1, xcix. 1.
The mention of pitch or bitumen is inconclusive, inasmuch as it is found
in both Babylonia and Egypt; but the mention of "heavens" and "stars of
heaven" (vv. 59, 63), agrees very well with Chaldean origin. So far,
therefore, as these considerations go, they turn the scale, to a small
extent, in favour of Babylonia.
The only natural object which may be regarded as telling in the opposite
direction is ???®?„?· (v. 79), which might be thought to point to
knowledge of the Mediterranean Sea (_see_ Child Chaplin, _Benedicite,_
1879, p. 324).
The birthplace of the LXX text is surely Alexandria. The character of
this, as of the other additions, indicates, according to Westcott
(_D.B._ ed. 2, I. 1714a) and Wordsworth (on Dan. iii. 23), the hand of
an Alexandrian writer.
It is well, however, to notice that this, with its companion pieces, has
as few indications of Greek philosophy and habits of thought as any part
of the Apocrypha; and in common with most Alexandrian writers it has
little or nothing of purely Egyptian character.
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