Laadah – Language of the Nt

Laadah

A Judahite (1 Chronicles 4:21).

Laban

1. Son of Nahor (Genesis 29:5; cf. 24:47. where " Bethuel, son of,’ is apparently an interpolation). He was the brother of Rebekah (24^‘), father of Leah and Rachel (29), and through them ancestor to three-fourths of the Jewish nation. He had several sons (BO’S 31’), and was father-in-law and uncle of Jacob. Hebrews 99 first in Scripture as engaged in betrothing his sister Rebekah to Isaac (24). We meet him next at Haran entertaining Jacob (29), who had escaped from his brother Esau. ‘The details of the transactions between Laban and Jacob for the fourteen years while the nephew served the uncle for his two daughters need not be recounted here (see chs. 29 and 30). At the end of the period Jacob was not only husband of Leah and Rachel and father of eleven sons, but also the owner of very many flocks and herds. As Laban was reluctant to part with Jacob, regarding his presence as an assurance of Divine blessing, the departure took place secretly, while Laban was absent shearing his sheep. Jacob removed his property across the Euphrates, while Rachel took with her the teraphim or household gods of the family. When Laban pursued after them and overtook them at Mount Gilead (31). he did no more than reproach Jacob for his stealthy flight and for his removal of the teraphim, and finally made a covenant of peace by setting up a cairn of stones and a pillar; these served as a boundary-stone between the Aramaeans and the Hebrews, which neither were to pass with hostile intent to the other.

In character Laban is not pleasing, and seems to reflect in an exaggerated form the more repulsive traits in the character of his nephew Jacob; yet he shows signs of generous impulses on more than one occasion, and especially at the final parting with Jacob.

2. An unknown place mentioned in Dt. 1:1.

T. A. MoxoN.

Labana

Labana (1 Esdras 5:29) =Ezr 2:45 and Nehemiah 7:48 Lebana(h).

Laocunus

Laocunus (1 Esdras 9:31) =Ezr 10 Chelal.

Lace

The Eng. word ‘lace’ comes from Lat. laqueus, a ‘snare,’ and is used in that sense in Old Eng. It is then employed for any cord or band, and that is its meaning in Exodus 28 39:21, 31. Sir

LA0ED.S:iIOIIIANS.— In 2 Maccabees 5:9 we read that Jason fled for refuge to the Lacedaemonians ‘because they were near of kin.’ This claim is further set forth in 1 Maccabees 12:2 ff.; cf. 14 15:23. where we read of Sparta and an alliance with the Spartans. It was, of course, entirely fanciful, the Hellenes and the Jews belonging respectively to the Indo-European and Semitic branches of the human race. A. E. Hillaed.

Lachish

A town in the south country of Judah referred to several times in the Tell el-Amarna tablets. In the Biblical records it first appears as joining the coahtion headed by the king of Jerusalem against the Gibeonites (Joshua 10:3). and as being in consequence reduced by Joshua (v. 31) in spite of the assistance given to it by the king of Gezer (v. 33). It is enumerated among the cities of the tribe of Judah (15:39). Rehoboam fortified it (2 Oh 11:9). Hither Amaziah, king of Judah, fled from conspirators, and here he was murdered (2 Kings 14:19). In the reign of Hezekiah, Sennacherib took Lachish, and while he was quartered there Hezekiah sent messengers to him to make terms (18:13–17). Sennacherib’s Lachish campaign is commemorated by a sculpture from Nineveh, now in the British Museum. Lachish and Azekah were the last cities to stand against the king of Babylon (Jeremiah 347). Lachish was one of the towns settled by the children of Judah after the Exile (Nehemiah 11:30). Micah’s denunciation of Lachish as ‘the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion’ (1) doubtless refers to incidents of which we are quite ignorant.

Lachish was identified by Conder with Tell el-Hesy, an important mound in the Gaza district, which was partially excavated with success by Flinders Petrie and Bliss for the Palestine Exploration Fund (1890-1893). Another site in the neighbourhood, of Roman date, called Vmm Lakis, probably represents a later dwelling of the representatives of the ancient Lachishites, and preserves the name of the city. R. A. S. Macalister.

Ladan

1. A name occurring in the genealogy of Joshua (1 Chronicles 7:26). 2. A Gershonite family name (1 Ch 23:7, 8, 9 26"««^). In 6:17 it appears as Libni (wh. see).

lADANUM.— See Myrrh.

Ladder

In ancient times ladders were used chiefly for scahng the walls of a besieged city, as frequently shown on the Egyptian and Assyrian monuments (Wilkinson, Anc. Egyp. i. 243; Layard, Nineveh, ii. 372). Although this use of them is probably implied in Proverbs 21:22, scaling-ladders are first expressly mentioned in the time of the Maccabees (1 Maccabees 5:30). See Fortification, §§ 3, 6.

Jacob’s ‘ladder’ (Genesis 28:12) seems to have been rather a ‘flight of stone steps, rising up to heaven’ (Driver, Com. in loc). A. R. S. Kennedy.

Lael

A Gershonite Levite (Numbers 3:24).

Lahad

A Judahite family name (1 Chronicles 4:2).

Lahai-boi

See Beer-lahai-eoi.

Lahmak

Lahmak l (EVm Lahmas) . — A town of Judah (Jos 15"), possibly mod. eULahm, near Beit Jibrin.

Lahdii

The brother of Goliath the Gittite, slain by Elhanan the son of Jair (1 Chronicles 20:5). There is a discrepancy between this passage and the parallel passage in 2 Samuel 21:19, where we read that ‘Elhanan [wh. see] the Bethlehemite slew Goliath the Gittite.’ If the text of Chronicles "is the more correct, the designation Bethlehemite of Samuel is simply a corruption of the name Lahmi, but the converse might also be the case.

T. A. MoxoN.

Laish

1. The original name of the town of Dan (,Ig 18’- "■ "• 29). The variation Leshem occurs in Joshua 19. 2. The father of Palti or Paltiel, to whom Michael, David’s wife, was given by Saul (I S 25, 283).

Laishah

Laishah (Isaiah 10:30). The name of a place connected vrith Gallim, and mentioned here along with other localities in Benjamin and Judah. It Gallim be Beit Jala near Bethlehem, Laishah would also be In that neighbourhood.

Lakkum

An unknown town of Naphtali (Joshua 19:33). .

Labia

See Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabachthani.

Lamb

See Sheep, and next article.

Lamb of God

The lamb was the most common victim in the Jewish sacrifices, and the most familiar type to a Jew of an offering to God. The title ‘the lamb of God’ (i.e. the lamb given or provided by God; cf. Genesis 22:8) is applied by John the Baptist to Jesus in John 1:29, 36. The symbolism which the Baptist intended can be inferred from the symbolic allusions to the lamb in the OT. Thus in Jeremiah 11:19 the prophet compares himself to a lamb, as the type of guilelessness and innocence. Again, in Isaiah 53:7 (a passage which exercised great influence on the Messianic hope of the Jews, and is definitely referred to Christ in Acts 8:32) the lamb is used as the type of vicarious suffering. It seems beyond doubt that these two ideas must have been in the Baptist’s mind. It is also quite possible to see in the phrase a reference to the lamb which formed part of the daily sacrifice in the Temple; and also, perhaps, an allusion to the Paschal lamb which would soon be offered at the approaching Passover (John 2:13), and which was the symbol of God’s deliverance. Certainly this is the idea underlying the expressions in John 19:36 and 1 Peter 1:19. Thus all these strata of thought may be traced in the Baptist’s title, viz. innocence, vicarious suffering, sacrifice, redemption.

The lamb is used 27 times in the Apocalypse as the symbol of Christ, and on the first introduction of the term in Revelation 5:6 the writer speaks specifically of ‘a lamb as though it had been slain.’ The term used in the Greek original is not the same as that found in the Baptist’s phrase, but the connexion is probably similar. It seems most likely that the sacrificial and redemptive significance of the Iamb is that especially intended by the Apocalyptic author.

The specific title ‘the lamb of God’ may be an invention of the Baptist’s own, which he used to point an aspect of the Messianic mission for his hearers’ benefit, or it may have been a well-known phrase currently employed to designate the Messiah; we have no trace of such an earlier use, but it may have existed (see Westcott on John 1:29). A. W. F. Blunt.

Lame, Lameness

See Medicine, p. 599.

Lamech

The name apparently of two people in the antediluvian period, the one belonging to the Cainite and the other to the Sethlte genealogy. 1. The fifth descendant from Cain (Genesis 4:18–24). He seems to have been a man of importance in the early legend, as the names of his two wives (Adah and Zillah), his three sons (Jabal, Jubal, and Tubal-cain), and his daughter (Naamah) are all mentioned. Special interest is attached to him on account of his song — ‘Adah and Zillah, hear my voice; Ye wives of Lamech, hearken unto my speech: For I have slain a man for wounding me, And a young man for bruising me: If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold. Truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold.’

The meaning of this song has been the subject of much conjecture. The song is clearly one of exultation, and it has not unnaturally been associated with the fact that Tubal-cain his son is specially mentioned as the ‘forger of every cutting instrument.’ Jerome relates the Jewish legend that Lamech accidentally slew Cain, but for this, of course, there is no foundation. It has been suggested (Lightfoot, Decas Chorogr- Marc, praem. § iv.) that the reference is to the fact that Lamech, as the first polygamist, introduced greater destruction into the world than Cain. R. H. Kennett sees in the song a deprecation of blood-guiltiness incurred by the fact that Lamech, as a tribal chieftain, has avenged an insult of a boy by slaying him.

A possible variant rendering might be mentioned: ‘I would have slain (or’ I will slay’) any man who wounds me.’ If this is accepted, it materially alters the sense.

2. The father of Noah (Genesis 6). It is now commonly believed, owing to the identity of some names and the similarity of others in the two genealogies, that they are merely different versions of one original list.

T. A. MoxoN.

Lamentations, Book of

l.Occasion.—InB.c. 586 Nebuchadnezzar captured Jerusalem, put out the eyes of Zedekiah, slew the princes, burned the Temple and palaces, razed the walls, and deported the inhabitants(save some of the poorest sort) to forced labour in Babylon (2 Kings 25). These events and their religious meaning are the theme of the five complete hymns in the Book of Lamentations. The poet looked on these calamities as the death of the Jewish people; and he prepares an elegy for the national funeral.

2. Date. — It need not be supposed that Jeremiah went about composing acrostics while Jerusalem was burning; on the other hand, the language of the poems is not that of some Rabbinical versifier after Nehemiah’s time. Between the desolation of B.C. 586 and the restoration of b.o. 536 is the time limit for the production of this book.

3. Form. — The form of these elegies has been recognized to be the type of Hebrew poetry which is peculiar to threnody. Its metrical character depends on the structure of the single line. The line has not the exact measure of a Latin hexameter or pentameter, but consists of five to seven words, making on an average eleven syllables. The line is divided by sense and grammar into two unequal parts, as 6: 5 or 4: 3; the first part being more emphatic in sense, and the second forming an antiphonal supplement to the first. Thus 1:1 Ah now I she sits alone — the populous city, Husbandless doomed to be — the foremost of peoples. Once the princess over states — a serf in a gang.’ Such is the ginali-metie, found also in parts of Amos, Isaiah, and Ezekiel.

4. Arrangement. — These Hebrew elegiacs may stand singly, as in Lamentations 3, or in two-lined stanzas, as in ch. 4, or in three-lined stanzas, as in chs. 1 and 2. But there is also in Lam. a more artificial embellishment. The 22 stanzas of chs. 1, 2, and 4 are introduced by the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet in regular order, except that 2 and 4 place the letter Pe before the letter Ayin. This inexplicable variation in the order of the letters has been held to imply a difference in authorship. Again ch. 3 has66 verses, the lines beginning aaa; bbb, etc. Ch. 5 has 22 verses, but no acrostic; and its lines are of a slightly different structure. As this chapter is a prayer, these external marks may have been felt to be inappropriate. The poetic form of Lam. is thus the result of elaborate effort; but this need not imply the absence of genuine feeling. The calamity in remembrance seemed to call for an adequate form of expression, and to invite the resources of technical skill.

6. Contents. — The contents of the five hymns are not pervaded by clear lines of thought; but the nature of the subject forbids us to look for the consistency of a geometrical’ theorem. The cruel scenes, the pity and horror they occasioned, the religious perplexity at the course of events, are depicted sometimes by the poet ‘himself, again by Jerusalem, or by the personified community. Ch. 1 describes the ruin of Jerusalem and the humiliation of the exiles — vv. 1–11 in the words of the poet, while the city itself speaks in vv. 12–22. The second hymn finds the sting of their sufferings in the fact that they are inflicted by Jehovah, their ancient defender. Ch. 3,’ the triumph song of ethical optimism,’ recounts the national misery (vv. 1–18). perceives the purpose of Jehovah in their calamities (vv. 19–47) and calls the people to penitence (vv. 48–66) Ch. 4 contrasts the past history of Zion with its present condition, and ch. 5 is a prayer for mercy and renewal of ancient blessings. The hope for Judah was the compassion of the Lord; ‘therefore let us search and try our ways and turn again to the Lord’ (3:40). It forms a curious contrast to the consolation offered to Athens in her decline and fall through the comedies of Aristophanes.

6. Authorship. — No author is named in Lam. itself. In 2 Chronicles 35:25 we read that ‘Jeremiah lamented for Josiah, and all the singing men and singing women spake of Josiah unto this day; and they made them an ordinance in Israel: and behold they are written in the lamentations.’ This statement is 300 years later than the fall of Jerusalem; and Lam. has nothing to do with Josiah. But it ascribes standard elegies to Jeremiah. The LXX, followed by the Vulgate and other versions, names Jeremiah the prophet as the author of Lam. ; and this view prevailed universally till recent times. Internal evidence has been considered unfavourable to Jeremiah’s authorship. The alphabetic form, a few peculiar words, an affinity in chs. 2 and 4 with Ezekiel, in chs. 1 and 5 with the younger Isaiah, and in ch. 3 with late Psalms, the accumulation of pictorial metaphors, the denial of vision to prophets, the reliance on Egypt (4:17). are given (LBhr, Com.) as conclusive objections to Jeremiah’s being the writer. But the acrostic form would then have the charm of novelty, and would be useful as a mnemonic for professional mourners; and it is not prophecy to which it is here attached. The affinities with later books are not very marked, and may be due to derivation from the elegies. And there is avowedly much resemblance in vocabulary and thought between Jeremiah and Lamentations. Both trace disaster to the sin of the nation, both deprecate trust in alliances, and both inculcate penitence and hope. Probably the internal evidence originated the traditional view that Jeremiah was the author; and the newer scrutiny of the evidence seems hardly sufficient to disprove the verdict of the ancients.

Again it is asked. Would one author make five independent poems on one and the same subject? If several authors treated the theme independently, it is not likely that their work would bear juxtaposition so well as the collection in Lamentations. Jeremiah’s life ended some 6 or 7 years after the Captivity began; and 5 implies a longer interval since the devastation. If we assign, with Thenius, chs. 2 and 4 to Jeremiah, and suppose that some disciples of the prophet imitated his model in 1, 3, and 5, then perhaps the differences and similarities in the several hymns may be accounted for. When Jerusalem was destroyed by Titus in a.d. 70, there was no new glnah; the elegies seem to presuppose a personahty of Jeremiah’s type as their originator.

7. Names. — The Hebrew name of Lam. is ‘Ekhah (‘Howl ‘), the first word in the book. It is also called Qimth or’ Elegies.’ The LXX has Threnoi (.leremiou); Vulg., Threni, id est lamentationes Jeremia prophetcB, and this is the source of the English title.

8. Position in the Canon. — In Hebrew Bibles Lam. is placed in the third division of the OT Canon. Its place is generally in the middle of the five Megittoth, between Ruth and Eoclesiastes. The Jews recite the book on the Black Fast (9th of Ab) — the anniversary of the destruction of Jerusalem. In the Greek OT and the other versions Lam. is attached to the prophecies of Jeremiah, in accordance with the current belief in his authorship. D. M. Kay.

Lamp

1. The earliest illuminant everywhere was supplied by pieces of resinous wood . Such probably were the torches of Gideon’s adventure (Judges 7:16, 20 RV for AV ‘lamps’) and other passages. There is no evidence of anything of the nature of our candles, which is a frequent AV rendering of the ordinary Heb. word (ner) for ‘lamp,’ now introduced throughout by RV except in Zephaniah 1:12 (but Amer. RV here also ‘lamp’). The unearthing of thousands of lamps in the course of recent Palestine exploration, sometimes as many as two or three hundred Irom a single grave, has made it possible to trace the development of the lamp from early pre-Israelite to Byzantine times. Only the barest outhne can be attempted here.

2. Two main stages in this development have to be recognized, the first that of the open, the second that of the closed, lamp, (a) The earliest form found in pre- Israelite strata is that of the plain open clay lamp in the shape of a shell, or shallow bowl, with rounded bottom. It is distinguished from the later form of open lamp by having the rim only slightly pinched along about one-third of its circumference, to keep the wick in position. (6) In the later forms just referred to, which are those of the late Canaanite and early Hebrew periods, the hps are drawn much more closely together, so as to form an elongated spout, as may be seen in the Must . in Hastings’ Z>B iii. 24, fig. 1 ; Bliss and Macalister, Excavations in Palestine (in the sequel cited as BMExc), plate 66; Bhss, Mownd of Many Cities, 87. For types of (a) and (6) side by side, see PEFSt, 1904, 327. (c) The’next step apparently was to substitute a flat base for the rounded forms of (a) and (6). This type of open lamp has continued in use to the present day in certain parts of Syria.

3. The introduction of the closed lamp cannot as yet be dated with certainty, but is probably due to Western influence. According to BUss (BMExc. 130), ‘by Seleucidan times the open lamp appears largely to have given way to the closed lamp.’ (a) The earlier specimens of this type consist of a circular bowl closed at the top, with the exception of a round opening for pouring in the oil, with a flat or concave base. They are further characterized by their long tapering, and sometimes straight, spout, which ‘forms a distinct angle with the bowl.’ These lamps are entirely without ornament, and , like all the others, without handles. (6) The later closed lamps, on the other hand, have their upper surface ornamented with an endless variety of design, ranging from simple lines through chevrons, spirals, etc., to animal forms. Numerous specimens of (a) and (6) are illustrated in BMExc. pi. 62, 63. For a typical lamp of the Maccabfflan period, se&PEFSt, 1904, 348, pl.iii. No. 6. This may be assumed to have been the prevailing type of lamp in NT times.

4. Many of the specimens hitherto given as illustrations of the lamps of OT are really of early Christian or even Byzantine date. A typical Byzantine form is given in BMExc. pi. 66, No. 6. This type is distinguished from the previous closed type by the fact that ‘the curve of the body is continuous with the top of the spout, giving a generally oval shape.’ See the collections illustrated PEFSt, 1892, 125; 1904, plate iii; 1905, 150.

5. In addition to the normal lamp with a single wick, the excavations in northern and southern Palestine have brought to light numerous specimens of ‘multiple lamps,’ a favourite form of which consisted of a bowl, having its rim pinched into three, four, or seven spouts (see BMExc. pi. 66). As in other lands, the Palestinian potter sometimes gave his lamp the shape of an animal, such as the remarkable clay duck from Gezer described and illustrated in PEFSt, 1903, 40.

The favourite material in all ages was clay. A good specimen of a bronze lamp with a handle, from the Greek period, is shown in BMExc. 60. Silver lamps are mentioned in Judith 10:22. Those of the Tabernacle and Temple were of gold. The usual illuminant was the oil of the olive; other oils, including naphtha, are named in the Mishna (Shabbath, ii. 1 ff . ) , where may be found, also, a list of the substances for wicks in addition to the ordinary wick of twisted flax (Isaiah 42:3 RVm), and other details regarding the household lamp.

6. In the poorer houses the lamp was placed, as it still is, in a niche in the wall. It is in the case of a ‘great woman’ that we first hear of a lampstand in a private house. Lampstands of stone, about 30 inches in height, have been found in the recent excavations in Crete; one of limestone is figured in Bliss, Mound, etc. 104, from Lachish. The candlestick of AV, which, strangely enough, is retained in RV (except in Matthew 5:15. where ‘stand’ is substituted), is of course a lampstand. For the elaborate lampstands or ‘candlesticks’ of the Tabernacle and the Temple see those articles. An interesting specimen of a lamp with seven spouts and stand in one piece was found by Sellin at Taanach (illust. in his Eine NachZese, etc. 22; Benzinger, Heb. Arch.’ [1907] 99).

In ancient times, as at the present day, it was customary to keep the household lamp continually alight, hence the figure in 1 Kings 11:36, 2 Kings 8:19; conversely, the putting out of the lamp of the wicked (Job 18:6 [AV ‘candle’], Proverbs 13:9) denotes their utter extinction.

For a recently discovered, and still obscure, early rite in which lamps and bowls played an essential part, see House, § 3; and for a later rite, see Dedication [Feast of]. a. R. S. Kennedy.

Lampsacus

(1 Maccabees 15 RVm). See Sampsames.

Lance, Lancet

The former only Jeremiah 50. RV ‘spear,’ but Heb. is kldBn, hence rather ‘javelin’; the latter only 1 Kings 18:28. RV ‘lance,’ Heb. rSmach. For both these weapons, see Armouh and Arms, § 1.

Land Crocodile

(Leviticus 11 RV). See Chameleon and Lizard.

Landmark

The word (3661^)80 rendered must not beidentified ofE-hand, as is usually done, with the )l;md«mt or boundary-stone of the Babylonians, for the fundamental passage, Deuteronomy 19:14. ‘Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour’s landmark, which they of old time have set,’ should rather be rendered: ‘Thou shalt not remove (or’ set back’) thy neighbour’s boundary, which they . . . ha ve drawn. ‘Under the old Hebrew system of the cultivation in common of the village land, the boundaries of the plots may have been indicated as at the present day by’ a furrow double in width to the ordinary one,’ at each end of which a stone is set up, called the ‘boundary-stone’ (.PEFSt, 1894, p. 195 f .). The form of land-grabbing by setting back a neighbour’s boundary-line must have been common in OT times, to judge by the frequent references to, and condemnations of, the practice (Deuteronomy 19:14 27:17. Hosea 5:10, Proverbs 22:28 23:10, Job 24:2).

A. R. S. Kennedy.

Language of Ot and Apocrypha

See Text Versions and Languages of OT.

Language of the Nt

The object of this article is to give a general non-technical account of the Greek in which the NT is written. It should be stated at the outset that the standpoint of scholarship in regard to this subject has materially altered since Prof. Thayer wrote his excellent article in vol. iii. of the DB. We shall therefore briefly state the nature of our change in view, and then describe the NT Greek as we now regard it, without further reference to older theories.

1. The old view.— In every age of NT study, scholars have been struck by the fact that its Greek to a large extent stands alone. It differs immensely from the language of the great classics of the period which was closed some four centuries earlier, and not much less from that of post-classical writers of its own time, even when those writers were Palestinian Jews, as was Josephus. During the 17th cent, the ‘Purist’ school sought to minimize these differences, holding that deviation from the ‘purity’ of classic standards was a flaw in the perfection of the inspired Book, which must at all costs be cleared away. But, except for such eccentricities of learning, the efforts of scholars in general were steadily directed towards the establishment of some rationale for this isolation of what Rothe called the "language of the Holy Ghost.’ Two excellent reasons were found for the peculiarities of NT Greek. (1) NT writers were steeped in the language of the Greek OT, a translation which largely followed the Hebrew original with slavish literalness. A special religious phraseology was thus created, which not only contributed a large number of forms tor direct quotation, but also supplied models for the general style of religious writing, much as the style of modern sermons or devotional books is modelled upon the English of the Bible. (2) The writers were mostly Jews who used Aramaic (a language closely related to Hebrew) in their daily life. When, therefore, they thought and wrote in Greek, they were prone to translate literally from their native tongue; and ‘Aramaisms’ thus infected the Greek, side by side with the ‘Hebraisms’ which came from the LXX. The degree to which either of these classes of Semitism was admitted to affect particular words or grammatical constructions in the Greek NT naturally differed in the Judgment of different writers; but even Thayer, who wrote after the new lights had already begun to appear, shows no readiness to abandon the general thesis that the NT Greek lies outside the stream of progress in the development of the Greek language, and must be judged by principles of its own.

2. Newer views. — The credit of initiating a most far-reaching change of view, the full consequences of which are only beginning to be realized, belongs to a brilliant German theologian, Adolf Deissmann. His attention having been accidentally called to a volume of transcripts from the Egyptian papyri recently added to the Berlin Museum, he was immediately struck by their frequent points of contact with the vocabulary of NT Greek. He read through several collections of papyri, and of contemporary Greek inscriptions, and in 1895 and 1897 published the two volumes of his Bible Studies (Eng. tr. in one volume, 1901). Mainly on the ground of vocabulary, but not without reference to grammar and style, he showed that the isolation of NT Greek could no longer be maintained. Further study of the papyri he used, and of the immense masses of similar documents which have been published since, especially by the explorers of Oxford and Berlin, confirms his thesis and extends it to the whole field of grammar. To put the new views into two statements — (1) The NT is written in the spoken Greek of daily life, which can be proved from inscriptions to have differed but little, as found in nearly every corner of the Roman Empire in the first century. (2) What is peculiar in ‘Biblical Greek’ lies in the presence of boldly literal translations from Hebrew OT or Aramaic ‘sources’: even this, however, seldom goes beyond clumsy and unidiomatic, but perfectly possible, Greek, and is generally restricted to the inordinate use of correct locutions which were rare in the ordinary spoken dialect. The Egyptian non-literary papyri of the three centuries before and after Christ, with the inscriptions of Asia Minor, the .^gEean islands and Greece during the same period, — though these must be used with caution because of the literary element which often invades them, — supply us therefore with the long desiderated parallel for the language of the NT, by which we must continually test an exegesis too much dominated hitherto by the thought of classical Greek or Semitic idiom.

3. History and diffusion of the Greek language, — At this point, then, we should give a history of the world- Greek of NT times. A sister-language of Sanskrit, Latin, Slavonic, German, and English, and most other dialects of modem Europe, Greek comes before us earliest in the Homeric poems, the oldest parts of which may go back to the 10th cent. b.c. Small though the country was, the language of Greece was divided into more dialects, and dialects perhaps more widely differing, than English in the reign of Alfred. Few of these dialects gave birth to any literature; and the intellectual primacy of Athens by the end of the classical period (4th cent, b.c.) was so far above dispute that its dialect, the Attic, became for all future time the only permitted model for literary prose. When Attic as a spoken language was dead, it was enforced by rigid grammarians as the only ‘correct’ speech for educated people. Post-classical prose accordingly, while varying in the extent to which colloquial elements invade the purity of its artificial idiom, is always more or less dominated by the effort to avoid the Greek of daily life; while in the NT, on the contrary, it is only two or three writers who admit even to a small extent a style differing from that used in common speech. Meanwhile the history of Greece, with its endless political independence and variation of dialect between neighbouring towns, had entered a new phase. The strong hand of Philip of Macedon brought Hellas under pne rule; his son, the great Alexander, carried victorious Hellenism far out into the world beyond. Unification of speech was a natural result when Greeks from different cities became fellow-soldiers in Alexander’s army, or fellow-colonists in his new towns. Within about one generation we suddenly find that a compromise dialect, which was based mainly on Attic, but contained elements from all the old dialects, came to be established as the language of the new Greek world. This ‘Common’ Greek, or Hellenistic, once brought into being, remained for centuries a remarkably homogeneous and slowly changing speech over the larger part of the Roman Empire. In Rome itself it was so widely spoken and read that St. Paul’s letter needed no translating, and a Latin Bible was first demanded far away from Latium. In Palestine and in Lycaonia the Book of Acts gives us clear evidence of bilingual conditions. The Jerusalem mob (Acts 21:40 22:2) expected St. Paul to address them in Greek; that at Lystra (14:11) similarly reverted with pleasure to their local patois, but had been following without difficulty addresses delivered in Greek. It was the one period in the history of the Empire when the gospel could be preached throughout the Roman world by the same missionary without interpreter or the need of learning foreign tongues. The conditions of Palestine demand a few more words. It seems fairly clear that Greek was understood and used there much as English is in Wales to-day. Jesus and the Apostles would use Aramaic among themselves, and in addressing the people in Judeea or Galilee, but Greek would often be needed in conversation with strangers. The Procurator would certainly use Greek (rarely Latin) in his official dealings with the Jews. There is no reason to believe that any NT writer who ever lived in Palestine learned Greek only as a foreign language when he went abroad. The degree of culture in grammar and idiom would vary, but the language itself was always entirely at command.

4. NT Greek. — We find, as we might expect, that ‘NT Greek’ is a general term covering a large range of individual divergence. The author of Hebrews writes on a level which we might best characterize by comparing the pulpit style of a cultured extempore preacher in this country — a spoken style, free from artificiality and archaisms, but free from anything really colloquial. The two Lukan books show similar culture in their author, who uses some distinctively literary idioms. But St. Luke’s faithful reproduction of his various sources makes his work uneven in this respect. St. Paul handles Greek with the freedom and mastery of one who probably used it regularly all his life, except during actual residence in Jerusalem. He seems absolutely uninfluenced by literary style, and applies the Greek of common intercourse to his high themes, without stopping a moment to polish a diction the eloquence of which is wholly unstudied. Recent attempts to trace formal rhetoric and laws of rhythm in his vmtings have completely failed. At the other end of the scale, as judged by Greek culture, stands the author of the Apocalypse, whose grammar is very incorrect, despite his copious vocabulary and rugged vigour of style. Nearly as unschooled is St. Mark, who often gives us very literal translations of the Aramaic in which his story was first wont to be told: there seems some

2 L reason to suspect that in the oldest form of his text this occurred more frequently still. The other main Gospel ‘source,’ the ‘Sayings of Jesus,’ shows likewise the traces of processes of translation. Space forbids any attempt to distinguish the position of all the NT writers, but we may note that the papyri supply parallels in degrees of culture to compare with them in turn, except so far as sheer translation comes in.

6. Help derived from Modern Greek, and from reconstructedAramaic originals . —We must now return to the development-history of Greek to observe that its later stages, even up to the present day, are full of Important contributions to our study of the NT. The ‘Common’ or Hellenistic Greek, described above, is the direct ancestor of the vernacular of modern Greece and the Greek-speaking districts of Turkey. We are daily learning more of the immense significance of this despised patois for interpreting the sacred language. Here the student must carefully eliminate the artificial ‘Modern Greek’ of Athenian newspapers and books, which is untrustworthy for this purpose, just as is the Greek of Plutarch or Josephus. The genuine vernacular — with its dialects, based on inconsiderable local variations in Hellenistic, which may ha ve no small weight ere long even in our NT criticism — may be placed by the side of modern folk-ballads and medieeval popular stories and saintlegends, to take us back to the papyri and inscriptions, as our latest-found tools for NT study. The literature, classical and post-classical, will of course retain the place it has always held, when modern methods have taught us how to check its testimony. And Comparative Philology, with lights on the meaning of eases and tenses and moods, may be added to the equipment with which purely linguistic science may now help forward the interpretation of Scripture. All this is on the side of the student of Greek itself. But the other side of NT language must naturally not be forgotten. Contributions of great value have recently been made to our knowledge of the Aramaic, in which nearly all the sayings of Christ must have been uttered, and in which Papias (as usually understood) shows they were first written down. The possibility of reconstructing to some extent the original of our Greek Gospel sources is drawing nearer; and the co-operation of Greek and Semitic scholars promises marked advances in our knowledge of the very kernel of the NT (cf. next art.).

6. Characteristics of NT Greek. — A few concluding words may be given to the general characteristics of the language which had so providentially become the language of the civilized world just at the time when the gospel began its advance. It used to be frequently contrasted unfavourably with the classical Attic, which is undeniably the most perfect language the world has ever seen, for the clearness, subtlety, and beauty with which it can express thought. In Hellenistic Greek the subtlety, the sense of rhythm, and the literary delicacy have largely disappeared. But the old clearness is only enhanced by a greater simplicity; and the boundless resourcefulness of the language impresses us powerfully when in the NT for the first and (practically) last time the colloquial dialect of the people was enshrined in literature, the authors of which were nearly always unconscious that they were creating literature at all. The presentation of Christianity to the Western world as a system of thought could never have been accomplished in Hebrew, even if that language had attained universal currency. In Greek we are always conscious of a wealth of suggestiveness which no translation can convey, an accuracy and precision of thought which repay the utmost exactness of study. This is in no sense lost even when the simpler grammar of the later language becomes the tool of men who had no inheritance of Greek culture. A comparatively elementary knowledge of this simpler Greek, which can be attained without touching the complex structure of the classical language, will constantly reveal important elements in the writer’s meaning that are beyond the reach of our language to convey directly. In our own time at last this language is being studied for its own sake; and even classical scholars are beginning to allow that the renewed youth of Greek, under conditions which make it largely a new language, produced a literature which the philologist, and not merely the theologian, can admire. James Hope Moulton.