Zecharias Frankel - Biblical Studies

Biblical Studies

His second great work was his "Historisch-Kritische Studien zu der Septuaginta Nebst Beiträgen zu den Targumim: Vorstudien zu der Septuaginta" (Leipzig, 1841). To the same category belong three later works: "Ueber den Einfluss der Palästinensischen Exegese auf die Alexandrinische Hermeneutik" (Leipzig, 1851); "Ueber Palästinensische und Alexandrinische Schriftforschung," published in the program for the opening of the Breslau seminary (Breslau, 1854); "Zu dem Targum der Propheten" (Breslau, 1872).

In all these works it was his object to show that the exegesis of the Alexandrian Jews, and with it that of the early Church Fathers, was dependent on Talmudic exegesis. In this investigation he became a pioneer, and many of his disciples followed him with similar investigations, not only of the Septuagint, but also of the Vulgate and of the Peshitta. A political motive was involved in his study on legal procedure, "Der Gerichtliche Beweis nach Mosaisch-Talmudischem Rechte: Ein Beitrag zur Kenntnis des Mosaisch-Talmudischen Criminal-und Civilrechts: Nebst einer Untersuchung über die Preussische Gesetzgebung Hinsichtlich des Zeugnisses der Juden" (Berlin, 1846). The law of Prussia discriminated against the Jews insofar as the testimony of a Jew against a Christian was valid only in civil cases, and in these only when they involved a sum less than fifty thalers. It was due to Frankel's work, which was cited as an authority in the Prussian Diet, that the new law of July 23, 1847 referring to the Jews, abolished this discrimination.