O then come hither
And lay this book, thy bead aud heart together.
The riddle is not, however, confined to Jewish literature. The riddle of the Sphinx is familiar from classical antiquity. It was a riddle that Tarquin the Proud acted when by striking off with a stall' the heads of the tallest poppies in his garden he gave Sextus the hint to put out of the way the chief citizens of captured Gabii. The riddle as an amusement at feasts and on convivial occasions among the Greeks and Romans is men- tioned in the pages of Athenajus and Aulus Gellius. (See liochart, HUrozoieon, iii. 384).
It was at his wedding feast that Samson pro- jK)sed the terms of his famous riddle (Jg 14). He /jave his Philistine friends seven days to lind it out, iiromising if they should be successful thirty fine linen wrappers and thirty gala dresses(v."; Moore's Commentary, p. .335), and requiring from them the same if they should be unsuccessful. They accepted the terms, and Samson propounded his riddle — ' Out of the eater came something to eat, and out of the strong came something sweet ? ' How far a riddle was fair, the solution of which required a knowledge of incidents so special as Samson's encounter with the lion and its sequel, need not be discussed. Their deceit and the treachery of his wife put the Philistines in possession of the secret. ' What,' they asked, ' is sweeter than honey, and what is stronger than a lion?' At once he saw he had been duped, and in a satirical vein he exclaimed, employing still the language of riddles : ' If ye had not ploughed with my heifer, ye had not found out my riddle.'
Solomon with his high repute for wisdom in other things is credited also with skill in the solution of riddles. The Queen of Sheba on her visit to Jerusalem proved him with riddles (1 K 10" = 2 Cli 9'). And Solomon ' told her all her ques- tions, there was not anything hid from the King which he told her not' (1 K 10» = 2 Ch 9'). Josephus tells a similar tale of Hiram king of Tyre. Solomon and Hiram were on the most friendly terms. 'What cemented the friendship between them,' says Jos. {Ant. vill. v. 3), 'was the passion both had for wisdom ; for they sent riddles (irpo- ^XiJmoto) to one another, with a desire to have them solved ; and in these Solomon was superior to Hiram, as he was wiser in all other respects.' In aniitl.er passage of his writings the Jewish his- torian (c. Apion. i. 18. 17), records the testimony of Dius the historian of the Phcenicians, who says
that Solomon when he was king at Jerusalem sent riddles (aiviftiara) for Hiram to guess, and desired that he would send others back for him V; find out, tlie condition being that he who failed should pay a fine to him who was successful. And as Hiram was unsuccessful, he had a large amount to pay. At length lie found a man of Tyre, Abuemon by name, who was able to guess the riddles proposed by Solomon, and himself pro- pounded others which Solomon could not solve, thus recovering for his sovereign the money he had lost. None of these riddles have survived, and therefore we have no means of estimating their character as hard questions.
There are to be found, however, in the Proverbs bearing the name of Solomon, sayings that appear to be of the nature of riddles. The riddle of the insatiable things is one of these (Pr 30"- '"). 'The horse-leech (but see art. HORSE-LKECH) hath two daughters, crj'ing. Give, give. There are three things that are never satisfied, yea, four things say not, It is enough.' What are these ? And the answer is, 'The grave, and the barren womb, the earth that is not filled with water, and the tire that saith not, It is enough.' This is followed by the riddles of the four mysterious things (Pr SO"-'*), of the four intolerable things (Pr 30^-^), of the four little wise things (SO-^"-^), and of the four stately things (30=«-"). Riddle and inter- pretation alike exhibit precise observation of nature, and convey at the same time moral in- struction.
To the riddles of the OT fall, perhaps, to be added the words of the mysterious writing on the wall on the night of Belsliazzar's feast (Dn S'-^'"*}, Mene, Men'e, Tekel, Uphar-sin (which see). The inscription is to be read according to recent authorities, ' A mina, a mina, a shekel and half minas.' Vv.'-"""'-*, says Bevan (The Book of Daniel, p. 106), are plays upon the words of the inscrip- tion ; in v.*" the pla3- is a double one. 'Una — God hath numbered thy kingdom and finished it. Shekel — thou hast been weighed in the balance and hast been found wanting. Half mina — thy king- dom hath been divided and given to the Medes and PersiaTis.
The parable is one of the unique features of the teaching of Christ {rapajioXri in the .Synoptists ; «rapoi/i(o in St. John), but the riddle, except in so far as the evangelist Matthew justifies instruction by parables with a reference to Ps 78-, is not expressly mentioned. Only once in the NT is the riddle expres.sly named, and in that instance (1 Co 13'-) the mention of it is obscured in EV. The meaning is — 'Now we see through a glass, in a riddle ' {iv ahlyfrnn), in contrast to the direct \'ision of spiritual realities, ' face to face.' In the Revela- tion of St. John there is a riddle which remains an enigma in spite of all attempts to solve it : ' He that hath understanding let him count the number of the beast ; for it is the number of a man, and his number is six hundred and sixty and six.' Following the method known among the Jews as Gematria, by which a number is obtained from the numerical values of the letters of a name, it has been found that the Hehrew transliteration of Neron Cesar yields a total of GOG. Although adopted by many modern interjireters, this .solu- tion of the riddle has not attaini'd general accept- ance any more than others which have been pro- posed from a much earlier time (see Bengel, Gnomon, p. 1095 iX. ; Milligan, Baird Lectures on The Jtevelation of St. John, p. 321 IT., and art. Rkvei.atidn [Book of] above, p. 258). In the Taliinid and Rabbinical literature there is no lack of riddles. In fact the Jews exhibit a curiosa feliiitds in this department which is unique. ' A large number of famous sayings,' says Abrahams