“The Hebrew language,” says Thomas De Quincey (1785–1859), “by introducing himself to the secret places of the human heart, and sitting there as incubator over the awful germs of the spiritualities that connect man with unseen worlds, has perpetuated himself as a power in the human system: he is co-enduring with man’s race, and careless of all revolutions in literature or in the composition of society....”[¹]
[¹] De Quincey’s Works, vol. ix. Leaders in Literature.... By Thomas De Quincey.... London:... MDCCCLVIII. Language, p. 81.
The Hebrew language deals best with concrete things, and is essentially personal. In poetry it is best adapted to re-echo the poet’s own thoughts, and to set forth the various phases of his intimate experience.
“Now, this poetry derives its excellence from its great outward simplicity: it acknowledges no rule of metrical art. Its poesy is esoteric, not exoteric. The outward characteristic of Hebrew poetic style is its parallelism, or the logical symmetry between two distichs of the same verse. The graceful execution of this difficult problem—unity of design under a diversity of forms—constitutes the incomparable charm of Hebrew poetic diction. Parallelism is the law of perfection. Thought and speech, body and spirit, here and hereafter, are divinely conceived parallelisms.”[¹]
[¹] Study of Arabic and Hebrew, by Tobias Theodores (1808–1886), London, 1860, p. 23.
The Hebrew language is pre-eminently intuitive, and adapted for teaching morality and expressing with authority religious and ethical truths in brief, pregnant utterances.
The best of English literature has been inspired by the Hebrew language of the Bible. Throughout the entire works of Francis Bacon (1561–1626)[¹] Scriptural influence is sufficiently apparent: but in his Essays—his favourite work—which he so carefully revised and re-wrote in the ripeness of his age and experience, and which, therefore, may be considered the very cream and essence of his genius, this characteristic element obtains a prominence that cannot fail to strike every reader. So natural was it—to borrow a figure of speech from Bacon himself—for his great mind “to turn upon the poles of truth,” and to revert to its great fountain-head, in support and confirmation of his own profound conclusions.
[¹] 1st Baron Verulam and Viscount St. Albans.
But by far the most prominent example of the deference and homage paid to the Bible will be found in the works of William Shakespeare (1564–1616). As he excels in nearly all other points, so also is he greatest in this respect. His works are so perfectly impregnated with the Bible that we can scarcely open them without encountering one or other of the Bible’s great truths, assimilated by Shakespeare and reproduced in words that renew the Bible’s authority and strengthen its claim upon men’s attention. The influence of the Bible is apparent not only in the tone of Shakespeare’s poetry but also in the shape and character of it.[¹] Both the spirit and the letter bear witness to this fact. The Bible has left its impression not only on Shakespeare’s mind but on his idiom, on the exquisite simplicity of his diction, while his innumerable allusions, direct and indirect, to Scripture history, persons, places, events, doctrines, parables, precepts, and even phrases show a great familiarity with the Bible.[²] The Reformation introduced the same spirit into all the English literature of the Elizabethan era. It was the distinguishing feature of the period, and naturally enough culminated in the greatest genius of the time.
[¹] It is interesting to note that some of Shakespeare’s plays have been rendered in Hebrew:—