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Excerpt from The Prophets of Israel: From the Eighth to the Fifth Century; Their Faith and Their Message By the foregoing remarks I have indirectly indicatedmy position also to the view, advanced by a recent school of biblical scholars, that Jewish eschatology existed fully developed in ancient Israel long before the appearance of literary prophecy and that its roots are to be sought in old-babylonian eschatological notions. It may suffice here to point out that the claim of the existence of an old-babylonian eschato logical speculation rests on postulation rather than on established facts, and that - not to consider other objections - to argue the existence of an Israelitish eschatology from the preexilic prophetic writings is possible only by reading abstruse meanings and hidden references into descriptions which, in their essence, are purely imaginative and poetic. The fact is, as I hope to show in the second volume that whatever there is of positive proof points to the rise of Jewish eschatology in the Persian period. Sellin, in his recent book, Der alttestamentliche Prophetismus (leipzig, which has just come to my notice, differs in his view of the eschatology of Israel from the scholars just referred to in that he holds that eschatology was indigenous to Israel, his explanation being that the real root of it lies in the act of Revelation from Sinai (p. I may add that Sellin's view-point through out his treatise is in accord with this explanation. My treatment of the prophets, though it departs to a certain extent from the chronological order of presentation, is not in opposition to, but is in full harmony with the historico-critical method of modern research. This method means for that province of knowledge which deals with the politico-social and mental development of the human race, what the analytic-genetic method means for the province of science. Like the latter it insists that every fact orphenomenon under consideration be minutely ana lyzed, that is to say, that its relation to its environment be determined, and its development and growth and, if possible, also its genesis, be traced. For it, also, emphasizes, as the guiding principle of modern te search, that no real knowledge can be obtained from detached phenomena or isolated facts; in other words, that no fact can be accepted by itself, but must be recognized as a part of a great complex, the inter relations of the various parts of which must be closely studied before the significance of the special phenom enon can be ascertained. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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