What remains of the Old Testament and other essays

Front matter

y* With a Preface ie a _Pror. ns MOFFAT.

.

THE REV. A. K. DALLAS, M.A.

Preface

BY

Rev. ProressoR JAMES MOFFATT, D.D., New York

THE five studies which Mr. Dallas has chosen and translated in this book are all devoted to the Old Testament. Yet Professor Gunkel’s first work was in the field of the New Testament; as far back as 1888 he published a remarkable monograph on Die Wirkungen des heiligen Geistes, which dealt with the experiences of the Spirit in the primitive Christian communities, and he has also contributed a commentary on the First Epistle of St. Peter to the Schriften series, edited by Johannes Weiss. At the same time, his main work has been done in Old Testament criticism, where his reputation shines high. No one who has endeavoured to penetrate into the realities of Old Testament religion will fail to acknowledge the debt he owes to books like Gunkel’s commentaries upon Genesis and the Psalms, for example. They possess the rare combination of learning and vision. The literary criticism is accompanied by a religious sympathy, which is a constant refreshment to the mind. For Professor Gunkel’s two main interests are these: the setting of the Old Testament in the larger context of ancient Oriental civilization, and the connection of the Hebrew religion with the actual experience of the people. In both departments he has been a pioneer, and in both his historical imagination and spiritual intuitions have been richly displayed.

It is astonishing and regrettable that his work has not been made accessible to English readers. Some German theological writers fail to win this entrance; Rothe is a case in point. Gunkel, in our own day, is another. But I feel confident that those who have read these studies will recognize that their author has something incisive to say which few other Old Testament scholars in Germany are able to contribute. Kazlitt used to draw a distinction between Sir James Mackintosh and Coleridge by saying that while “the first knows all that has been said on a subject, the last has something to say that was never said before.’ Professor Gunkel belongs to the second class. And even when others have said what he says, there is a quality of imagination and intuition in his writing which is too uncommon to be missed. No Old Testament critic of our age is more suggestive. None appreciate more truly the value of the Old Testament as a religious classic. The studies in this volume display him as a keen literary critic and also as a man of genuine moral and spiritual insight. His introduction to an English audience is long overdue, but I hope and believe that these characteristic essays from his pen will not only extend his reputation in circles beyond Germany, but also promote what has been one of his chief ends in life, the better appreciation of the faith that throbs within the tales and songs and prophecies of Old Testament literature.

JAMES MOFFATT.

Contents

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MEE a ty. i) ghey aR agi ed 9 CHAPTER I. WHAT IS LEFT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT? . . . 13

II, FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEMS OF HEBREW LITERARY HIS-

II Fundamental Problems Of Hebrew Literary History!

THE aim of this essay is to give a short account of the main principles underlying my article on Hebrew Literature which appeared in Kultur der Gegenwart.2 Down to the present time there is, properly speaking, nothing that can be called a history of Hebrew literature, although much valuable preliminary work has been done. There is, of course, a branch of study, usually called Old Testament Introduction, which deals mainly with the critical questions that concern the literature. For many years these critical problems have occupied the most prominent place in Old Testament study. That was just and right, and criticism will always remain an important, even a fundamental, branch of Old Testament scholarship. Some of the Old Testament writings have come down to us without any statement regarding the date when they were composed. In the case of others, traditional statements on that subject have been proved to be erroneous. We have learned that many of the books in the Old Testament have a very complicated history. They have been compiled from older oral or written traditions and have been subjected to frequent redaction. It was the first duty of scholarship to clear this jungle before undertaking any constructive t First published in Deutsche Literaturzeitung, Jahrgang xxvii, 1906, columns 1797-1800, 1861-1866. Reprinted in my Reden und Aufsdtze, p. 29 ff, 2 Vol. i, 1906, pp. 51-102, work. Even if some of the results reached can only be called tentative, this task has now been practically accomplished, and it is now possible to build on this foundation and make an attempt towards constructing the history of Hebrew literature.

Many scholars will at once raise the objection that no such history can be given. ‘To begin with, the chronology of the writings is quite uncertain. In many cases the most that can be done is to assign the writing in question to a period. To arrange all the books and their constituent parts in anything like a fixed chronological order is quite impossible. Again, we have no knowledge of the writers. In many cases we do not even know their names, and there is hardly a single case where we have reliable information regarding the personal circumstances and career of the writer. From this it is clear that a history of Hebrew literature, meaning an indication of the chronological order of the Old Testament writings and an exposition of each writing in the light of the personality of the author of it, cannot possibly be written.

But now the question arises whether, notwithstanding this, there cannot be a history of Hebrew literature in a different sense. The lack of a definite chronology would not be an insuperable obstacle. We should have to be content with indicating the periods of literary activity and dispense with more definite statements. In the case of such ancient literature the personalities of the writers are of far less importance than in the literature of later ages. In the great periods of later literatures, literary history must necessarily take the form of biographies of the great writers and their works must be interpreted through their personal experiences. But in ancient Israel personality, even in the case of an author, was far less developed. In the Psalms, for instance, we find an extraordinary sameness of content—in different Psalms we find the same thoughts, moods, forms of expression, metaphors, rhetorical figures, phrases. Even the very greatest writers in Israel, the prophets, frequently exhibit the most striking uniformity. This is due to the fact that in antiquity the power of custom was far greater than it is in the modern world, and besides, like everything else connected with religion, religious literature—and the writings contained in the Old Testament are almost exclusively religious—is very conservative. Therefore a history of Hebrew literature, if it is to do justice to its subject-matter, has comparatively little concern with the personality of the writers. That has, of course, a place of its own, but Hebrew literary history should occupy itself more with the literary type that lies deeper than any individual effort. Hebrew literary history is therefore the history of the literary types practised in Israel, and it is perfectly possible to produce such a history from the sources that are available.

The prime task of a history of literature in Israel must therefore be to determine the literary types represented in the Old Testament. We must take the writings of the Old Testament, and, as many of these are collections of writings, we must take their constituent parts out of the order in which they happen to appear in our Canon and in which ‘‘ Old Testament Introduction ” usually studies them, and then rearrange them according to the type to which they belong.

Some of the main literary types may be briefly mentioned. There is first the broad classification into Prose and Poetry. Narrative is usually found in prose form, and the following different kinds of narrative can be distinguished: stories about the deities, i.e. Myths ; primitive Folk-tales (of these two, only fragments are found in Israel) ; the popular Saga ; the longer Romance ; the religious Legend ; and, lastly, Historical Narrative in the stricter sense. Poetical literary types include: the oracular wisdom, the prophetic oracular saying, the Lyric—the two last mentioned being specially frequent. Lyric poetry is again subdivided into (a) secular lyrics, such as the Dirge, the Love Song, the scornful lay, the song of carouse, the wedding song, the song of victory, the royal song, and (6) spiritual lyrics, including the Hymn, the Thanksgiving, the Dirge (both private and public, the Eschatological Psalm, etc. Numerous types are found conjoined in the prophetic writings—the Vision in narrative form, the Prophetic Oracle, the Discourse (in many forms). Among these last mentioned the oldest is that which foretells the future, and may either be the Threat or the Promise ; the Invective, upbraiding sin; the Exhortation, calling to well-doing, and many others. Most of these types have long been recognized, and it is the task of Literary History to study them systematically and scientifically. Each type must be studied in order to show the materials with which it deals and the forms which it necessarily assumes. It will be found that a particular literary type is distinguished by a certain form of exordium. Just as the fairy-tale of to-day usually opens with “‘ Once upon a time,” a letter with “Dear Sir,” a sermon with “Brethren,” so the Hebrew Hymn frequently opens with “Sing unto the Lord,” the Dirge with ‘‘ Ah! How,” the Prophetic Invective with “Ha! Ye.” It is possible that students who are still unfamiliar with these ancient types will at first find it difficult to recognize them, definite and distinct as they are, but we must remember that this difficulty did not exist for the ancient world. To the people of Israel the laws of literary form were as familiar as the rules of Hebrew grammar. They obeyed them unconsciously and lived in them; it is only we who have to learn to understand them. Professor Karl Budde was the first to describe one ancient Hebrew literary type, the Dirge. It was he also who made out the Wedding Song and thus encouraged others to undertake similar studies. In more recent days, Hedwig Tahnor has described the Hebrew Dirge in all its varieties and compared it with similar poems of primitive peoples.

It goes without saying that a task of this kind calls for an artistic sense which up till now has not been very prominent in Old Testament “‘ Introduction.” But this zsthetic sense must not be content to express delight over the beauty of ancient Hebrew compositions. It must endeavour to dissect understandingly the beauty that is there, and scholars will then perhaps abandon the view that the zsthetic treatment of the Old Testament writings is unscientific and should be left to “ popular ” writers.

This study of the literary types, however, will only merit the name of Literary History when it attempts to get at the history through which these types have passed.

Every ancient literary type originally belonged to a quite definite side of the national life of Israel. Just as among ourselves the ‘‘ sermon ” belongs to the pulpit, while the ‘‘ fairy-tale” has its home in the nursery, so in ancient Israel the Song of Victory was sung by maidens to greet the returning war-host; the Lament was chanted by hired female mourners by the bier of the dead ; the Thora was announced by the priest in the sanctuary; the Judgment (mishpat) was given by the judge in his seat; the prophet uttered his Oracle in the outer court of the temple; the elders at the gate gave forth the Oracle of Wisdom. To understand the literary type we must in each case have the whole situation clearly before us and ask ourselves, Who is speaking ? Who are the listeners? What is the muse en scéne at the time? What effect is aimed at? In many cases a type is employed by a special class of speaker, and its use reveals of what class he is. Just as to-day a ‘“‘sermon”’ implies a professional “‘ preacher,” so in ancient times the Thora and the hymn of worship were given through the priest, the oracular saying was uttered by the ‘“‘ wise men,” and the lay was the utterance of a “singer.” There may even have been a professional class of popular “‘ story-tellers.”’

Only a short study of these literary types is needed to show that, almost without exception, they were originally not written, but spoken. It is another of the profound differences between ancient Hebrew life and the life of modern days that writing dominated life and even “literature” to a far less extent than it does with us. This explains the extreme brevity and small compass of the ancient compositions. This deserves to be strongly emphasized, because modern students, accustomed to much longer compositions, find it difficult to understand such brevity, and because the delimitation of the literary units is an essential postulate of any literary history. It is a familiar fact that a hearer is able to grasp much longer literary units than a reader, who can, of course, suspend and resume his reading at will. This is especially true of the ancient listener, whose receptive power was very limited. Therefore the units of ancient times, both spoken and sung, are much shorter than the written ones with which we are more familiar to-day. The most ancient Hebrew national ballad is contained in one or perhaps two long lines— that was all the average hearer of the day could grasp at a time. The Wisdom literature existed originally as single proverbs or sayings, only one being put forth at a time. And even the most ancient legal judgments, prophetic utterances, and Thora statutes: are not much longer. In the Sagas we can make out an ancient style in which the narrative originally consisted of not more than two or three of our modern Bible “‘ verses.”’

It is still possible, in the case of many of these literary types, to trace how they gradually became longer. Compare, for instance, the lengthy utterances of Ezekiel with those ‘‘ burdens,” mostly quite brief, of which the ** Book ” of Amos is composed ; or the detailed Joseph Romance with the brief Saga of the Tower of Babel. Just as we see the development of our children’s minds in the gradually increasing amount that they can take in at a time, so we can trace one feature of the growth of civilization in the gradual increase of the literary units in Israel. Finally, it is true in contrast to the ancient brevity of style, an entirely mew tendency arose, a tendency that resulted in tediousness, such as we find in the long-drawn-out speeches in Deuteronomy, in some passages of Jeremiah, in the already-mentioned Joseph Romance, in a Psalm like the cxixth. Without doubt this drift towards length indicates that the times had grown more literary.

But it is one of the critical moments in the life of an ancient literature when some of the types that originally belonged to the life of the people appear in definitive written form. Then, as a rule, collections of writings appear. Almost all that we have in the “‘ Books” of the Old Testament comes under this category. It is among the people that the single proverb, the single song, the single narrative emerges; but when these are reduced to writing, naturally several of them are put together. Thus arise collections of Sagas, Lays, and Proverbs. Such collections are of various kinds. Sometimes the original brief units are simply put together without any connection between the items, as in the case of our hymn-books, or Grimm’s Tales, the Old Testament Psalter, the book of Proverbs, and in many of the prophetic books. In that case the chief literary interest lies not so much in the “‘ Books,” as in the shorter units which were afterwards gathered into “‘ Books.” In other cases, the compilers have conjoined shorter units to form longer units, and these together constitute a new separate entity, i.e. a “‘ Book.” Thus most of the so-called Historical Books of the Old Testament are made up of oral traditions, which have been woven —sometimes by a complicated process—into some degree of unity by professional writers and infused with their spirit. Here, again, Literary History is specially interested in these collectors, who did more than merely collect the material. Then, lastly, there emerged great creative personalities, who followed up the artificial work of less gifted men and produced new, more comprehensive units. ‘Thus, in the days when the author of Job lived, there must have been an abundant literature of Songs and Sayings; but that genius proceeded to create complete cycles of long speeches and worked them up into one splendid comprehensive poem.

There is another line of the history of these literary types which runs parallel with that which has been described above. The ancient types grew up among the people and were part of their national genius. By and by arose professional writers—Poets, Story-tellers, Prophets—who employed the styles that had been perfected by the people and applied them for their own purposes. ‘Thus artistic poetry arose out of the national poetry. Less gifted men adopted a style as they found it; abler men added here and there something of their own ; men of genius transformed it. Each type had its classical period. Then came the mere imitators. In many parts of the Old Testament we have side by side examples of the oldest popular composition, classical creations, and fainter imitations—of the last named more than a few. Our science has the task of describing the mentality and the work of these writers, and the exposition of the great writers of Israel is the copestone of the Hebrew Literary History. It will be clear from what has been said that a true appreciation of these men is only possible when the types have been studied. We must also keep in view that a writer who employs a type which he has borrowed may use it in various ways. ‘There is no foundation for the fear that such a study of the types will push into the background the more important study of the writers. The two lines of study in no way exclude each other, but scholars should meantime devote attention first to what is really the primary task—the study of the types.

The oldest types, in the form in which they were current among the people, are always pure and unmixed ; but in later periods, when men and conditions of life were more complex, when professional writers adopted the type, there occur deviations and mixtures of styles. The Dirge, e.g., which was originally sung at the grave of a dead man, was used metaphorically in connection with the downfall of a people or of a city. At a still later stage it was employed to express scornful exultation over a fallen enemy. Again, religious songs, originally used in divine service, were sometimes divorced from such public use and were sung by an individual in his

E own chamber. It was in this way that the Psalm poetry » arose. Or, again, we find a combination of song and proverb or song conjoined with narrative. All manner of mixed styles are specially frequent in the prophets. In their eagerness to reach their people they adopted a very large number of types used by other writers, combined them, and filled them with prophetic content. It was thus the prophets became poets, historians, and legislators, and the types which they thus used and developed were continued by their disciples as independent types. Such mingling of styles is frequently found when the history of a literature is nearing its close.

Occasionally it is even possible to see the same material passing through different literary types, being transformed on each occasion in the spirit of a new age. For instance, the Saga can be seen passing into the Romance and into the Legend.

Finally we come to the tragedy of Hebrew literature. The spirit loses power. The types are exhausted. Imitations begin to abound. Redactions take the place of original creations. Hebrew ceases to be the living language of the people. By this time the collections are grouped together into larger collections. The Canon has come into being.

It need hardly be said that the Literary History of Israel, having such tasks to perform, must perforce take the shape of historical narrative. Old Testament Introduction may consider it sufficient to treat its problems separately, following the accidental order in which the books have come down to us. Some attempts have been made, even from that standpoint, to produce something to which the name of Literary History has been given. But a genuine History of the literature can only be founded on a thorough study of the types. Its character must be determined by a consideration of the types and of the periods into which the history of the nation and its civilization falls. It will only merit the title it claims when it can show how the literature emerged from the national history and was the expression of its spiritual life. Professor Reuss, in his Geschichte der Reiligen Schriften des Alten Testaments, has done much to prepare the way for a real Literary History of Israel.

There remains one more point of great importance. The history of Israel has very close connections with the history of the other Oriental peoples, and therefore, in the study of its literature, constant attention must be paid to the cognate literary types that were current among these peoples, especially in Babylonia and Egypt. In this regard Old Testament scholars have still a large debt to pay. The time is now surely past when men will try to interpret the oracles of the Old Testament without regard to the similar literature of Egypt, or to understand the religious songs of Israel apart from those of Babylonia. This study is still in its infancy, and a rich harvest awaits the student who endeavours to collect all the narratives, including those of distant nations, that exhibit any likeness to those of Israel and compare them with each other. Very curious affinities will be recognized, but on the other hand the peculiar character of the Hebrew mind will be all the more clearly seen. Such a task is, to be sure, far beyond the power of any one man. Can we not have an Academy, a brotherhood of scholars, who feel the importance of the subject and are willing to follow it up?

Although Literary History presupposes the settlement of the main problems of ‘‘ Introduction,” it will doubtless also have a reflex influence on that branch of study. It will save scholars from giving exclusive interest to mere details and direct their minds to larger problems. It will also shed new light on many aspects of Hebrew life. When we have seen how literary types arise, and understand that they are not the creations of individual men, but are produced by the co-operation of many generations, we shall not be likely to claim that one man—say Jeremiah—wrote the Psalms of Israel. Further, the influence of oral tradition on the literature will be seen to be greater than has yet been admitted.

The author’s article on the “ Literaturgeschichte Israels’ in Kultur der Gegenwart attempts in fifty pages to indicate what can be done in this direction. In view of the wide reach of the task, he is unable to say when he will be in a position to add anything to what he has there said.t

t Cf. the article “‘ Bibelwissenschaft IC: Literaturgeschichte,

Israels” in Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, and the numerous other literary articles there.

III THE RELIGION OF THE PSALMS:

Discussion about the value of the Old Testament for the Protestant Church has not yet come to an end in Germany. ‘The best interests of our Church, however, demand that this discussion should be carried on not with an excess of zeal for or against the Old Testament, but with calm impartiality and thorough knowledge of the subject, and therefore an Old Testament subject is specially relevant to our business here to-day.

We are to deal with a theme that lies at the very heart of the Old Testament, or at least constitutes one of its chief interests. In former days the Psalms were awarded a place almost equal to that occupied by the New Testament. To-day we are not to treat any of the external questions, although, of course, scholarship cannot evade them: we are to leave unmentioned all critical problems and all questions of date. We are to consider now exclusively the most characteristic content of the Psalter, the religion that finds expression there.

The material that is to occupy us now is extremely varied and complicated. It can also be fairly said that up till now this subject has been neglected. The task of the present day is to lay a foundation for the understanding of the Psalms. The purpose of this lecture is not to lay that foundation, but rather to put before you some results of that preliminary work. In order to

t A lecture delivered in the Bund fiir Gegenwartschristentum, Eisenach, October 4, 1921. First published in Die Christliche Welt, Xxxvi, 1922, Nos. 1, 2, 5, 6, and 7.

make these results intelligible, I must say a very few words about the kind of foundation work to which I have referred.

If we are to reach a clear view of these poems, with all their numerous similarities and divergences, our first business must be to arrange them in groups according to their literary types. This does not mean, however, any capricious classification in accordance with individual taste. Our aim is to restore the arrangement that indicates the origin and source of the Psalms. ‘This is, or should be, the prime interest of all study of the book at the present time, and should include a study of the rise and the history of Hebrew psalmody. I have already hinted at such a study in my Reden und Aufsdtze and in the article “‘ Psalmen ” in Schiele-Zscharnack’s Lexicon called Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, and I shall return to it at greater length in my Einlettung zu den Psalmen, which is about to be published. Here and now I shall enumerate a few of the chief results.

1. If we are to understand the Psalms as living poetry, we must not confine ourselves to the songs contained in the Psalter. We must include the cognate poetry in the historical books, in the book of Job, in the prophetical writings, in the Apocrypha, as well as the lyric poetry of other peoples, especially the Babylonians and the Egyptians. And we are discussing here to-day not only the piety of the Psalter, but that of Hebrew lyric poetry as a whole. We can, of course, on the present occasion give only a brief sketch of the subject.

2. Our most important task is to understand how this poetry arose. As in the case of all the literature of . Israel, we must think of the Psalms as primarily not written literature at all. We must put away all thoughts of paper and ink and look on the Psalms as having their source in the life of the people. They played a part there before they took literary form at all. The most important fact in this connection is that the singing of Psalms was originally a part of worship. In certain parts of worship, both public and private, songs were sung, and the most important aspect of the history of psalm-singing is that it spread beyond the public sanctuary and penetrated into the private worship of the pious individual. The individual imitated the models which were familiar to him in public worship and filled them with his own personal life.

3. We are thus able to classify the Psalms according to their types. These songs are to be arranged according to the aspect of religious life to which they ee belong. They are differentiated into:

Hymns, originally sung as choruses or solos at a sacred feast.

Songs of Praise, akin to the hymns used in public thanksgivings.

National Dirges, rendered by the choir at times of national stress or calamity.

Court Songs, sung by the Court singer in the temple in presence of the royal Court.

Individual Dirges, originally sung in the sanctuary by individuals in times of personal stress, such as sickness, whether in protestation of innocence or in acknowledgment of sin, and then used by such individuals at home to relieve their feelings.

Individual Songs of Praise, originally sung to accompany a thank-offering for deliverance out of great distress,

There are also minor or secondary types, which bear evidence of having been influenced by the prophetical writings and by the Wisdom literature, such as that represented by the Proverbs of Solomon.

Now if we wish to look at the inner life of the Psalmists we must start from these types, and we shall do well to take together the types that are most closely akin. We shall thus have a clear view of the aspects presented by the religious life of Israel, so far as that finds expression in religious lyric poetry. Such aspects comprise :

(1) The Religion of the Hymns, in which the fundamental thoughts and feelings find expression.

(2) The Religion of the People, contained in the National Dirges and Songs of Praise and Hymns, and in the eschatological poetry in imitation of the prophets.