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 with Aramaic affinities may have existed in Hebrew before the Exile. Still he decides that though part of the argument fails to pieces, yet for most there is a real foundation. This too, is substantially the judgment of Carl Budde. 'Despite all deductions from Bernstein's list it remains true that just the Book of Job is specially rich in words which principally belong to the Aramaic dialects.' Dillmann, too, who takes pains to emphasise the comparative scarcity of Aramaisms in the strictest sense of the word, yet finds in the body of the work (excluding the Elihu portion) Aramaising and Arabising words enough to suggest that the author lived hard by Aramaic- and Arabic-speaking peoples. By taking this view, Dillmann (whose philological caution and accuracy give weight to his opinion) separates himself from those who, like Eichhorn and more recently the Jewish scholar Kaempf, confidently maintain that the peculiar words in Job are genuine Hebrew 'Sprachgut.' To make this probable, we ought to be able to show that they have more affinities with northern than with southern Semitic (see p. 99), a task as yet unaccomplished. Dillmann, too, would certainly dissent from Canon Cook's opinion that the Aramaisms of Job are only 'such as characterise the antique and highly poetic style.' According to him, they are equally unfavourable to a very early and to a very late date.

Various lists of Aramaising words have been given since Bernstein's. I give here that of Dr. Lee in his Book of the Patriarch Job (p. 50), which has the merit of having been constructed from his own reading of Job. It refers to the whole book:—

(iii. 4); (iv. 12);  (v. 2);  (ib. 8), occur in the Aramaic, not the Hebrew sense;  (viii. 2);  (ib. 7); (xi. 20); (xii. 2);  (ib. 11);  (ib. 23); (xiii. 17); (xv. 17);  for  (ib.);  (ib. 31); (xvi. 15); (ib. 16);  (xviii. 2);    (xxi. 10); (xxiv. 22); (xxxi. 33);  (xxxii. 10, 18);  (xxxiii. 24);  (ib. 33);  (xxxvi. 2);  (ib. 21);  (xxxviii. 3); (xli. 12). I will not criticise this list, which no doubt contains some questionable items. We might, however, insert other words in exchange, e.g. (ix. 26);  (xvi. 19);  (xxx. 6); and (v. 22, xxx. 3); and perhaps (xiii. 28), which Geiger plausibly compares with Syr. rakbo 'wineskin' (so the tradition represented by the Septuagint, the Peshitto, and Barhebræus). Some supposed Arabisms may also in all probability be transferred to the list of Aramaisms; but the Arabisms which remain will abundantly justify