Part 37 (1/2)

[466] Ethiopian here means Phoenician. Tradition made Cepheus, the father of Andromeda, king of Joppa.

[467] From Damascus, said Justin, where Abraham was one of their kings, and Trogus Pompeius adds that the name of Abraham was honourably remembered at Damascus. These are variants of the Biblical migration of Abraham.

[468] _Il._ vi. 184; _Od._ v. 282.

[469] Another piece of fanciful philology, based on a misinterpretation of a Greek transliteration of the name Jerusalem. The Solymi are traditionally placed in Lycia. Both Juvenal and Martial use Solymus as equivalent to Judaeus.

[470] The only known King Bocchoris belongs to the eighth century B.C., whereas the Exodus is traditionally placed not later than the sixteenth.

[471] See Exod. xvii.

[472] i.e. an a.s.s. The idea that this animal was sacred to the Jews was so prevalent among 'the Gentiles' that Josephus takes the trouble to refute it.

[473] Cp. Lev. xvi. 3, 'a young bullock for a sin offering, and a ram for a burnt offering.' Tacitus' reasons are of course errors due to the prevalent confusion of Jewish and Egyptian history.

[474] Cp. Luke xviii. 12, 'I fast twice a week.'

[475] Cp. Deut. v. 15.

[476] Cp. Lev. xxv. 4, '... in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a sabbath unto the Lord: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard.'

[477] The seventh day being named after Cronos or Saturn (cp.

chap. 2, note 464).

[478] Reading _commeent_ (Wolfflin).

[479] This refers to proselytes, who, like Jews resident abroad, contributed annually to the Temple treasury. They numbered at this time about four millions. Romans naturally regarded this diversion of funds with disfavour.

[480] Jewish exclusiveness always roused Roman indignation, and 'hatred of the human race' was the usual charge against Christians (see _Ann._ xv. 44).

[481] The strict regulations of Deut. xxii. &c. give a strange irony to this slander. Most of these libels originated in Alexandria.

[482] 'A people,' says the elder Pliny, 'distinguished by their contemptuous atheism.'

[483] _Agnati_, as used here and in _Germ._ 19 means a child born after the father has made his will and therein specified the number of his children. The mere birth of such a child invalidated any earlier will that the father had made, but the fact of its birth might be concealed by making away with the baby. This crime seems to have been not uncommon, but there is no evidence that 'exposure of infants' was permitted.

[484] Josephus also alludes to this belief that the corruption of disease chained the soul to the buried body, while violent death freed it to live for ever in the air and protect posterity.

[485] Under the kings cremation was an honourable form of burial, but in Babylon the Jews came to regard fire as a sacred element which should not be thus defiled.

[486] This was over the door of the Temple. Aristobulus gave it as a present to Pompey.

[487] Plutarch shared this error, which seems somehow to have been based on a misinterpretation of the Feast of Tabernacles, at which they were to 'take ... the fruit of goodly trees, ...

and willows of the brook; and ... rejoice before the Lord your G.o.d seven days' (Lev. xxiii. 40).

[488] Over Coele-Syria, from the range of Lebanon.

[489] i.e. from Mount Hermon, nearly 9,000 feet high.