ARAMAIC PAPYRI—SACHAU. OL 
return. Under the Cambyses the temples of Egypt were destroyed, 
but the Jewish temple in Elephantine was spared. Under Persian 
rule in Egypt the Jewish community was able there to erect and 
maintain a magnificent house of God. When the Persian governor 
left the country, the enemies of the Jews, Egyptian priests and their 
allies, gained the upper hand and destroyed and pillaged the house 
of God. And again it was a Persian, the governor of Judea, to 
whom they turned with a petition for redress, after the high priest 
of their own nation and religion in Jerusalem, Jehohanan, had 
ignored their petition. (See Document I, line 19.) 
When Jeremiah prophesied to his countrymen in Egypt of their 
extermination through sword, famine, and pestilence (Jeremiah 
XLIV, 11 ff.), he intimated in one passage at least that they longed 
to return to the fatherland. (Jeremiah XLIV, 14: “ that they should 
return into the land of Judah, to the which they have a desire to 
return to dwell there”.) Such a longing can not be discerned in 
these papyrus documents, but they show how the Jews of Elephan- 
tine, when trouble befell them, turned their eyes in search of help to 
Palestine, to the high priest in Jerusalem, and to the governors of 
Israel and Judah appointed by the Persian Government. They 
must, therefore, have been at that time without influential protectors 
in Egypt itself. 
The language of the documents is pure Aramaic, as pure as only 
such model Aramaic writers as Aphraates, Ephraem, and Narses 
write. The date of these documents is important for the early his- 
tory of the Arameans, which, notwithstanding all researches, is still 
obscure. These documents are valuable for their dialect, which in 
this early period was closely akin to Hebrew, and also for the hght 
they throw on the history of Hebrew. My impression is that Hebrew 
for the Jews in Elephantine in the fifth pre-Christian century was 
at most only the language of the cultus and sacred writings. That 
they wrote their business documents in Aramaic may have been 
out of consideration for the government authorities before whom 
the affairs had eventually to be transacted. But if they also com- 
posed their narratives and poetry in Aramaic and not in Hebrew, 
as these papyri indicate, the conclusion would be that Aramaic was 
certainly the vernacular among them, the language of old and young, 
of man, woman, and child. 
The excavations in Elephantine have enriched the Old Testament 
with a new and significant chapter. What will their continuation 
bring to light? As to the fact that they must be continued, there can 
be no question among the friends of the Bible and of antiquity, and 
it is to be hoped that there will be no lack of funds in the present 
day when all are so enthusiastic on the subject of excavation in Bible 
lands. 
