(From the Academy.)
The Methods of the Higher Criticism.
I do not presume to enter into the discussion concerning the characters inscribed on Dr. Chaplin's Samaritan weight, or to estimate their value with regard to the date of the Canticles. I may say, however, that to me the title chosen by Professor Sayce, and which I have repeated above, has appeared not quite appropriate.
Now, however, I am concerned with some statements towards the end of Professor Robertson Smith's communication in last week's Academy. Professor Sayce (who is in Egypt) is accused of having committed a serious "grammatical blunder" in "deriving a segholate noun with initial Nun, namely netseg, from the root yâtsag," for "every Hebraist knows that if the word is netseg, it cannot possibly have come from yâtsag, or from any known Hebrew root." Now, "every Hebraist knows," though, it would almost seem, Professor Robertson Smith does not, that verbs with initial Nun are so closely related to verbs with initial Yod (the Nun being softened down into Yod), as to make it sometimes of little importance which form is chosen as the root. Indeed, with reference to these two forms, yâtsag and natsag, what Gesenius had previously referred to the latter he subsequently derived from the former. And as to segholate nouns with initial Nun, it may be seen from the Lexicon that these are sufficiently numerous. With the possible meaning of netseg I have nothing now to do.
(From the Academy.)
The Inscribed Weight from Samaria.
My departure from Cairo has prevented me from seeing until now the discussion which has arisen in the academy over the letter I wrote about Dr. Chaplin's inscribed weight from Samaria. It has followed the course I expected, and the reading public will now be able to appraise at their real value the ex cathedra assertions of those who claim a monopoly of "the critical method." Dr. Neubauer and myself, after a careful examination of the original, found that the inscription contained certain words; and the "critics" peremptorily denied our reading without taking the trouble to consult the original.
Professor Robertson Smith is mistaken in saying that the explanation of netseg as "a standard weight" is mine, or that I "derive" it from the root yâtsag. The explanation is due to Dr. Neubauer; and from the first
