As regards the ftjrm in which the sacred writings were preserved, there can be little doubt that the text was ordinarily written on skins, rolled up into volumes, like the modern synagogue rolls (Psa. xl, 7 ; Jer. xxxvi, 14; Zech. v, 1 ; Ezek. ii, 9). Josephus relates that the copy sent from Jerusalem as a present to Ptolemy in Egypt was written with letters of gold on skins of ad- mirable thinness, the joints of which could not be de- tected (.4«^ xii, 2, 11).
The original character in which the text was ex- pressed is that still preserved to us, with the exception of four letters, on the Maccaba^an coins, and having a strong affinity to the Samaritan character, which seems to have been treated by the later Jews as identical with it, being styled by them "^naiy DPS. At what date this was exchanged for the present Aramaic or square character, n^~i1"i'X SPD, or "2"n2 SHD, is still as un- determined as it is at what date the use of the Aramaic language in Palestine superseded that of the Hebrew. The old Jewish tradition, repeated by Origen and Je- rome, ascribed the change to Ezra. But the Maccabiv an coins supply us with a date at which the older charac- ter was still in use ; and even though we sliould allow that both may have been simultaneously employed, the one for sacred, the other for more ordinary purposes, we can hardly suppose that they existed side l>y side for any lengthened period. IIasscneam[) and Gesenius are at variance as to whether such errors of the Septuagint as arose from confusion of letters in the original text are in favor of the Greek interpreters having had the older
OLD TESTAMENT
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OLD TESTAMENT
or the more modem character before them. It is suffi- ciently clear that the use of the square writing mnst have been well established before the time of those au- thors who attributed the introduction of it to Ezra. Nor could the allusion in Matt, v, 18 to the yod as the small- est letter have well been made except in reference to the more modern character. We forbear liere all in- vestigation of the manner in which this character was formed, or of the precise locality whence it was derived. Whatever modiKcation it may have undergone in the hands of the Jewish scribes, it was in the first instance introduced from abroad ; and this its name, 3rD n'^IICX, i. e. Assyrian writing, implies, though it may geographically require to be interpreted with some lati- tude. (The suggestion of Hu|)feld that nilVi'N may be an appellative, denoting not Assjjrian, but firm, writing, is improbable.) On the whole, we may best suppose, with Ewald, that the adoption of the new character was coeval with the rise of the earliest Tar- gums, which would naturally be written in the Aramaic style. It would thus he shortly anterior to the Chris- tian ajra; and with this date all the evidence would well accord. It may be right, however, to mention that Avhile of late years Keil has striven anew to throw back the introduction of the square writing to^vards the time of Ezra, Bleek also, though not generally imbued with the conservative views of Keil, maintains not only that the use of the square writing for the sacred books owed its origin to Ezra, but also that the later books of the 0. T. were never expressed in any other charac- ter. See Hebrew Language.
No vowel-points were attached to the text : they were, through all the early period of its history, entirely unknown. Convenience had indeed, at the time when the later books of the O. T. were written, suggested a larger use of the niatres lectionis : it is thus that in those books we find them introduced into many words that had previously been spelled without them : ffillp takes the place of inp, T^n of Tn. An elaborate endeavor has recently been made by Dr. Wall to prove that up to the early part of the 2d century of the Christian aira the Hebrew text was free from vowel-letters as well as from vowels. His theory is that thej' were then inter- polated by the Jews, with a view to altering rather than perpetuating the former pronunciation of the words: their object being, according to him, to pervert thereby the sense of the prophecies, as also to throw discredit on the Septuagint, and thereby weaken or evade the force of arguments drawn from that version in support of Christian doctrines. Improbable as such a theory is, it is yet more astonishing that its author should not have been deterred from prosecuting it by the palpable objections to it which he himself discerned. Who can believe, with him, that the Samaritans, not- withstanding the mutual hatred existing between them and the Jews, borrowed the interpolation from the Jews, and conspired with them to keep it a secret? or that among other words to which by this interpolation the Jews ventured to impart a new sound were some of the best-known proper names; e.g. Isaiah, Jeremiah? or that it was merely through a blunder that in Gen. i, 2-1 the substantive ri"n in its construct state acquired its final 1, when the same anomalj' occurs in no fewer than three passages of the Psalms? Such views and argu- ments refute themselves; and while the high position occupied by its author commends his book to notice, it can only be lamented that industry, learning, and inge- nuity should have been so misspent in the vain attempt to give substance to shadow. See Vowei.-Points,