I Words seemingly conclusive in favour of Owen's view, if Jerome understood by " vacates " what we understand by "vowels." The former, however, in the language of Jerome denotes "gutturals." See Havernick's " Introduction to the Old Testa- ment," sect. 5-3, and Hupfeld, s. 580. — Ea
ARGUMENTS FOR THE NOVELTY OF HEBREW POINTS REFUTED. 399
some of them called reges; the accents have now got that appellation ; some of them are reges, and some ministri : so that the present state of things in reference to vowels and accents is but novel. 2. That the grammarians invented these regia puncta, as Aben Ezra says.
But, I pray, what cause of triumph or boasting is in all this goodly discovery? Was it ever denied by any that the casting of the names of the vowels and accents, with the titles, was the work of the gram- marians? was it not long since observed by many that the five long vowels, with . and .,, were called of old reges? and that the dis- tinction of the vowels into long and short was an invention of the Christians rather than Jewish grammarians, the Jews calling them some absolutely reges, some great and small, some matres et filias? " But then," saith he, " the grammarians were the inventors of these points." Why so ? " Aben Ezra refers this unto the work of the grammarians, to know the progresses of the holy tongue, the genera- tion of those kings," etc. But can any thing be more evident against his design than his own testimony? It was the work of the gram- marians to know these things, therefore not to invent them. Did they invent the radical and servile letters? Surely they also then invented the tongue; for it consists of letters radical and servile, of points and accents: and yet this is also ascribed to them by Aben Ezra. But it is well that Morinus hath at length lighted upon R Jehuda Chiug. His opinion before was collected out of Kimchi, Ephodius, Muscatus, and others. But what says he now himself? For aught that appears, by what we have quoted by Morinus, he is like to prove a notable witness of the antiquity of the points. It may be well supposed that Morinus, writing on set purpose against their an- tiquity, would produce that testimony which in his whole author was most to his purpose; and yet he fixes on one wherein this ancient grammarian, who lived about the year of Christ 1150 or 1200, cives us an account of the points, with their names, without the least inti- mation of any thing to the impeachment of their divine original. So also the same Aben Ezra on Ps. ix. 7 tells us of one Adonim Ben- lafrad, who, long before this R. Jehuda, found . for , in an ancient copy. And therefore, when Morinus comes to make the conclusion of his argument, discovering, it seems, himself the folly of the pre- tence that the points were invented by the grammarians, the last sort of men mentioned by Aben Ezra, he says, " Procul omni dubio est, et luce meridiana clarius Aben Ezram sensisse omnium vocalium punctationem a Masorethis Tiberiensibus, et grammaticis, qui hos sequuti sunt, originem ducere." But of these Masoretes there is not one word in the premises, nor is any such thing assigned unto them by Aben Ezra, but quite another employment, — of making a hedge about the law, by their observations on all the words of it; — and had he dreamed of their inventing the points, he would sure
400 INTEGRITY AND PURITY OF THE HEBREW AND GREEK TEXT.
enougli have assigned that work to them ; and as for the grammarians, his own testimony lies full to the contrary.
And these are the heads of the arguments insisted on by Cappel- lus and others, and by these Prolegomena, to prove the Hebrew punc- tuation to be an invention of the Jews of Tiberias five hundred years or more after the incarnation of Christ. " Brevis Cantilena, sed longum Epiphonema." As I have not here designed to answer them at large, with the various instances produced to give counte- nance unto them (nor is it needful for any so to do until the answer already given to them be removed), so by the specimen given of their nature and kind, the sober and pious reader may easily judge whe- ther there be any force in them to subvert the persuasion opposed by them, grounded on the catholic tradition and consent of the Jews; the uncontradicted reception of them absolutely, without the least opposition, all the world over, by Jews and Christians ; the very nature of the punctuation itself, following the genius of the language, not arising or flowing from any artificial rules ; the impossibility of assigning any author to it since the days of Ezra, but only by such loose conjectures and imaginations as ought not to be admitted to any plea and place in this weighty cause ; all attended with that great uncertainty which, without their owning of these points to be of divine original, we shall be left unto in all translations and expo- sitions of the Scripture. It is true, whilst the Hebrew language was the vulgar tongue of the nation, and was spoken by every one uni- formly everywhere, it had been possible that, upon a supposition that there were no points, men, without infallible guidance and direction, might possibly affix notes and figures which might with some exact- ness answer the common pronunciation of the language, and so, con- sequently, exhibit the true and proper sense and meaning of the words themselves : biit when there had been an interruption of a thousand years in the vulgar use of the language, it being preserved pure only in one book, to suppose that the true and exact pronuncia- tion of every tittle, letter, and syllable, was preserved alive by oral tradition, not written anywhere, not commonly spoken by any, is to build towns and castles of imaginations, which may be as easily cast down as they are erected. Yet unless this be supposed (which with no colour of reason can be supposed, which is yet so by Cappellus and the learned author of the Prolegomena), it must be granted that the great rule of all present translations, expositions, and comments, that have been made in the church of God for some hundreds of years, is the arbitrary invention of some few Jews, living in an ob- scure corner of the world, under the curse of God, in their unbelief and blindness ! The only relief in the Prolegomena against this amazing inference is, as was said, that the Masoretes affixed not the present punctuation arbitrarily (so also Cappellus), but according to