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 SOPHRONIUS

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SOPHRONIUS

the civil community), and of the Prophets and priests, as the directors of public worship.

(d) iii, 9-20. — A consolatory prophecy, or prophetic glance at the Kingdom of God of the future, in which all the world, united in one faith and one worship, wiU turn to one God, and the goods of the Messianic King- dom, whose capital is the daughter of Sion, will be en- joyed. The universality of the judgment as well as of" the redemption is so forcibly expressed in So- phonias that his book may be regarded as the "Catho- lic Epistle" of the Old Testament.

(e) The last exhortation of Sophonias (iii, 9-20) also has a Messianic colouring, although not to an ex- tent comparable with Isaias.

III. Ch.^racter of the Prophet. — Sophonias' prophecy is not strongly differentiated from other prophecies hkc that of Amos or Habacuc, it is confined to the range of thought common to all prophetic ex- hortations: threats of judgment, exhortation to pen- ance, promise of Messianic salvation. For this reason Sophonias might be regarded as the type of Hebrew Prophets and as the final example of the pro- phetic terminology. He does not seek the glory of an original writer, but borrows freely both ideas and stylo from the older Prophets (especiaU}' Isai:is and Jere- mias). The resemblances to the Book of Deuter- onomy may be explained by the fact that this book, found in the Josian reform, was then the centre of re- hgious interest. The language of Sophonias is vigor- ous and earnest, as became- the seriousness of the period, but is free from the gloomy elegiac tone of Jeremias. In some passages it becomes pathetic and poetic, without however attaining the classical dic- tion or poetical flight of a Xahum or Deutero-Isaias. There is something solemn in the manner in which the Lord is .so frequently introrluced as the speaker, and the sentence of judgment falls on the silent earth (i, 7). Apart from the few plays on words (cf. especially ii, 4), Sophonias eschews all rhetorical and poetical orna- mentation of language. As to the logical and rhyth- mical build of the various exhortations, he has two strophes of the first sketch (i, 7 and 14) with the same opening ("the day of the Lord is near"), and closes the second sketch with a hymn (ii, 15) — a favourite practice of his prototype, Jeremias. A graduated de- velopment of the sentiment to a climax in the scheme is expressed by the fact that the lastsketch contains an animated and longer lyrical hymn to Jerusalem (iii, 14 sqq.). In Christian painting Sophonias is repre- sented in two ways; either with the lantern (referring to i, 12: "I will search Jerusalem with lamps") or clad in a toga and bearing a scroll bearing as text the be- ginning of the hymn "Give praise, O daughter of Sion" (iii 14).

IV. Critical Problems Offered by Sopho- nias. — The question of authorship is authoritatively answered by the introductorj- ver.se of the book. Even radical higher critics like Marti acknowledge that no reason exists for doubting that the author of this piophccy is the Sophonias (Zephaniah) mentioned in the title ("Das Dodekapropheton", Tiibingen, 1904, 359). The fact that this Prophet's name is men- tioned nowhere else in the Old Testament does not affect the conclusive force of the first verse of the prophecy. Sophonias is the only Prophet whose gene- alogy is traced back into the fourth generation. From this has been inferred that the fourth and hist ancestor mentioned Ezechias (Hizkiah) is identical with the king of the same name (727-69S). In this case, however, the ex-planator\' phrase "King of Judah" would undoubtedly have been put in apposition to the name. Con.sequently the statement concerning the author of the book in the first part of the introduc- tory verse ajjpears entirely worthy of belief, because the statement concerning the chronology' of the book given in the second half of the same verse is confirmed by internal criteria. The descriptions of customs,

especially in the first chapter, showing the state of re- ligion and morals at Jerusalem are, in point of fact, a true presentation of conditions during the first years of the reign of King Josias. The worship of the stars upon the flat roofs, mentioned in i, 5, an imitation of the Babylonian worship of the heavens that had be- come the fashion in Palestine from the reign of Man- asses is also mentioned by the contemporary Prophet, Jeremias (xix, 13; xxxii, 29), as a religious disorder of the Josianic era. All this confirms the credibihty of the witness of i, 1, concemuig the authorship of Sophonias.

Critical investigations, as to where the original texts in the Book of Sophonias end and the glosses, revisions of the text, and still later revisions begin, have re- sulted in a unanimous declaration that the first chap- ter of the book is the work of Sophonias; the second chapter is regarded as not so genuine, and the third still less so. In separating what are called the sec- ondary layers of the second chapter nearly all the higher critics have come to different conclusions, — quot capita, tot sensus. Each individual verse cannot be investigated here as in the detailed analysis of a commentator. However, it may be pointed out in general that the technical plan in the literarj' construc- tion of the speeches, especially the symmetrical ar- rangement of the sjieeehes mentioned in section II, and the responses spoken of in section III, forbid any large excisions. The artistic form used in the con- struction of the prophetic addresses is recognized more and more as an aid to literary criticism.

The passage most frequent iy considered an addition of a later date is iii, 14-20, because the tone of a herald of salvation here adopted does not agree with that of the prophecies of the threatening judgment of the two earlier chapters. It is, however, the custom of the Prophets after a terrifying warning of the judgments of Jahve to close with a glimpse of the brilliant future of the Kingdom of God, to permit, as it were, the rain- bow to follow the thunder-storm. Joel first utters prophetic denunciations which are followed by pro- phetic consolations (Joel in Vulgate, i-ii, 17; ii, 18-iii); Isaias in ch. i calls Jerusalem a city like Sodom and di- rectly afterwards a city of justice, and Micheas, whose similarity to Sophonias is remarked upon by critics, also allows his threats of judgment to die away in an announcement of salvation. One of the guiding eschatological thoughts of all the Prophets is this: The judgment is only the way of transition to salva- tion and the consummation of the history of the world will be the salvation of what is left of the seed. For this reason, therefore, Sophonias, iii, 14-20 cannot be rejected. The entire plan of the book seems to be in- dicated in a small scale in the first address, which closes ii, 1-3, with an exhortation to seek the Lord that is with a consolatorj' theme directly after the ter- rible proclamation of the Day of the Lord.

The queries raised by the textual criticism of the Book of Sophonias are far simpler and nearer solution than those connected with the higher criticism. The condition of the tex-t, with exception of a few doubtful passages, is good and there are few books of the Bibli- cal canon which offer so few points of attack to Bib- lical hj-percriticism as the Book of Sophonias.

Reikke, Der Prophet Zepkanja (Miinster, 1868); Knaben- BAUER, Comment, in proph. min. (Paris, 1886); van Hoonackeb, Les dome pet. proph. (Pari.H, 1908); LlPPL. Das Buck dcf Proph. Sophon. (Freiburg, 1910), containing (pp. ix-xvi) an excellent bib- liography; ScHWALLY, Da.'i Bitch Zephnnja (Giessen, 1S90); ScHUU. Comment, fiber den Proph. Zephanja (Hanover. 1892); Adams, The Minor Proph. (New Yorlc. 1902); Driver, The Min. Proph. (Nahum. Habakkuk, Zephaniah) (Edinburgh, 1907); the compete commentaries of Strack-Zockleb; Nowack; Marti; and G. .\. .Smith.

M. Faulhaber.

Sophronius, Saint, Patriarch of Jerusalem and Greek erclcsiastical writer, b. about .560 at Damascus of noble parentage; d. probably 11 March, 638, at