Bibliotheca Sacra 103
(411) (July, 1946) 283-92.
Copyright © 1946
by
Department of
Semitics
and Old Testament
THE POETIC STRUCTURE OF THE
BOOK OF
JOB AND THE UGARITIC
LITERATURE
BY CHARLES LEE
FEINBERG, TH.D., PH.D.
INTRODUCTION
Within the short period of less than
half a century (1887-
1929)
the scholarly world was placed under heavy debt to
two peasants. Through a peasant woman at Tell El-Amarna
in
light (1887, and through the plowing of an Alaouite peasant
at
texts were later unearthed by the French
archaeologist
Schaeffer (1929)." The texts resulting
from these discoveries
date from a period about the middle of the second
millennium
B.C. The findings at Ras Shamra have opened to us the vast
extent of the Canaanite civilization: its society,
commerce,
political institutions, and religion.1
These had formerly been
only imperfectly known through allusions in the
Hebrew Bi-
ble and from Greek sources.
As study progresses much light
is being thrown not only upon Hebrew lexicography,
gram-
mar, and poetry, but also upon the cultural milieu
in which
The task of comparing the Biblical
literature with the
Ras Shamra alphabetic
texts is an exacting one and has
many ramifications. The purpose of this article is
to com-
pare the poetic structure of both literatures. The
matters
1 W. F. Albright, CBQ,
Vol. VII, 1945, pp. 5-9, and the fuller discussion
in Studies of the History of Culture, pp.
11-50. Note the abbreviations
used in
this article: AJSL, American Journal of
Semitic Languages and
Literatures; BASOR, Bulletin
of the American Schools of Oriental Re-
search; CBQ, The Catholic Biblical Quarterly; JPOS, Journal of the
Palestine Oriental Society; RB, Revue Biblique;
RP, Revue de Paris;
ZA, Zeitschrift fur Assyriologie.
283
284 Bibliotheca
Sacra
of similarities and differences in grammar, vocabulary,
and
concepts will occupy us in future studies.
HEBREW METRICS
Though unanimity has not been achieved
on all points
and much remains yet to be done, the study of
Hebrew meter
has made definite advance. Some of the early
deliverances
on the subject were those of Josephus and Philo,
who held
that Hebrew poetry had meter.2 Whether
they were judg-
ing by Greek models or not,
as some affirm, it is impossible
to determine. Toward the end of the eighteenth
century
Lowth made his contribution to the study in his
lectures at
Oxford.3
To him we are indebted for characterizing the
basic relationship in Hebrew verse as parallelismus membro-
rum.4 This phenomenon had
been noticed before him by Ibn
Ezra
(twelfth century) and Kimchi (thirteenth century),
but
the latter had not designated it in the clear
fashion which
Lowth did. Lowth also
maintained that the utterances of
the prophets especially, as well as other parts of
the Hebrew
Bible,
were originally in metrical form. Subsequent study
has borne out the validity of this position. His
shortcomings
were that he drew his examples from Greek and Latin
sources, since he was not conversant with
Oriental literature
as such, and that, though he recognized the Hebrew
poets
must have had metrical rules, he felt it was
impossible to
ascertain them now.
Because of the rich discoveries of the
past century through
archaeological campaigns in the
made possible with Babylonian and Assyrian, as well
as
Egyptian,
poetry.5 Assyrian poems, like the Epic of Crea-
tion and the Descent of Ishtar, reveal that the Accadians
had
a regular metric system and that the meter was
accentual.
2 The statements of
Josephus are not pertinent to Job, because Ant.
II 16.1
refers to
the song of Exodus 15; Ant. IV 8.44
to Deuteronomy 32; and
Ant. VI 12.3 to hymns composed by David.
3 Robert Lowth, Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews,
1829.
4 For his definition of
this phrase cf. R. Lowth, op. cit., pp. 35, 43, and 157.
5 W. F. Albright, JPOS, II, 1922, pp. 69-71.
Job and the Ugaritic Literature 285
Usually
the couplets were of two bicola (four hemistichs),
each with a caesura. Delitzsch
and Zimmern showed that the
bicolon was 2 plus 2. Some of
the poems manifest a com-
plex strophic arrangement as
well as a refrain, as in the
Ishtar and Saltu poem.6
The strophes are quatrains with
four bicola. When dealing
with the Assyrian poems, we
must keep in mind that much of the Accadian poetry has
been translated from a Sumerian original.7
Not only is the
meter of Assyrian poetry accentual, but, as Erman has
shown, that of Egyptian poetry was also. Generally the me-
ter was 3 plus 3 or 2 plus
2. The period of greatest develop-
ment in prosody in
Twelfth
Dynasty (c. 1989-1776 according to Edgerton's re-
vised low chronology).
The work of Ley
and Sievers, along with Budde,
Duhm,
and others, was destined to lay the foundation for
later
strides in the study of Hebrew metrics. Over a
period of
some twenty years Ley
occupied himself with the subject and
published three basic works.8 Sievers set out to find the
rhythm of Hebrew poetry and to judge the Hebrew meter
from it.9 The conclusion was that Hebrew
did not count syl-
lables, that is, it was not
quantitative in the strict sense of
the term, but depended upon the number of accents.
Lyric
meter was found to be 2 plus 2 (Canticles), dirge (qinah) is
3
plus 2 (Lamentations), and epic or didactic is 3 plus 3
(Job and Proverbs).
6 E. Sievers,
ZA, N.F., 4, 1929, pp. 22-29. Note
refrain in strophes XIII
and XXVIII,
pp. 23, 24, and 26.
7 W. F. Albright, BASOR, 91, 1943, p. 44.
8 J. Ley,
Die metrischen Formen der hebraischen
Poesie, 1886 (here much
emphasis
was placed on alliteration as a metric form of Hebrew
(poetry); Grundzuge des Rhythmus, des Vers-
und Strophenbaues in
der hebraischen Poesie, 1875. (esp. pp. 8-15 on
accent as. the principle
of Hebrew
meter); and Leitfaden der Metrik der hebraischen
Poesie,
1887.
9 E. Sievers,
Studien zur hebraischen Metrik, 1901. The
two basic laws of
his system
may be summarized thus: (1) no more than four unaccented
syllables
may accompany an accented syllable, so that a word with five
syllables
would have two stresses; (2) the accented syllable follows the
unaccented
ones and may not in turn be followed by more than a single
unstressed
syllable. Cf. G. B. Gray, Forms of Hebrew
Poetry, pp. 143-
144.
286
Bibliotheca
Sacra
THE POETRY OF JOB
Before entering into a more detailed
treatment of the
poetry of Job, we note the view of Bickell
and, more recently,
Holscher, because it differs from the position
just stated that
the meter of Job is 3 plus 3.10 These
scholars, judging the
Biblical
material from Syriac patterns where the law of ac-
centuation places the tone on the
penult, seek to construct a
system of quatrains for the Book of Job. Bickell holds that
the strophe of the book is "durchgangig je zwei siebensilbige,
rhythmischjambische, inhaltlich
parallele Verszeilen zu einem
Doppelverse, und zwei von diesen zu einer
Strophe verbin-
det."11 The arrangements
resulting from these attempts are
not only quite subjective, but require much
emendation of the
text. Rigid conformity to one pattern is not
possible through-
out the whole poem, as we shall see.
What
type of poetry is Job? Is it drama, Greek tragedy,
a didactic poem, or an epic poem? No one will
deny that
the book has dramatic action, but the action in the
pro-
logue and epilogue is
subordinate to the main purpose of the
work. Nor can we call Job a Greek tragedy for, among
other
distinctions, there is nothing in it
to answer to the inter-
spersed choral odes. Though its
subject matter is of a didac-
tic nature, it is not a didactic poem, for its
differences from
the poetry of the Book of Proverbs are clear. It is
definitely
an epic poem, treating of a lofty theme with unity
and some
progress in the action.12
This poem, the longest in the Old
Testament, is unique
in that it combines prose and poetry and utilizes
the dialogue,
the narrative being in prose and the dialogue in
poetry. In
the historical books of the Hebrew Bible, as well
as in the
prophetic books, we have the combination of prose
and
poetry, but not in the same manner as Job. Dialogue may
10 G.Holscher, Syrische Verskunst,
1932, esp. pp. 49-123, and Das Buch
Hiob,
1937, esp. pp. 3, 4, 8. His p~ition, as far as Job is
concerned, is
that the
poem follows the same metric system as the Syriac.
11 G. Bickell,
Das Buch Hiob, p. 11.
12 R. Dussaud,
RP, 1937, p. 216, thinks Ras Shamra has what Hebrew and
Arabic poetry
lack; namely, epic poetry. Surely Job can be placed in
the
category of the epics.
Job and the Ugaritic Literature 287
be found in the Song of Solomon (for example, 2
:1-3), but it
is not employed in the same type of discussion.
Attempts have been made to find
parallels to the Book of
Job in Semitic literature. The Babylonian poem on
the right-
eous sufferer, the so-called
Babyloman Job, has been com-
pared to the Biblical Job.13 Even a cursory reading
of the
Babylonian
selection reveals that the resemblances are slight,
while the differences are considerable. The cuneiform
poem
is, moreover, monologue and not dialogue. Among
the As-
syrian texts published by Ebeling he entitles one Ein baby-
lonischer Kohelet, but Dhorme thinks the relationship to Job
is closer, although he is not dogmatic on the
point.14 The se-
lection contains a discussion of the problem of
evil and bears
some striking parallels to Job. It is composed in
twenty-seven
strophes and employs the dialogue. Our Judgment
would be
that a closer parallel to the subject matter of Job
must still
be sought. As to the use of the dialogue in epic
poetry, both
a Babylonian and an Egyptian source have been
posited.
The
"Descent of Ishtar" has been compared with
Job, be-
cause in both dialogue is introduced into epic.15
"The Say-
ings of Amenemope"
has been suggested as the Egyptian
source of the dialogue." These maxims are
arranged
in thirty chapters, and are counsels directed to Amenemope's
youngest son, who was priest in the
olis. In form they scarcely
parallel Job. Comparisons with
the philosophical dialogue of the Greeks are not
relevant.
The 3 plus 3 meter in the Book of Job
is unmistakable.
Whether
it be in the cycles of addresses of Job and his
friends or in the Elihu
monologue or in the Jehovah speeches,
the predominant epic meter is clear. Jerome had
spoken of
"the hexameters" of Job 3:2 to 42:6 in distinguishing
the
prose from the poetry. There is no serious
disagreement
13 H. Zimmern,
Der Alte Orient,
7, 3, pp. 28fF.
14 E. Ebeling, Berliner Beitrage zu Keilschriftforschung,
1922.
P. Dhorme,
RB,
32, 1923, pp. 5-27.
15 E. Konig, Einleitung in das Alte Testament, pp. 410 f.
16 G. Holscher,
Das Buch Hiob, p. 4 refers to H. Gressmann,
Altorienta-
lische
Texte zum Alten Testament (2nd ed.), 1926, pp. 38-46."
288
Bibliotheca
Sacra
with this view, apart from the position of Bickell and Hol-
scher discussed above. The
three basic parallelisms--syn-
onymous, antithetic, and synthetic
or constructive-appear
in the text, with the great majority of the last
type and few
of the second type. An example of each will
suffice.
Synonymous parallelism, Job 8:3:
Will God pervert justice,
Or will Shaddai
pervert righteousness?
Antithetic parallelism, Job 8:7:
Though your beginning was
small,
Yet your latter end will be
very great.
Synthetic parallelism, Job 5:19:
In six troubles he will
deliver you,
And in seven no evil will
touch you.
Though the prevailing rhythm of Job is
that of the bal-
anced bicolon
with three accents to each colon, rigid uni-
formity is not maintained
throughout the poem. Attempts
to impose such uniformity have been unsatisfactory.
On the
other hand, variations are comparatively few and must
be
dealt with cautiously.17 Ley, according to Budde, claimed
to
be able to find 800 bicola
out of 1,000 verses.18 The presence
of tricola can be
explained as resulting from the poetic
freedom and skill of the writer. Most of the
alleged ex-
amples, however, are doubtful
or open to suspicion. Those
in Job 3 :4, 5, 6, and 9 probably arise from
disturbance in
the text. Possible examples are
and 39:25. What appears to be a tricolon
of 2 plus 2 plus 2
in
two words are vertical dittography from line 20.
Few cases
of 3 plus 2 and 4 plus 3 rhythm are original,
while 3 plus 4;
4
plus 4; and 2 plus 2 are very rare. However, there are
too
many variations from the dominant rhythm to allow
the
conclusion that none of them is original.
17 B. Gray, AJSL, 36,
1919-20, pp. 95-102. His emendations are not con-
vincing.
l8 K. Budde, Das Buch Hiob,
p. VII, n. 2.
Job and the Ugaritic Literature 289
When we examine the bicolon more closely, we find a
number of variations in the sentence structure. While
the
literary form a b c--a b d occurs in the Hebrew
Bible,
there are no examples in the Book of Job. The common
harmonic sequence in Job is a b c--a' b' c'.
Variations
from this pattern occur, but we shall occupy
ourselves with
the bicolon most frequent
in the poem. Following Gordon's
arrangement,19 we allow s, v, o, p,
and x to represent sub-
ject, verb, object,
prepositional phrase, and adverb or any
miscellaneous particle. Analysis
shows that these harmonic
Ibalances are present: pv pv, 4:9,
"By the breath of God they
perish,
And by the blast of his anger they are
destroyed";
vsp vsp,
6:5 (also
"Brays the wild ass upon (when he
has) the grass,
Or lows the
ox over his fodder?"
pvo pvo,
7:2 (also 26:12),
"As a servant that desires the
shade,
And as a hireling awaits his
wages";
ovo ovo,
"(With) skin and flesh thou dost
clothe me,
And with bones and sinews thou dost
knit me together";
and vpo vpo,
"He shall shake off as the vine
his unripe grape,
And he shall cast off as the
olive-tree his flower."
Instances
could be multiplied, but variety, even within cer-
tain types of bicola, is clear. We are coming to realize in-
creasingly that Hebrew prosody was
much more complex
than formerly recognized.20 Early in this
century
held that "The rhythmopoiia
of Hebrew is, as we should
expect, of the simplest and crudest description."21
His pro-
nouncement is not borne out by
subsequent studies.
In concluding our discussion of the
poetry of Job, we
19 C. H. Gordon, Ugaritic Grammar (
20 W. F. Albright, CBQ, 7, 1945, p. 19.
21 W. R. Arnold, Old Testament and Semitic Studies in Memory of W. R.
Harper,
Vol.
I, p. 202.
290
Bibliotheca
Sacra
may note that the poem employs alliteration and
assonance
(
Rhyme,
like strophe (see 31:5-10; 37:9-10), is only an occa-
sional form of Hebrew poetry.
Efforts have been made to
divide large portions of Job strophically,
as in Bickell's
system, but the results are subjective and arbitrary.
UGARITIC POETRY
With the finding of the Ras Shamra texts we have poetry
which comes from a cultural and literary setting more
closely related to Hebrew poetry than either the
Babylonian
lor Egyptian. We do well to
remember also that the cunei-
form tablets have not undergone the copyings which the
Hebrew
poetic books have. In the short period in which the
mythological poems of
distinctive features of the prosody have been noted.
Like
Hebrew
poetry, Ugaritic poetry is accentual. It is charac-
terized by parallelism with the
common rhythm of three
accents to a colon. Examples are numerous so we
confine
ourselves to one case. 49 (I AB) III 6, 7:
NrFmt
Nmw Mmw
Mtbn jlt MlHn
The heavens rain oil;
The wadies
run with honey.
Not
only is the bicolon frequent, but the tricolon is common
as well. A case in point is 49 VI 27.
Though the poetry was not quantitative
in the strict sense,
as we understand it from Indo-European models,
there ap-
pears to have been an attempt at counting syllables.
Words
vary from two to four, and even five, syllables.
Cases with
more than four are rare. Verbs with double energic nun
appear to have five syllables: Nnprwt and Nnyrdt in 49 II 32 and
33.
The number in each colon varied from eight to ten sylla-
bles, with the commonest at
nine. If the second member of a
bicolon omitted a word found in
the first, there was added in
22 I. M. Casanowicz (Paronomasia
in the Old Testament) cites 52 examples
(pp. 91-92) of
this literary device in Job.
Job and the Ugaritic Literature 291
the former one or more words to counterbalance the
latter, a
"ballast variant" as Gordon calls it.23 A
list of such devices
shows how largely it entered into Ugaritic
versification. Al-
bright explains the fact thus, "The regularity in
the number
of syllables must be connected with the fact that
these poems
were chanted with simple melodies adapted to regular
poetic
syllabification, not as psalms and
liturgies are chanted today
in ecclesiastical music, where almost any number
of syllables
can be accommodated to the melody.24
As in Job, the Ugaritic
poetry manifests variations from
the parallel cola with three beats. Dussaud, after referring
to the dominant rhythm in Phoenician poetry, holds
that
when a colon of two accents follows two cola with
three
stresses each, it is always by the intention of
the poet. The
uneven colon marks the pause or punctuation.25
Besides the
tricola, Ginsberg marks other
divergences from the bicolon:
single (extra-metric) words, as fdxv in 49 III 8; single (ex-
tra-metric) lines,26
as the oft-repeated Hcyv
hg xwy; run-on
lines; apocopated
end-lines; and rhyme, as ydy and ydhy
in 67 VI 17-21.27
Ugaritic
poetry enjoys a wide variety of harmonic bal-
Ances
within verses.
The poets of Ras Shamra
endeavored
by artistic devices to avoid monotony, and the
result is an
elaborate system of sentence structure. Gordon has
listed
twenty-six different types of verses, and this
number does
not exhaust the possibilities.
Before we summarize the similarities
between the poetry
of Job and the Ugaritic
texts, we call attention to some dif-
ferences. First, there is
nothing in Job that answers to the
long sections in Ugaritic
poetry which are repeated twice.
Second,
the verse-form a b c-a b d common in the cunei-
form texts is completely lacking in Job. Third, Ugaritic poetry
23 C. H. Gordon, op. cit., pp. 83, 84.
24 W. F. Albright, BASOR, 91, 1943, pp 43-44.
25 R. Dussaud,
1937, pp. 534-535) holds the same
position.
26 Such extra-metric lines
are found in Job 4:1; 6:1; 8:1; etc.
27 H. L. Ginsberg, Orientalia, N.S.,
5, 1936, p. 171.
292
Bibliotheca
Sacra
makes use of refrain (49 VI 16-22) as well as
strophic ar-
rangements (51 IV 52-57). Job has
no example of the for-
mer, and the occasional
examples of the latter in the book
are not so extended as the Ugaritic
patterns.
The similarities between the poetry of
Job and the Ras
Shamra literature may now be summarized briefly. (1)
Par-
allelism, with its repetition,
marks both literatures. (2) The
3
plus 3 meter based on accented syllables is the dominant one
for both. (3) Lines vary as to the number of words,
and
words differ in the number of syllables they contain.
The
corollary to this fact is that neither Hebrew nor Ugaritic
poetry is quantitative in the strict sense. (4) There
does
seem to be a conscious effort to keep lines approximately
to
(the same quantity. (5) Rhythms vary in both literatures,
so that change in rhythm cannot be interpreted as
"the blend-
ing of different
poems."28 Rigid uniformity is not to be im-
posed on either the Hebrew or Ugaritic
poems. (6) The sen-
tence structure within verses
reveals great artistic skill.
Prose
order does not apply; the elements of the verse may be
found in any order.
Definite points of contact, then,
between Hebrew and
Ugaritic poetry cannot be denied. Indeed, the
relationship is
closer than that which exists between Hebrew poetry
and
that of Mesopotamia and
28 C. H. Gordon, op. cit., p. 79, sec. 12.2.
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