this was succeeded by Matthew Poole's Synopsis Criti corum in 1669 (5 vols. folio).

III TEXTUAL CRITICISM IN THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES.

Biblical criticism continued in England till the midst of the eighteenth century. Mill issued his critical New Testament in 1707, the fruit of great industry, and was assailed by unthinking men who preferred pious ignorance to a correct New Testament.* But Richard Bentley espoused the cause of his friend with invincible arguments, and he himself spent many years in the collection of manuscripts, but died leaving his magnificent work incomplete, and his plans to be carried out by foreign scholars.

For "now original research in the science of Biblical Criticism, so far as the New Testament is concerned, seems to have left the shores of England to return no more for upwards of a century; and we must look to Germany if we wish to trace the further progress of investigations which our countrymen had so auspiciously begun."t

Bishop Lowth did for the Old Testament what Bentley did for the New. In his works + he called the attention of scholars to the necessity of emendation of the Massoretic text, and encouraged Kennicott to collate the manuscripts of the Old Testament, which he did and published the result in a monumental work in 1776– 1780. This was preceded by an introductory work in 1753-59.1

*Scrivener, Introduction to the Criticism of the N. T., 2d edit. 1874, p. 400. + Scrivener in /. c., F 402.

De Sacra Poesi Hebraeorum, 1753, and Isaiah: A New Translation, with Preaminary Dissertation and Notes, 1778, 2d edition, 1779.

& Vetus Test. Heb. cum var. lectionibus, 2 tom., Oxford.

The state of the printed Hebrew Text of the Old Testament considered. 2 vols., 8vo. Oxford.

After this splendid beginning, Old Testament criticism followed its New Testament sister to the continent of Europe and remained absent until our own day.

On the continent the work of Mill was carried on by J. A. Bengel J. C. Wetstein, J. J. Griesbach, J. M. A. Scholz,§ C. Lachmann, culminating in Const. Tischendorf, who edited the chief uncial authorities, discovered and edited the Codex Sinaiticus, and issued numerous editions of the New Testament, the earliest in 1841. He crowned his work with the eighth critical edition of the New Testament, which he lived to complete, but had to leave the Prolegomena to another.** Tischendorf is the greatest textual critic the world has yet produced.

In the Old Testament, De Rossi carried on the work of Kennicott.++ Little has been done since his day until recent times, when Baer united with Delitzsch in issuing in parts a revised Massoretic text, 1869–1882; Hermann Strack examined the recently-discovered Oriental manuscripts, the chief of which is the St. Petersburg codex of the Prophets of the year 916 A.D,‡‡ and Frensdorf undertook the production of the Massora Magna.§§

* Prodromus, N. T. Gr., 1725. Novum Test., 1734.

+ New Test. Gr. cum lectionibus variantibus Codicum, etc. Amst. 1751-2. Symbolae Criticae, II. tom., 1785-93.

§ Bib. krit. Reise Leipzig, 1823; N. T. Graece, 2 Bde. Leipzig, 1830–36. | Novum Test. Graece et Latine, 2 Bde., Berlin, 1842-50.

Bibliorum Codex Sinaiticus Petropolitanus, St. Petersburg, 1862; Die Sinaibibel, Ihre Entdeckung, Herausgabe und Erwerbung, Leipzig, 1871.

** Novum Testamentum Graece. Editio octava: Critica Major, Lipsiae, 1869-72. The Prolegomena is in the hands of an American scholar, Dr. C. R. Gregory.

tt Variae lectiones Vet. Test., 4 tom., Parm., 1784-1788.

‡‡ Prophetarum Posteriorum Codex Babylonicus Petropolitanus, Petropoli, 1876.

& Die Massora Magna; Erster Theil, Massoretisches Wörterbuch, Hanover und Leipzig, 1876.

Within recent times textual criticism has taken strong hold again in England. S. P. Tregelles,* F. H. Scrivener,† B. F. Westcott, and F. J. A. Hort ‡ have advanced the textual criticism of the New Testament beyond the mark reached by continental scholars. In Old Testament criticism England is advancing to the front rank. The work of Ginsburg on the Massora § is the greatest achievement since the unpublished work of Elias Levita. But the Massoretic text is only the beginning toward a correct text of the Old Testament.

The Textual Criticism of the Old Testament is at least half a century behind the New Testament. And the reason of it is, that scholars have hesitated to go back of the Massoretic text. Few have given their attention to the literary features of the Bible and especially its poetic structure. But it is just here that the eyes of the student are opened to the necessity of emendation of the text where we can receive no help from the Massorites, who seem to have been profoundly ignorant of the structure of Hebrew poetry. Prof. Grätz, the Jewish scholar, has recently said that we ought not to speak of a Massoretic text that has been made sure to us, but rather of different schools of Massorites, and follow their example and remove impossible readings from the text.T

* The Greek New Testament edited from ancient authorities, etc., 4to, 18571872, pp. 1017.

+ Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, 3d edition, 1883. The New Testament in the Original Greek. Vol. II. Introduction and Appendix. N. Y., 1882.

The Massorah compiled from Manuscripts Alphabetically and Lexically arranged, Vol. 1. and II. Aleph-Tav, London, 1880-83.

| Davidson, Treatise of Biblical Criticism, Boston, 1853, I., p. 160, seq. ¶ Krit. Com, zu den Psalmen nebst Text und Uebersetzung, Breslau, L, 1882, p. 118, seq.

· Bishop Lowth, with his fine æsthetic sense and insight into the principles of Hebrew poetry, saw and stated the truth:

"If it be asked, what then is the real condition of the present Hebrew Text; and of what sort, and in what number, are the mistakes which we must acknowledge to be found in it: it is answered, that the condition of the Hebrew Text is such, as from the nature of the thing, the antiquity of the writings themselves, the want of due care, or critical skill (in which latter at least the Jews have been exceedingly deficient), might in all reason have been expected, that the mistakes are frequent, and of various kinds; of letters, words, and sentences; by variation, omission, transposition; such as often injure the beauty and elegance, embarrass the construction, alter or obscure the sense, and sometimes render it quite unintelligible. If it be objected, that a concession, so large as this is, tends to invalidate the authority of Scripture; that it gives up in effect the certainty and authenticity of the doctrines contained in it, and exposes our religion naked and defenceless to the assaults of its enemies: this, I think, is a vain and groundless apprehension. . . . . Important and fundamental doctrines do not wholly depend on single passages; and universal harmony runs through the Holy Scriptures; the parts mutually support each other, and supply one another's deficiencies and obscurities. Superficial damages and partial defects may greatly diminish the beauty of the edifice, without injuring its strength, and bringing on utter ruin and destruction." *

...

The views of the critics prevailed over those of the scholastics, and no one would now venture to dispute their conclusions.

IV. THE TEXT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.

It has become more and more evident that the Hebrew vowel points and accents were not attached to the original MSS. of their authors, but that they have been the product of a long historical development. The Arabic Koran gives us doubtless the simplest sys

* Lowth, Isaiah, 2d ed., London, 779, pp. lix., L.

tem. The Syriac gives us a double system, the Greek and the Syrian proper, standing between the Arabic and the Hebrew. The Hebrew has also two systems, the Pales tinian and the Babylonian, the latter preserved in the Codex Petripol., 916 A.D., which was unknown until recent times. These two evidently developed side by side and go back on an earlier, simpler system, somewhat like the Arabic, which has been lost.* The origin of the system of pointing the Shemitic languages was probably in the Syrian school at Edessa, and from thence it passed over from the Syriac text at first to the Arabic and afterward to the Hebrew texts. The movement began with diacritical signs to distinguish certain letters and forms, such as we find in the Syriac. This gave place to a system of vowel points. Among the Hebrews the Babylonian is the earlier, and is characterized by placing the vowel points above the letters; the Tiberian is the later and more perfect system, and has therefore prevailed. The system did not reach its present condi tion until the seventh century at Babylon and the mid. dle of the eighth century of our era, in Palestine,† although Ginsburg attributes the origin of the Babylonian system to Acha, about 550, and the Tiberian to Mocha, about 570. It was the work of the Massoretic Jewish critics. The accents went through a similar course of development. They serve for a guide in the cantillation of the synagogues even more than for division of the sentences and the determination of the tone. These also were modelled after the musical notation of the Syrian Church. Hence the double tradition as to the place of

* Gesenius, Hebr. Gram., ed. Rödiger and Kautzsch, 22 Aufl., p. 31.

+ Dillmann, Bibeltext. A. T., in Herzog, Ency. II., pp. 394-6.

Life of Elias Levita, in l. c., p. 61, seq.

§ Wickes, Treatise on the Accentuation of the Three so-called Poetic Book of the Old Testament. Oxford, 1881.