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tions upon this passage are somewhat different: I place them below, though nothing material can be said upon what is so exceeding trifling.

4. It may be questioned whether James be one of the five disciples there named: I shall therefore allege a passage of the Talmud where he is mentioned.

R. Akiba and Rabbi Eliezer are talking together. • b 6 Elieser says, O Akiba, you have brought something to my mind. As I was walking in the high street of Zipporis, I met one of the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth, whose name is James, a man of the town of Shecaniah. He said to me; in your law it is written, "Thou shalt not bring the hire of a harlot." Deut. 'xxiii. 18. I did not make him any answer. But he added, and said to me: Jesus of Nazareth taught me the meaning. "She gathered it of the hire of a harlot; and they shall return to the hire of a harlot." Mic. i. 7. "From an impure place they came, and to an impure place they ⚫ shall return." Which interpretation, (says Elieser,) did not displease me.'

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5. We will now observe some passages concerning our Saviour's last sufferings. Says Lightfoot upon Matt. xxvii. 31. These things are delivered in Sanhedrim [cap. vi. Hal. 4] of one that is guilty of stoning: If there be no defence found for him, they lead him ' out to be stoned, and a crier went out before him, saying aloud thus: N. N. comes out to be 'stoned, because he has done so and so. The witnesses against him are N. N. Whosoever can bring any thing in his defence let him come forth and produce it. On which thus the Gemara of Babylon. The tradition is that, on the evening of the Passover, Jesus was hanged, and that a crier went before him for forty days, making this proclamation: This man comes forth to be 'stoned, because he dealt in sorceries, and persuaded, and seduced Israel. Whosoever knows of any defence for him, let him come forth and produce it: but no defence could be found: there⚫fore they hanged him upon the evening of the Passover. Ulla saith his case seemed not to ⚫ admit of any defence, since he was a seducer, and of such God has said, "Thou shall not spare him nor conceal him:" Deut. xiii.

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There is another place relating to the same event, the death of our Saviour, to be taken from the Babylonian Talmud. The Mishna explaining Deut. xiii. and shewing who is the seducer there spoken of, says, Of all that are adjudged to die, to none of them are snares to be laid, excepting a seducer: for, if he has attempted two, and they bear testimony against him, he is to be stoned. Upon this it is said in the Gemara: Against none are snares to be laid, except against a seducer of the people; [meaning one who seduces to idolatry:] and that is done

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Apparet, ista huc tendere, quasi in viros illos, quorum nomina exprimuntur, ultimis pœnis fuerit animadversum ; etsi magis est ut credamus, ab otioso aliquo, et scripturæ dicta in lusum et jocum sic detorquente, delirantis ingenii ostentandi causâ, ineptias has esse confictas. Wagens. ib. p. 18.

In Tr. Avoda Sara. f. 16. 2. Tradiderunt Rabbini-Tum P. Eliazar. In memoriam mihi, O Akiba, revocâsti, aiebat, me aliquando spatiatum in foro superiori urbis Zipporis, obvium habuisse aliquem ex discipulis Jesu Nazareni, cui nomen erat Jacobus, civis Caphar, vel viri Saccaniensis, qui dicebat mihi: In Lege vestrâ scribitur: Non afferes mercedem meretricis Quo audito, nihil prorsus ei respondebam. Illo autem pergente mihi dicere: Sic docuit me Jesus Nazarenus. Si ex mercede meretriciâ, meretrix quid colligat, usque ad mercedem meretricis revertetur. Ex loco impuro si qua venerint, in locum impurum redibunt. Et profuit mihi verbum hoc operâ hujus-ap. Scheid. Loca Talmud. p. 5. 6. Et conf. Edzardi Avoda Sara. Vol. i. p. 130.

I shall here put an exact Latin version of the same. Tr. Sanhedrim. fol. 43, Mishna. Inventâ reæ partis innocentiâ, reus ille liber dimittitur. Sin minus, exit, ut lapidetur. Præco autem exit ante eum, his verbis proclamans: Vir iste N. N. Filius alicujus N. N. exit, ut lapidetur, quia transgressus est. talem transgressionem. Cujus rei testes sunt hi, N. N. et N. N. Quicumque noverit aliquid de ejus innocentiâ, veniat, ét doceat de eo. Postea in Gemarâ ad verba Mishnæ præco autem exit ante eum, &c. notatur. Atqui traditio est: Die Parasceves Sabbati suspenderunt Jesum, et præco exibat ante eum 40 diebus, his verbis prolatis proclamans: Exit ut lapidetur, quia magicas artes exercuit, seduxit, et impulit Israelitas. Quicumque ergo noverit aliquid de ejus innocentiâ, veniat, et

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doceat de eo. Cum autem nihil de ejus innocentiâ comprobandâ inveniri potuisset, suspenderunt eum die Parasceves Paschatis. Dixit Ula: Et putetur, quod filius versorum seu contrariorum innocentiæ ipse seductor est. Dixit autem Deus, Deut. xiii. 8. Non parces, neque teges super eo. Deut. xiii. 8. et Conf. 5. et 6. Scheid. Loca Talmud. p. 7. 8. Conf. Wag. Confut. T. I. p. 19.

d Sanhedrim. f. 67. 1. Mishna, de quo Deut. xiii. 6. Ex omnibus qui morti adjudicantur in Lege, nulli insidiæ collocantur, hoc excepto-Postea, in Gemarâ notatur: Ex omnibus, qui morti adjudicantur in Lege, nulli insidia collocantur, hoc excepto [seductori, qui alium ad idololatriam, et cultum alienum cupit seducere.] Quomodo faciunt id ei? Accendunt illi candelam in conclavi interiori, et testes collocant in cubiculo exteriori, ut hi ipsum videre, et vocem ejus audire possint. Sed ipse non videt illos. Tum ille, quem antea conatus erat seducere, dicit ei, Repete, quæso, id quod antehac dixisti hic privatim. Tum, si id dicat, hic regerit ei: Quomodo relinquemus Deum nostrum in cœlis, et serviemus idolis? Ad hoc si convertatur, pœnitentiâ actâ, bene est. Si vero dicat: hoc est officium nostrum, atque ita omnino decet nos facere, testes exterius audientes, eum ad domum judicii abducunt, et lapidant. [Conf. Schabbath. f. 104. 2.] sic fecerunt filio Stade [vel Stadtæ] in Lud, et suspenderunt eum in vesperâ Paschatis, seu pridie diei Paschatis. Filius Stadæ filius Pandiræ est. Dixit R. Chasda: Maritus seu procus matris ejus fuit Stada, iniens Pandiram-Maritus Paphus filius Judæ ipse est, mater ejus Stada, mater ejus Maria, plicatrix capillorum mulierum erat: sicut dicimus in Pompedita. Declinavit hæc a marito suo. Glossa: Ideo quia scortata hæc erat, vocabatur ita. Schedii Loca Talmud. p. 1. et 2.

⚫ after this manner. They light a candle in a closet or inner room, and place witnesses in another room, so that they may see him, and hear his voice, but he does not see them: there he, whom some time before he had endeavoured to seduce, (being with him,) says to him: Repeat to me now in private what you before said to me. If he then repeats it, the other says to him: • How can we leave our God who is in the heavens, and serve idols? If he then owns his fault and ' repents, all is well. But if he says: This is our duty, and so we ought to do; the witnesses who are in the outer room carry him to the house of judgment, and stone him. So they did to 'the son of Stada in Lud, and hanged him on the evening of the Passover. Rabbi Chasda said: • The son of Stada is the son of Pandira-His mother was Stada. She was Mary the plaiter of ' women's hair; as we say in Pompedita, she departed from her husband. In the Glos it is said: she was so called because she transgressed the laws of chastity.'

This is translated by Lightfoot upon Matt. xxvii. 56, p. 270, after this manner: They ⚫ stoned the son of Satda in Lydda, and hanged him up on the evening of the Passover. Now this son of Satda was son of Pandira. Indeed Rabbi Chasda said the husband [of his mother] was Satda, her husband was Pandira, her husband was Papus, the son of Juda. But yet I say his mother was Satda, namely Mary the plaiter of women's hair; as they say in Pombeditha, she departed from her husband.'

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In several other places of these Talmudical writers Mary is called a plaiter of women's hair,' as may be seen in Lightfoot, p. 270.* And from some things alleged just now it seems that thereby they denote a transgressor of the laws of purity. And we are led to think that by this description they intended to represent not her outward condition, but her moral character. Upon the two foregoing passages, relating to the event of our Saviour's death, we may now make some remarks.

First, it is here acknowledged that Jesus suffered death as a malefactor; and that he was put to death at the time of a Jewish Passover, or on the evening of it, as the expression is.

Secondly, but here are many great and notorious falsehoods. It is here said that Jesus was put to death at Lud: whereas it is certain that he suffered at Jerusalem. It is insinuated that he endeavoured to persuade men to forsake the true God, and worship false gods, and idols : another abominable falsehood. It is also insinuated that he carried on this evil design of seducing men from the worship of the true God in a clandestine manner; whereas nothing is more certain than that Jesus lived, and acted, and taught, publicly before all the world. Farther, it is intimated that, for many days before his death, proclamation was made, that any who could say any thing in his defence might appear and plead for him, but no defence was made. It is also said that he was put to death by stoning, and then hanged up: (which indeed was the usual method among the Jews, first to put criminals to death and then hang them up); but Jesus was crucified; and though the Jews were his prosecutors, he was condemned and put to death by a Roman magistrate.

It is truly surprising to see such falsities contrary to well known facts. For the sufferings of Jesus, and the circumstances of them, are recorded in the gospels, well known histories, written in a language which was then almost universal in Europe, Asia, and Africa. That Jesus was crucified at Jerusalem, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, under the emperor Tiberius, was in all Christian creeds, and attested by Roman authors of good credit, and indeed was well known to all Greeks and Romans in general. How then was it possible for the Jewish rabbins, whose testimonies are collected in their Talmuds, to speak in the manner which we have now seen? Perhaps it is not easy to be accounted for; but I apprehend the case to be this: The rabbins taught and wrote in a language little known to any in the fourth and fifth centuries but themselves, and the men of their own nation. Their people were ignorant, and they endeavoured to keep them so. Their people had a great respect for them, and so they presumed to say whatever they pleased.

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6. There seems to be in these writings an acknowledgment of the power of miracles in Jesus and his disciples. • In the Gemara, upon Avoda Sara, in Bereitha, it is said: No man may a Vid. et Scheid. Loca Talmud. p. 3.

b Similis locus habetur infra in Gemarâ, fol. 27. col. 2. med. Sed insto ego. In Bareitha docemur. Non conversabitur quisquam cum hæreticis, neque licet medicinam ab illis admittere, etsi morbus videatur ita desperatus, ut ægrotus non sit ultra unius horæ spatium superfuturus. Exstat quoque hujus rei exemplum in filio Dama, nepote R. Ismaëlis

ex sorore quem cum momordisset serpens, venit Jacobus Secaniensis ad sanandum ipsum. Sed non permisit ei R. Ismaël. Dicebat quidem filius Damæ ad, R. Ismaëlem: O Rabbi Ismaël frater, [i. e. cognate, avuncule,] mi! Sine ipsum, ut saner ab ipso. Afferam enim textum e Lege, qui id concedat. Sed nondum absolverat omnia, quæ constituerat dicere, cum jam efflaret animam, atque moreretur. Tum R. Ismaël se

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'converse with heretics, nor receive medicines from them, though the disease be mortal and desperate. Of this there is an example in the Son of Dama, nephew to R. Ishmael by his sister: When he had been bit by a serpent, James of Shechania [a disciple of Jesus] came to heal him; but R. Ishmael did not allow it to be done. The son of Dama said to R. Ishmael: ⚫ O Rabbi Ishmael, my uncle, let me be healed by him: I will allege a text out of the law which • allows of it. But before he had finished all he would say, he expired. Then Ishmael pronounced this speech over him: Thou art happy, O son of Dama: for thy body has remained pure, and thy soul also has gone pure out of it: and thou hast not transgressed the words of thy brethren.' This is supposed to be an acknowledgment of the power of working miracles in the name of Jesus, at the same time that it shews the virulent temper of the Jewish doctors against him and his disciples.

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There is another like instance alleged from the Jerusalem Talmud: A child of a son of Rabbi Joses, son of Levi, swallowed somewhat poisonous. There came a man who pronounced 'some words to him in the name of Jesus, son of Pandira, and he was healed. When he was 'going away, R. Joses said to him: What word did you use ?he answered, such a word. R. Joses said to him: Better had it been for him to die, than to hear such a word. And so it happened, that is, he instantly died.'

Another proof this of the power of miracles inherent in the disciples of Jesus, and at the same time a mark of the malignity of the Jewish rabbins.

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That passage I have transcribed as it is in the Pugio Fidei: I shall now put it down below as it stands in Edzardi Avoda zara.

7. It will certainly be worth the while to take a testimony from these writers to the destruction of Jerusalem, and the temple there. I shall therefore transcribe and translate almost word for word a long passage out of the Babylonian Talmud, in the title Gittin, chapter Hannisah. This is the tradition. Rabbi Elieser said: Go, and see how the blessed and holy God

quentem super ipsum conciunculam habuit. Beatus es, o fili Dama! quod corpus tuum manserit mundum, etiamque anima tuo corpore exierit munda, neque fueris transgressus verba sociorum tuorum, &c. Edzard. Advoda Sara. Vol. i. p. 312. Conf. Martini Pug. Fidei. P. 2. cap. 8. p. 289.

a Memorabile hujus rei exemplum occurrit Cod. Abhoda zara f. 27. 2. de R. Ismaële vetante aliquem sanari in nomine Jesu-Exemplo est B. Dama-Insignis sane historia, et præclarum veritatis Evangelicæ testimonium, ab ipsis Judæis dictum. J. Rhenferd. Diss. de Redemtione Marcosiorum et Heracleonit. sect. L. p. 215.

Item in lib. Sabbat Jerosolymitano, distinctione Shemona Scheratzin-Filius filii R. Jose filii Levi glutiverat toxicum scilicet, vel aliud morbiferum. Venit itaque vir quidam, et conjuravit ei in nomine Jesu Pandirini, et sanatus est, sive quievit. Cumque exivisset, ait, ei, quomodo conjurâstieum? Ait ei, tali verbo. Ait ei: Remissius fuisset ei, si mortuus fuisset, ut non audivisset verbum tale. Et factum est sic ei: id est, statim mortuus est. Pug. Fid. ib. p. 290.

Si quis diligenter advertat has duas traditiones, in nomine domini nostri Jesu Christi fuisse facta miracula Judaïcarum scripturarum testimonio comprobabit. Raym. Martin. ib.

Similis textus est in Talmude Hierosolymitano Avoda S. Fol. 40. 4. et Schabb. fol. 14. 4. med.-Nepos R. Josuæ filii Levi laborabat ab absorpto: [id est, diglutiverat aliquid, quod ipsi in gutture hærebat, et suffocationem minabatur.] Venitque quidam, qui illi clam insusurravit, [id est, jussit ipsum convalescere,] in nomine Jesu filii Pandiræ. Unde confestim respiravit. Quando autem egressus est inde, dixit ad eum R. Josua filius Levi. Quid insusurrâsti ei? Respondit ille, vocem hanc [i. e. nomen Jesu] Tum. R. Josua: Præstitisset ipsum fuisse mortuum, et non audivisse nomen illud. Atque hoc ipsum etiam ei [haud longe post] contigit. Edzard. Avoda zara. Vol. 2. p. 311, 312.

e Traditio est. Dixit R. Elieser: Exi, et vide quanta est virtus pudoris, quia ecce Deus Sanctus et Benedictus juvit Barkamtza, et destruxit domum suam, et exussit templum suum, et desolavit Jerusalem-Ivit Romam, et dixit Neroni Cæsari: Judæj rebellârunt contra te. Dixit ei: Quis dicit?

Dixit ei, Mitte illis sacrificium. Videbis, si illi offerent. Ivit filius Kamtza, et misit per manus ejus vitulam trimam. Ipse autem rediens impressit in eâ maculam in orâ labii ejus. Alii dicunt, quod in pupillâ oculi ejus maculam impressit : secundum aliquorum opinionem est macula, et secundum opinionem aliorum non est macula. Rabbini censebant itaque illam sacrificandam propter pacem regni. Dixit eis R. Zacharias filius Onkelos: dicetur, Maculata offeruntur super altare. Voluerunt occidere eum, ne iret, et diceret. Dixit eis R. Zacharias, dicent: Mittens maculam in Sanctuarium occidetur. Dixit R. Jochanan : Superstitio R. Zachariæ destruxit domum nostram, et combussit templum nostrum, et urbem nostram evertit, et fecit ut nos e terrâ nostrâ captivi duceremur. Misit itaque Bar-Kamtza super his ad Neronem Cæsarem. Quando venit, jecit sagittam ad orientem. Cecidit ad Jerusalem ad occidentem-Dixit puero. Lege mihi versum tuum. Dixit ei Ezech. xxv. 14.-Dixit Nero: Deus sanctus, benedictus, vult per me destruere domum suam. Misitque contra illos Vespasianum, qui venit, et obsedit Jerusalem tres annos, et dimidium. Interim venit nuntius ad eum, dicens illi: Surge, quia mortuus est Nero Cæsar, et consenserunt tibi optimates Romanorum, ut te constituant principem-Ivit, et misit Titum impium filium suum.. Hic est Titus impius, qui blasphemavit, et maledixit contra Justum, i. e. Deum. Quid fecit? Cepit meretricem in manu suâ, et ingressus in Sancta Sanctorum stravit librum legis, et transgressus est super illum transgressionem. Et accepit gladium, et dirupit vela, et factum est miraculum. Et fuit sanguis erumpens et exiens. Et putavit occidisse ipsam substantiam Dei sancti benedicti, i. e. ipsum Deum.-Quid fecit? Accepit vela, et fecit illa sicut saccum, et adduxit omnia vasa quæ erant in Sanctuario, et posuit illa in illo. Et collocavit illa in navi, ut iret, et gloriaretur in urbe suâ-Stetit contra Draco, vel tempestas, in mari, ut demergeret illum in mari. Dixit: Puto ego, quod Deus horum nullam habet potentiam nisi in Mari: Venit Pharao et submersit eum in mari. Stat etiam contra me, ut me submergat. Si fortis est, ascendat in siccam, et faciat bellum mecum. Exivit filia vocis, et dixit ei, Impie fili impii, fili filii impii Esau: Creatura vilis est mihi in mundo meo, et cu

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helped Bar-kamtza, and he destroyed his house, and burnt up his temple, and made Jerusalem ' desolate,' [Here is inserted an account of a trifling discourse and difference between some rabbins.] Whereupon he [Bar-kamtza] went to Rome, and said to the emperor Nero, The 'Jews have rebelled against thee. Who says this, said the emperor? Kamtza answered: Send 'to them a sacrifice; see if they will offer it. Bar-kamtza returned. Nero sent by him an heifer. three years old. old. As he was going he made a blemish in the mouth of it; others say in the pupil of its eye: according to the opinion of others it was no blemish. The rabbins therefore thought it ought to be offered for preserving the peace of the nation. But Rabbi Zacharias, son of Onkelos, said: Shall blemished sacrifices be offered upon the altar? He that brings • blemished sacrifices into the sanctuary ought to be put to death. R. Jochanan said: The superstition of R. Zacharias has destroyed our house, and burnt up our temple, and overthrown our city, and caused us to be led captive out of our land. Bar-kamtza therefore sent an account of these things to Nero-Nero said: The great and blessed God has determined by me to destroy his house. And he sent against them Vespasian, who came and besieged Jerusalem three years and a half. In the mean time there came a messenger to him, who 'said: Arise, for the emperor Nero is dead, and the nobles of the Romans have agreed to 'make thee emperor. He went and sent the impious Titus his son-This is the impious Titus, 'who blasphemed the Most High, even God himself. What did he do? He took a harlot into 'the holy of holies, and there lay with her: and he took a sword and cut the veils; at the same time there was a miracle, for blood burst out: he thought he had killed God himself-Well, what 'did he? He took the veils and made a sack of them, and put into it all the vessels of the 'sanctuary: and then put them in a ship, that he might go and triumph in his city...There stood against him a dragon, that he might drown him in the sea. He said, I think the God of these 'men has no power but in the sea. Pharaoh arose, and he drowned him in the sea. He has a

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'mind to destroy me in the like manner: if he has power, let him come upon the dry land and • make war with me. There went forth a voice and said to him: O impious son of the wicked 'man, O son of the impious son of Esau, there is a contemptible creature in my world, called a gnat: go upon the dry land, and you shall make war against it. God presently rebuked the and it was calm. He went out upon the dry land, and the gnat came, and entered into his nose, and gnawed his brain seven years, and killed him.'

sea,

J. De Voisin, in his notes upon this passage, particularly the last words of it, quotes some Jewish authors, who say, the story of the fly is not to be understood literally, but mystically, and allegorically, intending to insinuate in men's minds a persuasion of the power of God, and that he is able to abase those who rise up against him, and to punish the proudest of men by ⚫ very contemptible creatures.' Nor is it any wonder that some should be ashamed of this silly story of the fly getting up a man's nose, and dwelling there seven years. But men of true wisdom can find out more cleanly allegories than this, when they are disposed to make use of that kind of instruction.

Nor has Voisin alleged any Jewish authors, who condemn the horrible story of Titus defiling the sanctuary of the temple with lewdness: though Martini has alleged another Jewish writing. in great repute, where the same story is told with all the same horrible, or yet more horrible, circumstances of filthiness, if such there can be: nor is the concluding part of that narrative of the Talmud there omitted. But I presume the Divine Being never arms his feeble creatures to destroy or annoy men for no fault at all; for none, but such as are only imputed to them by those who give a loose to their tongues, to lie and calumniate as they please: for Titus, when he lex est nomen ejus. Ascende in siccam, et bellum contra illam geres. Statim innuit Deus mari, et quievit. Ascendit in siccam, et venit culex, et ingressus est in nasum ejus, et perforavit illi cerebrum septem annis, et occidit illum. Ex libro Gittin. capite Hannisakin. ap. R. Martin. Pug. Fid. P. 3. cap. xxi. p. 703, 704.

Alii asserunt illud de culice, sive muscâ ejusmodi, non juxta literalem sensum intelligendum esse, sed sensum habere mysticum-Itaque poteris de historiâ Titi libere pronuntiare, quod narratio ejus nihil aliud sit, quam inventio, sive fabula, atque modus doctrinæ usitatus apud eruditos ad stabiliendum in corde plebis, quod magnus est Dominus noster, et potentissimus, ad retribuendum illis qui contra ipsum insurgunt; sed in primis ad puniendum superbos etiam per minimam creatu-. ram. Ap. Pugion. Fid. p. 714.

b Hucusque Talmud. Legitur quoque in Midrash Kohelet super illud Eccles. cap. v. 8.-Dixit Deus sanctus benedictus: Prophetis: Quid vos putatis, quod si vos non eatis in missio-nem meam, non sit mihi alius nuntius? In omni ego do missionem vel legationem meam, etiam per serpentem, vel scorpium, vel culicem, vel ranam. Titus impius ingressus est in. Sancta Sanctorum, quando destruxit domum Sanctuarii, et gladius ejus districtus in manu suâ, et dirupit duo vela, et accepit duas meretrices in manu illarum, et coivit cum illis, cum unâ super altare, cum alterâ super librum legis, et exivit et gladius ejus plenus sanguine. Et incepit blasphemare, et exsecrari. Quid fecit? Collegit omnia vasa Sanctuarii, et posuit illa in sacco, et descendit ad navem. Et reliqua, sicut modo ex Talmude citata sunt. Ibid. p. 704, 705..

went into the temple at Jerusalem all in flames, neither committed lewdness there, nor did he blaspheme the Deity.

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Behold then the temper, the incorrigible temper, of the Jewish people, and their rabbins, the Talmudical writers. Their temple had been burnt up, their city destroyed, their land laid waste, and they carried into captivity: but, instead of repenting, they revile him who, under God, had been the instrument of their chastisement; a prince, who, as good authority says, was as remarkable for the humanity, the compassion, and equity, in his manner of subduing them, as for his military skill and courage. Who then are the men who exalt themselves against God? But I may no longer indulge myself in such reflections as these. Let us attend for our own benefit. Here is a testimony to the destruction of Jerusalem from Talmudical writers: they agree very much with Josephus in their account of the origin of the war. He says that ⚫ Eleazar, then captain at the temple, persuaded those who officiated in sacred things, not to accept the 'gift or sacrifice of a stranger: which was the occasion of the war.' The Talmudists say the same thing in different words, after their manner. According to this account also, the war broke out near the end of the reign of Nero, who sent Vespasian general into Judea. Whilst Vespasian was there, carrying on the war, Nero died, and he was chosen to succeed him. When he was chosen emperor at Rome, he sent Titus to carry on the war in Judea: the issue of which was, that the temple was burnt up, their city destroyed, and their whole government overthrown, and they carried into captivity. Moreover, as they here own, Titus was in possession of the veils and sacred vessels of the temple which he took with him to adorn his triumph at Rome. All this (though they relate not particularly the distresses of the siege of Jerusalem) is said, not very differently from Josephus, and more agreeably to him in some respects, than by Josippon, who afterwards wrote at length the history of the war, as we shall see by and by.

CHAP. VI.

JOSEPH BEN GORION, OR JOSIPPON.

I. His age, work, and character. II. Extracts from his work; shewing his history of the Jewish war with the Romans, and the destruction of Jerusalem. III. Concluding remarks.

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I. We are now coming to an author of a very extraordinary, or even a singular, character, writer of The Jewish History in six books, who styles himself Josippon, or Joseph Ben Gorion. He had a very high opinion of himself, and has now been for some while in great reputation with the learned men of the Jewish nation.

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At the beginning of the thirty-sixth chapter, which is the first chapter of the fifth book, he writes: So says Joseph Ben Gorion the priest, who has written the things which have happened to Israel, and his calamities, to be a memorial and instruction to his posterity-From this day, and henceforward, this book is to be a testimony to other writers who shall come after me and ' attempt to write of the same things, and shall allege proofs of what they write. For they will say: So and so has recorded Joseph the priest, who is the prince of all writers, who have 'published books among the people of Israel, excepting only the writers of the four and twenty 'sacred books."'

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And indeed so it has happened. For Rabbi Tham, who published this work in the Hebrew original at Constantinople in the year 1510, and made another edition of it at Venice in 1544, says of it in his preface: Although this book resembles other books in some respects, it is

a De B. J. 1. 2. cap. 17. sect. 2. p. 192.

d

↳ Josippon, sive Josephi Ben-Gorionis Historia Judaïcæ libri sex. Ex Hebræo vertit, Præfatione et Notis illustravit Joannes Gagnier. A. M. Oxon. 1706, 4to.

Sic ait Joseph Ben Gorion Sacerdos, qui rerum historiam texuit, quæ contigerunt Israëli, et calamitatem ejus, ut sit memoria earum in documentum, et eruditionem posteris ejus.

Hic autem liber ab hac die, et deinceps futurus est in tes

timonium cæteris scriptoribus, qui post me venturi sunt, et aggredientur scribere, et testimonia allegare. Dicent enim: Sic et sic memoriæ prodidit Joseph Sacerdos, qui est princeps scriptorum omnium, qui libros ediderunt, quotquot reperti sunt in Israel, exceptis quidem scriptoribus quatuor et viginti librorum Sanctorum. lib 5 c. 36, p. 170.

Quamvis autem hic liber cum cæteris libris in genere conveniat, tamen ratione argumenti plurimum ab eis differt.

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