Shorter Notices

4-36 UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY summary treatment ever, more than cornpjensate This is an eXllaJ:ISlOm tributed to The . I t reDrest~nts and transmutes them under the influence Ancient Man ae"OIf:a to biblical A. & exr:~OSltI0I1S of the the basis for a new era of It may well be ......v,....'-' ..""...... , hn,,,,,,,,,,,,p>T' whether the assertion that the Old Testament is SHORTER NOTICES 437 By many people the Old Testament is regarded as a homogeneous work, varied in content but reflecting very much the same religious attitude throughout. One of the great merits of Professor Irwin's book is that it shows us that such is far from being the case. A surprising number of points of view are represented, ranging all the way from atheism and agnosticism to ultra-conservatism, and showing that Israel was the centre of a vigorous intellectual life, especially in matters pertaining to religion and morals. To the presence of a questioning , even sceptical, attitude Irwin attributes much of Israel's achievements in these fields. While the whole gamut of Old Testament thought is brought under review, the author devotes his attention primarily to the answers which Hebrew thinkers gave to those questions relating to the nature of God, man, and the world "which persist age after age and are new with each generation." Perhaps a truer picture of Old Testament thought would have bee~ presented if more attention had been paid to the purely nationalistic, bloodthirsty, and immoral passages. But would any useful purpose have been served thereby? It is only necessary to draw attention to such passages when exaggerated claims are made for the Old Testament. There is only one point where the reviewer would venture to differ with his fonner teacher. He doubts whether the idea of universal history appeared among the Hebrews "ages before" (p. 163) it appeared in the West. He believes it made its first appearance in Israel not more than a century before the time of Herodotus. F. V. WINNETT New Ways of Ontology. By NICOLAI HARTMANN. Translated hy REINHARD C. KUHN. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company [Toronto: S. J. Reginald Saunders and Company Limited]. 1953. Pp. vi, 146. $5.50. The present volume is the authorized English translation of the late Professor Hartmann's Neue lYege der Ontologie. It presents, according to the dust-jacket, "a metaphysics conceived in the spirit of modern science and the contemporary world." The great vice of Metaphysics , for Hartmann, is her propensity to indulge in speculation; and he wishes to make a respectable woman of her by marrying her off to that eminently solid citizen, Science, in the hope that such an alliance will permanently cure her of her roving eye and wandering mind. ...