in heaven, and how to treat our brethren on the earth; if by sitting at his feet and learning of him we can come to understand how we are to get the good of life, and what is really worth while then, oh then, we shall be saved! Is there any other way of salvation? I do not know of any. I have not found anyone else who seemed to know a better way. I do not believe that Plato or Macchiavelli, or Ricardo or Karl Marx or August Bebel can save us. The way of Jesus is, I believe, the way of salvation; and there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. II. THE BROWN-DRIVER-BRIGGS HEBREW-ENGLISH LEXICON. BY IRWIN HOCH DE LONG, D.B., PH.D. This lexicon is based on the lexicographical works of WILHELM GESENIUS, who was born February 3, 1786, at Nordhausen, a town situated on the southern slopes of the Harz Mountains, Germany. In 1809 GESENIUS became professor in Halle and died there in 1842 on the twenty-third of October. The work of this great German professor, in Hebrew lexicography, in Hebrew grammar, and in Semitic epigraphy is of continuing value. EWALD, however, one of the Göttingen seven ("einer der Göttinger Sieben!"), subsequently inaugurated by his keenness and originality a new era in Hebrew grammar. Nevertheless it remains true that GESENIUS, by his work, has placed all subsequent students in this large and important field under the greatest lasting obligation to himself and his untiring diligence, and thereby won for himself an immortal name that might well be envied. Gesenius is more than "the father of modern Hebrew Lexicography"; he is both the father and the master, using the latter term in a somewhat restricted sense, as is once more evidenced by this latest Hebrew-English Lexicon: "As to the arrangement of the work, the Editors [of the work in question] decided at an early stage of their preparations to follow the Thesaurus [of GESENIUS], and the principal dictionaries of other Semitic languages, in classifying words according to their stems, and not to adopt the purely alphabetical order which has been common in Hebrew dictionaries." This change, let us say in passing, to an older and more scientific arrangement is to * Preface, page vii. * be heartily commended; it is the only method of arranging a Hebrew, or Semitic vocabulary, because it is the scientific method. DELITZSCH is right in his constant and persistent insistence upon German lexicographers of the Hebrew language to return to this arrangement of the Hebrew vocabulary. It is, however, not only in the matter of arrangement, but in other aspects of his work as well, that the masters of our age acknowledge GESENIUS' keen and acute philological insight, his strong good sense, and the continuing value to-day of his lexicographical works. PROFESSOR DRIVER, himself one of the leading English Hebraists, and also one of the editors of the present work, has said, in other places, of one of the leading masters in Semitic scholarship of our age, PROFESSOR NÖLDEKE: "In questions of Semitic philology, the guidance of Nöldeke, where it can be obtained, is invaluable ";* "to differ from Professor Nöldeke on a point of Aramaic or Arabic usage would be to court certain error." The home of this "little giant," as American scholars already years ago delighted to call NÖLDEKE, is also in the Old World, not in Halle, but in Strassburg, and his "contributions to Hebrew lexicography and grammar have been constantly used" in the present work. This modern master in Semitic scholarship still finds the Thesaurus of GESENIUS indispensable and turns to it whenever he has occasion to use a Hebrew dictionary, as he has told the writer more than once when a student of his. PRESIDENT HARPER sent his students in his seminar work in the University of Chicago constantly to the Thesaurus of the Halle professor. In March, 1892, PROFESSOR DRIVER said of GESENIUS that he "still retains his place as the master of Hebrew Lexicography." Systematic theologians likewise, who, however, as a rule have little knowledge of the Hebrew language 666 p. 582 f. * Hebrew Tenses, page xii, note 2. +HASTINGS' Dictionary of the Bible, vol. IV, Hebraica, vol. VII, 1891, p. 232: 'the little giant' of Strassburg, Professor Nöldeke, generally recognized as the leading Semitic scholar of the world." See also REFORMED CHURCH REVIEW, October, 1906, p. 581 f. ... and still less of the Semitic languages, but who have the good grace of allowing merit to detailed linguistic study, seem also willing to acknowledge merit to the work of this German savant; thus, a systematic theologian acknowledged in a recent work in the form of the following question the indebtedness of Biblical Science to the philological work of GESENIUS: "What most rabid opponent of criticism is not ready to own his indebtedness, on the linguistic side, to that dry old rationalist, Gesenius?" In the presence of such testimony and with our own acquaintance with the work of this scholar, it is just what we look for when we find the editors of this work freely acknowledging their indebtedness to GESENIUS, not only in the title of their work, but also in the "Preface": "The Editors have made use of the Thesaurus of Gesenius on every page, with increasing admiration for the tireless diligence, philological insight and strong good sense of this great Lexicographer." Notwithstanding the abiding value of the lexicographical works of GESENIUS, there was need of a new Hebrew-English lexicon of the Old Testament. This need has long since been felt by those who are teaching Hebrew and by those who are not content with a mere superficial knowledge of the Old Testament and its languages. ROBINSON'S Gesenius, or TREGELLES' English edition of 1859, were only recommended to English speaking students because there was no HebrewEnglish lexicon more satisfactory than these. While the value of the work of GESENIUS will abide, nevertheless by reason of the vigorous work that has been done in the Semitic field since GESENIUS and since the appearance of the last Hebrew-English lexicon in 1859 the final completion and appearance of this new Hebrew-English lexicon can only be a matter of gratification to every friend and student of Old Testament science. The energetic work that has been done in the Semitic field since the appearance of the last HebrewEnglish lexicon is well characterized by the editors in their preface: "The language and text of the Old Testament have been subjected to a minute and searching inquiry before unknown. The languages cognate with the Hebrew have claimed the attention of specialists in nearly all civilized countries. Wide fields of research have been opened, the very existence of which was a surprise, and have invited explorers. Arabic, ancient and modern, Ethiopic, with its allied dialects, Aramaic, in its various literatures and localities, have all yielded new treasures; while the discovery and decipherment of inscriptions from Babylonia and Assyria, Phoenicia, Northern Africa, Southern Arabia, and other old abodes of Semitic peoples, have contributed to a far more comprehensive and accurate knowledge of the Hebrew vocabulary in its sources and its usage than was possible forty or fifty years ago. In Germany an attempt has been made to keep pace with advancing knowledge by frequent editions of the Handwörterbuch, as well as by the brilliant and suggestive, though unequal Wörterbuch of Siegfried and Stade (in 1892-93), but in England and America there has not been heretofore even so much as a serious attempt." The work of this lexicon was undertaken twenty-three years ago, and the first part of it appeared in 1891. Since that time the various parts made their appearance slowly at intervals. In the meantime the German Gesenius passed through a number of editions. In 1890 appeared the eleventh German edition of Gesenius under the editorship of PROFESSORS MÜHLAU and VOLCK, of Dorpat; in 1895 the twelfth, which also marks a new era in this valuable and convenient dictionary, under the editorship of PROFESSOR Frantz Buhl, of Leipzig, now at Copenhagen; in 1899 PROFESSOR BUHL issued the thirteenth edition; and in 1905 the fourteenth, a thorough revision of the preceding edition. Accordingly the German Gesenius passed through three editions within the fifteen years, the time required (1891-1906) for the complete appearance of this new English edition; the latter, so the editors inform us, was almost entirely in type, save the "Ap pendix," when the latest German edition appeared. Conse |