Part 61 (2/2)
[25] This account of the Idumeans admitting circ.u.mcision, and the entire Jewish law, from this time, or from the days of Hyrca.n.u.s, is confirmed by their entire history afterward. See Antiq. B. XIV. ch. 8. sect. 1; B. XV. ch. 7. sect. 9. Of the War, B. II. ch. 3. sect. 1; B. IV. ch.
4. sect. 5. This, in the opinion of Josephus, made them proselytes of justice, or entire Jews, as here and elsewhere, Antiq. B. XIV. ch.
8. sect. 1. However, Antigonus, the enemy of Herod, though Herod were derived from such a proselyte of justice for several generations, will allow him to be no more than a half Jew, B. XV. ch. 15. sect. 2.
But still, take out of Dean Prideaux, at the year 129, the words of Ammouius, a grammarian, which fully confirm this account of the Idumeans in Josephus: ”The Jews,” says he, are such by nature, and from the beginning, whilst the Idumeans were not Jews from the beginning, but Phoenicians and Syrians; but being afterward subdued by the Jews, and compelled to be circ.u.mcised, and to unite into one nation, and be subject to the same laws, they were called Jews.” Dio also says, as the Dean there quotes him, from Book x.x.xVI. p. 37, ”That country is called Judea, and the people Jews; and this name is given also to as many others as embrace their religion, though of other nations.” But then upon what foundation so good a governor as Hyrca.n.u.s took upon him to compel those Idumeans either to become Jews, or to leave the country, deserves great consideration. I suppose it was because they had long ago been driven out of the land of Edom, and had seized on and possessed the tribe of Simeon, and all the southern parts of the tribe of Judah, which was the peculiar inheritance of the wors.h.i.+ppers of the true G.o.d without idolatry, as the reader may learn from Reland, Palestine, Part I. p.
154, 305; and from Prideaux, at the years 140 and 165.
[26] In this decree of the Roman senate, it seems that these amba.s.sadors were sent from the ”people of the Jews,” as well as from their prince or high priest, John Hyrca.n.u.s.
[27] Dean Prideaux takes notice at the year 130, that Justin, in agreement with Josephus, says, ”The power of the Jews was now grown so great, that after this Antiochus they would not bear any Macedonian king over them; and that they set up a government of their own, and infested Syria with great wars.”
[28] The original of the Sadducees, as a considerable party among the Jews, being contained in this and the two following sections, take Dean Prideaux's note upon this their first public appearance, which I suppose to be true: ”Hyrca.n.u.s,” says be, ”went over to the party of the Sadducees; that is, by embracing their doctrine against the traditions of the eiders, added to the written law, and made of equal authority with it, but not their doctrine against the resurrection and a future state; for this cannot be supposed of so good and righteous a man as John Hyrca.n.u.s is said to be. It is most probable, that at this time the Sadducees had gone no further in the doctrines of that sect than to deny all their unwritten traditions, which the Pharisees were so fond of; for Josephus mentions no other difference at this time between them; neither doth he say that Hyrcanna went over to the Sadducees in any other particular than in the abolis.h.i.+ng of all the traditionary const.i.tutions of the Pharisees, which our Savior condemned as well as they.” [At the year.]
[29] This slander, that arose from a Pharisee, has been preserved by their successors the Rabbins to these later ages; for Dr. Hudson a.s.sures us that David Gantz, in his Chronology, S. Pr. p. 77, in Vorstius's version, relates that Hyrca.n.u.s's mother was taken captive in Mount Modinth. See ch. 13. sect. 5.
[30] Here ends the high priesthood, and the life of this excellent person John Hyrca.n.u.s, and together with him the holy theocracy, or Divine government of the Jewish nation, and its concomitant oracle by Urim. Now follows the profane and tyrannical Jewish monarchy, first of the Asamoneans or Maccabees, and then of Herod the Great, the Idumean, till the coming of the Messiah. See the note on Antiq. B. III. ch. 8.
sect. 9. Hear Strabo's testimony on this occasion, B. XVI. p. 761, 762: ”Those,” says he, ”that succeeded Moses continued for some time in earnest, both in righteous actions and in piety; but after a while there were others that took upon them the high priesthood, at first superst.i.tious and afterward tyrannical persons. Such a prophet was Moses and those that succeeded him, beginning in a way not to be blamed, but changing for the worse. And when it openly appeared that the government was become tyrannical, Alexander was the first that set up himself for a king instead of a priest; and his sons were Hyrca.n.u.s and Aristobulus.”
All in agreement with Josephus, excepting this, that Strabo omits the first king, Aristobulus, who reigning but a single year, seems hardly to have come to his knowledge. Nor indeed does Aristobulus, the son of Alexander, pretend that the name of king was taken before his father Alexander took it himself, Antiq. B. XIV. ch. 3. sect. 2. See also ch.
12. sect. l, which favor Strabo also. And indeed, if we may judge from the very different characters of the Egyptian Jews under high priests, and of the Palestine Jews under kings, in the two next centuries, we may well suppose that the Divine Shechinah was removed into Egypt, and that the wors.h.i.+ppers at the temple of Onias were better men than those at the temple of Jerusalem.
[31] Hence we learn that the Essens pretended to have ruled whereby men might foretell things to come, and that this Judas the Essen taught those rules to his scholars; but whether their pretense were of an astrological or magical nature, which yet in such religious Jews, who were utterly forbidden such arts, is no way probable, or to any Bath Col, spoken of by the later Rabbins, or otherwise, I cannot tell. See Of the War, B. II. ch. 8. sect. 12.
[32] The reason why Hyrca.n.u.s suffered not this son of his whom he did not love to come into Judea, but ordered him to be brought up in Galilee, is suggested by Dr. Hudson, that Galilee was not esteemed so happy and well cultivated a country as Judea, Matthew 26:73; John 7:52; Acts 2:7, although another obvious reason occurs also, that he was out of his sight in Galilee than he would have been in Judea.
[33] From these, and other occasional expressions, dropped by Josephus, we may learn, that where the sacred hooks of the Jews were deficient, he had several other histories then extant, [but now most of them lost,]
which he faithfully followed in his own history; nor indeed have we any other records of those times, relating to Judea, that can be compared to these accounts of Josephus, though when we do meet with authentic fragments of such original records, they almost always confirm his history.
[34] This city, or island, Cos, is not that remote island in the Aegean Sea, famous for the birth of the great Hippocrates, but a city or island of the same name adjoining to Egypt, mentioned both by Stepha.n.u.s and Ptolemy, as Dr. Mizon informs us. Of which Cos, and the treasures there laid up by Cleopatra and the Jews, see Antiq. B. XIV. ch. 7, sect. 2.
[35] This account of the death of Antiochus Grypus is confirmed by Appion, Syriac. p. 132, here cited by Spanheim.
[36] Porphyry says that this Antiochus Grypus reigned but twenty-six years, as Dr. Hudson observes. The copies of Josephus, both Greek and Latin, have here so grossly false a reading, Antiochus and Antoninus, or Antonius Plus, for Antiochus Pius, that the editors are forced to correct the text from the other historians, who all agree that this king's name was nothing more than Antiochus Plus.
[37] These two brothers, Antiochus and Philippus are called twins by Porphyry; the fourth brother was king of Damascus: both which are the observations of Spanheim.
[38] This Laodicea was a city of Gilead beyond Jordan. However, Porphyry says that this Antiochus Pius did not die in this battle; but, running away, was drowned in the river Orontes. Appian says that he, was deprived of the kingdom of Syria by Tigranes; but Porphyry makes this Laodice queen of the Calamans;-all which is noted by Spanheim. In such confusion of the later historians, we have no reason to prefer any of them before Josephus, who had more original ones before him. This reproach upon Alexander, that he was sprung from a captive, seems only the repet.i.tion of the old Pharisaical calumny upon his father, ch. 10.
sect. 5.
[39] This Theodorus was the son of Zeno, and was in possession of Areathus, as we learn from sect. 3 foregoing.
[40] This name Thracida, which the Jews gave Alexander, must, by the coherence, denote as barbarous as a Thracian, or somewhat like it; but what it properly signifies is not known.
[41] Spanheim takes notice that this Antiochus Dionysus [the brother of Philip, and of Demetrius Eucerus, and of two others] was the fifth son of Antiochus Grypus; and that he is styled on the coins, ”Antiochus, Epiphanes, Dionysus.”
[42] This Aretas was the first king of the Arabians who took Damascus, and reigned there; which name became afterwards common to such Arabian kings, both at Petra and at Damascus, as we learn from Josephus in many places; and from St. Paul, 2 Corinthians 11:32. See the note on Antiq.
B. XVI. ch. 9. sect. 4.
[43] We may here and elsewhere take notice, that whatever countries or cities the Asamoneans conquered from any of the neighboring nations, or whatever countries or cities they gained from them that had not belonged to them before, they, after the days of Hyrca.n.u.s, compelled the inhabitants to leave their idolatry, and entirely to receive the law of Moses, as proselytes of justice, or else banished them into other lands.
That excellent prince, John Hyrca.n.u.s, did it to the Idumeans, as I have noted on ch. 9. sect. 1, already, who lived then in the Promised Land, and this I suppose justly; but by what right the rest did it, even to the countries or cities that were no part of that land, I do not at all know. This looks too like unjust persecution for religion.
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