The section on Judah lacks the unity of the first two oracles, and is very probably composed of strophes of diverse origin and date. V.8 opens with a play on the name, like vv.16. 19, while v.9 starts afresh with an animal comparison, like vv.14. 17. 27 (see Introd. Note, p. 510). The impression of discontinuity is partly confirmed by the poetic form; v.8 being an irregular tristich, and the remainder a series of 7 perfect trimeter distichs. The dekastich 10-12 seems distinct from what precedes (note the repetition of the name in 10), but is itself a unity. The proposal to remove v.10 as a late Messianic interpolation, and to make v.11 the continuation of v.9, does not commend itself; and the excision of the third line in v.10 (Meier, Fripp) merely avoids an exegetical difficulty by sacrificing the strophic arrangement.
13-15. Zebulun and Issachar.
13 Zebulun shall dwell by the shore of the sea,
And . . . shore of ships (?),
And his flank is on Ẓidon.
14 Issachar is a bony ass
Crouching between the panniers (?):
15 And he saw that rest was good,
And that the land was sweet;
So he bent his shoulder to bear,
And became a labouring drudge.
13. shall dwell] An allusion to the etymology in 3020. It
is plausibly conjectured that (
Hebrew characters) has been substituted by
mistake for the original (Hebrew characters) (Gu. al.).—The second and
third lines are unintelligible, and the text is probably corrupt.
The comparison of Zebulun to a recumbent animal, with
'itself' ((Hebrew characters)) towards the sea-coast, and its hind-parts
towards Ẓidon (Di. Gu. al.), is unsatisfying and almost
grotesque. Dt. 3319b shows that it is the advantageousness
of Zebulun's geographical position which is here celebrated.—Ẓîdôn]
may be a name for Phœnicia, in whose commercial
pursuits it has been surmised that Zebulun became more and
more involved (Sta. GVI, i. 171).—14. bony] i.e. strong-*
13. (Hebrew characters)] Ju. 517; cf. (Hebrew characters), Dt. 17, Jos. 91, Jer. 477, Ezk. 2516 † : (Hebrew characters) is
never found with any other gen. except in the next line.—(Hebrew characters)] One
is tempted to construe prosaically thus: 'And that a shore for ships,
with its flank on Ẓidon'; but this would entail elision of (Hebrew characters), to the
detriment of the rhythm: besides, the repetition of (Hebrew characters) and the unique
combination (Hebrew characters) are suspicious. Ba. reads (Hebrew characters) for (Hebrew characters) (after Ju. 517),
and deletes the last line.—(Hebrew characters)] [E]GVSTOJ (Hebrew characters).—14. (Hebrew characters)] [E] (Hebrew characters), 'ass
