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support of every opposite sect. Probably, had they dug down to a considerable with these views, the memorable edict was depth, and were preparing to lay the foundaissued for the rebuilding of the Temple on tions, when suddenly flames of fire came Mount Moriah, and the restoration of the bursting from the centre of the hill, accompaJewish worship in its original splendor. The nied with terrific explosions. The affrighted execution of this project was intrusted, workmen fled on all sides, and the labors while Julian advanced with his ill-fated were suspended at once by this unforeseen army to the East, to the care of his favorite, and awful sign. Other circumstances are Alypius. said to have accompanied this event: an "The whole Jewish world was in commo- earthquake shook the hill; flakes of fire, tion; they crowded from the most distant which took the form of crosses, settled on quarters to be present, and to assist in the the dresses of the workmen and spectators; great national work. Those who were un- and the fire consumed even the tools of iron. able to come envied their more fortunate It was even added that a horseman was seen brethren, and waited in anxious hope for the careering among the flames; and that the intelligence that they might again send their workmen, having fled to a neighboring offerings, or make their pilgrimage to the church, its doors, fastened by some preternatTemple of the God of Abraham, in his holy ural force within, refused to admit them. place. Their wealth was poured forth in [Sic in text.] These, however, may be embellavish profusion; and all who were near the lishments, and are found only in later and spot, and could not contribute so amply, of- rhetorical writers; but the main fact of the fered their personal exertions; blessed were interruption of the work by some extraordithe hands that toiled in such a work; un-nary, and, as it was supposed, preternatural worthy was he of the blood of Israel who interference, rests on the clear and unsuspiwould not unlock, at such a call, his most cious testimony of the heathen Ammianus secret hoards. Men cheerfully surrendered Marcellinus." * the hard-won treasures of their avarice; women offered up the ornaments of their vanity. The very tools which were to be employed were, as it were, sanctified by the service, and were made of the most costly materials; some had shovels, mallets, baskets of silver; and women were seen carrying rubbish in robes and mantles of silk. Men, blind from the womb, came forward to lend their embarrassing aid; and the aged tottered along the ways, bowed beneath the weight of some burden, which they seemed to acquire new strength to support. The confidence and triumph of the Jews were unbounded; some went so far in their profane adulation as to style Julian the Messiah! The Christians looked on in consternation and amazement. Would the murderers of the Son of God be permitted to rebuild their *Milman's Hist. of Jews, vol. iii. pp. 181-184. devoted city, and the Temple arise again Dean Milman suggests that these prodigies may be from the abomination of desolation ?' Ma- the foundations, the workmen came upon subterattributable to secondary causes; that in digging terials had now accumulated from all quar-ranean vaults, charged with fire-damp; this, ignitters-some say at the expense of the empe- of the workmen. This is very ingenious, and quite ing, caused the explosion, which arrested the hands ror; but that is not probable, considering the possible; but why deny the miraculous agency of costly war in which he was engaged. Nor were the Jews wanting in ample resources: timber, stones, lime, burnt brick, clay, were heaped together in abundant quantities. Already was the work commenced; already

It is said that the news of this failure reached Julian before his death, and helped to draw from him that memorable confession, "Thou hast conquered, O Galilean!”

It was reserved for Theodosius to put an end to this power of the patriarch of the West. He passed an edict which stripped him of his authority by taking away his title and office of prefect. Gamaliel, who had been accused of erecting synagogues contrary to the imperial laws, was the last of the patriarchs: his real power had passed away when the tribute was forbidden to be collected from the Western Empire; the abolition of the office easily followed. A new order, that of primates, succeeded: these seem rather to have been local chiefs of the dispersed Jews in various countries,

the First Cause, as the Dean seems to do? He
goes even further, for he argues that the miracle
was unnecessary, inasmuch as the death of Julian,
which immediately followed, would, by itself, have
stopped the works. True; but by this line of ar-

very questionable.
gument the necessity of miracles at all becomes

spiritual authority devolved into the hands in the West: the kings of Persia, who were of a rabbinical aristocracy-an authority the suzerains of the princes of the captivwhich has continued to our own day.

ity, willingly permitted them the state of a king, and the independence of the people, in the hope that they would prove their allies in the frequent wars with the great Roman power-anxious to prevent the existence of a hostile nation in the heart of their empire.

We must now pass to the rival throne of Babylon; here another order of things prevailed: the patriarchate of Tiberias was essentially an ecclesiastical institution; the princedom of the captivity of Babylon was rather secular. The princes claimed-and the claim was admitted by a willing people- Unfortunately, this very éloignement of to be descendants of the royal house of Da- the Jews in the East prevents us from acvid; they affected more the pomp of a king quiring a full and accurate knowledge of than the chair of the doctor. Under them, them: historians the Jews had none, not even indeed, flourished the rabbinical schools of the more humble office of chronicler; such Nahardea, Sora, and Pumbeditha, long ri- employment was unworthy of the time and vals, and at last successfully so, of those of labor of the learned; other nations, they Sepphoris and Tiberias in the West: in the said, confine their literature to mundane former, as we have before mentioned, was matters, we labor in sacred wisdom and the completed that imperishable monument of knowledge of God. Among the latter they Jewish wisdom and Jewish extravagance-reckoned the puerilities of the fables in the the Babylonian Talmud; but we must ever Babylonian Talmud. Nor does Persia afford regard the throne of Babylon as represent- us much help; if records there were which ing to the Jewish mind the power of Solo- could throw light on the history of this most mon, rather than that of the Sanhedrim. interesting people, they have perished, or To it the Jews fondly applied the prophecy are yet to be discovered. Beyond Persia of Jacob, "The sceptre shall not depart the rest of Eastern Asia lies in impenetrable from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between darkness.* In the matter of dates, the Jew his feet, until Shiloh come." Even the patriarch of Tiberias was willing-possibly from a mere patriotic spirit-to accord to his rival the honor he claimed. "Should the prince of the captivity come to Tiberias, I would do him homage," is reported as having been said by the great Jehudah the Holy. The Talmudists of Babylon went still further, and sought to cast contempt on their brethren of Judea: "Esra," they said, "left the fine flour at Babylon, and took with him only the dregs of the people." Again: "All the earth is an impure mass in comparison with Judea; but Judea is a corrupted mass in comparison with Babylon." Even in the Persian empire there were degrees of pureness: Babylon is healthy; Mæson is dead; Media is sick; Persia is dying "--by which they meant that the Babylonian Jews were of pure blood; those of Mæson bastards; those in Media, some pure, many not; in Persia there remained few uncontaminated with foreign alliance.

Removed by locality from the influence of the Roman government, the princes could assume a state and magnificence unknown to the more unfortunate remnant of Israel

can very seldom be trusted; he either considers them as unworthy of accuracy, or else he wilfully falsifies them to make them agree with some Cabbalistic calculation, or, what perhaps was more frequent, to make them disagree with the Christian system, so as to escape the arguments of the latter from the prophecies of the Old Testament.

There can be no doubt that under the common name of Jew is to be comprehended the remnant of the captivity of Israel, which lingered, and, if we are to believe Dr. Wolff, still lingers yet, in the places where the Assyrian conquerors placed them. Though esteemed schismatic by their brethren of Judah, we may be sure that a common race, a common hope, a common religion, and, still more, in later times, under the horrors of the great Tatar invasion, a common misfor

We must make one exception to this in the discovery of a Jewish settlement in China. This colony is doubtless of great antiquity. Milman would refer the commencement to so remote a period as 58 or 75 A.C. Its synagogue was constructed to resemble the Temple, with a Holy of Holies, entered only by the High Priest; when discovered by Father Gozani, a Jesuit missionary, none had heard any thing of Christianity. They were employed in agriculture and traffic, and some had even attained the rank of Mandarin.

tune, would compel them to make up their | singular imperium in imperio, the rule of the differences, and unite as one people. Nei- princes of the captivity. The oriental mind, ther can it be doubted that the latter cause which ever glories in pomp and display, and would make many also apostates, and com- esteems the greatness of the people to be in plete the fulfilment of that fearful prophecy, proportion with the distance between themwhich alone is sufficient to prove the truth of selves and their monarch, had invented a inspiration: "And the Lord shall scatter ceremonial for the installation of their prince, thee among all people, from the one end of which might rival the magnificence of Solothe earth even unto the other; and there mon, who was the type of all greatness and thou shalt serve other gods, which neither glory in the eye of the Jew. We give the folthou nor thy fathers have known, even wood lowing account from Basnage: "The princes and stone." of the captivity were installed with much pomp and ceremony. For this purpose the heads of the neighboring schools, the senators, and the people, gathered in crowds to the city of Babylon. An assembly was formed, and the prince, whom they believed to be of the lineage of David, was seated on a kind of throne; then the head of the school of Sora exhorted him not to abuse his power, and represented to him that he was called to a state of captivity rather than to an empire, because of the sad condition of the people. On the following Thursday the heads of the schools laid their hands on him in the synagogue, accompanied by the blast of trumpets, and the acclamations of the people. The latter, after conducting him to his palace in procession, brought him rich presents. On Saturday morning all the personages of distinction assembled at his palace; he placed himself at their head, and, departing from his house, with a veil of silk over his face, proceeded to the synagogue, followed by a vast crowd, while the heads of the schools and the singers chanted hymns and benedictions before his throne. Then was brought to him the Book of the Law, of which he read the first line; after this he made an oration to the Should he not be able to do this the head of people with his eyes closed out of respect.

Over this united people, by the permission of the kings of Persia, was established that *Deut. xxviii. 64. Dr. Wolff, in his last work, gives examples of compliance with heathen religion, if it be not total apostasy. "Before we leave Poonah, Wolff must make mention of the Benee Israel, i.e.Children of Israel,' who were resident there, for they are totally distinct from the rest of the Jews in Europe and Hindostan. After the destruction of the first Temple in Jerusalem, their ancestors went first to Arabia, and then to Hindostan, where they have since forgotten their law; but they continue to repeat, in Hebrew, certain prayers which they have learned from other Jews. They serve the English as volunteers, in their armies, and are esteemed the best native soldiers. They possess great simplicity and honesty of character, and are faithful to their wives, and, by far, more moral than the Jews of Cochin. [Sic.] They keep in their houses idols of wood and stone, and thus the prophecy is fulfilled, And then ye shall serve other gods, even of wood and stone." "- -Wolff, vol. ii. p. 233. "At last, Wolff arrived at Mished, the capital of Khorassan. Here he stayed with a Jew, the most respectable of them, Mullah-Mehder by name, in whose house Wolff had lived fourteen years before, and where he was treated in a very gentlemanly manner. Wolff asked,' How are the Jews at Meshed going on? To his greatest horror, he learned that the whole community had become Mohammedan."— Ibid. pp. 373, 374. This apostasy was in consequence of a fanatical onslaught of the Mohammedans, who, incited by a Sayd, or prophet, believed that the Jews had killed a dog in derision of their religion. They were offered the choice of death or conversion: they chose

the latter.

"The Jews in Bokhara, which do not call themselves Jews, but children of Israel, and who assert that they belong to the Ten Tribes, say that those the school supplied his place. He enlarged, Kapi Seeahpoosh are their brethren, whose ances- above all things, on charity to the scholars, tors had entirely forgotten their law, and had fallen to idolatry-but into the ancient idolatry. They himself setting the example by bestowing call God, Imrah,' and they worship the figure of large alms; the rest immediately followed his a fish, called Dagon.' They have in their mountains the Ten Commandments written upon stone; example. The ceremony concluded by the acand their women observe the law of purification." clamations of the people, and prayers to God Vol. ii. p. 37. There cannot be the slightest doubt that deliverance might be brought to the nathat the Jews in Khorassan, Bokhara, Samarcand, and Balk, and also in Shahr-sabz, as well as the tion under his reign. He then gave the benedescendants of Tchingis Khan, and the Nogay Ta- diction, and prayed particularly for each provtars, and those called of the tribe of Naphtali, are ince, that God would protect it from pestilence all remnants of the Ten Tribes. This is not an hypothesis, but a relation of their own assertions. As and war; the rest of the prayer was said in to the Kafir Seeahpoosh, Wolff strongly suspects a low voice, so as not to reach the ears of them to be the same; but he cannot prove it, as he never heard it asserted by the Seeahpoosh themselves."-Ibid. p. 62.

any, lest his words might be repeated to his suzerain or other kings, for he prayed that

We are not to suppose, however, that the sun shone upon the prince of the captivity during this time without a cloud, or that he ever found his suzerain so compliant: from

than true successors of the patriarch; the Mohammedan wars, swept away the imperium the kingdom of the Jews might rise on the of the Resch-Glutha, as they did those of ruins of other monarchies. Coming out of greater and stronger monarchs. Yet with a' the synagogue, he was again conducted with pertinacity peculiarly Jewish, and an ungreat ceremony to his palace, where he made changeableness essentially oriental, the title is a feast to the great men of the nation. From still retained to this day.† this time he never went out except on visits of ceremony to the schools, when a great crowd accompanied him, and all rose up to receive him; and on those occasions when he went to pay his respects to the suzerain the death of R. Asche, who commenced the of Babylon [Baghdad]. Again, as before, Babylonian Talmud, the days of the children this affair was one of great magnificence. The king, being informed of his intention, sent him his own chariot; the prince of the captivity did not dare to accept the offer, but caused it to advance before him, as a mark of his respect and dependence. He was arrayed in a magnificent robe of cloth of gold, fifty guards marched before him; all who met him made it a matter of duty to follow him to the palace. There eunuchs received him, and conducted him to the throne, while his officers scattered gold and silver around. Approaching the throne he prostrated himself on the earth to show that he was a vas- father-in-law, forbade him: Huna privately sal and a subject; the eunuchs lifted him up, and placed him on a seat on the left of the king. After the first salutation the prince laid before his suzerain the grievances and the state of affairs of his people, for the latter to redress." *

of the captivity were indeed dark. The race of Persian monarchs from Izdigerdes to Kobad (430 to 530) were Magians, and persecutors both of Jew and Christian; sabbath and Lord's-day were alike prohibited, though the schools were still open. In the midst of this external violence, internal strife prevailed; the heads of the schools would not endure that the prince, though acknowledged to be of the house of David, should interpret the Talmud in the presence of the rabbies. Huna, the Resch-Glutha, presumed to do this; R. Chanina, master of the schools, and Huna's

The

insulted Chanina, and publicly interdicted his subjects from receiving him, or supplying him with the necessaries of life. Chanina prayed in secret, and it seemed as if his prayers were heard, for a pestilence carried off every living member of the royal line, The Resch-Glutha, or prince of the cap- leaving only his pregnant daughter. tivity, held his court with true oriental mag- history, or legend, goes on to say that Chanina nificence; we read of satraps, councillors, and dreamed that he stood in a garden, where he cup-bearers. The Jews of the East were had cut down all the cedar trees, one small many of them wealthy, they were merchants sapling alone remaining: on awaking, he beand artisans, as well as followers of their an- lieved the dream to signify that he had cestral employment of husbandmen and shep- caused the destruction of David's line, and herds; and no doubt willingly paid their that it was his remaining duty to tend the untaxes to keep up the glory of their prince. born infant: day and night he watched at his Their great pride was, however, in the schools daughter's door, till the child was born, which, of learning; the fame of those of Sepphoris from that hour, became the sole object of his and Tiberias in the West only stimulated the care and thought. In due time, the young school of Nahardea, Sora, and Pumbeditha, to Zutra succeeded to his father's honors; his a generous rivalry, This imperium lasted till | reign was short; an impostor, named Meir, the eleventh century: in the twelfth a mere brought it to an untimely end Most probanominis umbra, a Jew who called himself the bly pretending to be the Messiah, he gathered prince, without any royal power, was found a band of four hundred men, and devastated by Benjamin of Tudela, when he visited the country, giving out that a fiery pillar Baghdad; the irruption of the Mongul con- preceded his march: the Persian monarch querors, the dissolution of the Persian mon- Kobad soon quelled the insurrection, and took archy, and the revolutions caused by the

*Basnage, liv. iii. chap. 4, § 7. The above is a free translation.

"The Jews are mighty and rich in Bagdad, and many are learned among them, and their great man has still the title, "The Prince of Captivity."-Wolff, vol. i. p. 327.

fearful vengeance on the unhappy children of the Israelitish origin of the Tatars and Red the captivity; Zutra and Chanina were Indians; we need not say that a more corhanged, and the Jews dispersed. A son of rect knowledge of the races of mankind the former fled to Tiberias, when he renewed has long ago exploded these notions. At the Semicha, or laying on of hands. The the present day the Affghans are claimed by Jews of the East made peace with the Per- some, while Dr. Wolff would assign the sian monarch, and tried to persuade him into honor to the Nestorians of Persia. We are war with the Roman empire by a promise of afraid that we must say that all these claims fifty thousand troops as a contingent, and the seem to us to rest upon very little foundaplunder of Christian Jerusalem. Wars, in- tion; few of those who have been so ready surrections, conspiracies, succeeded each with their conjectures have really qualified other, in which the Jews seemed always themselves for a judgment on the point by destined to be on the losing side, and to suffer investigating in a calm and impartial manner the extremities of unsuccessful war. If there -perhaps not in any manner at all-the hiswas a struggle for the throne of Persia, they tory of Israel since its dispersion; and yet, took the part of the defeated candidate; if an without such investigation, every conjecture insurrection was planned, they lost all by im- must be utterly baseless. How few, e.g. patiently anticipating the right moment for have studied even Basnage, or Buxtorf, or rising, thus leaving themselves to the easy Jöst, to say nothing of Josephus and the vengeance of the successful power. Once, Talmudists. Dean Milman, though he eviindeed, they did possess the ever-coveted dently had Basnage lying before him when capital of their forefathers, under the pro- writing his history, does not enter into any tection of their Persian allies, with full per- discussion on the question; while others enmission to work their will there: every tertain the question, or rather entertain us church was demolished, the glorious building with their wild guesses, without any compeof Helena and Constantine, including the tent knowledge of the subject. How often Church of the Holy Sepulchre, given over we are told, for instance, that the Samarito the flames: "the devout offerings of three tans of our Lord's time were descendants of hundred years were rifled in one sacrilegious the Ten Tribes, instead of being those of the day:" it is said that ninety thousand Chris- heathen nations introduced by Shalmaneser; tians suffered death, most of them in cold how completely is the address of the Epistle blood. Their triumph was short; the empe- of St. James, " to the twelve tribes, scattered ror Heraclius marched to the relief of the abroad," ignored, and such casual notices as Holy City; the old decrees of Hadrian were that of St. Paul (Acts xxvi. 7), "our twelve put in force; the Christians called upon the tribes instantly serving God day and night; " emperor to make atonenment in Jewish blood, and again (St. Luke ii. 36), “Anna, a prophwhile he gladly restored the churches and etess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe buildings of the recovered city in more than of Aser," overlooked. We intend to give, former magnificence. Arabian conquests, at the sacrifice of all mystery, our reasons however, soon changed equally the fortunes for supposing, as we have casually mentioned of Jew and Christian; the Holy City, above, that the Ten Tribes have been long coveted alike by either, was soon lost to both; ago incorporated into the remnant of Judah the Crescent supplanted the Cross, and on and Benjamin, and included in the common the razed site of the Temple was erected the name of "Jews."* On this point the TalMosque of Omar.

We should not be completing our sketch of the history of the Jews in the East were we to pass over in silence the great question of the Ten Tribes: we need not remind our readers of the many solutions that have been given to this historical crux, in which almost every peculiar nation, from the AngloSaxon down to the wandering gypsy, has been claimed for the remnant of Israel. Basnage mentions the theories of his time of

to Alexandria from Jerusalem on this occasion,
"The making of seventy-two elders to be sent
[the translation of the LXX.] and these to be
chosen by six out of every tribe, by the advice of
vention, framed with respect to the Jewish Sanhe-
Demetrius Phalereus, all looks like a Jewish in-
drim, and the number of the twelve tribes of Israel;
it not being likely that Demetrius, a heathen
Greek, should know any thing of their twelve
tribes, or of the number of the seventy-two elders,
of which their Sanhedrim did consist.
in that of the Jews, and few knew of them in that
of Israel, and of the twelve tribes, were then absorbed
age by any other appellation. Although some of the

The names

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