The Minor Prophets. Edited by S. R. Driver, D.D. Part
II. (T. C. and E. C. Jack. 2s. 6d. net.)—This is one of the volumes of the "Century Bible." The Prophets of whom Canon Driver treats are, to put them in the chronological order which he con- jecturally assigns to them, Zephaniah (625 B.C.), Nahum (624 or 607, according as we refer this prophecy to the first siege or the destruction of Nineveh), Habakkuk (605-561), Haggai (520), Zechariah (ib.), Malachi (460-50). The latter part of Zechariah (ix.-xiv.) is supposed to be dated some two centuries later. Canon Driver prints the Revised Version as his text, but he emends in his notes with considerable freedom. The Revisers left, out of a quite intelligible sentiment, some archaic words, while they were influenced, probably by the conservative minority, to resist some renderings which really had a pre- ponderance of authority. We are very thankful, therefore, to have the help of so able a guide as Canon Driver. With his assistance some of the most obscure passages in the Old Testa- ment—Zechariah is perhaps the most difficult book in the whole volume—become at least tolerably clear.—Another volume in the same excellent series is the Psalms, Vol. II., "Ixxiii.-01.," by T. Wilton Davies, BA. Here the reader's need of help is not so urgent as in the Prophetical writers. The Psalms are largely expressions of personal feeling, and that may be said to interpret itself. Still, the force of the imagery is brought out, and the allusions are explained by the intelligent annotation which Mr. Davies supplies. He assigns, we see, an Exilic or post-Exilic date to the Psalms. We cannot but think that, whatever may be true of these compositions in their present form, there may have been older forms which were modernised. Psalm ci., for instance, may be a post-Exilic form of a Davidic utterance. There would be something like irony in a writer of later days, with David's history before him, putting into the future King's mouth resclutions which he notoriously failed to keep. Mr. Davies thinks it "doubtful whether the Psalter, as we have it, has anything at all to say of future rewards and punishments." Sheol is an abode where the good and the bad fare alike. He allows, however, that the doctrine of a future retribution is taught in "Job and other late books." But if the Psalms are largely post- Exilic, why should they not contain what we find in Job, assigned, we see, by Canon Driver to the sixth century B.C. p
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