Because there is no light in them "In which there is no obscurity."] rj shachor, as an adjective, frequently signifies dark, obscure; and the noun rj shachar signifies darkness, gloominess, Joel ii. 2, if we may judge by the context:- "A day of darkness and obscurity; Of cloud, and of thick vapor; As the gloom spread upon the mountains: A people mighty and numerous." Where the gloom, rj shachar, seems to be the same with the cloud and thick vapor mentioned in the line prceding. See Lam. iv. 8, and Job xxx. 30. See this meaning of the word rj shachar well supported in Christ. Muller. Sat. Observat. Philippians p. 53, Lugd. Bat. 1752. The morning seems to have been an idea wholly incongruous in the passage of Joel; and in this of Isaiah the words in which there is no morning (for so it ought to be rendered if rj shachar in this place signifies, according to its usual sense, morning) seem to give no meaning at all. "It is because there is no light in them," says our translation. If there be any sense in these words, it is not the sense of the original; which cannot justly be so translated. Qui n'a rien d'obscur, "which has no obscurity."-Deschamps.

The reading of the Septuagint and Syriac, dj shochad, gift, affords no assistance towards the clearing up of any of this difficult place. R. D.

Kimchi says this was the form of an oath: "By the law and by the testimony such and such things are so." Now if they had sworn this falsely, it is because there is no light, no illumination, rj shachar, no scruple of conscience, in them.

Ver. 21. Hardly bestead "Distressed"] Instead of hqn niksheh, distressed, the Vulgate, Chaldee, and Symmachus manifestly read lkn nichshal, stumbling, tottering through weakness, ready to fall; a sense which suits very well with the place.

And look upward "And he shall cast his eyes upward."] The learned professor Michaelis, treating of this place (Not. in de Sacr. Poes. Hebr. Prael. ix.) refers to a passage in the Koran which is similar to it. As it is a very celebrated passage, and on many accounts remarkable, I shall give it here at large, with the same author's farther remarks upon it in another place of his writings. It must be noted here that the learned professor renders fbn nibbat, fybh bean hibbit, in this and the parallel place, chap. v. 30, which I translate he looketh by it thundereth, from Schultens, Orig. Ling. Hebr. Lib. i. cap. 2, of the justness of which rendering I much doubt.

This brings the image of Isaiah more near in one circumstance to that of Mohammed than it appears to be in my translation:- "Labid, contemporary with Mohammed, the last of the seven Arabian poets who had the honour of having their poems, one of each, hung up in the entrance of the temple of Mecca, struck with the sublimity of a passage in the Koran, became a convert to Mohammedism; for he concluded that no man could write in such a manner unless he were Divinely inspired.

"One must have a curiosity to examine a passage which had so great an effect upon Labid. It is, I must own, the finest that I know in the whole Koran: but I do not think it will have a second time the like effect, so as to tempt any one of my readers to submit to circumcision. It is in the second chapter, where he is speaking of certain apostates from the faith. 'They are like,' saith he, 'to a man who kindles a light. As soon as it begins to shine, God takes from them the light, and leaves them in darkness that they see nothing. They are deaf, dumb, and blind; and return not into the right way. Or they fare as when a cloud, full of darkness, thunder, and lightning, covers the heaven. When it bursteth, they stop their ears with their fingers, with deadly fear; and God hath the unbelievers in his power.

The lightning almost robbeth them of their eyes: as often as it flasheth they go on by its light; and when it vanisheth in darkness, they stand still.