comparative immortality of a tree. And the simile is applied in two ways, (a.) Is the tree cut down while its life is yet young and vigorous ? (ver. 7). It is not on that account bereft of hope. Abundant sap is still flowing in the stump or roots, and at the welcome voice of spring, it will rise and effloresce. Or (b) does the tree begin to droop and decay as if from the feebleness of age ? (ver. 8). Even then the sap which is dying out of the ' roots, may be replenished by a timely supply of moisture from without. " Through the scent of water it will bud, and put forth its boughs like a new plant " (LXX, veo^vrov). Carey, in his Illustrations, refers this to the date-palm, which is pre-eminently a (juXvSpov