King James Bible Dictionary

Greek
Acts 17:28; Titus 1:12
Poetry; Psalms; Song

PO'ET, noun [Latin poeta. See Poem.]

1. The author of a poem; the inventor or maker of a metrical composition.

A poet is a maker, as the word signifies; and he who cannot make, that is, invent, hath his name for nothing.

2. One skilled in making poetry, or who has a particular genius for metrical composition; one distinguished for poetic talents. Many write verses who cannot be called poets.

PO'ETASTER, noun A petty poet; a pitiful or rhymer or writer of verses.

PO'ETESS, noun A female poet.

POET'IC

POET'ICAL, adjective [Latin poeticus.]

1. Pertaining to poetry; suitable to poetry; as a poetical genius; poetic turn or talent; poetic license.

2. Expressed in poetry or measure; as a poetical composition.

3. Possessing the peculiar beauties of poetry; sublime; as a composition or passage highly poetical.

POET'ICALLY, adverb With the qualities of poetry; by the art of poetry; by fiction.

POET'ICS, noun The doctrine of poetry.

PO'ETIZE, verb intransitive To write as a poet; to compose verse.

POET-LAUREAT, noun A poet employed to compose poems for the birth days of a prince or other special occasion.

POET-MUSI'CIAN, noun An appellation given to the bard and lyrist of former ages, as uniting the professions of poetry and music.

PO'ETRESS, noun A female poet.

Has been well defined as "the measured language of emotion." Hebrew poetry deals almost exclusively with the great question of man's relation to God. "Guilt, condemnation, punishment, pardon, redemption, repentance are the awful themes of this heaven-born poetry."

In the Hebrew scriptures there are found three distinct kinds of poetry, (1) that of the Book of Job and the Song of Solomon, which is dramatic; (2) that of the Book of Psalms, which is lyrical; and (3) that of the Book of Ecclesiastes, which is didactic and sententious.

Hebrew poetry has nothing akin to that of Western nations. It has neither metre nor rhyme. Its great peculiarity consists in the mutual correspondence of sentences or clauses, called parallelism, or "thought-rhyme." Various kinds of this parallelism have been pointed out-

1. Synonymous or cognate parallelism, where the same idea is repeated in the same words (Psalms 93:3; 94:1; Proverbs 6:2), or in different words (Psalms 22, 23, 28, 114, etc.); or where it is expressed in a positive form in the one clause and in a negative in the other (Psalms 40:12; Proverbs 6:26); or where the same idea is expressed in three successive clauses (Psalms 40:15, 16); or in a double parallelism, the first and second clauses corresponding to the third and fourth (Isaiah 9:1; 61:10, 11).

2. Antithetic parallelism, where the idea of the second clause is the converse of that of the first (Psalms 20:8; 27:6, 7; 34:11; 37:9, 17, 21, 22). This is the common form of gnomic or proverbial poetry. (See Proverbs 10-15.)

3. Synthetic or constructive or compound parallelism, where each clause or sentence contains some accessory idea enforcing the main idea (Psalms 19:7-10; 85:12; Job 3:3-9; Isaiah 1:5-9).

4. Introverted parallelism, in which of four clauses the first answers to the fourth and the second to the third (Psalms 135:15-18; Proverbs 23:15, 16), or where the second line reverses the order of words in the first (Psalms 86:2).

Hebrew poetry sometimes assumes other forms than these.

1. An alphabetical arrangement is sometimes adopted for the purpose of connecting clauses or sentences. Thus in the following the initial words of the respective verses begin with the letters of the alphabet in regular succession- Proverbs 31:10-31; Lamentations 1, 2, 3, 4; Psalms 25, 34, 37, 145. Psalms 119 has a letter of the alphabet in regular order beginning every eighth verse.

2. The repetition of the same verse or of some emphatic expression at intervals (Psalms 42, 107, where the refrain is in verses, 8, 15, 21, 31). (Comp. also Isaiah 9:8-10:4; Amos 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 13; 2:1, 4, 6.)

3. Gradation, in which the thought of one verse is resumed in another (Psalms 121).

Several odes of great poetical beauty are found in the historical books of the Old Testament, such as the song of Moses (Exodus 15), the song of Deborah (Judges 5), of Hannah (1 Samuel 2), of Hezekiah (Isaiah 38:9-20), of Habakkuk (Habakkuk 3), and David's "song of the bow" (2 Samuel 1:19-27).

Acrostic
Titus 19:25; Titus 19:34; Titus 19:37; Titus 19:111; Titus 19:119; Titus 19:145; Proverbs 31:10-31; Proverbs 25:1

Didactic:

Moses' song
Proverbs 5:32

Books of Job, Proverbs, and Song of Solomon
Proverbs 5:18; Proverbs 5:20; Proverbs 5:22
Psalms, Didactic

Elegy:

On the death of Saul
2 Samuel 1:19-27

On the death of Abner
2 Samuel 3:33-34
Elegy

Epic:

Epic:
Exodus 15:1-19

Miriam's song
Exodus 15:21

Song of Deborah
Jude 1:5

Lyrics, sacred:

Moses' and Miriam's songs
Jude 2:15

Hannah's song
1 Samuel 2:1-10

The song of Elizabeth
Luke 1:42-45

The song of Mary
Luke 1:46-55

The song of Zacharias
Luke 1:68-79

The Psalms
Luke 19:1

PO'ETRY, noun [Gr.] Metrical composition; verse; as heroic poetry; dramatic poetry; lyric or Pindaric poetry

1. The art or practice of composing in verse. He excels in poetry

2. Poems; poetical composition. We take pleasure in reading poetry

3. This term is also applied to the language of excited imagination and feeling.

1. Lyrical poetry .

   Of the three kinds of poetry which are illustrated by the Hebrew literature, the lyric occupies the foremost place. That literature abounds with illustrations of all forms of Lyrical poetry, in its most manifold and wide-embracing compass, from such short ejaculations as the songs of the two Lamechs and Psalms 15, 117 and others, to the longer chants of victors and thanksgiving, like the songs of Deborah and David. Judges 5; Psalms 18. The Shemitic nations have nothing approaching to an epic poem, and in proportion to this defect the lyric element prevailed more greatly, commencing in the pre-Mosaic times, flourishing in rude vigor during the earlier periods of the judges, the heroic age of the Hebrews, growing with the nation's growth and strengthening with its strength, till it reached its highest excellence in David, the warrior poet, and from thenceforth began slowly to decline.

2. Gnomic poetry .

   The second grand division of Hebrew poetry is occupied by a class of poems which are peculiarly Shemitic, and which represent the nearest approaches made by the people of that race to anything like philosophic thought. Reasoning there is none: we have only results, and those rather the product of observation and reflection than of induction or argumentation. As lyric poetry is the expression of the poet's own feelings and impulses, so gnomic poetry is the form in which the desire of communicating knowledge to others finds vent. Its germs are the floating proverbs which pass current in the mouths of the people, and embody the experiences of many with the wit of one. The utterer of sententious sayings was to the Hebrews the wise man, the philosopher. Of the earlier isolated proverbs but few examples remain.

3. Dramatic poetry .

   It is impossible to assert that no form of the drama existed among the Hebrew people. It is unquestionably true, as Ewald observes, that the Arab reciters of romances will many times in their own persons act out a complete drama in recitation, changing their voice and gestures with the change of person and subject. Something of this kind may possibly have existed among the Hebrews; still there is no evidence that it did exist, nor any grounds for making even a probable conjecture with regard to it. But the mere fact of the existence of these rude exhibitions' among the Arabs and Egyptians of the present day is of no weight when the question to be decided is whether the Song of Songs was designed to be so represented, as a simple pastoral drama, or whether the book of Job is a dramatic poem or not. Inasmuch as it represents an action and a progress, it is a drama as truly and really as any poem can be which develops the working of passion and the alter-nations of faith, hope, distrust, triumph and confidence and black despair, in the struggle which it depicts the human mind as engaged in while attempting to solve one of the most intricate problems it can be called upon to regard. It is a drama as life is a drama, the most powerful of all tragedies but that it is a dramatic poem, intended to be represented upon a stage, or capable of being so represented, may be confidently denied. One characteristic of Hebrew poetry, not indeed peculiar to it, but shared by it in common with the literature of other nations, is its intensely national and local coloring. The writers were Hebrews of the Hebrews, drawing their inspiration from the mountains and rivers of Palestine, which they have immortalized in their poetic figures, and even while uttering the sublimest and most universal truths never forgetting their own nationality in its narrowest and intensest form. Examples of this remarkable characteristic the Hebrew poets stand thick upon every page of these writings, and in striking contrast with the vague generalizations of the indian philosophic poetry. About one third of the Old Testament is poetry in the Hebrew

   a large part of Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Solomon, besides a great part of the prophets. Fragments of poetry are also found in the historical books. (The form which biblical poetry takes is not of rhyme and metre

   the rhythm of quantity in the syllables

   as with us, but the rhythm of the thought

   there usually being two corresponding members to each distich or verse, which is called a parallelism. To some extent there is verbal rhythm. Sometimes there were alliterations, as in the 119th Psalm, which is divided up into sections, one for each letter of their alphabet, and each of the eight verses in a section begins with the same letter in the Hebrew; and chap. 31, vs. 10-31, of the book of Proverbs is an alphabetical acrostic in praise of "the virtuous woman." The poetry of the Hebrews, in its essential poetic nature, stands in the front rank. It abounds in metaphors and images and in high poetic feeling and fervor.

   ED.)