Bible studies, contributions chiefly from papyri and ... - Predestination

82 BIBLE STUDIES. [76, 77
they render towards the understanding of the language itself.
It may be that their contents are often scanty ;
it may be that
hundreds of stones, tiresomely repeating the same mono-
tonous formula, have only the value of a single authority,
yet, in their totality, these epigraphic remains furnish us
with plenty of material—only, one should not expect too
much of them, or too little. The author is not now thinking
of the general historical contributions which they afford for
the delineation of the period—such as we must make for
Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor, Europe, if we would understand
the biblical writings (though for that purpose nothing can
be substituted for them) ; but rather of their value for the
history of the language of the Greek Bible, and particularly
of the New Testament. Those witnesses in stone come
before us with exactly the same variety as to time and place
as we have to take into account when dealing with these
writings :
the
period of most of them, and the original locality
of nearly all, can be determined with certainty. They afford
us wholly trustworthy glimpses into certain sections of the
sphere of ideas and of the store of words which belonged to
certain definite regions, at a time when Christian churches
were taking their rise, and Christian books being written.
Further, that the religious conceptions of the time may receive
similar elucidation is a fact that we owe to the numerous
sacred Inscriptions. In these, it may be observed that there
existed, here and there, a terminology which was fixed, and
which to some extent consisted of liturgical formulae. When,
then, particular examples of this terminology are found
not only in the early Christian authors, but in the LXX as
well, the question must be asked : Do the Christian writers
employ such and such an expression because they are familiar
with the Greek Bible, or because they are unaffectedly speak-
ing the language of their neighbourhood ? If we are dealing,
e.g., with the Inscriptions of Asia Minor and the Christians
of Asia Minor, the natural answer will be : Such
expressions
were known to any such Christian from his environment,
before ever he read the LXX, and, when he met them again
in that book, he had no feeling of having his store of words