about twenty-five in number, are assigned to the period of the Maccabees, Simon being understood to have edited the 4th and 5th Books of the Psalter. The great majority of the Psalms were, however, written during the Persian period, especially its later portion. The later lectures describe with some fulness the religious ideas of the Psalter, and trace out their development as the author conceives it to have taken place. He does not assert that those ideas, including "an intenser monotheism," a freer universalism, and a belief in immortality, were borrowed from surrounding nations, but he does hold that the influence of those nations was needed to cause the germ of the truth latent in earlier Judaism to spring forth, so that, in his own words, from Jeremiah onwards there has been a continuous development through the co-operation of some of the noblest non-Jewish races and the unerring guidance of the adorable Spirit of Truth, in the direction which leads to Christ."

The method adopted in determining the probable dates of the Psalms is not altogether happy. Professor Cheyne begins with the last two books of the Psalter, states his grounds for believing that they were edited by Simon the Macabee, and fixes upon a few Psalms which bear, as he thinks, decided marks of Maccabean origin. Then he works backwards, passing from one Psalm to another in an often bewildering fashion, till he reaches the earliest collections. The mere order of procedure is a small matter. But the method of weighing evidence, and the kind of evidence to which prominence is given, in a case where so much is necessarily conjectural and "subjective," is allimportant. We observe first, then, that such external evidence as is forthcoming receives very slight attention. True, it is scanty in amount, but the indirect importance of certain facts in the LXX. Version and some of the Apocryphal books is considerable. It is, for example, exceedingly difficult to believe that the titles in the Greek version, with their ill-understood musical directions, refer to Psalms composed almost contemporaneously in Palestine. Canon Cheyne, however, gives to this and other evidence only a few curt words in an Appendix. He does not "feel these to be important," while he bases the whole edifice of his argument upon a conjecture. He admits that there is no external evidence for the existence of Maccabean Psalms, but thinks there is great à priori probability that such were written. This may be granted, but is it wise and sound criticism to lay the foundation of an investigation of this kind in a mere hypothesis such as the following, "What more natural than that Simon should follow the example of David his prototype, as described in Chronicles, and make fresh regulations for the liturgical services of the sanctuary?" Nothing is said of any reconstitution of temple psalmody in 1 Maccabees, though there is a notice of the attention paid by Simon to the sanctuary and the vessels of the temple. Professor Cheyne argues, "Is it likely that he beautified the exterior and took no thought for the greatest of the spiritual glories of the temple?" The argument from silence here may fairly be urged the other way. In any caseand this is our main point-sober criticism should hardly pass by with a

sneer (p. 458) the external evidence as to date supplied by the titles to the Psalms in the LXX. Version, in order to clear the way, not for some testimony of cardinal importance, but for a guess that it is "natural" that something should take place of which we have no record or hint in history, and the probability of which has been questioned by nearly all critics, German and English, with two or three notable exceptions. Ewald, as is well known, held that no Maccabean Psalms are included in the Canon, but Professor Cheyne has left his former teacher far behind. Much has happened, of course, since Ewald's time, but when such a very decided shifting of the centre of gravity as regards the composition and collection of the Psalms is being effected, we are entitled to expect that very strong reasons will be alleged for making it.

Four criteria are laid down by Dr. Cheyne for determining Maccabean Psalms. They imply that there should be (1) Some fairly distinct allusions to Maccabean circumstances; (2) A uniquely strong Church feeling; (3) An intensity of monotheistic faith; and (4) In the later Psalms "an ardour of gratitude for some unexampled stepping forth of the one Lord Jehovah into history." The first is a good test, but not easy to apply, because the allusions in most cases are not distinct but general, and very few indeed can be said to be decisive. The same may be said of the last criterion. Jewish history contains more than one remarkable " stepping forth of Jehovah" on behalf of His people. The second we should hesitate to admit, because Canon Cheyne's views on the collective "I" of the Psalms, though interesting, are by no means established; and the third rests upon a basis of assumption concerning the history of the idea of God among the Jews, which requires careful examination before it can be granted that the presence of "intense monotheism" marks a Psalm as Maccabean. Our own conclusion is, that while a good case may be made out for the existence of two or three Maccabean Psalms in the Psalter, even so much is not proved, and Canon Cheyne's arguments for considering the prayers for "the King" in such Psalms as xx. and xxi., to belong to the times of the Maccabees rather than those of the monarchy, read like anything but sober and well-balanced criticism.

The same must be said of the extreme views taken concerning pre-Exilic psalms. To adopt the author's own method of reasoning, Is it “likely" that no such Psalms were composed, that David's fame as a Psalm writer rests on no foundation? Or if, as the Bampton Lecturer appears to admit, David did write some Psalms, and many Temple-songs were written and sung before the Exile, is it likely that all these were lost in the course of a few generations amongst a people well qualified and heartily disposed to preserve such sacred strains? We have a number of compositions declared by tradition— comparatively late and uncritical, it is true-to be in some sense "Davidic." Internal evidence shows that some of these cannot be what the titles declare them; are we, therefore, to say that all the traditions are unworthy of credence? When internal evidence also points in certain respects to David as author, what is to be said? Canon Cheyne's view is that authors of

the late Persian period "think themselves back into the soul of David." If early phrases and forms of expression are used, he says that later writers “archaized” or (as in the case of Habak. iii.) that they employed “affectations of archaic roughness." The evidence of 2 Sam. xxii. to the authorship of Psalm xviii. "only proves that the poem was conjecturally ascribed to the idealized David not long before the Exile."

The method adopted in these Lectures leads to some strange results. Things truly are not what they seem. Psalm xlv. refers to Ptolemy Philadelphus! Even Psalm cxxxvii. cannot be allowed the place during or immediately after the Exile which its language seems to imply. Canon Cheyne says, "Let us group it with Psalms cxxxv. and cxxxvi., and place it. in the time of Simon the Maccabee. It is in the fullest sense a dramatic lyric.' Just as the author of Psalm xviii. thinks himself into the soul of David, so a later temple-singer identifies himself by sympathy with his exiled predecessors in Babylon."

All this is possible, no doubt, though it implies more power of writing "dramatic lyrics" than might be expected in such an age; but why are we to adopt such hypotheses? There is nothing in linguistic considerations to necessitate it; indeed, the evidence of Koheleth and Daniel might be made to tell the other way. We do not forget Canon Cheyne's arguments based on the use of the word Chasidim, and the names of God, Shaddai and El'Elyon. A discussion of these points would hardly be suited to these pages, and the writer would express any difference from the opinion of such a scholar as Professor Cheyne with all diffidence and hesitation. But it may as well be argued (as Ewald, indeed, did argue) that the sect of the 'Aridaĵo took their name from the Chasidim of the Psalms, as that the mention of "the godly" in a Psalm necessarily points to the time when that sect flourished. And all deductions based upon the usage of the various names of God in the several stages of Jewish history rest, in the present state of our knowledge, upon a very slender basis.

The real ground for assigning so late a date to the Psalter is to be found elsewhere. It is almost necessary for the consistent maintenance of the ideas of religious development in Israel, as held by Wellhausen and his school. If these views, which now rule the critical world, are taken as proved, then there is supplied the tacit premise which alone gives force to Canon Cheyne's otherwise arbitrary assumptions and unwarrantable conclusions. True, he does not in so many words assume, say, the post-Exilic date of the Priestly Code, but all his arguments concerning Davidic Psalms virtually rest upon the improbability that "the versatile condottiere, chieftain, and king" composed such spiritual songs as those attributed to him, and the much greater likelihood that the Moses, the Elijah, the David of whom we read in the Old Testament, are not historical figures, but idealizations of a later day.

That is a matter which must be argued out in its own place. We only say at present that Canon Cheyne's arguments concerning the origin of the

NO. II.-VOL. I.-THE THINker.

Psalter will not of themselves carry conviction to those who have not previously accepted the views of religious development in Israel which lie at the foundation of the whole volume. These Lectures may be considered as an answer to the question, How can the Psalter be harmonized with the prevailing critical view of Old Testament history? It is clear that this can only be done by fixing its date some centuries later than that which Ewald, for example, accepted. But the reasonings of Canon Cheyne do not prove that there is anything in the language or thought of the Psalter to necessitate so late a date, or even to render it strongly probable, if traditional views of Revelation and religious development be maintained. Rather does he frankly accept the naturalistic or "psychologic" hypothesis, and then illustrates with great skill (for the task is a difficult one) how the facts can be reconciled with the later date, if the earlier be shown to be historically or "psychologically" impossible.

The real significance, therefore, of Canon Cheyne's position is in this volume thrown into the background. His reasoning is full of assumptions, esteemed, many of them, as matters of course by himself and those who agree with him, but strenuously repudiated by those who hold different views of Revelation. These Lectures, therefore, are not likely to provide any bridge between faith and free criticism, for one class of readers at least. Very different is the attitude of one who may be described as a colleague of Dr. Cheyne at Oxford-Professor Driver. He, as his recently-published Introduction abundantly shows, speaks with the greatest caution and hesitation. where mere hypotheses are concerned. His view of the Psalter is much more conservative than Professor Cheyne's, because he sees how impossible it is to determine the date of most of the Psalms from internal evidence, and he will not frame elaborate hypotheses concerning them, to be destroyed by the next theorist who gains the fickle favour of critics. Canon Cheyne does not appear to assume any theory, but his arguments are valid only if certain views of the religious history of Israel be admitted, which, in this country at least, are far from being established. Those who are not prepared to accept such views will be accordingly repelled instead of attracted; and whatever be the effect of this volume, it will not be likely to prepare the way for the acceptance of critical theories on the part of those who hold traditional beliefs concerning Revelation. This is, of course, a secondary consideration for the author, the one thing necessary for him being fully and frankly to declare his own view. But in this case the true ground for the conclusions reached does not lie in the language of the Psalter itself; and a reader who does not sympathize with Canon Cheyne's naturalistic explanations of the phenomena of the religious life of Israel, finds the author committing a petitio principii at every turn.

We have dwelt almost exclusively upon one aspect of this work, and have, consequently, failed to do it justice as a whole. It is needless to say that it is marked by great learning; it contains abundant suggestion for the exegete, and must be full of stimulus to the earnest student of the Old

Testament, whatever be his personal opinions. It is characterized throughout by a reverent and Christian spirit, but its underlying assumptions and bold and ingenious theorizing await a justification which the arguments actually adduced fail to furnish.

MACCABEAN PSALMS.

BY REV. PROF. W. H. BENNETT, M.A.

AT first sight, the evidence for the existence of Maccabean Psalms seems overwhelming. In the stirring times of the Maccabees, as in similar periods, it is natural to look for literary fruit from a full and enthusiastic life. Moreover, we have, in some kind of Hebrew, Ecclesiasticus before, and 1 Maccabees after this period. It is widely maintained that Daniel, at any rate, in its present form, belongs to the Maccabean age. The age, therefore, is not only full of life and passion, but is also literary; surely such an age must have produced Psalms of a high order.

Again, if we decide to accept Maccabæan Psalms, we shall find ourselves in very good, even if somewhat mixed, company. When a view which runs counter to traditional opinion is accepted not only by Reuss and Grätz and Cheyne, but also by the Targum, Theodore of Mopsuestia, John Calvin, Delitzsch, and Perowne, we almost seem to have a decisive consensus of authority. And yet we must not overlook the reluctance of Bleek and the hesitation of Driver as to Maccabæan Psalms.

But further internal evidence seems to shut us up definitely and finally to the Maccabæan period for many of the Psalms. At what other time when Israel had armies could the nation declare, as in Ps. xliv., that for the Lord's sake they were killed all the day long? Compare this tone of conscious rectitude on the part of the religious spokesman of Israel with the sombre pictures which Isaiah and Jeremiah draw of the morals and religion of Judah, Again, Ps. cviii., with its reference to the house of Aaron, and its enthusiasm for the temple, must, at any rate, be later than the Exile, and its jubilant gratitude for the destruction of hostile nations fits nothing in the post-Exilic period but the signal Maccabæan deliverance. Nor do we read of any other time when, as in Ps. cxlix., the saints went forth with the praises of God in their mouth and a two-edged sword in their hand to execute vengeance upon the heathen. Or again, turning to Psalms of a somewhat different character, lxxiv. and lxxix., when there was a mutilation and defilement of the temple, when there was no prophet, when there were synagogues in the land, before the periods of the Maccabees. Also in Ps. lxxxiii. we find Edom, Ishmael, Moab and the Hagarenes, Gebal, Ammon, Amalek, Philistines, Tyre, and Asshur confederate against Israel. The only passage in Israelite records that offers a basis for this Psalm is 1 Macc. v., where Judas fights with Edom, Arabians, Ammon, Philistines, Tyre, Syria, and other nations. And turning last of all to Ps. cx., where, except the