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peculiar contents. Just at what time in this period it was written cannot be decided, but certainly, as chap. 90 shows, before the death of Judas, and after his first victories. This statement cannot be overthrown with the remark that it would bring its composition too near that of Daniel. Even accepting, what is by no means an absolutely certain result of investigation, that the Book of Daniel was written during the struggle of the Maccabees, this itself does not exclude the composition of Enoch during the same period. This part of the book now under discussion does not, as the Parables so evidently do, show any positively certain dependence on Daniel, not even in the account of the seventy shepherds. There is not one passage of which we can say, as we can of many in 37-71, with a certainty, or even probability, that it has been taken from Daniel. In some respects indeed the general train of thought is the same, as might be expected from two authors writing about the same time and with almost the same object, but the discrepancies and differences are equally apparent. We are, then, forced to the conclusion that this part of the book was written before the death of Judas in 160 B.C., as from the historical data of that period alone the original character of the work can be intelligently understood, while the pre-eminently peaceful reign of John Hyrcanus, and the prosperity of the faithful during that time, excludes the idea of putting its origin in his days. d. Language.—It is almost universally acknowledged that the book was originally written in a Semitic tongue, either in Hebrew or Aramaic; Volkmar and Philippi alone from their false stand-points maintaining a Greek original. That the generally accepted opinion is the correct one admits scarcely of any doubt. Time, object, and character speak emphatically for its correctness, while the names of the angels, that is of the non- biblical ones, and the Semitic etymology of the names of the winds in 77 and of the names in 78:1, 2 put the Hebrew or Aramaic original beyond all rational doubt. The book must, then, be regarded as the Hebrew or Aramaic production of a Palestine Jew, written before the year 160 B.C. § 5. THE PARABLES, 37-71 (with the exception of the interpolations). a. Object. —The intimate connection between the Parables and the Book of Daniel is apparent at a glance, and admits of no rational doubt. The fundamental idea of the canonical writer, who sees in the rulers of his own times the radically opposites of the realized idea of theocratic kings, who must therefore give way to the God-pleasing and predicted Messianic kingdom, is copied throughout by his imitator in the Parables. The enemies this writer must oppose and the sins he must reprove are entirely different from those in the first part. Hence his aim is a different one, although his ultimate object, the prediction of the speedy arrival of the long-promised kingdom, is the same as that of apocryphal writers in general, and of the author of the first part also. His polemics are no longer directed against the class of sinners in general, but are particularly directed against the kings and the powerful, 38:4, 5; 46:4; 48:8; 53:5; 55:4; 62:1, 3, 6, 9; 63:1, 12, etc. Occasionally, indeed, they are accused of injustice and actual persecution, 46:7; 47:4; but this state of affairs has by no means the prominence that it occupies in the first part. This, too, will explain the fact that in the judgment to come over the sinners the period of the sword is not only not emphasized, as in the first part, but there is even some doubt whether the author teaches such a period at all. The passages that might be interpreted in this direction, 38:5; 39:2; 48:9; 46:4 sq.; 50:2, could all be well understood as referring in general to the overthrow and destruction of the sinners in the last judgment. The crimes of the author’s enemies are of a bloodless character and centre in the great one of atheism; not in a sin against the children of God, which is the basis of the first part, but rather in a sin against God himself. For they deny the Lord of the spirits, 38:2; 41:2; 45:1, 2; 46:7; 48:10 (cf. 43:4; 63:4-8), and a heavenly world, 45:1, and the Messiah, 48:10 (and the Spirit of God, 67:10, and the just judgment, 60:6). Hence, too, they rely on their wealth and are idolaters, 46:7; and in their confession, 63:1 sqq., they acknowledge that their cardinal sin and the ground of their condemnation was their failure to acknowledge God as their King and Lord, that they had placed their hope in their own power, and had not admitted that this power was from God. The author then directs his words against the doings of the aristocratic class among his people, who have deserted the God of the fathers and departed from the hope of Israel. The connection between the author’s ideas and the Old Testament idea of royalty, especially