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. Böhl, Dissertationes de aramaismis libri Koheleth (Erlangen, 1860); Bernh. Schäfer, Neue Untersuchungen über das Buch Koheleth (Freiburg in Breisgau, 1870); J. S. Bloch, Ursprung and 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 Buch Kohelet nach der Auffassung der Weisen des Talmud und Midrasch und der jüd. Erklärer des Mittelalters, Theil i. (Leipz. 1885); Engelhardt, ‘Ueber den Epilog des Koheleth’ in Studien und Kritiken, 1875; Klostermann, article on Wright’s Koheleth, in same periodical, 1885. See also Pusey’s Daniel the Prophet, ed. 2, pp. 327-8, and the introduction to Prof. Salmon’s commentary in Ellicott. [Prof A. Palm’s bibliographical monograph, Die Qohelet-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 ILLUSTRATED OR MORE FULLY TREATED.
[1.] 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]).
[11.] Herder on Job (pp. [106]-111).
[12.] Septuagint of Job (pp. [113], [114]).
[13.] Harūn ar-Rashid and Solomon (p. [131]).
[14.] On Prov. xxvii. 6 (p. [148]).
[15.] Eternity of Korán (p. [192]).
[16.] Text of Proverbs (p. [173]).
[17.] Religious value of Proverbs (p. [176], [177]).
[18.] Aids to the Student (p. [178]).
[19.] Date of Jesus son of Sirach (p. [180]).
[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.] Grätz 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 ‘stereotyped’ formula? Examples of a self-devotion designed to ‘merit’ good for the community, or even for an individual, abound in Judaism.
2. Page [7], note 2.—The word Kenotic is conveniently descriptive of a theory, and does not bind one who uses it to any particular expositon of the difficult Greek of Phil. ii. 7. I need not decide, therefore, whether we should render ἐν μορφῃ Θεοῦ בדמות חאלהים with Delitzsch, or בדמות אלהים with Salkinson. To the names of eminent 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 rügt die Rechtsrüge von euch.’ He thinks that מה here, as occasionally elsewhere, and mā often in Arabic, has the sense of ‘not’ (see Ewald, Lehrbuch, § 325b); comp. ix. 2, xvi. 6, xxxi. 1, and the characteristic בַּמָּה ‘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 themselves 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 immortality in this passage.
Next as to the text. Bickell’s recension of it, when pointed in the ordinary manner, is as follows:—
וַאֲנִי יָדַעְתִּי גֹּאֲלִי חָי 25
יְאַחֲרוֹן עָל־עָפָר יָקוּם ׃
וְאַחַר עֵרִִי נִקְּפָּה זֹאת 26
וּמִשּׁדַּי אֶחֱזֶה אֵלֶּה ׃
אֲשֶׁר אֲנִי אֶחֱזֶה־לִּי 27
וְעֵינַי רָאוּ וִלאׁ־זָר
כָּלוּ כִלְיֹתַי בְּחֵקִי ׃
Bickell does not attempt to make easy Hebrew; the passage ought not in such a connection to be too easy. He renders ver. 26a, ‘Et postea, his præsentibus absolutis, veniet testis meus’ (God, his witness, as xvi. 19), comparing for the sense of נקפה Isa. xxix. 1. Certainly we seem to require in ver. 26 some further development of 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 stands have on their side the parallelism of עוֹרִי and בְּשָׂרִי (comp. ver. 20); but this parallelism is counterbalanced by the want of correspondence between נִקְּפוּ־זאׁת and אחֱזֶה אֱלוֹהַּ. 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. 22b). Is it not more likely that וּמִבְּשָׂרִי came into the text through a reminiscence of ver. 22b? ‘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 exclaims, 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 testimony 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. 26b is concerned, it is supported in the main by the Septuagint. More violent corrections are offered by Dr. A. Neubauer, Athenæum, 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 ז became more and more frequent in the later periods (comp. the Talmudic מֵאוֹר עֵינַיִם = ‘blind’).
5. Page [39]. Job’s catalogue of the sins which he repudiates. The parallel suggested between Job and an Egyptian formulary may be 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 Greek characters, and contained in it these protestations: “I never exalted the proud rich man, neither hated the poor just man: I never denied 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 Webbe, D.D., 1699?)
6. Page [52] (On Job xxxviii. 31, 32, ix. 9).—(1) I admit that the identification of כִּימָה 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 (Jüdische Zeitschrift, 1865, Heft 4: comp. Nöldeke, Schenkel’s Bibel-Lexikon, iv. 369, 370) in favour of equating k’sîl and Orion remains valid. (2) As to מֵעֲדַנּוֹת ‘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 loc.). Dr. Driver has shown that ‘sweet influences’ is a legacy from Sebastian Münster (1535). (3) מִזָּרוֹת is probably not to be identified with מַזָּלוֹת (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, kîma = Sirius, k’sîl = Orion, Mazzaroth = the Hyades and Aldebaran, ‘Ayish’ = the Pleiades (Stade’s Zeitschrift, 1883, Heft 1). Mazzaroth = Ass. mazarati; Mazzaloth (i.e. the zodiacal signs) seems to be the plural of mazzāla = Ass. manzaltu station.
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], [110]), 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 Wellhausen, in a review of Dillmann’s Hiob, Jahrbücher für deutsche Theologie, xvi. 552 &c.: ‘Den launigen und doch mürrischen Ton, den der nonchalante Satan Gott gegenüber anschlägt, so ganz auf Du und Du, würde schwerlich der Dichter des Hiob gewagt haben; schwerlich auch würde es ihm gelungen sein, mit so merkwürdig 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 Bibliothek, 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 Job as based on a folk-tale is quite reconcileable with the view that the hero is a personification. 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.[[433]]
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 בני אלהים and continue (ver. 9),
וחלק יהוה יעקב [or עמו]
חבל נחלתו ישראל ׃
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. metricè, 1882, p. 192, where he adheres in both verses to the received text.)
9. Page [92].—No student of the Hebrew of Job will overlook the admirable ‘studies’ on the style of Elihu by J. G. Stickel (Das Buch Hiob, 1842, pp. 248-262) and Carl Budde (Beiträge sur Kritik des Buches Hiob, 1876, pp. 65-160). The former succeeded in obtaining 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 recognise in Elihu the same ‘Hebræoarabic’ 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 thoroughly 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 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 Aramæan 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. מַנְלָם, xv. 29, and אֻיִ for אַיִן, xxii. 30, both which forms are probably 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[[434]] style, warrants us in assigning the section to a later writer. This is, of course, not precluded by the numerous Hebraistic points of contact with the main part of the book, which Carl Budde has so abundantly collected (Beiträge, 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,[[435]] shown the bearings of the fact that the disputed chapters persistently avoid the juristic sense of צָדַק (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 הִרְשִׁיעַ has the sense of ‘acting wickedly’ only in a passage of Elihu (xxxiv. 12). The use of צֶרֶק, צַרִּיק, and צְרָקָה in xxxii, 1, xxxiii. 26, xxxv. 8, xxxvi. 3, is also dwelt upon in this connexion. It is true that Budde does not conceal these points; he tabulates them correctly, but does not indicate 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 Aufriss der Buchanlage nur das alleräusserlichste Verhältniss. Sie verlassen die scharfgezogenen Grundlinien der rechtlichen Auseinandersetzung, um in eine ethisch-paränetische, rein chokmatisch-didaktische Erörterung der Frage überzulenken.’ Kleinert also notes one peculiar word of Elihu’s which I have not met with in Budde, but which, from Kleinert’s point of view, is important—כֹּפֶר, ‘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.
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’?[[436]] The origin of Job, upon the linguistic 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 Nöldeke,[[437]] ‘We have no ground for regarding the language of Job 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;[[438]] 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 Historisch-kritische Einleitung[[439]] (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 distinctively Aramaising constructions are wanting in Job, and that words with Aramaic affinities may have existed in Hebrew before the Exile. Still he decides that though part of the argument fails 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.’[[440]] 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 Arabising words enough to suggest that the author lived hard by Aramaic- and Arabic-speaking peoples.[[441]] By taking this view, Dillmann (whose philological caution and accuracy give weight to his opinion) separates himself from those who, like Eichhorn and more recently the Jewish scholar Kaempf,[[442]] confidently maintain that the peculiar words in Job 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:—
נהרה (iii. 4); מנהו (iv. 12); לאויל (v. 2); אדרש (ib. 8), occur in the Aramaic, not the Hebrew sense; תמלל (viii. 2); ישׂגה (ib. 7); מנהם (xi. 20); עמם (xii. 2); מלין (ib. 11); משׂגיא (ib. 23); מלתי ואחותי (xiii. 17); אחוך (xv. 17); וזה for ואשר (ib.); שׁלהבת (ib. 31); גלדי (xvi. 15); חמרמרה (ib. 16); קנצי (xviii. 2); יגעל ... עבר (xxi. 10); בחיין (xxiv. 22); בחבי (xxxi. 33); אחוה (xxxii. 10, 18); פרע (xxxiii. 24); אאלפך (ib. 33); כתר (xxxvi. 2); בחרת (ib. 21); גבר (xxxviii. 3); נחיר (xli. 12). I will not criticise this list, which no doubt contains some questionable items. We might, however, insert other words in exchange, e.g. טושׂ (ix. 26); רׂהד (xvi. 19); כפים (xxx. 6); and כפן (v. 22, xxx. 3); and perhaps רקב (xiii. 28), which Geiger plausibly compares with Syr. rakbo ‘wineskin’ (so the tradition represented by the Septuagint, the Peshitto, and Barhebræus). Some supposed Arabisms may also in all probability be transferred to the list of Aramaisms; but the Arabisms which remain will abundantly justify 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,[[443]] and the region itself was called Arabia.[[444]]
11. 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 of Job 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 dearly, though he does not use the expression, is that Job is a character-drama. He denies that the speeches are monotonous.
‘So eintönig für 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 Gründe jenes eben für 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 of 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 drängen und drücken sich die Propheten! wie borgen sie von einander Bilder in einem ziemlich engen Kreise und führen sie nur, jeder nach seiner Art, aus! Diese alte ehrwürdige Pyramide steht im Ganzen unnachgeahmt da und ist vielleicht unnachahmbar.’ This passage occurs in the fifth conversation in his Geist der Ebräischenn 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 interesting 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 für 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,—Τίς γὰρ, ὡς ὁ Ἰώβ φησι, καθαρὸς ἀπὸ ῥύπου, καὶ ἂν μία ἡμέρα ἐοτίν ἡ ζωή (Sept. of Job xiv. 4 ὁ βίος); De Mutatione Nominum, § 6 (i. 585).
13. Page [131].—The character of Harūn ar-Rashid, in fact, became 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 מ 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 Korán 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 μὴ 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 μὴ, which is also wanting in Aquila. Comp. Field’s Hexapla ad loc.
17. Pages [176], [177] (Religious Value of Proverbs).—To appreciate the religious spirit of this fine book, we require some imaginative 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.
18. Page [178] (Aids to the Student).—Add, Les sentences et proverbes du Talmud et du Midrasch. Par Moïse 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 μετάνοια is Philonian (Palästinische Exegese, p. 44). Against this see Fritzsche, who explains the passage as a characteristically uncritical inference from Gen. v. 22. Enoch was a pattern of μετάνοια 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 number 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 leichtfertig 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. Edersheim, 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 deserves. 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 hic illic emendatiorem’ [one sixth-century MS. of Ecclesiasticus is used].
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 rendered into Hebrew and German, and paraphrased in Syriac with the Biur, Breslau, 1798 (translated title), and Geiger, ‘Warum gehört das Buch Sirach zu den Apocryphen?’ in Zeitschr. d deutschen morgenl. Gesellschaft, xii. 536 &c.
24. Page [207], note 2.—The name is undoubtedly an enigma, and M. Renan thinks that ordinary philological methods are inadequate to its solution. Even Aquila leaves it untranslated (κωλέθ). Without stopping here to criticise M. Renan’s theory that QHLTH were the initials of words (comp. Rambam, Rashi) in some way descriptive of Solomon,[[445]] let me frankly admit that none of the older explanations is absolutely certain, because neither Qōhēl nor Qohéleth 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 of Q H L is found in the Old Testament), so that Qōhēl will mean ‘one who calls together an assembly.’ The adoption thus supposed is found especially in proper names (e.g. רחביה). But how to explain the feminine form Qohéleth? By a tendency of later Hebrew to use fem. participles with a masc. sense.[[446]] In Talmudic Hebrew, e.g., we find לְקוּחוֹת, ‘buyers,’ נְקוּרוֹת, ‘stone-masons,’ לְעוּזוֹת, ‘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 Sophereth (hassofereth in Ezra ii. 55; sofereth in Neh. vii. 57), Pokereth (Ezra ii. 57). Why should not the name Qoheleth have been given to the great Teacher of the book before us, just as the name Sophereth was given apparently to a scribe? Delitzsch[[447]] 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 hæc virtus vel alia proprietas consummatissima sit, ut ejus exemplum haberi queat.’[[448]] Thus Qoheleth might mean ‘the ideal teacher,’ and this no doubt would be a title which would well describe 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 pekhāh, pakhatu ‘viceroy.’ Comp. ἡ ἐξουσία, ‘die Obrigkeit.’
The alternative is, with Ewald, Hitzig, Ginsburg, Kuenen, Kleinert, to explain Qoheleth as in apposition to חָכְמָה, Wisdom being represented in Prov. i. 20, 21, viii. 1-4, as addressing men in the places of concourse (Klostermann eccentrically explains ἡ συλλογίζουσα or συλλογιστική). Solomon, according to this view, is regarded by the author as the impersonation of Wisdom (as Protagoras was called Σοφία). 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 different 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 haqqohéleth in accordance with xii. 8[[449]] (comp. hassofereth, Ezra ii. 55).
The Sept. rendering ἐκκλησιαστής, whence the ‘concionator’ of Vulg., is therefore to be preferred to the singular Greek rend. ἡ ἐκκλησιάστρια of Græcus 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 עָלֻם.
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 author of the celebrated mediæval ‘Romance of the Rose.’[[450]] ‘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’ (mīnūth), a term which includes the Jewish Christian 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. Wünsche, Midraseh Koheleth, p. 110.
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. 1b-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.’ Döderlein supplies this prefix in xii. 6; but this is not enough. If we hesitate, with Luzzatto, Geiger, and Nöldeke to cancel xii. 1a as a later addition for purposes of edification, we must, with Gritz and Bickell, read either אֶת־בּוֹרְךָ or אֶת־בְּאִֹרְךָ. These two readings seem to have existed side by side, and to an ingenious moralist this fact apparently suggested a new and edifying reading אֶת־בּוֹרְאֶּךָ. Hence Akabia ben Mahalallel,[[451]] 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,’ implying בְּאֵרְךָ ‘thy fountain;’ ‘whither thou goest,’ בּוֹרְךָ, ‘thy pit, or grave;’ ‘before whom thou wilt stand,’ בּוֹאֶךָ, ‘thy creator.’
28. Page [232].—Döderlein (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 Grätz, Koheleth is not to be taken in earnest when he writes as if in a sombre and pessimistic mood. Such passages Grätz 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 Grätz 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 Immortality of the Soul does not, according to Grätz, involve the denial of the Resurrection of the Body, the Resurrection being regarded in early Judaism as a new creative act.[[452]] 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 observations 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 that 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 Grübler 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 Untersuchungen vorhält und meistens damit endet, “was zuletzt das Resultat des ganzen Lebens bleibe?” Es ist nicht völlig Frag’ und Antwort, Zweifel und Auflösung, aber doch aus Einem und demselben Munde etwas, das beyden gleicht, und sich durch Abbrüche und Fortsetzungen unterscheidet.’ Brief das Studium der Theologie betreftend, erster Theil (Werke, Suphan, x. 135-136).