the second so great a number of distichs, almost all parabolical, and besides, all more than two-lined proverbs of Solomon? One can scarcely find the reason of this singular phenomenon in anything else than in the judgment of the author of the first collection as the determining motive of his selection. For when we think also on the sources and origin of the two collections, the second always presupposes the first, and that which is singular in the author's thus restricting himself can only have its ground in the freedom which he allowed to his subjectivity. Before we more closely examine the style and the teaching of the book, and the conclusions thence arising, another phenomenon claims our attention, which perhaps throws light on the way in which the several collections originated; but, at all events, it may not now any longer remain out of view, when we are in the act of forming a judgment on this point. = 3. The repetitions in the Book of Proverbs.-We find not only in the different parts of the collection, but also within the limits of one and the same part, proverbs which wholly or in part are repeated in the same or in similar words. Before we can come to a judgment, we must take cognizance as closely as possible of this fact. We begin with "The Proverbs of Solomon," x.-xxii. 16; for this collection is in relation to xxv.-xxix. certainly the earlier, and it is especially with respect to the Solomonic proverbs that this fact demands an explanation. In this earlier collection we find, (1) whole proverbs repeated in exactly the same words: xiv. 12 = xvi. 25;—(2) proverbs slightly changed in their form of expression: x. 1 = xv. 20, xiv. 20 xix. 4, xvi. 2=xxi. 2, xix. 5 xix. 9, xx. 10=xx. 23, xxi. 9=xxi. 19;-(3) proverbs almost identical in form, but somewhat different in sense: x. 2 = xi. 4, xiii. 14=xiv. 27 ;—(4) proverbs the first lines of which are the same: x. 15=xviii. 11;—(5) proverbs with their second lines the same: x. 6 =x. 11, x. 8=x. 10, xv. 33 = xviii. 12 ;—(6) proverbs with one line almost the same: xi. 13=xx. 19, xi. 21=xvi. 5, xii. 14= xiii. 2, xiv. 31 = xvii. 5, xvi. 18 = xviii. 12, xix. 12 = xx. 2; comp. also xvi. 28 with xvii. 9, xix. 25 with xxi. 11. In comparing these proverbs, one will perceive that for the most part the external or internal resemblance of the surrounding has prompted the collector to place the one proverb in this place and the other in that place (not always indeed; for what reason e.g. could determine the position of xvi. 25 and xix. 5, 9, I cannot say); then that the proverb standing earlier is generally, to all appearance, also the earlier formed, for the second of the pair is mostly a synonymous distich, which generally further extends antithetically one line of the first: cf. xviii. 11 with x. 15, xx. 10, 23 with xi. 1, xx. 19 with xi. 13, xvi. 5 with xi. 21, xx. 2 with xix. 12, also xvii. 5 with xiv. 31, where from an antithetic proverb a synthetic one is formed; but here also there are exceptions, as xiii. 2 compared with xii. 14, and xv. 33 with xviii. 12, where the same line is in the first case connected with a synonymous, and in the second with an antithetic proverb; but here also the contrast is so loose, that the earlieroccurring proverb has the appearance of priority. We now direct our attention to the second collection, xxv.-xxix. When we compare the proverbs found here with one another, we see among them a disproportionately smaller number of repetitions than in the other collection; only a single entire proverb is repeated in almost similar terms, but in an altered sense, xxix. 20=xxvi. 12; but proverbs such as xxviii. 12, 28, xxix. 2, notwithstanding the partial resemblance, are equally original. On the other hand, in this second collection we find numerous repetitions of proverbs and portions of proverbs from the first:-(1) Whole proverbs perfectly identical (leaving out of view insignificant variations): xxv. 24=xxi. 9, xxvi. 22=xviii. 8, xxvii. 12 = xxii. 3, xxvii. 13=xx. 16;-(2) proverbs identical in meaning, with somewhat changed expression : xxvi. 13 = xxii. 13, xxvi. 15=xix. 24, xxviii. 6=xix. 1, xxviii. 19= xii. 11, xxix. 13=xxii. 2;—(3) proverbs with one line the same and one line different: xxvii. 21=xvii. 3, xxix. 22 = xv. 18; cf. also xxvii. 15 with xix. 13. When we compare these proverbs with one another, we are uncertain as to many of them which has the priority, as e.g. xxvii. 21 = xvii. 3, xxix. 22=xv. 18; but in the case of others there is no doubt that the Hezekiah-collection contains the original form of the proverb which is found in the other collection, as xxvi. 13, xxviii. 6, 19, xxix. 13, xxvii. 15, in relation to their parallels. In the other portions of this book also we find such repetitions as are met with in these two collections of Solomonic proverbs. In i. 7-ix. we have ii. 16, a little changed, repeated in vii. 5, and iii. 15 in viii. 11; ix. 10a i. 7a is a case not worthy of being mentioned, and it were inappropriate here to refer to ix. 4, 16. In the first appendix of "the Words of the Wise," xxii. 17-xxiv. 22, single lines often repeat themselves in another con = nection; cf. xxiii. 3 and 6, xxiii. 10 and xxii. 28, xxiii. 17 f. and xxiv. 13 f., xxii. 23 and xxiii. 11, xxiii. 17 and xxiv. 1. That in such cases the one proverb is often the pattern of the other, is placed beyond a doubt by the relation of xxiv. 19 to Ps. xxxvii. 1; cf. also xxiv. 20 with Ps. xxxvii. 38. If here there are proverbs like those of Solomon in their expression, the presumption is that the priority belongs to the latter, as xxiii. 27 cf. xxii. 14, xxiv. 5 f. cf xi. 14, xxiv. 19 f. cf. xiii. 9, in which latter case the justice of the presumption is palpable. Within the second appendix of "the Words of the Wise," xxiv. 23 ff., no repetitions are to be expected on account of its shortness; yet is xxiv. 23 repeated from the Solomonic Mashal xxviii. 21, and as xxiv. 33 f. are literally the same as vi. 10 f., the priority is presumably on the side of the author of i. 7-ix., at least of the Mashal in the form in which he communicates it. The supplements xxx. and xxxi. afford nothing that is worth mention as bearing on our present inquiry, and we may therefore now turn to the question, What insight into the origin of these proverbs and their collection do the observations made afford? From the numerous repetitions of proverbs and portions of proverbs of the first collection of the "Proverbs of Solomon" in the Hezekiah-collection, as well as from another reason stated at the end of the foregoing section of our inquiry, we conclude that the two collections were by different authors; in other words, that they had not both "the men of Hezekiah" for their authors. It is true that the repetitions in themselves do not prove anything against the oneness of their authorship; for there are within the several collections, and even within i.-ix. (cf. vi. 20 with i. 8, viii. 1 Quite the same phenomenon, Fleischer remarks, presents itself in the different collections of proverbs ascribed to the Caliph Ali, where frequently one and the same thought in one collection is repeated in manifold forms in a second, here in a shorter, there in a longer form. As a general principle this is to be borne in mind, that the East transmits unchanged, with scrupulous exactness, only religious writings regarded as holy and divine, and therefore these Proverbs have been transmitted unchanged only since they became a distinct part of the canon; before that time it happened to them, as to all in the East that is exposed to the arbitrariness of the changing spirit and the intercourse of life, that one and the same original text has been modified by one speaker and writer after another. Thus of the famous poetical works of the East, such e.g. as Firdusi's Schah-Nameh [Book of the Kings] and Sadi's Garden of Roses, not one мs. copy agrees with another. 10 f. with iii. 14 f.), repetitions, notwithstanding the oneness of their authorship. But if two collections of proverbs are in so many various ways different in their character, as x. 1-xxii. 16 and xxv.-xxix., then the previous probability rises almost to a certainty by such repetitions. From the form, for the most part anomalous, in which the Hezekiah-collection presents the proverbs and portions of proverbs which are found also in the first collection, and from their being otherwise independent, we further conclude that "the men of Hezekiah" did not borrow from the first collection, but formed it from other sources. But since one does not understand why "the men of Hezekiah" should have omitted so great a number of genuine Solomonic proverbs which remain, after deducting the proportionally few that have been repeated (for this omission is not to be explained by saying that they selected those that were appropriate and wholesome for their time), we are further justified in the conclusion that the other collection was known to them as one current in their time. Their object was, indeed, not to supplement this older collection; they rather regarded their undertaking as a similar people's book, which they wished to place side by side with that collection without making it superfluous. The difference of the selection in the two collections has its whole directing occasion in the difference of the intention. The first collection begins (x. 1) with the proverb— A wise son maketh glad his father, And a foolish son is the grief of his mother; the second (xxv. 2) with the proverb— It is the glory of God to conceal a thing, And the glory of kings to search out a matter. The one collection is a book for youth, to whom it is dedicated in the extended introduction, i. 7-ix.; the second is a people's book suited to the time of Hezekiah ("Solomon's Wisdom in Hezekiah's days," as Stier has named it), and therefore it takes its start not, like the first, from the duties of the child, but from those of the king. If in the two collections everything does not stand in conscious relation to these different objects, yet the collectors at least have, from the commencement to the close (cf. xxii. 15 with xxix. 26), these objects before their eyes. As to the time at which the first collection was made, the above considerations also afford us some materials for forming a judgment. Several pairs of proverbs which it contains present to us essentially the same sayings in older and more recent forms. Keil regards the proverbs also that appear less original as old-Solomonic, and remarks that one and the same poet does not always give expression to the same thoughts with the same pregnant brevity and excellence, and affirms that changes and reproductions of separate proverbs may proceed even from Solomon himself. This is possible; but if we consider that even Davidic psalms have been imitated, and that in the "Words of the Wise" Solomonic proverbs are imitated, moreover, that proverbs especially are subject to changes, and invite to imitation and transformation,—we shall find it to be improbable. Rather we would suppose, that between the publication of the 3000 proverbs of Solomon and the preparation of the collection x.-xxii. 16 a considerable time elapsed, during which the old-Solomonic Mashal had in the mouths of the people and of poets acquired a multitude of accretions, and that the collector had without hesitation gathered together such indirect Solomonic proverbs with those that were directly Solomonic. But did not then the 3000 Solomonic proverbs afford to him scope enough? We must answer this question in the negative; for if that vast number of Solomonic proverbs was equal in moral-religious worth to those that have been preserved to us, then neither the many repetitions within the first collection nor the proportional poverty of the second can be explained. The "men of Hezekiah" made their collection of Solomonic proverbs nearly 300 years after Solomon's time; but there is no reason to suppose that the old book of the Proverbs of Solomon had disappeared at that time. Much rather we may with probability conclude, from the subjects to which several proverbs of these collections extend (husbandry, war, court life, etc.), and from Solomon's love for the manifold forms of natural and of social life, that his 3000 proverbs would not have afforded much greater treasures than these before us. But if the first collection was made at a time in which the old-Solomonic proverbs had been already considerably multiplied by new combinations, accretions, and imitations, then probably a more suitable time for their origination could not be than that of Jehoshaphat, which was more related to the time of Solomon than to that of David. The personality of Jehoshaphat, inclined toward the promotion of the public worship of God, the edification of the people, the administration of justice; the dominion of the house of David recognised and venerated far and wide among neighbouring |