the existing race only. They are utterly silent as to the inferior human races which lived on the planet before the Adamic one. This race, or these races, were swept from the earth before Adam appeared, and became the head of the present family— the successor, but not the offspring, of lower, more primordial races and to him alone belong the words of Scripture; while to those barbarians, the users of flint knives, and hunters of mammoth and auroch, and collectors of Danish refuse heaps, and owners of ape-like skulls, death-sleepers in caves and in drift with extinct rhinoceros and bear and reindeer, belong the words of that antiquarian geology which adopts the theory of the high antiquity of man. But when the proofs of this theory are given, it will then be time enough to examine its claims. It is at present a "philosophic vision," and as a scientific question there are not data enough for a dogmatic decision. ART. IV. THE EMOTIONAL ELEMENT IN HEBREW TRANSLATION. [FOURTH ARTICLE.] ISAIAH XXI AND JOB IV. AMONG the Hebrew modes of emotional expression, the most difficult of translation, though the most effective when felt and understood, are those that arise from what may be called the Shemitic conception of time, as reckoned, not from an absolute present, but from an assumed shifting present, suggested by the interest of the narration or the emotion of the narrator. As it appears in the Old Testament, it is of two species, which may be described as the abrupt infinitive, having, seemingly, no regard to time at all, and the subjective future, which ever presents a futurity in fact, or an expectancy in feeling, to the standpoint assumed by the speaker. The first presents what may be called a standing, the second a moving picture. Both give us the appearance of soliloquizing language, whether of strong emotion, in which case it will be abrupt and startling, or of musing meditation, when it will present more appearance of method, but still without those connectives which make the logical, the didactic, or the calmly historical style. Examples of the abrupt infinitive are found, to some extent, in the coldest languages; but sometimes we cannot help regarding them as affectations of speech, designed to imitate spirit and emotion rather than as true and hearty expressions of them. They abound in Sallust, where we have frequently such sentences as these: Igitur reges populique finitimi bello tentare; at Romani domi militiaeque intente festinare, parare, alius alium hortari, hostibus obviam ire, libertatem, patriam, parentes, armis tegere. Such a mode was, doubtless, thought to give an air of animation, or a feeling of vigor; but when emotion is really wanting in the writer, as we feel to be the case with this artificial historian-so different, in all respects, from the Hebrew prophets-we come to regard it as rhetorical rather than eloquent. In Homer they are introduced less frequently, but always with a fine effect, because there is ever something in the preceding or succeeding facts that operates like the preparation and resolution of the grammatical dissonance. Take, as a very plain, yet significant example, (Iliad, xvii, 691,) where Menelaus, in the alarm and hurry of the battle-field, says to Antilochusἀλλὰ συγ' αἶψ' Αχιλῆϊ θεῶν ἐπί νῆας Ἀχαιῶν εἰπεῖν κ. τ. λ. Literally, "But you, running to tell Achilles quickly, that he may soonest place the naked corpse in safety by the ships." It is the mode, in grammars and scholia, to explain this as "the infinitive used for the imperative." Such a canon may do, indeed, as a mere mnemonic rule of short-hand parsing; but it fails utterly in this, that it does not point out what there is in the sentence that makes a demand for this seeming irregularity. Again, it is explained as a case of "ellipsis of the governing word." But still the question remains, What is gained in clearness, emphasis, or power, that this abrupt style of speech should be resorted to in certain cases? The poet never thought of any such explanation. It may be doubted whether Homer would have understood the scholiast or grammarian who should have thus reduced to rule his impetuous, irregular, and impassioned movement. Why is the governing word left out? The answer is, that an unusual emphasis intended for at certain word, or a certain idea, must lead to some anomaly in construction, if the writer would avoid the weakening effect of attempting the same thing by means of epithets and paraphrases. It is the mode that nature and feeling prompt for drawing attention to it, thus isolating it, as it were, from the more common modes of expression that may precede or follow it. In doing this, the same number of words is to be preserved; for conciseness is essential to energy. Emotion will not bear any thing that looks formal or studied. A logical structure immediately makes thought predominant at the expense of feeling, and this, in the supposed cases, is not what we want. To effect that prominence of certain words which is demanded for the pictorial effect, there is required an anomalous, that is, an uneven, or broken sentence. This is to be transferred, in the best way we can, to another language, and that is the best translation which, with the least sacrifice of thought, preserves the most of that irregular literality on which the feeling depends. Take, for example, the passage already quoted from Homer, (Iliad, xvii, 691.) Here, besides the command, there is to be given to the agent, personally, a peculiar prominence. Ev . . εlπεiv “you to tell." It is yours, Antilochus, above all other men, to tell Achilles the sad fact of his comrade's death. Here is not only command, but the reason for it; here is the emotional energy with which it is given, all preserved in the startling form of the sentence; as though the din of the conflict, so fiercely waged over the slain warrior, would not allow time for connectives, or the regularity of thought necessary for formal governing words. This abrupt infinitive may express a still more peculiar and emotional emphasis than is required in examples like the one quoted from Homer. And so we often find it in Hebrew, which, in boldness of phraseology, goes beyond almost every other language. Take, for example, Job xl, i: "And the Lord answered Job and said," which is so tamely as well as erroneously rendered in our translation, "Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct him?" * * It is the infinitive Kal, as in Judges xi, 25—3 by 37 377, "What! fight-fight with Israel!" The, in both cases, is the particle of sur This is not the style. It is not a question; it is not an assertion, nor a command, but a pure exclamation, that bursts from the storm-cloud, after this long enumeration of the great works of God. It is an expression of indignant astonishment at the murmuring human audacity. "To contend with the Almighty!" It is this simple, startling infinitive;* and any change or addition only obscures the meaning, and weakens the force of the reproof. "Contend with the Almighty! O complainer!" "He that reproveth God, let him answer it." And then, in perfect keeping with this sharp challenge, comes the response of Job: "Lo, I am vile; what shall I answer thee. I put my hand upon my mouth. Once have I spoken, but I will not reply; twice-but I will contend no more. answer no more." I will One great use of these abrupt infinitives, where a number occur together, is to denote vivid contrasts, to which attention is drawn by the appearance of such broken words placed in unusual forms. We venture to think that we have here the true key to the right interpretation of that difficult passage, Isaiah xxi, 5, so incoherent, as it stands in our Bibles, and apparently so unmeaning. It is a series of these broken infinitives, without any governing word, and with hardly anything that can be called syntax belonging to them. The speaker seems unconscious of everything else but a strange scene of mingled opposites that rises before his prophetic vision. Under the awe and excitement produced by it, he is talking to himself. Now, prise. Our translators have taken as a verb, but it is a noun in the vocative, formed like, Gen. x, 9; Isa. ix, 5. It is an indignant address-O complainer! O reprover! *Conant, in his very excellent translation of the book of Job, renders it: "Will the reprover contend with the Almighty ?" So Umbreit, "Will nun mit dem All Mächtigen der Tadler rechten ?" Ewald, still better: "Will hadern mit dem Höchsten er der Tadler ?" "Will he quarrel with the Highest? the fault-finder!" The difference between Ewald and Umbreit shows how much more of point and force may be given to a sentence by a very slight change in the words, or even in their collocation. All of these translators, however, unnecessarily change from the literal infinitive form, and so make it a question instead of an exclamation. Gesenius remarks, that the infinitive thus in connection with its subject noun is rare, and besides this place, he cites Ezek. i, 14. But, if our view be correct, it is the vocative, instead of the direct subject, and this changes the whole aspect of the case. nominative independent, and the infinitives treated as substantives: "And as for the living creatures, their running and returning was as the appearance of lightning." the noun may be taken as the החיות רצוא ושוב 14 ,In Ezek. i the soliloquizing style, though solemn and earnest, is generally calm and meditative. Here, however, it is passionate and abrupt. It indicates astonishment and alarm. The seer seems like one in terror at his own ideals. He calls out in perturbation, as though the scene were actually before him, and his voice could reach the unconscious participants. One after another, in quick succession, arise the vivid pictures, and each one brings out from him its cry of astonishment, mingled with ערך השלחן צפה הצפית אכול שתה קומו השרים :warning to the actors .משחו מגן This is rendered in our version by a series of undistinguished, uncontrasted imperatives: "Prepare the table; watch the watch; eat, drink; arise, ye princes, and anoint the shield." Now, they are not imperatives, but exclamations, properly expressed, and to be rendered as infinitives. Instead, too, of this apparent unconnected rhapsody, the preparing the table, the appointment of the watch, the eating and drinking, the rising and anointing the shield, must be in some kind of contrast, and can only make sense by being so regarded. This, however, is inconsistent with their being all parts of one command, or one series of commands. Besides, there would be no reason in a change from the infinitive form (as given by the Masoretic pointing) to the direct imperative (and that, too, plural number) in the last two. Now let the reader take them just as they are, only supplying that punctuation which is necessary to mark the contrasts that are in the things themselves, and must, therefore, be supposed to have been in the mind of the speaker. "To set the table! to appoint the watch; to eat! to drink! arise, ye princes, and anoint the shield." The first two are in direct contrast. The one is the preparation for the banquet, as it passes before the prophetic vision; the other, the prophet's own exclamation, in view of what would be far more suitable for such a time of foreseen danger. So of the third and fourth taken together as followed by the direct imperatives in the fifth and sixth. It is the language of one crying out to himself, as he stands upon his watch-tower and sees the vivid panorama passing before him. He verbally paints the scene, and mingles his own ejaculations with it. The reader must put himself in his place, and then he will feel the emotion that is roused by these broken infinitives, just as it is presented in the Hebrew. He wants no gov |