For my
brothers
were wroth with me,
And made me keeper of the vineyards.
And made me keeper of the vineyards.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v18 - Mom to Old
Another,
## p. 10795 (#675) ##########################################
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10795
Ps. cxxxii. , describes the choosing of the site of the temple. We shall
not find a more beautiful expression of trust in God than that which
is given by the 121st Psalm:
:-
I LIFT up mine eyes to the mountains!
Whence comes my help?
My help comes from the Lord,
Who made Heaven and Earth.
He will not suffer thy foot to be moved;
He who keeps thee does not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel
Slumbers not nor sleeps.
The Lord is thy keeper,
The Lord is a shade on thy right hand.
The sun shall not smite thee by day,
Nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep thee from all evil,
He will preserve thy life.
The Lord will keep thy going out and thy coming in
From this time forth and for evermore.
The longer psalms are either odes written on the occasion of
some national festivity, or narrations of national history, or, in a few
cases, the expression of national experiences. Of these perhaps the
most striking are the 18th and the 68th. The former is a description
of struggle and victory. It contains one of the most magnificent of
poetical passages: –
IN MY distress I called upon the Lord,
I cried unto my God.
He heard my voice from his palace,
And my cry came to his ears.
Then the earth shook and trembled,
The foundations of the mountains were shaken.
Smoke ascended in his nostrils,
Fire out of his mouth devoured,
Coals were kindled by it!
He bowed the heavens and descended;
Thick darkness was under his feet.
He rode upon a cherub and did fly;
He flew on the wings of the wind!
He made darkness his habitation,
And darkest clouds his pavilion.
In brightness passed his thick clouds,
With hail and coals of fire.
The Lord thundered in heaven,
## p. 10796 (#676) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
The Most High uttered his voice.
He sent out his arrows and scattered them,
Shot forth his lightnings and appalled them.
Then the bed of the Deep appeared;
The foundations of the world were laid bare,
At thy rebuke, O Lord,
At the blast of the breath of thy nostrils!
It was from this passage that Sternhold and Hopkins elicited the
only bit of poetry in their metrical version of the Psalms:-
The Lord descended from above,
And bowed the heavens most high,
And underneath his feet he cast
The darkness of the sky.
On cherub and on cherubim
Full royally he rode,
And on the wings of mighty winds
Came flying all abroad!
The 68th Psalm is a procession-ode, consisting of a series of stanzas
of singular majesty and force. Psalms 1xxvii. and 1xxxix. , cv. and
cvi. are historical reviews. Psalms ciii. and civ. are odes in celebra-
tion of the glorious and beneficent deeds of Jehovah.
A peculiarity of the Psalter is the presence of alphabetical psalms,
in which each verse or stanza begins with a letter of the alphabet in
order. There are a number of these: the alphabetical arrangement
is, however, not always perfect; and it is, of course, not recognizable
in the English translation. The most noteworthy example is the 119th
Psalm, a collection of couplets in praise of the Law. It is divided
into twenty-two stanzas (according to the number of letters in the
Hebrew alphabet) of eight couplets each. Such psalms, however, are
naturally the least attractive in poetic form.
The Psalter is divided in the Hebrew Bible, and in the English
Revised Version, into five books (in imitation of the division of the
Pentateuch): and these are supposed to indicate collections which
were made at different times; the whole having been finally combined
into our present Psalm-book. The Psalter grew with the temple
services, and many-perhaps the most-of its hymns were intended
for recitation in the sacred place.
A peculiar and very effective form of Hebrew poetry is the elegy.
The discovery of the form of the Hebrew elegy or lament (the
recognition of which adds not a little to the reader's pleasure) is
due to Professor Karl Budde, now of Strassburg. The elegiac verse
is characterized by a short clause, followed by a still shorter clause,
giving to the phrase a peculiar restrained movement. The most
## p. 10797 (#677) ##########################################
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10797
noted example of this poetic form is found in our Book of Lamenta-
tions a collection of laments over the sorrows of Israel. Thus, in
the beginning of the second chapter:-
―
THE Lord in his anger has smitten
The daughter of Zion,
And cast down from heaven to earth
The beauty of Israel;
He has not remembered his footstool
In the day of his wrath!
The Lord has destroyed without mercy
The dwellings of Jacob;
Has thrown down in anger the stronghold
Of the daughter of Judah;
Has cast to the ground, desecrated,
The realm and its princes.
One feels here how the emotion of the poet drives him into this
sad brief appendage at the end of each line. Elegies are not con-
fined to the Book of Lamentations, but are found elsewhere in the
Old Testament. In Ezekiel xix. are two laments, one for the princes
and the other for the nation. The first reads as follows:-
THY mother was like a lioness | among lions.
Amid young lions she couched, | she reared her whelps.
One of her whelps she brought up, | he became a young lion.
He learned to seize his prey, | men he devoured.
Against him the nations raised a cry, | in their pit he was taken.
They brought him with hooks away | to the land of Egypt.
She saw that she had failed, | her hope had perished.
Another of her whelps she took, | a young lion she made him.
(Etc. )
So the magnificent ode, written in elegiac form, in Isaiah xiv. , in
which the fall of the King of Babylon is celebrated:-
How is the tyrant quelled, | quelled his havoc!
The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, | the ruler's sceptre!
Who, in his wrath, smote the nations | with blows unceasing!
At rest is the world, and at peace- | breaks forth into song!
Over thee exult the spruce-trees, | the cedars of Lebanon:
"Since thou art laid low there comes no longer | the woodman
against us. "
The realm of Shades beneath is stirred | to meet thine arrival.
―――――
## p. 10798 (#678) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
―
It rouses the Shades for thee -
| the heroes of earth,
Rouses from their thrones | the kings of the nations.
To thee they all speak, and say:-
"Thou too art become weak as we, | art become like us;
Thy pomp is brought down to the Shades, | the clang of thy
harps;
Mold is the bed beneath thee | and worms thy covering.
How art thou fallen from heaven, | bright star of dawn!
How art thou hurled to the ground, | thou conqueror of nations!
Thou hadst thought in thy heart, 'To heaven I'll mount,
High above the stars of God | exalt my throne;
I will sit on the mount of God | in farthest north;
To the heights of the clouds I'll ascend- | be like the Most High! '
And now thou art hurled to the realm of death,
To the deepest abyss. "
A still better conception of the power of the elegiac verse is
given by the fine alphabetic ode in triplets contained in Lamenta-
tions i.
How sitteth the city solitary, | once full of people.
She who was great among the nations | is become as a widow.
The princess among the provinces | is become tributary.
She weepeth sore in the night, | her cheeks are wet with tears;
She hath none to comfort her | among all her lovers;
All her friends are traitors, | are become her enemies.
Exiled is Judah in grievous affliction, | in bitter servitude;
She dwelleth among the nations, | findeth no rest;
All her persecutors overtook her | in the midst of her straits.
The ways to Zion do mourn, | none come to her feasts;
All her gates are desolate, | her priests do sigh;
Her virgins are deeply afflicted, and she is in bitterness.
Her adversaries are become supreme, | her enemies prosper;
For Jehovah hath sorely afflicted her | for her many sins;
Her children are gone into captivity | before the adversary.
Gone from the Daughter of Zion | is all her splendor.
Her princes are become like harts | that find no pasture:
Powerless they have fled | before the pursuer.
Jerusalem remembereth her days of affliction and misery,
When her people succumbed to the foe, | and none did help
her;
On her her enemies gazed, | mocked at her bereavement.
## p. 10799 (#679) ##########################################
OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
10799
Jerusalem hath grievously sinned, | foul is she become;
All that honored her despise her | because they have seen her
disgrace.
Yea, she herself sigheth | and turneth away.
Her filthiness is in her skirts, | she remembered not her end;
Wonderful is her downfall, | she hath no comforter.
Behold, O Jehovah, my affliction, | for the foe doth triumph.
The adversary hath laid his hand | on all her treasures;
She hath beheld the nations enter | her sanctuary,
Who, thou commandedst, should not come into | thy congrega-
tion.
All her people sigh, | seeking bread.
Their treasures they have given for food | their life to sus-
tain.
See, O Jehovah, and behold | how I am despised.
Ho, all ye that pass by, | behold and see
If there be sorrow like to the sorrow | which is come upon
me,
Wherewith Jehovah hath afflicted me | in the day of his anger.
Fire from on high he hath sent, | into my bones hath driven it,
Hath spread a net for my feet, | turned me back;
Desolate he hath made me, | faint all the day.
Bound is the yoke of my trespasses | by his hand;
Knit together they lie on my neck, | my strength doth fail.
The Lord hath given me up to them | whom I cannot with-
stand.
My heroes the Lord hath cast down | in the midst of me,
Hath summoned a solemn assembly | to crush my warriors;
In a wine-press he hath trodden | the virgin daughter of Judah.
For these things weep mine eyes, | my tears run down;
Far away from me is the comforter | who should revive my
soul;
Desolate are my children | because the foe hath prevailed.
Zion spreadeth forth her hands, | there is none to comfort her;
This hath Jehovah ordained for Jacob, that his neighbors.
should be his foes;
Among them is Jerusalem become | a thing of loathing.
## p. 10800 (#680) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
Jehovah, he is just-I have rebelled against him.
Hear, all ye peoples, | behold my sorrow:
My virgins and my young men | are gone into captivity.
On my friends I called, they deceived me.
My priests and my elders | perished in the city,
Seeking food for themselves | to sustain their lives.
Behold, O Jehovah, my deep distress: | my soul is troubled;
My heart is o'erwhelmed within me, | rebellious was I.
Abroad the sword bereaveth, | at home is death.
They have heard that I sigh, | there is none to comfort me.
My foes have heard of my trouble, | they are glad thou didst it.
Bring in the day thou hast announced, | let them be like me.
Regard thou all their wickedness; | do to them
As thou hast done to me | for all my sins!
For many are my sighs, | my heart is faint.
Other examples of the elegy are found in Amos, v. 1; Ezek. xxvii.
32-36, and xxxii. 19–32.
The Book of Job must be reckoned among the great poems of the
world. The prose introduction - the story of the crushing of Job's
worldly hopes-is itself full of power. The poem is unique in form.
It is a series of monologues, all united by the author's intention to
develop a certain idea in connection with the question, "Why do
the righteous suffer? " The Three Friends affirm that the righteous
do not suffer,—that is, that no man suffers except for wrong-doing.
Job combats this view to the uttermost, holding that he is righteous
and that he suffers. Elihu further insists that suffering is designed to
destroy the pride of men who are otherwise good. Finally, Jehovah
intervenes, and proclaims the wonderfulness of his government of
the world, and Job is reduced to silence. The freshness and variety
of thought, the picture of a terrible struggle in Job's soul, the
majestic descriptions of Divine power,-all these together give a
peculiar impressiveness to the book. At the outset, Job gives us a
glimpse into his own soul:-
PERISH the day wherein I was born,
And the night which said, Behold, a man!
Let that day be darkness;
May God ask not of it;
May no light shine on it;
May darkness and gloom claim it,
Clouds dwell on it, and eclipses terrify it!
―
## p. 10801 (#681) ##########################################
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10801
Job longs for death, that he may go to that sad underworld, and
dwell
Where-
-
To this outburst, the eldest of the three friends, Eliphaz, replies
by insisting on the general rule that men receive in this world what
they deserve; and he expresses his conclusion in the form of a
vision:-
With kings and councilors of the earth,
Who built tombs for themselves,
-
The wicked cease from troubling,
And the weary are at rest.
XVIII-676
Stealthily came to me a word,
And a whisper to my ear;
In thoughts, from visions of the night,
When deep sleep falls on men.
Fear came upon me, and trembling,
Which made all my bones to shake;
And a breath passed over my face,
The hair of my head stood up.
There It stood! Its semblance I could not see! -
-
Job replies to this, and is answered by the second friend, replies
to him, is followed by the third friend, and so for several rounds of
argument, the only effect of which on Job is to draw him to deeper
hopelessness. He exclaims (vii. 7):—
A form was before my eyes!
I heard a voice which whispered,
"Shall man be more just than God,—
A creature purer than the Creator?
He puts no trust in his servants,
His angels he charges with folly:
How much more them who dwell in houses of clay,
Whose foundation is in the dust? "
A tree cut down may sprout again,
Its tender branch will not cease.
Though its root wax old in the earth,
And its stock die in the ground,
Yet through the scent of water it will bud,
And put forth boughs like a plant.
But man dies and wastes away,
Breathes out his life, and where is he?
The waters pour out of the sea,
The river dries up and fails;
## p. 10802 (#682) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
So man lies down and rises not;
Till the heavens be no more they shall not awake,
Nor be raised out of their sleep!
Then there comes to him a vague wish that God would think of
him after death in the underworld, and he exclaims:-
Oh that thou wouldst hide me in the underworld,
Keep me secret till thy wrath be past,
Appoint me a set time, and remember me!
The finest outbursts of poetry are to be found in the speeches of
Job himself, yet others also contain many striking pieces. See, for
example, the speech of Zophar, Chapter xx. ; that of Eliphaz, Chapter
xxii. ; and that of Bildad, Chapter xxv. Elihu's description of the
chastening power of suffering in xxxiii. 19-28 is also full of vigor:-
He is chastened with pain on his bed,
In his bones is continual torment;
He abhors all nourishing bread,
Cares not for dainty food;
His flesh wastes away to nothing,
His bones, hid no longer, stick out,
And he draws near unto the pit,-
His life approaches the dead!
—:
If there be an interpreter with him
Who will shew him what is right,
Will be gracious to him, and say,
"Loose him! I have ransomed his life,"
Then his flesh becomes fresher than a child's,
He returns to the days of his youth,
He prays to God, who accepts him,
Shews him his face in joy,
Restores to him his righteousness.
He sings before him, and says:-
"I had sinned, and done what was wrong,
-
But it was not requited to me;
He has redeemed me from the pit!
My life shall behold the light! "
The speeches of Jehovah make a magnificent poem in themselves.
Chapters xxviii. , xxxix. , are worthy to stand alongside the first chap-
ter of Genesis for sublimity of statement, and have in addition the
freshness and color of a fine imagination. One other poem in Job,
that contained in Chapter xxviii. , we may reserve, in order to place
it alongside of several similar poems.
## p. 10803 (#683) ##########################################
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10803
We have already seen that the Canticles, or Song of Songs, must
be taken as a group of songs of love, in which it is impossible to
discover any relation of time and place. It may be compared, for
poetic grace, with the finest idylls of Theocritus. It breathes the air
of the fields and mountains; and in this respect is unique among
the Old Testament books. For ancient poetry does not occupy itself
directly with external nature. Neither among the Greeks nor among
the Hebrews do we find the phenomena of nature introduced into
poetry for their own sake: they are used as illustrations purely.
The reason of this is not that the ancients did not love nature,-
tainly they must have been alive to its charm. It is rather that
only in modern times have men come to that habit of close observa-
tion of nature which has made it possible to use its varying forms as
part of poetic material. So, in the Psalms, clouds and mountains,
stream and sunshine, appear as exhibiting the power and wisdom or
the wrath or the love of God. But not even in such Psalms as xviii.
and xix. does the poet dwell on these phenomena for their own sake.
In this book we seem to have an exception to this rule; as in the
beautiful spring song in Chapter ii. :-
cer-
―
THE Voice of my Beloved! Lo, he comes,
Leaping over the mountains,
Skipping over the hills!
My Beloved is like a roe, a young hart.
Now he stands behind our wall,
Looks through the window,
Peeps through the lattice.
My beloved spake, and said to me:-
Arise, my Love, my Fair One, and come away!
For lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone,
The flowers appear on the earth,
The time of the singing of birds is come,
The voice of the turtle-dove is heard in our land,
The fig-tree ripens her figs,
The vines are in blossom,
They give forth their fragrance.
Arise, my Love, my Fair One, and come away!
Here the pictures introduced are all of the country, and all charm-
ing, and the poet seems to dwell on them for their own sake. But
after all he does not do this. It is the lover who describes the
beautiful face of nature, in order to tempt his beloved to come
forth and roam with him over the fields and hills. Nevertheless,
the pictures of natural scenery which he gives are very striking, and
## p. 10804 (#684) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
might easily prepare the way for that completer contemplation of
nature which is found in the modern poets. .
It is the occurrence of responsive songs in the book that has sug-
gested the opinion that it is a drama. How vague the speeches and
the supposed dialogue are, will appear from the following examples.
The occasion of the first address to the Jerusalem ladies (1. 5, 6) is
not obvious:-
I am dark but comely,
O ye daughters of Jerusalem,
As the tents of Kedar,
As the curtains of Solomon.
Scorn me not because I am dark,
Because the sun has shone on me.
For my brothers were wroth with me,
And made me keeper of the vineyards.
On this follows the first dialogue:-
The Beloved speaks (i. 7):
Tell me, thou whom I love,
Where thou feedest thy flock at noon;
For I would not seem to be a loiterer
Beside thy comrades' flocks.
The Lover replies (i. 8):
If thou know not, O fairest of women,
Go, follow the tracks of the flock,
And feed thy kids by the shepherds' tents.
After a brief descriptive strophe, the second dialogue proceeds (i. 15-
ii. 6):-
Thou art fair, my Love, thou art fair,
Thou hast the eyes of a dove.
Thou art fair, my Love, and lovely.
Our couch is the greensward,
The beams of our house are the cedars,
The walls of our rooms are the cypresses.
I am a rose of Sharon,
A lily of the valleys.
As a lily among thorns,
So is my Love among the maidens.
## p. 10805 (#685) ##########################################
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10805
As the apple-tree among the trees of the wood,
So is my Love among the youths.
Under his shadow I sat with delight,
And his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He brought me to the banqueting-house,
And his banner over me was love.
Stay me with raisins, strengthen me with apples,
For I am sick with love.
Be his left hand under my head!
Let his right hand embrace me!
Refrain (ii. 7, iii. 5):
I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
By the gazelles and the hinds of the field,
Rouse not nor awaken love
Until it please!
The search by night for the Beloved (iii. 1-4):
At night on my bed I sought my Beloved,
Sought him, and found him not.
(I said) I will arise and go through the city;
In the streets and the squares
I will seek my Beloved.
I sought him and found him not.
The watchmen, patrolling the city, found me.
"Saw ye my beloved? »
Scarce had I passed from them,
When I found him whom I love,
I held him, would not let him go.
The vagueness of this narration is equaled by that of its com-
panion song, the less fortunate search for the Lover, of which we
cannot say whether it is a dream or reality (v. 2-7):—
I sleep, but my heart is awake.
Hark! my Beloved knocks, and cries:
Open to me, my sister, my friend,
My dove, my perfect one!
For my head is filled with dew,
My locks with the drops of the night.
(She): I have put off my dress-
Must I put it on again?
I have washed my feet-
Must I defile them?
## p. 10806 (#686) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
My Beloved put his hand through the window,
My soul yearned for him.
I rose to open to my Beloved,
And my hand dropped with myrrh,
And my fingers with liquid myrrh,
On the handles of the bolt.
I opened to my Beloved,
But he had withdrawn and was gone —
My heart had failed me when he spake.
I sought him, but found him not,
I called, he answered not.
The watchmen, patrolling the city, found me,
They smote me, they wounded me,
The keepers of the walls took from me my veil.
This exquisite piece is the expression of the longing of love; it
does not belong to a drama. The reference to the night-watchmen
of the city is to be noted.
We add two beautiful expressions of love, the first, of joy in the
possession of the beloved one (iv. 16, v. 1):—
Awake, O north wind; come, O south!
Breathe on my garden that its balsam may flow!
Let my Beloved come into his garden,
And enjoy its precious fruits!
I am come into my garden, my sister-bride,
I have gathered my myrrh with my balsam,
I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey,
I have drunk my wine with my milk.
Then, love on its spontaneous, enduring, and controlling sià (viii.
6, 7):-
Set me as a seal-ring on thy heart,
As a seal-ring on thine arm.
For love is strong as death,
Passion is firm as the Underworld
Its flames are flames of fire,
Many waters cannot quench it,
Rivers cannot drown it.
If a man would give all his possessions for it,
He would be utterly despised.
The book is a group of rhapsodies in praise of pure and faithful
love. It has no movement, no dénouement, no plot, nothing but the
## p. 10807 (#687) ##########################################
OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
10807
isolated passionate utterances of a pair of lovers. Its hero is not
Solomon, but a shepherd, and its heroine is a country maiden; she
is not carried off by Solomon to his harem. The King is introduced
or alluded to by way of illustration: not always, it would seem, with
approbation,- see vi. 8, 9, where the Lover contrasts his one Beloved
with the numerous members of a great harem. Its unity is the unity
of an idea; the many attempts which have been made to discover in
it a unity of action have none of them gained general acceptance.
The gnomic literature of the Hebrews, contained mainly in the
books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes (but also in certain Psalms, as
the 27th and the 49th), has, by its nature, little of the poetic, except
the outward form; its balanced phrases present excellent examples
of Semitic parallelism. In some cases a longer description gathers
force by the accumulation of details; as in the well-known picture
of the good housewife (Prov. xxxi. 10–31), which is in the nature of
an ode to the housewife, as Ps. cxix. is an ode to the Law.
Ecclesiastes is written for the most part in prose, and has pass-
ages of great eloquence and beauty. The author counsels quiet ac-
ceptance of what God has given (iii. 11-15):—
HE HAS made everything beautiful in its time. He presents
the world to man, yet so that man, from beginning to end, can-
not find out what he has done. I thence conclude that there is
nothing better for them than to rejoice and taste of happiness.
while they live; for when one eats and drinks, and enjoys what
he has acquired by his labor, this is the gift of God. I know
that whatever God does shall be for ever. Nothing can be added
to it, nor anything taken from it. God so acts that men may
fear him. That which is, has already existed; that which is to
be, has already been; that which has passed away, God seeks in
order to give it existence again.
He warns against all excess (vii. 15-17):—
All this have I seen in the days of my vain life. The good
man perishes in spite of his goodness, and the bad man lives
long in spite of his badness. Be not too righteous, nor pretend
to be too wise, lest thou destroy thyself. Be not too wicked, nor
too foolish, lest thou die before thy time.
The description of old age and its slowly lessening powers (xii.
1-7) belongs to the best productions of Hebrew literature:
REMEMBER thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the
sad days come, and the years draw nigh when thou shalt say,
## p. 10808 (#688) ##########################################
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
"I have no pleasure in them;" before the sun, the light, the
moon, and the stars, be darkened, and the clouds return after the
rain; when the house-guards tremble, the strong men bow, when
the maidens grinding corn cease because they are few, and those
who look out of the windows are darkened, and the street-doors
are shut; when the sound of the grinding is low; when one starts
up from sleep at the voice of a bird, and all the daughters of
music are brought low, and one is afraid of what is high, and
terrors are in the way; when the almond-tree blossoms, the
grasshopper is a burden, and all stimulants fail; because man
goes to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets:
before the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken,
or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at
the cistern, and the dust return to the earth as it was, and the
spirit return to God who gave it.
The failure of light and the recurrence of rain (verses 1, 2) indicate
the growing gloom of old age. The decay of natural powers is repre-
sented (verses 3, 4) by the cessation of activity in a great house fall-
ing into ruin: arms (guards) and legs (strong men) lose their strength,
the teeth (maidens grinding) are few, the eyes grow dim (windows);
in a word, the avenues of the senses are closed (the doors are shut).
Then comes (verses 4, 5) a more literal description of bodily weak-
ness: the old man cannot sleep, music gives him no pleasure, he
walks about in fear and trembling, his hair turns white (almond-tree),
the smallest weight is burdensome, the appetite does not respond
to stimulants. Finally comes the end,- from the fountain of life no
water can be drawn. With this gloomy portraiture of old age we
may compare the cheerful picture given by Cicero. The object
of the preacher is to lead men to use aright the vigorous season of
youth.
THE APOCALYPSE
There remains to be mentioned the apocalypse, a species of com-
position which must be regarded as a creation of Hebrew thought.
Before the eye of a seer the history of generations or centuries is
unrolled in a series of visions, the culminating point of which is the
triumph of the people of Israel. It is the visional expression of that
unification of history which is given in simple narrative form in the
Hexateuch and suggested in the Prophets. Kingdoms rise and fall,
and all things move toward the divinely appointed goal, -the estab-
lishment of Israel in peace and prosperity. In the Book of Daniel
(the only elaborated apocalypse in the Old Testament) the kingdoms
set forth are the Babylonian, the Median, the Persian, and the Greek;
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and the visions all end with the downfall of Antiochus Epiphanes
(see particularly Chapter xi. ). A majestic picture is presented in the
description of the judgment of the enemies of Israel, the "one like a
man" being explained in the context as meaning Faithful Israel (vii.
9-14):-
I BEHELD till thrones were placed, and one that was full of
years did sit: his raiment was white as snow, and the hair of his
head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames and its wheels
burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before
him; a thousand thousands ministered unto him and ten thousand
times ten thousand stood before him; the judgment was set and
the books were opened. I beheld at that time till, because of the
voice of the great words which the horn spake, the beast was
slain, and his body destroyed, and he was given to be burned
with fire. And as for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was
taken away, yet their lives were prolonged for a season and a
time. I saw in the night visions, and behold there came with the
clouds of heaven one like a man, and he came to the Ancient of
Days, and was brought into his presence. And to him was given
dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations,
and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting
dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that
shall not be destroyed.
The Hebrew power of narration is well illustrated in the scenes
described in Chapters ii. -vi.
THE APOCRYPHA
THE books which constitute the Old Testament were slowly gath-
ered by the Jews into a sacred canon, the discussions on which did
not cease until the Synod of Jamnia, held probably about A. D. 95.
Meantime the Jews had been producing other works, which, though
some of them were excellent in tone, were for various reasons not
thought worthy by the Palestinian rabbis to be accepted as sacred
scripture. In respect to some of these books the Alexandrian Jews
appear to have held a different opinion; some are included in the
Septuagint along with the canonical books, and it is to these that
the name Apocrypha properly belongs. The purpose of some of the
Alexandrian additions is obvious. Since, for example, the Hebrew
Book of Esther does not contain the name of God, or make any ref-
erence to religion, the Greek supplies this lack by adding visions and
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
prayers. In any case we have, in this Jewish Apocrypha, a very in-
teresting mass of literature, reflecting the religious and literary cul-
ture of the Jews in the two centuries preceding the beginning of our
era. In addition to the works constituting the Apocrypha proper
(that is, the extra-canonical or deuterocanonical books contained in
the Septuagint,) there are several others, of no less importance and
equally deserving of mention. Such, for example, are the Books of
Enoch and the Sibyllines. We need make no distinction between
the two classes, but may take them all together.
The first book of this sort in order of time is the work com-
monly called Ecclesiasticus, or the Wisdom of the Son of Sirach;
better called the Proverbs of Ben-Sira, or simply Ben-Sira. It was
composed about 190 B. C. in Hebrew, by Jesus (Joshua) ben-Sira;
translated into Greek by his grandson in Alexandria in 132 B. C. ; and
afterwards translated into Latin, Syriac, and Arabic. The book con-
sists for the most part of apophthegms which resemble those in our
Book of Proverbs. It contains also several extended poems of no little
beauty; among which may be cited those in Chapters i. and xxiv. ,
and the roll of the great men of Israel, Chapters xliv. -1. Its sayings
are marked by great worldly wisdom, and bear the impress of a man
who lived in a large city. In common with the other Wisdom books,
it shows the marks of Greek influence in its conception of wisdom
and of morality.
Nothing was known of the Hebrew original until the present year
(1897), when MSS. containing about ten chapters (xxxix. 15-xlix. 11),
came to Oxford, and the text has now been edited. The language
of the fragment does not differ in style from that of the canonical
Book of Proverbs; it is classical, but with a small admixture of
later words. This fact is of great literary interest, as helping to
the solution of the question how long classical Hebrew continued
to be used in books: it appears that it was employed certainly as
late as 190 B. C. ; the occurrence of some late words is of course
to be expected in this period. It further appears that the Versions,
while they in general render the Hebrew correctly, differ from it
in not a few instances. Several scholars had undertaken to repro-
duce the Hebrew from the Greek and the Syriac; it turns out that
they had not in a single case written the Hebrew of a verse as it
is given in this MS. , but have in many instances departed widely
from it, a fact which should teach us caution in attempting to re-
store Hebrew texts from ancient Greek, Syriac, Latin, and Ethiopic
translations. Another important point is settled by this text. It had
been contended (especially by Professor Margoliouth of Oxford) that
the poetical form of the Hebrew Ben-Sira was metrical, and that the
original could often be restored by the aid of the laws of metre.
The form, however, is distinctly not metrical; it is simply the old
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Hebrew rhythm, such as appears in Psalms, Proverbs, and all the
poetical parts of the Old Testament. One leaf of the MS. was brought
by Mrs. Lewis from the East; the remainder was secured for the
Bodleian Library through Professor Sayce. The MS. contains vari-
ants, and must be subjected to critical sifting.
Not long after Ben-Sira came the apocalyptic Book of Enoch, which
now exists mainly in an Ethiopic translation. The apocalypse had
come to be a favorite form of literature among the Jews, and so con-
tinued for two hundred and fifty years. Amid depressing circum-
stances, it was pleasant to put into the mouth of some ancient seer a
prediction of future success and glory for the nation. In this case it
is the old patriarch Enoch who receives the revelation. The book is
composite, having been added to from time to time. The first section,
Chapters i. -xxxvi. (perhaps the oldest part of the book), describes the
fate of evil angels, and the abodes of good and bad men after death.
Next should come the section Chapters lxxxiii. -xc. , in which we
have the judgment of the world, ending with the victorious career
of Judas Maccabæus. In addition, the section Chapters xxxvii. -lxxi.
(partly a distinct work) describes further the Messianic judgment of
the world. Chapters lxxii. -lxxxii. contain a description of Enoch's
journey through the heavens,-a picture of the celestial physics of
the time. And finally, in the last section, Chapters xci. -civ. , the
problem of the fate of the righteous and the wicked is discussed in
a new form. The book in its present form has little literary interest,
but is valuable as giving a glimpse of the religious notions of the
time. The best English translation is that of R. H. Charles (1893).
Along with this may be mentioned a similar work entitled 'The
Secrets of Enoch,' translated from the Slavonic by W. R. Morfill,
and edited by Mr. Charles (1896); it is held by him to have been
composed about the beginning of our era.
Nearly contemporary with Enoch is the earliest part of the Sibyl-
line Oracles, a work written in Greek hexameters. The Jews, not to
be behind other nations of the time, would have their own Sibyl, who
should tell their national fortunes, and make manifest their national
greatness. The work, as we now have it, is a congeries of diverse
productions, the composition of which (partly by Jews, partly by
Christians) extends from the Maccabean period to the end of the
first Christian century. Though it has no literary value, it formerly
enjoyed extraordinary popularity, as the "teste David cum Sibylla" of
the 'Dies Iræ' indicates. Its predictions traverse the periods extend-
ing from the creation of the world down to the times of the various
authors. An excellent English metrical translation is that of M. S.
Terry (1890).
Other apocalypses may be briefly mentioned. The Assumption
(or Ascension) of Moses, written in the first quarter of the first
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
century of our era, puts into the mouth of Moses a prediction of
Jewish history, which comes on down, through the time of Antiochus
Epiphanes, to Herod the Great, and possibly even to a later period.
The period after the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans was pro-
lific in this species of writing. The Apocalypse of Baruch (the
scribe of Jeremiah) sketches the history down to the destruction of
the Second Temple. The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (pre-
dictions uttered by the twelve sons of Jacob), come down to about
the same time. To the end of the first century also belongs the
Fourth Book of Esdras, remarkable for its elaborate visions. Many
of these works are based on Jewish originals, with Christian addi-
tions.
The Jewish skill in story-telling is illustrated in the books of
Tobit and Judith. The former of these is a charming sketch of
family life in the second century B. C. The well-ordered households
of Tobit and Raguel, the ingenuous youth and maiden Tobias and
Sara, the affable angel Rafael, his disingenuousness and his business.
capacity, are drawn to the life.
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Ps. cxxxii. , describes the choosing of the site of the temple. We shall
not find a more beautiful expression of trust in God than that which
is given by the 121st Psalm:
:-
I LIFT up mine eyes to the mountains!
Whence comes my help?
My help comes from the Lord,
Who made Heaven and Earth.
He will not suffer thy foot to be moved;
He who keeps thee does not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel
Slumbers not nor sleeps.
The Lord is thy keeper,
The Lord is a shade on thy right hand.
The sun shall not smite thee by day,
Nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep thee from all evil,
He will preserve thy life.
The Lord will keep thy going out and thy coming in
From this time forth and for evermore.
The longer psalms are either odes written on the occasion of
some national festivity, or narrations of national history, or, in a few
cases, the expression of national experiences. Of these perhaps the
most striking are the 18th and the 68th. The former is a description
of struggle and victory. It contains one of the most magnificent of
poetical passages: –
IN MY distress I called upon the Lord,
I cried unto my God.
He heard my voice from his palace,
And my cry came to his ears.
Then the earth shook and trembled,
The foundations of the mountains were shaken.
Smoke ascended in his nostrils,
Fire out of his mouth devoured,
Coals were kindled by it!
He bowed the heavens and descended;
Thick darkness was under his feet.
He rode upon a cherub and did fly;
He flew on the wings of the wind!
He made darkness his habitation,
And darkest clouds his pavilion.
In brightness passed his thick clouds,
With hail and coals of fire.
The Lord thundered in heaven,
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
The Most High uttered his voice.
He sent out his arrows and scattered them,
Shot forth his lightnings and appalled them.
Then the bed of the Deep appeared;
The foundations of the world were laid bare,
At thy rebuke, O Lord,
At the blast of the breath of thy nostrils!
It was from this passage that Sternhold and Hopkins elicited the
only bit of poetry in their metrical version of the Psalms:-
The Lord descended from above,
And bowed the heavens most high,
And underneath his feet he cast
The darkness of the sky.
On cherub and on cherubim
Full royally he rode,
And on the wings of mighty winds
Came flying all abroad!
The 68th Psalm is a procession-ode, consisting of a series of stanzas
of singular majesty and force. Psalms 1xxvii. and 1xxxix. , cv. and
cvi. are historical reviews. Psalms ciii. and civ. are odes in celebra-
tion of the glorious and beneficent deeds of Jehovah.
A peculiarity of the Psalter is the presence of alphabetical psalms,
in which each verse or stanza begins with a letter of the alphabet in
order. There are a number of these: the alphabetical arrangement
is, however, not always perfect; and it is, of course, not recognizable
in the English translation. The most noteworthy example is the 119th
Psalm, a collection of couplets in praise of the Law. It is divided
into twenty-two stanzas (according to the number of letters in the
Hebrew alphabet) of eight couplets each. Such psalms, however, are
naturally the least attractive in poetic form.
The Psalter is divided in the Hebrew Bible, and in the English
Revised Version, into five books (in imitation of the division of the
Pentateuch): and these are supposed to indicate collections which
were made at different times; the whole having been finally combined
into our present Psalm-book. The Psalter grew with the temple
services, and many-perhaps the most-of its hymns were intended
for recitation in the sacred place.
A peculiar and very effective form of Hebrew poetry is the elegy.
The discovery of the form of the Hebrew elegy or lament (the
recognition of which adds not a little to the reader's pleasure) is
due to Professor Karl Budde, now of Strassburg. The elegiac verse
is characterized by a short clause, followed by a still shorter clause,
giving to the phrase a peculiar restrained movement. The most
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noted example of this poetic form is found in our Book of Lamenta-
tions a collection of laments over the sorrows of Israel. Thus, in
the beginning of the second chapter:-
―
THE Lord in his anger has smitten
The daughter of Zion,
And cast down from heaven to earth
The beauty of Israel;
He has not remembered his footstool
In the day of his wrath!
The Lord has destroyed without mercy
The dwellings of Jacob;
Has thrown down in anger the stronghold
Of the daughter of Judah;
Has cast to the ground, desecrated,
The realm and its princes.
One feels here how the emotion of the poet drives him into this
sad brief appendage at the end of each line. Elegies are not con-
fined to the Book of Lamentations, but are found elsewhere in the
Old Testament. In Ezekiel xix. are two laments, one for the princes
and the other for the nation. The first reads as follows:-
THY mother was like a lioness | among lions.
Amid young lions she couched, | she reared her whelps.
One of her whelps she brought up, | he became a young lion.
He learned to seize his prey, | men he devoured.
Against him the nations raised a cry, | in their pit he was taken.
They brought him with hooks away | to the land of Egypt.
She saw that she had failed, | her hope had perished.
Another of her whelps she took, | a young lion she made him.
(Etc. )
So the magnificent ode, written in elegiac form, in Isaiah xiv. , in
which the fall of the King of Babylon is celebrated:-
How is the tyrant quelled, | quelled his havoc!
The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, | the ruler's sceptre!
Who, in his wrath, smote the nations | with blows unceasing!
At rest is the world, and at peace- | breaks forth into song!
Over thee exult the spruce-trees, | the cedars of Lebanon:
"Since thou art laid low there comes no longer | the woodman
against us. "
The realm of Shades beneath is stirred | to meet thine arrival.
―――――
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
―
It rouses the Shades for thee -
| the heroes of earth,
Rouses from their thrones | the kings of the nations.
To thee they all speak, and say:-
"Thou too art become weak as we, | art become like us;
Thy pomp is brought down to the Shades, | the clang of thy
harps;
Mold is the bed beneath thee | and worms thy covering.
How art thou fallen from heaven, | bright star of dawn!
How art thou hurled to the ground, | thou conqueror of nations!
Thou hadst thought in thy heart, 'To heaven I'll mount,
High above the stars of God | exalt my throne;
I will sit on the mount of God | in farthest north;
To the heights of the clouds I'll ascend- | be like the Most High! '
And now thou art hurled to the realm of death,
To the deepest abyss. "
A still better conception of the power of the elegiac verse is
given by the fine alphabetic ode in triplets contained in Lamenta-
tions i.
How sitteth the city solitary, | once full of people.
She who was great among the nations | is become as a widow.
The princess among the provinces | is become tributary.
She weepeth sore in the night, | her cheeks are wet with tears;
She hath none to comfort her | among all her lovers;
All her friends are traitors, | are become her enemies.
Exiled is Judah in grievous affliction, | in bitter servitude;
She dwelleth among the nations, | findeth no rest;
All her persecutors overtook her | in the midst of her straits.
The ways to Zion do mourn, | none come to her feasts;
All her gates are desolate, | her priests do sigh;
Her virgins are deeply afflicted, and she is in bitterness.
Her adversaries are become supreme, | her enemies prosper;
For Jehovah hath sorely afflicted her | for her many sins;
Her children are gone into captivity | before the adversary.
Gone from the Daughter of Zion | is all her splendor.
Her princes are become like harts | that find no pasture:
Powerless they have fled | before the pursuer.
Jerusalem remembereth her days of affliction and misery,
When her people succumbed to the foe, | and none did help
her;
On her her enemies gazed, | mocked at her bereavement.
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Jerusalem hath grievously sinned, | foul is she become;
All that honored her despise her | because they have seen her
disgrace.
Yea, she herself sigheth | and turneth away.
Her filthiness is in her skirts, | she remembered not her end;
Wonderful is her downfall, | she hath no comforter.
Behold, O Jehovah, my affliction, | for the foe doth triumph.
The adversary hath laid his hand | on all her treasures;
She hath beheld the nations enter | her sanctuary,
Who, thou commandedst, should not come into | thy congrega-
tion.
All her people sigh, | seeking bread.
Their treasures they have given for food | their life to sus-
tain.
See, O Jehovah, and behold | how I am despised.
Ho, all ye that pass by, | behold and see
If there be sorrow like to the sorrow | which is come upon
me,
Wherewith Jehovah hath afflicted me | in the day of his anger.
Fire from on high he hath sent, | into my bones hath driven it,
Hath spread a net for my feet, | turned me back;
Desolate he hath made me, | faint all the day.
Bound is the yoke of my trespasses | by his hand;
Knit together they lie on my neck, | my strength doth fail.
The Lord hath given me up to them | whom I cannot with-
stand.
My heroes the Lord hath cast down | in the midst of me,
Hath summoned a solemn assembly | to crush my warriors;
In a wine-press he hath trodden | the virgin daughter of Judah.
For these things weep mine eyes, | my tears run down;
Far away from me is the comforter | who should revive my
soul;
Desolate are my children | because the foe hath prevailed.
Zion spreadeth forth her hands, | there is none to comfort her;
This hath Jehovah ordained for Jacob, that his neighbors.
should be his foes;
Among them is Jerusalem become | a thing of loathing.
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Jehovah, he is just-I have rebelled against him.
Hear, all ye peoples, | behold my sorrow:
My virgins and my young men | are gone into captivity.
On my friends I called, they deceived me.
My priests and my elders | perished in the city,
Seeking food for themselves | to sustain their lives.
Behold, O Jehovah, my deep distress: | my soul is troubled;
My heart is o'erwhelmed within me, | rebellious was I.
Abroad the sword bereaveth, | at home is death.
They have heard that I sigh, | there is none to comfort me.
My foes have heard of my trouble, | they are glad thou didst it.
Bring in the day thou hast announced, | let them be like me.
Regard thou all their wickedness; | do to them
As thou hast done to me | for all my sins!
For many are my sighs, | my heart is faint.
Other examples of the elegy are found in Amos, v. 1; Ezek. xxvii.
32-36, and xxxii. 19–32.
The Book of Job must be reckoned among the great poems of the
world. The prose introduction - the story of the crushing of Job's
worldly hopes-is itself full of power. The poem is unique in form.
It is a series of monologues, all united by the author's intention to
develop a certain idea in connection with the question, "Why do
the righteous suffer? " The Three Friends affirm that the righteous
do not suffer,—that is, that no man suffers except for wrong-doing.
Job combats this view to the uttermost, holding that he is righteous
and that he suffers. Elihu further insists that suffering is designed to
destroy the pride of men who are otherwise good. Finally, Jehovah
intervenes, and proclaims the wonderfulness of his government of
the world, and Job is reduced to silence. The freshness and variety
of thought, the picture of a terrible struggle in Job's soul, the
majestic descriptions of Divine power,-all these together give a
peculiar impressiveness to the book. At the outset, Job gives us a
glimpse into his own soul:-
PERISH the day wherein I was born,
And the night which said, Behold, a man!
Let that day be darkness;
May God ask not of it;
May no light shine on it;
May darkness and gloom claim it,
Clouds dwell on it, and eclipses terrify it!
―
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Job longs for death, that he may go to that sad underworld, and
dwell
Where-
-
To this outburst, the eldest of the three friends, Eliphaz, replies
by insisting on the general rule that men receive in this world what
they deserve; and he expresses his conclusion in the form of a
vision:-
With kings and councilors of the earth,
Who built tombs for themselves,
-
The wicked cease from troubling,
And the weary are at rest.
XVIII-676
Stealthily came to me a word,
And a whisper to my ear;
In thoughts, from visions of the night,
When deep sleep falls on men.
Fear came upon me, and trembling,
Which made all my bones to shake;
And a breath passed over my face,
The hair of my head stood up.
There It stood! Its semblance I could not see! -
-
Job replies to this, and is answered by the second friend, replies
to him, is followed by the third friend, and so for several rounds of
argument, the only effect of which on Job is to draw him to deeper
hopelessness. He exclaims (vii. 7):—
A form was before my eyes!
I heard a voice which whispered,
"Shall man be more just than God,—
A creature purer than the Creator?
He puts no trust in his servants,
His angels he charges with folly:
How much more them who dwell in houses of clay,
Whose foundation is in the dust? "
A tree cut down may sprout again,
Its tender branch will not cease.
Though its root wax old in the earth,
And its stock die in the ground,
Yet through the scent of water it will bud,
And put forth boughs like a plant.
But man dies and wastes away,
Breathes out his life, and where is he?
The waters pour out of the sea,
The river dries up and fails;
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So man lies down and rises not;
Till the heavens be no more they shall not awake,
Nor be raised out of their sleep!
Then there comes to him a vague wish that God would think of
him after death in the underworld, and he exclaims:-
Oh that thou wouldst hide me in the underworld,
Keep me secret till thy wrath be past,
Appoint me a set time, and remember me!
The finest outbursts of poetry are to be found in the speeches of
Job himself, yet others also contain many striking pieces. See, for
example, the speech of Zophar, Chapter xx. ; that of Eliphaz, Chapter
xxii. ; and that of Bildad, Chapter xxv. Elihu's description of the
chastening power of suffering in xxxiii. 19-28 is also full of vigor:-
He is chastened with pain on his bed,
In his bones is continual torment;
He abhors all nourishing bread,
Cares not for dainty food;
His flesh wastes away to nothing,
His bones, hid no longer, stick out,
And he draws near unto the pit,-
His life approaches the dead!
—:
If there be an interpreter with him
Who will shew him what is right,
Will be gracious to him, and say,
"Loose him! I have ransomed his life,"
Then his flesh becomes fresher than a child's,
He returns to the days of his youth,
He prays to God, who accepts him,
Shews him his face in joy,
Restores to him his righteousness.
He sings before him, and says:-
"I had sinned, and done what was wrong,
-
But it was not requited to me;
He has redeemed me from the pit!
My life shall behold the light! "
The speeches of Jehovah make a magnificent poem in themselves.
Chapters xxviii. , xxxix. , are worthy to stand alongside the first chap-
ter of Genesis for sublimity of statement, and have in addition the
freshness and color of a fine imagination. One other poem in Job,
that contained in Chapter xxviii. , we may reserve, in order to place
it alongside of several similar poems.
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10803
We have already seen that the Canticles, or Song of Songs, must
be taken as a group of songs of love, in which it is impossible to
discover any relation of time and place. It may be compared, for
poetic grace, with the finest idylls of Theocritus. It breathes the air
of the fields and mountains; and in this respect is unique among
the Old Testament books. For ancient poetry does not occupy itself
directly with external nature. Neither among the Greeks nor among
the Hebrews do we find the phenomena of nature introduced into
poetry for their own sake: they are used as illustrations purely.
The reason of this is not that the ancients did not love nature,-
tainly they must have been alive to its charm. It is rather that
only in modern times have men come to that habit of close observa-
tion of nature which has made it possible to use its varying forms as
part of poetic material. So, in the Psalms, clouds and mountains,
stream and sunshine, appear as exhibiting the power and wisdom or
the wrath or the love of God. But not even in such Psalms as xviii.
and xix. does the poet dwell on these phenomena for their own sake.
In this book we seem to have an exception to this rule; as in the
beautiful spring song in Chapter ii. :-
cer-
―
THE Voice of my Beloved! Lo, he comes,
Leaping over the mountains,
Skipping over the hills!
My Beloved is like a roe, a young hart.
Now he stands behind our wall,
Looks through the window,
Peeps through the lattice.
My beloved spake, and said to me:-
Arise, my Love, my Fair One, and come away!
For lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone,
The flowers appear on the earth,
The time of the singing of birds is come,
The voice of the turtle-dove is heard in our land,
The fig-tree ripens her figs,
The vines are in blossom,
They give forth their fragrance.
Arise, my Love, my Fair One, and come away!
Here the pictures introduced are all of the country, and all charm-
ing, and the poet seems to dwell on them for their own sake. But
after all he does not do this. It is the lover who describes the
beautiful face of nature, in order to tempt his beloved to come
forth and roam with him over the fields and hills. Nevertheless,
the pictures of natural scenery which he gives are very striking, and
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
might easily prepare the way for that completer contemplation of
nature which is found in the modern poets. .
It is the occurrence of responsive songs in the book that has sug-
gested the opinion that it is a drama. How vague the speeches and
the supposed dialogue are, will appear from the following examples.
The occasion of the first address to the Jerusalem ladies (1. 5, 6) is
not obvious:-
I am dark but comely,
O ye daughters of Jerusalem,
As the tents of Kedar,
As the curtains of Solomon.
Scorn me not because I am dark,
Because the sun has shone on me.
For my brothers were wroth with me,
And made me keeper of the vineyards.
On this follows the first dialogue:-
The Beloved speaks (i. 7):
Tell me, thou whom I love,
Where thou feedest thy flock at noon;
For I would not seem to be a loiterer
Beside thy comrades' flocks.
The Lover replies (i. 8):
If thou know not, O fairest of women,
Go, follow the tracks of the flock,
And feed thy kids by the shepherds' tents.
After a brief descriptive strophe, the second dialogue proceeds (i. 15-
ii. 6):-
Thou art fair, my Love, thou art fair,
Thou hast the eyes of a dove.
Thou art fair, my Love, and lovely.
Our couch is the greensward,
The beams of our house are the cedars,
The walls of our rooms are the cypresses.
I am a rose of Sharon,
A lily of the valleys.
As a lily among thorns,
So is my Love among the maidens.
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As the apple-tree among the trees of the wood,
So is my Love among the youths.
Under his shadow I sat with delight,
And his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He brought me to the banqueting-house,
And his banner over me was love.
Stay me with raisins, strengthen me with apples,
For I am sick with love.
Be his left hand under my head!
Let his right hand embrace me!
Refrain (ii. 7, iii. 5):
I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
By the gazelles and the hinds of the field,
Rouse not nor awaken love
Until it please!
The search by night for the Beloved (iii. 1-4):
At night on my bed I sought my Beloved,
Sought him, and found him not.
(I said) I will arise and go through the city;
In the streets and the squares
I will seek my Beloved.
I sought him and found him not.
The watchmen, patrolling the city, found me.
"Saw ye my beloved? »
Scarce had I passed from them,
When I found him whom I love,
I held him, would not let him go.
The vagueness of this narration is equaled by that of its com-
panion song, the less fortunate search for the Lover, of which we
cannot say whether it is a dream or reality (v. 2-7):—
I sleep, but my heart is awake.
Hark! my Beloved knocks, and cries:
Open to me, my sister, my friend,
My dove, my perfect one!
For my head is filled with dew,
My locks with the drops of the night.
(She): I have put off my dress-
Must I put it on again?
I have washed my feet-
Must I defile them?
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
My Beloved put his hand through the window,
My soul yearned for him.
I rose to open to my Beloved,
And my hand dropped with myrrh,
And my fingers with liquid myrrh,
On the handles of the bolt.
I opened to my Beloved,
But he had withdrawn and was gone —
My heart had failed me when he spake.
I sought him, but found him not,
I called, he answered not.
The watchmen, patrolling the city, found me,
They smote me, they wounded me,
The keepers of the walls took from me my veil.
This exquisite piece is the expression of the longing of love; it
does not belong to a drama. The reference to the night-watchmen
of the city is to be noted.
We add two beautiful expressions of love, the first, of joy in the
possession of the beloved one (iv. 16, v. 1):—
Awake, O north wind; come, O south!
Breathe on my garden that its balsam may flow!
Let my Beloved come into his garden,
And enjoy its precious fruits!
I am come into my garden, my sister-bride,
I have gathered my myrrh with my balsam,
I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey,
I have drunk my wine with my milk.
Then, love on its spontaneous, enduring, and controlling sià (viii.
6, 7):-
Set me as a seal-ring on thy heart,
As a seal-ring on thine arm.
For love is strong as death,
Passion is firm as the Underworld
Its flames are flames of fire,
Many waters cannot quench it,
Rivers cannot drown it.
If a man would give all his possessions for it,
He would be utterly despised.
The book is a group of rhapsodies in praise of pure and faithful
love. It has no movement, no dénouement, no plot, nothing but the
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10807
isolated passionate utterances of a pair of lovers. Its hero is not
Solomon, but a shepherd, and its heroine is a country maiden; she
is not carried off by Solomon to his harem. The King is introduced
or alluded to by way of illustration: not always, it would seem, with
approbation,- see vi. 8, 9, where the Lover contrasts his one Beloved
with the numerous members of a great harem. Its unity is the unity
of an idea; the many attempts which have been made to discover in
it a unity of action have none of them gained general acceptance.
The gnomic literature of the Hebrews, contained mainly in the
books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes (but also in certain Psalms, as
the 27th and the 49th), has, by its nature, little of the poetic, except
the outward form; its balanced phrases present excellent examples
of Semitic parallelism. In some cases a longer description gathers
force by the accumulation of details; as in the well-known picture
of the good housewife (Prov. xxxi. 10–31), which is in the nature of
an ode to the housewife, as Ps. cxix. is an ode to the Law.
Ecclesiastes is written for the most part in prose, and has pass-
ages of great eloquence and beauty. The author counsels quiet ac-
ceptance of what God has given (iii. 11-15):—
HE HAS made everything beautiful in its time. He presents
the world to man, yet so that man, from beginning to end, can-
not find out what he has done. I thence conclude that there is
nothing better for them than to rejoice and taste of happiness.
while they live; for when one eats and drinks, and enjoys what
he has acquired by his labor, this is the gift of God. I know
that whatever God does shall be for ever. Nothing can be added
to it, nor anything taken from it. God so acts that men may
fear him. That which is, has already existed; that which is to
be, has already been; that which has passed away, God seeks in
order to give it existence again.
He warns against all excess (vii. 15-17):—
All this have I seen in the days of my vain life. The good
man perishes in spite of his goodness, and the bad man lives
long in spite of his badness. Be not too righteous, nor pretend
to be too wise, lest thou destroy thyself. Be not too wicked, nor
too foolish, lest thou die before thy time.
The description of old age and its slowly lessening powers (xii.
1-7) belongs to the best productions of Hebrew literature:
REMEMBER thy Creator in the days of thy youth, before the
sad days come, and the years draw nigh when thou shalt say,
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
"I have no pleasure in them;" before the sun, the light, the
moon, and the stars, be darkened, and the clouds return after the
rain; when the house-guards tremble, the strong men bow, when
the maidens grinding corn cease because they are few, and those
who look out of the windows are darkened, and the street-doors
are shut; when the sound of the grinding is low; when one starts
up from sleep at the voice of a bird, and all the daughters of
music are brought low, and one is afraid of what is high, and
terrors are in the way; when the almond-tree blossoms, the
grasshopper is a burden, and all stimulants fail; because man
goes to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets:
before the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken,
or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at
the cistern, and the dust return to the earth as it was, and the
spirit return to God who gave it.
The failure of light and the recurrence of rain (verses 1, 2) indicate
the growing gloom of old age. The decay of natural powers is repre-
sented (verses 3, 4) by the cessation of activity in a great house fall-
ing into ruin: arms (guards) and legs (strong men) lose their strength,
the teeth (maidens grinding) are few, the eyes grow dim (windows);
in a word, the avenues of the senses are closed (the doors are shut).
Then comes (verses 4, 5) a more literal description of bodily weak-
ness: the old man cannot sleep, music gives him no pleasure, he
walks about in fear and trembling, his hair turns white (almond-tree),
the smallest weight is burdensome, the appetite does not respond
to stimulants. Finally comes the end,- from the fountain of life no
water can be drawn. With this gloomy portraiture of old age we
may compare the cheerful picture given by Cicero. The object
of the preacher is to lead men to use aright the vigorous season of
youth.
THE APOCALYPSE
There remains to be mentioned the apocalypse, a species of com-
position which must be regarded as a creation of Hebrew thought.
Before the eye of a seer the history of generations or centuries is
unrolled in a series of visions, the culminating point of which is the
triumph of the people of Israel. It is the visional expression of that
unification of history which is given in simple narrative form in the
Hexateuch and suggested in the Prophets. Kingdoms rise and fall,
and all things move toward the divinely appointed goal, -the estab-
lishment of Israel in peace and prosperity. In the Book of Daniel
(the only elaborated apocalypse in the Old Testament) the kingdoms
set forth are the Babylonian, the Median, the Persian, and the Greek;
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10809
and the visions all end with the downfall of Antiochus Epiphanes
(see particularly Chapter xi. ). A majestic picture is presented in the
description of the judgment of the enemies of Israel, the "one like a
man" being explained in the context as meaning Faithful Israel (vii.
9-14):-
I BEHELD till thrones were placed, and one that was full of
years did sit: his raiment was white as snow, and the hair of his
head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames and its wheels
burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before
him; a thousand thousands ministered unto him and ten thousand
times ten thousand stood before him; the judgment was set and
the books were opened. I beheld at that time till, because of the
voice of the great words which the horn spake, the beast was
slain, and his body destroyed, and he was given to be burned
with fire. And as for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was
taken away, yet their lives were prolonged for a season and a
time. I saw in the night visions, and behold there came with the
clouds of heaven one like a man, and he came to the Ancient of
Days, and was brought into his presence. And to him was given
dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations,
and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting
dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that
shall not be destroyed.
The Hebrew power of narration is well illustrated in the scenes
described in Chapters ii. -vi.
THE APOCRYPHA
THE books which constitute the Old Testament were slowly gath-
ered by the Jews into a sacred canon, the discussions on which did
not cease until the Synod of Jamnia, held probably about A. D. 95.
Meantime the Jews had been producing other works, which, though
some of them were excellent in tone, were for various reasons not
thought worthy by the Palestinian rabbis to be accepted as sacred
scripture. In respect to some of these books the Alexandrian Jews
appear to have held a different opinion; some are included in the
Septuagint along with the canonical books, and it is to these that
the name Apocrypha properly belongs. The purpose of some of the
Alexandrian additions is obvious. Since, for example, the Hebrew
Book of Esther does not contain the name of God, or make any ref-
erence to religion, the Greek supplies this lack by adding visions and
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
prayers. In any case we have, in this Jewish Apocrypha, a very in-
teresting mass of literature, reflecting the religious and literary cul-
ture of the Jews in the two centuries preceding the beginning of our
era. In addition to the works constituting the Apocrypha proper
(that is, the extra-canonical or deuterocanonical books contained in
the Septuagint,) there are several others, of no less importance and
equally deserving of mention. Such, for example, are the Books of
Enoch and the Sibyllines. We need make no distinction between
the two classes, but may take them all together.
The first book of this sort in order of time is the work com-
monly called Ecclesiasticus, or the Wisdom of the Son of Sirach;
better called the Proverbs of Ben-Sira, or simply Ben-Sira. It was
composed about 190 B. C. in Hebrew, by Jesus (Joshua) ben-Sira;
translated into Greek by his grandson in Alexandria in 132 B. C. ; and
afterwards translated into Latin, Syriac, and Arabic. The book con-
sists for the most part of apophthegms which resemble those in our
Book of Proverbs. It contains also several extended poems of no little
beauty; among which may be cited those in Chapters i. and xxiv. ,
and the roll of the great men of Israel, Chapters xliv. -1. Its sayings
are marked by great worldly wisdom, and bear the impress of a man
who lived in a large city. In common with the other Wisdom books,
it shows the marks of Greek influence in its conception of wisdom
and of morality.
Nothing was known of the Hebrew original until the present year
(1897), when MSS. containing about ten chapters (xxxix. 15-xlix. 11),
came to Oxford, and the text has now been edited. The language
of the fragment does not differ in style from that of the canonical
Book of Proverbs; it is classical, but with a small admixture of
later words. This fact is of great literary interest, as helping to
the solution of the question how long classical Hebrew continued
to be used in books: it appears that it was employed certainly as
late as 190 B. C. ; the occurrence of some late words is of course
to be expected in this period. It further appears that the Versions,
while they in general render the Hebrew correctly, differ from it
in not a few instances. Several scholars had undertaken to repro-
duce the Hebrew from the Greek and the Syriac; it turns out that
they had not in a single case written the Hebrew of a verse as it
is given in this MS. , but have in many instances departed widely
from it, a fact which should teach us caution in attempting to re-
store Hebrew texts from ancient Greek, Syriac, Latin, and Ethiopic
translations. Another important point is settled by this text. It had
been contended (especially by Professor Margoliouth of Oxford) that
the poetical form of the Hebrew Ben-Sira was metrical, and that the
original could often be restored by the aid of the laws of metre.
The form, however, is distinctly not metrical; it is simply the old
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Hebrew rhythm, such as appears in Psalms, Proverbs, and all the
poetical parts of the Old Testament. One leaf of the MS. was brought
by Mrs. Lewis from the East; the remainder was secured for the
Bodleian Library through Professor Sayce. The MS. contains vari-
ants, and must be subjected to critical sifting.
Not long after Ben-Sira came the apocalyptic Book of Enoch, which
now exists mainly in an Ethiopic translation. The apocalypse had
come to be a favorite form of literature among the Jews, and so con-
tinued for two hundred and fifty years. Amid depressing circum-
stances, it was pleasant to put into the mouth of some ancient seer a
prediction of future success and glory for the nation. In this case it
is the old patriarch Enoch who receives the revelation. The book is
composite, having been added to from time to time. The first section,
Chapters i. -xxxvi. (perhaps the oldest part of the book), describes the
fate of evil angels, and the abodes of good and bad men after death.
Next should come the section Chapters lxxxiii. -xc. , in which we
have the judgment of the world, ending with the victorious career
of Judas Maccabæus. In addition, the section Chapters xxxvii. -lxxi.
(partly a distinct work) describes further the Messianic judgment of
the world. Chapters lxxii. -lxxxii. contain a description of Enoch's
journey through the heavens,-a picture of the celestial physics of
the time. And finally, in the last section, Chapters xci. -civ. , the
problem of the fate of the righteous and the wicked is discussed in
a new form. The book in its present form has little literary interest,
but is valuable as giving a glimpse of the religious notions of the
time. The best English translation is that of R. H. Charles (1893).
Along with this may be mentioned a similar work entitled 'The
Secrets of Enoch,' translated from the Slavonic by W. R. Morfill,
and edited by Mr. Charles (1896); it is held by him to have been
composed about the beginning of our era.
Nearly contemporary with Enoch is the earliest part of the Sibyl-
line Oracles, a work written in Greek hexameters. The Jews, not to
be behind other nations of the time, would have their own Sibyl, who
should tell their national fortunes, and make manifest their national
greatness. The work, as we now have it, is a congeries of diverse
productions, the composition of which (partly by Jews, partly by
Christians) extends from the Maccabean period to the end of the
first Christian century. Though it has no literary value, it formerly
enjoyed extraordinary popularity, as the "teste David cum Sibylla" of
the 'Dies Iræ' indicates. Its predictions traverse the periods extend-
ing from the creation of the world down to the times of the various
authors. An excellent English metrical translation is that of M. S.
Terry (1890).
Other apocalypses may be briefly mentioned. The Assumption
(or Ascension) of Moses, written in the first quarter of the first
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OLD TESTAMENT AND JEWISH APOCRYPHA
century of our era, puts into the mouth of Moses a prediction of
Jewish history, which comes on down, through the time of Antiochus
Epiphanes, to Herod the Great, and possibly even to a later period.
The period after the capture of Jerusalem by the Romans was pro-
lific in this species of writing. The Apocalypse of Baruch (the
scribe of Jeremiah) sketches the history down to the destruction of
the Second Temple. The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (pre-
dictions uttered by the twelve sons of Jacob), come down to about
the same time. To the end of the first century also belongs the
Fourth Book of Esdras, remarkable for its elaborate visions. Many
of these works are based on Jewish originals, with Christian addi-
tions.
The Jewish skill in story-telling is illustrated in the books of
Tobit and Judith. The former of these is a charming sketch of
family life in the second century B. C. The well-ordered households
of Tobit and Raguel, the ingenuous youth and maiden Tobias and
Sara, the affable angel Rafael, his disingenuousness and his business.
capacity, are drawn to the life.
