Medes to enter into an alliance with him; that he collected together a large army of Babylonians and Medes, conquered Jerusalem, and took Jehoiakim prisoner; and that, having seized upon the gold, and silver, and brass of the temple, he sent them to Babylon." With this exception, there is not a single sentence, among the numerous fragments preserved by Eusebius, which contains the remotest allusion to any of the Jewish prophets; much less any passage in which mention is made of their written predictions. This fate, however, many valuable Heathen works have shared in common with the writings of the Jewish prophets. The History which we now have under the name of Velleius Paterculus, and which brings us acquainted with some things not mentioned by any other historian,* is not known to have been quoted by any writer till the time of Priscian, who lived about five hundred years after the author; and from this period we hear no more of it again till the time of Aventinus, a further interval of nine hundred years: yet no one doubts the authenticity or credibility of that work. It by no means follows, therefore, that the writings of the Jewish prophets, because they are not quoted by early Greek writers, were composed at a later period than the one usually assigned for the composition of them. The literary intercourse between the Greeks and the Jews, before the Babylonish captivity, and for a very considerable time after the re-establishment of the latter as a nation, was certainly far less than that which now subsists between the English and the Brahmins, and yet it was not without great difficulty that Warren Hastings, Governor-General of India, obtained a complete code or digest of the Brahminical laws and customs in Sanscrit; which it was necessary to translate first into Persian, and afterwards into English, before it could answer any useful end. The truth is, that Greeks and Jews, at the period in question, were notoriously ignorant of the literature of each other; and that we might with just as must reason contend that the "Iliad” and "Odyssey" of Homer, and the " Theogony" and "Works and Days" of Hesiod, are the fabrications of a later age, because they are not quoted in the books of the Old Testament, as that the writings of the Jewish prophets are spurious, because they were unknown to early classical Greek authors. These writings were composed in a language, the genius of which was totally different from that of the Greek, and the knowledge of which Heathens had few inducements, and still fewer opportunities, for cultivating; and as no Greek translation of them existed before the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, it is altogether unreasonable to look for evidences of their existence, much less for passages tending to establish their authenticity and credibility, in the works of Greek writers prior to the middle of the second century before Christ.

There are various methods, however, of establishing the date of a composition, besides producing passages with that view from the works of authors who lived in or near the time when such composition professes to have been written. It sometimes happens that the age of a work may be ascertained by collecting and analyzing the peculiar modes of expression found in it, or by comparing the sentiments which it contains with those which are known to have prevailed in the country, and at the period in which the supposed author flourished: and sometimes the sense, or even the orthography, of a

"Quædam habet, quæ haud alibi invenias." See an extract from G. J. Vossius De Historicis Litinis, prefixed to Mattaire's Velleins Paterculus.

Bentley's Dissertation upon the Epistles of Phalaris, &c. Ed. 1699, p. 508, Ed. 1817, p. 366.

single word may do more than whole pages of tabourer: reastum mine the particular period when a work was writter.

The name DAVID supplies us with an argumen & the .novelty of which may interest, white is success. apakang. 1 ter srAGE

in band may serve to convince the reader. In naner SOLLEINES WIN with, and sometimes without the 1, in the Hebrew couse of Lo

ment; and, as we find the same letter arbitrarin omnes or mener L. vu words, this variation in the mode of spelling the name La

any particular notice on the part of critics and commentator.

cott undertook to collate the Hebrew manuscript of te

was led to observe, in the course of me on, that the OsLE & HET;. of this letter in the name of Daric dic 19 unguas wi

the different books in which the name occur, DE WI selves. On examination it was found that

posed after the return of the Jews from the best zpwe this name occurred, it was writter T, UI ta

have been composed before or during the captve introduced, it was written

here, tre, a

presented itself for ascertaining whether an Testament, in which the name of Lava vec

the return of the Jews from the babyras zou.
this test, however, Dr. Kennicot was es tra
discovery. He employed it as an armer as te allenme
"Song of Solomon," because it the

written with a yod, whereas it was the Ban & out are
of Solomon to write it did a UE- bar ta

motive may have existed in the mix of the tener vu

motive, however, which, too

appear to have presented seru the mo

111 signifies beloved, aut a fount Ev
Song of Solomon, that u al te renang we g
together. It is by no means more tim
was originally written without av

I * E
play upon the word 77, with vesa a meter.
poem; but that some sorte afe to

with the intention of removing a subnet 20 A pened that all our present copies reac

Of the books winch consume the preen Je

second of Chronicles, Ezra, Netemal iste, za ka been last added; and tins addros a

vet av am toda a bud time of Simon the Just, who succeeded in fatur, true, a whopn B. C. 300, and retained that office tre van Now, di te kunn tioned books, except Nehemiah and Maart, are, upon gust pourta buted to Ezra, though not inserted in the canon til about & sangry as a ma after his time. We find, accordings, that the same of barn,

occurs in these books, is invariatey spet ways; we ha n historical books of an earlier date, it is with the same served my toy bear boy spelt without a yod. It seems impossible, therefor, to avoit se onévmen that the authors themselves adopted the mode of speling the same ass prevailed in their own times, and that the traueriters, faves why song

what the authors wrote, unconsciously transmitted to posterity an infallible criterion for determining the age of any particular book in which the name of David happens to occur.

In applying this criterion to the prophetical books, it will of course be necessary to exercise some degree of caution, because it can hardly be expected, after the numerous transcriptions which these books have undergone, that they should be entirely free from orthographical errors. But if we find the exceptions few, and those of such a nature as to admit of a rational and easy explanation, the rule must then be considered as established.

The prophetical books of the Old Testament are sixteen in number. Three of these (Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi,) are acknowledged to have been written after the return of the Jews from Babylon, and the remaining thirteen are generally supposed to have been written either before or during the captivity. Of the three which are acknowledged to have been written after the return of the Jews from Babylon, Zechariah is the only one in which the name of David occurs. We meet with it six times in this book, and it is invariably written with the yod. In Isaiah and Jeremiah it is repeatedly found, but always without the yod. In Ezekiel xxxiv. 23, it is written with the yod, but evidently by mistake, because that le ter is omitted in the verse immediately following, and the same omission is made in other parts of the book. In Hosea iii. 5, Amos vi. 5 and ix. 11, the yod is inserted in most printed editions; but with regard to the passage in Hosea, it may be observed, that, in the celebrated Venice or Bomberg Bible, edited by Felix Pratensis, and published so early as the year 1518, the yod is omitted; and, though it is inserted in both the passages from Amos, in the former of these passages the name has the little circle (o) over it, to indicate that it is a false reading, and in the latter it is printed 717 in the margin.

The result of this investigation, then, is quite as favourable as could have been anticipated or wished. Had Zechariah adopted the ancient mode of spelling the name of David; or had the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, or any other prophet who is supposed to have written before the captivity, contained undoubted instances of the modern orthography, it must be admitted on all hands that the antiquity, and, consequently, the authenticity and credibility of the prophetical writings, would have been in great jeopardy. But when the conclusion to which a fair application of this test leads, is found to correspond so exactly with that which had previously been deduced from totally different premises, the agreement must be acknowledged to furnish as strong a presumption in favour of the antiquity and genuineness of the books of the prophets as it is possible for human testimony, under any circumstances, to supply.

With regard to the particular question of authorship, it may be proper to observe, in this place, that, though no direct evidence can, at this distance of time, be adduced to prove that each individual book was written by the person whose name it now bears, and though no such evidence can in reason be expected, yet many circumstances concur to place this point beyond reasonable dispute, and to shew the utter improbability of the contrary supposition.

all

No chain of evidence can be conceived more complete than that exhibited in the proofs already adduced of the existence of these books, and their universal reception among the Jews, from the fifth century after Christ till the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, about the middle of the second century

before Christ. Nor will it be an easy matter to evade the force of the argument arising from the orthography of the name David, establishing, as it does, in so satisfactory a manner, a criterion for determining whether any particular book of the Old Testament, in which it may chance to occur, was written before or after the time of Ezra. It may nevertheless be thought, and has in fact been openly contended by some, that the whole of the prophetical books are from beginning to end a mere fabrication; but before such charges as these can be alleged against them with any show of reason, it behoves the person who is bold and reckless enough to prefer them to shew by what miraculous combination of circumstances the supposed fraud escaped detection; to point out how it happens that each separate book is written in a style altogether peculiar to itself; to ascertain whether these suspected forgeries were the work of a single individual, or of a number of individuals; and to bring to light the model after which each particular book was framed. In the mean time we may stand excused in the eye of the less fastidious reader if we take the liberty of assuming every book to be the production of a separate writer, and consider the authenticity of each as resting on grounds entirely peculiar to itself; assumptions which we are fully warranted, by the circumstances of the case, in making, and which nothing short of actual demonstration can subvert or set aside.

It was a very ancient custom among the Jews to adopt the words with which any particular book of Scripture began as a title to that book. Thus

,ואלה שמות IN THE BEGINNING, and Exodus בראשית Genesis was called

NOW THESE ARE THE NAMES; because the books so denominated began with these particular words.† Upon the same principle the book of Isaiah was called THe vision of ISAIAH THE SON OF AMOS, not, as the words at first view seem to import, because the subject matter of that book was originally confined to a single vision of the prophet, but because these words happened to stand at the head of that collection of prophecies which the Jews attributed to Isaiah; and under this very title we find it quoted in the second book of Chronicles (xxxii. 32). "Now the rest of the acts of Heze. kiah, and his goodness, behold they are written in The Vision of Isaiah, the prophet, the son of Amos."" The portion of Hezekiah's history to which the author of the second book of Chronicles refers in this passage, is found in the 36th, 37th, 38th, and 39th chapters of Isaiah. We are fully warranted, therefore, in concluding, that the book which we now have under the name of Isaiah, was known to the author of the second book of Chronicles, and, consequently, received as the undisputed production of that prophet, at least as early as the end of the fourth century before Christ, if not a century and a half earlier.

In the book of Daniel mention is made of certain volumes or rolls containing the celebrated prophecy of Jeremiah concerning the destruction of Jerusalem, from which Daniel himself is said to have ascertained the exact period at which the captivity was to terminate; and, although no direct quotation is made, in this passage, from the book of Jeremiah, the similarity of the expressions used by both writers is too close to have been the result of mere accident. "In the first year" of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, “I, Daniel, understood by books the number of years whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that he would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem." (Dan. ix. 2.) If the reader will now be

* Hieron. Præf. in xii. Proph.-Lowth, De Sacra Poesi Hebræorum. Præl. xxi. + Hieron. Prologus Galeatus.

at the trouble of comparing the words printed in Italics with others of similar construction and import in Jeremiah xxv. 1, 9, 12, he will find that the books to which Daniel refers must have been rolls upon which certain predictions of Jeremiah were written, and, consequently, that a very important part, if not the whole of the book which we now have under the name of Jeremiah, was known to Daniel, and regarded by him as the genuine production of that writer.

It appears, from a variety of passages in the Old Testament, that the character of prophet among the Jews was attended with great responsibility and danger. Those who sustained this character were often seen in the palaces of their sovereigns, restraining the profligacy of the court, and boldly censuring such measures as were calculated to entail disgrace and ruin upon the Jewish people. No apprehensions of personal danger could deter Jeremiah from warning his countrymen of the calamities impending over the Jewish state, and the approaching destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. This he did openly and unreservedly, braving the fury of an incensed populace and a wicked priesthood, at the hazard of his life. "Then," we are told, “rose up certain of the elders of the land, and spake to all the assembly of the people, saying, 'Micah, the Morashthite, prophesied in the days of Hezekiah, king of Judah, saying,'-' Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Zion shall be ploughed like a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountains of the house as the high places of the forest." " (Jer. xxvi. 17, 18.) These words were a literal quotation from Micah iii. 12, and produced the intended effect. The appeal grounded upon them (v. 19) was successful, and the prophet's life was saved. Here, then, we are incidentally furnished with a proof of the authenticity of the book which we now have under the name of Micah, and likewise of the high repute in which the predictions of its author were held within less than a century from the time of their publication.

If it were necessary to multiply remarks of this kind, it might be shewn that Jeremiah and Micah† contain quotations from Isaiah; and that clear references to the prophecies of Haggai and Zechariah are found in the book of Ezra. But, as the instances already adduced are amply sufficient to prove that the books which we now have under the names of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Micah, were received as theirs in times almost immediately succeeding those in which it is said that they were written, and as Haggai and Zechariah are acknowledged to have been comparatively late writers, we may here consider the chain of evidence in favour of the antiquity and authenticity of the books of the prophets as terminating, and proceed to make our inferences accordingly.

In the first place, then, we have the independent testimony of Jews and Christians to the existence and genuineness of these books for a space of more than eighteen centuries. This fact, it must be acknowledged, is a highly important as well as interesting one. To set it aside, "we must admit a principle, which, in no question of ordinary criticism, would be suffered for a single moment to influence our understandings. We must conceive, that two parties, at the very time that they were influenced by the

* Lowth's Isaiah, Introd. Rem. to chap. xv.; Blayney's Jeremiah, note on chap. xlviii. 31, &c.

+ Lowth's Isaiah, note on chap. ii. 2—4; Newcome's Minor Prophets, note on Micah iv. 1-3.

Ezra v. 1, vi. 14.