The Pulpit Commentary — Daniel — Section 14

from the Hebrew or Daniel. The third w<,rd, n.;io~;i. is not used in the B.ble; tho corresponding masculine noun does occur, but the feminine never, n'lt even when it is in apposition to a noun feminiue. 'fhe Latin Version, by using abs~ondita, show, that the tre.nsle.tor must he.ve had this word before him as in Biblical Hebrew, )!liJ mee.ns "to hide." The seco:-id clause presents nothing to be adverted on, but the third is full of lo.ta peculiarities. The first word, r,i;l?P., is nnknown in the Bible, though not infrequent in later Ilebrew. The verb and adjective are common in Biblical Hebrew, but the abstract noun never occurs. Next we have l'll;Jo/, a con- nective meaning" lest," and thus equivalent to J!;l in Biblical Hebrew. It is a com- pound of -vj, the short relative, and 119, "what," in Aramaic and Rabbiuic. Canon Driver translates ;,~7 ir~ (Dan. i. 10), "lest," as Theodotion. If this rendering be .accepted, we have certainly a preparative for the Rabbinic connective. Yet the form in Daniel is obviously very much the earlier. Connectives are marks of the age of a book, that do not ee a rule mislead, and this connective occurs five times in the space of these two verses. The last word, n1;1~i;ir:i, certainly is pa.rt of a well-known -verb, but it does not occur in Biblical Hebrew in this conjugation. In the next ,clause, besides the connective sheme', we have miP,i, "youth," a word unknown in l3iblical Hebrew. The first word of the next clause, n;,t=t, is the thircl feminine ,singular preterite of the verb ,~il, "to have reached a marriageable age "-a verb unknown in Biblical Hebrew, but not uncommon in Rabbinic writings; it is used in the Aramaic pnrte of the Talmud and in the Targums. In the same clause we find the word NIDl in the niphal, "to be married" (nubere)-a usage unknown in Biblical Hebrew, where we have ~J7::i used in kal for the man, and niphal of the woman. The nearest approach to this usage is 2 Chron. xx.iv. 3 and Neh. xiii. 25, where a father -takes a wife for his son, and 2 Chron. xiii. 21, where a man takes a wife to himself; but in no case is the po.eeive found in this meaning. In the last clause the phrase, i1;'P.'! l:l'Pi't', "to practise witchcraft," is not Biblical; the Bible writers employ 9~~ in the pieL Here, in the space of two verses, rather long verses certainly, are four words that -do not occur in Biblical Hebrew, and one of these is a connective repeated five times. -One of the other verbs is not used in the Bible in the conjugation, and another neither in the sense nor conjugation. Further, there is a phrase not Biblical. We might easily go on, and would only make our case stronger. It is certainly -clear to every unbiassed mind that the Hebrew of Ben Sira is very much more recent than that of Daniel. As we have said, the Hebrew of Beu Sira is more akin to that of Ecclesiastes, of which work it seems an imitation. If Ben Sira was written even so late as B.o. 180, Ecclesiastes must have been considerably earlier, and Daniel must liave been much earlier still. It is clear that the line which divides new from midJ.le Hebrew must pass between Daniel and Ecclesiasticus. As surely as the latter is on one side of the line, so surely is the former on the other. Canon Driver and Professor Bevan have amply proved the resemblance there is between the hmguago of Chronicles, Nehemiah, Ezra, and Esther, -and that of Daniel, a resemblance that is only what might readily b~ expected. It is the Hebrew naturo.1 to one who had become accustomed to .Aramaic as the language -of everyday life. The resemblances to Ezekiel have been pointed out by Delitzsch and -Keil. It must further be borne in mind that the first chapter is probably from the pen of an editor, and is a condensation of an Aramaic original. That the langu:.ge of Daniel should resemble that of a numb~r of works, ell of which claim to have beeo. written in the Persian period, doos not prove, as Bl'me critics think it does, that Daniel cwas written in the Greek period. DAXIEL. niil INTRODUCTION TO