The whole genuine and complete works of Flavius Josephus ... Translated from the original in the Greek language. And diligently revised and compared with the writings of contemporary authors, of different nations, on the subject. All tending to prove the authenticity of the work. ; To which is added various useful indexes ... ; Also a continuation of the history of the Jews, from Josephus down to the present time ... By George Henry Maynard, LL.D. ; Illustrated with marginal references and notes, historical, biographical, classical, critical, geographical, and explanatory. By the Rev. Edward Kimpton, author the the Compleat universal history of the Holy Bible. ; Embellished with upwards of sixty beautiful engravings, taken from original drawings of the Messrs, Metz, Stothard, and Corbould, members of the Royal Academy, and engraved by American artists.

CONTINUATION OF THE HISTORY of the JEWS, FROM THE TIME OF FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS. INCLUDING A PERIOD OF UPWARDS OF ONE THOUSAND SEVEN HUNDRED YEARS. CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF THEIR DISPERSION INTO THE VARIOUS PARTS OF EUROPE, ASIA, AFRICA, AND AMERICA. WITH THEIR DIFFERENT PERSECUTIONS, TRANSACTIONS, AND PRESENT STATE THROUGHOUT THE KNOWN WORLD. BOOK I.

CHAP. I INTRODUCTION.

THERE is not a circumstance, amongst the various events of revolving time, more worthy of admiration than the preserva|tion of the people of the Jews, in the midst of all the calamities they have undergone for the space of upwards of 1700 years. It has been remarked with propriety, that religions of every kind depend upon temporal prosperity; that they triumph under the protection of a conquering prince, and languish with decaying monarchies. The Christian church itself, so renowned for its martyrs, has yet been considerably injured by persecutions; and the breaches that have been made by violence could not easily be repaired. How|ever, we have now before us a people, and a reli|gion, which, though persecuted for 1700 years, still subsist, and are very numerous. Kings have fre|quently applied the severity of edicts and corporal punishments to destroy them. Seditious multitudes have exceeded the rigour and cruelties of princes. Both princes and people, however divided in opi|nions, either political or religious, have concurred in a design of extirpating this people, but have not been able to effect it.

The Jews have been driven from most parts of the world, which has only served to produce a ge|neral dispersion. They have, from age to age, un|dergone misery and persecution; but still live, not|withstanding the disgrace and hatred that attend them in all places, whilst nothing remains of many of the greatest monarchies but the name.

Their distresses are peculiarly aggravated, from this circumstance, that, though in former captivi|ties, the Almighty was pleased to point out a time in which he would be reconciled, break the yoke im|posed by tyrants, and restore his people to their li|berty, no term is now fixed to the duration of their miseries; and we have more certain assurance from the New-Testament of their being recalled, than they have in the writings of the prophets, whose race is extinct: nor is one of them to be seen who promises the end of a calamity which has al|ready continued such a number of ages.

The Romans when they made themselves masters of Judaea, left the inhabitants a public worship, and the exercise of their laws. The synagogues▪ as those of Damascus, without appeal, determined the affairs of religion even where the Christians were concerned. The high-priest had an eminent power. They had their judges even in Chaldae; but at present they have no shadow of a supreme authority

remaining; nevertheless they still subsist as a peo|ple, and are numbered by millions.

The chastisements the Almighty has inflicted upon them are most terrible, having involved the people, their religion, and land, in one common de|struction. Their religious ceremonies cannot be duly observed. All that pompous train of rites which raised the renown of the Jewish worship, and struck the heathen world with that veneration as to cause them to send presents and victims to Jerusalem, is absolutely lost; for they have neither temples, al|tars, or sacrifices.

Nor has their religion only suffered, but the pro|fessors were massacred; and such as escaped the rage of war, were sold for slaves in the public mar|kets. It seems, indeed, that the land itself was con|signed to perdition, as many nations have made themselves masters of Jerusalem one after another. How many revolutions have happened to states in so long a succession of ages? And yet the Jews are the peculiar people to whom God has denied the possession of this little spot of ground, which is in|finitely necessary to them, since they should worship upon this mountain, and they never have since met with so favourable a conjunction as could give them them the full enjoyment of it. It is alledged that no professor of Judaism can at this day purchase a piece of ground for a grave near Jerusalem.

The modern Jews are dispersed throughout every part of the known world. They abound in the east, and particularly in the great empire of China; and are thought to be the descendants of the ten tribes which were carried away captive. They are spread through most nations of the east, and of Europe and Africa, and many families of them are established in the West-Indies. Their occupation is trade. They are so disseminated, indeed, through all the trading parts of the world, that they are become the instru|ments by which the most distant nations converse with one another, and by which mankind are knit together in a general correspondence. The Jews are looked upon to be as numerous at present as they were formerly in the land of Canaan. This is won|derful, considering the dreadful slaughter made of them under some of the Roman emperors, which historians describe by the deaths of many hundred thousands in war; and the innumerable massacres and persecutions they have undergone in Turkey, as well as in all Christian nations of the world.

The rabbins, in giving a description of the great havock which has been sometimes made of them, tell us, that there were such torrents of holy blood shed, as to tinge the water in the sea for a consider|able distance.

Nor is their firm adherence to their religion less remarkable than their numbers and dispersion. These particulars may be accounted for, from na|ture and providential reasons. Their numbers may be attributed to their constant employment, their exemption from wars, and, above all, their frequent marriages; for they look upon celebacy as an ac|cursed state, and are generally married before twenty, as hoping the Messiah may descend from them. Their dispersion is naturally accounted for from their having been often driven out of their old habitations in the land of promise, and out of most other places where they have been settled.

Besides, the whole people is now a race of such merchants as are wanderers by profession; and, at the same time, are in most, if not all places, incapa|ble of enjoying either lands or offices that might en|gage them to make any part of the world their home

Their firm adherence to their religion is no less naturally accounted for from its genius and consti|tution. They are to live all in a body, and gene|rally within the same enclosure; to marry among themselves; and to eat no meats that are not killed and prepared their own way. This excludes them from all table conversation, and the most agreeable intercourses of life, and, of consequence, from the most probable means of their conversion.

If we consider what providential reasons may be assigned for these three particulars, we shall find that their numbers, dispersion, and adherence to their religion, have furnished every age, and every nation of the world, with the strongest arguments for the Christian faith; not only as these very par|ticulars are foretold of them, but as they themselves are the depositories of these and all the other pro|phecies which tend to their own confusion. Their number furnishes a sufficient cloud of witnesses that attest the truths of the Old Testament. Their dis|persion spreads these witnesses through all parts of the world. Their adherence to their religion makes their testimony unquestionable. Had the whole body of the Jews been converted to Christianity, we should certainly have thought all the prophecies of the Old Testament, that relate to the coming and history of Our Blessed Saviour, forged, and have looked upon them no less fallacious than the pro|phecies of the sibyls.

As to the religion of the modern Jews, it is obser|vable, that all their customs are not of equal autho|rity, nor observed by all after the same manner. The first comprehends the written law, that is, those precepts which are contained in the five book of Moses. The second order relates to the oral law, or that delivered by word of mouth. This contains the comments and expositions of the Rab|bins on the Pentateuch, that is, commandments of the doctors: they are collected into a large volume, called the Talmud. The third order comprehends the minhagim, or customs, which use has authoriz|ed in different times and places. Of these three orders of precepts the two first only are generally received by all the Jews: the third kind of precepts differs in different countries, according as the Jews have fallen into the manners and customs of the places where they reside.

It is an observation of a French author, that the religion of the Jews, since the preaching of Christi|anity, is, properly speaking, neither a true or a false religion. It cannot be a false religion, because it has God for its author; neither is it now a true religion, because God himself abolished it by the bringing in of the gospel. Besides, they being without a temple, sacrifices, and other circum|stances of religious worship, which they enjoyed in the Holy Land, the religion of the Jews cannot be considered as subsisting any longer.

The Jews came into England in the reign of Wil|liam the Conqueror, and settled in divers parts; but their principal residence was in London, where they had their grand synagogue. To secure them in their interests and property, the king gave them a civil superintendant, called, at that time, "the Justice of the Jews." His business was to protect them against oppression, to decide all controversies between them and the Christians, to keep the seal of their corpora|tion, and the keys of their public treasury. As to their spiritual government, they were all under one high-priest, who had his patent from the crown. It has been the opinion of some, that the Jews were not then permitted to purchase lands in England; but this is a mistake. However, being generally hated, and not upon an equal foot of privilege with the English, they commonly put out their money to interest, by which means their estates were less sub|ject to discovery, and more at command, in case they should be obliged to quit the country.

During their stay in England, they frequently met with rough usage, with great severity. Some|times they laboured under the extortion of govern|ment, and sometimes the people took their revenge upon them at discretion. However, they had en|couragement to turn Christians; for baptism was, as it were, a pardon for all former crimes; and Hen|ry III. built a house for convert Jews, and allowed them a pension for their maintenance. In 129•• the Jews, by proclamation of King Edward I. were banished the kingdom, on pretence that they im|poverished the Christians by excessive usury. They departed to the number of 15,••••••; and it was

commonly reported, that in their passage over the sea, the seamen plundered them, cut the throats of many, and threw them overboard. This banish|ment was perpetual. However, in process of time, they returned to England, and are tolerated in the exercise of their religion. But we now proceed to our main design.

CHAP. II.

The history of the Jews from the taking of Jerusalem till the rebellion under Adrian.

IT is needless to repeat what has been heretofore related by Josephus concerning the desolate condition to which both the kingdom and metro|polis of Judaea were reduced, or the dreadful sla|very to which the greatest part of the surviving Jews were condemned by the conqueror. Those that survived this sad catastrophe, and escaped the fury of the Romans, retired some into Galilee, and a much greater number into Egypt and Cy|rene, where we shall find them raising new re|bellions, committing horrid massacres, and bring|ing again the victorious Romans against them.

To pretend that the Sanhedrim was removed to Jamnia, and from thence to Tiberias, where it subsisted till after the death of Judas the Saint, that academies were established in many cities, and that the nation continued to be governed by a patriarch, is to run into an illusion founded mere|ly on tradition.

There remained no shadow of power and autho|rity to this wretched people in the country that God had given them. Domitian, covetous even to excess,* 1.1 helped to sink it by his taxes. It has been thought that this oppression respected only the Jews of Rome, who having been expelled out of the imperial city, could not return again without paying a certain tax; but it is a mistake. The tri|bute demanded by Domitian related to all the Jews, and was not a new one.

Pompey having subjected Judaea to the Romans, made it tributary according to custom. Julius Cae|sar granted Hyrcanus, and even the Jewish people, some exemptions. Nevertheless, Josephus adds, that they were obliged to carry their tribute every two years to Sidon. The privilege then consisted in having no intendant or collectors, who, in those times ruined nations. They were also exempted from winter quarters, and the entertainment of sol|diers. They paid nothing in the sabbatic year, be|cause the lands lay fallow. Alexander the Great had granted the same privilege before. Herod be|ing made king, and a friend of the Roman people, it is imagined that he was discharged from tribute; but the Romans (says Tacitus) continued to the princes the title of kings, and at the same time made them sensible of their slavery by forcing them to pay taxes. Cicero would have Jerusalem return thanks to the immortal gods that it had not been razed as Carthage. Apion, speaking of the kings that Mark Anthony had made tributary, names He|rod, with those of Pontus and Pisidia; and excepts only from this general law the princes of the Upper Armenia. That which might have misguided the learned is their not seeing any intendants, or re|ceivers, in this province, till after Herod's and Ar|chelaus's death. It was, indeed, a shadow of liberty left to this people, to suffer them to collect their taxes by their own receivers, as Josephus has ob|served; but it cannot be hence concluded that they were not tributary, and that this kingdom was the only exception to the general law. It cannot be doubted but this tribute was regularly paid during our Saviour's life-time, since the Pharisees tempted him by it; and Jesus Christ, discovering Caesar's image upon the denarion, that was paid for the poll, answered, They should render to Caesar the things that were Caesar's.

The truth is, they paid two sorts of taxes: one was a subsidy laid upon the lands, of which they paid the hundreth penny. But, besides this, Apion observes, that there was a capitation, more intole|rable to the Jews than all the other tributes; and therefore Judaea petitioned Tiberias to be exempted from the imposts with which it was overlaid, as well as Syria.

This capitation did not seem to be great, since they only paid one denarion; that is, about seven pence halfpenny per head. But it was equal for the poor as well as the rich. As the didrachm was paid equally to God, so the tribute which Caesar exacted was one and the same to all the inhabitants without any distinction. There were two reasons that aggra|vated this yoke in Judaea; one, that this people, priding themselves in their alliance with God, and thinking themselves perfectly free, could not brook the empire of the infidels, especially since the Mac|cabees had shook it off, and the capitation made them feel their slavery. Therefore Judas of Gali|lee rebelled, when Augustus sent to have Judaea en|rolled. There was another reason that rendered this yoke insupportable; for the money that was to be brought to the Roman treasure was stamped with the prince's image; and the Jews, over scrupulously addicted to the law, which only condemns the worship of images, could not see the emperor's figure upon the money, and be obliged to pay, without a mortification.

Hitherto Judaea paid but one tax upon lands,* 1.2 and the capitation, which brought three hundred and seventy thousand eight ••••ndred and thirty-three pounds, six shillings and eight-pence, into the em|peror's exchequer. But after the taking of Jerusa|lem, Titus ordered the didrachm, which was paid annually to the temple, to be confiscated: and Ci|cero observes, that they sent it from Rome, and the other cities of Italy, to Jerusalem, because they looked upon it as a tribute which they paid to God as his subjects. But the emperor usurped the place of God, whom they had forsaken, and appropriated this tribute to himself Each didrachm was worth sixteen-pence; and so the sum demanded of them was very considerable. But this third tax was the more disgraceful because they were obliged to pur|chase the liberty of their religion by it, and Domi|tian exacted it with the utmost severity.

Xiphilin relates that Titus, after the conquest of Judaea▪ ordered all the Jews, that would preserve their religion,* 1.3 to pay the didrachm annually to Ju|piter Capitolinus. The Romans made them pur|chase liberty of conscience by it. Tertullian com|plains bitterly that they had ranked the Christians among prostitutes and vagrants who paid a tri|bute to be suffered at Rome. The Jewish religion therefore being grown infinitely odious after the re|bellion, its professors were obliged to pay an annual sum for their toleration. Suetonius speaks of Do|mitian's injurious treatment in demanding the pay|ment. They stripped a man to inform themselves of his extract and religion by circumcision. Nei|ther the quality of persons, nor the age, nor the oaths of such as chose rather to pretend to be hea|thens than to furnish the sums demanded, were respected. A man of ninety years of age was for|ced to this scandalous inquest, under pretence of which were committed a thousand impieties.

Domitian's hatred stopped not here; for the Jews were comprised in the same persecution with the Christians. We cannot doubt of it, as both of them were, in the opinion of the Romans, equally guilty of impiety, since they worshipped only one God, and rejected idols, which was reckoned an atheism, and adduced as a pretence to persecution. Dion affirms, that many persons, who had embra|ced the Jewish religion, were condemned for the crime of impiety, and that some were punished with death, and others only with sequestration.

Nerva, Domitian's successor,* 1.4 did three things to the advantage of this nation: he absolved those who were accused of impiety, and recalled the exiles; which shews that if Domitian had that design, he was not able to execute it, being prevented by his

assassins. He forbad, for the future, the subjects of the empire to be tormented for the sake of religion, impiety, or Judaism. And he discharged the Jews of the imposts wherewith Domitian had oppressed them.

* 1.5We have placed the first of all the patriarchs of Judaea in this prince's reign, because he was more favourable to the Jews, and because there is no pro|bability that they could so suddenly have re-settled themselves after an almost general dispersion Ac|cording to this account, Gamaliel II. was then the head of the fathers, which the Greeks call patri|arch Joshua was elected father of the senate; Flea|zar was reconciled with Gamaliel, and they enjoyed their dignity together. Historians say, that Eleazar presided two sabbaths, and Gamaliel one, which shews that this office especially related to religion, and the Divine service.

The Jews endeavour to raise the glory of their desolate nation, by making many learned men sur|vive the ruin of the temple, and live in the begin|ning of the second century.

Eleazar the Great lived at that time. They make him the son of a person of quality, called Hyrcanus, who had so neglected his education, that at twenty-eight years of age he was ignorant of the law. He bewailed his ignorance for many days; but at last a certain person told him of a master.* 1.6 He made a journey to John, the son of Zachai, who taught at Jerusalem, by whom he was instructed in his prayers, and some points of the law. Eleazar wept and fasted till he had learnt them, and eight days passed over before he eat. His father came to Jeru|salem to disinherit him; but was so struck with the learning and modesty he found in him, that he would not sit down before him; and, instead of dis|inheriting him, he gave him his brothers portions, who had put him upon this design. The Jewish rab|bies enumerate these patriarchs, and ascribe to them properties almost divine; but they are too big with absurdity, and it may be added prophanation, to gain credit with a rational or religious reader.

* 1.7At that time lived the poet Ezekiel, who composed the departure from Egypt in Greek verse. He was a Jew, and probably meant to sing a miraculous de|liverance to comfort his nation, dejected by the Ro|mans, in giving it an idea of a redeemer like Moses. He lived after Josephus; who did not know him; and before Clemens Alexandrinus, who had quoted him. We must therefore place him at the end of the first, or rather at the beginning of the second, century.

* 1.8We must also place at the same time the author of the will of the twelve patriarchs. This man has disguised his religion, and speaks so often like a Jew, that a learned man, who was the first publisher of this work in Greek, maintains that the original was in Hebrew, composed by a doctor of that na|tion some time before the manifestation of our Lord, since the author has followed the common preju|dices of the doctors of that time, who expected a general of an army, famous for his battles▪ rather than a spiritual teacher.

The will of the twelve patriarchs was, however, composed at this time; for the author speaks of the destruction of Jerusalem, and several actions of the Messiah, and even of the writings of the evangelists, like a prophet who had seen these things.

The miserable are more mutinous and restless than other people. There is a s pirit of sedition imputed to some religions, and to the tempers and inclina|tions of certain nations. But this is im••ginary; for all men naturally love peace and quiet; leave them liberty of conscience, and the free enjoyment, or increase of their estates, and few rebellions will arise in nations. The hatred of parties, persecution, and the harshness of government,* 1.9 are the common springs of tumults and seditions: men do not swerve from their natural state, except when they are for|ced by despair or violence. We must not wonder then if the Jews notwithstanding their miseries, have so frequently an inclination to rebel. Misery puts men into agitation, and makes them turn on all sides to be easy, and commonly instead of com|passing their desires, they add fresh weight to their burthen. The Jews mis-timed their attempts in Trajan's reign. What could make them so ventur|ous as to brave the power of so great a prince?* 1.10 Being provoked by their preceding misfortunes▪ they carried, in their turn, cruelty and barbarity to a detestable excess; beginning at Cyrene, a city of Lybia, where they had been settled, and potent, for many ages. They had at first some advantages over the Greeks; for so they called the Egyptians; but the fugitives escaping to Alexandria▪ and carry|ing consternation, and a thirst of revenge, into this great city, they murdered all the Jews that were there. Those of Cyrene, enraged with a re|prizal they had justly deserved, fell into the great|est fury; and being headed by ••••e Andrea, ravaged the plain country under his conduct, and massa|cred two hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants in Lybia. The Romans returned into the field,* 1.11 under Martius Turbo, their general, whom Trajan had commissioned to quell these disorders. He ef|fected it; but could not defeat the rebels, without long and violent battles, and the loss of many men. Lybia remained so depopulated by the massacre the Jews made in the beginning of the war, that the emperor Adrian was obliged to send a colony to inhabit it.

Eusebius has run into a manifest contradiction as to this rebellion of the Jews; for he affirms, in his history, that it happened in the beginning of the eighteenth year of Trajan's reign▪ and he places it a year sooner in his chronicle.* 1.12 The history being exacter than the chronicle, we ought to give it the preference, and place this event in the beginning of the second century, and in the hundred and fif|teenth year of Jesus Christ. The Jewish historians say, that the war was caused by the ambition of the refugees who had retired to Alexandria after the destruction of Jerusalem, and had built a temple there. Some would fain lord it over the rest, and the weaker party called in Trajan to their assis|tance, who killed five hundred thousand of them. But their temple at Alexandria was imaginary, that of Onias being the only one they built.

The Thalmudists vary more grossly. Some say it was Adrian that killed twice as many Jews in Egypt as Moses had conducted out of it. Others place this event in Trajan's reign, and others affirm matters with as little foundation.

Nor did the disorder stop there,* 1.13 for the news came of new insurrections in Mesopotamia. The fate of Egypt threw the inhabitants of this government into a consternation, who saw themselves menaces with the same misfortune•• but Trai•• 〈◊〉〈◊〉 a ••••oor thither, called Lucius 〈◊〉〈◊〉, the gre•• general the empire then had, or has had ever since; who, in execution of his commission, ••stood the sedi|tions, and, by killing a vast number of J••w••, intimidated the rest. Nevertheless, as hi•• presence was thought necessary to retain them in their duty, and there was reason to fear they would take my arms again the very moment the conqueror with|drew, the emperor made him governor of Pales|tine, to keep a strict eye upon their motions.

A new storm arose in the island of Cyprus. The Jews in this island began with the massacre of two hundred and forty thousand inhabitants.* 1.14 Their own historians do not dissemble this action, but swell the number of the dead instead of abating it; for they tell you, that the noise of the insurrections elsewhere arrived at Gophri, that is to say Cyprus, the Jews, who were very numerous in this country, fell upon all the heathens, and made such a general massacre, that not one of them remained;

Which obliged Trajan to send Adrian, the general of his forces, against them, who subdued them; and afterwards the Romans published an edict, absolutely prohibiting the Jews access to this island.

CHAP. III.

Rebellion of the Jews under Adrian, of Barchochebas and Akiba, till the hundred and thirty eighth year of the Christian aera.

* 1.15THESE might be said to be only the beginning of the sorrows of the Jews, which were at length completed by Adrian, who reduced them to such an abject state of wretchedness, that, to obtain the ordinary means of subsistence, they were under a necessity of having recourse to the fraud of magic and interpretation of dreams.

We need no other evidence than that of the em|peror Adrian himself, who says, he saw not one Jew in Egypt but what was a mathematician; which name, though at present so honourable for useful discoveries by those who apply to this study, was at that time odious, because the mathematicians were generally deemed wizzards.

* 1.16The cause of this rebellion is differently related. They say that it was the custom, in their country, to plant a cedar at the door of the houses where a son was born, and to set a pine-tree upon the birth of a daughter. These trees grew till the time of marriage, and then they were cut down to make a bed for the married couple. The princess, Adri|an's daughter, travelling in Judaea, her chariot broke; and her officers had the insolence to cut down one of these trees planted before a house, wherewith they mended the chariot. But the re|lations and neighbours, provoked by this action, mutinied, and massacred the princess's retinue, who, being enraged, obliged the emperor to take arms, and subdue so fierce a nation.

Chrysostom asserts, that the Jews, who always, from their prejudices, preserved their own maxims, have three times attempted to rebuild the temple, and that their first effort to restore their republic was under Adrian; that they rebelled against him, without reflecting on the consequences, whom, with all their efforts, it was impossible to conquer: that this prince, having subdued them, placed his statue where Jerusalem was; and knowing that this monument of victory would not last for ever, or|dered that the city should bear his name, which was still observed, since, in his time, it was called Aelia. Chrysostom has treated this event with no great degree of precision; for if he believed that the Jews designed to restore their temple under Adrian, he is deceived, since they made no motion towards it; and the first of the attempts ascribed to them is evidently false. The same must be said of the se|cond, if he thought the Jews went to re-establish their republic. It is not even true that they at|tempted to rebuild Jerusalem. Moreover, Aelia had been built before the rebellion. Nor did Jerusalem still go by the name of Adrian; for it was so called at the council of Nice; but Constantine having built temples in this city, and Christianity being grown triumphant there, it resumed its ancient name of Jerusalem. Eusebius, who had called it Aelia in his history, always stiles it Jerusalem in the life of Con|stantine, when he speaks of the edifices that this prince had raised there.

* 1.17There were two causes of the great rebellion un|der Adrian. First, This prince had forbidden them, like Domitian and Nerva, to be circumcised. Spar|tan says so; and I know not how the express testi|mony of an author can be contested who lived un|der Dioclesian. Modestinus observes also, that the Jews, addressing themselves to Antoninus, he per|mitted them to circumcise only their own children, and forbad doing it to any person of another reli|gion under heavy penalties. Secondly, There is a law forbidding all the Roman citizens to be circum|cised like the Jews, or to cause their slaves to be circumcised, upon pain of banishment, and award|ing death to the physicians that should do it. It also banishes and condemns, sometimes to death, the Jews that cut the children of another religion. Did the Jews attempt to circumcise strangers, in order to increase their numbers, whereby to go on afterwards more effectually in the restoration of their commonwealth, as St. Chrysostom has said? Some great men have said it after him. But it is not probable they believed that the converted Roman citizens, or their slaves, could make up a considera|ble army to restore their state. The Roman prose|lytes were never so numerous to possess them with this conceit. These edicts were given only to pre|vent any changes of religion, which now and then happened at Rome, and scandalized the heathens. Besides, Antoninus licensed them to circumcise themselves after his war with them. This prince, being weary of their rebellion, and seeing that de|nying them this custom exasperated them, yielded something to pacify them: but they were not then in a condition to proselyte sufficient numbers to form armies, and restore their commonwealth. A|drian, who had forbidden them circumcision, offend|ed the Jews in one of the principal acts of their religi|on: it was robbing them of the seal of the cove|nant, the mark that distinguished them from hea|thens, and the grace of God, which they thought annexed to this custom: and therefore it is no sur|prising thing that they should mutiny, when they found themselves deprived of this ceremoy.

This prince had also sent a colony to Jerusalem,* 1.18 and built a city upon its ruins, to which he gave his own name, and consecrated it to Jupiter Capitoli|nus. The second cause of the war is as much dis|puted as the first, since Eusebius says, that the colony was not sent to Jerusalem till after the taking of Bi|ther. But Dion says, this colony was the cause of their rebellion, because they could not bear to have strangers come and live in their city, and worship strange gods there; so that we cannot doubt of the truth of the fact. To reconcile Eusebius and Dion, it appears that the emperor's first design was crossed by the Jews rebelling before it was fully executed, because the jews had expelled the new inhabitants; though the emperor accomplished it when he had subdued them. So that he had sent the colony be|fore the war, as Dion affirms; and he completed his project, when the rebellion was quelled, as Eu|sebius relates.

Barchochebas's ambition, who knew how to make his advantage of the disturbance which these two circumstances created in the minds of the people, fully determined the nation to prosecute the war. But to speak of the false Messiahs that have deceived their nation.

The time was come in which impostors appeared with full assurance.* 1.19 Gamaliel had seen two of them perish, and was so moved with the ill success of their enterprize, that he would not have the pro|gress of Christianity opposed, being persuaded that Providence would bring the design to nought if it was not from heaven:

Theudas (said he) before these days rose up, who was slain, and all, as many as obeyed him, were brought to nought. After this man rose up Judas of Galilee, in the days of the taxing, and he also perished: and now I say unto you, if this counsel be of men it will come to nought.

The Christians, from a high sense of his great moderation and piety, afterwards ca|nonized him.

St. 〈◊〉〈◊〉,* 1.20 in the 5th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, particularly speaks of the impostors, Theudas and Judas of Galilee, whom Gamaliel mentions to the people, as having practised their arts heretofore to deceive; from which (though his design was to invalidate the apostle's doctrine) it is evident such delusions had been practised.

The Romans sent some forces against Judas,* 1.21 and he miserably perished. Alexander, Fadus's successor, persecuted his children, and caused them to be mur|dered. His followers maintained their master's doc|trine, with an unshaken confidence, in the midst of the most cruel tortures. They subsisted, notwith|standing the violence that was offered them after the taking of Jerusalem, in a very antient castle, where they were shut up; and the fugitives carried

this doctrine into Egypt, where it occasioned new massacres.

Other impostors started up, and, with the same fallacious pretensions, endeavoured to delude the credulous multitude; but the most impious, daring, and injurious,* 1.22 wa•• Coziba, or Barchochebas. He was a robber, like the rest, who hoped to enrich himself with plunder; and acquire some authority in his nation by his outrages against the Romans. It is pretended that there were two impostors of this name, the grandfather and grandson; and their history is thus related by the Jews. Coziba I. was elected king by the Jews two years after the ruin of the first temple, and died at Bither, a city in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, which was the capital of his empire. His son the Red succeeded him; and afterwards reigned his grandson Romulus, who was called Coziba. The Jews assembled about him, and acknowledged him for the Messiah. The emperor Adrian, having notice of it, came with a numerous army, took Bither, and destroyed a mul|titude of the Jews, in the seventy-third year after the ruin of the temple. Hence it is concluded, that the reign of the three Cozibas lasted one and twen|ty years. Some extend it much farther, and make the first Coziba's reign under Domitian. The an|tient chronicle of the Jews, on the contrary, assigns but two years and a half to Coziba's reign.

It is absurdly supposed there have been two Co|zibas, or Barchochebases. Most of the Jews ac|knowledge but one, and they are right. For he that induced the Jews to a rebellion, towards the end of Trajan's reign, was not called Barchochebas, but Andrea. Neither did he call himself the Mes|siah; and this rebellion was in Egypt, whereas that of Barchochebas happened in Judaea. They were unacquainted with Trajan's genealogy, since they say, that he sent Adrian, his sister's son, against the Jews in Egypt; for Ulpia, Adrian's grandmother, was Trajan's aunt, and these two princes were only cousins. They err in making the war with Coziba last so long, and give him, and his heirs and succes|sors, a reign of one and twenty years; for his race ended with him; and the war terminated in a little time, as we shall see in the sequel. They make him perish in the seventy-third year of the ruin of the temple. Adrian was already dead, in the year 141; and the city of Bither, by which the war was concluded, had been taken in the eighteenth of Adrian. This chronological error suffices to shew the misrepresentations of the rest. The author of the chronicle of the Jews is more exact than his commentators, for he makes Coziba to reign but two years and a half, and speaks but of one impo|stor. We must therefore acknowledge but one Coziba, who took the title of Barchochebas, lived in Adrians reign, and was the source of infinite mischiefs to this nation.

This impostor•• to facilitate the success of his en|terprize, changed his name, and took that of the Son of the Star, or Barchochebas, in order to have it believed that he was the Star that "Balaam had seen afar off." He maintained that he was one of the stars of heaven sent to succour the people, and relieve them from the oppression under which they groaned. He also made choice of a forerunner, of the same character with himself, who was very as|sistant to him in his designs.

This was Akiba, whom, they say, descended from Sisera, general of the army of Jabin, a king of Tyre, and from a Jewish mother. He had spent forty years upon the plains, in looking to the flocks of 〈◊〉〈◊〉 citizen at Jerusalem, called Calba Chuva. His master's daughter being in love with him, and unwilling to marry a shepherd, advised him to ap|ply himself to study. They made a clandestine marriage 〈◊〉〈◊〉 which Akiba went and spent twelve years in the academy, and brought back with him twelve thousand scholars. His wife advised him to return again. He continued still twelve years more, and brought with him twenty thousand disciples. His wife came to meet him with her clothes rent, because her father, provoked with her marriage, had disinherited her; but no sooner had he seen A|kiba than he fell at his feet, revoked his oath, and gave him a great part of his estate. He continued teaching and writing books, one whereof is cabalis|tical▪ and is called Jetsirah; but it must be distin|guished from that which is ascribed to the Patriarch Abraham, and bears the same name. He was so learned as to give an account of the least letter of the law. We find in the Misnah and Thalmud a thousand sentences ascribed to him, and which are looked upon as so many judicious decisions. These are the commendations they give this doctor, who caused the desolation of his country, and support|ed the fraud of an impostor No great weight therefore can be laid upon what the Jews relate concerning the birth and death of Akiba, since they are so perfectly ignorant of the time.

Barchochabas appearing at the time that Akiba's fame was at the height,* 1.23 when he was head of the Sanhedrim, he exclaimed, "Behold the Star that was to come out of Jacob!" and made himself his forerunner. These two impostors availed them|selves of the prejudices of the people, who were for a conquering Messiah, that should deliver them from the Roman yoke, which the last war, and A|drian's persecution, daily made more insupportable. Barchochebas, who found the people disposed to follow him, mustered up an army of 200,000 men; and Bither was chosen for his residence, and the capital of his kingdom. The Jews called it Beth|tar, or the House of Spies, because, after the ruin of Jerusalem, centinels were placed there to spie those that went to Jerusalem, who were accused of court|ing the Roman favour, and desiring offices, or of selling their estates, of which they stripped them by virtue of these calumnies. They even sometimes impeached them to the Romans under other pre|tences. Eusebius places this city in the neighbour|hood of Jerusalem; but there were two cities of this name, one twelve, and the other fifty-two, miles distant from the holy city.

Jerome called these two cities Bethoron, and maintains they were built by Solomon, and ruined by the war. Bethoron was given by Pharaoh for a portion to his daughter, when she married Solomon, who restored it to the Levites, in whose partition it lay. But if we believe the Jews, this is not the true Bi|ther, since one signifies a House of Spies, and the other a House of Liberty. Barchochebas chose this place to receive the royal unction, and afterwards caused money to be coined, declaring himself at the same time the Messiah, and the Jewish prince of the na|tion. He waited to declare war when the emperor Adrian had left Egypt; but it burst out in the year 134, in the seventeenth of Adrian's reign.

Dion asserts, that Adrian, having sent a colony to Jerusalem, and placed a statue of Jupiter where the temple of God stood▪ this foreign worship vio|lently affected the Jews.

However,* 1.24 Adrian's pre|sence, who was then in Egypt, and who went from thence to Syria, stopped them for some time. They contented themselves, during his time, with making imperfect arms, and selling them to the Romans, that they might not em|ploy them against themselves; but they revolted when the emperor was gone.

Phlegon, Adrian's secretary, has preserved a letter of his master, addressed to Servian, the consul.* 1.25 He gives him an account of what he had seen in Egypt, and of the turbulent inclination of its inhabitants; and makes him a present of some vessels, which he had designed for him and his sister. It is easier to know the time of the Jewish war from this letter, than from the medals of the cities of Syria; for it must have been written when the emperor left Egypt or Syria. Servian, to whom this letter was written, was his brother-in-law, since he made him a present in common with his sister and himself. This Servian is called consul, which dignity he had not under Adrian till 134. We must conclude then that the emperor left not Egypt and Syria till the beginning of that year, and that his absence the same year instigated the Jews to rebellion. Another heathen

historian, quoted by Eusebius, asserts, that the war was in its whole vigour; and that Bither, which the rebels had fortified, was taken the tenth of August, in the eighteenth year of Adrian. The war there|fore began the preceding year, since it was in its vigour, and near its conclusion. The emperor gave his name to the city he had built about the ruins of Jerusalem in the year 136, in which he celebrated his Vicenalia. So that the war began in the year 134, and ended two years after. Buonarotti pro|duces a medal struck by this prince in the eigh|teenth year of his reign, for having obtained a great victory over the rebels, and driven the Jews from Jerusalem. To this nothing can be objected, but the authority of the Jews quoted by Jerome, who say the war lasted three years and an half.

The Romans at first seem to have neglected this revolt: as the Jews had been so effectually humbled by Trajan's wars, they could hardly imagine they would so soon be in a condition to oppose them. But when they saw the numbers of the seditious in|crease,* 1.26 and that they fought with a valour that seemed raised upon despair, that all the robbers of the neighbouring provinces joined them in hopes of plunder, and that not only Judaea, but all the world was in motion, they were obliged to change their measures. Some think that the emperor march|ed in person against the rebels; because they ob|serve, that this prince, writing to the senate, had not ventured to preface his letters with the ordi|nary form, because of the great losses he had sus|tained in this war; but, on due enquiry, it appears that he carried it on by his generals.

Barchochebas, who was superior in troops, at first committed great ravages. Justin Martyr complain|ed that he openly attacked and massacred the Chris|tians, because they would not abjure their religion. His hatred against these professors of religion, and despair of making the Christians embark in his vio|lent measures, who had the same interest as himself to declare against the Romans, might redouble his cruelty. But can it be imagined that the heathens, against whom he declared war, and the colony which Adrian had begun to send to Jerusalem, were more humanely treated by this usurper than the Christians? This impostor only favoured his own nation, and treated with the utmost barbarity all others that fell into his hands.

* 1.27We find▪ by Eusebius and Syncellus, that the ge|neral, who commanded the army in Judaea against Barchochebas, was called Tinnius Rufus. Adrian, who was not acquainted with the importance of the war, sent him at first a great reinforcement; but this commander being often defeated, he sent for Julius Severus, one of the greatest generals of his age, from Britain. This able commander deem|ing it imprudent to engage so powerful an army, attacked them in parties, straitened them in their camp, cut off their provisions, and by that means growing superior, laid siege to Bither, which they made their retreat.

The rabbins say, that there were in that city four hundred colleges, in each college four hundred pro|fessors, and that each professor of these colleges had four hundred scholars, who being mustered up made a great army. They sustained the first efforts of the siege, though they were very badly armed, and unacquainted with discipline. Barchochebas encouraged all his subjects, and executed Tryphon, a famous rabbin,* 1.28 who talked of surrendering. Ne|vertheless the city was taken, and Barchochebas was killed. Adrian, to whom they brought his head, was desirous to see his body; but when they attempted to carry it, they found a serpent about his neck, which frightened the bearers; and the prince ac|knowledged that God alone ••ou•••• will that man. However, they have since owned the imposture of this man, whom they afterwards called Bachozab, or, The Son of a Lie. The scholars, who had so well defended the place, were bound with their books, and thrown into the fire. They add, that the slaughter was so great, that more people died in this war than came out of Egypt. Upon one single stone were found the skulls of 300 chlidren. The inhabitants of these places did not dung their ground for seven years together, being sufficiently fattened by the carcasses: therefore they have in|serted in their liturgy a hymn appionted for the fast celebrated the eighteenth of the month of Ab, which answers to the months of July and August, in which they call Adrian a second Nebuchadnezzar, and pray God to remember this cruel prince, who destroyed 480 synagogues. As for Akiba, after a very severe imprisonment, he was condemned to a cruel death; and with him, the Jews tell us, died the glory of the Jewish laws.

Indeed,* 1.29 Dion represents this war as one of the cruellest that ever was. The Romans were fre|quently beaten, and lost abundance of good troops. The Jews, who had, at that time, a profound vene|ration for Solomon's tomb, saw it fall; and at once the wild beasts entered Jerusalem, which was an omen of the following slaughter. The presage was not insignificant, for five hundred and eighty thou|sand persons were killed in the battles; and the numbers that perished by famine, misery, or fire, cannot be reckoned. After the taking of Bither, the Jews had still fifty fortified castles, and troops to de|fend them. It seems also, from a medal that the emperor struck the year following, that he had ob|tained a victory over them that year; but, in reali|ty, the resistance was not long; and the leaders be|ing taken off, the rest more easily submitted.

Adrian finished the building of Aelia, (Jerusalem:) but the Jews of St. Jerome's time ridiculously ascribe this work to Aelius Titus, the destroyer. Epipha|nius says, that he gave Aquila, his brother-in-law, the care of these buildings. But this proselyte, who turned Jew after he had embraced Christianity, had no consanguinity with this prince; nor do we find that he was entrusted with the inspection of these buildings. The circumference of the new city was somewhat different from the old, several places being included in it that were formerly without gates; but, in the main, they made use of the foundations of the first city. Valesius denies it, and, for a reason, alledges, that Adrian would be far from re-building a city implacable to the Romans, and favouring the Jews, who had brought upon him such a wretched war. But this prince did not do it in favour of the Jews, for he gave it to other inhabitants. And therefore historians ob|serve, that they began to settle a bishop there, who came of heathen race. The design was to mortify the old inhabitants, by excluding them for ever from their primitive habitation.

The truth is, Adrian prohibited their return for ever: and to make the city odious,* 1.30 if it were pos|sible, he changed the use of the remaining monu|ments of old Jerusalem; for he employed the stones that had been used in the building of the ••emple to make a theatre; and he erected statues of false gods in the place where the temple formerly stood. And, lastly, St. Jerome says, that he caused the image of a hog to be placed over the gate that led to Bethlehem, to shew that the Jews were subject to power of the Romans▪ but he is mistaken; the swine was not placed there to indicate the Jews' slavery, but to make them abhor entering into Je|rusalem, because they hated this animal, the use of which was forbidden by the law, and they thought the gate was defiled and profaned by this fi|gure.

Adrian,* 1.31 the more effectually to evacuate the city of its old inhabitants, caused a great part of them to be sold at the fair of Terebinth. Hegesippus says, that the Terebinth was a tree that had continued from the creation of the world, under which they met to traffick: but it was the place where Abra|ham had pitched his tent, and received the angels, which made it venerable. The Jews were exposed to sale there at the price of horses; and those that could not be sold, were carried to another fair, which was kept at Gaza. In Jerome's time they ap|plied to this misery these words; "A cry was heard

in Ramah Rachael weeping for her children;" be|cause their misery and affliction were excessive. This Father also applied to the miseries that happened un|der Adrian this prophecy of Zachariah, "I will seed the flock of slaughter;" because that he had learnt, from the tradition and ancient history of the Jews, that this prince had put a great number to death, punished others with the most rigorous severity, and sold them at Terebinth, or carried them into Egypt. This Father acquaints us with three things. 1. That he had read the traditions and history of the Jews concerning their calamities, and therefore there must have been such at that time. 2. That Terebinth fair still continued; but that the Jews were ashamed to be present at it, because they re|membered the usage of their fathers. 3. That the Jews assembled, and came, in his time, to buy, of the soldiers, the liberty of seeing Jerusalem. They could not weep without paying for it. The old men and women were seen with tears in their eyes▪ to re|pair to the mount of Olives, and bewail the destruc|tion o•• the temple. The soldiers made great ad|vantage of the Jews' veneration for the remains of the holy city, and of Adrian's severity of forbidding their entrance for ever; for they sold them, at a dear rate, the sight of this place and the liberty of strewing perfumes upon a stone there. Jerome assures us, that Adrian conveyed part of these pri|soners to Egypt, where their number was consi|derably augmented.

Adrian having successfully concluded the war in Judaea, stamped medals, on which was seen a wo|man holding two naked children, and sacrificing upon an altar, with these words:

ADVENTUS AUG. JUDAEAE. The arrival of the Emperor in Judaea.

Tristan thought that the woman who sacrifices, represents this subdued province, which consents to become heathen, and to sacrifice to the false gods; and that she brings to the altar two naked children, to shew that she renounced circumcision. The em|peror meant rather to signify, by the altar and sa|crifice,* 2.1 that the old religion was abolished in this province, which he had colonied with new inhabi|tants. We see another medal of this same prince, where JUDAEA is represented as a woman on her knees, giving her hand to the emperor, and three children imploring mercy. One of these children is naked. Will it be said that the design of it was to shew his not being circumcised? The medalist's intention was to impress a monument, representing the submission and desperate misery of Judaea, after Barchochebas's defeat.

* 2.2Those that dealt in the east were much more for|tunate. Trajan had carried the war against them as far as Mesopotamia. But Adrian, upon his acces|sion to the throne, having preferred an inglorious peace to a doubtful war, consented that the Eu|phrates should be made the boundary of the Ro|man empire. So that the Jews of this country had no share in this prince's war against their nation.

It is true a confederacy had been formed of three sorts of Jews. Some inhabitants of the neighbour|ing provinces, animated with the hopes of plun|der, and the first advantageous successes, joined their ancient enemies to fight the Romans. Many Jews of other provinces of the empire, who still breathed after their liberty, and sought an opportunity of recovering it, laid hold on this. Perhaps too some came from the remotest parts, and from beyond Euphrates, to the succour of their brethren; and therefore the number of the dead amounted to a|bove six hundred thousand; which number could not have been found in Judaea alone, after what it had suffered under Trajan. Nevertheless it cannot be said that Adrian himself carried the war into the east, and passed the Euphrates; for he went into his retreat of Tivoly, where he rendered him|self completely odious by the exercise of his various cruelties.

We find that this prince had added a new degree misery to the Jews,* 2.3 by imposing on them a tribute for the liberty of reading the Bible in Hebrew, and that this tribute was still paid in Tertullian's time; for he says, in his apology, that the Jews, every sabbath, purchased the liberty of reading publicly by a tax they paid. They say that the Jews that had highly esteemed the Septuagint version, began to abhor it, when they perceived it was more fa|vourable to the Christians than the Hebrews. But Adrian commanded them only to use this version; so that they were forced to pay money to read the Hebrew in the synagogues on the sabbath.

CHAP. IV.

Of the disciples of Akiba, and of the other learned men who lived at that time.

WE are told that Akiba left many disciples, who all distinguished themselves by their learning.* 2.4 But the most celebrated amongst them was judah Hakkadash, who compiled the Mishnah, or Com|mentary on Leviticus. He was the son of Simeon the Just, born at Sepphoris, and flourished during the reigns of three emperors, who were great ene|mies to the Christians, but very favourable to the Jews, viz. Antoninus Pius, M. Aurelius, and Com|modus. He became very considerable on account of his sanctity, and much more for his great learn|ing, and presided over the great academy of Ti|berias with uncontrouled authority. But he was esteemed above all for his famous book called the Mishnah, or repetition of the law, of which the fol|lowing is an abstract.

The Mishnah is divided into six parts.* 2.5 The first is intitled "Seder Zerahim," and treats on seeds in the fields, trees, fruits, plants, &c.

The second. "Seder Mohadim," treats of the Jewish feasts.

The third, "Seder Nashim," treats of women, and all matrimonial causes.

The fourth, "Seder Nezikim," treats of losses, damages, trade, and law-suits arising from them, and the manner of proceeding in them.

The fifth, "Seder Kodoshim," treats of sacri|fices, oblations, and all other holy or sacrificed things.

The sixth treats of all kinds of expiations, and all things relating to purification. Each of these books contained several tracts, amounting in the whole to sixty-three.

This code, or body, of oral traditions, is founded upon a five-fold authority.

1st. Upon the writings of Moses, whose exposi|tions are contained in the Pentateuch, and are either decisive of themselves, or by consequences fairly drawn from them.

2d. Upon the ordinances of that legislator deli|vered to him on the mount, or, as they are com|monly stiled, the oral law, which are looked upon to be of the same authority with the written.

3d. Upon the different decisions of the ancient doctors, concerning which a man is at liberty to take which side he pleases, whether, for instance, those of Hillib or Shammai.

4th. On the maxims and sayings of the prophets and wise men, which are on that account stiled the hedges or fences of the law; but from which the rabbins do often swerve; though, in the main, they hold them in great esteem.

5th. On the ancient rites and customs, which have

since gained the sanction of a law, and are made by it equally obligatory.

This is the sum of that so much boasted treatise, which is therefore stiled a body of civil and ecclesi|astical rights of the Jews, and is a collection of their oral laws, rules, &c. However, it is probable this book was not published, or, at least, received, im|mediately, since we find mention made, in Hegesip|pus, of such oral traditions being still appealed to, and canvassed, towards the latter end of the second century. Those who want a fuller account of it, may consult the Latin version of Surenhusius, with the notes of several learned commentators.

Jochanan Hassandalar, who lived also in Adrian's reign, said,

that every assembly that was made in the name of God remained, and that others were dispersed;

because virtue is the soul of societies, and the knot that ties them close, but vice ruins and destroys them. We should not speak of Eleazar, the son of Simeon Jochaides, who was pursued by the Romans, and concealed a long time, with his father, were not some prayers ascribed to him, which the Italian and German Jews make use of.

* 2.6One of the most famous of all Akiba's pupils was the illustrious Meir They gave him this name be|cause he was the light of the learned, and opened the eyes of his disciples. He married a learned woman, whose decisions the Thalmudists receive with greater reverence than those of her husband, notwithstanding all their veneration for him.

Dosithens was one of Meir's disciples; but we must not confound him with one Dositheus a priest, sent by Esarhaddon to the Cuthaeans, to teach them the law, that they might not be devoured by lions. There was also another Dositheus, who was the son of ••anni,* 2.7 who could not have studied under Meir, since his father lived not till the end of the second century. This man determined that it was no crime to forget some portion of the law, except when it was done voluntarily; and this forgetfulness be|came innocent, when application to study was the cause of it. The decision is not very curious; but yet it has admitted Dositheus into the rank of Ta|naites and Fathers, whose sentences are religiously preserved.

* 2.8Somechus▪ the son of Joses, was another of Meir's scholars, and a most excellent casuist.

* 2.9Chelpeta, a citizen of Tsippori, had two sons that studied under Meir. Joses grew the most famous. The emperor Adrian banished him from Tiberias, and sent him to live in his native country, where the learned were not honoured as in an academy. Here he took to the trade of a currier. The Jews, who find most part of the doctors to be only mechanics, have turned their reproach into glory, by making a law, commanding all Rabbins to learn a trade. Some Christians imagine this was done in emulation of the apostles and disciples, who laboured with their own hands: but this reasoning is unjust; for if the handicraft of the apostles was a subject of jealousy, the Council of Trent ought not to have destroyed this glory, and changed it into a reproach, by for|bidding the conferring of orders on a man that had not a benefice or a patrimony sufficient to maintain him. Besides, it was better to get a livelihood by honest labour, like St. Paul, than to authorize such a mendicant indolence as that of the Monks.

His younger brother, Scimon, who lived under Antoninus, and the following emperors, with Judah the Saint, was a man eminent for his skill in the learned and more abstruse sciences.

* 2.10The same age produced another Scimon, the son of Eleazar, a man of learning, but of excessive pride, which, however, according to the a••••ount of a La|tin writer, was humbled by an extraordinary inci|dent, so that afterwards he acquired the graces of modesty and candour.

Meir had also the honour of instructing Judah, the author of the Misnah, of whom we have spoken more at large; and presume these sketches will suffice to shew the genius of the doctors of that age.

CHAP. V.

Antoninus Pius becomes a proselyte to the Jewish reli|gion. Is offended with the Jews, and makes war against them. Defeats them, and grants them privi|leges under certain restrictions. Justin Martyr has a conference with Tryphon. Principles of the latter. Marcus Aurelius makes war against the Jews, and punishes them for entering into a confederacy with Cassius. Conversion of Hegesippus. His account of the different sects of Jews. Other sects mentioned by Justin Martyr. Various translations of the Scrip|tures.

ANTONINUS Pius, who was adopted by Adrian,* 2.11 and raised to the highest dignities, is repre|sented as a great friend and patron of the Jewish nation, having been a disciple of Judah, and sub|mitted to the rite of circumcision. He always, however, dissembled his religion; and though he professed Judaism, which he was perfectly acquaint|ed with, yet he appeared devoted to the service of idols. He constantly favoured the Jews, and so strenuously applied himself to the study of the law and tradition, that he joined with his master Judah in the composition of the Misnah.

Antoninus, however,* 2.12 instead of countenancing the Jews, was soon under a necessity of making war against them, because they had rebelled. Adrian's prohibition of circumcision was still in force. They had obeyed an emperor who had forced them to it by the torrent of his conquests, and power of his arms. But they could not long brook their being deprived of this accustomed sign of their religion. They rose the first opportunity, and were res••lved, sword in hand, to oblige Antoninus to give them this liberty. Capitolinus, in his narrative of this war, has comprized Antoninus's victories in the compass of five or six lines, and by his brevity occa|sioned Baronius to believe that the insurrection of the Jews happened in the first year of his reign. But the Jews, who were dispersed, and extremely debi|litated by Adrian, required some years to collect a body, and capacitate themselves to make head a|gainst a potent prince. Besides, Capitolinus's ac|count is a compendium of this prince's noble actions, which ought to be distinguished, as having been at|chieved at different times. The Jews were unsuc|cessful, and defeated by Antoninus; but when he had conquered them, he restored them the privilege of circumcision under these restrictions:

1. It only related to the Jews: but the Samarians,* 2.13 who professed the same religion, had not the benefit of it. 2. Proselytes were also excluded, and none of them were suffered to be made Jews by this rite.

Justin Martyr had at that time a conference with Tryphon. The Jews speak of a famous Rabbin,* 2.14 who was preceptor or colleague with Akiba, called Tryphon; and Dr. Lightfoot thinks it was he that Justin Martyr disputed with. He was not only rich but charitable; for we are told that Akiba, being employed to take care of the poor, he gave him 4000 gold crowns, which he distributed in one day. Though he was a disciple of Schammy's school, yet he has been esteemed; and many sentences of his are preserved and inserted in the maxims of the Fathers. He solicits men to hasten their sanctification, because of the brevity of human life. God demands it, and the recompence will be considerable. Nevertheless, he teaches,

That man is not obliged to the per|formance of the whole law; and provided he does his endeavour to know but one part of it, yet he shall receive a great reward.

We are taught also from him,* 2.15 that the name of twelve letters ceased to be pronounced at that time. The name of Jehovah is ineffable, because it ex|presses the essence of God without ambiguity;

whereas the others only make him known by his at|tributes. There was moreover a dispute among the doctors about the manner of pronouncing it. The prophane, who increased their numbers after the death of Simeon the Just, abused it; and therefore they left off pronouncing it. Instead of this in|effable name was substituted one of twelve letters, which the priest uttered in giving the blessing to the people. But Tarphon affirms, that one day coming near the priest to hear him pronounce his benedic|tion, he perceived that he did not articulate the twelve letters; but that he only muttered whilst the brethren sang; and the reason of this change proceeded from the number of the prophane, which was increased. They highly commend the wisdom of this Tarphon, and his knowledge in the law.

Though Marcus Aurelius was naturally of a mild temper,* 2.16 yet this exempted not the Jews from great miseries during his reign. This pirnce had such an opinion of them, that, as he once passed through Judaea in his way to Egypt, he cried out, that he had found people as wicked as the Marco|mans and Sarmatians; those barbarous nations that made continual war, and ravaged a great part of his empire in his reign.

Besides, there were two circumstances very preju|dicial to them. Vologesus, king of Parthia, was making warlike preparations at the time that Anto|nius died; and he commenced the war a little after his death by violent incursions. Severian, the go|vernor of Cappadocia, attempting to oppose him, perished with his whole army. Marching after|wards into Syria, the Parthians made terrible de|struction. The eastern Jews, who were subject to the Parthians, and enemies to the Romans, joined them, and increased the number of their troops. Mercus Aurelius sent Lucius Verus, his colleague, with the best officers of the empire; but he stopped at Antioch to relax, and left the war to the manage|ment of his generals. Cassius, who commanded, beat Vologesus, and pursued him to his capital Ctesiphon, which he took, and demolished the pa|lace of the kings. Babylon, which still made some figure, Mesopotamia, and the lands of the Medes, where there were a great number of Jews, were laid waste. Seleucia, upon the banks of the Ti|gris, voluntarily surrendered: but the Romans vio|lating the capitulation, killed four or five hundred thousand persons. By a treaty of peace concluded four years after the beginning of the war, Mesopo|tamia and Osrene, however, remained subject to the Romans. Thus the Jews of this country were re|duced once more under their obedience.

Cassius, who left the east to vanquish the Sarma|tians, flushed with so many exploits and victories, which raised him to the rank of heroes, encouraged as is said,* 2.17 by Faustina, Marcus Aurelius's wife, who was for making him an emperor, that she might mar|ry him after her husband's death, assumed the title of emperor in Syria, where he was governer, having first spread a report that the throne was vacant by Marcus Aurelius's death. His reign was but a dream, for it lasted but three months and six days. However, the Jews, who only waited for an oppor|tunity to rise, seeing the fire kindled in the neigh|bourhood, added fuel to the flames, by joining with the rebels. Marcus Aurelius pardoned the children of Cassius, whose head had been brought to him, and spared the blood of the senators who had en|gaged in the conspiracy. He even caused his letters to be burnt, that they might not be known. But he could not bear the insult which the Jews had of|fered him, and to punish them he renewed Adrian's laws against them. Whether these laws were ill exe|cuted, particularly in Asia, where the Jews were numerous, and very remote from the capital, or that they purchased the liberty of annoying the Christians, they signalized themselves in this coun|try by their hatred. Justin Martyr had before charg|ed them with the consequences of his passion, which frequently broke out. But they manifested it at Smyrna, in Polycarp's martyrdom; for they not only joined their voices with the heathens, in crying in the theatre, "He is an Atheist," but were also the most vehement round his pile. They persecuted this great man after his death, by soliciting the judge to deny his body to the Christians; but, at last, the captain of the guards, seeing the bitter rage of the Jews against the dead body, caused it to be reduced to ashes.

These commotions might be made by a mutinous rabble, and tolerated by reason of the hatred to the Christians; yet it is certain that the Jews enjoyed great liberty of conscience at Smyrna, since they were present at the theatre, and distinguished them|selves from the heathens. Moreover we find some footsteps of their authority in Phrygia, by the an|swers that an orthodox person made to the Monta|nists, who accused them of being murderers of the prophets.

Is there one of them that, from the origin of their sect, has been persecuted by the Jews, or killed by the impious? Is there any wo|man who has been whipped in the synagogues or stoned?

This author attributes to the Jews the persecutions of the Christians, and the branches that divided Christianity. He adds the power of scourg|ing. The uncontrouled and numerous rabble in Asia, in Marcus Aurelius's time, pursued the Chris|tians in the streets with stones, and sometimes cru|cified them. It is even very probable that Thraseas, bishop of Eumenia, or of Emalhisar, in Phrygia Pecatiana, was martyred in this manner. The cir|cumcised must have been numerous in this part of the world, since Montanus endeavoured to allure them, by giving the name of Jerusalem to two lit|tle cities of Phrygia, which he looked upon as the principal seats of his sect.

This time produced the conversion and unusual baptism of a Jew. A man of this nation travelling, in the reign of Marcus Aurelius, with Christians in a desart, was taken with such a violent thirst, that it was thought he was going to expire. He demanded baptism with an impatience, which made the Chris|tians uneasy, as being utterly destitute of water. One of them supplied the defect, by taking sand,* 2.18 which he threw upon the catechumen's body, pro|nouncing the baptism form. The Jew recovered by this new baptism, and marched on to the city of Alexandria Dionysius, who was then bishop there, being informed of the fact, ordered the Jew to be re-baptized with water. Nicephorus adds, that such another instance happened under Athana|sius; and he has annexed a third example, that fell out in his time at Constantinople.

The conversion of Hegesippus,* 2.19 who lived at that time, seems also dubious to many. It is agreed that he was a Jew, and that he embraced Christia|nity; but some sectarists represent him as a kind of half Christian, in not being brought to give up cer|tain tenets he had imbibed from his infancy.

Though the truth would not be weakened by the loss of its defenders, and by the judgment we form at this day of his doctrine, yet we cannot forbear saying,* 2.20 that the arguments produced against him are very weak. For Eusebius only says, that he had published several things drawn from the He|brew and Syriac gospel, and the unwritten tradi|tions of the Jews. It should therefore be concluded, that he continued a Jew, because he used the un|written traditions of the synagogue: as it is con|cluded he was an Ebionite, because he has some|times quoted the Hebrew gospel. Nevertheless, nobody denies that he embraced Christianity. He|gesippus says, that he went to Corinth, where the church continued constant in the purity of the faith; and that Primus, who was then bishop of it, gave him great comfort by the discourses they had con|cerning the truth. From thence he went to Rome, and maintained constant communion with the bi|shop who held the see. The church of Corinth was neither Arian nor Ebionite. Hegesippus attributes to it the profession of a true saith. He united with this bishop, and conversed with him about this pure faith: it is therefore indisputable that He|gesippus was of the same religion with the bishop

and the church, whose purity of faith he commends, and that he held the doctrine received at Corinth and Rome.

Hegesippus informs us, that there were tradi|tions among the Jews, and that they were not writ|ten in his time. We have reason therefore to think, that Judah the Saint, did not compose the Misnah till Commodus's reign, towards the end of the se|cond century, since they were not yet published in Hegesippus's time, who lived under Marcus An|toninus. Eusebius had first placed him under A|drian; but it seems that he discovered his error, and corrected it.

* 2.21Hegesippus speaks of four famous sects among the Jews; the Samarians, the Pharisees, the Sad|ducees, and the Essenes; to which he adds the Ga|lileans. These were the followers of that famous Judas, who rose in the days of the taxing made by Augustus, and who would not have the emperors acknowledged for their lords, nor tribute paid to them. This spirit of sedition was still in being; and these sectaries were those who had caused the terri|ble rebellions which completed the ruin of the na|tion. The Hemero-baptists are charged by Epi|phanius with having incorporated all the errors of the Pharisees and Sadducees; but I do not see what reason there is for this accusation; for their name only denotes their care to wash themselves every day, or many times in a day. It was a branch of the Pharisees that Christ taxed with fondness for washings, and who afterwards separated from the body of the sect to make a particular one, and per|haps a more rigid one in point of washings.

Hegesippus reckons the Masbothaeans amongst the Jewish sects. This sect arose after our Saviour; for they are not known from the gospel, nor by any more ancient author. We discover their true opi|nion in the apostolical constitutions: they denied a Providence, and believed that every thing happened by chance: they also rejected the doctrine of the im|mortality of the soul. So that the Masbothaeans were a branch of the Sadducees; as the Hemero-baptists proceeded from the Pharisees. I know not wherefore it has been thought that their name was borrowed from the sabbath, which they ob|served more religiously than others; for there is no analogy betwixt the terms Masbothaeans and Sabba|tarians. It was the character of the heretics of that time to confound languages; and to coin unknown words from them. There were other Masbothaeans, disciples to Simon Magus, which Theodoret has distinguished from the Jewish sectaries, and with reason, for they derived that pedigree from one Masbothaeus, their founder, and may be ranked among Christian heretics.

Justin Martyr gave Tryphon a very different ac|count of the sects that divided the Jews of his age,* 2.22 though he was cotemporary with Hegesippus. He passes over the Essenes in silence, as if they were vanished; and I could easily believe that Hege|sippes only mentioned them because they had for|merly made a considerable schism in the nation. Justin Martyr maintains three sects, the Genists, the Merists, and the Hellenists. It is said the Ge|nists derived their glory from being the descendants of Abraham, the Father of the faithful. The Me|rists divided the Scripture, and did not receive all the prophets, because they were animated by diffe|rent spirits. These Merists might be those men|tioned by Benjamin of Tudela. He found a schism at Cairo, because the Jews at Babylon, and of the ••rack divided the Scripture differently from those of Syria. The former so partitioned it, as to read it all in one year; the others multiplying the sections, read it but in three years. Scaliger imagined that the schism was between the Greeks and Babylonians, because he had read in Benjamin the word Igrikim, which he translated the Greeks. But Constantine the emperor, who published and translated his tra|vels, read it irraeakin. The Jews of the Irack were perhaps Hegesippus's Merist's, who began to separate about the manner of reading and dividing the Scripture.

The Hellenists began also to set up a new sect, of which it will not be amiss to trace the original. Af|ter the conquests of Alexander the Great, a distinc|tion was made of the Hellenist Jews, which is ex|pressed in great characters in the gospel. This name was given them because they were mingled with the Greeks, spoke their language, and read the Holy Scriptures in it after they were translated. We observe this only difference between them and the other Jews, with whom otherwise they partook in the same religion, sacrifices, and ceremonies.

Scaliger imagined that the jealousy and hatred were of very long standing betwixt these two parts of the nation, and that they had always made a kind of schism. They reproach the Hellenists with read|ing the Scripture in the Egyptian way, from the left to the right, and this was a kind of an affront. From reproaches they came to blows; and whilst the second temple stood, Eleazar, the son of Tsadoc, entering the synagogue of the Alexandrians at Jerusalem, said the most provoking things his rage could suggest. Scaliger found traces of this schism as low as the twelfth century.

If Scaliger was right, the sect of the Hellenists would be much more ancient than we make it. But though there were some jealousy betwixt the Hel|lenists and the Jews of Palestine, yet it proceeded not to a separation or schism. The Hellenist were even permitted to build many synagogues at Je|rusalem for their use, where they performed their devotions; whilst Josephus has related no dispute upon this matter, nor Philo complained that his country men were ill used.

The learned are divided, and run into extremes, as to the rise, cause, and time of the division. Some, as S••lmasius, think they have proved, that the Bi|ble was never read in Greek, because it was not read in Arabic, which was more common, and better known by the Jews than the Greek could be. Ano|ther joins together both Hellenists and Jews into one synagogue at Jerusalem; and fancies that he finds a proof of it in the history of the Acts, where the Jews and Greeks were divided about the crea|tion of the deac••nesse; which could not have hap|pened had they not been both in the same syna|gogue, as if the question there was not about the converted Greeks and Jews, who made but one body in the church, where they could not continue long without dividing.

Others, prepossessed in favour of the Septuagint version, find it every where, and exalt it far above the original. The safest way is to embrace a due medium. Necessity required that the Hellenists, who understood not Hebrew, should read the law in Greek in their synagogues. Though it were true that Philo, and some other of the learned, understood the Syriac, there would still be the same necessity for the Greek version for that great number of Hellenists that were in Egypt, and in all the great cities of Asia under the Roma•• jurisdiction. The Jews of Jerusalem could not condemn this practice, since they had such another in using the Chaldee paraphrases; and when there were no writ|ten paraphrases, they filled up this defect by an ex|plication of each verse, which custom being as an|cient as Ezra, authorized, that of the Greek versions in all the places where the Chaldee was not the lan|guage of the country. Simeon, the son of Gama|liel, who lived at the time of Titus's war, deter|mined that the law might be read and written in Greek. We shall see hereafter why the Gemara has hunted this decision to the five books of Moses. We may add that R. Levi, coming to Cesarea, where there were many Greeks, was surprized to hear the Hebrew words "Hear O Israel," pro|nounced in Greek. But R. Joses asked him whe|ther those that understood not the Hebrew never read the law; and added, without waiting for an an|swer,

"That whoever reads in a language he knows or understands, does his duty."

Lightfoot, who could not deny but that there were Greek copies in the synagogues, imagined that they were placed there by way of precaution, that when the heathens came in to explode their religion, they might be convinced by their own eyes that it was not bad.

To own that there were Greek copies in the sy|nagogues, is to confess that the law was read in this language; and the Hebrews hindered not a custom that was universally received in the regions of the Roman empire. Nevertheless, they both of them considered the original as sacred, and preferable, as well to the versions as to Chaldee paraphrases, because it was God that had made choice of this tongue.

Christianity disturbed this harmony of the Jews. The Christians disputing with them, always used the version of the LXX.* 2.23 which not only was better known, but more advantageous to them. Justin Martyr produces proofs out of it; for he taxes the Hebrews with lately having struck out these words of Jeremy, "I am like a lamb that is led to the slaughter," which were found in the seventieth ver|sion. He carried his proofs farther, in quoting a passage of Esdras, which is no where to be found, and which he is accused of having put into Greek; though it is more than probable that this fra••d was more ancient than he that made use of it. These reproaches, well or ill grounded, began to disgust the Jews with the Greek version, and to give them less esteem for those who were obliged to use it. The originals were cried up above the version, which was rejected, and found pernicious: they flew into an extreme, and this dispute produced four effects. 1. The name of Hellenist became odious; and those that bore it, finding themselves abused with bitter reproaches, set up the sect mentioned by Justin Martyr. Here then you have the origin of the sect. 2. They attempted new versions, of which we shall give an account. 3. The Gemarists, not being able to prohibit the reading of the Greek books, confined it to ••he Pentateuch; because these five books contained ••••ss disputed prophecies than those of the other prophets. 4 As the hatred to the Hellenists continually increased, those fabulous prodigies were invented, said to be wrought at the time that the Septuagint version was composed, and they talked of a fast that was celebrated on the account of this version, of which no mention is made in the Talmud. Thus it is we disentangle the his|tory of the Hellenists, and not only extricate it with probability, but our opinions are founded upon many irrefragable testimonies. These new secta|ries appeared therefore a little before Justin Mar|tyr; or rather the name of Hellenists, which was hardly odious before, grew so then, and became the title of a sect.

The different parties fell to work upon several translations of the Scripture, and this sort of busi|ness became much in fashion among the Jews; which the Hellenists we have been speaking of desired; or else they became more necessary to dis|pute against the Christians dispersed over all the Roman empire. Aquila was the first that engaged in it; whose version was received with a general applause of the Hellenists. Origin affirms, That all the Jews,* 2.24 who did not understand the Hebrew, were accustomed to this version, which they looked upon to be the best of all. Philestrius not only say•• the same thing, but adds, that some heretics followed it. In the mean time the Thalmudists, full of that jealousy that had for some time prevailed against the Hellenists, made their efforts to disgust the people with it, and reduce them to the Hebrew Bible. We find, in their writings, several strokes of censure against the Greek one. The Christians complained of it, because it came from a suspected hand, and which had robbed them of many passages of Scripture; but, however, they sometimes made use of it: and St. Jerome, who had condemned it, praised afterwards the exactness of the author. Theodotion made another of them. The Jews car|ried off this conquest from the church; for Theo|dotion, who was born an heathen, had embraced Christianity; but being brought over to Judaism, was circumcised. He was a native of Pontus, where he had known Mercion, his countryman, and had entered into his sect. From thence he went to E|phesus, where the Jews were numerous and consi|derable, and he listed into the synagogue. It seems that this was an invasion upon Antoninus's law, who forbad the Jews the making of proselytes, and cir|cumcising them. But we have already observed, that these laws were ill executed in Asia; and per|haps Marcus Aurelius had revoked them; for The|odotion made no mystery of his circumcision, and the Christians knew it well enough. He learnt of his new masters Hebrew enough to translate the Scripture, or rather to copy the Septuagint; for he followed them so close, that Origin made use of his version to fill up the chasms and vacuities that were found in the Septuagint. It is said that he published it in the first year of Commodus's reign, according to the custom of the time; for the learned took a pride to publish their works in the Decennalia or Vicennalia, and at the birth of princes, or when they came to the throne. Not to dispute about this custom, did a Jew make a sufficient figure in the empire to honour Commodus's coronation by a ver|sion of the Holy Scriptures? As odious as his per|son must have been, the Christians reaped some ad|vantage by his work; and read publicly his tran|slation of the prophet Daniel, because that of the Septuagint was full of faults; or rather because this version was by a hand that was much inferior to those that had worked upon the Pentateuch. Also the Ebionites and Nazarenes preferred it be|fore all others. Symmachus composed a third tran|slation in Severus's reign. It appeared much clearer, and more useful than the preceding ones; because this author had more respect to the sense than to the signification of words. The Christians made use of all these translations; though they were only made to their prejudice, and by doctors that infi|nitely hated them. However, the version of the Septuagint still raised its head above all these new fangled pieces. In the mean time it must be owned, that they were only undertaken to weaken its au|thority, to hinder its being used in the synagogues, as it hitherto had been, and to prevent the Chris|tians, who disputed with the Jews, from drawing objections out of it. For, indeed, these last inter|preters had robbed us of Isaiah's oracle, "A virgin shall bring forth."

CHAP. VI.

The Jews firmly attached to Severus, who makes war against the Parthians. Severus extends the war ••nto Judea, but is very favourable to the Jews. Expla|nation of a law admitting Jews into offices. Infe|rences drawn therefrom. The Jews are favoured un|der Caracalla Traditions peculiar to the Hellenists, and others to the Jews. Jachanan compiles the Tal|mud. Account of it, Clemency of Alexander Severus to the Jews.

PESCENNIUS Niger being proclaimed emperor in Syria, endeavoured to make Judaea,* 2.25 which was adjacent, declare for him; and finding this people of an unshaken fidelity for Severus,* 2.26 he did them all the mischief that the shortness of his reign could permit him. Severus was not so sensible at first as he ought to have been of their firm attachment to him. Be|sides he was taken up with more important affairs; being obliged to carry the war into the east against Vologesus, king of Parthia. The Jews,* 2.27 who were numerous betwixt the Tigris and the Euphrates, suffered much from this war. Adiabena, whose kings had professed Iudaism at the end of the last century, and the beginning of this, was ravaged. Babylon and Seleucia were taken. The siege of Ctesiphon lasted long, because the Romans were reduced to the feeding on herbs and roots: but this

city being carried by storm, part of its inhabitants were put to the sword, and 100,000 persons carried prisoners out of it.

We are told that Severus, being apprehensive that the Jews, dispersed in the east, would declare for Vologesus, softened them by many edicts. But it does not appear that they were distinguished from the rest of the subjects of the Parthian empire, and the favourable edicts were not promulgated till after the war.

* 2.28On the contrary, Severus, at his return, marched into Judaea; and Eusebius says positively, that he made war with the Samarians and Jews. Besides, the senate, confounding what the father had done in Syria, and the son in Judaea, decreed a Jewish tri|umph. The emperor, in the same journey, made several laws relating to Palestine, one of which pro|hibited the turning Jew. He left this nation liberty to circumcise their children; but hindered the re|ceiving proselytes, and initiating strangers by this custom. They had an abode, and some settlements, in Galilee; but the inhibition of living at Jerusa|lem was still in force in Severus's reign. It cannot then be doubted but Severus declared against this nation in the first year of his reign.

* 2.29But at length he grew more favourable to them, when he was apprized of their fidelity; or, which was, perhaps, a more prevailing motive, as he was bey••nd measure covetous, when he came to know that they had many rich and considerable persons, who would be glad to purchase his protection on any terms. Accordingly we find several of them raised to high posts, and preferred to the Christians, who were persecuted with grievous imposts.

* 2.30There was another law made in the same prince's reign, importing, that "the privileges of the Jews extending only to things that might prejudice their religion, they should be called to the Tutelage of the heathens like the rest." Guardianship was bur|thensome in all ages. Nevertheless, strangers were excluded from it at Rome; and a man could not exercise it without being a denizen of this great city Nevertheless, this prince persecuted the Chris|tians, instead of promoting them to dignities.

* 2.31These laws therefore shew that the Jews were looked upon as Roman citizens, since they were charged with the guardianship not only of children of their own nation, but with that of idolatrous strangers, and that they were capable of offices, and divers employments; and this irrevocable edict was observed for a great many years; but at last Leo abolished it. There was a clause in the law of Severus which rendered it doubly advantageous; for, by giving the Jews the enjoyment of all the privileges of Roman citizens, they were left the liberty of refusing offices of court, and being made decurions; because if there was any degree of ho|nour in these posts, yet they were too burthensome. They were shunned instead of being canvassed for; and those that were called to them were forced to an acceptance. The emperors shewed favour to such as they exempted from them; and the eunuchs of Constantius made a trade of these immunities, which they sold. His successor Julian has been highly com|mended for cancelling all these exemptions, and for being so rigorous in that respect, that he scarcely granted it to those who endeavoured to discharge themselves on the most plausible pretences. Seve|rus therefore shewed great favour to the Jews in al|lowing them these exemptions, and this puffed them up with pride and insolence, especially against the persecuted Christians.

St. Jerome says, that, in the twelfth year of Se|verus, a jubilee was celebrated. This term is pe|culiar to the Jews; but Scaliger has remarked, that whatsoever way we reckon the years, the Jewish ju|bilee could not happen in this. The Christians had borrowed this word from the synagogue. But yet it was not a jubilee of the church; and those that should refer the origin of that celebrated at Rome to this, would be grossly mistaken; but Severus causing the secular games to be celebrated in the empire, the Christians, who partook in the feast, called it a jubilee.

Caracalla followed his father's steps;* 2.32 nor can it be doubted but that he loved the Jews from his child|hood, since one of them at court, who was his play-fellow, being whipped by the emperor's order, he was so afflicted that he would not see his father for several days. So that, as we do not find he acted against the Jews, we have reason to believe that they took the advantage of a quiet interval to make their collection of traditions.

There were two sorts of traditions;* 2.33 some that were peculiar to the Hellenists, and others received by the Hebrews of the Holy Land, descended from the Parisees. The former traditions, vented by the fore-cited authors, were actually unknown, and re|jected by the Tiberian doctors, whose contempt and hatred of the Greeks increased daily.

Traditions, both Jewish and Hellenist,* 2.34 were by this time grown very numerous, and the teachers and writers of both not a few. In this century flourished the famed Jochanan, chief of the Ama|raijen, or commentators on the Misnah, and com|piler of the Jerusalem Talmud.* 2.35 The most proba|ble supposition is, that he was born about the latter end of the second century, or Anno Dom. 184 or 185. Some writers pretend that he was chosen chief of the academy of Tiberias in the fifteenth year of his age, which is improbable, and contrary to the practice of the Jews, because his master was still alive; and Caniner, whom he appointed his suc|cessor, is affirmed, by the Jewish chronologists, to have enjoyed the dignity about ten years more; so that the soonest he can be supposed to have ascend|ed the chair is about anno 225, and about the for|tieth year of his age, by which time he had an op|portunity sufficient to finish his studies under those two masters, in order to qualify himself for his great work, in which he was assisted by two other learned rabbies, R. Samuel, and Rab, or Rau, who had like|wise been disciples of his two masters, Judah the Saint, and R. Chanina.

The following is a brief account of this famous production, commonly known by the name of the Hierosolymitan Talmud.

The word Talmud signifies "Doctrine,* 2.36" and is emphatically given to this work as being a complete system or body of it, or of the religion and morals of the Jews. They have two of that name and im|port, viz. this of Jerusalem, which is the shorter, and more obscure, of the two; as like wise the more ancient by near one century; and that of Babylon, of which we shall speak in its proper place. It is properly a comment upon the Misnah of Judah Hakkadash.

Judah had scarcely finished his own work, before he had the mortification to see a collection of dif|ferent traditions published, and afterwards inserted in the Misnah. To remedy, therefore, this evil▪ these three great men wrote this comment upon it, which being completed in Judaea, and in the Hebrew then in use, was stiled the Gemarrah, or Perfection; and this and the Misnah together made that which is called the Talmud of Jerusalem.

This Talmud, distinguished by the title of "Hiero|solymitan," being still found not only too succint, as well as too obscure, by reason o•• the barbarous terms it had borrowed from other nations, gave birth to the Babylonian Talmud, compiled by Rab|bi Ase, a learned disciple of the great Jochanan, who left the academy of Tiberias, and went to pre|side at that of Sara, near Babylon, where he conti|nued in that dignity about forty years, during which he compiled his Gemarrah▪ or comment upon the Misnah of Judah the Saint; and from the place where he wrote it, it came to be stiled the Babylo|nian Talmud. Ase did not live to finish it; but this was effected by his sons, and some of his disciples; so that it became a vast body or collection of traditions concerning the canon laws of the Jews, and of all

the questions relating to the Jewish law, wherein the Misnah is the text, and the Gemarrah the comment upon it.

The Jews in general prefer this Babylonian Tal|mud, on account of its clearness and fullness, above that of Jerusalem; and though it abounds with ri|diculous fables and stories, they will not suffer any one to call it in question without the censure of he|resy. We shall dispense with giving a farther ac|count of that voluminous work, and only observe, that the learned Maimonides hath given us an ex|cellent abridgement of it, in which he has thrown out all that was puerile and ridiculous, and confin|ed himself to a collection of the most material cases and decisions that are contained in it. This epi|tome, which he stiles "Yad Khazchah," or, "Strong Hand," is therefore much preferable to the Talmud itself, as being one of the most complete bodies of the Jewish laws that ever was written.

* 2.37Hitherto the Jews had lived in peace and happi|ness, but had nearly suffered a most dreadful perse|cution in the reign of Heliogabalus. That whim|sical prince caused himself to be circumcised, and abstained from swine's flesh out of devotion to his gods. He might have borrowed this from the Jews, in whose neighbourhood he had been brought up, and with whom his family had intimate correspon|dence. But all this predilection would not have secured them from his violence, had not death prevented it.

Lampridius relates, that this prince, having built a fine temple to the honour of Heliogabalus▪ order|ed the Palladium, the vestal fire, the mother of the gods, and whatsoever was held most sacred by the Romans, to be conveyed thither, being resolved that Heliogabalus should be the only person to be worshipped. To render this union of worship more complete, he formed the design of introdu|cing the Samarians and Jews religion, who were well known to him. The lives and fortunes of the Jews depended upon the execution of this design; for they never would have consented to have worship|ped the sun in the emperor's temple, with that heap of ceremonies his religion consisted of; and they could expect nothing but death, and the most cruel tortures, from a prince whom the historians com|pare to the Neros, and other monsters that have governed the empire. The unexpected death of this prince, who was assassinated by his soldiers, se|cured them from this impending danger. Indeed, he only says, it was a design of the emperor's, and that he talked of doing it. Beside, though Helio|gabalus had sent the image of his god, and had ordered it to be placed in the senate above victory, even before his entrance into Rome, and though the historians relate the extravagancies he commit|ted to honour this deity, yet it required time to build the temple in which all religions were to be combined. Eusebius says, it was not raised till the year of his death; and so God thereby preserved them, as well as the Christians, from a scourge that was likely to destroy them.

* 2.38The clemency of Alexander Severus contributed doubtless to the flourishing state of the Jews; for, indeed, this prince openly favoured that nation. The wits of that time called him an Archi-syna|gogue of Syria; because he favoured the Jews, cor|responded with them, and was instructed in their religion, of which he had received some tincture from his mother Mammaea. Indeed, this prince had a variety of religions in his head. He never aban|doned the gods of his fathers, nor the heathen ido|latry, which still prevailed. But he listed among these gods Abraham, the Father of the faithful, and the great patriarch of the Jews. It seems as if he only did it to rectify the design Heliogabalus had formed of ranking the Samarian, Jew, and Chris|tian, with the heathens in the same temple; but he did it with candour and charity.

Alexander Severus was for having the names of the officers he sent into the provinces proclaimed, and the people licensed to accuse them; because, as the Jews and Christians proclaimed their priests, that they might be known, it was fit the same thing should be done in point of governors, who were entrusted with the lives and fortunes of the people. In fine, he often repeated this maxim, which he had learnt from the Jew and Christian, "Do not to others what ye would not have them do unto you."

The following emperors continued the tranquil|lity which this nation enjoyed. Philip, who was born in Arabia, where the Jews had so great a com|merce, gave them countenance. Decius, who per|secuted the Christian church in hatred to the pro|tection Philip had granted it, might have confound|ed them with it. But, besides that the difference of these two religions was well known, it does not appear that they had any share in the short and violent persecutions this prince brought upon the church. Nor must they be admitted into Valerian's persecution, nor considered as the authors of it: though Dionysius of Alexandria says, this prince was compelled to it by an Archi-synagogue of Egypt.

We may observe, that they place the doctor Sce|sciath at the end of the third century. He was blind, but nevertheless became very learned He had also a dispute with the Christians. Two works are ascribed to him; one upon the Cabala, which was an explication of the Splendors, the manuscript of which was in the Heidelberg library: the other was a Targum, or a Chaldee paraphrase upon the Scripture.

CHAP. VII.

State of the Jews in the east. They are greatly favour|ed by the Romans. Learned men among them in that part of the world. The Jews persecuted by Sapor. The Persians make war against the Romans. The Jews are greatly favoured by Zenobia. Sapor is vanquished by Odenatus Zenobia is defeated by Aurelius, and afterwards lives in retirement.

IT is now time to pass over the Euphrates,* 2.39 and give some account of the eastern Jews, of their princes and chiefs, of their captivity, their acade|mies, and most celebrated doctors, and such other transactions as may be deemed worthy of notice. These chiefs and doctors did not begin before the third century to make a figure, and to found their most celebrated academies. We therefore think that this new dignity was not introduced into Baby|lon till the time of Huna, the son of Nathan, who was cotemporary with Judah the Saint, and flourished a|bout the year 220, or, at the earliest, under his fa|ther, about the beginning of the third century. Even then their authority could be but small, con|sidering the slavery under which the Jews groaned from the Parthians, Romans, and other tyrants, whatever titles they might bestow on them to raise the credit of their nation.

Artaxerxes, the famed restorer of the Persian mo|narchy, died about anno 244,* 2.40 and was succeeded by his son Sapor, from whom the princes of that new succession took their name. Both of them became great favourers of the Jews, and shewed an extra|ordinary esteem for the rabbies. They had been hi|therto much despised, but under his and the follow|ing reigns, they had so great authority, that the state was governed by their advice. Indeed, this was the time that their academies at Babylon were erected and grew famous, of which, and the doc|tors that then flourished, the following is an ac|count.

Samuel the astronomer,* 2.41 had left Judaea to go into the east. He settled at Nahardea, which he render|ed very famous by his astronomical lectures. He found out the method of fixing the four revolu|tions of the year, or the solstices. He was coun|sellor to Huna, prince of the captivity. He is said to have died in the year 250 of the Christian aera. His glory was eclipsed by that of Ada, who was born at Babylon, and had a more exact knowledge of the

course of the sun than his predecessor. There were, indeed, at that time very considerable men of their nation at Babylon, as well as learned men in their academies.

The honour of this academy was supported by two great men who lived in the same century; one of whom was Jehudah, the son of Eliezar. He raised himself by his learning much above the professor of Sora, who could not stand against him, but by his alliance with the princes of the captivity. We find in the Babylonian Talmud abundance of his deci|sions. His hatred of the heathens, whom he com|pares to ass••s, manifestly appears there. But this aversion to strangers has generally raised the glory of doctors instead of depressing it. Nachman also possessed this chair, and kept up the succession of eminent doctors. This was the state of one of their eastern academies in the third century. Let us pass to that of Sora, which is no less noted.

Abba Aricha, who is entitled Rau, by way of excellence, and known only by that name, had gone into Judaea, to study under Judah the Saint, with Samuel, the astronomer. But, after his master's death, he returned to Babylon to teach there. He refused to settle at Nahardea, to avoid competition; but erected his academy at Sora, where he remained till his death. One of the princes of Babylon, called Adarchan, was so fond of him, that he went to hear his lectures, and was circumcised. They make him the author of a commentary upon Ruth, and some other books. But as the number of authors was very great at that time, their works are hard to be distinguished. Rau determined that the syna|gogues ought to be raised above all the houses of a city. The city where it is not so shall perish, said he; for God hath extended mercy unto us to set up his house. He never went to sea with an infidel, lest God should exercise his judgment at that time. He imagined the Romans were to become masters of all the world.

Huna, a relation to the prince of the captivity, and of the same name, succeeded him in this aca|demy, and pluming himself upon this alliance, or being full of vanity, was the first that took the title of prince of the academy. He had an hundred and sixty volumes of the law; but one was found illegitimate, because it was as long as broad. This may suffice to give us an idea of the character of these princes of the academy, and what taste they had for learning.

Let us add another learned man, called Cohana. He had left the country, like the rest, to go and study in Judaea, which was the route then in fashion. A man was not thought to be learned un|less he had seen the academy of Tiberias. Having heard Jochanan, and seen the patriarch Samuel, he returned to Babylon, where he officiated as a priest.

All the learned, that sought a retreat in the Per|sian empire, and erected academies there, demon|strate that Artaxerxes treated them with great cle|mency.

But these Magi did not enjoy that uninterrupted felicity under the reign of Sapor, as they had done under his father and predecessor. It appears that he corresponded with the Rabbins, and disputed with them. As it was not the custom of the Persians to bury their dead, he wondered that the Jews should do it He sent for Chasda, one of the learned of that time, who was afterwards president of the aca|demy of Sora, and had under him twelve thousand scholars. He asked the reason of this custom, and required him to prove it by an express passage of the law. The doctor was reduced to silence: but another that was more subtle, evaded the objection; and, instead of a precept, produced examples. Sa|por likewise quoted the example of Moses, who was not buried. The doctors still evaded the difficulty, by saying, that the people wept for him.

This prince from controversy came to persecu|tion;* 2.42 as appears from a Jewish historian, who had read, in the annals of Persia, which had been sent to the king of Spain, that the people of his nation had till then been very happy under the dominion of the Persians, because their rabbins had learning and integrity equal to that of the doctors who lived be|fore the fall of the temple. But the people, elated by the esteem they were held in, obliged the king to persecute them. He resisted their importunity some time; but fearing the people would mutiny, and the rather because the Arabians threatened him with a war, he imprisoned, against his will, three of the principal Jews of his dominions, and endea|voured to force them by scourging, to renounce their religion; but they bore it with constancy. Being mortified with this unsuccessful attempt, he made all the princes of the Jews prisoners, and tor|tured them to the utmost extreme. But God a|venged their cause; for the Persians were no lon|ger so happy as they were before. The Arabians made war against them, and bound all the Persian kings with fetters. The king of the Arabians sent officers, with promises to the Jews, that, if they would retire to his territories, they should enjoy full liberty of conscience, because a religion embraced by constraint becomes useless. The Persians per|ceiving that the violence they had exercised drew these chastisements upon them, permitted the Jews the profession of their religion.

The Persians had again taken up arms against the Romans, and besieged Antioch,* 2.43 which was forced to surrender. Capitolinus, who is quoted as an evi|dence, says, that the Persians held it, when Gordian came to the assistance of the subjects of the empire. This prince obtained many advantages by means of Misitheus, his father-in-law, and prefect of the Prae|torium, who took Corrae Nisibis, and drove Sa|por to his capital. Gordian marched to the extre|mities of Persia, where he was killed by Philip. The soldiers, in honour to their commander's me|mory, set up a tomb with this inscription: "To Gordian, conqueror of the Persians, of the Goths, and Sarmatians; to him that appeased the seditions of the Romans, who conquered the Germans, and could not conquer the Philippi." The Latin word is equivocal, and may signify that he could not con|quer or keep the field of battle at Philippi, because he had been beaten there by the Alanes, or else he had been conquered by the Philips, who had caused him to be killed. This inscription was engraven in Persian and Jewish characters, that every one might read it; and is a farther confirmation that there were, at that time, abundance of Jews in the Per|sian dominions, and that they spoke Hebrew, be|cause these characters were used to communicate to them the encomiums bestowed on Gordian.

The splendor of the Jews revived through the means of Zenobia,* 2.44 who might be stiled the queen of the east. This princess, who became so famous, had married Odenatus, king of Palmyra, and com|mander of the Saracens of that country, which was but a day's march from the Euphrates. Odenatus, seeing every thing stoop before Sapor, sent him pre|sents, and wrote to him in testimony of his sub|mission. The conqueror, who had penetrated al|ready into Cappadocia, and taken Caesarea, tore Odenatus's letter, and ordered his presents to be thrown into the river. Being exasperated of him|self, and by Zenobia, a most haughty princess, he made an alliance with the Romans, declared war with Sapor, gave him many battles, which he al|ways won, and obliged this victor of so many pro|vinces to give up all the treasures he had amassed in Syria, in the garrison of Edessa,* 2.45 to purchase his re|treat. Odenatus pursued him, ravaged Mesopota|mia, routed the nobility of the kingdom several times, who were assembled upon business of state, and twice besieged his enemy in Ctesiphon. But, after divers conquests, and being declared Augus|tus, Zenobia, his wife, who would reign alone, caused him to be slain, with a son he had by a for|mer wife.

Zenobia had been brought up in the Jewish re|ligion, and was a zealous professor of it.* 2.46 She is recorded to have built a great number of stately synagogues, and to have raised the Jews to the highest dignities. It cannot be doubted but the

Jews made great use of her protection, and became very potent in the east under Odenatus, her hus|band, who carried every thing before him. When she came to the throne, she added Egypt to her con|quests; extended her arms into Asia Minor, as far as Tyana, and Ancyra; and passed into Bithynia, where she took Chalcedon.

At this juncture, however, Aurelian began to restore the affairs of the empire, which Zenobia had ruined. He entered into Bithynia, which acknow|ledged its former master without resistance. From thence he went on to Cappadocia, and the gates of Tyana being shut against him, he vowed vengeance on all the inhabitants. Zenobia was at Antioch, from whence she advanced with her troops as far as Immes,* 2.47 which was not far from it. The battle was fought near the river Orontes. Aurelian's troops retreated, that they might put the queen's horsemen, who were heavily armed, out of breath; and falling afterwards upon them, they put them to flight. Zabdas, who commanded for the prin|cess, foreseeing that Antioch would shut her gates against him, if they had notice there of his defeat, dressed up a man, and calling him Aurelian, gave out that he carried the emperor prisoner. The stratagem was quickly discovered. He staid no longer at Antioch than to take Zenobia along with him, and make a precipitate retreat.

A second battle was fought, in which Aurelian's cavalry was broken; but whilst the Palmyrenians pursued it, they fell upon the infantry, which was cut in pieces. Zenobia had no other resource than to shut herself up in Palmyra, whose situation was advantageous. The Persians, Saracens, and eastern nations, still devoted to this princess, notwithstand|ing her misfortunes, in vain attempted to succour her. The Persians were beaten, and the Saracens obliged to list in Aurelian's army. Zenobia, secretly departed out of the city to seek for succour among the Persians. But, as she was going to pass the Eu|phrates, Aurelian's courtiers, who pursued her, took her prisoner. Palmyra surrendered. Zenobia was led in triumph with her son. She was adorned with jewels, and mounted upon a stately chariot, on which she had hoped to make a triumphant entry into Rome, whereas she entered like a slave. The chariot of her husband Odenatus was also one of the ornaments of Aurelian's triumph, who exposed to view whatever was most rich and precious in the east,* 2.48 which, by his present victories, he had re|united to the empire. Zenobia went to Rome, or rather to Trivoli, where she had a small villa, and lived in retirement.

Thus vanished this glimpse of prosperity and au|thority of the Jewish nation, unless it may be said that Vaballat, her son, to whom Aurelian gave some sovereignty in Armenia, had embraced his mother's religion and favoured the Jews as she had done, which is very uncertain.

Most of the Jews retired into the cities of Persia, where there doctors continued in some repute.* 2.49 They boasted highly at that time of one Chi••a, the son of Ase, who not being able to conquer the force of concupiscence, threw himself into a smoaking bakehouse.

There was at that time a famous disputant, who not only puzzled the Babylonian doctors, but, to shame them the more, made his wife dispute with them. He was called Jeremy, and was master of ca|suistry. Other doctors had flocked to Sora, be|cause the academy of Nahardea was fallen with the city, which was taken and plundered. Zira, sur|named Kattina, was still there. He at first left his country to go and study at Tiberias, where he had also received the imposition of hands; but the au|thority and friendship of Huna had recalled him to his academy, where he lived till the year 300, when desiring to lay his bones in Judaea, he chose rather to carry his living body thither himself, than have it conveyed after his death. So that though the Jews of Babylon had a great esteem for their own coun|try, yet that hindered not their going to study in Ju|daea, whence they commonly returned before they died.

But the most famed among them was Manes. He could by no means be reconciled to the religion of the Jews, nor to what was recorded of their na|tion destroying and exterminating such numbers of people and kingdoms. He preferred the doctrine of the Christians, which recommended nothing so much as love and benignity. Nevertheless, he held great conference with the Jews of Persia, where he had much correspondence, whether he designed to be fully instructed in the law, or rather desired to recover them from what he called their infatua|tion. The modern Jews are not agreed about their ancestors conference with Manes, and in their kalender they six the origin of his sect towards the end of Constantine's reign.

The persecution which was raised against the Christians under Dioclesian did not much effect the Jewish nation, either in the east or west; though those of the former pretend that he designed to have made them feel the severest marks of his re|sentment, for some scandalous reflections which the disciples of Judah the Saint had cast upon him; but that they found means to appease his wrath.

CHAP. VIII.

State of the Jews under the Christian emperors during the fourth century. Prevalence of the human pas|sions. The Jews said to be severely persecuted by Constantine, who is vindicated from such aspersions. Conversion of Joseph. The emperor Constantine issues an edict for suppressing the outrages of the Jews. Enacts several laws relative to the Jews. Decrees of the council of Elvira. Account of Ravena, or famous rabbi of the east. Also of Joseph the Blind. The Jews raise a persecution against the Christians i•• Persia. Commit great outrages at Alexandria. A rebellion against Constans. Edicts of Constans against the Jews. Conversion of Epiphanius. The emperor Julian grants protection to the Jews. A city in the East inhabited by the ten tribes Conduct of Jovia, the successor of Julian. The Jews greatly favoured by Maximus. Vindication of St. Ambrose. St Jerome esteems the Jews. Takes great pains to learn He|brew. His different masters. Eulogium bestowed on him for his learning.

THE Jews were not much happier under the Christian emperors than they had been under the reign of idolators.* 2.50 Their fate varied according the genius of princes. The Christians were so gal••ed by the persecutions they had suffered, that they could not so suddenly resolve upon a change of maxims. Constantine contented himself with mak|ing some laws that confined the Jews' liberty to narrower bounds, though they were the objects of his hatred; but, by degrees, way was given to the bent of nature, which tends to the punishing and persecuting those that contradict us in point of re|ligion. The councils themselve, that ought to have been more equitable, were of this temper, and be|came incendiaries, that inflamed princes against the remains of a miserable nation.* 2.51 We often boast of humanity, and fancy the instincts of nature suffi|cient to make us compassionate to other men; but we do not well consider this matter. Pride is ano|ther principle in man, which has far the ascendant over humanity, and rises upon seeing those conside|rable parts of mankind, who think differently from us, and assume the privilege of contesting th•• truths we believe ourselves possessed of. Humanity sug|gests notions of lenity; but pride quickly imposes its silence, inflames the heart, and deafens the mind to the dictates of justice and equity. And as all men are obnoxious to this passion, it is no wonder to find persecutions in all religions. Those that more im|mediately appertain to sacred offices, are more cruel

than the rest, because they are not only puffed up by opinion, which raises them above the level of men of equal birth, but fancy the opposition made a|gainst the mysteries of which they are the defenders and ministers, to be a personal affront upon them|selves: so that councils commonly authorize and begin persecutions, which kings afterwards carry to the utmost excess.

The first event we find in the life of Constantine concerning the Jews is related by Zonaras. This historian says, they had a conference at Rome with Helena, this emperor's mother, who was yet uncon|verted. They represented to this princess, that though her son had reason to abolish heathenism and its idols, yet he had made no great progress towards his own salvation, since, instead of the heroes of ancient heathenism, he worshipped a man who had been crucified but a few ages before. Helena, who was devout, and anxious for her son's salvation, called the doctors to conference with pope Syl|vester, who quickly triumphed over the enemies of the Christian religion.

* 2.52It is said, likewise, that Constantine persecuted the circumcised; for St. Chrysostom affirms, that, upon their assembling once to re-build Jerusalem, this prince, disgusted with the rash attempt, surprising them, caused their ears to be cut off, and afterwards dispersed them into all the territories of his empire, as so many fugitive slaves. Eutychius adds, that Constantine obliged them all to be baptized, and to eat swine's flesh on a passover day. Persecution can|not be carried farther: but I question the truth of these particulars. Though Chrysostom has great authority in the church, he is liable to error: for the Jews say themselves, that it was the emperor Adrian who caused their ears to be cut off,* 2.53 like the slaves which he sold at the fairs of the emperor. Besides, Jerusalem had been re-built under Constantine's empire; its bishop had assisted at the council of Nice; and the emperor had raised such stately edi|fices in it, that Eusebius told him it was the New Jerusalem. We may add, that though the Theodo|sian code contains many laws against the Jews, under Constantine's name, yet there is not one con|demning them "to the loss of their ears, to be bap|tized, or to eat swine's flesh."

But this prince published several edicts, which acquaint us with the condition and restless humour of the Jews under his reign. The first is one of the most important: it was issued upon occasion of Joseph,* 2.54 who had abandoned the synagogue to em|brace Christianity. The Jews, incensed by his con|version, went to insult him in his house; and finding that he read the gospel, forced his book from him, loaded him with abuses and blows, and dragged him to the synagogue, where they unmercifully scourg|ed him. But not content with this first outrage, they pushed him into the river Cydnus, whose cur|rent carried him far enough to give them the joyful hopes that he was drowned. But God preserved him. He received baptism, made himself known at court, and obtained the emperor's leave to build temples in several places where none had been erec|ted before. The Jews were settled at Diocaesarea, Tiberias, Nazareth, and Capernaum, and had so ap|propriated these cities to themselves, as not to ad|mit any strangers, not excepting the Samarians, who professed the same religion▪ Joseph undertook to introduce the Christian religion into all these cities, and to that affect built churches in them.

The Jews, however, were still powerful in Ju|daea, under Constantine's empire, since they alone possessed four cities, one which was Nazareth. Their numbers rendered them insolent; and they abused those that had turned Christians, and pub|licly opposed the execution of the prince's orders for the building of temples.

* 2.55This doubtless obliged Constantine to publish the edict before-mentioned. "He taxed them with stoning or burning whoever had a mind to re|nounce their religion;" and he condemned them to the same punishment, with all their accomplices. Herein we still see the footsteps of that furious zeal which they thought authorized them to kill those who were taken in a notorious crime. They ima|gined these were the precepts of the oral law, and said, that Phi••eas had executed the verbal order of Moses. They produced another example under the Maccabees, when Matthias killed a Jew, who was practising heathen ceremonies. The doctors autho|rized this practice; for Philo doubted not but God had established it. The Essenes, those austere vota|ries, ordered, that if any man had blasphemed a|gainst Moses, he should be killed. Josephus says, that they "punished him with death." The inter|preter has improperly translated it, they "con|demned him to death." For as this sect had no power of life and death, it punished blasphemers by a motion of zeal. Notwithstanding the terrible dis|orders, and the torrents of blood that the zealots had caused to flow at Jerusalem, yet this dangerous maxim was still preserved: and the Misnah teaches, that if any one "renounces the foundation," (that is the articles of faith,) he ought to be killed; and, pursuant to this principle, they s••••ned, burnt, and drowned those that deserted them in Constantine's reign. This obliged him to repress that violence; and as they did not obey the first law, he was forced to make a second.

He also forbad the Christians to turn Jews,* 2.56 upon pain of an arbitrary punishment. There was more danger in point of slaves, who might be brought over by their masters; and therefore this prince published a law, six months before his death, prohi|biting the Jews to circumcise those in their service; and giving liberty to all who accused their master of having circumcised them, or that embraced Christianity.

Constantine farther ordered, that the Jews might be made decurions, because it was fit that they should have their share in the public burthens: but he exempted the patriarchs and priests, and those that had considerable employments in the syna|gogues, because, being taken up by their functions, they could not attend to the duties of those offices. For, indeed, the post of decurion was not an ho|nour, but a servitude. Every one endeavoured to be discharged from it, by taking other employments in the army and government. They endeavoured to exempt themselves by some privilege which they begged of the emperor. Constantine granted so many of them, that there was nobody left to fill these posts in Julian's time, which obliged him to revoke them all without exception; and this raised murmurs against him, even after his death, whilst others commended him for it. No wonder, then, that Constantine, who did not love the Jews, made decurions of them. Such was the condition of the Jews under the first Christian prince.

Under his reign is placed the council of Elvira,* 2.57 which made two decrees against the Jews of Spain, in which country they had great correspondence with the Christians. They eat and lived sociably to|gether; but the council forbad this table society, upon pain of excommunication to those that eat with a Jew. The punishment was grievous, and ab|surdly inflicted, since eating together is an action purely civil; and excommunication ought not to be issued, except for ecclesiastical crimes. The learned commentator of the council of Elvira pre|tends, that the council of Nice ordered the same thing in one of its decrees, which had been dictated by Osius, who was president of it, and who was for having the discipline received in the Spanish churches, and admitted into all others. Mendoza is mistaken; for the canon he quotes was never made by the council of Nice. He took it from the Ara|bians, who have falsely imputed to this council many canons it never made. Nor do we know what the Arabians mean by quoting the apostles in their decree; for St. Paul was so far from condemning the commerce of civil society, that he made himself "all things to all men; a Jew to the Jews, and a Greek to the Greeks." If we have recourse to the

canons that bear the names of these holy men, we shall only find, that they condemned usury, without forbidding eating and society with the Jews. Re|cardoe, who renewed the decree of the Elviran council, and supported it with his authority, ground|ed also upon the authority of St. Paul, who says that "All things are impure to the defiled and un|believing." From whence he concluded, that the Jews being impure, their meats must be so too: but this is a weak and inconclusive argument.

The same council, by another decree, forbad "the possessors of lands to suffer their fruits to be blessed by the Jews, because their benediction frustrated that of the Christians; and it threatened absolutely to cast out of the church such as should not obey it" This custom of blessing the fruits of the earth, at certain seasons, was common to Pagans and Jews, as well as Christians. But who would have imagined that the latter should have made use of either of the former, if this decree had not informed us of it? However, this and the other decree plainly shew that the Jews had lived very peaceably in Spain, and in good harmony with the Christians, till that time, whatever they may have done since.

The Jews enjoyed a no less benign sunshine in the cast, and their academies went on in a flourishing manner, if we except the persecution raised against one of their greatest doctors. This was the famous Ravena, or Rabba Nachmanides, head of the aca|demy of Sora. They mention two famous men of that name, one ancient and the other modern. The latter lived in the 474; but the other died before the council of Nice, in 322. He was so esteemed,* 2.58 that ••hey recken twelve thousand disci|ples in his academy. He was commonly called the Remover of Mountains. Not that he had power to work miracles, and convey mountains into the midst of the sea, but so profound was his know|ledge as to solve the greatest difficulties. He wrote a book that was in great esteem whilst he lived, and after his death. It was a commentary upon the first book of Moses, containing the history of the Holy Land, with the literal and mystical sense. The title of it was Bereschit Rabba. It must not be confounded with another work of the same name, which is a commentary upon the Misnah of Judah the Saint, composed by one of his disciples.

Ravena, having long taught in the academies of Babylon, was accused of divers crimes by the king of Persia. The fear of being taken, and condemned to death, obliged him to fly, and conceal himself; and he died in his retreat. It is said he was com|mitted prisoner, and that Sapor was about to con|demn him, but that the empress, his mother, sent to tell him, that "he should have nothing to do with that Jew, because she had suffered much on his account." However, this persecution was not general; for the academies flourished at Babylon, and the neighbouring parts.

Ravena left a nephew, whom he stiled Avii. for two reasons: one was, that he meant to signify that he had been an orphan, and that he had entertained him out of charity; the other was, that he would not have him go by the name of his grandfather Nachman, lest afterwards the nephew should ••e confounded with the uncle, and the disciple with the master. He made such proficiency by Ravena's lectures, as to become head of the academy of Pun|debita, in the year 325, which he governed till 339. At the latter end of his life he married a widow, by whom he had a son, who is known by the name of Ra•• Bibi.

* 2.59There was also a professor in the academy of Sora, called Joseph of Great Light, or Saghi Nahci. He was blind; nevertheless he was a man of great knowledge. He was also sirnamed Sinai, because he knew to perfection all the traditions that had been given Moses upon Sinai. He is supposed to be the author of the Chaldee paraphrases upon some of the holy penmen, the Psalms, the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Ruth, and Esther. This paraphrase is highly es|teemed, if we judge of it by the number of its par|ticular editions.

At the close of Constantine's reign, the Jews, who were potent at the court of Persia, revenged themselves for what they suffered in the Roman em|pire, by raising a cruel persecution against the Christians of the east.

The gospel had some time before reached Ar|menia. We are told that one of its kings,* 2.60 called Tiridates, had embraced Christianity. From thence it passed on to the Persians, who had great corres|pondence with the Armenians. They began to build churches, and to consecrate priests. There was also a bishop for the two cities of Seleucia, and Ctesiphon, which were the most considerable of the country. The Jews were numerous there, because, as Jerome observes, they lived quiet and undisturbed, and were persecuted by none of the Persian kings. Being jealous of the progress of Christianity, they murmured: but when they saw Ustazades, one of Sapor's principal eunuchs, turn Christian, they no longer observed any bounds, and made a league with the Magi. Simeon, bishop of Ctesiphon, was accused of criminal correspondence with Constan|tine, which was enough to destroy him. This bishop ••efused to worship the sun and the king, when he was brought at the foot of his throne. "I bent my knee formerly (said he) before your majesty because I did it voluntarily, and it was a civil homage; but I cannot do it when you make it an act of religion, and would make me renounce my God." The king, being enraged, caused him to be chained in a dungeon. The Jews and the Magi, taking advantage of this opportunity, pulled down all the Christian churches. The persecution was long and bloody. Ustazades, an old eunuch of Sapor, and eminent for his services, was also one of the first martyrs.

The sons of Constantine were much severer than their father had been. Constantius coming to the empire, was obliged to make war against them. This prince must have been moved by the disorders the Jews had committed at Alexandria, when Gregory,* 2.61 the Cappadocian, went to succeed St. Athanasius. Joining with the heathens, who were then numerous in this great city, they burnt the sacred books, and prophaned the baptisteries in so indecent a manner, that St. Athanasius durst not speak it. Their inso|lence went so far as to force the virgins they had stripped to abjure their religion. In all these in|dignities they were countenanced by the before|mentioned bishop, who was then in high favour at court, so that they went on with the utmost boldness and impunity.

The inhabitants of Diocaesarea thought they might safely rise during Magnetius's revolt. This rebel was of the same persuasion as Constans, since we find his medals have the Laborum, or church-ban|ner; though Baronius supposes him to have dis|sembled, and cherished heathenism in his heart like Julian, because he revoked all the edicts published against the idolators in the places he was master of. The Jews could expect nothing from him, espe|cially since it was in the west that his rebellion had the greatest footing. But as he was powerful, and his troops had often been successful, the emperor was obliged to go personally into Hungary to en|counter him. The Persians, taking advantage of his absence, took up arms, and attacked Nisibis, which sustained a four months siege. The Jews, seeing the sire kindled at both ends of the empire, could not forbear making use of such a favourable conjuncture.

Diocaesarea is a city but little known, situate in the second Palestine. Mention is made of three ci|ties of this name, one in Cappadocia, another in Phrygia, and a third in Isauria, since John, bishop of Diocaesarea in Isauria, subscribed in the council of Chalcedon. But the geographers, the learned Hol|stenius not excepted, generally forget that of Ju|daea. Scaliger confounds it with another city of Palestine, called Ge••h, in the neighbourhood of Gaza. This learned man's error, which has been often copied, proceeded from his not understanding Jerome. This father says, that Geth was but a mile

and an half from Sepphoris, called at present Dio|caesarea. This Father speaks of Sepphoris, and he was thought to speak of Geth. Sepphoris had been famous, and the Romans made it a metropolis, when Agrippa II. was put in possession of Tiberias, which occasioned great jealousies and disputes be|twixt these two cities. It retained its name till the empire of Trajan. As, after the taking of Jerusa|lem, a great number of Jews were retired to Sep|phoris and Tiberias, the heathens and Christians, who continued with them in these two cities, suf|fered much in their revolt against Adrian, in which the rebels put all to the sword that came to their hands: when, therefore, the emperor had delivered them from their insults, they testified their acknow|ledgements with emulation. Those of Tiberias built a temple we have spoken of, which they called Adrianion; and Sepphoris relinquished its ancient name to be called Diocaesarea Adriana, or Dio|caesarea.

Though great slaughter had been made of the Jews in this country,* 2.62 yet they still got together there, under the following princes, in such numbers, that, in Constantine's time, they were the only inha|bitants, and suffered nobody else of whatever reli|gion to settle there. It is no wonder then that this was the rendezvous of the malecontents under Constans; and that the inhabitants of this city were the forwardest to arm, when they understood that Magnentius obliged the emperor to march with his troops into Hungary, and that the Per|sians made a great diversion in the east.

But Gallus, whom Constans had created Caesar, and commissioned to march against the Persians, came into Judaea, beat the rebels, and razed Dio|caesarea, which had been the seat of their rebellion Nevertheless, this city raised its head again, and the Jews settled in it.

Constans being incensed against the Jews, and be|ing withal zealous for the Christian religion,* 2.63 made some laws against them. There is, says St. Hillary, who lived at that time, an edict of the emperor, which hinders them at present from entering into Jerusalem. He makes them perambulate the walls of that great city without entering it. They com|plained to Julian, when he came to the throne, of this hard usage, in being excluded the gates of a city which had been the residence of their ances|tors for many ages. All this is an argument that Constans had renewed Adrian's edicts, or had made new ones upon the same subject. This prince also made it death for a Jew to marry a Christian, or to circumcise a slave. He also prohibited their having Christians in their service; and especially forbad, under great punishments, the embracing their reli|gion. So that if they had liberty of conscience for themselves and posterity, they were not per|mitted to receive proselytes when they offered themselves. He loaded them likewise with taxes, and had projected new pecuniary edicts against them when he died.

It was under this reign that Epiphanius was con|verted from Judaism to Christianity; not (as related) without the interposition of some extraordinary cir|cumstances,* 2.64 with which we shall not trouble our readers, since they were not powerful enough to keep him from running into the wild notions of the sect of Gnostics, whom he met with in Egypt.

Julian was much more favourable than Constans. This prince had no reason to love the Jews,* 2.65 who worshipped but one God, and abominated the hea|then idolatry; but he was glad to augment the num|ber of the enemies of Christianity, which he thought most formidable, and to set all religions at war, that paganism might triumph in the midst of these conflicts. He discharged the circumcised from the taxes wherewith Constans had loaded them. He wrote to them, and in his letter honoured their pa|triarch with the style of brother; which is a proof they were then considerable in the empire. He gave them liberty to sacrifice, and rebuild the temple at Jerusalem, because they represented to him that they could not offer sacrifice out of the Holy Land. They availed themselves of the emperor's protec|tion to insult the Christians; for they assembled in many cities of Judaea and Syria, pulled down their temples at Gaza, Ascalon, and Berytus, and demo|lished two at Damascus. Those of Egypt did the same thing, and the most magnificent of all the temples of Alexandria was destroyed. They fell to re-building the temple of Jerusalem: but this event, which historians relate with many attendant cir|cumstances, deserves to be particularly noticed.

The emperor not only authorized the building of the temple of Jerusalem, but also furnished them with materials and money. Jerome, speaking of the Jews of his time, says, they imagined that, four hundred and thirty years after their dispersion, they were to become masters of the Romans, sell them to the Sabeans, rebuild Jerusalem, and restore it to its primitive glory; and that the boroughs and neigh|bouring cities, not excepting Sodom itself, should be rebuilt. This they grounded upon several ora|cles, promising that God would revenge his people of their enemies, and rebuild Sion. When they saw Julian solicitous for their labouring upon this structure, they fancied the promises accomplished. They insultingly asked the Christians, whether they would cause gold and silver tools to be made to work upon this new edifice. The women and children lent a helping hand; and the heathens themselves assisted them in the restoration of the temple.

But at length an effectual stop was put to it, by such a series of prodigies as quite deterred them from pursuing it, and made them sensible of the infallibility of Christ's predictions against that place. Dreadful earthquakes, and eruptions of fire from the ground interrupted the workmen when digging for the foundation of the new temple, to|gether with a variety of other contingencies, as are set forth at large in the celebrated performance of Bishop Warburton.

Julian, who had permitted the re-building of the temple before he departed for Persia,* 2.66 carried his conquests very far. He found there a part of the ten tribes, which possessed an entire city. Histo|rians observe, that this prince, being arrived at Mesene, which is an island made by the Tigris, where Apamea bore a considerable rank, marched towards a place where the Euphrates divides itself into many channels, and found a city called Bithra, which was inhabited by the Jews, who had aban|doned it, because the walls were not strong or high enough to sustain a siege. This city had been con|siderable in the Persian empire, since the emperor's palace, and houses to lodge a garrison, were still seen in it. Julian's army seeing it deserted, set fire to it, and reduced it to ashes. It cannot be doubted but these were Jews of the ten tribes dispersed in the east, since they were situated between the channels of the Euphrates. They were numerous and po|tent there, as they possessed an entire city. They were also faithful to their prince; for they rather chose to forsake all, than to wait and receive the Romans, who would have profited by their stay.

Julian being killed in this war, Jovian, his suc|cessor,* 2.67 was obliged to check the insolence this prince's countenance had infused both into the hea|thens and Jews of the Roman empire. This he did; but his reign was so short, that they looked upon it only as a fleeting cloud; and the rather, because Va|lens restored entire liberty of conscience to all the enemies of the Christian religion, heathens, Jews, and heretics. He did something more; for Valen|tinian and he maintained the Jews and their patri|archs in the possession of all their privileges. The law of those two princes is lost; but since Arcadius supports himself with their example in confirming all these privileges, it cannot be doubted but they made it. However, Valens abolished one of their greatest advantages, since he submitted them to public offices, and revoked the preceding decrees that had exempted them. This prince's words are remarkable, because they shew that the clergy was not so far privileged as is at present imagined.

The edict upon which the Jews flatter them|selves

that they are exempted from the offices of court, is voided by these presents; for even the clergy are not allowed to consecrate themselves to the service of God, without having first paid what is due to their country; and he that will truly give himself to God, ought to furnish a man to fill up his place in public offices.

Though Theodosius had not revoked this law of Valens, which was executed in the reign of Arca|dius, yet the Jews continued happy enough at that time. Maximus rebelling in the ••ast, and obliging Valentinian to implore the protection of Theodo|sius, who was then in Illyricum, thought it most expedient to gain the Jews, and bring them over to his interests.* 2.68 He not only favoured them, but un|derstanding that the people had burnt one of their synagogues at Rome, he ordered it to be rebuilt. Indeed, Maximus's reign was short. Theodosius having often beat his troops, caused his head to be cut off at Aquileia, and came afterwards to Milan, where Valentinian and he revoked all they had decreed. But as the rebuilding of the syna|gogue at Rome was a particular ordinance, and Theodosius was persuaded the Jews ought not to be deprived of their religious places, it is doubted whether he annulled that relating to the Jews.

St. Ambrose was, indeed, very inveterate against the Jews,* 2.69 and strenuously opposed the rebuilding another synagogue in lieu of that which the Chris|tians had set on fire at Callinicum, and which Theo|dosius had ordered to be rebuilt, at their charge; but what Zonaras, a Greek monk, and some other writers of later date, say of his preaching before him, taking him to task, and reproaching him for suffering the Jews to enjoy the privilege of their synagogues in his capital, is all entirely false and absurd. He did not preach, but write, to him; and his letter is still preserved, importing that they were so far from thinking themselves obliged to observe the Roman laws, that they thought it a crime to submit to them.

The contrary, however, appears, by all that we have hitherto said of the edicts made for and a|gainst them; and much more by the new law which that prince published, in the last year of his life, against the untimely zeal of some Christians, who, under pretence of religion, plundered and demo|lished their synagogues, contrary to the laws which allowed them liberty of conscience, and for pu|nishing such offenders for the future. He even granted them a particular jurisdiction, on account of the frequent law-suits which they had either a|mong themselves, or with the Christians, by which they were not only free from the trouble and charge of seeking for justice from strange tribu|nals▪ but were likely more easily to obtain it from judges that were maintained by themselves; all which privileges would hardly have been granted them, if, as is pretended to have been alledged by St. Ambrose, they had looked upon it as a crime to submit to the laws of the empire.

St. Jerome had not the same prejudice against the doctors of this nation as St. Ambrose; for, on the contrary, he paid them a pension, and made use of their instruction for understanding the Hebrew tongue, and the Holy Scriptures. This father, who thought that he had taken too much pleasure in reading Cicero and Virgil, (you are not a Christian, but a Ciceronian,* 2.70 said a judge to him,) changed his opinion for the Hebrews, learned their language with difficulty, consulted their doctors, studied un|der them, and made use of them to compose a Latin version of the Scripture.

He acquaints us, That, to restrain the sallies of his youth,* 2.71 he put himself under the discipline of a young Hebrew, that had turned Christian, and un|derwent very uncommon labour to learn a strange language.

He was not contented with the instruction of this converted Jew, but took another, who so passion|ately loved him, that he fetched the books from the synagogue, under pretence of reading them, and brought them to his disciple.* 2.72 This master was an ingenious man, and St. Jerome has quoted some of his explications. He sent for a third from Tiberias, whom he employed to revise, by the Hebrew, his version of the Chronicles, which he had made from the Septuagint. He says that this new master was admired by the synagogue. He sent for a fourth from Lydda, whom he paid very dear, because he was a leared man, and interpreted the traditions in the synagogue. It was this rabbin that helped him to translate the book of Job. He had occasion for new assistance to understand Daniel and Tobias, because of the Chaldee expressions that are scattered in these books. But as he laboured with great assi|duity, he employed but one day in the translation of Tobias; which a rabbin, equally skilled in the Chaldee and Hebrew, dictated to him.

St. Jerome grew so much the haughtier from these assistances which he had drawn from the syna|gogue; because this erudition, which was new, and almost unknown in the Christian church, distin|guished him from the rest of the priests, and even from the bishops, who hardly knew any more than their mother tongue. In doing some justice to his masters, he boasted of his own skill and understand|ing of the Scripture. St. Austin, who did not love him, admired him as a prodigy, because he un|derstood three languages. An author,* 2.73 who has taken his name, adds, that St. Jerome understood the language of the Greeks, the Hebrews, the Chal|deans, the Persians, the Medes, the Arabians, and of all nations. The moderns have gone farther than the ancients; and because this Father under|stood the holy tongue, they have espoused his ob|servations as those of an almost infallible commen|tator.

CHAP. IX·

Equitable conduct of Theodosius the Younger. His pi|ous and liberal disposition. The synagogues destroyed in Macedonia. A remarkable impostor in the island of Candia. Many Jews embrace Christianity. The Jews raise a tumult in Alexandria. Riot and mur|der the effects of party zeal. Bishop Cyril censured for his violent proceedings. The patriarchal dignity suppressed.

MOST of the edicts which the Christian empe|rors had published in the fourth century were enforced in the succeeding. Some of them were re|newed, and others added, that were thought ne|cessary to check the Jews' insolence against the Christian religion. Theodosius the Younger was obliged to remedy this mischief; but he always did it in an equitable manner, for he only punished those who had deserved it by their crimes. In the beginning of this century new troubles sprung up in Macedonia and Dacia. On the one hand the Jews of these countries continued to insult the Christian religion; and, on the other, the Christians burnt their houses and synagogues, and even some|times condemned the Jews to death,* 2.74 for no other crime than their religion. Theodosius, who was always equitable, condemned this oppression of the Jews, forbad the magistrates to punish them for religion, and not suffer the edifices belonging to them to be burnt, on condition that, on their part, they would not violate the respect that was due to the prevailing church. But yet the inhabitants of Inmestar, three years after, fell into an excess. Debauchery prevailed over the respect that was due to the prince's laws; for they fastened a young Christian to a gibbet, and scourged him so cruelly, that he died. The Christians of that country, en|raged at such a barbarous outrage, ran to arms. The battle was violent▪ because the Jews were nu|merous. The governor of the province giving Theodosius information of it, he sent orders to chastise the guilty, and the tumult was appeased by their punishment.

Theodosius, who spent the winter at Constanti|nople, (in the year 425.) made many edicts there:

one of which forbad the celebrating games and spectacles on Easter Sunday,* 2.75 and during the prin|cipal feasts of the year. The Jews and heathens might have alledged, that this decree did not relate to them; but the emperor declared, that they were subject to the law; and told them, there was a time for devotion, and another for pleasure. They thought to excise the prince's jealousy, by com|plaining, that this mistaken devotion hindered the people from crowning and saluting the emperor's statues: but Theodosius put himself above that, and declared, it was honouring of him to do service to God. However, we see that this relic of heathen|ism was still retained in this prince's reign, of salu|ting the emperor's statues, and inserting the stile of Numen in the laws.

Those that profess the predominant religion, are apt to imagine that every thing is lawful to them. They think that they signalize their zeal in pro|portion to the outrages they commit, and, under this notion, prescribe no bounds to their passion. It is the highest prudence, in kings, to restrain these excesses▪ and to cherish the public peace, by punish|ing an inordinate zeal. But this is not commonly done; and those who, from being convinced of its necessity, undertake it, do not always succeed. They often render their religion suspected, expose themselves to the raileries of the people, and incur an odium.

* 2.76The Christians, in Theodosius's empire, pulled down the synagogues, without any other reason than their hatred to this religion. If a private per|son thought himself affronted by a Jew, immediate|ly he engaged the populace in his interest; and the next thing was to run in shoals to the synagogue, and set it on fire. This was often done in Macedo|nia: and the emperor was obliged to represent to his subjects, that it was not lawful for private per|sons to do themselves justice; that there were tri|bunals appointed to hear their grievances, and to judge of their complaints; and that he had com|manded the judges of that country to take cogni|zance of them The ecclesiastics accustomed to re|ligious broils joined with the people: those of Anti|och, where the ••ews were numerous and rich, plun|dered the synagogue, and thought to sanctify the theft by consecrating the booty to the church. Complaints were made of so scandalous a conduct, which were so reasonable, that they were backed by the prefect of the praetorium, who gave informations of the disorder, and the occasions that had produ|ced it. Theodosius condemned the clergy to restore what they had taken, or the value; and ordered a place to be assigned the Jews to build a temple. The decree was equitable, since the Jews lived in the em|pire upon the public faith of the edicts. But it did not seem so to Simeon Stilites, who was then alive, and violently espoused the interests of the clergy, and the mutineers of Antioch: he wrote so pressing|ly in their favour to Theodosius, that he not only revoked the orders he had given, but cashiered the prefect who had advised him to punish the rob|bers. This favour which Theodosius granted upon his request, not only encouraged the Christians of Antioch▪ but those of the cities and neighbouring provinces to make new assaults upon the synagogues. They were obliged to have recourse to Theodosius, to obtain some security against these frequent in|sults. This prince, who was an enemy to violence, forbad them doing any. The Christians were dis|gusted at it: they resumed the charge against the Jews, and complained that the emperor's protec|tion had rendered them insolent. In explication of the preceding decrees, it was said, that, in answer|ing the sad and doleful complaints of the Jews, it was designed to screen them from the persecution that some turbulent spirits exercised on them, under pretence of religion, and to prohibit the burning of their churches; but, at the same time, it was declar|ed that, if they had nothing to fear for the temples they were in possession of, it was not lawful for them to build new ones; and that death should be inflicted on all those that undertook the circumcising of a Christian. There were still Christians, at that time, that embraced Judaism; for laws were only made against reigning abuses; and it was difficult for the Jews to enforce circumcision on a Christian, if he was not disposed to submit to it.

The losses of the church were repaid by an acci|dent that happened, in the year 434, in the island of Candia, where there were a great many rich Jews, the greatest part whereof were converted, after they had been grossly deceived by an impostor.* 2.77 His name was Moses; and he pretended to be the ancient law|giver of the people, who descended from heaven to procure them a glorious deliverance, by leading them through the sea, to return to the Land of Promise, as they had done when they left Egypt. We cannot conceive how a man could be so frantic as to attempt such a deception, or to persuade him|self that he was able to effect it. But yet Socrates affirms, that he not only had this imagination, but also that he had, in one year, run over all the cities and villages of the island, and persuaded the inha|bitants into a belief of it. The infatuation was so great, that▪ in expectation of the day appointed to throw themselves into the sea, the ploughman neg|lected the tillage of his fields, and the proprietors abandoned the possession of their lands and houses to the first comer; every one contenting himself with taking what he could carry away. This pseudo Moses, having mustered up his flock upon the top of a rock, the first at hand threw themselves into the water, without any wavering of faith: the wo|men and children plunged themselves in with equal ardour. But it was quickly perceived that their abettor was an impostor; for some were drowned; and others were saved by the Christian fishermen, who happened to be there with their barks, and went to acquaint their brethren how near their cre|dulity had been to cost them their lives. They at|tempted to seize the impostor, but he had disap|peared. In consequence of this, many Jews em|braced Christianity; most of them grew wise; and all were ashamed of putting so much confidence in so distinguished an impostor.

There were other adventures that happened in the reign of Theodosius. A Jew of Constantinople, who had been paralytic for many years, and baf|fled the art of the physicians, thought he might re|cover the use of his limbs if he were baptized, and therefore desired this ordinance. Atticus, the pa|triarch, caused him to be instructed; he received baptism, and coming out of the baptismal font, found himself cured. This extraordinary cure made so great an impression upon the Jews and heathens, that great numbers became converts; though the far greater part of the former still con|tinued in their unbelief.

As we are writing the history of the Jews, and not that of the church, we shall pass over a number of those very strange conversions with which this cen|tury abounded, and only observe,* 2.78 that the Chris|tians, having then accustomed themselves to make considerable presents to new converts, induced many Jews not only to become Christians with that view alone, but even to run privately from one sect to another, and be baptized in them all for the sake of obtaining fresh tokens of their liberality.

Socrates, in his ecclesiastical history, gives us a remarkable instance of a Jew, who went through all the sects then at Constantinople; but was at length discovered in a singular manner, by the Novatian bishop there, and owned that he had been baptized by every one but that. These cheats could not but render the Jews obnoxious to the Christians: but there was still another consideration that made them more so. This was the several arch-heretics, such as the Novatians, Nestorians, &c. who, by bor|rowing some of the Jewish tenets, were stiled Ju|daizers and Jews.

The Jews in the city of Alexandria,* 2.79 who amount|ed to upwards of 100,000, were mutinous and se|ditious; and the hatred they cherished against the Christian religion tended to sharpen and exasperate their turbulent disposition: so that commotions frequently happened in this great city, and seldom

ended without bloodshed. Sabbaths were noted as so many days of battle; because the Jews, who de|voted this day to idleness and debauchery, instead of going to the synagogues, sought occasion to signal|ize themselves; and the Christians and heathens commonly insulted them when they went to the synagogue. There were also public shews upon that day; and the Jews chose rather to be there than at their devotions, whereupon the people that flocked thither often engaged in quarrel•• with them. They used to come to blows, and the go|vernors had seldom sufficient authority to restrain these riots. One day Orestus, the governor of A|lexandria, was in the theatre, intending to make some political regulations in the entertainments. He designed, perhaps, by good laws, to prevent the disorders which had been attended with such fatal consequences to the public peace and good of the city. But he was mistaken; for, as he was at|tempting it, it was perceived, that he was surroun|ded by the party of Cyril, bishop of the place. It was suspected that they came only there to incense the governor, and dictate to him some ordinance against the Jews. The presence of Hierax, who was only an usher of the lower classes, but one of Cyril's hired flatterers, who used to applaud this bishop as he preached, served to provoke them; insomuch, that they cried aloud, that that man, whom they looked upon as their enemy, was come only to insult them, and to raise sedition. He must have given occasion for these complaints, since the governor caused him to be seized by his officers, and scourged upon the stage, without any form of trial. Cyril was not a man that would bear such an insult from the prefect, whom he mortally hated. Instead of complaining to him of his injustice, (if it was true that he had been guilty of any,) he sent for some Jews to his palace, and threatened them▪ They despised the threatenings of an ecclesiastic whom the governor openly opposed, and even re|solved to massacre the Christians. In order to this design, a body of the cons••irators ran along the streets in the night, crying that the principal church of the Christians at Alexandria was on fire. The croud burst forth, without arms to extinguish it. The Jews, who had a mark to distinguish them|selves, killed them as fast as they came. Cyril, having notice of it, came out with a multitude of people entered into all the synagogues, appropri|ated them to the church, gave up the houses to be plundered, and drove the Jews quite naked out of the city. The governor was highly enraged, be|cause the bishop encroached upon the jurisdiction of the officers of the empire, and because he saw this great city almost unpeopled by such a general expulsion of the Jews. He informed the court of it, whilst Cyril also sent his complaints against the Jews. The people sided with the governor against their patriarch, and obliged him to go and sue for peace to Orestus, who refused to be reconciled.

Cyril brought religion into the affair, and went to the governor with the gospel in his hand, to oblige him upon sight of that book, to a reconciliation: but Orestus being inflexible in his resentment, Cyril, who had a troop of soldiers, in the habit of monks, ordered them all down from the mountains of Ni|tris. These anchorets were never seen to descend, but they put the people into a consternation. They marched down that day to the number of fifteen hundred; and observing the governor, as he went into his chariot,* 2.80 began to load him with abuse, and accused him of being an heathen, that they might have a pretence to get rid of him, under a shew of justice. It was in vain for him to cry out, that he had been baptized at Constantinople. Instead of hearing him, they fell upon him with showers of stones, wounded him on the head, and covered him with blood. His guards deserted him, being op|pressed by number's; and the governor would have been left to perish, if the people had not run to his assistance. Ammonius, one of the riotors, was arrested, and condemned to punishment. Orestus wrote to the court. Cyril, on his part, justified the proceedings of the Monks, by declaring Ammonius a martyr, and making his penegyric in the pul|pit on the man who died in so glorious an action. The tumult began again some time after, and Cyril was loaded with all the odium of the event, in which the celebrated Hypatia, an heathen virgin, of great sense, learning, and virtue, lost her life, whom this bishop, jealous of his reputation, had caused to be assassinated.

It is in vain to extol Cyril of Alexandria, and to make him one of the principal saints of the purest church. People suffer themselves to be easily dazzled in favour of some men, and canonize those who have been actuated by violent and criminal passions, instead of a regular devotion. It is owned, that Cyril incurred Orestus's hatred by his ambition, and encroachment upon the authority of the impe|rial officers. How did he take his revenge on him?* 2.81 He caused him to be assassinated by the monks. Is this conduct consistent with the character of a bishop? But he stops not here: he again brings his officers, like so many assassins, against a virtuous, amiable fair one, who unmercifully killed her at a church-door. Socrates had reason to say, that this action involved Cyril and his ecclesiastics in shame and confusion. This same prelate had drawn upon him the people's hatred; since they always engaged against him, notwithstanding their reverence for re|ligion and sacred persons. How could they esteem an ambitious prelate, who hired people to applaud his sermons in public, as Cyril did, and who after|wards acted the votary, and crowned a seditious monk, who had been punished for his crimes, with martyrdom? We cannot justify his conduct against the Jews, since they were not of his jurisdiction: it belonged to the governor to expel them the city, if he thought it expedient; and the bishop was no judge of their privileges and settlements. It was a perfect rapine to head a rabble, to plunder their sy|nagogues, and appropriate them to themselves, with their houses and effects. It was uncharitable to the last degree, to expel people quite naked, who had lived there ever since the time of Alexander the Great, under the protection of edicts.

The Jewish nation received a severe blow in this century in the total suppression of their patri|archs; for their way of living raised murmurs and complaints against them, and the taxes they levied upon the nation occasioned their fall. We have al|ready spoken of their privileges; and have only to add, that Theodosius and Valentinian deprived them of that income, and appropriated an impost made upon their subjects to the imperial treasury.* 2.82 By this means the patriarchal dignity was more effectu|ally suppressed than if it had been annulled by any edict, so that, for want of competent support, it dwindled away. Photius pretends that the pri|mates, who succeeded the patriarchs, were charged with this collection, answerable for it, and obliged to see it conveyed into the treasury.

Thus was the patriarchal dignity absolved in the year 429.

CHAP. X.

State of the Jews, in the western empire, under Hono|rius. Equitable law of Honorius respecting the Jews. He deprives them of the office of agents. Determi|nation of Severus to convert the Jews. State of the Jews under the Vandals in Africa. Their privi|leges confi••med by Valentinian. The Jews protected by Theodoric king of the Goths.

HONORIUS, who possessed the western part of the empire, was harrassed with many revolts.* 2.83 Never did prince master so many tyrants; and there|fore we see him, in most of his medals, holding a la|barum in one hand, a victory in the other, and trampling a rebel under his feet. St. Chrysostom, who derived this prince's glory from hence, did not ascertain the character of heroes; for it is most commonly the weakness or cruelty of the governor that excites rebellions; and it is no great honour

for a prince to see his subjects vanquished, and in chains at his feet. The zealots persuade themselves, that his victories were the recompence of his vehe|mence against the sectaries. It is true he sometimes persecuted them; but he shewed great equity to the Jews who lived in his dominions. There is even a law preserved, made upon their account, which is an honour to him;* 2.84 for he declares, "That the glory of a prince consists in permitting every society quietly to enjoy the privileges they have acquired; and that, though a religion is not approved by a sove|reign, yet he ought to preserve its privileges." Pur|suant to these maxims, he decreed, that none could destroy or appropriate the synagogues with impu|nity. He even forbad them to violate the sabbath, under pretence of the public good, and service of the state; because the rest of the week was sufficient to satisfy the necessities of the empire.

* 2.85Nevertheless, to prevent the abuse of their li|berty, he forbad the building of synagogues, and deprived the professors of it of offices in the mi|litia and of that of agents. The agents were dis|tinguished in the militia, having three sorts of em|ployments; to raise taxes in the provinces, to con|vey bread to the magazines and army for the sub|sistence of the troops, and to be spies and couriers to the princes. Augustus had appointed these in|spectors in every province and region: they brought an account of all that was done to the prince, and to this purpose had the disposal of the public car|riages. Honorius deprived the Jews of this em|ploy, who were, at that time, commissioned to fur|nish the magazines, as they are at this day in some states.

This prince severely restrained the sect of the Coe|licolae, who had no image of the deity in their tem|ples: they prayed to God in open places, and on flat roofs: they neglect the temples, (says Tertullian,) and make their prayers upon the banks in the air. They swore by the heaven, it is said, that this more particularly agrees with the Samarians, who had for|merly an oratory near Napolousse, built in the form of a theatre, where they went to pay their devo|tions. Besides, they had a baptism like the secta|ries we speak of. They were called Coelicolae, because they read the Bible in Hebrew. Scaliger thought it was a sect of the Essenes that bore the name of Coelicolae, or angels, by reason of the an|gelical life they led. And thus, in the latter ages, the monks have been intitled Coelicolae, as if they had led the life of heavenly citizens whilst they were upon earth.

* 2.86There was another sect in this nation, called Schamain, or the Heavens. Benjamin of Tudela found it in Egypt; and it had so much resemblance to that of the Coelicolae, that it is very probable it was a remainder of those who were condemned in the Theodosian code. It has been further main|tained, that they were apostates, who forsook Christianity, and turned Jews.

Honorius looks upon these heretics as people that were but just sprung up in Africa, and whose doctrines he was yet unacquainted with. This cha|racter cannot be applied to the Jews, or Samarians, or Essenes, nor to the apostates that returned to ju|daism, whose doctrine, worship, and ceremonies, could not be unknown to the emperor. Besides, the Schamain,* 2.87 which Benjamin of Tudela found in Egypt, were not Coelicolae, nor so much as secta|ries. This is easily to be observed by any one that reads this traveller with attention; for he distin|guishes two different synagogues he saw at Grand C••iro, one whereof belonged to the Jews of the Irack, and the other to the Jews Schamain. As the first name is that of a province from which these Jews came, viz. the Babylonian Irack, from whence they went into Egypt; the second name must also signify a province from whence the Jews who pos|sessed that synagogue proceeded: and Syria is actu|ally called Scham, and the Syrians, Schamain: or rather, there needed no more than to forsake Arias Montanus's version, and to follow that of the em|peror Constantine, which removes all the difficulty. Indeed, Benjamin makes no difference between these two synagogues, except in their manner of dividing their reading, and the sections of the law, which makes no variation in the worship.

An ingenious commentator has differed 〈◊〉〈◊〉 all the rest, by observing,* 2.88 that the Coelicolae are ac|cused, by Honorius, of disturbing the rules of the church; wherefore he suspected they were bap|tized in the name of heaven, instead of the common form; and by heaven they understand the God that reigns in it. This was the Jews style long ago. They say still, that the name of heaven is prophaned; that the fear of heaven is necessary; and that the assembly instituted by heaven shall remain.

These Coelicolae, or worshippers of heaven, were in Africa; for it was to the gov••••••ors of this pro|vince that the emperor directed his orders against them. They were all schismatics; for they had their particular assemblies: and Honorius was for reducing them within the pale of the church. These sectaries attacked the sacraments of the Catholick faith, and the worship and veneration of God; all which is an argument, that they were real Donatists; for these latter impugned the sacraments of the church, by re-baptizing those who had been bap|tized by the orthodox, and by the addition of some ceremonies. St. Austin says, that Major, one of the Coelicolae, was searched for, who had invented a new baptism among them, and had seduced many people. Here you have the Coelicolae in Africa; and their principal was Major, of the sect of the Donatists, with whom St. Austin would have enga|ged in a conference, had he not been called away upon the ordination of a bishop. The baptism Major had invented was new, and little known: he had set up new congregations, and misled many people by this new sacrament. St. Austin's passage so perfectly agrees with Honorius's declaration, that the one seems to be a comment of the other.

They departed also from the worship of God; for we know that the Donatists swore by their mar|tyrs as by the only religion▪ says Optatus. They demonstrated their veneration for them, by admit|ting their decisions as so many oracles. This is enough to make them pass for Coelicolae, since the saints are regarded as the inhabitants of heaven, and they swore by them; which was not done in the Christian church.

This sect is little known because it continued but a short time. And as the Donatists soon vanished after Honorius, the Coelicolae, who made but a very small part of the schismatics, quickly dis|appeared; and therefore we only find their name in St. Austin and the Theodosian code. We find no track of them among the ancients, who have given the catalogue of heresies; and almost all the mo|derns have forgot them, as well as the ancients.

They must not be confounded with the Jews,* 2.89 be|cause we find them in the Theodosian code under the same title, and included in the same law. Gode|froy has judiciously observed, that the law ought to the distinguished into two articles; one whereof relates to the Coelicolae, who were obliged to re|turn to the church before a year's end, under pain of being confounded with other heretics; and the other forbids the Jews the making of prose|lytes.

It is true, that this learned commentator thought the Coelicolae had a worship common with the Jews, who worshipped the heavens and the stars; but since this worship of the ancient idolators was abo|lished among the Jews, and the Donatists had a baptism, and a peculiar worship for their martyr's, there is no need of confounding two different reli|gions. And therefore we discharge the synagogue from this new crime, of which it hath hitherto been thought convicted by the laws of Honorius.

Betwixt Africa and Spain is the island of Mi|norca, in which were two considerable cities: one,

where the bishop resided, was inaccessible to the Jews: there were neither wolves or wild beasts there; and the serpents, which were very numerous, lost their venom. On the contrary, in the other city, called, at present, Port-Mahon, the Jews were so considerable,* 2.90 that, though it was subject to the emperor Honorius, yet they arrived to titles, and exercised all civil dignities: for Theodosius, who was doctor of the law, and head of the synagogue, bore the first rank among the Christians, because he had passed through all the offices.

* 2.91Severus, being appointed bishop of this island, was easily persuaded by Orosius, who had lately re|turned from Jerusalem, loaded with singular re|lics, to undertake the conversion of the Jews. They began with private conferences, and proceeded to public disputes; the last of which was held in their synagogue, where finding some Jewish women had armed themselves with stones to strow at them, they provided for their own defence. The consequence was, that the synagogue was pulled down, and nothing saved out of it but the books and plate: but the bishop, through the power of oratory, brought their greatest men to relent; and, in about eight days, the greater part of them were convert|ed, and the synagogue turned into a church. Ma|ny, however, that remained obdurate, went and hid themselves in caverns, till hunger forced them out; and others, leaving all they had behind them, went and sought an asylum in foreign countries; all which circumstances shew that there was some violence used against them by the bishop and his clergy. Beronius seems to own as much; and adds, that this example would have been followed in many other places, had not the crowned head put a stop to this method of conversion.

* 2.92The irruption of the Vandals, a barbarous people, who had no notion of toleration in point of reli|gion, was very likely to create them new troubles. But yet it is probable they brought upon this na|tion only such confusions as are inevitable in great revolutions; for we find in St. Austin's works se|veral tracts composed against the Jews, which shew that their condition was not grown more hard or unhappy here, than in the other parts of the empire.

In the "Plea of the synagogue against the Chris|tian Church," written by a lawyer of that time, the synagogue alledges,

That she is neither a slave or a servant of the Christians, since they are not committed prisoners; and, instead of wearing Irons, and other marks of slavery, they were left the liberty of sailing and merchandizing.

The Vandals, therefore, promised them the liberty of professing their religion and trading. But, on the other hand, the church answers,

That she is obliged to pay tribute to the Christians; that a Jew cannot pretend to the empire, nor become a leading man or governor of a province; that he cannot enter into the senate or the camp; and that if he be left the liberty of getting his live|lihood, it is only to prevent his dying with hunger.

* 2.93Valentinian confirmed all their privileges at Rome, and in the rest of the empire under his obe|dience. He left the synagogues remaining, that had been built in the preceding reigns; but at the same time opposed innovations; and understand|ing they were building a temple, he caused it to be pulled down, and fined the undertaker. When the empire changed its master, and the Goths seized on Italy, the Jews still found protection from these barbarous kings.

* 2.94Theodoric defended them against the insults of the people. He attended to, and followed, the maxims infused into him by the secretary Cassio|dorus, of forcing no one; because all violence in point of religion is criminal. This prince often represented to them, their excessive love of riches, and a temporal rest, whilst they lost immortality. But he would not have them driven into this road by violence, since they obstructed their salvation, when they did not enter it with their whole desire. He was much affected when he heard, that, to re|venge a private quarrel, the synagogue of Rome was burnt. He censured the senate for permitting it, and represented the consequences such a tumult might have had, since the flames of that building, carried by the wind, might have consumed a great part of their city. He also severely reprimanded the ecclesiastics of Milar, who went to seize upon a synagogue and its appurtenances. The Christian religion does not authorize robbery. The citizens of Genoa were going to vacate all the privileges which the Jews possessed, who had been settled there for a long time. The people, fermented by their leaders, mutinied, and went to plunder the synagogue, of which they carried away the roof. The oppressed had recourse to Theodoric, whose equity was known to them. They were not mis|taken; for this prince maintained their privileges, and permitted them to rebuild the synagogue, on condition that they would add no ornaments, nor make it larger than it was before. And thus the Jews concluded the fifth century in the Roman em|pire. They frequently submitted to the hatred and tumults of the people, but still they preserved the best part of their privileges by the authority of the sovereigns.

CHAP. XI.

State of the Jews in Persia, under R. Asce. Method of compiling the Babylonish Talmud. Successors of Asce. Revenues and power of the princes of the captivity. Composition of the Talmud obstructed by persecution. Rise of the Sebureans or Sceptics. A new sect, called Gaenim, or Excellents.

LET us now take a view of the Jews in Persia,* 2.95 during that interval where we find their acade|mies in a flourishing condition, under their famed chief, R. Asce, the compiler of the Babylonish Tal|mud, lately mentioned. Sora was the place of his birth, and the most celebrated academy of all the east, of which he was chosen president at a very ear|ly age.

He invented a new method of instruction; for, instead of fixing his disciples constantly to the col|lege, and reading them lectures all the year, he only did it in the months of February and August. In February he gave his scholars a treatise, and sent them to study at home for six months. They re|turned in August, and gave an account of their proficiency. The subjects were examined: they disputed in his presence; and afterwards he re|moved the difficulties by the decisions of preceding doctors.

Ten persons were seated over against him; seven whereof were called Princes of the Crowns, whose office it was to paraphrase upon the dictates of the master, and to make repetitions to the scholars, whose number amounted to 2400. Those that distinguished themselves by their diligence were praised and rewarded. The president made a col|lection of all the subjects that had been handled, and from this the Babylonian Talmud was compo|sed. He then gave them a subject they were to study the half year following, and so the school broke up.

Asce, having taught in this manner sixty years,* 2.96 published a collection of his decisions, which he di|vided into four different parts. The first contained the maxims and rules of the Misnah, with the doubts that might be proposed, and their solutions. In the second he handled divers questions, and related the opinion of the Tannaeans and Gemarists about them. The third part consisted of the sentences and maxims that had been published since Judah the Saint: and in the last were all the explications the scripture affords for the determination of dif|ferences, with the commentaries of the principal doctors. This was the first division of the Babylo|nian Talmud. But as R. Asce could not finish his undertaking, those that came into it after him

changed the method, and made additions, which have rendered it much more confused.

* 2.97This great doctor died in the year 427. Some make Marimar his successor; but others say, that the feet of R. Hovan hastened; that is, that this master was made president of the academy of Sora, in Asce's place. His son Thobiomi (according to the pompous Jewish stile) ascended the throne of his father in the year 455, and reigned thirteen years, during which the nation enjoyed such profound tranquillity, that they called this doctor their Daily Prosperity. He must needs have contributed to their felicity, since they gave him the name of it. We must not be surprized to hear them use the phrases of succession to the throne, and thirteen years reign, though the questions are only about the office of a doctor, or the pedagogue of a school. It is the rabbicinal stile to give great ideas of their masters, and to caress them with flattering titles. Those that are unaccustomed to this stile are easily dazzled by it, not imagining that a pedant is placed upon the throne, and that they should expressly say, he reigned thirteen years, when his empire extended no farther than over some scholars, to whom he taught traditions. They also called plain students princes of crowns, because they were the uppermost of a class.

* 2.98Seeing such a glorious title is given to the scho|lars, we need not wonder that the princes of the captivity wore it likewise. They entertain lofty notions of these princes, whereas their power was not so considerable as is commonly supposed. The whole nation did not depend on them, as is said, since, as far as the year 429, the patriarchs of Judaea extended their jurisdiction over many provinces; and since that time, the Jews, dispersed in the Ro|man empire, could not acknowledge a prince resi|ding in the territories of the Persian or Arabian kings, with whom there were continual wars. Would the Grecian emperors, so extremely jealous of their authority, have suffered a foreign Jew to raise taxes upon his subjects, and correspond with them in time of war? This prince's revenues were but small. The doctors say, he obtained of the Per|sians the privilege of setting up but one judge for the determination of differences between man and man, without being obliged to repair the damage, when the sentence was given wrong; whereas, by the common laws, they were to be judged by three persons. This observation is futile: for it was the Talmudists that fixed the number of these judges to three; and it was impertinent to desire of the king of Persia dispensation from a law which they had voluntarily imposed on themselves. However, the prince established three judges at Nerea, a town half a day's journey from Babylon; and here they paid the Didrachm when they came to be twenty years old. He also punished the violators of the law by fines, which were reserved for the prince. There was such another tribunal at Chaloan, five days journey from Babylon. There was a third at Ke|sar; and the last at Babylon, where the prince re|sided: and in all these courts they collected but seven hundred gold crowns, which composed the prince's revenue; and supposing his dignity propor|tioned to his income, it could not be considerable. By this we discover the reason of the silence of all the historians concerning these heads of the capti|vity. They say, that all these princes were of the house of David. They assign them a great empire, by which they say the sceptre was preserved in the tribe of Judah. However, these historians, who pre|serve the succession, these names, and some actions of the doctors, who taught in the schools of Sora, Pundebita, and elsewhere, hardly ever mention the heads of the captivity; and if we discover some names of them, it is not without great uncertainty. R. Asce is highly celebrated; they enumerate his successors in the academy: but in all the fifth cen|tury we are examining, we find but one name of a prince of the captivity. It is impossible they should have been so entirely forgotten, if they had per|formed any important actions in the fifth century, or had ••een princes, as they are stiled. But to re|turn to the Babylonian Talmud, which the head of the academy composed.

This work was interrupted by the death of Asce,* 2.99 thought he left able disciples, that might have finished it. But this interruption was caused by a persecution that lasted seventy-three years▪ it was violent; for the observation of the sabbath was sup|pressed, the synagogues were shut up, and the holy houses given to the Magi. The principal doctors of the nation were made prisoners. Animar, Mor, Asce's disciples, and Huna his son, who was prince of the captivity, were condemned to death, and suffered it courageously; but the Jewish youth, more addicted to the pleasures of life, deserted their reli|gion; so that the Jews were severely afflicted to|wards the end of the fifth century. However, they resumed courage some time after, and the Talmud was accomplished in the year 500.

Towards the end of the same century arose a new sect, called Sebureans, or Sceptics,* 2.100 at the head of which was R. Josi. These doctors pretended to doubt of every thing, and seem to have started up to oppose the infallibility which the Talmudists at|tributed to the Talmud; but whether by openly questioning its authority, or the sense of its deci|sions, we cannot affirm. However, this kind of usurped pre-eminence became so odious to the rest of the Jews, that it did not last long. It began to appear about the close of the fifth century, and was driven out of the world before the middle of the next, by the Gaonim, or Gaons, a new set of doc|tors, who took that pompous title upon them, which signifies sublime, or excellent, and who, in the suc|ceeding century, became the idols of the academies, and of the people.

CHAP. XII.

Persecution of the Jews in Persia, under Cavades. They rise against him. Are persecuted under Chos|roes. Restored by Hormisdas. Persecuted under Chosroes II. Great numbers slaughtered at Antioch. Conspiracy against the inhabitants of Tyre punished. Chosroes dies of famine. End of the Persian mo|narchy.

THE sixth century commenced with the persecu|tions the ten tribes suffered in the east.* 2.101 Cava|des, a violent and haughty prince, who could not bear a difference of religion in his kingdom, caused many Christians to be severely tortured. He design|ed also to force the Iberians to forsake Christianity for the Persian religion; but having first demanded of their king, that their bodies should be left unbu|ried a prey to birds and wild beasts, and the Iberians not being willing to consent to an action so mani|festly repugnant to humanity, they put themselves under the protection of the Roman••. We must not therefore wonder that this king tormented the Jews of his empire; and it is probably to this that we are to ascribe the frequent alterations that hap|pened in the dignity of the princes of the captivity, for in less than ten years we find four of these prin|ces succeeding one another.

These were Huna, to whom they gave but two years reign; Acha, who reigned three; Tetana, who reigned four; and Zeutra, who reigned twenty years.

In his time arose the famous Meir, a learned rabbi,* 2.102 and great doctor of law, who having declared war against the Persian king with only four hundred men, was very successful against him during seven years; after which his men having polluted them|selves with strange food and female intercourse, he was defeated, taken, and put to death by the Per|sians. They went thence into the city where Zeu|tra resided, and plundered it. They then took that prince, and the president of the council, and hanged them upon a bridge. His family were forced to betake themselves to flight; and his son and heir, Zeutra II. retired into Judea, where he became

president of the senate, or Sanhedrim. This the Jewish historians tell us was the source of that se|ries of misfortunes which attended them in Persia, insomuch that their great master Hahonai never dared to shew his face during the space of thirty years, that is, during the whole time of the reign of Cavades.

Chosroes the Great was not more favourable to them than his father.* 2.103 They had endeavoured to purchase his favour by betraying the emperor Justi|nian. This prince had sent ambassadors to the east to negociate a peace, and had loaded them with presents, which were received with such acknow|ledgments, that there was reason to hope for aspeedy issue of the treaty, when the Jews, who had their spies and deputies at this court, insinuated to Chos|roes, that if he was willing to continue the war, they would furnish him with fifty thousand men in Judaea, by which means he might take Jerusalem, one of the richest cities in the world. Chosroes accepted the proposal, broke off the negociation with the emperor, and was preparing to second the endeavours of the traitors, when news was brought that the deputies, who were departed to execute the design, had been seized upon their return, and sentenced to death, having first confessed their crime.

This desire to oblige the Persian prince did not engage him in their interests; and they not only had their share in the general miseries of the em|pire, when Chosroes, who often took arms against the Romans, pillaged Syria, and advanced to Judaea, to make himself master of Jerusalem, but this prince also shut up the academics of the east, which ob|structed the progress of the sciences. We do not so much as find that there was then a prince of the captivity, since Zeutra II. had been obliged to re|tire to Judaea, where he long exercised an office infinitely beneath that he would ••••ve possessed at Babylon, if he had been suffered there.

* 2.104Hormisdas III. restored them their liberty; for the academy of Pundebita was opened. R. Chanon Mehischka began to teach: but this unhappy prince reigned not long: his rebellious subjects took him prisoner; and his own son, Chosroes II. deprived him of his life.

This young prince did not peaceably enjoy the fruits of his parricide; for Varanes, who had been his father's enemy, declaring himself also his, and pretending to ascend the throne, expelled him Per|sia, having first beat his army. He was obliged to engage in many battles, before he could get the mastery of Varanes, who had made a considerable party in the state, and defended himself with great bravery.* 2.105 The Jews were in his interest. "This faithless, restless, imperious, jealous, envious, im|placable nation (says the Greek historian) was then so powerful in Persia, as to raise the people against their prince, and to fortify the rebels; because it was extremely multiplied, and had amassed prodigious wealth." Chosroes, getting the mastery, expiated this treachery with their blood. Those of Antioch fell first into the hands of Mebodus, the Roman general. This was not the Syrian city, but ano|ther, which Chosroes I. had built in Persia, and had given it that name, because he had formed it by the other's model, and had transplated its inha|bitants. It is said they were amazed, when they entered it, to find their country again; a second Antioch: the same streets and houses they had left. Mebodus, having taken this place, put numbers of Jews to the sword,* 2.106 destroyed others by different punishments and reduced the rest to a miserable slavery.

However, Chosroes being resettled, was recon|ciled to them, and usefully employed them in his designs. Indeed, this prince, who delighted in war, gave out, that he armed to revenge the death of Mauritius, his benefactor, upon Phocas, who had killed him, and made himself master, of the em|pire. Chosroes broke into Syria and Judaea, where he did terrible execution. He returned again in Heraclius's time, took Jerusalem, and carried with him a cross which a Jew had found. It is most probable this nation had correspondence with Chosroes, since,* 2.107 upon his being master of Jerusa|lem, he returned them all the Christian prisoners, which they only bought to satiate their implacable malice; for ninety thousand persons were unmer|cifully butchered.

Elmacinus, and other Arabian historians, add, that Chosroes going to besiege Constantinople, there was a necessity of evacuating all the places of Syria, and drawing out all the garrisons, to come to the assistance of the capital; and the Jews, seiz|ing this opportunity, conspired with all their na|tion in Judaea, to murder, on Easter-day, all the in|habitants of the city of Tyre, and make themselves masters of that important post.* 2.108 All the conspira|tors came secretly to the walls; but finding greater resistance than they expected, they spread them|selves in the country, where they burnt the Chris|tian churches. The Tyrians, who beheld this spec|tacle from the ramparts and towers, struck off a Jew's head upon every church that fell, or was burning; and as they killed two thousand Jews, they must have burnt two thousand churches. The citizens going out, found this company dispersed like a flock of sheep in the field, and made great slaughter of them. It is no wonder that Chosroes then favoured the eastern Jews, since they made such advantageous diversions on his account.

Historians relate, that Chosroes continued always devoted to judicial astrology; that entering, one day, the church of Dora whilst the service was per|forming, the Christians were disturbed, as if their mysteries had been profaned, and their religion dishonoured, by the presence of this heathen prince. Domitian, bishop of Melitene, not being able to bear the affront he offered the church, went out, and threatened to bring his troops. Chosroes sent his apology to the prelate, who received it, return|ed, censured the prince, and drove him out of the church.

This prince was imprisoned by his subjects and his son,* 2.109 and they gave him gold and silver instead of bread, saying, "Enjoy, at they pleasure, all the things thou hast desired with an insatiable thirst." He died of famine in the midst of his treasure, in the year 628; and three years after concluded the Per|sian monarchy, which went to the Saracens; Isdi|gerdes, the last of their kings, having been con|quered near Cadesia.

CHAP. XIII.

Conquests of Omar, successor to Mahomet. Taking of Jerusalem. Fall of the Persian monarchy. Othman elected caliph. His conquests. Is succeeded by Aly. Moavia reigns at Damascus. Isdigerdes persecute•• the Jews. Liberality and candour of the Arabians. Aly marries the princess of Persia to the head of the captivity. Academies restored.

THE Arabians made great conquests, and the Jews of the east universally changed masters.* 2.110 Omar, the second caliph, after the death of Maho|met, his predecessor, reigned but ten years and a half, during which he took thirty-six thousand ci|ties or castles, pulled down four thousand temples belonging to the Christians or Magi, built fourteen hundred mosques, and made himself master of all the east.

Notwithstanding all that Heraclius could do to relieve Damascus, which this caliph besieged by his generals, he entered in at the same time by as|sault and capitulation; for they had forced the in|trenchments on one side, whilst they capitulated on the other.

Syria being conquered, by the taking of this place, they prosecuted the siege of Jerusalem, which was already begun, and in a short time totally reduced the place. Omar, walking the streets with an air of

devotion, desired them to shew him Solomon's temple, intending to raise a mosque in the place.

The Arabians assert, that their caliph granted the bishop of Jerusalem a very honourable capitu|lation for the city; that he entered it without suf|fering any disorders of his troops; and not allowing any church to be taken from the Christians, very modestly desired of Sophronius a place where he might build a mosque. The bishop shewed him Jacob's stone, and the place where Solomon's tem|ple stood, followed by the principal officers of his army, where, in fine, he built a mosque.

This caliph at the same time attacked the Per|sians by his generals, and, after many battles, Isdi|gerdes, the last of the Persian kings, lost Cadesia. His capital, children, and treasures, fell into the enemy's hands.* 2.111 For his own part he fled to Cho|razan, where he lay concealed for sixteen years, shifting from place to place, till one of his subjects, the governor of Merou, betrayed him, and invited Tarcan, king of the Turks, to take upon him the government. Isdigerdes gave him battle, lost it; and attempting to pass a river in his flight, the boat man disputed with him about the price of his passage; and whilst they were wrangling, the Turk|ish horse, who pursued him close, arrived, and took away his life. Thus ended the Persian monarchy; and the Jews, who had been long under its domi|nion, came under that of the Saracens and Omar, who pushed on his conquests, on the one hand, to the river Oxus, and on the other to Egypt, where he made himself master of Alexandria. Mahomet had educated him; so that two parties appealing from his judgment to that of Omar, when he had heard them, he fetched his sabre, and struck off the head of him that had refused to stand by Ma|homet's decision. He took the title of Comman|der of the Faithful, and observed such great humi|lity in the midst of all his glory, that the governor of Susiana going to wait upon him in a temple, he found him asleep upon the steps among the poor: and it was only to do an honour to his nation before this stranger, that he went and sat in the pulpit of the mosque, which served him for a throne. Re|nouncing the ties of nature, and the endearments of blood, he declared the caliphship should be elective, and that his son should not have a place in the council, unless he was found worthy to reign. He was killed by a slave as he was at prayer.

After his death the six electors met to nominate a caliph. One of them renounced the election of himself, upon condition he might chuse the caliph alone. The thing was agreed to, and he made choice of Othman, in preference to Aly, the son-in-law of Mahomet,* 2.112 and who was the most eminent for that dignity. He entirely subdued Chorazan, and many provinces of the east; and pushed his conquests as far as Andalous,* 2.113 that is, Andalusia, in Spain. In the mean time Aly, who always looked upon him with a jealous eye, raised some Arabians against him. They besieged him in his castle of Me|dina, where water failing after a three months siege, he came out to the rebels with the Alcoran in his hand, and protested he would have no other judge than that book, which was to be the rule of their conduct. This did not stop the mutineers: they stabbed him in many places, and put an end to his existence.

Aly was elected in his room; and though his passion for the caliphship was violent enough to make him kill his brother-in-law, yet he wanted to be entreated to accept this dignity.

Aischah, Mahomet's widow, rebelled against her son-in-law; and as she had great interest with the Mussulmen, already provoked by the conspiracy against Othman, she was at no trouble to form a numerous army. The battle was fought near Bas|sora. Aly got the victory, and took Aischah, after a great deal of blood was shed about the camel she rode upon; because brave men had surrounded this woman, and lost their lives in her defence; and for that reason it was called the Battle of Camel. He respectfully sent back his mother-in-law to Mecca; and seeing Arabia and the Babylonian Irach fully subjected to his command, he marched to stifle ano|ther rebellion, which was raised against him in Syria.

Moavia headed this revolt, resolving to revenge the death of Othman, his benefactor and relation. This prince prided himself in his humanity and cle|mency. "The one is brave, and the other cou|rageous, (said he, speaking of his enemies;) but for my own part, I am content to be considered among the Mussulmen as a merciful and gentle prince." It was he that first made a gallery, or a separate place, in the mosque, for the caliph, who was at once the pontiff and sovereign. It was from thence he re|peated the office of the Mussulmen,* 2.114 and made them a sort of homily, as the bishop and curate do in the church of Rome. This prince was master of Syria, and made Damascus his capital: he pushed his con|quests as far as Constantinople, and besieged it so long, as to sow and reap in the neighbouring fields.

Moavia was a formidable enemy for Aly, who, notwithstanding, marched against him, and arrived in a little time upon the frontiers of Syria. Water falling him, he asked for some of a Christian her|mit, who had his cell near the camp. The hermit had only three hogsheads of water in his cistern, but told Aly, there was a well in the neighbour|hood, shut up with a huge stone, where he might plentifully supply himself. Aly discovered the well, and caused it easily to be uncovered; and having procured a sufficient refreshment, returned thanks to God, and continued his march against Moavia.

The armies were quickly in sight, but not ven|turing to give a decisive battle,* 2.115 fought in little par|ties: they reckoned ninety of these skirmishes in an hundred days. Moavia lost forty-five thousand men, but Aly infinitely less. The former perceiv|ing himself too much weakened, fastened many copies of the Alcoran at the end of lances, and causing them to be carried at the head of the army, cried, this was the book that was to decide all dif|ferences, and that it was not lawful, without rea|son, to shed Mussulmens blood. Aly was sensible of the artifice; but his troops being struck with an instinct of devotion for that book, demanded that arbiters should be chosen to terminate the differen|ces betwixt Moavia and Aly.

Aly's umpire was nominated by his generals, who chose a man of great devotion and integrity. Moavia's arbitrator was a man of art. They agreed to depose the two pretenders, and to elect a caliph, who should rule over all the countries which the Mussulmen had conquered. Aly's arbitrator spoke first, and cried, he deposed Aly and Moavia, as he took the ring from his finger. Moavia's arbitrator approved Aly's deposition, and confirmed Moavia in the caliphship, with which he invested him in the same manner, by putting his ring upon his finger. It was in vain to appeal to upright dealing and the agreement, which the last umpire openly violated. They cursed and excommunicated one another. In the mean time Aly, who faithfully observed the sus|pension of arms, had the mortification to see a great part of his army rebel against him, because he had acknowledged another judge betwixt him and Moavia. He beat the mutineers, and marched a second time against Moavia, with different success. Here he lost Abdalla, one of his best generals: he had also the misfortune to hear that his own bro|ther had deserted him, and sided with his enemies. At last three resolute men, enraged to see so much bloodshed, resolved to slay the heads of a faction who caused so great a division between the Mussul|men. Aly was killed in the mosque by one of these assassians, and Moavia was only wounded. Hassan, Aly's son, was forced to yield the caliphship to Moavia, who remained master of Syria and Egypt. He was the chief founder of the race of the Om|miades, which was always an enemy to that of Aly.

Jesid, his son and successor, was cruel and impi|ous; and therefore the Persians never speak of him

without execration. However, he was acknow|ledged caliph in Persia, and in all the lands of the Musselmen, eccept Mecca, Medina, and some ci|ties of Chaldea.

Moavia II. succeeded his father; but he was of so weak a constitution, that he voluntarily resigned the caliphship three months after he had excepted it, and went and shut himself up in a chamber, which he seldom or never came out of. Being wi|ser, or more resigned, than Charles V. he never re|pented his abdication, and lived happily in his re|treat: but the people regretted the loss of him, and caused the man to be buried alive who advised him to quit his dignity. He was so scrupulous as not to charge his conscience with the choice of a succes|sor, because he did not know any one sufficiently accomplished to sustain so heavy a burden. His motto upon his seal was, "The World is nothing but a Cheat."

Marvan was elected, upon condition, This his children should not succeed him, and that the ca|liphship should return to the house of Moavia. Marvan at first designed to execute his promise; but having humbled all his enemies, he despised Khaled, who was to succeed him, and called him bastard. This young prince's mother, whom Mar|van had married, could not bear this insult, but revenged her son, by strangling her husband.

We have related the great revolution by which the Persian monarchy fell; and the dispersed tribes came under the empire of the Musselmen, who became masters of the east. Let us now see what share they had in these events.

* 2.116Their historians assert, that Isdigerdes, king of Persia, persecuted them some time before the war of the Arabians against him. Their synagogues were given to the Magi; their academies shut up; and the persecution caused the fall of many persons. No wonder then that they rejoiced upon the change of their master. It is an inclination rooted in the heart of the oppressed, to desire, and rejoice at, the humbling of their persecutor. They imagine that God, a just protector of the innocent, punishes the oppressor, and makes him sensible of the iniquity. The Jews passed this judgment upon Isdigerdes and the Persians, who had given them such hard treatment.

They are accused not only of rejoicing at the con|quests of the Musselmen, who destroyed abundance of churches, and did great mischief to the Chris|tians, but of associating with them, of taking their mark, and encouraging them to carry their arms in|to the empire. But their joy must have often been in|terrupted by their own misfortunes; for the havock which the conquerors made in Persia, and Syria must have given them disturbance. Besides, it was not necessary that they should provoke the Saracens to war, who were sufficiently inclined to it; and from the moment they had tasted the pleasure of wealth, by plundering some provinces, they forgot their antient poverty, and thought of nothing but enriching themselves with the spoils of their neigh|bours. We ought therefore to found the motives of the war, and the invasion of so many kingdoms, on the avarice of the Arabians, and the ambition of their leaders, which was never satiated.

The Jews highly extol the humanity of the Ara|bians,* 2.117 who condemned the violence offered to con|science, and restored them to the free possession of their religion. They lived peaceably under the first caliphs, and their academies were open. Chana taught at Pundebita, under Omar. Mar. Rabba succeeded him; whilst Chenina Sursaeus, the son of Calipta, reigned at Sora.

* 2.118Omar sometimes favoured the Jews: for a Mus|sulman having gained his cause by Mahomet's de|cision, and the process being brought before him to be revised, he took his sabre, and cut off the obsti|nate Musselman's head, to avenge the Jew of his adversary's cavils. After he was caliph, a Jew complaining to him of a governor of a province, to whom he had delivered some goods which he did not pay for, Omar called for ink, and there being none in the place, he took a brick from the wall of Medina, which he was building, and drew upon it these words: "Put an end to the complaints that are brought against you, or leave your govern|ment." The Jew carrying the brick, was presently paid the money. This shews what access this na|tion had to the caliph, and this prince's love of justice. But yet, if he had equity for private per|sons, he was very injurious to the nation; for that part which continued in Arabia after Mahomet's conquests he totally expelled.

The Jewish nation, instead of suffering under Jesid, and his first successors, enjoyed a full and ab|solute peace. Its prince of the captivity reigned with almost as great an authority as if he had been king. The academies had been almost abandoned during the revolution. So great was the desertion of scholars and masters, that they were forced at Sora to make a weaver professor, because he had studied the law. But then they began to relish the sciences again. The profession of physic, which is always profitable, resumed its former lustre. A priest of Alexandria, named Aaron, was at once a physician and teacher: he had published a book, intitled, "The Pandects; or, the Treasure of Re|medies." The Jew, Messergieuf, who was at the caliph's court, then translated it into Arabic.

CHAP. XIV.

Justinian's edicts against the Jews. The synagogues of Africa changed into churches. Borium peopled by the Jews. Their insurrection against justinian. Revolt at Cesarea Exploits of Bel••sarius, the Roman gene|ral. The Jews assist the Goths Naples besieged, and taken. Cruelties of the Jews at Antioch. They are powerful in Cyprus. Quiet state under Gregory the Great. His great moderation and equity in matters of religion. Change of the Jewish affairs under He|raclius. They are banished Jerusalem. Their pecu|liar situation in Spain and Gaul. Decrees of the council of Toledo. A new council. New decrees against the Jews. Their artful conduct. Julian writes against them. Fresh resolutions of the council of Toledo. Their state in France. Edicts published against them Severity of prelates towards them. Lunel, an academy of the Jews. They are persecuted again in France.

WE shall now turn our attention to the Jews in the west under the Roman emperors at Con|stantinople, Africa, Italy, Spain, and France,* 2.119 dur|ing the sixth and seventh centuries, which we think expedient to join together, to avoid breaking the chain of their history.

The first cause of complaint which the emperor Justinian gave them, was his edict, which forbad them to celebrate their passaver according to their own calculation, and enjoined them to keep it at the same time with the Christians. This was no more ••han what we are told he did to the latter, whom he obliged to follow his new calculation, which caused no less confusion amongst them; but the Jews, ever tenacious of their old customs, resented it at a higher rate.

They were soon after exposed to a more severe edict, by which that emperor deprived them of se|veral privileges, particularly of making wills, and bequeathing legacies.

He likewise deprived those of Africa of the pub|lic exercise of their religion,* 2.120 at the request of the council of Carthage, and sent orders to the prefect of the praetorium to turn all their synagogues into churches, and to restrain them from performing any religious duties in caverns.

This law was executed chiefly at Borium,* 2.121 a city of Africa, situate at the foot of the mountains which bounded Pentapolis on the western-side. The situa|tion of this city was strong, because a chain of mountains shut up its entrance, and left but a very narrow passage to come in at. The Jews had made

it a retreat in Justinian's time. Here they lived the more peaceably, because the emperor demanded no taxes of them, and no imperial collector was ever seen there. They had a stately temple, the founda|tion whereof they referred to Solomon's time. We are to conclude from this, that they had been a long time settled in this place, and that they were rich, notwithstanding the neighbourhood of the Moors. Justinian undertook the conversion of the inhabi|tants of this city, as well as of that of Aigula, where heathenism still remained, and where they sacrifi|ced to idols, in temples consecrated to Alexander the Great, and Jupiter Ammon. He succeeded in his design; for the Jews as well as heathens embra|ced Christianity. The synagogue, or temple of Solomon, became a church: and Justinian caused the city to be walled in, to make it more safe.

* 2.122These edicts, which were, by the Jews, looked upon as a kind of persecution, failed not, as usual, to produce a more than ordinary discontent, which, by degrees, ripened into a revolt, as soon as a pro|per opportunity offered.

The first was caused by an impostor, named Ju|lian. He appeared in Palestine, and deluded the people of that country. As he took the title of Conqueror, the easier to surprize his nation, he caused all his credulous followers to arm them|selves. The seditious falling unexpectedly upon the Christians, who fancied they had nothing to fear from a nation so often humbled, made great slaugh|ter of them: but Justinian's troops ran to the relief of the oppressed: they soon found they were led by a misguided zeal. Their leader was taken, and punished with death, which terminated the revolt.

* 2.123There was a second disturbance, twenty-five years after, at Cesarea. The Samarians and Jews, though mortal enemies to each other, united against the Christians of this city. They demolished the church|es, murdered many people, and assassinated the go|vernor in his palace. His wife escaping the dan|ger, carried her complaints to Justinian, who sent speedy orders to Adamantius to bring the cause be|fore him. Informations being laid, and the Jews charged with all the odium and cruelty of this vio|lence, Adamantiu•• confiscated the estates of the rich, put to flight great numbers of the mutineers who had a share in the action, and took off the heads of others. The execution was performed with such severity, that it made all the Jews of that country tremble, and prevented, for a time, their taking up arms against the Christians.

In Italy the Jews declared loudly against Justi|nian and Belisarius, who besieged Naples. This famous general had recovered Africa to the em|peror's obedience; vanquished the Vandals; and, in the triumph decreed him for it at Constantinople,* 2.124 brought out the sacred vessels of the temple of Je|rusalem, which Titus had brought to Rome, and Gizeric had carried away when he plundered that great city. This spectacle, which revived the re|membrance of the taking of Jerusalem, and the ruin of its temple, must have disturbed the Jews of Constantinople. Upon this sight, one of them ex|claimed, "that these precious vessels ought not to be brought to Constantinople, nor placed in the emperor's palace. They cannot (said he) be pre|served in any other place than that where Solomon consecrated them; and this is the reason that Gize|ric has taken Rome, and the Romans have con|quered Gizeric."

Belisarius, having conquered the Vandals in Af|rica, passed over into Italy to fight the Goths, who were masters of the principal places, and first at|tacked Naples.

* 2.125There were two factions in this great city, one for the emperor, and the other for the Goths, whom the Jews, who were numerous and considerable there, favoured. The imperialists, to free them|selves from the inconvenience of a siege, had re|presented to Belisarius, that it was more advantage|ous to lay siege to Rome; because, if he took that capital, Naples, which continued in subjection to the barbarians but by force, would naturally return to its obedience: but he rejected this proposition, and only made them great promises if they would capitulate. Articles of capitulation were already drawn up, and accepted by Belisarius, who granted all their demands, when the friends of the Goths pa|thetically addressed the inhabitants, and supported their arguments by the presence of the Jewish mer|chants, who were there, to assure the people, that they should neither want provisions or ammunition during the siege. The citizens,* 2.126 encouraged by this assurance, took heart, and defended the place for twenty days with the greatest vigour. Belisarius lost many good officers and soldiers in the different assaults in which he was repulsed. The Jews de|fended that part towards the sea; and as they were persuaded they should have no quarter, since they were the principal cause of the resistance that was made, they fought like desperate men. The city was already taken on another side, whilst they still sustained the enemy's assault in their entrenchments: but at day-light they were forced in them. Belisa|rius exhorted his army to clemency; but whether he spoke but faintly, or that the soldiers, bent on murder and plunder, were deaf to the general's ad|vice, they respected neither age, sex, or religion, and without distinction of persons, made a great slaughter. This dreadful severity quelled them for a time; and we hear of neither revolt or persecu|tion during the two subsequent reigns.

Though the reign of Mauritius was disturbed with the wars of the Avari, who came from the Da|nube, and made frequent incursions into Thracia, yet the Jews remained quiet there. This prince's avarice, perhaps, contributed to it; for it was easy to purchase their liberty and peace of him. Besides, the Avari were so remote from Judaea and Syria, that they could not flatter themselves with draw|ing any hopes of assistance from thence; and per|haps their motions were but little known. But Phocas ascending the throne, by assassinating his master and his children, it was apprehended this revolution might cause many alterations.

Those of Syria, finding themselves powerful at Antioch, laid hold on the opportunity, and armed against the Christians. The sedition was general,* 2.127 and they fought resolutely on both sides; but the Jews, being the strongest, killed many, and burnt others in their houses, which they had set on fire. The bishop Anastus was treated in a barbarous man|ner, for they dragged him along the streets, and, after exposing him in the most ignominious manner, threw him into the fire, and burnt him. They were at length, with great difficulty, suppressed by Count Bonosus, whom Phocas sent with a sufficient force against them. Those that came off easiest were banished, and sent away mangled and maimed.

The Jews were as numerous and formidable in the isle of Cyprus,* 2.128 where they had found means to establish themselves, notwithstanding the resolu|tion that had been taken in Adrian's reign, of not suffering so much as travellers of that religion there. It was about four years after the massacre at Anti|och, that the good Cyprian bishop Leontius, fearing perhaps the same fate from them, resolved, if possi|ble, to convert them to Christianity; and succeed|ed so well in it, if we may depend upon his apology as genuine, that the far greater part of them were baptized.

Gregory the Great lived at that time: this pontiff was persuaded that the Jews ought to be cultiva|ted, instead of hated, because they were one day to be recalled. Their general conversion was the vehement object of his desires: he prosecuted the means, and wrote to his receiver in Sicily, to abate his farmers, who turned Christians, the third of the revenues they were indebted to him.

They must (said he) be called to the unity of the faith, by mild persuasion, and charitable advice. Violence is likely to disgust those whom gentleness and charity allure. Menaces and terror stop those whom the idea of God's justice, often repeated, has shaken. The true method to convert then

is not to make them fear us, by carrying severity to excess, but to oblige people to come and hear the word of God.

He imagined it lawful to employ money, without believing these presents could infuse faith; for, said he, if we convert not the fathers, we may win the children. The Jews have praised this pontiff, in their annals, for his lenity and indulgence to them; and they had reason; for the abbess of St. Stephen de Gergenti, in Sicily, desiring to signalize her zeal to the pope, gave him notice, that a great number of Sicilian Jews desired to be converted. But he would not be dazzled with a notion of increasing the church. He ordered the abbess not to be too hasty, but to wait till those catechumens were well instructed, before she suffered them to receive bap|tism.

He had the equity to condemn the extravagant zeal of a new convert of Cagliari. A Jew, who had received baptism the day before, thinking to distinguish himself in his new religion, put himself at the head of a company of young people, and went to the synagogue on Easter-day, and set up a cross there. The chief officers, military and civil, instead of approving this violence, certified against the Jew. The bishop himself, whom he had con|sulted, denied his consent, and condemned the ac|tion. Gregory the Great, desiring to coincide with this prelate in his equitable notions, praised him for not confounding the evil with the good, and advi|sed him to pass censure upon the new convert, without hearkening to the excuses he might make, by laying the fault upon his zeal, and love for re|ligion. He required that the cross should be remo|ved, and the synagogue left to the Jews; since, though the law forbids them to build new ones, it appoints that they should be left the enjoyment of those they had already. With the same spirit he condemned the bishop of Terracina, who had taken away a synagogue in his diocese, which the laws had established; and had driven the Jews from another place where they had retired for their devotion.

This pontiff not only revived the old edicts issued against their having Christian slaves, which had been long since shamefully neglected, but ordained that all the Jewish domestics who should take re|fuge in the churches, and be baptized, should be|come free.

* 2.129The condition of the Jews altered much for the worse as soon as the emperor Heraclius had con|cluded a peace with Persia, by which some relics, formerly taken by them, had been restored to him, and sent to Jerusalem. It plainly appears, from his own words, that he hated the Jewish nation because they were enemies to the Christian religion: but what gave him the first handle against them was his meeting with one at Tiberias, named Benjamin, a man so wealthy as to have alone furnished his army and court with provisions, and so elated on that ac|count, that he harassed the Christians with trouble|some law-suits, and malicious prosecutions. Ben|jamin, fearing his resentment, found no better ex|pedient to avoid it than turning Christian. But this circumstance did not lessen the emperor's aver|sion to the nation,* 2.130 whom he caused soon after to be banished out of Jerusalem, with a severe prohi|bition against those who should, from that time, approach within three miles of the city.

The prediction of some soothsayers, whom he had consulted, gave him greater provocation against the Jews. This restless prince questioned them a|bout the fate of the empire, which was in violent convulsions; and they answered him, "It should be ruined by a circumcised nation." As he saw the Jews numerous, he gave credit to the soothsayers, and persecuted the Jews, by obliging them to ab|jure their religion.

Not content with this, the emperor carried his zeal against them into the neighbouring kingdoms, and particularly to Sisibut, king of Spain, who made great numbers prisoners; and, to avoid the most cruel torments, many abandoned their religion.

Isidorus, bishop of Sevil, who was one of Sisibut's admirers in other respects, has yet condemned this princes zeal, which was without knowledge; and, instead of impressing faith in the hearts of the peo|ple, commanded it. Being afterwards at the head of the fourth council of Toledo, he caused a very so|lemn decree to be made concerning it. This council was assembled by order of Sisimand, who had de|throned Scuintilla, the son of Sisibut, and perceiv|ing the peoples' minds divided, because his compe|titor was still alive, made use of religious means to unite them. He convened the prelates of the king|dom to Toledo, prostrated himself before them, and, in profound humiliation, desired a reformation of discipline. The council furthered the designs of the new king, by giving instructions to the Goths to unite under the same prince for the defence of the nation, and pronouncing anathemas on those who should violate the oath of fidelity they had taken to the usurper. The council declared, that neither Scuintilla, who had abdicated the crown, nor his wife, nor children, nor Gelanus, his brother, who had pretended to take Sisimand's part, and had deceived him, should ever be admitted to the benefit of the church. They went also upon the correction of several abuses, and made regulations about the state of the Jews.* 2.131 It condemned the vio|lence that had been done them by Sisibut's order, declaring, that nobody ought to be forced to be|lieve; that we can only save those that desire it; that, as the first man ruined himself wilfully, by cre|diting fallacious promises, man cannot be saved but by a free conversion of his mind; and that he ought to be persuaded, and not driven, to the faith.

Chintila, who succeeded Sisimand,* 2.132 and was per|haps his brother, thought also he ought to bring the churchmen into his interest. To this effect he called the fifth council of Toledo, which made many decrees in his favour. But to render his laws more authentic, he caused them to be confirmed by ano|ther council, assembled the same year, in the same place. This council did three things against the Jews. 1. It recommended its king,* 2.133 who was in|flamed with a persecuting zeal. 2. It solemnly ratified the law that this prince had made to banish all the Jews out of his kingdom. Lastly, it de|creed, that no king, for the future, should ascend the throne till he had taken an oath never to violate this law; and anathematized him if he broke it. It is probable this variation of the two councils was caused by the death of Isidorus of Sevil. This prudent and moderate man, whose sentiments were known, presided in the fourth council of Toledo, but he died before the sixth; hence arose the in|constancy of the prelates, who, having lost their truly Christian president, swerved from modera|tion to violence.

Recesuinthus afterwards called several councils at Toledo, where he offered them a plan of what ought to be the subject of their deliberations He proposed that they should debate about the election of kings, in which the clergy had great share given them. The Jews were not forgotten, who, after their conversion in former reigns, continued to Ju|daize. The king was weary of this dissimulation, and would have it remedied. However,* 2.134 it seem•• that this motion of the king, and the decrees of the council, produced a salutary effect: for the principals of the nation met, and wrote to the king, in the name of those of Toledo, and of all Spain, who were in the same circumstances, protesting to him, that, though they had hitherto dissembled, being neither perfect Christians or perfect Jews, they were resolved to change their conduct, and sincerely em|brace the Christian religion. They assured this prince, that they would no longer have any com|merce with those of their nation who were unbap|tized; that they would not intermarry with them, or observe the sabbath or circumcision. They promised to stone or burn him who should violate this engagement; and if the king would graciously grant them their lives, they would be content to be his slaves, and that their goods should be confiscated.

But their practices soon appeared totally opposite

to their professions; for they not only espoused the cause of Judaism,* 2.135 but publicly attacked Christianity, insomuch that Ervigius was obliged to order Julian, then archbishop of Toledo, to write against them, which he accordingly did, with great force and suc|cess, in a learned treatise which he published a lit|tle before the close of the seventh century.

Egica complained of a conspiracy the Jews, and their dispersed brethren in Africa, had made against his government. This prince represented to the council assembled at Toledo, that the mischief was spread into all the provinces of the kingdom: that it had not passed the Alps, nor come into France; but that it was nevertheless worthy of considera|tion; and that it could not be dissembled or toler|ated; and therefore demanded not only the coun|cil's advice but assistance.* 2.136 Upon deliberation, it was resolved, that all the Jews should be degraded of their privileges, declared slaves for ever, that their estates should be confiscated, and their chil|dren educated by Christians.

France changing its master, the Romans being expelled, and the Visigoths depressed, the Jews laid hold of this revolution to make their way into se|veral places they had not entered before. At least we find after Clovis, the kings and councils of this kingdom made many regulations relating to their conduct and liberty. They must have been settled at Paris, and the adjacent parts; since Childebert, to whom this kingdom fell by lot, published an ordi|nance,* 2.137 forbidding them to appear in the streets from Maunday Thursday till Easter Sunday: because he feared that the people's devotion might cause some insurrection against them; or that they might take advantage of that conjuncture, when the churches were full and the streets empty, to execute some villainous design. The council of Orleans, held in the year 540. made such another ordinance; which shews that they were dispersed throughout the kingdom.

They were still more numerous and potent in the diocese of Uzes, since Ferreol, the bishop of it, fell under the king's displeasure, and was banished on their account. He thought that he might convert them by living familiarly with them. This fami|liarity rendered him suspected: it was imagined he engaged in their interests, and probably in their opi|nions. He was obliged to quit his bishopric, and go to Paris,* 2.138 to justify himself to Childebert, where he continued many years in exile. But the king be|ing convinced of his innocence, and having restored him to his bishopric, he fell into another extreme, and expelled all the Jews from his diocese.

Avitus, bishop of Clermont, went also to convert the Jews of Auvergne; but the means he employed were not always lawful: on the other hand,* 2.139 the in|credulous fell into criminal violence: for a new convert entering the city with his white habit, upon his receiving baptism, a man of his nation, enraged to see him in that dress, threw upon him a pot of nauseous oil. The people rioting upon that inso|lence, were going to tear him in pieces, if Avitus had not opposed it: but their revenge was only re|tarded; for, on Ascension-day, Christians of the Clermont mutinying, quitted the procession to pull down the synagogue. Avitus took occasion to write to the Jews, that he did not approve the vio|lence, but that, as a shepherd, who was to take care of his flock, and seek the straggling sheep, he ex|horted them to believe as he did, or leave the city. The threats of the bishop, and the fury of the peo|ple, had the effect. The fear of a cruel death en|lightened the Jews; and on the third day a part of the people sent their confession of faith to the bishop, desiring to be baptized, which was perform|ed on Whit-Sunday. Those who had resolution to persevere, were banished the city, and obliged to return to Marseil••es, from whence they came.

St. Germain, bishop of Paris,* 2.140 was very zealous for their conversion; and the historians of those times relate some instances of his zeal, accompanied with very strange circumstances.

King Chilperic, who found them rich and consi|derable in his kingdom of Soissons and Paris, also undertook their conversion. Being an abandoned prince, he made it a point to force the Jews, and present them to the font. But this custom was prophaned by these new converts. No great ad|vantage was derived from these designs of Chilpe|ric; indeed, he was actuated by a motive that could not succeed.

Lunel became afterwards one of the most famous academies of the Jews in the west.* 2.141 The youth came to study there from the remotest countries, and found not only doctors that instructed them, but an exemplary charity. Benjamin of Tudela affirms, that the doctors maintained their scholars, and sup|plied them with cloaths, all the time during their stay in the academy.

After the persecution of the Jews in France great numbers fled for protection to other countries, where, at the instigation of the Gallic princes, they were most cruelly persecuted. Some were put to death, and others confined in prisons; while great numbers had their heads and beards shaved, and were treated with other marks of infamy, no less obnoxious to the Jews, than degrading to their persecutors.

THE END OF BOOK I.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The Jews wretched with taxes
• * 1.2

  The sum paid in Judaea.
• * 1.3

  An aggre|vation un|der Titus and Domi|tian.
• * 1.4

  Lenity of the empe|ror Nerva
• * 1.5

  Rise of the patriachs of Judaea.
• * 1.6

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.7

  The poet Ezekiel a Jew.
• * 1.8

  The will of 12 ••a|tr••archs compose at that time.
• * 1.9

  Source of sedition.
• * 1.10

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.11

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.12

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.13

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.14

  A•• 〈…〉〈…〉
• * 1.15

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 ••ched 〈◊〉〈◊〉 of the 〈◊〉〈◊〉 under 〈◊〉〈◊〉
• * 1.16

  〈…〉〈…〉 of 〈◊〉〈◊〉 rebel|••.
• * 1.17

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 real ••••uses of 〈◊〉〈◊〉 insur|••••••tion.
• * 1.18

  A colony sent to Jerusalem before the war.
• * 1.19

  Impostors that pre|ceded Bar|chochebas
• * 1.20

  Some men|tioned by St Luke, Acts 5th.
• * 1.21

  Defeat of Judas.
• * 1.22

  Barcho|chebas the arch im|postor.
• * 1.23

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.24

  O•• Dion
• * 1.25

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.26

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 impos|•••••• gains 〈◊〉〈◊〉 at 〈◊〉〈◊〉.
• * 1.27

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 1.28

  〈…〉〈…〉 and 〈…〉〈…〉
• * 1.29

  This war is attende•• with hor|rid massa|cres.
• * 1.30

  Jerusalem rendered odious to the Jews.
• * 1.31

  Numbers of Jews sold at 〈◊〉〈◊〉 public mar••
• * 2.1

  Their 〈…〉〈…〉
• * 2.2

  More 〈…〉〈…〉 ••••ws ••f the east
• * 2.3

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.4

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.5

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.6

  ••••••r.
• * 2.7

  ••••sitheus.
• * 2.8

  ••••••echus.
• * 2.9

  ••••elpeta.
• * 2.10

  ••••••mon.
• * 2.11

  Antoninus Pius a pro|selyte to the Jewish religion.
• * 2.12

  Antoninus makes war with the Jews.
• * 2.13

  Antoninus grants the Jews privi|leges un|der certain restrictions
• * 2.14

  Conference of Justin with the Rabbin Tryphon.
• * 2.15

  Hamme|p•••• 〈◊〉〈◊〉.
• * 2.16

  Mercus Aurelius's war with the Jews.
• * 2.17

  Their con|federacy with Cassi|us punish|ed.
• * 2.18

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.19

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.20

  Apology for 〈◊〉〈◊〉 doctrine.
• * 2.21

  Different sects among the Jews.
• * 2.22

  Other se••t•• 〈…〉〈…〉 J••••t••n Mar|tyr.
• * 2.23

  Septuagint why cried down.
• * 2.24

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 ••••ansac|••••ons.
• * 2.25

  〈…〉〈…〉 Niger
• * 2.26

  The 〈…〉〈…〉 Se••er••••
• * 2.27

  Sever•••• 〈…〉〈…〉
• * 2.28

  ••••rries the 〈◊〉〈◊〉 into ••••daea.
• * 2.29

  ••ecomes 〈…〉〈…〉 to the ••ews.
• * 2.30

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.31

  In••••••nces 〈…〉〈…〉 ••••ws.
• * 2.32

  The Jews are ••avour|ed under Caracalla.
• * 2.33

  Traditions peculiar to the Helle|nists, and others to the Jews.
• * 2.34

  Many apo|chryphal books written at this time.
• * 2.35

  Jochanan compiles the Tal|mud.
• * 2.36

  Account of the Tal|mud.
• * 2.37

  The Jews are in dan|ger under Heliogaba|lus.
• * 2.38

  Clemency of Alexan|der Seve|rus.
• * 2.39

  〈…〉〈…〉 eastern Je••••
• * 2.40

  Th•• 〈…〉〈…〉 name.
• * 2.41

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.42

  ••or per|••••cutes the 〈◊〉〈◊〉.
• * 2.43

  The Per|sians make war against the Ro|mans.
• * 2.44

  Zenobia is favourable to the Jews
• * 2.45

  Sapor is vanquish|ed by O|denatus.
• * 2.46

  Zenobia a Jewess.
• * 2.47

  Zenobia is vanquished by Aure|lian.
• * 2.48

  Her ••••verse o•• ••o••••••me.
• * 2.49

  Doctors that ••••••|rished 〈◊〉〈◊〉 the ••••••t.
• * 2.50

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.51

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 of the 〈…〉〈…〉
• * 2.52

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 of ••••••stantine 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Jews.
• * 2.53

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.54

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.55

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 ••he Jews 〈◊〉〈◊〉.
• * 2.56

  Several laws are enacted by the same emperor
• * 2.57

  Decrees of the council of Elvira.
• * 2.58

  Famous ••••••bies of the east.
• * 2.59

  Joseph the Blind▪ h••s works.
• * 2.60

  The 〈…〉〈…〉
• * 2.61

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.62

  ••ebel|•• at Diocaesarea 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.63

  〈◊〉〈◊〉 o•• 〈…〉〈…〉 the 〈◊〉〈◊〉.
• * 2.64

  ••••nversion 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.65

  〈…〉〈…〉 the 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.66

  A city in|habited by the ten tribes in the east.
• * 2.67

  Conduct of Jovian.
• * 2.68

  The Jews favoured by Maximus
• * 2.69

  Vindication of St Am|brose.
• * 2.70

  St. Jerome's esteem for the Jews.
• * 2.71

  Takes great pains to learn He|brew.
• * 2.72

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.73

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.74

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.75

  ••io•• liberal ••sition.
• * 2.76

  ••••••••gogues ••oyed.
• * 2.77

  An impos|tor in the ••••land of Candia.
• * 2.78

  Frauds ex|ercised un|der the ma••k of religion.
• * 2.79

  Jews raise a tumult at Alexandria
• * 2.80

  Riot•• and 〈◊〉〈◊〉 f••r the effects of party real
• * 2.81

  V•• of the b•• Cyril 〈…〉〈…〉▪
• * 2.82

  The 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.83

  We•• Je•• 〈◊〉〈◊〉
• * 2.84

  ••••itable 〈◊〉〈◊〉 o•• Ho|•• re|••••••cting 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Jews.
• * 2.85

  〈…〉〈…〉 them ••f the of|••ice of ••gents.
• * 2.86

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.87

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.88

  Different opinions about the Coelicolae.
• * 2.89

  They have no analogy to the wor|ship of the synagogue
• * 2.90

  Jews nu|merous at Minorca, where they exercised the chief offices.
• * 2.91

  Determina|tion of Se|verus to convert the Jews.
• * 2.92

  State of the Jews under the Vandals in Africa.
• * 2.93

  Valentinian confirms their pri|vileges.
• * 2.94

  Theodoric king of the Goths, pro|tects the Jews.
• * 2.95

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.96

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.97

  ••••••cessors 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Asce.
• * 2.98

  〈…〉〈…〉 power 〈◊〉〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉〈◊〉 of the 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.99

  A persecu|tion puts a stop to the composi|tion of the Talmud.
• * 2.100

  Rise of the sect of the Sebureans, or Sceptics.
• * 2.101

  Jews per|secuted in Persia un|der Ca••a|des.
• * 2.102

  Insurrec|tion of the Jews a|gainst the king of Persia.
• * 2.103

  The Jews persecuted under Chosroes.
• * 2.104

  Restored by Hormis|das.
• * 2.105

  Persecuted by Chosroes II.
• * 2.106

  Slaughter|ed at Anti|och.
• * 2.107

  〈…〉〈…〉 by 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Jews
• * 2.108

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.109

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.110

  C•• of 〈◊〉〈◊〉 saviour to Maho|met.
• * 2.111

  Fall of the Persian mo|narchy.
• * 2.112

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.113

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.114

  Moavia reigns at Damascus.
• * 2.115

  Many skir|mishes be|tween Aly and Moa|via.
• * 2.116

  Isdigerdes persecutes the Jews.
• * 2.117

  Liberality and can|dour of the Arabians.
• * 2.118

  Omar's equity.
• * 2.119

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.120

  The 〈…〉〈…〉 Africa chan•••• into church••.
• * 2.121

  Borium 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Africa▪ 〈◊〉〈◊〉 the Jews.
• * 2.122

  ••••••rrec|•••••••• of 〈◊〉〈◊〉 Jews 〈◊〉〈◊〉 m••st ••••••tinian.
• * 2.123

  ••••volt at ••••sa••••a.
• * 2.124

  ••••loits of 〈…〉〈…〉 Roman ••••••eral.
• * 2.125

  ••••e Jews 〈◊〉〈◊〉 the ••ch••.
• * 2.126

  Naples be|sieged and taken.
• * 2.127

  Cruelties of the Jews at Antioch.
• * 2.128

  The Jews powerful in Cyprus.
• * 2.129

  Change of the Jewish affairs un|der Hera|clius.
• * 2.130

  He banishes them from Jerusalem.
• * 2.131

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.132

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.133

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.134

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.135

  〈1 paragraph〉〈1 paragraph〉
• * 2.136

  ••••solutions 〈◊〉〈◊〉 the ••••••••cil o•• 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.137

  ••cts pub|••••••hed 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.138

  ••••ren••, ••••o•• of ••••ont, 〈…〉〈…〉.
• * 2.139

  Avitus treats them with severity.
• * 2.140

  Zeal of Germain for their conver|sion.
• * 2.141

  Lunel an academy of the Jews.