[41] Simonides (MacKail’s translation, Greek Anthology, pp. 149, 151.)
[42] Bevan, Jerusalem under the High Priests, p. 35.
[43] Bevan, Stoics and Sceptics, pp. 25, 26.
[44] Stoicism, whilst it offered the thinker immunity from the fears of life, was also adapted to the needs of the generality of men whom it sought to provide with principles for the stable and successful conduct of ordinary life. Bevan (op. cit.) points out that the system shows signs of hasty construction, reflecting the urgency of the problems it sought to meet. Its strongly practical character is seen in the tendency to find expression in brief, pointed, formulæ, catch-words, and maxims, evidently designed to make its doctrines easy for the average man to comprehend. The resemblance to Hebrew Wisdom-teaching is interesting and obvious.
[45] We have to use the term “worldly-wisdom” and not “wisdom,” because the Greeks also had their seekers after true wisdom at this period, as may be seen in the gnomic verses of Solon, Phocylides and Theognis, many of whose maxims, as well as the sayings of Stoic philosophers, might be quoted to show that Hellenism was not without the protest from within itself of noble souls. The contrast suggested above is therefore not one between Greek and Hebrew Wisdom-teaching, but between the Hebrew Wisdom and the general “unwisdom” of ordinary Hellenic life.
[46] See G. A. Smith, Jerusalem, vol. i., ch. i., where a beautiful description of night and dawn in Jerusalem may be found.
[47] Mishna, Yoma, 3.1
[48] See p. 174 and 198. Of the Book of Proverbs Toy remarks that “if for the name Jehovah we substitute ‘God,’ there is not a paragraph or a sentence which would not be as suitable for any other people as for Israel” (Proverbs, p. xxi.)
[49] The Jews seem to have had an unusual aptitude for confining themselves to particular points of view. Mark to what an extent the Prophets ignore the Priests, and the Priests the Prophets. This makes it less surprising to find that the Proverbialists should ignore both.
[50] Further reference may be made to Delitzsch, Jewish Artisan Life in the time of Christ, and also Büchler, Der galilaische ‘Am-ha-’ Arets des zweiten Jahrhunderts. Some of the trades then reckoned ignoble seem by no means so to us; for example, tanners, weavers, and hairdressers were particularly despised. One Rabbi quaintly remarks: “Ass-drivers are mostly wicked, camel-drivers mostly honest, sailors mostly pious, the best of physicians is destined for Gehenna, and the most honourable of butchers is a partner of Amalek.”