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. NOV i 1954 ^
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BS 1160 .S4

Sime, James, 1843-1895

Uncritical criticism

UNCRITICAL CRITICISM

'BW554(o
.S(£>5"35

UNCRITICAL CRITICISM

A BEVIEW OF

PROFESSOR ^Y. ROBERTSON SMITH'S
COMMISSION SPEECH

JAMES SIME, M.A, F.E.S.E.

EDINBURGH:
JOHN MACLAREN & SON, PRINCES STREET.

■J

MORRISON- AND GIBB, rDINBURGH,
PRINTERS TO HER MAJESTV'3 STATIONERY OFFICE.

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

My reason for venturing on the following criticism is, that any
member of the Committee who feels himself aggrieved by the
charges of ' ignorance,' ' gross unfairness,' and ' captiousness ' freely
flung out against the whole body of them, is entitled to repel these
charges by all fair and honourable means. If they are true, so
much the worse for the Committee.

Of the three versions of the Speech, — the spoken, the reported,
and the revised, — I have used the last, as being the most favourable
for the speaker, though not the fairest for the Committee.

I propose to discuss the points in dispute solely on their literary
and historical merits. My hope also is, that I shall discuss them
as a scholar should. And therefore I appeal for a fair hearing to
sensible men on both sides, whose only object is the maintenance of
truth and not the triumph of party.

The merits of the points in dispute seem to me of far more
consequence than questions of procedure. I have therefore limited
my criticism to about sixteen pages of the Speech (pp. 9-24).
Every one is aware that the correction of an erroneous statement
usually requires more space than is taken up in originally setting
forth the error.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

xVs a second edition of this review has been called for, I take the
opportunity of saying that nothing which has come to my know-
ledge renders it necessary for me to alter or modify aught which I
have advanced.

By an extraordinary perversion of my object and meaning,
Prof. W. It, Smith recently attempted to show that 07ic of the
three points involved in the proof at p. 13, 3 a, was unfounded.
Instead of facing the argument that is there used, he put forward
a totally different question, which I had from the first resolved
not to look at, as it has not the slightest bearing on the point
in dispute. And having thus perverted my meaning, he pretended
to have disproved this thtrd part of one argument, and therefore to
have shown the worthlessness of all the proofs adduced in support
of the conclusion that more than a score of other blunders and mis-
representations exist in his Speech. A generalization so sweeping,
from a premiss so meagre, was supported by language at once un-
scholarlv and absurd. And, besides, his assertion that a knowledo'e
of Syriac was required to form a judgment on the irrelevant point
raised by him was trifling; for men of ordinary education and
intelligence can, without knowing a letter of that language, gather
from Field's book, to which Mr. Smith referred, all that he has
learned, and perhaps more.

i ..lC. SE,P laai

UNCRITICAL CRITICISM.

THE SPEECH A MINE OF INACCUEACY.

The wealth of inaccurate statement in Mr, Smith's Speech is so
great that it would be wearisome to gather up the whole in one
place. Some of it lies on the surface ; much of it needs a little
digging before it can be found ; but there is none of it beyond the
reach of a man gifted with common sense and with love for historical
research. As the literary side of the Bible alone is understood to
be considered in his Articles and Speech, there is no call here for
dragging in the inspiration and infallibility of the Book to eke out
imperfect argument. Looking at it as an ordinary work of ancient
literature, placed on its trial in the house of its friends, we hold
that it has not got fair-play from Mr. Smith and some of his
admirers. There have been a roughness of handling and an unfair-
ness of treatment on their part, which would have drawn down on
them the ridicule of the world if they had attempted tlie like towards
Chaucer or Shakespeare or Milton. Nor is it difficult to prove this,
even from the Speech. A cursory reading will show that it is
partly a learned defence of Mr. Smith's views, and partly a popular
exposition of literary questions. Of really learned criticism, how-
ever, there is little, and even that little is scarcely worthy of the
name. It is popularly put and can be popularly met. Of popular
exposition there is more ; perhaps to some men's thinking there is
too much. Not a few would have preferred less of the modern
Midrash or ' sermonizing treatment,' and more of definite scientific
utterance. Vehemently to charge those who do not hold your views
with ignorance, captiousness, prejudice, unfairness, and want of charity,
as Mr. Smith does without proving it, is weakness ; to prove the

fact is quite enough. Had these disagreeables fallen from Mr.
Smith in the heat of a trying moment, they might have been over-
looked ; but when they are printed, almost three weeks later, after
a revisal,'^ which ought to have convinced him that nearly every-
thing he was saying was wrong, there is no lielp for it but to show
where the ignorance really lies.

I. The Leauxed CitiTiciSM.
1. The Chroiildcr and the Booh of Ezra.

{a) Inaccurate statement of the point in dispute.

According to the citations made in the Eeport, Mr. Smith charges
the chronicler with ifrnorance of the Hebrew writings which he
used in compiling his books. And that there may be no mistake
about the nature of this ignorance, a special example is also quoted,
Ezra iv. 6-23, in which 'oversight,' 'antedating,' and 'dislocat-
ing of events ' are ascribed to the writer of Chronicles, by whom it
is taken for granted that that part of Ezra was composed. The
lleport shows that Mr. Smith charges the Chronicler with what may
be called thorough blundering. But how differently all this sounds
in the Speech ! Xot a word is found there of oversight, or dis-
locating the order of events, or of anything approaching to blunder-
ing. It is not the sacred writer who has got any reason to speak
of a wrong done to his good name ;" it is Mr. Smith who has been
wronged. On the passage from the Book of Ezra he says : ' So far as
I remember, there is not a single recent writer, not even Keil, who
does not hold the view that the things in Ezra iv. referred to in tiie
passage quoted by the Committee, which seem at first sight to refer
to the building of the temple, refer only to the building of the walls.
There is a little disorder in the text. There is a little transposition
of some of the sources, as there often is in manuscripts.' And after
this travesty of the Committee's position, he wound up with a
commonplace about the providence exercised in preserving the
manuscripts so pure as they are.

' That the Speech was revised is shown hotli by the additions within brn elects [ ] on
page 20, and by otlicr things.

• Must he not receive well-deserved ceusiue for a careless handling of easily-understood
documents, if Mr. Smith be right ?

If the Committee had had nothing else to complain of than that
Mr. Smith discovered a little disorder in the text, and a little
transposition of some of the sources, he would have been justly
entitled to denounce their conduct as captious and uncharitable.
By an ordinary grammatical usage, any writer is at liberty to finish
what lie is speaking of, and then to go back on the narrative with
the object of resuming a dropped thread of the action. This
may sometimes cause a little trouble to an inattentive reader ; it
may also lead a critic to say that the writer was a bungler.
Anticipating what is to follow is a historian's acknowledged right :
to confound the exercise of this right with blundering indicates lack
of critical ability. Apparently Mr, Smith considers that this well-
known usage was all the Committee had to complain of in his treat-
ment of the passage. But he might know that their objections to
his criticism are altogether different. Put the two views side by
side —

The Speech says :-r- The Article says : —

1. The Chronicler was not a perfect 1. He did not thoroughly understand

Hebrew scholar ; the old Hebrew writings ;

■ 2. His writings show a little disorder 2. It is probable he dislocates the order

of the text ; and of events ;

3. A little transposition of sources. 3. Assigns to 520 B.C. what really

happened in 457 B.C. ; and

4. The Chronicler committed an over-
sight.

But Mr, Smith also says that the Chronicler ' conveys the
impression that large gifts for tlie temple were offered by the
leading Jews on their first return (Ezra ii. 68, 69), that the founda-
tion of the house was laid by Joshua and Zerubbabel in the second
year of the return,' etc. He means to say, and to some extent he
actually says, that this is an erroneous impression, and that the sacred
writer was mistaken.^ It was the ignorance and blundering charged
upon the Chronicler that were before the Committee. But instead
of directing attention to these weighty matters, Mr. Smith speaks of
a small matter, viz. whether Ezra iv. 6-23 refers to the building
of the temple or to the building of the city walls. The Committee
state one thing ; he puts forward another as the point in dispute.

To justify his charge of ignorance, he referred to the apostles' use

^ Kuenen preceded him in part, at least, of this. See Beligion of Israel, ii. 205.

of the old Greek translation known as tlic Septuagint, wliicli is
often inaccurate. But their case is different in every respect.
They used the translation in circulation among those they weve
speaking or writing to, just as we use our common English Bible.
It was not the apostles' object, any more than it would be ours, to
call attention to an incorrect rendering, unless something of im-
portance turned on the right translation being brought out. And
this is what the apostles did, by implication at least. But the
Chronicler was professing to write history in the language of the
books he was using as sources, and his ignorance led liim, according
to Mr. Smith, to commit mistakes wdiich, however, he assures us,
do not impair the general utility of his work. We should be as
thankful for this certificate to the Chronicler as for the grotesque
information ' that the apostles, like the Chronicler, were not perfect
Hebrew scholars' (p. 12). But why stop at the apostles? The
argument cuts deeper, and closely touches their Master, for, accord-
ing to Alford, ' Whereas the Evangelists themselves, in citing the Old
Testament, usually quote from the Hebrew text, our Lord in His
discourses almost uniformly quotes the Septuagint, even where it
differs from the Hebrew.' What then ?

(h) Inaccurate citing of witnesses in his favour.

But Mr. Smith is bolder stiU. So far as he knew, hu said, there
was not a single recent writer, not even Keil, who does not hold
that the passage in Ezra referred to the building of the city walls
and not to the temple. He ought to be aware that this is not the
point in debate, and he ought also to be perfectly aware that he is
without M-arrant in quoting Keil, at least, against the Eeport. The
point in dispute is the blundering of the historian, the oversight,
the antedating, the dislocation, the conveying of erroneous impres-
sions. Keil denies that there is aught of the kind ; ]\Ir. Smith says
there is. Keil and others aver that the passage was put where it
stands ' for the sake of presenting at one glance a view of all the
machinations against the Jews.' They refer the passage to the
building of the city walls, not to the building of the temple, pre-
cisely as Mr. Smith does ; but they deny that there is oversight or
blundering, which Mr. Smith affirms. Keil is on the Committee's
side, not on i\Ir. Smith's ; for the Committee were thinking of ' over-

sight ' and ' antedating/ not of city walls or of temple walls— a
matter on wliicli they would have pronounced no opinion. Here,
then, Mr. Smith in his printed Speech attempts to lead evidence
against the Committee, wdiich turns out to be utterly against him
and wholly in favour of the lieport.

2. The llisc of Written Fi'oiyhccij.

(a) Misstatement of the case in the Speech.

The case was thus stated by Mr, Smith against the Committee : —
' The Committee report that, in attributing the rise of written
prophecy to the eighth century before Christ, I appear to be at
variance with the plain teaching of our Lord, who says, "Had ye
believed Moses, ye would have believed Me, for he wrote of Me."
Let us accept the whole traditional view ; let us satisfy Dr. Wilson's
heart, and say that Moses wrote the wdiole Pentateuch, Very well,
that was at all events the Pentateuch ; and the Pentateuch has
always been called the Law, and neither our Lord, nor the Jews, nor
any theologian in any age has ever called it part of the prophetical
books. Our Lord always -^ speaks of the Law and the Prophets' as
two distinct things. I do the same, and, doing so, state the un-
doubted fact that the earliest of the prophetic books" w^ere written
in the eighth century' (p. 24).

Mr. Smith has here set up a straw figure, charged it with great
fury, and of course knocked it over. He has put down as facts
what every one acquainted with the rudiments of the subject
knows are not facts. And he has shrunk from facing the real
point, which was something perfectly intelligible, but totally
different from his statements. However, he has had no hesitation
in laying the blame of ignorance at the door of the Committee : ' I
cannot better leave my defence in the hands of the Commission
than by pointing out that this Committee has been capable of
founding a charge against me — whether from ignorance or from
captiousness, I am unable to say — which has no other basis than
disregard of the fact that the Hebrew Bible is divided into the Law,
the Prophets,- and the Hagiographa.' These are the last words of
the Speech. Not only do they misstate the point put forward by

' John xii. o4, xv. -5. - All the middle section of the Bible. ^ Half of it.

the Committee, but tlicy are contradicted by facts, and by Mr.
Smith's own words.

The Committee do not speak of Prophecy, or of the division of
the Hebrew Bible known to the Jews as Tltc Prophets. It is of
these that ]\Ir. Smith speaks, and speaks of them as if they were
one and the same thing. It is not of these that the Eeport speaks,
as any one may see. Out of the wdde field oi iproiphccy oy irrcachincj,
the Committee chose one department of comparatively narrow area,
prediction, or as it is called in the Eeport, 'prophecy in its pre-
dictive aspect.' Instead of confining himself to this narrow and
well-understood area, Mr. Smith attributes to the word propliccy a
meaning which it does not bear, and never has borne, for he hokls
that prophecy is the same as the division of the Bible called The
Prophets, Every one at all read in tlie rudiments of the subject
knows how unfounded, how ludicrous, indeed, this view must
appear. Besides, even Mr. Smith himself calls one of the books
of Moses 'a prophetic legislative programme,' and says it was
* rewritten in the prophetic spirit.' We were therefore entitled to
look for prophecy in the law, according to his own written testimony !
But to confine prophecy and prediction to the prophetical books
properly so called, will be indeed a revolution in biblical literature ;
at least, our Lord says, ' AU the prophets and the Law prophesied
until John.'

(5) Mr. Smith contradicts himself.

Mr. Smith answers the Committee by saying that ' the earliest of
the prophetic books were written in the eighth century.' This is a
different statement from the one quoted in the Eeport. Eemember-
ing also that Mr. Smith has defined his use of the words ' prophetic
books ' to be what the Jews called ' The Prophets,' we shall see that
it is an absurdly wrong statement. First, the words, written prophecy
arose in the eighth century B.C., are one thing, and form the gist of the
quotation made by the Committee. But Tlic Prophets (as the middle
division of the Hebrew Bible is called) Ijcgan to he written in the
eighth century B.C., is a totally different matter, and is Mr. Smith's
translation of the Committee's words. The Committee speak of the
thing called prophecy in its predictive aspect, and as it is found in
all three divisions of the Hebrew Bible (Luke xxiv. 44) ; while Mr.

Smith proposes to confine 'proinliecy to a few books -wliicli Ly a tradi-
tion of the Eabbins are called The Prophets.

But the statement is altogether unfounded that the earliest of the
Prophets were written in the eighth century. When hazarding
that view, Mr. Smith, M'ithout warning, and in two consecutive
sentences, used the Avord Prophets in two meanings. By The
Prophets in the second sentence he meant one-half, and in the first
sentence, the whole of the middle division of the Hebrew Bible.
It is split up by the Ptabbins into the Former Prophets, viz. the
Books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings ; and the Latter Prophets,
viz. the Books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the twelve Minor
Prophets. Now it is absurdly wrong to speak of all these having
been wTitten in and after the eighth century. It is not true in any
view of the case whatever. Of the Books of Samuel, Mr. Smith
says that the older parts must have hecn ivritten not long after the time
of David. This carries them back to the eleventh or tenth century
B.C. But the Books of Samuel form part of the Prophets, a section,
he says, not written earlier than the eighth century. Saying in
one breath and unsaying in another, such as we have here, cannot be
borne. The contradiction is glaring. But if Mr. Smith says he
means by the prophetical books not the whole of those so called,
but only the latter prophets, viz. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the
twelve Minor Prophets, then he evidently uses the same phrase.
The Prophets, to taunt the Committee with not observing that he
used it in the wilder or rabbinical sense (All), and to shield himself
from their attack by saying that he used it in the narroAver or modern
sense (Half). He cannot use it in both senses at the same time, but
this is exactly what he does.

Nor is it even true that prophetic literature took its origin in the
eighth century. Ewald will be allowed to be a better witness than
Mr. Smith, and his testimony is quite clear. ' Of purely prophetic
writings produced in the tenth century,' he says, ' there are now no
extant remains.' However, he makes a kind of exception to this in
the Book of Kings ; but he proceeds : ' Pure prophetic ^ composition
advanced as early as Joel to a high degree of cultivation and
perfection ; although this prophet appeared about a century and a
half before Isaiah, and belongs to the earlier period of prophecy.

1 History, iv. 196, 197.

Moreover, Joel ^vas certainly not the lirst prophet distinguished
for such composition, but he was in early times the highest model of
it.' A century and a half before Isaiah carries us back to the
borders of the tenth century ! And other prophetic writings before
that day must therefore have been written in the tenth or eleventh
century ! But IMr. Smith has some fears of his own accuracy on
this head ; for in the article ' Bible ' he says : ' There is a probability
that Joel flourished in the ninth century, and that the opening
verses of Amos are cited from his book.' There is no probability in
the matter ; it is quite certain to almost every one, except theorizers
who follow the school of Graf and Kuenen.

If Mr. Smitli's concluding words have any meaning, they amount
to this, that prophecy and the prophets — that is, the thing and the
books in which the thing is most fully found — are interchangeable
terms. According to him there was no written prophecy, and
therefore there could still less be any written 2J'i'ccUdioii before the
earliest of these books in the middle division of the Bible were
composed. Xobody ever knew this before. Every one knows that
the thing is ludicrous. Even Mr. Smith himself^ tells us of
' official prophetic societies, the unworthy successors of Samuel " and
Elijah.' ^ There were thus prophetic societies and great prophets
long prior to the eighth century. Jeremiah'* affirms that prophets
were never M'anting in Israel from the exodus to liis own time. If
so, did tliey write or did tlicy not write about Christ ? Our Lord
Himself says that one of them, Moses, foretold His coming. But
Mr. Smith says Moses was not one of the prophets, tlie middle
division of the Hebrew Bible. True enough ; but he had the spLrit
of prophecy in larger meapure than any of tliem, as we know from
express statements (Num. xii. 7, 8; Deut. xxxiv. 10), and as has
been always acknowledged. "Who M'ould question a thing so plain ?

If Mr. Smith really wished to remove the fears of the Committee,
or to disprove tlie inference drawn from his views, nothing was
simpler. Their inference, that he could not regard the written
prediction of our Lord's work by ]\Ioses as earlier than the eighth

' Enc. Brit. xi. 599 a. « Eleventh century B.C.

* Tenth century B.C. * Jcr. vii. 25, xxviii. 8.

century, was either true or false. If it was false, lie could have
said so at once, and in plain terms. But if it be true, what good
end can be served by going into vague and absurd statements about
prophecy ? Truth can never be advanced by these roundabouts.

M, Soiifj of Solomon.

(a) Advance on the article ' Canticles.'

The Committee took exception to three things in Mr. Smith's
treatment of this book — Jlrst, that ' it has suffered much from inter-
polation ; ' second, that ' it was not written down till a comparatively
late date ; ' and, third, ' from imperfect recollection.' Of course, the
negative in tlie second does not apply to the third of these parti-
culars ; at least the sense, though not the grammar, requires this. Of
the three, Mr. Smith cannot well be said to have handled any but
the first in his Speech, and there he limits himself to an ' acknow-
ledgment of some passages as interpolations.' This is scarcely equal
to the words complained of, ' suffered much from interpolation,' but
the difference may be overlooked in presence of more serious
matters. For here it must be remarked that he has made progress
in his studies since he wrote the article ' Canticles.' At the end of
that article he says ' the book must have been written ' a])out
twenty-five years after Solomon's death, though it will remain a
mystery to every one why Ewald should fix on that period rather than
on Solomon's lifetime. ' Imperfect recollection,' and ' not written
down till a comparatively late date,' are therefore an unmistakeable
advance. Of interpolations he then found only one (iv. 6), which
exists both in the Hebrew and Septuagint, and is oddly enoufli
called an interpolation ; perhaps it is nothing of the kind. But he
believed that ' an a ■priori probability of interpolations and corruptions
is very great in a poem like Canticles ; ' a view of the matter which
comes far short of the position he now holds, that it ' has suffered
much from interpolation.' And yet Mr. Smith had the courage to
say in his speech, ' Now, as to the Song of Solomon, I was tried
upon that point in connection with my old article " Canticles," and 1
was acquitted upon it,' ^

^ The boldness of Professor Lindsaj' in his Reasons of Dissent is startling (No. 5) :
' Besides, every statement about the Song of Solomon in article "Hebrew Language and
Literature " had been already made in article " Canticles." '

(b) Misstatement of evidence from tlie Septuagint.

How then does Mr. Smith prove that there are interpolations ?
' By the use of the versions,' he says ; ' from the ancient versions,'
Professor Lindsay says in his Eeasons of Dissent. And what versions ?
* It is the original Septuagint,' Mr. Smith adds, ' which is to us the
principal means for going over and correcting the received text of
the Old Testament ; * for ' it is plain that such a version as the
Septuagint carries us with a single leap over a span of twelve
hundred years,' farther back than our most ancient manuscript of
the Hebrew Bible. The Greek translation was made say 200 B.C. ;
and the earliest Hebrew manuscript dates from the tenth century
after Christ. But if tlie Song in this most valuable version be
compared with the Hebrew, no interpolations wiU be found. A
word is read differently here and there, showing most conclusively
that the Greek translator was neither a perfect Hebrew nor a
perfect Greek scholar ; but there are no traces of interpolation. Is
it all a blunder on Mr. Smith's part ? However, after devoting
nearly a page to this use of the Septuagint, its high antiquity and
its critical value — all of them utterly against his interpolation
theory — he suddenly changes his whole argument : ' My study of
that version, particularly with the aid of the Syro-hexaplar, which is
one of our chief helps for the Septuagint/ etc. The Septuagint does
duty by drawing attention to antiquity, critical value, and vast
importance. But it is not the version referred to at all. The
Syro-hexaplar is the one ! The Septuagint is a translation from the
original Hebrew, as everybody knows ; the Syro-hexaplar is not
more than a translation from a translation. Only nine lines
previously in his Speech Mr. Smith spoke of the antiquity of the
Septuagint, the ' twelve hundred years,' A careless hearer or
reader will attribute this antiquity to the work really relied on —
the Syro-hexaplar. But M'hat does Mr. Smith himself say about this
work in his article ' Bible ' ? He calls it ' the Syriac translation
composed by I'aul of Tela (616 a.d.).'^ Here there is a tumble-
down of the antiquity from twelve to tln'ee hundred years ; while
a claim for honours which can be paid only to the original Sep-
tuagint is put in for a comparatively modern translation from tlie
Greek, of which vre know little with certainty, except that it was

' Encij. Brit. iii. C4C h. On the sulijert of IToxaplars see Lagardo, Genesis, p. 16,

made out of a previous translation from the Hebrew. But the
jumble is worse than ever. He so far rejects the Hebrew original
because the oldest manuscript dates only from the tenth century of
our era. He sets against it the Septuagint Greek, which was
written say about 200 B.C., eleven or twelve hundred years earlier.
But he forgets that the oldest manuscript of that Greek version is
not older than the fourth century of our era, a fact which lops off
about six from his eleven centuries. And when he shifts his
ground to appeal to the Syro-hexaplar, he does not care to tell us
how old the oldest manuscript of that work may be ! So here is
a jumble and a maze, in comparison with which the old paths are
vastly better. Why should more be said on this head ? If the
Committee had done what Mr. Smith has done — using versions
when he refers to only one ; claiming support for his view from
the Septuagint when it gives him none; and partly correcting
himself by quoting a comparatively modern translation (made no one
knows how), so that hearers and readers could not fail to confound
it with the ancient Greek text — had the Committee done this,
words would have failed to denounce their ignorance and unfairness.

Mr. Smith supports his view of interpolations in the Song by
these words : 'Is it not admitted by the most orthodox scholars
that the last verses of the Gospel of Mark are a fragment of some
other evangelical narrative ? Are they less valuable because they
are a fragment ? ' It required some courage to advance this
argument, at least in the manner quoted. Dean Alford, with over-
readiness to reject what is written, uses words not unlike those
employed by Mr. Smith. ' It is an authentic fragment, placed as
a completion of the gospel in very early times.' But as a support
to Mr. Smith's view, it is thoroughly useless. Scrivener will be
accepted by every scholar as a critic whose word ought to have
more weight in this question. And his view rests on a thorough
study of the manuscripts. * This fact,' he says, ' has driven those
who reject the concluding verses to the strangest fancies ; that, like
Thucydides, the Evangelist was cut off before his work was completed,
or even that the last leaf of the original gospel was torn away. . . .
we can appeal to the reading of Irenteus and of loth the older Syriac

translations in the second century ; of nearly all other versions, and

of all extant manuscripts excepting two.' To cite this paragraph
from Mark's Gospel as evidence in his favour cannot be regarded as a
worthy treatment of manuscripts and ancient versions by Mr. Smith.

(d) Professor Lindsay's misstatements.

In the Eeasons of Dissent, Professor Lindsay affirms that ' tlie
statement quoted about the Song of Solomon is only asserted by
Professor Smith to be a probability.' And of this 'probable con-
jecture ' he writes under the same head, ' The existence of interpola-
tions is proved from the ancient versions.'

Seldom is there witnessed a more singular jumble of words and
ideas in so brief a space. Mr. Smith made three different statements
about the Song. Professor Lindsay calls the three one, and this one
statement he describes first as a probability, but as he discovers im-
mediately after that it is 'p-ovcd, it must therefore be a fact I It is
not the xn'obability which is proved ; it is the existence of interpola-
tion. But Mr. Smith does not speak of interpolations as a probability.
He affirms that the Song has suffered much from them, while he
limits the probability to ' imperfect recollection,' and to recent
writing out of the poem. Nor does this list exhaust Professor
Lindsay's liberties with his friend's words. He ventures to appeal
to ' ancient versions,' while ]\Ir. Smith discreetly confines himself to
one very recent version of a version ! If this way of handling a
scientific question be considered an exhibition of learning, most
people will think it does not differ at all from ignorance.

Professor Lindsay also says that the Song ' contains Greek and
Persian words and phrases.' On any view of the matter, Persian
and Greek would have been better than Greek and Persian, but in
such a confusion of thought as is presented in these Pieasons, so
small a matter may well pass. But what are the Persian and
Greek words and phrases ? Until Professor Lindsay enlighten the
world, it must be content to remain in darkness. It is no doubt well
known that one Persian word and one Greek word were fished up
out of the depths of somebody's reading of the Song, and paraded as
proofs of its late origin. But how were they received by Gesenius and
Samuel Davidson ? — men who are surely Professor Lindsay's betters

' Introduction, 512, 513.

in this field of research, and, we hope, further advanced in critical
radicalism than he. They were repudiated as nothing of the kind.
And so, till the new light reveal itself more clearly than by pro-
claiming its coming, the world must remain in the darkness which
contented great scholars like Gesenius. But if these do not carry
weight enough with any mind, the last sentence of Mr. Smith's
article on ' Canticles ' may show how he regarded the ' Greek and
Persian ' theory at the time it was written : ' Thus the book must
have been written about the middle of the tenth century B.C. The
attempt of Griitz^ to bring down the date to the Grecian period
(about 230 b.o.) is ingenious, but nothing more.' This should satisfy
everybody that it would be waste of time to say another word.

4. The Booh of Jasliar.

{a) Misstatement of the Committee's Position.

Mr. Smith's words are : ' I suppose the gravamen of the charge
here is in the statement that the Book of Jashar was not earlier than
the time of Solomon.' It is difficult to restrain from condemning in
strong terms a misrepresentation so bold. The Committee are here
held up as objecting to Mr. Smith's view of the date to which the
composition of the Book of Jashar should be assigned. But he
might know that the Committee never had that matter under debate.
Jashar may have been like many other books — perhaps like the
Book of Psalms — added to from age to age by prophets and priests ;
but that was not an inquiry which fell to the Committee to engage
in, and Mr, Smith knows that. The Committee say — (1) that
Mr. Smith places the historical books, elsewhere called a continuous
narrative — from Genesis to Kings — later than the Book of Jashar ;
(2) that he assigns Jashar to the time of Solomon at the earliest ;
and (3) that therefore he assigns all the historical books to times
subsequent to Solomon. Mr. Smith is concerned about the date of
Jashar; the Committee are concerned about the dates of the his-
torical books from Genesis to Kings. Any one may say that Jashar
received part of its contents in Joshua's days, part in Samuel's, and
part in David's ; but to affirm that the historical books from Genesis
to Kings — as the Committee think Mr. Smith practically does — are

' See further on this point, Speaker's Commentary, 4, p. 700.
B

all later than Solomon's reign, is a serious business. Mr. Smith
must have read the Eeport very carelessly if he believes that he has
correctly stated the Committee's view. But any stick is good
enough wherewith to belabour the Committee's back.

(&) Inaccurate quoting of the Septuagint.

In the article Hebreio Literature, Mr. Smith maintains that a
fragment of the Book of Jashar was recovered by Wellhausen, an
often-quoted Eationalist, from the Septuagint version of 1 Kings viii,
A reference so indefinite suggested the desirability of examining the
whole chapter. Of course, no Book of Jashar was found in it, not
even in verse 53, which turned out to be the part referred to. But
although this was spoken of as a thing the Committee could not let
pass without loss of credit, Professor Lindsay repeated the assertion
in his Eeasons of Dissent : ' Professor Smith, founding on the Septua-
gint, says it contained a fragment referring to the building of the
temple.' And Professor Smith in his Speech, alluding evidently to
what was said in the Committee, declared that ' to restore the
Septuagint text depends upon certain delicate operations which re-
quire a peculiar training.' ' I know a great deal has been said^ about
the fragment of it referring to the building of the temple, which I
state to have been recovered from the Septuagint of 1 Kings viii.
. . . But on careful examination and inquiry, a passage will be
found given as a quotation from the Book of Jashar, which says that
Solomon, when he opened the temple, rose and said.' And here we
shall put Mr. Smith's translation side by side with Bagster's ^ : —

Mr. Smith's. Bagster's.

' The Lord created the sun in the ' He manifested the sun in the heavens ;

heavens, but He saith that He will dwell the Lord said He would dwell in darkness ;

in thick darkness ; build a house for me, build thou my house, a beautiful house for

a house of habitation, that I may dwell thyself to dwell in anew. Behold, is not

therein for ever.' — 1 Kings viii. 53. this written in the Book of the Song ? '

^ Where? The loss of credit to the Committee which is mentioned in the text
seems to be referred to ; at least nothing else can be conjectured as probable. Mr. Smith,
therefore, knew what passed in the Committee. This gave him time to prepare page 15
of the Speech, and to indicate the edition of the Septuagint he was quoting ; but beyond
some reference to Lagarde by Professor Lindsay, there has been no attempt to give satis-
faction on this point. Lagarde has published Genesis in the Greek (1868), but he has
not fulfilled his intention of publishing more of the Septuagint.

- The words in italics show the additions and changes made by Mr. Smith on three
Greek lines, the words within brackets [ ] show the usual rendering. ' The Lord
created the sun in the heavens ; hut he said [the Lord said] tliat he will dwell in thick

The errors in Mr, Smith's account of this verse almost make one
think he has never seen it in the Greek. He begins with saying
that Solomon rose and said. Now it is distinctly related that the
king was on his knees when he uttered the words quoted by Mr.
Smith, for in the following verse we are told that he rose up from
kneeling before the altar as soon as the words were spoken (ver. 54).^
Mr. Smith also affirms that the passage will be found given as a
quotation from the Book of Jashar, Bagster's translation shows that
this is not the fact. But Mr. Smith further maintains that this
imaginary fragment refers to the building of the temple. And
how does he prove his assertion ? By rejecting, or seeming to
reject, one clause, and altering another ! His translation runs,
' Build a house for me, a house of habitation, that I may dwell
therein for ever.' But he omits or alters the clause, ' a beautiful
house for thyself to dwell in,' or, what is equally serious, he
presents it in an entirely new dress, without assigning any authority
for so doing. He holds that the quotation refers to the building
of the temple. To prove this, he throws aside the longer clause,
which refers to the building of Solomon's own house ! Then he
translates ' anew ' by ' for ever,' which is very fine, only it is not
usual. The words rendered ' anew ' are perhaps untranslateable.
And the whole passage, instead of being a splendid piece of poetry,
as Mr. Smith holds, is but a jumble, not unlike many other jumbles
in the Greek version.

But where is the Book of Jashar all this time ? It seems that
it can only be found by careful inquiry, peculiar training, and
delicate handling. No doubt this is true ; but unfortunate it was
that an ignorant assembly was not enlightened on the process. The
tedium of a lengthened sitting might have been relieved a little, if

darkness ; build a house /or me [my house], a [beautiful] house of habitation [for thyself]
that I may [to] dwell therein /o7' ever [anew].' Liberties so great can be taken with no
text by any scholar till he has first established his right to do so. This Mr. Smith
has neither done nor attempted. The first two words are a well-known various
reading, which may be correct or not. But as the Speech was strengthened by refer-
ences added in the revised edition (p. 20), it would have been easy to have done something
similar here. No one could have made these changes without some authority.

^ The mistake is curious, as showing how cursorily the story had been read by the
critic. In 1 Kings viii. 22, Solomon, before he began to pray, is said to have stood before
the altar. But it appears that he was hieeling all the time of prayer. A contradiction,
then ? Not at all. The despised chronicler explains the whole (2 Chron vi. 13).

the process at all resembles the one by which long ago the Greek
word for Song was shown to be transmutable into the Hebrew word
for Jashar. Probably the modern crucible treats the word to
precisely the same changes as it underwent before. But as the
' certain delicate operations ' Mr. Smith speaks of are left for us to
imagine, we must be content with the more candid description of
the first inventor. And here it is. Out of a dozen Hebrew words
for Song, choose the one most suitable for transmutation, and assume
that that was the word the Greek translator had in the manuscript
he was translating. Clearly this will be the word Shir. But every
scholar knows that the vowel sound i might readily have been
spoken or written for a. If this be allowed as a second assumption,
Shir at once becomes Shar. But it is also well known and
universally admitted that the prefix Ja, represented by one letter,
and that the smallest in the Hebrew alphabet, has sometimes
dropped out, or been transposed, or come to grief in other ways.
Suppose, third, that it ought to be prefixed to Shar. You have then
the transmutation complete : Jashar is before you. These are
' delicate operations,' no doubt ; but by such grammatical legerdemain
you may get anything you wish from anything else, or you may
stretch words and syllables on the wheel, till you torture them into
saying what you are resolved they shall say. History, however,
records that those who pride themselves on their success in these
' delicate operations ' find, in the long run, that they have only
earned the laughter, or, at the best, the neglect of sensible
scholars, who always regard such discoveries as confessions wrung
from a wretched word, stretched and torn on an inquisitor's rack.
Mr. Smith has not said that these are the delicate operations he
refers to. By leaving them vague and dark, he may impress
unlearned readers with the idea that his are fine and infallible.
But see further on this point, note, p. 48.

In connection with this part of the Speech it may be well to
quote Mr. Smith against Mr. Smith, because, with a blindness
altogether incredible, he speaks of the 'statement' made in the
Report as 'grossly unfair.' He seems to have forgotten his own
words. Thus :

The Speech, p. 18 :— Article, Heh. Lit.:—

' The statement of the Report is grossly ' A scribe was attached to the roj'a

unfair, in assuming, as it does, that I do court from the reign of David downwards

not think there was any writer before and the older parts of the Book of Samuel

David, when I have pointed out so ex- which must have been \vritten not long

pressly that the older parts of Samuel after the time of that king, are framed in

are practically contemporary with the a masterly style. '
events they record,' etc.

There are two things to be said about these contradictory extracts.
One is, that the Committee never said that Mr. Smith denied the
existence of writers before the time of David. They knew better ;
for his theory of writers and writings was before the Committee in
its full details, as we shall see afterwards. He knows, or ought to
know, this. A man who is so very touchy about quotations from
his own writings as Mr. Smith has shown himself to be, ought to
be careful not to misquote other people, far less to represent them
as saying what they neither said nor thought. But this he has
done most unwarrantably. He misrepresents the Committee's words
by asserting that they meant ' any writer.' The words used in the
passage of the Eeport referred to are ' the narrative ' ^ — a difference
so great as to justify the sharpest language being applied to his
statement. It is notorious that, in his opinion, ' the narrative,' as
we now have it, is long posterior to David's time. This was the
Committee's meaning, as Mr. Smith ought at least to know, for they
use his own words. It is equally notorious that Mr. Smith believes
there were ivritings before David's time, and therefore writers ; and
the Committee not only recognised this, but some members even
thought that the peculiar view taken by him of these writings,
instead of making his position better, made it worse. So much,
then, for the utter baselessness of the charge he makes — that the
statement of the Committee was ' grossly unfair.'

But there is a second and an equally serious point brought out
in these extracts. Mr. Smith affirmed in his Speech that he had
' expressly pointed out that the older parts of Samuel are practically
contemporary with the events they record.' If Mr. Smith has
expressly pointed this out, he has strange notions of the meaning of
words and of the lapse of time. An angry man, irritated by the
previous words, would, in his haste, come out with the remark that
it was not true ; perhaps he would stick to this after reflection. For
1 Or, 'Present Historical Books of the Old Testament.'— i?e/?or^, p. 5.

]\Ir. Smith's real words were, that these older parts were written not
long after the time of David. Now, David died about 1016 B.C. ;
say, therefore, that they were written in 1000 B.C. Then, as the
story of Hannah, the death of EK, and the rise of Samuel all
happened more than a century before David's death, we have these
oldest events in the book dating from 1136 B.C., at least, or about
140 years before they were committed to writing. The whole of
Saul's reign, also, was thus 60 or even 100 years before the writing
down of the history, according to the meaning assigned to ' not long
after.' But biblical criticism, the meanings of words, chronology —
everything, in fact, must be put in the wrong, that Mr. Smith may
triumph over a Committee whose Eeport he answers by finding in
it what is not there.

5. Tlic Prophecy of Jeremiah 1., li.

(«) Misstatement of the case by Mr. Smith.

Mr. Smith affirms that this Prophecy of Jeremiah is anonymous.
Professor Lindsay evidently holds that this is his view. Properly,
however, he does not go so far in the printed Speech. He only
says, what Professor Lindsay also says, that 'in the oldest Sep-
tuagint text the name of Jeremiah does not occur in the title of the
chapter, which I call anonymous, but that does not i^rove that the
prophecy is not an inspired prophecy' (p. 22). Now this is not the
statement made by Mr. Smith and complained of by the Committee.
What he really writes in the Encydopccdia is wholly different. He
said in his Speech as it is printed, that he calls a certain chajjtcr
anonymous ; he really did no such thing, for his words are : — ' " The
holy and beautiful house where our fathers praised Thee " was a
chief thought of the sorrowing exiles, and to one anonymous tvritcr
the Lord's vengeance on Babylon appears eminently as vengeance
for His temple (Jer. 1. 28).'^ In his Speech we find anonymous
chapter; in the Article i-eferred to by the Committee we find
anonymous writer. It is for Mr. Smith to explain himself, if he
can. Perhaps it may be ignorance or captiousness to condemn a
man for saying ' chapter ' was what he wrote, when the word really
printed was ' writer.' But, whatever be the explanation, Mr. Smith

' Sincy. Brit. xi. 370 i.

knows that the difference between the two words, in this case at
least, is immense. If an author put his name not to the first
chapter of his book but to the last, the man would be laughed at who
said that the first chapter was anonymous ; he would be summarily
thrust out of court as not worth reasoning with if he said the writer
was anonymous. But Mr. Smith has fallen into both these blunders.
Unable to defend his first statement, that the ivriter is anonymous,
which the Committee take exception to, he says one chapter is
anonymous, which is not the point in dispute, and is, besides,
altogether indefensible, for

(b) Mr. Smith's original statement is wrong.

Mr. Smith refuses to receive the evidence of Jer. 1. 1 as proof that
the prophecy was written by Jeremiah. He affirms that the Hebrew
heading not only may be, but actually is, wrong, for it is wanting
in the ' oldest Septuagint version.' He does not say the heading of
the prophecy, but only the heading of the chapter, and the word
' oldest ' is most uselessly added before Septuagint. As the pro-
phecy extends over two chapters (1., li.), it makes no difference
where the name of the writer is found. And the name is given so
often, and with such fulness of detail in the Septuagint, as well as
in the Hebrew, that its omission in one verse is not of the smallest
moment (Jer. li. 59-64). To cite the first verse of the prophecy
in the Greek as evidence for considering the whole of it anonymous,
is as senseless as to say that a book is anonymous because tlie
writer has put his name at the end and not at the beginning.
Mr. Smith says the name of Jeremiah is wanting at the beginning
of this prophecy in the Greek, therefore he infers it is anonjTnous.
But it is found three times at the end, and under circumstances
which leave no doubt of its genuineness ; therefore we hold that
there is no excuse for calling it anonymous. For the ground he
has taken up, and for the reason he has alleged in support of it,
Mr. Smith is wholly without excuse. The one is as unscholarly
as the other.

But why does the Greek version omit the name of Jeremiah
from the heading of the prophecy ? No doubt the question is hard
to answer satisfactorily. Still, it is worth observing that the Greek
version does not place chaps. 1., li. in the connection found in our

Bible. It places them immediately after another proj)hecy in which
Babylon is introduced, and in which Jeremiah is named as the
author (xlvi. 13-28). Mixed up with the tale of Babylon's
greatness and fall are found, throughout both these prophecies,
assurances of comfort to down-trodden Zion, as if these assurances
formed a thread on which the woes and triumphs of Babylon were
strung by the Greek translator. On this view of the matter the
Greek heading of the prophecy is not Jer. 1. 1, but Jer. xlvi. 13,
or, at any rate, Jer. xxv. 13, and that translation gives the name of
Jeremiah as the utterer of it, precisely as does the Hebrew. But
be this or be it not a correct explanation of the want of the
prophet's name in the verse, of which Mr. Smith has made so
unfair a use, there can be no doubt that he has done nothing
whatever to clear away difficulties of this nature, except by making
assumptions which render the difficulties tenfold more serious.

Mr, Smith, speaking of ' the anonymous writer in the Book of
Jeremiah,' says : ' All I need do is to point out that an exact
parallel to this prophecy, in the sense in which I speak of it, is
to be found in the case of the Epistle to the Hebrews.' There
is not a shadow of foundation for this ' exact parallel.' The
prophecy in Jeremiah contains the prophet's name four times, and
even the Greek translation gives it three times at least. But
the name of Paul is nowhere read at the beginning, in the middle,
or at the end of the Epistle to the Hebrews. There is no parallel
between them to support Mr. Smith's view. Of course, if Mr.
Smith refuses to receive the Hebrew original in preference to the
Greek translation, and if he says that the latter half of the pro-
phecy in chap. li. 59-64. refers to something altogether different
from the earlier half, then anything may be asserted, passed off
as probable, and be allowed room to grow in the realm of the
New Criticism.

II. Popular Expositions.

On the method of popular exposition adopted by Mr. Smith in
the Speech, it is possible to say much if it were worth while.

After the specimens of learned criticism, popularly put, which
have been already examined, it would be unwise to dwell at
length on all the popular expositions contained in the Speech.
Two or three of the most important will suffice to vindicate the
position of the Committee. Hebrew law and history from the
time of Moses stand out as the chief.

1. Hebrew Laio and History.

(a) Misleading view of tradition.

Eeferring to the mode of writing history practised by Arabian
writers, Mr. Smith says: 'Let me illustrate this by an example
from profane history. The earliest extant historical and tradi-
tional collections for the life of Mohammed were written some
two centuries later than the events they record. Yet in these
writings older books now lost have been so conscientiously copied,
and genuine reminiscences of the prophet's contemporaries have
been handed down so exactly in the words of the first narrator,
that many of Mohammed's sayings and doings stand before us as
exactly and vividly as if we had been eye-witnesses of the events.
I believe it was in this way that our present historical books came
together.' Certainly if the parallel be exact, the sorrowful con-
clusion will soon be reached that our present historical books are,
like Canticles, a product of ' imperfect recollection.'

In the first place, it is unwarrantable to speak of the sources
from which the life of Mahomet is drawn, as dating two centuries
after the events. The Koran itself is left out of account, and that
is accepted as to all intents and purposes a collection of documents
contemporary with Mahomet. Then it is also unwarrantable to
represent extracts from older books, ' conscientiously copied,' as
being of the same age with the later books into which they were
copied. Sir William Muir, whose right to be heard will be admitted
by all, says : ' Muhammad Ibn Ishac is the earliest biographer
of whom any extensive remains, the authorship of which can
certainly be distinguished, have reached us.' ^ As he died 141
years after the prophet, he must have collected materials for his
history ten or twenty or thirty years before. Mr. Smith's two

1 Sir William Muir, Smaller Life of Mahomet, p. 605.

centuries require, therefore, to be cut down by one-third at least ;
and the high praise he gives to succeeding historians for a con-
scientious copying of their predecessors is not wholly borne out by
facts.^ But his admiration of the vivid and exact traditions is not
shared by accurate writers; for out of 600,000 traditions collected
regarding Mahomet, only 4000 are deemed correct, while of these
the European critic will reject at least one - half. And this is
the case, although, about a century after Mahomet, the Caliph
Omar ii. gave orders ' for the formal collection of all extant tradi-
tions.'^ To draw a parallel between these histories or traditions
and the sacred books of the Jews, is to degrade the latter to a level
with the legendary stories of other ancient nations, as shall now be
shown.^

(b) Misrepresentation of Hebrew history.

Those who do not happen to be acquainted with the mode of
proof by which critics have arrived at the result that the early
history of ancient Eome, copious and detailed though it be, is
a series of poetic and untrustworthy legends, will receive with
incredulity the statement that Mr. Smith has adopted precisely the
same mode of proof to establish his view that early Hebrew history
is an authentic narrative of facts. Most likely he was not aware of
the result of the process he had hit on. But in the hands of Lord
Macaulay and other able expounders of classical criticism, it leads
to the conclusion that the early history of Eome, from about 750 B.C.
to 390 B.C., is a mass of fable and legend, foimded on some grains
of fact. In the hands of Mr. Smith, precisely the same mode of
proof leads to the conclusion that the early history of the Hebrews
from 2200 B.C. to about 750 B.C. is an authentic narrative of facts.
Assuming, what we have yet to prove, that the mode of proof is the
same in both cases, it may be thought that the additions of inspira-
tion and infallibility by Mr. Smith convert the turbid stream of

1 Sir William Muir, Smaller Life of Mahomet, p. 607. ^ /jj^_ p_ 557.

' The books read on the banks of the Bosphonis, detailing the sayings and actions
of Mahomet, are not such as would satisfy the science of a European critic. They are
drawn, as might be expected, from the half million of rejected traditions. But the
sacred books of the Jews had contemporary records and a kingdom's treasured archives
for their originals, if the books are true ; and they were the books read far and near by
Hebrew men and women.

legend and fable into the pure waters of truth. The lines on which
Macaulay and the great classical critics travel, lead them to find
myth and romance in a history which only begins where the disputed
history of the Hebrew people practically ends. Mr. Smith travels
along precisely the same lines for much more remote history. But
they conduct him — and him alone of all the critics — to indubitable
facts. If inspiration and infallibility form the switch whereby he
passes off these lines on to those of truth, he will have a hard task
if he attempt to persuade the world that that switch ever could
exist save in his own imagination.

Passing by his remark on ' the little prejudices of little minds
who have not studied eastern history ' as singularly out of place, we
find the following on the ' continuous story from Genesis to the end
of Second Kings : ' ' The narrative, therefore, in its present form, as it
came from the hand of the last editor, is not older than the exile.
But its historical value is vindicated by the observation that the
work is really due to a succession of writers, acting upon the same
method which has secured for us an authentic record of the profane
history of the East.' We have already seen that the parallel
between Bible history and the life of Mahomet, drawn by Mr.
Smith in this connection, is not reassuring to seekers after truth.
But dismissing the parallel as unsatisfactory, we learn that the whole
narrative, from Genesis to Second Kings, is in its present shape
not older than the exile. A general statement like this may mean a
great deal, or it may mean nothing at all. Unquestionably it has an
ugly look about it, quite as ugly as if any one were to affirm, which
he might do with some show of reason, that the New Testament
is, in its present shape, not older than the time of the Elzevirs,
who published the edition which was current for two centuries.
' The successive writers, one coming after the other, although they
might have something to add, actually quoted in their own words
the older historians ; and in no other possible way can so accurate
and so contemporary a record for remote antiquity be obtained as
that gives.' This then is the theory of the Speech ; writer following
writer, always quoting those who went before, but always adding a
bit of his own till the last editor gave the finisliing touch, and made
the final additions during or not before the exile. Of facts in
support of the theory none are adduced, except the traditions about

the life of Mahomet. Of facts against the theory we need say
nothing, as Mr. Smith was bound to prove, not to assert his views.

But the theory, as thus presented in the Speech, wears a different
aspect from what it has in the Article. According to the latter, the
continuous narrative of which Mr. Smith speaks, exhibits three
different, well-marked stages of growth, corresponding precisely to
the three stages of growth in the legends and history of ancient
Eome, and other nations. These are thus given in his own words :
(1) ' The earliest products of Hebrew authorship seem to have been
lyrics and laws, which would circulate in the first instance from
mouth to mouth without the use of written copies.' ^ But (2) there
were at a later period ' early written collections of lyrics prior to
our present historical books — the Booh of the Wars of Jeliovali
(Num. xxi. 14), and the Book of Jashar (Josh. x. 2 ; 2 Sam. i.).'
These ancient pieces were poems. But ' it is certain,' he says,
' that ancient law was handed down by ancient tradition and local
custom to a much later date than the time of Moses,' of whom ' it
may fairly be made a question whether he left in writing any other
laws than the commandments on the tables of stone.' A third
phase followed, for (3) ' written history began comparatively early/
— certainly in the time of David. Mr. Smith informs his readers
that the early prose, which thus began to be written, ' was taken
over and incorporated in their works by later historians ; ' while
' the early lyric collections have disappeared, all but a few fragments,
presumably because their tone was prevailingly secular.'

Having reached a ' masterly ' prose writer, we might stop. But
Mr. Smith goes a step farther. He has got (1) oral songs or
ballads ; (2) written ballads ; (3) chronicles in prose ; and he adds
as the topstone of his building, a great historian : ' On such prin-
ciples minor narratives were fused together one after the other ; and
at length, in exile, a final redactor completed the great work, on
the first part of which Ezra based his reformation, while the latter
part was thrown into the second canon.' "

Before we proceed to compare these views with Lord Macaulay's
view of legendary history in general, it is well to keep in mind that
orally-transmitted songs are first assumed, then written collections
of them are assumed, next the disappearance of these is assumed,

1 Ency. Brit. xi. 598 a. ^ Bible, p. 638 a.

and lastly a reason for this disappearance is assumed. On what,
then, does the theory rest ? On assumption after assumption.
There are no facts given to justify these large assumptions. Every-
thing is taken for granted with the easy credulity of a writer, who
has no doubt that these manifold drafts on the Bank of Faith will
be honoured by every thinker. To say that here law and history
are as old as the oldest of these songs is more in accordance with
common sense than this mass of assumptions. But let us sec
where the roots and source of the theory really lie.

Lord Macaulay, discovering a grievous blunder committed by
Hume in his History of England, and illustrating from it the
legendary history of Eome, thus writes : ' When we turn to William
of Malmesbury, we find that Hume, in his eagerness to relate these
pleasant fables, has overlooked one very important circumstance.
William does indeed tell both the stories ; but he gives us distinct
notice that he does not warrant their truth, and that they rest on
no better authority than that of ballads. Such is the way in
which these two well-known tales have been handed down. Tliey
originally appeared in a poetical form. They found their way from
ballads into an old chronicle. The ballads perished ; the chronicle
remained. A great historian, some centuries after the ballads had
been altogether forgotten, consulted the chronicle. He was struck
by the lively colouring of these ancient fictions ; he transferred them
to his pages ; and thus we find inserted, as unquestionable facts, in
a narrative which is likely to last as long as the English tongue,
the inventions of some minstrel whose works were probably never
committed to writing, whose name is buried in oblivion, and whose
dialect has become obsolete.' Let Lord Macaulay 's method be
compared with Mr. Smith's. Let it be also borne in mind tliat the
former relates, in the first place at least, to events alleged to have
happened in England not a thousand years ago, while the latter
relates to pieces of history transacted in Palestine more than one
thousand five hundred years earlier. Here is the parallel : —

Lord Macaulay's Method. Mr. Smith's Metliod.

1. Ballads, oral or m-itten : authors im- 1. Songs or lyrics— unwritten ballads
known — lively colour of tliese ancient —not religious. Then,

fictions. Then,

2. Ballads perished and were forgotten, 2. "Written collections of songs, which,
after they had found their way into an old except a few fragments, have disappeared,
chronicle (prose). presumably because they were not reli-

gious ; preserved in the prose writings
which ' embodied many poems, legends,
and other remains.'

3. A great historian, struck by the lively 3. A great historian, writing ' in a
colour of these ancient fictions, transferred masterly style,' includes in his book 'the
them from the chronicle to his pages. narratives that are fullest of human interest,

and the poetry richest in colour and ima-
gination.'

4. The product is Untrustworthy 4. The product is an Authentic Narra-
Legend.^ tive of facts.

Mr. Smith's premises are exactly the same as Lord Macaulay's. But

the condusion in the former case is authentic history ; in the latter,

the conclusion is untrustworthy legend. To say that Mr. Smith

assumes the inspiration of the ballads, or of the chronicle that

followed them, or of the continuous history which followed the

chronicle, does not disprove the conclusion which must follow from

the premises. It is demanding from us belief in a miracle, for

which there is no reasonable call — belief, too, in a miracle which

overrides all the laws affecting the transmission of songs, and ballads,

and legends. To this demand men will turn a deaf ear. Whoever

makes it, let him charm as wisely as he may, will meet with

ridicule ; legend will be legend and nothing else. Lord Macaulay,

representing the reason and the instincts of men in this matter,

will be treated with respect, as he deserves to be.

It will not be denied that, had God so chosen, he could have

enabled editor after editor to sift the wheat from the chaff in popular

ballads and songs, to impart to the wheat a sublimely religious

character, and to present the whole in the form of a thoroughly

authentic and even highly poetical history. This is Mr. Smith's

theory of history and inspiration at once. But it is the ordinary

theory of mythical or legendary history, without the inspiration of

truth being breathed into it. Of proof for this theory of inspiration

Mr. Smith has given none ; we may safely say, there is none to be

had. In proof of his theory of an authentic history, he quotes the

life of Mahomet, which not only does not support his view, but may

satisfy every one that history, written as he imagines, cannot rise

higher than its source — legend. He and his friends deride some-

^ Ticknor, in his History of Spanish Literature, Period I., chap, vi.-x., has shown
the same principles at work in comparatively recent times, ballads, always changing,
going to the manufacture of chronicles, and these latter recording stories which ' must be
almost entirely fabulous.'

thing or other which they call the mechanical theory of inspiration,
but which nobody seems to understand. Yet here, on the theory
avowed by Mr. Smith, editor after editor picks out the M'heat from
the chaff, adds some M^heat of his own, and presents his labours to
the world as authentic history. Did these editors choose the wheat
of real facts, and throw away the chaff of legend on the human
principles which guided the Moslem critics in selecting 4000
traditions of Mahomet's life, and in throwing away half a million
more ? If so, then the history from Genesis to 2 Kings is a purely
human production, and must be judged as such. And there is
common sense in so treating it, if any one will. But were the
editors guided by a divine power to choose the facts, and to reject
the legends ? If so, then the new theory of history and inspiration
is entirely mechanical ; at least, it is as mechanical a theory as any
other. And it also introduces some fear lest, under the guise of
history, we have only inspired legends or parables, or whatever you
like to call these old world stories. Let it be borne in mind that
the thing denied is not Mr. Smith's belief in the authenticity of the
narrative, but the probability of an authentic narrative coming to us
in the way he believes.

Here, then, are two things quite distinct, which Mr. Smith has
driven together to the confusion and danger of both — the history
and the inspiration. That his theory of history by itself is a probable
theory of an authentic history, we believe no critic will for one
moment allow. That ' in no other possible way can so accurate and
so contemporary a record for remote antiquity be obtained as that
frives,' may be Mr. Smith's opinion, but it is not Lord Macaulay's.
On the other hand, the traditional view, as it is contemptuously
called, proceeds upon the well-defined lines, which all historians
lay down as tests of fact and discoverers of legend. It says that
the men who lived and acted at the time of certain events wrote
down what they did or saw or kneM-, or at least what they got from
unimpeachable sources of knowledge. There may be difficulties in
fully establishing aU this, as there are difficulties about every
authentic history ; but the fact remains, that this so-called tradi-
tional view has an immense advantage over that propounded by Mr.
Smith. His theory leads to myth and legend ; this other leads to
authentic history. With the question of inspiration it is different.

That Mr. Smith's theory of inspiration is a possible theory no one
ought to deny ; that it is a probable theory may be questioned.
What inspiration is, how it affects the man, how it preserves and
yet modifies his individuality, are questions we may guess at, but
can never fully answer. There is thus a wide field for speculation.
We know, for example, that the evangelist Luke sifted the materials
for his Gospel, choosing and rejecting as an ordinary historian would.
But he claimed ' eye-witnesses and ministers of the Word ' as the
sources of his knowledge. Would a gospel written two hundred
years later be equally well received as authentic history, on the
ground that the writer was inspired to gather together the facts, and
to throw away the romance and the legends ? This is claimed by
Mr. Smith to be true of the generally-received life of Mahomet, apart
from inspiration altogether. He cannot expect critics and historians
to accept this view. If, however, the distance in time were not one
century or two, but ten centuries, is it probable that any thinking
men would receive the history as authentic because it was said to
be inspired ? But this seems to be Mr. Smith's theory — seems, for
there is a lack of clear scientific statement of his views. Certainly
it is unbecoming in those who sympathise with this theory, or any
form of it, to speak of the mechanical theories of other people.

2. Jonah : Ruth : Daniel.

(a) Misrepresentations and inaccuracies in the Speech.

' As for the Book of Jonah,' Mr. Smith says in his published
Speech, ' on this point I have said nothing more than before. I
have not tied myself to a theory, nor do I wish to tie myself or the
Church to any theory of the Book of Jonah ; but this I may say,
that the theory of Jonah as a parable is a current theory. It is
held by many moderate scholars.' ^ Now the Committee did not and
could not find fault with any one for saying that this theory of
Jonah is ' a current theory.' That is fact, of which there ought to
be no gainsaying. And the Committee did not deny or even refer
to the fact. But Mr. Smith wishes it to be understood that this is
their objection to his treatment of that book. He affirms also that
he has said nothing more about it than what he said previously,

'P. 19 ; but ' treated liy most critics now as parabolical ' (p. 20).

that is, in the article ' Bible.' If so, he might have cause to complain.
But he has actuaUy said more, and so said it that the consequences
of his farther advance are such as attach heavy responsibility to
him. Perhaps he has forgotten what he then said. Here are the
two passages : —

Art. Bihle. Art. Hebrew Literature.

In the Book of Job we find poetical in- The other writings of the last age are on

vention of incidents, attached for didactic the whole much inferior. . . . Alonf^

purposes to a name apparently derived with this came the beginnings of Haggada°

from old tradition. There is no vaM a the formation ofparables and tales attached

priori reason for denying that the Old to historical names, of which the Book

Testament may contain other examples of Jonah is generally taken as an early

of the same art. The Book of Jonah is example.— P. 599 b.
generally viewed as a case in point. —
P. 639 6.

In the Speech, the theory is called ' a current theory ; ' in both
Articles it is spoken of as the generally-received theory. When a
difference so great is treated as nothing, the Committee assailed
have some ground to complain. But the article ' Hebrew Literature '
shows a decided advance on the article ' Bible.' In the latter not a
word is said about the time when the book was written ; in the
former it is distinctly ascribed to the last age of Hebrew Literature,
which is said to have begun after the return from Babylon. And
yet Mr. Smith affirms that he has ' said nothing more than before.' ^
And this is an important advance.

Of the several reasons alleged in the Speech for regarding the
book as a parable, he gives only one ; but for it he decKnes respon-
sibility. There is therefore no call to examine it here. But there
are two arguments used that need to be looked at, because for these
he is responsible : ' Thus he was overtaken by the judgment of
God, and was swallowed by the great fish. Throughout the whole
of the Old Testament, the figure of the leviathan or great fish is the
usual figure for the world-power oppressing the Church [Isa. li. 9,
xxvii. 1 ; Ps. Ixxiv. 13, 14].'^ A confiding reader at once accepts the

1 The late Emanuel Beutsch will bo allowed to be a better expounder of this word :
' The aim of the Haggadah being the purely momentary one of elevating, comforting,
edifying its audience for the time being, it did not pretend to possess the slightest
authority. As its method was capricious and arbitrary, so its cultivation was open to
every one whose heart prompted him. It is saga, tale, gnome, parable, allegory— poetry,
in short, of its own most strange kind,' etc. The italics are his.

2 Jonah is commonly ascribed to about 800 B.C. ; Mr. Smith gives a date posterior to
536 B.C.

3 P. 20.

identity of the great fish of Jonah with leviathan. This is unquestion-
ably the impression conveyed by the words of the Speech, whatever may
have been Mr. Smith's meaning. And if the conveying of an impression
be a valid argument in Mr. Smith's hands when finding an oversight
in the Book of Ezra, it is an equally valid argument in the hands of
others when impugning any of his parables. A confiding reader also
accepts the accuracy of the references given. But it would be wise
to look for himself first. The great fish in Jonah is called ' a great
fish,' but never 'leviathan.' Mr. Smith had not a shadow of reason
from the book for even seeming to make the two one. As little
reason had he for putting down the references to the use of leviathan
in the Old Testament. That word occurs in five (six) places through-
out the Old Testament, and only in two of them can it be said to
mean the world-power. The word used in Isa. li. 9, Ps. Ixxiv. 13, is
not leviathan, but the more common word tannin, while in Jonah
the word used is dag, the ordinary word for a fish. In two passages
leviathan is a name applied to Egypt or Babylon ; elsewhere it
means a crocodile or some creature similar. But ' throughout the
whole of the Old Testament ' ! And such carelessness is lauded as
the highest scholarship ! Eeally, before any speaker flings abroad
charges of ignorance and captiousness against others, he might at
least make sure that his own pretences to accuracy cannot be
impugned ; and he might make sure that two passages cannot mean
the whole of such a book as the Old Testament.

The one reason given by Mr. Smith for regarding the Book of
Jonah as a parable is supported by a second argument of a nature
entirely novel. For the reason itself, as we have seen, he declines
responsibility ; he cannot say the same for the two arguments used.
The latter of them is this. The people who lived in Malachi's days
— and this fixes the time when Jonah was written — ' forgot that
it was a condition, or part, of Israel's glorification that she should
be a missionary nation to spread God's truth to the ends of the
earth.' Hitherto, then, the world, even Kuenen, has been labouring
under a complete misapprehension of the destiny of that people.
An exclusive, self-contained, haughty race, shut up within its own
boundaries of land or creed, with no wish and no call to impart to
others the grand truths it was preserving for growth in future ages
and in other hands — this is the usual idea of Israel's place among

the nations. Because it may suit Mr. Smith's purpose, as shall
presently be shown, to represent Israel as a missionary people for-
getful of their high destiny, he ignores this generally-accepted belief.
Perhaps it is only one of the absurd traditions which must now be
knocked on the head. But we shall not argue in favour of it till
he has endeavoured to prove his position.

To the Book of Daniel, Mr. Smith devotes more than a page of
the revised Speech. And nowhere does he assail the Committee so
blindly and so bitterly. He declares that ' men appointed members
of a Committee by the Free Church take the side of Porphyry,' the
advocate of the ancient heathen as well as an assailant of the
Christian faith, ' and say that if the Book of Daniel is a book of
prophecy, it is so not because it speaks of Christ, but because it
speaks of events which were past one hundred and sixty years
before Christ.' That he was allowed to make these statements
without interruption says much for the fairness with which he was
treated. There is not a shadow of truth in them, and care was
taken in framing the Report that he should not have it in his
power to use the argument. Let the facts speak : —

The Speech. The Report.

' In regard to the Book of Daniel, the The Book of Daniel is said to have been

predictive character of which I am said to probably written as late as the national

have destroyed by saying that it was pro- revival under the Maccabees, about 160

bably written as late as about 160 B.C.,' B.C., a statement which tends largely to

etc. destroy its predictive character.

' It is said that if the book belongs to
a late date its predictive element is de-
stroyed. '

Mr. Smith has represented the Eeport as saying what it does not
say. He puts the case absolutely : ' I am said to have destroyed
its predictive character,' and, ' Its predictive element is destroyed ; '
and again : ' The whole predictive value of the book is lost.' This
can only be called a programme, or a wish on his part that such
had been the inference of the Committee. The Eeport says that
Mr. Smith's view tends to this end, and not a few men would argue
that if the prophecies in most of the book be wiped out wholly or
almost wholly, those that remain will have a small chance of
standing. Porphyry did this. Everything previous to the time of
Antiochus, he said, was borrowed from history ; the rest was not
prediction, but was conjecture or falsehood. Mr. Smith says

this is the position of the Committee. But special care was taken
that an argument from the Messianic part of Daniel should not be
left to any critic of the Eeport, for the word largely was intentionally
added to tends — tends largely to destroy its predictive character.
Mr. Smith has read the clause as if it were wholly destroys its pre-
dictive character, and in his Speech he used ' whole ' where he
ought to have used ' largely ' — a freedom nothing can excuse or
justify. One would imagine that he considers himself entitled to
turn a clause of the Report into anything he pleases. Of course he
can easily cover it with ridicule if he be permitted to do this
unchecked.

Had the Committee indulged in this freedom with Mr. Smith's
words, would language have sufficed to condemn their injustice,
their ignorance, and their unfairness ? Most certainly not ; and the
world would have said, Well spoken !

(h) Porphyry and the Committee.

By uselessly dragging in the opinions of Porphyry, Mr. Smith has
contrived to discredit the character and position of the Committee
to a degree, which can only appear incredible to those who have
access to ordinary books of reference. ' At that time [the time of
Jerome],' he said, * the fathers of the Church held that the Book of
Daniel was prophetic, because, like all the prophecies, it prophesied
of Christ; and the opposite view was taken by the heathen
philosopher Porphyry : but we now find men appointed members of
a Committee in the Free Church, who take the side of Porphyry,
and say that if the Book of Daniel is a book of prophecy, it is so
not because it speaks of Christ, but because it speaks of events
which were past one hundred and sixty years before Christ.' These
are most serious statements to make — so serious that nothing more
is required than to put side by side the words of the Committee and
the sentiments of Porphyry.

The Committee. Porphyry.

The Book of Daniel is said to have been "Whatever the author of the Rook of

probal)ly written as late as the national Daniel has said previous to the time of
revival under the Maccabees, about 160 Antiochus contains true history ; if, how-
B.c. , a statement which tends largely to ever, he has conjectured aught more
destroy its predictive character. recent, he has lied, because he knew not

the future.

Not a vestige of right reason had Mr. Smith for this attack on
the Committee, as if they sided with the assailant of Christianity in
its early days. But instead of defending them from an assault so
unfounded, it will be more to the purpose to direct attention to Mr.
Smith's matters of fact. He says, or at least he conveys the
impression, that 'in the time of Jerome' this controversy about
Daniel was carried on, and that Porphyry was on the opposite side
from the fathers of the Church. There is some confusion of thought
in his way of writing history, apparently ; if not, there is a conveying
of confused impressions, and a want of scientific clearness. Por-
phyry was in his grave in Jerome's time. Porphyry wrote his
famous books against the Christians long before heathenism was
overthrown in the Eoman Empire, about 270 A.D. ; while Jerome
wrote his commentary on Daniel long after the triumph of Chris-
tianity, in 407 A.D. An interval of almost 140 years counts for
nothing in the Speech ! We saw already that in the same way 140
years counted for nothing in the history before David's time !^ It
appears, too, that the fathers of the early Church, like Jerome,
* held that the Book of Daniel was prophetic, because it prophesied
of Christ.' To reply to this novel view would be indeed waste of
words : but is not the word only implied before ' because ' ?

Porphyry regarded all that the Book of Daniel contained previous
to the time of Antiochus as true history. Of course the Committee
consider much of that part of the book to be history, and nothing
but history ; much of it they also consider to be prediction. But
while these are certainly the Committee's views, what are Mr.
Smith's ? He assigns the writing of the book to, probably, 167 B.C.
It records events previous to that date, and it professes to give pre-
dictions of events between 536 B.C. and that time. Not one word
has Mr. Smith let fall of the view he takes of that history and these
predictions. He abuses the Committee for siding with a heathen,
which they do not do ; he wishes it to be thought that he sides
with the fathers of the Church. But he says nothing definite and
nothing scientific. He probably agrees with Porphyry about the

' The eighth century b.c. class of critics have a contempt for arithmetic. Kuenen, who
is perhaps their chief, declares, with much arithmetical parade, that the size of David's
kingdom was under 500 square miles ! (I. 175, E. T.). To be sure, he has but left out the
small figures 1 and 0. However, the one goes in front, and the mthing comes behind,
turning 500 into 15,000 square miles !

date of the book : nothing more is known for certain. But the
Committee said ' largely ' in the Eeport to prevent misconception.
There are 357 verses altogether in the book: upwards of 140 are
predictive, and of these about 20 verses refer to Messianic and
later times. Clearly, and without cavil, to exclude these 20 verses
was the object of inserting ' largely,' as any fair-minded critic
would at once have seen and acknowledged.

Mr. Smith has scrupulously abstained from giving any reason for
assigning these two books to the period after the return from
Babylon. Although his remarks on them occupy more than two
pages of the Speech, there is the most cautious avoidance of any
attempt to give reasons for this change on the traditional view.
They are parables or tales, it seems ; but even for considering them
so, or for thinking it allowable to consider them so, Mr. Smith gives
no reason that he will be bound by. He mentions one of several
reasons for the Book of Jonah, but even for that one reason he
declines to be responsible ! It is the Committee who must give
reasons for their faith, not he ; for, with most charming simplicity,
he throws the whole burden of proof off his own shoulders by
asking, ' Perhaps Dr. Wilson will endeavour to prove that Euth was
not written in the post-exile period ? ' (p. 1 9). He conveys the
impression that he has attacked such questions ' with the sweat of
his brow ; ' but if the result be that he will not give reasons for his
faith, and when at last he ventures to state but one out of several,
will not accept responsibility for even that lonely one — if such be
the result, people will fear that he has sweated and toiled in
vain.

However, whether Mr. Smith will or will not, he must face a
serious entanglement arising from his views of Jonah and Euth.
It is this : at the time he says these two books were w^ritten — for
that is a settled point with him — a great controversy was raging in
the Jewish church. Ezra tells the story at full length (ix., x.), and
the prophet Malachi refers to it (ii. 11). Men of all ranks had
broken the Mosaic law by intermarrying with the surrounding
heathen, Ezra and Nehemiah (x. 28—30) insisted on a reform,
carried their point amid great obstacles, and separated the foreign

women from their Jewish husbands. Feeling was very hot in
Jerusalem on both sides, as the story shows. If then a tale or
parable like Euth were published in the city at or about that time,
how would it be regarded ? Moabite women are represented as
married to Hebrews of high standing in Bethlehem, and one of them
is not only a pattern of every womanly grace, but becomes the
ancestor of David, the greatest King of Zion. Another book (Jonah),
published at or about the same time, according to Mr. Smith,
inculcates kindly feeling towards the heathen, and exhibits some of
them as more God-fearing than the prophet Jonah himself. What
bearing therefore would these books have on the great and bitter
controversy that then raged in Jerusalem ? Mr. Smith says he has
toiled at these studies with the sweat of his brow. Who cares, if
he treats with silence this and other questions which demand from
him an answer ? Kuenen and his school readily give an answer,
the only answer that history can accept as relevant in the case.
And it is very singular that, while Mr. Smith seems certain these two
books were written in that age, Kuenen thinks it is only highly
]jrobable. The Scottish critic has no doubt regarding the time the
books were written : — the post-exile period. Kuenen is doubtful,
for he only thinks the guess highly probable. Of reasons for so
thinking, Mr. Smith, however, declines to give any. There are
several, he says, but they are kept out of sight. Kuenen is more
outspoken on this point ; he gives a perfectly intelligible reason.
And what is Kuenen's reason ? These two books, he practically
says, were political pamphlets, written by the Liberal party in
Jerusalem to give Ezra, Nehemiah, the prophets, and all their
supporters a slap in the face for the narrow bigotry they showed
towards the foreign women. This reason is quite intelligible, and
would go far to make the two books intelligible if they were
parables written in that age. But whatever Mr. Smith's view may
be of the reason for the writing of these parables, he must make his
theory of the date of the books fit in with this bitter contro-
versy in Jerusalem. It was an extraordinary thing that any
prophet should select this, of all times, for writing two parables, with
a bearing so sinister on the proceedings of the governors, and so
directly inducing to defiance and rebellion. He ran a good chance
not of getting his parable inserted in the sacred books of the nation

but of having his beard pulled and his house dismantled, as
happened in other cases. Kuenen's position is intelligible, Mr.
Smith's is not, and it is not likely that his appeal to Dr. Wilson for
help to take him out of the difficulty will receive a response.

3. Anonymous Broadsides.

Mr. Smith claims to ' have spoken of Scripture in the
language of scholarship,' setting ' statements of facts down in
plain language ' (p. 8). When therefore he speaks of several short
prophecies (Isa. xiii., xiv.) as ' anonymous broadsides,' he justifies
the phrase against the Committee on what may be a scholarly and an
intelligible ground. ' On the other hand,' he says, ' when the people
came to Babylon, God stiU sent them preachers; but how could
these prophets get up in the market-place under the eyes of the
Babylonian police, and there preach a sermon that Babylon was to
be destroyed ? We know what would have happened.' And the
upshot of this was, that prophets, ' instead of waiting till they had a
large book, put a single individual short prophecy Tipon parchment,
upon a broadside — that is, upon a single open sheet of parchment —
and sent it through among the people in order that in that way they
might have the word of God. That statement may be right or
not, hut it is not irreverent' (p. 10). Is it a scholarly statement?
Is it a statement of facts ? When those who refuse to recognise in
any man the gift of predicting the future, read prophecies of
Babylon's overthrow ages before it happened, they say that these
so-called predictions must have been written after the events. The
name of the prophet, as in Isa. xiii., xiv., was added by the forger, or
whatever he may have been, to give weight to his fables. This is
quite intelligible from the standing-ground of these writers. But
Mr. Smith does not belong to their ranks. He may accept results
approaching somewhat closely to the results accepted by them, but
he arrives at these results by a different process. Are the steps he
takes consistent with the reverence he professes to the Book, or with
* the language of scholarship ' ?

Has he any ground in scholarship for regarding Isa. xiii., xiv., and
Jer. 1., li., as anonymous sheets, written, not when Scripture says
they were written, but fifty or two hundred years afterwards ? He

must make both prophecies anonymous, for the latter (in Jeremiah)
shows numerous and unmistakeable traces of borrowing from the
former (in Isaiah). Even an English reader can have no difficulty in
determining which of the two is the earlier, and which the later.
If, then, that in Jeremiah be accepted as a sheet which was written
before the fall of Jerusalem, that in Isaiah must be considerably
older. It seems this can on no account be allowed. But why ?
Simply because Isaiah predicts what some critics think he could not
have predicted.^ ' This is the true account of the origin of the criti-
cism upon Isaiah. It was in the swaddling-clothes of rationalism that
it attained its maturity. Its first attempts were very juvenile. The
names of its founders have been almost forgotten. It was Gesenius,
Hitzig, and Ewald who first raised it to the eminence of a science.' ^

But see how grotesque the whole thing is. First, Mr. Smith
claims the right of thrusting out of the Book a whole verse : ' The
burden of Babylon, which Isaiah, the son of Amoz, did see.' He
has no authority whatever for this right of censorship, except that
the verse is destructive of some theory he and others maintain. It
stands in their road ; therefore it must be done away with. If it be
a reverent proceeding to take as much or as little of a passage as
suits a man's own view of its origin, then there is no irreverence
here. However, it is not enough to strike out this heading. You
must strike out the same, or almost the same heading at the very
beginning of the whole Book of Isaiah. Critical science will thus
soon saw through the branch of the tree it is sitting on.

But, second, Mr. Smith affirms that the prophets sent single sheets
of parchment abroad among the people, without adding their names,
at least when they foretold the ruin of Babylon. Well, how does
he know ? He cannot appeal to Isa. xiii. or to Jer. 1., for both these
prophets have fully signed their prophecies against her. They refuse
to countenance his theory. He maintains his position by proposmg
to thrust their names out of those parts of their own books ! Verily,
you may prove anything if this procedure be allowable. And it is
certainly not a reverent procedure towards the famous dead.

But, third, had any prophets in Babylonia dared to sign their

1 Line 5, Speech, p. 23, iv., has nothing like it in the Keport. There vxis something
very like it in the Private and Confidential Proof.

2 Delitzsch, I. 58.

names to predictions uttered against that country, they would have
at once fallen into the hands of ' the Babylonian police.' This is
as odd an argument as a man could use, for neither Isaiah nor
Jeremiah preached in a Babylonian market-place. The argument
seems to be, Suppose they did ; what then ? Well, there is nothing
irreverent in saying, He that fights and runs away, may live to fight
another day ; but it partakes very much of the ludicrous. ' The
Babylonian police ! ' Not one fact has Mr. Smith to produce in
support of this strange idea. All the facts of history prove that
when a prophet got a message from God, he felt bound to deliver
it, whatever the cost to himself might be. Of shrinking from duty
he dared not think. Whether he had to discharge that duty in a
king's palace and to a king's face, or in a public square amid an
ano^ry crowd, made no difference to the prophet. If he quailed
under a king's frown or a people's anger, the fate of Urijah warned
him what the greatest of all Kings would do. And he knew, also,
that a lion might meet him by the way as the messenger of
venfTeance, if he dared to infringe his orders in the least ; or the
sore strokes of conscience might teach him as they taught Elijah ;
or the winds might stay his flight as they did Jonah's; or those
who ran when they were not sent might be ' roasted in the fire,'
as were Ahab and Zedekiah. But, ' the police ' ! Did Micaiah care
for the police of Samaria? Nay, truly, but they cared for him.
Was Jonah afraid of the police magistrates of Nineveh ? Be the
story of his preaching a parable or a fact, it makes no difference in
this respect ; for he inspired court and people with such terror, that
* word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his
throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with
sackcloth, and sat in ashes!' Did Micah or Jeremiah care for
the police of Jerusalem ? Or did Daniel care for the police, when,
in the presence of Babylonian emperors, he told one of them that
his kingdom would pass away and his reason fail? and when he
announced to another, before his drunken courtiers, that ruin would
overtake them all that very night ? These are notorious facts : Mr.
Smith's prophetic fear of the police is worse than ludicrous ; it is
a wrong done to the great men of olden times, and a singular lack
of reverence for the message they delivered. All thoughts of police
and police magistrates may be dismissed as unworthy of the subject.

4. Eher.

The dispute about Eber is probably of less importance than the
matters already considered. But Mr. Smith rests his case, as usual,
on a statement which cannot be examined without shaking all
confidence in his capacity to judge. ' In Gen. x./ he says, ' Eber
is the descendant of Arphaxad, and Aram or Syria is Arphaxad's
brother, and the ancestor not of the Hebrews but of Uz and others.
But in Deut. xxvi. 5 the Hebrew, in his confession before the altar,
is directed to say that his ancestor was a nomad Aramaean ; and
again, in Gen. xxii. 21, Uz and Aram are both descendants of Eber
through ISTahor, and Uz is Aram's uncle instead of his son. If we
find, then, that Eber, Uz, or Aram had one father in one part
of the Pentateuch, and another father in another part of the Penta-
teuch, we are not to suppose that an actual historical man had two
fathers — (laughter) — but that the authors of Scripture, who were
wise as well as inspired authors, meant something which was sense,
and was consistent with the actual facts of the case. (Laughter
and applause.)' Probably the laughter caused by these sentiments
was not laughter at the wit, but laughter at the blindness shown.
Mr. Smith makes these three references to Aram come from three
different authors, tliough they are all found in the Pentateuch.
Quote a fourth author, 1 Chron. vii. 14, 34. We shaU then find
that Aram was a descendant of one of Jacob's sons, and that the
Aramitess, corresponding to the Arama3an (Deut. xxvi. 5), was the
mother of Machir, Manasseh's son. If the rule be laid down, that
whenever the same name occurs in a book of history, the same man
is always referred to, we may close the book and cease to read.
Obadiah is so common a name in the Old Testament, that at
least a dozen men in different ages are known to have been so
called. Mr. Smith's rule regarding Aram requires us to confound
these dozen men as one and the same! Different men bearing
the same name readily occur to ordinary mmds as an easy explana-
tion of difficulties. Mr. Smith does nut recognise this simple rule
in the case of Aram. And probably it was his manifest want of
this ordinary perception which caused the laughter.

In summing up this review of the Speech, it will conduce to a

clearer understanding of its merits, if there be brought together in
brief compass part of the evidence, which has been advanced in the
preceding pages for withholding confidence from the statements it
contains.

First, under the general heading of Misrepresentations, or in-
accurate statements of the point in dispute, it is shown that
ordinary care has not been taken to do justice to the Eeport, on at
least eight main particulars, without reckoning errors of less con-
sequence. Most of these particulars are grave misstatments of
easily-ascertained facts. Some people may think all of them equally
grave. Generous minds consider a single misstatement of another's
position an injustice or a blunder that must be rectified at once.
But here are at least eight in sixteen pages ; and reasoning from
these eight, Mr. Smith both claims the sympathy of all men under
what he considers unfair treatment, and holds up the Committee
to the scorn of the world as ignorant opponents of learning and
truth. Now, the unfair treatment has been suffered by the Com-
mittee, not by him ; and the interests of sound learning are safer in
their hands than in his. Condemning his rash handling of Daniel's
prophecies, the Committee said that it tends largely to destroy their
predictive character, which Mr. Smith represents as equal to ' the
whole predictive value of the book is lost.' When the Committee
refer to a well-known ' narrative,' written by a series of writers,
according to Mr. Smith, a century or two after David, he denounces
them as ' grossly unfair ; ' he charges them with representing him as
denying that ' there was any writer before David,' a sentiment as
unlike the reference made by them as can be. And when the
Committee say that a prophecy, consisting of two chapters in our
version, if not two and a half in the Greek, is signed four times by
its author, Jeremiah, he says that because the heading of one chapter
is wanting in the Greek, therefore the writer is anonymous !
Eeferring to pieces of thorough blundering in the Book of Ezra (if
his article on Haggai is to be relied on), he says that the Committee
found fault with him for the harmless doctrine that there ' was a
little transposition of some of the sources.' And when the Com-
mittee speak of the predictive element in Scripture, he quietly
assumes that they are speaking of prophecy, or preaching in its
wider meaning, and expresses his amazement at the ignorance of

men, who could not distinguish the rabbinical division of TJie Law
from The Pro2)hets. These are a few of the particulars in which Mr.
Smith has grievously misrepresented the Committee's position. His
friends cannot imagine that this is no wrong done. He himself
ought to remember that in the realms of scholarship, precisely as in
the world at large, neither of two opposing parties counts it honour-
able to misrepresent the other.

Under the second general heading of Wrongful Evidence in his
own favour, got from inaccurate citing of witnesses, falls a mass of
proof which bears out the Committee's views and condemns Mr.
Smith's. Questions of criticism are treated by him with an
incredible lightness, as if the books or the authors cited had never
been really examined. There are many instances of this. Keil,
for example, is called in to prove that Mr. Smith is right, when his
evidence is that Mr. Smith is wrong. To be sure, both of them
take the same view of a difficulty which was never spoken of in
Committee ; while on the real point in dispute between the Com-
mittee and Mr. Smith, he sides with the former and condemns the
latter. Porphyry, too, is cited as friendly to the Committee ; but if
he is friendly to either side, it is to Mr. Smith. Because IcviatJian
is found in two passages as a symbol of world-power, therefore it
has that meaning * throughout the whole of the Old Testament ' .'
And because some writers regard with suspicion the last few verses
of Mark's Gospel, therefore ' the most orthodox scholars ' take this
view ! The Septuagint is quoted ; but on turning to the passage,
the evidence relied on is not there, and can only be got by puttinor
into the text what you want to take out of it — a performance
which Mr. Smith has the modesty not to attempt in print. Next,
the words of the Greek are translated ; but Mr. Smith's translation
is so novel, and his changes on the original so alarming, that a
critic will leave his readers to form their own judgment of the
rendering. It is useless to refer to more witnesses, who, though
cited by Mr. Smith in his own favour, refuse when cross-examined
to speak for him, but give evidence for the Committee. Ten at
least of the witnesses are in this position : there are really more.

Under a third general heading comes the most singular of all
evidence, Mr. Smith against himself and against Professor Lindsay.
Twice he has been found contradicting himself; once, indeed, when

he denounced the view of the Committee as ' grossly unfair.' Once,
too, he claims that he was acquitted upon the views regarding
The Song which he has now advanced ; and Professor Lindsay even
goes so far as to say that ' every statement ' about it in Hebrew
Literature ' had been already made in Canticles.' It requires great
faith in the ignorance of other men to make statements so free
from fact ! But the two professors do not always agree ; and of
Mr. 'Smith's contradiction of Professor Lindsay, it may be said that
when Greek meets Greek, then comes the tug of war.

Had the score of principal errors which we have culled from
these sixteen pages of the Speech arisen from the Eeport having
been put into Mr. Smith's hands an hour or two before he began
to speak, there would have been excuse for the speaker. Every one
would have made most generous allowance for rashness of state-
ment and inaccuracy of reading. But the Speech was carefully
revised and published more than a fortnight after it was delivered.
There is, therefore, no excuse for errors and misstatements which
ordinary care could not have failed to discover. But even for the
Speech as spoken there is little excuse. Most of page 15 of the
Speech seems an attempt on Mr. Smith's part to reply to what was
said in the Committee two days before. As Professor Lindsay allows
he kept his friend informed of what took place in Committee, it is
probable that that page was one result of this. But it was not
the only result; for the Speech largely follows the Keasons of Dissent
given in by Professor Lindsay on Monday, 25 th October. These
Eeasons must have been written two or three full days before the
Commission met on 27th October. Without taking any side on the
propriety or impropriety of not formally communicating the Eeport
to Mr. Smith before that morning, we may say that few men will be
disposed to blame his friends for any information they may have
given him.

It is now four years since the struggle began which was caused
by the critical papers in the Encyclopccdia Britannica. Of the
efforts at first made to persuade the world that learning and a
demand for reasonable freedom were arrayed on one side, while only
ignorance and a bigoted opposition to all change could be found on
the other, it is needless to speak. All that nonsense is a thing of
the past. It may be said also that the field over which the struggle

ranges has greatly widened. But no one can believe that what was
then indistinct in the new views is a whit clearer to-day ; or what
was indefinite is more plain; or what was called the probable is
now certain. For four years, ' probable ' and ' appears ' have figured
as chief factors in this game of war. No certainty has been reached
by the advocates for change. Has even one addition been made to
our stock of knowledge ? Or has a single fact been put in a new
or a better light ? Truly, had these years and efforts been spent
even in collating manuscripts, how different might have been the
result ! And with what pride would a grateful country have
sounded the praises of her sons, who had the leisure and the ability
for that department of scholarly research. Has there not rather
been a purposeless calling in question of surely believed things,
without a real basis in science for the doubts expressed ? And can
any one say that aught has been advanced on Mr. Smith's side to
exalt the greatness of that grand Old Book, which has held its place
unmoved amid the countless storms of scores of ages ? But the one
result of this four years' battle appears to be (for even here there is
not certainty), a theory of inspiration, which is implied rather than
clearly stated, but of which it may be said that the boldness of the
man who will pin his faith to it is more worthy of admiration than
his science.

NOTE.

As the authority given by Mr. Smith for the Book of Jashar (1 Kings viii.
53) is Wellhausen in Bleek's Introduction^ 4th ed. 1878, it is perfectly fair
to assume that the authority is the same for his translation of the passage in
dispute. Should this turn out to be a mistake, the responsibility rests on
Mr. Smith himself. The case then stands thus : — Bagster's translation (above,
p. 18) is from the Greek, and is authenticated by existing manuscripts fourteen
or fifteen centuries old. Mr. Smith's rendering, on the same page, is from
the German ; is not according to the Septuagint ; is in one essential part
called only ' more probable,' even by its first narrator ; and dates no further
back than 1878 a.d. Or, if it is not from the German, it is from Hebrew com-
posed by Wellhausen three years since, as a specimen of what he conjectured
was written in Jerusalem perhaps 2000 years before. His imaginary Hebrew ia
of no more value than if it had been, what it greatly resembles, the College
exercise of an intelligent student. And yet the Commission of Assembly were
led to understand that Mr. Smith was quoting a book which had been written
during or shortly after Solomon's reign, and of which a fragment had been
preserved in the real Septuagint as it was first published 2000 years ago ! He
was actually quoting an imaginary passage manufactured by "Wellhausen in 1878 !
That any one should cite a witness so unreliable is indeed very singular ; but not
more so than that he should cite our Lord as ' always speaking of the Law and
the Prophets as two distinct things,' when he might easily have found, even by
consulting Alford on the passages referred to at the foot of page 9, that it is
not the fact.

PHOTOMOUNT
HAMPHLET BINDER

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|GAYLORD BROS. Inc.

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Uncritical criticism : a review of

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