of the land of Egypt), signifying a division, a province, means, I. dominion, or power (Rom. vii. 2; comp. 1 Corinthians vii. 39); II. precept, or principle (Gal. vi. 2); III. command, as giving a rule of life (Rom. iv. 15; vii. 8, 9); IV. generally an order or manner of conduct (Phil. iii. 5. Acts xxii. 3); V. civil statutes or institutions (John vii. 51. Acts xxiii. 3); VI. the Mosaic polity, the 'law of works,' in contradistinction to Christianity, the law of faith' (Rom. iii. 27; comp. ix. 31); VII. the law of Moses considered in relation to certain requirements (Luke ii. 22. John vii. 23); VIII. the laws of Moses in general (Matt. xxiii. 23. Acts vi. 13; xv. 24). Those under the law' are Jews (1 Cor. ix. 20; comp. Rom. ii. 12; iv. 14). The passage in Gal. ii. 19 seems to mean that Paul, in virtue of the divine ordination ('law') respecting the salvation of the Gentiles, had bidden farewell to the law (of Moses). Compare Rom. vii. 6, where read with the margin, Griesbach and Tischendorf, 'being dead to that' (vi. 2). In the epistle to the Romans, as well as in that to the Galatians, care must be taken to discriminate the exact meaning of law, which signifies the entire Mosaic economy (Rom. iii. 28. Gal. ii. 16)-or some part of that system, its promises, its threateningsor God's natural laws considered as promulgated in the law of Moses (Rom. ii. 14, 15, 25-27; iii. 31; xiii. 8, 10. Galatians v. 4); whence the law' means, the law viewed as published by Moses, and in its moral relations (Rom. iii. 19; v. 13. Gal. iii. 2-24).

The law,' by the figure which puts the contained for the container, also signifies the book of the law, the Scriptures of the Old Testament, or the Pentateuch (Matt. xii. 5. Luke x. 26. John viii. 17. 1 Cor. xiv. 21. Gal. iii. 10). Reference is probably made to tradition in 1 Cor. xiv. 34.

The law was in the days of the apostles read in the synagogues (Acts xiii. 15). The custom arose 150 years before the birth of Christ. It was read in portions, or divisions, ascribed to Ezra. The five books of Moses, termed the Law, were divided into 54 chapters; so that on each sabbath of the (lunar) year one portion might be read. When the year contained less than 54 weeks, two or more portions were read together. When Antiochus Epiphanes burnt 'the law' and forbad its being read, the Jews chose portions from the prophets, which in sense corresponded with those of the Pentateuch, and these they read in the synagogues. When they were again allowed to read the law, they continued to read also the prophetic portions. A portion or chapter of the kind was termed hapthare, or dismissal, because when the reading was terminated the congregation was dismissed, unless any member of the synagogue arose and delivered an address. This exception explains the question of the rulers of the

synagogue made in the verse referred to

above.

The Roman law, as being that of the military superiors of Judea, was more or less introduced into the usages and language of the people and the practice of the courts. In Matt. v. 25, the words refer to a legal usage among the Romans. Parties among them suing each other at law might, on their way to the tribunal, come to a good understanding If this was not effected, the accuser required the accused to go with him before the Prætor. Should the latter refuse, the former, calling in a witness, might enforce compliance (comp. Matthew xviii. 28). Still, should the accused, while on the way, effect an accommodation, the matter was terminated. Comp. Luke xii. 58.

LAZARUS, an abridged and Grecised form of the Hebrew Eleazar, is the name under which Jesus spoke of the beggar (hence lazaretto) whom, in his parable, he set in contrast with the rich man that fared sumptuously every day (Luke xvi. 19, seq.). The latter denotes the Jews, the former the despised and hated Gentiles. There is no reason to suppose, with some, that a real person, by name Lazarus, formed the subject of our Lord's brief discourse. Probably, the heathen form of the name Lazarus may have suggested it as the denomination of the representative of the Gentile world, while there is much skill and delicate feeling manifested in Christ's avoiding to mention his fellowcountrymen by name as those intended under the general description of the rich man.'

Of course, as this parable was intended to operate immediately on the minds of Jews, its imagery and forms of thought are such as they were familiar with. It is characteristic of the universal spirit of the gospel of Luke, that he alone of the evangelists has recorded this parable.

LAZARUS was also the name of the friend of Jesus (John xi. 3), the brother of Mary and her sister Martha, of Bethany, in whose abode the Saviour appears to have found a home, whom he raised to life after he had been dead four days, and whom, as being by his very existence a visible and resistless proof of the divine power of Jesus, the Jewish authorities, in their insane and inveterate hatred, contemplated putting to death. In the defectiveness of our narratives we are unable to say whether those enemies of the gospel were deterred by a fear of thereby giving a fresh impulse to the already too prosperous cause of Christ; and are equally deprived of the means for determining how Lazarus acted in the woful tragedy through which his friend and benefactor passed, partly as a consequence of the benefit conferred on himself. According to an ancient tradition, Lazarus lived thirty years after his restoration, being then thirty years of age. With this stands in opposition the Western legend,

that Lazarus, with Martha, proceeded into France, and preached the gospel at Marseilles.

The tomb of Lazarus is shewn on the edge of the village of Bethany. It is not easy to determine whether this is a natural cave, remodelled by human labour, or wholly an artificial excavation; most probably, the former. The entrance is about three and a half feet high, and two feet wide, immediately after which a descent is made, by twenty-seven stone steps, into a dark room about nine feet square. In its sides are four niches for the reception of bodies, and there is one fractured sarcophagus. Three more steps lead through an excavated passage into an arched chamber eight feet square by nine in height. This might readily be taken for an ancient Jewish tomb, which it sufficiently resembles in its form and construction. If this is indeed the sepulchre of Lazarus, which there seems good reason for doubting, his body probably rested in the particular apartment just described; the first room, with its niches, serving the double purpose of a family sepulchre and of an ante-chamber to the second, after the style which prevails in several apartments of the tombs of the kings north of Jerusalem. The possession of such a sepulchre supposes the possession of considerable wealth by Lazarus and his family. That they were rich we should naturally infer from several facts mentioned by the evangelists. They extended a liberal, and what, upon the whole, must have been an expensive, hospitality to Christ and his numerous retinue of disciples, who seem often to have retired to the bosom of this friendly family for repose and social enjoyment. The box of very precious ointment which was poured upon our Saviour's head in Simon's house, and which called forth the rebuke of Judas, was an offering from Mary, the sister of Lazarus. The large concourse of Jews who, upon the death of Lazarus, resorted to Bethany to sympathise with the bereaved, is a sufficient proof that it was a family of note and substance.

We may mention as an illustration of the tomb of Lazarus, one still found on the base of the mountain on the western side of the sea of Tiberias. It is approached through a cut in the rock leading to a semicircular recess, in the rear of which a square entrance opens into an arched chamber. Here are three sarcophagi on the right, with as many on the left, hewn in the rock on a level with the floor, and entered by small square doors

We have entered into these particulars the rather because, while illustrating the general subject of Jewish sepulchres, they serve to show how utterly improbable is the supposition which, in order to escape from the fact of a miracle having been performed in the raising of Lazarus, makes him to have been revived from a swoon or a sickness,

mistaken for death (comp. xii. 1), under the effects of aromatics employed at his burial, and the repose and fresh air of the grotto in which he was laid To say nothing of the obvious unlikelihood that his loving sisters should, through mistake, have interred their brother alive; to say nothing of the cramping and benumbing effects on a sick person of the swathing bands of death; omitting to urge that the taled, or head-cloth, in which it was customary to envelop the head and face (xi. 44; see also i. 215), could not have failed to cause suffocation, if life were not already extinct, - -we find in the account above given of the structure of the tomb, reason sufficient to deny that any reviving virtue could be found in that abode of death, the narrowness of whose space and the dampness of whose air would combine with the overpowering odour of the strong perfumes, rather to extinguish any remaining spark of life than give to its tenant the power requisite of himself to burst the bars of his prison, and come forth' up into the eye of day. It is needless to add, that when he did appear, Lazarus was still enveloped in his grave-clothes' (44); because the hypothesis is constructed with an entire disre gard of the recorded facts. We think it both more easy and more ingenuous to reject the whole narrative at once, than thus to attempt an explanation, on what are called purely natural grounds, of what the narrator obvi ously regarded, and intended to set forth, as a wonderful instance of the exercise of God's power in and on behalf of his Son.

This prodigy was wrought by our Lord with a view to create in its spectators a belief in him as the special Messenger of God (42). With this view our Lord, by an express act of prayer, connected the performance of the miracle with the exertion of his heavenly Father's power (42). Take the appeal thus made in conjunction with the character and mission of Christ, and the argument was unexceptionable and convincing. Stated in general terms, the argument was this-the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, attests the divine mission of Jesus, who goes about doing good, by empowering him to raise his friend from the dead. For those to whom the appeal was made we can see no ground of objection. They held that God had of old wrought miracles for his own good purposes; they held that he would enable the Messiah to work miracles; they had strong presumptions in his life and doctrine that Jesus was the Christ; and therefore, when they saw him at a word restore Lazarus to life, with the supplicated and avowed aid of God, they had every reason for believing that God had sent him. Many did so believe. That others were only made active in their hostility to Jesus, is only one among many painful evidences of the blinding efficacy of a wicked heart. The fact that

many did believe rests not merely on the statement of the historian (45), but is traceable in minor incidents found in his narrative (xi. 53, seq.; xii. 1—19). Indeed, the miracle is the point of transition to the great events recorded after it in John's Gospel, all of which more or less immediately depend on this cardinal transaction.

The faith of the spectators of the miracle becomes a source, and a valid source, of conviction to men of later times; for we are thus supplied with a sufficient cause of the recorded events which, without this miracle and others, would appear sometimes unlikely and at others impossible. And while we are thus of necessity carried back to the belief of the first disciples as the inspiring cause of their indomitable and all-conquer ing zeal, we see also that their convictions were founded on grounds which, at least to them, were perfectly valid and satisfactory. As to the evidence of miracle in the abstract, then will it be time enough to discuss the matter, when an abstract miracle shall have been, we do not say performed, but intelligibly defined. With such mere notions, however, the Scripture has nothing to do.

In a necropolis in the valley of Hinnom, Kraft investigated tombs which throw light on the subject. In the rock is one which is entered by an ornamented opening, the upper half of which is still covered by a stone door. This door is on the upper part fixed by two hinges in corresponding holes in the two sides, and below is fastened on the door-jambs. The grave was opened by raising the stone from below. Another mode of securing the tomb, was by a bar of wood which ran across a stone rolled up to the mouth of the cave, and was fixed in the side walls. This explains the form and the sealing of our Lord's tomb (Matt. xxvii. 66). The seal was applied at the point where the beam fastened into the rock. The interior of the half-closed tomb mentioned above is richly adorned, and still presents a good specimen of the formation of a Jewish sepulchre hewn out in the rock' (60). Through the opening you enter a vaulted chamber twelve feet square, with half-columns cut out of the side walls, the capitals of which are very simple. On the right and the left of these columns are small chambers, or niches, holding each a sarcophagus cut out of the living rock. Opposite the entrance is a second door, which leads to inner chambers, in which are sarcophagi, or niches in the sides, into which corpses were put. These details correspond with those given in the Talmud respecting Jewish rock-tombs.

LEAVEN (L. levo, 'I raise'), so called from its raising' the dough and so making the bread light,' the original of which is not incorrectly translated by Wickliff, sourdow' (so in German, sauerteig), represents Hebrew terms which signify to be 'sour' and

'sharp'as a natural consequence of fermentation. That the Egyptians were acquainted with the operation and effects of yeast, seems probable in itself, and from the high loaves that are seen on the monuments. The Hebrews were at an early period familiar with leaven, which they commonly prepared from the dregs of wine or from must, or from dough allowed to remain in water some days. When in haste, they baked their bread without yeast (Gen. xix. 3. Judg. vi. 19). as is at present done among the Bedouins. In this fact lies the reason of the law which commanded the Passover to be celebrated with unleavened bread; which thus became a perpetual symbol of the haste with which the nation had quitted Egypt (comp. Exod. xii. 9, 11, 14). According to the law, for seven days unleavened bread was to be eaten (15. Deut. xvi. 15; comp. 1 Cor. v. 7); and, in obedience to later authorities, in the night before the 14th Nisan, great care was taken in every house to remove from it every portion of leaven, which, when found, was com. monly burnt. No meat-offering was to be made with leaven, which was not to be burnt in any offering (Lev. ii. 11). This disallowal may have been derived from the idea that fermentation is a process involving destruction. On the contrary, at Pentecost the loaves, which represented ordinary human food, were to be made with leaven, as being probably conducive to digestion and health (Lev. xxiii. 17). The bread which was offered with thank-offerings was also leavened (Lev. vii. 13).

LEBANON (H. white), a much celebrated mountain in Syria, which, springing from the Taurus, runs southward, and having in its more imposing masses formed the northern boundary of Palestine, sinks down into the lower hills which, dividing, constitute the valley of the Jordan and the ridges of Judea, and then rise as they go until they reach the elevation of the mountains at the southern extremity of the peninsula of Sinai. Lebanon, viewed in itself, consists of two parallel ranges, divided by a wide vale, called Cole-Syria, or Bekan. Of these two, the western was specially denominated Lebanon by the Greeks, while its opposite received the name of Anti-Lebanon. This distinction was unknown to the Hebrews, with whom Lebanon stands for the mountain in general, or rather the southern extremity of Auti-Lebanon, which runs down to Tyre, and with which, as forming a part of their country, the Hebrews were acquainted. The mountain throws out also an eastern arm, which forms Hermon and gives rise to the Jordan. Lebanon consists chiefly of limestone, to whose white summits, as much as to the highest of them being covered with perpetual snow, it owes its appellation, Lebanon, or the white mountain.

Varying in elevation, it reaches to the

height of 10,200 feet. The entire district is steep and full of cliffs and precipices:

LEBANON IN THE DISTANCE.

the eastern border is unfruitful; the western admits of culture. On the contrary, in the Anti-Lebanon range, the eastern is fertile, the western barren. The ranges present their bare sides to each other, so that the valley which they form is bordered by desert uplands. The only considerable rivers are the Jordan and the Orontes. In general, Lebanon, compared with other high lands, is poor in water, for from eight to nine months in the year no rain falls. This fact may in part be ascribed to the general absence of trees. The ancient wealth which Lebanon possessed in cedar and other trees has long disappeared. All that remain form a wood of about a mile in circuit (see CEDAR). The chief products of the district now are silk, tobacco, oil, cotton, and wine (Hos. xiv. 7). One species, namely, its so-called gold wine, is highly valued among the Christians of Syria. The present population of the district amounts to 1,400,000.

In ancient times, Lebanon, being well covered with trees, of which some were odoriferous, was famed for its grateful perfumes, as well as its vegetable riches, and the streams of water which it sent from its western sides into the sea (Cant. iv. 11, 14, 15. Hos. xiv. 7,8).

By the valley of Lebanon' (Josh. xi. 17), Cole-Syria is hardly meant, but some vale running from the mountain southwards into Palestine, perhaps that in which Banias (Dan) lay. The wood of Lebanon' (Cant. iii. 9) has been said to be cedar; but Lebanon produced trees of various kinds, and it is not easy now to determine to which of these this distinctive appellation was applied.

LEBANON.

LEECH, or HORSELEECH, mentioned only once in the Bible (Prov. xxx. 15), is a small water serpent, noted for its thirst for blood (whence, probably, the name, from a root denoting earnest desire; comp. lecherous, lickerish, L. ligurius). Its Hebrew original, galovkah, whose root-form has the two essential letters and k, of the words above given, has passed through the Arabic into the word 'ghoule, a fabulous female monster delighting in destroying men, disinterring dead bodies, and dealing in tragical rites;a blood-sucker, a vampire. Appropriately is the leech, whose two daughters show how insatiable they are by always crying 'Give, give!' set at the head of the four things that are never satisfied (15). In the galovkah of Proverbs, Herder saw the Destiny of oriental fable, which, like 'hell and destruction' (xxvii. 20), is 'never full.'

In Syria, brooks and basins of fountains abound with leeches, which often cause men and horses great annoyance by getting into their mouths. When a horse is the sufferer, the leech fixes itself in the soft parts of the

inner mouth, and remains there some days before it becomes swelled to a size sufficient for its detection and retraction. The accident is sometimes very injurious to human beings. Many of Bonaparte's soldiers in Egypt were bled into a consumption by leeches taken into the mouth with their drink. The Arabs, when they have a doubt, strain the water.

LEES (G. liegen, F. lie), that which lies or is at the bottom, sediment (L. sedeo, I sit'), stands for the Hebrew shmareem, which, from a root having the idea of thickness, is translated also 'dregs' (Ps. lxxv. 8). 'Wine on the lees,' in Is. xxv. 6, signifies clarified wine, having the rich flavour and odour (Jer. xlviii. 11) of the fruit extracted by a slow process, in remaining in contact with the sediment deposited during fermentation. In order to promote clarification, wine was passed from vessel to vessel. The omission of this process caused the liquor to be thick and heavy. Hence to be settled (thickened or curdled) on the lees,' meaus to be stupid and indocile (Jer. xlviii. 11. Zeph. i. 12).

LEGION (L.), a body of Roman soldiers consisting of from three to six thousand and more men (see CENTURION); hence a large, indefinite number (Mark v. 9. Luke viii. 30; comp. Matt. xxvi. 53). This is one of those Latin words which, agreeably to the written history of the times, show that Judea was in the days of our Lord under the foreign yoke of the Romans. How deeply imprinted on the popular mind that galling burden was, appears from the fact, that (and in the text cited above) the Gadarene maniac employed this military Roman term. His doing so also aids us to see that his notions on demoniacal possession were of an impure, earthly origin.

LENDING (T., connected with loan, G. darlehn) was enjoined on the Israelites as a duty which they owed to their needy brethren, from whom they were not allowed to take interest, though they might take interest from foreigners (Deut. xv. 7, 8. Exod. xxii. 25. Ps. xxxvii. 26). In degenerate times, usury was taken (Ps. xv. 5) and severely condemned (Prov. xxviii. 8. Ezek. xviii. 8. Jer. xv. 10). In its condemnation we see reason to think that the laws of Moses on this point were not totally neglected, since their influence is traceable in the moral sense of the nation. Pledges might be taken, but were to be restored (Ezek. xviii. 7), and should not consist of the widow's ox (Job xxiv. 3) or the hand-mill (Deut. xxiv. 6); and if the large cloak that enveloped the body, and sometimes was the only article of dress, were taken, it was to be returned before night, when it would be specially needed (Exod. xxii. 26, 27. Deut. xxiv. 12, 13). In the latter passage, rudeness and force in obtaining the restoration of the

loan are strictly forbidden. In the sabbath year, hence called 'the year of release,' debts and mortgages were to be universally given up (Lev. xxv. 25, seq. Deut. xv. 1, seq.), when an Israelite who had sold himself to a brother was to be set at liberty (Exod. xxi. 2. Lev. xxv. 2, seq.). It was, however, expressly forbidden to compel a creditor to serve as a bond-servant (Lev. xxv. 39). Yet the law appears to have been broken (2 Kings iv. 1), and in later periods oppression on the part of the creditor was not uncommon (Is. 1. 1. Neh. v. 8. Matt. xviii. 25); and under the Romans, the rigour which marked their own code, and which more than once brought their state to the brink of ruin, seems to have intruded itself into the usages of the Jews (Matt. v. 26; xviii. 30). In relation both to this severity and to the Mosaic requirement that an Israelite should lend to a brother without interest, our Lord, as a part of his general code of benevolence by which he completed the law, commanded his disciples to lend to the indigent, whatever their country, hoping for nothing again' (Luke vi. 34, 35).

The ordinances of Moses in regard to loans must be viewed in their connection with his agrarian laws, which, making God the sole owner of the land, imposed as of right such burdens on its possessors as seemed good to him for the promotion of the general welfare, the support of an approach to equality of social condition, and the particular benefit of the ordinarily neglected class, the poor and indigent. Loans might the more readily and safely be made where in general they were sure to come back in a few years. The system was in accordance with the general tenor and aims of the Mosaic polity. It manifested special care towards those who were most in need of care. It tended to restrain the Hebrews from trade with foreigners and keep them an agricultural people. It prevented gorgeous wealth and abject poverty-the two great evils of our present social conditionevils which are full of danger. The particular requirements of the Mosaic law are not binding on Christians, but they may learn from them a lesson of benevolence. The present disposition of landed property, founded solely on the right of conquest, needs mitigation by virtue of the influence of high moral considerations, which political economy cannot, and popular systems of religion will not, furnish. Money is indeed property, and for its use those who own it may legitimately claim a fair return. But the wealth, not the labour, of a country, should be made to bear its burdens. Were this the case, the indigence which leads to borrowing would, under a good system of education, disappear. Meanwhile, most needful is it that the iron rigidness of our present