INTRODUCTORY 31
Dr. Charles^1 finds a considerable element of
poetry in the fragments of a Zadokite work of
which the Hebrew text was first edited (with
translation and introduction) by Dr. Schechter^2
in 1910. In the opinion of some this work is
considerably later than IV. Esdras; but Dr.
Charles has strong reasons for concluding that
it was written before A.D. 70. Be the date, how-
ever, what it may, except in quotations from the
Old Testament, parallelism in this work is not at
all conspicuous; whether, therefore, the passages
marked by Dr. Charles as possessing poetical
form actually do so, turns on matters which have
to be considered later. Happily, in this case the
question can be considered, not through transla-
tions merely, but with the original text before us.
The Odes of Solomon, of which the Syriac text
was first edited by Dr. Rendel Harris^3 in 1909,
were scarcely written before A.D. 70, and they
may belong to the second century A.D. ; in the
which recall, though the lines are longer, the ring of Ps. xi. 3. Two
similar distichs follow. A further example occurs in Hagigah 15 b
vnybr jynpl dmf xl | Htph rmw vlypx
Even the keeper-of-the-door (of Gehenna)
Stood not his ground before thee, 0 our teacher.
As the sustained parallelism which is so characteristic of much of
the Old Testament and Jewish literature to the second century A.D.
appears to run back to origins in the popular poetry of the early
Hebrews, so parallelism seems to have maintained an existence for
some time in the occasional poetry of the later Jews, after it had
ceased to be employed in more formal literature.
1 Fragments of a Zadokite work translated... 1912.
2 In Documents of Jewish Sectaries, vol. i.
3 The Odes and Psalms of Solomon published from the Syriac Version,
1909 (ed. 2, 1911).