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DIVINITY SCHOOL
TROWBRIDGE LIBRARY

THE WISDOM

THE OLD TESTAMENT

JOB AND SOLOMON

OR

THE WISDOM OF THE OLD TESTAMENT

BY THE

REV. T. K. CHEYNE, M.A., D.D.
ORIEL PROFESSOR OF INTERPRETATION AT OXFORD
CANON OF ROCHESTER

NEW YORK
THOMAS WHITTAKER
2 & 3 BIBLE HOUSE
1887

-TjtAAO 1o^ I

TO
THE VERY REVEREND
GEORGE GRANVILLE BRADLEY, D.D.
DEAN OF WESTMINSTER
IN HIGH APPRECIATION OF HIS LONG-PROVED INTEREST IN EXEGESIS
AND OF HIS HAPPILY CONCEIVED LECTURES ON ECCLESIASTES

PREFACE.

THE present work is a fragmentary realisation of a plan
which has been maturing in my mind for many years.
Exegesis and criticism are equally necessary for the full en
joyment of the treasures of the Old Testament, and just as no
commentary is complete which does not explain the actual
position of critical controversies, so no introduction to the
criticism of a book is trustworthy which does not repose, and
show the reader that it reposes, on the basis of a thorough
exegesis. In this volume I do not pretend to have ap
proached the ideal of such students' manuals as I have de
scribed ; I have not been sufficiently sure of my public to
treat the subject on the scale which I should have liked, and
such personal drawbacks as repeated changes of residence,
frequent absence from large libraries, and within the last two
years a serious eye-trouble, have hindered me in the prose
cution of my work. Other tasks now claim my restored
strength, and I can no longer withhold my volume from
those lovers of the sacred literature who in some degree
share the point of view from which I have written.
The Books of Job and Ecclesiastes are treated somewhat
more in detail than those of Proverbs and Ecclesiasticus.
The latter have a special interest of their own, but to bring
this into full view, more excursions into pure philology would
have been necessary than I judged it expedient to allow my
self. I had intended to make up for this omission so far as
Proverbs is concerned at the end of the volume, but have

V1U PREFACE
been interrupted in doing so. Perhaps, however, even in the
Appendix such detailed treatment of special points might
have repelled some readers, and I hope that the Appendix
is on the whole not unreadable. The enlarged notes on
Proverbs in the forthcoming new edition of Messrs. Eyre and
Spottiswoode's Variorum Bible may enable the student to do
for himself what I have not done. As for Ecclesiasticus, the
light which Prof. Bickell's and Dr. Edersheim's researches
are sure to throw on the text may enable me some day to
recast the section on this book ; at present, I only offer this
as an illustrative sequel to the section on Proverbs. It should
be added that the canonicity of Ecclesiasticus is handled in
conjunction with that of Ecclesiastes at the close of the part
on the latter book.
The interest of Job and Ecclesiastes is of a far deeper and
more varied kind. Even from a critical point of view, the
study of these books is most refreshing after the incessant
and exciting battles of Pentateuch-criticism. But as monu
ments of the spiritual struggles of a past which is not wholly
dead, they have been to me, as doubtless to many others,
sources of pure delight. If I appreciate Job more highly
than Ecclesiastes, it is not from any want of living sympathy
with the philosophic doubter, but because the enjoyment
even of Scriptures is dependent on moods and impulses. De
Sanctis has pointed out (Storia della letteratura italiana, i. 80)
how the story of Job became the favourite theme of the early
Italian moralists, and everyone knows how the great Latin
doctors (Gregory the Great, Bede, Aquinas, Albertus Magnus)
delighted to comment on this wonderful book. In our own
day, from perfectly intelligible causes, Ecclesiastes has too
much drawn off the attention of the educated world, but there
are signs that the character-drama of Job will soon reassert
its old fascinating power.
In conclusion, will earnest students, whether academical
or not, grant me two requests ? The first is, that they will

PREFACE IX
meet me with confidence, and gather any grains of truth they
can, even where they cannot yield full assent. The problems
of Hebrew literature are complex ; herein partly lies their
fascination ; herein also is a call for mutual tolerance on the
part of all who approach them. There is nothing to regret
in this complexity ; in searching for the solution of these
problems, we gain an ever fresh insight into facts and ideas
which will never lose their significance. My second request
is, that the Appendix, which, short as it is, contains something
for different classes of readers, may not be neglected as only
an Appendix. I would add that the ' much-desired aid ' in the critical
use of the Septuagint referred to on p. 114 has already to a
large extent been given by Gustav Bickell's essay (see p. 296),
which I have now been able to examine. His early treatise
(1862) is at length happily supplemented and corrected. We
shall know still more when P. Ciasca has completed the publi
cation of the fragments of the Sahidic version. It is clear
however that each omission in the pre-Hexaplar Septuagint
text (represented by this version) must be judged upon
its own merits, nor can I estimate the value of the text of the
Septuagint quite as highly as some critics.
It is hoped that the present work may be followed by a
volume on the Psalms, the Lamentations, and the Song of
Songs.

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION

PAGE I

THE BOOK OF JOB.

CHAPTER

I. Job's Calamity; the Opening of the Dialogues
(Chaps, i.-xiv.) ....
II. The Second Cycle of Speeches (Chaps, xv.-xxi.) .
III. The Third Cycle of Speeches (Chaps, xxii. -xxxi.)
IV. The Speeches of Elihu (Chaps, xxxii.-xxxvii.)
V. The Speeches of Jehovah (Chaps, xxxviii. -xlii. 6)
VI. The Epilogue and its Meaning ....
VII. The Traditional Basis and the Purpose of Job
VIII. Date and Place of Composition .
IX. Argument from the Use of Mythology
X. Argument from the Doctrine of Angels.
XI. Argument from Parallel Passages
XII. On the Disputed Passages in the Dialogue Por
tion, especially the Speeches of Elihu
XIII. Is Job a Hebr^eo-Arabic Poem? ....
XIV. The Book from a Religious Point of View .
XV. The Book from a General and Western Point of
View 
Note on Job and the Modern Poet? .
Note on the Text of Job 
Aids to the Student 

n
3° 37
42 48 58
60 717679 Sj
90 96
102 106112 112"5

Xll

CONTENTS

THE BOOK OF PROVERBS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Hebrew Wisdom, its Nature, Scope, and Import
ance .  n7
II. The Form and Origin of the Proverbs . . . 125
III. The First Collection and its Appendices . .130
IV. The Second Collection and its Appendices . . 142
V. The Praise of Wisdom  156
VI. Supplementary on Questions of Date and Origin . 165
VII. The Text of Proverbs  173
Note on Prov. xxx. 3 1 . . .... 175
VIII. The Religious Value of the Book of Proverbs . 176
Aids to the Student  178

THE WISDOM OF JESUS THE SON OF
SIRACH.
I. The Wise Man Turned Scribe. Sirach's Moral
Teaching  179
II. Sirach's Teaching (continued). His Place in the
Movement of Thought  188
Aids to the Student (see also Appendix) . . . 198

THE BOOK OF KOHELETH;
ECCLESIASTES.

OR,

I. The Wise Man Turned Author and Philosopher 199
II. 'Truth and Fiction' in an Autobiography . . 207
III. More Moralising, interrupted by Proverbial
Maxims . . . ,  213
IV. Facts of Contemporary Life  218
V. The Wise Man's Parting Counsels . . . 222

CONTENTS X1U
CHAPTER PAGE
VI. Koheleth's 'Portrait of Old Age;' the Epilogue,
its Nature and Origin  229
VII. Ecclesiastes and its Critics (from a Philological
Point of View)  236
VIII. Ecclesiastes and its Critics (from a Literary
and Psychological Point of View) . . . . 242
IX. Ecclesiastes from a Moral and Religious Point
of View  248
X. Date and Place of Composition  255
XI. Does Koheleth contain Greek Words or Ideas ? . 26a
XII. Textual Problems of Koheleth  273
XIII. The Canonicity of Ecclesiastes and Ecclesi
asticus  279
Aids to the Student  285

APPENDIX (see Special Table of Contents) . . . .287

INDEX   303

JOB AND SOLOMON.

INTRODUCTION.
HOW IS OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM RELATED
TO CHRISTIANITY ?
THE point of view represented in this volume is still so little
recognised and represented in England and America that the
author ventures to prefix a short paper delivered as an address
at the Church Congress held at Reading in October 1883.
It is proverbially more difficult to write a thin book than a
thick one, and the labour involved in preparing this twenty
minutes' paper, with its large outlook and sedulously under
stated claims, was such as he would not willingly undertake
again for a like purpose. The subject was not an ephemeral one
and the attitude of the Churches towards it has not materially
altered within the last three years. The present volume is
pervaded by the spirit which breathes, as the author trusts, in
every line of this paper. It relates, indeed, only to a small
section of the Old Testament, but no part of that ' library '
(as mediaeval writers so well named it) can be studied in com
plete severance from 'the rest. And if a high aim is held
forward in one of the opening sentences to the Church of
which the writer is a son, those who are connected with the
other historic communions will easily understand the bitter
sweet feeling of hope against hope with which those lines
were penned.
' My own conviction,' said the late Dr. Pusey, ' has long
been that the hope of the Church of England is in mutual B

2 INTRODUCTION
tolerance.' ' That truly great man was not thinking of the
new school of Old Testament critics, and yet if the Anglican
Church is ever to renovate her theology and to become in any
real sense undeniably the Church of the future, she cannot
afford to be careless or intolerant of attempts to modernise
our methods of criticism and exegesis. It would no doubt be
simpler to content ourselves with that criticism and exegesis,
and consequently with that theology, which have been fairly
adequate to the wants of the past ; but are we sure that Jesus
Christ would not now lead us a few steps further on towards
' all the truth,' and that one of His preparatory disciplines may
not be a method of Biblical criticism which is less tender to
the traditions of the scribes, and more in harmony with the
renovating process which is going on in all other regions of
thought ? Why, indeed, should there not be a providence
even in the phases of Old Testament criticism, so that where
some can see merely the shiftings of arbitrary opinion more
enlightened eyes may discern a veritable progress, leading at
once to fresh views of history, and to necessary reforms in our
theology, making this theology simpler and stronger, deeper
and more truly Catholic, by making it more Biblical ?
Some one, however, may ask, Does not modern criticism
actually claim to have refuted the fundamental facts of Bible
history? But which are these fundamental facts? Bishop
Thirlwall, twenty years ago, told his clergy ' that a great part
of the events related in the Old Testament has no more
apparent connection with our religion than those of Greek
and Roman history.' Put these events for a moment on one
side, and how much more conspicuous does that great ele
mentary fact become which stands up as a rock in Israel's
history— namely, that a holy God, for the good of the world,
chose out this people, isolating it more and more completely
for educational purposes from its heathen neighbours, and
interposing at various times to teach, to chastise, and to deliver
it ! It is not necessary to prove that all such recorded inter
positions are in the strictest sense historical ; it is enough if
1 ' Toleranz sollte eigentlich nur eine voriibergehende Gesinnung sein ; sie
muss zur Anerkennung fiihren.' — Goethe.

INTRODUCTION 3
the tradition or the record of some that are so did survive the
great literary as well as political catastrophe of the Babylonian
captivity. And I have yet to learn that the Exodus, the
destruction of Sennacherib's army, the restoration of the Jews
to their own land, and the unique phenomenon of spiritual
prophecy, are called in question even by the most advanced
school of Biblical criticism. One fact, indeed, there is,
regarded by some of us as fundamental, which these advanced
critics do maintain to be disproved, and that is the giving of the
Levitical Law by Moses, or if not by Moses, by persons in the
pre-Exile period who had prophetic sanction for giving it.
Supposing the theory of Kuenen and Wellhausen to be correct,
it will no doubt appear to some minds (i) that the inspiration
of the Levitical Law is at any rate weakened in quality thereby,
(2) that a glaring inconsistency is introduced into the Divine
teaching of Israel, which becomes anti-sacrificial at one time,
and sacrificial at another, and (3) that room is given for the
supposition that the Levitical system itself was an injurious
though politic condescension to popular tastes, and conse
quently (as Lagarde ventures to hold) that St. Paul, by his
doctrine of the Atonement, ruined, so far as he could, the
simple Gospel of Jesus Christ.
But I only mention these possible inferences in order to
point out how unfair they are. (1) The inspiration (to retain
an often misused but indispensable term) of the Levitical Law
is only weakened in any bad sense if it be maintained that
the law, whenever the main part of it was promulgated, failed
to receive the sanction of God's prophetic interpreters, and that
it was not, in the time of Ezra, the only effectual instrument
for preserving the deposit of spiritual religion. (2) With
regard to the inconsistency (assuming the new hypothesis)
between the two periods of the Divine teaching of Israel, the
feeling of a devout, though advanced critic would be that he
wa,s not a fit judge of the providential plan. Inconsistent
conclusions on one great subject (that of forgiveness of sins)
might in fact be drawn from the language of our Lord Him
self at different periods of His ministry, though the parallel
may not be altogether complete, since our Lord never used

4 INTRODUCTION
directly anti-sacrificial language. And it might be urged on
the side of Kuenen, that neither would the early prophets
have used such language— at any rate in the literary version
of their discourses— if they had foreseen the canonical
character which this would' assume, and the immense im
portance of a sacrificial system in the post-Exile period. (3)
The theory that the law involves an injurious condescension
is by no means compulsory upon advocates of the new hypo
thesis. Concessions to popular taste have, indeed, as we know
but too well, often almost extinguished the native spirit of a
religion ; but the fact that some at least of the most spiritual
psalms are acknowledged to be post-Exile ought to make us
all, critics and non-critics alike, slow to draw too sharp a
distinction between the legal and the evangelical. That the
law was misused by some, and in course of time became
spiritually almost obsolete, would not justify us in de
preciating it, even if we thought that the lesser and not the
greater Moses, the scribe and not the prophet, was mainly
responsible for its promulgation. Finally, the rash statement
of Lagarde has been virtually answered by the reference of
another radical critic (Keim) to the well-attested words of
Christ at the institution of the Eucharist (Matt. xxvi. 28).
I have spoken thus much on the assumption that the
hypothesis of Kuenen and Wellhausen may be true. That it
will ever become universally prevalent is improbable — the
truth may turn out to lie between the two extremes — but that
it will go on for some time gaining ground among the
younger generation of scholars is, I think, almost certain. No.
one who has once studied this or any other Old Testament
controversy from the inside and with a full view of the evi
dence can doubt that the traditional accounts of many of the
disputed books rest on a very weak basis, and those who crave
for definite solutions, and cannot bear to live in twilight, will
naturally hail such clear-cut hypotheses as those of Kuenen
and Wellhausen, and credit them with an undue finality. Let
us be patient with these too sanguine critics, and not think
them bad Churchmen, as long as they abstain from drawing
those dangerous and unnecessary inferences of which I have

INTRODUCTION 5
spoken. It is the want of an equally intelligent interest which
makes the Old Testament a dead letter to so many highly
orthodox theologians. If the advanced critics succeed in
awakening such an interest more generally, it will be no
slight compensation for that ' unsettlement of views ' which is
so often the temporary consequence of reading their books.
One large part, however, of Kuenen and Wellhausen's
critical system is not peculiar to them, but accepted by the
great majority of professed Old Testament critics. It is this
part which has perhaps a still stronger claim to be considered
in its relation to Christian truth, because there is every ap
pearance that it will, in course of time, become traditional
among those who have given up the still current traditions of
the synagogue. I refer (i) to the analysis of the Pentateuch
and the Book of Joshua into several documents, (2) to the
view that many of the laws contained in the Pentateuch arose
gradually, according to the needs of the people, and that Ezra,
or at least contemporaries of Ezra, took a leading part in the
revision and completion of the law book, and (3) to the
dating of the original documents or compilations at various
periods, mostly long subsequent to the time of Moses. Time
forbids me to enter into the grounds for the confident asser
tion that if either exegesis or the Church's representation of
religious truth is to make any decided progress, the results of
the literary analysis of the Pentateuch must be accepted as
facts, and that theologians must in future recognise at
least three different sections, and as many different concep
tions of Israel's religious development, within the Penta
teuch, just as they have long recognised at least three
different types of teaching in the Old Testament as a whole.
On the question as to the date of these sections, and as to
the Mosaic origin of any considerable part of them, the opinions
of special scholars within the Church will, for a long time
yet, be more or less divided. There is, I know, a belief
growing up among us, that Assyrian and Egyptian disco
veries are altogether favourable to the ordinary English view
of the dates of the historical books, including the Pentateuch.
May I be pardoned for expressing the slowly formed convic-

6 INTRODUCTION
tion that apologists in England (and be it observed that I do
not quarrel with the conception of apologetic theology) fre
quently indulge in general statements as to the bearings of
recent discoveries, which are only half true ? The opponents
of whom they are thinking are long since dead ; it is wasting
time to fight with the delusions of a past age. No one now
thinks the Bible an invention of priestcraft ; that which his
torical critics doubt is the admissibility of any unqualified as
sertion of the strict historicalness of all the details of all its
component parts. This doubt is not removed by recent
archaeological discoveries, the critical bearings of which are
sometimes what neither of the critical schools desired or ex
pected. I refer especially to the bearings of Assyrian disco
veries on the date of what are commonly called the Jehovistic (
narratives in the first nine chapters of Genesis. I will not
pursue this subject further, and merely add that we must not
too hastily assume that the supplement hypothesis is alto
gether antiquated.
The results of the anticipated revolution in our way of
looking at the Pentateuch strike me as fourfold, (i) Histori
cally. The low religious position of most of the pre-Exile
Israelites will be seen to be not the result of a deliberate re
bellion against the law of Jehovah, the Levitical laws being
at any rate virtually non-existent. By this I mean, that even
if any Targe part of those laws go back to the age of Moses
they were never thoroughly put in force, and soon passed out
of sight. Otherwise how can we account for this, among
other facts, that Deuteronomy, or the main part of it, is known
in the reign of Josiah as ' the law of Moses ' ? We shall also,
perhaps, get a deeper insight into the Divine purpose in rais
ing up that colossal personage who, though ' slow of speech,'
was so mighty in deed — I mean Moses — and shall realise
those words of a writer specially sanctioned by my own uni
versity : ' Should we have an accurate idea of the purpose of
God in raising up Moses, if we said, He did it that He might
communicate a revelation ? Would not this be completely to
misunderstand the principal end of the mission of Moses,
which was the establishment of the theocracy, and in so far as

INTRODUCTION 7
God revealed through him the revelation was but as means to
this higher end ? ' '
(2) We shall, perhaps, discriminate more between the parts
of the Old Testament, some of which will be chiefly valuable
to us as bringing into view the gradualness of Israel's educa
tion, and as giving that fulness to our conceptions of Biblical
truths which can only be got by knowing the history of their
outward forms ; others will have only that interest which at
taches even to the minutest and obscurest details of the his
tory of much-honoured friends or relatives ; others, lastly,
will rise, in virtue of their intrinsic majesty, to a position
scarcely inferior to that of the finest parts of the New
Testament itself.
(3) As a result of what has thus been gained, our idea of
inspiration will become broader, deeper, and more true to
facts. (4) We shall have to consider our future attitude towards
that Kenotic 2 view of the person of Christ which has been
accepted in some form by such great exegetical theologians
as Hofmann, Oehler, and Delitzsch. Although the Logos,
by the very nature of the conception, must be omniscient,
the incarnate Logos, we are told, pointed His disciples to a
future time, in which they should do greater works than He
Himself, and should open the doors to fresh departments of
truth. The critical problems of the Old Testament did not
then require to be settled by Him, because they had not yet
come into existence. Had they emerged into view in our
Lord's time, they would have given as great a shock to
devout Jews as they have done to devout Christians ; and
1 See essay on ' Miracles ' in Christian Remembrancer (list of works recom
mended to theological honour-students in Oxford).
2 The self-humiliation of Christ is described (need/I remark ?) by St. Paul as a
Kevacrts (Phil. ii. 7). How far this ichcecris extended is a theological problem
which in the sixteenth century, and again in our own, has exercised devout
thinkers. For the modern form of the Kenotic view or doctrine the English
reader will naturally go to Dorner's History of the Doctrine of the Person of Christ,
vol. iii., in Clark's Library. Dorner's opposition to this view is u weighty but
not, of course, a decisive fact. We must be loyal to the facts of Christ's humanity
reported in the Gospels. The question as to the extent of the Ktvacns is an open
one.

5 INTRODUCTION
our Master would, no doubt, have given them a solution fully
adequate to the wants of believers. In that case, a reference
to some direction of the law as of Mosaic origin would, in
the mouth of Christ, have been decisive ; and the Church
would, no doubt, have been guided to make some distinct
definition of her doctrine on the subject.
Thus in the very midst of the driest critical researches
we can feel that, if we have duly fostered the sense of Divine
things, we are on the road to further disclosures of religious
as well as historical truth. The day of negative criticism is
past, and the day of a cheap ridicule of all critical analysis of
ancient texts is, we may hope, nearly past also. In faith
and love the critics whose lot I would fain share are at one
with many of those who suspect and perhaps ridicule them :
in the aspirations of hope their aim is higher. Gladly would
I now pass on to a survey of the religious bearings of the
critical study of the poetical and prophetical books, which,
through differences of race, age, and above all spiritual
atmosphere, we find, upon the whole, so much more attractive
and congenial than the Levitical legislation. Let me, at least,
throw out a few hints. Great as is the division of opinion
on points of detail, so much appears to be generally accepted
that the number of prophets whose works have partly come
down to us is larger than used to be supposed. The analysis
of the texts may not be as nearly perfect as that of the Penta
teuch, but there is no doubt among those of the younger
critics whose voices count (and with the pupils of Delitzsch the
case is the same as with those of Ewald) that several of the
prophetical books are made up of the works of different writers,
and I even notice a tendency among highly orthodox critics
to go beyond Ewald himself and analyse the Book of Daniel
into portions of different dates. The result is important, and
not for literary history alone. It gives us a much firmer hold
on the great principle that a prophet's horizon is that of his
own time ; that he prophesied, as has been well said, into the
future, but not directly to the future. This will, I believe, in
no wise affect essential Christian truth, but will obviously
modify our exegesis of certain Scripture proofs of Christian

INTRODUCTION 9
doctrine, and is perhaps not without a bearing on the two
grave theological subjects referred to already.
Bear with me if, once again in conclusion, I appeal to the
Church at large on behalf of those who would fain modernise
our criticism and exegesis with a view to a not less dis
tinctively Christian but more progressive Church theology.
The age of oecumenical councils may have passed ; but if
criticism, exegesis, and philosophy are only cultivated in a
fearless and reverent spirit, and if the Church at large troubles
itself a little more to understand the workers and their work,
an approximation to agreement on great religious questions
may hereafter be attained. What the informal decisions of
the general Christian consciousness will be, it would be imper
tinent to conjecture. It is St. John's ' all truth ' after which we
aspire — ' all the truth ' concerning God, the individual soul,
and human society, into which the labours of generations, en
couraged by the guiding star, shall by degrees introduce us.
But one thing is too clear to be mistaken — viz. that exegesis
must decide first of all what essential Christian truth is before
a devout philosophy can interpret, expand, and apply it, and
Old Testament exegesis, at any rate, cannot be long separated
from its natural ally, the higher criticism. A provisional
separation may no doubt be necessary, but the ultimate aim
of successive generations of students must be a faithful
exegesis, enlightened by a seven-times tested criticism.

THE BOOK OF JOB.
CHAPTER I.
JOB'S CALAMITY ; THE OPENING OF THE DIALOGUES.
(CHAPS. I. -xiv.)
The Book of Job is not the earliest monument of Hebrew
' wisdom,' but for various reasons will be treated first in order.
The perusal of some of the pages introductory to Proverbs
will enable the student to fill out what is here given.
The Hebrew ' wisdom ' is a product as peculiar as the dia
lectic of Plato, and not less worthy of admiration ; and the
author of Job is its greatest master. To him are due those
great thoughts on a perennial problem, which may be sup
plemented but can never be superseded, and which, as M.
Renan truly says, cause so profound an emotion in their first
nal've expression. His wisdom is that of intuition rather
than of strict reasoning, but it is as truly based upon the facts
of experience as any of our Western philosophies. He did
not indeed reach his high position unaided by predecessors.
The author of the noble ' Praise of Wisdom ' in Prov. i.-ix.
taught him much and kindled his ambition. Nor was he in
all probability without the stimulus of fellow-thinkers and
fellow-poets. The student ought from the outset to be aware
of the existence of discussions as to the unity of the book —
discussions which have led to one assured and to several pro
bable results — though he ought not to adopt any critical re
sults before he has thoroughly studied the poem itself. The
student should also know that the supposed authors of the

12 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. i.
(as I must believe) inserted passages belong to the same circle
as the writer of the main part of the book, and are therefore
not to be accused of having made ' interpolations.' I need
not here distinguish between passages added by the author
himself as afterthoughts (or perhaps paralipomena inserted by
disciples from his literary remains) and compositions of later
poets added to give the poem greater didactic completeness.
A passage which does not fall into the plan of the poem is to
all intents and purposes the work of another poet. The philo
sophic Goethe of the second part of Faust is not the passion-
tossed Goethe of the first.
All the writers who may be concerned in the production
of pur book are, however, well worthy of reverent study ;
they were not only inspired by the Spirit of Israel's holy re
ligion, but in their various styles true poets. In some degree
we may apply to Job the lines of Schiller on the Iliad with its
different fathers but one only mother — Nature. In fact}
Nature, in aspects chiefly familiar, but not therefore less in
teresting, was an open book to these poets, and ' Look in
thine heart and write ' was their secret as well as Spenser's
for vigorous and effective expression.
I now proceed to give in plain prose the pith and substance
of this great poem, which more than any other Old Testa-
tament book needs to be brought near to the mind of a
Western student. I would entitle it The Book of the Trial
of the Righteous Man, and of the Justification of
God.
In its present form the Book of Job consists of five
parts —
i. The Prologue, written in prose (ch. i.-ii.), the body ot
the work in the Hebrew being written in at any rate an
approach to metre ; '
2. The Colloquies between Job and his three friends (ch.
iii.-xxxi.) ;
3. The Discourses of Elihu (ch. xxxii.-xxxvii.) ;
1 Jerome already saw this. He represents the Book of Job as composed
mainly in hexameters with a dactylic and spondaic movement (Prczf. in fob).
Does he mean double trimeters ?

chap. I. JOBS CALAMITY 1 3
4. Jehovah's Reply to Job (ch. xxxviii.-xlii. 6) ;
5. The Epilogue, in prose (ch. xlii. 7-17).
There are some differences in the arrangement which
will presently be followed, but these will justify themselves
in the course of our study. Let us first of all examine the
Prologue, which will bear to be viewed by itself as a striking
specimen of Hebrew narrative. The idyllic manners of a .
patriarchal age are delineated with sympathy — no difficult
task to one who knew the early Hebrew traditions — and still
more admirable are the very testing scenes from the super
natural world.
It may perhaps seem strange that this should be only a
prose poem, but the truth is that narrative poetry was entirely
alien to the Hebrew genius, which refused to tolerate the
bonds of protracted and continuous versification. Like that
other great hero of parallelistic verse Balaam, Job is a non-
Israelite ; and in this the unknown author shows a fine tact,
for he is thus absolved from the embarrassing necessity of
referring to the Law, and so complicating the moral pro
blem under consideration. Job, however, though an Arabian
sheich ' (as one may loosely call him), was a worshipper of
Jehovah, who declares before the assembled ' sons of the
Elohim ' that ' there is none like Job in the earth,' &c. (i. 8).
Job's virtue is rewarded by an outward prosperity like that
of the patriarchs in Genesis : he was a great Eastern Emeer,
and had not only a large family but great possessions. His
scrupulous piety, which takes precautions even against heart-
sins, is exemplified to us by the atoning sacrifice which he
offers as head of his family at some annual feast (i. 4, 5).
Then in ver. 6 the scene is abruptly changed from earth to
heaven. The spirit of the narrative is not devoid of a de-
1 Where is the ' Uz ' spoken of in Job i. I ? The ' land of Uzza ' seems to
have been not far from the Orontes (Shalmaneser's Obelisk ; see Friedr. Delitzsch's
Parodies, p. 259). Tradition places the home of Job in the fertile volcanic region
called the Hauran(see the very full excursus in Delitzsch's_/fl#). But the 'land of
Uz ' might be farther south, nearer to Edom, in connection with which it is men
tioned, Lam. iv. 21, Gen. xxxvi. 28 (comp. ver. 21). This is supported by the
curious note appended to the Book of Job in the Septuagint. It is true that Uz
is called a son of Aram (Gen. x. 23), but ' Uz ' may have had several branches, or
the use of Aramaic may have extended far beyond the limits of Aram proper.

14 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. r.
lightful humour. In the midst of the ' sons of the Elohim '
— supernatural, Titanic beings, who had once been at strife
with Jehovah (if we may illustrate by xxi. 22, xxv. 2), but
who now at stated times paid Him their enforced homage
— stood one who had not quite lost his original pleasure in
working evil, and who was now employed by his Master as a
kind of moral and religious censor of the human race. This
malicious spirit — ' the Satan ' or adversary, as he is called —
had just returned from a tour of inspection in the world, and
Jehovah, who is represented under the disguise of an earthly
monarch, boldly and imprudently draws his attention to the
meritorious Job. The Satan refuses to give human nature
credit for pure goodness, and sarcastically remarks, ' Does
Job serve God for nothing ? ' (i. 9.) Jehovah therefore allows
His minister to put Job's piety to as severe a test as possible
short of taking his life. One after another Job's flocks, his
servants, and his children are destroyed. His wife, however,
by a touch of quiet humour, is spared ; she seems to be re
cognised by the Satan as an unconscious ally (ii. 9). The
piety of Job stands the trial ; he is deeply moved, but main
tains his self-control, and the scene closes with a devout
ascription of blessing to Jehovah alike for giving and for re
calling His gifts.
Before passing on the reader should notice that, accord
ing to the poet, the ultimate reason why these sufferings of
' Job were permitted by the Most High was that Job might
set an example of a piety independent of favouring outward
circumstances. The poet reveals this to us in the Prologue,
that we may not ourselves be staggered in our faith, nor cast
down by sympathy with such an unique sufferer ; for after
the eulogy passed upon Job in the celestial court we cannot
doubt that he will stand the test, even if disturbed for a time.
A second time the same high court is held. The first ex
periment of the Adversary has failed, and this magnified
earthly monarch, the Jehovah of the story, begins to suspect
that he has allowed a good man to be plagued with no suffi
cient motive. Admiringly he exclaims, pointing to Job,
* And still he holds fast his integrity, so that thou didst incite

chap. I. JOB S CALAMITY 1 5
me against him to annihilate him without cause' (ii. 3).
Another sarcastic word from the Adversary (' Touch his bone
and his flesh, and then see . . . .'), and once more he receives
permission to try Job. The affliction this time is elephanti
asis, the most loathsome and dangerous form of leprosy. But
Job's piety stands fast. He sits down on the heap of burnt
dung and ashes at the entrance of the village, such as those
where lepers are still wont to congregate, and meets the de
spairing counsel of his wife (comp. Tobit's wife, Tob. ii. 14) to
renounce a God from whom nothing more is to be hoped but
death with a calm and pious rebuke. So baseless was the
malicious suggestion of the Satan ! Meantime many months
pass away (vii. 3), and no friend appears to condole with him.
Travelling is slow in the East, and Job's three friends ' were
Emeers like himself (the Sept. makes them kings), and their '
residences would be at some distance from each other. At
last they come, but they cannot recognise Job's features, dis
torted by disease (as Isa. Iii. 14). Overpowered with surprise
and grief, they sit down with him for seven days and seven
nights (comp. Ezek. iii. 15). Up to this point no fault can
be found with his friends. I never yet did hear
That the bruised heart was pierced through the ear.
(Othello, act i. scene 3.)
It was their deep, unspoken sympathy which encouraged
him to vent his sorrow in a flood of unpurified emotion
(chap, iii.) The very next thing recorded of Job is that he
' opened his mouth and cursed his day ' (i.e. his birthday ; see
ver. 3). This may at least be the poet's meaning, though it is
also possible that the prologue and the body of the poem are
not homogeneous. Not to mention other reasons at present,
the tone of Job's speech in chap. iii. (the chapter read by
Swift on his birthday) is entirely different from the stedfast
1 Of the three friends Eliphaz comes from the Edomitish district of Teman, so
famous for its wisdom ; Bildad from the land of Shuah ( ' Suhu ' lay, according to
the inscriptions, between the mouths of the Belich and the Khabur, confluents of
the Euphrates) ; Zophar from Naamah, some unknown district east of the Jordan.
How well these notes of place agree with the Aramaic colouring of the book !

1 6 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. i.
resignation of his reply to his wife, which, as Prof. Davidson
has said, ' reveals still greater deeps in Job's reverent piety '
than the benediction at the end of chap, i., the latter being
called forth not by the infliction of positive evil, but merely
by the withdrawal of unguaranteed favours.
How strangely vivid were the sensations of the race to
which the author of Job belonged ! How great to him must
have been the pleasures of existence, and how great the
pains! Nothing to him was merely subjectively true : his
feelings were infallible, and that which seemed to be was.
Time, for instance, had an objective reality : the days of the
year had a kind of life of their own (comp. Ps. xix. 2) and
paid annually recurring visits to mankind. Hence Job, like
Jeremiah (Jer. xx. 14-18), in the violence of his passion ' can
wish to retaliate on the instrument of his misery by ' cursing
his day.' . . ¦.
Perish the day wherein I was born,
and the night which said, A man has been conceived. . ,
(iii. 3 ; comp. 6) • ;
i.e. let my birthday become a blank in the calendar. Or, if
this be too much and the anniversary, so sad to me, must
come round, then let magicians cast their spell 2 upon it and
make it an unlucky day (such as the Babylonians had in
abundance). Let them curse it that curse days,
that are skilful to rouse the leviathan (iii. 8) ;
i.e. the cloud dragon (vii. 12, xxvi. 13, Isaiah li. 9, Jer.
li. 34), the enemy of the sun (an allusion to a widely spreacf ¦
solar myth). So fare it with the day which might, by hin
dering Job's birth, have ' hid sorrow from his eyes ! ' Even if
he must be born, why could he not have died at once and .
escaped his ill fortune in the quiet phantom world (iii.
1 Bishop Lowth (Prcelect. xxxiii.) admires the dramatic tact with which the ¦
poet makes Job err at first merely by the exaggeration of his complaints, thus in
viting censure, which in turn leads to bold misstatements on Job's part.
2 For a late Egyptian incantation of this class see Ancessi, Job et le RSdemp- '\
teur, pp. 240-1 ; for the dragon myth itself see Cheyne's note in the Prophecies of
Isaiah (on Isa. xxvii. 1) and in the Pulpit Comm. on Jeremiah (on Jer. li. 34).

chap. l. JOB S CALAMITY I 7
13-19)? Alas! this melancholy dream does but aggravate
Job's mental agony. He broods on the horror of his situa
tion, and even makes a shy allusion to God as the author of
his woe — Wherefore gives he light to the miserable,
and life to the bitter in soul ? (iii. 20.)
And now Job's friends are shaken out of their composure.
They have been meditating on Job's calamity, which is so
difficult to reconcile with their previous high opinion of
him ; for they are the representatives of orthodoxy, of the
orthodoxy which received the high sanction of the Deutero
nomic Tora, and which connected obedience and prosperity,
disobedience and adversity. Still it is not a stiff, extreme
orthodoxy which the three friends maintain : calamity, as
Eliphaz represents their opinion (v. 17; comp. 27), is not
always a punishment, but sometimes a discipline. The
question therefore has forced itself upon them, Has the
calamity which has befallen our friend a judicial or a dis
ciplinary, educational purpose ? At first they may have
leaned to the latter alternative ; but Job's violent outburst, so
unbecoming in a devout man, too clearly pointed in the other
direction, and already they are beginning to lose their first
hopeful view of his case. One after another they debate the
question with Job (Eliphaz as the depositary of a revelation^
Bildad as the advocate of tradition, Zophar as the man of,
common sense) — the question of the cause and meaning of
his sufferings, which means further, since Job is not merely
an individual but a type,' the question of the vast mass of
evil in the world. This main part of the work falls into
three cycles of dialogue (ch. iv.-xiv., ch. xv.-xxi., ch.
xxii.-xxxi.) In each there are three pairs of speeches, be
longing respectively to Eliphaz and Job, Bildad and Job,
Zophar and Job. Eliphaz opens the debate as being the
oldest (xv. 10) and the most experienced of Job's friends.
There is much to admire in his speech ; if he could only
have adopted the tone of a sympathising friend and not of a •
lecturer — 1 See Chap. VII. (end of Section 2). C

1 8 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. i.
Behold, this have we searched out ; so it is ;
hear thou it, and know it for thyself (v. 27) —
he might have been useful to the sufferer. At the very
beginning he strikes a wrong key-note, expressing surprise at
his friend's utter loss of self-control (vattibbahel, ver. 4), and
couching it in such a form that one would really suppose Job
to have broken down at the first taste of trouble. The view
of the speaker seems to be that, since Job is really a pious
man (for Eliphaz does not as yet presume to doubt this), he
ought to feel sure that his trouble would not proceed beyond
a certain point. ' Bethink thee now,' says Eliphaz, ' who ever
perished, being innocent ? ' (iv. 7.) Some amount of trouble
even a good man may fairly expect ; though far from
' ploughing iniquity,' he is too weak not to fall into sins of
error, and all sin involves suffering ; or, as Eliphaz puts it
concisely — Man is born to trouble,
as the sparks fly upward (v. 7).
Assuming without any reason that Job would question this,
Eliphaz enforces the moral imperfection of human nature by
an appeal to revelation — not, of course, to Moses and the
prophets, but to a vision like those of the patriarchs in
Genesis. Of the circumstances of the revelation a most -
graphic account is given.
And to myself came an oracle stealthily,
and mine ear received the whisper thereof,
in the play of thought from nightly visions,
when deep sleep falls upon men,
a shudder came upon me and a trembling,
and made all my bones to shudder,
when (see !) a wind sweeps before me,
the hairs of my body bristle up :
it stands, but I cannot discern it,
I gaze, but there is no form,
before mine eyes (is) ....
and I hear a murmuring voice. '
1 The translation follows Bickell's text. The correction in line 2 of ver, 16 is,
from the Septuagint ; the transposition in line 4 is suggested by 1 Kings xix. 12. ' 4

chap. I. JOBS CALAMITY 1 9
' Can human kind be righteous before God ?
can man be pure before his Maker ?
Behold, he trusts not his own servants,
and imputes error to his angels ' ' (iv. 12-18).
There is no such weird passage in the rest of the Old '
Testament. It did not escape the attention of Milton, whose
description of death alludes to it.
If shape it could be called that shape had none,
Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb ;
Or substance might be called that shadow seemed.
(Par. Lost, ii. 266.)
A single phrase (' a murmuring voice,' ver. 16) is borrowed
from the theophany of Elijah (1 Kings xix. 12), but the
strokes which paint the scene, and which Milton and Blake
between them have more than reproduced, are all his own.
The supernatural terror, the wind betokening a spiritual
visitor, the straining eyes which can discern no form, the
whispering voice always associated with oracles2 — each of these
awful experiences we seem to share. Eliphaz himself recalls
his impressions so vividly that he involuntarily uses the present
tense in describing them.
But why should Eliphaz imagine that because Job had
not had a revelation of this kind he is therefore ignorant of
the truth ? He actually confounds the complaints wrung
from Job by his unparalleled mental and bodily sufferings
with the ' impatience ' of the ' foolish man ' and the ' passion '
of the ' silly ' one, and • warns him against the fate which
within his own experience befell one such rebellious murmurer
against God — an irrelevant remark, unless he has already
begun to suspect Job of impiety. Then, as if he feels that he
has gone too far, he addresses Job in a more hopeful spirit,
and tells him what he would do in his place, viz. turn trustfully
to God, whose operations are so unsearchable, but so bene-
1 So xv. 15. M. Lenormant compares Gen. vi. 1-4 (an incomplete fragment).
See above on the ' sons of the Elohim ' of the prologue, and comp. Chap. X.
2 Compare the Hebrew ue'iim in a common prophetic formula.

20 THE BOOK OF JOB - chap. i.
volent. Let Job regard his present affliction as a chastening
and he may look forward to even more abundant blessings
than he has yet enjoyed.
In these concluding verses Eliphaz certainly does his best '
to be sympathetic, but the result shows how utterly he has
failed. He has neither convinced Job's reason nor calmed
the violence of his emotion. It is now Job's turn to reply.
He is not, indeed, in a mood to answer Eliphaz point by
point. Passing over the ungenerous reference to the fate of
the rebellious, which he can hardly believe to be seriously
meant, Job first of all justifies the despair which has so
astonished Eliphaz.1 Since the latter is so cool and so
critical, let him weigh Job's calamity as well as his words,
and see if the extravagance of the latter is not excusable.
Are these arrow wounds the fruit of chastisement ? Does the
Divine love disguise itself as terror ? The good man is never
allowed to perish, you say ; but how much longer can a body
' of .flesh hold out? Why should I not even desire death?
God may be my enemy, but I have given Him no cause. And
now, if He would be my friend, the only favour I crave is that
He would shorten my agony.
Then should (this) still be my comfort
(I would leap amidst unsparing pain),
that I have not denied the words of the Holy One (vi. 10).
Job's demeanour is thus fully accounted for ; it is that of,
his friends which is unnatural and disappointing.
My brethren have been treacherous as a winter stream,
as the bed of winter streams which pass away :
(once) they were turbid with ice,
and the snow, as it fell, hid itself in them ;
but now that they feel the glow they vanish,
when it is hot they disappear from their place.
Caravans bend their course ;
they go up into the desert and perish.
The caravans of Tema looked ;
1 The foUowing lines develope what Job may be supposed to have had in his'
mind.

chap. I. JOB S CALAMITY 2 I
the companies of Sheba hoped for them ; '
they were abashed because they had been confident ;
when they came thither they were ashamed (vi. 15-20).
And was it a hard thing that Job asked of his friends ? .
No ; merely sympathy. And not only have they withheld
this ; Eliphaz has even insinuated that Job was an open sinner.
Surely neither honesty nor wisdom is shown in such captious
criticism of Job's expressions.
How forcible is honest language,
and how cogent is the censure of a wise man !
Think ye to censure words,
and the passionate speech of one who is desperate? (vi. 25, 26.)
With an assertion of his innocence, and a renewed chal
lenge to disprove it, this, the easiest part of Job's first reply,
concludes. And now, having secured his right to complain, Job freely
avails himself of his melancholy privilege. A 'desperate'
man cares not to choose his words, though the reverence which
never ceased to exist deep down in Job's nature prompts him
to excuse his delirious words by a reference to his bitter
anguish (vii. 1 1). Another excuse which he might have given
lies on the very surface of the poem, which is coloured
throughout by the poet's deep sympathy with human misery
in general. Job in fact is not merely an individual, but a re
presentative of mankind ; and when he asks himself at the
beginning of chap. vii. —
Has not frail man a warfare [hard service] upon earth,
and are not his days like the days of a hireling ? —
it is not merely one of the countless thoughts which are
like foam bubbles, but the expression of a serious interest,
which raises Job far, very far above the patriarchal prince of
the legend in the Prologue. It is the very exaggeration of
1 Thomson has finely but inaccurately paraphrased this, changing the locali
ties : — ' In Cairo's crowded streets
The impatient merchant, wondering, waits in vain,
And Mecca saddens at the long delay. '
(Summer, 980-2 ; of the caravan which perished in the storm).

2 2 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. I.
this interest which alone explains why the thought of his
fellow-sufferers not only brings no comfort ' to Job, but fails
even to calm his excitement.
Am I the sea (he says) or the sea monster,
that thou settest a watch over me? (vii. 12.)
It is an allusion to a myth, based on the continual ' war in
heaven ' between light and darkness, which we have in these
lines. Job asks if he is the leviathan (iii. 8) of that upper
ocean above which dwells the invisible God (ix. 8, Ps. civ. 3).
He describes Jehovah as being jealous (comp. Gen. iii. 4, 5,
22) and thinking it of importance to subdue Job's wild nature,
lest he should thwart the Divine purposes. But here, again,
Job rises above himself; the sorrows of all innocent sufferers
are as present to him as his own ; nay, more, he bears them
as a part of his own ; he represents mankind with God. In
a bitter parody of Ps. viii. 5 he exclaims —
What is frail man that Thou treatest him as a great one
and settest Thy mind upon him ;
that Thou scrutinisest him every morning,
and art every moment testing him? (vii. 17, 18.)
It is only now and then that Job expresses this feeling of
sympathetic union with the human race. Generally his
secret thought (or that of his poet) translates itself into a
self-consciousness which seems morbidly extravagant on any
other view of the poem. The descriptions of his physical pains,
however, are true to the facts of the disease called elephan
tiasis, from which he may be supposed to have suffered. His
cry for death is justified by his condition — ' death rather than
(these) my pains'2 (vii. 15). He has no respite from his
1 Contrast the touchingly natural expressions of an Arabian poet, translated by
Riickert (Ham&sa, ii. 315) : —
' Gieng es nicht wie mir vii ^j£ern,
Wiird' ich's nicht ertragen; "
Doch wo ich nur will, gibt Antwort
Klage meinen Klagen.'
The same sentiment is expressed more than once again; comp. Buddha's apologue j
of the mustard seed.
2 So Merx and Bickell. Text, ' my bones.'

CHAP. I. JOB S CALAMITY 23
agony ; ' nights of misery,' he says, ' have been allotted to me '
(vii. 3), probably because his pains were more severe in the
night (xxx. 17). How can it be worth while, he asks, thus
to persecute him ? Even if Eliphaz be right, and Job has
been a sinner, yet how can this affect the Most High ?
(Even) if I have sinned, what do I unto thee,
O thou watcher of men ? (vii. 20.)
What bitter irony again ! He admits a vigilance in God, but
only the vigilance of 'espionage' (xiii. 27, xiv. 16), not that
of friendly guardianship ; God only aims at procuring a long
catalogue of punishable sins. Why not forgive those sins
and relieve Himself from a troublesome task ? Soon it will
be too late : a pathetic touch revealing a latent belief in God's
mercy which no calamity could destroy.
Thus to the blurred vision of the agonised sufferer the
moral God whom he used to worship has been transformed
into an unreasoning, unpitying Force. Bildad is shocked at
this. ' Can God pervert judgment ' ? (viii. 3.) In his short
speech he reaffirms the doctrine of proportionate retribution,
and exhorts Job to ' seek earnestly unto God ' (viii. 5), thus
clearly implying that Job is being punished for his sins.1
Instead of basing his doctrine on revelation, Bildad supports
the side of it relative to the wicked by an appeal to the
common consent of mankind previously to the present genera
tion (viii. 8, 9). This common consent, this traditional wisdom,
is embodied in proverbial ' dark sayings,' as, for instance —
Can the papyrus grow up without marsh ?
can the Nile reed shoot up without water ?
While yet in its verdure, uncut,
it withers before any grass.
So fares it with all that forget God,
and the hope of the impious shall perish (viii. n-13).
It is interesting to see at how early a date the argument
in favour of Theism was rested to some extent on tradition.
' We are of yesterday, and know nothing,' says Bildad, ' be-
1 Bildad more than implies that the fate which overtook Job's children was the
punishment of iniquity (viii. 4). Wonderful harshness !

24 THE BOOK OF JOB 0HAP- Tl
cause our days on earth are a shadow ' (viii. 9), whereas the
wisdom of the past is centuries old, and has a stability to
which Job's novelties (or, for this is the poet's meaning, those
of the new sceptical school of the Exile) cannot pretend.
But Job at least is better than his theories, so Eliphaz and
Bildad are still charitable enough to believe, and the closing
words of the speech of Bildad clear up any possible doubt
with regard to his opinion of erring but still whole-hearted »
(' perfect ') Job.
Those that hate thee shall be clothed with shame,
and the tent of the wicked shall be no more (viii. 22).
But Job has much to say in reply. He ironically admits
the truth of the saying, 'How can man be righteous with
God ? ' but the sense in which he applies the words is very
different from that given to them by his friends. Of course
God is righteous (' righteousness ' in Semitic languages some
times means ' victory '), because He is so mighty that no one,
however innocent, could plead successfully before Him.
This thought suggests a noble description of the stupendous
displays of God's might in nature (ix. 5-10). The verse
with which it closes is adopted from Eliphaz, in whose first
speech to Job it forms the text of a quiet picture of God's
everyday miracles of benevolence to man (v. 9). Where
Eliphaz sees power, wisdom, and love, Job can see only a
force which is terrible in proportion to its wisdom. The pre
dominant quality in this idol of Job's imagination is not love,
but anger — capricious, inexorable anger, which long ago
' the helpers of Rahab ' (another name for the storm dragon,
which fought against the sun) experienced to their cost (ix.
13 ; comp. xxvi. 12). Job himself is in collision with this
force; and how should he venture to defend himself? The
tortures he endured would force from him an avowal of un
truths (ix. 20). If only God were a man, or if there were an
umpire whose authority would be recognised on both sides,
how gladly would Job submit his case to adjudication ! But,
alas ! God stands over against him with His rod (ix. 32-34).
1 See viii. 20. Bildad agrees with the statement in the prologue (i. 1).

CHAP. r. JOBS CALAMITY 25
Bildad had said, ' God will not cast away a perfect man '
(viii. 20). But Job's experience is, ' He destroys the perfect
and the wicked ' (ix. 22). Thus Job has many fellow-sufferers,
and one good effect of his trial is that it has opened his eyes
to the religious bearings of facts which he had long known but
not before now seriously pondered.
At last a milder spirit comes upon the sufferer. He has
been in the habit of communion with God, and cannot bear
to be condemned without knowing the cause (x. 2). How,
he enquires, can God have the heart to torture that which
has cost Him so much thought (comp. Isa. lxv. 8, 9) ? A man
is not a common potter's vessel, but framed with elaborate
skill. Thy hands fashioned and prepared me ;
afterwards dost thou turn ' and destroy me ?
Remember now that as clay thou didst prepare me,
and dost thou turn me into dust again ?
Life and favour dost thou grant me,
and thine oversight guarded my spirit (x. 8, 9, 12).
God appeared to be kind then ; but, since God sees the
end from the beginning, it is too clear that He must have
done all this simply in order to mature a perfect human
sacrifice to His own cruel self-will. Job's milder spirit has
evidently fled. He repeats his wish that he had never lived
(x. 18, 19), and only craves a few brighter moments before he
departs to the land of darkness (x. 20-22).
It was not likely that Zophar would be more capable
of rightly advising Job than his elders. Having had no
experience to soften him, he pours out a flood of crude dog
matic commonplaces, and in the complaints wrung from a
troubled spirit can see nothing but ' a multitude of words '
(xi. 2). Yet he only just misses making an important con
tribution to the settlement of the problem. He has caught a
glimpse of a supernatural wisdom, to which the secrets of all
hearts are open : —
But oh that God [Eloah] would speak,
and open his lips against thee,
1 Following Sept., with Merx and Bickell.

26 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. I.
and show thee the secrets of wisdom,
for wondrous are they in perfection ! *
Canst thou find the depths of God [Eloah] ?
canst thou reach to the end of Shaddai ?
Heights of heaven ! what canst thou do ?
deeper than Sheol ! what canst thou know ? (xi. 5-8.)
If Zophar had worked out this idea impartially, he might
have given to the discussion a fresh and more profitable turn.
He is so taken up with the traditional orthodoxy, however,
that he has no room for a deeper view of the problem. His
inference is that, in virtue of His perfect knowledge, God can
detect sin where man sees none, though that cruellest touch
of all with which the Massoretic text 2 burdens the reputation
of Zophar is not supported by the more accurate text of the
Septuagint, and we should read xi. 6 thus :
and thou shouldest know that God [Eloah] gives unto thee
thy deserts 3 for thine iniquity.
But indeed a special revelation ought not to be necessary
for Job. His trouble, proceeding as it does from one no less
wise than irresistible (xi. 10, 11), ought to dispel his dream
of innocence ; as Zophar generalises, when God's judgments
are abroad —
(Even) an empty head wins understanding,
and a wild ass's colt is new-born as a man (xi. 12).
We may pass over the brilliant description of prosperity
consequent on a true repentance with which the chapter con
cludes. It fell quite unheeded on the ears of Job, who was
more stung by the irritating speech of Zophar than by those
of Eliphaz and Bildad.
The taunt conveyed indirectly by Zophar in xi. 12 is ex-
1 Comp. Isa. xxviii. 29 (Heb.) By a slight error of the ear the copyist whom
our Hebrew Bibles follow put a Yod for an Alef. Hence the Massoretic critics
pronounce kiflayim ' twofold,' instead of kifldim ' like wonders : ' following
this text, Davidson renders, ' that it is double in (true) understanding.'
2 Literally ' . . . . that God brings into forgetfulness for thee some of thy
guilt.' s Following Sept., with Bickell. Comp. the Hebrew of Job xxxiii. 27.

CHAP. r. JOBS CALAMITY 2f
posed in all its futility in the reply of Job. Zophar himself,
however, he disdains to argue with ; there is the same intoler
able assumption of superiority in the speeches of all the three,
and this he assails with potent sarcasm.
No doubt ye are mankind,
and with you shall wisdom die.
I too have understanding like you,
and who knows not the like of this ? (xii. 2, 3.)
In what respect, pray, is he inferior to his friends ? Has
Eliphaz enjoyed a specially unique revelation ? Job has had a
still better opportunity of learning spiritual truth in commu
nion of the heart with God (xii. 4). Is Bildad an unwearied
collector of the wisdom of antiquity ? Job too admits the
value of tradition, though he will not receive it unproved
(xii. 11, 12). In declamation, too, Job can vie with the j
arrogant Zophar; Job's description of the omnipotence of-
God forms the counterpart of Zophar's description of His
omniscience. But of what account are generalities in face of \
such a problem as Job's ? The question of questions is not, < j
Has God all power and all wisdom, but, Does He use them
for moral ends ? The three friends refuse to look facts in the
face ; the righteous God (we must understand the words, if
there be one) will surely chastise them for insincerity and par
tisanship (xiii. 10).
And now Job refuses to waste any more words on his
opponents. But as for me, to Shaddai would I speak,
I crave to reason with God ; \
But ye — are plasterers of lies,
patchers of that which is worthless.
Your commonplaces are proverbs of ashes ;
your bulwarks are bulwarks of clay (xiii. 3, 4, 12).
He forms a new project, but shudders as he does so, for
he feels sure of provoking God thereby to deadly anger. Be
it so ; a man who has borne till he can bear no longer can
even welcome death.

28 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. i.
Behold, let him slay me ; I can wait [be patient] no longer ;'
still I will defend my ways to his face (xiii. 15).
It is the sublimest of all affirmations of the rights of con
science. Job is confident of the success of his plea : ' This
also (guarantees) victory to me, that an impious man cannot
come before him' (xiii. 16) with such a good conscience.
Thus virtue has an intrinsic value for Job, superior to that of
prosperity or even life : moral victory would more than com
pensate for physical failure. He indulges the thought that
God may personally take part in the argument (xiii. 20-22),
and in anticipation of this he sums up the chief points of his
intended speech (xiii. 23-xiv. 22), such as, 'How many2 are
my sins,' and 'Why chase dry stubble?' (xiii. 23, 25). Sad
complaints of the melancholy lot of mankind follow, reminding
us again that Job, like Dante in his pilgrimage, is not only an
individual but a representative.
Man that is born of woman,
short-lived and full of unrest,
comes up as a flower and fades,
flies as a shadow and continues not.
And upon such an one keepest thou thine eye open,
and me dost thou bring into judgment with thee ! (xiv. 1-3.)
Hard enough is the natural fate of man ; why make it
harder by exceptional severity ? An early reader misunder
stood this, and thought to strengthen Job's appeal by a
reference (in ver. 4) to one of the commonplaces of Eliphaz
(iv. 17-21). But ver. 5 shows that the idea which fills the
mind of Job is the shortness of human life.3 A tree, when
cut down according to the rules still current in Syria,4 dis
plays a marvellous vitality ; but man is only like the falling
1 This rendering is based on the reading of the Hebrew margin. The Hebrew
text has, ' Behold, should he slay me, for him would I wait,' implying an expec
tation of a Divine interposition in Job's favour after his death. But this idea is
against the connection ; besides which the restrictive particle ' only' (nearly = still)
agrees better with the other reading and rendering. ' Wait ' means ' wait for a
change for the better,' as in vi. 11, which occurs in a similar context.
2 He admits that he is not without sins (comp. ver. 26).
3 Comp. the well-known lamentation of Moschus (iii. 106-111).
4 See the notices from Wetzstein in Delitzsch.

chap. r. JOB S CALAMITY 29
leaves of a tree (xiii. 25), or (the figure preferred here) like
the canals of Egypt when the dykes and reservoirs are not
properly kept up (xiv. 1 1 ; comp. Isaiah xix. 5, 6). If it were
God's will to ' hide ' Job in dark Sheol for a time, and then
to recall him to the light, how gladly would he ' wait ' there,
like a soldier on guard (comp. vii. 1), till his 'relief came
(xiv. 14) ! — a fascinating thought, on which, baseless though
he considers it, Job cannot forbear to dwell. And the beauty
of the passage is that the happiness of restoration to con
scious life consists for Job in the renewal of loving communion
between himself and his God (xiv. 15). Alas ! the dim light
of She61 darkens the glorious vision and sends Job back into
despair.

30 THE BOOK OF JOB chap.

CHAPTER II.
THE SECOND CYCLE OF SPEECHES.
(chaps. XV.-XXI.)
The three narrow-minded but well-meaning friends have
exhausted their arsenal of arguments. Each with his own
favourite receipt has tried to cure Job of his miserable illusion,
and failed. Now begins a new cycle of speeches, in which
our sympathy is still more with Job than before. His replies
to the three friends ought to have shown them the incom
pleteness of their argument and the necessity of discovering
some way of reconciling the elements of truth on both sides.
They can teach him nothing, but the facts of spiritual expe
rience which he has expounded ought to have taught them
much. But all that they have learned is the impossibility
of bringing Job to self-humiliation by dwelling upon the
Divine attributes. No doubt their excuse lies in the irreverence
of their friend's manner and expressions. It is a part of the
tragedy of Job that the advice which was meant for practical
sympathy only resulted in separating Job for a time both
from God and from his friends. The narrow views of the
latter drove Job to irreverence, and his irreverence deprived
him of the lingering respect of his friends and seemed to
himself at times to cut off the slender chance of a recon
ciliation with God. From this point onwards the friends
cease to offer their supposed ' Divine consolations ' (xv. 1 1) —
t such as the gracious purpose of God's ways and the corrective
| object of affliction (v. 8-27)— and content themselves with
frightening Job by lurid pictures of the wicked man's fate,
i leading up, in the third cycle of speeches, to a direct accu
sation of Job as a wicked man himself. And yet, strange to

CHAP. n. THE SECOND CYCLE OF SPEECHES 3 1
say, as the tone of the friends becomes harsher and more
cutting, Job meets their vituperation with growing calmness
and dignity. Disappointed in his friends, he clings with'
convulsive energy to that never quite surrendered postulate
of his consciousness a God who owns the moral claims of
a creature on the Creator. Remarkable indeed is the first
distinct expression of this faith of the heart, of which an
antiquated orthodoxy sought to deprive him. He has just
listened to the personalities, the cruel assumptions, and the
shallow commonplaces of Eliphaz (who treats Job as an
arrogant pretender and a self-convicted blaspheming sinner),
and with a few words of utter contempt he turns his back on
his ' tormenting 1 comforters ' (xvi. 2). (Soon, however, he
will appeal to them for sympathy ; so strong is human nature !
See xix. 21.) Left to his own melancholy thoughts, he
repeats the sad details of his misery and of God's hostility
(and again we feel that the poet thinks of suffering humanity
in general 2), and reasserts his innocence in language after
wards used of the suffering Servant of Jehovah (xvi. 17 ; comp.
Isaiah liii. 9). Then in the highest excitement he demands'
vengeance for his blood. But who is the avenger of blood
but God (xix. 25 ; comp. Ps. ix. 12) — the very Foe who is
bringing him to death ? And hence the strange but welcome
thought that behind the God of pitiless force and undiscrimi-
nating severity there must be a God who recognises and
returns the love of His servants, or, in the fine words of the
Koran, ' that there is no refuge from God but unto Him.' 3
' Even now,' as he lies on the rubbish-heap —
Even now, behold, my Witness is in heaven,
and he that vouches for me is on high.
My friends (have become) my scorners ;
mine eye sheds tears unto God —
that he would right a man against God,
and a son of man against his friend (xvi. 20, 21).
1 Miss E. Smith's rendering, 'irksome,' Renan's 'insupportable,' are not defi
nite enough. Job means that his would-be comforters do but aggravate his unease.
2 Notice the expressions in xvi. 10, and comp. Ps. xxii. 7, 12, 13. (Ps. xxii.,
like the Book of Job, has some features which belong to an individual and some to
a collection of sufferers. ) Job would never have spoken of his friends in the terms
used in xvi. 10, 11. 3 Sur. ix. 119.

32 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. II.
It is a turning-point in the mental struggles of Job. He
cannot indeed account for his sufferings, but he ceases to
regard God as an unfeeling tyrant. He has a germ of faith
in God's goodwill towards him — only a germ, but we are
sure, even without the close of the story, that it will grow up
and bear the fruit of peace. And now, perhaps, we may
qualify the reproach addressed above to Job's friends. It is
true that they have driven Job to irreverent speeches respect
ing God, but they have also made it possible for him to reach
the intuition (which the prophetic Eliphaz has missed) of an
affinity between the Divine nature and the human. In an
earlier speech (ix. 32-35) he has already expressed a longing
for an arbiter between himself and God. That longing is
now beginning to be gratified by the certitude that, though
the God in the world may be against him, the God in heaven
is on his side. Not that even God can undo the past ; Job
requests no interference with the processes of nature. (Did
the writer think that Job lived outside the sphere or the age
of miracles ?) All that he asks is a pledge from God, his
Witness, to see his innocence recognised by God, his Perse
cutor (xvii. 3). So far we are listening to Job the individual.
' But immediately after we find the speaker exhibiting himself
as the type of a class — the class or representative category
of innocent sufferers. Job, then, has a dual aspect, like his
God. And he hath set me for a byword of peoples,
and I am one in whose face men spit.
At this the upright are appalled,
and the innocent stirs himself up against the impious ;
but the righteous holds on his way,
and he who has clean hands waxes stronger and stronger
(xvii. 6, 7, 9).
Here it is difficult not to see that the circumstances of the
poet's age are reflected in his words. The whole Jewish
nation became ' a byword of peoples ' during the exile,1 and
the mutual sympathy of its members was continually taxed.
1 Comp. Ps. xxii. 6, Isa. xlix. 7, Joel ii. 17 (where we should render 'make a
bvword upon them ').

CHAP. ii. THE SECOND CYCLE OF SPEECHES 33
It was a paradox which never lost its strangeness that a
' Servant of Jehovah ' should be trampled upon by unbelievers,
and the persecutor was rewarded by the silent indignation
of all good Jews. That this is the right view is shown by the
depression into which Job falls in vv. H-16, in spite of the
elevating passage quoted above.
Bildad's speech, with its barbed allusions to Job's sad
history, had a twofold effect. First of all it raised the .
anguish of Job to its highest point, and, secondly, it threw
the sufferer back on that great intuition, already reached by
him, of a Divine Witness to his integrity in the heavens. It
is a misfortune which can scarcely be appraised too highly
that the text of the famous declaration in xix. 25-27 is so
uncertain. ' The embarrassment of the English translators,'
remarks Prof. Green, of Princeton,1 ' is shown by the unusual
number of italic words, and these of no small importance to
the meaning, which are heaped together in these verses.' It
is scarcely greater, however, than that of the ancient versions,
and we can hardly doubt that the text used by the
Septuagint translator was already at least as corrupt as that
which has descended to us from the Massoretic critics.2 This
would the more easily be the case since, as Prof. Green says
again, ' Job is speaking under strong excitement and in the
language of lofty poetry ; he uses no superfluous words ; he
simply indicates his meaning in the most concise manner.'
Without now entering on a philological discussion, we have, I
think, to choose between these alternatives, one of which
involves emending the text, the other does not. Does Job
simply repeat what he has said in xvi. 18, 19 (viz. that God
will avenge his blood and make reparation, as it were, for
his death by testifying to his innocence), without referring
to any consequent pleasure of his own, or does he combine
with this the delightful thought expressed in xiv. 13-15 of a
1 The Argument of the Book of Job (1881), p. 200.
2 Dr. Hermann Schultz is an unexceptionable witness, because his tastes lead
him more to Biblical and dogmatic theology than to minute textual studies. He
is convinced, he says, after each fresh examination, of ' the baffling intricacy and
obscurity and the probable corruption of^Jiied^iU^-ijHftesfaMientliche Theologie,
¦ed. 2 [1878], pp. 661-2). "'' .\ rs.ri Of fy^
/ •'¦-—

34 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. ii.
conscious renewal of communion with God after death ? '
The context, it seems to me, is best satisfied by the former
alternative. Job's mind is at present occupied with the
cruelty, not of God (as when he said, ' O that thou wouldst
appoint me a term and then remember me,' xiv. 13), but of
his friends. His starting-point is, ' How long will ye (my
friends) pain my soul ? ' &c. (xix. 2.) We may admit that
the best solution of Job's problem would be 'the beatific
vision ' in some early and not clearly defined form of that
deep idea ; but if Job can say that he not merely dreams
but knows this (' I know that .... I shall see God,' xix.
25, 26), the remainder of the colloquies ought surely to pursue
a very different course : as a matter of fact, neither Job
nor his friends, nor yet Jehovah Himself, refers to this sup
posed newly-won truth, and the only part of ' Job's deepest
saying ' which the next speaker fastens upon (xx. 3) is the
threatening conclusion (xix. 29). Ewald himself has drawn
attention to this, without remarking its adverse bearing on
his own interpretation.2
Here, side by side, are Dr. A. B. Davidson's and Dr.
W. H. Green's translations of the received text of vv. 25-27,
and Dr. Bickell's version of his own emended text.
But I know that my redeemer liveth,
and in after time he shall stand upon the dust
and after this my skin is destroyed
and without my flesh I shall see God :
1 I agree with Dr. W. H. Green that the third view, which ' conceives Job to
be here looking forward, not to a future state, but to the restoration of God's
favour and his own deliverance out of all his troubles in the present life,' is to be
rejected. I do not follow him in all his reasons, but these two are decisive. ',
I. Everywhere else Job ' regards himself as on the verge of the grave. . . .Every
earthly hope is annulled ; every temporal prospect has vanished. He invariably
repels the idea, whenever his friends present it to him, of any improvement of his
condition in this world as plainly impossible.' 2. ' If he here utters his expecta
tion that God will interfere to reward his piety in the present life, be completely ;
abandons his own position and adopts [that of the friends]' (The Argument of
Job, pp. 204-5).
2 Job's vindication, thinks Ewald, would be incomplete if at least the spirit of
the dead man did not witness it.
3 The dust beneath which Job lies ; comp. ' ye that dwell in dust ' (Isa. ¦'
xxvi. 19).

chap. ir. THE SECOND CYCLE OF SPEECHES 35
whom I shall see for myself,
and mine eyes shall behold, and not another—
my reins consume within me !
And I know my redeemer liveth, and last on earth shall he
arise ; and after my skin, which has been destroyed thus, and
out of my flesh [i.e. when my vital spirit shall be separated
from my flesh] shall I see God ....
Ich weiss, es lebt mein Retter,
Wird noch auf meinem Staub stehn ;
Zuletzt wird Gott mein Zeuge,
Lasst meine Unschuld schauen,
Die ich allein jetzt schaun kann,
Mein Auge und kein andres.
Most critics are now agreed that the immediately pre
ceding words (vv. 23, 24) are not an introduction, as if vv.
25-27 composed the rock inscription. Job first of all wishes
what he knows to be impossible, and then announces a far
better thing of which he is sure. His wish runs thus :
Would then that they were written down —
my words — in a book, and engraved
with a pen of iron, and with lead
cut out for a witness in the rock.1
But whatever view we take of the prospect which glad
dened the mind of Job, his remaining speeches contain no
further reference to it. Henceforth his thoughts appear to
dwell less on his own condition, and more on the general
question of God's moral government, and even when the
former is spoken of it is without the old bitterness. In his
next speech, stirred up by the gross violence of Zophar, Job
for the first time meets the assertions of the three friends in
this cycle of argument, viz. that the wicked, at any rate,
always get their deserts, and, according to Zophar, suddenly
and overwhelmingly. He meets them by a direct negative,
though in doing so he is as much perturbed as when he
1 On the text see Bickell, Merx, Hitzig ; on the use of metal for public
notices see Chabas, quoted by Cook in Speaker's Comm., ad loc. D 2

36 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. n.
proclaimed his own innocence to God's face. He is familiar
now with the thought that the righteous are not always
recompensed, but it fills him with horror to think that the
Governor of the world even leaves the wicked in undeserved
prosperity, as if, in the language of Eliphaz, He could not 'judge
through the thick clouds ' (xxii. 1 6).
Why do the wicked live on,
become old, yea, are mighty in power ?
Their houses are safe, without fear,
neither is Eloah's rod upon them.
They wear away their days in happiness,
and go down to Sheol in a moment (xxi. 7, 9, 13).

37

CHAPTER III.
THE THIRD CYCLE OF SPEECHES.
(CHAPS. XXII.-XXXI.)
It is not wonderful that the gulf between Job and his friends
should only be widened by such a direct contradiction of the
orthodox tenet. The friends, indeed, cannot but feel the
force of Job's appeal to experience, as they show by the
violence of their invective. But they are neither candid nor,
above all, courageous enough to confess the truth ; they
speak, as the philosopher Kant observes, as if they knew
their powerful Client was listening in the background. And
so a third cycle of speeches begins (chaps, xxii.-xxxi.), in
which the friends grasp the only weapon left them and charge
Job directly with being a great sinner. True to his character, ¦
however, Eliphaz even here seeks to soften the effect of his
accusations by a string of most enticing promises, partly
worldly and partly other-worldly in their character, and which
in a different context Job would have heartily appreciated
(xxii. 21-30).
But Job cares not to reply to those charges of Eliphaz ;
his mind is still too much absorbed in the painful mystery of
his own lot and that of all other righteous sufferers. He
longs for God to set up his tribunal, so that Job and his
fellows might plead their cause (xxiii. 3-7, xxiv. 1). What
most of all disturbs him is that he cannot see God — that is •
cannot detect the operation of that moral God in whom his
heart cannot help believing. ' I may go forward, but he is
not there ; and backward, but I cannot perceive him ' (xxiii. 8).
With the ardour of a pessimist he depicts this failure of
j'ustice in the darkest colours (chap, xxiv.), and is as power
less as ever to reconcile his deep sense of what God ought to

38 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. UT.
be and must be and the sad realities of life. Upon this
Bildad tries to frighten Job into submission by a picture of
'God's irresistible power, as exhibited not only in heaven and
earth, but even beneath the ocean depths in the realm of the
shades (xxv., xxvi. 5-14). Not a very comforting speech, but
fine in its way (if Bildad may really be credited with all of it),
and the speaker frankly allows its inadequacy.
Lo ! these are the outskirts of his ways,
and how faintly spoken is that which we hear !
but the thunder of his power who can understand ? (xxvi. 14.)
In a speech, the first which is described as a mashal?- Job
demolishes his unoriginal and rhetorical opponent, and with
dignity reasserts his innocence (xxvi. 1-4, xxvii. 1-7). He
may have said more ; if so, it has been lost. But, in fact, all
that was argumentative in Bildad's speech was borrowed from
Eliphaz, and though Job had the power (see chaps, ix., xii.),
he had not the will to compete with his friends in rhetoric.
The only speaker who is left is Zophar, and, as it is unlikely
that the poet left one of his triads of speeches imperfect, we
may conjecture that xxvii. 8-10, 10-23 belongs to the third
speech of Zophar.2 Certainly they are most inappropriate in
the mouth of Job, being in direct contradiction to all that he
has yet said. If so it seems very probable that besides the
introductory formula a few opening verses have dropped $ut
of the text. The verses which now stand at the head of the
speech transport us to the disputes of those rival schools of
which Job and his friends were only the representatives.
Hence the use of the plural in ver. 12, of which an earlier
instance occurs in the second speech of Bildad (xviii. 2).
What Zophar says is in effect this : Job's condition is desperate,
for he is an ' impious ' or ' godless ' man. It is too late for
1 On this characteristic word for parallelistic poetry, see on Proverbs.
2 Note that xxvii. 13 is repeated from an earlier speech of Zophar (xx. 29).
There it concludes a sketch of the ' impious ' man's fate ; here it begins a similar
description. Verses II and 12 of the same chapter would stand more properly
(Bickell and virtually Hirzel) immediately before chap, xxviii. Mr. B. Wright
is very near doing the same ; following Eichhorn, he takes vv. 1 3-23 as a speci
men quoted by Job of the friends' ' inconsequential ' style of argument (a less
natural hypothesis than that adopted here).

CHAP. in. THE THIRD CYCLE OF SPEECHES 39
any one to attempt to pray when overtaken by a fatal
calamity. For how can he feel that ' deep delight ' in God
which enables a man to pray, with the confidence of being
heard, 'in every season' of life, whether prosperous or the
reverse ? The rest of the speech is substantially a repetition
of Zophar's former description of the retribution of the
wicked. It was not to be expected that Job should reply to
this, and accordingly we find that in continuing his mashal
(xxix. i) he utterly ignores his opponents. But unhappily he
is almost as far as ever from a solution of his difficulty. His
friends, we may suppose, have left him, and he is at liberty to
revive those melancholy memories which are all that remain to
him of his prosperity.
In chap. xxix. (a fine specimen of flowing, descriptive
Hebrew poetry) Job recalls the honour in which he used to
be held, and the beneficent acts which he was enabled to
perform. Modesty were out of place, for he is already
in the state of ' one turned adrift among the dead ' (Ps.
lxxxviii. 5). The details remind us of many Arabic elegies
in the Hamdsa (e.g. No. 351 in Riickert's adaptation, vol. i.,
or 97 in Freytag). In chaps, xxx., xxxi. he laments, with
the same pathetic self-contemplation, his ruined credit and
the terrible progress of his disease. Then, by a somewhat
abrupt transition,1 he enters upon an elaborate profession of
his innocence, which has been compared to the solemn
repudiation of the forty-two deadly sins by the departed
souls of the good in the Egyptian ' Book of the Dead.' The
resemblance, however-, must not be pressed too far. Job's
morality, even if predominantly ' legal,' has a true ' evange
lical ' tinge. Not merely the act of adultery, but the glance
of lust ; not merely unjust gain, but the confidence reposed
in it by the heart ; not merely outward conformity to idol-
worship, but the inclination of the heart to false gods, are in
his catalogue of sins. His last words are a reiteration of his
1 It seems clear that chap. xxxi. was not written as the sequel of chap. xxx.
Since, however, it bears such a strong impress of originality, one can only suppose
that the author placed it here by an afterthought, and omitted to construct a con
necting link with the preceding chapter.

40 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. ill.
deeply cherished desire for an investigation of his case by
Shaddai. With what proud self-possession he imagines him
self approaching the Divine Judge ! In his hands are the
accusations of his friends and his own reply. Holding them
forth, he exclaims —
Here is my signature — let Shaddai answer me —
and the indictment which mine adversary has written.
Surely upon my shoulder will I carry it,
and bind it as chaplets about me.
The number of my steps will I declare unto him ;
as a prince will I come near unto him (xxxi. 35-37).1
-^ We must here turn back to a passage which forms one of
' the most admired portions of the Book of Job as it stands —
the mashal on Divine Wisdom in chap, xxviii. The first
eleven verses are at first sight most inappropriate in this
connection. The poet seems to take a delight in working
into them all that he knows of the adventurous operations of
the miners of his day — probably those carried on for gold in
Upper Egypt, and for copper and turquoises in the Sinaitic
peninsula (both skilfully introduced by Ebers into his stories
of ancient Egypt). How vividly the superiority of reason to
instinct is brought out to vary the technical description of the
miners' work in vv. 7, 8.
A path the eagle knows not,
nor has the eye of the vulture scanned it ;
the sons of pride have not trodden it,
nor hath the lion passed over it.
No earthly treasures lie too deep for human industry ; but
— here we see the use of the great literary feat (Prov. i.-ix.)
which has gone before — 'where can wisdom be found, and
where is the place of understanding ? ' And then follows that
fine passage in which language is strained to the uttermost
(with another of those pictorial inventories in which poets
delight, vv. 15-19) to convey at once the preciousness and the
unattainableness of the higher wisdom. The moral of the
whole, however, is not revealed till the last verse.
1 These verses have been misplaced in the Massoretic text (as Isa. xxxviii. 21,
22). They clearly ought to stand at the end of the chapter. So Kennicott,
Ekhhorn, Merx, Delitzsch.

CHAP. in. THE THIRD CYCLE OF SPEECHES 4 1
And unto man he said,
' Behold, the fear of the Lord is wisdom,
and to turn aside from evil is understanding' (xxviii. 28).
Thus there is no allusion whatever to Job's problem, and it is
only the present position of the mashal in the Book of Job
which suggests a possible relation for it to that problem.
And now, looking at the passage by itself, is it conceivable
that it was originally written to stand where it now does ?
Is it natural that the solemn contents of chap, xxvii. (even if
we allow the first seven verses only to be Job's) should leave
Job in a mood for an elaborate poetical study of mining •
operations, or that after agonising so long over the painful
riddles of Divine Providence he should suddenly acquiesce in
the narrow limits of human knowledge, soon, however, to
relapse into his old inquisitiveness ? Is it not, on the other
hand, very conceivable (notice the opening word ' For ') that
it was transferred to its present position from some other
work ? In a didactic poem on Wisdom (i.e. the plan of the
universe), similar to Prov. i.-ix., it would be as much in place
as the hymn on Wisdom in Prov. viii. To this great work
indeed it presents more than one analogy, both in its subject
and its recommendation of religious morality (or moral
religion) as the branch of wisdom suitable to man. The
only difference is that the writer of Job xxviii. expressly says
that this is the only wisdom within human ken, whereas
the writer of Prov. viii. does not touch on this point.
But, whether an extract from a larger work or written as a
supplement to the poem of Job, the passage in its present
position is evidently intended to have a reference to Job's
problem. The author, or the extractor, regarded the fore
going debates much as Milton regarded those of the fallen
angels, who ' found no end, in wandering mazes lost ; ' in
short, he could only solve the problem by pronouncing it
insoluble.1 Verses n and 12 of chap, xxvii. have very much
the appearance of an artificial bridge inserted by the new
author or the extractor.
1 But for this tendency of the poem one might follow Delitzsch (art. ' Hiob '
in Herzog-Plitt, vi. 133) and regard chap, xxviii. as inserted by the author oi Job
from his ' portfolio.'

42 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. iv.

CHAPTER IV.
THE SPEECHES OF ELIHU.
(CHAPS. XXXII.-XXXVII.)
At a (perhaps) considerably later period than the original
work (including chap, xxviii.) — symbolised by the youthful-
ness of Elihu as compared with the four older friends — the
problem of the sufferings of the innocent still beset the minds
of the wise men, the attempt of the three friends to 'justify
the ways of God ' to the intellect having proved, as the wise
men thought, a too manifest failure (xxxii. 2, 3). One of
their number therefore invented a fourth friend, Elihu (or is
this the name of the author himself ? '), who is described as
having been a listener during the preceding debates, and who
reduces Job to silence. It is noteworthy that the sudden
introduction of Elihu required the insertion of a fresh narra
tive passage (xxxii. 1-6) as a supplement to the original
prologue. I assume, as the reader will observe, the one assured
result of the criticism of Job. To those who follow me in
this, the speeches of Elihu will, I think, gain greatly in
interest. They mark out a time when, partly through the
teaching of history, partly through a deeper inward experi
ence, and partly through the reading of the poem of Job, the
old difficulties of faith were no longer so acutely felt. Two
courses were open to the Epigoni of that age — either to force
Job to say what, as it seemed, he ought to have said (this,
• So M. Derenbourg, who points out that none of the other speakers have a
genealogy, and identifies Buz with Boaz, and Ram with an ancestor of David
(Ruth iv. 19). The author of chaps, xxxii. -xxxvii. might thus be a descendant of
Elihu the brother of David (1 Chr. xxvii. 18).

CHAP. IV. THE SPEECHES OF ELIHU 43
however, was not so easy as in the case of Ecclesiastes), or
to insert fresh speeches in the style of the original, separating
the corn from the chaff in the pleadings of the three friends,
and adding whatever a more advanced religious thought sug
gested to the writer. In forms of expression, however, it
must be admitted that Elihu does not shine. (True, he does
not profess to comfort Job.) For offensiveness the two fol
lowing verses are not easily matched :
Where is there a man like Job,
who drinks 1 scoffing like water? (xxxiv. 7.)
Would that Job might be tried to the uttermost
because of his answers in the manner of wicked men (xxxiv. 36).
A ' vulgar braggart ' he may not be from an Oriental point
of view, nor is he ' the prototype of the Bachelor in Faust ; '
but that he is too positive and dogmatic, and much overrates
his own powers, is certain. He represents the dogmatism of
a purified orthodoxy, which thinks too much of its minute
advances (' one perfect in knowledge is with thee,' xxxvi. 4).
Elihu distributes his matter (of which he says that he is
'full,' xxxii. 18-20) over four speeches. His themes in the
first three are : 1, the ground and object of suffering (chaps.
xxxii., xxxiii.) ; 2, the righteousness of God (chap, xxxiv.) ;
and 3, the use of religion (chap, xxxv.), all of which are
treated in relation to the questionable or erroneous utterances
of Job. Then, in his last and longest effort, Elihu unrolls
before Job a picture of the government of God, in its benefi
cence and righteousness as well as its omnipotence, in the
hope of moving Job to self-humiliation (chaps, xxxvi.,
xxxvii.) Let us remember again that Elihu represents the
debates of the ' wise men ' of the post-regal period, who were
conscious of being in some sense ' inspired ' like their pro
phetic predecessors (xxxii. 8, xxxvi. 4 ; Ecclus. xxiv. 32-34,
1. 28, 29), so that we cannot believe that the bizarre im
pression made by Elihu on some Western critics was in
tended by the original author. That his portrait suggests
certain grave infirmities, may be granted ; but these are
1 On ' drinks ' see Thomson, The Land and the Book, p. 319.

44 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. iv.
the failings of the circle to which the author belongs :
the self-commendation of Elihu in his exordium is hardly
excessive from an Oriental point of view, or would at any
rate be justifiable in a more original thinker. Indeed, he
only commends himself in order to excuse the unusual step
of criticising the proceedings of men so much older than him
self. After what he thinks sufficient excuse has been offered,
Elihu takes up Job's fundamental error, self- righteousness,
but prepares the way by examining Job's assertion (xix. 7,
xxx. 20) that God took no heed of his complaints.
Wherefore hast thou contended with Him
because ' He answers none of my words '? ' (xxxiii. 13.)
To this Elihu replies that it is a man's own fault if he cannot
hear the Divine voice. For God is constantly speaking to
man, if man would only regard it (' revelation,' then, is not
confined to a class or a succession). Two means of commu
nication are specially mentioned — nightly dreams and visions,
and severe sickness. The object of both is to divert men
from courses of action which can only lead to destruction.
At this point a remarkable intimation is given. In order to
produce conversion, and so to ' redeem a man from going
down to the pit,' a special angelic agency is necessary — that
of a ' mediator ' or ' interpreter ' (Targ. p'raqllta ; comp.
-rrapcucXnTos, John xiv. 16, 26), whose office it is to 'show unto
man his rightness ' (i.e. how to conform his life to the right
standard, xxxiii. 23).
We must pause here, however, to consider the bearings of
this. It seems to show us, first, that inspired minds (see
above) were already beginning to refine and elevate the
popular notions of the spiritual world. That there were two
classes of spirits, the one favourable, the other adverse to
man, had long been the belief of the Israelites and their
neighbours.2 The author of the speeches of Elihu now intro-
1 The text (which has 'His words') is generally rendered ' because He gives not
account of any of His matters,' i.e. of the details of His government. This is very
strained; the Sept. has ' my words,' the Vulgate 'thy words,' either of which
readings gives a natural sense.
2 See 2 Sam. xxiv. 16, and comp. 1 Chr. xxi. 15, Ps. lxxviii. 49, Prov. xvi.

OHAr. iv. THE SPEECHES OF ELIHU 45
duces one of them among the symbols of a higher stage of
religion. In antithesis to the ' destroyers ' l (ver. 22) he implies
that God has thousands of angels (the ' mediator ' is ' one
among a thousand '), whose business it is to save sinners
from destruction by leading them to repentance. Such is
the cpiXavOpcoiTia, the friendliness to man, of the angelic
world,1 without which indeed, according to Elihu, the purpose
of sickness would be unobserved and a fatal issue inevitable.
To students of Christianity, however, it has a deeper interest,
if the concluding words, ' I have found a ransom,' be a part
of the Old Testament foundation of the doctrine of redemp
tion through Christ. This, however, is questionable, and
even its possibility is not recognised by the latest ortho
dox commentator.2 In his second speech Elihu returns
to the main question of Job's attitude towards God. He
begins by imputing to Job language which he had never
used, and which from its extreme irreverence Job would
certainly have disowned (xxxiv. 5, 9), and maintains that
God never acts unjustly, but rewards every man according to
his deeds. There is nothing in his treatment of this theme
which requires comment except its vagueness and generality,
to which, were the speech an integral part of the poem, Job
would certainly have taken exception.
The subject of the third speech is handled with more ori
ginality. Job had really complained that afflicted persons such
as himself appealed to God in vain (xxiv. 12, xxx. 20). Elihu
14, Ezek. ix. I, a. 7 ; also Jost, Gesch. des Judenthums, i. 304. For Assyria
see Records of the Past, i. 131-5 ; iv. 53-60 (the sinner was thought to be given
up in displeasure by his God into the hands of the evil spirits). For Arabia see
Koran, Ixxix. I, 2 —
' By those (angels) who tear out (souls) with violence,
And by those who joyously release them : '
for the early Christian, Justin M. Dial. c. Tryph. 105, to av-ra afc&ntv rbv 8ebv,
tov Svv&iievov ctirocrrptyai iroi/TO avaiSrj Trovqpbv &yye\ov jU7) Aaj8eV0oi rfpuv rrjs
tyvxvs '¦ and for the medieval, Dante, Inferno, xxvii. 1 12-123 ; Purgatorio, v. 103-
108. Comp. below, Chap. X.
1 Blake seems to have felt Elihu's strong faith in the angels. The border of
his 1 2th illustration is filled with a stream of delicate angel forms.
2 Davidson. Ewald explains the ' ransom ' partly of the intercession of the
angel, partly of the prayer of repentance.

46 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. IV.
replies to this (xxxv. 9-1 3) that such persons merely cried from
physical pain, and did not really pray. The fourth and last
speech, in which he dismisses controversy and expresses his
own sublime ideas of the Creator, has the most poetical
interest. At the very outset the solemnity of his language
prepares the reader to expect something great, and the
expectation is not altogether disappointed. ' God,' he says,
'is mighty, but despiseth not any ' (xxxvi. 5) ; He has given
proof of this by the trials with which He visits His servants
when they have fallen into sin. Might and mercy are the
principal attributes of God. The verses in which Elihu
applies this doctrine to Job's case are ambiguous and perhaps
corrupt, but it appears as if Elihu regarded Job as in danger
of missing the disciplinary object of his sufferings. It is in
the second part of his speech (xxxvi. 26-xxxvii. 24) that
Elihu displays his greatest rhetorical power, and though by
no means equal to the speeches of Jehovah, which it appears
to imitate, the vividness of its descriptions has obtained the
admiration of no less competent a judge than Alexander
von Humboldt. The moral is intended to be that, instead
of criticising God, Job should humble himself in devout awe at
the combined splendour and mystery of the creation.
It is tempting to regard the sketch of the storm in xxxvi.
29-xxxvii. 5 and the appeals which Elihu makes to Job as
preparatory to the appearance of Jehovah in xxxviii. 1.
' While Elihu is speaking,' says Mr. Turner, ' the clouds
gather, a storm darkens the heavens and sweeps across the
landscape, and the thuncjer utters its voice .... out of the
whirlwind that passes by Jehovah speaks.' ' So too Dr.
Cox thinks that Job's invisible Opponent ' opens His mouth
and answers him out of the tempest which Elihu has so
graphically described.'2 In fact in xxxviii. 1 we may equally
well render ' the tempest ' (i.e. that lately mentioned) and
'a tempest' The objection is (1) that the storm does not
come into the close of Elihu's speech, as it ought to do, and (2)
that in His very first words Jehovah distinctly implies that
1 Turner, Studies Biblical and Oriental, p. 146.
2 Cox, Commentary on the Book of fob, p. 489.

chap. iv. THE SPEECHES OF ELIHU 47
the last speaker was one who ' darkened counsel by words
without knowledge' (xxxviii. 2).
Such are the contributions of Elihu, which gain con
siderably when considered as a little treatise in themselves.
It is, indeed, a strange freak of fancy to regard Elihu as
representing the poet himself.1 Neither aesthetically nor
theologically do they reach the same high mark as the
remainder of the book. ' The style of Elihu,' as M. Renan
remarks, ' is cold, heavy, pretentious. The author loses him
self in long descriptions without vivacity. . . . PI is language
is obscure and presents peculiar difficulties. In the other
parts of the poem the obscurity comes from our ignorance
and our scanty means of comprehending these ancient docu
ments ; here the obscurity comes from the style itself, from
its bizarrerie and affectation.'2 Theologically it is difficult
to discover any important point (but see Chap. XII., below, on
Elihu) in which, in spite of his sharp censure of the friends,
he distinctly passes beyond them. His arguments have been
so largely anticipated by the three friends that, on the whole,
we may perhaps best regard chaps, xxxii.-xxxix. as a first
theological criticism on the contents of the original work.
From this point of view it is interesting that the idea of
affliction as correction, which had already occurred to Eliphaz,
acquired in the course of years a much deeper hold on think
ing minds (see xxxiii. 19-30, xxxvi. 8-10). There is one
feature of the earlier speeches which is not imitated by Elihu,
and that is the long and terrifying descriptions in each of the
three original colloquies of the fate of the impious man, and
one of the most considerate of Elihu's Western critics 3 thinks
it possible that Elihu, who says in one place —
And the impious in heart cherish wrath,
and supplicate not when he hath bound them (xxxvi. 13) —
considered no calamity whatever as penal in the first
instance. 1 So Lightfoot (see Lowth, Pralect. xxxii.). 2 Le livre dejob, p. liv.
3 Davidson, The Book of Job, p. xiv.

48 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. V.

CHAPTER V.
THE SPEECHES OF JEHOVAH.
(CHAPS. XXXVIII.-XLII. 6.)
' The words of Job are ended ' (xxxi. 40^), remarks the ancient
editor, and amongst the last of these words is an aspiration
after a meeting with God. That Job expected such a favour
in this life is in the highest degree improbable, whatever view
be taken of xix. 25-27. It is true, he sometimes did almost
regard a theophany as possible, though he feared it might
be granted under conditions which would make it the re
verse of a boon (ix. 3, 15, 33-35 ; xiii. 21, 22). He wished
for a fair investigation of his character, and he craved that
God would not appear in too awful a form. It seems at first
sight as if Jehovah, casting hard questions at Job out of the
tempest, and ignoring both the friends' indictment and Job's
defence (xxxi. 35-37), were realising Job's worst fears and
acting as his enemy. The friends had already sought to
humble Job by pointing him to the power and wisdom and
goodness of God, and Job had proved conclusively that he
was no stranger to these high thoughts. Is the poet con
sistent with himself, first, in introducing Jehovah at all, and,
secondly, in making Him overpower Job by a series of sharp,
ironical questions ? Several answers may be given if we wish
to defend the unity of the poem. Job himself (it may be said)
has not continued at the same high level of faith as in
xix. 25-27 (assuming Prof. Davidson's view of the passage);
he needs the appearance of Jehovah more than he did then.
As to the course attributed in xxxviii. 1 to Jehovah, this too
(the poet may have felt in adding these speeches) was really the
best for Job. Jehovah might no doubt have declared Job to

CHAP. V. THE SPEECHES OF JEHOVAH 49
be in the right as against his friends. He might next have
soothed the sufferer's mind by revealing the reason why his
trials were permitted (we know this from the Prologue). But
this would not have been for Job's spiritual welfare : there
was one lesson he needed to learn or to relearn, one grace of
character he needed to gain or to regain — namely, devout and
trustful humility towards God. In the heat of debate and
under the pressure of pain Job's old religious habit of mind
had certainly been weakened — not destroyed, but weakened —
and a strong remedy was necessary if he was not to carry his
distracted feelings to the grave. And so, as a first joyful
surprise, came the theophany : to ' see ' God before death
must have been a joyful surprise ; and if the questioning cast
him down, yet it was only to raise him up in the strength of
self-distrust. The object of these orations of Jehovah is not
to communicate intellectual light, but to give a stronger tone to
Job's whole nature. He had long known God to be strong and
wise and good, but more as a lesson learned than as personal
experience (xlii. 5). And the means first adopted to convey
this life-giving ' sight ' is not without a touch of that humour
which we noticed in the Prologue. Job, who was so full of
questions, now has the tables turned upon him. He is put
through a catechism which admits of but one very humbling
answer, each question being attached to a wonderfully vivid
description of some animal or phenomenon. For descriptive
power the first speech of Jehovah, at any rate, is without a
parallel. The author, as Prof. Davidson remarks, ' knew the
great law that sublimity is necessarily also simplicity.' It is
true he does but give us isolated features of the natural
world : no single scene is represented in its totality. But
this is in accordance with the Hebrew genius, to which nature
appears, not in her own simple beauty, but bathed in an
atmosphere of emotion. The emotion which here animates
the poet is mainly a religious one ; it is the love of God, and
of God's works for the sake of their Maker. He wishes to
cure the murmuring spirits of his own day by giving them
wider views of external nature and its mysteries, so won-
E

50 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. v.
drously varied and so full of Divine wisdom and goodness.
He has this great advantage in doing so, that they, like him
self (and Job), are theists ; they are not of those who say
in their heart, 'There is no God,' but of the 'Zion' who
complains, 'Jehovah has forsaken me, and my Lord has
forgotten me' (Isaiah xlix. 14). And the remedy which
he applies is the same as that of the Babylonian-Jewish
prophet, a wider study of the ways of God. Job had
said, ' I would tell Him the number of my steps ; ' Jehovah
replies by showing him, in a series of questions, not irritating
but persuasive, the footprints of His own larger self-manifes
tation. The Divine Speaker is introduced by the poet thus :
And Jehovah answered Job out of a tempest, and said.
A storm was the usual accompaniment of a Divine ap
pearance : there was no intention of crushing Job with terror.
In Blake's thirteenth drawing Job (and his wife !) are repre
sented kneeling and listening, with countenances expressive
of thankfulness ; in his fourteenth, Job and his four friends
kneel rapt and ecstatic, while the ' sons of God,' sweet, vital,
heavenly forms, are shouting for joy. In fact, the speeches of
Jehovah contain, not accusations (except in xxxviii. 2), but
remonstrances, and, though the form of these is chilling to
Job's self-love, yet the glorious visions which they evoke are
healing to every sorrow of the mind. The text of the
speeches is unfortunately not in perfect order. For instance,
there are four verses which have, no one can tell how, been
deposited in the description of behemoth (xii. 9-12, A. V.)
but which most probably at one time or another opened the
first speech of Jehovah. Perhaps the author himself removed
them, feeling them to be too depressing for Job to hear ; or
perhaps it was purely by accident that they were transferred,
and Merx and Bickell have done well to replace them in their
corrected editions of Job between xxxi. 37 and xxxviii. 1,
As corrected by the former they run thus : —
Behold, his hope is belied :
will he fight against mine appearing ?

chap. v. THE SPEECHES OF JEHOVAH 5 1
He is not so bold as to stir me up ;
who indeed could stand before me ?
Who ever attacks me in safety ?
all beneath the whole heaven is mine.
I will not take his babbling in silence,
his mighty speech and its comely arrangement.
We must regard this as a soliloquy, after which, directly \
addressing Job, Jehovah upbraids the ' mighty speaker ' with
having shut himself out by his ' blind clamour ' from a view of
the Divine plan of his life.
Who is this that darkens counsel
by words without knowledge ? (xxxviii. 2.)
To gain that ' knowledge ' which will ' make darkness light
before him,' Job must enrich his conception of God. Those
striking pictures already referred to have no lower aim than
to display the great All-wise God, and the irony of the cate
chising is only designed to bring home the more forcibly to
Job human littleness and ignorance. Modern readers, how
ever, cannot help turning aside to admire the genius of the
poet and his sympathetic interest in nature. His scientific
ideas may be crude ; but be observes as a poet, and not as a
naturalist. Earth, sea, and sky successively enchain him, and
we can hardly doubt that the natural philosophy of the Chal
daeans was superficially at least known to him.1 In his childlike
curiosity and willingness to tell us everything he reminds us
of the poet of the Commedia.
Has the rain a father ? 2
or who has begotten the dew-drops ?
from whose womb came forth the ice,
and the hoar frost of heaven — who engendered it,
(that) the waters close together like a stone,
and the face of the deep hides itself?
1 See Sayce on ' Babylonian Astronomy' ( Transactions of Soc. of Bibl. Archeo
logy, 1 874) ; Lenormant, La magie chez les ChaUMens, and his Syllabaires cunei-
formes (1876), p. 48.
2 This is not mere « patriarchal simplicity' (Renan, p. lvi.), but a contradic
tion of the mythic view that a nature god like Baal is the ' father ' or producer of
the rain and the crops (see Cheyne, Isaiah, ed. 3, i. 28, 294, ii. 295). Elihu
no doubt goes further in his explanations ; see xxxvi. 27, 28. B 2

52 THE BOOK OF JOB

CHAP. v.

Dost thou bind the knots of the Pleiades,1
or loose the fetters of Orion ? 2
Dost thou bring forth the moon's watches at their season,
and the Bear and her offspring — dost thou guide them ?
Knowest thou the laws of heaven ?
dost thou determine its influence upon the earth ?
(xxxviii. 28-33.)
' The laws of heaven ! ' Can we refuse to observe the first
beginnings of a conception of the cosmos, remembering other
passages of the Wisdom Literature in which the great world
plan is distinctly referred to ? Without denying a pre-Exil'e,
native Hebrew tendency (comp. Job xxxviii. 33 with Jer. xxxi.
35, 36) may we not suppose that the physical theology of
• Babylonia had a large part in determining the form of this
conception ? Notice the reference to the influence of the sky
upon the earth, and especially the Hebraised Babylonian
phrase Mazzaroth (i.e. mazarati3 plural of mazarta, a watch),
the watches or stations of the moon which marked the
progress of the month. But it is not so much the intel
lectual curiosity manifest in these verses which we would
dwell upon now as the poetic vigour of the gallery ot
zoology, and, we must add, the faith which pervades it,
reminding us of a Bedouin prayer quoted by Major Palmer,
' O Thou who providest for the blind hyaena, provide for me ! '
Ten (or nine) specimens of animal life are given — the lion and
(perhaps) the raven,4 the wild goat and the hind, the wild
1 Heb. kima ; comp. Ass. kimtu, ' a family.' The word occurs again in ix. 9,
Am. v. 8 (but are not this verse and the closely related one in iv. 13 additions by
a later editor of Amos in the Exile period ?)
2 Heb. k'sil, the name of the foolhardy giant who strove with Jehovah. The
Chaldeo-Assyrian astrology gave the name kisiluv to the ninth month, connecting
it with the zodiacal sign Sagittarius. But there are valid reasons for attaching the
Hebrew popular myth to Orion.
3 ' He did not watch the stars of heaven, nor the mazarati.'' So Fox Talbo
quotes from a cuneiform tablet (Transactions of Soc. of Bibl. Archeology, 1872, p.
341). The above explanation, however, which is that of Delitzsch on Job, diners
from that of Fox Talbot.
4 Mr. Bateson Wright's pointing, Id'ereb for la'orebh, is plausible. The raven
is' an insignificant companion to the lion, and the birds of prey are mentioned at
the end of Job's picture gallery. Render ¦ who provides in the' evening his food,'
&c. ; but in this case should not labhi in ver. 39 be rendered ' lion ' rather than
« lioness ' (note ' his young ones ') ? The root idea is probably voracity. That

chap. v. THE SPEECHES OF JEHOVAH 53
ass, the wild ox,1 the ostrich, the war horse, the hawk and
the eagle. It is to this portion that the student must
turn who would fain know the highest attainments of the
Hebrew genius in pure poetry, such as Milton would have
recognised as poetry. The delighted wonder with which the
writer enters into the habits of the animals, and the light and
graceful movement of the verse, make the ten descriptions
referred to an ever-attractive theme, I will not say for the
translator, but for the interpreter. They are ideal, as the
Greek sculptures are ideal, and need the pen of that poet-
student, faint hints of whose coming have been given us in
Herder and Riickert. The finest of them, of course, is that
of one of the animals most nearly related in Arabia to man
(in Arabia, but not in Judaea), the horse.
Dost thou give might to the horse ?
Dost thou clothe his neck with waving mane ?
Dost thou make him bound as a locust ?
The peal of his snort is terrible !
He paws in the valley and rejoices in his strength ;
he goes foith to meet the weapons ;
he laughs at fear, and is not dismayed,
and recoils not from the sword :
the quiver clangs upon him,
the flashing lance and the javelin :
bounding furiously he swallows the ground,
and cannot stand still at the blast of the trumpet ;
at every blast he says, ' Aha ! '
and smells the battle from afar,
the captain's thunder and the cry of battle (xxxix. 19-25).
The terrible element in animal instincts seems indeed to
fascinate the mind of our poet ; he closes his gallery with a
sketch of the cruel instincts of the glorious eagle. We are
labium iv. 11 is the feminine is no objection. Comp. Ps. lvii. 5, and perhaps Hos.
xiii. 8. Possibly, however, the ' raven ' was inserted here to make up the number
ten, by a reminiscence of Ps. cxlvii. 9.
1 The ' unicorn ' of A. V. comes from the Sept. and Vulg. ; but in Deut.
xxxiii. 17 the re' em is said to have ' horns.' Schlottmann and Delitzsch identify
it with the oryx or antelope, but the oryx was tamable (Wilkinson, Egyptians,
i. 227), whereas our poet asks, ' Will the re' em be willing to serve thee?' See
Cheyne on Isa. xxxiv. 7.

54 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. v.
reminded, perhaps, of the lines of a poet painter inspired by
Job- Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry ? '
And now we might almost think that the object of the
theophany has been attained. Never more will Job presume
to litigate with Shaddai, or measure the doings of God by his
puny intellect. He has learned the lesson expressed in Dante's
line — State contenti, umana gente, al quia,2
but also that higher lesson, so boldly expressed by the same
poet, that in all God's works, without exception, three attributes
are seen united —
Fecemi la divina potestate,
La somma sapienza, e '1 primo amore.3
He is silenced, indeed, but only as with the poet of Para
dise — • AU' alta fantasia qui mancb possa.4
The silence with which both these ' vessels of election '
meet the Divine revelation is the silence of satisfaction, even
though this be mingled with awe. Job has learned to forget
himself in the wondrous creation of which he forms a part ,
just as Dante when he saw
La forma universal di questo nodo.5
Job cannot, indeed, as yet express his feelings ; awe pre
ponderates over satisfaction in the words assigned to him in
xl. 4, 5. In fact, he has fallen below his better knowledge,
and must be humbled for this. He has known that he is but
a part of humanity — a representative of the larger whole, and
might, but for his frailty, have comforted himself in that
thought. God's power and wisdom and goodness are so
wondrously blended in the great human organism that he
1 Blake, Songs of Experience. z Purer., j;;, 37,
8 Lnf., iii. 5, 6. 4 paraij,t xxxjjj. I42.
3 Parad., xxxiii. 91.

CHAP, v, THE SPEECHES OF JEHOVAH 55
might have rested amidst his personal woes in the certainty
of at least an indirect connection with the gentler manifesta
tions of the ' Watcher of mankind ' (vii. 20). This thought
has proved ineffectual, and so the Divine Instructor tries
another order of considerations. And, true enough, nature
effects what ' the still, sad music of humanity ' has failed to
teach. Job, however, needs more than teaching; he needs
humiliation for his misjudgment of God's dealings with him
personally. Hence in His second short but weighty speech
' out of the tempest ' Jehovah begins with the question (xl. 8) —
Wilt thou make void my justice ?
wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous ?
This gives the point of view from which Jehovah ironically
invites Job, if he thinks (see chap, xxiv.) that he can govern
the world — the human as well as the extra-human world —
better than the Creator, to make the bold attempt. He bids
him array himself with the Divine majesty and carry out that
retribution in which Jehovah, according to him, has so com
pletely failed (xl. 11-13). If Job will prove his competence
for the office which he claims, then Jehovah Himself will
recognise his independence and extol his inherent strength.
Did the poet mean to finish the second speech of Jehovah
here ? It is probable ; the subject of the interrogatory hardly
admitted of being developed further in poetry. A later
writer (or, as Merx thinks, the poet of Job himself) seems to
have found the speech too short, and therefore appended the
two fancy sketches of animals which follow. But in the
original draft of the poem xl. 14 must have been followed
immediately by Job's retractation, closing with those striking
words (see above, p. 49) which so well supplement the less
articulate confession of xl. 4, 5 —
I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear,
but now mine eye sees thee : •
therefore I retract and repent
in dust and ashes (xlii. 5, 6).
1 [All his thinkings seemed like hearsay. This, then, was the real God.]
So an anonymous writer well expresses it (Mark Rutherford's Deliverance, p. 196),

56 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. v.
How complete a reversal of the ' princely ' anticipations of
Job in xxxi. 37 ! To us, indeed, it may seem somewhat
ungracious to Job to give this as the last scene of his pathetic
drama. But the poet leaves it open to us to animate Job's
repentance with love as well as awe and compunction. With
fine feeling Blake in his seventeenth illustration almost fills
the margin with passages from the Johannine writings.
The long description of the two Egyptian monsters
(xl. 15, xii. 26) is, as we have hinted above, out of place in
the second speech of Jehovah. It has indeed been suggested
that the writer may have intended it as a development of
xl. 14 —
Then will I in return confess unto thee
that thy right hand can help thee —
which implies that Job has no power to help himself in the
government of the world. According to this view, the open
ing words of the behemoth section will mean, ' Consider,
pray, that thou hast fellow-creatures which are far stronger
than thou ; and how canst thou undertake the management of
the universe ? ' It must, however, be admitted that the
emphasis thus laid on the omnipotence of God, apart from
His righteousness, introduces an obscurity into the argument
which almost compels us to assume that the sketches of
behemoth and leviathan are later insertions. At any rate,
even if we regard them as the work of the principal writer of
Job, we must at least ascribe them to one of those after
thoughts by which poets not unfrequently spoil their best
productions. The style of the description, too, is less
chastened than that of chaps, xxxviii. xxxix. (so that
Bickell can hardly be right in placing xl. i5,&c, immediately
after xxxix. 30), and if it relates to the hippopotamus and
the crocodile is less true to nature than the other ' animal
pieces.' The truth is that neither behemoth nor leviathan corre
sponds strictly to any known animal. The tail of a hippo
potamus would surely not have been compared to a cedar by
a truthful though poetic observer like the author of chaps.
xxxviii. xxxix. Moreover that animal was habitually hunted

OHAP. V. THE SPEECHES OF JEHOVAH 57
by the Egyptians with lance and harpoon, and was therefore
no fit symbol of indomitable pride. The crocodile too was
attacked and killed by the Egyptians, though in xii. 26-29
leviathan is said to laugh at his assailants. Seneca in his
description of Egypt describes the crocodile as ' fugax animal
audaci, audacissimum timido' (Qucest. Nat., iv. 2). Comp.
Ezek. xxix. 4, xxxii. 3 ; Herod, ii. 70.
To me, indeed, as well as to M. Chabas, the behemoth and
the leviathan seem to claim a kinship with the dragons and
other imaginary monsters of the Swiss topographies of the
sixteenth century. A still more striking because a nearer
parallel is adduced by M. Chabas from the Egyptian monu
ments, where, side by side with the most accurate pictures
from nature, we often find delineations of animals which
cannot have existed out of wonderland.1
It is remarkable that the elephant should not have been
selected as a type of strange and wondrous animal life ;
apparently it was not yet known to the Hebrew writers,
though of course it might be urged that the poet was acci
dentally prevented from writing more. Merx has pointed
out that the description of behemoth is evidently incomplete.
He also thinks that the poet has not yet brought the form of
these passages to final perfection : a struggle with the diffi
culties of expression is observable. He therefore relegates
xl. 1 5 -xii. 26 to an appendix with the suggestive title (comp.
Goethe's Faust) Paralipomena to Job. He thinks that a
reader or admirer of the original poem sought to preserve
these unfinished sketches by placing them where they now
stand. This is probably the most conservative theory (i.e.
the nearest to the traditional view) critically admissible.
1 Etudes sur Vantiquiti historique, prem. id., pp. 391-393.

58 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. VI,

CHAPTER VI.
THE EPILOGUE AND ITS MEANING.
We now come to the dt*noument of the story (xlii. 7-17),
against which, from the point of view of internal criticism,
much were possible to be said. We shall not, however, here
dwell upon the inconsistencies between the epilogue on the
one hand and the prologue and the speeches on the other.
The main point for us to emphasise is the disappointingness
of the events of the epilogue regarded as the final outcome
of Job's spiritual discipline. Surely the high thoughts
which have now and then visited Job's mind, and which,
combined with the personal self-revelation of the Creator,
must have brought back the sufferer to a state of childlike
resignation, stand in inappropriate companionship with a tame
and commonplace renewal of mere earthly prosperity. Would
it not have been fitter for the hero on whom so much moral
training had been lavished to pass with humble but courageous
demeanour through the dark valley, at the issue of which he
would " see God ' ? It is hardly a sufficient answer that a
concession was necessary to the prejudices of the unspiritual
multitude ; for what was the object of the poem, if not to
subvert the dominion of a one-sided retribution theory ? The
solution probably is that Job in the epilogue is a type of
suffering, believing, and glorified Israel. Not only the '
1 individual believer, not only all the elect spirits of suffering
humanity, but the beloved nation of the poet — Israel, the
' Servant of Jehovah ' — must receive a special message of com-
/ort from the great poem. In Isa. lxi. 7 we read that glorified
Israel is to ' have double (compensation) instead of its shame ; '
comp. Zech. ix. 12, Jer. xvi. 14-18. The people of Israel,

chap. vt. THE EPILOGUE AND ITS MEANING 59
according to the limited view of the prophets, was bound
indissolubly to the Holy Land. The only promise, therefore,
which would be consolatory for suffering Israel, the only
possible sign of God's restored favour, was a material one
including fresh ' children ' and many flocks and herds
(Isa. liv. 1, lx. 7). Observe in this connection the phrase,
xlii. 10, 'Jehovah turned the fortunes of Job' (others, as
A. V, turned the captivity of ~ Job ') — the phrase so well
known in passages relating to Israel (e.g. Ps. xiv. 7, Joel
iii. 1). The explanation is perhaps adequate. Some, however,
will be haunted by a doubt whether the author of the pro
logue would not have thrown more energy and enthusiasm
into the closing narrative. An early reader, probably of
Pharisaic leanings, felt the poverty of the epilogue,1 and
sought to remedy it by the following addition in the Septua
gint : ' And Job died, old and full of days ; and it is written
that he will rise again with those whom the Lord raiseth.' 2
The remainder of the Septuagint appendix testifies only to
the love of the later Jews for amplifying Biblical notices (see
Chap. VII.) Our own poet painter has also amplified the de
tails of the epilogue, but in how different a way ! (Gilchrist's
Life of Blake, i. 332-3).
1 Other readers, however, found no difficulty in the close of the story ; to such
St. James addresses himself in the words, ' Ye have heard of the endurance of Job,
and have seen the end of the Lord ' (James v. II), i. e. the blessed end vouchsafed
by the Lord to Job. It was also, no doubt, such a reader who composed the
beautiful romance of Tobit, to show that, however tried, the righteous man is at
last delivered by his God.
2 Those rabbis who in later times held this view appear to have assumed that
Job was of the Israelitish race (Frankl in Gratz's Monatsschrift, 1872, p. 311).

60 THE BOOK OF JOB chap, viii

CHAPTER VII.
THE TRADITIONAL BASIS AND THE PURPOSE OF JOB.
I.
Did Job really live ?
This is widely different, remarks Umbreit,1 from the question
whether Job actually said and did all that is related of him
in our book. It is scarcely necessary, he adds, in the present
day to disprove the latter, but we have no reason to doubt
the former (the theory as to the historical existence of a sort
of Arabian king Priam, named Job). In truth, we have no
positive evidence either for affirming or denying it, unless the
' holy places,' each reputed to be Job's grave, may be mentioned
in this connection. The allusion in Ezek. xiv. 14 to ' Noah,
Daniel, and Job,' proves no more than that a tradition of
some sort existed respecting the righteous Job during the
Babylonian Exile : we cannot tell how much Ezekiel knew
besides Job's righteousness. In later times, Jewish students
do appear to have believed that ' Job existed ; ' but the force
of the argument is weakened by the uncritical character of the
times, and the extreme form in which this belief was held by
them. How early doubts arose, we know not. The authors
of Tobit and Susanna may very likely have been only half-
believers, since they evidently imitate the story of Job in their
romantic compositions. At any rate, the often-quoted saying
of Rabbi Resh Lakish, rvn Sb>» n"?k mna *6i rr*n vb 3VK,
' ' Job existed not, and was not created, but he is (only) a
parable,' 2 shows that even before the Talmud great freedom
1 Book of fob (1836), E. T. i. 7.
2 Baba Bathra, § 15, I. Comp. Frankl in Gratz's Monatsschrift, 1872, pp.
309-310.

chap. vii. TRADITIONAL BASIS AND PURPOSE OF JOB 6 1
of speech prevailed among the Rabbis on such pdints. In
Hai Gaon's time (d. 1037), the saying quoted must have
given offence to some, for this Rabbi not only appeals for
the historical character of Job to the passage in Ezekiel, but
wishes (on traditional authority) to alter the reading of Resh
Lakish's words, so as to read b&ob nSx tnaa &61 n'n ab ni'K,
'Job existed not, and was not created, except to be a
parable.' l (See note 7, Appendix.)
The prevailing opinion among the Jews doubtless con
tinued to be that the Book of Job was strictly historical, and
Christian scholars (with the exception of Theodore — see
Chap. XV.) found no reason to question this till Luther arose,
with his genial, though unscientific, insistence on the right
of questioning tradition. In his Tischreden Luther says,
' Ich halte das Buch Hiob fiir eine wahre Historia ; dass
aber alles so sollte geschehen und gehandelt sein, glaube ich
nicht, sondern ich halte, dass ein feiner, frommer, gelehrter
Mann habe es in solche Ordnung bracht.'2 Poetically treated
history — that is Luther's idea, as it was that of Grotius after
him, and in our own country of that morning-star of Biblical
criticism, Bishop Lowth.3 It is acquiesced in by Schlott
mann, Delitzsch, and Davidson, and with justice, provided it
be clearly understood that no positive opinion can reasonably
be held as to the historical origin of the tradition (Sage,
Ewald) used by the author. I have said nothing of Spinoza
and Albert Schultens. The former4 pronounces most unfavour
ably on the religious and poetical value of the book which
he regards as a heathenish fiction, reminding us somewhat
(see elsewhere) of the hasty and ill-advised Theodore of
Mopsuestia. The latter5 actually defends the historical
character both of the narratives and of the colloquies of Job
in the strictest sense. Hengstenberg, alone perhaps among
orthodox theologians, takes a precisely opposite view. Like
Reuss and Merx, he regards the poem as entirely a work of
1 Ewald and Dukes, Beitrage zur Gesch. der altesten Auslegung, ii. 166.
2 Werke (Walch), xxii. 2093. s De sacrdpoesi (1753), Prelect, xxxii.
' Tractatus theologico-politicus, c. x.
' Liber Jobi (it H), vol. i., in fine Prcef.

62 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. vii.
imagination. We may be thankful for his protest against
applying a prosaic standard to the poetical books of the
Hebrew Canon. Those who do so, he remarks,1 'fail to
observe that the book stands, not among historical, but among
poetical books, and that it would betray a very low grade of
culture, were one to depreciate imaginative as compared with
historical writing, and declare it to be unsuitable for sacred
Scripture.' I entirely agree with the eminent scholar, whose unpro-
gressive theology could not entirely extinguish his literary
and philological sense. But I see no sufficient reason for
adopting what in itself, I admit, would add a fresh laurel to
the poet's crown. Merx indeed assures us2 that the meaning
of the name ' Job ' is so redolent of allegory that it must be
the poet's own invention, especially as the name occurs no
where else in the Old Testament. He adds that the story of
Job is so closely connected with the didactic part of the book
that it would be lost labour to separate the legendary from
the new material. All was wanted ; therefore all is fictitious.
This is not, however, the usual course of procedure with poets
whether of the East or of the West, whose parsimony in the
invention of plots is well known. As for the name Job
(lyyob) it may no doubt be explained (from the Arabic) ' he
who turns to God,' 3 and in other ways, but there is no evi
dence that the author thought of any meaning for it. When
he does coin names (see Epilogue), there is no room for doubt
ing their significance. Ewald may, certainly, have gone too
far in trying to recover the traditional element : how difficult
it would be to do so with Paradise Lost, if we had not
Genesis to help us ! But the probability of the existence of
a legend akin to the narrative in the Prologue, is shown by
the parallels to it which survive, e.g. the touching Indian story
1 Das Buch Hiob (1870-75), i. 35.
2 Das Buch Hiob, Vorbemerkungen, p. xxxv.
" In Koran, xxxviii. 16, 29, 44, David, Solomon, and Job are all called, one
after another, awwdb, i.e. not 'penitent,' but ' ever turning to God.' Hitzig re
marks that Iyy6b (Arabic Ayyub) will thus be equivalent to the mythic prophet
Saleh (= 'pious') in the Koran (Das Buch Hiob, Einl., S. x.), on whom see
Palmer, Desert of the Exodus, p. 50, where he is identified with Moses. This is
bold, and, in any case, must not such a name be comparatively modern ?

OHAP. VII. TRADITIONAL BASIS AND PURPOSE OF JOB 6$
of Harischandra,1 given by Dr. Muir in vol. i. of his Sanskrit
Texts. The resemblance may be slight and superficial, but
the sudden ruin of a good man's fortunes is common to both
stories. Had we more knowledge of Arabic antiquity, we
should doubtless find a more valuable parallel.2
The story of Job had a special attraction for Mohammed,
who enriched it (following the precedent of the Jewish
Haggada) with a fresh detail (Koran, xxxviii. 40). To him,
as well as to St. James, Job was an example of ' endurance.'
The dialogue between Allah and Eblis in Koran, xv. 32-42,
may perhaps have been suggested by the Prologue of our
poem. ' Did then, Job really live ? ' That for which we most care
comes not from ' Tradition, Time's suspected register,' 3 but
from an unnamed poet, who embellished tradition partly from
imagination, partly (see next section) from the rich and varied
stores of his own experience. 2.
The Autobiographical Element in its Bearing on the
Purpose of the Poem.
A German critic (Dillmann), in speaking of Job, has well
reminded us that ' the idea of a work of art must reveal itself
in the development of the piece : it is not to be condensed
into a dry formula.' Least of all, surely, is such formulation
possible when the work of art is an idealised portraiture of
the author himself, and such, I think, to a considerable ex
tent is the Book of Job. Those words of a psalmist,
Come and hear, all ye that fear God,
and I will declare what he hath done for my soul
(Ps. Ixvi. 16, R. V.)
might be taken as the motto of Job. In short, the author is
1 This was perhaps first pointed out by Schlottmann, in chap. i. of the Intro
duction to his Commentary.
! Nothing can be built upon the occurrence of the name Ayyub in pre- Islamic
times, for Jews and Arabs were in frequent intercourse before Mohammed.
3 Davenant.

64 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. to.
thoroughly 'subjective,' like all the great Hebrew and es.
pecially the Arabian poets. ' In the rhythmic swell of Job's
passionate complaints, there is an echo of the heart-beats of
a great poet and a great sufferer. The cry " Perish the day
in which I was born " (iii. 3) is a true expression of the first
effects of some unrecorded sorrow. In the life-like descrip
tion beginning " Oh that I were as in months of old " (xxix. 2),
the writer is thinking probably of his own happier days, before
misfortune overtook him. Like J ob (xxix. 7, 2 1 -2 5 ) he had sat
in the " broad place " by the gate and solved the doubts of
perplexed clients. Like Job, he had maintained his position
triumphantly against other wise men. He had a fellow-feeling
with Job in the distressful passage through doubt to faith.
Like Job (xxi. 16) he had resisted the suggestion of practical
atheism, and with the confession of his error (xlii. 2-6) had
recovered spiritual peace.'
The man who speaks to us under the mask of Job is not
indeed a perfect character ; but he does not pretend to be so.
How pathetic are his appeals to his friends to remember the
weight of his calamity — ' therefore have my words been wild '
(vi. 3) — and not to ' be captious about words when the speeches
of the desperate are but for the wind ' (vi. 26). He was no
Stoic, and had not practised himself in deadening his sensibility
to pain. Strong in his sense of justice, he lacked those higher
intuitions which could alone soothe his irritation. But he was
throughout loyal to the God whom his conscience revered, and,
even in the midst of his wild words, he let God mould him.
First of all, he renounced the hope of being understood by
men ; he ceased to complain of his rather ignorant than un
feeling friends. He exemplified that Arabic proverb which
says, ' Perfect patience allows no complaint to be heard against
(human creatures).' Then he came by degrees to trust God.
There is a kernel of truth in that passage of the Jerusalem
Talmud (Berakhoth, cix. 5) where, among the seven types of
Pharisees, the sixth is described as ' he who is pious from fear,
like Job,' and the seventh, as ' he who is pious from love, like
, Abraham.' Job's religion was at first not entirely but still too
much marked by. fear ; it ended by becoming a religion of

chap. vii. TRADITIONAL BASIS AND PURPOSE OF JOB 65
Jrust^justifying the title borne by Job among the Syrians, as 1
if in contradiction to the Talmud, of ' the lover of the Lord.' ' '
So far as the author ol Job has any direct purpose beyond
that of giving a helpful picture of his own troubles, it is no
doubt principally a polemical one. He has suffered so
deeply from the inveterate error (once indeed a relative truth)
so tenaciously maintained by the wisest men that he would fain
crush the source of so much heart-breaking misery. But that
for which we love the book is its cpiXavOpcoTrla, its brotherly
love to all mankind. No doubt the author thinks first of
Israel, then (as I suppose) suffering exile ; but the care with
which the poem is divested of Israelitish peculiarities, seems
to show that he looks beyond his own people, just as in his
view of God hehas broken the bonds of a narrow 'particularism.'
' I can see no other explanation of those apparently hyper
bolical complaints, that strange invasion of self-consciousness,
and that no less strange 'enthusiasm of humanity'2 . . . . than
the view expressed or implied by Chateaubriand, that Job is
a 'type of righteous men in affliction — not merely in the land
of Uz, nor among the Jews in Babylonia, nor yet, on War-
burton's theory of the poem, in the Judaea of the time of
Nehemiah, but wherever on the wide earth tears are shed and
hearts are broken.' This is the truth in the too often ex
aggerated allegorical view 3 of the poem of Job. According
to his wont, the author lets us read his meaning by occasional
bold inconsistencies. No individual can use such phraseology
as we find in xvii. 1, xviii. 2, 3, xix. 11, and perhaps I may
add xvi. 10, xxvii. 11, 12. And yet the fact that Job often
speaks as the ' type of suffering humanity ' no more destroys
1 Hottinger, referred to by Delitzsch, lob, p. 7. In the Peshitto, Heb. xii.
3-1 1 has for a sub-title, 'In commemoration of Job the righteous.' The choice
¦of the section shows in what sense Job's ' righteousness ' is affirmed — not the
Talmudic. 2 See especially Job vi. *, 3, vii. 1-3, xiv. 1-3.
8 This view goes back to the last century (Warburton, Michaelis, &c. ) It has
been remodelled by Seinecke and Hoekstra, who regard Job, not as the people of
Israel in general, but the idealised Israel or ' Servant of Jehovah.' See especially
Hoekstra's essay, Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1871, p. 1 &c, and Kuenen's reply,
Th. Ti., 1873, p. 492 &o.

66 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. vir.
his claim to be an individual ' than the typical character of
Dante in his pilgrimage and of Faust in Goethe's great poem
annuls the historical element in those two great poetical
figures.' l 3-
The Purpose of Job as illustrated by Criticism.
More precise definitions of the purpose of Job depend on
the acceptance of a critical analysis of the book, Some
suggestions on this subject have been already given to facili
tate the due comprehension of the poem. I must now offer the
reader a connected sketch of the possible or probable stages of
its growth. This, if it bears being tested, will perhaps reveal
the special purpose of the several parts, and above all of that
most precious portion — the Colloquies of Job and his friends.
(Compare below, Chap. XII.)
I. The narrative which forms the Prologue is based upon
a traditional story which represented Job as hurled from the
height of happiness into an abyss of misery, but preserving
a devout serenity in the midst of trouble. It is impossible to
feel sure that this Prologue is by the same author as the
following Colloquies. It stands in no very'close connection
with them ; ' the Satan ' in particular (an omission which
struck William Blake 2) is not heard of again in the book ;
and there is abundant evidence of the liking of the pre-Exile
writers for a tasteful narrative style. It is not a wild con
jecture that the first two chapters originally formed the
principal part of a prose book of Job, comparable to the
' books ' once current of Elijah, and perhaps one may add of
Balaam and of Daniel — a book free from any speculations of
the ' wise men ' and in no sense a mashal or gnomic poem, but
supplying in its own way a high and adequate solution of
1 Quoted from Essay ix. in vol. ii. of The Prophecies of Isaiah.
2 Blake's 1 6th design is devoted to the defeat of Satan. Beneath the en
throned Jehovah and his angels, 'the Evil One falls with tremendous plummet.
force, Hell naked before his face, and Destruction without a covering.' Another
point in which Blake corrects his author is the introduction of Job's wife into the
illustrations of the Colloquies.

chap. vii. TRADITIONAL BASIS AND PURPOSE OF JOB 67
the great problem of the suffering of the righteous. The
writer of this Prologue, whether he also wrote the Colloquies
or not, firmly believed that the calamities which sometimes
fell on the innocent were both for the glory of God and of
human nature. It was possible, he said, to continue in one's
integrity, though no earthly advantage accrued from it. If
the Prologue once formed part of a distinct prose ' book ' of
Job, one can hardly suppose that the same author wrote the
Epilogue ; for while the Colloquies do contain hints of Job's
typical character (as to some extent a representative of
humanity), the Prologue does not, and it is only the typical or
allegorical intepretation which makes the Epilogue tolerable.
In fact, the Epilogue must, as it seems to me, have been
written, if not by the author of the Colloquies, yet by some
one who had this work before him. The prose ' book ' of Job,
if it existed, and if it originated in Judah, cannot have been
written before the Chaldaean period. This period and no
other explains the moral purpose of the ' book,' precisely as
the age of the despotic Louis XIV. is the only one which suits
the debate on the disinterested love of God with which the
name of F^nelon is inseparably connected. The Chaldaean
period, however, we must remember, did not begin with the
Captivity, but with the appearance of the Babylonian power
on the horizon of Palestine. We must not therefore too hastily
assume that the Book of Job is a monument of the Babylonian
Captivity, true as I myself believe this hypothesis to be.
We are, however, of course not confined to this hypothesis
of a prose ' book ' of Job. The author of the Colloquies may
have been equally fitted to be a writer of narrative, and may
have felt that the solution mentioned above, although the
highest, was not the only one admissible. We may therefore
conceive of him as following up the solution offered in the
Prologue by a ventilation of the great moral problem before
himself and his fellow 'wise men.' He throws the subject
open as it were to general discussion, and invests all the
worthiest speculations of his time in the same flowing poetical
dress, that no fragment of truth contained in them may be
lost. He himself is far from absolutely rejecting any of them ;

68 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. vn.
he only seems to deny that the ideas of the three represen
tative sages can be applied at once, as they apply them, to
the case of one like Job.
[Bottcher, however, regards Job as the work of one princi
pal and several subordinate writers. It was occasioned, he
thinks, by a conversation on the sufferings of innocent men,
at that time so frequent (i.e. in the reign of Manasseh). See
his Aehrenlese, p. 68.]
II. The completion or publication of the colloquies re
vealed (or seemed to reveal) sundry imperfections in the
original mode of treating the subject. Some other ' wise men,'
therefore (or possibly, except in the case of III., the author
himself), inserted passages in the poem with the view of
qualifying or supplementing its statements. These were
merely laid in, without being welded with the rest of the
book. The first in order of these additions is chap, xxviii.,
which cannot be brought into a logical connection with the
chapters among which it is placed, in spite of the causal
particle ' for ' prefixed to it (' For there is a vein '). It is pos
sible, indeed, that it has been extracted from some other work.
The hypothesis of insertion (or, if used without implying illicit
tampering with the text, ' interpolation ') is confirmed by the
occurrence of ' Adonai ' in ver. 28, which is contrary to the
custom of the author of Job, and by its highly rhetorical cha
racter. If the passage was written with a view to the Book of
Job, we must suppose the author to have been dissatisfied with
the original argument, and to have sought a solution for the
problem in the inscrutableness of the divine wisdom. Zophar,
it is true, had originally alluded to this attribute, but with a
more confined object. According to him, God, being all-wise,
can detect sins invisible to mortal eyes (xi. 6) : — it is needless
to draw out the wide difference between this slender inference
and the large theory which appears to be suggested in
chap, xxviii.
III. One of the less progressive 'wise men' was scan
dalised at the irreverent statements of Job and dissatisfied
with the three friends' mode of dealing with them (xxxii. 2, 3)-
Hence the speeches of Elihu, the most generally recognised]

CHAP. VII. TRADITIONAL BASIS AND PURPOSE OF JOB 69
of all the inserted portions (chaps, xxxii.-xxxvii.) The
author partly imitates the speeches of Jehovah.
IV. In another inserted passage (ch. xxxviii.-xl. 14, xlii.
1-6), the Almighty is represented as chastising the presump
tion of Job, and showing forth the supreme wisdom by con
trast with Job's unwisdom. It is clear that the copy in which
it was inserted was without the speeches of Elihu, for the
opening words of Jehovah (xxxviii. 2) clearly have reference
to the last discourse of Job, which they must have been in
tended to follow. The effect of this fine passage is much
impaired by the interposition of the speeches of Elihu.
V The description of the behemoth and the leviathan
(xl. 1 5-24, xii.) seems also to be a later insertion, and somewhat
more recent than the speeches of Jehovah. It is a ' purple
patch,' and the appendix last mentioned gains by its removal.
VI. An editor appended the epilogue. He must have
had the prologue before him, but took no pains to bring his
own work into harmony with it, except in the one point which
he could not help adopting, namely the vast riches of his hero.
He agreed with Job's friends on the grand question of retri
bution, though he would not sanction their line of argument.
Job's doubts, according to him, contained more faith than
their uncharitable dogmatism.
Can we feel grateful to this writer? He has at any rate
relieved the strain upon the imagination of the reader, and
possibly, if we assume him to be distinct from the author of
the Prologue, carried out an unfulfilled intention of that
author (note the words in i. 12, 'only upon himself put not
forth thy hand '). But he did so in a prosaic spirit, and made
a sad. concession to a low view of providential dealings. He
has also, I think, caused much misunderstanding of the object
of the book. Thus we find Dr. Ginsburg saying,1
The Book of Job .... only confirms the old opinion that the
righteous are visibly rewarded here, inasmuch as it represents their
calamities as transitory, and Job himself as restored to double his
original wealth and happiness in this life.
Against which I enter a respectful protest.
1 Art. ' Ecclesiastes,' Ency. Brit., 9th ed.

JO THE BOOK OF JOB chap, to,
The view here adopted of the gradual growth of the book
seems important for its right comprehension. In its present
form, it seems like a very confused theodicy, designed to
justify God against the charge of bringing misfortune upon
innocent persons. But when the disturbing elements are
removed, we see that the book is simply an expression of the
conflicting thoughts of an earnest, warm-hearted man on the
great question of suffering. He protests, it is true, against
the rigour and uncharitableness of the traditional orthodox
belief, but is far more aspiring to solve the problem theoreti
cally. This is one chief point in which he differs from his
interpolators (if the word may be used), who mostly appear
to have had some favourite theory (or partial view of truth)
to advocate.

7i

CHAPTER VIII.
DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION.
We have seen (Chap. VII.) that the unity of authorship of
the Book of Job is not beyond dispute, but we shall not at
present assume the results of analysis. Let us endeavour to
treat of the date and place of composition on the hypothesis
that the book is a whole as it stands (on the Elihu-portion
however, comp. Chap. XII.) It is at any rate probable
that the greater part of it at least proceeds from the same
period. Can that period be the patriarchal ? The author
has sometimes received credit for his faithful picture of this
early age. This is at any rate plausible. For instance, he
avoids the use of the sacred name Jehovah, revealed to Moses
according to Ex. vi. 3. Then, too, the great age ascribed to
Job in the Epilogue (xlii. 16) agrees with the notices of the
patriarchs. The uncoined piece of silver (Heb. kesitd) which
each kinsman of Job gave him after his recovery (xlii. 11), is
only mentioned again in Gen. xxxiii. 19 (Josh. xxiv. 32). The
musical instruments referred to in xxi. 12, xxx. 31, are also
mentioned in Gen. iv. 21, xxxi. 27. There is no protest
against idolatry either in the Book of Job 1 or in Genesis.
Job himself offers sacrifices to the one true God, like the
patriarchs, and the kind of sacrifice offered is the burnt-offer
ing (i- S> xm- 8) ; there is no mention of guilt- or sin-offerings.
The settled life of Job, too, as described in the Prologue is
not inconsistent with the story of Jacob's life in the vale of
1 The absence of such a protest is characteristic of the Wisdom-literature in
general. The reference to star-worship in Job xxxi. 26 suggests a date subsequent
to the origination of the title 'Jehovah (God) of Hosts.' See appendix to Isa. i.
in my commentary.

72 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. vm.
Shechem,1 though in reality the author probably described it
from his observation of settled life in Arabia. But none of
these allusions required any special gift of historical imagina
tion. The tone of the few descriptive passages in the
Colloquies, and of the reflections throughout, is that of an age
long subsequent to the patriarchal. The very idea of wise
men meeting together to discuss deep problems (as in the
later Arabic maqamat, compared by Bertholdt and others)
is an anachronism in a ' patriarchal ' narrative, and (like the
religious position of the speeches in general) irresistibly sug
gests the post-Solomonic period. The Job of the Colloquies
is a travelled citizen of the world at an advanced period of
history ; indeed, he now and then seems expressly to admit
this (xxiv. 12, xxix. 7). It is therefore needless to discuss
the theory which assigns the book to the Mosaic or pre-
Mosaic age, — a theory which is a relic of the cold, literal,
unsympathetic method of the critics of the last two centuries.
A few scholars of eminence, feeling this, placed the poem in
the Solomonic period, a view which is in itself plausible, if we
consider the pronounced secular turn of the great king, and
his recorded taste for eastern parabolistic ' wisdom,' but which
falls with the cognate theory of the authorship of Proverbs.
A more advanced stage of society than that of the period
referred to, and a greater maturity of the national intellect,
are presupposed on every page of the poem. The tone of
the book — I refer especially to the Colloquies — suggests a
time when the nationalism of the older periods had, in gene
ral, ceased to satisfy reflecting minds. The doubters, whom
Job and his friends represent, have been so staggered in their
belief in Israel's loving God, that they decline to use His re
vealed name : — 2 once or twice only does it slip in (xii. 9 ; cf.
xxviii. 28), as if to show that the poet himself has fought his
1 Mr. Tomkins compares Job's mode of life with that of Abram before his
departure from Kharran (Studies on the Times of Abraham, 1878, p. 61).
2 I cannot go quite so far as Lagarde, who argues from the use of ' Eloah '
(instead of ' Elohim' and ' Jehovah ') that the doubters have cast off belief in all
the supposed various manifestations of divinity in the world, and merely retain
a comfortless belief in rd Beiov. ' Numen quoddam esse non negant, sed ' &c,
Psalterium Hieronymi, pp. 155-6 (' Corollarium ').

CHAP. vm. DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION 73
way to a reconciling faith. As is clear from the cognate
psalms xxxvii., xlix., lxxiii., the patriarchal theory of pros
perity and adversity had been found wanting. Doubts had
arisen, most painful in their intensity, from observing the dis
proportion between character and fortune — doubts which might
indeed insinuate themselves at any time, but acquire an
abnormal force in a declining community (ix. 24, xii. 4-6, 23,
and especially chap, xxi.) Some had even ventured on
positive doctrinal heresy. In opposition to these, Eliphaz
professes his adhesion to the tradition of the fathers, in whose
time religion was untainted by alien influence (xv. 17-19)-
It is merely an incidental remark of Eliphaz, but it points to
a date subsequent to the appearance of Assyria on the
horizon of Palestine. For it was the growing influence of that
power, which, for good and for evil, modified the character of
Israelitish religion both in its higher and in its lower forms.
Precise historical allusions are almost entirely wanting.
We may, however, infer with certainty that the book was
written subsequently to the ' deportation ' of Israel, or of
Judah, or at the very least of some neighbouring people (xii.
17-19 ; comp. xv. 19 '). For the uprooting of whole peoples
from their original homes was peculiar to the Assyrian policy.2
But which of these forced expatriations is intended ? — We are
not compelled 'to think of the Babylonian Exile by the reference
to the Chaldaeans in the Prologue. The Chaldseans might have
been known to a well-informed Hebrew writer ever since the
ninth century B.C., at which time they became predominant
in the southern provinces on the lower Euphrates : we find
Isaiah, speaking of the ' land of Chaldaea ' (Isa. xxiii. 1 3) in
the eighth century. Still I own that the description of the
Chaldaeans as robbers does appear to me most easily explained
by supposing a covert allusion to the invasions of Nebuchad
nezzar.3 The Assyrians are indeed once called ' treacherous
1 Job xv. 19 certainly implies the siege and capture of Jerusalem by some
foreign foe. Comp. Joel iii. (Heb. iv. ) 17.
* Dr. Barth quotes Am. i. 6, ii. I -3, ix. II, 15 in proof that 'deportation'
also took place in the ' pre-Assyrian ' time. But, in fact, Amos is not ' pre-
Assyrian.' 3 It is no sufficient objection that the ravages of the Chaldaeans in Job are on a

74 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. viii.
dealers ' by Isaiah (xxxiii. i), but the Babylonians impressed
the Hebrew writers by their rapacity far more than the
Assyrians. The 'unrighteous' of the Psalms are, when
foreigners are spoken of, not the Assyrians, but either the
Babylonians or still later oppressors (e.g. Ps. cxxv. 3) ; and the
description of the Babylonians in the first chapter of Habak
kuk strongly reminds us of those complaints of Job, ' The
earth is given over into the hand of the unrighteous ' (ix. 24),
and ' The robbers' tents are in peace, and they that provoke
God are secure, they who carry (their) god in their hand '
(xii. 6 ; comp. Hab. i. 11, 16).
The view here propounded might be supported by an argu
ment from linguistic data (see Chap. XIII.) which would lead us
into details out of place here. It is that of Umbreit, Knobel,
Gratz, and (though he does not exclude the possibility of a
later date) the sober and thorough Gesenius. Long after the
present writer's results were first committed to paperj he had
the rare satisfaction of finding them advocated, so far as the
date is concerned, in a commentary by a scholar of our own
who has the best right to speak (A. B. Davidson, Introduction
to The Book of Job, 1884). On the other hand, Stickel,
Ewald, Magnus, Bleek, Renan (i860), Kuenen (1865), Hitzig,
Reuss, Dillmann, Merx, prefer to place our poem in the period
between Isaiah and Jeremiah, and this seems to me the earliest
date from which the composition and significance of the book can
be at all rightly understood. Reasons enough for this state^
ment of opinion, will suggest themselves to those who have
followed rne hitherto ; let me now only add that the pure
monotheism of the Book makes an earlier date, on historical
principles, hardly conceivable.1 A later date than the Exile-
period is not, I admit, inconceivable (see Vatke, Die biblische
small scale, nor yet that side by side with them are mentioned the Sabeans, surely
not those of S. Arabia (Noldeke), but those of N. Arabia (Delitzsch), detachments
of whom might have encamped on the borders of Edom. Comp. Wetzstein
in Delitzsch's lob, ed. 2, p. 596 &c.
1 I write this with deference to the contrary opinion of Delitzsch, who is, how
ever, too prejudiced against late dates, and biassed by his belief in the authenticity
of the Song of Hezekiah. If the Book of Job be pre-Hezekian, it is of course
natural to throw it back to the age of Solomon.

chap. viii. DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION 75
Theologie, i. 563 &c), and is now supported by Kuenen.1
If there were an allusion to the doctrine of the Resurrection,
in xix. 26, or if the portraiture of Job were (as Kuenen thinks
it is) partly modelled on the Second Isaiah's description of
the Servant of Jehovah, I should in fact be driven to accept
this view. I have stated above that I cannot find the
Resurrection in Job, and in Isaiah, ii. 267 that the priority
of Job seems to me to be made out. I need not combat
Clericus and Warburton, who ascribe the authorship oi Job to
Ezra. For Jeremiah (Bateson Wright) or the author of
Lamentations (i.e. Baruch, according to Bunsen) something
might perhaps be said, but — Ezra!
As to the place of composition. Hitzig and Hirzel think
of Egypt on account of the numerous allusions to Egypt in the
book ; and so Ewald with regard to xl. 1 5-xli. 34. ' Die
ganze Umgebung ist egyptisch,' says Hitzig with some ex
aggeration.2 More might be said in favour of the theory
which places the author in a region where Arabic and
Aramaic might both be heard. Stickel, holding the pre-Exile
origin of the book, supposed it to have come from the far
south-east of Palestine. Nowhere better than in the hill-
country of the South could the poet study simple domestic
relations, and also make excursions into N. Arabia. He thus
accounts 3 for the points of contact between the Book of Job
and the prophecy of Amos of Tekoa (see below, Chap. XL),
which include even some phonetic peculiarities (the softening
of the gutturals and the interchange of sibilants). To me,
the whole question seems well-nigh an idle one. The author
(or, if you will, the authors) had travelled much in various
lands, and the book is the result. The place where, is of far
less importance than the time when it was composed.
1 Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1873, p. 538.
2 Das Buch Hiob (1874), p. xlix. 3 Das Buch Hiob (1842), p. 276.

J6 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. ix.

CHAPTER IX.
ARGUMENT FROM THE USE OF MYTHOLOGY.
ONE of the peculiarities of our poet (which I have elsewhere
compared with a similar characteristic in Dante) is his willing
ness to appropriate mythic forms of expression from heathen
dom. This willingness was certainly not due to a feeble grasp
of his own religion ; it was rather due partly to the poet's
craving for imaginative ornament, partly to his sympathy
with his less developed readers, and a sense that some of
these forms were admirably adapted to give reality to the
conception of the 'living God.' Several of these points of
contact with heathendom have been indicated in my analysis
of the poem. I need not again refer to these, but the semi-
mythological allusions to supernatural beings who had once
Deen in conflict with Jehovah (xxi. 22, xxv. 2), and the cog
nate references to the dangerous cloud-dragon (see below)
ought not to be overlooked. Both in Egypt and in Assyria
and Babylonia, we find these very myths in a fully developed
form. The ' leviathan ' of iii. 8, the dragon probably of vii. 12
(tannin) and certainly of xxvi. 13 (nakhdsh), and the 'rahab'
1 of ix. 13, xxvi. 12, remind us of the evil serpent Apap, whose
struggle with the sun-god Ra is described in chap, xxxix. of
the Book of the Dead and elsewhere. ' A battle took place,'
says M. Maspero, ' between the gods of light and fertility and
the " sons of rebellion," the enemies of light and life. The
former were victorious, but the monsters were not destroyed.
They constantly menace the order of nature, and, in order
to resist their destructive action, God must, so to speak, create
the world anew every day.'1 An equally close parallel is
1 Maspero, Histoire ancienne de I 'Orient, ed. I, p. 30. Comp. Chabas'
translation from the Harris papyrus, Records of the Past, x. 142-146.

CHAP. IX. ARGUMENT FROM THE USE OF MYTHOLOGY Jf
furnished by the fourth tablet of the Babylonian creation-
story, which describes the struggle between the god Marduk
(Merodach) and the dragon Tiamat or Tiamtu (a fem. cor
responding to the Heb. masc. form thorn ' the deep '), for
which see Delitzsch's Assyrische Lesestiicke, 3rd edition, Smith
and Sayce's Chaldean Genesis, p. 107 &c, and Budge \n Pro
ceedings of the Society of Biblical Archeology, Nov. 6, 1883.
Nor must I forget the 'fool-hardy' giant (K'sil = Orion) in
ix. 9, xxxviii. 31, nor the dim allusion to the sky-reaching
mountain of the north, rich in gold (comp. Isa. xiv. 13, and
Sayce, Academy, Jan. 28, 1882, p. 64), and the myth-derived
synonyms for Sheol — Death, Abaddon, and 'the shadow of
death' (or, deep gloom), xxvi. 6, xxviii. 22, xxxviii. 17, also
the 'king of terrors' (xviii. 14), who like Pluto or Yama rules
in the Hebrew Underworld. Observe too the instances in
which a primitive myth has died down into a metaphor, e.g.
' the eyelids of the Dawn ' (iii. 9, xii. 18); and especially that
beautiful passage,
Hast thou ever in thy life given charge to the Morning,
and shown its place to the Dawn,
that it may take hold of the skirts of the earth,
so that the wicked are shaken out of it,
and the earth changes as clay under a seal,
and (all things) stand forth as in a garment,
and light is withheld from the wicked,
and the arm lifted up is broken ? (xxxviii. 12-15).
How very vivid ! The personified Dawn seizes the coverlet
under which the earth has slept at its four ends and shakes
the evil-doers out of it like flies ; upon which form and colour
return to the earth, as clay (a Babylonian image) receives a
definite form from the seal, and as the sad-coloured night-
wrapper is exchanged for the bright, embroidered holiday-
robe. Could we only transfer the poet to an earlier stage of
mythic consciousness, we should find him expressing the
same ideas — that morning-light creates all fair things anew,
and discomfits the evil-doer — very much in the style of the
Vedic hymns to Ushas (the Dawn), from which I quote

78 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. ix.
the following in Grassmann's translation (Rig Veda, I.
123, 4, 5) — Die tageshelle kommt zu jedem Hause
und jedem Tage gibt sie ihren Namen ;
zu spenden willig, strahlend naht sie immer
und theilet aus der Giiter allerbestes.
Als Bhaga's Schwester, Varuna's Verwandte,
komm her zuerst, o schone Morgenrothe ;
Wer frevel iibt, der soil dahinter bleiben,
von uns besiegt sein mit der Uschas Wagen.
(There is also an Egyptian parallel in a hymn to the Sun-
god, Records of the Past, viii. 1 3 1, 'He fells the wicked in
his season.') How far the poet of Job believed in the myths
which he has preserved, e.g. in the existence of potentates or
potencies corresponding to the ' dragon ' of which he speaks,
we cannot certainly tell. Mr. Budge has suggested that
Tiamat, the sky-dragon of the Babylonians, conveyed a dis
tinct symbolic meaning. However this may have been, the
' leviathan ' of Job was probably to the poet a ' survival ' from
a superstition of his childhood, and little if anything more than
the emblem of all evil and disorder.
And now for the bearing of the above on criticism. It
is a remarkable fact that there are mythological allusions,
very similar to some of those in Job, in the later portions of
the Book of Isaiah (Isa. xxiv. 21, xxvii. 1, li. 9). This evi
dently suggests a date for the Book of Job not earlier than
the Exile. It is not necessary to assume that the authors of
these books borrowed either from Egypt or from Babylonia.
They drew from the unexhausted store of Jewish popular
beliefs. They wrote for a larger public than the older poets
and prophets could command, and adapted themselves more
completely to the average culture of their people.

79

CHAPTER X.
ARGUMENT FROM THE DOCTRINE OF ANGELS.
The facts on which our argument is based are mainly the
passages in Job which refer to ' sons of Elohim ' (or better, as
Davidson, 'of the Elohim'), to ' the Satan,' and to the mal'akim.
The first of these three phrases means probably inferior
members of the class of beings called Elohim (i.e. 'super
human powers ') ; the second, ' the adversary (or opposer) ; '
the third, ' envoys or messengers ' (ayyeXoi). We may at
once draw an inference from the expression 'the Satan,' the-
full importance of which will be seen later on. ' The Satan '
being an appellative, the book in which it occurs was probably
written before Chronicles, where we find ' Satan ' without the
article, almost l as if a proper name ; and being applied to a
minister and not an opponent of Jehovah, the Book of Job
is probably earlier than the prophecies of Zechariah and the
Books of Chronicles ; see Zech. iii. i, 2 (where observe that
Jehovah's only true representative gives a severe reproof to
' the Satan'), 1 Chron. xxi. 1 (where ' Satan,' uncommissioned,
* entices ' David to an act displeasing to Jehovah 2). The dif
ference between the notices of the Satan (or Satan) may not
seem great to an unpractised student, but no one who has
followed the development of any single doctrine will under
value such traces of a growing refinement in the conceptions
of good and evil. Whether or no the ideas of the Chronicler
1 It is not likely that Satan was ever used entirely as a proper name ; but
being frequently in men's mouths, it naturally lost the article. At last the name
Sammael was invented for the arch-Satan (see above).
2 In 2 Sam. xxiv. I, the temptation is ascribed to Jehovah ; the Chronicler is
at any rate on the road to James i. 13. Contrast the stationariness of Mohammed
(' God misleadeth whom He will,' Koran, xxxv. 9).

80 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. x.
and his age had been modified by hearing of the Persian
Ahriman, may be questioned ; but a similar supposition can
not be allowed in the case of the author of Job. The Satan
of the Prologue is, in theory at least, simply Jehovah's agent,
though he certainly betrays a malicious pleasure in his in
vidious function of trying or sifting the righteous. It is not
impossible that the author of the Prologue was the first to
use the term Satan in this sense. At any rate, it is a pure
Hebrew term, unlike the Ashmedai or Asmodaeus of the
Book of Tobit. [Ashmedai, in later Judaism, is the head of
the Shedim — demons who were never angels of God, just as
Sammael is the 'head of all Satans,' i.e. the prince of the
fallen angels. Weber, System der altsynagog. Paldstin.
Theologie, pp. 243-5.]
Next, turning to the matakim, observe that the word
occurs very rarely in Job, viz. once in the original Colloquies
(iv. 18), and once (virtually) in the first speech of Elihu (xxxiii.
23). We find, however, a kindred phrase 'the q'doshtm,' or 'holy
ones,' i.e. superhuman, heavenly beings, separate from the
world of the senses1 (v. 1, xv. 15), and comparing v.'i with
iv. 1 8 we cannot doubt that the same class of beings is in
tended. We nowhere meet with the Mal'ak Yahve, so familiar
to us in certain Old Testament narratives ; Elihu's mal'ak melic
(xxxiii. 23) is not synonymous with the older expression (see
account of Elihu). In fact, the thousands of maTakim
known at the period of the writers of Job have made the
one great mafak unnecessary, just as, but for the influence of
Persian ideas, the multitudinous ' hurtful angels ' (Ps. lxxviii.
49) might sooner or later have entirely supplanted the single
Satan. And yet even an ordinary matak, when he appears,
is more awful than the great mafak Yahve ; the angel who
appears to Eliphaz (Job iv. 15, 16) is as unrecognisable as the
' face ' of Jehovah himself. This is an indication, though but
a slight one, of a somewhat advanced age, when the gulf
between God and man was more acutely felt, and religious
thought was more specially directed to filling it up.
The title 'holy ones ' (v. 1 ) enables us to identify the ' angels '
1 So rightly Baudissin, Studien, ii. 125.

CHAP. x. ARGUMENT FROM THE DOCTRINE OF ANGELS 8 I
with the ' sons of the Elohim.' Separateness from human weak
ness, though not mediatorial ability ' is equally, predicated of
both. But neither the poet of Job, nor any of the psalmists,
identifies the phrases in express terms ; 2 a virtual identifica
tion (see above, and Ps. lxxxix. 7, 8) is all that they venture
upon. There was a good reason for this — viz. their recollection
of the physical and mythological origin of the phrase, ' the
sons of the Elohim.' ' Angels ' and ' sons of the Elohim '
are indeed alike ' holy ' and ' servants ' of the supreme God,
but not always so, according to Hebrew tradition, were the
' sons of the Elohim.' In support of this, we may refer, not
only to Gen. vi. 4 (which the author of Job need not have
known), but to the allusions in his poem (see above) to a war
among the inhabitants of heaven. This war, I think, stands
in connection not merely with the physical phenomena of
light and darkness, but also with speculations of pious
Jehovists, or worshippers of Jehovah, as to the basis and
value of 'heathen' religions. According to Deut. xxxii. 8,3
each of the nations of the world was allotted by the Most
High (Elyon) to some one of the ' sons of El ' (the simplest
name for God) ; of course we are to suppose that these ' sons
of El ' and their worshippers were meant to recognise the
1 Eliphaz apparently assumes that the ' holy ones ' might plead for Job with
Eloah (comp. xxxiii. 23). There is an analogy for this in Arabian religion. The
Koreish (Qurais) tribe were willing to join Mohammed, if he would only admit
their three idol-gods to be mediators with the supreme God, and for a time he
consented. See Palmer's Koran, Introd., p. xxvii. This was equivalent to recog
nising these heathen deities as b'ne Elohim and also (Eliphaz would say) as
Q'doshtm or ' holy ones. '
2 The Elohistic narrator in Gen. xxviii. 12, 17, xxxii. 2, 3 even appears to
identify the terms ' angels of Elohim ' ( = God) and ' Elohim ' ( = divine powers).
Beth 'elohim and makhani 'elohim are more naturally rendered ' place, host, of
divine powers ' than ' place, host of God. '
8 The ' Song of Moses ' is placed by Ewald and Kamphausen in the Assyrian
period of Israel's history. Ver. 8 runs, in a corrected version,
' When Elyon gave the nations as inheritances, when he parted out the sons
of men, he set the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the sons of
El ; ' comp. ver. 9, ' For Jehovah is the portion of his people, Jacob is the lot of
his inheritance. '' (With many recent critics, I follow the reading of the Septuagint.
A scribe, offended by the no longer intelligible statement in ver. 8, inserted an I
before HA, and so formed the usual abbreviation of 'lcrpariK. ) This passage ex
plains Sirach xvii. 17. G

82 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. x.
supremacy of the ' God of Gods ' — Jehovah. But (so we may
suppose the train of thought of the Jehovists to have run)
the nations and their deities formed the vain dream of inde
pendence. The result of the struggle between Jehovah and
the inferior Elohim is referred to in Job : the Elohim re
nounced their dream of independent sovereignty and were
admitted into Jehovah's service. Henceforth they were no
longer shedim, i.e. 'lords' (?), Deut. xxxii. 17, but malakim
' messengers.' But the ' heathen ' nations go on worshipping
the Elohim, ignorant that their divinities have been dispos
sessed of their misused lordship.1 Instead of Him who alone
henceforth is ' enthroned in the heavens ' (Ps. ii. 4), they
honour 'that which is not God' (Deut. xxxii. 21), phantom-
divinities whom they localise, like Jehovah, in the sky. Thus,
except as to the region of the divine habitation, they differ
radically from Jehovists like the author of Job. In that
one point he agrees with them : the stars and the ' sons of
Elohim ' he still pictures to himself as closely conjoined
(xxxviii. 6). Thus, the old and the new are fermenting in his
brain, and on the ground of their angelology we can safely
date the authors ol Job somewhere in the great literary period
which opens with the ' Captivity.'
1 There is a singular reference to a still future deposition of the patron spirits
of the nations in Isa. xxiv. 21 (post-Exile), with which comp. Ps. lviii., lxxxii.
In lxxxii. 6 the title 'elohim is interchanged with b'ne 'elyon ' sons of the Most
High.'

83

CHAPTER XI.
ARGUMENT FROM PARALLEL PASSAGES.
The new phase into which the controversy as to the early
Christian work on the Teaching of the Apostles has passed
excuses me from justifying the importance (in spite of its diffi
culty) of the study of parallel passages. A great point has
been gained in one's critical and exegetical training when one
has learned so to compare parallel passages as to distinguish
true from apparent resemblances, and to estimate the degree
of probability of imitation. In Essay viii. of vol. ii. of The
Prophecies of Isaiah, I endeavoured to help the student to do
this for himself within the field of the Book of Isaiah. I shall
not attempt this with the same thoroughness for the Book of
Job. It is a sign of the consummate skill of the writer that he
is an artist even in his imitations. As Luther says, ' Die
Rede dieses Buches ist so reisig und prachtig als freilich keines
Buches in der ganzen Schrift' The author retains the pa-
rallelistic distich, but is no longer content with a bare synony
mous or antithetic bifurcation of his material, and dwells on
the decoration of an idea with a freedom which sometimes
obscures his meaning ; hence too the germinal phrase or
word suggested by an earlier book may easily escape notice.
I shall confine my attention to the most defensible po nts of
contact, referring for the rest, without pledging myself to
agreement, to Dr. J. Barth's Beitrage zur Erklarung des
Buches Job (Leipzig, s.a.), pp. 1-17.
The influence ol Job on the works which all admit to be
of post-Exile origin need not detain us here. There is but
one undoubted reference to Job in Ecclesiastes (v. 14 ; comp.
Job i. 21) — we should perhaps have expected more. But

84 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. XI.
Sirach with a true instinct detected an affinity between his
own ideas and Job xxviii. (comp. this chapter with Ecclus. i.
3, 5, &c), though he neglects the rest, and does not include
our poet among the ' famous men ' and the ' fathers that begot
us.' Passing upwards, we shall, if historical criticism be our
guide, make our first pause at the undeniably later psalms and
at the later portions of Isaiah. In the former compare (as
specimens), Ps. ciii. 1 6 with Job vii. 12
— cvii. 40 — — xii. 21, 24
— — 41 — — xxi. 11
— — 42 — — xxii. 19, v. 16
— cxix. 28 — — xvi. 20
— — 50 — — vi. 10
— — 69 — — xiii. 4
— — 103 — — vi. 25.
There is, I think, no question that these psalm-passages_
were inspired by the parallels in Job. In Isa. xl.-lxvi. there
are, as I have pointed out (Isaiah, ed. 3, ii. 250), at least
* twenty-one parallels to passages in our poem. I do not, how
ever, think that we can venture to describe either set of passages
en bloc as imitations. But there are at least two clear cases
of imitation, and here the original is not the prophet but the
poet (comp. Isa. li. gb, 10a, with Job xxvi. 12, 13, and Isa.
liii. 9 with Job xvi. 17). With regard to the book (II. Isaiah)
as a whole, or at least the greater part of it, we may say
that there is a parallelism of idea running through it and
the Book of Job, which may to a large extent account for
parallelisms of expression. This does not, however, apply
everywhere, least of all to the great prophetic dirge on the
' despised and rejected ' one, which presents stylistic phenor
mena so unlike that of its context that we seem bound to
assign the substratum of Isa. Hi. 1 3 — liii. to a time of perse
cution previous to the Exile.1 How the poet of Job became
acquainted with this striking passage, we know not. Did it
form part of some prophetic anthology similar to the poetic
1 See Cheyne, The Prophecies of Isaiah, ed. 3, ii. 39 ; art. ' Isaiah,' Encyclo
pedia Britannica, xi. 380.

CHAP. XI. ARGUMENT FROM PARALLEL PASSAGES 85
Golden Treasury called ' The Book of the Righteous ' ? or
shall we follow those bolder critics who suppose the author
of Job to have lived in the post-Exile times, when he may
easily have had access to both parts of our Book of Isaiah ?
These are questions not to be evaded on account of their
difficulty, but not to be decided here.
Our next halt may be made at the Book of Proverbs, the
three concluding sections of which composite work belong at
the earliest to the last century of the Jewish state. Among
the clearest literary allusions in Job are those to this book, and
some of these are especially important with regard to the dis
puted question of the relation between our poem and the
introduction to the Book of Proverbs (Prov. i.-ix.) That the
latter work is the earlier seems to me clear from a comparison
of the general positions indicated by the following passages
from Prov. i.-ix. and the Book of Job. Compare —
Prov. i. 7 with Job

1.

7

iii.

11

iii.

14,

15

viii.

10,

11

iii.

!9.

20

viii.

22,

25

viii.

29

XXVIII.

28

V.

17

xxviii.

is-^

xxviii.

26, 27

xv.

7. 8

xxxviii.

10.

29 —
It will be seen by any one who will compare these passages
that the case here is different from that of the parallelisms in
Job and the second part of Isaiah. The latter do not perhaps
allow us to determine with confidence which of the two books
is the earlier. But, as Prof. Davidson has amply shown,1 the
stage of intellectual development represented by Job is more
advanced than that in the ' Praise of Wisdom.' The general
subjects may be the same, but in Job they have entered upon
a new phase. — We now pass to the earliest of the proverbial
anthologies (Prov. x.-xxii. 16). Here of course the relation
is reversed : the proverbs are the originals to which the author
of Job alludes. Compare —
Prov. xiii. 19 1 with Job xyiii 6j xxL I?
— xxiv. 20 J
— xv. 11 — — xxvi. 6
— xvi. 15 — — xxix. 23, 24.
' The Book of fob (1884), pp. lx.-lxli.

86 THE BOOK OF JOB chap xi.
We may infer from this group of parallels that the author oljob
not only studied venerated ' Solomonic ' models, but even ven
tured directly to controvert their leading doctrine ; see especially
Job xxi. 17. In our next comparison the relation seems re
versed. The author of Prov. xxx. 1-4 not improbably alludes
sarcastically to the theophany in Job xxxviii.-xlii. 6. Note
in passing the occurrence of Eloah for ' God ' in Prov. xxx. 5
(comp. the speeches in Job).
There are several parallels in the Book of Lamentations ;
I restrict myself to those in the third elegy, which differs in
several points from the others, especially in its poetic
feebleness. It is easier to believe that the author of the elegy
was dependent on Job than to take the reverse view. A poem,
the hero of which was obviously the typical righteous man,
naturally suggested features in the description of the re
presentative Israelite. Compare, then, Lam. iii. 7, 9 with
Job xix. 8 ; iii. 8 with Job xxx. 20 ; iii. 10 with Job. x.
16 ; iii. 12, 13 with Job vii. 20, xvi. 12, 13 ; iii. 14, 63 with
Job xxx. 9.
Parallels to Job also occur in Jeremiah. It is often, in
deed, not easy to say on which side is the originality. But in
one of the most important instances we may pronounce de
cidedly in favour ol Job (comp. Jer. xx. 14-18 with Job iii.
3-10). The despairing utterance referred to is an exaggera
tion in the mouth of Job, but suitable enough in Jeremiah's.
In Job, La, we seem to recognise the slightly artificial turn
which the author loves to give to the ideas and phrases of his
predecessors ; while the cutting irony of the words ' making
him very glad ' (Jer. xx. 1 5) as clearly betokens the hand of
the original writer. Compare also Job vi. 15 with Jer. xv. 18 ;
ix. 19 with Jer. xlix. 19; x. 18-22 with Jer. xx. 14-18;
xii. 4, xix. 7 with Jer. xx. 7, 8 ; xii. 6, xxi. 7 with Jer. xii. 1 ;
xix. 24 with Jer. xvii. 1 ; xxxviii. 33 with Jer. xxxi.
35. 36.
There are two plausible points of contact in Job with
Deuteronomy (comp. Job xxiv. 2, Deut. xix. 14 [removing
landmarks]; Job xxxi. 9, 11, Deut. xxii. 22), but only one
worth mentioning with Genesis (xxii. 16; comp Gen.vi. &c),

chap. XI. ARGUMENT FROM PARALLEL PASSAGES

87

and here observe that the word for A.V.'s ' flood ' (Job, I.e.) is
not mabbfd but nahdr.1 Hitzig and Delitzsch find another in
xxxi. 33. But adam in Job always means ' men : ' in xv. 7,
8, where the first man is referred to, he is not named. The
reference in xxxi. 33 is not to hiding sins from God, but
from man. I think, however, that the Prologue implies a
general acquaintance with some current descriptions of the
patriarchal period — the ' golden age ' to men of a more ad
vanced civilisation.
It is remarkable, what interesting parallels are afforded by
the prophets of the Assyrian period. Isaiah, as might be
expected, contains the largest number (see The Prophecies of
Isaiah, ed. 3, ii. 243) ; but Hosea follows close after. Compare
especially —

Isa. xix. 5 (certainly the originals
of Job, I.e., where the special ! . ,
reference to the sea-like Nile is f
dropped) /
Isa. xxviii. 29
Hos. x. 13 (combined with Prov.
xxii. 8)
Hos. vi. 1 (or Deut. xxxii. 39)
Hos. v. 14, xiii. 7, 8 | —
Hos. xiii. 12 (or Deut. xxxii. 34) I —
Am. iv. 13, v. 8 (the comparison
suggests that v. 8, 9 stood
immediately after iv. 13 when
Job was written, and that ' the
sea,' i.e. the upper ocean, stood
for ' the earth ')

Job xiv. 11 ('the waters
fail from the sea,' i.e.
any inland body of
water)
Job xi. 6 (God's wisdom
marvellous; see Merx,
and Isaiah, ii. 154)
(Job iv. 8 ('ploughing
t iniquity,' &c.)
Job v. 18 ('he maketh
sore and bindeth up,'
&c.)
(Job x. 16 (God com-
1 pared to a lion)
(Job xiv. 17 ('transgres-
1 sion sealed up,' &c.)
Job ix. 8, 9 (' that tread-
eth upon the heights
of the sea ; that
maketh the Bear,
Orion, and the Plei
ades ')

Comp. also Am. v. 8, ix. 6 with Job xii. 15 ; Am. ii. 9
with Job xviii. 16.
1 According to Ewald, the reference is to Sodom and Gomorrah, the story f
which, we know, was familiar as early as Hosea's time (Hos. xi. 8).

88 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xi.
I say nothing here of the parallels in the Song of Hezekiah
(Isa. xxxviii. 10-20). I have shown reason in Isaiah, i. 228,
for believing that the Song is a highly imitative work, and
' largely based on Job, such a work in fact as can only be
accounted for in the Exile or post-Exile period.
There still remains the great body of psalms of disputed
date. The parallelisms in Ps. xxxvii.1 are too general to be
mentioned here, striking as they are ; but we may venture to
compare Ps. viii. 5 with Job vii. 17 ; Ps. xxxix. 12b with Job
iv. 19^ ; ib. 14a with Job vii. io.a, x. 20 ; ib. 14$ with Job
x. 21, 22 ; Ps. lxxii. 12 with Job xxix. 12 ; ib. 16 with
Job v. 2t,b ; Ps. lxxxviii. 16b with Job xx. 25 (the rare
word 'emim) ; ib. 17 with Job vi. 4 (btiithim) ; ib. 19 (lxix. 9)
with Job xix. 14 ; and note throughout this psalm the same
correspondence of extreme inward and outward suffering
which we find in Job. Then, turning to the psalms of differ
ent tenor, comp. lxxii. 12 with Job xxix. 12 ; ib. 16 with Job
v. 25^. I have selected these instances precisely because
1 they allow us to draw an inference as to priority. Ps.
lxxxviii. is clearly imitative, and no doubt there is more
imitation of the great poem in other psalms. Psalms viii.,
xxxix., and (probably) lxxii. were however known to and
imitated by the authors of Job. The parallel in Ps. viii. is
specially important. That this psalm is not earlier than the
Exile is disputed, but extremely probable ; the bitter
'parody' in Job vii. 17 must in this case be of the same or
a later period.
And now to sum up the results of our comparisons. The
Colloquies in Job are of later origin than Deuteronomy,
' Jeremiah, Lamentations, and most of Proverbs, but possibly
nearly contemporaneous with much in the second part of
Isaiah, except that Isa. liii. not improbably lay before the
author of Job ; also that Ps. viii., a work of the Exile period,
was well known to him. We are thus insensibly led on to
; date the Book of Job (the speeches, at any rate) during the
1 See Bateson Wright's The Book of Job, Appendix. The author concludes
that the poet of fob ' selects the main threads from the complete treatise of Ps.
xxxvii. and interweaves them into the highly poetical discourse of Eliphaz.'

chap, XI. ARGUMENT FROM PARALLEL PASSAGES 89
Exile. This will account for the large amount of imitation to
which the book gave rise. Men felt respecting the author
that he was the first and greatest exponent of the ideas and
feelings, not of a long-past age, but of their own ; that he
' sat chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, as one that com-
forteth the mourners' (Job xxix. 25).

/

90 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xii.

CHAPTER XII.
ON- THE DISPUTED PASSAGES IN THE DIALOGUE-PORTION,
ESPECIALLY THE SPEECHES OF ELIHU.
A DETAILED exegetical study would alone enable the reader
to do justice to the controversies here referred to. But I may
at least ask that, even upon the ground of the slender analysis
which I have given, he should recognise the difficulties at the
root of these controversies. In comparison with his possession
of a ' seeing eye,' it is of little moment to me whether he
adopts my explanations or not. Poets, like painters, have
different periods. It is therefore conceivable that the author
ol Job changed in course of time, and criticised his own work;
these afterthoughts of his being embodied in the ' disputed
passages.' It is indeed also conceivable that the phenomena
which puzzle us are to be explained by the plurality of author
ship. In the remarks which follow I wish to supplement the
sketch of the possible or probable growth of the Book offered
in section 3 of Chap. VII., chiefly with regard to the speeches
of Elihu. Keil has spoken of ' the persistently repeated assaults
upon the genuineness ' of these discourses. I must however
protest against the use of the word 'genuineness' in this
connection. Even if not by the author of the poem of Job,
the speeches of Elihu are as ' genuine ' a monument of Israel's
religious ' wisdom ' as the work of the earlier writer. No
critic worthy of the name thinks of 'assaulting ' them, though
divines no less orthodox than Gregory the Great and the
Venerable Bede have uncritically enough set the example.
The speeches of Elihu only seem poor by comparison with
the original work ; they are not without true and beautiful

CHAP. xii. DISPUTED PASSAGES 91
passages, which, with all their faults of expression, would in
any other book have commanded universal admiration. The
grounds on which chaps, xxxii.-xxxvii. are denied to the
original writer may be summed up thus.
(1) Elihu puts forward a theory of the sufferings of the
righteous which does not essentially differ from that of the
three friends (see especially xxxiii. 25-28 ; xxxiv. 9, 11, 12,
36, 37; xxxv. 9-16; xxxvi. 5-7, 21-25; xxxvii. 23, 24).
No doubt he improves the theory, by laying more stress upon
the chastening character of the righteous man's afflictions
(xxxiii. 14-30; xxxvi. 8-12, 15, 16, and comp. Eliphaz in
v. 18, 19), and to many disciples of the New Covenant his form
of the theory may recommend itself as true. But, even apart
from the appendix or epilogue (see xlii. 7-9), it is clear from
the whole plan of the poem, particularly if the discourses of
Jehovah be taken in, that this was not, in the writer's mind, an
adequate solution of the problem, especially in the case of the
God-fearing and innocent Job.
(2) These speeches interrupt the connection between the
' words of Job ' and those of Jehovah, and seem to render the
latter superfluous. Whether the 'words of Job' (to borrow the
phrase of some editor of the book) should end at xxxvii. 37 or
at ver. 40, it is difficult not to believe that xxxviii. 1, 2, 'And
Jehovah answered Job out of the storm, and said, Who then
is darkening counsel by words without knowledge ? ' was
meant to follow immediately upon them. The force of this
seems to some to be weakened by taking Elihu's description
of the storm (xxxvii. 2-5) as preparatory to the appearance
of Jehovah in chap, xxxviii. But, evidently, to make this an
argument, the storm ought to be at the end of the speech.
(3) There is no mention of Elihu in the Prologue, nor is
any divine judgment passed upon him in the Epilogue.
It is not enough to reply with Stickel that Jehovah himself
is not mentioned in the Prologue as the umpire in the great
controversy ; why should he be ? — and that the absence of any
condemnation of Elihu on the part of Jehovah, and the harmony
(?) between Elihu's and Jehovah's discourses, sufficiently indi
cate the good opinion of the Divine Judge.

92 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xii.
(4) Elihu's style is prolix and laboured ; his phrases often
very obscure, even where the words separately are familiar.
As Davidson remarks, there are not only unknown words
(these we meet with elsewherein the book), but an unknown
use of known words. There is also a deeper colouring of
Aramaic (see Appendix), which F. C. Cook, following Stickel,
explains by the supposed Aramaean origin of the speaker ; in
this case, it would be a refinement of art which adds a fresh
laurel to the crown of the poet. But the statement in
xxxii. 2 is that Elihu was ' the son of Barakel the Buzite, of
the kindred of Ram.' That Ram = Aram is unproved ;
while Buz, as Jer. xxv. 23 shows, is the name of a genuine
Arabian people. It would be better to explain the in
creased Aramaism by the lapse of a long interval in the
writer's life. This explanation is, to me, equivalent to
assigning these speeches to a different writer (as I have
remarked elsewhere, comparing Goethe's Faust). Those who
will may adopt it ; but my own respect for the poet of Job
will not allow me to believe that his taste had so much
declined as to insert this inferior poem into his masterpiece.
(5) Elihu's allusions to passages in the rest of the book
(comp. xxxiii. 1 5 with iv. 13; xxxiv. 3 with xii. 1 1 ; xxxv.
5 with xxii. 1 2 ; xxxv. 8 with xxii. 2 ; xxxvii. 8 with
xxxviii. 40) and his minute reproductions of sayings of Job
(see xxxiii. 8, 9 ; xxxiv. 5, 6 ; xxxv. 2, 3) point to an author
who had the book before him, so far as then known, as a
whole. (6) Elihu's somewhat scrupulous piety, or shall I call it
his advance in reverential, contrite devoutness ? compared with
the three friends, suggests that the poet of Elihu was the
child of a later and more sombre generation which found the
original book in some respects disappointing.
Putting all this together, if the main part of the Book of
Job belongs to the Exile, the Elihu-portion may well belong
to the post-Exile period.
To this view, it is no objection that, on the one hand,
Elihu not merely (to express oneself shortly) criticises the
position of the three friends, but, by ignoring it, criticises the

chap. xn. DISPUTED PASSAGES ' 93
view of Job's afflictions taken in the Prologue, and, on the
other, has much in common with the rest of the book in
orthographic, grammatical, and lexical respects. The idea
that God permits affliction simply to try the disinterestedness
of a good man, is one which might easily shock the feelings
of one only too conscious that he was not good ; and the
linguistic points which ' Elihu ' and the rest of the book have
in common are such as we should expect to find in works
proceeding from the same class of writers. If Jeremiah
wrote all the pieces which contain Jeremian phraseology, or
Isaiah all the prophecies which remind one at all of the great
prophet, or the same ' wise man ' wrote Proverbs and Ecclesi
astes, then we may perhaps believe that the author of Job
also wrote the speeches of Elihu and perhaps one or two of
the didactic psalms.
Professor Briggs, the author of that excellent work Biblical
Study, takes up a different position, which, though not new,
acquires some authority from his respected name. He does
not see any literary or theological merit in Elihu's speeches,
and yet regards them as ' an important part of the original
work.' The author designed to pourtray Elihu as a young
and inexperienced man, and uses these ambitious failures ' as
a literary foil ... to prepare the way for the divine inter
position, to quiet and soothe by their tediousness the agitated
spirits of Job and his friends.' • To me, this view of the
intention of the speeches lowers the character of the original
writer. So reverent and devout a speaker as Elihu is ill
rewarded by being treated as a literary and theological foil.
Artistically, the value of this part may be comparatively slight,
but theologically it enriches the Old Testament with a
monument of a truly Christian consciousness of sin. Had the
original writer equalled him in this, we should perhaps have
missed a splendid anticipation of the life of Christ, who ' did no
sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.' But the Elihu-
section expresses in Old Testament language the great truth
announced by St. Paul in 1 Cor. xi. 32.2
1 Presbyterian Review, 1885, p. 353.
2 Delitzsch, art. ' Hiob,' Herzog-Plitt's Realencyklopddie, vi. 132.

94 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xii.
On the other ' disputed passages ' I have little to add.
(a) To me, the picture of the behemoth and the leviathan
(xl. 15-xli.) seems but little less probably a later insertion
than the speeches of Elihu ; this view of the case has the
authority of Ewald. That cautious critic, Dr. Davidson,
remarks that this passage has a very different kind of movement
from that of the light and graceful sketches in chaps, xxxviii.,
xxxix., and that the poetic inventory which it contains reminds
us more of an Arab poet's description of his camel or his horse
(Job, p. liv.)
(b) I cannot speak so positively as to the speeches of
Jehovah. From a purely aesthetic point of view, I am often
as unwilling as any one to believe that they were ' inserted.'
At other times I ask myself, Can the inconsistencies of this
portion as compared with the Colloquies be explained as
mere oversights ? The appearance of the Almighty upon the
scene is in itself strange. Job had no doubt expressed a
wish for this, but did not suppose that it could be realised,1
at any rate in his own lifetime. It is still stranger that the
Almighty should appear, not in the gentle manner which Job
had desired (ix. 34, 35), not with the object of a judicial
investigation of the case, but in the whirlwind, and with a
foregone conclusion on Job's deserts. For in fact that splendid
series of ironical questions which occupies chaps, xxxviii.,
xxxix., and which Job had by anticipation deprecated (ix. 3),
is nothing less than a long drawn-out condemnation of Job.
The indictment and the defendant's reply, to which Job has
referred with such proud self-confidence (xxxi. 35, 36), are
wholly ignored ; and the result is that which Job has uncon
sciously predicted in the words, —
To whom, though innocent, I would not reply,
but would make supplication unto my Judge (ix. 15).
(c) Great difficulties have been found in xxvii. 8 (or 11)-
23, xxviii. First of all, Is there an inner connection between
these passages ? Dr. Green seeks to establish one. ' While
continuing,' he says, ' to insist upon his own integrity, notwith-
1 Since this wish cannot be realised, Job pleads his cause against an invisible
God with the same earnestness as if he stood before His face.

CHAP. xii. DISPUTED PASSAGES 95
standing the afflictions sent upon him, he freely admits, and
this in language as emphatic as their own, the reality of God's
providential government, and that punishment does overtake
the ungodly. Nevertheless there is a mystery enveloping the
divine administration, which is quite impenetrable to the
human understanding' (The Book of Job, p. 233). This is
very unnatural.1 How can Job suddenly adopt the language
of the friends without conceding that he has himself hitherto
been completely in error ? And what right have we to force
such a subtle connection between chaps, xxvii. and xxviii. ?
Looking at the latter by itself, one cannot help suspecting
that it once formed part of a didactic treatise similar to the
Introduction to the Book of Proverbs (see end of Chap. III).
For a careful exegetical study of chaps, xxvii., xxviii., see
Giesebrecht (see ' Aids to the Student,' after Chap. XV), with
whom Dr. Green seems to accord, but who fails to convince
me. See also Budde in his Beitrage, and Gratz, ' Die Inte-
gritat der Kap. 27 und 28 im Hiob,' Monatsschrift, 1872, p.
241 &c.
1 It is a pleasure to quote the forcible summing-up of Mr. Froude. ' A diffi
culty,' he remarks, ' now arises which, at first sight, appears insurmountable. As
the chapters are at present printed, the entire of the 27th is assigned to Job, and
the paragraph from the Ilth to the 23rd verses is in direct contradiction to all
which he has maintained before — is, in fact, a concession of having been wrong
from the beginning. Ewald, who, as we said above, himself refuses to allow the
truth of Job's last and highest position, supposes that he is here receding from it,
and confessing what an over-precipitate passion had betrayed him into denying.
For many reasons, principally because we are satisfied that Job said then no more
than the real fact, we cannot think Ewald right ; and the concessions are too
large and too inconsistent, to be reconciled even with his own general theory of
the poem' (Short Studies, vol. i.) He then proceeds to mention with cautious
approbation the theory of Kennicott (see note on Text at end of Chap. XV. )

96 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xm.

CHAPTER XIII.
IS JOB A HEBR^O-ARABIC POEM?
That the Bookof Job is not as deeply penetrated with the
spirit of revelation, nor even as distinctly Israelitish a pro
duction, as most of the Old Testament writings, requires no
argument. May we venture to go further, and infer from
various phenomena that, not merely the artistic form of the
mashal, but the thoughts and even the language of Job
came in a greater or less degree from a foreign source ? The
question has been answered in the affirmative (as in the case
of the words of Agur in Prov. xxx., and those of Lemuel
in chap, xxxi.) by some early as well as some more modern
writers. This view has been supposed to be implied in the
Greek postscript to the Septuagint version ' (strongly redolent
of Jewish Midrash), which contains the statement, ovtos
sp/j,r)vsvsTai ek rrjs 'Zvpiaicrjs /3t/3Xou, but though Origen
appears so to have understood,2 it is more probable that ovtos
merely refers to the postscript (Zunz ; Frankl). Ibrt Ezra,
however, on independent grounds does express the opinion
(commenting on Job ii. 11) that the Book of Job is a trans
lation ; he ascribes to the translator the words in xxxviii. 1
1 There is a doubt whether the Septuagint postscript or the statement of the
Egyptian Jew (?) Aristeas (as given by Eusebius from Alexander Polyhistor in Prrnf.
Evang. 1. ix. ) be the earlier. The ordinary view is that Aristeas had the Septua
gint Job before him ; Freudenthal, however, infers from the strange description
of Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar in Sept. Job ii. ii (taken verbally from Aristeas)
that the reverse was the case, and that the fragment of Aristeas is only a condensed
extract from the prologue and epilogue of the Book of Job (Freudenthal,
Hellenistische Studien, 139, 140 ; Gr'atz, Monatsschrift, 1877, p. 91). This in
ference in turn suggests Griitz' hypothesis that the Septuagint Job is a work of the
first century a.d. (see note at end of Chap. XV.)
2 Opera, Delarue, ii. 851, ap. Delitzsch, lob, p. 603.

chap. xm. IS JOB A HEBR/EO-ARABIC POEM ? 97
containing the sacred name Jehovah. The increased study
of Arabic in the 17th century led several theologians of
eminence to the same conclusion. Spanheim, for instance,
thought that Job and his friends wrote down the history and
the colloquies in Arabic, after the happy turn in the fortunes
of the sufferer, and that some inspired Israelitish writer, in
the age of Solomon, gave this work a Hebrew dress. Albert
Schultens, in the preface to his Liber J 'obi (17 '37), is at the pains
to discuss this theory, which he rejects on two main grounds,
(1) the disparagement to our magnificent Book of Job involved
in calling it a translation, and (2) that in those primitive and,
according to him, pre-Mosaic times, the Hebrew and Arabic
languages cannot have been so different (!) as Spanheim
from his point of view imagines. Elsewhere he expresses
his own opinion shortly thus, ' ' Linguam qua liber Jobi
conscriptus est, genuinum illius temporis Arabismum esse.'
He actually imagines that Job and his friends extemporised
the Colloquies we have before us, referring to the amazing
faculty of improvisation still possessed by the Arabs — a view
scarcely worthier than that of Spanheim, for, as Martineau
remarks in another connection, Who ever improvised a great
poem or a great sermon ? Both these great scholars have
fallen into the error of confounding the poet with his hero
and the use of poetic and didactic fiction with deliberate fraud.
One cannot be severe upon this error, for it has survived
among ourselves in Prof. S. Lee's great work (1837), where our
Book of J9b is actually traced back through Jethro to Job him
self. The only form however in which a critic of our day
could discuss the question mentioned above would be this, Is
it in some degree probable that the author ol Job was a
Hebrew who had passed some time with the Arabic-
and Aramaic-speaking peoples bordering on the land of
Israel ?
On grounds independent of Eichhorn and Dean Plumptre,
the former of whom combines his theory with that of a pre-
Mosaic, and the latter with that of a Solomonic date of Job,
1 Opera minora (Lugd. Bat. 1769), p. 497. H

98 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xhi.
I think that we may venture to reply in the affirmative. These
grounds have reference (i) to the ideas of Job, (2) to its
vocabulary. (1) I am well aware that the argument from the ideas of
Job cannot claim a strong degree of cogency. It is possible
to account for the conceptions of the author from the natural
progress of the (divinely-guided) moral and religious history
of Israel, and those who believe (I do not myself) that Psalms
xvii., xxxvii., xlix., lxxiii., are Palestinian works of earlier
date than Job will have a ready argument in favour of a
purely native origin of the latter book. Still it seems to me
that we can still better account for the author's point of view
by supposing that he was in sympathy with an intellectual
movement going on outside Israel. The doctrine of retribution
in the present life, which he finds inadequate, is common to
the friends and to the religion which has in all ages been
that of the genuine Arab — the so-called din Ibrahim (or
' religion of Abraham '). The Eloah and the Shaddai of Job
are the irresponsible Allah who has all power in heaven and on
earth, and before whom, when mysteries occur in human life
which the retribution-doctrine cannot solve, the Arab and every
true Moslem bows his head with settled, sad resignation.
The morality alike of the din Ibrahim, and of the religion of
Mohammed (who professed to restore it in its purity), is
faulty precisely as the religion of the three friends (and
originally of Job himself) is faulty. The same conflict which
, arose in the heart of Job arose in the midst of the Moslem
world. I refer to the dispute between the claimants of ortho
doxy and the sect of the Mo'tazilites (8th and 9th cen
turies) ; the latter, who were worsted in the strife, viewed
God as the absolutely Good, the former as a despotic and
' revengeful tyrant.1 May not this conflict have been fore
shadowed at an earlier time? Is not the difficulty which
led to it a constantly recurring one, so soon as reflection
acquires a certain degree of maturity ? It may well have
been felt among the Jews, especially in the decline of the
1 Kremer, Herrschende Ideen des Islams, p. 27 &c. ; Kuenen, Hibbert Lectures,
p. 48 &c.

CHAP. xiii. IS JOB A HEBR^O-ARABIC POEM ? 99
state, but it must also have been felt among their neigh
bours, and freedom of speech has always, in historical time3,
been an Arab characteristic. Putting aside the anachronism
of placing Job in the patriarchal age, does not the poet
himself appear to hint that it was so felt by the names
and tribal origins of the speakers in the great religious
discussion ?
(2) As to the Arabisms and Aramaisms of the language
of Job (see Appendix). Jerome already says that his own
translation follows none of the ancients, but reproduces, now
the words, now the sense, and now both, ' ex ipso hebraico
arabicoque sermone et interdum syro.' In the 17th and 18th
centuries, De Dieu, Bochart, and above all Schultens made it
a first principle in the study of Job to illustrate it from
Aramaic and especially Arabic. Schultens even describes the
language as not so much Hebrew, as Hebraeo-Arabic, and
says that it breathes the true and unmixed genius of Arabia.
This is every way an exaggeration, and yet, after all reason
able deductions, our poem will stand out from the Old
Testament volume by its foreign linguistic affinities. It is
not enough to say that the Arabisms and Aramaisms have
from the first formed part of the Hebrew vocabulary, and
were previously employed only because the subjects of the
other books did not call for their use. Unless a more
thorough study of Assyrian should prove that the Arabism
(for of these I am chiefly thinking) belonged to northern as
well as to southern Semitic, it will surely be more natural to
suppose that the author of Job replenished his vocabulary
from Arabic sources. There is not a little in the phraseology
ol Job which is still as obscure as in the days of Ibn Ezra, but
which receives, or may yet receive, illustration from the stores
of written and spoken Arabic.1
May we not, in short, conjecture that the poem of Job is
a grand attempt to renovate and enrich the Hebrew language ? 2
1 Prof. Socin once observed to me how useful spoken Arabic would be found
for this purpose.
2 Arabic literary history presents an example of literary experimenting which
will at once occur to the mind — the ' Maqamas ' or Sessions of Hariri.
hs

IOO THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xnr.
If so, the experiment can hardly have been made before the
great subversion of Hebrew traditions at the Babylonian
captivity. Residence in a foreign land produces a marked
effect on one's language. Recollect too that our author was a
literary man. Internal evidence converges to show that Job
belonged to that great literary movement among the wise
men, philosophers, or humanists, to which we shall have to
refer Prov. i.-ix., the Wisdom of Sirach, and the Book of
Ecclesiastes. Before leaving this subject, let us notice the parallels to
descriptions in the speeches of Jehovah in the Arabian poets,
who show the same attention to the striking phenomena of
earth and sky as the author of these speeches. The Arabian
tone and colouring of the descriptions of animals in Job has
been already remarked upon by Alfred von Kremer in vol. ii.
of his Culturgeschichle des Orients. Is it possible to conceive
/that those sketches of the wild goat, the wild ass, and
the horse, were not written by one who was familiar with
the sight? Or that the author had not observed the habits
of the ostrich, when he penned his lines on the ostrich's
neglect of her eggs ? Or that his interest in astronomy
>vas not deepened by the spectacle of a night-sky in Arabia ?
Or that personal experience of caravan life did not inspire
the touching figure in vi. 15-20? And observation of the
mines in the Sinaitic peninsula l the fine description of xxviii.
1-10? It is possible that some of these passages maybe
due to other travelled ' wise men ; ' but this only increases the
probability that the Hebrew movement was strengthened by
contact with similar movements abroad. The ' wise men ' had
certainly travelled far and wide among Arabic-speaking
populations, though nowhere perhaps were they so much at
home as in Idumsea and its neighbourhood. As M. Deren
bourg remarks, ' Les riantes oasis, au milieu des contr&s
d&olees, environnant la mer Morte, eteient la demeure des
1 On the mining passage see further p. 40. Stickel, however, though in
clining to the above view, thinks that it is still not quite impossible that Pales
tinian mines are meant, comparing Edrisi's statements on the iron-mines of
Phoenicia and the words of the Deuteronomist in Deut. viii. 9. Das Buch Hiob
pp. 265-6.

ohap. xiii. IS JOB A HEBR/EO-ARABIC POEM ? 10 1
sages et des reveurs. Bien des siecles apres I'auteur de Job,
les Esseniens et les Th^rapeutes se plongeaient la dans la vie
contemplative, ou bien ils se livraient a une vie simple, active
et d^gag^e de tout souci mondain. Encore un peu plus tard
cette contr^e devint probablement le berceau de la kabbale
ou du mysticisme juif.'

102 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xiv.

CHAPTER XIV.
THE BOOK FROM A RELIGIOUS POINT OF VIEW.
Motto : ' Jedem n'amlich wollte ich dienen, der hfnlanglich Sinn hat in die
grosse Frage tiefer einzugehen, welche das ernste Leben einmal gewiss an Jeden
heranbringt, nach der Gerechtigkeit der gottlichen Waltung in den menschlichen
Geschicken.' — Stickel (Das Buch Hiob, Einl. S. vi.)
THERE was a period, not so long since, when a Biblical writing
was valued according to its supposed services to orthodox
theology. From this point of view, the Book of Job was re
garded partly as a typical description of the sufferings of our
Saviour,1 partly as a repository of text-proofs of Christian
doctrines, which though few in number acquired special im
portance from the immense antiquity assigned to the poem.
We must not, in our reaction from the exclusively theological
estimate of the Old Testament, shut our eyes to the signi
ficance of each of its parts in the history of the higher religion.
The Book of Job is theological, though the theology of its
writer, being that of a poet, is less logical than that of an
apostle, less definite even than that of a prophet, in so far as
the prophet obtained (or seemed to obtain) his convictions
by a message or revelation from without. Being a poet,
moreover, the writer ol Job can even less than a prophet have
had clear conceptions of the historical Messiah and His
period. Moral and spiritual truths — these were his appointed
1 ' The Church in all ages has regarded the one as a type of the other,' Turner,
Studies Biblical and Oriental, p. 150. But Del. has already dissuaded from insist
ing too much on the historic character of the story of Job. ' The endurance of
Job' (James v. Ii) is equally instructive whether the story be real (wirklich) or
only ideally true (wahr) ; and if by the phrase ' the end of the Lord ' St. James
refers to the Passion of Jesus (to me, however, this appears doubtful), he can be
claimed with as much reason for the view of Job here adopted as for the older
theory advocated by TurnerJ

chap. xiv. A RELIGIOUS POINT OF VIEW IO3
province, not the secret counsels of God, nor those exceptional
facts or truths which orthodoxy still perhaps regards as
among the postulates of the faith of the Hebrew prophets.
Nor can the hero of the poem be considered a strict and
proper type of the Christ, for this reason among others, that
Job is to all intents and purposes a creation of the fancy,
whether of the unconsciously working fancy of the people,
or of the rich and potent imagination of a poet. In what
sense, then, may the Book of Job still claim a theological
significance, and be allowed to fill a not unimportant place
in the Vorgeschichte of Christianity ?
I. The hero of the poem (I exclude from consideration
the speeches of Elihu ') is, not indeed a type, but in some
sense prophetic of the Christ, inasmuch as the very concep
tion of a righteous man enduring vast calamities, not so
much for his own sake as for the world's, is a bold hypothesis
which could only in the Christ be made good. The poet
does more than merely personify the invisible Church of
righteous and believing sufferers ; he idealises this Church in
doing so, and this idealising is a venture of faith. Job is an
altogether exceptional figure : he is imperfect, no doubt, if
viewed as a symbol of the Christ, but this does not diminish
the reality and the grandeur of the presentiment which he
embodies. To a religious mind, this remarkable creation
will always appear stamped by the hand of Providence. Job
is not indeed a Saviour, but the imagination of such a figure
prepares the way for a Saviour. In the words of Dr. Mozley,
' If the Jew was to accept a Messiah who was to lead a life of '
sorrow and abasement, and to be crucified between thieves, it
was necessary that it should be somewhere or other distinctly
taught that virtue was not always rewarded here, and that there
fore no argument could be drawn from affliction and ignominy
against the person who suffered it' 2
II. This then is the grandest of the elements in the
Book of Job which helped to prepare the noblest minds
among the Jews for the reception of primitive Christianity —
1 On the Elihu-section, see Chap. XII.
8 Mozley, Essays, ii. 227 ; comp. Turner, Studies, p. 149.

I04 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. Xiv.
viz. the idea of a righteous man suffering simply because (as
was said of One parallel in many respects to Job) ' it pleased
Jehovah (for a wise purpose) to bruise him.' The second
element is the idea of a supra-mundane justice, which will
' one day manifest itself in favour of the righteous sufferer, not
only in this world (xvi. 18, 19, xix. 25, xlii.), so that all men
may recognise their innocence, but also beyond the grave, the
sufferers themselves being in some undefined manner brought
back to life in the conscious enjoyment of God's favour (xiv.
13-15, xix. 26, 27?) There may be only suggestions of
these ideas, but suggestions were enough when interpreted
by sympathetic readers. Let me add that by ' sympathetic,'
I mean in sympathy with the conception of God formed by
the author of Job. Nothing is more out of sympathy with
this conception than the saying of the Jewish scholar, S. D.
Luzzatto, 'The God of Job is not the God of Israel, the
Gracious One ; He is the Almighty and the Righteous, but
not the Kind and Faithful One.' No ; the God of Job would
be less than infinitely righteous if He were not also kind
(comp. Ps. Ixii. 12). And of this enlarged conception of
God, faith in thg_c£>ntinuance of the human spjrit is a conse-
quence. Justice to those with whom God is in covenant
requires that He should not after a few years hurl them back
into non-existence (comp. Job x. 8-13). But I can only
skirt the fringe of the great religious problems opened by this
wonderful book.
In conclusion, and in the spirit of my motto, let me invite
the reader's attention (even if he be no theologian) to the
spectacle of a powerful mind dashing itself against perennial
problems too mighty for it to solve. The author of our poem
missed the only adequate and possible solution, and hence he
has been erroneously regarded by several moderns as the repre
sentative of a mental attitude akin to their own. Heine, for
instance, can term this book ' the Song of Songs of scepticism.'
No doubt those who are at sea on religious matters can find
¦ sayings in Job which may seem as if spoken by themselves ;
but in truth these only enhance the significance of the coun
teracting elements in the poem. It is the logical incomplete-

chap. xi\. A RELIGIOUS POINT OF VIEW 105
ness of Job which at once exposes the book to misjudgment,
and gives it an eternal fascination. As Quinet has said, ' Ce
qui fait la grandeur de ce livre, c'est qu'en depassant la
mesure de l'Ancien Testament il appelle, il provoque ndces-
sairement des cieux nouveaux . . . . Le christianisme vit au
fond de ce blaspheme.' We need a second part of Job, or at
least a third speech of Jehovah, which could however only be
given by some Hebrew poet who had drunk at the fountains
of the Fourth Gospel. Failing these, the reader must supply
what is necessary for himself, — a better compensation to Job
for his agony than the Epilogue provides, and a more touching
and not less divine theophany (comp. Job ix. 32, 33). This
Christianity will enable him to do. Intellectually, the problem
of Job's life may remain, but to the Christian heart the cloud
is luminous. The Infinite remains unknown,
Too vast for man to understand :
In Him, the ' Woman's Seed,' alone
We trace God's footprint in the sand.1
1 Aubrey De Vere. Need I guard myself on the subject of Gen. iii. 15,
referred to in a recent memorable debate in the Nineteenth Century; A strict
Messianic interpretation is, since Calvin's time, impossible to the exegete, but
the application of the words to Jesus Christ is dear to the Christian heart, and
perfectly consistent with a sincere exegesis. M. Reville would, I think, concede
this to Mr. Gladstone.

106 THE BOOK OF JOB CHAP. xv.

CHAPTER XV.
THE BOOK OF JOB FROM A GENERAL AND WESTERN POINT
OF VIEW.
The Book of Job is even less translatable than the Psalter.
And why ? Because there is more nature in it. 'He would
be a poet,' says Thoreau, ' who could impress the winds and
streams into his service to speak for him.' They do speak for
the poet of Job ; the ' still sad music of humanity ' is con
tinually relieved by snatches from the grand symphonies of
external nature. And hence the words of Job are ' so true
and natural that they would appear to expand like the buds
at the approach of spring.' It is only a feeble light which
the Authorised Version sheds upon this poem ; and even the
best prose translation must for several reasons be inadequate.
Perhaps, though English has no longer its early strength, a
true poet might yet achieve some worthy result. Rarely has
the attempt been made. George Sandys was said by Richard
Baxter to have ' restored Job to his original glory,' but he
lived before the great era of Semitic studies. The poetical
translator of Job must not disdain to consult critical inter
preters, and yet by his own unassisted skill could he bring
this Eastern masterpiece home to the Western reader? I
doubt it. Even more than most imaginative poems the Book
of Job needs the help of the painter. It is not surprising
therefore that a scholar of Giotto should have detected
the pictorial beauties of the story of Job. Though only two
of the six Job-frescoes remain entire, the Campo Santo of
Pisa will be impoverished when time and the sea-air effect
the destruction of these. I know not whether any modern
painter besides William Blake has illustrated Job. He, a

chap. xv. A GENERAL POINT OF VIEW 107
' seer ' born out of due time, understood this wonderful book
as no modern before him had done. The student will get
more help of a certain kind from the illustrations thus repro
duced in the second volume of Gilchrist's Life of William
Blake, compared with the sympathetic descriptions by Blake's
biographer (vol. i. pp. 330-333), than from any of the com
mentaries old or new.
In every respect the poem ol Job stands in a class by itself.
More than any other book in the Hebrew canon it needs
bringing near to the modern reader, untrained as he is in
Oriental and especially in Semitic modes of thought and
imagination. Such a reader's first question will probably re
late to the poetic form of the book. Is it, for instance, a
drama ? Theodore of Mopsuestia (died 428) answered in
the affirmative, though he was censured for this by the
Council of Constantinople. The author of Job, he says,
wronged the grand and illustrious story by imitating the
manner of the pagan tragedians. ' Inde et illas plasmationes
fecit, in quibus certamen ad Deum fecit diabolus, et voces sicut
voluit circumposuit, alias quidem justo, alias vero amicis.' ¦
Bishop Lowth devotes two lectures of his Sacred Poetry
to the same question. He replies in the negative, after com
paring Job with the two CEdipi of Sophocles (dramas with
kindred subjects), on the ground that action is of the essence
of a drama and the Book of Job contains not even the sim
plest action. Afterwards indeed he admits that Job has at
least one point in common with a regular drama, viz. the
vivid presentation of several distinct characters in a tragic
situation. The view that it is an epic, held in recent times
by Dr. Mason Good and M. Godet, found favour with one no
less than John Milton, who speaks, as he who knows, of
'that epic form, whereof the two poems of Homer and those
other two of Virgil and Tasso are a diffuse, and the Book of
Job a brief model' 2 Something is to be said for this opinion
if Paradise Regained be a true epic. Dialogue with the
addition of a certain amount of narrative is, roughly speak-
1 Migne, Synes. et Theod., col. 698. Comp. Kihn, Theodor von Mopsuestia,
p. 68 &c. 2 The Reason of Church Government, Book II.

108 THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xv.
ing, the literary form of the Book of Job as well as of the
unequally great English poem, and Coleridge is probably
right in representing Milton as indebted to the former for his
plan. It is however open to us to doubt not only whether
Paradise Regained is a true epic poem, but whether any sec
tion of the Book of Job except the Prologue partakes of the
nature of an epic. The Prologue certainly does ; it is more
than a mere introduction to the subsequent speeches ; it is an
independent poetical narrative,1 if not a narrative poem ; nor
is there wanting a strong infusion of that supernatural element
which tradition regards as essential to the epic. True, it is a
torso, but this does not interfere with its genuinely poetic
character: it is, as Milton says, a 'brief model' or miniature
of an epic poem. The Colloquies on the other hand are as
undoubtedly a germinal character-drama, as the Song of
Songs is a germinal stage-drama. The work belongs to the
same class as Goethe's Iphigenie and Tasso ; only there is
much more passion in it than in these great but distinctively
modern poems. Some one has said that ' there is no action
and reaction between the speakers ' [in the Colloquies].
This is an over-statement. Not only is each speaker con
sistent with his type of character, but the passionate excite
ment of Job, and his able though fragmentary confutation of
his opponents, do produce an effect upon the latter, do
force them to take up a new position, though not indeed to
recall their original thesis.2
But in order to bring the Book of Job nearer to the
modern Western mind, we must not only study it from the
point of view of form, but also compare its scope and range
with those of the loftiest modern Western poems of similar
import ; only then shall we discover the points in which it is
distinctively ancient, Oriental, Semitic. — The greatest English
work of kindred moral and religious import is Paradise Lost.
Like Jcb, it is a theodicy, though of a more complex charac
ter, and aims
1 Comp. Bateson Wright, The Book of fob, pp. 29-31.
* Bunsen observes, not badly, ' Hiob ist ein semitisches Drama aus der Zeit
der Gefangenschaft. Das Dramatische windet sich aber erst aus dem Epos heraus,
ohne eine selbststandige Gestalt zu gewinnen.' Gott in der Geschichte, i. 291.

CHAP. XV. A GENERAL POINT OF VIEW IO9
.... (to) assert eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to man.
And the author of Paradise Lost, though not to be equalled
with the founders of Biblical religion, is still distinguished
from all modern poets (except Dante and Bunyan) by his
singularly intense faith in the operations of the Divine Spirit.
That prayer of his, beginning ' And chiefly Thou, O Spirit,'
and a well-known parallel passage in his Reason of Church
Government, prove conclusively that he held no contracted
views as to the limits of Inspiration. This, in addition to
his natural gifts, explains the overpowering impression of
reality produced by the visions of Milton, and perhaps in a
still greater degree by those of our Puritan prose-poet, John
Bunyan. A similar faith in the divine Spirit, but more
original and less affected by logical theories, was one great
characteristic of the author of Job. He felt, like all the re
ligious 'wise men' (of whom more presently), that true wisdom
was beyond mortal ken, and could only be obtained by an
influence from above. In the strength of this confidence he
ventured, like Milton, on untrodden paths, and presumed to
chronicle, in symbolic form, transactions of the spiritual world.
Whether or not he believed in the Satan of the Prologue, as
a Sunday School child might, we need not decide ; that he
used popular beliefs in a wide, symbolic sense, has been
pointed out elsewhere. Probably both Milton and he, if
questioned on the subject, would have replied in the spirit ol
those words of our Lord, ' If ye will receive it,' and 'All men
cannot receive this saying.' It is not to be forgotten that the
author of Job distinctly places the Satan in a somewhat
humorous light, and though Milton is far from doing the
same, yet we know from Comus that the conception of a
symbol was as familiar to him as to Lord Bacon. Notice,
in conclusion, that Milton's Satan, though unlike the Satan
of his predecessor in some points,1 resembles him in this
striking particular, that he is not yet (in spite of Milton's
attempt to represent him as such) the absolutely evil being.
1 Compare Satan after his overthrow with Tasso's Soldan (Gerus. Lib., c. ix.,
st. 98.

I'lO THE BOOK OF JOB chap. xv.
Faust has in some respects a better right to be compared
with Job than Paradise Lost. Not so much indeed in the
Prologue, though Goethe deserves credit for detecting the
humorous element in the Hebrew poet's Satan, an element
which he has transferred, though with much exaggeration, to
his own Mephistopheles. Neither the Satan nor Mephisto-
pheles (a remote descendant of the Hebrew x mastema, from
the root satam=satan) is the Origin of Evil in a personal
form,2 but the Hebrew poet would never have accepted the
description in Faust ot the peculiar work of the ' denying
spirit' But in the body of the poem there is this marked simi
larity to the Book of Job — that the problem treated of is a
purely moral and spiritual one ; the hero first loses and then
recovers his peace of mind ; it is the counterpart in panthe
istic humanism of what St. Paul terms working out one's
own salvation. Still there are great and most instructive
divergences between the two writers. Observe, first, the
complete want of sympathy with positive religion — with the
religion from which Faust wanders — on the part of the
modern poet. Next, a striking difference in the characteristics
of Job and Faust respectively. Faust succumbs to his bound
less love of knowledge, alternating with an unbridled sensual
lust ; Job is on the verge of spiritual ruin through his
demand for such an absolute correspondence of circum
stances to character as can only be realised in another world.
The greatness of Faust lies in his intellect ; that of Job
(who in chap, xxviii. directly discourages speculation) in his
virtue. Hence, finally, Faust requires (even from a pan
theistic point of view) to be pardoned, while Job stands so
high in the divine favour that others are pardoned on his
account. A third great poem which deserves to be compared with
1 Mr. Sutherland Edwards (Fortnightly Review, Nov. 1885, p. 687) states
that Hebrew etymologies have proved failures. But the steps of the change from
mastema to Mephistopheles are all proved, beginning with the name Mastiphat,
for the prince of the demons, in the chronographers Syncellus and Georg.
Cedrenus (comp. MacmipciT = Mastema in the Book of Jubilees). Comp. Diez,
Roman. Wbrterbuch, i. pp. xxv., xxvi.
2 Turner and Morshead, Faust (1882), pp. 307-8.

CHAP. xv. A GENERAL POINT OF VIEW III
Job is the Divina Commedia. Dante has the same purpose
of edification as the author of Job and even of Faust, though
he has not been able to fuse the didactic and narrative
elements with such complete success as Goethe. Nor is he
so intensely autobiographical as either Goethe or the author
of Job ; his own story is almost inextricably interlaced with
the fictions which he frames as the representative of the
human race. He allows us to see that he has had doubts
(Farad, iv. 129), and that they have yielded to the con
vincing power of Christianity (Purgat. iii. 34-39), but it was
not a part of his plan to disclose, like the author of Job, the
vicissitudes of his mental history. In two points, however —
the width of his religious sympathies (which even permits him
to borrow from the rich legendary material of heathendom ')
and the morning freshness of his descriptions of nature — he
comes nearer to the author ot Job than either Goethe or Milton,
while in the absoluteness and fervour of his faith Milton is
in modern times his only rival.
The preceding comparison will, it is hoped, leave the
reader with a sense of our great literary as well as religious
debt to the author of Job. His gifts were varied, but in one
department his originality is nothing less than Homeric ; his
Colloquies are the fountain-head from which the great river
of philosophic poetry took its origin. He is the first of those
poet-theologians from whom we English have learned so
much, and who are all the more impressive as teachers because
the truths which they teach are steeped in emotion, and have
for their background a comprehensive view of the complex and
many-coloured universe.
1 On the parallel phenomena in Job, see Chap. IX.

112 THE BOOK OF JOB

NOTE ON JOB AND THE MODERN POETS.
Job, like Spenser, should be the poet of poets ;] but though
Goethe has imitated him in royal fashion, and here and there other
poets such as Dante may offer allusions, yet Milton is the only poet
who seems to have absorbed Job. Paradise Regained is in both
form and contents a free imitation of the Book of Job, the story of
which is described in i. 368-370, 424-6, iii. 64-67. The following
are the principal allusions in Paradise Lost : — i. 63, comp. Jobx. 22 ;
ii. 266, comp. Job iv. 16; ii. 603, comp. Job xxiv. 19 Vulg. ; iv. 999
comp. Job xxviii. 25 ; vii. 253-4 (Hymn on the Nativity, st 12),
comp. Job xxxviii. 4-7 ; vii. 373-5, comp. Job xxxviii. 31 ; vii. 102,
comp. Job xxxviii. 5. Shelley, too, is said to have delighted in Job ;
I must leave others to trace this in his works. I conclude with
Thomas Carlyle. The words — 'Was Man with his Experience
present at the Creation, then, to see how it all went on ? System of
Nature ! To the wisest man, wide as is his vision, Nature remains
of quite infinite depth, of quite infinite expansion ' x — are at once a
paraphrase of the questions of Eliphaz, ' Art thou the first man that
was born? . . . Didst thou hearken in the council of Eloah?'
(xv. 7, 8), and a suggestive statement of the problem of Job as a
challenge to limited human ' experience ' to prove its capacity for
criticising God's ways.

NOTE ON THE TEXT OF JOB.
That the received text of our Hebrew Bible has a long history
behind it, is generally recognised ; and few will deny that its worst
corruptions arose in the pre-Massoretic and pre-Talmudic periods
(comp. The Prophecies of Isaiah, vol. ii., Essay vii.) The popularity
of the Book of Job may not have been equal to that of many other
books, but we have seen reason to suppose that within the circles of
the ' wise men ' it was eagerly studied and imitated. In those early
1 Sartor Resartus ('Natural Supernaturalism ).

NOTE ON THE TEXT OF JOB II3
times such popularity was a source of danger to the text, and hasty
copyists left their mark on many a corrupt passage. Is there any
remedy for this ?
Dr. Merx's book, Das Gedicht von Hiob (1871), has the merits
and defects of pioneering works, but his introduction should by all
means be studied. Two points in it have to be examined, (1) the
relative position given by Merx to the chief ancient versions, and (2)
the use which he makes of his own strophic arrangement for detect
ing interpolations or gaps in the text. More, I think, is to be gained
from his discussion of the use of the versions than from his strophic
arrangement ; and yet before quite so much importance is attached
to the text of the Septuagint, ought we not to be surer than we are
of the antiquity and of the critical value of the Septuagint Job ?
That version may not be of as recent origin l as Griitz would have it,
but can hardly be much earlier than the second century b.c Before
this date the text of Job had time to suffer much from the usual
causes of corruption. Besides this, there are special reasons for dis
trusting the literal accuracy of the translator. He seems to have
been in his own way an artist, and to have sought to reproduce
poetry in poetical language. In this respect his vocabulary differs
from that of all the other Septuagint translators ; he thinks more of
his Greek readers than of his Hebrew original. Had he been more
mechanical in his method, the critical value of his work would have
been greater. I agree therefore with H. Schultz that even where the
Septuagint and the Peshitto are united against the Massoretic reading,
the decisive arguments for the reading of the former will be, not the
external one of testimony, but the internal one (if so be it exists) of
suitableness. Mr. Bateson Wright goes almost farther than Dr. Merx in his
opinion of the corruptness of the received text. His work on Job
(1883), however unripe, shows remarkable independence, and con
tains, among many rash, a few striking emendations. That he does
not restrict himself to corrections suggested by the versions, is not in
the least a defect ; the single drawback to his work is that he has
not pondered long enough before writing. Purely conjectural emen
dation was doubtless often resorted to by the old translators them
selves ; it was and still is perfectly justified, though to succeed in its
use requires a singular combination of caution and boldness which
even older critics have not always attained. Special attention is
devoted by Mr. Wright to the poetical features of the speeches in Job.
Dr. Merx had already observed that most of the o-tixoi contain eight
1 ' A child of the first Christian century,' Griitz's Monatsschrift, p. 91.
Noldeke dates this version about 150 B.C. (Gott. gel. Anzeigen, 1865, p. 575). I

114 THE BOOK OF JOB
syllables, to read which, however, it is often needful to dispense with
Metheg and with the Chateph vowels, and contract the dual termi
nations. Mr. Wright, building upon Dr. Merx's foundation, offers a
more elaborate scheme, which cannot be discussed here. It was a
misfortune for him that he had not before him the ambitious metrical
transliteration of Job by G. Bickell, in his Carmina Vet. Test.
metrice, of which I would rather say nothing here than too little.
Subsequent editors of the text of Job will have one advantage,
which will affect their critical use of the Septuagint. It is well
known that the Alexandrine version was largely interpolated from
that of Theodotion. The early Septuagint text itself can however,
now be reconstructed, through a manuscript of the Sahidic or The
baic version from Upper Egypt. (Comp. Lagarde, Mittheilungen,
pp. 203-5 ; Agapios Bsciai, art. in Moniteur de Rome, Oct. 26, 1883.)
Dr. Merx was well aware of the necessity of expurgating the Septua
gint, and would have hailed this much-desired aid in the work (see
p. Ixxi. of his introduction).
So much must suffice in my present limits on the subject of metre
and textual emendation. I need not thus qualify the list which
follows of gaps and misplacements of text in our Book of Job.
Observe (1) that Bildad's third speech (chap, xxv.) is too short.
Probably, as Mr. Elzas has suggested,1 the continuation of it has
been wrongly placed as xxvi. 5-14 ; the affinity of this passage to
chap. xxv. is obvious. Probably the close of Bildad's speech is
wanting. If so (2), something must have dropped out of Job's reply,
since xxvi. 4 has no connection with xxvii. 2. (3) Zophar's third
speech appears to be wanting, but may really be contained in chap.
xxvii. (ver. 8 to end). The student should not fail to observe that
xxvii. 13 is a repetition of xx. 29. As the text stands, Job is made
to recant his statements in chaps, xxi., xxiv., and to assert that there
is (not merely ought to be) a just and exact retribution. The tone,
moreover, of xxvii. 9, 10 is not in accordance with Job's previous
speeches. If this view be correct, an introductory formula (' And
Zophar answered and said ') must have fallen out at the beginning
of ver. 7, and probably one or more introductory verses.2 (4) The
verses which originally introduced chap, xxviii. must (on account of
the causal particle 'for' in ver. 1) either have dropped out, or else
have been neglected by the person who inserted the chapter in the
Book of Job. (5) The passage xxxi. 38-40 has at any rate been
1 Elzas, The Book of Job (1872), p. 83 ; Griitz inclines to a similar view.
2 A similar view has been propounded by Kennicott, and also more recently
by Gr'atz (Monatsschrift, 1872, p. 247). But Kennicott regarded chap, xxviii. as
Job's reply to Zophar, while Griitz would include it in the speech of Zophar.

NOTE ON THE TEXT OF JOB II5
misplaced (Delitzsch), and probably, as Merx has pointed out, should
be inserted between ver. 32 and ver. 33. Thus verses 35-37 will
furnish an appropriate and impressive close to the chapter. (6) xxxvi.
31 should probably go after ver. 28 (not ver. 29, as Dillmann misstates
the conjecture) ; verses 30, 32 have a natural connection (Olshausen).
(7) The passage xii. 9-12 destroys the connection, and should pro
bably be placed immediately before chap, xxxviii. 1, as an introduc
tory speech of Jehovah. In that case, we must, with Merx, supply
the words, ' And Jehovah said,' before ver. 9.

AIDS TO THE STUDENT.
There are many books and articles of importance besides the
commentaries. Among these are Hupfeld, Commentatio in quosda?n
fobeidos locos (1855) ; Bickell, De indole ac ratione versionis Alex
andrine? in interpretando libro lobi (1862) ; G. Baur, ' Das Buch Hiob
und Dante's Gottliche Comodie,' Theol. Studien und Kritiken (1856),
p. 583 &c. (with which may be grouped Quinet's splendid chapter, in
his early work on religions, entitled 'Comparaison du scepticisme
oriental et du scepticisme occidental ') ; Seinecke, Der Grundgedanke
des Buches Hiob (1863) ; Froude, 'The Book of Job,' Short Studies,
Series 1 (1867), p. 266 &c; Reuss, Das Buch Hiob (1869) ; Plumptre,
' The Authorship of the Book of Job,' Biblical Studies (1870), p. 173
&c. ; C. Taylor, 'A Theory of Job xix. 25-27,' Journal of Philology
(1871), pp. 128-152 ; Godet, ' Le livre de Job,' Etudes bibliques,
prem. partie (1873), p. 185 &c. ; Turner, 'The History of Job, and
its Place in the Scheme of Redemption,' Studies Biblical and
Oriental (1876), p. 133 &c. ; Griitz, chapter on Job in Geschichte
der Juden, Bd. iii. ; Studer, ' Ueber die Integritat des Buches Hiob,'
fahrbiicher fiir protestant. Theologie (187 5), p. 688 &c, comp. 1877,
p. 540 &c. ; Budde, Beitrage zur Kritik des Buches Hiob (1876),
reviewed by Smend in Studien u. Kritiken (1878), pp. 153-173 ;
Giesebrecht, Der Wendepunkt des Buches Hiob (1879) ; Deren
bourg, ' Reflexions de'tache'es sur le livre de Job,' Revue des etudes
juives (1880), pp. 1-8 ; Claussen, ' Das Verhaltniss der Lehre des
Elihu zu derjenigen der drei Freunde,' Zeitschr. f. kirchl. Wis-
senschaft und Leben (1884), pp. 393 &C, 449 &c, 505 &c. ; W.
H. Green, The Argument of the Book of Job Unfolded (1881) ;
Cheyne, 'Job and the Second Part of Isaiah,' Isaiah, ii. 259 &c,
with which compare the very full essay of Kuenen, ' Job en de lijdende
knecht van Jahveh,' Theologisch Tijdschrift (1873), p. 492 &c. ; De
litzsch, art. 'Hiob,' Herzog-Plitt's Realencyclopadie, bd. vi. (1880).

THE BOOK OF PROVERBS.
CHAPTER I.
HEBREW WISDOM, ITS NATURE, SCOPE, AND IMPORTANCE.
We have studied the masterpiece of Hebrew wisdom before
examining the nature of the intellectual product which the
Israelites themselves graced with this title. The Book of Job
is in fact much more than a didactic treatise like Ecclesiastes
or a collection of pointed moral sayings like the Books of
Proverbs and Ecclesiasticus. Its authors were more than
thinkers, they were poets, ' makers,' great imaginative artists.
But we must not be unjust to those who were primarily
thinkers, and only in the second degree poets. The phase of
Hebrew thought called ' wisdom ' (khokma) can be studied
even better in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes than in the poetry of
Job. Let us then enquire at this point, What is this Hebrew
wisdom ? First of all, it is the link between the more ex
ceptional revelations of Old Testament prophecy and the best
moral and intellectual attainments of other nations than the
Jews. ' Wisdom ' claims inspiration (as we have seen already),
but never identifies itself with the contents of oracular com
munications.1 Nor yet does it pretend to be confined to a
chosen race. Job himself was a non-Israelite (the Rabbis
were even uncertain as to his part in the world to come) ; and
the wisdom of the ' wise king ' is declared to have been
different in degree alone from that of the neighbouring peoples 2
1 The heading ' the oracle ' &c. in xxx. I is exceptional ; so also is the oracle
of Eliphaz (Job iv. 12-21).
2 The author of Baruch (iii. 22, 23), however, expressly denies that the
ordinary Semitic ' wisdom ' was akin to that of Israel. This represents the
Judaism of the Maceabean period.

1 1 8 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. i.
(i Kings iv. 30, 31 ; comp. Jer. xlix. 7, Obad. 8). It is to be
observed next, that the range of enquiry of this ' wisdom ' is
equally wide, according to the Biblical use of the term.1
¦' Wisdom,' as Sirach tells us, ' rains forth skill ' of every kind ;
' the first man knew her not perfectly : no more shall the last
trace her out ' (Ecclus. i. 19, xxiv. 28). Nothing is too high,
nothing too low for Wisdom ' fitly ' to ' order ' (Wisd. viii. 1).
Law and government (Prov. viii. 15, 16), and even the pre
cepts of husbandry (Isa. xxviii. 23-29) are equally her
productions with those moral observations which constitute
in the main the three books of the Hebrew Khokma. The
fact that the subject of practical ethics ultimately appropriated
the technical name of ' wisdom ' ought not to blind us to the
larger connotation of the same word, which throws so much
light on the deeply religious view of life prevalent among the
Israelites. For religious this view of wisdom is, though it may
seem to be so thoroughly secular. The versatility of the
mind of man is but an image of the versatility of its arche
type. ' The spirit of man is a lamp of Jehovah,' says one of
the ' wise men ' (Prov. xx. 27), by an anticipation of John i. 9.
' Surely it is the spirit in man,' says another (Job xxxii. 8),
' and the breath of Shaddai which gives them understanding.'
Isaiah, too, says that the ' spirit of wisdom ' is one of the
three chief manifestations of the ' Spirit of Jehovah' (Isa. xL 2),
and the introductory treatise, which gives the editor's view of
the original Book of Proverbs, expressly declares that the
' wise men ' are but the messengers of divine Wisdom (ix. 3).
The sages, whose collected wisdom we are about to study,
are very different from those antique sages who like Balaam
could be hired to curse a hostile people. A new kind of
wisdom grew up both in Israel and in the neighbouring
countries, as unlike its spurious counterpart as the spiritual
lyric poetry both of Israel and of Babylonia is unlike the in
cantations which in Babylonia coexisted with it. Israel, never
slow to adopt, received the higher wisdom, and assimilated it.
' Observe that ' wisdom ' is called khokmoth (plural form) in Prov. i. 20, ix.
11, all the forms of wisdom being viewed as one in their origin. So too Wisdom
adorns her house with seven pillars (Prov. ix. 1).

CHAP. I. HEBREW WISDOM H9
The earthly elements can still be traced in it ; the ' wise men '
are not prophets but philosophers ; indeed, the Seven Wise
Men of Greece arose at precisely the same stage of culture
as the Hebrew sages. It is true, the latter never (in pre-
Talmudic times) attempted logic and metaphysics ; they
contentedly remained within the sphere of practical ethics.
If a modern equivalent must be found, it would be best to call
them the humanists, to indicate their freedom from national
prejudice (the word ' Israel ' does not occur once, the word
adam ' man ' thirty-three times in the Book of Proverbs), and
their tendency to base a sound morality on its adaptation to
human nature. We might also venture to call them realists
in contradistinction to the idealists of the prophethood ; they
held out no prospect of a Messianic age, and ' meddled not
with them that were given to change.'1 The sages whose
* wisdom ' is handed down to us were not however opposed
to the spiritual prophets. It is only ' the fool ' (or, to employ
a synonym from the proverbs, the ' scorner ' or ' mocker ') who
' saith in his heart, There is no God.' A mocking poet of a
late period may demand the Creator's name (Prov. xxx. 4),
but the writer who (if I may anticipate) has perpetuated this
strange poem indicates his own very different mental attitude ;
and though religious proverbs are less abundant than secular
in the early anthologies, such as we do find are pure and
elevated in tone. For instance,
(1) Who can say, I have made my heart clean,
I am pure from my sin ? (xx. 9.)
(2) The eyes of Jehovah are in every place,
observing the evil and the good (xv. 3).
(3) Shedl and Abaddon 2 are before Jehovah,
how much more then the hearts of the sons of men !
(xv. 11.)
(4) The hearing ear and the seeing eye,
Jehovah has made them both (xx. 12).
(5) A man's steps are from Jehovah,
and man — how can he understand his way? (xx. 24.)
One point in which the wise men agreed with Amos and
1 Xxiv. 21 A.V. 2 I.e. Perdition ; a synonym for Sheol.

120 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS Chap. i.
Isaiah was the inferiority of a ceremonial system ' to prayer
and faithful obedience (xv. 8, xxi. 3, 27, xvi. 6), and the im
portance which one of the proverb-writers attached to
prophecy is strikingly expressed (if only the text be sound)
in the saying,
When there is no prophecy (lit., vision) people become disorderly,
but he that observes precept, happy is he (xxix. 18).
The prophets seem to have returned the friendly feeling of
the sages. In tone and phraseology they are sometimes
evidently influenced by their fellow-teachers (see e.g. Isa.
xxviii. 23-29, xxix. 24, xxxiii. 11), and if they do not often
refer to the wise men,2 yet they do not denounce them, as
they denounce the priests and the lower prophets. It may
perhaps be inferred from this that there was in the early times
no opposition-party of sceptical wise men, such as Ewald
supposes,3 and such as not improbably did exist in later
times (see below on xxx. 1-4) ; and I notice that Ewald
himself does not attempt to strengthen his view by appealing
to the phrase ' men of scorn ' in Isa. xxviii. 14, which some,
following Rashi and Aben Ezra, explain of wise men who
misused their talent by making mischievous proverbs.4 The
1 The author of the Introduction however writes, ' Honour Jehovah with thy
substance,' i.e. by dedicating a part of it to the sanctuary (iii. 9), which the Septua
gint translator carefully limits to substance lawfully gained (Deut. xxiii. 19).
2 As perhaps they do in Am. v. 10, Isa. xxix. 21 (' him that rebuketh in the
gate '). Observe again in this connection that the endowments of the Messiah
include the spirit of wisdom as well as that of might (Isa. xi. 2), and that the
wisdom of Jehovah is emphasised in Isa. xxxi. 2 ; comp. xxviii. 29.
8 Die dichter des alten bundes, ii. 12. Ewald refers to xiii. I, xiv. 6, and
other passages in which ' scorners ' are referred to. But it is not clear that
¦ a powerful school ' of wise men is here intended ; the title may be given to
' those who opposed or despised the counsels of the wise men, and broke through
the restraints of law and religion ; comp. Prov. xv. 12, xxi. 24 ' ( Tlie Prophecies of
Isaiah, ed. 3, i. 165). Among such persons were the politicians of Isaiah's day,
so far as they opposed the warnings of the prophet ; they were popularly con
sidered ' wise men ' (xxix. 14 ; comp. Jer. viii. 9), but not in the technical sense
with which our present enquiries are concerned.
4 Luzzatto renders, ' o voi uomini insipienti, poeti di queslo popolo,' taking
moshelim in the same sense as in Num. xxi. 27 (similarly Barth, in his tract on
Isaiah, p. 23, following Rashi and Aben Ezra), a view which receives some sup
port from the parable offered by Isaiah in xxviii. 23-29 as if in opposition to the
false parables of unsound teachers. But in Isa. xxix. 20 ' scorner ' is clearly used,
not as a class-name for certain wise men, but in a moral sense.

CHAP. i. HEBREW WISDOM 121
inference mentioned just now commends itself to me as sound ;
but I admit that the saying on prophecy in Prov. xxix. 18
(already quoted) is isolated, and that the tone of the religious
proverbs falls far short of enthusiasm. This is probably all
that M. Renan means in a too French sentence of his work
on Ecclesiastes. Religion, according to the wise men, was a
necessary element in a worthy character, was even (I should
say) the principal element, but the religion of these practical
moralists has nothing of that delighted abandon which we find
in the more distinctly religious Scriptures. ' Happy the man
who dreadeth continually,' says one characteristic proverb
(xxviii. 14 ; contrast the ' not caring ' of the ' fool ' in xiv. 16).
Later on, a more devout moralist writes that 'the fear of
Jehovah is the beginning of wisdom' (i. 7), and though
' fear ' need not exclude ' love ' yet there is nothing here to
suggest their combination. The proverb of the Egyptian
prince Ptahhotep,1 'To obey is to love God ; not to obey is to
hate God,' has no parallel, at any rate in the early anthologies ;
much less does the great saying in Ps. lxxiii. 25 strike a note
congenial to any of the Hebrew sages. And yet it remains
true that the wise men happily supplemented the more
spiritual teaching of psalmists and prophets.
There is still another important point on which both pro
phets and ' wise men ' were agreed. Whatever their inward
religion may have been, they (like the Egyptian moralists)
were outwardly utilitarians ; i.e., they invite men to practise
righteousness, not because righteousness is the secret of blessed
ness, but because of its outward rewards both for the man
himself and for his posterity (Prov. xi. 21, xx. 7 ; comp. Jer.
xxxii. 18). The form in which the doctrine of proportionate
retribution is expressed in xi. 4 would have been completely
acceptable to the prophets, whose conception of the ' day of
Jehovah ' (i.e., not the last great dies irtz, but any providential
crisis in the world's history) is adopted in it, —
Wealth is of no profit in the day of wrath,
but righteousness delivers from death.
Proverbs expressing this idea in various forms abound in the
1 Brugsch, Religion und Mythologie der alten Aegypter, p. 91.

122 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS CHAP. I.
first anthology. Not a hint is given that retribution loiters
on the road ; at most a warning not to envy the (temporary)
prosperity of the wicked (xxiii. 17, xxiv. 1, 19 ; with regard
to xxiii. 18 see above).
This was the ' certitude of the golden age,' to use Mr.
Matthew Arnold's expression ; it is justwhat we might expect
in a simple and stationary condition of society. The strange
thing is that it should have lasted on when oppression
within or hostile attacks from without had brought manifold
causes of sorrow upon both good and bad.1 That the teachers
of the people should have held up the doctrine of earthly
retribution —
Behold, the righteous hath a reward upon earth ;
much more the ungodly and the sinner (xi. 31) —
as long as it could reasonably be defended, was natural. But
that shortly before the Maceabean rising a ' wise man ' 2 should
still be found to write —
The gift of the Lord remains with the godly,
and his favour brings prosperity for ever (Ecclus. xi. 17),
seems to contradict the usual correspondence between the re
ceived moral theory and the outward circumstances of society.
All that we can say is that such inconsistencies are found to
exist ; old forms of doctrine do not, as a rule, ' melt like frosty
rime.' There must have been circles of Jewish moralists averse
to speculation, who would continue to repeat the older view of
the providential government even at a time when the social
state had completely exposed its shallowness.
Dean Plumptre, indeed, following Ewald, credits the ' wise
men ' of pre-Exile times with deeper views. According to him,
certain proverbs, e.g. x. 25, xi. 4, xiv. 32, xxiii. 18 (Ewald adds
xii. 28) imply the hope of immortality. None of these passages
however can be held conclusive, x. 2 5, xi. 4 simply say that the
righteous shall be unhurt in a day of judgment ; in xiv. 32
the antithesis is between the ruin which follows upon wicked
ness and the safe refuge of integrity (read b'thummo with the
1 Yet in Prov. iii. 11, 12 there is distinct evidence of deepened experience
and progress of moral thought.
2 On the orthodoxy of Ecclesiasticus, see later on.

CHAP. I. HEBREW WISDOM 1 23
Sept.) ; in xxiii. 18, 'there is a future,' the reference is perfectly
vague — it is natural to explain by comparing Job xlii. 12.
xii. 28, no doubt, on Ewald's view of the passage, seems
conclusive, In the way of righteousness is life,
and the way of its path is immortality.
But this great word ' immortality ' is unparalleled before the
Book of Wisdom, and cannot fairly be extracted from the
Hebrew.1 The Septuagint has a different view of the pronun
ciation of the text, and renders 6S0I Be fivijcTiicdicav els ddvarov.
The easiest plan is to correct n'thlbhah into nith'dbh, with
Levy, and render,
but an abominable way (comp. xv. 9) leads unto death.
I do not deny that the idea of eternal life may have been
conceived at the time of these proverbs. This may plausibly
be inferred from the occurrence of the phrase ' a tree of life '
in iii. 18, xi. 30, xiii. 12, xv. 4, and 'a fountain of life' in x. 11,
xiii. 14, xiv. 27, xvi. 22, — phrases certainly borrowed from
some traditional story of Paradise analogous to that in Gen.
ii.2 It is a singular fact however that in all these passages
(even, I think, in iii. 18) these expressions are simply figura
tive synonyms for ' refreshment,' which suggests that the
proverb-writers shrank from using them in their literal sense
of the individual righteous man.
The importance of the ' wise men ' as a class is too seldom
recognised. To the hasty reader they are overshadowed by
the prophets, between whom and the rude masses they seem
to have occupied a middle position. Their popular style and
genial manners attracted probably a large number of dis
ciples ; at any rate, in the time of Jeremiah the ' counsel ' of
the ' wise men ' was valued as highly as the ' direction ' (lord)
of the priests and the ' word ' of the prophets (Jer. xviii. 1 8).
By constantly working on suitable individuals, they produced
a moral sympathy with the prophets, without which those
1 The Vulg. has, iter autem devium ducit ad mortem (but this pregnant sense
of iter devium is too bold).
2 Analogous only, because apparently it had both a tree and a fountain of life,
like a New Zealand myth mentioned by Schirren.

1 24 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS CHAP. 1.
heroic men would have laboured in vain. Thus that friendly
relation must have sprung up between the prophets and the
'wise men,' of which I have spoken already, and which reminds
us of the sanction said to have been given to the Seven Sages
of Greece by the oracle of Delphi.1
It is a misfortune that our sources for the history of Israel
itish ' philosophy ' are so scanty. Were there ' wise men ' in
N. Israel ? and if so, have any of their proverbs come down to
us, besides the mashal or fable of Jotham ? Did they confine
their activity to the capital city or cities, or did they also, like
the ' scribes,' settle or itinerate in the provinces ? (Matt. ix. 3,
Targ. of Judg. v. 9.) Did their public instructions assume
anything like the form of the proverbs of our anthologies ? Did
they teach without fee or reward ? 2 At any rate, a post- Exile
proverb-writer tells us with retrospective glance where the ' wise
men ' awaited their disciples — not in the quietude of the cham
ber, but either within the massive city-gates, or in the adjacent
squares or ' broad places' on which the streets converged (i,
20, 2 1 ; comp. Job xxix. 7). No doubt they had a large stock
of sayings in their memory, such as had been tested by the
experience of past generations. Sometimes they would modify
old proverbs, sometimes they would frame new ones, so that
when their disciples gathered round them, they would ' bring
out of their treasure things new and old.' From time to time
they would commit their ' wisdom ' to writing in a more
perfect form, and such records must have formed the basis of
the proverbial collections in the Old Testament.
1 Curtius, History of Greece, ii. 52.
2 Ewald infers from xvii. 16 that even in early times it was customary to fee
the ' wise men ' for their advice (comp. Saul and Samuel). At a later time Sirach
says, ' Buy (instruction) for yourselves without money ' (Ecclus. li. 25, but comp.
28). The Rabbis were not allowed to receive fees from their pupils. R. Zadok
said, ' Make not (the Tora) a crown to glory in, nor an axe to live by' (Pirke
Aboth, iv. 9). So the Moslem teachers at the great Cairo ' university ' (el Azhar).

12 =

CHAPTER II.
THE FORM AND ORIGIN OF THE PROVERBS.
In one of the opening verses of the Book of Proverbs (i. 6)
three technical names for varieties of proverbs are put
together: — (i) mashal, a short, pointed saying with reference
to some striking feature in the life of an individual, or in
human life generally, often clothed in figurative language
(whence, according to many, the name mashal, as if ' simili
tude ; ' comp. -n-apafSoXij), (2) m'liga, perhaps a 'bent,'
' oblique ' or (as Sept.) ' dark ' saying, (3) khida, a ' knotty ' or
intricate saying, especially a riddle. Each of these words
has a variety of applications ; for instance (1) is used in Num.
xxiii., xxiv., for a parallelistic poem, (1) and (2) sometimes'
mean a ' taunting speech ' (see below, and comp. Hab. ii. 6,
Isa. xiv. 4, Mic. ii. 4), and (3) can be used, not merely of true
riddles with a moral meaning, such as we find here and there
in Prov. xxx., but also of didactic statements upon subjects as
difficult as riddles (see Ps. xlix. 5, A.V. 4, lxxviii. 2). We
have no collection of popular proverbs, such as exists in
Arabic ; the proverbs in the canonical collection show great
technical elaboration, though some may be based on the
naive ' wisdom ' of the people. A very few specimens of the
popular proverb have indeed been preserved in the canonical
literature.1 ' Is Saul also among the prophets ? ' (1 Sam. x. 12,
xix. 24) preserves the memory of a humorous fact in the
story of that king. ' Wickedness proceeds from the wicked '
(1 Sam. xxiv. 13) is, unlike the former, a generalisation, and
means that a man's character is shown by his actions (comp.
1 In the Midrash-literature, proverbs are often quoted with an express state
ment that they are from the lips of the people.

126 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. ii.
Isa. xxxii. 6). ' As is the mother, so is the daughter ' (Ezek.
xvi. 44) is also an induction from common experience. ' The
fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are
set on edge ' (Jer. xxxi. 29, Ezek. xviii. 2), words applied no
doubt, as Lowth says, profanely, but not originally meant so,
is a figurative way of saying that the sins of the fathers are
visited upon the children. We have one specimen of the
riddle (strictly so called) — that well-known one of Sam
son's, From the eater came forth food,
and from the strong one came forth sweetness (Judges xiv. 14).
The parable, too, was doubtless called mashal, and of this we
have three Old Testament examples, which will at once occur
to the reader (2 Sam. xii. 1-6, xiv. 4-9, 1 Kings xx. 39, 40) ;
but it is more important to draw the reader's attention to the
rare specimens of the fable. Some may think it bold to refer
in this connection to a portion of a narrative which seems at
first sight to be historical (Num. xxi. 22-35). The strange
episode of the speaking ass is, however, most difficult to
understand, except as a sportive quasi-historical version of a
popular mashal ox fable (compare the four Babylonian animal-
fables discovered among the fragments of King Assurbanipal's
library).1 The passage being evidently distinct from the rest
of the story of Balaam, in passing this judgment upon it, we
are not committed as a matter of course to a denial of all
historical character to the rest of the narrative. The fables
of Jotham (Judg. ix. 8-15) and Joash (2 Kings xiv. 9), in
which the trees are introduced speaking, have also their
parallels in Babylonian literature. One of them indeed has
a claim to be called a mashal on a second account ; the tree-
fable of Joash is a taunt of the keenest edge, and one of the
secondary meanings of mashal is ' taunting speech ' (see Isa.
xiv. 4, A. V.). It is true the ' taunting speeches ' expressly
1 See Smith and Sayce's Chaldean Genesis, pp. 140-154. For the Egyptian
animal-fables, which may be the originals of those of ^Esop, see Mahaffy, Prole
gomena to Anc. Hist., p. 390 ; for the Indian, see the apologues of the Pancha-
tantra by Benfey or Lancereau, and the Buddhist Birth-Stories—' the oldest, most
complete, and most important collection of folk-lore extant ' — translated by Rhys
Davids, vol. i.

CHAP. II. FORM AND ORIGIN OF THE PROVERBS T27
called mashals — not only those in the prophetic writings
(see above), but the verses ascribed to ' those that speak in
mashals' in Num. xxi. 27-30 — are poetical in form, but this
is because the Hebrew writers never conceived the idea of
a narrative poem ; even the prologue of the Book of Job is
in prose. These are the principal specimens of the mashal apart'
from those in the three Books of Old Testament Wisdom.
They are but the ' two or three berries ' left after the beating
of the tree (Isa. xvii. 6), and excite a longing for more which
cannot be gratified. We may be sure that in Israel's prime
the telling of proverbs was almost as popular as the recital of
stories, and became a test of ability. For —
The legs of a lame man hang loose,
so is a proverb in the mouth of fools (xxvi. 7) ;
and though Sirach says of the labouring class, ' They shall not
be found where parables are spoken' (Ecclus. xxxviii. 33), it
is reasonable to account for this by the aristocratic pride of
the students of Scripture in the later Jewish community. At
any rate, as I have said already, some at least of the early
literary proverbs are very possibly based on popular sayings ;
these would naturally embody a plain, bourgeois experience
such as marks not a few of the proverbs in our book. Dr.
Oort conjectures x that some of our proverbs were originally
current among the people as riddles, such for instance as, ' What
is sweet as honey ? — Pleasant discourse, for it is sweet to the
soul and a medicine to the bones ' (xvi. 24) ; ' What is worse
than meeting a bear ? — Meeting a fool in a fit of folly ' (xvii.
12); 'What is sweet at first, and then like sand in the mouth?
— Stolen food' (xx. 17). Certainly the introduction to the
1 proverbs of Solomon ' may seem to imply (i. 6) that the
collection which follows contains specimens of the riddle, but
probably all the writer means is that the ' words of the wise '
are often ' knotty ' because epigrammatic. We may indeed
reasonably hold that, like their prototype Solomon,2 the ' wise
men ' were accustomed to sharpen their intellects upon enig-
1 The Bible for Young People, E. T., iii. 105-6.
2 I Kings x. 1 ; comp. Menander's account in Josephus, Antiq. viii. 5, 3.

128 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. n.
mas (such as lie at the root of the so-called ' numerical
proverbs' in xxx. 15, 18, 21, 24, 29 ; comp. vi. 16) ; but a still
more important discipline than the battle of wits was the
habit of keen observation. We cannot reduce all the proverbs
involving comparison to the form of riddles, any more than
we can do this with the following Buddhist sayings, equal to
the more refined specimens of the Hebrew proverb : — •
As rain breaks through an ill-thatched house, so passion will
break through an unreflecting mind.
Like a beautiful flower, full of colour, but without scent, are the
fine but fruitless words of him who does not act accordingly.
A tamed elephant they lead to battle ; the king mounts a tamed
elephant ; the tamed is the best among men, he who silently endures
abuse. Well-makers lead the water ; fletchers bend the arrow ; carpenters
bend a log of wood ; wise people fashion themselves.
Another plausible hypothesis similar to that of Dr, Oort
is that some of our proverbs are based on popular fables, as is
the case according to Dr. Back with many of the proverbs in
the Talmud and Midrash.2 The Jewish scholar referred to
applies this key to Prov. vi. 6-1 1 (comp. the Aramaic fable of
the ant and the grasshopper — see Delitzsch's note), to the nu
merical proverbs in chap. xxx. (' skeletons of fables ' he calls
them), and to Eccles. ix. 4 and x. 1 1. Both proverbs and fables
indeed are common in later Jewish literature. Fables, espe
cially animal fables, were not perhaps appropriate vehicles of
moral instruction according to the O.T. writers. But the
later Jewish teachers do not seem to have felt this objection.
Rabbi Meir (2nd cent. A.D.) was the writer of animal fables
par excellence ; Rabbi Hillel (B.C. 30), however, so noted for his
versatility, was also a copious fabulist.3
1 From Max Miiller's translation of the Dhammapada, or ' Path of Virtue '
(1870) 2 Dr. Back gives a list of these in Gratz's Monatsschrift, 1884, PP- 265-7.
3 In the Talmudic treatise Soferim xvi. 9, a list of Hillel's acquirements is
given, including the conversations of the mountains, the trees, the animals, the
demons &c. On the Jewish fable literature, the wealth of which seems un
paralleled, see Back, Die Fabel in Talmud und Midrash, in Gratz's Monatsschrift,
187 5-1884. Curiously enough the two oldest Jewish fables are similar in character
to those of the Old Test.

CHAP. II. FORM AND ORIGIN OF THE PROVERBS 1 29
This popular origin of some at least of the proverbs suffi
ciently accounts for their comparatively trite and common
place character. They were not trite and commonplace to
those who first used them, and successive generations loved
them because of their antiquity (Job viii. 8-10). Even to us
they are not so commonplace as the far less popular and
piquant Egyptian proverbs,1 though I confess that they will
hardly compare with the relics of Indian gnomology,2 still less
with the singularly rich and pointed proverbs of the Chinese.3
The practice of writing antithetic sentences on paper or silk
to suspend in houses (contrast Deut. vi. 9) gave an edge to
the shrewd earthly wisdom of the countrymen of Confucius.
The Jewish intellect developed but slowly into the acuteness of
the later periods which produced fables, proverbs, and riddles
which can safely challenge comparison.4
1 Comp. Renouf, Hibbert Lectures, pp. 75, 76, 100— 103 ; Mahaffy, Prolego
mena to Ancient History, pp. 273-291 ; Brugsch, Religion und Mythologie der
alten Aegypter, p. 91 ; Records of the Past, viii. 157-160.
2 Comp. Weber, Indische Literaturgeschichte, p. 227.
8 See Scarborough, Collection of Chinese Proverbs (1875). The Chinese
proverbs have no known authors.
4 On the riddles referred to, see Wunsche, Die Rathselweisheit bei den
Hebrdern (1883). Comp. them with the later Arabic proverbs (see Hariri, and
comp. Freytag, Proverbia arabica).

K

I30 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. hi.

CHAPTER III.
THE FIRST COLLECTION AND ITS APPENDICES.
UPON entering what Dante in the De Monarchic so well
calls ' the forest ' of the canonical proverbs, we are soon struck
by differences of age and growth. The central portion of the
book, and in some respects the most interesting, is comprised
in x. 1 -xxii, 16. To this, which is indeed the original Book
of Proverbs, the first nine chapters were intended to serve as
the introduction. It is the oldest Hebrew proverbial anthology
extant. Probably from its compiler it received the name
' Proverbs of Solomon,' and from this title has sprung the
tradition accepted by so many subsequent ages and indeed
by the editor of the whole book (Prov. i. 1) of Solomon's
authorship of the Proverbs. The title however cannot be
historically correct. Those maxims in this anthology which
refer to the true God under the name Jehovah ( Yahve) are
too monotheistic and inculcate too pure a morality to be the
work of the Solomon of the Book of Kings. That great
despot's ' wisdom,' so far as we can judge both from his cha
racter and from the traditional notices, cannot have had a
distinctively religious character. Listen to these proverbs, —
Better a little with the fear of Jehovah
than great treasure and turmoil therewith (xv. 16).
The horse is prepared against the day of battle,
but victory is Jehovah's (xxi. 31).
The mouth of strange women is a deep pit ;
he with whom Jehovah is wroth falleth therein (xxii. 14).
A wise son (loveth) his father's correction,
but a scorner heareth not rebuke (xiii. 1), —
and for a commentary read 1 Kings iv. 26, xi. 1, 4, 14-40,
xii. 14, 1 5- Nor is the moral tone of the ' Solomonic ' proverbs

CHAP. III. THE FIRST COLLECTION

131

in its plain bourgeois simplicity any more suitable to the name
they bear than the religious. Unless Solomon was like
Haroun al-Rashid, and made himself privately acquainted with
the ways and thoughts of the citizens, it is difficult to see how
he can have written so completely as one of them would have
done. The truth is that both David and Solomon were idealised
by later generations. The heroes of a grander if not better
age, they towered far above the petty figures of their suc
cessors. Favoured by the contemporary depression of Egypt
and Assyria, they had been enabled to rear and to retain a
powerful empire, comparable to those which afflicted and op
pressed the divided people of the later Israelites. Solomon
in particular is represented in tradition as not only the most
fortunate but the wisest of kings, not in the sense in which it
is said that religion is the best part of wisdom (Prov. i. 7), but
in that in which the ' children of the east ' were accustomed
to use the word. This is clear from the language of the
Hebrew narrator : —
' And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding
much, and largeness of heart even as the sand on the sea-shore. And
Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the
east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt. For he was wiser than
all men ; than Ethan the Ezrahite [read, perhaps, ' the native,' i.e.
the Israelite], and Heman, and Calcol, and Darda, the sons of
Mahol [probably a foreigner] : and his fame was in all the nations
round about. And he spoke three thousand proverbs [or, similitudes],
and his songs were a thousand and five. And he spoke of trees, from
the cedar in Lebanon unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall :
he spoke also of beasts, and of birds, and of creeping things, and of
fishes. And there came of all peoples to hear the wisdom of Solomon,
from all kings of the earth, who had heard of his wisdom.' (1 Kings
iv. 29-34.) I see no reason for not accepting the substance of this
tradition. The principal point in it is the ascription to
Solomon of a power of apophthegmatic composition which
the author, as a devout theist, could not but trace to a divine
gift, just as the author of Ex. xxxvi. ascribes the skill of the
artisans ofthe tabernacle to the direct operation of Jehovah.

132 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iii.
But we are also informed that the talents of Solomon were
neither peculiar to him, nor exercised on different subjects
from those of foreign sages. The precise meaning of the
Hebrew m'shallm in 1 Kings iv. 32 is suggested by ver. 33.
The word seems to mean moralising similitudes ' derived partly
from the animal, partly from the vegetable kingdom (for Lord
Bacon's view,2 hinted in the New Atlantis, is more plausible
than sound). Was I not right in saying that the traditional
notices of Solomon's wisdom do not agree with the title of
our anthology ? I wish that it were otherwise. How gladly
one would see a few of Solomon's genuine utterances
(whether proverbs, or similitudes, or fables) incorporated into
one or another of the Hebrew Scriptures !
I think however that it is unfair both to the compiler and
to the editor who repeats his statement (i. 1) to take the as
cription of these proverbs to Solomon literally. Accuracy in
the details of literary history was not a qualification which
would seem important to an Israelite. The name of Solomon
was attached (for dogmatism here seems permissible) to these
•choice specimens of Hebrew proverbiology simply from a very
•characteristic hero-worship. Solomon had in fact become the
symbol of plain ethical ' wisdom ' just as David had become
the representative of religious lyric poetry. We may see this
from the alternative title of the Book of Proverbs in both
Jewish and Christian writings — ' Book of Wisdom ;'3 still more
from the fiction of Solomon's authorship of Ecclesiastes, and
1 Dr. Gratz is of opinion that Solomon was a fabulist like Jotham ; in the text
I have followed Josephus (Ant. vii. 2, 5). Legend related how the wise king,
like the early men in African folk-lore (Max Miiller, Hibbert Lectures, p. 116),
talked with (not merely of) beasts, birds, and fishes, but delighted most in the
birds. 2 This was also the opinion of Ewald (History, iii. 281). It might now be
urged in its favour that Assurbanipal's library contained bilingual lists of animals,
-vegetables, and minerals. But remember that the Assyrians were incomparably
more civilised than the Israelites, and had both a lexicographical and a scientific
interest in making these lists, and above all that Solomon is not stated to have
written, but only to have spoken.
3 See the Tosefoth to the Talmudic treatise Baba bathra, \sf>, where the name
is given both to Proverbs and to Ecclesiastes. It is however more commonly
found in Christian than in Jewish literature, often under the fuller form v
vav&peTOS crocpta (set especially Eusebius, H. E., iv. 22).

CHAP. III. THE FIRST COLLECTION

133

from the Targumic paraphrase of Jer. ix. 23,' Let not Solomon
the son of David, the wise man, glory in his wisdom.' Of
course, the real names of the authors of the proverbs
had been as irrecoverably lost as those of our early ballad-
writers. But though we must deny the Solomonic authorship a far-
off influence of the Solomonic age may perhaps be admitted;
at least, there are grounds for the opinion that some of the
proverbs are as old as the ninth century. (1) The second col
lection of so-called Solomonic proverbs was compiled according
to a credible tradition (xxv. 1) in the reign of Hezekiah ; this
of itself throws the earlier collection a considerable way back
into the eighth century. (2) Upon examining the first antho
logy we find that some of the proverbs already have a history.
For instance, (a) the solemn generalisation in xiv. 12 occurs
in exactly the same form in xvi. 25, (b) eight other proverbs
are repeated with slight changes in expression (x. 1 = xv. 20,
x. 2 = xi. 4, xiii. I4 = xiv. 27, xiv. 20 = xix. 4, xvi. 2 = xxi. 2,
xix. S = xix. 9, xx. io = xx. 23, xxi. 9 = xxi. 19), but except
in the case of xi. 4, xiv. 27 no change in thought, (c) ten are
repeated, at least so far as one line goes, either exactly or
with but slight differences (x. I5=xviii. 11, x. 6J = x. 11,
x. 8 = x. 10,2 xv. 33 = xviii. 12, xi. I3 = xx. 19, xi. 2i = xvi. 5,
xii. I4 = xiii. 2, xiv. 3i=xvii. 5, xvi. i8 = xviii. 12, xix. 12 =
xx. 2). It is probable that some time would elapse before a
proverb attained such notoriety as to be circulated in varying
forms. (3) The originality of the diction (a) and the careful
observance of technical rules of composition (b) favour an
early date, (a) For instance, ' steersmanship ' 3 (xi. 14, xii. 5,
xx. 18), as a term for practical wisdom or counsels, evidently
springs from a fresh enthusiasm for commerce ; a long list of
striking expressions might be added from any chapter of the
collection, (b) Nor is technical precision at all less conspi
cuous in this early anthology. Each proverb is a distich, i.e.
1 The second line however seems to have intruded from ver. II, and thus to
have supplanted the original.
2 Here again the second line is evidently an intruder (from ver. 8). We
should doubtless read with Sept., ' but he that reproves produces welfare.'
3 This word (takhbiiloth) also occurs in xxiv. 6, i. 5> Job xxxvii. 12.

134 ™E BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. hi.
consists of two lines, as a rule three-toned, and in most cases
antithetically parallel. It is true, xix. 7 in its present form
is a tristich, i.e. consists of three members, but this proverb
undoubtedly arose out of two, the second of which is mutilated
in the Hebrew text, but is found in a complete though not
entirely correct form in the Septuagint. The incomprehen
sible third line of xix. 7 given in versions based upon the
Hebrew now becomes the distich,
He that does much evil perfects mischief;
he that provokes ' with words shall not escape.
According to Ewald, the collection is divided into five
parts by the recurrence at intervals of a proverb exhorting
the young to receive instruction ; see x. 1, xiii. 1, xv. 20,
xvii. 25, xix. 20. If this division is intentional it may be
compared with the equally mechanical triple division found
by some in Isa. xl.-lxvi. Of arrangement by subject there is
but little trace ; here and there two or more verses come in
succession dealing with the same theme. Observe too the
recurrence of 'Jehovah,' xv. 33, xvi. 1-9, 11, and of the word
' king ' in xvi. 10, 12-15, which shows that one principle of
arrangement was simply the recurrence of certain catchwords.
Bickell thinks that another principle was the occurrence of the
same initial letter (see xi. 9-12, xx. 7-9, xx. 24-26, xxii.
2-4). Altogether, it is abundantly clear that we have before us
works of art, and not the simple maxims handed down in
Israel from father to son. There may sometimes be a
traditional basis, but no more. The anthology contrasts,
therefore, as Ewald remarks, with the collections of Arabic
proverbs due to Abu-Obaida, Maidani2 and others. But
whether we may go on to assert with the same great critic
that we have here the wise men's applications of the truths of
religion to the infinite cases and contingencies of the secular
life, seems doubtful. It is not clear to me that these wise
1 For rn'raddefiead m'gaddef.
2 Landberg denies that Maidani's proverbs were ever really popular, but A.
Miiller judges that this view is extravagant (Zeitschrift fiir Vbikerpsychologie,
xii. 441).

CHAP. in. THE FIRST COLLECTION 135
men were preoccupied by religion. There are indeed not a
few fine religious proverbs, but it cannot be shown that
those who wrote the secular proverbs also wrote the religious.
It is possible and even probable that some of the religious
proverbs are the work of the author of the introductory
chapters ; without dogmatising, I may refer to xiv. 34 (comp.
viii. 15, 16), xv. 33, xvi. 1-7, and perhaps to xix. 27, which is
quite in the parental tone of chaps, i.-ix. The tone of the
secular proverbs is not, from a Christian point of view (of
which more later on), an elevated one. The ethical principle
is prudential. Virtue or ' wisdom ' is rewarded, and vice or
' folly ' punished in this life. It is indeed nowhere expressly
said that every trouble is a punishment ; but there is nothing
like xxiv. 16 in this anthology to prevent the reader from in
ferring it. At any rate, the writers are clearly not in the van
of religious thought : no ' obstinate questionings ' have yet
disturbed their tranquillity.
We need not pause here to demonstrate what no one
probably will dispute, that the origin of this first anthology is
impersonal. The fact that it is so may well give us the more
confidence in the accuracy of the social picture which it con
tains. This is certainly a pleasing one, and points to a
comparatively early period in the history of Judah. Com
merce and its attendant luxury have not made such progress
as at the time when the introduction was written ; poverty is
only too well known, but there seems to be a middle class
with a sound moral sense, to which the writers of proverbs can
appeal. It is true, says one of these, that in daily life ' rich
and poor meet together,' but for all that 'Jehovah is the
maker of them all ' (xxii. 2), and ' he that oppresses the poor
reproaches his maker ' (xiv. 31). And if it is true on the one
hand that ' the poor is hated even of his neighbour ' (xiv. 20),
and that ' the destruction of the wretched is their poverty '
(x. 15), it is equally so on the other that 'he that trusts in
his riches shall fall ' (xi. 28), and that
Better is the poor man who walks in his blamelessness,
than he who is perverse in his ways and is rich ] (xix. 1).
' The text has ' than he who is perverse in his lips and is a fool. ' With Gr'atz,
I follow the Peshitto and (partly) the Vulgate.

136 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS CHAP. 111.
The strength, of the land still consists in the number of
small proprietors tilling their own ground. Two proverbs
express an interest in these, e.g.
The poor man's newly ploughed field gives food in abundance,
but there is that is cut off by injustice (xiii. 23).
Better is a mean man that tills for himself1
than he that glorifies himself and has no bread (xii. 9).
All the farmers however were not so diligent as those
indicated in these passages. One of the numerous proverbs
against laziness (then as now a prevalent vice in this part of
the East 2) brings before us a land-owner who is too lazy to
give the order for ploughing at the right time, and so when
he looks for the harvest, there is none.
When autumn comes the sluggard ploughs not ;
so if he asks at harvest-time, there is nothing (xx. 4).
The right use of the gift of speech is another very favourite
subject in this anthology. The charm of suitable words is
best described in a Hezekian proverb (xxv. 11), but it is well
said in xv. 4 that ' a gentle tongue is a tree of life,' and else
where that There is that babbles like the thrusts of a sword,
but the tongue of the wise is gentleness (xii. 18).
The wonderful power of language could hardly at that age
have been better expressed than by the saying,
The words of a man's mouth are deep waters,
a gushing torrent, a wellspring of wisdom (xviii. 4).
The standard of family morals is high ; a good wife is de
scribed as God's best gift (xii. 4, xviii. 22, xix. 14), and the
restraints of home are commended to the young (xix. 18,
xxii. 6, 15), as in the Egyptian proverbs. Monogamy is
throughout presupposed, and a want of respect for either parent
is condemned (xiii. 1, xv. 5, xix. 26). The king too is re
peatedly held up to reverence (xiv. 35, xvi. io, 12-15, xix.
1 Pointing obhed, with Hitzig, Ewald, and Bickell ; comp. ver. 11. Dijserinck
ingeniously emends cobher ' heaps up ' (i.e. saves).
2 Comp. Thomson, The Land and the Book, pp. 336-8.

CHAP. ill. THE FIRST COLLECTION 1 37
12, xx. 2, 8, 26, 28, xxii. 11) ; it is not so in the Hezekian
collection. The king however is not identified with the
Deity, as in Egypt ; we are told that the will of the monarch
is pliable in the hand of Jehovah (xxi. 1), and the true glory
of a nation is, not in the prowess of its king, but in righteous
ness (xiv. 34). And even if we must confess that the spirit
of the more secular proverbs is utilitarian, the utilitarianism is
sometimes a very refined one, as for instance where the
refreshing character of a quiet, contented mind is contrasted
with the dull reaction which follows on an outburst of passion
(xiv. 30). In conclusion, I will quote a few proverbs interest
ing chiefly as characteristic of their age, and then a few more
of the gems of the collection.
(a) The poor is hated even by his neighbour,
but the rich has many friends (xiv. 20).
Whoso withholds corn, him the people curse,
but blessing is on the head of him who sells it (xi. 26).
The beginning of strife is as when one lets out water,
so leave off quarrelling before the teeth be shown (xvii. 14).
The gift of a man makes a free space for him,
and brings him before the great (xviii. 16).
' Bad, bad,' says the purchaser,
but when he goes away, he boasts (xx. 14).
(b) The righteous regards the life of his cattle,1
but the heart of the wicked is cruel (xii. 10).
The heart knows its own bitterness,
and a stranger cannot intermeddle with its joy (xiv. 10).
He that covers transgression helps forward love,
but he that repeats a matter separates best friends (xvii. 9).
There are friends (good enough) acting their part,2
and there is a loving friend who sticks closer than a brother
(xviii. 24; comp. xvii. 17).
Who can say, I have made my heart clean,
I am pure from my sin? (xx. 9.)
Say not, I will recompense evil ;
wait for Jehovah, and he will deliver thee (xx. 22).
1 The word is behema (Seneca's 'muta animalia'). Schopenhauer, thinking
perhaps of the Levitical sacrifices, accuses the Old Testament of cruelty to animals.
But see, besides this passage, Gen. i. 27-29, Num. xxii. 28, Jon. iv. 11.
2 With Hitzig and others, taking 'ish as a softened form oiyesh (comp. 2 Sam.
xiv. 19, Mic. vi. 10) ; ihayodis kept as in Aramaic. So Targ. , Pesh.

I38 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS CHAP. in.
The first appendix to the original Book (appended possibly
before the composition of the Introduction) is a small collection
of proverbial sayings called 'words of the wise' (xxii. 17-
xxiv. 22). Virtually the same phrase occurs again in xxiv. 23
at the head of a still shorter work, compiled or composed
evidently about the same time by another ' wise man ' (perhaps
the whole work has not come down to us). In the introduc
tory verses the compiler's object in writing down these proverbs
is said to have been that his disciple might learn virtue and
religion, and might become qualified to teach others. There
is one very difficult passage in it, but this has been corrected
in a masterly way by Bickell : — ¦
That thy confidence may be in Jehovah,
to make known unto thee thy ways.
Now, yea before now, have I written unto thee,
long before, with counsels and knowledge,
That thou mayest know the rightness of true words,
that thou mayest answer in true words to those that ask thee
(xxii. 19-21).
The construction of ver. 20b and ver. 2 1 in the Hebrew thus be
comes more idiomatic (comp. %#£* re kclX irpcorjv), though not
free from ambiguity. The words may mean either that the
compiler took long over his work, or that this was not the
first occasion of his writing. On the latter explanation the
passage may imply that the compiler of this anthology also
wrote chaps, i.-ix. (comp. i. 6b). His hortatory style and pre
dilection for grouping verses may seem to plead for this view.
There are however no important points of contact in phraseo
logy between the work before us and Prov. i.-ix.,2 and certainly
the appendix falls far below the standard of the Introduction.
1 At the end of ver. 19 Bickell nearly follows Sept. Cod. Vat., tV bUv crov
(A.C.S. aiirov). But as this takes the place of hayyom, it would seem that
Bickell ought to begin ver. 20 with of ethmol. This however would not suit his
metrical theory.
2 The phraseological resemblance of xxiii. 19^ to iv. 14* is incomplete. As for
khokmoth in xxiv. 7, it means simply 'wisdom ' (as in xiv. I, where khakmoth is
wrong) ; the parallelism with i. 20, ix. 1 is not of critical importance. Any real
points of contact (such as xxiii. 23a; comp. iv. 5, 7) can be accounted for by
imitation, and one could easily bring together points of difference.

CHAP. III. THE FIRST COLLECTION 1 39
At any rate, it is undoubted that these ' words of the wise '
appeared long after the ' Solomonic ' proverbs. The peculiari
ties of style referred to show this, and also the imitation of
some of the ' Solomonic ' proverbs in the ' words of the wise ; '
(comp. xi. 14 with xxiv. 5, 6 ; xiii. 9 with xxiv. 19, 20 ;
xxii. 14a with xxiii. 27).
There is no occasion to suppose that all these proverbs
come from one period ; but the hand of a compiler is more
conspicuous here than in the first anthology. He has not in
deed removed repetitions (see xxii. 28a, xxiii. 10a ; xxiii. 17^,
xxiv. la ; xxiii. 18, xxiv. 14), but the personal element pre
ponderates so much that he might fairly have prefixed his
own name as the author. Artistically, he may perhaps be
found wanting. He has left one tristich (i.e. a proverb of three
lines), viz. xxii. 29 ; two pentastichs (i.e. proverbs of five lines),
viz. xxiii. 4, 5, xxiv. 13, 14 ; and one heptastich (i.e. a proverb
of seven lines), viz. xxiii. 6-8. Unsymmetrical as these may
be, it seems hazardous, unless there be any specially doubtful
passage, to restore symmetry (i.e. to convert tristichs into
tetrastichs, and so on) by inserting words conjecturally.
There1 are a few distichs (xxii. 28, xxiii. 9, xxiv. 7, 8, 9, 10),
thus affording a slight point of contact with the first anthology ;
more tetrastichs (xxii. 22, 23 ; 24, 25 ; 26, 27 ; xxiii. 10, 11 ;
15, 16; 17, 18 ; xxiv. i, 2 ; 3,4; 5, 6 ; 15, 16; 17, 18; 19,
20 ; 21, 22), and hexastichs (xxiii. 1-3 ; 12-14 ; 19-21 ; 26-
28 ; xxiv. 11, 12). One octastich occurs (xxiii. 22-25), and
one long poem, in the main a group of distichs, referred to
again below (xxiii. 29-35).
Beautiful in form, the proverbs of this collection certainly
are not ; one cannot apply to the author the saying in xxiv.
26, ' He kisses the lips who answers in suitable words.' The
contents however are not without points of interest. In
xxiii. 1-3 we have a picture of a man of the middle class
admitted to the table of a governor. Being unused to
' dainties,' he is tempted to excess ; as a restraint, the ' wise
man ' bids him consider the capriciousness of princely favour
(comp. Ecclus. ix. 13). The abuse of luxuries such as wine
and meat was in fact a sore evil in the eyes of this writer

140 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS CHAP. III.
(see the caution in xxiii. 20, 21 in the Septuagint version,
which reminds one of vii. 14). He has even left us a poem on
the evils of drunkenness (xxiii. 29-35) which contains several
striking details from its satirical opening, ' Who hath oi, who
hath aboi ? ' (interjections expressing pain), to the picturesque
comparison of the drunkard to a man ' that lieth upon the top
of a mast,' ! which shows incidentally that sea-life was by this
time a familiar experience. Another interesting passage,
though marred by its obscurity, is that in xxiv. 11, 12. The
innocent victims of a miscarriage of justice are about to be
dragged away to execution ; the pupil of the wise is exhorted
to ' deliver ' them, by intervening with resistless energy, like
the St. Ives of a favourite Breton legend, and testifying to the
innocence of the sufferers (see xxxi. 8). He may of course
refuse, thinking to pretend afterwards that he had not heard
of the case ; but God knows all, and will requite falsehood,
not perhaps at once, but at a future time, when ' the lamp of
the wicked shall be put out ' (xxiv. 20). The wise men, as
we have seen, clung firmly to the doctrine of retribution in
some one of its various forms. We are not therefore surprised
that a book of proverbs should conclude with a dissuasion
from consorting with lawless persons, and an earnest advice
to 'fear Jehovah and the king' (xxiv. 21).
Much need not be said of the second appendix (xxiv.
23-34). ' These also are by wise men,' writes the collector,
implying that he is to be distinguished from the editor of the
preceding collection. The proverbs are all 2 either in two,
four, or six lines, except ver. 27, where however it is possible
that some words have dropped out.3 At the end comes a
parable or apologue professedly drawn from the writer's ex
perience (reminding us in this of vii. 6-23, but still more of
Job v. 3-5). The scene is laid in a vineyard which has run
to waste and become a wilderness from the carelessness of its
1 The word for ' mast ' is a St. \*y. The Septuagint and Peshitto have ' as a
steersman (or seaman) in great breakers.'
2 xxiv. 23* is no exception ; it is merely the first line of a hexastich.
3 For 'and afterwards' the Hebrew has 'afterwards and thou shalt build.'
' And ' may mean ' then,' marking out the perfect as consecutive, but it may also
have been intended to join two parts of a sentence.

CHAP. III. THE FIRST COLLECTION 141
owner (comp. xx. 4). The mashal (xxiv. 30-32) has been
lengthened by the addition of two verses from vi. 9, 10,
originally no doubt a marginal note, It was needless ;
the story (if story it can be called) is more vivid in its
brevity, and forms a fitting close to this section of proverbial
wisdom.

142 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iv.

CHAPTER IV.
THE SECOND COLLECTION AND ITS APPENDICES.
The next proverbial anthology (xxv.-xxix.) like its chief pre
decessor is described in the heading as ' Proverbs of Solomon.' '
The social state however presupposed in many of them is so
different from that of the Solomonic age that we may at once
reject the theory of the wise king's authorship. Another
name with which in xxv. 1 the work is connected is that of
Hezekiah, who has been suggestively called ' the Pisistratus
of Judah.' The comparison halts, no doubt ; for Pisistratus
and his ' companions ' meant to collect the whole of the
Homeric poems, whereas completeness can hardly have been
the object of those ' friends (or counsellors) of Hezekiah '
who ' collected ' 2 the ' Proverbs of Solomon ' in xxv. 2-xxix.
27 ; at least, we know that there was much proverbial wisdom
in circulation which had as good or as bad a claim to be called
' Solomonic ' as the sayings which they have admitted into
their anthology. It may indeed well be doubted whether the
compilers had any thought of collecting the relics (now already
1 ' These also ' suggests that what follows is a last gleaning of Solomonic
proverbs. And in fact xxv. 24, xxvi. 13, 15, 22, xxvii. 12, 13, 21a, seem to be
taken from the ' Solomonic ' collection. Hitzig however rejects this view.
Why did not the collectors combine all the Solomonic proverbs they could find in
one work ? So he supposes this new collection to have been made ' aus dem
Volksmunde,' and remarks that a commission would be specially appropriate for
this task. To me this seems an anachronism. The proverbs of the Hezekian
collection are moreover as artistic as those of the first ' Solomonic'
2 So virtually the Septuagint (Qeyptyavro), followed by the Peshittoand the
Targum ; Aquila, fiery pav. The Greek, curiously enough, inserts an epithet for the
proverbs, viz. oi aScdxpiroi, i.e. either impossible to distinguish, miscellaneous (so
Sophocles, Lexicon), or better, difficult to interpret. Symmachus has atidiepcros
for bohil, Gen. i. 2. The Peshitto and Targum render the Greek of our passage
by 'deep proverbs,' i.e. enigmatical ones (so too Aquila and Theodotion in the
Syro -hexapla).

CHAP. IV. THE SECOND COLLECTION 1 43
more than 200 years old) of the wise king. The style of
these proverbs makes such a hypothesis even more improbable
than in the case of x. i-xxii. 16. The words with which the
heading begins are of course not decisive, especially as the
whole verse appears to be due, not to the royal officials who
are spoken of, but to the author of the heading in xxiv. 23a
(both headings begin with ' these also '). That Hezekiah
was the instigator of the compilation, need not however be
disputed. Even if not himself an author,1 he may well have
shared his friend Isaiah's interest in literature ; and besides, it
was at that time one of the glories cf a great king to be the
founder of a library.2 The word used in describing the
activity of his commissioners means literally ' transferred '
(from one place to another), and will equally well apply to
the noting down of oral traditions and to the making extracts
from existing collections. Among the latter, the ' Proverbs of
Solomon ' in x. i-xxii. 16 are of course to be included, though
it is not quite certain whether the compilers of the later
anthology had the book before them. It is true that nine
proverbs are the same in the two books either absolutely
(xxv. 24 = xxi. 9, xxvi. 22 = xviii. 8, xxvii. I2 = xxii. 3,
xxvii. I3 = xx. 16) or virtually (xxvi. I3 = xxii. 13, xxvi. 15
= xix. 24, xxviii. 6 = xix. 1, xxviii. I9 = xii. II, xxix. 13
= xxii. 2), besides two which agree in one line (xxvii. 21
= xvii. 3, xxix. 22 = xv. 18 ; comp. also xxvii. 15, xix. 13).
But there still remains the question, Why the collectors took
so little and left so much of manifest antiquity, and to this
question we cannot expect to find an answer. All that we
can say is that their compilation has striking characteristics
of its own. In technicalities they admit a greater variety than
those of the first anthology. They allow not only distichs but
tristichs (xxv. 8, 13, 20, xxvii. 10,22, xxviii. 10), tetrastichs (xxv.
4, 5, xxv. 9, IO, xxv. 21, 22, xxvi. 18, 19, xxvi. 24, 25, xxvii. 15,
16), and in one case a pentastich3 (xxv. 6, 7), agreeing in this
1 Cheyne, Tlie Prophecies of Isaiah, i. 228-9 (on Isa. xxxviii. 9).
2 Sayce's ed. of Smith's Chaldean Genesis, pp. 15, 26, 27.
8 Sept., Symm., Pesh., Vulg., however, attach the last line of ver. 7 to ver.
8 ('Qiue viderunt oculi tui, ne proferas in jurgio cito'), which makes ver. 7 a
distich and ver. 8 a tetrastich.

144 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iv.
respect with the two appendices of the first anthology. There
is also a long mashal, analogous to some we have had already,
which can only with some laxity be called a proverb, and
which extends over ten distichs (xxvii. 23-27). With regard
to parallelism, the antithetic kind, which predominates in the
first ' Solomonic ' anthology, is rare in this collection, except
in chaps, xxviii., xxix. ; sometimes indeed there is no parallel
ism at all (see xxv. 8, 9, ro, 21, 22, xxvi. 18, 19, xxvii. 1,
xxix. 12). As a compensation, similitudes abound in the
three first chapters of the collection. Sometimes the com
parison is expressed, e.g.
As the cold of snow in the heat 1 of harvest
is a faithful messenger to those that send him :
he refreshes the soul of his master (xxv. 13) ;
at other times it is implied by the juxtaposition of the two
objects, e.g. Apples of gold in chased work of silver,
a word smoothly spoken 2 (xxv. n).
Let us pause on this favourite proverb of Goethe's. The
Hebrew ' wise men ' would not have agreed to a later sage's
depreciation of speech. 3 ' A word in due season, how good is
it ' (xv. 23) ; but when not only seasonable but set off by
charms of style, how much better is it ! The ' apples of gold '
in xxv. 1 1 are probably oranges ; the ' chased work of silver '
means either baskets of silver filagree, or, as I should like to
think with Mr. Neil, the brilliant white blossoms among
which the . golden fruit is seen peeping out. If the ' gold '
is figurative, why not also the ' silver ' ? We are reminded of
Andrew Marvell's lines in the ' Emigrants' Song,'
He hangs in shades the orange bright,
Like golden lamps in a green night,
1 Reading b'khom for b'yom with Sept.
2 Literally, ' a word spoken (or, perhaps, driven, or sent home) on its wheels,'
i.e. smoothly and elegantly ('ore rotundo '). So Schultens, who sees a reference
to the tropes and figures of elegant Oriental style. Comp. Neil, Palestine Ex
plored, p. 197. The interpretation is an attractive one, though uncertain. Ewald
has a slightly different view (see History, ii. p. 14, n. 6).
3 Carlyle however borrows an Arabic proverb (Freytag, Prov. Ar., iii. 92).

CHAP. IV. THE SECOND COLLECTION 141;
though Marvell forgot what Addison (Spectator, No. 455) well
knew, that flowers as well as fruit and leaves continue on the
orange-tree for the best part of the year.
But to return to our anthology. It would almost seem as
if two editors with different tastes had been concerned in it,
the one responsible for chaps, xxv.-xxvii., and the other for
chaps, xxviii , xxix. According to Ewald, the proverbs in
the latter section are mostly somewhat, older than those in the
former. This is perhaps an impression rather than a judg
ment ; and few will deny that some at least of the parabolic
proverbs in the first section may be as old as those of the
same class in x. i-xxii. 16.
It is difficult to suppose that many of the proverbs in
either part of the book go back to a remote date. The
cheerfulness of Israel's ' golden prime ' is gone ; society seems
to have changed, not altogether for the better, even since the
first great anthology was made. The king is still looked up
to with awe ; the book begins with a group of four sentences
on the true glory of a monarch, followed by two on the right
behaviour for a subject (xxv. 2-7). The king is described
(surely with a touch of idealism) as inquisitive in the best
sense; his 'heart,' or understanding, is unsearchable. But
this happy view of monarchy passes away. There are several
proverbs complaining of the wickedness of kings, which are
almost without a parallel in the earlier collection. Ungodly
rulers have made the people ' sigh ' (xxix. 2) ; they have been
like ' roaring lions and ravenous bears ' to the ' poor folk '
(xxviii. 15, 16), and have completely destroyed the freedom
of social intercourse (xxviii. 12, 28). Sometimes, as in the
northern kingdom after the death of Jeroboam II.,1 the crown
has become the object of competition to a crowd of pretenders
(xxviii. 2). The misery of the people has been heightened
by the greed of petty tyrants, according to the forcible
saying —
1 It is of course possible that xxviii. 2 may be of northern origin, but why
should not a wise man in Judah have watched with sympathy the course of events
in Israel ? L

I46 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iv.
A man who is rich ' and oppresses the poor
(is) a rain which sweeps away and gives no bread (xxviii. 3).
What kind of oppression is meant we may learn from Micah
(ii- 3) - And they covet lands and take them by violence ;
houses, and take them away ;
and they oppress the owner and his house,
a man and his inheritance.
It is in short the same unscrupulous accumulation of landed
property to which Isaiah devotes one of his solemn ' woes ' in
his earliest prophecy, and which is one of the causes of the
threatened captivity (Isa. v. 8-10 13). Exile has indeed
become a familiar idea to those who admitted xxvii. 8 into
the anthology, if, as most think, in the pathetic words of
xxvii. 8 we may hear an echo of the march of Assyrian
armies, 'to wander' being an euphemism for going into
banishment. As a bird that wanders from her nest,
so is a man that wanders 2 from his home (xxvii. 8).
As a rule, however, the proverbs relate to ordinary bourgeois
life. Religious proverbs occur but rarely.3 ' Folly ' too is
not so often mentioned as in the first collection, and the
censure which it has to bear is mostly indirect and more or
less satirical ; see e.g. the proverb —
Though thou shouldest beat a fool in a mortar
in the midst of bruised corn with a pestle,
his folly would not depart from him (xxvii. 22),
and especially the paradoxical exhibition of the two sides of
a truth — Answer not the stupid man according to his folly,
lest thou thyself also become like unto him :
Answer the stupid man according to his folly,
lest he regard himself as wise (xxvi. 4, 5),
where the first distich dissuades from retaliating on a fool by
a word or an action on his own low moral plane, while the
1 Reading, with Griitz, 'ashir for rash ' poor,' which makes no sense.
2 Sept. well airofej/wOj?.
3 Notice however the remarkable saying, already quoted, in xxix.

chap. iv. THE SECOND COLLECTION I47
second recommends giving his folly the exposure or the
sharp answer which it so richly deserves.1 The wide mean
ing of ' folly ' in this pair of proverbs may be illustrated by
xvii. 12, where it evidently means a paroxysm of passion
Next to this noisy passionate ' folly,' if we may judge from
the arrangement of chap, xxvi., comes the vice of idleness
(xxvi. 13-16). How dangerous this was felt to be we have
seen already, and the exhortation to agricultural industry in
xxvii. 23-27 forms a counterpart to the meditation on the
'field of the slothful' in xxiv. 30-32. If the motives urged
for this and other duties are not lofty, the standard is at
least an easily attainable one.
Sometimes, indeed, the eye sharpened by a regard to
prudence discerns moral points of some refinement.2 This
proverb, for instance, strikes one as delicate, in spite of the
prudential motive attached to it in the next verse, —
Conduct thy quarrel with thy neighbour,
but expose not the secret of another (xxv. 9);
and the well-known precept on showing kindness to one's
enemies, though partly supported by the prospect of a reward
(comp. xxiv. 17, 18), is so nobly expressed that an apostle can
adopt it without change (Rom. xii. 20), —
If one that hates thee hunger, give him bread to eat,
and if he thirst, give him water to drink,
for thou heapest coals of fire thereby
upon his head, and Jehovah shall recompense thee (xxv. 21, 22).
Let us pause a moment on this proverb, which contrasts
so strongly with the advice on the treatment of enemies
given1 by Sirach. ' Coals of fire on the head ' is probably
here a metaphorical expression for what St. Augustine calls
' urentes conscientise gemitus ' (De doctr. Christ., 1. iii., c. 16).
The appositeness of the phrase will be heightened if we
suppose the enemy spoken of to be one who has never heard
1 The proverbs xxvi. I, 3-12, form a string of satirical attacks on the 'fool' or
stupid man.
2 One of these points however is noticed in the earliest part of the Law.
The love of one's enemy is taught in Ex. xxiii. 4, 5. L 2

148 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iv.
of the wise man's rule— a man of rude, uncultured nature,
and perhaps of alien race. To such a one, the being fed by
the very man whom he ' hated ' would give first of all a shock
of surprise, and then a pang of intolerable remorse for his
own unworthiness.1 I wish one could be sure that this pang
was referred to as purifying as well as painful to the sufferer.
A parallel passage would be a great boon. Of course we
can apply the passage in the same sense as St. Paul when he
followed his quotation with the words, ' Be not overcome of
evil, but overcome evil with good.'
But we should wrong our ' wise men ' by treating them as
pure utilitarians ; they are often sympathetic observers of cha
racter and circumstance. For instance, —
Vinegar falling upon a wound,2
and he who sings songs to a heavy heart (xxv. 20).
Silver dross spread over an earthen vessel —
fervent lips 3 and a bad heart (xxvi. 23).
Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth :
a stranger, and not thine own lips (xxvii. 2).
Faithful are the wounds of one who loves,
but the kisses of a hater are profuse 4 (xxvii. 6).
Thine own friend, and thy father's friend, forsake not ;
and go not to thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity :
better is a near neighbour than a far off brother6 (xxvii. 10).
He who blesses his friend with a loud voice, rising early in the
morning,
it is reckoned to him for a curse 6 (xxvii. 14).
Iron is sharpened by iron,
and a man sharpens the face (or edge) of his friend (xxvii. 17).
1 See however Mr. Yonge in The Expositor, Aug. 1885, pp. 158-9.
' The received text has ' vinegar upon nitre ; ' but this would be rather an
emblem for anger. The correction is Bickell's, and is partly founded on Sept.
(fimrep &£os €\K€i acriixcpopov). Tbe opening words of the verse in rec. text arise
from the repetition in a corrupt form of the four last words of the preceding verse
(Lagarde and Bickell).
3 The Septuagint has 'smooth lips.'
4 To have added ' but perfidious,' would have made the line too long.
a This seems a combination of two distinct proverbs. The one says that a
friend can give more sympathy than a relative ; the other, that a neighbour, being
on the spot, can give more help than a relative at a distance.
6 A humorous picture ! Such ostentatious and inopportune salutations are
execrable flattery.

chap. iv. THE SECOND COLLECTION

149

The three appendices to the Hezekian collection (xxx.,
xxxi. 1-9, xxxi. 10-31) are, to take the most conservative
position possible, obviously not earlier than the closing
century of the Jewish state. The art of proverb-writing has
declined ever since the compilation of the previous anthology.
The marks of simplicity and naturalness are wanting ; the
enigmatical and artificial seem to be sought for. Each part
of these two chapters has moreover something of its own
pointing in the direction of a late origin. The two first
appendices are very possibly even later than the return of
the Jews from Babylon.
The first appendix begins — ' The words of Agur the son of
Jakeh, the prophecy' (or, divine utterance)1 (comp. xxxi 1).
The heading is enigmatical ; in what sense are the ' words ' ' a
prophecy,' and who are the persons spoken of? The latter
question we have no means of answering. The names are not
found elsewhere, and have been thought to be pseudonyms
(Agur might mean ' collector ' and Jakeh ' obedient,' i.e. ' reli
gious ').2 As to the title ' the prophecy,' it must be admitted
that it is not by any means an appropriate one. It is too
bold to accuse the proverb-writer of claiming prophetic in
spiration. (And why should the article be prefixed ?) The only
alternative to this is to read, with Prof. Gratz, (for hammassa
' the prophecy ') hammoshel ' the proverb-writer.' After the
heading comes a group of four verses complete in itself.
The oracle of the man ' I have wearied 3 myself about God ' (?),
I have wearied myself about God and have not prevailed.4
For I am too stupid for a man,
and am without human reason ;
I have not learned wisdom,
nor have I knowledge of the All-holy.s
Who has gone up to heaven and come down ?
1 On the conjectural reading, ' the man of Massa ' (' Massa,' instead of ' the
prophecy'), see Chap. VI.
2 This was the view of St. Jerome, derived of course from his Jewish teacher.
3 Pointing Idithi.
1 Reading with Bickell v'lo iikdl. Another correction of the text is, v'ekel ' and
have pined away.
5 Q'doshim, a word formed on the analogy of elohim ; comp. ix. 10, Hos,
xii. I.

150 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iv.
who has gathered the wind in his fists ?
who has bound up the waters in a garment ?
who has established all the ends of the earth ?
what is his name, and what is his son's name, if thou knowest ?
It is not easy to interpret this little passage. Evidently
the speaker is a ' wise man,' who, according to some critics,
inculcates a reverent humility by reporting the fruitlessness
of his own theological speculations. After long brooding
over the problems of the divine nature (so they explain), the
Hebrew sage was compelled to desist with the feeling of his
utter incapacity. Like Israel the patriarch he strove with
God, but unlike Israel he did not prevail. He knows indeed
what God has done and is continually doing ; He is the
Omnipresent One, the Lord of wind and flood, the Author of
the boundaries of the earth. But what is this great Being's
name, and (to know Him intimately) what is His son's name ?
On this view of its meaning, the passage reminds one of the
words of Goethe's Faust, ' Who can name Him, or who confess,
I believe Him ? Who can feel, and can be bold to say, I
believe Him not ? ' Or perhaps we may still better compare
Max Letteris' masterly Hebrew translation or adaptation, in
which the mediaeval doctor has been transformed into Ben
Abuyah (or Acher ins), the famous apostate from Judaism in
the second century of our era. The passage with which we
are concerned as illustrative of the passage before us is on
page 164, and begins in.33; »p-1 -inn^t! 'P. Notice the delicate
tact in the choice of the second verb, ' Who can give Him
an honourable surname?' (comp. Isa. xliv. 5, xiv. 4,) Later
on, after other names suggested by the German original, the
modern Hebrew poet continues, •lT'STD 1&: '3 i»B> !V3 is, and
in a note refers to a parallel passage in a Hebrew poem by
Ibn Gabirol.
I must make bold to doubt the correctness of this ex
planation. (1) Because it does not sufficiently account for
the language of ver. 2. (2) Because upon this view of the
questions of ver. 4, an Israelite's answer would simply be,
Jehovah (comp. Job xxxviii. 5, Isa. xl. 12). (3) Because it is
so difficult to see why the poet should have asked further,

CHAP. iv. THE SECOND COLLECTION 151
What is His son's name ? Is not the passage rather a philo
sophic fragment from a school of ' wise men,' not so much
unbelieving as critical ? The speaker declares, soberly enough,
that he has tried in vain by thinking to find out God. Then
comes in a piece of irony. No doubt it is his own stupidity ;
grand theologians, such as the writer of Isa. xl. 12 &c, Job
xxxviii., Prov. viii. 22 &c, may well look down upon the
dullard, who has not passed through their school ! ' But who
is it that is ever and anon coming down 1 to earth, and that
performed all these creative works of which you delight to
speak ? I have never seen him ; tell me his name and his
son's name since you are so learned.' The latter phrase may
be an allusion, either (anticipating Philo, who calls Wisdom
God's Son) to the ' I was brought forth ' in viii. 24, or more
probably 2 the primeval man (who might be called a ' son of
God ' in the sense of Luke iii. 38) spoken of in Job xv. 7,
who was the embodiment of all wisdom and sat in the council
of Elohim.3 The satirical turn of this secularistic ' wise man ' is
even perhaps traceable in the heading of his poem. He calls
his work an ' oracle,' taking up a favourite word of the
disciples of the prophets, and flinging it back to them with a
laugh. Obviously too the name of the writer, if genuine, is best
explained as an assumed name. [But the emphatic hagge-
bher is very difficult. I cannot believe, with Ewald, that
haggebher is said ironically, as if ' the mighty one in his own
conceit;' comp. Isa. xxii. 17 (?), Ps. Iii. 3. The analogy of
Num. xxiv. 3, 15, 2 Sam. xxiii. 1, suggests that there is a cor
ruption in the text, and that haggeblier, 'the man,' was
originally followed by words descriptive of the person referred
to. Gratz boldly corrects (haggebher) lo-khayil ' the man
without strength.]
Are we surprised at this ? But a strikingly parallel con-
1 It may be objected that ' hath gone up and come down ' does not suit this
explanation, and that, to refer to God, it should run ' hath come down and gone
up.' But we have ' angels of Elohim ascending and descending' in Gen. xxviii.
12 ; usage, in Hebrew as in English, forbids the phrase ' to go down and up.'
2 ' More probably ; ' because the name of the speaker in viii. 24 has been
told. 3 Comp. Ewald, Die Lehre der Bibel von Gott, iii. 2, pp. 81, 82.

152 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. iv.
fession of honest scepticism is found in the Rig Veda (x. 1 29),
though I would not of course identify the opinions of the
Sanskrit and the Hebrew poet,
Who knows, who here can declare, whence has sprung — whence,
this creation ? . . . . From what this creation arose ; and whether
[any one] made it, or not, — he who in the highest heaven is its ruler,
he verily knows, or [even] he does not know.1
The poet who ' takes up his parable ' after Laithi-el calmly
and uncontroversially indicates his own very different religious
position. He earnestly prays that he may not 'become a
liar and ask, Who is Jehovah ? ' (xxx. 9) ; for him the divine
revelations (the outward form of which is already sacred) are
amply sufficient. ' Every utterance of God \Eloah, the sing.
form, as in Job] is free from alloy (xxx. 5 ; see the commen
tators on Ps. xviii. 31); the divine 'name' declared in Ex.
xxxiv. 6, should satisfy the wisest of men. Thus, like the
editors of Ecclesiastes, this later writer neutralises the doubt
ful expressions of the poem which he has saved from perishing.
Can we avoid the impression that both these poets lived
in an age of advanced religious reflection and of Scripture-
study? The one is more of a philosopher, the other of a
Biblical theologian ; both would be at home only in the Exile
or in the post-Exile period, when doubt and even scepticism
lifted their heads side by side with Biblical study. Our
second more believing poet seems to be thinking of Ps. xviii.
30 ; but the portion of that verse which he adopts assumes
another colour through the warning which follows, derived
from Deut. iv. i.xiii. 1. It is no longer the 'promise of God'
which is 'tried' or 'pure,' but the revelation of which the
Jewish Church is gradually finding itself the possessor.
The poet's prayer for himself (w. 7-9) is followed by
eight groups of proverbs, each of which describes some
quality or character which is either commended or warned
against, and (with the exception of the first) contains a
similitude. In most of these the number four is conspicuous
generally as the climax after 'three' (vv. 15, 18, 21, 29).
1 Muir, Original Sanskrit Texts, v. 356 ; comp. Max Miiller, Hibbert Lectures,
p. 316.

. w.

1 1

-14

. —

!5,

16

. —

17

. —

18-

-20

. —

21-

23

—

24-

-28

. —

29-

-3i

. —

32,

33

chap. iv. THE SECOND COLLECTION 1 53
The fact that similar ' numerical proverbs ' were popular in
the early Rabbinical period,1 gives a certain support to the
view that this collection is of late origin. The groups referred
to are — The four marks of an evil generation
The four insatiable things
The fate of the disobedient son
The four incomprehensible things .
— — intolerable things
— — wise animals
— — comely in going (see p. 175)
A warning against strife .
One of these (vv. 15, 16) has probably suffered a slight
mutilation, which has been thus remedied by Bickell, —
The leech has two [three 2] daughters,
they say continually, ' Give, give : '
there are three things which are never satisfied,
four which never say, ' Abundance.'
Shedl is never satisfied with dead,
and the closing of the womb is never satisfied with men,
the earth is never satisfied with water,
and fire never says, 'Abundance.'3
' Daughters of the leech ' is a quasi-mythical expression,
which no one could misunderstand (comp. 'upon a hill the
son of oil,' Isa. v. 1). We find a similar group of four
insatiables in the Sanskrit Hitopadesa.4
Fire is never satisfied with fuel ; nor the ocean with rivers ; nor
death with all creatures ; nor bright-eyed women with men.
The verses are of course older than the trumpery story of the
cowherd's wife which they serve to illustrate. The coincidence
with the Hebrew, being obviously accidental, is worth remem
bering in other connections. The two parallels, present in
1 See above, p. 128, and comp. Wunsche, Midrasch Kohelet, p. xiii.
2 Sept., followed by Pesh. , reads ' three' for ' two.' Accepting this reading,
the second half of the verse becomes an explanation of the first.
3 Bickell's reconstruction of the text makes the proverbs symmetrical with the
rest. In lines 5, 6 he makes an ingenious parallelism with methTm ' dead' and
m'thim 'men' (i.e. children).
' F. Johnson's translation (1848), chap, ii., fable 7; comp. Fritze's metrical
version (Leipz. 1884).

154 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. rv.
the Hebrew but not in this Sanskrit quaternion, are given in
a quatrain of a Vedic hymn to Varuna —
The path of ships across the sea,
The soaring eagle's flight he knows.1
The second appendix (xxxi. 1-9) consists of a single group
of sayings, described as 'the words of Lemuel, a king, the
prophecy [better the proverb, reading mashal~\ with which his
mother instructed him.' Possibly, as Ewald suggests, Lemuel
(or rather, Lemoel, as the word is pointed in ver. 4) is an ima
ginary name, descriptive of the character of an ideal monarch
(' God's own ; ' comp. Lael, Num. iii. 24). It is not necessary
to suppose that the poet himself lived under a native king ; he
may, like the author of Koheleth, have thrown himself back
in imagination to Israel's golden prime. His own period
was late, judging from the unclassical Hebrew (notice the
Aramaisms in vv. 2, 3, and the strange expressions in vv. 5,
8). The form of the heading suggests that these ' words of
Lemuel ' formed part of the same collection as the ' words of
Agur ; ' and there is at least nothing in the contents to forbid
this view. The warnings of this queen-mother 2 (whose rela
tion to Lemuel reminds us of that of Bathsheba to Solomon)
are very homely and practical ; one is against sensuality,
another against drunkenness; upon which follows an ad
monition to defend the cause of the poor. Even if there were
no native king at the time, the advice would be appropriate
for all members of the upper class of society.
The third appendix (xxxi. 10-31) contains the praise of
the virtuous woman. In style it is quite unlike the two
preceding sections ; it must come therefore from another
source. It is an alphabetic poem ; each distich begins with a
letter of the Hebrew alphabet. This, combined with the
position of the work at the close of the various collections of
proverbs, of itself suggests a date not far removed on the one
side or the other from the Exile-period, when Hebrew litera
ture became undoubtedly more artificial and technical. From
1 Muir, Metrical Translations (1879), p. 160.
2 On the early importance of the queen-mother, see Cheyne's Isaiah, i. 47,
note 1 (on Isa. vii. 13).

CHAP. iv. THE SECOND COLLECTION 1 55
xxxi. 23 ('the elders of the land ') we may perhaps infer that
it was written in Palestine. It is very interesting to see the
ideal of womanhood formed by a late Hebrew poet. Activity
appears to him the one great feminine virtue — not however
the activity which is entirely devoted to trifling details, for the
ideal woman ' is like the ships of the merchant ; from far she
brings her food ' (ver. 14). Nor is she a stranger to sympa
thetic impulses ; ' she holds out her hand (with something in
it) to the afflicted, and stretches forth her hands to the needy
[to bring them in],' ver. 20. Nor must we forget ' one of the
most beautiful features in the portrait ' (Delitzsch) : ' she
opens her mouth with wisdom, and a law of kindness is on
her tongue ' (ver. 26). But for this verse, indeed, it would read
almost like satire that 'far above pearls is her value' (ver. io),
since no higher estimate than this has been offered for God's
choicest blessing, ' Wisdom.' •
The poet does not say that he has found such a woman
(comp. Eccles. vii. 28). The picture is perhaps too brightly
coloured to be drawn from reality, unless with Hitzig we
bring down the composition of the poem as late as the Greek
period. Most probably, it is idealistic.
1 This hardly recommends the view of Castelli, that this poem is properly the
conclusion of the introductory treatise (i.-ix.)

156 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. v.

CHAPTER V.
THE PRAISE OF WISDOM.
' THOU hast kept the good wine until now, for ' good wine '
well describes the glorious little treatise at the head of our
Book of Proverbs (i. 7-ix. 18). I do not think it is right to
infer from the heading in i. 1 that its unknown author assumed
the mask of Solomon. In itself such a hypothesis would not
be incredible. We have the analogy of the Egyptian scribe
who represents Amenemhat I. ' rising up like a god ' and ad
dressing to his son some instructions on the royal art of
governing.1 But it is more natural to explain the heading as
a repetition of the formula in x. 1, for the ' Praise of Wisdom '
(to coin another title) is in fact the introduction to the follow
ing anthology,2 together with which and its appendices it forms
the ' older book of Proverbs.' If we ask why an introduction
was prefixed, the answer must be that the writer wished to
recommend his own inspiring view of practical ethics as a
branch of divine wisdom ; in other words, to counteract the
sometimes commonplace morality of the earlier proverbs
by enveloping the reader in a purer and more ethereal atmo
sphere. The key-note of the anthology is nothing but Expe
rience ; that of the introductory treatise is Divine Teaching.
It is a sign of moral progress that the editor of an anthology
of Experience should have thought his work only half-done
till he had prefixed the ' Praise of Wisdom.' As a wise
teacher of our own time 3 has observed, ' It would not be un
true to say that in all essential points Experience is the teacher
1 (Maspero) Records of the Past, ii. 9-16.
2 Its close relation to the first of the two great anthologies is shown by the
linguistic points of contact between the two works (see Chap. VI. )
3 Rev. J. H. Thorn.

chap. v. THE PRAISE OF WISDOM 1 57
only of fools, of those who have gone astray through turning
a deaf ear to the voice of a prior and more legitimate teacher.'
The nature of the wisdom so earnestly commended by this
self-forgetting writer, we will consider presently ; and our
study will probably convince us that such a writer can only
have arisen at an advanced period of Israel's history. The
class or circle to which he belonged, and its characteristics,
can easily be determined ; but the precise period only with
some degree of hesitation. Without anticipating the discus
sion which will be given at another point, I think it may safely
be laid down that each of those kindred poems — the ' Praise of
Wisdom* and 'Job' — must have arisen at one of three periods,
marked respectively by the composition of Deuteronomy, by
the Captivity, and by the Restoration. The progress of the
higher Israelitish wisdom was so gradual that it does not
perhaps, to the exegete as distinguished from the historian,
greatly matter which of these periods we select. For my own
part, however, I incline to connect at any rate the former of
these works with the age of Deuteronomy. Apart from the
details to be mentioned elsewhere, it is clear (I speak now of
Prov. i.-ix.) that the tone of the exhortations, and the view of
religion as ' having the promise of the life that now is,' corre
spond to similar characteristics of the Book of Deuteronomy.
And if we turn from the contents to the form of this choice little
book, the same hypothesis seems equally suitable. The pro
phets had long since seen the necessity of increasing their
influence by committing the main points of their discourses to
writing ; some rhetorical passages indeed were evidently com
posed to be read and not to be heard. It was natural that the
moralists should follow this example, not only (as in the
anthologies) by remodelling their wise sayings for publication,
but also by venturing on long and animated quasi-oratorical
recommendations of great moral truths.
Such a recommendation, addressed especially to the young
and impressionable (i. 4), lies before us in chaps, i.-ix. In
grave but harmonious accents the opening verses (which refer
chiefly to i. 7-ix. 1 8, but not without a secondary reference to
the anthology which follows) describe its object and character.

158 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. v.
Then follows a motto, the first line of which occurs again
near the close of the book in ix. 10 (Job xxviii. 28, Ps. cxi. 10),
and which stamps the author as belonging to a new and more
religious class of 'wise men' (see p. 121), —
The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of wisdom,
i.e. the foundation of true wisdom (its ' root,' Ecclus. i. 20) is
reverence. The disciple is to begin by taking this upon trust,
but when further advanced he will see that it is the shortest
way to his goal, true wisdom having an objective existence in
the unseen world. At present he is simply to follow the
' direction ' of those wiser than himself : — our moralist is as
zealous for a torn as the author of Deuteronomy. But though
serious and authoritative, he is never stern ; indeed, to enforce
his appeal he breaks through a Hebrew writer's usual veil of
reticence and describes his own home-life (iv. 3, 4). He can
enter into the feelings of the young, for he too has ' borne the
yoke in his youth ' (Lam. iii. 27), and learned to prefer it to
' unchartered freedom.' The whole of chap. iv. is devoted to
a summary of the wise doctrine which he received from his
father ; indeed, throughout the book he shows a wonderful
appreciation of the parental and the filial relations, and, ac
cording to Ewald's arrangement (see below), begins each
section with an exhortation to listen to parental instruction.
He himself feels like a father to his young disciples (iv. 1).
The errors to which his hearers are specially tempted
are highway robbery (i. 11 -18, iv. 16, 17) and unchastity
(ii. 16, v. 3-20, vi. 24-35, vii. 5-27, ix. 13-18). From the
time that the simplicity of the ancient life began to give way
to the inroads of luxury, we meet in the Biblical writings with
complaints of acts of violence leading to murder (see, for in
stance, in the prophecies, Isa. i. 15, v. f, xxxiii. 15, Mic. iii. 10,
Jer. ii. 34, xxii. 17, Isa. lix. 3, 7, and in a collection of proverbs
contemporary with our book, Prov. xxiv. 15, 16). 'At no
time,' as Dean Plumptre well remarks, ' has Palestine ever
risen to the security of a well-ordered police-system ; ' even
down to the fall of Jerusalem, bands of robbers defied the
authority of the central government. The remarkable thing

chap. v. THE PRAISE OF WISDOM 1 59
is that young men in the higher circles of society (for such
our moralist appears to address) should be thought capable of
joining the banditti, at a time when ' bandit ' could not be
synonymous with 'patriot.' Our moralist contents himself
with dissuading his disciple from doing so, on the ground of
the retribution which will follow (i. 18, 19). The exhortation
to industry, with its slow but sure profits, comes later, and in
a less appropriate place (vi. 6-8). But the other besetting sin
of youth is still more earnestly denounced as the most glaring
specimen of folly.' Once indeed the ' strange, or alien, woman,'
i.e. the adulteress, is introduced dramatically as ' Madam
Folly' (ix. 13). The picture is remarkable, and forms a de
signed contrast to that at the beginning of the chapter. She
sits at the door of her house, counterfeiting her great rival
Wisdom (comp. ver. 14 with ver. 3, and ver. 16 with ver. 4), like
Dante's Siren ; but the disciple of the ' wise man ' knows
.... that phantoms are there,
and that her guests are in the depths of Shedl
(ix. 18; comp. ii. 18, xxi. 16).
' Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way ? ' is
the problem for our moralist to solve. He does so by insist
ing on an education conducted in reliance on divine Wisdom.
The reward of diligent attention to the earlier lessons (for
each chapter is a lesson, and its repetitions have a pedagogic
justification) is the famous portrait of Wisdom in viii. 22-31.
She (for Wisdom, khokma, is a feminine word) has indeed
been mentioned before (i. 20, iii. 13-20, iv. 5-9), but from
viii. 1 to ix. 6 the poet is absorbed in his grand personification.
Wisdom is now presented to us, in the familiar dialect of
poetry, as the firstborn Child of the Creator. There is but
one Wisdom ; though her forms are many, in her origin she
is one. The Wisdom who presided over the ' birth ' of nature
is the same who by her messengers (the ' wise men ') calls
mankind to turn aside from evil (ix. 3). There can therefore
be no real disharmony between nature and morality ; the
picture leaves no room for an Ahriman, in this and other
respects resembling the Cosmogony in Gen. i. and portions of

l6o THE BOOK" OF PROVERBS chap. v.
the striking descriptions in Job xxvi., xxviii., xxxviii. There
is also no time when we can say that ' Wisdom was not.'
Faith declares that even in that primitive Chaos of which our
reason has a horror divine Wisdom reigned supreme. The
heavenly ocean, the ancient hills, the combination of countless
delicate atoms to form the ground, the fixing of the vault of
heaven on the world-encircling ocean, the separation of sea
and dry land ¦ — all these were later works of God than the
Architect through whom He made them. And how did
the Architect work ? By a ' divine improvisation ' which
allowed no sense of effort or fatigue, and which still continues
with unabated freshness. But though her sportive path 2 can
still be traced in the processes of nature, her highest delight
is in the regeneration of the moral life of humanity. The
passage runs thus —
Jehovah produced 3 me as the beginning of his way,
as the first of his works, long since.
From of old I received my place,
from the beginning, from the first times of the earth.
When there were no floods, I was brought forth,
when there were no fountains rich in water.
Before the mountains were settled,
before the hills was I brought forth ;
While as yet he had not made the earth with (its) fields,
and the atoms of dust which form the ground.
When he established the heaven, I was there,
when he marked a circle upon the face of the flood,4
1 The poet, we can see, has not arranged the creative works as carefully as the
cosmogonist in Genesis.
2 Pleaseth him, the Eternal Child,
To play his sweet will, glad and wild. — Emerson, Wood Notes.
3 ' Produced ' seems the best rendering (Sept., eicricre), in the sense of 'creating,'
not (as Del.) of 'revealing,' for which there is no authority. The secondary
meaning ' possessed ' (Aquila &c. iicrtiaaro, Vulg. possedit ; comp. Ecclus. xxiv. 6)
is less agreeable to the context (see Hitzig's note). There is the same diversity of
rendering in Gen. xiv. 19-22. On the patristic expositions of this passage, see
Dean Goode, The Divine Ride of Faith and Practice, ed. 1, i. 299. The ante-
Nicene Fathers mostly apply it to the divine generation of the Son, the post -Nicene
to the generation of the human nature of Christ. Basil and Epiphanius are ex
ceptions. The former applies the passage to ' that wisdom which the apostle
mentions ' (in 1 Cor. i. 21) ; the latter expresses a strong opinion that ' it does not
at all speak concerning the Son of God.'
4 Comp. Milton's noble conception of the Creator's golden compasses (Par.
Lost, vii. 225, 6).

CHAP. v. THE PRAISE OF WISDOM l6l
When he made firm the sky above,
when he strengthened the fountains of the flood,
When he appointed to the sea his bound,
that the waters should not transgress his command,
when he fixed the foundations of the earth,
Then was I beside him as architect,
and was daily full of delight,
sporting 1 before him at all times,
I who (still) have sport with his fruitful earth,
and have my delight with the sons of men.
The bold ' originality of this passage requires no proof.
It cuts away at a blow the old mythical conception of the
world as the work of God's hands, and of an arbitrary
omnipotence. ' God,' as Hooker says, ' is a law both to
himself and to all things beside ; ' 'his wisdom hath stinted
the effects of his power.' ' Nor is the freedom of the will of
God any whit abated, let, or hindered, by means of this ;
because the imposition of this law upon himself is his own
free and voluntary act ' (' Jehovah produced me '). The idea,
then, of the world as a Cosmos was not adopted by the
Jews from the Greeks ; it arose of itself as soon as religious
men pondered over the phenomena of nature. The author of
Job took up the idea, and reexpressed it worthily in xxviii.
12-28, the chief difference between him and his predecessor
being that he denies the attainableness for man of wisdom in
the larger sense, while the author of the ' Praise of Wisdom '
does not raise the question whether the higher department of
wisdom is open to human enquiry.
At the subsequent history of the conception of Wisdom
we can barely glance.2 The cosmogonist in Gen. i., a sublime
1 Comp. Delitzsch, System der christlichen Apologetik, § 16, where the history
of this conception in Jewish literature is traced in connection with that of the
Logos-idea ; also Ewald, Die Lehre der Bibel von Gott, iii. 74-77.
2 In Wisd. vii. 22 &c. the language appears to some to rise above poetical
personification, and to imply a conscious hypostatising of Wisdom. Dante, a
good judge on this point, certainly thought otherwise (Convito, iii. 15); he evi
dently holds that the Sophia of the Book of Wisdom is precisely analogous to his
own very strong personification of divine Philosophy. Still such language may
have partly prepared the way for the well-known Gnostic myth of Achamoth or
Sophia (comp. Baur, Three First Centuries, E. T., i. 207). It was well, as
Plumptre remarks, that Philo adopted Logos rather than Sophia as the name of
M

1 62 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS CHAP. v.
thinker, but addressing untutored minds, preferred to convey
truth in forms borrowed from mythology. The moralists
however saw the poetical and religious importance of the
personification of Wisdom, and repeatedly introduced it into
their didactic works (see Ecclus. i., xxiv., Wisd. vi.-ix.,1 and
comp. Bar. iii. 29-37). Sirach even takes a step in advance
of his original, and at least for a moment identifies Wisdom
with the Law of Moses.2 It became indeed a tradition of
Jewish exegesis (see Pirke Aboth, vi. 10) to interpret the
absolute Khokma of the Tora, either in opposition to
Hellenistic views of the higher wisdom, or from a practical
instinct such as Wordsworth followed when in praise of Duty
he employed figures which had occurred long before in the
' Praise of Wisdom,' or (a closer parallel) Richard Hooker,
when he described the Scripture as one embodiment of that
divine Law which he so splendidly eulogises at the close ot
his first book. That Jewish legalism degenerated into a
mechanical formalism, should not blind us to the practical
instinct in which it originated.
The title ' The Praise of Wisdom ' has now, I hope, been
justified. The passage quoted above forms the high-water
mark of this elevated poetry, and points the way to the
grand things in the poem of Job. Regularity of structure is
not a merit of our treatise, but the repetitions are not feeble,
and are perhaps deliberately made. The author is a didactic
poet, and only after he can presume that his lessons have
been assimilated will he venture on his highest flights. Does
Ewald bear this in mind when he divides the book into three
sections, I. a general exhortation to wisdom, in which the
the creative energy. A system in which Sophia had been the dominant word
might have led to an earlier development of Mariolatry (Introduction to Proverbs
in the Speaker's Commentary).
1 Ecclus. xxiv. 23. (Comp. a sublime passage of E. Irving, identifying the
contents of the ' sacred volume ' with ' the primeval divinity of revealed Wisdom,'
Miscellanies, p. 380 &c. ) According to late Jewish theology, the Law is one of
the seven things produced before the creation of the world. The alphabet-fables
in Talmud and Midrash, in which letters of the alphabet converse with God, pre
suppose the same view (comp. the Mohammedan view of the Koran).
2 So Milton (a Hebraist), Paradise Lost, vii. 10 ('didst play'), and again in
Tetrachordon ('God himself conceals not his own recreations,' &c.)

chap. v. THE PRAISE OF WISDOM 1 63
whole of the truth is touched upon, but no part is completely
unfolded (i. 8-iii. 35); II. an exhaustive treatment of a few
details (iv. i-vi. 19) ; III. a gradual rise to the highest and
most universal truth, closing in almost lyric enthusiasm (vi.
20-ix. 18) ? Or Hitzig, when, to suit an artificial arrangement,
he omits as later additions iii. 22-26, vi. 1-19, viii. 4-12, 14-
16, ix. 7-10? These are the two extremes of critical theory;
their failure may be taken as a proof that the only possible
division is one like that of Delitzsch into fifteen poems, rather
loosely connected together, but presenting the same peculi
arities of style and diction. Mashals we can only term them
in a wide sense of the word ; not condensation but expansion
is the characteristic of this book ; the discourse flows on till
the subject has been exhausted, and then, after a brief pause, it
gushes forth anew. One of the chapters (ii.) actually forms
a single carefully elaborated sentence. Now and then the
matter is more broken up ; we meet with some small groups
of detached sentences (e.g. iii. 27-35, vi- i_II> I2~i9). which
introduce some variety into the style, and suggest that the
author revised his work with the view of making it an ethical
manual, as well as an introduction to the anthology. In one
of these groups we find the interesting similitude of the ant,
which the Septuagint has supplemented by one of purely
Greek origin (see Hitzig and Lagarde) on the bee.
The author has the pen of a ready writer, and his work
shows that he has studied the literature of his time. He was
familiar 1 with the phraseology of the ' Solomonic ' proverbs,
though he struck out a style of his own, in harmony
with the altered conditions of the teaching office. He ad
dresses those who have time to listen, and taste to appreciate
his flowing rhetoric. He implies throughout that his audience
belongs to the wealthier class, and his favourite images are
drawn from the life of the merchant.2 Clearly too he has a
strong hold upon the doctrine that prosperity and adversity
are indicative of moral character. Thus, speaking of ethical
Wisdom, he says,
1 The proof of this cannot be given here.
2 See ii. 4, iii. 13-15, iv. 7, vii. 16, 17, 19, 20 (especially), viii. 10, 18-21. M 2

164 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. v.
Length of days is in her (Wisdom's) right hand,
in her left riches and honour (iii. 16). '
And yet there is evidence, even in Prov. i.-ix., of a nascent
scepticism on this point, originating probably in some recent
event, such as the captivity of the Ten Tribes. In words
which remind us of Psalms xxxvii. and lxxiii. the writer
exclaims —
Envy thou not the man of violence,
and have thou pleasure in none of his ways . . .
The curse of Jehovah is in the house of the ungodly,
but the habitation of the righteous he blesses (iii. 31, 33) ;
and to furnish his disciples with an answer to the sceptic —
Truly, whom Jehovah loves, he corrects,
and as a father the son in whom he delights
(iii. 12 ; comp. Job v. 17).
With this sweet saying I take leave for the present of this
beautiful work. How true it is that the doubts of a believer
are the stepping-stones to higher attainments of faith !
1 Comp. i. 32, 33, ii. 21, 22, iii. 1-10, ix. n, 12, 18.

i65

CHAPTER VI.
SUPPLEMENTARY ON QUESTIONS OF DATE AND ORIGIN.
There are two extreme views on the date of the Book of
Proverbs, between which are the theories of the mass of
moderate critics. The one is that represented by Keil in his
Introduction and Bishop Ellicott's Commentary, that the
whole book except chaps, xxx., xxxi., and perhaps the head
ing i. 1-6, is in substance of Solomonic origin ; 1 the other is
that of Vatke and Reuss (the precursors of Kuenen and
Wellhausen) that our proverbs as a collection come from the
post-Exile period. Much need not be said on the first of
these extreme views. It has been pointed out already that
the ethical and religious character even of the earliest pro
verbial collection stands far removed from that of the his
torical Solomon. It is indeed a pure hypothesis that any
Solomonic element survives in the Book of Proverbs. I
doubt not that many bright and witty sayings ot Solomon
came into circulation, and some of them might conceivably
have been gathered up and included in the anthologies. But
have we any adequate means of deciding which these are ?
It would appear from I Kings iv. 33 that the wisdom of the
historical Solomon expressed itself in spoken fables or moral-
isations about animals and trees. A few, a very few, of the
proverbs in our book may perhaps satisfy the test thus
obtained, and be plausibly represented as a Solomonic ele
ment. But why Solomon should be singled out as the
author, it would tax one's ingenuity to say, and the judgment
of Hitzig (in such matters a conservative critic) must be
maintained that the survival of Solomonic proverbs is no
more than a possibility.2
1 Keil qualifies this however by admitting that Solomon may have incorpo
rated many sayings of other wise men. - Die Spriiche Salomo's, p, xvii.

1 66 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. vi.
The other extreme view requires some little explanation.
Vatke does not deny that Solomon composed proverbs, but
only that his proverbs can have resembled those in the
canonical book. Putting aside some sayings of earlier date
Vatke holds that the stamp of the post-Exile period (and
more particularly of the fifth century) is as marked in the
Book of Proverbs as it is, according to him, in that of Job ;
in short, that both works imply, equally with the still later
Ecclesiastes, a long and earnest struggle between the prin
ciples represented respectively by the higher prophets and
by the priests. The result of this struggle has become to
the authors of these books an objective truth which it is
henceforth their business to realise as true subjectively.1
The existence of a free-minded school of thought in the post-
Exile period is very plausibly defended both by Vatke and
by Kuenen,2 and if our only choice lay between the extreme
alternatives mentioned above, we should be shut up to the
acceptance of the latter.
I shall not however discuss here the post-Exile origin of
the Book of Proverbs as a whole, but only that part of the
hypothesis which relates to the very interesting section desig
nated by Ewald the ' Praise of Wisdom.' If this portion is
not of Exile or post-Exile origin, I do not see how it can be
maintained that any other part of the book is so, except
indeed the sayings of Agur and Lemuel (xxx. i-xxxi. 9).
The following are some of the leading arguments for the
late -origin of Prov. i.-ix. I. These chapters are said to con
tain a few parallels to passages in works belonging probably
to the Exile or post-Exile period (11. Isaiah,3 Job). I lay no
stress on the occurrence of Prov. i. 16 (with the addition of
' innocent ') in Isa. lix. fa, because this verse is not in the
rhythm of the rest of Prov. i.-ix., and is not found in the
Septuagint. There may however be a parallelism between
Prov. ii. 1 5 and Isa. lix. 8 ; the prophet is, at any rate,
influenced by some proverbial work similar to Prov. i.-ix.
1 Die biblische Theologie, i. 563. 2 The Religion of Israel, ii. 242.
3 The passages in II. Isaiah referred to in this paragraph belong to sections most
probably of post-Exile origin. (See art. 'Isaiah' in Encyclopedia Britannica,
new ed.)

chap. vi. QUESTIONS OF DATE AND ORIGIN 167
There may also be one between Prov. i. 24, 26, 27 and Isa.
lxv. 1 2, Ixvi. 4. More striking are the affinities already pointed
out between Prov. i.-ix. and the Book of Job, which may be
taken to prove that these works proceeded from the same circle
of ' wise men,' but not necessarily that they are of the same
period (see above, p. 85).
II. As to the religious ideas of these chapters, (a) The
Theism expressed is both pure und broad. Polytheism is
not even worthy to be the subject of controversy ; the tone
is throughout positive. Jehovah's vast creative activity fills
the writer's mind, and begins to stimulate speculative curiosity;
from this point of view comp. Prov viii. 22-31 with Job xv. 7,
8,1 xxxviii. 4-1 1, and Gen. i. (The affinities with the cos
mogony are only general,2 but perhaps gain in importance
when taken together with the possible allusion to Gen. ii. in
Prov. iii. 18, ' She is a tree of life ' &c.) (b) It is no objection
to the Exile or post-Exile date that the doctrine of invariable
retribution is presupposed in this treatise. We find this
doctrine both in the speeches of Elihu (Job. xxxii.-xxxvii.,
a separate work in its origin) and in the Wisdom of Sirach.
There is some weight in these arguments. But it can, I think,
be shown that the age of Jeremiah contained the germs of
various mental products which only matured in the later
periods, and Reuss seems to me singularly wilful in
assuming that the personification of Wisdom of itself proves
the late date of Prov. i.-ix.
III. The luxurious living implied in Prov i.-ix. would suit
the Exile and post-Exile period. As soon as the Jews had the
chance of participating in the world's good things, they eagerly
availed themselves of it. The prominence of the retribution
doctrine in these nine chapters might possibly be accounted
for by the prosperity of many of the dispersed Jews. To me
however the expression ' peace-offerings ' (vii. 14) points away
1 We should perhaps read here v'thigga' for v'thigra', following Sept.'s els Se
ere a<pli<iTn aocpta ; so Merx and Bickell.
2 Were the affinities with Gen. i. more definite, critics of Wellhausen's school
would naturally derive from them an argument for the post-Exile origin of Prov.
i.-ix. I do not myself attach much weight to these slight parallelisms.

1 68 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS cha*. vi.
from Babylon, just as the expression ' yarn of Egypt ' in
vii. 1 6 points away from Egypt.
IV. The phraseology of these chapters (as well as of the
rest of the book) is said by Hartmann • to be late. His
instances of late and Aramaising words and forms require
testing ; an argument of this sort (except in more extreme
cases) is not conclusive as to date. Reuss appears to base
his linguistic argument rather on the clearness of the style,
which ' betrays this section to be the latest part of the book.' 2
Noldeke however more soberly infers, from the ' flowingness
and facility of the language,' that the author lived subsequently
to Isaiah.3 On the whole, I am compelled to reject the hypothesis of
either the Exile or the post-Exile origin of Prov. i.-ix. The
Exile-date seems to be excluded by Prov. vii. 14, which
implies the sacrificial system ; the post-Exile by the want of
any sufficient reason for descending so late in the course of
history. The fifth century in particular, to which Vatke
refers the whole Book of Proverbs, seems to me out of the
question for this section of the book. Before the time of
Sirach, I cannot find a period in the post-Exile history in
which the life of Jerusalem can have much resembled the
picture given of it in Prov. i.-ix. But Sirach's evident imi
tation of the ' Praise of Wisdom ' (we shall come back to this
in studying Ecclesiasticus) seems of itself to suggest that
Prov. i.-ix. is the monument of an earlier age, and this is con
firmed by Sirach's different attitude towards ceremonial
religion. There remains the hypothesis that the treatise, Prov. i.-ix.,
was written towards the close of the kingdom of Judah. There
seems to me no sufficient argument against this view, which
agrees with the result above attained on the relation of
Prov. i.-ix. to the Book of Job (p. 85). The collapse of the
state was sudden, and for some time after the composition or
at least promulgation of the Deuteronomic Tora the Jews ap-
1 Die enge Verbindung des A. T. mit dem Neuen, pp. 148-9.
2 Geschichte der heiligen Schriften Alten Testaments, p. 494.
3 Die alttestamentliche Literatur (1868), p. 159.

CHAP. vi. QUESTIONS OF DATE AND ORIGIN 1 69
peared to be in the enjoyment of national prosperity. Now
the author of Prov. i.-ix. depicts a state of outward prosperity
and is evidently familiar with the exhortations of Deuteronomy.
Who, as Delitzsch remarks, can fail to hear in Prov. i. 7-ix.
an echo of the Shemd (' hear '), Deut. vi. 4-9 (comp. xi.
18-21) ? This is quite consistent with the opinion that Prov.
i.-ix. is later than the proverbs in the two principal collections
of our book, an opinion which commends itself to most '
especially on account of the higher moral standard of Prov.
i.-ix., and its advance in the treatment of literary form.
I have said ' the composition or at least promulgation ' of
Deuteronomy. If Deuteronomy was written (which is at least
possible) as early as the reign of Hezekiah,2 we may perhaps
follow Ewald, who places the ' Praise of Wisdom ' in the period
of relative prosperity which, he thinks, closed the reign of
Manasseh.3 It is noteworthy that Mic. vi., which Ewald
plausibly assigns to the period of Manasseh's persecution, also
presents some points of contact with Deuteronomy.4 And
yet it seems to me safer to date the book in the reign of
Josiah, when, as we know from history and prophecy, the dis
courses of Deuteronomy first became generally known.
Next, as to the body of the work. That the collection in
x. i-xxii. 16 is the earliest part of the book is admitted by
most critics. The fact that chaps, i.-ix. present linguistic
points of contact with it, does not prove the two parts to be
of the same date, for the opening chapters also display pecu
liarities quite unlike those of the ' Solomonic ' anthology.5 I
have already set forth my own view on this and on other
critical points, and will now only register the results of Ewald
1 Hitzig, however, almost alone among recent critics, regards the opening
chapters as the oldest part of the book.
"- This seems to me the earliest probable date, but does not exclude the possi
bility that early traditional material has been worked into the book.
3 History of Israel, iv. 219. It should be mentioned however that Ewald
places Job (except the Elihu-portion), Prov. i.-ix., and, last in order, Deuteronomy
all in the reign of Manasseh. He fails to recognise the influence of Deuteronom
on the ' Praise of Wisdom.'
4 See Micah in the Cambridge School and College Bible.
3 Delitzsch, Proverbs, i. 33 ; Kuenen, Onderzoek, iii. 75.

170 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. vi.
and of Delitzsch. Both are agreed that the older Book of
Proverbs extends from i. 1 to xxiv. 22, i. 1-6 (or 7) being the
descriptive heading of the work, and i. 7 (or 8) -ix. 1 8 a horta
tory treatise, by the author, more or less introductory to the
sayings which follow. The date of the collection of the latter
Ewald places at the beginning of the eighth century ; that of
the heading and introduction in the middle of the seventh.
Towards the end of the seventh century the three appendices
(xxii. 17-xxiv. 22, xxiv. 23-35, xxv. i-xxix. 27) were added ;
the contents of the two former were derived from two popular
proverbial collections, while the latter was a great and offici
ally sanctioned anthology dating from the end of the eighth
century. The remaining parts of the book (xxx. i-xxxi. 9,
and xxxi. 10-31) Ewald assigns to the seventh century.
Delitzsch (whose view is perhaps the most conservative one
still tenable) dates the publication of the first Book of Proverbs
as early as the reign of Jehoshaphat (referring to 2 Chr. xvii.
7-9). To its editor he ascribes not only the authorship of
i. i-ix. 18 but the conclusion of the ' older book ' by the words
of the wise, xxii. 17-xxiv. 22, while a later editor is responsi
ble both for the supplementary sayings of the wise, xxiv. 22-
34, and for the great Hezekian collection, of which he thus
ensured the preservation. The same person probably ap
pended the obscure sayings of Agur (xxx.) and of Lemuel (xxxi.
1-9), possibly too the closing alphabetic poem (xxxi. 10-31),
which is assigned by Delitzsch to the pre-Hezekian period.
Both Ewald and Delitzsch are substantially agreed as to the
existence of a genuine Solomonic element in both the great
anthologies (especially in the first), but upon very conjectural
grounds. One point only remains to be considered, however briefly.
The Book of Job has already furnished an example of the
poetical fiction of the non-Israelitish authorship of a Hebrew
poem. It is possible enough that this and the similar instance
of the Balaam-oracles were not alone in Hebrew literature.
Nor are they so, if a view of the first words of the headings in
Prov. xxx. 1, xxxi. 1, which has found many friends, be correct,
and we may render in the one case, ' The words of Agur the

chap. vr. QUESTIONS OF DATE AND ORIGIN 171
son of Jakeh, of (the country of) Massa,' reading either mim-
massa (or, as Delitzsch proposes, mimmesha) or hammassa'i l) ;
and in the other, ' The words of Lemuel the king of Massa.'
Miihlau in his monograph on ' Agur ' and ' Lemuel ' thinks
that both the contents and the language of the sayings of Agur
' almost necessarily point to a region bordering on the Syro-
Arabian wastes, but his theory of an Israelitish colony in a
certain Massa in the Hauran (comp. 1 Chr. v. 10), like a some
what similar theory of Hitzig's (he places 'Massa ' in N. Arabia,
comparing 1 Chr. iv. 42, 43, where the Simeonites are said to
have settled in Mount Seir, and Isa. xxi. 11, 12 2), is too con
jectural to be readily accepted. There is however much force
in a part of the arguments of Miihlau, especially in his first
and second (referring to xxxi. 1), ' The word melek in apposi
tion to Lemuel cannot go without the article,' 3 and ' Massa
" utterance " is never used elsewhere except of (prophetic)
oracles.' If any one therefore likes to adopt the above render
ings, taking Massa as the name of a country (comp. Gen. xxv.
14, 1 Chr. i. 30), I have no strong objection. Ziegler's view cited
by Miihlau,4 that Lemuel was an Emeer of an Arabian tribe in
the east of Jordan, and that an Israelitish wise man translated
the Emeer's sayings into Hebrew, is perhaps not as untenable
as Miihlau thinks, provided that ' translation ' be taken to in
clude recasting in accordance with the spirit of the Old Testa
ment religion. For my own part, however, I prefer the
' In the version known as the Grcecus Venetus (14th or 15th cent.) xxx. la
runs thus, A6yoc hyobpov views laicius rov pacrdov (Jakeh the Massaite). Delitzsch's
view, given above, is taken from his art. on ' Proverbs * in Herzog-Plitt's Ency
clopaedia ; he refers to Friedrich Delitzsch's Parodies, p. 303 ; comp. 243.
- On Isa. xxi. 11, 12, see The Prophecies of Isaiah, i. 129, ii. 152. Hitzig's
theory, originally stated in Zeller's Theol. Jahrbuchcr, 1844, pp. 269-305, will be
found in the well-known short commentary (Kurzgefasstes exeg. Handbuch, 1847)
by Bertheau, who substantially accepts it.
3 This is a little too strong. We should certainly have expected melek Lemuel
(or Lemoel) rather than Lemuel melek, on the analogy of melek Ydreb, Hos. v. 13,
x. 6. As it stands in the text, melek (after Lemuel, and without the article) can
only be a definition of class. The Lemuel spoken of was quite unknown to the
reader, and therefore the editor appends the descriptive title 'king.' Comp. Ex.
xxxiii. 11, where Joshua, son of Nun, being introduced for the first time, is de
scribed as na'ar ' a squire. '
* Referring to Neue Uebersetzung der Denkspriiche Salomo's, 1791, p. 29.

I 72 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. vi.
simpler explanation given already in considering chaps, xxx.,
xxxi. 1-9. I account for the Aramaisms, Arabisms, and other
peculiarities of these sections by their post-Exile origin, with
which the character of the contents of the most striking portion,
xxx. 1-6, appears to me to harmonise (notice e.g. the strong
faith in the words of revelation in xxx. 5). But I am not
writing a commentary, and can only draw the reader's atten
tion to some of the most important exegetical phenomena.
Let me refer in conclusion to a critical note on p. 175, which
has a bearing on the question raised by some whether Job
and this part of Proverbs may fitly be called Hebrseo- Arabic
works. It is strange that Hitzig should have renounced the
support for his theory (see p. 171) to be obtained from Prov.
xxx. 31.

m

CHAPTER VII.
THE TEXT OF PROVERBS.
The sense of proverbs is naturally most difficult to catch
when there has been no attempt to group them by subjects.
Hence the textual difficulties of so large a part of the earliest
anthology. Gratz has made some valuable among many too
arbitrary corrections ; but a systematic use of the ancient
versions is still a desideratum. Lagarde, Oort, Bickell, and
others have led the way ; but much yet remains to be done.
My space only allows me to give some preliminary hints, which
may at least stimulate further inquiry, on the relation of the
Hebrew text to the versions, especially the Septuagint ver
sion (if I should not rather speak of ' versions '). How comes
it, we may ask first of all, that the Septuagint contains so
many passages not found in the Hebrew ? One answer is
that in a foreign land, with a new language and a new circle
of ideas, explanation was as necessary to the Hellenistic
Jews as translation. Hence the tendency of the Septua
gint translators to introduce glosses. But the form of the
Book of Proverbs specially favoured interpolations. Some
times only a few words were inserted to make the text more
distinct (e.g. i. 22, xii. 25, xxiv. 23) ; at other times explana
tory or suggested remarks were added, at first perhaps in
the margin. Of course, it is perfectly conceivable that the
received Hebrew text itself may contain similar additions ;
the analogy of other books, in which such interpolations
occur, even favours this idea. One such insertion is patent ;
there can be no doubt that i. 16 was added in the Hebrew,
to the detriment of the connection, from Isa. lix. 7. As this
passage is wanting in the best MSS. of the Septuagint, we
might be tempted to use this version as a means of detecting

174 THE .BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. vii.
other interpolations in the Hebrew. This however would
lead us into researches of too much complexity.
Some of the Septuagint additions are also found in the
Vulgate, some again also in the Peshitto ; and where a Sep
tuagint addition is not found in the Vulgate we may, at least
in some cases, assume that the Septuagint text did not in
St. Jerome's time contain the additional matter. Among the
most interesting passages from a text-critical point of view
peculiar to the Septuagint are those found at iii. 15, iv. 27, vi.
8, 11, vii. 2, ix. 12, l 18, xi. 16, xii. 13, xv. 18, xvi. 5, xix. 7,
xxvi. 11, xxvii. 20, 21, xxviii. 10. Most of these can be ren
dered back into Hebrew, though this is difficult with vi. lib
as it stands, and impossible with vi. 8 (' the bee '). In any
case the Hebrew origin of a proverb does not prove that it
was inserted by the original collector or collectors. With
regard to the Targum and its deviations from the Hebrew
text, it is to be observed that this version has the same rela
tion to the Peshitto as the Vulgate to the old Latin version
on which it is based. The Peshitto translates from a Hebrew
text substantially the same as our own ; though the translator
has consulted the Septuagint (according to Hitzig) in the
portion of the book beginning at vii. 23.
There are also some remarkable transpositions in the
Septuagint Proverbs, reminding us of those in the Septuagint
Jeremiah. The three appendices to the Hezekian collection
are given in a very different order from that of the Hebrew.
The first fourteen verses of chap. xxx. are inserted between
ver. 22 and ver. 23 of chap, xxiv., and all the remainder, together
with xxxi. 1-9, is placed before chap. xxv. The treatment
of the headings in the Septuagint is also remarkable, and
seems arbitrary ; e.g. it looks as if the translator had expunged
all those peculiarities in the superscriptions which suggested
a variety of authorship. The proper names in chaps, xxx.,
xxxi. have been explained away, and the heading in x. i,
which limits the Solomonic authorship too much for the
translator, has been actually omitted.
1 The addition here is very poetical, and may, as Ewald says, have been ex
tracted from an ancient anthology. But it disturbs the connection.

CHAP. VII. THE TEXT OF PROVERBS 1 75
On the Septuagint additions to Proverbs, comp. Deane in
Expositor, 1884, pp. 297-301 ; on the larger subject of the
Greek and the Hebrew text, see introduction to Hitzig's
commentary, Lagarde's Anmerkungen &c, and a series of
papers, thorough but less masterly than Hitzig's or Lagarde's
work, by Heidenheim (title in ' Aids to the Student,' below).

NOTE ON PROVERBS XXX. 31.
Some assume here a corruption of the text, but the margin of the
Revised Version gives an appropriate sense. It implies indeed the
admission of a downright Arabism, but there are parallels for this in
vv. 15, 16, 17, and alqum for the Arabic al-qaum is (see Gesenius)
like elgabhish (Ezek. xiii. n, 13, xxxviii. 22) and almodad (Gen. x. 26).
' The king when his army is with him ' may very fitly be adduced as a
specimen of the ' comely in going.' M. Halevy indeed has suggested
that qiim in alqum may be the Qavam or Qajam often mentioned in
the Sinaitic inscriptions (Bulletin No. 2S of the Soci^te' de Lin-
guistique ; see Academy, March 27, 1886). But the former view is
still the more plausible one. Why should a king with whom is ' God
Qavam ' be described as specially 'comely in going' ? Wetzstein too
has stated that alqaum is still pronounced al-qom by the Bedawins.
Comp. Blau, Zeitschr. d. deutschen m'org. Ges., xxv. 539.

176 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS chap. viii.

CHAPTER VIII.
THE RELIGIOUS VALUE OF THE BOOK OF PROVERBS.
It is only in modern times that the Book of Proverbs has
been disparaged ; the early Christian Fathers considered it to
be of much ethico-religious value. Hence the sounding title,
first used by Clement of Rome (Cor., c. 57), 1) iravdpeTos
aocfiia. From our point of view, indeed, the value of the
book is different in its several parts, but no part is without
its use. Can any Christian help seeing the poetic foregleams
of Christ in the great monologue of Wisdom in chap. viii. ?
Dorner may be right in maintaining that the idea of the
Incarnation cannot have been evolved from Hebraism or
Judaism, and yet the description of Wisdom, ' sporting with
Jehovah's world ' and 'having her delights with the sons of men'
(viii. 31), cannot but remind us of the sympathetic, divine-
human Teacher, who 'took the form of a servant' How
deeply this great section has affected the theology of the past,
I need not here relate. Will it ever lose its value as a symbolic
picture of the combined transcendence and immanence of the
Divine Being?
Turning to the other parts of the book, do they not fur
nish abundant justification of that type of Christianity which
accepts but does not dwell on forms, so bent is it upon moral
applications of the religious principle? Do they not show
that the ' fear of the Lord ' is quite compatible with a deep
interest in average human life and human nature? The
Book of Proverbs, taken as a whole, seems to supply the
necessary counterweight to the psalms and the prophecies.
The psalmists love God more than aught else ; but must
every one say, ' Possessing this, I have pleasure in nothing

CHAP. VIII. RELIGIOUS VALUE OF THE PROVERBS 1 77
upon earth ' (Ps. lxxiii. 26) ? Would it be good to be al
ways in this mood ? Is there not something more satisfac
tory in the Pauline saying, ' All things are yours, and ye are
Christ's ' ? And as for the prophets — do they not (we may
conjecture and perhaps partly prove this) depreciate too much
the morality and religion of their neighbours ? The Book of
Proverbs gives us only average morality and religion ; yet, if
we judge it fairly, how pleasing on the whole is the picture !
Taking it as equally authoritative with the psalms and pro
phecies, shall we not rise to a more comprehensive religion
than a mere pupil of psalmists or prophets knew — to one that
charges us, not to love God less, but our neighbour more ?
It would no doubt be easy to criticise the Book from a New
Testament point of view. But the New Testament itself
has absorbed much that is best in it, and quotations from
it occur not unfrequently, especially in the Epistles. Nor
can any teacher of the people afford to neglect its stores of
happily expressed practical wisdom. We must not even de
spise its ' utilitarianism.' The awful declarations of ' Wisdom '
in Prov.i. 24-32 are simply the voice of the personified laws
of God l warning men that the consequences of their acts,
even if they may be overruled for good, yet cannot by any
cunning be escaped. Does the New Testament quite super
sede this form of teaching ? And does not the Hebrew sage
once at least give a suggestion of that very overruling love of
God which is among the characteristic ideas of Christian lore
(see Prov. iii. 11)?
1 So we may venture to paraphrase ' Wisdom ' in this connection.

N

178 THE BOOK OF PROVERBS

AfDS TO THE STUDENT.
The ' aids ' here mentioned are such as might otherwise escape notice.
W. Nowack, Die Spriiche Salomo 's u.s.w. (a recast of Bertheau's
commentary in the Kurzgefasstes Exeg. Handbuch), 1883 ; Ff.
Deutsch, Die Spriiche Salomo 's nach der Auffassung im Talmud und
Midrasch dargestellt und kritisch untersucht (erster Theil, 1885) ;
Bickell, ' Exegetisch-kritische Nachlese : Proverbien und Job,' in
Zeitschr. fur kathol. Theologie, 1886, pp. 205-208 ; Aben Ezra's
commentary on Proverbs, edited by Chaim M. Horowitz, 1884;
Loewenstein, Die Proverbien Salomo's, mit Benutzung dlterer und
neuerer Manuskripte, 1837 (text and commentary in Hebrew, with
German metrical version ; contains valuable contributions to a
more critical Massoretic text from the papers of W. Heidenheim) ;
M. Heidenheim, ' Zur Textkritik der Proverbien,' in his Vierteljahres-
schrift for 1865 and 1866 ; Lagarde, Anmerkungen zur griechischen
Uebersetzung der Proverbien, 1863; Gratz, 'Exegetische Studien zu
den Salomonischen Spriichen,' in his Mbnatsschrift, 1884 ; Dijserinck,
' Kritische Scholien,' in Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1883, p. 577 &c. ; Oort,
'Spreuken I.-IX.,' in same periodical, 1885, p. 379 &c. ; Bottcher,
Aehrenlese, part iii., 1865 (contains 39 pages on Proverbs); Miihlau,
De proverbiorum Agur et Lemuel origine, 1869; Bruch, Weisheitslehre
der Hebraer, 185 1 ; Hooykaas, Gesch. van de beoefening der Weisheid
onder de Hebre'en, 1862 ; Dukes, Rabbinische Blumenlese, 1844 (in
cludes Talmudic proverbs ; comp. the older works of Drusius, 15 90-1,
and Briill's supplement in his Jahrbiicher, 1885) ; Delitzsch, art.
' Spriiche Salomo's,' in Herzog-Plitt's Real-Encyklopddie, ed. 2, vol.
xiv. ; and the works of Oehler and Schultz on Old Testament
Theology (the former in Clark's Library).

THE WISDOM OF JESUS THE
SON OF SIRACH.

CHAPTER I.
THE WISE MAN TURNED SCRIBE. SIRACH'S MORAL
TEACHING.
The inclusion of Sirach within our range of study, as an ap
pendix and counterpart to the canonical Book of Proverbs,
requires no long justification. The so-called 'Wisdom of
Solomon ' is in form and colouring almost as much Greek as
Hebrew, and has no place in a survey of the wisdom of Pales
tine. But the ' Wisdom ' more modestly ascribed to the son
of Sirach is a truly Israelitish production, though as yet none
but the masters of our subject have recognised its intrinsic
importance. Whence comes this prevalent neglect of a work
still known as ' Ecclesiasticus ' or a ' church-book ' ? Doubtless
it has fallen in estimation from being combined with books
more difficult to appraise fairly and consequently regarded
with suspicion. The objection which some Jewish doctors
entertained to recommending parts of the Hagiographa has
been felt by many moderns with regard to the Apocrypha.
The objection is too strong and general not to have some
foundation, but it implies an unhistorical habit of mind.
Granted that the Apocryphal writings of the Old Testament
belong in the main to a period of outer and inner decadence
(though the noble Maceabean days may qualify this) ; yet
periods of decadence are often also periods of transition to
some new and better thing, which cannot be understood or

l8o SIRACH chap. I.
appreciated without them. Ewald has suggested the title of
' intermediate writings ' (Zwischenschriffen1) as a substitute for
Apocrypha, to indicate that transitional character which gives
these books so high a value for the student of both Testaments.
The book now before us — the largest and most compre
hensive in the Wisdom-literature — is one of these ' inter
mediate writings,' but in what sense beyond the most
superficial one remains to be seen. It is mentioned here first
of all because of the proof which it gives of the great literary
force of the canonical Book of Proverbs. But no product of
literature could maintain itself as Sirach has done if it were a
mere imitation ; Sirach, not less than the Wisdom-books of
the Old Testament proper, is at least a partial reflection of the
life of the times. Its date indeed has been disputed. Suffice
it to say here that the author was, beyond reasonable doubt,2
a contemporary of ' Simon the high priest, the son of Onias.'
Now there were five high priests who bore the name of Simon
or Simeon, two of whom, Simon I. (B.C. 310-290) and
Simon II. (B.C. 219-199), have by different critics been thought
of. The weight of argument is in favour of the second of the
name, who was certainly the more important of the two, and
who is referred to in the Talmud under the name of Simeon
the Righteous.3 This is in accordance with the Greek trans
lator's statement in his preface that he was the grandson of
the author, and we may conjecturally fix the composition of
the book at about 180 B.C. The translator himself came into
Egypt, as he tells us, in the 38th year of king Euergetes4
(comp. Luke xxii. 25). Now Euergetes II. Physkon, who
must be here intended, began to reign jointly with his brother
1 Revelation, p. 365 ; Die Lehre der Bibel von Gott, i. 378.
2 Note the phrase in I. 1, 'who in his life repaired the house,' implying
'now indeed he is dead.' Gratz in fact is the only scholar who doubts the author's
contemporaneousness with Simon ( Monatsschrift, 1872, p. 114).
3 See, besides the well-known passage in Pirke Aboth (i. 2), the legendary
extracts from (Bab.) Yoma, 39*, translated by Wunsche, Der bob. Talmud, i. I,
pp. 368-9 ; and comp. Derenbourg, Hist, de la Palestine, i. 44 &c.
4 So we must paraphrase ev ref 6yS6cp Kal rpicucocrr$ erec errl rov 'E.vepyirov
fiacrlKeces. See Stanley's note in fewish Church, iii. 235, and Abbot's note in
the American edition of Smith's Bible Diet. (I am indebted to Bissell for the latter
reference). Comp. Wright, The Book of Koheleth, p. 34 n.

chap. i. SIRACH'S MORAL TEACHING l8l
Philometor B.C. 170 ; his brother died B.C. 145, and he reigned
alone for twenty- five years longer (till B.C. 116). Hence the
translator's arrival in Egypt and possibly the translation itself
fall within the year 132. The object of his work, we gather
from the preface, was to correct the inequalities of moral and
religious culture (iratBsia) among the Jews of Egyptjby setting
before them a standard and a lesson-book of true religious
wisdom. Let us pause a little over these dates. It has been well
observed by Mommsen that the foundation of Alexandria
was as great an event in the history of the people of Israel
as the conquest of Jerusalem. It must indeed have seemed
to many Israelites more fraught with danger than with hope.
Never before had Paganism presented itself to their nation in
so attractive a guise. Would their religion exhibit sufficient
power of resistance on a foreign soil ? The fears, however,
were groundless ; at any rate, for a considerable time. The
forms of Egyptian-Jewish literature might be foreign, but its
themes were wholly national. Even in that highly original
synthesis of Jewish, Platonic, and Stoic elements — the Book
of Wisdom — the Jewish spirit is manifestly predominant. In
Palestine there was also a Hellenic movement, though less
vigorous and all-absorbing than in Egypt. Without a
spontaneous manifestation of Jewish sympathy, Antiochus
Epiphanes would never have made his abortive attempt to
Hellenise Judaea. Girt round by a Greek population, the
Palestinian Jews, in spite of Ezra's admirable organisation,
could not entirely resist the assaults of Hellenism. It is
probable that not merely Greek language, but Greek philo
sophy, exerted a charm on some of the clearest Jewish
intellects. But we are within the bounds of acknowledged
fact in asserting that the ardour of Judaean piety, at least in
the highest class, greatly cooled in the age subsequent to
Ezra's, and in ascribing this to Greek influences. The high
priest Simeon II.,1 surnamed the Righteous (i.e. the strict
1 The Mishna (Pirke Aboth, i. 2) ascribes this saying to Simeon the Righteous :
SOn three things the world stands — revelation (tora), worship, and the bestowal
of kindnesses.'

1 82 SIRACH CHAP. I.
observer of the Law), of whom so glowing an account is given
by Sirach (chap. 1.), is the chief exception to this degeneracy ;
yet he was powerless to stem the revolutionary current even
within his own family. His cousin Joseph was the notorious
farmer of the taxes of Palestine, who by his public and private
immorality l sapped the very foundations of Jewish life, while
two of Simeon's sons, Jason and Menelaus, became the
traitorous high priests who promoted the paganising movement
under Antiochus. It is well known that many critics refer
the Book of Ecclesiastes to the period immediately preceding
this great movement. The deep and almost philosophical
character of the unknown author's meditations seems to be in
harmony with this date. On the other hand, there is the
well-ascertained fact that the Book of Sirach shows no trace
of really philosophical thought : it is little more than a new
version of the ordinary proverbial morality. It is to this book,
the ' Doppelganger des kanonischen Spruchbuchs,' as Schurer
calls it, the work, as a Greek writer puts it, of an attendant
(oiraBos) of Solomon, that these pages are devoted. Nothing
is more remarkable (and it ought to make us very deliberate
in determining dates upon internal evidence) than the appear
ance of such a book at such a time.
The name of the author in full is Joshua (Jesus) ben Sira
(Sirach),2 but he may be called Sirach for shortness, this being
the form of his family-name in the Greek translation. He
tells us himself that he was of Jerusalem ; that from his
youth up his desire was for wisdom ; that he laboured
earnestly in searching for her ; and that the Lord gave him a
tongue for his reward (1. 27 ; li.) Sirach, in fact, is one of
those ' wise men ' to whom was entrusted so large a part of
the religious education of the Jewish people. The remarkable
fact that ' wise men ' exist so long after the time of their
prototype Solomon, proves that their activity was an integral
part of the Jewish national life. The better class of ' wise
1 See Jos. , Ant. , xii. 4.
2 On the identity of the Ben Sira of the Talmud and our Sirach, see Horowitz
in Frankel's Monatsschrift, 1865, p. 181 &c. The ch in the form Sirach may be
due to an old error in the Greek text.

chap. i. sirach's moral teaching 183
men' gave an independent support to the nobler class of
prophets. With their peremptory style, the prophets would
never have succeeded in implanting a really vigorous religion,
had not the 'wise men,' with their more conciliatory and
individualising manner of teaching, supplemented their en
deavours. The Babylonian Exile introduced a change into
the habits of the ' wise men,' who, though some of them used
the pen before the overthrow of the state, became thence
forward predominantly, if not entirely, writers on practical
moral philosophy. Such was Sirach. He is not indeed a
strictly original writer, nor does he lay claim to this. This is
how he describes the nature of his work (xxxiii. 1 6) —
I too, as the last, bestowed zeal,
and as one who gleans after the vintage ;
By the blessing of the Lord I was the foremost,
and as a grape-gatherer did I fill the winepress.
Sirach, then, was first of all a collector of proverbs, and he
found that most of the current wise sayings had been already
gathered. It is not likely that up to xxxvi. 22 he merely
combined two older books of proverbs (as Ewald supposed1),
though it is more than probable that older proverbs do really
lie imbedded in his work. But whether old proverbs or new,
Sirach has this special characteristic, that he loves to arrange
his material by subjects. This was already noticed by the
early scribes,2 and is well brought out by Holtzmann in
Bunsen's Bibelwerk, and I will merely refer to chap. xxii. 1-6,
'On good and bad children;' 7-18, 'The character of the
fool ; ' 19-26, ' On friendship,' 27-xxiii. 6, ' Prayer and warn
ing against sins of the tongue and lusts of the flesh ;' 7-15,
' The discipline of the mouth;' 16-27, 'On adultery;' xxix.
1-20, 'On suretyship;' 21-28, 'An independent mode of life.'3
The plan of grouping his material is not indeed thoroughly
carried out, but even the attempt marks a progress in the
1 Hist, of Israel, v. 263-4. Ewald includes xxxix. 12-35 m the portion be
longing to the second (supposed) collection.
' See the headings at certain points of the Greek version.
* With vv. 21, 23 comp. St. Paul, Phil. iv. 11, 12.

184 SIRACH chap. 1.
literary art. This is one of the points in which Sirach differs
from his canonical predecessors.
In other respects his indebtedness is manifest. Night and
day he must have studied his revered models to have attained
such insight into the secrets of style. But, so far from
affecting originality, he delights in allusions to the older
proverbialists. Many parallelisms occur in the sayings on
Wisdom (comp. Sir. i. 4, Prov. viii. 22 ; Sir. i. 14, Prov. i. 4,
ix. 10 ; Sir. iv. 12, 13, Prov. iv. 7, 8 ; Sir. xxiv. 1, 2, Prov. viii.
1,2; Sir. xxiv. 3, Prov. ii. 6 ; Sir. xxiv. 5, Prov. viii. 27).
This we might expect ; for Wisdom in a large sense is more
persistently the object of Sirach than it was at any rate of
the earlier writers in Proverbs. But, besides this, points of
contact abound in very ordinary sayings. Thus compare,
among many others which might be given,
(a) Better a mean man that tills for himself
than he that glorifies himself and has no bread
(Prov. xii. 9, Sept. &c.)
Better he that labours and abounds in all things
than he that glorifies himself and has no bread
(Sir. x. 27, Fritzsche).
(b) A merry heart makes a cheerful face,
but with sorrow of heart is a crushed spirit (Prov. xv. 13).
The heart of a man alters his face,
as well for good cheer as for bad ;
A merry face betokens a heart in good case (Sir. xiii. 25, 260).
(c) A passionate man stirs up strife,
and one that is slow to anger allays contention (Prov. xv. 18).
Abstain from strife, and thou shalt diminish thy sins,
for a passionate man will kindle strife (Sir. xxviii. 8).
(d) An intelligent servant rules over the son that causes shame
(Prov. xvii. 2).
Unto the wise servant shall free men do service (Sir. x. 25).
(e) Death and life are in the power of the tongue (Prov. xviii. 21).
Good and evil, life and death ;
and the tongue rules over them continually (Sir. xxxvii. 18).
( f) Golden apples in silver salvers ;
a word smoothly spoken (Prov. xxv. 11).
Golden pillars upon a silver pediment ;
fair feet upon firm soles (Sir. xxvi. 18, Fritzsche).

chap. I. SIRACH'S MORAL TEACHING 1 85
(g) He who digs a pit shall fall therein,
and he who rolls a stone, upon himself it shall return
(Prov. xxvi. 27).
He who casts a stone on high, casts it on his own head ;
He who digs a pit shall fall therein (Sir. xxvii. 25a, 26a).
(h) The crucible for silver, and the furnace for gold,
and a man is tried by his praise (Prov. xxvii. 21).
The furnace proves the potter's vessels,
the trial of a man is in his discourse (Sir. xxviii. 5).
It will be seen from these examples that, though Sirach
adapted and imitated, he did so with much originality.
His style has colour, variety, and vivacity, and though
Hengstenberg accuses the author of too uniform a mode of
treatment, yet a fairer judgment will recognise the skill with
which the style is proportioned to the subject ; now dithy-
rambic in his soaring flight, now modestly skimming the
ground, the author of the iravdpsTos crocpia (for so Sirach, no
less than Proverbs, was called !) is never feeble and rarely
trivial. * Its general tone,' says Stanley, ' is worthy of that
first contact between the two great civilisations of the ancient
world.' ' Nothing is too high, nor too mean,' says Schurer, ' to
be drawn within the circle of Sirach's reflections and admoni
tions.' I have elsewhere spoken of his comprehensiveness.
This quality he partly owes to his being so steeped in the
Scriptures. One result of this is that he is more historical
than his predecessors, and connects his wisdom with those
narratives of early times, which were either but little known
to or valued by the proverb-writers of antiquity. The earlier
psalmists and prophets indeed show the same neglect of the
traditions of the past : they lived before the editing and
gradual completion of any roll of ' Scriptures.' Sirach on
the other hand (see his preface) had 'the Law and the
Prophets, and the rest of the books,' the latter collection
being a kind of appendix, still open to additions. He was
a true ' scribe,' and gloried in the name (xxxviii. 24), not in
the New Testament sense, but in one not unworthy of a
religious philosopher ; he gave his mind to the wisdom both
1 See St. Jerome, Prof, ad Libros Salomonis, and comp. Lightfoot's Clement
of Rome, p. 164 &c.

186 SIRACH chap. I.
of the Scriptures and of ' all renowned men,' and travelled
througff^strange countries, trying the good and evil among
men. H parts at least of the Book of Job probably contain
an autobiographical element, it is still more certain that the
chapter (xxxix.) which closes the book before us expresses
the ideal of the author's life. And if he does sometimes take
delight in his own attainments, yet why is this to be censured
as mere 'bose Selbstgefalligkeit ' ? x A deep consciousness of
moral imperfection is not equally to be expected in the Old
Testament and in the New, nor should the philosophic writings
in the former be appealed to for striking anticipations of fun
damental Gospel ideas. Sirach does no doubt in some sense
claim inspiration (xxiv. 32-34, 1. 28, 29), and place his own
work in a line with the prophecies (xxiv. 33), but why should
this be set down to arrogant inflation ? Lowth, with more
charity, quotes similar language of Elihu (Job xxxii. 8, xxxvi.
4.) in proof of the speaker's modesty (Pralect. xxxiv.) It was
probably a characteristic of the later ' wise men ' so to account
for their wisdom (see above, p. 43), and surely in that wide
sense recognised by the Anglican Prayerbook he was ' inspired,'
he was a ' son of the prophets.' I am only sorry that he forgot
the lesson of Ex. xxxi. 2 when he wrote so disparagingly of
trades (xxxviii. 25 &c), and agree with Dr. Edersheim2 that
the Jewish teachers of the time of Christ and afterwards were
more advanced on this point than the son of Sirach.
It is true enough that there are sayings in this book which
offend the Christian sentiment, and which serve to show how
great was the spiritual distress which the Gospel alone could
relieve. For instance,
(a) He who honours his father shall make atonement for sins (iii. 3).
Water will quench a flaming fire,
and alms make atonement for sin (iii. 30).
Brethren and help are against time of trouble ;
but alms deliver more than both (xl. 24).
Here is one of those ' false beacon lights ' of which Prof.
Bissell speaks (Apocrypha, p. 282). But in arrest of judgment
1 Keerl, Die Apokryphenfrage (1855), p. 214.
2 Sketches of Jewish Social Life, p. 1 89.

CHAP. I. SIRACH'S MORAL TEACHING 1 87
remember that long discipline in the duties spoken of has
produced some of the finest qualities in the Jewish character.
(b) Happy the man who has not offended in his speech,
and is not pricked with grief for sins (xiv. 1).
(c) Gain credit with thy neighbour in his poverty,
that thou mayest rejoice in his prosperity ;
abide stedfast unto him in the time of his affliction,
that thou mayest be heir with him in his heritage (xxii. 23).
(d) Nine things I in my heart pronounce happy, ....
and he that lives to see the fall of enemies
(xxiv. 7 ; comp also xii. 10-12, xxx. 6).
(e) Who will praise the Most High in Hades,
instead of those who live and give praise? (xvii. 27.)
For man cannot do everything,
because the son of man is not immortal (xvii. 30).
With the latter saying, contrast Wisd. of Sol. ii. 23, ' For God
created man for immortality.'
(/) (Give me) any plague but the plague of the heart,
and any wickedness but the wickedness of a woman &c.
(xxv. 13-26).
This opening verse might perhaps be otherwise rendered,
Any wound but a wound in the heart,
and any evil but evil in a wife.
The misfortune of having a bad wife is often touched
upon in the Talmud. Ewald's sentence is however just, that
Sirach's ' estimate of women, and sharp summary counsel
concerning divorce [see ver. 26], place [him] far below the
height of the Hebrew Bible.' •
I admit the imperfection of these moral statements ; but
can they not several of them be paralleled from the Psalms,
Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes ? And can we not find as many
more anticipations of the moral teaching of the Synoptic
Gospels and St. James (e.g. iv. 10, vii. 11, 14, xi. 18, 19, xv.
14, xvii. 15, xxiii. 4, 11, 18)? Do not let us undervalue any
foregleams of the coming dawn.
1 Ewald, Revelation, p. 364 n.

1 88 SIRACH chap. n.

CHAPTER II.
SIRACH'S TEACHING (continued). HIS PLACE IN THE
MOVEMENT OF THOUGHT.
Passing now from Sirach's moral statements to those which
are concerned with doctrine, an honest critic must admit that
the author is here even less progressive. The Messianic
hope, in the strict sense of the word, has faded away.1 In
xiv. 25 (comp. xlviii. 15) the 'covenant with David' is de
scribed as being ' that the inheritance of the king should be
only from father to son ; ' similarly in xlvii. 22 the ' root of
David ' denotes Rehoboam and his descendants. But this
want of a definite Messianic hope is characteristic of the age ;
it is no special defect of Sirach. But what shall we say of
another charge brought against our author, viz. that he has
unbiblical conceptions of the Divine nature ? One of these
(xi. 16; see A.V.) may be dismissed at once, the passage
having insufficient critical authority. Another —
We may speak much and not attain ;
indeed to sum up, He is all (xliii. 27) —
has been misapprehended. The Bereshith Rabba says (c. 68),
' Why is the Holy One also called Mctkom (place) ? Because
He is the place of the world ; His world is not His place.'
This is all that Sirach means, and Philo, too, who uses similar
words, accused by Keerl of heresy, and adds, are eh Kal to
irdv ainos &v-
The doctrines of the Satan and the Resurrection, which
Sirach probably regarded somewhat as we regard the ' develop-
1 Ewald (History, v. 263, n. 3) refers to iv. 15, x. 13-17, xi. 5 sq., xxxii. 17-
19, xxxiii. 1-12, xxxvi. 11-17, xxxvii. 25, xxxix. 23, xlviii. 10 sq., but only for a
vague Messianism (in the last passage the Greek seems to be interpolated). I
would add xxxv. 17-19, xxxvi. I-10.

chap. ii. SIRACH'S MORAL TEACHING 1 89
ments ' of the Papal Church, he appears studiously to ignore !
— more especially the latter — and he thereby puts himself into
direct opposition to the newer popular orthodoxy. For
though not the invention (as M. Renan regards it) of the
Maceabean period, there can be no doubt that the doctrine of
the Resurrection became then for the first time an article of
the popular creed. Instead of the ' awakening to everlasting
life ' (Dan. xii. 2), it is the peaceful but hopeless life of the
spirits in Shedl to which he resignedly looks forward.
Weep for the dead, for he hath lost the light,
and weep for the fool, for he wanteth understanding :
make little weeping for the dead, for he is at rest,
but the life of the fool is worse than death.2
This, however orthodox (as former generations had counted
orthodoxy), was rank Sadduceanism, and hence (for how
otherwise to interpret the glosses of the Greek and Syriac
versions of xlviii. 1 1b3 it is difficult to see) very early readers
of Sirach, especially perhaps well-meaning but unscrupulous
Christian readers, effected an entrance for their cherished
beliefs by violence.
Another point on which Sirach is equally — shall we say
orthodox, or reactionary ? — is the connection between piety
and temporal prosperity. He really seems to be no more
troubled by doubts on this ancient doctrine than the author
of the beautiful, but in this respect naively simple, introduc
tion to the Book of Proverbs. This perhaps was strange
under Sirach's circumstances. How striking and even pain-
1 True, the Greek version of Sirach has, at xxi. 27, the words, ' When the un
godly curseth the Satan, he curseth his own soul ; ' but ' the Satan ' may here be
synonymous with the depraved will, the yecer ra (this seems to have Talmudic
authority ; see Weber, System der altsynag. pal. Theol. , pp. 228-9). In Baba
bathra, \$a, Satan is not distinguished from the yecer rd'. See Appendix.
2 Chap. xxii. 11. Comp. xiv. 11-19 (correcting by the help of the Syriac),
xvii. 27, 28, 30. Contrast the glowing language of the 'Wisdom of Solomon,'
iii. 1-4.
8 The Syriac has, ' Nevertheless he dieth not, but liveth indeed.' The Greek
version I have quoted farther on. Also the Latin, which probably corresponds
most to the original. See Geiger, Zeitschr. d. d. morg. Ges., xii. 536. The
false reading KeKoi/nj/ieVoi, adopted by A.V., for KeKoo-fnjfievoi, in xlviii. 11a, is
due to the same theological motive.

190 SIRACH chap. 11.
ful is the contrast between Josephus' vivid and truthful com
parison of Judaea at this period to ' a ship in a storm, tossed
by the waves on both sides,' ¦ and that proverb of Sirach,
worthy, considering the times, of the ' miserable comforters ' of
Job— The gift of the Lord remains with the godly,
and his favour brings prosperity for ever.2
In short, Sirach represents the reconciliation between the
practical ethics of the inspired ' wise men ' of old and the all-
embracing demands of the Law. Himself only in a com
paratively low sense inspired — for we should not hastily reject
his claim to a ' tongue ' from above — he did nothing, on the
ethical side, but repeat the old truths in their old forms, though
one gladly admits that he shows a genuine and unassumed
interest in the varieties of human character. But on the re
ligious side he is really in a certain sense original, in so far as
he combines the traditional ' wisdom ' with a heartfelt regard
for the established forms of religion, such as the older ' wise
men' scarcely possessed. On the latter point he would
sympathise with the author of Ps. cxix. Unlike the older
proverb-writers, he recommends the punctual observance of
rites and ceremonies. These however are to be penetrated
by a moral spirit ; hence he says,
Do not [seek to] corrupt [the Lord] with gifts, for he receives them not ;
and trust not to unrighteous sacrifices.
He who serves acceptably shall be received,
and his prayer shall reach unto the clouds (xxxv. 12, 16).
By Greek philosophy Sirach, as far as we can see, was wholly
uninfluenced. And yet Sirach cannot have been entirely unacquainted
with Greek culture, in the more general sense of the word.
One striking proof of this is his attitude towards medical
science,3 which is exactly the opposite of the Chronicler's (2
1 Antiquities, xii. 3, 3.
'' Ch. xi. 17 ; comp. ii. 7 &c; xvi. 6 &c; xl. 13, 14. There are, however,
passages in which Sirach betrays some little feeling of the practical difficulties of
the older form of the doctrine of retribution ; see xxxv. 18 [xxxii. 18].
3 See Dukes, Rabbinische Blumenlese, pp. 29, 30 ; Griitz, Schir ha-schirim,
p. 86. Grotius even supposed the author to be a physician.

chap. II. SIRACH S MORAL TEACHING 19I
Chr. xvi. 12). It seems as if the older generation were
offended by human interference with the course of nature,
appealing perhaps to Ex. xv. 26 ; a curious Talmudic tradi
tion ascribes a similar view to Hezekiah and his wise men.
Sirach, however, appealing to the passage preceding that re
ferred to above (see Ex. xv. 23-25), seeks to reconcile the op
posing parties (xxxviii. 1— 1 5). No doubt he had learned this
at Alexandria : he tells us himself that he had travelled and
learned many things (xxxiv. 9-1 1), and from xxxix. 4 we may
even infer that he had appeared at court, where probably his
life was endangered by calumnious accusations (li. 6). There,
perhaps, he acquired his taste for the Greek style of banquet,
with its airy talk and accompaniment of music, a taste which
seems to have inspired a piquant piece of advice to the kill
joys of his time, who insisted on talking business out of
season (xxxii. 3-5) —
Speak, O elder, with accurate knowledge, for it beseemeth thee,
but be not a hindrance to music.1
When playing is going on, do not pour out talk ;
and show not thyself inopportunely wise.
A seal-ring of carbuncle set in gold,
[such is] a concert at a banquet of wine.
In a similar mood he writes (xiv. 14) —
Defraud not thyself of a joyous day,
and let not a share of a lawful pleasure escape thee.
But his tone is commonly more serious. Though no ascetic,
he cautions his readers against the unrestrained manners which
had invaded Judaea, especially against consorting with the sing
ing and dancing girls (fierd "i/raA.A.oi/o-T;?, ix. 4, includes both ;
Vulg. cum saltatrice), and draws a picture of the daughters of
Israel (xlii. 9, 10) which forms a melancholy contrast with
the Old Testament ideal. His prayer to be guarded from the
infection of lust (xxiii. 4, 5) finds its commentary in the story
already mentioned of Joseph the tax-farmer. He notes with
1 ko! ^ e'f/.irob'tcrys povcrticd. So xlix. I, Sis fiovcriKa iv crvtnrocricfs olvov; comp.
Ex. xxxii. 18 Sept. That Greek music was known in Palestine very shortly after
wards may be inferred from the Greek names of musical instruments in the Book
of Daniel.

192 ^*^ SIRACH chap. ii.
observant eye the strife of classes. What bitter sighs must
have prompted a saying like this (xiii. 2, 3) —
A burden that is too heavy for thee take not up,
and have no fellowship with one that is stronger and richer than
thyself :
For what fellowship hath the kettle with the earthen pot ?
this will smite, and that will be broken.
The rich man doth wrong, and he snorteth with anger,
the poor man is wronged, and he entreateth withal.
And again (xiii. 18) —
What peace hath the hyaena with the dog ?
and what peace hath the rich man with the poor ?
He is painfully conscious of the deserved humiliation of
his country, and the only reason which he can urge why
God should interpose is the assured prophetic word (xxxvi.
15, 16=20, 21). Elsewhere he ascribes all the evil of his
time to the neglect of the Law (xii. 8), which, by a strong
hyperbole, he almost identifies with personified Divine Wis
dom (xxiv. 23 ; see above on Prov. viii.) Not however without
a noble introduction leading up to and justifying this identifi
cation. In the true mdshal-style he describes how Wisdom
wandered through the world seeking a restingplace, —
Then the Creator of all gave me a commandment,
and he that made me caused my tent to rest,
and said, Let thy dwelling be in Jacob,
and thine inheritance in Israel (xxiv. 8).
And after a series of wondrous images, all glorifying the
Wisdom enthroned in Jerusalem, he declares —
All this [is made good in] the book of the covenant of the Most
High God,
the Law which Moses commanded us
as a heritage unto the congregations of Jacob (xxiv. 23).
This remarkable chapter deserves to be studied by itself ; it is
most carefully composed in 72 arlxoi. Lowth and Wessely '
have with unequal success retranslated it into Hebrew. I
1 Wessely was one of the most eminent fellow-workers of the great Moses
Mendelssohn. See Wogue, Histoire de la Bible et de fexlgise biblique (1881),
PP- 334-337-

chap. ii. SIRACH S MORAL TEACHING 193
have already spoken (on Proverbs) of its interest for the
student of doctrine ; it has indeed been thought to show clear
traces of Alexandrinism, but this is improbable and unproved.
It remains to notice the author's interest in nature and
history. The hymn of praise for the works of creation (xlii.
1 5— xliii. 32) is only poor if compared with parts of the Book
of Job. But perhaps more interesting is the panegyric of
' famous men ' (xliv.-L), from Enoch the patriarch to Simeon
the Righteous, whose imposing appearance and beneficent
rule are described with the enthusiasm of a contemporary.1
It is worth the student's while to examine the contents of this
roll of honour. A few corrections of the text may be noticed
as a preliminary. At xlviii. 1 ib, the Greek has ' for we shall
surely live (again).' But the Latin has, ' nam nos vita
vivimus tantum, post mortem autem non erit tale nomen
nostrum.' There is good reason in this instance, as we shall
see presently, to prefer the reading of the Latin to that of
the Greek. At 1. 1, after ' son of Onias,' it is well to remove
the abruptness of the transition by inserting from the Syriac,
' was the greatest of his brethren and the crown of his people.'
At 1. 26 (27), for ' Samaria ' we should probably read ' Seir '
(else how will there be three nations ?), and for ' foolish,'
' Amoritish ' (with the Ethiopic version and Ewald, comp.
Ezek. xvi. 3). Turning to the names of the heroes com
memorated, it is startling to find no mention made of Ezra,
the second founder of Jewish religion. Aaron, on the other
hand, is celebrated in no fewer than seventeen verses. This
cannot be a mere accident, for the veneration of the later Jews
for Ezra was hardly less than that which they entertained for
Moses. Notice, however, that Moses himself is only praised in
five verses. It seems as if Aaron better than Moses symbolised
those ritual observances in which Sirach perhaps took a
special delight. The name of Ezra, too, may have had its
1 The Mussaph prayer in the liturgy of the Day of Atonement (German
ritual) contains a striking imitation of Sirach's eloquent description of the high
priest (see Delitzsch, Gesch. der fi/'d. Poesie, p. 21), every verse of which closes
with the refrain mar'e/i kohen ' the appearance of the priest ; ' Meshullam 1
Kleonymos is known to be the author. O

>ar-

194 SIRACH chap. II.
symbolic meaning to the author. He may have had deficient
sympathy with those elaborators of minute legal precepts,
who took Ezra as their pattern. Not that he 'disbelieved in
the continuity of inspiration — for in some sense he claims it
for himself (e.g. xxiv. 33), but that he did not fully recognise
the workings of the spirit in the ' fence about the Law.' Other
names which he passes over in silence are Daniel and Mordecai.
Does this mean that he was unacquainted with the Books of
Daniel and Esther ? Whatever be the date of these books,
so much as this is at least a probable inference.
The panegyric seems to have originally closed with the
ancient liturgical formula in verses 22-24 But the writer
could not resist the temptation of giving a side-blow to the
hated Samaritans (those 'half-Jews,' as Josephus the historian
calls them), called forth perhaps by the dispute respecting the
rival temples held at Alexandria before Ptolemy Philometor.1
The last chapter of all (chap, li.) contains the aged author's
final leave-taking. It is a prayer of touching sincerity and
much biographical interest. The immediateness of the re
ligious sentiment is certainly greater in this late ' gatherer '
than in many of the earlier proverb-writers.
Enough has been said of the contents of the book to give
a general idea of its moral and religious position. Let us
now consider its outward form. The work, as we have seen,
was originally written in Hebrew. This indeed was to have
been expected. For although the influence of the Seleucidae
had greatly strengthened the hold of Aramaic on the Jewish
population of Palestine, Hebrew was still, and for a long time
afterwards remained, the language of scholars and litte'rateurs.
The author of the ' Wisdom of Sirach ' was both. He was
thoroughly penetrated with the spirit and style of the Scrip
tures, especially of those of the KIwkma, and he would have
thought it as much a descent to lavish his great powers on
Aramaic as Dante did at first to write in Italian. Is this
Hebrew original still extant ? Alas ! no ; Hebrew literature,
so scantily represented for this period, has to mourn this great
loss. A page of fragments, gathered from the Talmud and
1 Jos., Ant., xiii. 3, 4.

chap. n. SIRACH S MORAL TEACHING 195
the Midrashim,1 is all that we can, with some occasional hesi
tation, plausibly regard as genuine. There is indeed a small
work, called the Alphabet of Ben Sira, consisting of two series
of proverbs, one in Aramaic, and one in Hebrew. But no sig
nificance can be attached to this. The genuineness of many
of the Hebrew proverbs is guaranteed by their occurrence in
the Talmud, but the form in which the alphabetist quotes them
is often evidently less authentic than that in the Talmud. The
original work must have been lost since the time of Jerome, if
we may trust his assurance2 that he had found it in Hebrew,
and that it bore the name ' Parables ' (m'shallm). Of the
ancient versions, the Syriac and the Old Latin are (after the
Greek) the most important ; the former is from the Hebrew,
the latter from a very early form of the Greek text. Neither
of them is always in accordance with the Greek as we have it,
but such differences are often of use in restoring the original
text. All the versions appear to contain alterations of the
text, dictated by a too anxious orthodoxy, and in these the
one may be a check upon the other. Bickell indeed goes
further than this, and states that an accurate text of Sirach
can only be had by combining the data of the Greek and the
Syriac. Lowth, in his 24th Lecture, strongly urges the re-
translation of Sirach into Hebrew. Such an undertaking
would be premature, if Bickell's judgment be correct that the
book consists of seven-syllabled verses or ariypi, grouped in
distichs,3 except in the alphabetic poem on wisdom (li. 1 3-20).
The latter, consisting of 22 cniyoi,, he has translated into
German from his own corrected text, dividing it into four-lined
strophes, as also the preceding, ' alphabetising ' poem, con-
1 See Zunz, Gottesdienstliche Vortrdge, p. 102 ; Delitzsch, Zur Gesch. der
ji'idischen Poesie, p. 204 (comp. p. 20, note 5) ; Dukes, Rabbinische Blumenlese,
p. 67 &.c. It should be noticed that among these Talmudic m'shalim there are
some, and even long ones, which do not occur in the Greek Sirach.
2 Pricf. in libr. Sal. ' Fertur et iravdperos Jesu filii Sirach liber et alius
\\ievSeirlypacpos liber . . . Quorum priorem Hebraicum reperi, non Ecclesiasticum,
ut apud Latinos, sed parabolas pramotatum, cui juncti erant Ecclesiastes et Canti-
cum canticorum.' Nowhere since has Sirach been found in this position, nor
with this title.
3 But is not a strophic division sometimes visible, e.g. ii. 7-17 ? See Selig-
mann, Das Buch der IVeisheit des J. S., &c, p. 34. o 2

196 SIRACH chap. 11.
sisting of 22 distichs (li. 1-12), in the Zeitschrift fiir katho-
lische Theologie, 1882, pp. 326-332.
We must reserve our opinion on Bickell's theory till the
appearance of a complete edition from his pen. Meantime
three passages (xxiv. 27, xxv. 15, xlvi. 18) maybe referred
to as giving striking proof of the Hebrew original of the
work. In xxiv. 27 the translator seems to have found in his
Hebrew copy "lto, i.e. properly "i'N)3 ' as the Nile ' (the weak
letter * being elided in pronunciation as in "i&O, Am. viii. 8),
but as he supposed "liN? 'as the light' In xxv. 15, he found
EW, which in the context can only mean ' poison,' but which
he inappropriately rendered 'head.' In xlvi. 18, the Hebrew
had D^X, i.e. cnx ' enemies,' but, according to the translator,
D*"fs ' Tyrians.' Compare also in this connection the allu
sions to the meanings of Hebrew words in vi. 22 (' wisdom ')
and xliii. 8 (' the month '). There are still questions to be
decided which can only be adverted to briefly here. Did the
translator make use of the Septuagint, and more particularly
of the portion containing the prophets ? He certainly refers
to a translation of the Scriptures in his preface, but Frankel
thinks that a Targum may be meant, and even doubts the
genuineness of the passage ; he explains the points of con
tact with the Septuagint which are sometimes so interesting •
in the Greek version of Sirach by Ueberarbeitung, i.e. the
' working over ' of the version by later hands.2 This seems
to me a forced view. It is more probable that a Greek
version is meant, or perhaps we may say Greek versions ; no
special honour is given to any one translation. Next, as to
the position accorded to the Wisdom of Sirach. It is often
cited in the Talmud with formulae which belong elsewhere to
the Scriptures, and was therefore certainly regarded by many
as worthy to be canonical (see Appendix). In strict theory,
this was wrong. According to the Tosephta Yadayim, c. 2,
the book of Ben Sira, though much esteemed, stood on the
border between the canonical and extraneous or non-canonical
books. Such books might be read cursorily, but were not to
1 See especially xlvi. 19, with which, comp. the Septuagint of I Sam. xii. 3.
* Vorstudien zu der Septuaginta (1841), p. 21, note w.

chap. ii. SIRACH S MORAL TEACHING 1 97
be studied too much.1 Sirach neither claimed the author
ship of a hero of antiquity, nor v/as it, according to the rising
Pharisaic school, orthodox ; thus perhaps we may best
account for the fact that a work, regarded in itself, in no way
inferior to the Book of Proverbs, was left outside the sacred
canon. No certain allusions to our book are traceable in the New
Testament ; the nearest approach to a quotation is James i.
19 ; comp. Ecclus. v. 13. Clement of Alexandria is the first
Christian writer who quotes directly from Sirach. From its
large use in the services of the Church the book received
the name Ecclesiasticus, to distinguish it perhaps from the
canonical book which was also often called ' Wisdom.' In
later times, it half attracted, but — owing to the corrupt
state of the text — half repelled, the great Hellenist Camera-
rius, the friend of Melancthon, who published a separate
edition of Sirach (the first) at Basle in 1 55 1. It appears from
his preface that it was highly valued by the reformers from
an educational point of view. Bullinger proposes it as a less
dangerous text book of moral philosophy than the works of
Plato and Aristotle, and Luther admits it to be a good house
hold book, admired however too much by the world, which
' sleepily passes by the great majestic word of Christ concern
ing the victory over death, sin, and hell.'
No impartial critic will place the Wisdom of Jesus the
son of Sirach on the same literary eminence with the so-called
Wisdom of Solomon. It is only from its greater fidelity to
the Old Testament standard, or at least to a portion of this
standard, that it can claim a qualified superiority. A few
noble passages of continuous rhetoric it no doubt contains,
especially the noble Hymn of Praise on the works of creation
(xxxix. 16-xliii. 33) ; and a few small but exquisite gems
especially the sayings on friendship (counterbalanced, I admit
by those on the treatment of one's enemies, xii. 10-12, xxv. 7,
xxx. 6), e.g. —
1 Wright, Koheleth, p. 48 n. ; Strack, art. ' Kanon des A. T.' in Herzog-Plitt,
Realencyclopddie, vii. 430, 431 ; Gratz, Kohelet, p. 48.

198 SIRACH chap. 11.
Forsake not an old friend,
for the new is not comparable to him.
A new friend is as new wine,
when it is old, thou wilt drink it with pleasure (ix. 10),
with which we may bracket the noble passage on the treat
ment of a friend's trespass (xix. 13-17). One of the fine re
ligious passages has been quoted already (xliii. 27 ; comp.
Job xxvi. 14) ; we may couple this 1 with it —
As a drop from the sea, and a grain of sand,
so are a few years in the day of eternity (xviii. 9).
Still the chief value of the book is, historically, to fill out the
picture of a little known period, and doctrinally, to show the
inadequacy of the old forms of religious belief, and the moral
distress from which the Christ was a deliverer.

AfDS TO THE STUDENT.

Besides the commentaries of Bretschneider (1806), Fritzsche (1859),
and Bissell (in the American edition of Lange), see Gfrorer, Philo,
ii. (1831), pp. 18-52 ; Dahne, Geschichtliche Darstellung der judisch-
alexandrin. Religionsphilosophie, ii. (1834), pp. 126-150 ; Zunz, Die
gottesdienstl. Vortrdge der Juden (1832), pp. 100-105; Ewald, Jahr-
biicher der bibl. Wissenschaft, iii. (185 1), pp. 125-140; History of
Israel, v. 262 &c. ; Jost, Gesch. des Judenthums, i. (1857), p. 310
&c. ; Herzfeld, Gesch. des Volkes Jisrael, iii. (1863), see Index ;
Horowitz, Das Buch Jesus Sirach (1865) ; Dyserinck, De Spreuken
van Jesus den zoon van Sirach vertaald (1870) ; Gratz, Monatsschrift
for 1872, pp. 49 &c, 97 &c. ; Seligmann, Das Buch der Weisheit
des Jesus Sirach (1883) ; Fritzsche, art. in Schenkel's Bibellexikon,
iii. 252 &c. ; Stanley, Jewish Church, vol. iii. (see Index) ; Westcott,
art. ' Ecclesiasticus ' in Smith's Bible Dictionary ; Deane, ' The
Book of Ecclesiasticus : its Contents and Character,' The Expositor,
Nov. 1883 ; Wright, The Book of Koheleth, 1883, chap. ii. (decides,
perhaps, too hastily that Sirach in many passages imitates Koheleth).
1 Bishop Butler, who is fond of Sirach, quotes this saying in his 4th sermon.

THE BOOK OF KOHELETH ;
OR, ECCLESIASTES.

CHAPTER I.
THE WISE MAN TURNED AUTHOR AND PHILOSOPHER.
.... II mondo invecchia,
E invecchiando intristisce. — Tasso, Aminta.
In passing from the book of Ecclesiasticus to that of Eccle
siastes, we are conscious of breathing an entirely different „
intellectual atmosphere. ' Seek not out the things that are too
hard for thee,' said Sirach, ' for thou hast no need of the secret
things' (iii. 21, 22), but the book now before us is the record
of a thinker, disappointed it is true, but too much in earnest
to give up thinking. Of meditative minds there was no lack
in this period of Israel's history. The writers of the 119th
and several other Psalms, as well as Jesus the son of Sirach,
had pondered over the ideal life, but our author (the only
remaining representative of a school of writers r) was meditative
in a different sense from any of these. He could not have
said with the latter, ' I' prayed for wisdom before the temple '
(Ecclus. li. 14), nor with the former, ' Thy commandment is
exceeding broad ' (Ps. cxix. 96). The idea of the religious
primacy of Israel awakened in his mind no responsive enthu- "
siasm. We cannot exactly say that he conceals the place of
his residence,2 but he has certainly no overpowering interest in
1 The 'many books' spoken of in xii. 12 were probably less orthodox than
Ecclesiastes, but in so far as Ecclesiastes, especially in its uncorrected state, is
sceptical, it may be grouped with them.
1 In common with most interpreters, I regard Ecclesiastes as a Judrean wcrk.

200 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. r.
the scene of his life's troublesome drama. In this feature he
resembles to a considerable extent the humanists of an earlier
date (see p. 1 19), but in others, and those the most character
istic, he differs as widely from them as the old man from the
child. They believed that virtue was crowned by prosperity ;
even the writer of Job, as some think, had not wholly cast off,
the consecrated dogma ; but the austere and lonely thinker
who has left us Ecclesiastes finds himself utterly unable to
harmonise such a theory with facts (viii. 14). To him, living
during one of the dreariest parts of the post-Exile period, it
seemed as if the past aspirations of Israel had turned out a
gigantic mistake. That home-sickness which impelled, if not
the Second Isaiah himself, yet many who were stirred by his
eloquence, to exchange a life of ease and luxury for one of
struggle and privation — in what had it issued ? In ' vanity
and pursuit of wind ' (comp. Isa. xxvi. 18). To quote a great
Persian poet, who in some of his moods resembles Koheleth
(see end of Chap. IX.),
The Revelations of Devout and Learn'd,
Who rose before us and as Prophets burn'd,
Are all but Stories, which, arose from Sleep,
They told their fellows, and to Sleep return' d.
Such thoughts as these made the history of Israel an aid
to scepticism rather than to faith ; added to which it is
probable that society in Koheleth's ' time seemed to him too
corrupt to admit of an idealistic theory of life. For an
individual to seek to put in practice such a theory would
expose him to hopeless failure and misery. Therefore, ' be
not righteous overmuch,2 neither pretend to be exceedingly
wise; why wilt thou ruin (lit. desolate) thyself ? ' (vii. 16).
Some, no doubt, as the Soferim or Scripturists, had tried it,
but they had only succeeded in making their lives ' desolate,'
without any compensating advantage. Nor can we say that
Ecclesiastes had given up theistic religion. He does not indeed
1 Following the precedent of the Epilogue (xii. 9), I designate the author by
the name which he has invented for his hero.
2 There is a touch of humour in the expression, which can perhaps best be
reproduced in our northern Doric, 'Be not unco' guid.'

CHAP. I. THE WISE MAN TURNED AUTHOR 201
believe in immortality and a future judgment, and is thus
partly an exception to the rule of Lucretius,
. . . nam si certam finem esse viderent
Aerumnarum homines, aliqua ratione valerent
Religionibus atque mineis obsistere vatum.
(De rerum natura, i. 108-110.)
He mentions God twenty-seven times, but under the name
Elohim, which belonged to Him as the Creator, not under that
of Yahveh, which an Israelite was privileged to use ; and his "
one-sided supernaturalism obscured the sense of personal
communion with God. He accepts only the first part of the
great proclamation concerning the dwelling place of God in
Isa. Ixvii. 15 (see Eccles. v. 2). It is no doubt God who
1 worketh all ' (xi. 5), but there are nearer and almost more
formidable potentates, an oppressive hierarchy of officials
ranging from the taxgatherer to the king, ' a high one watching
above the high, and high ones over both ' (v. 8). True, our
author seems to admit — at least if the text be sound (iii. 17 ;
comp. viii. 12, 13)— that ' God will judge the righteous and the
wicked ' (i.e. in this life, for he does not believe in another),
but the comfort of this thought is dashed with bitterness by
an unspoken but distinctly implied complaint, which may
perhaps be well expressed in the language of Job (xxiv. 1),
' Why are judgments laid up (so long) by the Almighty,1 and
(why) do they that know him not see his days ? ' or in other
words, Why is divine retribution so tardy ? It is, in fact, this
extreme tardiness of God's judicial interpositions which our
author considers one of the chief causes of the prevalence of
wickedness ; —
' Because sentence against the work of wickedness is not speedily
executed, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them
to do evil' (viii. 11).
On the whole, we may say that the older humanists were
sincere optimists, while Koheleth, though theoretically perhaps
an optimist (iii. 1 1), constantly relapses into a more congenial
• malism.' I use this word designedly. Koheleth can only be
1 I follow Sept. and Dr. Merx. The received reading is very harsh.

202 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. i.
called a pessimist loosely. Bad as things are, he does not
believe that the world is getting worse and worse and hasting
to its ruin. He believes in revolutions, some for evil, some
for good, some for ' rending ' or ' breaking down,' others for
' sewing ' or ' building up.' He believes, in other words, that
God brings about recurrent changes in human circumstances.
But (like another wise man, Prov. xxv. 21) he does not trust
revolutions of human origin (' evil matters ' he calls them, viii.
3) ; he is no carbonaro (x. 20). And so for the present he is
a ' malist,' and having no imaginative faculty he cannot sym
pathise with the ' Utopian ' prospects for the future contained
in the prophetic visions.
Yet, in spite of appearances, Koheleth builds upon a true
Israelitish foundation. It is already something that he cannot
bear to plunge into open infidelity, that he is still (as we have
seen) a theist, though his theism gives him but little light and
no comforting warmth. Now and then he alludes to the
religious system of his people (see v. 1-5, 17, viii. 10). A
stronger proof of his Israelitish sympathies is his choice of
Solomon as the representative of humanity ; I say, of
humanity, because the author evidently declines to place
himself upon the pedestal of Israelitish privilege. (Perhaps,
too, as Herzfeld thinks,1 he would console his people by show
ing them that they have companions in misfortune every
where ' under the sun ; ' and we have already seen Job snatch
a brief alleviation of pain from the thought of suffering
humanity.) Koheleth is not only a Jew, but a man of culture.
He cannot perhaps entirely defend himself from the subtle
influence of the Greek view of life, and is even willing to
associate from time to time with the ministers of alien sove
reigns. True, he has noted with bitter irony the absurd and
capricious changes in the government of Palestine (x. 5-7),
but he has no spark of the spirit of the Maccabees, unless
indeed in viii. 2-5, x. 4, 20, beneath the garb of servile
prudence we may (with Dr. Plumptre) detect the irony of
indignation. To the simple-minded reader at any rate he
appears to counsel passive obedience, and a cautious crouching
1 Geschichte des Volkes Jisrael, iii. 30.

CHAP. I. THE WISE MAN TURNED AUTHOR 203
attitude towards those in power. I suspect myself that either
the advice is but provisional, or else Koheleth still feels the power
of the prophetic Utopia : ce peuple reve toujours quelque chose
d 'international} Nay ; shall we not carry our generosity even
farther ? That ' last word,' which he would have spoken had
he lived longer, may possiblynot have been that which the
Soferim have forced upon him. Not a future judgment, but
a return of prosperity to a wiser though sadder Israel, may
have been his silent hope, and in this prosperity we may be
sure that a wider and more philosophic culture would form a
principal ingredient. This is by no means an absurd fancy.
Koheleth firmly believed in recurrent historical cycles, and
if there was ' a time to break down,' there was also ' a time
to build up ' (iii. 3). Sirach knows no future life and no
Messiah ; but he believes in the eternity of Israel ; why, on
the ground of his fragmentary remains, deny the same con
solation to Koheleth ? Much as I should prefer to imagine
a far more satisfactory close for his troubled life (see Chap. IX.),
I think we ought to admit the possibility of this hypothesis.
As an author, the characteristics of Koheleth are in the
main Hebraic, though not without vague affinities to the
Greek philosophic spirit. His work is without a model, but
the dramatic element in it reminds us somewhat of the Book
of Job. Just as the writer of that great poem delineates his
own spiritual struggles — not of course without poetic ampli
fication — under the assumed name of Job, so our author, with
a similar poetical license, ascribes his difficulties to the
imaginary personage Koheleth (or Ecclesiastes). There are
also passages in which, like Job, he adopts the tone, style and
rhythm 2 of gnomic poetry, though far from reaching the
literary perfection of Job or of the proverbial collections.
The attempt of Koster and Vaihinger to make him out an
artist in the management of strophes is a sport of fancy.
Unity and consistency in literary form were beyond the
reach, if not of his powers, yet certainly of his opportunities ;
even his phraseology, as a rule, is in the highest degree rough
1 Renan, V Antichrist, p. 228.
- On the rhythm, comp. Bickell, Der Prediger (1884), pp. 27, 46-53.

204 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. I.
and unpolished. This is the more striking by contrast with
the elegant workmanship of Sirach. But the unknown author
has very strong, excuses. Thus, first, the negative tone of his
mind must have destroyed the cheerful composure necessary
to the artist. ' The burden of the mystery ' pressed too heavily
for him to think much of form and beauty. His harp, if he ever
had one, he had long since hung up upon the willows. Next, it
is highly probable that he was interrupted in the midst of his
literary preparations. Noldeke has remarked [ that his object
was not to produce ' ein literarisches Schaustiick.' That is
perfectly true ; his primary object was ' to scatter the doubts of
his own mind.' But he did not despise the literary craft ; he
was well aware that even ' the literature of power ' may in
crease its influence by some attention to form. It seems to
me that the ' labour of the file ' has brought the first two
chapters to a considerable degree of perfection ; but the rest
of the book, upon the whole, is so rough and so disjointed,
that I can only suppose it to be based on certain loose notes
or adversaria, written solely with the object of dispersing his
doubts and mitigating his pains by giving them expression.
The thread of thought seems to break every few verses, and
attempts to restore it fail to carry conviction to the unbiassed
mind. The feelings and opinions embodied in the book are
often mutually inconsistent ; in Ibn Ezra's time, and long
before that, the Jewish students of the book were puzzled by
this phenomenon, so strange in a canonical Scripture. Not a
few scattered remarks have absolutely no connection with the
subject. The style, too, is rarely easy and natural, and some
times (especially in viii. 16, 17) we meet with a sentence
which would certainly not have passed an author's final re
vision. The most obvious hypothesis surely is that from
r chap. iii. onwards we have before us the imperfectly worked-
up meditations of an otherwise unknown writer, found after
his death in proximity to a highly finished fragment which
apparently professed to be the work of king Solomon. The
meditations and the fragment were circulated in combination
(for which there was much excuse, especially as some parts of
1 Die alttestamentliche Literatur, p. 173.

CHAP. I. THE WISE MAN TURNED AUTHOR 205
the notes seemed to be in the narrative and even autobio
graphic style), and were received with much favour by the
students of ' wisdom,' more, I should think, owing to the in
trinsic interest of the book than to the literary fiction of
Solomonic authorship. If this hypothesis be correct, we need
not be surprised either at the author's inconsistencies in
opinion, or at the general roughness of his style. The book may
not even be all one man's work. Luther has already brought
Ecclesiastes into connection with the Talmud.1 Now the
proverbial sayings which interrupt our thinker's self-question
ings on ' vanity of vanities ' are like the Haggadic passages
which gush forth like fountains in the weary waste of hair
splitting Talmudic dialectics. No one has ever maintained the
unity of the Talmud, and no one should be thought un
reasonable for doubting the absolute freedom of Ecclesiastes
from interpolations.2
The third and last excuse which I have to offer is that
the meditations of Koheleth partake of the nature of an ex
periment. He may indeed (as I have remarked) be a member
of a school of writers, but his strikingly original manner
compels us to regard him as a master rather than a disciple.
No such purely reflective work had, so far as we know, as
yet been produced in Hebrew literature. Similar moral
difficulties to those which preoccupied our author had no
doubt occurred to some of the prophets and poets, but
they had not been sounded to their depths. Even in the
Book of Job the reflective spirit has very imperfect scope.
The speeches soon pass into a lyric strain, and Jehovah
Himself closes the discussion by imposing silence. But the
author of Ecclesiastes was a thinker, not a lyrist, and was
compelled to form his own vehicle of thought. He ' sought,'
indeed, ' to find out pleasant words ' (xii. 10), but had to strain
the powers of an unpliant language to the uttermost, to coin
(presumably) new words, and apply old ones in fresh senses,
till he might well have complained (to apply Lucretius) ' propter
1 ' Dazu so ist's wie ein Talmud aus vielen Biichern zusammengezogen.'
Luther's Tischreden, quoted in Ginsburg, p. 113.
2 See Supplementary Chapter.

206 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. r.
egestatem linguae et rerum novitatem.' ' He deserves great
praise for his measure of success ; Luzzatto in his early work
failed to do him justice. He is not ambitious ; as a rule, he
abstains from fine writing. Once indeed he attempts it, but,
as I venture to think, with but ill success — I refer to the
closing description of old age (xii. 4-9), which has a touch
of the extravagant euphuism of late Arabic literature.2 From
a poetical point of view, the prelude (i. 4-8) is alone worthy to
be mentioned, though not included either by Renan or by
Bickell among the passages poetical in form (for a list of
which see below 3). Let us mark this fine passage, that we
may return to it again in another connection.
1 De rerum naturd, i. 140 (appositely quoted by Mr. Tyler).
2 See the passage quoted from Chenery's translation of Hariri by Dr. Tayloi
(Dirge of Coheleth, p. 55) ; comp. Riickert's rhyming translation (Hariri, i.
104-5). 3 Renan's list is i. 15, 18; ii. 2, 14; iii. 2-8, iv. 5, 14; v. 2; vii. 1-6; 7, 8;
9b; 13*; 24; viii. 1, 4; ix. 16, 17; x. 2, 12, 18; xi. 4, 7; xii. 3-5; 10; II,
12. Bickell's, i. 7, 8 ; 15 ; 18 ; ii. 2 ; v. 9 ; vi. 7 ; iv. 5; ii. 14; viii. 8; ix.
16-x. 1; vii. 1-6, vi. 9, vii. 7-9; vii. II, 12; vii. 20; v. 2;'x. 16-20; xi. 6;
xi. 4; viii. 1-4, a. 2, 3 ; a. 6, 7 ; a. 10-15; ix. 7; xi. 9, 10, xii. la; xii.
1^-5 ; 6. (The order of these passages arises out of Bickell's critical theory ; on
which see Chap. XII. )

?o;

CHAPTER II.
' TRUTH AND FICTION ' IN AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.
Let us now take a general survey of this strange book, re
garding it as a record of the conflicting moods and experi
ences of a thoughtful man of the world. The author is too
modest to appear in his own person (at least in i. i — II. 12),
but, like Cicero in his dialogues, selects a mouthpiece from
the heroic past. His choice could not be doubtful. Who so
fit as the wisest of his age, the founder and patron of gnomic
poetry, king Solomon (1 Kings iv. 30-32)? After the pre
luding verses, from which a quotation has been given above,
Ecclesiastes continues thus : —
I Koheleth have been ' king over Israel in Jerusalem ; and I
gave my mind to making search and exploration, by wisdom, con
cerning all that is done under heaven ; that is a sore trouble which
God hath given to the sons of men to trouble themselves therewith !
I saw all the works which are done under the sun ; and behold, all
is vanity and pursuit of wind.
That which is crooked cannot be straightened,
and a deficiency cannot be reckoned (i. 12-15).
The name or title ' Koheleth ' is obscure. According to
the Epilogue * Koheleth was a wise man ' (xii. 9)— a statement
which confirms the explanation of the name as meaning
' one who calls an assembly.' 2 The ' wise men ' of Israel
1 See the fantastic legend to account for the past tense in Midrash Koheleth
(transl. Wiinsche), or Ginsburg (p. 268 ; comp. p. 38).
2 Dean Plumptre thinks Koheleth (like lKK\r\criacrrr]s), which is rendered by
him ' the Debater,' means rather a member of an assembly, than a teacher or
preacher, and compares Ecclus. xxxviii. 33, where the son of Sirach says of la
bourers and artisans that they 'shall not sit high in the congregation,' i.e. in the
ecclesia or academy of sages. But judging from the parallel line the ' congrega
tion ' is rather that of the people in general (comp. Ecclus. xv. 5). The Dean's

208 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. II.
gathered their disciples together, and such an able teacher as
Koheleth would fain gather all who have ears to hear around
his seat. But Koheleth is also Solomon (though only for a
short time — the author did not, I suppose, live long enough
thoroughly to fuse the conceptions of king and philosopher •),
The wise king is to be imagined standing on the brink of
the grave, and casting the clear-sighted glance of a dying
man on past life, somewhat as Moses in parts of Deutero
nomy or David in 2 Sam. xxii., xxiii. 1-7. A subtle and
poetic view of Solomon's career is thus opened before us.
He is not here represented in his political relation, but as
a specimen of the highest type of human being, with a
boundless appetite for pleasure and every means of gratifying
it. But even such a man's deliberate verdict on all forms of
pleasure is that they are utterly unsubstantial, mere vanity
(lit. a vapour — Aquila, drfiis ; comp. James iv. 14). Neither
pure speculation (i. 13-18), nor riotous mirth (ii. 1, 2), nor even
the refined voluptuousness consistent with the free play of the
intellect 2 (ii. 3), could satisfy his longing, or enable him, with
Goethe's Faust, to say to the flying moment, ' Ah ! linger
yet, thou art so fair.' It is true that wisdom is after all better
than folly ; Solomon from his ' specular mount ' could ' see '
this to be a truth (ii. 1 3) ; but in the end he found it as
resultless as ' the walking in darkness ' of the fool.
'And I myself perceived that one fate befalleth them all. And
I said in my heart, As the fate of the fool will be the fate which shall
befall me, even me ; and why have I then been exceeding wise ? and
view that the book embodies the inward debates of a Jewish philosopher may be
to a great extent true, but for all that Koheleth is throughout represented as speak
ing alone and with authority. On the philological explanation of the word, see
Appendix. 1 This seems a reasonable view. Bickell boldly maintains that i. I, 12, 16,
ii. 7, 8, 9 [12] are interpolations (made presumably to facilitate the recognition of
the book as canonical). Observe however that the (fictitious) author is nowhere
declared to be Solomon, but only ben-David (i. 1). He claims attention merely
as a private person, as an interpreter of the complaints of humanity. Though he
does once expressly refer to his royal state (i. 12), it is only to suggest to his
readers what ample opportunities he has enjoyed of learning the vanity of earthly
grandeur. So, very plausibly, Bloch (Ursprung des Kohelet, p. 17).
2 The passage indeed is obscure and possibly corrupt (so Bickell), but the
above words probably do justice to the mood described.

CHAP. II. ' TRUTH AND FICTION '

209

I said in my heart that this also is vanity' (ii. 14^, 15), i.e. that this
undiscriminating fate is a fresh proof of the delusiveness of all
things. And in this strain Koheleth runs on to nearly the end of
the chapter, with an added touch of bitterness at the thought
of the doubtful character of his successor (ii. 18, 19). Then
occurs one of those abrupt transitions which so often puzzle
the student of Ecclesiastes. In ii. 1-11 Koheleth has rejected
the life of sensuous pleasure, even when wisely regulated,
as ' vanity.' He now returns tothe subject, and declares this
to be, not of course the ideally highest good, but the highest
good open to man, if it were only in his power to secure it.
But he has seen that both sensuous enjoyment and the wis
dom which regulates it come from God, who grants these
blessings to the man who is good in his sight, while profitless
trouble is the portion of the sinner. He repeats therefore
that even wisdom and knowledge and joy, the highest attain
able goods, are, by reason of their uncertainty, ' vanity and
pursuit of wind ' (ii. 26).
At the end of this long speech of Koheleth, we natur
ally ask how far it can be regarded as autobiographical.
Only, I think, in a qualified sense. Its psychological depth
points to similar experiences on the part of the author, but to
experiences which have been deepened in their imaginative re
production. It is truth mingled with fiction — Wahrheit und
Dichtung — which we meet with in the first two chapters. A
more strictly biographical narrative appears to begin in chap.
iii., from which point the allusions to Solomon cease, and
are replaced by scattered references to contemporary history.
The confidences of the author are introduced by a passage
(iii. 1-8) in the gnomic style, containing a catalogue of the
various actions, emotions, and states of feeling which make
up human life. Each of these, we are told, has its own al
lotted season in the fixed order of nature, but as this is
beyond the ken and influence of man, the question arises,
'What profit hath he that worketh in that wherewith he
wearieth himself ? ' (iii. 9.) Thus, the ' wearisome trouble ' of
the ' sons of men ' has no permanent result. All that you can
P

2IO THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. n.
?¦do is to accustom yourself to acquiesce in destiny : you
will then see that every act and every state in your ever-shift
ing life is truly beautiful or seemly (iii. n), even if not
profitable to the individual (iii. 9). More than this, man has
been endowed with the faculty of understanding this kaleido.
scopic world, with the drawback that he cannot possibly em
brace it all in one view : — ¦
Also he hath put the world into their heart (i.e. mind), except
that man cannot find out from beginning to end the work which
God hath made (iii. 11).
In fact, to quote Lord Bacon's words in the Advancement
of Learning, ' God has framed the mind like a glass, capable
of the image of the universe, and desirous to receive it, as the
eye to receive the light.' But here a dark mood interrupts
the course of our author's meditations ; or perhaps it is the
record of a later period which is but awkwardly attached to
the previous passages. ' To rejoice and to fare well ' — sen
sual (or, let us say, sensuous) pleasure, in short — is now repre
sented as the only good for man, and even that is not to be
1 Among the many other interpretations of this difficult passage, two may be
mentioned here, (i) ' He has also set worldliness in their heart, without which
man cannot understand the work that God does, from beginning to end.' So
Kalisch (Path and Goal, frequently). This is an improvement upon the transla
tion of Gesenius and others, who render, not ' without which ' &c. , but ' so that
man may not ' &c. The objection to the latter rendering is that it gives ' world
liness' a New Testament sense (comp. i John ii. 15). Kalisch, however, in full
accord with the spirit of Judaism, makes Koheleth frankly accept ' worldliness ' as
a good, understanding by ' worldliness ' a sense of worldly duties and enjoyments.
Had this however been Koheleth's meaning, would he not have coined another of
his favourite abstract terms (comp. the Peshitto's 'olmoyutho = culcv in Eph. ii. 2) ?
(2) ' Also he has put eternity into their heart, but so that man cannot ' &c. So-
Ginsburg and Delitzsch (desiderium atemitatis, taking 'eternity' in a metaphysical
sense = 'that which is beyond time ') ; so also Nowack (taking it in the popular
sense of years following upon years without apparent limit). Ginsburg's view is
against the context, in which the continuance of the human spirit is doubted ; but
Nowack's explanation is not unacceptable. Man has been enabled to form the idea
of Time (for the popular view of ' eternity ' comes practically to this), and has
divided this long space into longer and shorter periods ; what happens in one
period or season, he can compare with what happens in another, thus finding all'
well-adapted and 'beautiful.' But he cannot grasp the whole of Time in one
view. But I still prefer the explanation given in the text, as being simpler, in
spite of the fact that 'oldm nowhere else occurs in the sense of ' world ' (or the
present order of things), so common in later Hebrew.

CHAP. II. ' TRUTH AND FICTION ' 211
too absolutely reckoned upon, for ' it is the gift of God ' (iii.
12, 13, 22 ; comp. ii. 24). Certainly our author at any
rate did not succeed in drowning care in the wine-cup : he is
no vulgar sensualist. His merriment is spoiled by the thought
of the misery of others, and he can find nothing ' under the
sun ' (a passionate generalisation from life in Palestine) but
violence and oppression. In utter despair he pronounces
the dead happier than the living (iv. 1, 2). In fact, he says,
neither in life nor in death has man any superiority over the
other animals, which are under no providential order, and ^
have no principle of continuance. Such is the cynical theory
which tempts Koheleth ; and yet he seems to have hesitated
before accepting it, unless we may venture with Bickell to
strike out iii. 1 7, as the work of a later editor who believed in
retributions hereafter (like xi. gb, xii. 7, 13, 14). I confess
that consistency seems to me to require this step ; the verse is
in fact well fitted to be an antidote to the following verse, which
seems to have suggested the opening phrase. This is how
the text runs at present : —
I said in my heart, The righteous and the wicked shall God
judge ; for there is a time for every purpose and for every work there
(emphatically for ' in the other world ; ; or read, hath he appointed).
I said in my heart, (It happens) on account of the sons of men, that
God may test them, and that they may see that they are but beasts.
For the sons of men are a chance (comp. Herod, i. 32), and beasts
are a chance ; yea, all have one chance : as the one dies, so dies the
other ; yea, they all have one spirit ; and advantage of the one over
the other there is none, for all is vanity. All go unto one place ; all
are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knows whether the
spirit of man goes upward, and whether the spirit of the beast goes
downward to the earth? l (iii. 17-21.)
1 This is the rendering of the four principal versions and of all the best critics,
including Mercier, Ewald, Ginsburg, Gratz and Delitzsch ; it agrees with the
general tendency of Koheleth, and in particular with xii. 5, where the grave is
called man's ' eternal home ' (see below). It is no doubt opposed by the vowel-
points, which are followed in King James's Bible. But it is more than probable
(considering other parallel phenomena) that the authors of the points were directed
by a theological and therefore uncritical motive, that, namely, of effacing as far as
possible a trace of Koheleth's opposition to the doctrine, by that time recognised
as orthodox, of the immortality of the soul. p 2

212 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. ii.
Our author's abiding conviction is that ' the spirit does
but mean the breath ' (In Memoriam, lvi.), so that man
and the lower animals have ' one spirit ' and alike end in
dust. * Pulvis et umbra sumus.' It is true, some of his contem
poraries hold the new doctrine of Immortality, but Koheleth, in
his cool scepticism, hesitates to accept it. Which indeed of
its enthusiastic advocates can claim to ' know ' that which he
asserts ; or can prove to Koheleth's satisfaction that God (as
a psalmist in Ps. xlix. 1 5 puts it) will ' receive ' the spirit of
man, in spite of the fact that the vital principle of beasts loses
itself in the dust of death ? It is no doubt an awkward con
struction which Koheleth adopts : he seems to express an un
certainty as to the fate of the lower animals. To convey the
meaning which I have given, the construction ought to have
been disjunctive, as in this line from a noble modern poem,
Friend, who knows if death indeed have life, or life have death
for goal ? '
But there is, or rather there ought to be, no doubt as to Ko
heleth's meaning. Dean Plumptre frankly admits that ' it is
not till nearly the close of the book, with all its many wander
ings of thought, that the seeker rests in that measure of the
hope of immortality which we find ' [but this is open to con
siderable doubt ] ' in xii. 7.'
1 Swinburne, On the Verge.

213

CHAPTER III.
MORE MORALISING, INTERRUPTED BY PROVERBIAL
MAXIMS.
LET us now resume the thread of Koheleth's moralising. Vio
lence and oppression were two of the chief evils which struck
an attentive observer of Palestinian life. But there were two
others equally worthy of a place in the sad picture — the evils
of rivalry and isolation. First, with regard to rivalry (iv. 4-6).
What is ' skilful work,' or art, but an ' envious surpassing of
the one by the other'? This also is 'pursuit of wind;' it
gives no permanent satisfaction. True, indolence is self-de
struction : but on the other hand a little true rest is better
than the labour of windy effort, urged on by rivalry yielding
no rest ' (Delitzsch). Such at least is the most probable con
nection, supposing that vv. 5 and 6 are not rather interpolated
or misplaced. If however it be objected (here Koheleth passes
to a second great evil — that of isolation) that a man may
labour for his child or his brother, yet who, pray, is benefited
by the money-getting toils of one who has no near relative,
and stands alone in the world ? A pitiable sight is such un
profitable toil ! The fourth chapter closes with maxims on
the blessings of companionship (iv. 9-12), followed by a vivid
description of the sudden fall of an old and foolish king (iv. 1 3-
16), who had not cared to appropriate one of the chief of these
blessings, viz. good advice. There is much that is enigmatical
in the last four verses. We should expect the writer to be al
luding to some fact in contemporary history, but no plausible
parallel has yet been indicated.1 Ver. 16 is certainly either cor-
1 Hitzig in his commentary refers to the history of the high priest Onias and his
nephew Joseph. Afterwards he recalled this opinion ; but we may be thankful to
him for directing attention to this curious and instructive historical episode.

214 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. III.
rupt or mutilated. Bickell thinks that it must originally have
run somewhat as follows : —
There was no end of all the people, even of all those who [ap
plauded him and cast reproaches on the old king. For because he
had despised the counsel of the prudent, to rule foolishly and to
oppress the people, therefore they hated him, even as those had
hated him] who were before them ; they also that came afterwards
did not rejoice in him.
At this point the ideal autobiography of Koheleth is in
terrupted. From v. i (=iv. 17 in the Hebrew) to vii. 14 we
J are presented with a mixture of proverbial sayings (such
perhaps as Koheleth was continually framing and depositing
in his note-books) and records of the wise man's personal ex
perience. Notice especially the reappearance of the old
Israelitish instinctive sympathy with husbandmen (or, shall I
say, with yeomen) in ver. 9. Both proverbs an'd personal
records are the offspring of different moods, and therefore not
always consistent. Thus at one time our author repeats his
preference of sensuous enjoyment to any other mode of passing
one's life.
For (then) he will not think much on the (few) days of his life,
because God responds to the joy of his heart (v. 20).
But the writer is too pessimistic to rest long in this thought.
It is a ' common evil among men ' to have riches without the
full enjoyment of them : ' better an untimely birth,' he cries,
than to be in such a case (vi. 3). Note here in passing the
fondness of our author for using a comparison in expressing
an emphatic judgment (comp. iv. 9-16, vii. 1-8). Better, he
continues, is a momentary experience of real happiness than
to let the desire wander after unattainable ends. ' There are
many things that increase vanity ; ' with the reserve of good
taste, he understates his meaning, for what human object, ac
cording to Koheleth, is not futile? That gift which to the
Christian is so wondrously fair— the gift of life — to him be
comes ' the numbered days of his life of vanity ; ' and ' who
knows what is good for man in life, which he spends as a
shadow ? For who can tell a man what shall be after him

chap. ill. MORE MORALISING 21 5
under the sun ?' (vi. 12.) Koheleth, we see, has no faith in
his nation, nor in humanity.
I do not feel sure that we may say with Dean Bradley
that ' out of this very gloom and sadness come forth in the
next chapter thoughts that have gone, some of them, the
round of the world.' No doubt there is more than a mere
tinge of the same midnight gloom in some of these proverbial
sayings. But surely there is a complete break in the thread
of thought of vi. 1 2, and a fresh collection of looser notes has
found a place at the head of chap. vii. At any rate, these
sayings supply a convincing proof that Koheleth was not a
mere hedonist or Epicurean. He recalls in vii. 2 his former
commendation of feasting, and declares,
It is better to go into the house of mourning than to go into the
house of feasting,
inasmuch as that is the end of all men, and the living can lay it
to his heart (vii. 2).
I said that Koheleth was too pessimistic to remain long
under the influence of hedonism. I might have said that he
was too thoughtful : a rational man could not, without the
anticipations of faith, close his mind to the suggestions of
pessimism in the circumstances of Koheleth's age. Better
thoughtful misery than thoughtless mirth, is the keynote of
the triad of maxims (vii. 2-6) on the compensations of misery
which follows the dreary sentence praising death, in vii. I.1
Resignation is the secret of inward peace ; ' with a sad face
the heart may be cheerful.' Not only in view of the great
problem of existence, but in your everyday concerns, restrain
your natural impulses whether to towering passion or to
brooding vexation at the wrongness or the slowness of the
course of human affairs (vii. 8, 9). Above all, do not give way
to an ignorant idealism. It is unwise to ask ' How is it that
1 The mechanical juxtaposition of the two halves of ver. 1 is obvious. The
proverb gains considerably, if read with Bickell's very plausible supplements,
' Better is a good name than precious ointment,
[but wisdom is still better than fame ;
better is not -being than being ]
and the day of death than the day of one's birth.'
The ' wisdom ' meant will be that of resignation and renunciation.

2l6 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. in.
the former days were better than these ?' (vii. 10.) The former
time, so bright and happy, and the present, with its predominant
gloom, were alike ordained by God (vii. 13 should follow
vii. 10) ; and as a last consolation for cool and rational
thinkers, be sure that there is nought to fear after death ; there
are no torments of Gehenna. This in fact is the reason why
God ordains evil ; there being no second life, man must learn.
whatever he can from calamity in this life.
On a good day be of good cheer, and on an evil day consider
(this) : God hath also made this (viz. good) equally with that (evil),
on the ground that man is to experience nothing at all hereafter l
(vii. 14 ; comp. ix. 10).
Thus, not only ' be not righteous over much ' (vii. 16), but
' do not believe over much ' is the teaching of our rationalist-
thinker. There is neither good nor evil after death. But is
there no present judgment ? Yes ; but this is not a thought of
life and hope. It is a true ' religion ' to him ; it binds him in
his words as well as his actions. But although Hooker so ad
mired the saying in v. 2 (' God is in heaven, and thou upon
earth, therefore let thy words be few ') as to quote it in one
of his finest passages,2 yet the context of v. 2 sufficiently
shows how different was the quality of the reverence of the
two writers. Be careful to pay thy vows, says Koheleth, lest
when thou invokest God's name, His angel should appear, and
call thee to account.
Suffer not thy mouth to bring punishment upon thy body ; and
say not before the angel, It was an oversight ; 3 wherefore should
God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of thy hands?'
(v. 6.)
1 ' Hereafter ' is, literally, ' after him ' (for the meaning of which see iii. 22,
vi. 12) ; ' experience,' literally ' find ' (comp. Prov. vi. 33). For other views,
see Wright, who objects to the above explanation that it ' is opposed to the teach
ing of Koheleth respecting a future judgment. ' But the question is, Did Koheleth
believe in a future judgment ?
2 Eccles. Polity, i. 2, § 3.
3 There is a touch of humour here ; comp. the wretch in the fable who called
Death to his aid, but refused him when he came. Klostermann has done well in
reviving this interpretation, which, in Germany at least, had been generally aban
doned. (Delitzsch thinks the ' angel ' is the priest whom the man who has vowed
approaches with a request to be released from his vow. This is supported by

chap, ill. MORE MORALISING 217
To Koheleth the mention of the divine name is a possible
source of danger ; to Hooker God is One ' whom to know is
life, and joy to make mention of his name.' Koheleth has
only fear for God's holy name— a fear which is not indeed -
ineffectual but very pale and cheerless ; Hooker, a ' perpetual
fear and love,' and the love gives a new quality and a new
efficacy to the fear.
Mai. ii. 7, where the priest is called 'the messenger of Jehovah Sabaoth;' but
see the notes of Ginsburg and Kingsbury. Renan renders, a I envoy i des pretres.)
The angel is the destroying angel, whose action is discerned by faith in the judicial
calamities which, sometimes at least, overtake the wrong-doer. (So the Targum,
but postponing the appearance of the angel to the future judgment.)

2l8 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. rv.

CHAPTER IV.
FACTS OF CONTEMPORARY LIFE.
At vii. 15a new section begins, consisting almost entirely
of the author's personal experiences, very loosely connected ;
it continues as far as ix. 12. A curious passage at the outset
appears to describe virtue as residing in the mean between
two extremes (vii. 15-18). The appearance however is de
ceptive : it is as much out of place to quote Aristotle's famous
definition of virtue (fiecrorris Bvo /ea/cia>v), as Buddha's counsel to
him who would attain perfection to ' exercise himself in the
medium course of discipline.' Koheleth merely offers prac
tical advice how to steer one's ship between the rocks. Do
not, he says, make your life a burden by excessive legalism.
But on the other hand, do not earn the reputation of caring
nothing for the precepts of the law. That were folly, and
would bring you to an early death.1 Koheleth expresses this
sharply and enigmatically ; do not be too ' righteous,' and do
not be too ' wicked.' ' Righteous ' and ' wicked ' are both to
be taken in the common acceptation of those terms in the re
ligious world : the words are used ironically. Our author's
only theory of virtue is that no theory is possible. The
' wisdom ' which both gives ' defence ' and ' preserves life '
(vii. 1 2) is the practical wisdom of resignation and moderation.
Of essential wisdom (or philosophy as we should call it 2) he
says, alluding to Job xxviii. 12-23, that it is ' far off, and ex
ceeding deep ; who can find it out ? ' (vii. 24.) The old theory,
1 As Plumptre well remarks, the vices thought of and the end to which they
lead are those of sensual license (comp. Prov. vii. 25-27).
2 In Koheleth's phrase, 'that which is ;' comp. Wisd. vii. 17-21, where 'the
infallible knowledge of the things that are ' is equivalent to a perfect natural
science. Here a similar phrase means rather philosophy.

CHAP. IV, FACTS OF CONTEMPORARY LIFE 219
which claimed to give the secret of history, and which even
afterwards satisfied some wise men (e.g. Sirach) — the theory
that the good are rewarded and the bad punished in this world
— is not borne out by Koheleth's experience, —
There is (many) a righteous man who perishes in spite of his
righteousness, and there is (many) an ungodly man who lives long in
spite of his wickedness (vii. 15 ; contrast the interpolated passage
viii. 12, 13).
But though Koheleth, like Job, despairs of essential wisdom,
he ' turns ' with hope to the wide field of wisdom — or, as he
calls it, ' wisdom and reasoning,' i.e. moral inquiries pursued
on the inductive method. And what is the result of his in
quiry ? He gives it with much deliberateness, stating that he
(viz. ' the Koheleth,' see on xii. 8) has put one fact to another
in order to form a conclusion (ver. 27) and it is that women-
tempters are more pernicious than Death (man's great enemy
personified, as so often). Or, putting it in other words, which
I am forced to paraphrase to bring out their meaning — -words
to which the well-known poem of Simonides is chivalry itself —
' A few rare specimens of uncorrupted human nature I have
found, so rare that one may reckon them as one among a
thousand ; but not one of these truly human creatures was a
woman.' • The latter statement is the stronger, and shows
that our author agrees with Ecclus. xxv. 19, that 'all wicked
ness is but little to the wickedness of a woman.' And so much
in earnest is he, that he even tries a third mode of expressing
his conclusion. Carefully limiting himself he says, ' Lo ! this
only have I found ; that God made mankind upright, but
they have sought out many contrivances ' (ver. 29) ; that is,
men and women are both born good, but are too soon sophis
ticated by civilisation (and the leaders in this downward
process, we may infer from the context, are the women).
Koheleth scarcely means to imply that civilisation is bad in
1 So Klostermann. The ordinary interpretation is, ' One man among a thou -
sand (men) I have found, but a woman among all these I have not found ; ' i.e. I
have tested a thousand men and a thousand women ; I have found one true man,
but not one true woman. The objection is that 'dddm elsewhere (e.g. ver. 29)
means human beings without distinction of sex.

2 20 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. IV.
itself ; if he does, the few good men he has met must apparently
have been hermits ! But though not essentially immoral, the
inventive or contriving faculty (so wonderful to Sophocles)
seems to Koheleth the chief source of moral danger.
But are these the only results of Koheleth's wide induc
tion from the facts of contemporary life ? Yes ; a time
such as this ' when man rules over man to his hurt ' (viii. 9)
suggests, not only prudential maxims, but this sad conclusion,
already (vii. 1 5) mentioned by anticipation, that the fate proper
to the wicked falls upon the righteous, and that proper to the
righteous on the wicked (viii. 14), or to express this in the
concrete, And in accordance with this I have seen ungodly men honoured,
and that too in the holy place (i.e. the temple ; comp. Isa. xviii. 7) ;
but those who had acted rightly had to depart and were forgotten in
the city. This too is vanity 1 (viii. 10).
No wonder that wickedness is rampant ! It requires singular
courage to do right when Nemesis delays her visit ; or, as
Koheleth puts it, in language which sorely displeased a later
editor, Because sentence against a wicked work is not executed speedily,
therefore men have abundant courage to do evil. For I know that it
even happens that a sinner does evil fora long time, and yet lives long,
whilst he who fears before God is short-lived asa shadow 1 (viii. 12, 13).
Koheleth does not, of course, include himself among the reck
less evil-doers. He acquiesces in the painful inconsistencies
of the world, and seems to comfort himself with the relatively
best good — ' to eat and drink and be merry ' (viii. 15). Charity
may perhaps suggest that this is not said without bitter
irony. Then follows a clumsy but affecting passage (viii. 16, 17)
on the uselessness of brooding (as the author had so long
1 Following Bickell. In viii. 10 it is the linguistic form, and in viii. 12, 13
the contents of the Massoretic text which excite suspicion. The former verse is
thus rendered by Delitzsch, ' And then I have seen the wicked buried, and they
entered into (their ' perpetual house,' the grave) ; but they that had done right had
to depart (into exile) from the holy place (Jerusalem ; cf. II. Isa. xlviii. 2), and
were forgotten out of the city : this too is vanity.'

CHAP. IV. FACTS OF CONTEMPORARY LIFE 22 I
done) over the mysteries of human life, which introduces the
concluding part of the section (ix. 1-12). These twelve
verses are full of a restrained passion. Such being the unfree
condition of man that he cannot even govern his sympathies
and antipathies, and so regardless of moral distinctions the
course of destiny, and there being no hereafter,1 what remains
but to take such pleasure as life — especially wedded life — can
offer, and to carry out one's plans with energy ? Yet, alas !
it is only too true that neither success nor freedom of action
can be reckoned upon, for ' the race is not to the swift,' and
men are ' snared ' like the fishes and the birds.
The section which begins at ix. 13 is of still more varied
contents. It begins with a striking little story about the
' poor wise man,' a Themistocles in common life, ' who bv his
wisdom delivered the city, and no one remembered that poor
man' (ix. 14, 15). Surely here (as in iv. 13, 14, viii. 10) we
catch the echo of contemporary history. It is not a generali
sation (comp. Prov. xxi. 22), but a fact which the author
gives us, and it may plausibly be conjectured that he was the
1 poor wise man ' himself. The rest of the section (down to
x. 15) contains proverbs on wisdom and folly, and some
bitterly ironical remarks on the exaltation of servants and
burden-bearers 2 above the rich and the princely.
1 The view expressed in ix. 10 is, I hope, very far from being the private belief
of the many preachers who are accustomed to quote it. See the chapter on Eccle
siastes from a religious point of view.
2 Correcting the text in x. 6 with A. Krochmal.

222 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. v.

CHAPTER V.
THE WISE MAN'S PARTING COUNSELS.
A NEW section begins at x. 16 — no ingenuity avails to esta
blish a connection with the preceding verses. We are ap
proaching our goal, and breathe a freer air. From the very
^ first the ideas and images presented to us are in a healthier
and more objective tone. The condemnation expressed in
ver. 1 6 does credit to the public spirit of the writer, and, I need
hardly say, is not really inconsistent (as Hitzig supposed) with
the advice in ver. 20. In the words —
Even among thine acquaintance 1 curse not the king, and in thy
bedchambers curse not the rich ; for the birds of the heaven may
carry the voice [comp. the cranes of Ibycus] and that which hath
wings may report the word —
Dean Plumptre perhaps rightly sees ' the irony of indig
nation ' which ' veils itself in the garb of a servile prudence.'
There is no necessity to reduce Koheleth to the moral level
of Epicurus, who is said to have deliberately preferred despot
ism and approved courting the monarch.
It is a still freer spirit which breathes in the remainder of
the book. Let courtiers waste their time in luxury (x. 18),
1/ but throw thou thyself unhesitatingly into the swift stream of
life. Be not ever forecasting, for there are some contingencies
which can no more be guarded against than the falling of
rain or of a tree (xi. 3, 4). Act boldly, then, like the corn-
merchants, who speculate on such a grand scale 
Send forth thy bread upon the wide waters [lit. upon the face of
the waters], for thou mayst find it [i.e. obtain a good return for it]
after many days (xi. 1).
1 Altering the points with Klostermann.

CHAP. v. THE WISE MANS PARTING COUNSELS 223
But since fortune is capricious, do not risk thine all on a
single venture. ' Ships are but boards, sailors but men ' &c,
as Shylock says. Divide thy merchandise, and so, if one
vessel is wrecked or plundered, much may still be saved ; or —
another possible interpretation — store thy property in various
hiding-places, so that, in case of some political revolution,
thine all may not be taken from thee, —
Make seven portions, and also eight ; for thou knowest not what
evil shall be upon the earth (or, the land) (xi. 2).
This is not, of course, the usual explanation of these two
verses, which are enigmas fairly admitting of more than one
solution. Most commentators understand them as recom
mending beneficence, which ver. 2 requires to be of extensive
range, and which ver. 1 compares to cakes of bread thrown
upon the water, and gathered up no one knows by whom.
So perhaps (besides Rashi, Aben Ezra, Ginsburg &c.) Goethe
in the Westbstliche Divan
Was willst du untersuchen
Wohin die Milde fliesst !
Ins Wasser wirf dein Kuchen —
Wer weiss wer sie geniesst ! •
I do not think that this suits the context, which suggests
activity and caution as the two good qualities recommended
by Koheleth. But it is very possible that the proverb was
a popular one which the author took up, giving it a fresh
application. Such is the author's parting advice to the elder part of his
readers, — not very elevated, but not without a breath of
courageous faith (xi. 5). Not that he has given up his advo
cacy of pleasure. Side by side with work, a man should
cherish, even to the very last, all those sources of joy which
God Himself has provided, remembering the long dark days
which await him in Sheol. Then, at ver. 9, he addresses the
1 But Goethe may have thought of the Turkish proverb, ' Do good, throw the
loaf into the water ; if the fish knows it not, the Creator does,' or the story from
the life of the Caliph Mutewekyil [Mutawakkfl ?] quoted, "with this proverb, from
H. F. v. Diez by Dukes, Rabbinische Blumenlese, pp. 73-74. Comp. also the
stories in the Midrash Koheleth on our passage.

224 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. v.
young, and in measured distichs intreats them to enjoy life
while they may.
Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth,
and let thy heart gladden thee in the flower of thine age ;
and walk in the ways of thy heart
and according to the sight of thine eyes ;
And banish discontent from thy heart,
and put away evil from thy flesh : —
for youth and the prime of life are vanity.
Between lines 4 and 5 we find the received text bur
dened with a prosaic insertion, which is probably not due
to an after-thought on the part of the writer, but to the
anxiety of later students to rescue the orthodoxy of the book.
The insertion consists of the words, Rabbinic in expression as
well as in thought, ' But know that for all this God will bring
thee into the judgment.' l It was the wisdom of true charity
to inseit them ; but it is our wisdom as literary students to
' banish discontent ' with the discord which they introduce
by restoring the passage to its original form.
At this point Koheleth turns away from the young to those
(presumably) of his own age. Again there are traces at least
of a series of distichs which must once have stood here, but
either the author or one of his editors, or both, have so far
worked over them that the series is no longer perfect. The
first suspected instance of this ' overworking ' occurs at the
very outset. ' Remember thy Creator in the flower of thine
age,' are the opening words of Koheleth's second address.
They are usually explained as taking up the idea of the last
judgment expressed at the close of xi. 9. ' Since God,' to quote
Dr. Ginsburg's paraphrase, ' will one day hold us accountable
for all the works done in the body, we are to set the Lord
always before our eyes.' The importance of this passage, when
thus interpreted, is manifest. It suggests that Koheleth had
struggled through his many difficulties to an assured doctrinal
and practical position, and that it is not mere rejoicing, but
' rejoicing in the Lord,' that Koheleth recommends in xii. 1—
1 What judgment ? Present or future (i.e. after death)? The latter gives a
more forcible meaning (comp. iii. 17, xii. 14).

CHAP. v. THE WISE MANS PARTING COUNSELS 225
an edifying view of the old man's final result which every one
must desire to be true if only it be consistent with the rest
of the book. I fear that this is not the case. Elsewhere in
the book sensuous pleasure in moderation is praised without
any reference to God, and in the immediate neighbourhood
of this verse the motive given for rejoicing is not the thought
of God, but that of the many days of darkness (i.e. of Sheol)
which are coming. Besides, the exhortation ' Remember thy
Creator' does not perfectly suit the close of the verse, or
indeed of the section. What is the natural inference from
the fact that at an advanced age life becomes physically a
burden ? Surely this — that man should enjoy life while
his powers are fresh. Cannot an old man ' remember ' his
Creator ? (To ' remember ' is to think upon ; it is not a
synonym for conversion.) The text therefore is almost cer
tainly incorrect.
Has an editor, then, tampered with the text of the opening
words of the exhortation ? May we, for instance, follow
Gratz and read, for bor'e'ka ' thy Creator,' bor'ka ' thy foun
tain ' (lit. thy cistern), taking this as a metaphorical expres
sion for 'thy wife' or 'thy wedlock' (as in Prov. v. 15-18)?
The objection certain to be raised is that the text when thus
corrected brings the book to a lame and impotent conclusion.
It may be true, as Bishop Temple has said, that chastity and
monotheism are the chief legacies which the Jewish Church
has bequeathed to mankind.1 There is nothing in an exhor
tation to prize a pure married life unworthy of a high-minded
Jewish teacher. But in this connection it is certainly to a
Western reader strange, and one is sorely tempted to suppose
a displacement of the words, and, following Bickell, to make
the distich — And remember thy fountain
in the flower of thine age—
the conclusion of the stanzas beginning at xi. 9. This, it
is true, involves (1) the excision of the words 'for youth
and the prime of life are vanity,' and (2) an alteration of the
1 Essays and Reviews (1869), pp. 15-17.

2 26 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. V.
construction of xii. i, 2 (reading ' and evil days shall come' &c.)
This violent change is no doubt justified by Bickell on metri
cal grounds, but as I cannot unreservedly adopt his metrical
theory, I have not sufficient excuse for accepting his rear
rangement of the text.
I wish some better remedy than that of Gratz could be de
vised. I would gladly close these Meditations with admiration
as well as sympathy. But at the risk of being called unimagi
native, I must venture to criticise the entire conclusion of the
original Book of Koheleth (xii. 1-7). Most English critics
admire the poem on the evils of old age which follows on the
earnest ' Remember,' and naturally think that it requires some
specially sublime saying to introduce it. I do not join them
in their admiration, and consequently find it easier to adopt
what seems to some the ' low view ' of Dr. Gratz. Observe
that we have already met with an eulogy of wedded bliss side
by side with a gloomy picture of death in an earlier section
(ix. 9, 10).
This is the poem (if we may call it so) with which the
second exhortation of Koheleth is interwoven —
Ere the evil days come, and the years approach
of which thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them :
Ere the sun be darkened, and the light, and the moon, and the
stars,
and the clouds keep returning after heavy rains [the winter
rains, i.e. old age] :
In the day when the keepers of the house [the hands and arms]
tremble,
and the strong men [the feet and legs] bow themselves,
and the grinding-maids [the teeth] cease because they are.
few,
and the (ladies) who look out at the lattice [the eyes] are
darkened :
And the doors [the lips] are shut towards the street,
while the sound of the grinding is low,
And the voice riseth into a sparrow's [' childish treble ']
and all the daughters of song [words] are faint.
They are afraid too of a steep place,
and terror besets every way ;

chap. v. THE WISE MANS PARTING COUNSELS 227
and the almond-tree is in bloom [white hair ¦],
and the locust drags itself along,
and the caper-berry fails [to excite the appetite],
For the man is on the way to his eternal home,
and the mourners go about in the street.
Ere the silver string [the tongue] be tied,
and the golden bowl [the head] break,
and the pitcher [the heart] be shivered at the fountain,
and the windlass [the breathing apparatus] break into the pit.
With a little determination the traces of development in
the Biblical literature can be more or less effaced. The pious
but unphilological editors of Koheleth were not deficient in
this quality. After altering the introduction of the poem on
old age they proceeded to furnish it with a finale. Not only
the opening words of ver. i., but the comfortless expression ' his
eternal house ' 2 in ver. 5 gave them serious offence. One remedy
would have been to transpose (with the Syriac translator) two
of the letters of the Hebrew, and thus change ' home of his
eternity ' into ' home of his travail ' (i.e. the place where ' the
weary are at rest'). They preferred, however, to add two
lines — and the dust return to the earth as it was,
and the spirit return unto God who gave it.
This no doubt is a direct contradiction of iii. 21. But the
ancients probably got over this, as most moderns still do, by
supposing that the earlier passage did but express a sceptical
suggestion which skimmed the surface of Koheleth's mind.
The excision of these words would of course not be justi
fied in a translation intended for popular use ; but for the pur
poses of historical study seems almost inevitable. It hangs
together with the view adopted as to the origin of xi. gb, and
implies the assumption that the Targum rightly paraphrases,
1 Does the eastern sun blanch the ' crimson broidery ' of the almond-blossom ?
From the language of travellers like Thomson and Bodenstedt it would seem so.
8 The Hebrew 'oldm here expresses perpetuity (comp. Jer. li. 39, Ps. cxliii.
51, Ezek. xxvi. 20), not (as some moderns, after Aben Ezra) long continuance
It is true, that in the Targum of Isa. xlii. 1 1 an exit from the ' eternal house ' is
spoken of ; but no one doubts that the belief in the Resurrection was general in
the fourth century A. D.
Q2

2 28 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. V.
* and thy spirit (lit. thy breath, nishm'thak) will return to stand
in judgment before the Lord who gave it thee.' It ought to be
mentioned, however, that some critics (accepting the clause as
genuine) see in that return to God nothing more than the
absorption of the human spirit into the divine (whether in a
naive popular or in a developed philosophical sense).1 This
will seem plausible at first to many readers. As a Lutheran
writer says, ' Si spes, quam nos fovemus laetissimam, Eccle-
siastae adfulsisset, non obiter ipse tetigisset et verbis ambiguis
notasset rem maximi momenti ' (Winzer, ap. Hengstenberg).
But if the Hebrew ritakh means, as I think it does, the per
sonal, conscious, spiritual side of man in iii. 21,2 I fail to see
why it should not bear that meaning here.
1 Mr. Tyler interprets it in a Stoic sense of absorption in the World-Soul.
2 Nowack denies this meaning of rilakh altogether, but this seems a Gewalt-
streich.

229

CHAPTER VI.
KOHELETH'S ' PORTRAIT OF OLD AGE ; ' THE EPILOGUE,
ITS NATURE AND ORIGIN.
We have now arrived at the conclusion of the meditations of
our much-tried thinker. It is strongly poetic in colouring ;
but when we compare it with the grandly simple overture of
the book (i. 4-8), can we help confessing to a certain degree
of disappointment ? It is the allegory which spoils it for ,
modern readers, and so completely spoils it, that attempts
have been sometimes made to expel the allegorical element
altogether. That the first two verses are free from allegory,
is admitted, and it is barely possible that the sixth verse may be
so too — may be, that is, figurative rather than allegorical.
Poets have delighted in these figures ; how fitly does one of
them adorn the lament in Woolner's My Beautiful Lady, —
Broken the golden bowl
Which held her hallowed soul !
The most doubtful part, then, is the description in w. 3-5. I
am not writing a commentary, and will venture to express an
opinion in favour of the a'llegorists (it is not fair to call them
satirically the anatomists).1 It is true that there is much
variety of opinion among them ; this only shows that the al
legory is sometimes far-fetched, not that it is a vain imagina
tion. Can there be anything more obscure than the canzoni
1 The title only belongs to pre-critical writers like Dr. John Smith, who, in his
Portrait of Old Age (1666), sought to show that Solomon was thoroughly ac
quainted with recent anatomical discoveries. In revising my sheets, I observe
that even such a fairminded student as Dean Bradley speaks of ' the long-drawn
anatomical explanations of men who would replace with a dissector's report a
painter's touch, a poet's melody. ' But the Dean only refers to ver. 6 ; I under
stand his language, though I think him biassed by poetic associations.

230 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. vi.
in Dante's Convito, which we have the poet's own authority
for regarding as allegorical ? And if we compare the rival
theories with that which they attempt to displace, can it be
said that Taylor's dirge-theory,1 or Umbreit's storm-theory,2
or that adopted by Wright from Wetzstein 3 is more suit
able to the poem than the allegorical theory ? Certainly the
latter is a very old, if not the oldest theory, and on a point of
this sort the ancients have some claim to be deferred to.
They seem to have felt instinctively that the intellectual at
mosphere of Koheleth (as well as of the Chronicler) was that
of the later Judaism. The following story is related in a Tal-
mudic treatise.4 ' The Emperor asked R. Joshua ben Hanan-
yah, " How is it that you do not go to the house of Abidan
(a place of learned discussions) ? " He said to him, " The
mountain is snow (my head is white) ; the hoar frosts sur
round me (my whiskers and my beard are also hoary) ; its dogs
do not bark (I have lost my wonted power of voice) ; its mil
lers do not grind (I have no teeth) ; the scholars ask me whe
ther I am looking for something I have not lost (referring
probably to the old man feeling here and there)." '
Once more (see i. 2) the mournful motto, ' Vanity of vani
ties ! saith the Koheleth ; all is vanity ' (xii. 8), and the book
in its original form closes.5 Did the author himself attach
this motto ? Surely not, if the preceding words on the return
of the spirit to its God (see above, on iii. 21) are genuine, for
1 Namely, that vv. 3-5 are cited from an authorised book of dirges (comp. 2
Chr. xxxv. 25). There seems, however, no assignable reason for separating these
verses from the context. And how can the supposed mourners have sung the
latter part of ver. 5 ?
2 This supposes the approach of death to be described under the imagery of a
gathering storm.
s Namely, that the evil days of the close of life are described by figures drawn
from the 'seven days of death,' as the modern Syrians designate the closing days
of their winter. In a native Arabic rhyme, February says to March, ' O March, O
my cousin, the old women mock at me : three (days) of thine and four of mine—
and we will bring the old woman to singing (another tune).' Wright, Ecclesiastes,
p. 271 ; Delitzsch, Hoheslied und Kohelet, p. 447.
4 Shabbath, 151*, 152* (Wright, Ecclesiastes, p. 262). The anecdote is given
in connection with an allegoric interpretation of our poem.
s Dean Plumptre and Dr. Wright, however, make this the opening verse of
the Epilogue. But between ver. 8 and that which follows there is no inner con«
nsetion.

chap. vi. KOHELETH'S 'PORTRAIT OF OLD AGE ' 23 1
then ' Vanity of vanities ' would be a patent misrepresenta
tion. All is not ' vanity,' if there is in human nature a point
connecting a man with that world, most distant and yet most
near, where in the highest sense God is. If Koheleth wrote
xii. fb, he cannot have written xii. 8, any more than the
author of the Imitation could have written Vanitas vanitatum
both on his first page and on his last. Yet who but Koheleth
can be responsible for it ? For the later editors of whom I
have spoken, would be far from approving such a reversal of
the great charter of man's dignity in the eighth Psalm. To
me, the motto simply says that all Koheleth's wanderings had
but brought him back to the point from which he started.
' Grandissima vanita,' as Castelli, in his dignified Italian, puts
it, ' tutto e vanita.' All that I can assign to the editors in
this verse are the parenthetic words ' saith the Koheleth.'
Everywhere else we find ' Koheleth ; ' here alone, and perhaps
vii. 17 (corrected text), 'the Koheleth.'1
Let us now consider the Epilogue itself.
And moreover (it should be said) that Koheleth was a wise man ;
further, he taught the people wisdom, and weighed and made search,
(yea) composed many proverbs. Koheleth sought to find out
pleasant words, and he wrote down 2 plainly words of truth. The
words of the wise are like goads, and like nails well driven in ; the
members of the assemblies 3 have [in the case of Ecclesiastes] given
them forth from another shepherd.4 And as for all beyond them,
my son, be warned ; of making many books there is no end, and
1 The object of the article is perhaps to suggest that Koheleth is not really a
proper name. In vii. 27 we should correct dm'rdh qoheleth to dinar haqqoheleth.
Probably these words are an interpolation from the margin. They are nowhere
else used in support of Koheleth's opinions. The author of the interpolation may
have wished to indicate his disagreement with Koheleth's low opinion of women.
'' So Aquila, Pesh., Vulg., Gratz, Renan, Klostermann (v'kdthab).
3 I.e. the assemblies of 'wise men' or perhaps of Soferim. Surely ba'ale
must refer to persons. The meaning ' assemblies ' is justified by Talmudic pas
sages quoted by Griitz, Delitzsch, and Wright.
1 So Klostermann. ' Shepherd ' must, I think, mean teacher (comp. Jer. ii.
8, iii. 15 &c. ) ; the expression is suggested by the ' goads.' ' One shepherd ' (the
text-reading) might mean Solomon ; and we might go on to suppose the Solomonic
origin of Proverbs as well as Ecclesiastes to be asserted in this verse. But the
author of the Epilogue apparently considers Koheleth to be merely fictitiously
Solomon, but really a wise man like any other. If so, he cannot have grouped it
with Proverbs as a strictly Solomonic work.

232 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. VI.
much study is a weariness of the flesh. — That which the word ' all is
vanity ' comes to : ' it is understood (thus), Fear God, and keep His
commandments. For this (concerns) every man. For every work
shall God bring into the judgment (which shall be) upon all that is
concealed and all that is manifest, whether it be good or whether it
be evil. This translation has not been reached without some emen
dations of the text. It seems to me that everything in this
Epilogue ought to be clear. There is but one verse which
contains figurative expressions ; the rest is simple prose. It
is only fair, however, to give one of the current renderings of
those verses in which an emendation has been attempted
above. Koheleth sought to find out pleasant words and that which was
written down frankly, words of truth. Words of wise men are like
goads, and like nails driven in are those which form collections [or,
the well-compacted sayings, Ewald ; or, the well-stored ones, Kamp-
hausen] — they have been given by one shepherd. . . . Final result,
all having been heard : — Fear God and keep His commandments,
for this (concerns) every man.2
The first scholar to declare against the genuineness of the
Epilogue was Doderlein (Scholia inlibros V. T. poeticos, iffg),
who was followed by Bertholdt (Einleitung, p. 2250 &c),
Umbreit, Knobel, and De Jong.3 It was however a Jewish
scholar, Nachman Krochmal,4 who first developed an elaborate
theory to account for the Epilogue. According to him, it
1 So Klostermann, regarding this verse down to ' commandments ' as an ad
ditional note on this difficult saying of Koheleth's, which was liable to give offence
to orthodox readers. The word ' (is) vanity ' is supposed to have dropped out of
the text. The object of the note is to show under what limitations it can be ad
mitted that ' all is vanity. ' Then the writer continues, ' For this (concerns) every
man ; for every work ' &c, to show that the limiting precept is not less univer
sally applicable than Koheleth's melancholy formula.
2 Thus Delitzsch, who takes the ' words of the wise ' and the ' collections ' in
ver. 1 1 to refer at least in part, the former to the detached sayings, and the latter to -
the continuous passages, which together make up Ecclesiastes. The ' one shep
herd ' is held to be God, so that the clause involves a claim of divine inspiration.
3 De Jong's discussion of the Epilogue deserves special attention (De Prediker,
p. 142 &c.) ; comp. however Kuenen's reply, Onderzoek, iii. 196 &c.)
4 Krochmal died in 1840, but his view on the Epilogue first saw the light in
1851 in vol. xi. of the Hebrew journal Mori nebiike hazzeman (see Griitz, Kohe-
let, p. 47). His life is to be found in Zunz, Gesammelte Schriften, ii. 150 &c.

CHAP. vr. KOHELETH'S 'PORTRAIT OF OLD AGE ' 233
was added at the final settlement of the Canon at the Synod
of Jamnia, A.D. go, and was intended as a conclusion not
merely for Ecclesiastes, but for the entire body of Hagiographa.
He thinks (but without any historical ground) that Ecclesi
astes was added at that time to close the Canon. The cor
rectness of this view depends partly on its author's interpreta
tion of w. 11, 12, partly on his definition of the object of the
Synod of Jamnia (see Appendix.) The two former verses
are condensed thus,
The words of the wise are like ox-goads, and the members of the
Sanhedrin are like firm nails, not to be moved. As for more than
these, beware, my son ; of making many books there is no end.
The ' wise ' spoken of, thinks Krochmal, are the authors
of the several books of the Hagiographa, and the warning in
ver. 1 2 is directed against the reception of any other books into
the Canon. Whether the Song of Solomon and Ecclesiastes
were to be admitted, was, according to him, a subject of de
bate at the Synod referred to.
But there is no necessity whatever for this interpretation
of vv. 11, 12. The phrase, ' the words of the wise,' is not a fit
description of all the books of the Hagiographa (of Psalms,
Daniel, and Chronicles for instance), and the warning in
ver. 12 more probably has relation to the proverbial literature
in general, such as Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Wisdom
of Sirach, or at least to the Book of Proverbs, to which
Kleinert conjectures that Ecclesiastes once formed an ap
pendix. There is nothing in the Epilogue to suggest a re
ference to the Canon. The ' many books ' spoken of are
probably such as did not proceed from thoroughly orthodox
sources. We have absolutely no information as to Jewish
literature outside the Canon. That there was a heterodox
literature, has been inferred by Ewald from Jer. viii. 8, Prov.
xxx. 1-4 ; it is also clear from several passages in the Book
of Enoch. Tyler and Plumptre may possibly be right in
seeing here an allusion to the incipient influence of Greek
literature upon the Jews. This is at any rate more justifiable
than to assume an arrangement of the Hagiographa with

234 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. VI.
Ecclesiastes for the closing book for which there is no ancient
testimony. Krochmal's ingenious theory has, however, been adopted
by Jost, Gratz and Renan,1 though Renan is willing to admit
that vv. 9, 10 may be from the pen of the author himself.
' Cet epilogue complete bien la fiction qui fait la base du livre.
Quel motif d'ailleurs eut amend a faire posteVieurement une
telle addition ? ' 2 I do not myself, hold with Krochmal, but
vv. 9-12 seem to me to hang together, and I do not think
that the author himself would be at the pains to destroy his
own 'fiction, whereas a later editor would naturally append
the corrective statement that the real Koheleth was not a
king, but a wise man. (Observe too that ' Koheleth ' in ver. 8
has the article, but in vv. 9, 10 is without it, suggesting ' a
change of writer.) I agree however with Renan that vv. 13,
14, which differ in tone and in form from the preceding verses,
appear to be a later addition than the rest of the Epilogue.
Renan, it is true, distrusts this appearance ; he fears a too
complicated hypothesis. But we must at least hold that vv.
13, 14 were added (whether by the Epilogist or by another)
by an after-thought. The Epilogue should therefore be
divided into two parts, vv. 9-12, and vv. 13, 14. In the first
part, the real is distinguished from the fictitious author ; his
qualifications are described ; the editors of his posthumous
work are indicated ; and a warning is given to the disciple of
the Epilogist (to apply the words of M. Aurelius) ' to cast
away the thirst for books.' 3 In the second part, a contra
diction is given to what seemed an unworthy interpretation of
a characteristic expression of Koheleth's, and the higher view
of its meaning is justified — justified, that is, to those who
approach the work from the practical point of view of those
who have as yet no better moral ' Enchiridion.' 4
1 See Jost (Gesch. des Judenthums, i. 42, n. 2). Derenbourg too seems to
tend in this direction (Revue des etudes juives, i. 179, note). Reuss, Bickell,
and Kleinert too agree in denying that ' Koheleth ' composed the Epilogue. So
also apparently Geiger (fiid. Zeitschr., iv. 10, Anm. )
2 L' Ecclesiaste, p. 73. » Meditations, ii. 3.
4 I designedly refer to the great work of Epictetus, as its adaptation by Chris
tian hands to the use of Christian believers to some extent furnishes a parallel for
the editorial adaptation of Ecclesiastes.

CHAP. VI. KOHELETH S ' PORTRAIT OF OLD AGE 235
At what period was the Epilogue added ? The conside
ration of its style may help us at least to a negative result.
The Hebrew approaches that of the Mishna, but is yet suffi
ciently distinct from it to be the subject of expository para
phrase in the Talmuds.1 It is therefore improbable that it
was added long after the period of the author himself. Books
like Sirach and Koheleth soon became popular, and attracted
the attention of the religious authorities. Interpolation or
insertion seemed the only way to counteract the spiritual
danger to 'unsuspicious readers.
1 Delitzsch, Hoheslied u. Koheleth, p. 215.

236 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. vii.

CHAPTER VII.
ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS (FROM A PHILOLOGICAL
POINT OF VIEW).
By comparison with Ecclesiastes, the books which we have
hitherto been studying may be called easy ; at any rate, they
have not given rise to equally strange diversities of critical
opinion. A chapter with the above heading seems therefore
at this point specially necessary. Dr. Ginsburg's masterly
sketch of the principal theories of the critics down to i860
dispenses me, it is true, from attempting an exhaustive sur
vey.1 It is not the duty of every teacher of Old Testament
criticism to traverse the history of his subject afresh, any
more than it is that of the commentator as such to begin with
a catena of the opinions of previous writers. Suffice it to call
attention to two of the Jewish and two of the Christian expo
sitors mentioned by Dr. Ginsburg, viz. Mendelssohn and Luz
zatto, and Ewald and Vaihinger. MENDELSSOHN seems im
portant not so much by his results as by his historical position.
His life marks an era in Biblical study, most of all of course
among the Jews, but to some extent among Christians also.
His Hebrew commentary on Koheleth deserves specially to be
remembered, because with it in 1770 he broke ground anew
in grammatical exegesis. To him, as also to VAIHINGER,
the object of Koheleth is to propound the great consolatory
truth of the immortality of the soul, while Ewald, more in
accordance with facts, describes it as being rather to combine
1 For the Jewish traditions and theories, see further Schiffer, Das Buch Kohelet
nach der Auffassung der Weisen des Talmud und Midrasch und der jiidischen
Erkldrerdes Mittelalters, Theil I, Leipzig, 1885 ; and to complete Dr. Ginsburg's
survey of the literature, see Zbckler's list in Lange's Commentary and the additions
to this in the American edition ; also the preface to Wright's treatise on Eccle
siastes.

CHAP. VII. ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS 237
all that is true, however sad, and profitable, and agreeable to
the will of God in a practical handbook adapted to those
troublesome times. Ewald and Vaihinger both divide the
book into four sections, — (1) i. 2— ii. 26, (2) iii. i-vi. 9, (3) vi.
10-viii. 15, (4) viii. 16-xii. 8, with the Epilogue xii. 9-14.
The latter, whose view is more developed than Ewald's, and
whom I refer to as closing and summing up a period, main
tains that each section consists of three parts which are again
subdivided — for Koheleth, though you would not think it, is
a literary artist — into strophes and half-strophes, and that the
theme of each section is thrown out, seemingly by chance,
but really with consummate art, in the preceding one. Thus
the four sections interlace, and the unity of the book is esta
blished. The Epilogue, too, according to Vaihinger, can thus
be proved to be the work of the author of Koheleth ; for it
does but ratify and develope what has already been indicated
in xi. 9, and without it the connection of ideas would be in
complete.1 I think that our experience of some interpreters
of the Book of Job may predispose us to be sceptical of such
ingenious subtleties, and I notice that more recent critics show
a tendency to insist less on the logical distribution of the con
tents and to regard the book, not indeed as a mere collection
of rules of conduct, but at any rate as a record of a practical
and not a scholastic philosopher. This tendency is not in
deed of recent origin, though it has increased in favour of late
years. Prior the poet had already said that Ecclesiastes ' is
not a regular and perfect treatise, but that in it great trea
sures are "heaped up together in a confused magnificence ;" '2
Bishop Lowth, that ' the connection of the arguments is in
volved in much obscurity ; ' 3 while Herder, in his letters to a
theological student, had penned this wise though too enthusi
astic sentence, which cuts at the root of all attempts at
logical analysis,
Kein Buch ist mir aus dem Alterthum bekannt, welches die
Summe des menschlichen Lebens, seine Abwechselungen und
1 See Vaihinger's article in Herzog's Realencyclopddie, xii. 92-106. I have
not seen his book on Ecclesiastes (1858).
8 Ginsburg, Coheleth, p. 168. s Ibid., p. 178.

-j

8 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. vii.

Nichtigkeiten in Geschaften, Entwiirfen, Speculationen und Ver-
gniigen, zugleich mit dem was einzig in ihm wahr, daurehd, fortge-
hend, wechselnd, lohnend ist, reicher, eindringlicher, kiirzer be-
schriebe, als dieses.1
But I must retrace my steps. One of my four critics has
yet to be briefly characterised — S. D. LUZZATTO of Padua, best
known as the author of a Hebrew commentary on Isaiah,
but also a master in later Hebrew and Aramaic scholarship.
As a youth of twenty-four he wrote a deeply felt and some
what eccentrically ingenious treatise on Koheleth, which he
kept by him till i860, when it appeared in one of the annual
volumes of essays and reviews called Ozar Nechmad. In it
he maintains, with profound indignation at the unworthy
post-Exile writer, that the Book of Ecclesiastes denies the im
mortality of the soul, and recommends a life of sensuous plea
sure. The writer's name, however, was, he thinks, Koheleth,
and his fraud in assuming the name of Solomon was detected
by the wise men of his time, who struck out the assumed
name and substituted Koheleth (leaving however the words
' son of David, king in Jerusalem,' as a record of the impos
ture). Later students, however, were unsuspicious enough to
accept the work as Solomon's, and being unable to exclude a
Solomonic writing from the Canon, they inserted three quali
fying half-verses of an orthodox character, viz. ' and know
that for all this God will bring thee into judgment ' (xi. 6b) ;
' and remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth ' (xii. id) ;
' and the spirit shall return to God who gave it ' (xii. 8b).
This latter view, which has the doubtful support of a Talmudic
passage,2 appears to me, though from the nature of the case
uncertain, and susceptible, as I think, of modification, yet in
itself probable as restoring harmony to the book, and in accord
ance with the treatment of other Biblical texts by the Sofe-
rim (or students and editors of Scripture). Geiger may have
fallen into infinite extravagances, but he has at any rate
shown that the early Soferim modified many passages in the
interests of orthodoxy and edification.3 If so, they did but
1 Werke (Suphan), x. 134. 2 Shabbath, 97a (see Ginsburg, p. 98).
3 See his Urschrift und Uebersetzungen der Bibel (l8$J).

chap. vii. ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS 239
carry on the process already begun by the authors of the
sacred books themselves ; it may be enough to remind my
readers of the gradual supplementing of the original Book of
Job by later writers. To the three passages of Koheleth
mentioned above, must be added, as Geiger saw,1 the two
postscripts which form the Epilogue. From the close of the
last century a series of writers have felt the difficulties of
this section so strongly that they have assigned it to one or
more later writers, and in truth, although these difficulties
may be partly removed, enough remains to justify the obe
lising of the passage.
There is no evidence that Luzzatto ever retracted the criti
cal view mentioned above. To the character of the author, it
is true, he became more charitable in his later years. I do
not think the worse of him for his original antipathy. An
earnest believer himself and of fiery temperament, he could
not understand the cool and cautious reflective spirit of the
much-tried philosopher ; 2 and as a lover of the rich, and, as the
result of development, comparatively flexible Hebrew tongue,
he took a dislike to a writer so wanting in facility and grace
as Koheleth.3 It was an error, but a noble one, and it shows
that Luzzatto found in the study of criticism a school of
moral culture as well as of literary insight.
The adoption of Luzzatto's view,4 combined with Doder-
lein's as to the epilogue, removes the temptation to interpret
Koheleth as the apology of any particular philosophical or
theological doctrine. The author now appears, not indeed
thoroughly consistent, but at least in his true light as a
thinker tossed about on the sea of speculation, and without
1 Jiidische Zeitschrift, iv. 9 &c.
* David Castelli, a cool and cautious scholar but not original, is naturally
better fitted to appreciate Koheleth (see II libro del Kohelet, Pisa, 1866).
3 ' Die harte, ungefugige, tiefgesunkene Sprache des Buches entzog ihm in
Luzzatto's Auge den verklarenden Lichtglanz ; er blickte mit einer gewissen Miss-
achtung auf den Schriftsteller, der sowenig Meister der edlen ihn erfullenden
Sprache war ' (Geiger).
4 Not only Geiger, but the learned and fairminded Kalisch, has made this
view his own (Bible Studies, i. 65) ; among Christian scholars it has been adopted
by Noldeke and Bickell (the latter includes iii. 17 among the inserted passages,
and I incline to follow him).

240

THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. VII.

any fixed theoretic conclusions. Without agreeing to more
than the relative lateness of the epilogue, De Jong,1 a Dutch
scholar, recognises the true position of Koheleth, and in the
psychological interest of the book sees a full compensation
for the want of logical arrangement. De Jong indeed was
not acquainted with the theory of Nachman Krochmal, which
if sound throws such great light on the reason of the addition
of the epilogue (see end of Chap. VI.) This has been accepted
by Gratz and Renan, but, as I have ventured to think, upon
insufficient grounds. The brevity of my reference to these
two eminent exegetes must be excused by my inability to
follow either of them in his main conclusions. The glossary
of peculiar words and the excursus on the Greek translation
given by the former (1871) possess a permanent value, and
there is much of historical interest in his introduction. But I
agree with Kuenen that the student who selects Gratz as his
guide will have much to unlearn afterwards.2 In order to
show that Ecclesiastes is a politico-religious satire levelled
against king Herod, with the special object of correcting cer
tain evil tendencies among the Jews of that age, Gratz is com
pelled to have recourse to much perverse exegesis which I
have no inclination to criticise.3 Renan's present view differs
widely from that given in his great unfinished history of the
Semitic languages. But I shall have occasion to refer to his
determination of the date of our book later.
Among recent English students, no one will refuse the palm
of acuteness and originality to Tyler (1874). His strength
lies not in translation and exegesis, but in the consistency
with which he has applied his single key, viz. the comparison
of the book with Stoic and Epicurean teaching. He is fully
aware that the book has no logical divisions. Antithesis and
contradiction is the fundamental characteristic of the book.
Not that the author contradicts himself (comp. the quotation
from Ibn Ezra in Ginsburg's Coheleth, p. 57), but that a faith
ful index of the contradictions of the two great philosophical
1 De Prediker vertaald en verklaart door P. de Jong (Leiden, 1861).
2 Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1883, p. 114.
3 See however Kuenen's condensed criticism in Theol. Tijdschrift, p. 127 &c.

CHAP. VII. ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS 24 1
schools gives a greater point to his concluding warning against
philosophy. It is the ' sacrificio dell' intelletto ' which the
author counsels. But Mr. Tyler's theory or at least his point
of view demands a separate consideration. It may however
be fairly said here that by general consent Mr. Tyler has
done something to make the influence of Greek philosophical
ideas upon Ecclesiastes a more plausible opinion.
To a subsequent chapter I must also beg to refer the
reader for a notice of Gustav BICKELL'S hypothesis ( 1 884) re
lative to the fortunes (or misfortunes) of the text of Koheleth.
This critic is not one of those who grant that the book had
from the first no logical division, and his hypothesis is one
of the boldest and most plausible in the history of criticism.
Its boldness is in itself no defect, but I confess I desiderate
that caution which is the second indispensable requisite in
a great critic. The due admixture of these two qualities
nature has not yet granted. Meantime the greatest successes
are perhaps attained by those who are least self-confident,
least ambitious of personal distinction. Upon the whole,
from the point of view of the student proper, are there more
thankworthy contributions to criticism not less than to exege
sis than the books of Plumptre (1881), Nowack (1883), and
above all the accomplished altmeister Franz Delitzsch
(1875)? Whatever has been said before profitably and well,
may be known by him who will consult these three accom
plished though not faultless expositors. I would not be
supposed to detract from other writers,1 but I believe that the
young student will not repent limiting himself, not indeed to
one, but to three commentaries.
1 Hitzig, for instance, has been passed over in spite of Noldeke's judgment
that no modern scholar has done so much for the detailed explanation of the text.
This may be true, or at least be but a small exaggeration. No critic has so good
a right to the name as Hitzig, who, though weak in his treatment of ideas, has the
keenest perception of what is possible and impossible in interpretation. But for
the larger critical questions Hitzig has not done much ; the editor of the second
edition of his commentary (Nowack) has therefore been obliged to rewrite the
greater part of the introduction. The historical background of the book cannot
be that supposed by Hitzig, nor has he hit the mark in his description of Koheleth
as 'eine planmiissig fortschreitende Untersuchung.' Wright fails, I venture to
think from different causes. He is slightly too timid, and deficient in literary art ;
and yet his scholarly work does honour to the Protestant clergy of Ireland.

242 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. viii.

CHAPTER VIII.
ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS (FROM A LITERARY AND
PSYCHOLOGICAL POINT OF VIEW).
It is not every critic of Ecclesiastes who helps the reader to
enjoy the book which is criticised. Too much criticism and
too little taste have before now spoiled many excellent books
on the Old Testament. Ecclesiastes needs a certain prepa
ration of the mind and character, a certain ' elective affinity,'
in order to be appreciated as it deserves. To enjoy it, we
must find our own difficulties and our own moods anticipated
in it. We must be able to sympathise with its author either
in his world-weariness and scepticism or in his victorious,
struggle (if so be it was victorious) through darkness into
light. We must at any rate have a taste for the develop
ment of character, and an ear for the fragments of truth which
a much-tried pilgrim gathered up in his twilight wanderings.
Never so much as in our own time have this taste and this
ear been so largely possessed, as a recent commentary has
shown in delightful detail, and I can only add to the names
furnished by the writer that of one who perhaps least of all
should be omitted, Miss Christina Rossetti.1 But to prove
the point in my own way, let me again select four leading
critics, as representatives not so much of philology as of that
subtle and variable thing — the modern spirit, viz. RENAN,
Gratz, Stanley, and Plumptre. The first truly is a
modern of the moderns, though it is not every modern who
will subscribe to his description of Ecclesiastes as ' livre char-
mant, le seul livre aimable qui ait etc" compose par un Juif.' 2
1 See especially her early sonnet ' Vanity of Vanities,' and her striking poem
' A Testimony.' 2 L' Antichrist, p. 101.

OHAP. vm. ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS 243
One might excuse it perhaps if in some degree dictated by
a bitter grief at the misfortunes of his country ; pessimism
might be natural in 1872. But alas ! ten years later the
same view is repeated and deliberately justified, nor can the
author of Koheleth be congratulated. He is now described l
as ' le charmant ecrivain qui nous a laisse" cette deUicieuse fan-
taisie philosophique, aimant la vie, tout en en voyant la
vaniteV or, as a French reviewer condenses the delicate
phrases of his author, 'homme du monde et de la bonne
socieie, qui n'est, a proprement parler, ni blase ni fatigud,
mais qui sait en toutes choses garder la mesure, sans enthou-
siasme, sans indignation, et sans exaltation d'aucune espece.'
A speaking portrait of a Parisian philosopfie, but does it fit
the author of Ecclesiastes? No ; Koheleth has had too hard
a battle with his own tongue to be a ' charming writer,'
and even if not exactly blase1 (see however ii. 1-11), he is
' fatigued ' enough with the oppressive burdens of Jewish
life in the second century B.C. That he has no enthusiasm,
and none of those visions which are the 'creators and
feeders of the soul,' 2 is cause for pity, not for admiration ;
but that he has had no visitings of sceva indignatio, is an un
just inference from his acquired calmness of demeanour. He
is an amiable egoist, says M. Renan ; but would Koheleth
have troubled himself to write as he does, if egoism were the
ripened fruit of his life's experience ? Why does this critic
give such generous sympathy to the Ecclesiastes of the Slav
race,3 and such doubtful praise to his great original ? It is
true, Koheleth seems to despair of the future, but only perhaps
of the immediate future (iii. 21), and Turgenieff does this too.
' Will the right men come ? ' asks one of the personages of
Turgenieff s Helen, and his friend, as the only reply, directs a
questioning look into the distance. That is the Russian
philosopher's last word ; Koheleth has not told us his. His
literary executors, no doubt, have forced a last word upon
him ; but we have an equal right to imagine one for ourselves.
M. Renan ' likes to dream of a Paul become sceptical and dis-
1 V Ecclisiaste, pp. 24, 90. " Mordecai in Daniel Deronda.
3 See his funeral c'loge, reprinted in Academy, Oct. 13, 1883, p. 248. R 2

244 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH cnAP. vni.
enchanted ; ' • his Koheleth is an only less unworthy dream.
M. Renan praises Koheleth for the moderation of his philoso
phising ; he repeatedly admits that there was an element of
truth in the Utopianism of the prophets ; why not ' dream '
that Koheleth felt, though he either ventured not or had no
time left to express it, some degree of belief in the destiny of
his country? M. Renan, in fact, seems to me at once to admire Kohe
leth too much, and to justify his admiration on questionable
grounds. It might have been hoped that the unlikeness of
this book to the other books of the Canon would have been
the occasion of a worthy and a satisfying estimate from this
accomplished master. A critic of narrower experience repre
sents Koheleth partly as a cynical Hebrew Pasquin, who
satirises the hated foreigner, Herod the Great, and the minions
of his court, partly as an earnest opponent of a dangerous
and growing school of ascetics. I refer to this theory here,
not to criticise it, but to call attention to its worthier con
ception of Koheleth's character. The tendency of Ecclesiastes
Dr. Gratz considers to be opposed to the moral and religious
principles of Judaism and Christianity, but to the man as dis
tinguished from his book he does full justice. It is a mistake
when this writer's theory is represented by Dean Plumptre as
making Koheleth teach ' a license like that of a St. Simonian
rehabilitation of the flesh.' 2 Koheleth's choice of language is
not indeed in good taste, but it was only a crude way of em
phasising his opposition to a dangerous spirit of asceticism.
Such at least is Dr. Gratz's view. ' Koheleth is not the slave of
an egoistic eudemonism, but merely seeks to counteract pie-
tistic self-mortification.' 3 Dr. Gratz thinks, too, and rightly,
that he can detect an old-fashioned Judaism in the sup
posed sceptical philosopher : Koheleth controverts the new
tenet of immortality, but not that of the resurrection. I am
anticipating again, but do so in order to contrast the sym
pathetic treatment of the Breslau professor with the un
sympathetic or at least unsuitable portraiture of Koheleth
given by the Parisian critic.
1 V 'Antichrist, p. 200. 2 Ecclesiastes, p. 8. » Gratz, Kohelet, p. 33.

CHAP. viii. ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS 245
Of all writers known to me, however, none is so sympa
thetic to Koheleth as Dr. Plumptre, in whose pleasing article
in Smith's Dictionary we have the germ of the most interest
ing commentary in the language. A still wider popularity
was given to the Herder- Plumptre theoiy by Dr. Stanley, who
eloquently describes Ecclesiastes as ' an interchange of voices,
higher and lower, within a single human soul.' ' It is like,' he
continues, ' the perpetual strophe and antistrophe of Pascal's
Pens/es. But it is more complicated, more entangled, than
any of these, in proportion as the circumstances from which
it grows are more perplexing, as the character which it repre
sents is vaster, and grander, and more distracted.' 1 In his
later work, Dr. Plumptre aptly compares the ' Two Voices '
of our own poet (strictly, he remarks, there are three voices
in Ecclesiastes), in which, as in Koheleth, though more de
cidedly, the voice of faith at last prevails over that of
pessimism.2 I fear, however, that Dr. Plumptre's generous
impulse carries him farther than sober criticism can justify.
The aim of writing an ' ideal biography ' closing with the
' victory of faith ' seems to me to have robbed his pen of that
point which, though sometimes dangerous, is yet indispensable
to the critic. The theory of the ' alternate voices,' of which
Dr. Plumptre is, not the first,3 but the most eloquent advocate,
seems to me to be an offspring of the modern spirit. It is so
very like their own case — the dual nature 4 which a series of
refined critics has attributed to Koheleth, that they in
voluntarily invest Koheleth with the peculiar qualities of
modern seekers after truth. To them, in a different sense from
M. Renan's, Ecclesiastes is ' un livre aimable,' just as Marcus
Aurelius and Omar Khayyam are the favourite companions of
those who prefer more consistent thinking.
Certainly the author of Ecclesiastes might well be satisfied
with the interest so widely felt in his very touching con
fidences. It is the contents, of course, which attract so many
1 Jewish Church, ii. 256. 2 Ecclesiastes, pp. 53, 259.
3 See the passage from Herder quoted in Appendix (end).
1 Comp. Jacobi's confession (imitated by Coleridge ?) that he was with the
head a heathen, and with the heart a Christian.

246 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. viii.
of our contemporaries — not the form : only a student of
Hebrew can appreciate the toilsome pleasure of solving philo
sophical enigmas. And yet M. Renan has made it possible
even for an exigeant Parisian to enjoy, not indeed the process,
but the results, of philological inquiry, in so far as they reveal
the literary characteristics of this unique work ; he has,
indeed, in his function of artistic translator, done Koheleth
even more than justice. In particular, his translations of the
rhythmic passages of Koheleth which relieve the surrounding
prose are real tours de Jorce. These passages M. Renan,
following M. Derenbourg,1 regards as quotations from lost
poetical works, reminding us that such poetical quotations are
common in Arabic literature. To represent in his translation
the character of the Hebrew rhythm, which is ' dancing, light,
and pretentiously elegant,' M. Renan adopts the metres of
Old French poetry. ' II s'agissait de calquer en francais des
sentences concues dans le ton degage, goguenard et pru-
d'homme a la fois de Pibrac, de Marculfe ou de Chatonnet, de
produire un saveur analogue a celle de nos quatrains de
moralit^s ou de nos vieux proverbes en bouts -rimeV Of the
poem on old age he says that it is ' une sorte de joujou funebre
qu'on dirait cisele par Banville ou par Theophile Gautier et
que je trouve supeVieur m£me aux quatrains de Khayyam.' 2
I should have thought the comparison very unjust to the
Persian poet. To me, I confess, the prelude or overture
(i. 4-8), though not in rhythmic Hebrew, is the gem of the
book. Questionable though its tendency may seem, if we look
at the context, its poetry is of elemental force, and appeals to
the modern reader in some of his moods more than almost
anything else in the Old Testament outside the Book of Job.
I cannot help alluding to Carlyle's fine application of its
imagery in Sartor Resartus, ' Generations are as the Days of
toilsome Mankind : Death and Birth are the vesper and the
matin bells, that summon mankind to sleep, and to rise re
freshed for new advancement' How differently Koheleth, —
1 Revue des Hudesjuives, i. 165-185. I do not myself see why Koheleth, who
sought 'pleasant words,' should not have written poetry as well as prose.
2 L'Ecclisiaste, pp. 83, 84.

CHAP. viii. ECCLESIASTES AND ITS CRITICS 247
One generation goeth, another cometh ;
but the earth abideth for ever :
And the sun ariseth, and the sun goeth down,
and panteth unto his place where he ariseth :
It goeth to the south, and whirleth about unto the north,
the wind whirleth about continually ;
and upon his circuits the wind returneth.
All streams run into the sea, and the sea is not full ;
unto the place whither the streams go, thither they go again.
All things are full of weariness ; no man can utter it ;
the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with
hearing.
Compare with this the words, so Greek in tone, of xi. 7, as
well as the constantly recurring formula ' under the sun '
(e.g. i. 3, iv. 3). We can see that even Koheleth was affected
by nature, but without any lightening of his load of trial.
The wide-open eye of day seemed to mock him by its
Unfeeling serenity. He lacked that susceptibility for the
whispered lessons of nature which the poet of Job so pre
eminently possessed ; he lacked too the great modern con
ception of progress, embodied in that fine passage from
Carlyle. He was prosaic and unimaginative, and it is partly
because there is so little poetry in Ecclesiastes that there is
so little Christianity. But I am already passing to another
order of considerations, without which indeed we cannot
estimate this singular autobiography aright. We have next
to consider Koheleth from a directly religious and moral
point of view.

248 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap, ix.

CHAPTER IX.
ECCLESIASTES FROM A MORAL AND RELIGIOUS
POINT OF VIEW.
We have seen how large a Christian element penetrates and
glorifies the bold questionings of the Book of Job. Whatever
be our view on obscure problems of criticism, the character-
drama which the book in its present form presents is one
which it almost requires a Christian to appreciate adequately.
It is different with the Book of Ecclesiastes. ' He who will
allow that book to speak for itself, and does not read other
meanings into almost every verse, must feel at every step that
he is breathing a different atmosphere from that of the teach
ing of the Gospels.' : Still more is this the case if we claim
the right of free criticism, and deny that the hints of a
growing tendency to believe are due to the morbidly scepti
cal author of the book (if it may be called a book). Certainly
the religious use of Koheleth is more directly affected by
modern criticism and exegesis than that of any other Old
Testament writing. The early theologians could dispense
with criticism, because they so frequently allegorised or un
consciously gave a gentle twist to the literal meaning. But
we, if for a religious . purpose we use the book uncritically,
must be well aware that we often misrepresent both the
author of Koheleth himself and Christian faith. Let me only
mention three texts in the use of which this misrepresentation
very commonly takes place. The fixity of the spiritual state
in which a man is at death may or may not be an essential
Christian doctrine, but we have no right to quote either
1 Dean Bradley, Lectures on Ecclesiastes (1885), p. 7.

CHAP. ix. FROM A MORAL POINT OF VIEW 249
Koheleth's despairing description of the inert life of the
shades (ix. 10), or the proverbial saying on the unalterable-
ness of the laws of nature (xi. 3), in support of this ; nor is it
well to adopt a phrase (descriptive of Sheol) from xii. 5,
which favours the false idea expressed in the too common
' Here lieth ' of the churchyard. Anticipations of really fun
damental Christian doctrines are, I admit, rarely sought for in
Ecclesiastes. It is well that this should be so. How completely
the evangelical elements in Jewish religion had been obscured
later on in this period, we have seen from the Wisdom of
Sirach. It seemed in fact as if the only alternatives then for a
thoughtful Jew were a more or less strict legal orthodoxy and
a resigned acquiescence in things as they were, brightened
only by gleams, eagerly hailed, of intellectual or sensuous plea
sure. Sirach chose the former of these, Koheleth the latter.
Koheleth's was not in itself the better choice. But the worse
alternative needed perhaps to be stated as forcibly as pos
sible, that men might see the rock and avoid shipwreck.
Ecclesiastes, like the first part of Goethe's Faust, may, with
the fullest justice, be called an apology for Christianity, not
as containing anticipations of Christian truth — the error of
Hengstenberg ; ' but inasmuch as it shows that neither wisdom,
nor any other human good or human pleasure, brings perman
ent satisfaction to man's natural longings. It is at any rate
a contribution towards the negative criticism with which such
an apology must begin, just as the Book of Job is a contribu
tion, or a series of contributions, towards a more perfect and
evangelical theodicy.
There is at least one point, then, which the moral and
religious critic of Ecclesiastes can adopt out of all the strangely
distorted views of patristic writers, so ably summed up by Dr.
Ginsburg in his Introduction, viz. that the gloomy sentence,
Vanitas vanitatum, is perfectly accurate when applied to the
life of Koheleth, but only to a life like his. Thomas a Kempis
1 See Der Prediger Salomo (1859). Hengstenberg misses, it is true, any direct
reference to tbe Christian hope, but finds the idea of chastisement as a proof
of divine love in iii. 18, vii. 2-4, an emphatic affirmation of eternal life in iii. 21,
and tbe resignation of a faith like Job's in iii. 11, vii. 24, viii. 17, xi. 5. Kohe
leth's questionings are therefore according to him ' eine heilige Philosophie.'

25O THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. IX.
could prelude with two verses from Koheleth (i. 2, 8), but he
could only prelude. A life of true service — one whose centre
is outside self or family or even nation — is not vanity nor
vexation of spirit : Koheleth might have added this as the
burden of a second part of his book. But did he not actually
append it as his epilogue ? Did he not ' faintly trust ' the hope
of immortality (xii. 7) ? Did he not work his way back to a
living faith, like ' Asaph ' in Ps. lxxiii. ? There is no question
that the book was admitted into the Canon on the assumption
that he did. As a great Jewish preacher says, the book [in
its present form] opens with Nothingness, but closes with the
fear of God.1 It is parallel in this respect to many Jewish
lives, like that of Heine, which may be described as the
prodigal son's quest of his long-lost father. Accepting this
view, we may join with another Jewish writer in his admira
tion of the influences of Jewish theism, which were then at
least so strong that a consistent Jewish sceptic was an im
possibility. ' It is this,' he remarks, ' that gives the peculiar
charm to this little book.' 2 It is impossible to give a conclusive
refutation of this view, which I should like to believe true, but
which seems to me to labour under exegetical difficulties.
To me, Koheleth is not a theist in any vital sense in his
philosophic meditations, and his so-called ' last word ' seems
forced upon him by later scribes, just as Sirach's orthodoxy
was at any rate heightened in colour by subsequent editors.
To me, Derenbourg's view is a dream, though an edifying one.
It may be that the author did return to the simple faith of
his childhood. He certainly never lost his theism, though pale
and cheerless it was indeed, and utterly unable to stand
against the assaults of doubt and despondency. It may be
that history, neglected history, taught him at last to believe in
the divine guidance of the fortunes of Israel. I would fain
imagine this retracing of the weary pilgrim's steps ; but other
and less pleasing dreams to a Christian are equally possible
and I do not venture to accept the return of the prodigal as a
well-authenticated fact.
1 Preface to vol. iii. of S. Holdheim's Predigten.
2 J. Derenbourg, Revue des itudes juives, No. 2, Oct. 1880.

CHAP. IX. FROM A MORAL POINT OF VIEW 25 1
We must remember too that the troubled wanderer had not
really so many steps to retrace. Much that both Christians
and Jews now regard as essential to faith was not, in the time
of Koheleth, commonly so regarded. I am well aware of the
great intuitions of some of the psalmists at certain sublime
moments, and admit that they seem to us to lead naturally
on to our own orthodoxy. But these intuitions could not and
did not possess the force of dogmas. The great doctrines of
the Resurrection and of Immortality had long to wait for a
moderate degree of acceptance (they were not held, for instance,
by Sirach), and longer still before they coalesced in a new and
greater doctrine of the future life. Koheleth's dissatisfaction
with the doctrine of present retribution (the central point both
of his heterodoxy and of Job's) might have helped him to
accept the former of these. His acquaintance with non-Jewish
philosophical literature, if we may venture to assume this as a
fact, might have led him, as it led the author of the Wisdom
of Solomon, to embrace the hope of immortality. But though
there probably is an allusion to this hope as well-founded in
xii. fb, we have seen reason to doubt whether the words came
from Koheleth himself; at any rate, they are isolated, and
many do not admit the allusion. Either of these doctrines
would have saved Koheleth from despondency had he accepted
it. From our present point of view, we must blame him for
not accepting one refuge or the other, or even that simpler
belief in the imperishableness of the Jewish race which Sirach
had, and which has preserved so many Israelitish hearts in
trials as severe as Koheleth's. There must have been a strange
weakness in his moral fibre ; how else can we account either
for his want of Jewish feeling or, I would now add, using the
word in its looser sense, for his pessimism ? As Huber has
well observed,1 none of the ancient peoples was naturally less
inclined to pessimism than the Jews, so that a work like
Ecclesiastes is a portent in the Old Testament, and alien to
.the spirit of true Judaism. I cannot wonder that both Jews
and Christians have now and again been repelled by this
1 Der Pessimismus, 1876, p. 8. Schopenhauer too calls the Jews the most opti
mistic race in history.

252 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. IX,
strange book i and denied its title to canonicity, partly for
its pessimism, partly for its supposed Epicureanism, or that
the author of the Book of Wisdom before them should have
given Koheleth the most scathing of condemnations by
putting almost its very language into the mouth of the un
godly.2 The true student may no doubt be equally severe
upon Koheleth for his despair of wisdom and depreciation of
its delights (i. 17, 18, ii. 15, 16), which are hardly redeemed
by the utilitarian sayings in vii. 11, 12.
I cannot justify Koheleth, but I can plead for a mitigation
of these censures, and altogether defend the admission of the
Book (not, of course, as Solomonic) into the sacred Canon.
Whether Jewish or not, the pessimistic theory of life has a
sound kernel. ' Our sadness,' as Thoreau says, ' is not sad,
but our cheap joys. Let us be sad about all we see and are,
for so we demand and pray for better. It is the constant
prayer [of the good] and whole Christian religion.' 3 This too
is the burden of E. von Hartmann's criticism of a crudely opti
mistic Christianity ; and need we reject the truth for the ex
travagances of the teacher ? Next, as to the preference of
sensuous enjoyment to philosophic pursuits in Koheleth. I
would not seek to weaken passages like ii. 24, viii. 15, by
putting them down to the irony of a smva indignatio. But as
for the depreciation of intellectual pleasure, may it not be ex
cused by the author's want of a sure prospect of the ' age to
come ' such as we find in those lines of Davenant,4
Before by death you nearer knowledge gain
(For to increase your knowledge you must die),
Tell me if all that knowledge be not vain,
On which we proudly in this life rely.
And as to the commendations of sensuous pleasure, have they
not a relative justification ? 5 The legalism of the ' righteous
1 See Appendix.
2 Wisd. ii. 6; comp. Plumptre, Ecclesiastes, p. 71 &c, Wright, Koheleth, pp.
69, 70. s Letters to Various Persons, p. 25.
4 See the extracts in Trench's Household Book of English Poetry, p. 405.
5 I do not of course assent to the form in which Gratz puts this, to serve his
hypothesis as to the age of Koheleth. See Appendix.

CHAP. IX. FROM A MORAL POINT OF VIEW 253
overmuch ' threatened already perhaps to make life an in
tolerable burden. And though Koheleth erred in the form of
his teaching, yet he did well to teach the ' duty of delight '
(Ruskin) and to oppose an orthodoxy which sought, not
merely to transform, but to kill nature. It is to his credit
that he touches on the relations of the sexes with such
studious reserve.1 As a rule, the enjoyments which he recom
mends are those of the table, which in Sirach's time (Ecclus.
xxxii. 3-5) and perhaps also in Koheleth's included music
and singing,— in short, festive but refined society. His praise
of festive mirth is at any rate more excusable morally than
Omar Khayyam's impassioned commendations of the wine-
cup.2 As Jeremy Taylor says, ' It was the best thing that
was then commonly known that they should seize upon the
present with a temperate use of permitted pleasures.' 3 Lastly,
the admission of the book into the Canon is (perhaps we may
say) not less providential than that of the Song of Songs.
The latter shows us human nature in simple and healthy
relations of life ; the former, a human nature in a morbid
state and in depressed and artificial circumstances. How to
return at least to inward simplicity and health, the latter
part (not the Epilogue) of the Book of Job beautifully
shows us.
Our great idealist poet Shelley, who so admired Job, dis
liked Ecclesiastes for the same reason as the ancient heretics
already mentioned. One greater than he, our 'sage and
serious ' Milton, justifies the sacred Scripture for the variety
of its contents on the same ground that he advocates ' un
licensed printing.' Both are ' for the trial of virtue and the
exercise of truth.' We need not, then, he says, be surprised
if the Bible 'brings in holiest men passionately murmuring
1 Once Koheleth appears as a sharp critic of the female sex (vii. 26-29).
2 Lagarde describes Omar as ' ein schlemmer, der die angst des irdischen
daseins und die ode langeweile seiner noch in den anfangen stehenden wissenschaft
hinwegzuschwelgen suchte' (Symmicta, 1877, p. 9). Too hard a judgment per
haps on this changeful and impressionable nature. See Bodenstedt's version as
well as Fitzgerald's.
J The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying, chap. i. , sect. 3. Parts of this
chapter remind us strongly of Koheleth, and are strange indeed in a book of
Christian devotion.

254 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. IX.
against Providence through all the arguments of Epicurus.' '
The Bible, according to Milton, is perfect not in spite but
because of its variety ; it is like the rugged ' mountains of
God,' not like the symmetrical works of human art. But
Milton has also reminded us that a fool may misuse even
sacred Scripture. 1 Prose Works, ed. Bohn, ii. 69.

-'55

CHAPTER X.
DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION.
JEWISH tradition, while admitting a Hezekian or post-
Hezekian redaction of the book, assigns the original author
ship of Ecclesiastes to Solomon. The Song of Songs it
regards as the monument of this king's early manhood, the
Book of Proverbs of his middle age, and the semi-philosophi
cal meditations before us as the work of his old age. The
tradition was connected by the Aggada with the favourite
legend ¦ of the discrowned Solomon, but is based upon the
book itself, the passages due to the literary fiction of Solomon's
authorship (which Bickell indeed attributes to an interpolator)
having been misunderstood. Would that the author of the
Lectures on the Jewish Church had given the weight of his
name to the true explanation of these passages ! The
reticence of the lines devoted in the second volume of the
Lectures to Ecclesiastes has led some critics to imagine that
according to Dean Stanley, this book, like much of Proverbs,
might possibly be the work of the ' wisest ' of Israel's kings.
Little had the author profited by Ewald if he really allowed
such an absolute legend the smallest standing-ground among
reasonable hypotheses ! Whichever way we look, whether
to the social picture, or to the language, or to the ideas of the
book, its recent origin forces itself upon us. The social
picture and the ideas need not detain us here. Either
Solomon was transported in prophetic ecstasy to far distant
times (the Targum on Koheleth frequently describes him as
a prophet), or the writer is a child of the dawning modern
age of Judaism. The former alternative is plainly impos
sible. Political servitude, and a generally depressed state of
1 See the Midrasch Kohelet (ed. Wunsche, 1880), or Ginsburg, p. 38.

256 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. x.
society (exceptional cases of prosperity notwithstanding),
mark the book as the work of a dark post-Exile period. The
absence of any national feeling equally distinguishes it from
the monuments of the earlier humanistic movement (even
from Job). The germs of philosophic thought, which cannot
be explained away, supply, if this be possible, a still more
convincing argument. We shall return to these later on : at
present, let us confine ourselves to the linguistic evidence,
which has been set. forth with such accuracy and complete
ness by Delitzsch ' and after him by Dr. Wright of Dublin.
The Hebrew language has no history if Ecclesiastes
belongs to the classical period ; indeed, the Hebrew name of
the book may seem of itself to stamp it as of post-Exile
origin (see note on Koheleth in Appendix). The student
would do well, however, to examine all the peculiar words
or forms in Delitzsch's glossary, and to classify them for
himself, under two principal heads, (1) those which occur
elsewhere but in distinctively late-Hebrew books, (2) those
only found in Koheleth, with four subdivisions, viz., (a) words
which can be explained from Biblical Hebrew usage, (b) those
which belong to the vocabulary of the Mishna, (c) those of
Aramaic origin and affinities, (d) those borrowed from non-
Semitic languages. The student should also notice the strik
ing grammatical peculiarities of Koheleth, especially the fact
that the ordinary historic tense (the imperfect with Waw con
secutive) is hardly ever used. The scholar's instinct but
three times reveals itself in the adoption of this old literary
idiom (i. 17, iv. 1, 7), but elsewhere the usage of the Mishna
is already law. Almost equally important is the fact that
the Hebrew mood-distinctions are so little used in Koheleth
(on which point see Delitzsch's introduction) ; indeed, we may
say upon the whole that that which gives a characteristic flavour
to the old Hebrew style is ' ready to vanish away.' The Mishnic
peculiarities of the book are especially interesting, as confirm
ing our view of its origin. The author is very different in
his opinions from the doctors of the Mishna, but he resembles
them in his questioning and reflective spirit, and helped to
• Comp, the glossary at the end of Gratz's commentary.

CHAP. x. DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION 257
form the linguistic instrument which they required. Less
important, but not to be ignored, are the Aramaic elements.
Even Dr. Adam Clarke, untrained scholar as he was, pro
nounced that the attempts which had as yet been made to
overthrow the evidence, were ' often trifling and generally in
effectual.' ¦ The Aramaisms of Koheleth are irreconcileable
with a pre-Exile date ; they can only be paralleled and ex
plained from the Aramaic portions of the books of Ezra and
Daniel. That they are comparatively few, only proves that
the force of the Aramaising movement has abated, and that
the Hebrew language, at any rate in the hands of some of its
chief cultivators, is passing into a new phase (the Mishnic).
The judgment of Ewald, as already expressed in 1837, appears
to me on the whole satisfactory : ' One might easily imagine
Koheleth to be the very latest book in the Old Testament.
A premature conclusion, since Aramaic influence extended
very gradually and secretly, so that one writer might easily
be more Aramaic in the colouring of his style than another.
But though not [even if not] the latest, it cannot have been
written till long after Aramaic had begun powerfully to in
fluence Hebrew, and therefore not bejore the last century of
the Persian rule.'2
For the sake of my argument, it is hardly necessary to
refer to the words of non-Semitic origin, which are (as most
critics rightly hold) but two in number ; 1 DT18 (ii. 5, plur.) un
doubtedly a Hebraised Persian word, on which I lay no stress
here, because it occurs, not only in Neh. ii. 8, but also in Cant.
iv. 13, where many critics deny that it militates against a
pre-Exile date, and 2 Djr>9 (viii. 1 1), which occurs in the
Aramaic parts of Ezra and Daniel, and also in Esth. i. 20,
and while used in the Targums and in Syriac, did not become
naturalised in Talmudic. This word, too, is commonly
regarded as Hebraised Persian, but, following Zirkel, the
eminent Jewish scholar Heinrich Gratz declares it to be the
Hebraised form of a Greek word. Is this possible or pro
bable ? Are there any genuine Grsecisms of language, and
1 Quoted by Ginsburg, Coheleth, p. 197.
Die poetischen Biicher des Alten Bundes, Theil iv.

258 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. x.
consequently also of thought, in the Book of Koheleth ? An
important question, to which we will return.
The date suggested by Ewald, and accepted by Knobel,
Herzfeld, Vaihinger, Delitzsch, and Ginsburg, suits the politi
cal circumstances implied in Koheleth. The Jews had long
since lost the feelings of trust and gratitude with which in
' better days ' (vii. 10) they regarded the court of Persia ; the
desecration of the temple by Bagoses or Bagoes (Jos. Ant. xi.
7) is but one of the calamities which befel Judaea in the last
century of the Persian rule. It is a conjecture of Delitzsch that
iv. 3 contains a reminiscence of Artaxerxes II. Mnemon (died
about 360), who was ninety-four years old, and according to
Justin (x. 1), had 115 sons, and of his murdered successor
Artaxerxes III. Ochus. Probably, if we knew more of this
period, we should be able to produce other plausible illustra
tions. Certainly the state of society suits the date proposed.
As Delitzsch remarks, 'The unrighteous judgment, iii. 16; the
despotic depression, iv. 1, viii. 9, v. 8 ; the riotous court-life,
x. 16-19 ; the raising of mean men to the highest dignities,
x. 5-7 ; the inexorable severity of the law of military service,
viii. 8 ; the prudence required by the organised system of
espionage, — all these things were characteristic of this period.'
Probably an advocate of a different theory would interpret
these passages otherwise ; but as yet no conclusive argument
has been offered for supposing allusions to circumstances of
the Greek period.
Let me frankly admit, in conclusion, that the evidence of
the Hebrew favours a later date than that proposed by Ewald
— favours, but does not actually require it. It seems, how
ever, that if the book be of the Greek period, we have a right
to expect some definite traces of Greek influence. This will
supply the subject of the next chapter.
At any rate, the author addresses himself to Palestinian
readers. He lives, not (I should suppose) in the country, as
Ewald thought, but near the temple, or at least has oppor
tunities of frequenting it (v. 1/ viii. 10). Some recent scholars
1 The ' house of God ' must, I think, mean the temple of Jerusalem. That of
Onias IV. was not built till 160 B.C. The synagogues would not be called 'houses
of God ' (on Ps. lxxiv. 8, see Hitzig).

CHAP. x. DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION 259
place him in Alexandria ; but the reference to the corn trade
in xi. 1 does not prove this to be correct ; indeed, the very same
section contains a reference to rain (so xii. 2). Sharpe • is
alone in preferring Antioch, the capital of the Greek king
dom of Syria. Kleinert's remark that ' king in Jerusalem '
(i. 12) implies a foreign abode is met by the remark that
Jerusalem was in the writer's time no longer a royal city.
The author may have travelled, and like Sirach have had
personal acquaintance with the dangers of court-life (either
at Susa or at Alexandria). The references to the king do
not perhaps compel this supposition ; ' are not my princes
altogether kings?' (Isa. x. 8) could be said of Persian satraps.
1 Histoiy of the Hebrew Nation and its Literature (ed. 2), p. 344.

260 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xi.

CHAPTER XI.
DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS OR IDEAS?
We now begin the consideration of the question, Are there
any well-ascertained Graecisms in the language and in
the thought of this obviously exceptional book ? That there
are many Greek loan-words in Targumic and Talmudic, is
undeniable, though Levy in his lexicon has no doubt exag
gerated their number. G. Zirkel, a Roman Catholic scholar,
was the first who answered in the affirmative, confining himself
to the linguistic side of the argument. His principal work,1
Untersuchungen iiber den Prediger (Wiirzburg, 1 792), is not in
the Bodleian Library, but Eichhorn's review in his Allgemeine
Bibliothek, vol. iv. (1792), contains a summary of Zirkel's
evidence from which I select the following.
(a) ns;, in sense of caAoc 'becoming' (iii. n, v. 17). This is one
of the Grsecisms which commend themselves the most to Gratz and
Kleinert. The former points especially to v. 17, where he takes
na* "IE'K 2it3 together as representing k«X6v Kayadov (comp. Plumptre
on v. 18). The construction, however, is mistaken (see Delitzsch).
The second "\WX indicates that nS11 is a synonym of 301 'excellent.'
The notion of the beautiful can b developed in various ways. The
sense ' becoming,' characteristic of later Hebrew, is more distinctly
required in iii. n.
(b) ' In the clause ifl« ts »jk wpari nd? (ii. 15) the words in* ?N
must signify in paWov : quid mihi prodest majorem adhuc sapientise
operam dare ? ' But the demonstrative particle tN means, not hi,
but ' in these circumstances ' (Jer. xxii. 15). Its position and con
nection with -iJV are for emphasis. The fact of experience men
tioned makes any special care for wisdom unreasonable.
(c) '3'1D nw (iii. 12) is a literal translation of el rrpaTteir.' This
1 He also published Der Prediger Salomon; ein Lesebuch fiir den jungen Welt-
burger ; ubersetzt und erkldrt ( 1 792). The very title bears the mark of the century.

CHAP. XI. DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS ? 26 1
is accepted by Kleinert and also by Tyler. The very next verse
seems to explain this phrase by 3113 HtO (comp. v. 17); certainly the
ethical meaning is against the analogy of ii. 24, iii. 22, and similar
, passages. But should we not, with Gratz and Nowack, correct
niDniK-} in iii. 12?
(d) ''Ul DTDijin *3 (v. 19) must mean, God gives him joy of heart.
ros? "respondere" seems to have borrowed the meaning "remunerari"
from a/xriPicrdat, which has both senses. The ancient writer of the
book thought thus in Greek, on Beds a/xeifleTai (aiirov) evcppocrvi y rrjc;
KapSiag.' Zirkel forgets Ps. lxv. 6. See however Delitzsch.
(e) K>aj"^n (vi. 9) = op fir) rrjg xpvxvG [M. Aurelius iii. ,15]. But
the phrase is idiomatic Hebrew for ' roving of the desire.'
(/) fij>*rnKKX* (vii. 18). 'The Hebrew writer found no other
equivalent for i»im\v fialifciv.' But unless he borrowed the idea
(that of cultivating the mean in moral practice), why should he have
tried to express the technical term ?
(g) DlKn^a np? (xii. 13). 'A pure Grscism, roiiro iravroe
avtipi>irov.' But how otherwise could the idea of the universal obli
gation to fear God have been expressed ? Comp. the opening words
of iii. 19.
To these may be added (h) rDID DV3 (vii. 14) = tvrm*pia (see
however xii. 1) ; (i) the 'technical term' "1113 (i. 13, ii. 3, vii. 25) =
cruf/n-Ttcrdai [but good Hebrew for ' to explore '] ; (k) DJns (viii. n) =
ftiiyfia ; (/) DTlB (ii. 15) = -rrapaZitcroc; (see above).
No one in our day would dream of accepting these
' Graecisms ' in a mass.
Zirkel tried to prove too much, as Gratz himself truly
observes. Any peculiar word or construction he set down as
un-Hebraic and hurried to explain it by some Greek parallel,
ignoring the capacity of development inherent in the Hebrew
language. His attempt failed in his own generation. Three
recent scholars however (Gratz, Kleinert, and Tyler), have been
more or less captivated by his idea, and have proposed some
new and some old ' Graecisms ' for the acceptance of scholars.
To me it seems that, their three or four very disputable words
and phrases are not enough. If the author of Koheleth really
thought half in Greek, the Greek colouring of the language
would surely not have been confined to such a few expres
sions. If rvnemo (vii. 24) were really derived from to ri eariv,
as Kleinert supposes, should we not meet with it oftener?

262 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xi.
But the phrase most naturally means, not ' the essence of
things,' but ' that which hath come into existence ; ' phenomena
are not easily understood in their ultimate causes, is the
simple meaning of the sentence. I have said nothing as yet
of the supposed Graecism in the epilogue — the last place
where we should have expected one (considering ver. 1 2). But
Mr. Tyler's proposal to explain 73H (xii. 13) by ro icadokov
or to 6\ov (a formula introducing a general conclusion), falls
to the ground, when the true explanation of the passage has
been stated (see p. 232).
There are therefore no Graecisms in the language of the
book. Of course ideas may have been derived from a Greek
source notwithstanding. The book, as we have seen already,
is conspicuous by its want of a native Jewish background, nor
does it show any affinity to Babylonian or Persian theology.
It obviously stands at the close of the great Jewish humanistic
movement, and gives an entirely new colour to the traditional
humanism by its sceptical tone and its commendations of
sensuous pleasure. It is not surprising that St. Jerome should
remark on ix. 7-9, that the author appears to be reproducing
the low ideas of some Greek philosophers, though, as this
Father supposes, only to refute them.
' Et hasc inquit, aliquis loquatur Epicurus, et Aristippus et Cyren-
aici et cseteras pecudes Philosophorum. Ego autem, mecum dili-
genter retractans, invenio ' : &c.
Few besides Prof. Salmon would accept the view that
Eccles. ix. 7-9 and similar passages are the utterances of an
infidel objector (see Bishop Ellicott's Commentary) ; but it is
perfectly possible to hold that there are distinctively Epicurean
doctrines in the Koheleth. The later history of Jewish
thought may well seem to render this opinion probable.
How dangerously fascinating Epicureanism must have been
when the word ' Epicuros ' became a synonym in Rabbinic
Hebrew for infidel or even atheist.2 It is indeed no mere.
1 Opera, ii. (1699), 765 (Comm. in Ecclesiasten). Comp. the use made of
Koheleth's phraseology by the author of Wisdom (ii. 6-10).
2 See Sanhedrin, a. i :-nTin }»K "iDIKn X3n d"?1j£ pbn Drr? pHS? \bs
¦ Dnip'SKi D'op j» min jw rnmn jd cnbn— Comp. Aboth, ii. i4 <io
Taylor), and Genesis Rabbah, 19 (' the serpent was Epicuros').

CHAP. XI. DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS ? 263
fancy that just as Pharisaism had affinities with Stoicism, so
Sadducaeism had with Epicureanism. As Harnack well says,
'No intellectual movement could withdraw itself from the
influences which proceeded from the victory of the Greeks
over the Eastern world.' * Mr. Tyler,2 however, and his ally
Dean Plumptre, have scarcely made the best of their case, the
Epicurean affinities which they discover in Koheleth being
by no means striking. Much use is made of the De Rerum
Natur d of Lucretius — a somewhat late authority ! But if
points of contact with Lucretius are to be hunted for, ought
we not also to mention the discrepancies between the ' wise
man 'and the poet? If Lucr. i. 11 3-1 16 may be used to
illustrate Eccles. iii. 21, must we not equally emphasise the
difference between the festive mirth recommended by Koheleth
(ix. 7, 8 &c.) and the simple pleasures so beautifully sung by
Lucretius (ii. 20-33), and which remind us rather of the
charming naturalness of the Hebrew Song of Songs?3 The
number of vague analogies between Koheleth and Epicu
reanism might perhaps have been even increased, but I can
find no passage in the former which distinctly expresses any
scholastic doctrine of Epicureanism. For instance the doctrine
of Atomism assumed for illustration by Dean Plumptre,4
cannot be found there by even the keenest exegesis ; the
plurality of worlds is not even distantly alluded to, and the
denial of the spirit, if implied in iii. 21 (see p. 212), is only
implied in the primitive Hebrew sense, familiar to us from Job
and the Psalter. The recommendation of drapa^ia (to use the
Epicurean term), coupled with sensuous pleasure (v. 18-20),
requires no philosophic basis, and is simply the expression of
a. pococurante mood, only too natural in one debarred from a
1 Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte, p. 46.
2 See his Ecclesiastes, a Contribution to its Interpretation, &c. (1874). The
main results of this work were accepted by Prof. Siegfried, who reviewed it in the
Zeitschriftf. wissenschaft!. Theologie, 1875, pp. 284-291.
3 This discrepancy I had noted down before observing that Dean Plumptre
had quoted the very same passage of Lucretius as a parallel to Eccles. ii. 24.
For my own view of Koheleth's recommendations, see p. 253. Lucretius seems
to me, in this strain, to soar higher than Koheleth ; Omar Khayyam to fall below
him. 4 Ecclesiastes, p. 47.

264 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. ii.
career of fruitful activity. Lastly, there is nothing in the
phraseology either of the Hebrew or of the Septuagint to
suggest an acquaintance with Epicureanism.
A stronger case can be made for the influence of Stoicism.
The undoubted Oriental affinities of this system and its moral
and theological spirit would, as Mr. Tyler observes, naturally
commend it to a Jewish writer. We know that, at a some
what later day, Stoicism exercised a strong fascination on
some of the noblest Jewish minds. Philo,1 the Book of Wisdom,
and the so-called Fourth Book of Maccabees, have undeniable
allusions to it ; and more or less probable vestiges of Stoicism
have been found in the oldest Jewish Sibyl 2 (about B.C. 140)
and in the Targum of Onkelos.3 But how does the case
stand with Koheleth ? First of all, are there any traces of
Stoic terminology ? That terminology varied no doubt
within certain limits, and could not be accurately reproduced
in Hebrew. Still even under the contorted forms of expression
to which a Hebrew-writing Stoic or semi-Stoic might be driven
we could hardly fail to recognise the familiar Stoic expressions,
slfiapf^evT), irpovoia, epavracrla, cpvais, cppovrjcris, dperr). The
Septuagint version ought to help us here. But among the
twenty words almost or entirely peculiar to the Greek of
Ecclesiastes, the only two technical philosophic terms are
crocpla and cyv&crts.
Next, can we detect references to distinctive Stoic doc
trines ? Mr. Tyler lays great stress in his reply on the
Catalogue of Times and Seasons (iii. 1-8), which he regards
as an expansion of the Stoic 6fj,oXoyovfj,eva>s tfqv. But the
idea that there is an appointed order of things, and that
every action has its place in it, is much more a corollary of
the doctrine of Destiny than of the doctrine of Duty. The
essence of the latter doctrine is that men were meant to con
form and ought to conform to the Universal Order, acquiesc-
1 Philo alludes, e.g., to the Stoic doctrine of revolutions (which some have
found in Koheleth) and remarks that the Stoics think of God as of a boy who
builds up sandhills, and then throws them down again.
' Hilgenfeld, Jiidische Apokalyptik, p. 51, &c.
J See Deut. viii. 18, and especially Gen. ii. 7 (Neubiirger in Gratz's Monats
schrift, 1873, p. 566).

chap. xi. DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS ? 265
ing in that which is inevitable, shaping in the best way that
which is possible to be moulded. Upon this the practical
ethics of Stoicism depend. But this is the very point which
is absent in Ecclesiastes. The Catalogue of Times and
Seasons ends not with the Stoic exhortation &Kiri\r)pov rrjv
X&pav, ' Fulfil thy appointed part,' but with the despondent
reflection of the Fatalist, ' What profit hath he that worketh
in that wherein he toileth ? ' (iii. 9.) A second argument is
that the idea ' There is no new thing under the sun ' (i. 9)
is a phase of the Stoic doctrine of cyclical revolutions. But
all that which gave form and colour to the Stoic doctrine is
entirely absent — especially, as Mr. Tyler himself admits, the
idea of etcrripwcns. The idea, as it is found in Ecclesiastes,
has nothing Stoic or even philosophical about it. It is simply
an old man's observation that human actions, like natural
phenomena, tend to repeat themselves in successive genera
tions.1 That there are analogies between Stoicism and the ideas
of Koheleth need not be denied ; Dr. Kalisch has collected
some of them in his very interesting philosophico-religious
dialogue.2 Prominent among these is the peculiar use of the
terms ' madness ' and ' folly.' ' From the followers of Zeno,'
remarks Dean Plumptre,3 'he learned also to look upon
virtue and vice in their intellectual aspects. The common
weaknesses and follies of mankind were to him, as to them,
only so many different forms and degrees of absolute insanity
(i. 17, ii. 12, vii. 25, ix. 3).' But this division of mankind into
wise men and fools is common to the Stoa with the ancient
Hebrew sages who ' sat in the gate.' When the great popu-
lariser of Stoicism says, ' Sapientia perfectum bonum est
mentis humanae,' 4 he almost translates more than one of the
proverbs which we have studied already. Another point of
contact with Stoicism is undoubtedly the Determinism of the
1 For this criticism upon Mr. Tyler's view of iii. 1-8, I am indebted to Dr.
Hatch. 2 Path and Goal, p. 1 1 6. But see p. 92.
3 Ecclesiastes, p. 45.
4 Seneca, Ep. 89, quoted by Bruch, Weisheiislehre der Hebraer, p. 253, with
reference to the teaching of Proverbs.

266 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. XI.
book, which, as Prof. Kleinert observes, leaves no room for
freedom of the will, and fuses the conceptions of elp.app.evq
and irpovoia (see especially chap. iii.). But such Determinism
need not have been learned in the school of Zeno. It is
genuinely Semitic (did not Zeno come from the Semitic
Citium ?) What is the religion of Islam but a grandiose system
of Determinism ? Indeed, where is virtual Determinism more
forcibly expressed than in the Old Testament itself (e.g., Isa.
lxiii. 17) ?
Those who adopt the view which I am controverting are
apt to appeal to somewhat late philosophic authorities. I
cannot here discuss the parallelisms which have been found
in the Meditations or Self-communings (Ta els eavrov) of
the great Stoic emperor. Some, for instance, consider the
pvcreis /cat aXXoidaeis which ' renew the world continually '
(M. A. vi. 15) and the irepioBtKr) TraXiyyevecria r&v okasv
(M. A. xi. 1) to be alluded to in Eccles. i. 5-9. More
genuine are some at least of the other parallelisms, e.g.
Eccles. i. 9, M. A. vi. 27> vn- !, x- 27, xh. 26 ; Eccles. ii. 25,
M. A. ii. 3 (ad init.) ; Eccles. iii. 1 1, M. A. iv. 23 (ad init.) ;
Eccles. vi. 9, M. A. iv; 26 ; Eccles. xi. 5, M. A. x. 26.
I admit that there is a certain vague affinity between the
two thinkers ; both are earnest, both despair of reforming
society, both have left but a fragmentary record of their
meditations. But the ' humanest of the Roman race ' • stands
out, upon the whole, far above the less cultured and more
severely tried Israelite. Alike in intellectual powers and
in moral elevation the soul of the Roman is of a truly
imperial order. He is not, like Koheleth, a ' malist ' (see
pp. 201-202) ; he boldly denies evil, and his strong faith in
Providence cannot be disturbed by apparent irregularities in
the order of things. It is true that this does but make the
sadness of his golden and almost Christian book the more
depressing. But the book is ' golden.' 2 Koheleth and M.
Aurelius alike call forth our pity and admiration, but in v/hat
different proportions !
1 R. H. Stoddard, The Morals of M. Aurelius.
2 Comp. Niebuhr, Lectures on the History of Rome, iii. 247.

CHAP. XI. DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS ? 267
If, then, there are points of agreement between Koheleth
and M. Aurelius, there must also of necessity be points of
disagreement. Every page of their writings would, I think,
supply them. Suffice it to put side by side the saying of
Koheleth, ' God is in heaven, and thou upon earth ' (v. 2),
and M. Aurelius' invocation of the world as the ' city of God '
(iv. 23). The comparison suggests one of the greatest dis
crepancies between Koheleth and the Stoics- — the doctrine
of God. Such faith as the former still retains is faith in a
transcendent and not an immanent Deity. The germs of a
doctrine of Immanence which the older Wisdom-literature
contains (Kleinert quotes Ps. civ. 30, Job xxvi. 13), have
found no lodgment in the mind of our author, who is more
affected by the legal and extreme supernaturalistic [ point of
view than he is perhaps aware.
Mr. Tyler's introduction to his Ecclesiastes is a work of
great acuteness and originality, and seeks to provide against
all reasonable objections ; I cannot do justice to it here.
One part of his theory, however, is too remarkable to be
passed over (see above, pp. 240, 241). He supposes that
Stoic and Epicurean doctrines were deliberately set over
against each other by the wise man who wrote our book, in
order by the clash of opposites to deter the reader from
dangerous and unsatisfying investigations. The goal of the
author's philosophising thus becomes the negation of all
philosophy, and this ' sacrificio dell' intelletto ' he insinuatingly
commends by the subtlest use of artifice. Such a theory
may have occurred to one or another early writer (see
Ginsburg), but seems out of harmony with the character of the
author as revealed in his book. He is not such a weak-kneed
wrestler for truth. You may fancy him sometimes a Stoic,
sometimes an Epicurean ; but he always speaks like a man
in earnest, however his opinions may change through the fluc
tuations of his moods. Mr. Tyler's theory confounds Koheleth's
point of view with that of a far inferior thinker, the author of
Ecclesiasticus (see above, p. 199).
1 The phrase is objectionably modern, but in this -connection could not be
avoided.

268 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. XI.
I cannot, therefore, be persuaded to explain this enig
matical book by a supposed contact with Greek philosophy
such as we do really find in the Book of Wisdom. I have
no prejudice against the supposition in itself. It would help
me to understand the Hellenising movement at a later day if
Stoic and (still more) Epicurean ideas had already filtered
into the minds of the Jewish aristocracy. The denunciations
in the Book of Enoch (xciv. 5, xcviii. 15, civ. 10) not impos
sibly refer to a heretical philosophical literature (see p. 233) ;
the only question is, To a native or to a half foreign litera
ture ? I see no sufficient reason at present for adopting the
latter alternative. Koheleth is really a native Hebrew
philosopher, the first Jew who, however awkwardly and in
effectually, ' gave his mind to seek and explore by wisdom
concerning all things that are done under heaven ' (i. 1 3).
Very touching in this light are the memoranda which he has
left us. They are incomplete enough ; Koheleth is but the
forerunner of more systematic philosophisers. His ideas are
nothing less than scholastic ; how could we expect anything
different, his first object being in all probability to soothe
the pain of an inward struggle by giving it literary expres
sion ? If, however, I was compelled to suggest a secondary
reference to any foreign system, I could most easily suppose
one to the pessimistic teaching of Hegesias Peisithanatos,
who, after Ptolemy Soter and Philadelphus had made Alex
andria the seat of the world's commerce and the centre of
Greek literature and culture, was seized with the thought of
the vanity of all things, of the preponderance of evil, and of
the impossibility of happiness.1 Koheleth's teaching would
be a safeguard to any Jew who might be tempted by this
too popular philosopher. He admits paraiorrjs paraiortfrcov,
but insists that, granting all drawbacks, ' the light is sweet '
(xi. 7), the living are better off than the dead (ix. 4-6), and
sensuous pleasure, used in moderation, is at least a relative
good (ii. 24) ; also that it is futile to inquire ' why the former
days (of the earlier Ptolemies ?) were better than these '
(vii. 10), and, if a later view of his meaning may be trusted,
1 Zeller, Philosophic der Griechen, ii. i, p. 278.

.CHAP. XI. DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS ? 269
he sought to displace the many dangerous books which were
current by words which were at once pleasantly written and
objectively true (xii. 10, 12).
Koheleth is a native Hebrew philosopher. The philo
sophy of an eastern sage is not to be tied up in the rigid
formulae of the West. Easterns may indeed take kindly to
Western doctrines ; but where they think independently, they
eschew system. Koheleth's seeming Stoicism is, as we have
seen, of primitive Hebrew affinities ; his seeming Epicureanism,
if it be not sufficiently explained as a mental reaction against
the gloom of the times, may perhaps be connected more or
less closely, not with the schools of Greek philosophers, but
with the banquet-halls of Egypt. The Hebrew writer's in
vitations to enjoy life remind us of the call to ' drink and be
happy,' which accompanied the grim symbolic ' coffin,' or
mummy, at Egyptian feasts (probably they were funeral-
feasts), according to Herodotus (ii. 78), and of the festal dirges
translated by Goodwin and Stern.1 A stanza in one of the
latter may be given here. It is from the song supposed to
be sung by the harper at an anniversary funeral feast in honour
of Neferhotep, a royal scribe, and still to be seen cut in the
stone at Abd-el-Gurna, in the Theban necropolis. As Ebers
has remarked,2 the song ' shows how a certain fresh delight
in life mingled with the feelings about death that were
prevalent among the ancient Egyptians, who celebrated
their festivals more boisterously than most other peoples.'
By a poetic fiction, the dead man is supposed to be present,
and to listen to the song.
Make a good day, O holy father !
Let odours and oils stand before thy nostril.
Wreaths of lotus are on the arms and the bosom of thy sister,
Dwelling in thy heart, sitting beside thee.
Let song and music be before thy face,
And leave behind thee all evil cares !
Mind thee of joy, till cometh the day of pilgrimage,
When we draw near the land which loveth silence.
1 Records of the Past, iv. 1 15-118; vi. 127-130.
2 'Cairo, the Old in the New,' Contemp. Rev., xliii. 852.

270 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xi.
We have seen that the Wisdom of Sirach betrays a taste
for Egyptian festivity (p. 191). May we not suppose that
Koheleth too had travelled to Alexandria ? This view com
mends itself to Kleinert, and I have no objection to it with
due limitations. Koheleth may have envied and sought to
copy the light-hearted gaiety of the valley of the Nile. But
we ought not to conceal the fact that the lines quoted
above are followed by others which have no parallel in
Koheleth. Good for thee then will have been (an honest life),
Therefore be just and hate transgressions,
For he who loveth justice (will be blest).
(They in the shades) are sitting on the bank of the river,
Thy soul is among them, drinking its sacred water.
.... (woe to the bad one !)
He shall sit miserable in the heat of infernal fires.
There is a wide difference between a people who believed
in a happy Amenti where Osiris himself dwelt and the Jew
who doubted much but believed firmly in Sheol. I admit
then the probability that the latter had travelled, and was not
unaffected by the brightness of Egyptian society, but I see
no reason to suppose that he knew and was influenced by
the expressions of Egyptian songs. The resemblances
adduced are to me as fortuitous as those between the love-
poems of the Nile valley and the Hebrew Song of Songs,
or (we may add) as that striking one between Eccles. i.
4 and some of the opening lines of the ' Song of the
Harper,' —
Men pass away since the time of Ra [the sun of day]
And the youths come in their stead.
Like as Ra reappears every morning,
And Turn [the sun of night] sets in the horizon,
Men are begetting,
And women are conceiving.1
I make no excuse for the length of this inquiry. If we
could trace Greek influences, linguistic or philosophical, in
1 Records of the Past, vi. 127.

chap. xi. DOES KOHELETH CONTAIN GREEK WORDS ? 27 1
the strange book before us, its date would be decided.
Taking into account the circumstances of the writer, we
might assign it to the reign of Ptolemy IV. Philopator, when
the Egyptian rule began to be calamitous for Judaea.
Kleinert would place it rather in one of the early, fortunate
reigns (Herzog-Plitt, xii. 173) ; but he forms perhaps too
favourable a view of the social picture in Koheleth. Hitzig,
who gives a very restricted range to Greek philosophical
influence upon our book, and accepts none of Zirkel's Grae
cisms, fixes the date in the first year of Ptolemy V. Epi
phanes. Geiger, Noldeke, Kuenen, Tyler, and Plumptre, on
various grounds, think this the most probable period,1 and
the view is endorsed by Zeller, the historian of Greek
philosophy. A Maccabaean and still more a Herodian date seem to
me absolutely excluded, though Zirkel and Renan have advo
cated the one, and Heinrich Gratz (see p. 240) the other.
The book is certainly pre-Maccabaean, not merely because of
a Talmudic anecdote,2 but because of its want of religious
fervour (comp. Esther) and its cosmopolitanism. The germs
of the-Jewish parties may be there, but only the germs. To
me Hitzig's is the latest possible date ; but if we must admit
a vague and indirect Greek influence, should we not place
the book a little earlier as suggested above ? But I do not
see that we must admit even a vague Greek influence. The
inquiring spirit was present in the class of ' wise men ' even
before the Exile, and the circumstances of the later Jews were,
from the Exile onwards, well fitted to exercise and develope
it. Hellenic teaching was in no way necessary to an ardent
but unsystematic thinker like Koheleth. The date proposed
by Ewald and Delitzsch is on this and other grounds probable,
and on linguistic grounds not impossible.
There are two recent treatises on the philosophical affi
nities of Koheleth which may be mentioned here, though
1 Geieer Urschrift, pp. 6°> 61; Noldeke, Die alttestamentliche Literatur.,
p. 175; Kuenen, Hist.-krit. Onderzoek., iii. 188, Theologisch. Tijdschrift, 1883,
p. 143- 2 See reference, p. 200.

272 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAP. xr.
only the first is known to me. Paul Kleinert, who has long
made a special study of Koheleth (see his Prediger Salomo,
1864), contributed to the Theolog. Studien und Kritiken, 1883,
p. 761, &c, a striking paper called ' Sind im Buche Koheleth
ausserhebraische Einfliisse anzuerkennen,' and August Palm
in 1885 published a programme entitled ' Qohelet und die
nacharistotelische Philosophie ' (Mannheim).

273

CHAPTER XII.
TEXTUAL PROBLEMS OF KOHELETH.
I.
ACCORDING to Delitzsch, the Song of Solomon is the most
difficult book in the Old Testament. If so, Ecclesiastes
comes next in order. None of the attempts to discover a
logical plan having been successful, Gustav Bickell's new
hypothesis (1884) deserves a respectful hearing, since it
endeavours to solve the enigma in a most original way,
connecting it with the problem of the text. This critic starts
from the observation that continuous passages of some extent
are suddenly closed by an abrupt transition, and that such
passages are pretty equal in length. His explanation of this
is a purely mechanical one. The troubles of the commen
tators have arisen principally from an accident which
happened to a standard MS., called by Bickell, ' die Un-
fallshandschrift ' (the Accident-manuscript). This MS. seems
to have consisted of 21 or 22 leaves, with an average of
518 to 535 letters to a leaf. To speak more precisely, it was
composed of fasciculi of four double leaves each ; the book
began on the sixth leaf of the first fasciculus, and ended on
the second, or more probably on the third leaf of the fourth.
Through a loosening of the two middle fasciculi, a disloca
tion took place, and an almost entirely new order arose,
though with one exception the leaves which had been placed
in pairs remained together. But the story of the fortunes of
Ecclesiastes has not yet been told. Three hands, besides
the original writer, have worked on this ill-fated book. One
of these is considered to have been a downright 'enemy' who
T

274 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xii.
tampered with the text before the dislocation had taken place.
From him proceed ' the protests against Koheleth's principles
on the obedience due to the king in viii. i, $a as well as the
offensive expressions in xi. 5, xii. 4, 5, by which he sought to
make the book ridiculous and contemptible.' Subsequently
to him, and after the leaves had been thrown into confusion,
another writer made ' well-meaning additions,' and so brought
the book into nearly its present form ; among these addi
tions was the Epilogue. His aim was ' to brighten Koheleth's
gloomy view of the world, partly by emphasising the doc
trine of a present retribution, but still more by pointing to a
future judgment in which inequalities should be rectified.'
The third hand is that of the so-called pseudo-Solomonic
interpolator. He must have gone to work after the
Epilogist, for the latter simply knows Koheleth as a wise man
skilled in proverbial composition. Bickell also claims to
make transpositions on a small scale, and offers many emen
dations sometimes based on the Septuagint. ' Habent sua
fata libelli.'
I have said that Bickell's explanation of the want of order
in Ecclesiastes is a purely mechanical one. It is not on that
account to be rejected. A German reviewer l has mentioned
a case within his own experience in which the double leaves
of one of the fasciculi of an Oriental MS. had been disarranged
in the binding, a circumstance which had led to various
additions and alterations. It may indeed be urged as an
objection that the Septuagint text differs in no very material
respect from the Massoretic. But a work like Ecclesiastes
had at first in all probability but a very slight circulation,
so that an accident to a single MS. would naturally involve
unusually serious consequences. Still from the possibility to
the actuality of the ' accident ' is a long step. Apart from
other difficulties in the theory, the number and arbitrariness
of the transpositions, additions, and alterations are reason
enough to make one hesitate to accept it ; and when we pass
from the very plausible arrangement of the contents (Bickell,
PP- 53. 54) to the translation of the text, it is often only
1 In the Theologisches Literaturblatt, Sept. 19, 1884.

CHAP. XII. TEXTUAL PROBLEMS OF KOHELETH 275
possible to make them tally by a violent and imaginative
exegesis. Among the transpositions (to which I have no theoretic
objection ') are the following :
v. 9-16 placed after ii. n,
viii. 9-14 „ „ iii. 8,
vi. 8-12 „ „ x. 1,
iv. 9-16 „ „ vii. 20,
x. 16-xi. 6 ,, „ v. 8,
xi. 6 „ „ xi. 3.
Bickell's theory that the passages which assert or suggest
Solomonic authorship in i. 1, 12, 16, ii. 7, 8, 9, [12], are due to
an interpolator,2 is plausible ; it throws a new light on the
statement of the Epilogue (xii. 9) that ' Koheleth was a wise
man,' and a motive for the interpolation can be readily imagined
— the desire to obtain ecclesiastical sanction for the book. It
is, however, incapable of proof. 11.
There are in fact few books on Ecclesiastes so stimu
lating as Bickell's, though it needs to be read with discrimi
nation3 (comp. p. 241). Putting aside the author's peculiar
theory, it must be owned that he has enabled us to realise
the inherent difficulties of the text as it stands, and contri
buted some very happy corrections. All critics will admit
the need of such emendations. The text of Koheleth is even
more faulty than that of Job, Psalms, or Proverbs. We
cannot wonder at this. Meditations often so fragmentary
on such a difficult subject were foredoomed to suffer greatly
at the hands of copyists. A minute study of the various
readings and of the corrections which have been proposed
would lead us too far, interesting as it would be (compare
Renan's remarks, L'Eccl&iaste, p. 53). Cappellus (Louis
1 Van der Palm first conjectured that passages had been misplaced, and Gratz
has adopted the idea (Kohelet, pp. 4°-43)-
2 Comp. Rashbam's interpolation theoiy (Ginsburg, Coheleth, p. 42).
3 See Budde's review of Bickell's work in the Theologische Literaturzcitung,
Feb. 7, 1885.

276 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH CHAr. XH.
Cappel) has done most for the text among the earlier critics
(see his Critica Sacra, Par. 1650) ; Gratz has also made use
ful suggestions based upon the versions. Renan, and (as we
have seen) Bickell, have corrected the text on a larger scale ;
occasional emendations of great value are due to Hitzig,
Delitzsch, Klostermann, and Krochmal. The notes in the
expected new edition of Eyre and Spottiswoode's Variorum
Bible will indicate the most important various readings and
corrections ; to these I would refer the reader. The correc
tions of Bickell are those least known to most students. In
considering them, we must distinguish between those which
arise out of his peculiar critical theory and those which are
simply the outcome of his singular and brilliant insight. Of
the latter, I will here only mention two. One occurs in
iii. 11, where for aVjffi-n^ (or Dyiyrrn^ the Oriental or Baby
lonian reading), he gives (see below, p. 299) D^rr'psTiS B>£3^;
remarking that ^3 survived in the text translated in the Sep
tuagint. The fact is, however, that though Cod. Vat. does
read avpiravra rov alcava, Cod. Alex., Cod. Sin., and the
Complutensian ed. all read avv rov alwva, and as the verse
begins Ta avpiravra (v. \.%vpiravra) it is probable enough that
crvpiravra was written the second time in Cod. Vat. by mistake.
At any rate, copyists both of the Greek and of the Hebrew
were sometimes inclined to insert or omit ' all ' at haphazard ;
thus, in iv. 2, Cod. Vat. inserts ' all,' which is omitted in Cod.
Alex, and Cod. Sin.
Another, adopted above at p. 220, is in viii, 10. Read
¦13^1 B>hp DipD31: (or DH3p:}) D'133. 1S31 is a fragment of the
correct reading DlpMl which stood side by side with the alter
native reading DlpDDi,
On the question of interpolations, enough has been said
already. Probably Cornill's book on Ezekiel will dispose
many critics to look more favourably on attempts to purify
Biblical texts from glosses and other interpolations. Gratz's
conclusion certainly cannot be maintained, ' Sammtliche
Sentenzen gehoren streng zu ihrer nachbarlichen Gedanken-
gruppe, fiihren den Gedanken weiter oder spitzen ihn zu.'
I have still to speak of the Septuagint version. Its import-

CHAP. XII. TEXTUAL PROBLEMS OF KOHELETH 277
ance for textual criticism is great ; indeed, we may say
with Klostermann that the Massoretic text and this translation
are virtually two copies of one and the same archetype. It
is distinguished from the Septuagint versions of the Books of
Job, Proverbs, and even Psalms by its fidelity. Those versions
approximate more or less closely to the elegant manner of
Symmachus, but the Greek style of the Septuagint Koheleth
is most peculiar, admitting such words as avripprjais, ejKoiros,
eKKXrjcTiaarrjs, evrpvcprjpa, eiri/cocrpelv, rrapacpopd, irepiovcnacrpos
irepicpepeta, "irepunracTpos, rrpoaLpecrts (in special sense, ii. 17)
ifjovcri,d£ei,v (not less than eleven times), and such abnormal
phrases as vtto rov rjXiov (i. 3 and often), and especially <rvv
as an equivalent of J"iN when distinctive of the accusative
(ii. 17, iii. 10, iv. 3, vii. 15, and nine other passages ; elsewhere
crvpiravra or the like). The last-named peculiarity reminds
us strongly of Aquila 1 (comp. [God created] crvv rbv ovpavbv
Kal crvv rr/v yrjv, Aquila's rendering of Gen. i. 1) ; but it
must be also mentioned that in more than half the pas
sages in which riK of the accusative occurs in the original,
this characteristic rendering of Aquila is not found. This
fact militates against the theory of Gratz,2 that the Septua
gint version of Ecclesiastes is really the second improved
edition of Aquila, and against that of Salzberger,3 who
argues that the fragments given as from Aquila in Origen's
Hexapla are not really Aquila's at all, the one and only true
edition of Aquila's Ecclesiastes being that now extant in the
Septuagint (comp. the case of Theodotion's Daniel). It seems
clear that the Septuagint version, as it stands, is a composite
one, but it is possible, as Montfaucon long ago pointed out,4
that an early version once existed, independent of Aquila.
1 On Aquila and his theory of interpretation, comp. Renan, L'Ecclisiaste,
p. 54 ; and on his artificial vocabulary, Field's remarks, Hexapla, Prolegomena,
p. xxii. 2 Kohilet, Anbang. Before Griitz, Frankel was already inclined to think that
the Septuagint version might be really Aquila's ( Vorstudien, p. 238, note w). So
more positively Freudenthal. Renan inclines to agree with Gratz.
3 Gratz's Monatsschrift, 1873, pp. 168-174
1 Hexapla (1713), i., Preeliminaria, p. 42. Montfaucon indicates vn. 23a as
manifestly made up of a genuine version, and one interpolated from Aquila,
Comp. Clericus' note on Eccles iv. 1. .  ,

278 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xii.
The question of the origin of this version is of some critical
importance, for if the work of Aquila, the Septuagint Eccle
siastes cannot be earlier than 1 30 A.D. Supposing this to be
the first Greek version of the book, we obtain an argument
in favour of the Herodian date of Ecclesiastes advocated by
Gratz. Upon the whole, however, there seems no sufficient
reason for doubting that there was a Septuagint version of the
book distinct from Aquila's, as indeed Origen's Hexapla and
St. Jerome in the preface to his commentary attest, and that
this version in its original form goes back, like the versions
of Job and Proverbs, to one of the last centuries before Christ.
On the Peshitto version of Koheleth and Ruth there is
a monograph by G. Janichs, Animadversiones criticce &c.
(Breslau, 1871), with which compare Ndldeke's review, Lit.
Centralblatt, 1871, No. 49. For the text of the Grcecus
Venetus, see Gebhardt's edition (Leipz. 1874). Ginsburg's
well-known work (1861) contains sections on the versions.

279

CHAPTER XIII.
THE CANONICITY OF ECCLESIASTES AND ECCLESIASTICUS.

It is not surprising that these strange Meditations should
have had great difficulty in penetrating into the Canon.
There is sufficient evidence (see the works of Plumptre and
Wright) ' that the so-called Wisdom of Solomon is in part a
deliberate contradiction of sentiments expressed in our book.
The most striking instance of this antagonism is in V/isd.
ii. 6-10 (cf. Eccles. ix. 7-9), where the words of Koheleth are
actually put into the mouth of the ungodly libertines of
Alexandria. The date of Wisdom is disputed, but cannot
be earlier than the reign of Ptolemy VII. Physcon (B.C. 145-
117). The attitude of the writer towards Koheleth may
perhaps be compared with that of the Palestinian teachers
who relegated the book among the apocrypha on this
among other grounds, that it contained heretical statements,
e.g. ' Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth ' &c. (xi. 9).
Nothing is more certain than that the Book of Koheleth
was an Antilegomenon in Palestine in the first century
before Christ. And yet it certainly had its friends and
supporters both then and later. Simeon ben Shetach and
his brother-in-law, King Alexander Jannaeus-(B.C. 105-79),
1 Plumptre, Ecclesiastes, pp. 71-74 5 Wright, Koheleth, pp. 67-70. It is
plainly impossible in the light of the history of dogma to place Wisdom before
Ecclesiastes. Vet Hitzig has done this. Nachtigal took a sounder view in 1799
when he published a book on Wisdom regarded als Gegenstiick des Koheleth. It
forms vol. ii. of a singular work called Die Versammlung der ll'eisen, of which
Koheleth forms vol. i.

280 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xrtr.
were as familiar with Koheleth as the young men of Alex
andria, and Simeon, according to the Talmudic story1
(Bereshith Rabba, c. 91), quoted Eccles. vii. 12a with a prefix
(3*ron ' as it is written ') proper to a Biblical quotation. From
another Talmudic narrative (Baba bathra, 4a) it would seem
that Koheleth was cited in the time of Herod the Great as
of equal authority with the Pentateuch, and from a third
(Shabbath, 30^) that St. Paul's teacher, Gamaliel, permitted
quotations from our book equally with those from canonical
Scriptures. Like the Song of Songs, however, it called forth
a lively opposition from severe judges. The schools of
Hillel and Shammai were divided on the merits of these
books. At first the Shammaites, who were adverse to them,
carried a majority of the votes of the Jewish doctors. But
when, after the destruction of Jerusalem, Jewish learning
reorganised itself at Jamnia (4^ leagues south of Jaffa), the
opposite view (viz. that the Song and Koheleth 'defile the
hands ' — i.e. are holy Scriptures) was again brought forward
in a synod held about A.D. 90, and finally sanctioned in a
second synod held A.D. 118. The arguments urged on
both sides were such as belong to an uncritical age. No
attempt was made to penetrate into the spirit and object of
Koheleth, but test passages were singled out. The heretically
sounding words in xi. ga were at first held by some to be
decisive against the claim of canonicity, but — we are told —
when the ' wise men ' took the close of the verse into consi
deration (' but know that for all this God will bring thee into
the judgment '), they exclaimed no^B> "idk nfi'', ' Solomon has
spoken appropriately.'2
This first synod or sanhedrin of Jamnia has played an
important part in recent arguments. According to Krochmal,
Gratz, and Renan, one object of the Jewish doctors was to
decide whether the Song and Koheleth ought to be admitted
into the Canon. It seems, however, to have been satisfactorily

1 See Schiffer, Das Buch Kohelet nach der Auffassung der Weisen, part i.,
pp. 100-102.
2 Midrasch Koheleth, § I, 3 ; comp. Pesikta of R. Kahana, § 8 (Schiffer,
pp. 6, 7).

chap. xiii. THE CANONICITY OF ECCLESIASTES 28 1
shown ¦ that their uncertainty was not as to whether these
books ought to be admitted, but whether they had been
rightly admitted. It is true that there was, even as late as
A.D. 90, a chance for any struggling book (e.g. Sirach) to find its
way into the Canon. But in the case of the Song and Kohe
leth a preliminary canonisation had taken place ; it only
remained to set at rest all lingering doubts in the minds of
those who disputed the earlier decision. Another matter was
also considered, according to Krochmal, at the synod of A.D.
90, viz. how to indicate that with the admission of Ecclesiastes
the Canon of the Hagiographa was closed. I have already
referred to this scholar's view of the Epilogue (p. 232 &c), and
need only add that, if we may trust the statement of the Talmud,
the canonicity of Koheleth was finally carried in deference to
an argument which presupposes that xii. 13, 14 was already
an integral part of Koheleth. The Talmudic passage is well
known ; it runs thus —
' The wise men ' [i.e. the school of Shammai] ' sought to
" hide " the Book of Koheleth because of its contradictory
sayings. And why did they not " hide " it ? Because the
beginning and the close of it consist of words of Tora ' [i.e.
are in harmony with revealed truth 2]. By the ' beginning '
the Jewish doctors meant Koheleth's assertion that ' all a
man's toil which he toileth under the sun (i.e. all earthly, un-
spiritual toil) is unprofitable (i. 3), and by the 'close' the
emphatic injunction and dogmatic declaration of the epilogist
in xii. 13, 14. The Talmudic statement agrees, as is well
known, with the note of St. Jerome on these verses. ' Aiunt
Hebraei quum inter caetera scripta Salomonis quae antiquata
sunt, nee in memoria duraverunt, et hie liber obliterandus
videretur, eo quid vanas Dei assereret creaturas, et totum
putaret esse pro nihilo, et cibum, et potum, et delitias trans-
euntes praeferret omnibus ; ex hoc uno capitulo meruisse
auctoritatem, ut in divinorum voluminum numero poneretur,
1 By Delitzsch'; see Wright's Koheleth, p. 471, and comp. Strack, art. 'Kanon
des A. T.' in Herzog-Plitt, vol. vii.
2 I quote the characteristic closing words, min »"On 1D1D1 min '"I3T in^'nn
(Shabbath, c. 30/').

282 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH t'HAP. xin.
qu6d totam disputationem suam, et omnem catalogum hac
quasi dva/cecpaXaicocTei, coarctaverit, et dixerit finem sermonum
auditu esse promtissimum, nee aliquid in se habere difficile :
ut scilicet Deum timeamus, et ejus prsecepta faciamus ' (Opera,
ii. 787). The canonicity of Ecclesiastes was rarely disputed in the
ancient Church. The fifth oecumenical council at Constanti
nople pronounced decisively in its favour. On the Christian
heretics in the fourth century who rejected it, see Ginsburg,
Coheleth, p. 103.
Let me refer again, in conclusion, to the story in which
that remarkable man — ' the restorer of the Law ' — Simeon
ben Shetach plays a chief part. It not only shows that
Koheleth was a religious authority at the end of the second
or beginning of the first century B.C., but implies that at this
period the book was already comparatively old, and, one may
fairly say, pre-Maccabaean. I presume too that -the addition
of the Epilogue (see pp. 234-5) with the all-important 13th
and 14th verses had been made before Simeon's time.
II.
It was remarked above that as late as A.D. 90 there was
a chance for any struggling book to gain admission into the
Canon. Now for at least 1 80 years the Wisdom of Ben Sira
had been struggling for recognition as canonical. In spite of
the fact that it did not claim the authorship of any ancient
sage, and that, like Koheleth, it contained some questionable
passages, it was certainly in high favour both in Alexandria
and in Palestine. As Delitzsch points out, 'the oldest
Palestinian authorities (Simeon ben Shetach, the brother of
Queen Salome, about B.C. 90, seems to be the earliest) quote
it as canonical, and the censures of Babylonian teachers only
refer to the Aramaic Targum, not to the original work. The
latter was driven out of the field by the Aramaic version,
which, though very much interpolated, was more accessible
to the people.' ' Simeon ben Shetach was counted among
1 Gesch. der ji'idischen Poesie, p. 20.

chap. xiii. THE CANONICITY OF ECCLESIASTES 283
the Jewish ' fathers,' and a saying of his is given in Pirke
Aboth, i. 10. It is remarkable that the very same passage of
Bereshith Rabba (c. 91) which contains this wise man's
quotations from Koheleth (see above) also contains one from
Sirach introduced with the formula 3*ns KTD pn &nSD3, ' in the
book of Ben Sira it is written.' The quotation is, ' Exalt her,
and she shall set thee between princes ' — apparently a genuine
saying of Ben Sira (Sirach), though not found in our Eccle
siasticus. The first word (' Exalt her') comes, it is true, from
Prov. iv. 8, but, as Dr. Wright remarks,1 Ben Sira ' was fond
of tacking on new endings to old proverbs.' At a much
later period, a quotation from Ben Sira (Sir. viL 10 ?) is
made by Rab (about 165-247 A.D.) introduced with the
formula 10KJE' Diro, 'because it is said,' Erubin, c. 65a.
Strack indeed supposes that Rab meant to quote from
canonical Scripture, but by a slip quoted from Ben Sira
instead ; but this is too bold a conjecture. Lastly, Rabba
(about 270-330 A.D.) quotes a saying of our book (Sir. xiii.
15 ; xxvii. 9) as 'repeated a third time in the Kethubhim
(the Hagiographa) ' — Dmnsi C^1B>D, Baba Kamma, c. 92$.
It is quite true that, according to the Talmudic passage
referred to on p. 196, the Book of Ben Sira stands on the
border-line between the canonical and the non-canonical
literature : the words are, ' The Books of Ben Sira, and all
books which were written thenceforward, do not defile the
hands.' But taking this in connection with the vehement
declaration of Rabbi Akiba that the man who reads Ben
Sira and other ' extraneous ' books has no portion in the
world to come,2 we may safely assume that the Book of Ben
Sira had a position of exceptional authority with not a few
Jewish readers. It is equally certain, as the above quotations
show, that even down to the beginning of the fourth century
A.D. sayings of Sirach were invested with the authority of
Scripture. Whatever, then, may have been the theory (and
no one pretends that the Synods of Jamnia placed Sirach
1 Koheleth, p. 46.
2 See the passage from Sanhedrin (Jer. Talm.), *. 28a, quoted at length in
Wright's Koheleth, pp. 467-468,

284 THE BOOK OF KOHELETH chap. xiii.
on a level with Koheleth), the practice of some Jewish
teachers was to treat Sirach as virtually canonical, which
reminds us of the similar practice of some Christian Fathers.
St. Augustine says (but he retracted it afterwards) of the two
books of Wisdom, 'qui quoniam in auctoritatem recipi meiu-
erunt, inter propheticos numerandi sunt ' (Dedoctr. Christiana",
ii. 8), and both Origen and Cyprian quote Sirach as sacred
scripture. Probably, as Fritzsche remarks, Sirach first became
known to Christian teachers at Alexandria at the end of the
second century.

285

AIDS TO THE STUDENT
The literature upon Koheleth is unusually large. Some of the
most important books and articles have been referred to already, and
the student will naturally have at hand Dr. Wright's list in The Book
of Koheleth (1883), Introd., pp. xiv.-xvii. It may suffice to add
among the less known books, J. G. Herder, Briefe das Studium der
Theologie betreffend, erster Theil (xi.), Werke, ed. Suphan, Bd. x. ;
Theodore Preston, Ecclesiastes, Hebrew Text and a Latin Version,
with original notes, and a translation of the Comm. of Mendelssohn
(1845) ; E. Bohl, Dissertatmies de aramaismis libri Koheleth
(Erlangen, i860) ; Bernh. Schafer, Neue Untersuchungen iiber das
Buch Koheleth (Freiburg in Breisgau, 1870) ; J. S. Bloch, Ursprung
und Entstehungszeit des Buches Kohelet (Bamberg, 1872); Studien
zur Gesch. der Sammlung der althebr. Literatur (Breslau, 1876) ;
C. Taylor, The Dirge of Coheleth in Eccl. xii., discussed and literally
translated (1874) ; J. J. S. Perowne, articles on Ecclesiastes in
Expositor, begun 1879 ; M. M. Kalisch, Path and Goal (contains
translation of our book and much illustrative matter), 1880 ; A.
Kuenen, Religion of Israel (1875), iii. 153 &c, also Onderzoek (1873),
vol. iii., and article in Theologisch Tijdschrift, 1883, p. 113, &c; S.
Schiffer, Das Btich Kohelet nach der Auffassung der IVeisen des
Talmud und Midrasch und der jud. Erkldrer des Mittelalters, Theil i.
(Leipz. 1885); Engelhardt, 'Ueber den Epilog des Koheleth' in
Studien und Kritiken, 1875; Klostermann, article on Wright's Kohe
leth, in same periodical, 1885. See also Pusey's Daniel the Prophet,
ed. 2, pp. 327-8, and the introduction to Prof. Salmon's commen
tary in Ellicott. [Prof. A. Palm's bibliographical monograph, Die
Qphelet- Literatur, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Exegese des Alten
Testaments, 1886, appeared too late to be of use.]

APPENDIX

IN WHICH VARIOUS POINTS IN THE BOOK ARE ILLUS
TRATED OR MORE FULLY TREATED.

i. Pfleiderer on St. Paul (p. 3).
2. The word Kenotic ; Phil. ii. 7 (p. 7).
3. Kleinert on Job vi. 25 (p. 21).
4. On Job xix. 25-27 (pp. 33-35).
5. Job's repudiation of sins (p. 39).
6. On Job xxxviii. 31, 32 (p. 52).
7. Source of story of Job (pp. 60-63).
8. Corrected text of Deut. xxxii. 8, 9
(p. 81).
9., The style of Elihu (p. 92).
10. The Aramaisms and Arabisms of
Job (p. 99).
II. Herder on Job (pp. 106-m).
12. Septuagint of Job (pp. 113, 114).
13. Harun ar-Rashid and Solomon
(P- 130-
14. On Prov. xxvii. 6 (p. 148).
15. Eternity of Koran (p. 192).
16. Text of Proverbs (p. 173)'

1 7. Religious value of Proverbs (p. 1 76,
177).
18. Aids to the Student (p. 178).
1 9. Date of Jesus son of Sirach (p. 1 80).
20. On Sirach xxi. 27 (p. 189).
21. Sirach's Hymn of Praise (p. 193).
22. Ancient versions of Sirach (p. 195).
23. Aids to the Student (p. 198).
24. On the Title Koheleth (p. 207).
25. On Eccles. iii. 11 (p. 210).
26. On Eccles. vii. 28 (p. 219).
27. On Eccles. xi. 9-xii. 7 (pp. 223-
227).
28. On Eccles. xii. 9 &c. (p. 232).
29. Griitz on Koheleth's opposition to
asceticism (p. 244).
30. Herder on the alternate voices in
Koheleth (p. 245).

1. Page 3. — Pfleiderer, in the spirit of Lagarde, accounts for the
Pauline view of the atonement by the ' stereotyped legal Jewish '
doctrine of the atoning merit of the death of holy men (Hibbert
Lectures pp. 60-62). But was not this idea familiar and in some
sense presumably real to Jesus? And why speak of a 'stereo
typed ' formula ? Examples of a self-devotion designed to ' merit '
good for the community, or even for an individual, abound in
Judaism. * Pao-e 1 note 2. — The word Kenotic is conveniently descriptive
of a theory, and does not bind one who uses it to any particular expo-

288 APPENDIX
sition of the difficult Greek of Phil. ii. 7. I need not decide, there
fore, whether we should render iv popcprj deov BWNn m^3, with
Delitzsch, or DWN niD13 with Salkinson. To the names of emi
nent exegetes mentioned on page 7, add that of Godet.
3. Page 21 (on Job vi. 25). — Kleinert (Theol. Studien u. Kritiken,
1886, pp. 285-86) improves the parallelism by translating ' Wie so gar
nicht verletzend sind Worte der Rechtschaffenheit, aber wie so gar
nichts riigt die Rechtsriige von euch.' He thinks that HD here, as
occasionally elsewhere, and ma often in Arabic, has the sense of
' not ' (see Ewald, Lehrbuch, § 325^) ; comp. ix. 2, xvi. 6, xxxi. 1,
and the characteristic nS3 'how seldom,' xxi. 19. Without entering
into his doubtful justification of ' verletzend,' it is possible to render
' How far from grievous are straightforward speeches, but how little
is proved by the reproof from you ! '
4. Pages 33-35 (Job xix. 25-27). — First, as to the sense of Goel
(A.V. and R.V. 'redeemer'). The sense seems determined by
xvi. 18 (see above, p. 31). It is vengeance for his blood that Job
demands, and hence in xix. 29 he warns his false friends to beware
of the sword of divine justice. The ' friends ' have identified them
selves with that unjust Deity against whom Job appeals to the
' witness in heaven ' (xvi. 20) — the moral God of whom he has a
dim but growing intuition. The whole plan of the book, as Kleinert
remarks, calls for a definite legal meaning. But as no direct
reference to Job's blood occurs in xix. 25-27, ' my vindicator ' will
be a sufficiently exact rendering (as in Isa. xliv. 6). I cannot
however follow Kleinert in his recognition of the hope of immor
tality in this passage.
Next as to the text. Bickell's recension of it, when pointed in
the ordinary manner, is as follows : —
: nip* -flir'py fnnsj
nxi nap: >iy -\m) 26
: rr?K nrpg '^p-i
^¦n.m$ '3« iK'K 2V
np6] -iso wy.)
; »pra wb 63
1. .. . - ; • t
Bickell does not attempt to make easy Hebrew ; the passage ought
not in such a connection to be too easy. He renders ver. 260 ' Et
postea, his prsesentibus absolutis, veniet testis meus ' (God, his
witness, as xvi. 19), comparing for the sense of nBpj Isa. xxix. 1.
Certainly we seem to require in ver. 26 some further development of

APPENDIX 289
the idea suggested by the appearance of the Goel on the dust of
Job's burial-place, and such a development is not supplied by the
received text. We must not look at any corrupt passage by itself,
but take it with the context. Those who defend the text of ver. 26 as
it stand? have on their side the parallelism of niy and n"B»3 (comp.
ver. 20) ; but this parallelism is counterbalanced by the want of
correspondence between ntfr-IBiM and iili!?J« n.fqN- Dr. C. Taylor
suggests an aposiopesis, and gives the sense intended by the writer
thus, ' When they have penetrated my skin, and of my flesh have
had their fill ' (comp. ver. 22^). Is it not more likely that H.b'ap-I
came into the text through a reminiscence of ver. 22^? ' I shall see
these things from Shaddai ' will be, on Bickell's view, equivalent to
' I shall see these things attested by Shaddai.' As yet, the sufferer ex
claims, I can recognise this, viz. my innocence, for myself alone ; mine
eyes have seen it, but not another's (Prov. xxvii. 2). The connexion
is in every way improved. Job first of all desired an inscribed testi
mony to his innocence, but now he aspires to something better.
Bickell's is the most natural reconstruction of the passage as yet
proposed ; so far as ver. 261^ is concerned, it is supported in the main
by the Septuagint. More violent corrections are offered by Dr. A.
Neubauer, Athenmum, June 27, 1885. — As a rendering of the text as
it stands, I think R.V. is justified in giving ' from my flesh ' (with
marg., ' Or, without ') ; ' mine eyes shall see ' (— ' will have seen ')
certainly suggests that Job will be clothed with some body when he
sees God (Dillmann's reply is not adequate). ' Without my flesh '
(so Amer. Revisers) is in itself justifiable (see especially xi. 15) ; in the
use of the privative J became more and more frequent in the later
periods (comp. the Talmudic D^V. 11N» = ' blind ').
5. Page 39. — Job's catalogue of the sins which he repudiates.
The parallel suggested between Job and an Egyptian formulary may
he illustrated by a passage in the life of the great Stoic Emperor. A
learned Bishop, popular in his day, reminds us of ' that golden Table
of Ptolomy (sic) Arsacides, which the Emperour Marcus Aurelius
found at Thebes, which for the worthiness thereof that worthy
Emperour caused every night to be laid at his bed's head, and at his
death gave it as a singular treasure to his sonne Commodus. The
Table was written in Greeke characters, and contained in it these
protestations : " I never exalted the proud rich man, neither hated
the poor just man : I never d enied justice to the poor for his poverty
neither pardoned the wealthy for his riches. ... I alwaies favoured
the poor that was able to do little, and God, who was able to do
much, alwaies favoured me." ' (The Practice of Quietnesse, by George
Webb'e, D.D., 1699?) u

29O APPENDIX
6. Page 52 (On Job xxxviii. 31, 32, ix. 9).— (1) I admit that the
identification of nD»3 and the Pleiades is uncertain. Still it is
plausible, especially when we compare Ar. kumat 'heap.' And even
if it should be shown that kimtu was not the Babylonian name for
the Pleiades, this would not be decisive against the identification
proposed. The Babylonians did not give the name kisiluv to Orion,
yet Stern's argument (Jiidische Zeitschrift, 1865, Heft 4 ; comp.
Noldeke, Schenkel's Bibel- Lexikon, iv. 369, 370) in favour of
equating k'sil and Orion remains valid. (2) As to n'my.D ' sweet
influences ' is fortunate enough to exist by sufferance in the margin
of R.V. It is sometimes defended by comparing 1 Sam. xv. 32.
But the only possible renderings there are ' in bonds ' or ' trembling '
(see Variorum Bible ad loci). Dr. Driver has shown that ' sweet
influences ' is a legacy from Sebastian Minister (1535). (3) niTJO
is probably not to be identified with ni^-JD (2 Kings xxiii. 5), in
spite of the authority of the Sept. and the Targum (see Dillmann's
note). In this I agree with G. Hoffmann, whose adventurous.
interpretations of the astronomical names in Amos and Job do not
however as yet seem to me acceptable. According to him, kima =
Sirius, k'sil = Orion, Mazzaroth = the Hyades and Aldebaran,
'Ayish' = the Pleiades (Stade's Zeitschrift, 1883, Heft 1). Mazza
roth = Ass. mazarati ; Mazzaloth (i.e. the zodiacal signs) seems to
be the plural ot mazzdla = Ass. manzaltu station.1
7. Pages 60-63. — That the story of Job is an embellished folk
tale is probable, though still unproved. The delightful humour
which in the Prologue (see pp. 14, no), as in the myths of Plato,
stands side by side with the most impressive solemnity of itself
points to this view. No one has expressed this better than Well
hausen, in a review of Dillmann's Hiob, Jahrbucher fiir deutsche
Theologie, xvi. 552 &c. : 'Den launigen und doch miirrischen Ton,
den der nonchalante Satan Gott gegeniiber anschlagt, so ganz auf
Du und Du, wiirde schwerlich der Dichter des Hiob gewagt haben ;
schwerlich auch wiirde es ihm gelungen sein, mit so merkwiirdig
einfachen Mitteln so wunderbar plastische Figuren zu entwerfen.'
He also points out the inconsistencies of the story, precisely such as
we might expect in a folk-tale, and concludes (a little hastily) that
the Prologue is altogether a folk-story and had no didactic object.
Eichhorn, too, in a review of Michaelis on Job (Allgemeine Biblio-
thek, i. 430 &c), well points out that the illusion of the poem is
much impaired by not admitting an element in the plot derived
from tradition. Of course this view of yob as based on a folk-tale
is quite reconcileable with the view that the hero is a personification.
1 On Mazzaloth, see Friedrich Delitzsch, Prolegomena &c. (1886), p. 142.

APPENDIX 291
The latter is much older than the last century ; it explains the Jewish
saying (p. 60) that ' Job was a parable,' and the fascination which the
book possessed for the age preceding the final dispersion of the
Jews.1 8. Page 81 (further correction of text of Deut. xxxii. 8, 9). — The
passage becomes more rhythmical if with Bickell we reproduce the
Septuagint Hebrew text at the close of ver. 8 as DWN ya and continue
(ver. 9;, [or ids;] apy> mrv p?m
: ?k-ie» in!?™ bn
The correction of the last couplet is important as a supplement of
the explanation of ver. 8 given in the text. To other nations God
gave protective angels, but He reserved Israel for Himself. (See
Bickell, Zeitschrift f. kathol. Theologie, 1885, pp. 718-19, and comp.
his Carmina V. T. metrice, 1882, p. 192, where he adheres in both
verses to the received text.) The Style of Elihu.
9. Page 92. — No student of the Hebrew of 5^ will overlook the
admirable ' studies ' on the style of Elihu by J. G. Stickel (Das Buch
Hiob, 1842, pp. 248-262) and Carl Budde (Beitrage zur Kritik des
Buches Hiob, 1876, pp. 65-160). The former succeeded in obtain
ing the admission of such an eminent critical analyst as Kuenen, that
style by itself would be scarcely sufficient to prove the later origin of
the Elihu speeches. It also, no doubt, assisted Delitzsch to recog
nise in Elihu the same ' Hebraeoarabic ' impress as in the rest of the
book. In spite of this effective ' study,' Dillmann's brief treatment
of the same subject in 1869 made it clear that the subject had not
yet by any means been threshed out, and perhaps no more powerful
argument against chaps, xxxii.-xxxvii. has been produced than that
contained in a single closely-printed page (289) of his commentary.
There was therefore a good chance for a Privatdocent to win himself
a name by a renewed attempt to state the linguistic facts more tho
roughly and impartially than before. This indeed fairly expresses
Budde's object, which is not at all to offer a direct proof that the
disputed chapters belong to the original poem, but merely to show
that the opposite view cannot be demonstrated on stylistic grounds.
His method is to collect, first of all, points of resemblance and then
points of difference between ' Elihu ' and the rest of the book.
Last among the latter appear the Aramaisms and Arabisms. Budde
t > See Rosenthal, Vier apokryphische Bikher aus der Zeit und Schule Akiba' s
(1885), pp. 6-12. U 2

292 APPENDIX
rejects the view, adopted from Stickel (see p. 92) by Canon F. C.
Cook, that the deeper colouring of Aramaic is only the poet's
way of indicating the Aramaean origin of Elihu. He denies that
there is any such greater amount of Aramaism as can form a real
distinction between 'Elihu' and the undisputed chapters. I will
not inquire whether the subjectivity of a writer may impress itself on
his statistics, and willingly grant that the Aramaic colouring in ' Elihu '
may perhaps affect the reader more owing to the faults of style to
which Budde himself alludes on p. 157, and which, to me, indicate
an age or at least a writer of less taste and talent than the original
author. The Aramaisms may be thrown into stronger relief by these
infirmities, and so the colouring may seem deeper than it is. I am
not however sure that there is an illusion in the matter. Among
the counter-instances of Aramaism given by Budde from the speeches
of Eliphaz, there are at least two which have no right to figure there,
viz. DJJD, xv. 29, and 'X for )?X, xxii. 30, both which forms are pro
bably corrupt readings. Until Dillmann has published his second
edition I venture to retain the statement on p. 92. There is a
stronger Aramaising element in Elihu, which, with other marks of a
peculiar and inferior l style, warrants us in assigning the section to a
later writer. This is, of course, not precluded by the numerous
Hebraistic poin ts of contact with the main part of the book, which
Carl Budde has so abundantly collected (Beitrage, pp. 92-123). . No
one can doubt that the original poem very early became an absorbing
study in the circles of ' wise men.'
As to the words and phrases (of pure Hebrew origin) in which
Elihu differs from the body of the work, I may remark that it is
sometimes difficult to realise their full significance from Budde's
catalogue. Kleinert has thrown much light on some of them in a
recent essay. He has, for instance,2 shown the bearings of the fact
that the disputed chapters persistently avoid the juristic sense of pi)?'
(Kal), except in a quotation from speeches of Job (xxxiv. 5), Elihu
himself only using the word of correctness in statement (xxxiii. 12),
or of moral righteousness (xxxv. 7), and that J^Cjhrj has the sense of
' acting wickedly' only in a passage of Elihu (xxxiv. 12). The use
of p~y$> p^V' and np"iy in xxxii. 1, xxxiii. 26, xxxv. 8, xxxvi. 3, is also
dwelt upon in this connexion. It is true that Budde does not con
ceal these points ; he tabulates them correctly, but does not indicate
1 ' Ist's denkbar, dass ein solcher Dichter demjenigen Redner, dem er die
Hauptrolle zugedacht, die Charakteristik jenes inferioren Redetypus zugewiesen
haben konnte ? ' Kleinert.
2 Das spezifisch-hebraische im Buch Hiob, Theol. Studien und Kritiken, 1886,
pp. 299-300.

APPENDIX 293
the point of view from which they can be understood. Kleinert
supplies this omission. The body of the poem, he remarks, is juristic
in spirit ; the speeches of Elihu ethical and hortatory. This brings
with it a different mode of regarding the problem of Job's sufferings.
' Die Reden Elihu's haben zu dem gerichtlichen Auffiss der Buch-
anlage nur das allerausserlichste Verhaltniss. Sie verlassen die scharf-
gezogenen Grundlinien der rechtlichen Auseinandersetzung, um in
eine ethisch-paranetische, rein chokmatisch-didaktische Erorterung
der Frage iiberzulenken.' Kleinert also notes one peculiar word of
Elihu's which I have not met with in Budde, but which, from Klei-
nert's point of view, is important — -1B3, ' a ransom ' (xxxiii. 24, xxxvi.
18). Why did not the juristic theologians of the Colloquies use it?
Evidently the speeches of Elihu are later compositions.
The Aramaisms and Arabisms of jfob (excepting the Elihu portion).
10. Page 99. — The critic, no less than the prophet, is still with
too many a favourite subject of ironical remark ; ' they say of him,
Doth he not speak in riddles ' ? ' The origin of jfob, upon the lin
guistic as well as the theological side, may be a riddle, but the interest
of the book is such that we cannot give up the riddle. We may not
all agree upon the solution ; the riddle may be one that admits of
different answers. All that this proves is the injudiciousness of
dogmatism, which specially needs emphasising with respect to the
bearings of the linguistic data. To say, with Noldeke,2 'We have no
ground for regarding the language of 'jfob as anything but a very
pure Hebrew' seems to me as extreme as to assert with G. H.
Bernstein (the well-known Syriac scholar) that the amount of
Aramaic colouring would of itself bring the book into the post- Exile
period. Bernstein carried to a dangerous extreme a tendency already
combated by Michaelis and Eichhorn ; 3 but his research is thorough
going and systematic. Those who, like the present writer, have no
access to it, may be referred to L. Bertholdt's Hislorisch-kritische
Einleitung* (Erlangen, 1812-1819), where it is carefully examined,
and its arguments, as it would seem, reduced to something like their
just proportions. Bertholdt does not scruple to admit that distinc
tively Aramaising constructions are wanting in Job, and that words
1 Ezek. xx. 49.
2 Die alttestamentliche Literatur, p. 192.
3 See Eichhorn's notice of Michaelis in vol. i. of his Allgemeine Bibliothek der
biblischen Literatur.
4 Pp. 2076, 2077. Bernstein's title is, Ueber das Alter, den Inhalt, den
Zweck tmd die gegenwdrtige Gestalt des Buches Hiob (in Keil and Tzschirner's
Analeklen, 1813, pp. i-»37)-

294 APPENDIX
with Aramaic affinities may have existed in Hebrew before the Exile.
Still he decides that though part of the argument falls to pieces, yet
for most there is a real foundation. This too, is substantially the
judgment of Carl Budde. ' Despite all deductions from Bernstein's
list it remains true that just the Book of Job is specially rich in
words which principally belong to the Aramaic dialects.' 1 Dillmann,
too, who takes pains to emphasise the comparative scarcity of
Aramaisms in the strictest sense of the word, yet finds in the body of
the work (excluding the Elihu portion) Aramaising and Arab-
ising words enough to suggest that the author lived hard by
Aramaic- and Arabic-speaking peoples.2 By taking this view, Dill
mann (whose philological caution and accuracy give weight to his
opinion) separates himself from those who, like Eichhorn and more
recently the Jewish scholar Kaempf,3 confidently maintain that the
peculiar words in jfob are genuine Hebrew ' Sprachgut.' To make
this probable, we ought to be able to show that they have more
affinities with northern than with southern Semitic (see p. 99), a task
as yet unaccomplished. Dillmann, too, would certainly dissent from
Canon Cook's opinion that the Aramaisms of Job are only ' such as
characterise the antique and highly poetic style.' According to him,
they are equally unfavourable to a very early and to a very late date.
Various lists of Aramaising words have been given since Bernstein's.
I give here that of Dr. Lee in his Book of the Patriarch Job (p. 50),
which has the merit of having been constructed from his own reading
of Job. It refers to the whole book : —
mm (iii. 4) ; in:D (iv. 12) ; ^1&6 (v. 2) ; EmK (ib. 8), occur in
the Aramaic, not the Hebrew sense ; bhnn (viii. 2) ; nJB" (ib. 7) ;
DrDD (xi. 20); DDU (xii. 2); t,(?D (ib. 11); m&Q (ib. 23); 'ninKI TO
(xiii. 17); -pna (xv. 17); nn for -ib>xi (ib.); na,-6tJ> (ib. 31); nhi
(xvi. 15) ; mDIDn (ib. 16) ; »S3p (xviii. 2) ; bvV ¦ • ¦ lay (xxi. 10) ;
j"na (xxiv. 22) ; iana (xxxi. 33) ; ninx (xxxii. 10, 18) ; yna (xxxiii.
24) ; -\sbnn (ib. 33) ; "ina (xxxvi. 2) ; mm (ib. 21); 133 (xxxviii. 3) ;
ITU (xii. 12). I will not criticise this list, which no doubt contains
some questionable items. We might, however, insert other words in
exchange, e.g. °E>1D (ix. 26) ; inb> (xvi. 19) ; D»B3 (xxx. 6) ; and JB3
(v. 22, xxx. 3) ; and perhaps ap") (xiii. 28), which Geiger plausibly
compares with Syr. rakbo 'wineskin' (so the tradition represented by
the Septuagint, the Peshitto, and Barhebrasus). Some supposed
Arabisms may also in all probability be transferred to the list of
Aramaisms ; but the Arabisms which remain will abundantly justify
1 Beitrage zur Kritik des Buches Hiob (1876), p. 140.
2 Hiob (1869), Einleitung, pp. xxvii. xxix.
1 Die Grabschrift Eschmunazar's (1874), p. 8.

APPENDIX 295
what has been stated in the section on Job. I have not attempted
to decide precisely where the poet heard both Arabic and Aramaic.
Dillmann accepts the view mentioned on p. 75. But Gilead, too,
was at all times inhabited by Arab tribes, both nomad and settled,1
and the region itself was called Arabia.2
n. Pages 106-111. — Herder (to whom I gladly refer the
student) is perhaps the best representative of the modern literary
point of view. Whatever he says on the Hebrew Scriptures is
worth reading, even when his remarks need correction. No one
felt the poetry oljob more deeply than Herder ; to the religious ideas
of the poem his eyes were not equally open. Indeed, it must
have been hard to discern and appreciate these adequately in the
eighteenth century ; the newly-discovered sacred books of the East,
with their deep though obscure metaphysical conceptions, for a time
almost overshadowed the far more sobre Hebrew Scriptures. Like
Carlyle (who is to some extent his echo) Herder underrates the
specifically Hebrew element in the book, which is of course not very
visible on a hasty perusal. One point, however, that he sees very
clearly, though he does not use the expression, is that Job is a cha
racter-drama. He denies that the speeches are monotonous.
' So eintonig fiir uns alle Reden klingen, so sind sie mit Licht
und Schatten angelegt und der Faden, oder vielmehr die Verwirrung
der Materie, nimmt zu von Rede zu Rede, bis Hiob sich selbst
fasset und seine Behauptungen lindert. Wer diesen Faden nicht
verfolgt und insonderheit nicht bemerkt, wie Hiob seinem Gegner
immer den eigenen Pfeil aus der Hand windet ; entweder das
besser sagt, was jener sagte, oder die Griinde jenes eben fiir sich
braucht — der hat das Lebendige, Wachsende, kurz die Seele des
Buchs verfehlet ' (Hiob als Composition betrachtet, Werke, Suphan, ii.
318). He has also clearly perceived the poet's keen sympathy with
mythology, and this, combined with the (supposed) few imitations
ol Job in the Old Testament, confirmed him in the erroneous view
that the original writer of Job was an Edomitish Emeer. On the
limited influence of Job he has some vigorous sentences, the edge of
which, however, is turned by more recent criticism. It is of the
prophets he is chiefly thinking, when he finds so few traces of
acquaintance with Job in the Scriptures, and of the pre-Exile
prophets. ' Wie drangen und driicken sich die Propheten ! wie
borgen sie von einander Bilder in einem ziemlich engen Kreise und
fuhren sie nur, jeder nach seiner Art, aus ! Diese alte ehrwiirdige
1 Blau, Zeitschr. der deutsch. morgenl. Ges., xxv. 540.
' Wetzstein in Delitzsch's lob, p. 528.

296 APPENDIX
Pyramide steht im Ganzen unnachgeahmt da und ist vielleicht un-
nachahmbar.' This passage occurs in the fifth conversation in his
Geist der Ebrdischen Poesie (Werke, ed. Suphan, xi. 310). The
student of Job will not neglect this and also the two preceding very
attractive chapters. The description of Elihu is not the least inte
resting passage. Herder does his best to account for the presence of
this unexpected fifth speaker, but really shows how unaccountable it
is except on the theory of later addition. Prof. Briggs's theory
(p. 93) that the poor speeches of Elihu are intended ' as a literary
foil ' was suggested by Herder. ' Bemerken Sie aber, dass er nur
als Schatte dasteht, dies Gottes-Orakel zu erheben' ( Werke, xi. 284).
12. Pages 113, 114. — The latest study on the original Septuagint
text of the Book of Job is by Bickell in the Zeitschrift fiir katholische
Theologie, 1886, pp. 557-564. As to the date of the Alexandrine
version, Hody's remark, De Bibliorum Textibus, p. 196, deserves
attention, viz. that Philo already quotes from it, — Tt's yap, wc 6 'I<i/3
cjujcri, KadapoQ airo pxnrov, Kal av fxia fjpipa kcrriv fj Ccor) (Sept. of Job
xiv. 4 6 jiioo) ; De Mutatione Nominum, § 6 (i. 585).
13. Page 131. — The character of Harun ar-Rashid, in fact, be
came almost as distorted by legend as that of Solomon. Neither of
them were models of civil justice (Weil, Geschichte der Chalifen,
ii. 127). 14. Page 148 (Prov. xxvii. 6). — Consult, however, the Septuagint,
which seems to have read 'D at the beginning of the second line
(' More faithful .... than' &c). See Cornill on Ezek. xxxv. 13.
15. Page 162, note 1. — The Mo'tazilites ('the Protestants of
Islam ') denied the eternity of the Koran because it implied the
existence of two eternal beings (Weil, Gesch. der Chalifen, ii. 262).
16. Page 173.— Text of Proverbs. Among the minor additions
in Sept., note the pr) in Prov. v. 16 (so Vatican and, originally,
Sinaitic MS.), if we may follow Lagarde and Field. The Alexandrine
MS., however, and the Complutensian edition, omit pi), which is also
wanting in Aquila. Comp. Field's Hexapla ad loc.
17. Pages 176, 177 (Religious Value of Proverbs). — To appre
ciate the religious spirit of this fine book, we require some imagina
tive sympathy with past ages. The ' staid, quiet, " douce," orderly
burgher of the Book of Proverbs, who is regular in his attendance
at the Temple, diligent in his business, prosperous in his affairs, of
repute among the elders, with daughters doing virtuously, and a
wife that has his house decked with coverings of tapestry, while her
own clothing is silk and purple ' (Mr. Binney's words in Is it possible
to make the best of both worlds?), is not the noblest type of man, and
therefore not the model Christian even of our own day.

APPENDIX 297
18. Page 178 (Aids to the Student). — Add, Les sentences et
proverbes du Talmud et du Midrasch. Par Mo'ise Schuhl. Par. 1878.
19. Page 180. — On the date of Jesus son of Sirach, comp. Hody,
De Bibliorum Textibus Originalibus (Oxon., 1705), pp. 192-194.
20. Page 189, note 1 (Sirach xxi. 27). — Fritzsche weakens the
proverb by taking ' Satan ' as equivalent to ' accuser ' (Ps. cix. 6,
Zech. iii. 1). The wise man says that it is no use for the ungodly
man to disclaim responsibility for his sin. ' The Satan ' either means
the depraved will (comp. Dukes, Rabbin. Blumenlese, p. 108) or the
great evil spirit. In the latter case the wise man says that for all
practical purposes the tempter called Satan may be identified with
the inborn tempter of the heart. Comp. Ps. xxxvi. 2, ' The ungodly
man hath an oracle of transgression within his heart.'
21. Page 193 (The Hymn of Praise). — Frankel suspected xliv.
16 to be an interpolation, on the ground that the view of Enoch as
an example of perdvoia is Philonian (Paldstinische Exegese, p. 44).
Against this see Fritzsche, who explains the passage as a character
istically uncritical inference from Gen. v. 22. Enoch was a pattern
of ptTavoca because he walked with God after begetting Methuselah.
22. Page 195 (Ancient Versions of Sirach). — The Peshitto version
deviates, one may venture to assume, in many points from the
original Sirach. Geiger has pointed out some remarkable instances
of this (Zeitschr. der deutschen morgenl. Ges. xii. 536 &c), and if the
Greek version is to be regarded as absolutely authoritative, the num
ber of deviations must be extremely great. Fritzsche goes so far as
to say that in the latter part of the Syriac Sirach (from about chap.
xxx,) the original is only hazily traceable (' durchschimmert '). He
describes this version as really no version, but ' eine ziemlich leicht-
fertig hingeschriebene Paraphrase ' (' a rather careless paraphrase ').
This, as fairer judges of the Syriac are agreed, is not an accurate
statement of the case. It can be readily disproved by referring to
some of the passages in which the Greek translator has manifestly
misrendered the original (e.g. xxiv. 27; see above, p. 196). Dr. Eders-
heim, who is working upon both versions, agrees with Bickell that
the Syriac often enables us to restore the Hebrew, where the Greek
text is wrong. This is not placing the Syriac in a superior position
to the Greek, but giving it the subsidiary importance which it de
serves. Doubtless, the Hebrew text which the Syriac translator
employed was in many places corrupt. — The best edition of the
Peshitto, I may add, is in Lagarde's Libri Vet. Test. Apocryphi Syriaci
(1861). It is from Walton's Polyglot, but 'codicum nitriensium ope
et coniecturis meis hie illic emendatiorem ' [one sixth-century MS. of
Ecclesiasticus is used].

298 APPENDIX
The Old Latin has many peculiarities ; its inaccuracies are no
proof of arbitrariness ; the translator means to be faithful to his
Greek original. Many verses are transposed ; others misplaced.
For instances of the former, Fritzsche refers to iii. 27, iv. 31, 32,
vi. 9, 10, ix. 14, 16, xii. 5, 7 ; for the latter, to xvi. 24, 25, xix. 5, 6,
xlix. 17. Sometimes a double text is translated, e.g. xix. 3, xx. 24.
It is to be used with great caution, but its age makes it valuable for
determining the Greek text. For the text of Ecclesiasticus in the
Codex Amiatinus, see Lagarde's Mittheilungen.
23. Page 198 (Aids to the Student). — -To the works mentioned
add Bruch, Weisheitslehre (1851), p. 283 &c, and especially Jehuda
ben Seeb's little known work The Wisdom of Joshua ben Sira ren
dered into Hebrew and German, and paraphrased in Syriac with the
Biur, Breslau, 1798 (translated title), and Geiger, 'Warum gehort
das Buch Sirach zu den Apocryphen ? ' in Zeitschr. d. deutschen mor-
genl. Gesellschaft, xii. 536 &c.
The Title Qpheleth (twice, see below, ' the Qoheleth ').
24. Page 207, note 2. — The name is undoubtedly an enigma,
and M. Renan thinks that ordinary philological methods are inade
quate to its solution. Even Aquila leaves it untranslated (/.-wAc'fi).
Without stopping here to criticise M. Renan's theory that QHLTH
were the initials of words (comp. Rambam, Rashi) in some way de
scriptive of Solomon,1 let me frankly admit that none of the older
explanations is absolutely certain, because neither Qohel nor Qoh'e-
leth occurs elsewhere in the Old Testament literature. Two views
however are specially prevalent, and I will first mention that which
seems to me (with Gesenius, Delitzsch, Nowack &c.) to deserve the
preference. In one respect indeed it harmonises with the rival
explanation, viz. in supposing Qal to have adopted the signification
of Hifil (the Hifil ofQHL is found in the Old Testament), so that
Qohel will mean ' one who calls together an assembly.' The adoption
thus supposed is found especially in proper names (e.g. n*ani). But
how to explain the feminine form QohSleth? By a tendency of
later Hebrew to use fem. participles with a masc. sense.'2 In
Talmudic Hebrew, e.g., we find nin-lp?, 'buyers,' nil-lpj, 'stone
masons,' nit-ly?, ' foreigners ' (passive participles in this stage of the
language tend to adopt an active sense). But even earlier we find
the same tendency among proper names. Take for instance So-
phereth (hassofereth in Ezra ii. 55 ; sofereth in Neh. vii. 57), Po-
kereth (Ezraii. 57). Why should not the name Qoheleth have been
' On this, see Wright, Ecclesiastes &c. p. 127.
' Strack, Lehrbuch der neuhebr. Sprache, p. 54.

APPENDIX 299
given to the great Teacher of the book before us, just as the name
Sophereth was given apparently to a scribe ? Delitzsch x reminds us
that in Arabic the fem. termination serves sometimes to intensify
the meaning, or, as Ewald puts it, ' ut abstracto is innuatur in quo
tota haec virtus vel alia proprietas consummatissima sit, ut ejus ex-
emplum haberi queat.'2 Thus Qoheleth might mean 'the ideal
teacher,' and this no doubt would be a title which would well de
scribe the later view of Solomon. It is simpler, however, to take
the fem. termination as expressing action or office ; thus in Arabic
khalifa means 1, succession or the dignity of the successor, 2, the
successor or representative himself, the ' caliph,' and in Hebrew
and Assyrian pekhdh, pakhatu ' viceroy.' Comp. 1) i£,<ivoia, ' die
Obrigkeit.' The alternative is, with Ewald, Hitzig, Ginsburg, Kuenen, Klei
nert, to explain Qoheleth as in apposition to noan, Wisdom being
represented in Prov. i. 20, 21, viii. 1-4, as addressing men in the
places of concourse (Klostermann eccentrically explains 11 crv\\oyl£ovcra
or avWoytcrriKi)). Solomon, according to this view, is regarded by
the author as the impersonation of Wisdom (as Protagoras was called
2ocj>ia). It is most unlikely, however, that Solomon should have
been thus regarded, considering the strange discipline which the
author describes Qoheleth as having passed through, and how dif
ferent is the language of Wisdom when, as in Prov. i.-ix., she is
represented as addressing an assembly ! A reference to vii. 27, where
Qoheleth seems to be spoken of in the fem., is invalid, as we should
undoubtedly correct haqqoh'eleth in accordance with xii. 8 3 (comp.
hassofereth, Ezra ii. 55).
The Sept. rendering £i.(.Xi;<ria<rr?;c, whence the ' concionator '
of Vulg., is therefore to be preferred to the singular Greek rend.
1/ eKKXrjo-ic'icrTpia of Graecus Venetus.
25. Page 210. — Eccles. iii. 11. Might we render, ' Also he hath
put (the knowledge of) that which is secret into their mind, except
that,' &c, i.e. 'though God has enabled man to find out many
secrets, yet human science is of very limited extent ' ? This implies
Bickell's pointing D^y.
26. Page 219. — Eccles. vii. 28. The misogyny of the writer was
doubtless produced by some sad personal experience. Its evil effect
upon himself was mitigated by his discovery of another Jonathan
with a love ' passing the love of women.' This reminds us of the
' Hoheslied und Koheleth, pp. 212-3.
" Grammatica arabica, § 284 (i. 167). Comp. Wright, Arabic Grammar, i.
157 (§ 233). , . , 1 • u u
3 The mistake was caused by the rarity of n?i"1|3 with the article.

300 APPENDIX
author of the celebrated mediaeval ' Romance of the Rose.' ¦ ' What
is Love ? ' asks the lover, and Reason answers, ' It is a mere sickness
of the thought, a sport of the fancy. If thou scape at last from Love's
snares, I hold it but a grace. Many a one has lost body and soul in
his service' (comp. Eccles. vii. 26). And then he continues, 'There
is a kind of love which lawful is and good, as noble as it is rare, — the
friendship of men.' To quote Chaucer's translation,
And certeyn he is wel bigone
Among a thousand that findeth oon.
For ther may be no richesse
Ageyns frendshippe of worthynesse.
The allusion to Eccles. vii. 29 is obvious. Thus the same varieties of
character recur in all ages. This point of view is very different from
that of the Agadic writers who borrow from Eccles. vii. 26 a weapon
against ' heresy ' (miniith), a term which includes the Jewish Chris
tian faith. All are agreed that the ' bitter woman ' is heresy, and
one of them declares that the closing words of the verse refer to
'the men of Capernaum' (see Matt. ix. 8). Delitzsch, Ein Tag
in Kapernaum, 1886, p. 48; comp. Wunsche, Midrasch Koheleth,
p. no. 27. Pages 223-227. — Eccles. xi. 9~xii.-7. The key to the whole
passage is xi. 8. ' For, if a man lives many years, let him rejoice in
them all, and let him remember the days of darkness, that they shall
be many.' I cannot accept the ingenious conjecture of Dr. C. Taylor,
which might (see Chap. X.) have been supported by a reference to
Egypt, that xii. 3-5 are cited from an authorised book of dirges.
Not only these verses but xii. 1^-6 form a poem on the evils of
old age, the whole effect of which is lost without some prefix, such
as 'Rejoice in thy youth' Doderlein supplies this prefix in xii. 6 ;
but this is not enough. If we hesitate, with Luzzatto, Geiger, and
Noldeke to cancel xii. \a as a later addition for purposes of edifica
tion, we must, with Gratz and Bickell, read either ^pi3"nK or ^"ifclS'ns?.
These two readings seem to have existed side by side, and to an
ingenious moralist this fact apparently suggested a new and edifying
reading ^$ni3"n??- Hence Akabia ben Mahalallel,2 one of the
earliest of the Jewish ' fathers,' and probably a contemporary of
Gamaliel I., advises considering these three points as a safeguard
against sin, ' Whence thou comest, whither thou goest, and before
whom thou wilt have to give an account.' ' Whence thou comest,'
1 Comp. British Quarterly Review, Oct. 1871.
2 Aboth, iii. 1 (ed. Strack) ; comp. Schiffer, Das Buch Kohelet nach der
Auffassung der Weisen, part i., p. 49.

APPENDIX 3OI
implying ^«3, ' thy fountain ; ' ' whither thou goest,' ^113, ' thy pit,
or grave ; ' ' before whom thou wilt stand,' ^7fi> ' thy creator.'
28. Page 232. — Doderlein (in a popular work on Ecclesiastes,
p. 119) describes xii. 9 &c. as the epilogue, 'perhaps, of a larger
collection of writings and of the earlier Hebrew canon.' Herder,
too, thinks that the close of the book suggests a collection of sayings
of several wise men (Werke, ed. Suphan, x. 134).
29. Page 244. — According to Gratz, Koheleth is not to be taken in
earnest when he writes as if in a sombre and pessimistic mood. Such
passages Gratz tries to explain away. Koheleth, he thinks, is the
enemy of those who cultivate such a mood, and who, like the school
of Shammai, combine with it an extravagant and unnatural asceticism
(comp. vii. 16, 17). The present, Koheleth knows, is far from ideal,
but he would fain reconcile young men to inevitable evils by pointing
them to the relative goods still open to them. This attitude of the
author enables Gratz to account for Koheleth's denial of the doctrine
of Immortality. This doctrine, he remarks, was not of native Jewish
origin, but imported from Alexandria, and was the source of the
ascetic gloom opposed by Koheleth. Koheleth's denial of the Im
mortality of the Soul does not, according to Gratz, involve the denial
of the Resurrection of the Body, the Resurrection being regarded in
early Judaism as a new creative act. ¦ It is not clear to me, however,
that Koheleth accepts the Resurrection doctrine, even if he does not
expressly controvert it.
30. Page 245, note 3. — Herder says with insight, though with
some exaggeration, that most of Koheleth consists of isolated obser
vations on the course of the world and the experience of the writer.
No artistic connection need be sought for. But if we must seek for
one (so thai Herder is not convinced of the soundness of the theory), it
is strange that no one has observed the twofold voice in the book,
' da ein Griibler Wahrheit sucht, und in dem Ton seines Ichs meistens
damit, " dass alles eitel sey," endet ; eine andre Stimme aber, im
Ton des Du, ihn oft unterbricht, ihm das Verwegne seiner Unter-
suchungen vorhalt und meistens damit endet, " was zuletzt das Re-
sultat des ganzen Lebens bleibe ? " Es ist nicht vollig Frag' und
Antwort, Zweifel und Auflosung, aber doch aus Einem und dem-
selben Munde etwas, das beyden gleicht, und sich durch Abbriiche
und Fortsetzungen unterscheidet.' Briefe das Studium der Theologie
betreffend, erster Theil (Werke, Suphan, x. 135-136).
1 Kohelet, p. 29. Certainly this is not the view of Talmudic Judaism, at
least not in the sense described by Dr. Gratz. See Weber, Altsynagogale Theo
logie, p. 323-

INDEX.

AAR
Aaron, celebrated by Sirach, 193
Achamoth, Gnostic myth of, 161 n.
Adam, occurrence of the woid in
'Proverbs,' 119
Addison, 145
Age, ascribed to Job, 71 ; descrip
tion of, 229 sq.
Agur, 154, 170 sq.
Ahriman, 80
Akabia ben Mahalallel, 300
Akiba, Rabbi, 283
Alexandria, importance of, to Jews,
181
Allegorical view of 'Job,' 65; ot
Koheleth's portrait of old age,
229 sq.
Alphabet of Ben Sira, 195 sq.
Amenemhat I., 156
Amos, parallels to ' Job ' in, 87
Amos iv. 13, v. 8, perhaps interpo
lations, 52 n.
Angels, doctrine of, 44 sq. See also
Spirits
Apap, the serpent, 76
Apocrypha, value of the, 1 79
Aquila, versions of, 277
Arabian theory of angels, 44 11.
Arabic Literature, euphuism in,
206
Arabic Poets, subjectivity, 64 ;
parallels to 'Job' in, 100
Arabic Proverbs compared with
Hebrew, 134; one quoted, 64
Arabisms, in 'job,' 99, 291 sq. ; in
Proverbs, 172
Aramaisms, in 'Job,' 15 «., 92,97>
99, 291 sq., 294; in 'Proverbs,'
154, 168, 172; in Koheleth, 257
Aristeas, the fragment of, 96
Aristotle, definition of Virtue, 28
Arnold, Matthew, 122
Artaxerxes II. and III., 258
Ashmedai, 80

BOO
Assyrian, Discoveries, 5 sq. ; Policy
of uprooting nations, 73 ; Theory
of Angels, 44 n.
Atomism, doctrine of, 263
Atonement, doctrine of the, 3, 287,
45
Augustine, Saint, quoted, 147, 284
Aurelius, Marcus, mentioned, 289 ;
quoted, 234 ; compared with
Koheleth, 245, 266 sq.

Babylonian, animal fables, 126 ;
physical theology, 52
Bacon, Lord, the New Atlantis,
132 ; Adv. of Learning, 210
Bagoses, 258
Bede, the Yen., on 'Job,' 90
Bedouin prayer, 52
Behemoth, 56
Ben Abuyah, 150
Bereshith Rabba, quoted, 188
Bernstein, on 'Job,' 293
Bertholdt, on 'Job,' 293
Bible, Milton's view of the, 253
Biblical criticism, I sq.
Bickell, as a critic, 241 ; on Job
(xix. 25-27), 35, 2S8 ; on Prov.
(xxii. 19-21), 13S ; on Sirach,
195 ; on Koheleth (iv. 13-16),
213, (iii. II) 276, (viii. 10) 220,
276 ; list of poetical passages in
Koheleth, 206 ; on the text of
Koheleth, 273 ; and passim
Bildad, his home, 15 ; the advocate
of tradition, 17, 23
Binney, Mr., 296
Birthday, Job's curse of his, 16
Blake, William, quoted, 54 ; his
illustrations to 'Job,' 19, 45 «.,
5°. 56. 59. 65, 106 sq.
Book of the Dead, parallels with
'Job,' 39, 76

304

INDEX.

BOT
Bottcher, on ' Job,' 68
Bradley, Dean, 215, 229 n., 248
Breton legend of St. Ives, 140
Briggs, Prof., on Elihu's speeches,
93. 296
Budde, on Aramaisms in 'Job,'
291 sqq.
Buddha, 218
Buddhist sayings, 128
Budge, Mr., on Tiamat, 78
Bullinger, on Sirach, 197
Bunsen, quoted, 108 n.
Bunyan, 109

Camerarius, edition of Sirach,
197
Canon, the, final settlement, 233,
281
Carlyle, quoted, 112, 144 «., 246
Ceremonial system, value of, 1 19
sq. ; approved by Sirach, 190
Chabas, M., quoted, 57
Chaldaeans, 73 ; their philosophy
known to Job, 51
Chateaubriand, quoted, 65
Chinese proverbs, 129
Christ, never used directly anti-
sacrificial language, 3 sq. ; Keno
tic view of His person, 7 ; whether
Job a type of, 102 sq. ; foregleams
of, in Prov. viii., 176
Christian doctrine in Koheleth, 248
sq.
Church of England, attitude to
Biblical criticism, I sq.
Cicero, dialogues, 207
Clement, of Rome, 176
Coleridge, quoted, 108
Constantinople, Councils at, 107,
282
Cosmos, conception of the world as,
52, 161
Cox, Dr., quoted, 46

Daniel, plural authorship of the
Book of, 8
Dante, allusions to, 28, 51, 66, 76,
r59) I94i 23° ! quotations from,
45. 54> l3°j comparison of the
Divina Commedia to 'Job,' n 1
Davenant, quoted, 252
David, idealisation of, 131 sqq.
Davidson, on Job (xix. 25-27), 34
Dawn, personified, 77
De Jong, on Koheleth, 240
Delitzsch, on the Praise of Wisdom,
163; on the date of Proverbs,

ELE
170 ; on the period of Koheleth,
258 ; his Hebrew New Testa
ment, 288 ; and passim.
Derenbourg, quoted, 100
De Sanctis, quoted, viii.
Determinism, in Koheleth, 265 sqq.
Deuteronomy, in the reign of Josiah,
6 ; points of contact with Job,
86 ; influence on the Praise of
Wisdom, 168 sq. ; (xxxii. 8) ex-
, plained, 81 n., 291
De Vere, Aubrey, quoted, 105
Dillmann, on style of Job, 294
Din Ibrahim, morality of the, 98
Dragon Myth, 16, 24, 76
Dramatic character of 'Job,' 107
Drunkenness, 140, 156

Ebers, Prof., 40, 269
Ecclesiastes, the Bock of —
(a) Canonicity, 279 sqq.; title,
207 n. , 298 ; date and place
of composition, 255 sqq. , 271,
278 ; break in its composition,
204 ; language, 256 ; style,
203, 207, 246 ; how far auto
biographical, 209 ; compari
son with Job, 203 ; with
Sirach, 279 ; its standpoint,
200 sqq. ; its pessimism, 215,
251 sq., 301 ; its relation to
Epicureanism, 215, 222, 252,
262 sq. ; to Stoicism, 264
(b) Passages explained or emended:
(iii. 11, 12) 210, 260, 276,
299; (iii. 17-21) 211 ; (iv.
13-16) 213; (v. 17) 260; (v.
19) 261 ; (vi. 9) 261 ; (vii. 1)
215 ; (vii. 18) 261 ; (vii. 27)
219; (viii. 10) 220, 276;
(viii. 12) 220; (x. 20) 222;
(xi. 9-xii. 7) 300; (xii. 1-7)
226; (xii. 8- 14) 229 sqq.,
261, 301
Transpositions, 273 sq. ; In
terpolations, 275, and 211,
213, 224 sq., 226, 229^.
Ecclesiasticus, see Sirach
Edwards, Sutherland, on Mephis
topheles, no
Egypt, theory that ' Job ' was com
posed in, 75
Egyptian, animal fables, 126 n. ;
discoveries, 5; incantations, 16;
proverbs, 129 ; influence on Ko
heleth, 269 sq.
Egyptian-Jewish literature, 181
Elephantiasis, Job's disease, 22

INDEX

305

ELE
Elephants, 57
Elihu, genealogy, 42 n ; speeches
of, 68, 90 sqq. ; their date, 42,
92 ; their style, 47, 92, 291
Eliphaz, his home, 15 ; the 'depo
sitary of a revelation,' 17
Elohim, the sons of the, 14, 79, 81,
82, 151
Emerson, quoted, 160
Enoch, 297 ; Book of, 268
Epictetus, 234 n.
Epicureanism, in Koheleth, 240^.,
252, 262 sq.
Epicurus, 222
Ethics, practical, relation to Hebrew
Wisdom, 118 sq. ; of the Pro
verbs, 135 sq.
Euergetes II. Physkon, 180
Ewald, his division of the Book of
Proverbs, 134; of the Praise of
Wisdom, 162 ; on the date of
Proverbs, 190 ; on Koheleth, 236
sqq. ; and passim
Ezekiel (xiv. 14), 60
Ezra, why not mentioned in Sirach,
'93 *<?•

Family life, in Proverbs, 136
Farmers, Israelitish goodwill to,
136, 214
Faust, the Hebrew, 1 50
Fees, whether paid to the ' Wise
Men,' 124 n.
Fenelon, 67
Friends, Job's, Emeers, 15; repre
sentatives of orthodoxy, 17 ; their
narrowness, 30
Froude, J. A. , quoted on Job xxvii. ,
95 "¦

Gamaliel, 280
Geiger, on Koheleth, 238 sq.
Genesis, no protest against Idolatry
in, 71 ; opening chapters of, 6;
(xiv. 19-22) 160
Gilchrist, Life of Blake, 107
Ginsburg, Dr., on 'proportionate
retribution ' in Job, 69 ; on Ko
heleth, 236; on Eccles. (iii. 12),
210 «.; and passim
Gnostic myth of Achamoth, 161
God, name of, in Koheleth, 201,217
Godet, 288
Griitz, on Koheleth, 244, 301
Grave, Job's, 60
Greek influence on Koheleth, 202,
241, 260 sqq.

ISR

Green, Prof., of Princeton, on Job,
(xix. 25-27) 33, 34 n.; (xxvii.-
xxviii.) 94
Gregory the Great, on ' Job,' 90

Hai Gaon, Rabbi, on 'Job,' 61
Harischandra compared to Job, 63
Harnack, quoted, 263
Harun ar-Rashid, 131, 296
Hegesias Peisithanatos, 268
Heine, on 'Job,' 104
Hellenic movementin Palestine,i8i
Hengstenberg, on 'Job,' 61 ; on
Koheleth, 249 n.
Herder, on 'Job,' 295; on Kohe
leth, 301
Hezekiah, the Song of, 88 ; his
supposed authorship of Proverbs
xxv. -xxix., 142 sq. ; his views on
medical science, 191
Hillel, Rabbi, a copious fabulist,
128 ; the School of, on Koheleth,
280
Hitopadesa, quoted, 153
Hitzig, as a critic, 241 n. ; on the
arrangement of the Praise of Wis
dom, 163; and passim
Hooker, 161, 162, 216 sq.
Hosea, parallels to ' Job ' in, 87
Humboldt, A. von, 46
Humour, touches of, in 'Job,' 13,
14, 49, 109, 290; in Proverbs, 148
n. ; in Koheleth, 200, 216
Husbandmen, Israelite goodwill to,
136, 214

Ibn Ezra, opinion that 'Job ' was a
translation, 96
Ibycus, the cranes of, 222
Idealism, of the Prophets, 119
Immortality, the hope of, in Pro
verbs, 122 sq. ; attitude of Kohe
leth to, 216, 251, 301
Inconsistencies in the Canonical
Scriptures, 204
Indian, animal fables, 126 n.; pro
verbs, 129
Inspiration, view of, broadened by
literary criticism, 7
Irving, Edward, 162
Isaiah, mythological allusions in,
78 ; parallels to ' Job' in, 84, 87 ;
xxviii. 14, 120 11.
Israel, Job a type of, 58 ; the word
not in Proverbs, 119; Koheleth
indifferent to its religious primacy,
199

306

INDEX

ISR
Israelites, low religious position be
fore the Exile, 6 ; their sympathy
with husbandmen, 136, 214
Italian moralists, their use of ' Job,'
viii.
Ives, Saint, Breton legend of, 140

Jamnia, Synod of, 233, 280
Jehovah, the name, 71, 72 n. ; con-
' sistency of the speeches of, in
'Job,' 48, 94
Jeremiah, parallels to 'Job ' in, 86
Jerome, Saint, on metrical charac
ter of 'Job,' 12 n. ; on Epicurean
ism in Koheleth, 262, 281
Jewish nation, like Job, a byword,
32
Job, the Book of—
(a) Proposed title for, 12; divi
sions of, 12 sq. ; perhaps a
translation, 96 sq. ; probable
stages of the growth of, 66
sqq. ; date of, 67 sqq. , 88,
157 ! place of composition,
75 ; effect of removing the
interpolations in, 70 ; Ara
maic colouring of, 1 5 «. , 92 ;
whether historical, 60 sq. ,
1 83, 290 ; whether autobio
graphical, 63 ; whether a
drama, 107 ; polemical aim
of, 65 ; religious teaching of,
102 sqq. ; feeling for nature
in, 51 ; humour in, 13 sq., 49,
109, 290 ; influence of, on
other writers, viii. 83 sq.
(b) Author, the greatest master
of Hebrew Wisdom, II ; cir
cumstances of his age reflected
in xvii. 6-9, 32 ; a traveller,
75. 97 ! looks beyond Israel,
65 ; place of writing, 75
(c) Hero, his name, 62 ; title
given him by the Syrians, 65 ;
his nationality, 13, 59, 117,
170 ; whether historical, 60
sqq., 103; great age ascribed
to him, 71; bis grave, 60;
dual aspect of, 32; a type, 17,
21, 22, 28, 31, 32, 58, 65
(d) Text. (i. ) Passages explained or
emended: (vi. 25) 288; (xi. 6)
26; (xiii. 15) 28; (xv. 7) 167;
(xvi. 2) 31 ; (xix. 25-27) 33
sqq., 288 sq. ; (xxxiii. 13)
44 ; (xxxviii. 41) 52 n. ;
(xxxix. 10) 53 n.

LUT
(ii. ) Passages misplaced, list of,
114; also 38, 39»., 40».,4i,
50, 68, 94, 115
(iii.) Passages interpolated, 55
sq. , 68 sq., 94, &c.
Joel ii. 17 explained, 32
Joseph, the tax farmer, 182, 191,
213
Josephus, quoted, 190
Joshua ben Hananyah, Rabbi, 230

Kalisch, Dr., on Eccles. iii. 12,
210 n. ; his Path and Goal, 265
Kant, on Job's friends, 37
Kenotic view of Christ's person, 7,
287
Kliida, a riddle, 1 25
Kings, First Book of, (iv. 32) 132,
(xix. 12) 19
Kleinert, on Job (vi. 25), 288 ; on
the style of Elihu, 293
Klostermann, translation of Eccles.
vii. 21, 219
Koheleth, the name, 207, 231 ; his
personality partly fused with
Solomon, 208 ; his originality,
205,268^. See also Ecclesiastes
Koheleth, the Book of, see Eccle
siastes
Koran, quoted, &c, 31, 62 11., 63,
79 n.
Krochmal, N., on Epilogue to
Koheleth, 232 sq.
K'sil, = Orion, 77
Kuenenj on the Levitical Law, 3

Lagarde, on the use of ' Eloah,'
72 n.
Lamentations, parallels to ' Job ' in,
86
Landed property, accumulation of,
146
Law, the Levitical, authorship of,
3 sqq. ; not enforced in pre-Exile
period, 6 ; identification of, with
personified wisdom, 162, 192 ;
' Koheleth's attitude to, 218
Lee, Prof. S., on 'Job,' 97, 294
Lemuel, 154, 1 70 sq.
Letteris, Max, 150
Leviathan, 56
Love for one's enemies, 147
Lowth, Bp., 16, 61, 107, 186, 237
Lucretius, quoted, 201, 205 ; com
pared with Koheleth, 263
Luther, on Job, 61 ; on Sirach,
197 ; on Koheleth, 205

INDEX

307

LUZ
Luzzatto, on the ' God of Job,' 104;
on Koheleth, 238 sq.

Mal'ak Yahve, 80
Mal'akim, 79, 80, 82
Marduk, the god, 77
Mariolatry, 162 «.
Marvell, Andrew, quoted, 144
Mashal, 125 sq., 132, 163
Maspero, quoted, 76
Massa, in the Hauran, Israelite co
lony at, 171
Medical Science, attitudes of Sirach
and Hezekiah to, 190 sq.
Meir, Rabbi, the writer of animal
fables, 128
Mendelssohn, on Koheleth, 236
Mephistopheles, 1 10 n.
Merodach, the god, 77
Merx, view of Job, 62, 113
Messianic hope, 119, 1 88
Midrash, proverbs in, 128
Milton, allusions to, 53, 62, 107,
108, 112, 162, 253; quotations
from, 19, 41, 107, 160, 162
Mishnic peculiarities in Koheleth,
256
M'llca, a dark saying, 125
Mohammed, delight of, in ' Job,
63 ; religion of, 98
Mommsen, quoted, 181
Monarchy, view of, in Proverbs,
145 ; in Koheleth, 222
Monogamy, in Proverbs, 136
Monotheism, of Job, 74 ; in Pro
verbs, 130
Morality, of the Proverbs, 135 sq.,
177
Moses, authorship of the Law, 3 ;
nature of his work, 6
Mo'tazilites, 98, 162 «., 296
Mozley, quoted, 103
Mussaph prayer, 193
Mythology, in 'Job,' 76

Narrative poetry, alien to He
brew genius, 13
Nature, feeling for, in 'Job,' 51 ; in
Sirach, 193
Nebuchadnezzar, 73
Neferhotep, stanzas in honour of,
269
Neubauer, Dr. A., 289
New Testament, attitude to Pro
verbs, 177
Nowack, on Eccles. (iii. 12), 210//.
Numerical Proverbs, 153

PRO
Old Testament, general remarks
on the criticism of, 1 sqq. ; need
to distinguish between the parts
of, 7 ; critical problems of, not
prominent in Christ's time, 7
Omar Khayyam, 200, 245, 246,
253, 263
Onias, the High Priest, 213
Onkelos, Targum of, 264
Oort, Dr., on proverbs, 127
Orion, 77

Palmer, Major, 52
Parables, in the Old Testament, 1 26
Paradise, tradition of, 123
Patriarchal Age, whether delineated
in Job, 13, 71 sqq.
Paul, Saint, doctrine of the Atone
ment, 3, 287
Pentateuch, the literary analysis of
it, 5 sq.
Peshitto translation of Proverbs, 1 74
Philo, 151, 161 n., 264
Pisa, Job frescoes at, 106
Pleiades, 52, 290
Plumptre, Dean, 122, 158, 207 «.,
212, 245, 263, 265 ; and passim
Prior, the poet, on Koheleth, 237
Prophetical books, plural authorship
in, 8
Prophets, their antisacrificial langu
age, 4 ; their horizon that of their '
own times, 8 ; their relations to
the ' Wise Men,' 119 sqq., 182 sq.
Proverbs, different names for, 125 ;
no collection of popular, 125 ;
some originally current as riddles,
127
Proverbs, the Book of —
(a) The division of, 134 ; repeti
tions in, 133, 143 ; no subject
arrangement, 134 ; the tone
of the different parts of, 135,
146, 167, 177 ; their dates,
13°. 133. .145. !49. I52. I65
sqq. ; their authorship, 1 30
sqq., 142, 135, 165 sq. ; their
form and style, 133, 139, 143,
149, 154,168; interpolations
in, 173 sqq. ; transpositions
in, 174
(b) Passages explainedor emended :
(v. 16) 296; (viii. 22) 160;
(xiv. 32) 122; (xviii. 24)
137 ; (xix. 1) 135 n. ; (xix.
7) 134! (xxii- 19-21) 138;
(xxiii. 18) 123 ; (xxvii. 6)
148, 296 ; (xxx. 1-5) 149 sq. ,

3o8

INDEX

PSA
170 ; (xxx. 15-16) 153 ;
(xxx. 31) 175 ; (xxxi. 1) 170
Psalms, relations of, to 'Job,' 84,
88; Psalm viii. 5 parodied in
'Job' (vii. 17, 18), 22
Ptahhotep, Proverbs of, 121
Ptolemy Arsacides, Golden Table,
289
Pusey, Dr. quoted, 1

Q'doshim, 80, 149 n.
Quinet quoted, 105

Ra, the sun god, 76
Rabab, the helpers of, 24, 76
Raven (in Job xxxviii. 41), 52 n.
Realism of the 'Wise Men,' 119
Renan, on the style of Elihu, 47 ;
on Koheleth, 206, 234, 242 sq.,
246, 298 ; and passim
Resb Lakisb, Rabbi, quoted, 60
Resurrection, hope of, 34, 75, 188
sq., 251, 301
Retribution, proportionate, 23, 35,
58. 73> 98, 121, 140. 167. 189,
190 »., 200, 219, 251
Riddles, proverbs originally current
as, 127
Rig Veda, quoted, 78, 152
Romans, vii. 20 adopted from Pro
verbs (xxiv. 17, 18), 147
Romaunt of the Rose, quoted, 300
Rossetti, Miss C, 242

Sacrificial system, importance of,
in post-Exile period, 4 ; relations
of Job to, 71. See also Law
Salmon, Prof. , on Eccles. (ix. 7-9),
262
Samaritans, 194
Sammael, 80
Sandys', George, translation of
'Job,' 106
Satan, the, 14, 79, 80, 109, 188 sq.,
297
Schiller, 12
Schultens, Albert, quoted, 61, 97, 99
Sea Life, familiar, 140 ; cf. 133
Seneca, quoted, 57, 265
Septuagint version, of 'Job,' 113,
114, 296; of Proverbs, 173; of
Koheleth, 277
Seven Wise Men, of Greece, 119,
124
Shammaites, on Koheleth, 280 sq.
Shedim, 80

TAL
Shelley, delight in Job, 112, 253 ;
dislike of Koheleth, 253
Sibyl, the oldest Jewish, 264
Simeon ben Shetach, 282 sq.
Simon II. , 180, 181 sq.
Sirach, parentage, 180 ; early life,
182 ; a true 'scribe,' 185 ; unac
quainted with Greek philosophy,
190 ; interested in nature and
history, 193
Sirach, the Book of —
(a) Canonicity, 279 sq,, 282 sq. ;
the name Ecclesiasticus, 197;
written in Hebrew, 194, 196 ;
ancient versions of, 297 ; its
date, 180 sqq. ; subject ar
rangement, 183 ; style, 185 ;
whether autobiographical,
186 ; parallelisms in, to Pro
verbs, 184; no philosophical
thought in, 182 ; imperfect
moral teaching in, 187 ; con
ception of the divine nature,
188
(b) Passages emended or explained :
(xi. 16) 188; (xxi. 27) 189
n. ; (xxiv. 37) 196 ; (xxv.
15) 196 ; (xlvi. 18) 196 ;
(xlviii. 11) 189, 193; (1. I)
193 ; (I. 26) 193
Soferim, 238. See also ' Wise Men '
Solar Myths, 16, 22, 24, 76, 77
Solomon, secular turn of, 72 ; re
puted authorship of Proverbs,
130 sqq., 165, 170 ; Koheleth's
representative of humanity, 202,
207 ; reputed authorship of Kohe
leth, 255, 275
Sophia, Gnostic myth of, 161 n.
Sophocles, 107, 220
Spanheim, quoted, 97
Spenser, the poet, 12
Spinoza, on Job, 61
Spirits, classes of, 44 sq.
Stanley, Dean, on Koheleth, 245,
255
Star worship, 71, 82
Steersmanship, the term, 133
Stickel, quoted, 102
Stoicism, in Koheleth, 240 sq. , 264
Swift, 15
Swinburne, quoted, 212
Syrian title for Job, 65

Talmud, on Job, 64 ; proverbs in
the, 128; Sirach cited in, 196;
comparison of Koheleth with,
205 ; on Koheleth, 281

INDEX

309

TAS
Tasso, 109 n.
Taylor, C, on Job (xix. 26), 289
Taylor, Jeremy, 253
Temple, Bishop, 225
Tennyson, quoted, 212
Theism, argument for, early based
on tradition, 23 ; of the Praise of
Wisdom, 167
Theodore of Mopsuestia, 107
Thirlwall, Bishop, quoted, 2
Thomas a Kempis, 231, 249
Thomson, the poet, quoted, 21
Thoreau, quoted, 106, 252
Tiamat, 77
Trades, disparaged in Sirach, 186
Turgenieff, 243
Turner, Studies Biblical and Orien
tal, quoted, 46
Tyler, on Koheleth, 240, 263 sq.

Unicorn, in Job (xxxix. 10), 53 n.
Utilitarianism of the Wise Men,
121, 137
Uz, locality of, 13 n.

Vaihinger, on Koheleth, 236 sq.
Varuna, Vedic hymn to, 154

Vatke, on date of Proverbs, 1
Vedic hymns, 77, 154. See also Rig
Veda
Virtue, Koheleth's ' theory of, '
218

Webbe, George, quoted, 113
Wellhausen, on Levitical Law, 3
sqq. ; on Job, 290
Wisdom, the Hebrew, nature of,
117 sq. ; personification of, 162,
192
Wise Men, the, 118, 123, 148, 182
sqq.
Women, in Proverbs, 135, 154 ; in
Sirach, 187; in Koheleth, 219,
299
Woolner, quoted, 229
Wordsworth, 162
Wright, Bateson, on Job, 113

Zeno, 265 sq.
Zirkel, on Gracisms in Job, 260 sq.
Zophar, home of, 15; the ' man of
common sense,' 17
Zwischenschriften, 180

liii

11