others of whatever age, is fiction. To use the word in its noblest sense, all the prophets of all times have made use of fiction; without it oracles cannot be. But no other prophet has given so free course to his fancy, nor produced so many fictions of such various character. We find scarcely any prophetic discourses in Ezekiel worked out and rounded off like those of the other prophets. Almost all is clothed in symbolical actions, fables, narratives, allegories, or in the yet higher kind of fiction, in visions. Since these are, for the most part, very complicated, so great labyrinths of fictions occur in his writings; and since but very few commentators have the skill of Theseus, so complaints resound, from all quarters, on the obscurity of the prophet. What belongs in the spiritual he brings over into the material world; introduces long trains of ideas in a single picture, and, as they are represented by objects purely sensual, so there arise great and sometimes dazzling compositions. He who can embrace all these in an eagle-glance, and is not distracted from the main piece by the subordinate parts, all of which concur only to produce the chief figure, - he alone can understand the meaning of the whole picture, and can scarcely fancy how any one can accuse the artist of obscurity.”].... § 224. MANNER IN WHICH THE BOOK ORIGINATED. There is no doubt that Ezekiel, who commonly speaks of himself in the first person, wrote the whole book. Some of the rabbins expressed doubts respecting the authority of the book, but merely on account of its doctrines." Ezekiel himself may have compiled the separate prophecies, for they are arranged according to a certain plan. The first part (i.-xxiv.) is arranged in perfect chronological order, as the table in the note will show." In the compilation of the prophecies against foreign nations, (xxvi.-xxxii. 17,) the order of events alone is followed. The following table, in the note, shows the chronology of the chapters. This collection of prophecies relating to foreign nations may have been inserted as a supplement, or episode, since a resting-place is afforded at the end of the first part of the book, (xxiv. 27;) or because some of these prophecies actually belong between xxiv. 27, and xxxiii. 21: others may have been connected with them on account of the similarity of their subject. Jahn's supposition that these oracles were misplaced at a later period, is unnecessary. Chap. xxxiii. 1-20, a passage of a general character, has been inserted in its present place, without regard to chronology. The prophecy goes regularly on in verse 21, and all that follows belongs in the period after the destruction of the city. Chap. xl. belongs to the twenty-fifth year of the exile. See Carpzov, vol. iii. p. 214, sqq. [Spinoza, Tractatus Theol. polit. ch. ii.] The statement in Baba Bathra (in § 14, above, p. 31) is striking. Zunz (1. c. p. 158, sqq.) makes use of that, the peculiarities of the language, and some other arguments, and dates the composition in the Persian era. [But see Knobel, vol. ii. p. 314, sqq.] Eichhorn explains the arrangement of the book by his favorite theory, that it was written on several separate rolls. Bertholdt thinks there were several independent collections made, namely, chap. xxv.-xxxii. xxxiii. 21 -xxxix. But xxxiii. 21, is necessarily connected with xxiv. 27. CHAPTER IV. THE TWELVE MINOR PROPHETS." § 225. COLLECTION OF THE TWELVE MINOR PROPHETS THESE twelve prophetic works formerly composed but one book in the canon. In the Wisdom of Sirach it с Jerome, Comm. in Proph. min., Opp. iii. Mart., vi. Vallars. Theophylacti Comment. in Hos., Habac., Jon., Nah., et Mich., in Opp.; Venet. 1754-1763, vol. iv. Victorin. Strigelii Argumenta et Scholia in XII. Proph. minores; 1561. Joa. Merceri Comm. in Prophetas quinque priores inter eos, qui minores vocantur. Joa. Drusii Comment. in Proph. min. Casp. Sanctii Comm. in XII. Proph. min.; Lugd. 1621, fol. Joa. Schmidii in Proph. min. Comm.; Lips. 1685, 1687, 1689, 4to. Joa. Tarnovii Comment. in Proph. min., c. Præf. J. B. Carpzovii ; Frcf. et Lips. 1688, 1706, 4to. Ed. Pococke, Commentaries on Hosea, Joel, Micha, and Malachi, Oxf. 1685, fol., and in his Works, Lond. 1740, fol. Joa. Marki in Proph. min. Comm.; Amst. 1696–1701, 4 vols. 4to. Apparatus crit. ad formandum V. T. Interpretem congestus a D. C. Fr. Bahrdt. Vol. i.; Lips. 1775, 8vo. (Hos., Jo., Hab., Hagg.) Will. Newcome, An Attempt towards an Improved Version, a Metrical Arrangement, and an Explication of the twelve minor Prophets; Lond. 1785, 4to. G. L. Bauer, Die kleinen Proph. übers. u. m. Comm. erl.; Lpz. 1786, 1790, 2 pts. is said, (xlix. 10,) "And of the twelve prophets let the memorial be blessed, and let their bones flourish again out of their place; for they comforted Jacob, and delivered them by assured hope." But this passage is probably spurious. However, Gregory of Nazianzen says, "The twelve, indeed, are one scripture," and enumerates our present minor Prophets." The Jewish writers make four books of the prophets-Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Twelve. It is probable, therefore, after each of these had, for some time, been in circulation by itself, that they were all collected together, and written on the same roll. Kimchi says, "Our teachers of pious memory say that they were collected into one volume, lest, if they remained separate, one or the other of them, on account of its smallness, would be lost." They seem to be arranged in a chronological order, though differently in the Hebrew and Greek manu C. F. Stäudlin, Beit. z. Erläut. d. bibl. Propheten u. z. Gesch. ihrer Auslegung; als Versuche Hoseas, Nahum, Habakuk neu übers. u. exeg. krit. erl.; Stuttg. 1786. Chr. G. Hensler, Animadverss. in quædam XII. Prophet. min. Loca; Kilon. 1783. J. Ch. Dahl, Observatt. philol. atque crit. ad quædam Prophet. min. Loca, subjecta vernacula Chabacuci Interpretatione; Neostrelitiæ, 1798. Rosenmüller, Hitzig, and Maurer, 1. c. Translated into German, by Struense, 1770; Vollborth, 1783; Moldenhauer, 1787. A translation of Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, and Obadiah, with remarks, 1791; by Theiner, with remarks, 1828. Noyes, 1. c. See the Elenchus Interprett. in Rosenmüller's Scholia on the minor Prophets. [Exeget. Handbuch d. A. T. pt. i.; 1838.] a [Μίαν μέν εἰσιν ἐς γραφὴν οἱ Δώδεκα· See Carpzov, vol. iii. p. 270, sqq. scripts, and not with perfect accuracy, as the table beneath will show." This collection may have been commenced earlier, but it cannot have been completed until a long time after the exile." I. HOSEA." § 226. HIS LIFE AND TIMES. Hosea, the son of Beeri, was, perhaps, a citizen of the kingdom of Ephraim. But this does not follow from See Jäger, De Ordine Prophetarum minorum chronolog. in the Tübingen Zeitschrift, pt. ii. 1828. [But see, also, Newcome's chronological table, prefixed to his minor Prophets.] Hoseas cum Targ. et Comment. Rabb. ed. Herm. von der Hardt. See above, § 59. Is. Abarbanelis Comm. in Hoseam, Latinitate donatus, una cum Notis suis ab Francisc. ab Huysen; Lug. Bat. 1687, 4to. Capitonis Comm. in Hoseam; Argent. 1528, 8vo. Joa. Brentii Comm. in Hoseam Prophetam ; Hagenoæ, 1560, 4to.; Tüb. 1580, fol. [Burroughs, Exposition of Hos.; Lond. 1643, ed. Sherman, 1840.] Seb. Schmidii Comin. in Hoseam; Frcf. ad M. 1687, 4to. |