But the Jewish scribes had wonderful memories. A teacher would read a long passage from the Psalms to his pupil, and very soon the lad would be able to repeat the whole correctly, the consonant words just refreshing his memory.
THE FIRST LINE OF THE BIBLE IN HEBREW
This would not always be as difficult as you might suppose. For instance, you can read this easily enough:
'TH LRD S M SHPHRD SHLL NT WNT.'
Indeed, to this day the Hebrew of the sacred Books in the Jewish Synagogues is all written without vowel-points.
At this time it was that the Jews became really the 'People of the Book,' and that a special society was formed to guard and copy the Bible.
How wonderfully this work was done! Never have the words of any other book been so lovingly cared for.
We have called the Bible the oldest Book in the world; we have seen that it tells about nations and people who were almost forgotten before the days of Abraham. It seems strange, therefore, that the most ancient copy of the Old Testament Scriptures, written in Hebrew and in the possession of the Jews to-day, carries us back only to the time of our Saxon kings.[[3]]