The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur

Produced by David Starner, Thomas Berger
and the Distributed Prooreaders team.
with English text translated for the first time from the primitive Hebrew as restored on the basis of recent philological discoveries.
E. J. Dillon
Late Professor of Comparative Philology and Ancient Armenian at the Imperial University of Kharkoff; Doctor of Oriental Languages of the University of Louvain; Magistrand of the Oriental Faculty of the Imperial University of St. Petersburg; Member of the Armenian Academy of Venice; Membre de la Société Asiatique de Paris, &c. &c.

To ALEXANDER VASSILYEVITCH PASCHKOFF, M.A. THE FOLLOWING PAGES ARE AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED

_My Dear Paschkoff,
In the philosophical problems dealt with by the Sceptics of the Old Testament, you will recognise the theme of our numerous and pleasant discussions during the past sixteen years. Three of these are indelibly engraven in my memory, and, if I mistake not, in yours.
The first took place in St. Petersburg one soft Indian-summer's evening, in a cosy room on the Gagarine Quay, from the windows of which we looked out with admiration upon the blue expanse of the Neva, as it reflected the burnished gold of the spire of the Fortress church. At that time we gazed upon the wavelets of the river and the wonders of the world from exactly the same angle of vision.
The second of these memorable conversations occurred after the lapse of nine years. We had met together in the old place, and sauntering out one bitterly cold December evening resumed the discussion, walking to and fro on the moonlit bank of the ice-bound river, until evening merged into night and the moon sank beneath the horizon, leaving us in total darkness, vainly desirous, like Goethe, of light, more light.