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THE BOOK OF PSALMSPREVIOUS CHAPTER - NEXT CHAPTER - HELP
INTRODUCTION TO THE PSALTER Pa'nta hoo'sper en mega'loo tini' kai' koinoo' tamiei'oo tee' bi'bloo too'n psalmoo'n tetheesau'ristai Mangey), where he makes the following distinction no'mous kai' lo'gia thespisthe'nta dia' profeetoo'n kai' hu'mnous kai' ta' a'lla ohi's epistee'mee kai' euse'beia sunau'xontai kai' teleiou'ntai.)
The order of the books in the Hebrew MSS of the German class, upon which our printed editions in general use are based, is actually this:
Psalms, Proverbs, Job, and the five Megilloth. But the Masora and the MSS of the Spanish class begin the Kethubim with the Chronicles which they awkwardly separate from Ezra and Nehemiah, and then range the Psalms, Job, Proverbs and the five Megilloth next. (Note: In all the Masoretic lists the twenty four books are arranged in the following order: 1) br'shyt; 2) shmwt w'lh; 3) wyqr' Ginsburg, 1867, p. 120, 248.)
And according to the Talmud (Baba Bathra 14b) the following is the right order: Ruth, Psalms, Job, Proverbs; the Book of Ruth precedes the Psalter as its prologue, for Ruth is the ancestor of him to whom the sacred lyric owes its richest and most flourishing era. It is undoubtedly the most natural order that the Psalter should open the division of the Kethubim, and for this reason: that, according to the stock which forms the basis of it, it represents the time of David, and then afterwards in like manner the Proverbs and Job represent the Chokma-literature of the age of Solomon.
But it is at once evident that it could have no other place but among the Kethubim.
The codex of the giving of the Law, which is the foundation of the old covenant and of the nationality of Israel, as also of all its subsequent literature, occupies the first place in the canon. Under the collective title of nby'ym, a series of historical writings of a prophetic character, which trace the history of Israel from the occupation of Canaan to the first gleam of light in the gloomy retributive condition of the Babylonish Exile (Prophetae priores) is first attached to these five books of the Thôra; and then a series of strictly prophetical writings by the prophets themselves which extend to the time of Darius Nothus, and indeed to the time of Nehemiah's second sojourn in Jerusalem under this Persian king (Prophetae posteriores). Regarded chronologically, the first series would better correspond to the second if the historical books of the Persian period (Chronicles with Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther) were joined to it; but for a very good reason this has not been done.
The Israelitish literature has marked out two sharply defined and distinct methods of writing history, viz., the annalistic and the prophetic. The socalled Elohistic and so-called Jehovistic form of historical writing in the Pentateuch might serve as general types of these. The historical books of the Persian period are, however, of the annalistic, not of the prophetic character (although the Chronicles have taken up and incorporated many remnants of the prophetic form of historical writing, and the Books of the Kings, vice versâ, many remnants of the annalistic): they could not therefore stand among the Prophetae priores. But with the Book of Ruth it is different. This short book is so like the end of the Book of the Judges (ch. 17-21), that it might very well stand between Judges and Samuel; and it did originally stand after the Book of the Judges, just as the Lamentations of Jeremiah stood after his prophecies.
It is only on liturgical grounds that they have both been placed with the so-called Megilloth (Canticles, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther, as they are arranged in our ordinary copies according to the calendar of the festivals). All the remaining books could manifestly only be classed under the third division of the canon, which (as could hardly have been otherwise in connection with twrh and nby'ym) has been entitled, in the most general way, ktwbym-a title which, as the grandson of Ben-Sira renders it in his prologue to Ecclesiasticus, means simply ta' This strikes one as strange, because with the exception of Ps 17 (and further on Ps 86; 90; 102; 142) they are all inscribed otherwise; and because in part, as e.g., Ps 1 and 2, they contain no supplicatory address to God and have therefore not the form of prayers. Nevertheless the collective name Tephilloth is suitable to all Psalms. The essence of prayer is a direct and undiverted looking towards God, and the absorption of the mind in the thought of Him. Of this nature of prayer all Psalms partake; even the didactic and laudatory, though containing no supplicatory address-like Hannah's song of praise which is introduced with wttpll Sephar Tallim Quod interpretatur volumen Ymnorum explicit.)
This name may also seem strange, for the Psalms for the most part are hardly hymns in the proper sense: the majority are elegiac or didactic; and only a solitary one, Ps 145, is directly inscribed thlh. But even this collective name of the Psalms is admissible, for they all partake of the nature of the hymn, to wit the purpose of the hymn, the glorifying of God. The narrative Psalms praise the magnalia Dei, the plaintive likewise praise Him, since they are directed to Him as the only helper, and close with grateful confidence that He will hear and answer. The verb hileel The language of the Masora gives the preference to the feminine form of the name, instead of thlym, and throughout calls the Psalter thlwt cpr (e.g., on 2 Sam 22:5). (Note: It is an erroneous opinion of Buxtorf in his Tiberias and also of Jewish Masoretes, that the Masora calls the Psalter hlyl' (hallêla).
It is only the so-called Hallel, Ps 113-119, that bears this name, for in the Masora on 2 Sam 22:5; Ps 116:3a is called dhlyl' hbrw (the similar passage in the Hallel) in relation to 18:5a.)
In the Syriac it is styled ketobo demazmûre, in the Koran zabûr (not as Golius and Freytag point it, zubûr), which in the usage of the Arabic language signifies nothing more than "writing" (synon. kitâb: vid., on Ps 3:1), but is perhaps a corruption of mizmor from which a plural mezâmir is formed, by a change of vowels, in Jewish-Oriental MSS. In the Old Testament writings a plural of mizamor does not occur. Also in the postbiblical usage mizmorîm or mizmoroth is found only in solitary instances as the name for the Psalms. In Hellenistic Greek the corresponding word psalmoi' By the psalterium described by Augustine, Casiodorus and Isidorus understand the trigonum, which is in the form of an inverted sharpcornered triangle; but it cannot be this that is intended because the horizontal strings of this instrument are surrounded by a three-sided sounding body, so that it must be a triangular lyre. Moreover there is also a trigon belonging to the Macedonian era which is formed like a harp (vid., Weiss' Kostümkunde, Fig. 347) and this further tends to support our view.) being transferred metaphorically to the songs that are sung with its accompaniment. Psalms are songs for the lyre, and therefore lyric poems in the strictest sense. 3. The History of Psalm Composition Before we can seek to obtain a clear idea of the origin of the Psalmcollection we must take a general survey of the course of the development of psalm writing. The lyric is the earliest kind of poetry in general, and the Hebrew poetry, the oldest example of the poetry of antiquity that has come down to us, is therefore essentially lyric. Neither the Epos nor the Drama, but only the Mashal, has branched off from it and attained an independent form. Even prophecy, which is distinguished from psalmody by a higher impulse which the mind of the writer receives from the power of the divine mind, shares with the latter the common designation of nikaa' (1 Chron 24:1-3), and the psalm-singer, mshrr, is also as such called chozeh The time of Moses was the period of Israel's birth as a nation and also of its national lyric. The Israelites brought instruments with them out of Egypt and these were the accompaniments of their first song (Ex 15)-the oldest hymn, which re-echoes through all hymns of the following ages and also through the Psalter (comp. v. 2 with Ps 118:14; v. 3 with Ps 24:8; v. 4, 14:27 with Ps 136:15; v. 8 with Ps 78:13, v. 11 with Ps 77:14; 86:8; 89:7f.; v. 13, 17 with Ps 78:54, and other parallels of a similar kind). If we add to these, Ps 90 and Deut 32, we then have the prototypes of all Psalms, the hymnic, elegiac, and prophetico-didactic. All three classes of songs are still wanting in the strophic symmetry which characterises the later art. But even Deborah's song of victory, arranged in hexastichs-a song of triumph composed eight centuries before Pindar and far outstripping him-exhibits to us the strophic art approximating to its perfect development. It has been thought strange that the very beginnings of the poesy of Israel are so perfect, but the history of Israel, and also the history of its literature, comes under a different law from that of a constant development from a lower to a higher grade. The redemptive period of Moses, unique in its way, influences as a creative beginning, every future development. There is a constant progression, but of such a kind as only to develope that which had begun in the Mosaic age with all the primal force and fulness of a divine creation. We see, however, how closely the stages of this progress are linked together, from the fact that Hannah the singer of the Old Testament Magnificat, was the mother of him who anointed, as King, the sweet singer of Israel, on whose tongue was the word of the Lord.
In David the sacred lyric attained its full maturity. Many things combined to make the time of David its golden age. Samuel had laid the foundation of this both by his energetic reforms in general, and by founding the schools of the prophets in particular, in which under his guidance (1 Sam 19:19f.), in conjunction with the awakening and fostering of the prophetic gift, music and song were taught. Through these coenobia, whence sprang a spiritual awakening hitherto unknown in Israel, David also passed. Here his poetic talent, if not awakened, was however cultivated. He was a musician and poet born. Even as a Bethlehemite shepherd he played upon the harp, and with his natural gift he combined a heart deeply imbued with religious feeling. But the Psalter contains as few traces of David's Psalms before his anointing (vid., on Ps 8; 144) as the New Testament does of the writings of the Apostles before the time of Pentecost. It was only from the time when the Spirit of Jahve came upon him at his anointing as king of Israel, and raised him to the dignity of his calling in connection with the covenant of redemption, that he sang Psalms, which have become an integral part of the canon.
They are the fruit not only of his high gifts and the inspiration of the Spirit of God (2 Sam 23:2), but also of his own experience and of the experience of his people interwoven with his own. David's path from his anointing onwards, lay through affliction to glory. Song however, as a Hindu proverb says, is the offspring of suffering, the çloka springs from the çoka. His life was marked by vicissitudes which at one time prompted him to elegiac strains, at another to praise and thanksgiving; at the same time he was the founder of the kingship of promise, a prophecy of the future Christ, and his life, thus typically moulded, could not express itself otherwise than in typical or even consciously prophetic language. Raised to the throne, he did not forget the harp which had been his companion and solace when he fled before Saul, but rewarded it with all honour. He appointed 4000 Levites, the fourth division of the whole Levitical order, as singers and musicians in connection with the service in the tabernacle on Zion and partly in Gibeon, the place of the Mosaic tabernacle. These he divided into 24 classes under the Precentors, Asaph, Heman, and Ethan = Jeduthun (1 Chron 25 comp. 15:17ff.), and multiplied the instruments, particularly the stringed instruments, by his own invention (1 Chron 23:5; Neh 12:36) (Note: I tended, says David in the Greek Psalter, at the close of Ps, my father's sheep, my hands made pipes (o'rganon = `wgb) and my fingers put together (or: tuned) harps (psaltee'rion = nbl Numeri Rabba c. xv. (f. 264a) and the Targum on Amos 6:5.).
In David's time there were three places of sacrifice: on Zion beside the ark (2 Sam 6:17f.), in Gibeon beside the Mosaic tabernacle (1 Chron 16:39f.) and later, on the threshing-floor of Ornan, afterwards the Temple-hill (1 Chron 21:28-30). Thus others also were stimulated in many ways to consecrate their offerings to the God of Israel. Beside the 73 Psalms bearing the inscription ldwd-Psalms the direct Davidic authorship of which is attested, at least in the case of some fifty, by their creative originality, their impassioned and predominantly plaintive strain, their graceful flow and movement, their ancient but clear language, which becomes harsh and obscure only when describing the dissolute conduct of the ungodly-the collection contains the following which are named after contemporary singers appointed by David: 12 l'cp (Ps 50; 78:1-83:18), of which the contents and spirit are chiefly prophetic, and 12 by the Levite family of singers, the bny-qrh (Ps 42-49; 84:1-85:13; 87:1-88:18, including Ps 43), bearing a predominantly regal and priestly impress.
Both the Psalms of the Ezrahite, Ps 88 by Heman and 89 by Ethan, belong to the time of Solomon whose name, with the exception of Ps 72, is borne only by Ps 127. Under Solomon psalm-poesy began to decline; all the existing productions of the mind of that age bear the mark of thoughtful contemplation rather than of direct conception, for restless eagerness had yielded to enjoyable contentment, national concentration to cosmopolitan expansion. It was the age of the Chokma, which brought the apophthegm to its artistic perfection, and also produced a species of drama. Solomon himself is the perfecter of the Mashal, that form of poetic composition belonging strictly to the Chokma, Certainly according to 1 Kings 5:12 Hebr.; 4:32, Engl. he was also the author of 1005 songs, but in the canon we only find two Psalms by him and the dramatic Song of Songs. This may perhaps be explained by the fact that he spake of trees from the cedar to the hyssop, that his poems, mostly of a worldly character, pertained rather to the realm of nature than to the kingdom of grace.
Only twice after this did psalm-poesy rise to any height and then only for a short period: viz., under Jehoshaphat and under Hezekiah. Under both these kings the glorious services of the Temple rose from the desecration and decay into which they had fallen to the full splendour of their ancient glory. Moreover there were two great and marvellous deliverances which aroused the spirit of poesy during the reigns of these kings: under Jehoshaphat, the overthrow of the neighbouring nations when they had banded together for the exstirpation of Judah, predicted by Jahaziel, the Asaphite; under Hezekiah the overthrow of Sennacherib's host foretold by Isaiah. These kings also rendered great service to the cause of social progress. Jehoshaphat by an institution designed to raise the educational status of the people, which reminds one of the Carlovingian missi (2 Chron 17:7-9); Hezekiah, whom one may regard as the Pisistratus of Israelitish literature, by the establishment of a commission charged with collecting the relics of the early literature (Prov 25:1); he also revived the ancient sacred music and restored the Psalms of David and Asaph to their liturgical use (2 Chron 29:25ff.). And he was himself a poet, as his mktb (mktm?) (Isa 38) shows, though certainly a reproductive rather than a creative poet. Both from the time of Jehoshaphat and from the time of Hezekiah we possess in the Psalter not a few Psalms, chiefly Asaphic and Korahitic, which, although bearing no historical heading, unmistakeably confront us with the peculiar circumstances of those times. (Note: With regard to the time of Jehoshaphat even Nic. Nonne has acknowledge this in his Diss. de Tzippor et Deror (Bremen 1741, 4to.) which has reference to Ps 84:4.)
With the exception of these two periods of revival the latter part of the regal period produced scarcely any psalm writers, but is all the more rich in prophets. When the lyric became mute, prophecy raised its trumpet voice in order to revive the religious life of the nation, which previously had expressed itself in psalms. In the writings of the prophets, which represent the lei'mma As the Reformation gave birth to the German church-hymn, and the Thirty years' war, without which perhaps there might have been no Paul Gerhardt, called it into life afresh, so the Davidic age gave birth to psalmpoesy and the Exile brought back to life again that which had become dead.
The divine chastisement did not fail to produce the effect designed. Even though it should not admit of proof, that many of the Psalms have had portions added to them, from which it would be manifest how constantly they were then used as forms of supplication, still it is placed beyond all doubt, that the Psalter contains many psalms belonging to the time of the Exile, as e.g., Ps 102. Still far more new psalms were composed after the Return. When those who returned from exile, among whom were many Asaphites, (Note: In Barhebraeus on Job and in his Chronikon several traditions are referred to "Asaph the Hebrew priest, the brother of Ezra the writer of the Scriptures.") again felt themselves to be a nation, and after the restoration of the Temple to be also a church, the harps which in Babylon hung upon the willows, were tuned afresh and a rich new flow of song was the fruit of this reawakened first love.
But this did not continue long. A sanctity founded on good works and the service of the letter took the place of that outward, coarse idolatry from which the people, now returned to their fatherland, had been weaned while undergoing punishment in the land of the stranger. Nevertheless in the era of the Seleucidae the oppressed and injured national feeling revived under the Maccabees in its old life and vigour. Prophecy had then long been dumb, a fact lamented in many passages in the 1st Book of the Maccabees.
It cannot be maintained that psalm-poesy flourished again at that time.
Hitzig has recently endeavoured to bring forward positive proof, that it is Maccabean psalms, which form the proper groundwork of the Psalter. He regards the Maccabean prince Alexander Jannaeus as the writer of Ps 1 and 2, refers Ps 44 to 1 Macc. 5:56-62, and maintains both in his Commentary of 1835-36 and in the later edition of 1863-65 that from Ps 73 onwards there is not a single pre-Maccabean psalm in the collection and that, from that point, the Psalter mirrors the prominent events of the time of the Maccabees in chronological order. Hitzig has been followed by von Lengerke and Olshausen. They both mark the reign of John Hyrcanus (B.C. 135-107) as the time when the latest psalms were composed and when the collection as we now have it was made: whereas Hitzig going somewhat deeper ascribes Ps 1-2; 150 with others, and the arrangement of the whole, to Hyrcanus' son, Alexander Jannaeus.
On the other hand both the existence and possibility of Maccabean psalms is disputed not only by Hengstenberg, Hävernick, and Keil but also by Gesenius, Hassler, Ewald, Thenius, Böttcher, and Dillmann. For our own part we admit the possibility. It has been said that the ardent enthusiasm of the Maccabean period was more human than divine, more nationally patriotic than theocratically national in its character, but the Book of Daniel exhibits to us, in a prophetic representation of that period, a holy people of the Most High contending with the god-opposing power in the world, and claims for this contest the highest significance in relation to the history of redemption. The history of the canon, also, does not exclude the possibility of there being Maccabean psalms. For although the chronicler by 1 Chron 16:36 brings us to the safe conclusion that in his day the Psalter (comp. ta' tou' When Judas Maccabaeus, by gathering together the national literature, followed in the footsteps of Nehemiah (2 Macc. 2:14: hoosau'toos de' kai' Iou'das ta' deiskorpisme'na dia' to'n po'lemon to'n gegono'ta heemi'n episunee'gage pa'nta kai' e'sti par' heemi'n), we might perhaps suppose that the Psalter was at that time enriched by some additions. And when Jewish tradition assigns to the so-called Great Synagogue (hgdwlh knct) a share in the compilation of the canon, this is not unfavourable to the supposition of Maccabean psalms, since this sunagoogee' It is utterly at variance with historical fact to maintain that the Maccabean period was altogether incapable of producing psalms worthy of incorporation in the canon. Although the Maccabean period had no prophets, it is nevertheless to be supposed that many possessed the gift of poesy, and that the Spirit of faith, which is essentially one and the same with the Spirit of prophecy, might sanctify this gift and cause it to bear fruit. An actual proof of this is furnished by the so-called Psalter of Solomon (Psaltee'rion Salomoo'ntos in distinction from the canonical Psalter of David) (Note: First made known by De la Cerda in his Adversaria sacra (1626) and afterwards incorporated by Fabricius in his Codex Pseudepigraphus V. T. pp. 914ff. (1713).) consisting of 18 psalms, which certainly come far behind the originality and artistic beauty of the canonical Psalms; but they show at the same time, that the feelings of believers, even throughout the whole time of the Maccabees, found utterance in expressive spiritual songs.
Maccabean psalms are therefore not an absolute impossibility-no doubt they were many; and that some of them were incorporated in the Psalter, cannot be denied à priori. But still the history of the canon does not favour this supposition. And the circumstance of the LXX version of the Psalms (according to which citations are made even in the first Book of the Maccabees) inscribing several Psalms Aggai'ou kai' Zachari'ou, while however it does not assign the date of the later period to any, is against it.
And if Maccabean psalms be supposed to exist in the Psalter they can at any rate only be few, because they must have been inserted in a collection which was already arranged. And since the Maccabean movement, though beginning with lofty aspirations, gravitated, in its onward course, towards things carnal, we can no longer expect to find psalms relating to it, or at least none belonging to the period after Judas Maccabaeus; and from all that we know of the character and disposition of Alexander Jannaeus it is morally impossible that this despot should be the author of the first and second Psalms and should have closed the collection. 4. Origin of the Collection The Psalter, as we now have it, consists of five books. (Note: The Karaite Jerocham (about 950 A.D.) says mglwt (rolls) instead of cprym.)
Tou'to' se mee' pare'lthoi oo' filo'loge-says Hippolytus, whose words are afterwards quoted by Epiphanius-ho'ti kai' to' psaltee'rion eis pe'nte diei'lon bibli'a ohi Hebrai'oi hoo'ste ei'nai kai' auto' a'llon penta'teuchon.
This accords with the Midrash on Ps 1:1: Moses gave the Israelites the five books of the Thôra and corresponding to these (kngdm) David gave them the book of Psalms which consists of five books (cprym chmshh bw shysh thlym cpr). The division of the Psalter into five parts makes it the copy and echo of the Thôra, which it also resembles in this particular: that as in the Thôra Elohistic and Jehovistic sections alternate, so here a group of Elohistic Psalms (42-84) is surrounded on both sides by groups of Jehovistic (1-41, 85-150). The five books are as follow:-1-41, 42-72, 83- 89, 90-106, 107-150. (Note: The Karaite Jefeth ben Eli calls them 'shry cpr, k'yl c' etc.)
Each of the first four books closes with a doxology, which one might erroneously regard as a part of the preceding Psalm (Ps 41:14; 72:18f., 89:53; 106:48), and the place of the fifth doxology is occupied by Ps as a full toned finale to the whole (like the relation of Ps 139 to the so-called Songs of degrees). These doxologies very much resemble the language of the liturgical Beracha of the second Temple. The w|'aameen From this we see that the Psalter was already divided into books at that period; the closing doxologies had already become thoroughly grafted upon the body of the Psalms after which they stand. The chronicler however wrote under the pontificate of Johanan, the son of Eliashib, the predecessor of Jaddua, towards the end of the Persian supremacy, but a considerable time before the commencement of the Grecian.
Next to this application of the beracha of the Fourth book by the chronicler, Ps 72:20 is a significant mark for determining the history of the origin of the Psalter. The words: "are ended the prayers of David the son of Jesse," are without doubt the subscription to the oldest psalmcollection, which preceded the present psalm- pentateuch. The collector certainly has removed this subscription from its original place close after 72:17, by the interpolation of the beracha 72:18f., but left it, as the same time, untouched. The collectors and those who worked up the older documents within the range of the Biblical literature appear to have been extremely conscientious in this respect and they thereby make it easier for us to gain an insight into the origin of their work-as, e.g., the composer of the Books of Samuel gives intact the list of officers from a later document 2 Sam 8:16-18 (which closed with that, so far as we at present have it in its incorporated state), as well as the list from an older document (2 Sam 20:23-26); or, as not merely the author of the Book of Kings in the middle of the Exile, but also the chronicler towards the end of the Persian period, have transferred unaltered, to their pages, the statement that the staves of the ark are to be found in the rings of the ark "to this day," which has its origin in some annalistic document (1 Kings 8:8; 2 Chron 5:9).
But unfortunately that subscription, which has been so faithfully preserved, furnishes us less help than we could wish. We only gather from it that the present collection was preceded by a primary collection of very much more limited compass which formed its basis and that this closed with the Salomonic Ps 72; for the collector would surely not have placed the subscription, referring only to the prayers of David, after this Psalm if he had not found it there already. And from this point it becomes natural to suppose that Solomon himself, prompted perhaps by the liturgical requirements of the new Temple, compiled this primary collection, and by the addition of Ps 72 may have caused it to be understood that he was the originator of the collection.
But to the question whether the primary collection also contained only Davidic songs properly so called or whether the subscribed designation dwd thlwt is only intended a potiori, the answer is entirely wanting. If we adopt the latter supposition, one is at a loss to understand for what reason only Ps 50 of the Psalms of Asaph was inserted in it. For this psalm is really one of the old Asaphic psalms and might therefore have been an integral part of the primary collection. On the other hand it is altogether impossible for all the Korahitic psalms 42-49 to have belonged to it, for some of them, and most undoubtedly 47 and 48 were composed in the time of Jehoshaphat, the most remarkable event of which, as the chronicler narrates, was foretold by an Asaphite and celebrated by Korahitic singers.
It is therefore, apart from other psalms which bring us down to the Assyrian period (as 66, 67) and the time of Jeremiah (as 71) and bear in themselves traces of the time of the Exile (as Ps 69:35ff.), absolutely impossible that the primary collection should have consisted of Ps 2-72, or rather (since Ps 2 appears as though it ought to be assigned to the later time of the kings, perhaps the time of Isaiah) of Ps 3-72. And if we leave the later insertions out of consideration, there is no arrangement left for the Psalms of David and his contemporaries, which should in any way bear the impress of the Davidic and Salomonic mind. Even the old Jewish teachers were struck by this, and in the Midrash on Ps 3 we are told, that when Joshua ben Levi was endeavouring to put the Ps. in order, a voice from heaven cried out to him: arouse not the slumberer ('t-hyshn 'ltpychy) i.e., do not disturb David in his grave! Why Ps 3 follows directly upon Ps 2, or as it is expressed in the Midrash 'bshlwm prsht follows wmgwg gwg prsht, may certainly be more satisfactorily explained than is done there: but to speak generally the mode of the arrangement of the first two books of the Psalms is of a similar nature to that of the last three, viz., that which in my Symbolae ad Psalmos illustrandos isagogicae (1846) is shown to run through the entire Psalter, more according to external than internal points of contact. (Note: The right view has been long since perceived by Eusebius, who in his exposition of Ps 63 (LXX 62), among other things expresses himself thus: egoo' de' heegou'mai tee's too'n eggegramme'noon dianoi'as he'neken efexee's allee'loon tou's psalmou's kei'sthai kata' to' plei'ston ohu'toos en polloi's epiteeree'sas kai' ehuroo'n dio' kai' sunee'fthai autou's hoosanei' sugge'neian e'chontas kai' akolouthi'an pro's allee'lous e'nthen mee' kata' tou's chro'nous emfe'resthai alla' kata' tee'n tee's dianoi'as akolouthi'an (in Montfaucon's Collectio Nova, t. i. p. 300). This akolouthi'a On the other side it cannot be denied that the groundwork of the collection that formed the basis of the present Psalter must lie within the limits of Ps 3-72, for nowhere else do old Davidic psalms stand so closely and numerously together as here. The Third book (Ps 73-89) exhibits a marked difference in this respect. We may therefore suppose that the chief bulk of the oldest hymn book of the Israelitish church is contained in Ps 3-72. But we must at the same time admit, that its contents have been dispersed and newly arranged in later redactions and more especially in the last of all; and yet, amidst these changes the connection of the subscription, 72:20, with the psalm of Solomon was preserved. The two groups 3-72, 73-89, although not preserved in the original arrangement, and augmented by several kinds of interpolations, at least represent the first two stages of the growth of the Psalter. The primary collection may be Salomonic. The after portion of the second group was, at the earliest, added in the time of Jehoshaphat, at which time probably the book of the Proverbs of Solomon was also compiled.
But with a greater probability of being in the right we incline to assign them to the time of Hezekiah, not merely because some of the psalms among them seem as though they ought to be referred to the overthrow of Assyria under Hezekiah rather than to the overthrow of the allied neighbouring nations under Jehoshaphat, but chiefly because just in the same manner "the men of Hezekiah" appended an after gleaning to the older Salomonic book of Proverbs (Prov 25:1), and because of Hezekiah it is recorded, that he brought the Psalms of David and of Asaph (the bulk of which are contained in the Third book of the Psalms) into use again (2 Chron 29:30). In the time of Ezra and Nehemiah the collection was next extended by the songs composed during and (which are still more numerous) after the Exile. But a gleaning of old songs also had been reserved for this time.
A Psalm of Moses was placed first, in order to give a pleasing relief to the beginning of the new psalter by this glance back into the earliest time. And to the 56 Davidic psalms of the first three books, there are seventeen more added here in the last two. They are certainly not all directly Davidic, but partly the result of the writer throwing himself into David's temper of mind and circumstances. One chief store of such older psalms were perhaps the historical works of an annalistic or even prophetic character, rescued from the age before the Exile. It is from such sources that the historical notes prefixed to the Davidic hymns (and also to one in the Fifth book: Ps 142) come. On the whole there is unmistakeably an advance from the earliest to the latest; and we may say, with Ewald, that in Ps 1-41 the real bulk of the Davidic and, in general, of the older songs, is contained, in Ps 42-89 predominantly songs of the middle period, in Ps the large mass of later and very late songs.
But moreover it is with the Psalm-collection as with the collection of the prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel: the chronological order and the arrangement according to the matter are at variance; and in many places the former is intentionally and significantly disregarded in favour of the latter.
We have often already referred to one chief point of view of this arrangement according to matter, viz., the imitation of the Thôra; it was perhaps this which led to the opening of the Fourth book, which corresponds to the Book of Numbers, with a psalm of Moses of this character. 5. Arrangement and Inscriptions Among the Fathers, Gregory of Nyssa has attempted to show that the Psalter in its five books leads upward as by five steps to moral perfection, aei' pro's to' hupseelo'teron tee'n psuchee'n hupertithei's hoos a'n epi' to' akro'taton efi'keetai too'n agathoo'n; (Note: Opp. ed. Paris, (1638) t. i. p. 288.) and down to the most recent times attempts have been made to trace in the five books a gradation of principal thoughts, which influence and run through the whole collection. (Note: Thus especially Stähelin, Zur Einleitung in die Psalmen, 1859, 4to.)
We fear that in this direction, investigation has set before itself an unattainable end. Nevertheless, as we shall see, the collection bears the impress of one ordering mind. For its opening is formed by a didacticprophetic couplet of psalms (Ps 1-2), introductory to the whole Psalter and therefore in the earliest times regarded as one psalm, which opens and closes with 'shry; and its close is formed by four psalms (Ps 146-149) which begin and end with hllw-yh. We do not include Ps for this psalm takes the place of the beracha of the Fifth book, exactly as the recurring verse Isa. \1\48:22 is repeated in 57:21 with fuller emphasis, but is omitted at the close of the third part of this address of Isaiah to the exiles, its place being occupied by a terrifying description of the hopeless end of the wicked. The opening of the Psalter celebrates the blessedness of those who walk according to the will of God in redemption, which has been revealed in the law and in history; the close of the Psalter calls upon all creatures to praise this God of redemption, as it were on the ground of the completion of this great work. Bede has already called attention to the fact that the Psalter from Ps 146 ends in a complete strain of praise; the end of the Psalter soars upward to a happy climax. The assumption that there was an evident predilection for attempting to make the number complete, as Ewald supposes, cannot be established; the reckoning 147 (according to a Haggadah book mentioned in Jer. Sabbath xvi., parallel with the years of Jacob's life), and the reckoning 149, which frequently occurs both in Karaitic and Rabbinic MSS, have also been adopted; the numbering of the whole and of particular psalms varies. (Note: The LXX, like our Hebrew text, reckons 150 psalms, but with variations in separate instances, by making 9 and 10, and 114 and 115 into one, and in place of these, dividing 116 and 147 each into two. The combination of 9 and 10, of 114 and 115 into one has also been adopted by others; 134 and 135, but especially 1 and 2, appear here and there as one psalm. Kimchi reckons 149 by making Ps and 115 into one. The ancient Syriac version combines Ps 114 and 115 as one, but reckons 150 by dividing Ps 147.)
There are in the Psalter 73 psalms bearing the inscription ldwd, viz., (reckoning exactly) 37 in book 1; 18 in book 2; 1 in book 3; 2 in book 4; in book 5. The redaction has designed the pleasing effect of closing the collection with an imposing group of Davidic psalms, just as it begins with the bulk of the Davidic psalms. And the Hallelujahs which begin with Ps 146 (after the 15 Davidic psalms) are the preludes of the closing doxology.
The Korahitic and Asaphic psalms are found exclusively in the Second and Third books. There are 12 Asaphic psalms: 50, 73-83, and also Korahitic: 42, 43, 44-49, 84, 85, 87, 88, assuming that Ps 43 is to be regarded as an independent twin psalm to 42 and that Ps 88 is to be reckoned among the Korahitic psalms. In both of these divisions we find psalms belonging to the time of the Exile and to the time after the Exile (74, 79, 85). The fact of their being found exclusively in the Second and Third books cannot therefore be explained on purely chronological grounds. Korahitic psalms, followed by an Asaphic, open the Second book; Asaphic psalms, followed by four Korahitic, open the Third book.
The way in which Davidic psalms are interspersed clearly sets before us the principle by which the arrangement according to the matter, which the collector has chosen, is governed. It is the principle of homogeneousness, which is the old Semitic mode of arranging things: for in the alphabet, the hand and the hollow of the hand, water and fish, the eye and the mouth, the back and front of the head have been placed together. In like manner also the psalms follow one another according to their relationship as manifested by prominent external and internal marks. The Asaphic psalm, Ps 50, is followed by the Davidic psalm, 51, because they both similarly disparage the material animal sacrifice, as compared with that which is personal and spiritual. And the Davidic psalm 86 is inserted between the Korahitic psalms 85 and 87, because it is related both to Ps 85:8 by the prayer: "Show me Thy way, O Jahve" and "give Thy conquering strength unto Thy servant," and to Ps 87 by the prospect of the conversion of the heathen to the God of Israel. This phenomenon, that psalms with similar prominent thoughts, or even with only markedly similar passage, especially at the beginning and the end, are thus strung together, may be observed throughout the whole collection. Thus e.g., Ps 56 with the inscription, "after (the melody): the mute dove among strangers," is placed after Ps 55 on account of the occurrence of the words: "Oh that I had wings like a dove!" etc., in that psalm; thus Ps 34 and 35 stand together as being the only psalms in which "the Angel of Jahve" occurs; and just so Ps 9 and 10 which coincide in the expression btsrh `twt.
Closely connected with this principle of arrangement is the circumstance that the Elohimic psalms (i.e., those which, according to a peculiar style of composition as I have shown in my Symbolae, not from the caprice of an editor, (Note: This is Ewald's view (which is also supported by Riehm in Stud. u. Kirt. 1857 S. 168). A closer insight into the characteristic peculiarity of the Elohim-psalms, which is manifest in other respects also, proves it to be superficial and erroneous.) almost exclusively call God 'lhym, and beside this make use of such compound names of God as tsb'wt yhwh, tsb'wt 'lhym yhwh and the like) are placed together without any intermixture of Jehovic psalms. In Ps 1-41 the divine name yhwh Community in species of composition also belongs to the manifold grounds on which the order according to the subject-matter is determined.
Thus the mas|kiyl It could not possibly be otherwise than that the inscriptions of the psalms, after the harmless position which the monographs of Sonntag (1687), Celsius (1718), Irhof (1728) take with regard to them, should at length become a subject for criticism; but the custom which has gained ground since the last decade of the past century of rejecting what has been historically handed down, has at present grown into a despicable habit of forming a decision too hastily, which in any other department of literature where the judgment is not so prejudiced by the drift of the enquiry, would be regarded as folly. Instances like Hab 3:1 and 2 Sam 1:18, comp. Ps 60:1, show that David and other psalm-writers might have appended their names to their psalms and the definition of their purport. And the great antiquity of these and similar inscriptions also follows from the fact that the LXX found them already in existence and did not understand them; that they also cannot be explained from the Books of the Chronicles (including the Book of Ezra, which belongs to these) in which much is said about music, and appear in these books, like much besides, as an old treasure of the language revived, so that the key to the understanding of them must have been lost very early, as also appears from the fact that in the last two books of the Psalter they are of more rare, and in the first three of more frequent occurrence. 6. The Strophe-System of the Psalms The early Hebrew poetry has neither rhyme nor metre, both of which (first rhyme and then afterwards metre) were first adopted by Jewish poesy in the seventh century after Christ. True, attempts at rhyme are not wanting in the poetry and prophecy of the Old Testament, especially in the tephilla style, Ps 106:4-7 cf. Jer 3:21-25, where the earnestness of the prayer naturally causes the heaping up of similar flexional endings; but this assonance, in the transition state towards rhyme proper, had not yet assumed such an established form as is found in Syriac. (Note: Vid., Zingerle in the Deutsch. Morgenländ. Zeitschrift. X. 110ff.)
It is also just as difficult to point out verses of four lines only, which have a uniform or mixed metre running through them. Notwithstanding, Augustine, Ep. cxiii ad Memorium, is perfectly warranted in saying of the Psalms: certis eos constare numeris credo illis qui eam linguam probe callent, and it is not a mere fancy when Philo, Josephus, Eusebius, Jerome and others have detected in the Old Testament songs, and especially in the Psalms, something resembling the Greek and Latin metres. For the Hebrew poetry indeed had a certain syllabic measure, since-apart from the audible Shebâ and the Chateph, both of which represent the primitive shorteningsall syllables with a full vowel are intermediate, and in ascending become long, in descending short, or in other words, in one position are strongly accented, in another more or less slurred over.
Hence the most manifold rhythms arise, e.g., the anapaestic wenashlîcha mimennu abothêmo (Ps 2:3) or the dactylic áz jedabber elêmo beappó (2:5). The poetic discourse is freer in its movement than the Syriac poetry with its constant ascending (_ _' ) or descending spondees (_' _); it represents all kinds of syllabic movements and thus obtains the appearance of a lively mixture of the Greek and Latin metres. But it is only an appearance-for the forms of verse, which conform to the laws of quantity, are altogether foreign to early Hebrew poetry, as also to the oldest poetry; and these rhythms which vary according to the emotions are not metres, for, as Augustine says in his work De Musica, "Omne metrum rhythmus, non omnis rhythmus etiam metrum est." Yet there is not a single instance of a definite rhythm running through the whole in a shorter or longer poem, but the rhythms always vary according to the thoughts and feelings; as e.g., the evening song Ps 4 towards the end rises to the anapaestic measure: ki-attá Jahawe lebadád, in order then quietly to subside in the iambic: labetach tôshibeni. (Note: Bellermann's Versuch über die Metrik der Hebräer (1813) is comparatively the best on this subject even down to the present time; for Saalschütz (Von der Form der hebr. Poesie, 1825, and elsewhere) proceeds on the erroneous assumption that the present system of accentuation does not indicate the actual strong toned syllable of the words-by following the pronunciation of the German and Polish Jews he perceives, almost throughout, a spondaeo-dactylic rhythm (e.g., Judg 14:18 lûle charáshtem beegláthi). But the traditional accentuation is proved to be a faithful continuation of the ancient proper pronunciation of the Hebrew; the trochaic pronunciation is more Syrian, and the tendency to draw the accent from the final syllable to the penult, regardless of the conditions originally governing it, is a phenomenon which belongs only to the alter period of the language (vid., Hupfeld in the Deutsch. Morgenl. Zeitschr. vi. 187).)
With this alternation of rise and fall, long and short syllables, harmonizing in lively passages with the subject, there is combined, in Hebrew poetry, and expressiveness of accent which is hardly to be found anywhere else to such an extent. Thus e.g., Ps 2:5a sounds like pealing thunder, and 5b corresponds to it as the flashing lightning. And there are a number of dull toned Psalms as 17, 49, 58, 59, 73, in which the description drags heavily on and is hard to be understood, and in which more particularly the suffixes in mo are heaped up, because the indignant mood of the writer impresses itself upon the style and makes itself heard in the very sound of the words. The non plus ultra of such poetry, whose very tones heighten the expression, is the cycle of the prophecies of Jeremiah ch. 24-27.
Under the point of view of rhythm the so-called parallelismus membrorum has also been rightly placed: that fundamental law of the higher, especially poetic, style for which this appropriate name as been coined, not very long since. (Note: Abenezra calls it kaapuwl Even the punctuation does not proceed from a real understanding of the rhythmical relation of the members of the verse to one another, and when it divides every verse that is marked off by Silluk wherever it is possible into two parts, it must not be inferred that this rhythmical relation is actually always one consisting of two members merely, although (as Hupfeld has shown in his admirable treatise on the twofold law of the rhythm and accent, in the D. M. Z. 1852), wherever it exists it always consists of at least two members.)
The relation of the two parallel members does not really differ from that of the two halves on either side of the principal caesura of the hexameter and pentameter; and this is particularly manifest in the double long line of the caesural schema (more correctly: the diaeretic schema) e.g., Ps 48:6,7:
They beheld, straightway they marvelled, bewildered they took to flight.
Trembling took hold upon them there anguish, as a woman in travail. Here the one thought is expanded in the same verse in two parallel members.
But from the fact of the rhythmical organization being carried out without reference to the logical requirements of the sentence, as in the same psalm vv. 4, 8: Elohim in her palaces was known as a refuge. With an east wind Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish, we see that the rhythm is not called into existence as a necessity of such expansion of the thought, but vice versâ this mode of expanding the thought results from the requirements of the rhythm.
Here is neither synonymous or identical (tautological), nor antithetical, nor synthetical parallelism, but merely that which De Wette calls rhythmical, merely the rhythmical rise and fall, the diastole and systole, which poetry is otherwise (without binding itself) wont to accomplish by two different kinds of ascending and descending logical organization. The ascending and descending rhythm does not usually exist within the compass of one line, but it is distributed over two lines which bear the relation to one another of rhythmical antecedent and consequent, of proodo's This distich is the simplest ground-form of the strophe, which is visible in the earliest song, handed down to us, Gen 4:23f. The whole Ps 119 is composed in such distichs, which is the usual form of the apophthegm; the acrostic letter stands there at the head of each distich, just as at the head of each line in the likewise distichic pair, Ps 111-112. The tristich is an outgrowth from the distich, the ascending rhythm being prolonged through two liens and the fall commencing only in the third, e.g., 25:7 (the ch of this alphabetical Psalm): Have not the sins of my youth and my transgressions in remembrance, According to Thy mercy remember Thou me For Thy goodness' sake, O Jahve!
This at least is the natural origin of the tristich, which moreover in connection with a most varied logical organization still has the inalienable peculiarity, that the full fall is reserved until the third line, e.g., in the first two strophes of the Lamentations of Jeremiah, where each line is a long line in two parts consisting of rise and fall, the principal fall, however, after the caesura of the third long line, closes the strophe: Ah! how doth the city sit solitary,otherwise full of people!
She is become as a widow,the great one among nations, The princess among provinces,she is become tributary.
By night she weepeth soreand her tears are upon her cheeks; There is not one to comfort herof all her lovers, All her friends have betrayed her,they are become her enemies.
If we now further enquire, whether Hebrew poesy goes beyond these simplest beginnings of the strophe-formation and even extends the network of the rhythmical period, by combining the two and three line strophe with ascending and descending rhythm into greater strophic wholes rounded off into themselves, the alphabetical Ps 37 furnishes us with a safe answer to the question, for this is almost entirely tetrastichic, e.g., About evil-doers fret not thyself, About the workers of iniquity be thou not envious.
For as grass they shall soon be cut down, And as the green herb they shall wither, but it admits of the compass of the strophe increasing even to the pentastich, (v. 25, 26) since the unmistakeable landmarks of the order, the letters, allow a freer movement: Now I, who once was young, am become old, Yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken And his seed begging bread.
He ever giveth and lendeth And his seed is blessed.
From this point the sure guidance of the alphabetical Psalms (Note: Even the older critics now and then supposed that we were to make these Ps. the starting point of our enquiries. For instance, Serpilius says: "It may perhaps strike some one whether an opinion as to some of the modes of the Davidic species of verse and poetry might not be formed from his, so-to-speak, alphabetical psalms.") fails us in investigating the Hebrew strophe-system. But in our further confirmatory investigations we will take with us from these Psalms, the important conclusion that the verse bounded by Sôph pasûk, the placing of which harmonizes with the accentuation first mentioned in the post- Talmudic tractate Sofrim, (Note: Even if, and this is what Hupfeld and Riehm (Luth. Zeitschr. 1866, S. 300) advance, the Old Testament books were divided into verses, pcwqym, even before the time of the Masoretes, still the division into verses, as we now have it and especially that of the three poetical books, is Masoretic.) is by no means (as, since Köster, 1831, it has been almost universally supposed) the original form of the strophe but that strophes are a whole consisting of an equal or symmetrical number of stichs. (Note: It was these stichs, of which the Talmud (B. Kiddushin 30 a) counts eight more in the Psalter than in the Thôra, viz., 5896, which were originally called pcwqym. Also in Augustine we find versus thus used like sti'chos. With him the words Populus ejus et oves pascuae ejus are one versus. There is no Hebrew MS which could have formed the basis of the arrangement of the Psalms in stichs; those which we possess only break the Masoretic verse, (if the space of the line admits of it) for ease of writing into the two halves, without even regarding the general injunction in c. xiv. of the tractate Sofrim and that of Ben-Bileam in his Horajoth ha-Kore, that the breaks are to be regulated by the beginnings of the verses and the two great pausal accents. Nowhere in the MSS, which divide and break up the words most capriciously, is there to be seen any trace of the recognition of those old pcwqym being preserved. These were not merely lines determined by the space, as were chiefly also the sti'choi or e'pee according to the number of which, the compass of Greek works was recorded, but liens determined by the sense, koo'la Hupfeld (Ps. iv. 450) has objected against this, that "this is diametrically opposed to the nature of rhythm = parallelism, which cannot stand on one leg, but needs two, that the distich is therefore the rhythmical unit."
But does it therefore follow, that a strophe is to be measured according to the number of distichs? The distich is itself only the smallest strophe, viz., one consisting of two lines. And it is even forbidden to measure a greater strophe by the number of distichs, because the rhythmical unit, of which the distich is the ground-form, can just as well be tristichic, and consequently these so-called rhythmical units form neither according to time nor space parts of equal value. But this applies still less to the Masoretic verses. True, we have shown in our larger Commentary on the Psalms, ii. 522f., in agreement with Hupfeld, and in opposition to Ewald, that the accentuation proceeds upon the law of dichotomy. But the Masoretic division of the verses is not only obliged sometimes to give up the law of dichotomy, because the verse (as e.g., Ps 18:2; 25:1; 92:9), does not admit of being properly divided into two parts; and it subjects not only verses of three members (as e.g., 1:1; 2:2) in which the third member is embellishingly or synthetically related to the other two-both are phenomena which in themselves furnish proof in favour of the relative independence of the lines of the verse-but also verses of four members where the sense requires it (as 1:3; 18:16) and where it does not require it (as 22:15; 40:6), to the law of dichotomy.
And these Masoretic verses of such various compass are to be the constituent parts according to which strophes of a like cipher shall be measured! A strophe only becomes a strophe by virtue of its symmetrical relation to others, to the ear it must have the same time, to the eye the same form and it must consequently represent the same number of lines (clauses). The fact of these clauses, according to the special characteristic of Hebrew poetry, moving on with that rising and falling movement which we call parallelism until they come to the close of the strophe where it gently falls to rest, is a thing sui generis, and, within the province of the strophe, somewhat of a substitute for metre; but the strophe itself is a section which comes to thorough repose by this species of rhythmical movement. So far, then, from placing the rhythm on one leg only, we give it its two: but measure the strophe not by the two feet of the Masoretic verses or even couplets of verses, but by the equal, or symmetrically alternating number of the members present, which consist mostly of two feet, often enough however of three, and sometimes even of four feet.
Whether and how a psalm is laid out in strophes, is shown by seeing first of all what its pauses are, where the flow of thoughts and feelings falls in order to rise anew, and then by trying whether these pauses have a like or symmetrically correspondent number of stichs (e.g., 6. 6. 6. 6 or 6. 7. 6. 7) or, if their compass is too great for them to be at once regarded as one strophe, whether they cannot be divided into smaller wholes of an equal or symmetrical number of stichs. For the peculiarity of the Hebrew strophe does not consist in a run of definite metres closely united to form one harmonious whole (for instance, like the Sapphic strophe, which the four membered verses, Isa 16:9-10, with their short closing lines corresponding to the Adonic verse, strikingly resemble), but in a closed train of thought which is unrolled after the distichic and tristichic ground-form of the rhythmical period.
The strophe-schemata, which are thus evolved, are very diverse. We find not only that all the strophes of a poem are of the same compass (e.g., 4. 4. 4. 4), but also that the poem is made up of symmetrical relations formed of strophes of different compass. The condition laid down by some, (Note: For instance Meier in his Geschichte der poetischen Nationalliteratur der Hebräer, S. 67, who maintains that strophes of unequal length are opposed to the simplest laws of the lyric song and melody. But the demands which melody imposes on the formation of the verse and the strophe were not so stringent among the ancients as now, and moreover-is not the sonnet a lyric poem?) that only a poem that consists of strophes of equal length can be regarded as strophic, is refuted not only by the Syriac (Note: Vid., Zingerle in the Dm. M. Z. x. 123, 124.) but also by the post-biblical Jewish poetry. (Note: Vid., Zunz, Synagogale Poesie des Mittelalters, S. 92-94.)
We find the following variations: strophes of the same compass followed by those of different compass (e.g., 4. 4. 6. 6); as in the chiasmus, the outer and inner strophes of the same compass (e.g., 4. 6. 6. 4); the first and third, the second and fourth corresponding to one another (e.g., 4. 6. 4. 6); the mingling of the strophes repeated antistrophically, i.e., in the inverted order (e.g., 4. 6. 7. 7. 6. 4); strophes of equal compass surrounding one of much greater compass (e.g., 4. 4. 10. 4. 4), what Köster calls the pyramidal schema; strophes of equal compass followed by a short closing stanza (e.g., 3. 3. 2); a longer strophe forming the base of the whole (e.g., 5. 3. 3. 7), and these are far from being all the different figures, which the Old Testament songs and more especially the Psalms present to us, when we arrange their contents in stichs.
With regard to the compass of the strophe, we may expect to find it consisting of as many as twelve lines according to the Syrian and the synagogue poetry. The line usually consists of three words, or at least only of three larger words; in this respect the Hebrew exhibits a capacity for short but emphatic expressions, which are inadmissible in German or English. This measure is often not uniformly preserved throughout a considerable length, not only in the Psalms but also in the Book of Job.
For there is far more reason for saying that the strophe lies at the basis of the arrangement of the Book of Job, than for G. Hermanjn's observation of strophic arrangement in the Bucolic writers and Köchly's in the older portions of Homer. 7. Temple Music and Psalmody The Thôra contains no directions respecting the use of song and music in divine worship except the commands concerning the ritualistic use of silver trumpets to be blown by the priests (Numb. ch. 10). David is really the creator of liturgical music, and to his arrangements, as we see from the Chronicles, every thing was afterwards referred, and in times when it had fallen into disuse, restored. So long as David lived, the superintendence of the liturgical music was in his hands (1 Chron 25:2). The instrument by means of which the three choir-masters (Heman, Asaph, and Ethan- Jeduthun) directed the choir was the cymbals (m|tsil|tayim The trumpets (chatsots|rowt At the dedication of Solomon's Temple the Levites sing and play and the priests sound trumpets neg|daam In the second Temple it was otherwise: the sounding of the trumpets by the priests and the Levitical song with its accompanying music alternated, they were not simultaneous. The congregation did not usually sing with the choir, but only uttered their Amen; nevertheless they joined in the Hallel and in some psalms after the first clause with its repetition, after the second with hallelujah (Maimonides, Hilchoth Megilla, 3). 1 Chron 16:36 points to a similar arrangement in the time of the first Temple. Just so does Jer 33:11 in reference to the "Give thanks unto the Lord, for He is good." Antiphonal singing in the part of the congregation is also to be inferred from Ezra 3:10f. The Psalter itself is moreover acquainted with an allotment of the `lmwt, comp. mshrrwt Ezra 2:65 (whose treble was represented by the Levite boys in the second Temple, vid., on Ps 46:1) in choral worship and speaks of a praising of God "in full choirs," 26:12; 68:27.
And responsive singing is of ancient date in Israel: even Miriam with the women answered the men (lhm The Levites standing upon the suggestus (duwbaan)-i.e., upon a broad staircase consisting of a few steps, which led up from the court of the laity to that of the priests-who were both singers and musicians, and consequently played only on stringed instruments and instruments of percussion, not wind-instruments, were at least twelve in number, with citherns, 2 harps, and one cymbal: on certain days the flute was added to this number. (Note: According to B. Erachin 10a the following were the customary accompaniments of the daily service: 1) 21 trumpet blasts, to as many as 48; (2) 2 nablas, to 6 at most; 2 flutes (chlylyn), to 12 at most. Blowing the flute is called striking the flute, hechaaliyl hikaah.
On 12 days of the year the flute was played before the altar: on the 14th of Nisan at the slaying of the Passover (at which the Hallel was sung), on the 14th of Ijar at the slaying of the little Passover, on the 1st and 7th days of the Passover and on the eight days of the Feast of Tabernacles. The mouth-piece ('abuwb according to the explanation of Maimonides) was not of metal but a reed (comp. Arab. anbûb, the blade of the reed), because it sounds more melodious. And it was never more than one flute (ychydy 'bwb, playing a solo), which continued at the end of a strain and closed it, because this produces the finest close (chiluwq). On the 12 days mentioned, the Hallel was sung with flute accompaniment. On other days, the Psalm appointed for the day was accompanied by nablas, cymbals and citherns. This passage of the treatise Erachin also tells who were the flute-players. On the fluteplaying at the festival of water-drawing, vid., my Geschichte der jüdischen Poesie S. 195. In the Temple of Herod, according to Erachin 10b, there was also an organ. This was however not a waterorgan (hdrwlyc, hydraulis), but a wind-organ (mag|reepaah) with a hundred different tones (zmr myny), whose thunder-like sound, according to Jerome (Opp. ed. Mart. v. 191), was heard ab Jerusalem usque ad montem Oliveti et amplius, vid., Saalschütz, Archäol. i. 281- 284.)
The usual suggestus on the steps at the side of the altar was changed for another only in a few cases; for it is noticed as something special that the singers had a different position at the festival of water-drawing during the Feast of Tabernacles (vid., introduction to Ps 120-134), and that the fluteplayers who accompanied the Hallel stood before the altar, hmzkch lpny (Erachin 10a). The treble was taken by the Levite youths, who stood below the suggestus at the feet of the Levites (vid., on Ps 46). The daily hqrbn shyr (i.e., the week-day psalm which concluded the morning sacrifice) was sung in nine (or perhaps more correctly 3) (Note: This is the view of Maimonides, who distributes the 9 trumpetblasts by which the morning sacrifice, according to Succa 53b, was accompanied, over the 3 pauses of the song. The hymn Haazînu, Deut 32, which is called hlwym shyrt par excellence, was sung at the Sabbath Musaph-sacrifice-each Sabbath a division of the hymn, which was divided into six parts-so that it began anew on every seventh Sabbath, vid., J. Megilla, sect. iii, ad fin.) pauses, and the pauses were indicated by the trumpet-blasts of the priests (vid., on Ps 38; 81:4). Beside the seven Psalms which were sung week by week, there were others appointed for the services of the festivals and intervening days (vid., on Ps 81), and in Biccurim 3, 4 we read that when a procession bearing the firstfruits accompanied by flute playing had reached the hill on which the Temple stood and the firstfruits had been brought up in baskets, at the entrance of the offerers into the Azara, Ps was struck up by the Levites. This singing was distinct from the mode of delivering the Tefilla (vid., on Ps 44 ad fin.) and the benediction of the priests (vid., on Ps 67), both of which were unaccompanied by music.
Distinct also, as it seems, from the mode of delivering the Hallel, which was more as a recitative, than sung (Pesachim 64a, hhll 't qaar|'uw). It was probably similar to the Arabic, which delights in shrieking, long-winded, trilling, and especially also nasal tones. For it is related of one of the chief singers that in order to multiply the tones, he placed his thumb in his mouth and his fore finger hnymyn byw (between the hairs, i.e., according to Rashi: on the furrow of the upper lip against the partition of the nostrils), and thus (by forming mouth and nose into a trumpet) produced sounds, before the volume of which the priests started back in astonishment. (Note: Vid., B. Joma 38b and J. Shekalim v. 3, comp. Canticum Rabba on Canticles Ps 3:6.)
This mode of psalm-singing in the Temple of Herod was no longer the original mode, and if the present accentuation of the Psalms represents the fixed form of the Temple song, it nevertheless does not convey to us any impression of that before the Exile. It does, however, neither the one nor the other.
The accents are only musical, and indirectly interpunctional, signs for the chanting pronunciation of the synagogue. And moreover we no longer possess the key to the accents of the three metrical (i.e., consisting of symmetrical stichs and strophes) books as musical signs. For the so-called Sarkatables (which give the value of the accents as notes, beginning with Zarka, zrq'), e.g., at the end of the second edition of Nägelsbach's Gramm., relate only to the reading of the pentateuchal and prophetic pericopeconsequently to the system of prose accents. In the German synagogue there is no tradition concerning the value of the so-called metrical accents as notes, for the Psalms were not recited according to the |
