Solomon and Solomonic LiteratureConway, Moncure Daniel
History
Solomon and Solomonic Literature
Conway, Moncure Daniel
Hebrew literature -- History and criticism; Solomon, King of Israel
"Praised be Jahveh for evermore!
Amen, and Amen!"
Great is Diana of the Ephesians! Or is this the half-sardonic
submission of Job under the whirlwind-answer, which extorted from him
no tribute except a virtual admission that when the ethical debate
became a question of which could wield the loudest whirlwinds,
he surrendered!
In Job's case the only recantation is that of Jahveh himself, who
admits (xlii. 7) that Job had all along spoken the right thing about
him (Jahveh). The epilogue is a complete denial of Jahvist theology.
Job's small voice of scepticism which followed the whirlwind was
never silenced. The fragment of Agur (Proverbs xxx. 1-4) appears to
have been written as the alternative reply of Job to Jahveh. Job had
said, "I am vile, I will lay my hand upon my mouth, I have uttered
that I understand not." Agur adds ironically, "I am more stupid
than other men, in me is no human understanding nor yet the wisdom
to comprehend the science of sacred things." Then quoting Jahveh's
boast about distributing the wind (Job xxxviii. 24), about his "sons
shouting for joy" (Ibid. 7), and giving the sea its garment of cloud
(Ibid. 9), Agur, the "Hebrew Voltaire," as Professor Dillon aptly
styles him, asks:
"Who has ascended into heaven and come down again?
Who can gather the wind in his fists?
Who can bind the seas in a garment?
Who can grasp all the ends of the earth?
Such an one I would question about God: 'What is his name?
And what the name of his sons, if thou knowest?'"
The stupid Jahvist commentator who follows Agur (Proverbs xxx. 5-14)
and in the same chapter interpolates 17 and 20, has the indirect value
of rendering it probable that there were a great many "Agurites" (a
"bad generation" he calls them) and that they were rather aristocratic
and distrustful of the masses. This commentator, who cannot understand
the Agur fragments, also shows us, side by side with the brilliant
genius, lines revealing the mentally pauperised condition into which
Jahvism must have fallen when such a writer was its champion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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