have been illustrated by Vorstius and Visir. The proverbs which are found in the New Test. are collected and illustrated by Drusius and Anireas Schottus, whose works are comprised in the ninth volume of the Critici Sacri, and also by Joachim Zehner, who elucidated them by parallel passages from the fathers, as well as from heathen writers, in a treatise published at Leipsic in 1601. The proverbs contained in the Old and New Tests. whence it appears how much they were in use among that people, and that they were applied by Christ and his apostles agreeably to common usage. Our Lord frequently employed proverbs in his public instructions and the illustration of these proverbs as occupied many learned men, who proceed partly by the aid of similar passages from the Old Test., and partly from the ancient writings of the Jews, especially from the Talmud. But in every part of the Eastern world, from Pekin to Damascus, the popular teachers of moral wisdom have immemorially been poets, and there would be no end of enumerating their works, which are still extant in the five principal languages of Asia." SEE PARABLE. Jones says, "The moralists of the East have in general chosen to deliver their precepts in short, sententious maxims, to illustrate them by sprightly comparisons, or to inculcate them in the very ancient forms of agreeable apologues: there are, indeed, both in Arabic and Persian, philosophical tracts on ethics written with sound ratiocination and elegant perspicuity. 27-31), are called mashals, from no one particular character which discriminates them from the rest of the poem, but from the sublime the figurative, the sententious manner which equally prevails through the whole poem, and makes it one of the first and most eminent examples extant of the truly great and beautiful in poetic style." Sir W. Thus Job's last speeches, in answer to the three friends (ch. Balaam's first prophecy (Nu 23:7-10) is called his mashal, although it has hardly anything figurative in it but it is beautifully sententious, and, from the very form and manner of it, has great spirit, force, and energy. Such, in general, is the style of the Hebrew poetry. Parables or proverbs, such as those of Solomon, are always expressed in short, pointed sentences frequently figurative, being formed on some comparison, both in the matter and the form. Lowth, in lis notes on Isa 14:4, - speaking of mashal, says: "I take this to be the general name for poetic style among the Hebrews, including every sort of it, as ranging under one, or other, or all of the characters, sententious, figurative, and sublime which are all contained in the original notion, or in the use and application of the word mashal. in Nu 23:7-10 Nu 24:3-9,15-24, are prophecies conveyed in figrmes but mashal also denotes the "parable" proper, as in Eze 17:2 Eze 20:49 (21:5) 24:3. Many instances of this kind occur in the first section of the book of Proverbs others are found in Job 27 Job 29, in both which chapters Job takes up his mashal, or "parable," as it is rendered in the A.V. Next we find it used of those larger pieces in which a single idea is no longer exhausted in a sentence, but forms the germ of the whole, and is worked out into a didactic poem. Such comparisons are either expressed, or the things compared are placed side by side, and the comparison left for the hearer or reader to supply. From this stage of its application it passed to that of sententious maxims generally, as in Pr 1:1 Pr 10:1 Pr 25:1 Pr 26:7,9 Ec 12:9 Job 13:12, many of which, however, still involve a comparison (Pr 25:3,11-14, etc. It was applied to denote such short, pointed sayings as do not involve a comparison directly, but still convey their meaning by the help of a figure, as in 1Sa 10:12 Eze 12:22-23 Eze 17:2-3 (comp. Probably all proverbial savings were at first of the nature of similes, but the term mashal soon acquired a more extended significance. This form of comparison would very naturally be taken by the short, pithy' sentences which passed into use as popular sayings and proverbs, especially when employed in mockery and sarcasm, as in Mic 2:4 Hab 2:6, and even in the more developed taunting song of triumph for the fall of Babylon in Isa 14:4. mathala, to "resemble"), and the primary idea involved in it is that of' likeness, comparison. It is derived from a root מָשִׁל, mashdl, "to be like" (Arab. "byword," "parable," "proverb" (παραβολή, παροιμία), expresses all and even more than is conveyed by these its English representatives.
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