Page:A critical and exegetical commentary on Genesis (1910).djvu/624



more briefly Gen. 410-415); Posnanski, Schilo Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Messiaslehre: 1 Theil: Ausleg. von Gn. 49$10$ im Altert. bis zum Ende des MA, 1904; Di. 462 ff.—The renderings grammatically admissible fall into two groups, (i.) Those which adhere to the text. rec., taking as nom. pr. (a) 'Until Shiloh come' (Shiloh, a name of the Messiah), the most obvious of all translations, first became current in versions and comm. of the 16th cent., largely through the influence of Seb. Münster (1534). Although the Messianic acceptation of the passage prevailed in Jewish circles from the earliest times, it attached itself either to the reading (ii. below) or to the rendering 'his son', or (later and more rarely) to ('gifts to him'). The earliest trace (if not the actual origin) of Shiloh as a personal name is found in the following passage of the Talmud (Sanh. 98b): (the words are repeated in Echa Rabba, with the addition ): "Rab said, The world was created only for the sake of David; but Samuel said, For the sake of Moses; but R. Yoḥanan said, For the sake of the Messiah. What is his name? Those of the school of R. Shela say, Shiloh is his name, as it is said, 'Until Shiloh come.'" The sequel of the quotation is: "Those of the school of R. Yannai say, Yinnôn is his name, as it is said (Ps. 72$17$), Let his name be for ever, before the sun let his name be perpetuated . Those of the school of R. Ḥaninah say, Ḥanîn[=]h is his name, as it is said (Jer. 16$13$), For I will give you no favour . And some say Menahem is his name, as as it is said (La. 1$16$), For comforter and restorer of my soul is far from me. And our Rabbis say, The leprous one of the school of Rabbi is his name, as it is said (Is. 53$4$), Surely our sicknesses he hath borne, and our pains he hath carried them, though we did esteem him stricken (sc. with leprosy), smitten of God, and afflicted." Now there is nothing here to suggest that Shiloh was already a current designation of the Messiah any more than, e.g., the verb in Ps. 72$17$ can have been a Messianic title. Yet, as Dri. says, it is "in this doubtful company that Shiloh is first cited as a name of the Messiah, though we do not learn how the word was read, or what it was imagined to signify." Subsequently Shiloh as a personal name appears in lists of Messianic titles of the 11th cent. (Posn. 40), and it is so used (alongside of the interpretation ) by Samuel of Russia (1124). Partly from this lack of traditional authority, and partly from the impossibility of finding a significant etymology for the word (v.i.), this explanation is now universally abandoned.—(b) 'Until he [Judah] come to Shiloh' (Herder, Ew. De. Di. [hesitatingly] al.). This is grammatically unexceptionable (cf. 1 Sa. 4$12$), and has in its favour the fact that ([,  [orig. ]) everywhere in OT is the name of the central Ephraimite sanctuary in the age of the Judges (Jos. 18$1ff.$, 1 Sa. 1-4 etc.). At the great gathering of the tribes at Shiloh, where the final partition of the land took place (Jos. 18 f.), Judah is imagined to have laid down the military leadership which had belonged to it during the wars of conquest; so that the prophecy marks the termination of that troubled period of the national life. But all this is unhistorical. The account in Jos. 18 belongs