are nothing; ye see my casting down, and are afraid' (Job vi. 15-21).

Perhaps, however, the Psalmist is describing not the inability of others to help him, but his own frailty :-' I said in my extreme affliction, Man's life is a shadow, a phantom, an unreality.

2. To pass by the Syriasm 'overcome,' we have to reconcile the following ἐν τῷ κρίνεσθαί σε (usually rendered passively) with the original Hebrew, where the corresponding verb is active, and the justice of God's sentence is acknowledged :-'that thou mightest be justified when Thou speakest, and be clear when Thou judgest' (Ps. li. 4). An explanation frequently adopted is, That Thou mightest be acknowledged righteous, when the justice of Thy dealings is called in question. But some think a middle rendering of Kρiveolaι more suitable. Thus Bengel :-'Simul Deus et κpívei et кpiveтai. Kpíveraι, media significatione, qualem habere soleat verba certandi. Kpivovтai, qui in jure disceptant. LXX., Es. xliii. 26. Jud. iv. 5; Jer. xxv. 31. Exemplum Mich. vi. 2 s. necnon 1 Sam. xii. 7. Ineffabilis benignitas, qua Deus ad hominem disceptandi causa descendit.'

II. Gen. xviii. 10; Rom. ix. 9.

The citation differs from the LXX. in a detail involving merely critical considerations. In the former we read: 'At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son;' while the LXX. uses the fuller expression, κατὰ τὸν καιρὸν τοῦτον εἰς pas. The Hebrew is literally, at the living season1, i.e. according to the analogy of χρόνῳ τῷ ζῶντι καὶ παρόντι (Soph. Trach. 1169)—at the present season, sc. of next year. Nor does there seem to be any necessity for assigning to the adjective living the unusual sense reviving. The latter meaning is not established by such passages as: 'and... the spirit of Jacob their father revived" (Gen. xlv. 27); 'If a man die shall he live again?' (Job xiv. 14); 'They are dead, they shall not

! כעת חיה

2 ותחי

3 היחיה

live" (Is. xxvi, 14); for the fact that a tense of a verb may mean, to become alive (sc. again), does not prove that reviviscence is expressed radically by the verb 'to live.' It would seem, then, that the Hebrew phrase in question means at the living (i.e. present) season, and that it is fully and sufficiently rendered by κατὰ τὸν καιρὸν τοῦτον. On the other hand, the citation may be a direct abbreviation from the LXX.

III. Hos. i. 10; ii. 23; Rom. ix. 25, 26; 1 Pet. ii. 10.

One expression in the citation calls for critical remark. 'As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved. And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said into them, Ye are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God.'

The phrase italicized is taken from the LXX.: Kai čσTAL ἐν τῷ τόπῳ οὗ ἐῤῥέθη κ.τ.λ., and it is also a literal rendering of the Hebrew: but a difficulty arises in explaining the local reference, which is further marked by the subsequent exeî. Dean Alford's comment illustrates the difficulty: By Ev TÔ TÓT..... ékeî must not, I think, be understood, in any particular place, as Judæa; nor among any peculiar people, as the Christian Church but as a general assertion, that in every place where they were called, not His people, there they shall be called, His people. The original might, however, be rendered literally: 'in place of that they should be called;' i.e. 'instead of their being called;' which appears to satisfy the requirements of the context better than the local rendering, and to agree better with the general statements of a subsequent verse: 'And I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God' (Hos. ii. 23).

It remains to ask whether the citation is susceptible of a like general rendering; and it may be suggested in answer,

בל יחיו 1

2

.Hos. ii. 1, Heb במקום אשר יאמר להם

that the Greek ἐν τῷ τόπῳ κ.τ.λ. may have been intended originally as a simply literal (and therefore unidiomatic and non-natural) rendering. Thus much being premised, we remark that, Tóπos (like locus) may mean a passage, or place in a book, as in Luke iv. 17: 'when he had found the PLACE where it was written'. With a very similar non-local sense

of TÓTOS, St Paul's citation may be explained to mean, that 'where, or whereas, they used to be called où λaós pov, they should be called υἱοὶ θεοῦ ζῶντος.

IV. Deut. xxxii. 43; Rom. xv. 10.

This is one of the places in which the Jews have been suspected of corrupting the text of the original; and, whatever may be the grounds of the accusation, there is certainly a wide divergence between the Hebrew and the Greek. The citation occurs in connection with some others of which the characteristic word is evn Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: And that the Gentiles might glorify God for His mercy; as it is written, For this cause I will confess to Thee among the GENTILES, and sing unto Thy name (Ps. xviii. 49). And again He saith, Rejoice ye GENTILES, with His people (Deut. xxxii. 43). And again, Praise the Lord, all ye GENTILES; and laud Him, all ye people (Ps. cxvii. 1). And again, Esaias saith, There shall be a root of Jesse, and He shall rise to reign over the GENTILES; in Him shall the GENTILES trust (Is. xi. 10).'In the Hebrew of the passage in Deuteronomy, it is said: 'Rejoice, ye nations, His people;' which will bear the same application as St Paul's 'with His people;' for in the original the nations are addressed as His people, while in the citation, they are numbered with His people. And moreover the hypothesis of a very simple case of double-rendering would go far to account for the Septuagintal reading, regarded as a development out of a briefer original.

1 τὸν τύπον οὗ ἦν γεγραμμένον.

The Authorized Version, following the Hebrew, reads:—

'Rejoice, O ye nations, His people: for He will avenge the blood of His servants, and will render vengeance to His adversaries, and will be merciful unto His land and to His people'

and the Greek:

εὐφράνθητε οὐρανοὶ ἅμα αὐτῷ, καὶ προσκυνησάτωσαν αὐτῷ πάντες ἄγγελοι θεοῦ· εὐφράνθητε ἔθνη μετὰ τοῦ λαοῦ αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἐνισχυσάτωσαν αὐτῷ πάντες υἱοὶ θεοῦ· ὅτι τὸ αἷμα τῶν υἱῶν αὐτοῦ ἐκδικᾶται, καὶ ἐκδικήσει καὶ ἀνταποδώσει δίκην τοῖς ἐχθροῖς, καὶ τοῖς μισοῦσιν ἀνταποδώσει· καὶ ἐκκαθαριεῖ κύριος τὴν γῆν τοῦ λαοῦ αὐτοῦ.

Against the view that the Greek here represents the genuine Hebrew text, it may be urged that the whole passage in the Greek is apparently an expansion, and is not sufficiently concise to represent the original; so far at least as may be judged from the remaining portions, wherein no such wilful corruption is suspected. It is not only to the former part of the passage cited from the LXX. that there is nothing correspondent in the Masoretic text, but the like may be said of the latter part, where a tampering with the text would have been aimless and superfluous. If there is an accidental double-rendering of the clause, will render vengeance, the like may be the case with the preceding clauses; nor is evidence in confirmation of this hypothesis altogether lacking. Thus, whereas the literal rendering of the third word in the Hebrew1 is ó Xaòs avτoû, its literal rendering if pointed differently would be, ἅμα αὐτῷ, or μετ ̓ αὐτοῦ, the former whereof occurs in the first clause of the Septuagint rendering, while a confusion of the latter with ó λads avтoû might have led to the μετὰ τοῦ λαοῦ αὐτοῦ.

Further, it is well known that the LXX. in many cases vacillate between υἱοὶ θεοῦ and ἄγγελοι θεοῦ, as renderings of one and the same expression; and hence (not to mention that in another reading of this passage the two expressions

י עמו.

are transposed) it seems more than probable that we have here too a case of double-rendering. The apostrophe to the heavens, εὐφράνθητε οὐρανοί, may have been suggested by the opening words, ver. 1: 'Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak;' and, in connection with this, the language of Ps. xcvi. 6-8 (LXX.) may have contributed to the interpolation. In particular, the words προσκυνησάτωσαν αὐτῷ πάντες ἄγγελοι Oeoù have been compared with the seventh verse of the Psalm, προσκυνήσατε αὐτῷ πάντες άγγελοι, and if, as some think, the citation in Heb. i. 6 is referable directly to the Psalm, the interpolation in the LXX. may have come to pass through the medium of the citation, as in the case of Ps. xiv., which has been already discussed'. Lastly, it may be noted that if ἅμα αὐτῷ and μετὰ τοῦ λαοῦ αὐτοῦ have indeed arisen from a single Hebrew word, the fact that καὶ προσκυνησάτωσαν K.T.. intervenes goes far to prove it an interpolation, and with it the corresponding clause καὶ ἐνισχυσάτωσαν κ.τ.λ. must stand or fall. We may conclude then that the LXX. cannot safely be adduced as evidence that the Masoretic text of Deut. xxxii. 43 has been, wilfully or otherwise, corrupted.

V. Is. xxv. 8; Hos. xiii. 14; 1 Cor. xv. 54, 55.

Two more or less direct citations are joined together in the last-named passage:-'Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?'— but it might be questioned, whether the formula of citation applies in the outset to both passages, or to the former only; the latter being supposed to follow as an adaptation of Hos. xiii. 14, suggested by the foregoing. It may be well to notice the passages separately.

I. In the Authorized Version Is. xxv. 7, 8 is rendered as follows: 'And He will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the vail that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death in victory; and the LORD God will wipe away tears from off all faces; and

1 See pp. 314-317.