and immediately bringing the speaker, "a man of some discretion," to book, and on questioning him whether all the details of the prophecy have corresponding details in the then recorded Tradition, wringing from him the answer, "It is not, indeed, so handed down in our Tradition; but it may have been so." But "an honest and illiterate leather-cutter," whom Onesimus puts through the same catechism, boldly declares that it was so, not that he remembers anything of the sort in the Tradition, but "because it must needs be that all things that are written in the Law and the Prophets should be fufilled in Christus." And Onesimus shrewdly surmises that, not the "discreet" speakers, but the "illiterate leather-cutter" and his kin will prove the progenitors of the Tradition held by the succeeding generation (p. 85).

Before the martyrdom of Onesimus, the Synoptics are fully formed, even to the prodigies of Matthew I., II. But when Onesimus would remove the after-growth from the Tradition received of the first disciples, and disabuse the minds of the people, Philochristus, from far-off Britain, then, it seems, as now, the native soil of the Broad Church theory, writes to him :

"Be thou content. But,' sayest thou, they err in certain traditions concerning the Lord.' Well, then, they err. But which is better, that they should love the Lord and be in some error, or that they should be free from error and void of love? Better to have wheat with tares than no tares and no wheat. Let both stand till the harvest; and in the day of winnowing of the Master, a separation shall be made " (p. 285).

R. A. A.

A

DR. DAVIDSON'S INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE NEW

TESTAMENT.'*

VETERAN writer like Dr. Davidson does not wait for his reputa

tion upon the verdict of critics less competent than himself. More than thirty years have elapsed since the appearance of his Introduction to the New Testament, and his qualities as a Biblical scholar have long been familiar to those who are interested in the studies which he has chosen as his own. During that considerable period he has not been content to rest passively in the results which he so carefully elaborated and defended in earlier days, but has kept his mind open to fresh investigations, and gradually changed his point of view, so that arguments on which he formerly relied are no longer able to convince him, and difficulties in the way of the traditional belief, which he once regarded as inconclusive, present themselves now with a magnitude and force which he is unable to resist. In process of time his opinions became so largely

An Introduction [to the Study of the New Testament, Critical, Exegetical, and Theological. By SAMUEL DAVIDSON, D.D., of the University of Halle, and LL.D. Second Edition, Revised and Improved. London: Longmans, Green, and Co. 1882.

modified, that it was undesirable to bring out a second edition of his original work; and accordingly, in 1868, he published a new treatise, entitled An Introduction to the Study of the New Testament, Critical, Exegetical, and Theological, in which he sought to supply an acknowledged want by providing the English reader with a compendium suited to the existing state of knowledge. Of this work a second edition, “revised and improved," has just appeared, containing important modifica tions of some of the judgments previously expressed, and exhibiting the ripest fruit of the author's scholarship and thought. One could wish that the process of change had been brought before the reader, and that when Dr. Davidson discards as "traditionalism" an opinion maintained in the earlier edition he had marked the alteration, and distinctly explained why reasons, which at a comparatively recent date appeared insufficient, are now able to command his assent. This would add to the interest of the volumes, and afford a useful training to the critical faculty of the student; and if the frank acknowledgment of change left on the minds of the injudicious the impression of a vacillating judgment, or an uncertain critical method, the more discerning would appreciate the vigour of thought which even in advancing years refuses to stiffen into unalterable moulds, and the candour which abandons a position that, long defended, seems at last to be untenable.

We cannot in a short notice discuss any of the difficult questions raised by an Introduction; but it may be interesting to point out some of the more important differences of view which distinguish the two editions. The arrangement of the books in what is conceived to be their chronological order facilitates comparison, and serious variations are immediately apparent. In the first edition 2nd Thessalonians is placed at the head of the list, and Dr. Davidson holds strongly to its Pauline authorship, assigning it to about 52 A.D. He now introduces it after the Epistle of James; and though he still allows it a comparatively early date, about 69 A.D., he does not bring it within the Apostle's lifetime. He does not, however, absolutely reject its Pauline origin, but thinks "it may be called authentic, with modifications," the latter having been made in it by a Pauline Christian, ii. 1-12 especially being an addition. Carrying our eye down the list we are next struck by the disappearance of Colossians from its position between Philemon and Philippians. In 1868 Dr Davidson, though not unconscious of difficulties, still believed that the preponderance of internal evidence favoured the genuineness of the epistle, and that it was written at Rome in 62 A.D. We must suppose that the argu ments of Baur, though dismissed as inconclusive, silently persisted in asserting their force, for our author now bestows upon this question a completely fresh treatment, and argues strongly against the authenticity of the letter. He relies especially on the developed Christology and the evidence afforded by the epistle of an active, if still incipient, Gnosticism, and arrives at the conclusion that the work proceeded from a Pauline Christian living in Asia Minor, probably about 120 A.D. Ephesians, which is so obviously related to Colossians, had been already rejected from

the list of Paul's genuine epistles, but still allowed a place upon the borders of the Apostolic age. In the first edition its author is supposed to be an inhabitant of Rome and a stranger to the Church at Ephesus, and the year 75 is fixed upon as the nearest approach to its real date. The arguments which induced Baur to bring it down to the Gnostic period are reviewed, and declared to be unsatisfactory. In the second edition all this is changed. We now learn, as though no competent and unprejudiced scholar had ever been of a different opinion, that "it is easy to see that it originated in the Gnostic period;" its composition is transferred from Rome to Asia Minor, and its date is fixed between 130 and 140 A.D. In the treatment of the Pastoral Epistles, Titus now comes between 2nd and 1st Timothy, instead of being regarded as the earliest of the three; but they are all assigned to about the same date as before, between 115 and 125 A.D.

If we pass to the Catholic Epistles, we find that that of James is placed a year or two later, and therefore after, instead of before, Revelation; but Dr. Davidson's view of it is substantially unaltered. His opinion of 1st Peter has undergone a more serious change, though even in the first edition its Apostolic origin is denied. A comparatively early date, between 75 and 80 A.D., is there accorded to it; and the opinion of Schwegler and Baur that it referred to the calamities in Trajan's reign is rejected because the trials alluded to "are too general to admit of restriction to one period in particular." This opinion is now accepted, and the epistle, believed to have been written by a Roman Christian, perhaps in 113 A.D., is placed in the list between the Gospels of Luke and Mark. Jude, which was formerly regarded as an authentic production of the Lord's brother, and referred to the year 80, is now set aside as supposititious, because "the description of the men who had crept in among the readers suits antinomian Gnostics only." It is supposed to be "not much later than A.D. 140."

In regard to the historical books, we need only observe that the old chronological order is retained,-Matthew, Luke, Mark, Acts, and John; and that, notwithstanding recent investigations, Mark is still represented as dependent on Matthew and Luke.

66

From this brief survey it is apparent that the work has been revised in both its form and its substance. Alterations are numerous, and many parts have been rewritten. The revision, however, sometimes betrays marks of haste. Thus we are told that a quotation in 1st Timothy is taken from Luke, and then follows the strange inference, Hence Luke's gospel, which preceded the present epistle, was not written till the second century."* What is obviously intended is that the Epistle cannot be earlier than the second century, because it is subsequent to a Gospel which belongs to that century. The argument is correctly given in the first edition. On the next page it is stated, on the authority of Holtzmann, that the number of words occurring in the Pastoral Epistles, and nowhere else in the New Testament, is 171, and yet the words unknown * II. p. 58.

to Paul's authentic Epistles are set down as only 133. Holtzmann's statement is perhaps misleading; but his lists show that the 133 ought to be added to the 171. In the first edition the numbers are not given, but instead there is a useful list of the words themselves, which is now omitted. A few lines further on the curious remark is retained that evoéßeia is a post-apostolic production." It is meant, presumably that it is not found in undisputed Apostolical writings. That this circumstance is accidental may perhaps be inferred from the use of àσéßeia and aσeß in Romans. It is amusing to find Dr. Davidson expressing a devout faith in the book of Tobit. He says, "if it was believed that angels appeared in the form of men, as we know they did from the book of Tobit."* Doubtless his real meaning would require the substitution of "it was" for" they did." The Epistle of Polycarp receives unequal treatment. As a testimony to 1st Thessalonians, and on many other occasions, it is cited as though it were genuine +; but when we come to 2nd Thessalonians we are informed that the Epistle is not authentic, ‡ and the same statement is repeated elsewhere. § When we seek for further information, we learn in one passage that Ritschl has shown that its date is between 160 and 170 A.D., after Polycarp's death, and in another that Ritschl supposes interpolation in various places," and that its date is between 147 and 167. These casual instances may show that the work would bear a little revision; but allowance must be made for the very condensed form in which the necessary matter has to be imparted, and for the inevitable occurrence of slight oversights in volumes replete with such a multiplicity of detail. We may not be able to acquiesce in all Dr. Davidson's judg ments; but his work will be indispensable to the student who wishes to know the present state of the criticism of the New Testament and has not yet acquired facility in the use of German, and the more advanced scholar will weigh the author's conclusions with the care and respect which are due to the conscientious devotion of so many years to such important and difficult investigations.

66

JAMES DRUMMOND.

THE

MR. BURGESS'S NOTES ON THE HEBREW PSALMS.**

HE writer of these volumes has carefully limited the scope of his work. He does not offer a treatise on the Psalm-book, regarded as a whole, and hence he takes no heed of the problems concerning the origin of its collections, or the circumstances and date of its completion. Nor does he attempt any full account of the separate poems, and he

* I. p. 256.

+ I. pp. 9, 41, 85, 117, 157, &c.

I. p. 337. § II. p. 207: see also II. p. 166. || II. p. 36. ¶ II. p. 328-9. **Notes, chiefly Critical and Philological, on the Hebrew Psalms. By WILLIAM ROSCOE BURGESS, M.A. Vol. I., 1879; Vol. II., 1881. London: Williams and Norgate.

rarely drops any observations on their probable authorship. He has for the most part confined himself to annotations on difficult passages, chiefly of a grammatical and philological kind. These give ample evidence of long and devoted study of the text; and many of the suggested emendations have a probability about them which entitles them to respectful consideration, while they are certainly the fruit of laborious meditation. In some of his criticism he has, no doubt, been anticipated by other writers; but this need not lessen their independent merit, as it appears doubtful how far the author is familiar with the later exegesis of foreign scholars. His results are often announced with great modesty; but some of those about which he expresses a confidence almost amounting to demonstration seem unlikely to gain general assent. Thus in Ps. xl. 7, he proposes to read asham for oznayim. This suggestion is founded on several considerations, of which the two chief are(1) That the word asham is needed to complete the list of sacrifices named in the verse; and (2) That it will, at least, explain, if not justify the rendering oua, in the LXX., "adopted by St. Paul in Heb. x. 5.' These considerations touch two of the weak places in Mr. Burgess's method. As for the LXX., to which he generally appears to ascribe a critical value far above its deserts, he does not notice that all the other Greek versions, and even many MSS. of the LXX. itself, read wría, while the Vulgate has aures, which implies that the word oua is of very doubtful parentage (see Hupfeld's note in loc.). The constant use of the LXX. without adequate critical safeguards, tends sometimes, we think, to lead Mr. Burgess astray. Next, however, and more seriously, the endeavour to vindicate a place for the word asham is connected with a theory of the Pentateuchal sacrifices which recent research cannot be said to sustain. Mr. Burgess treats the Levitical law as if it were undoubtedly Mosaic, and attaches to the narratives of patriarchal sacrifice a significance which we are convinced they will not bear. He attempts on this basis to establish a theory as to the meaning of certain Levitical ordinances, which he then applies to this and other Psalms (e.g., Ps. li.); and this is regarded as a key to what the author represents as the complex relations between Yahveh and his people. The subject is a large one we can only express our total dissent from the author's fundamental conceptions. The Pentateuch and the Psalms cannot be employed for mutual illustration until the innumerable questions attending the rise and form of the laws and the dates of the poems have been at least partially solved. Mr. Burgess finds the uncertainty all on one side. He is commendably free from undue adhesion to traditional titles; but he is content to support the claim advanced on behalf of Ps. xc. to Mosaic authorship by reference to the so-called Song of Moses, in Deut. xxxii. Mr. Burgess professes that he does not understand the "higher criticism" of Ewald; but till he has, at least, seen that it has a meaning, and must be answered, instead of peremptorily dismissed, we fear that much of his patience and labour will fail to win the success which they deserve.

J. E. C.