By the Acts of David I understand here the two books of Samuel, or at the least the second book. Out of the Acts of the Kings, written from time to time by the prophets, he composed the books of the Kings of Judah and Israel, the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah, and the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. And in doing this he joined those Acts together, in due order of time, copying the very words of the authors, as is manifest from hence, that the books of the Kings and Chronicles frequently agree with one another in words for many sentences together. Where they agree in sense, there they agree in words also.
So the Prophecies of Isaiah, written at several times, he has collected into one body. And the like he did for those of Jeremiah, and the rest of the Prophets, down to the days of the second Temple. The book of Jonah is the history of Jonah written by another hand. The book of Daniel is a collection of papers written at several times. The six last chapters contain Prophecies written at several times by Daniel himself; the six first are a collection of historical papers written by others. The fourth chapter is a decree of Nebuchadnezzar. The first chapter was written after Daniel’s death: for the author saith, that Daniel continued to the first year of Cyrus; that is, to his first year over the Persians and Medes, and the third year over Babylon. And, for the same reason, the fifth and sixth chapters were also written after his death. For they end with these words: So this Daniel prospered in the reign of Darius, and in the reign of Cyrus the Persian.
Yet these words might be added by the collector of the papers, whom I take to be Ezra.
The Psalms composed by Moses, David, and others, seem to have been also collected by Ezra into one volume. I reckon him the collector, because in this collection I meet with Psalms as late as the Babylonian captivity, but with none later.
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