The works of the Reverend and learned John Lightfoot D. D., late Master of Katherine Hall in Cambridge such as were, and such as never before were printed : in two volumes : with the authors life and large and useful tables to each volume : also three maps : one of the temple drawn by the author himself, the others of Jervsalem and the Holy Land drawn according to the author's chorography, with a description collected out of his writings.

To the READER.

IT was my promise in the Preface to The first Part of the Harmony of the Evangelists, that at the Publishing of the third, I would also set forth A Chorographical Description of the Land of Canaan, and those adjoining places that we have occasion to look upon as we read the Gospels: which task I undertook accordingly when I began the working up of this third part which is now published, and spent very much time and pains upon it, though it hath not found the hap to come forth with this part, as was my promise.

My design was (and I had made some reasonable progress upon it) to have described the Land of Israel, in a way something new indeed, and untrodden, and I believe unattempted (and so much the more difficult because it was so) but yet which I supposed might be of very good use and advantage for the fuller understanding of the situation and story of that Land. In reading of the two Talmuds, and other of the Iewish Authors of the greatest Antiquity, I have observed, and that not without much delight and content, that as to the subject that we are speak∣ing of, namely, the description of, the Land of Canaan, these things may be picked up out of them dispersedly in their writings to very good profit.

• 1. In exceeding many passages, when they come to speak of places of the land, that are menti∣oned in the Scripture, they either describe them, or shew their situation, or distance from such and such places, or all these together, which might be of singular use, to compare with the descri∣ptions, situations, and distances that are given of such places in Christian writers.
• 2. They give us abundance of names of Cities, Mountains, and other places in that land, which names are neither to be found in Scripture, nor Josephus, nor in the Heathen or Christian Records that speak of the places of that Country, but in these Iudaick writers only: and yet which carry with them so fair a probability and rational evidence, that there were such names and places, that the looking after them might be exceeding pertinent to a Canaan story.
• 3. They relate many choice, eminent and remarkable stories occurring in such and such places, which are not to be found in any records but their own, and of singular illustration, both of the situation, and of the History of the Land and Nation: and especially of the scholastical History of their learned men and Doctors.

I shall spare examples here (though I could produce them by multitudes of all these particu∣lars.) He that doth read the two Tracts of mine about The Temple and The Temple Ser∣vice, will find so much falling in obiter of this nature, as may give him a taste of the rest, and some guess what use might be made of such like antiquities, well weighed and examined in a Geographical and Historical description of the Holy Land.

It hath been my course and my care for many years together, as I have had occasion to read these Talmudick writers, to observe and take notice of passages of this nature as I have met with them, and to be gathering such stock of these rarities, as I thought might be convenient for my Chorographical work, when I should fall upon it.

When I began to draw together my thoughts, notes, and notions, for the compiling of this third part of the Harmony of the Evangelists, I began to do the like for the compiling of that work also with it, that as my promise was of their publishing together, so their growing up might be together, till they should come to be so jointly published. I went on in that work a good while, and that with much cheerfulness and content, for me thought a Talmudical survey and history of the Land of Canaan, (not omitting Collections to be taken up out of the Scripture and other writers) as it would be new and rare, so it might not prove unwelcom nor unprofitable to those that delighted in such a subject: But at last I understood that another Workman, a far better Artist than my self, had the Description of the Land of Israel, not only in hand, but even in the Press, and was so far got before me in that travail, that he was almost at his journies end, when I was but little more then setting out: Here it concerned me to consider what I had to do. It was grievous to me to have lost my labour if I should now sit down: and yet I thought it wis∣dom not to loose more in proceeding further, when one in the same subject, and of far more abilities in it, had got the start so far before me. And although I supposed, and at last was as∣sured even by that Author himself (my very learned and worthy friend) that we should not thrust nor hinder one another any whit at all, though we both went at once in the perambulation of that land, because he had not meddled with that Rabbinick way that I had gone, yet when I considered what it was to glean after so clean a Reaper, and how rough a Talmudical pensil would seem after so fine a pen; I resolved to sit down, and to stir no more in that matter, till time and occasion did shew me more incouragement thereunto, than as yet I saw. And thus was my promise fallen to the ground not by any carelesness or forgetfulness of mine, but by the happy prevention of another hand, by whom the work is likely to be better done.

Yet was I unwilling to suffer my word utterly to come to nothing at all, though I might evade my promise by this fair excuse, but I was desirous to pay the Reader something in pursuance of it, though it were not in the very same coin, nor the very same sum that I had undertaken. Hereupon

I turned my thoughts and my endeavours to a description of the Temple, after the same manner and from the same Authors that I had intended to have described the Land; and that the ra∣ther, not only that I might do something towards the making good of my promise, but also that by a trial in a work of this nature of a lesser bulk, I might take some pattern and assay how the other which would prove of a far larger pains and volume, would be accepted, If I should again venture upon it.

But here by the way I cannot but mention, and I think I can never forget a handsom and deserved check, that mine own heart meeting with a special occasion did give me upon the lay∣ing down of the other task and the undertaking of this, for my daring to enter either upon the one or the other. That very day whereon I first set pen to paper to draw up the Description of the Temple, having but immediately before laid aside my thoughts of the Description of the Land, I was necessarily called out toward the Evening, to go to view a piece of ground of mine own, concerning which some litigiousness was emerging and about to grow. The field was but a mile from my constant residence and habitation, and it had been in mine owning divers years together, and yet till that very time had I never seen it, nor looked after it, nor so much as knew whereabout it lay. It was very unlikely I should find it out of my self, being so utterly ignorant of its situation, yet because I desired to walk alone for the injoying of my thoughts upon that task that I had newly taken in hand, I took some directions which way to go, and would venture to find out the field my self alone. I had not gone far but I was at a loss, and whether I went right or wrong I could not tell, and if right thither, yet I knew not how to do so further; and if wrong, I knew not which way would prove the right, and so in seeking my ground I had lost my self. Here my heart could not but take me to task, and reflecting upon what my studies were then and had lately been upon, it could not but call me Fool, and me thought it spake as true to me as ever it had done in all my life, but only when it called me sinner. A Fool that was so studious, and had been so searching about things remote, and that so little concerned my interest, and yet was so neglective of what was near me both in place, and in my particular concernment. And a Fool again, who went about to describe to others places and buildings that lay so many hundred miles off, as from hence to Canaan, and under so many hundred years ruines, and yet was not able to know or find the way to a field of mine own that lay so near me.

I could not but acknowledge this reproof to be both seasonable, and seasoned both with truth and reason, and it so far prevailed with me that it not only put me upon a resolution to lay by that work that I had newly taken in hand that morning, but also to be wiser in my bookishness for the time to come, than for it, and through it to neglect and sink my estate as I had done. And yet within a little time after, I know not how I was fallen to the same studies and studiousness again, had got my laid-by task into my hands again before I was aware, and was come to a de∣termination, to go on in that work, because I had my notes and collections ready by me as ma∣terials for it, and when that was done, then to think of the advice that my heart had given me, and to look to mine own business.

So I drew up the Description of the Temple it self, and with it the History of the Temple Service, both of them partly from the Scriptures, and partly from the Talmudical records of the Iews Traditions and Antiquities: both which if the Reader will but look upon, as tendred in lieu of that which was promised concerning the description of the Land, he will charitably judge I hope, that I have not been a wilful violator or neglecter of my promise, though I have not been so very punctual a performer.

The Tract of the Temple Service hath been in publick some space of time already, and as for the other about the Temple it self, I had thought to have kept it in suppression till I could have obtained the graving of a Map of the Temple, which I drew also together with it, that they might have both come out together: But I am hopeless of obtaining that, even to this very mo∣ment, and yet have I been perswaded to let the book forth though the Map be wanting, partly through importunity of some friends, and partly because of my promise referring to this third part of The Harmony of the Evangelists now published.

I have been more tedious about this business, than either was needful in such a trifle, or hath been pertinent in the ensuing discourse. I must cast my self upon the Readers gentleness for ex∣cuse, both of the failing of my promise, and of my troublesom discourse about that failing. I shall say nothing concerning the ensuing Tract of The Harmony of the Evangelists, nor of its fellow Tract of The Description of the Temple, I shall refer them both to the Readers per∣usal and charity, and commit him to the keeping and goodness of the Almighty.

Old Jewry London, Ian. 30. 1649/50.

I. L.