2. Again, we are told in Scripture, that when the Cutheans, or Samaritans, heard that the Jews, who were returned from the Captivity, were rebuilding the Temple, they came and desired to be partners in the work, and joint Worshippers of the God for whom it was erected; to which the Jews gave this round reply: You have nothing to do with us, to build an House unto our God, but we ourselves together will build unto the Lord God of Israel, as King Cyrus the King of Persia hath commanded us*. And Nehemiah, on the same occasion, gave them a still rougher answer: The God of Heaven he will prosper us, therefore we his Servants will arise and build: but you have no Portion, nor Right, nor Memorial in Jerusalem†. This was a tender place: it was touching upon the very sore, in an express declaration of the Unsociableness complained of. The story therefore, we may be sure, was to be softened before the Gentiles were to be intrusted with it. Accordingly, Josephus makes them speak in these obliging terms: That they could not possibly admit them as partners in the work; for that the command to build the Temple was directed to them first by Cyrus, and now by Darius: That indeed they were at liberty to worship along with them; and that this was the only Community, in religious matters, that they could enter into with them, and which they would do with as many of the rest of Mankind, as were willing to come up to the Temple to adore the God of Heavent. The reason the Scripture Jews give for the refusal of the offer to be joint partners with them in their work and * Ezra iv. 3. 66 + Neh. ii. 20. ἔφασαν, “ τῆς μὲν οἰκοδομίας αὐτὲς ἀδύνατον εἶναι κοινωνεῖν, αὐτῶν προσαχθέντων κατασκευάσαι τὸν ναὸν, πρότερον μὲν ὑπὸ Κύρε, νῦν δὲ ὑπὸ Δαρείο προσκυνεῖν δὲ αὐτοῖς ἐφιέναι. καὶ τᾶτο μόνον εἶναι κοινὸν, εἰ βέλονται, πρὸς αὐτὸς καὶ πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις, ἀφικνυμένοις εἰς τὸ ἱερὸν σέβειν τὸν Θεόν. Vol. i. p. 556. worship, is, that it was a Temple built in the Land of Israel, and to the honour of the God of Israel. The reason Josephus's Jews give for their refusal, is, obedience to the King of Persia: else, as for community of worship, they were very ready to receive them. And now was not that a wise project* which proposed reforming the sacred Text by the Writings of Josephus? But this Explanation will enable us to conclude with certainty against that spurious passage concerning CHRIST. I think I have already offered one demonstrative argument against it. And I suppose, the many marks of forgery are so glaring, that most men would be willing to give it up, were Josephus's silence on so extraordinary an occasion but easy to be accounted for. Now we have so far laid open his conduct, as to see, that the preaching up of CHRIST was an affair he would studiously decline. His great point, as we observed, was to reconcile the Gentiles to his Countrymen. But the Pagan aversion was greatly increased by the new Sect of Christians, sprung, as was well known, from the Country of Judea. It was therefore utterly destructive of his purpose to shew, as he must have done, in giving them an account of CHRIST, the close connexion between the two Religions. Of all dangerous subjects, therefore, Josephus would be careful to avoid this. So that "La plus forte preuve qu'on ait, pour soutenir que le passage en question, où il est parlé de JESUS CHRIST, est de Joseph, c'est qu'il n'est pas croyable, qu'il n'ait rien dit de JESUS CHRIST. Photius fournit une réponse a ce raisonnement, en parlant de Juste de Tiberide, qui a ecrit l'Histoire des Juifs en Grec, et qui vivoit du tems de Joseph, avec qui il a eû de grands demelez. Juste de Tiberide, dit Photius n'a point parlé de JESUS CHRIST parce qu'il etoit Juif de Nation et de Religion." P. Simon, Bibl. Crit. vol. ii. pag. 41. (certain (certain as I am of the Writer's purpose, and not ignorant of the liberty he took with the sacred Records, when it served his ends, of adding and omitting at pleasure) I should have been as much surprised to have found the History of JESUS in his Works, as others are to be told that it is not there. This too will equally well account for his omission of Herod's slaughter of the children at Bethlehem, which Scaliger so much wondered at *; which Collins so much triumphed in †; and for the sake of which, our Whitby seemed ready to give up the truth of the story. Thus did this excellent Writer, out of extreme love to his Country (the most pardonable however of all human frailties) make too free with Truth and Scripture; though most zealously attached to the Religion of his Forefathers: as those Men generally are who love their Country best. And a Jew he strictly was, of a very different Stamp too, from that poor paltry Mimic of the Greek Sophists, Philo§. Of whom his Master Plato would have said, what Josephus tells us Aristotle did say, of one of his Jewish Acquaintance, A GREEK HE WAS, AND NOT IN SPEECH ONLY, BUT IN SOUL LIKEWISE. I judged it of importance to set this matter in a true light: Because many, I supposed, would think it a fair prejudice against the Divinity of the Mosaic Religion, had a person so eminent amongst his Coun Animad. in Chron. Eusebii. + Scheme of literal Prophecy considered. Comment on the New Testament. Philo, in his life of Moses, brings in the Egyptian Priests reasoning on the Platonic principles, concerning the soul that informed Moses's body; which is altogether as well judged, as if a modern Writer of the Life of Ptolemy the Astronomer should bring him in explaining Sir Isaac Newton's Principia. · || Ελληνικὸς ἦν, ὁ τῇ διαλέκτῳ μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ τῇ ΨΥΧΗ trymen while the Republic was yet existing, and of so learned an age; so conversant in the Jewish Records, and so skilled in the best Grecian Literature; had such a one afforded only a political or philosophic Faith to the sacred Volumes. But then it will follow on the other hand, that the sincere Belief of one, so circumstanced, will be as fair a prejudice in its favour. Not that I am over fond of this kind of evidence, in matters where every one is obliged to judge for himself; and consequently, where every one, on a due application to the subject, is capable of judging. Much less would I lay great weight on the opinions of Men out of their own Profession, however eminent in any other. What is it to Truth, for instance, what a Courtier judges of a Church; a Politician of Con→ science; or a Geometer, grown grey in Demonstration, of moral Evidence? To go on : MIRACLES, therefore, as they are recorded to be continued through so large a period of this Republic, I give for one proof that the Scriptures have represented the Israelites as living under an extraordinary Providence. I say, as they are recorded to be so continued: For when miracles are only given at the first propagation of a Religion (as of the Christian), they are to be no otherwise esteemed of, than as the Credentials of a new Revelation: These being like the Cloud which conducted the Israelites in their journeyings in the wilderness; the other like the same Cloud which abode upon the Mercy-seat: These like the Manna rained down from heaven only for a present subsistence; the other like the same Manna preserved uncorrupted in the Ark, to be a testimony to future ages. II. This extraordinary Providence is represented as administered; 1, Over the State in general. 2. Over 15 private private Men in particular. And such a representation we should expect to find from the nature of the Republic; because, as an extraordinary Providence over the STATE necessarily follows Gop's being their TUTELARY DEITY; so an extraordinary Providence to PARTICULARS follows as necessarily from his being their SUPREME MAGISTRATE *. As to this Providence over the State, it would be absurd to quote particular texts, when the whole BIBLE is one continued history of it. Only it may not be amiss to observe, that from a passage in Ezekieł, where God says, Because that Moab and Seir do say, BEHOLD THE HOUSE OF JUDAH IS LIKE UNTO ÁLL THE HEATHEN †, it appears the Jews had boasted, and the Gentiles, till then, had acknowledged, that they were under an extraordinary Providence. As this therefore is so plain, I shall not hazard the obscuring it by many words: but go on to shew, that Scripture represents this Providence as administered likewise to Particulars. 66 In the Dedication of the first Temple, SOLOMON addresses his Prayer to Gon, that the Covenant between him and the People might remain for ever firm and inviolate, and the old Economy be still continued. And after having enumerated divers parts of it, be proceeds in this manner : "When the heaven is shut up, and there is no rain, because they have sinned against thee; yet if they pray towards this Place, "and confess thy name, and turn from their sin when "thou dost afflict them; Then hear thou from heaven, " and forgive the sin of thy SERVANTS and of thy "PEOPLE ISRAEL, when thou hast taught them the good way wherein they should walk; and send rain |