Introduction to the Book of Isaiah.

By the Rev. T. K. Cheyne, M.A., D.D., Oriel Professor of the Interpretation of Holy Scripture at Oxford. London: Adam & Charles Black, 1895. Pp. xxxix. and 449. Price 248.

THIS is in reality the work of more than half a life-time. For nearly thirty years Canon Cheyne has laboured to interpret the complex group of writings to which the name of Isaiah is prefixed. The first fruits of his industry was the pamphlet "Notes and Criticisms on the Hebrew text of Isaiah," published in 1868, followed in 1870 by a small octavo volume, embracing the whole of the prophecies, entitled "The Book of Isaiah chronologically arranged," and containing spirited and idiomatic translations, accompanied by brief scholarly notes. Here the dominant influence was that of Göttingen, where the young Oxford scholar had studied under the teaching of the renowned Semitist and exegete Ewald. Both these writings obtained immediate recognition in Germany, and a laudatory mention of them is inserted by Diestel in the preface to his Commentary on Isaiah (1872). Cheyne was then known as the almost solitary English representative of a new spirit and tendency in Old Testament studies.

A decennium follows of earnest scholarly work in the field of Hebrew studies, despite the interruptions occasioned by the cares of an Essex parish. In 1880 there appeared a new commentary on Isaiah in two volumes, with full annotations and rendering. The critical results are here made less prominent, but the rich store of archaeological material, which has always characterized Cheyne's work, is now greatly enlarged and becomes a fresh and welcome contribution to the interpretation of Isaiah. The charge is sometimes brought by conservative scholars against the more advanced Higher Critics that they are oblivious of, or depreciate the results of Assyriology. Of Wellhausen this was formerly true; but of Cheyne this could never have been said with any truth. His earliest and his latest work show that he has consistently taken pains to master all the best results of this important ancillary branch of study.

But we must turn to the article "Isaiah" in the Encyclopædia Britannica (1881) in order to learn what were the critical results attained in 1870-1880. We there find a considerable modification of his critical estimate of Isa. xl.-lxvi. We are now referring to that last section of literature (lvi.-lxvi.) recently called by Duhm

"Trito-Isaiah." In 1881 Cheyne wrote:-" natural as the feeling against disintegration may be, the difficulties in the way of admitting the unity of chaps. xl.-lxvi. are insurmountable." It would not be out of place to register in brief his opinions at that date respecting the concluding chapters of the great Isaiah collection. Lvi. 1-8 he considers post-exilian (age of Nehemiah), also lviii., which resembles it in hortatory tone. Stress is laid on fasting; comp. Zech vii. 3; viii. 19: Joel ii. 12, 13. Moreover, he seemed disposed to regard lix. as post-exilian owing to its affinity with Proverbs, a favourite subject of study during the Exile. Lxiii. 1-6, with its eschatological and apocalyptic tone, Cheyne is strongly disposed to make post-exilian owing to its parallels with Joel and Malachi. Lxiii. 7-lxiv., with its thanksgiving, penitence, and supplication, is compared with Lamentations, but no opinion is given as to its date. On the other hand, lxv. and lxvi. proceed from one author, and have points of contact with Joel iii. 12-16. Accordingly it is placed by Cheyne "well on in the Persian period." On the other hand, lvi. 9-lvii. he is disposed (with Ewald and Bleek) to assign to a time of persecution in the reign of Manasseh. Such were the main critical results attained by Cheyne fourteen years ago on the last eleven chapters of Isaiah. It is obvious that he had even then advanced a considerable way towards the conclusions indicated in the volume before us. In 1891 two articles in the Jewish Quarterly Review (July and October) show that the author had then attained to a definite position on problems which had in 1881 remained untouched, or had only received partial solution. Thus on lxiii. 7—lxiv. 12 (11) the author, after a careful survey (Oct. 1891, p. 104, foll.), arrives at the conclusion that this section of "liturgical poetry," furnishing numerous parallels with post-exilian Psalms, must be referred " to the last century of Persian rule, to the period when the doleful book of Ecclesiastes was written . . . which witnessed the cruel treatment of the Jews by Artaxerxes Ochus."

In order to do justice to our author we have thought it right to lay particular stress upon the preliminary stages of his work (“Vorarbeiten") which have prepared the way for the monument of massive erudition exhibited in these pages. No one can accuse him of undue haste in the formation of his judgments. And on this subject of the Trito-Isaiah the results have been matured through constant study not only of Isaianic literature, but also of the entire field of Old Testament writings (particularly Prophetæ posteriores, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Lamentations). Throughout all his work there has been evidence of patient investigation of the minutiae of language and of literary parallels. The results attained are rarely simple, for, as Prof. Cheyne has observed

with profound insight and truth, "Complication and not simplicity is the note of the questions and of the answers which constitute Old Testament criticism" (Proph. of Isaiah, ii., p. 228).

It is instructive in the light of this dictum to turn to Duhm's results on the same department (Trito-Isaiah) in his recent brilliant commentary. This ingenious writer appears to move more rapidly to his conclusions than his English contemporary. Amid the disparities of form and substance he sees but one author and historic standpoint in chapters lvi.-lxvi. With felicitous powers of generalization he sums up the post-exilic situation (preceding the rebuilding of the temple and the constitution of Ezra) with its internal disorganization, its heretic enemies, and the false brethren of the Jerusalemite community. Far different, and to the ordinary reader less attractive, is the exposition contained in Cheyne's "Introduction" (pp. xxxi. foll., p. 310 foll.), owing to its insistence on the complex features. The internal diversities of thought are now presented in stronger lights and shadows, while the specialities of style are duly enforced. But is it not most usefulindeed necessary—to have in our hands the results of the patient inductive method of the English scholar to place by the side of the rapid luminous generalizations of his brilliant German contemporary: In one respect, indeed, the Oxford scholar shows a decisive superiority. No one has been more vehemently attacked; no one has shown a more kindly courtesy to opponents. It would be impossible in all Cheyne's writings to find any approach to such bitterness in literary polemic as sometimes afflicts the reader of Duhm's pages.1

It is in the region of the Proto-Isaiah that I find it most difficult to follow Canon Cheyne. And the criticism which I passed three years ago on his Bampton Lectures I am constrained to repeat upon his Introduction to Isaiah, viz.: that he underrates the intellectual and spiritual possibilities of the great prophetic leaders of præ-exilian Israel. The result of this tendency is an excessive restriction of the range of vision open to a remarkable creative personality like that of Isaiah. Surely it is time for us to consider well whether comparative tables of linguistic usage, founded on relatively small areas of literature, and those constantly redacted, may not conduct us to illusory results, unless the cumulative effect

1 Read for example the scolding he gives to the great exegete Dillmann (p. 26 on Isaiah iii. 10, 11). And yet surely Duhm, with all his brilliance of suggestion, exposes himself to some severe retorts when he deliberately coins Hebrew words for Isaiah's use, when it is obvious that the invention (Hifil of p in Isa. viii. 13) is merely a textual "Nothbehelf" of the German critic. It deserves a stronger epithet than "a needlessly hard riddle" (Introduction, p. 41).

of the evidence be overwhelming (like the masterly array of facts presented on pp. 247-271). But when we have to examine brief sections, the utmost caution is needed lest the use of one or two words or phrases, which find an echo in late literature, should betray us into imposing restraints on the possibilities of genius, which, if consistently enforced, would reduce the history of human thought to a mechanical and uniform gradient. But the history of mankind, as we all know, has its Alpine peaks of personality to break the monotony of normal evolutional progress. To a mind such as Isaiah possessed, succeeding to the great spiritual inheritance left to him by Amos, we may well attribute such universalism and imaginative forecasts as find expression in Isa. ii. 2-4; xix. 19-22; nor should the Messianic ideals portrayed in ix. 1-6 and xi. 1-9 occasion serious misgiving. These considerations would at least save us from such textual peddling as endeavours to manipulate the evidence by altering into 5 (Duhm on Isa. v. 13) as though Isaiah remained tied to one idea all his life, and that with Ephraim's doom straight before his eyes!

I find that this tendency to depreciate the intellectual and spiritual possessions of præ-exilian prophets increases with every successive work that comes from Canon Cheyne's pen. Thus the literary gem (Isa. ii. 2-4) which belongs to the collection of Micah's and of Isaiah's oracles in common, which in 1889 the author recognised as an "old prophecy" and is still regarded as such by Duhm, is now made post-exilian (a result previously announced in the Jewish Chronicle, July 1892).

Has the mind of the writer been unconsciously influenced by the exigencies of his theory of the Psalter as a literary product lying entirely outside the region of Israel's præ-exilian history (unless we except Ps. xviii.)? Whatever be the reason, he, like Cornill (Einleitung p. 139, comp. Z.A.T.W. 1884 p. 88) appears to have been converted by the arguments of Stade (Z.A.T.W. ibid. p. 292). It must be acknowledged that Cheyne's later position has the merit of logical consistency, for such passages as Isa. ii. 2-4; iv. 2-6 1 form inconvenient fulcra whereby the cogency of arguments for the late origin of Pss. xlvi., xlviii., and 1. may be successfully overturned. In the volume before us the process of elimination has been carried still further, and the great Messianic passages ix. 1-6 and xi. 1-8 are surrendered, though with reluctance, accompanied by the confession that the weight of evidence is not very great (see pp. 44 foll. and also xxiv).

Let us consider ix. 1-6 first. Here neither language nor contents appear to me to lend any strong support to Hackmann's view,

1 I admit that there is some force in the arguments against iv. 5, 6.

especially when we take into account the speciality of subject with which this lyrical passage deals. One of Prof. Cheyne's arguments for surrendering the Isaianic authorship is that neither Jeremiah, II. Isaiah, nor Zechariah refer to these great passages. Surely such a plea has no cogency. For (1) Care must be exercised in the use of an argumentum ex silentio, unless we are prepared for some very strange results; (2) II. Isaiah and Zechariah belonged to an age which had almost ceased to find its consolation in the idea of a Messianic king; (3) Cheyne has already stated that "x. 26 and xiv. 5 contain allusions to ix. 3, and xxxvii. 32 (end) is copied from ix. 6 end." In other words, later writers regarded ix. 1-6 as Isaiah's. Surely the following sentence (top of page 45), in its attempt to minimize the force of the author's own concession, contains some weak special pleading. For, according to Cheyne himself, xiv. 5 belongs to the close of the exile (a very probable date), while the non-Isaianic origin of x. 26 is by no means proved. For the coincidence with the P passages in Exod. xiv. is too slight to be significant, while another parallel, Judg. vii. 24, 25, belongs, according to Budde's analysis, to the older sections of the Gideonnarratives (Richter und Samuel pp. 112 foll. 124). When we turn to xi. 1-9 we find that the discussion (pp. 62-66) leads to very un satisfactory results. There is certainly no lack of thoroughness in dealing with Hackmann's arguments. But what is the total impression left on the reader's mind after a perusal of Cheyne's carefully balanced analysis of both the formal and material side of Hackmann's evidence? Surely (1) that the linguistic phenomena present no decisively preponderating evidence for a late origin; (2) that there seems to be some exaggeration " in Hackmann's treatment of the contents. Yet we are finally assured of this "seriously important result," that the question must be decided against the authorship of Isaiah both in ix. 1-6 and xi. 1-9.

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Respecting xix. 18-25, I still find myself unable to agree with the author's later opinions. His views expressed in 1881 (Encycl. Britt.) appear to me sounder. It is quite possible that verse 18 may have been inserted in the interests of Onias, who founded the rival temple to Jehovah at Leontopolis. At the present time Cheyne regards the entire chapter 1-15 and 16-25 as non-Isaianic. On the linguistic side of the problem it is not easy to argue with a writer who contends that "Isaianic phrases are easily accounted for by imitation." On the general arguments for Isaianic authorship it is sufficient to refer to Kuenen's careful and well-balanced discussion (German edition, pp. 66 foll.) and to Dillmann's commentary. Both these critics rightly lay stress on the maṣṣebah in Egypt (verse 19) as strong evidence for a pre-Deuteronomic origin. There is no cogency in the citation of Mal. i. 11. (p. 101) where the