The

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK. BOSTON CHICAGO

DALLAS SAN FRANCISCO

MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED

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THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd.

TORONTO

THE

MODERN READER'S BIBLE

THE BOOKS OF the Bible WITH THREE BOOKS OF THE APOCRYPHA

PRESENTED IN MODERN LITERARY FORM

EDITED, WITH INTRODUCTIONS AND NOTES,

BY

RICHARD G. MOULTON, M.A. (CAMB.), PH.D. (Penn.)

PROFESSOR OF LITERARY THEORY AND INTERPRETATION

IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

New York

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD.

1912

All rights reserved

PREFACE

THE Bible is its own best interpreter. When however we approach the practical application of this sound principle, we are met by an obstacle of an unusual kind. We are all agreed to speak of the Bible as a supremely great literature. Yet, when we open our ordinary versions, we look in vain for the lyrics, epics, dramas, essays, sonnets, treatises, which make the other great literatures of the world; instead of these the eye catches nothing but a monotonous uniformity of numbered sentences, more suggestive of an itemised legal instrument than of what we understand as literature.

Now it is clear that this strange form of our bibles was not given to them by the sacred writers themselves. The Bible goes back to a remote antiquity, when literature indeed was at its highest development, but when there was no corresponding development in the art of writing such as would enable manuscripts to reflect differences of literary form. The most ancient manuscripts are unable to distinguish verse and prose; in prose they make no distinctions of sentences, still less of paragraphs; in verse they have no distinctions of metre, nor can they discriminate speeches in drama or suggest the names of speakers. Many of them have not even divisions of words; and as a whole they are as barren of form as a stenographer's note book. Not then the original authors of the books of Scripture, but their successors at the time when manuscripts began to discriminate literary form, must be held responsible for the arrangement of our bibles. Now those who intervene between ourselves and the sacred authors - scribes, rabbis, mediæval doctors may all be summed up under the one description of commentator. They have rendered infinite service to the world by the care with whic they have preserved the words of Scripture; but its literary characte" would have been the last thing they would have considered. Whertherefore the advance in the art of writing enabled manuscripts to dishguish varieties of literature, the form these commentators gave to Scriure was, naturally, that of 'texts' for comment. And in this mediæval fem of numbered texts the Bible has come down to our own day. I instane a very simple passage: more adequate illustrations would be too long to cite. Such a passage as Hosea, chapter xiv, verses 5-8, would in

V

an ancient manuscript (if we assume the language to be English) have appeared thus:

I WILL BE AS THE DEW UN TOISRAEL H
E SHALL BLOSSOM AS THE LILY AND C
ASTFORTH HIS ROOTS AS LEBANON H
IS BRANCHES SHALL SPREAD AND HI
S BEAUTY SHALL BE AS THE OLIVETR
EE AND HIS SMELLAS LEBANON THEY
THAT DWELL UNDER HISSHADOW SHA

LLRETURN THEY SHALL REVIVEAST
HE CORN AND BLOSSOM AS THE VINET
HESCENT THEREOF SHALL BE AS THE
WINE OF LEBANONEPHRAIM SHALL S
AY WHAT HAVE ITO DO ANYMORE WITH
IDOLS I HAVE ANSWERED AND WILL R
EGARD HIMIAM LIKE A GREEN FIRTR
EE FROM MEIST HY FRUIT FOUND

This the medieval commentators broke up into short masses sentences, texts, propositions of what they considered a convenient length for discussion, and numbered them for reference.

5. I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall blossom as the lily and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.

6. His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon.

7. They that dwell under his shadow shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and blossom as the vine: the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon.

8. Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? I have answered, and will regard him: I am like a green fir tree; from me is thy fruit found.

Yet a brief examination of the passage is sufficient to show that it is a portion of a dramatic scene; and its structure ought to be exhibited as that of dramatic dialogue.

THE LORD

I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon. They that dwell under his shadow shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and blossom as the vine: the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon.