6. Biblical Style and Language Contrasted with those of [ADDISON, Spectator, No. 405.] There is a certain coldness and indifference in the phrases of our European languages when they are compared with the Oriental forms of speech; and it happens very luckily that the Hebrew idioms run into the English tongue with a particular grace and beauty. Our language has received innumerable elegancies and improvements from that infusion of Hebraisms which are derived to it out of the poetical passages in Holy Writ. They give a force and energy to our expressions, warm and animate our language, and convey our thoughts in more ardent and intense phrases than any that are to be met with in our own tongue. There is something so pathetic in this kind of diction that it often sets the mind in a flame, and makes our hearts burn within us. . . . If any one would judge of the beauties of poetry that are to be met with in the Divine writings, and examine how kindly the Hebrew manners of speech mix and incorporate with the English language, after having perused the Book of Psalms let him read a literal translation of Horace or Pindar. He will find in these two last such an absurdity and confusion of style, with such a comparative poverty of imagination, as will make him very sensible of what I have been here advancing. [STEDMAN, The Nature and Elements of Poetry, in the Century Magazine for May, 1892.] The naïveté of the Davidic lyre is beyond question, and so is the superb unrestraint of the Hebrew prophecy and pæans. We feel the stress of human nature in its articulate moods. This gives to the poetry of the Scriptures an attribute possessed only by the most creative and impersonal literature of other tongues that of universality. Again, it was all designed for music, by the poets of a musical race, and the psalms were arranged by the first com posers the leaders of the royal choir. It retains forever the fresh tone of an epoch when lyrical composition was the normal form of expression. Then its rhythm is free, unrestrained, in extreme opposition to that of classical and modern verse, relying merely upon antiphony, alliteration, and parallelism. Technical abandon, allied with directness of conception and faithful revelation of human life, makes for universality — makes of the Hebrew Scriptures a Bible, a world's book that can be translated into all tongues with surpassing effect, notably into a language almost as direct and elemental as its own, that of our Anglo-Saxon in its Jacobean strength and clarity. . . . It has been said of the Hebrew language that every word is a poem; and there are books of the Old Testament, neither lyrical nor prophetic, so exquisite in kind that I call them models of impersonal art. Considered thus, the purely narrative idyls of Esther and Ruth have so much significance that I shall have occasion to recur to them with reference to poetic beauty and construction. [CHATEAUBRIAND, Genius of Christianity, Part II., Bk. 5, Chaps. 3 and 4.] So much has been written on the Bible, it has been so repeatedly commented upon, that perhaps the only method now left to make its beauties felt is to compare it with the works of Homer. Consecrated by ages, these poems have received from time a species of sanctity which justifies the parallel and obviates every idea of profanation. If Jacob and Nestor are not of the same family, both at least belong to the early ages of the world, and you feel that it is but a step from the palace of Pylos to the tents of Ishmael. In what respect the Bible is more beautiful than Homer, what resemblances and what differences exist between it and the productions of that poet - such are the subjects which we purpose to examine in these chapters. Let us consider these two monuments, which stand like solitary columns at the entrance to the temple of Genius, and form its simple peristyle. In the first place, it is a curious spectacle to behold the rivalry of the two most ancient languages of the world, the languages in which Moses and Lycurgus published their laws, and David and Pindar chanted their hymns. The Hebrew, concise, energetic, with scarcely any inflection in its verbs, expressing twenty shades of a thought by the mere apposition of a letter, proclaims the idiom of a people who, by a remarkable combination, unite primitive simplicity with a profound knowledge of mankind. The Greek . . . displays in its intricate conjugations, in its inflections, in its diffuse eloquence, a nation of an imitative and social genius, a nation elegant and vain, fond of melody and prodigal of words. . . . Our terms of comparison will be: Simplicity; Antiquity of Manners; Narrative; Description; Similes or Images; the Sublime. Let us examine the first of these terms. 1. Simplicity. The simplicity of the Bible is more concise and more solemn, the simplicity of Homer more diffuse and more lively. The former is sententious, and comes back to the same locutions to express new ideas; the latter is fond of expatiating, and often repeats in the same phrases what has been said before. The simplicity of Scripture is that of an ancient priest, who, imbued with all the sciences, human and divine, pronounces from the recess of the sanctuary the precise oracles of wisdom; the simplicity of the poet of Chios is that of an aged traveler, who, beside the hearth of his host, relates what he has learned in the course of a long and checkered life. 3. Narrative. The narrative of Homer is interrupted by digressions, harangues, descriptions of vessels, garments, arms, and sceptres, by genealogies of men and things. Proper names are always surcharged with epithets; a hero seldom fails to be divine, like the immortals, or honored by the nations as a god. A princess is sure to have white arms, her shape always resembles the trunk of the palm-tree of Delos, and she owes her locks to the youngest of the Graces. The narrative of the Bible is rapid, without digression, without circumlocution; it is broken into short sentences, and the persons are named without flattery. Proper names are incessantly recurring, and the pronoun is scarcely ever used instead of them, a circumstance which, added to the frequent repetition of the conjunction and, indicates by this simplicity a society much nearer the state of nature than that sung by Homer. The forms of selflove are already evoked in the characters of the Odyssey, whereas they are dormant in those of Genesis. 4. Description. The descriptions of Homer are prolix, whether they be of a pathetic or a terrible character, melancholy or cheerful, energetic or sublime. The Bible, in all its different species of description, gives in general but one single trait, but this trait is striking, and distinctly exhibits the object to our view. 5. Similes. The Homeric similes are lengthened out by accidental circumstances; they are little pictures hung round an edifice to refresh the eye which has been fatigued with the height of the domes, by calling it back to rest on scenes of nature and rural manners. The comparisons of the Bible are almost all given in but few words you have a lion, a stream, a storm, a fire, roaring, falling, ravaging, devouring. It is, however, no stranger to circumstantial similes, but then it adopts an Oriental turn and personifies the object, as pride in the cedar, etc. 6. The Sublime. Finally, the sublime in Homer commonly arises from the general combination of the parts, and arrives by degrees at its acme. In the Bible it is almost always unexpected; it bursts upon you like lightning, and you are left smoking and riven by the thunderbolt before you know how you were struck by it. In Homer, again, the sublime consists in the magnificence of the words harmonizing with the majesty of the thought. In the Bible, on the contrary, the highest degree of sublimity often proceeds from a contrast between the grandeur of the idea and the littleness, at times even the triviality, of the word that expresses it. From this results a shock, a violent wrench to the mind; for when, raised by contemplation, the soul darts towards the highest regions, suddenly the expression, instead of buoying it up, lets it fall from heaven to earth, and hurls it from the bosom of God to the mire of this nether world. This species of sublime, the most impetuous of all, is admirably adapted to an immense and awful being, allied at once to the greatest and the smallest objects. . . We shall conclude this parallel, and the whole subject of Christian poetics, with an essay which will show at once the difference between the style of the Bible and that of Homer; we shall take a passage from the former and paint it with colors borrowed from the latter. Ruth thus addresses Naomi: "Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God; where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried." Let us try to render this verse into the language of Homer: "The fair Ruth thus responds to the wise Naomi, honored by the people as a goddess: 'Cease to oppose the determination with which a divinity inspires me; I will tell thee the truth, just as it is, and without disguise. I am resolved to follow thee. I will remain with thee, whether thou shalt continue to reside among the Moabites, so dexterous in throwing the javelin, or shalt return to Judea, so fertile in olives. With thee I will demand hospitality of the nations who respect the suppliant. Our ashes shall be mingled in the same urn, and I will offer agreeable sacrifices to the God who incessantly accompanies thee.' She said; and as when the vehement West Wind brings a warm, refreshing rain, the husbandmen prepare the wheat and the barley, and make baskets of rushes nicely interwoven, for they foresee that the falling shower will soften the soil and render it fit for receiving the precious gifts of Ceres; so the words of Ruth, like a fertilizing rain, melted the heart of Naomi." |