Ifis 178 212 24"') ; He directs all things, the actions of men (IG'- "• ^ 19-' 20=-' 21'-»"- 20-«) as well as their fortunes, etc. In view of this displacement of the subject of religion, it is quite comprehensible why in these proverbs there is likewise no mention of the Messianic deliverance which the prophets ex- pected for the nation ; rather is the central position occupied by the belief in individual retribution, as this had been growing up since the days of Jeremiah and Ezekiel (cf. Pr lO^-'-*"'- ii»-8.si i2:a. is. 21 13s 15^ etc.). As in some of the P.sjilnis, the godly are cautioned against the envy awakened by the prosperity of the wicked, ancl have their attention directed to the righteousness of Jahweh which will manifest itself in the future.
Views such as we have briefly sketched are not conceivable as contemporaneous with the preach- ing of the prophets — it is not without justification that Kuenen (I.e. § 97, note 15) calls the ethico- religious train of ideas represented by the com- posers of these proverbs an anachronism if referred to the period of the projjhets — but only in the post-exilic period, a period in which Law and Prophecy are raised above all doubt, and hence not the slightest attempt is made to prove their truth, while at the same time there is an evident attempt to apply the results of the prophetic teach- ing to real life. In this the composers of the proverbs are quite in agi-eement with the tendency that prevailed in the post-exUic time.
As an objection to fixing the date then, the character of this period as one of narrow legal piety has, indeed, often been urged ; but this view scarcely needs nowadays to be seriously refuted : books like Ruth and Jonah, whose post-exilic com- position hardly any one now doubts, and a large portion of our Psalms show that it is quite in- correct to characterize the post-exilic period in such a way. What is true of the time of the Maccabsean wars we have no right to transfer to the whole preceding period back to the Exile ; in this earlier period very difl'erent currents flowed side by side. But we lack the necessary data for fixing more definitely the period when lO'*- and 25"'- were composed, whether towards the end of the Persian or at the beginning of the Greek period.
Later in any case than these portions, as we have said already, is first of all the introduction (cA.5. 1-9), in which Wisdom and Religion are actually identified, and the former is personified. In the latter circumstance it has been sought to discover the influence of the Greek doctrine of ideas, but this notion is rightly rejected by Kuenen, Baudissin, and others ; the contrast of the personified Folly shows that we have to do manifestly with a purely poetical personification. But Baudissin (I.e. p. 20) rightly adds : ' The mythologizing freedom with which Wisdom is portrayed as plaj'ing a r6le in the presence of God or upon eartn, is not according to the ancient Hebrew manner, but recalls the Haggadic creations of the Rabbinic literature.' That we have actually before us a period more advanced than in 10'*- and 25'"- follows from the conception that here meets us of the guests of ' Madam Folly ' as in the depths of Sheol (9'8). The latter, which was originally simply the abode of departed souls, has become synonymous with hell. In view of the close aflinity in spirit and tendency between these chapters and Sirach, no very long period can have intervened between the composi- tion of the two. We shall not be far wrong if we fix upon c. 250 B.C. as the date of the origin of these chapters, and therewith of our book as a whole. To bring the date further down (cf. Geiger, Urschrift unci Uebersetzungen, p. 61 fit) is impossible, inasmuch as no reason is then evident why Sirach itself was not admitted into
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the Canon. It cannot, indeed, be made out with certainty how far the book edited by the author of the introduction extended. While Delitzsch regards 24-^-29 as the tirst considerable addition, to which afterwards chs. 30. 31 were aiipemled (cf. Driver, LOT, ch. viii.), others, like Curnill, ascribe the publication of the whole book, or, like Wildeboer, almost the whole with the exception of ch. 31 or 31""-, to the author of chs. 1-9 (cf. t)ie Conim. on 1»).
iv. Kelatio.v of the Massoretic Text to THE Veksions. —The MT shows marked deviations from the LXX, the Syr. Version, the Targum, ami the Vulgate, aUliougli the deviations of the last three almost all go back to the LXX.
The Targum is entirely dependent upon the Peshitta, nay, it has practically arisen from it, hence the strong Syriac colouring of its language. Its author has at tlie same time plainly striven to approximate his renilering to the MT (cf. S. May- baum in Merx' Archiv, ii. 66 U'., and Noldeke, ib. 246 ir.).
The Peshitta exhibits such close agreement with the LXX, that one can hardly avoid supposing that the author in making his translation had the help ot the LXX (cf. H. Pinkuss in ZATiV, 1894, pp. 6511"., 16111'.).
The case of the Vulgate is simil.ar to that of the Peshitta: Jerome evidently called in the LXX to aid the acconiplishiiient of his task of translation.