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Josephus and Jerome did not contradict it. The agreement is better explained by the hypothesis that the explanation of the Targums lies at the basis of the later punctuation. Some very late writers of Targums may have had a pointed text before their eyes. . . . . .

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2. The statements of the Talmud, upon this subject, are still more difficult and obscure. It is certain, and generally admitted, that it makes no actual and express mention of the points." But silence respecting a subject supposed to have been known, is not a convincing argument that it was not known. The numerous passages, selected, for the most part, from the Gemara, which relate to this inquiry, may be divided into two classes.

(1.) Passages where the meaning of clauses in the Bible is contested; and here the controversy rests on the different pronunciation of the same word; for example, Cant. i. 2, 7777, or 77797; Ex. xxi. 8, 12, or 3, &c. According to a rabbinical legend, Joab put his teacher to death because he taught him to pronounce, instead of, in Ex. xiv. 17. From the last passage it is perfectly clear that the Talmudists supposed the letters were written entirely without points in the time of David, and therefore this is analogous to similar controversies which have arisen respecting the unpointed Koran. But both, and especially the latter controversy, carry us back to a time when the ambiguity of a text without points began to be seriously felt, and when custom had fixed the pronunciation in some difficult places, which was usually observed in reading them.

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there is a mother, i. e. a ", יֵשׁ אֵם לְמִקְרָא וְיֵשׁ אֵם לְמָסוֹרֶת The phrase

reason for this reading, but it is itself the mother of the Masora," seems to refer to this. It occurs frequently, and is differently explained. Probably the p designates the received way of reading the text; the 70, a traditional explanation of the text, which, in this case, differs from the pronunciation of the word. In our editions of the Talmud, the text is without points in so many impor

• The following writers contend for the mention of vowels in the Talmud: Buxtorf, De Origine Punctorum Vocal. p. 76, sqq., 101, sqq.; G. O. Tychsen, in Repert. vol. iii. p. 105, sqq. On the other side, see Jo. Morinus, Exercit. Bibl. xii. ch. 3-5, xv. ch. 3-5.

b Buxtorf, Tiberias, p. 80.

Mishna Aboda Sara, 2, § 4. Gem. Kiddushin, c. 1, fol. 18. Sanhedrim, c. 1, fol. 4, A. Sota. c. 1, fol. 4, B.

d Baba Bathra, c. 2, fol. 21, A. B.

Buxtorf, 1. c. p. 103. Jo. Morinus, p. 456. Tychsen, p. 106.

tant passages that they must be learned from the context. However, we must suppose a sign, showing how the word was to be read, was almost indispensable."

(2.) Another class is composed of these passages, where certain marks in the text are mentioned, especially the Tangmim, (x) the Pesookim, (,) and the Semanim,' (.) The first, which afterwards was the common term for accents, is perhaps taken in the wider sense of vowel points and marks of interpunction, although its connection with Pesook seems to lead solely to a division of the words, sense, and verses.

The last is explained by Raschi as meaning vowel points, (;) but there are passages where it will not bear this meaning.

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(3.) There is no trace of marks for the vowel in the oldest critics upon the Bible, who were nearly contemporary with the Talmudists, the authors or collectors of the Keri and Kethib. All these readings relate solely to the consonants.

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FURTHER TRACES IN ORIGEN, JEROME, AND OTHERS.

Some express statements of Jerome relate more directly than the Talmud to the existence of certain characters to assist the reading." The pronunciation of the Hebrew words in Origen's Hexapla, in Jerome, and some contemporary authors, is still very fluctuating, and analogous to the pronunciation of the Alexandrians, though somewhat more fixed than that."

a Morinus, 1. c. Baba Bathra, 1. c. : Cum venit (Joab) ante David dixit ei, Quare sic fecisti? Respondit ei, Quia scriptum est. Regessit David, Sed non legimus . Dixit ei Joab, Docuerunt me legere. Ivit et interrogavit preceptorum suum, dixit illi, Quomodo docuisti me legere? Dixit

. זכר,ei

Gem. Berachoth, fol. 62. Nedarim, fol. 37. Megilla, fol. 3, ad Nehem. viii. 8. Hagiga, fol. 6. Nedarim, fol. 53. See Buxtorf, Morinus, and Tychsen, 1. c. See above, § 79, sqq.

C

Buxtorf, p. 76. Morinus, p. 447. Tychsen, p. 108.

d Cappellus, Arcan. Punct. i. 10. Jo. Morinus, 1. c. p. 463. St. Morinus, p. On the other side, Buxtorf, De Punct. Origine, p. 143, sqq. G. O. Tychsen, 1. c. p. 127. Comp. Dupuy, (on the vowels in Jerome's Heb. MSS.)

404, sqq.

in Eichhorn's Repert. vol. ii. p. 270. Jahn, Einleit. vol. i. p. 340, sqq.

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• Montfaucon, Quomodo Vet. Int. Hebraice legerint, in Origen, Hexap. vol.

1. Jerome knew as little of the present vowel points, and their names, as of any other technical expression of Hebrew grammar. He maintains expressly, as a peculiarity of Hebrew writing, that it is rare to find a vowel in the middle of a word, but the consonants were pronounced differently, according to the pleasure of the reader, and the different custom of different provinces. This is the reason that he makes the frequent remark, that a word may mean very different things, as it is differently pronounced. In this connection he makes use of the term accent, (accentus,) which sometimes refers to the pronunciation, but sometimes it must mean a sign in the text, to indicate the pronunciation. Perhaps he used it as a translation of the Talmudic word. Jerome's version agrees with the present system of vowels far better than the Seventy."

2. The pronunciation of the Hebrew appellatives in Origen, Jerome, and some others, is analogous to that of the Seventy, but it agrees more closely with the present pronunciation. . . .

3. If any one is willing to rest the question on the fact that signs of the vowels are occasionally mentioned in the Talmud and Jerome, the most that could be made out from them is, that three vowel signs were early used in the Hebrew. We must give up all historical proof of the fact, sought from other sources, and the age of these three marks is not wholly secured. But the fact is remarkable, that nearly all the variations of the old translators can be easily explained on the supposition that there was such a simple and ambiguous system of vocalization; for they are almost all but different gradations of the chief vowels. In general, the whole system of vocalization may be referred back to these three chief vowels; it only fixed their fluctuating pronunciation; and the entire doctrine of the vowel changes in the Hebrew languages relates almost solely to the limits

ii. p. 397, sqq., reprinted in Wolf, 1. c. vol. ii. p. 653, sqq. Jahn, Gram. Heb. 3d ed. p. 443, sqq. On a passage of Clem. Alex. (Strom. iii. p. 529, ed. Potter,) which some refer to the Heb. vowels, see Bib. Bremensis, vol. ii. p. 147.

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Com. ad Habak. iii. 5. Hos. xiii. 3. Ad Titum iii. 6. Isa. lxv. 16. Jon. iii. 4. Gen. xxxiii. 29. See other passages in Buxtorf, p. 147. Jahn, 1. c. Montfaucon, Нехар.

Vossii Aristarchus, i. 32. Jo. Morinus, p. 544. Schultens, Inst. Ling. Heb. p. 48, 62, sqq. Michaelis, Com. de Syrorum Vocal. p. 174, § 6, 7, in Comment.; Gott. 1774. Bauer takes the other side, Crit. sac. p. 146. See Trendelenburg, in Eichhorn's Repert. vol. xviii. p. 80.

of these three vowels. thoroughly carried out."

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This remark was made long ago, and

Others think only the diacritical point was used at this time, and it is certain the term accent in Jerome is not limited solely to the vowels. The analogy of the Arabic and rabbinical manuscripts confirms the opinion that at first only difficult passages were pointed.

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TIME OF THE ORIGIN OF THE PRESENT SYSTEM OF PUNCTUATION, AND OBJECTIONS TO IT.

1. Without reckoning on uncertain accounts from the fourth century, we find many certain traces of the use of the present vowels in the fifth century. The Masora, collected, though not closed, about this time, mentions the chief of them by name, and notices their variations. The comparison between the Babylonian and Palestine readings relates, at least in two places, to Mappik in He; but the comparison which Ben Assher and Ben Naphtali made (about 1034 A. C.) relates exclusively to the vowels and marks to aid the reading. Still further, the version of Saadias, and the Greek version of St. Mark's library, pro suppose the existence of a pointed text. In fine, the Jewish grammarians, from the eleventh century downwards, seem to have known nothing respecting this matter, except that the vowels were formerly written. Therefore they could not have known any manuscripts which contained an imperfect punctuation, or which showed the origin of punctuation.

2. If we are, from these facts, to determine the time in which the present vocalization was formed and completed, then more arguments speak in favor of that period between the sixth and eighth than between the ninth and the tenth centuries. They may have been quite generally known, for the first time, about the latter period. Between the eighth and the tenth century, the Jewish chroniclers mention

a Eichhorn, Bib. vol. viii. p. 205....... Michaelis, Or. Bib. vol. iv. p. 228, sqq. Clericus, Quæst. Jerome, p. 95. Jahn, Heb. Gram. 3d ed. p. 19. Jerome, Quæst. in Gen. ii. 23.

b Buxtorf, p. 55 and 189. Cappellus, Arcan. Punct. i. 12.

Michaelis, Or. Bib. vol. iv. p. 219.

d Morinus, p. 525. R. Simon, 1. c. i. c. 27. St. Morinus, Ling. Primæv. p. 420. Eichhorn, 1. c. Tychsen, Tent. p. 133.

Hottinger, Hist. Eccl. N. T. vol. i. p. 421, 528.

almost exclusively Babylonian scholars, and yet this masoretic and grammatical work was universally ascribed to the men of Tiberias. Furthermore, the works that have come down to us from these two centuries, such as the later Targums, show that learning was in so degraded a condition that we cannot place that undertaking in this age. And, finally, in an earlier age, there was the same need of them as at a later day, and the difficulty of propagating a knowledge of the Scriptures by tradition became greater continually. At the same time, this hypothesis renders it easy to explain the fact that the true origin of the vowels was completely unknown to the Jewish scholars in that age; for some centuries, and those very dead centuries, lay between the periods. From these considerations, it becomes quite probable that the vowel points came into the schools of the critics of the Bible at an earlier date- before they came into general use. Such distinct traditions respecting the origin of the vowels as the Arabians have, are entirely wanting, for those which pass for such vanish on examination.

3. Among the objections which may be raised against the later origin of the vowels are many that seem not unimportant; yet they may be removed without doing violence to facts. "It is scarcely conceivable," says one, "that history should be silent respecting a fact so important for the outward form of the sacred Scriptures." " But it is silent concerning other things still more important in the history of Jewish literature; on the formation of the canon; on the composition of so many anonymous writings; and, besides, the same must be said respecting similar contrivances of the Greek and Latin grammarians. But the men who did the most in this business did not boast of their invention; it was rather for their interest to avoid the appearance of novelty, and to give their work the authority of age as soon as possible. The history of literature shows how completely this agrees with the spirit of the Jews and of that age. To this is to be added the interposition of dark ages.

"We nowhere find any controversy about this matter, which we should expect among the Jews, who love controversy." But the passages of the Talmud above referred to may certainly be consid

a See Prideaux, (1. c.,) Fourmont, (in Memoires de la Litterat. vol. xx. p. 222, sqq.,) Semler, (Theol. Abhand. vol. i. p. 191,) and against them Houbigant, Not. crit. vol. i. p. 77.

Buxtorf, p. 398. Robertson, p. 65. Morinus, 421.

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