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Introduction to the Old Testament

J >> John Edgar McFadyen >> Introduction to the Old Testament




If chs. ix.-xiv. belong to the third century B.C., they give us an
interesting glimpse into the aspirations and defects of later Judaism.
They reveal an unbounded faith in the importance of Jerusalem, and in
the certainty of its triumph over the assaults of heathenism; on the
other hand, they are inspired by a fine universalism, xiv. 16ff. But
this universalism has a distinctly Levitical and legalistic colouring,
xiv. 21. Membership in the kingdom of God involves abstinence from
food proscribed by the Levitical law, ix. 7; and even for the heathen
the worship of Jehovah takes the form of the celebration of the feast
of booths, xiv. 16. There is in the prophecy a noble appreciation of the
world-wide destiny of the true religion, but hardly of its essentially
spiritual nature.




MALACHI


It is not inappropriate that Malachi,[1] though not the latest of
the prophets, should close the prophetic collection. The concluding
words of this book, which predict the coming of the great prophet
Elijah, iv. 5f, and the apocalyptic tone of Malachi, show that
prophecy feels itself unable to cope adequately with the moral
situation and is conscious of its own decline. Here, as in Haggai,
interest gathers round ritual rather than moral obligation, though
the latter is not neglected, iii. 5, and the religion for which
Malachi pleads is far from being exhausted by ritual. He takes a
lofty view, approaching to Jesus' own, of the obligations of the
marriage relation, ii. 16; and perfunctory ritual he abhors, chiefly
because it expresses a deep-seated indifference to God and His
claims, iii. 8. The clergy or the laity who offer God their lame or
blemished beasts are guilty of an offence that goes deeper than
ritual. Their whole ideal of religion and service is insulting; they
have forgotten that Jehovah is "a great King," i. 14.
[Footnote 1: Ch. i. 1 is late, modelled, like Zech. xii. 1 on Zech.
ix. 1. The word Malachi has no doubt been suggested by
_Malachi_ in iii. i (= my messenger). The prophecy is really
anonymous.]

The prophecy of Malachi is closely knit together. Addressing a people
who doubt the love of their God, he begins by pointing-strangely
enough from the Christian standpoint, but intelligibly enough from
that of early post-exilic Judaism--to the desolation of Edom, Judah's
enemy (cf. Obadiah) in poof of that love, i. 2-5; and asks how Judah
has responded to it. The priests present inferior offerings, thus
forming, in their insulting indifference, a strange contrast to the
untutored heathen hearts all the world over, which offer God pure
service; they have put to shame the ancient ideals, i. 6-ii. 9. The
people, too, are as guilty as the priests; for they had divorced
their faithful Jewish wives who had borne them children, and married
foreign women who were a menace to the purity of the national religion,
ii. 10-16. Those who are beginning to doubt the moral order because
Jehovah does not manifestly interpose as the God of justice, are
assured by the prophet that the Lord, preceded by a messenger, is on
His way; and He will punish, first the unfaithful priests, and then
the unfaithful people, ii. 17-iii. 5. His apparent indifference to the
people is due to their real indifference to Him; if they bring in the
tithes, the blessing will come, iii. 6-12. As before, ii. 17ff., the
despondent are assured that Jehovah has not forgotten them; He is
writing their names in a book, and when He comes in judgment, the
faithful will be spared, and then the difference between the destinies
of the good and the bad will be plain for all to see. The wicked shall
be trampled under foot, and upon the dark world in which the upright
mourn shall arise the sun, from whose gentle rays will stream healing
for bruised minds and hearts, iii. 13-iv. 4. Before that day Elijah
will come to heal the dissensions of the home, iv. 5, 6. (cf. ii. 14).

The atmosphere of the book of Malachi is very much like that of
Ezra-Nehemiah. The same problems emerge in both--foreign marriages,
neglect of payment of tithes, etc. But the allusion to the presents
given the governor, i. 8, shows that the book was not written during
the governorship of Nehemiah, who claims to have accepted no
presents (Neh. v. 14-18). On the other hand, the state of affairs
presented by the book is inconceivable after the measures adopted by
Ezra and Nehemiah; therefore, Malachi must precede them. Probably
however, not by much; it was Malachi and others like-minded who
prepared the way for the reformation, and his date may be roughly
fixed at 460-450 B.C. Consistently with this, the priests are
designated Levites, ii. 4, iii. 3, as in Deuteronomy; the book must
therefore precede the priestly code which sharply distinguishes
priests and Levites.

There is an unusual proportion of dialogue in Malachi. Good men are
perplexed by the anomalies of the moral order, and they are not
afraid to debate them. Malachi's solution is largely, though not
exclusively, iii. 8-12, apocalyptic; and though in this, as in his
emphasis on the cult, iii. 4, and his attitude to Edom, i. 2ff., he
stands upon the level of ordinary Judaism, in other respects he
rises far above it. Coming from one to whom correct ritual meant so
much, his utterance touching heathen worship is not only
refreshingly, but astonishingly bold. In all the Old Testament,
there is no more generous outlook upon the foreign world than that
of i. 11. Though the priests of the temple at Jerusalem insult the
name of Jehovah and are wearied with His service, yet "from sunrise
to sunset My name is great among the (heathen) nations, and in every
place pure offerings are offered to My name; for great is My name
among the heathen, saith Jehovah of hosts."




PSALMS


The piety of the Old Testament Church is reflected with more
clearness and variety in the Psalter than in any other book of the
Old Testament. It constitutes the response of the Church to the
divine demands of prophecy, and, in a less degree, of law; or,
rather, it expresses those emotions and aspirations of the universal
heart which lie deeper than any formal demand. It is the speech of
the soul face to face with God. Its words are as simple and
unaffected as human words can be, for it is the genius of Hebrew
poetry to lay little stress upon artifices of rhyme and rhythm. By
its simple device of parallelism, it suggests a rhythm profounder
than the sound of any words--the response of thought to thought, the
calling of deep to deep, the solemn harmonies that run throughout
the universe. Whether the second thought of a verse is co-ordinate
with the first, as--

Let us break their bands asunder,
And cast away their cords from us, ii 3.

or contrasted with it, as--

Jehovah knows the way of the righteous,
But the way of the ungodly shall perish, i. 6,

the resulting parallelism is essentially simple, and the Hebrew poet
can express his profoundest thoughts and feelings with lucidity and
freedom. It is the depth and sincerity of its emotion, coupled with
this unrivalled simplicity of expression that has given the Psalter
its abiding-place in the religious history of humanity.

With the partial exception of Psalm xlv., which is a marriage song,
the songs of the Psalter are exclusively religious. Indeed most of
the poetry of the Old Testament is religious; the Song of Deborah,
e.g. (Jud. v.), or the Psalm of Hezekiah (Isa. xxxviii.). But, from
scattered hints it is abundantly plain that, especially before the
exile, Hebrew poetry must have ranged over a wide variety of themes.
So far as we know, the Hebrews never had an epic; and though a
certain epic power is occasionally suggested by the extant
literature, it may be doubted whether the Hebrew genius, which was
essentially lyrical, would have been capable of the long sustained
effort demanded by a great epic. But the lyrical genius of the
Hebrew found abundant opportunity in life's common joys, sorrows and
activities. Victories in battle were celebrated in ballads, which
made the blood leap, love songs were sung at weddings, and dirges
were chanted over the dead. The labour of drawing water, of reaping
the fields or gathering the vintage, was relieved by snatches of
song. There was all this and more, but it has nearly all perished,
leaving little more than an echo, because the men who compiled and
edited the Old Testament were dominated by an exclusively religious
interest.

But if the interest of the Psalter be exclusively religious, we have
no reason to complain of its variety. From the deepest despair to
the highest exaltation, every mood of the soul is uttered there.
Many a classification of the Psalter has been attempted, e.g. into
(_a_) psalms of gladness, such as thanksgiving (xlvi.),
adoration (viii.); (_b_) psalms of sadness, such as lamentation
(lxxiv.), confession (li.), supplication (cii.); (_c_) psalms
of reflection, such as the occasional didactic poetry (cxix.), or
discussions of the moral order (lxxiii.). But in the nature of the
case, no classification can ever hope to be completely satisfactory,
if for no other reason than that the psalms, being for the most part
lyrics, are often marked by subtle and rapid changes of feeling,
passing sometimes, as in Psalm xxii., from the most touching laments
to the most daring expressions of hope and gladness. The following
classification, though exposed, as all such classifications must be,
to the charge of cross-division, will afford a working basis for the
study of the Psalter:--

(1) Psalms of Adoration, including (_a_) adoration of God for
His revelation in nature, viii., xix. 1-6, xxix., civ.; (_b_)
adoration of Him for His love to His people, xxxiii., ciii., cxi.,
cxiii., cxv., cxvii., cxlvii.; (_c_) praise of His glorious
kingdom, cxlv., cxlvi., ending with the call to universal praise,
cxlviii., cl.

(2) Psalms of Reflection (_a_) upon the moral order of the
world, ix., x., xi., xiv., xxxvi., xxxvii., xxxix., xlix., lii.,
lxii., lxxiii., lxxv., lxxxii., xc., xcii., xciv.; (_b_) upon
Divine Providence, xvi., xxiii., xxxiv., xci., cxii., cxxi., cxxv.,
cxxvii., cxxviii., cxxxiii., cxxxix., cxliv. 12-15; (_c_) on
the value of Scripture, i., xix. 7-14, cxix.; (_d_) on the
nature of the ideal man, xv., xxiv. 1-6, l.

(3) Psalms of Thanksgiving, most of them for historical
deliverances, e.g. from the exile, or from the Syrians in the second
century B.C., xxx., xl., xlvi., xlviii., lxv., lxvi., lxvii.,
lxviii., lxxvi., cxvi., cxviii., cxxiv., cxxvi., cxxix., cxxxviii.,
cxliv. 1-11, cxlix.

(4) Psalms in Celebration of Worship, v., xxiv., 7-10, xxvi.,
xxvii., xlii.-xliii., lxxxiv., cxxii., cxxxiv.

(5) Historical Psalms (_a_) emphasizing the unfaithfulness of
the people, lxxviii., lxxxi., cvi.; (_b_) emphasizing the love
or power of God, cv., cxiv., cxxxv., cxxxvi.

(6) Imprecatory Psalms, lviii, lix., lxix., lxxxiii., cix., cxxxvii.

(7) Penitential Psalms, vi., xxxii., xxxviii., li., cii., cxxx.,
cxliii.

(8) Psalms of Petition (_a_) prayers for deliverance,
preservation or restoration, iii., iv., vii., xii., xiii., xvii.,
xxv., xxxi., xxxv., xli., xliv., liv., lv., lx., lxiv., lxxi.,
lxxiv., lxxvii., lxxix., lxxx., lxxxv., lxxxvi., lxxxviii., cxx.,
cxxiii., cxxxi., cxl., cxli., cxlii; (_b_) answered prayers,
xxii., xxviii., lvi., lvii.

(9) Royal Psalms (_a_) king's coronation, xxi.; (_b_)
marriage, xlv.; (_c_) prayers for his welfare and success, xx.,
lxi, lxiii.; (_d_) his character, lxxii., ci.; (_e_)
dominion, ii., xviii., cx.; (_f_) yearning for the Messianic
King, lxxxix., cxxxii.

(10) Psalms concerning the universal reign of Jehovah, i.e.
Messianic psalms in the largest sense of the word, xlvii., lxxxvii.,
xciii., xcv., xcvi., xcvii., xcviii., xcix., c.

The Psalter has plainly had a long history. In its present form it
obviously rests upon groups, which in turn rest upon individual
psalms, that are no doubt often far older than the groups in which
they stand. Like the Pentateuch, and perhaps in imitation of it, the
Psalter is divided into five books, whose close is indicated, in
each case, by a doxology (xli., lxxii., lxxxix., cvi.), except in
the case of the last psalm, which is itself a doxology (cl.). This
division appears to have been artificially effected. Psalm cvii.,
which starts the last book, goes naturally with cv. and cvi., which
close the fourth book; and the circumstance that the number of
psalms in the fourth book corresponds exactly with that of the
third, raises a strong suspicion that the break was deliberately
made at Psalm cvi. It is very probable, too, that the doxology at
the close of Psalm cvi. (cf. 1 Chron. xvi. 36), which differs
somewhat from the other doxologies, was originally intended as a
doxology to that psalm only, and not to indicate the close of the
book. In any case, the contents of books 4 and 5, which are very
largely liturgical, are so similar that they may be practically
considered as one book.

Books 2 and 3 may also be similarly regarded; for whereas in books
1, 4 and 5 the name of the divine Being is predominantly Jehovah, in
books 2 and 3 it is predominantly Elohim (God), and there can be no
doubt that these two books, at least as far as Ps. lxxxiii., have
been submitted to an Elohistic redaction. Psalm xiv., _e.g._,
reappears in the 2nd book as Psalm liii. in a form practically
identical, except for the name of God, which is Jehovah in the one
(xiv.) and Elohim in the other (liii.); the change is, therefore,
undoubtedly deliberate. This is also made plain by the presence of
such impossible phrases as "God, thy God," xlv. 7, 1. 7, instead of
the natural and familiar "Jehovah, thy God." Whatever the motive for
the choice of this divine name (Elohim) may be, it is so thoroughly
characteristic of books 2 and 3 that they may not unfairly be held
to constitute a group by themselves. In this way the Psalter falls
into three great groups--book I (i.-xli.), which is Jehovistic,
books 2 and 3 (xlii.-lxxxix.), which are Elohistic, and books 4 and
5 (xc.-cl.), which are Jehovistic..

These greater groups rest, however, upon other smaller ones, some formally
acknowledged, e.g. the so-called Psalms of Ascent or Pilgrim psalms
(cxx.-cxxxiv.), the Psalms of David, Psalms of the Korahites (xlii.-xlix.,
etc.), Psalms of Asaph (lxxiii.-lxxxiii., etc.), and others not so obvious
in a translation, e.g. the Hallelujah Psalms, cxi.-cxiii., cxlvi.-cl.
These groups must often have enjoyed an independent reputation as
groups, and even been invested with a certain canonical authority, for
occasionally the same psalm appears in two different groups (xiv.=liii.,
xl. 13-17=lxx., cviii.=lvii. 7-11 +lx. 6-12). Such repetition proves that
the final editors did not consider themselves at liberty to make any
change within the groups. The principle of the arrangement of individual
psalms within the group was probably not a scientific one: e.g. xxxiv.
and xxxv. seem to be placed together for no other reason than that both
refer to "the angel of Jehovah," xxxiv. 7, xxxv. 5. Sometimes a psalm
has been wrongly divided into two (cf. xlii., xliii., originally one
psalm) and occasionally two psalms have been united, usually for
reasons that are transparent (so perhaps xix., the revelation in the
heavens and the revelation in the Scriptures, and xxiv., the entrance
of Jehovah into His temple, and the essential conditions for the
entrance of man).

The original order of the groups themselves appears to have been
dislocated. Whoever added the subscription to Psalm lxxii. can hardly
have been aware of the eighteen psalms which, in the subsequent books
of the Psalter, are ascribed to David; nor is it natural to suppose
that the Asaphic (l.) and Korahitic psalms (xlii.-xlix.) stood in the
second book when that subscription was written. It is not improbable
that Psalms xlii.-l. originally belonged to the third book, along
with the Asaphic group, lxxiii.-lxxxiii., and that lxxii. 20, "The
prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended," was intended as the
subscription of all the Davidic psalms that had then been collected
(Book I, except Pss. i., ii., x., xxxiii., and book 2, Pss. li.-lxx.).[1]
The first two books originally represented a Davidic hymn-book; they
probably represent, as a whole, the oldest part of the Psalter.
[Footnote 1: Psalms i. and ii. were placed at the beginning as
prefatory to the whole Psalter. They deal with the two cardinal
points of Judaism--the law and the Messianic hope. Psalms ix. and x.
originally constituted _one_ alphabetic psalm, and xxxiii. is
ascribed to David in the Septuagint.]

The problem of the authorship of the Psalms is one of the thorniest
in the Old Testament. One hundred psalms are ascribed to definite
authors: one is ascribed to Moses (xc.), seventy-three to David, two
to Solomon (lxxvii., cxxvii.); and yet there are not a few scholars
who maintain that, so far from any psalm being Mosaic, or even
Davidic, there is not a single pre-exilic psalm in the Psalter, and
the less radical critics do not allow more than thirty or forty. The
question must be settled entirely upon internal evidence, as the
superscriptions, definite as they often are, are never demonstrably
reliable, while some of them are plainly impossible. To begin with,
doubt attaches to the meaning of the Hebrew preposition in the
phrase, "Psalm _of_ David." It is the same preposition as that
rendered by _for_ in the phrase, "For the chief musician," and
as in this phrase authorship is out of the question, it may be
seriously doubted whether it is implied in the phrase rendered
"Psalm of David." This doubt is corroborated by the phrase, "Psalms
of the sons of Korah." Plainly all the Korahites did not cooperate
in the composition of the psalms so superscribed; and the most
natural inference is that the phrase does not here designate
authorship, but that the psalm is one of a collection in some sense
belonging to or destined for the Korahitic guild of temple-singers.
[1] In that case the phrase would have a liturgical sense, and the
parallel phrase "of (or for) David," might have to be similarly
explained. It must be confessed, however, that whatever the actual
origin of the superscription, "of (or for) David," it certainly came
to be regarded as implying authorship--the many historical notices
in the superscriptions of Psalms li.-lx. are proof enough of that;
and no other explanation is possible of the superscription "of
Moses" in Psalm, xc (cf. Is. xxxviii. 9, the writing of Hezekiah).
[Footnote 1: It is not absolutely impossible that the phrase might
point to a collection composed by this guild, cf. "Moravian
brethren." But the other supposition is more likely.]

In later times, then, authorship was plainly intended by the
superscriptions. But it is quite certain that the superscriptions
themselves are no original and integral parts of the psalms. In the
Septuagint they occasionally differ from the Hebrew, assigning
psalms that are anonymous in the Hebrew (xcv., cxxxvii.) to David,
or to other authors (e.g., cxlvi.-cxlviii. to Haggai and Zechariah.)
The ease with which psalms were, without warrant, ascribed to David
may be seen from the Greek superscription to Psalm xcvi. "When the
house [i.e. the temple] was being built after the captivity; a song
of David": in other words, an admittedly post-exilic psalm is
ascribed to David. The superscriptions were added probably long
after the psalms, and there is no reason to suppose that the Hebrews
were exempt from the uncritical methods and ideas which
characterized the Greek translators. That they shared them is
abundantly proved by the historical superscriptions. One at least
(Ps. xxxiv.) in substituting the name of Abimelech (Gen. xx.) for
Achish (1 Sam. xxi.) shows either ignorance or carelessness, and
casts a very lurid light on the reliability of the superscriptions.
The contents of other psalms are manifestly irreconcilable with the
assumed authorship: Asaph, e.g., whom the Chronicles regards as a
contemporary of David (1 Chron. xvi 7), laments in Psalms lxxiv.,
lxxix. the devastation of the temple, which was not at that time in
existence. The principles on which the superscriptions were added
were altogether superficial and uncritical. Psalm cxxvii. is
ascribed to Solomon, chiefly because its opening verse speaks of the
building of the house, which was understood to be the temple. So
Psalm lxiii. is described as "a psalm of David when he was in the
wilderness of Judah," simply on the strength of the words, "My soul
thirsteth for thee in a dry and weary land where no water is"--words
which are taken literally, though they were undoubtedly intended
metaphorically. A parallel case is that of the psalm inserted in
Jonah ii., obviously a church psalm whose figurative language has
been too literally pressed.

Enough has been said to show that the superscriptions are later than
the psalms themselves, and often, if not always, unreliable; we are
therefore wholly dependent upon internal evidence, and the criteria
for Davidic authorship must be sought outside the Psalter. The only
absolutely undisputed poems of David's are the elegy over Saul and
Jonathan in 2 Samuel i. and the lament over Abner (2 Sam. iii. 33,
34). There is no means of proving that 2 Samuel xxii. (=Ps. xviii.)
and 2 Samuel xxiii. 1-7 are David's, as they are interpolated in a
section of Samuel which is itself an interpolation (xxi.-xxiv.),
interrupting as it does the continuity of 2 Samuel xx. and I Kings
i. The data offered by the elegy are much too slender to enable us
to decide whether any particular psalm is David's or not. Some have
ventured to ascribe a dozen psalms or so to him on the strength of
their peculiar vigour and originality, but obviously all such
decisions must be altogether subjective. What is certain is that
David was an accomplished musician (1 Sam. xvi. 18) and a great poet
(2 Sam. i.), a man of the most varied experience, rich emotional
nature and profound religious feeling, a devoted worshipper of
Jehovah, and eager to build Him a temple; and it is not impossible
that such a man may have written religious songs, but in the nature
of the case it can never be proved that he wrote any of the songs in
the Psalter. Psalm xviii. has been by many assigned to him with
considerable confidence because of the support it is thought to
receive from its appearance in a historical book; but besides the
fact that this support, as we have seen, is slender, the psalm can
hardly, at least in its present form, have come from David. The
superscription assigns it to a later period in his life when he had
been delivered from all his enemies; but at that time he could not
have looked back over the past, stained by his great sin, with the
complacency which marks the confession in vv. 20-24. Others have
supposed that xxiv. 7-10, with its picture of the entrance of
Jehovah through the "ancient gates," may well be his. It may be, if
the gates are those of the city; but if, as is more probable, they
are the temple gates, then the psalm must be long after the time of
Solomon. In the quest for Davidic psalms we can never possibly rise
above conjecture. Later ages regarded David as the father of sacred
song, just as they regarded Moses as the author of Hebrew law.

There can be little doubt, however, that there are pre-exilic psalms
or fragments in the Psalter. From Psalm cxxxvii. 3, 4 we may safely
infer that already, by the time of the exile, there were songs of
Jehovah or songs of Zion. We cannot tell what these songs were like;
but when we remember that for nearly two centuries before the exile
great prophets had been working--and we cannot suppose altogether
ineffectually, for they had disciples--it is difficult to see why,
granting the poetic power which the Hebrew had from the earliest
times, pious spirits should not have expressed themselves in sacred
song, or why some of these songs may not be in the Psalter.

We appear to be on tolerably sure ground in at least some of the
"royal" psalms. Doubtless it is often very hard to say, as in Psalms
ii., lxxii., whether the king is a historical figure or the
Messianic King of popular yearning; and possibly (cf. lxxii.) a
psalm which originally contemplated a historical king may have been
in later times altered or amplified to fit the features of the ideal
king. Other psalms, again (e.g., lxxxix., cxxxii.), clearly are the
products of a time when the monarchy is no more. But there remain
others, expressing, e.g. a wish for the king's welfare (xx., xxi.),
which can only be naturally referred to a time when the king was on
the throne. It is not absolutely impossible to refer these to the
period of the Hasmoneans, who bore the title from the end of the
second century B.C.; but the history of the canon renders this
supposition extremely improbable. The contents of these psalms are
not above pre-exilic possibility, and their position in the first
book would, generally speaking, be in favour of the earlier date.
Psalm xlv. also, which celebrates the marriage of a king to a
foreign princess, seems almost to compel a pre-exilic date.

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