Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/722

Rh 708 CHRONICLES That the work so often cited by the Chronicler is not the Biblical book of the same name is manifest from what is said of its contents. It must have been quite an exten sive work, for among other things it contained genealogical statistics (1 Chron. ix. 1), and it incorporated certain older prophetic writings in particular, the debarim [words or history] of Jehu the son of Hanaui (2 Chron. xx. 34, where for &quot; who is mentioned in &quot; read &quot; which was copied into &quot;) and the vision of Isaiah (2 Chron. xxxii. 32). Now it is noticeable that where the Chronicler does not cite this com prehensive work at the close of a king s reign he generally refers to some special authority which bears the name of a prophet (2 Chron. ix. 29 ; xii. IT), &amp;lt;fec.). But the book of the Kings and a special prophetic writing are not cited for the same reign. It is therefore highly probable that in other cases than those of Isaiah and Jehu the writings of or about prophets which are cited in Chronicles were known to the author only as parts of the great book of Kings. Even 2 Chron. xxxiii. 18, 19, where the English version departs from the received Hebrew text, but probably expresses the correct reading, 1 seems rather to confirm than to oppose this conclusion, which is now disputed by very few scholars except in the case of Isaiah s history of Uzziah, 2 Chron. xxvi. 22. 2 The general conclusion is that it is very doubtful whether the chronicler used any his torical work now lost with the exception of the book of Kings. Even his genealogical lists may have been wholly derived from that work (1 Chron. ix. 1), though for these he may also have had other materials at command. Now we know that the two chief sources of the canonical book of Kings were entitled Annals [&quot; events of the times &quot;] of the Kings of Israel and Judah respectively. That the lost source of the Chronicles was not independent of these works at once appears probable both from the nature of the case and from the close and often verbal parallelism between many sections of the two Biblical narratives. But while the canonical book of Kings had separate sources for the northern and southern kingdoms, the source of Chronicles was a history of the two kingdoms combined, and so, no doubt, was a more recent work in great measure extracted from the older annals. Yet it contained also matter not derived from these works, for it is pretty clear from 2 Kings xxi. 17 that the Annals of the Kings of Judah gave no account of Manasseh s repentance, which, according to 2 Chron. xxxiii. 18, 19, was narrated in the great book of the Kings of Israel. It was formerly the opinion of Bertheau, and is still maintained by Keil, that the paral lelisms of Chronicles with Samuel and Kings are sufficiently explained by the ultimate common source from which both narratives drew. But most critics hold that the Chronicler also drew directly from the canonical books of Samuel and Kings as he unquestionably did from the Pentateuch. This opinion is probable in itself, as the earlier books of the Old Testament cannot have been unknown to the author ; and perhaps the critical analysis of the canonical book of Kings is already far enough advanced to enable us to say that in some of the parallel passages the Chronicler uses words which were not written in the annals but by the author of Kings himself. In particular Chronicles agrees with Kings in those short notes of the moral character of individual monarchs which can hardly be ascribed to an earlier hand than that of the final author of the latter book. It is, of course, possible, as Bertheau points out, that the author of the chief source of Chronicles already used our canonical book of Kings ; and in general the connections of the successive historical books which preceded the present canonical 1 Others, following the Massoretic text, find in verse 19 an unknown prophet Chozai. So E.V. margin has Hosai. 8 Zbckler and Keil still dissent from the current view. histories are sufficiently complex to make it very unwise to indulge in positive assertions on a matter in which so many possibilities may be suggested. Those critics who have a low opinion of the historical value of the Chronicles, and especially Graf, are ready to regard the earlier canonical books as the chief source of the work, and to suppose that the author seldom had authority for his additions to Samuel and Kings ; while Keil, on the other hand, is anxious to prove that the earlier canonical histories were not used at all, and so makes the most of the value of the special sources open to the Chronicler. The truth probably lies between these two extremes. The close and frequently verbal coincidence of the text of so many passages of Chronicles and the earlier books raises a presumption that in general the later author copied his sources with great fidelity. In other cases diversities of statement occur from which inferences unfavourable to the Chronicler have often been drawn. It must, however, be remembered that even copyists at that time were allowed a degree of freedom which modern writers would not venture to exercise, and that different recensions of the same book for example the extant Hebrew text of Samuel and that which lay before the Greek translators frequently varied not only in points of expression but in names and numbers, in the addition or omission of details and explanatory remarks, and even in larger matters. Of course such variations must be more numerous and important in the case of parallel narratives which are derived only in an indirect way from the same original sources. If proper weight is allowed to these considerations we must agree with Bertheau that &quot; critics ought not to have charged our author with intentional distortions of the narrative or with inventing false statements; evidence to justify such charges cannot be adduced.&quot; Full proof of the soundness of this observation cannot be given without a long discussion of details. As an example it may suffice to take the tendency to exaggerate which has been traced in the larger numbers of Chronicles (1 Chron. xxi. 5 compared with 2 Sam. xxiv. 9, 1 Chron. xxi. 25 compared with 2 Sam. xxiv. 24, and so forth). It may fairly be said that such larger numbers are in general characteristic of a later record. But they prove little as to the idiosyncrasy of the Chronicler, and cannot with any certainty be laid to his charge as an individual, when we find that in the Massoretic text of 1 Sam. vi. 19 the original number 70 has increased to 50,000. The tendency of numbers to grow in successive transcriptions is one which criticism must always keep in view, and which, doubtless, was at work before as well as after the time of the Chronicler. Variations which can be distinctly connected with demonstrable personal peculiarities of the writer or with the specific object of his work belong to a different category. But here also great caution must be exercised. For example, no part of the narrative has been more suspected than the captivity and repentance of Manasseh. It is argued that the author s theory of Divine retribution made it incredible to him that a wicked and unrepentant king could enjoy the long reign granted to Manasseh. But it is quite plain from 2 Chron. xxxiii. 18 that this narrative existed in the sources which lay before the writer, and the Assyrian inscriptions have shown that what is said of the captivity of the Judaean king is in perfect accordance with the state of affairs in the Assyrian empire at the time (Schrader, KeMinschriften und A. T., p. 238, sqq.). In general, then, it seems safe to conclude with Ewald, Bertheau, and other cautious critics that there is no founda tion for the accusation that the Chronicler invented history in the interest of his parenetic and practical purposes. But on the other hand it is not to be doubted that in shaping his narrative he allowed himself the same freedoms as wore