tries to comply with the idolatrous worship of the church of Rome, and to bow down to stocks and stones rather than their effects should be seized and confiscated? Here again we must cite the author, who hath most studied, and hath best written their modern history, and whom we have had occasion to quote several times in this discourse. The Spanish and Portugal inquisitions," saith he, 'reduce them to the dilemma of being either hypocrites or burnt. The number of these dissemblers is very considerable; and it ought not to be concluded, that there are no Jews in Spain or Portugal, because they are not known: They are so much the more dangerous, for not only being very numerous, but confounded with the ecclesiastics, and entering into all ecclesiastical dignities.' In another' place he saith, 'The most surprising thing is, that this religion spreads from generation to generation, and still subsists in the persons of dissemblers in a remote posterity. In vain the great lords of Spain' make alliances, change their names, and take ancient scutcheons; they are still known to be of Jewish race, and Jews themselves. The convents of monks and nuns are full of them. Most of the canons, inquisitors, and bishops proceed from this nation. This is enough to make the people and clergy of this country tremble, since such sort of churchmen can only profane the sacraments, and want intention in consecrating the host they adore. In the mean time Orobio, who relates the fact, knew these dissemblers. He was one of them himself, and bent the knee before the sacrament. Moreover, he brings proofs of his assertion, in maintaining, that there are in the synagogue of Amsterdam, brothers and sisters and near relations to good families of Spain and Portugal; and even Franciscan monks, Dominicans, and Jesuits, who come to do penance, and make amends for the crime they have committed in dissembling.'

16. "They should become an astonishment, a proverb, and a by-word among all nations," ver. 37. And do we not hear and see this prophecy fulfilled almost every day? is not the avarice, usury, and hard-heartedness of a Jew grown proverbial? and are not their persons generally odious among all sorts of people? Mahommedans, Heathens, and Christians, however they may disagree in other points, yet generally agree in vilifying, abusing, and persecuting the Jews. In most places where they are tolerated, they are obliged to live in a separate quarter by themselves, (as they did here in the Old Jewry,) and to wear some badge of distinction. Their very countenances commonly distinguish them from the rest of mankind. They are in all respects treated as if they were of another species. And when a great master of nature would draw the portrait of a Jew, how detestable Basnage, b. 7, c. 33, § 14. 9 B. 7, c. 21, § 26. Limborch Collat. cum. Jud. p. 102.

a character hath he represented in the person of his Jew of Venice!

17. Finally "their plagues should be wonderful, even great plagues, and of long continuance," ver. 59. And have not their plagues continued now these 1700 years? Their former captivities were very short in comparison: and Ezekiel and Daniel prophesied in the land of the Chaldæans: but now they have no true prophet to foretel an end of their calamities, they have only false Messiahs to delude them and aggravate their misfortunes. In their former captivities they had the comfort of being conveyed to the same place; they dwelt together in the land of Goshen, they were carried together to Babylon; but now they are dispersed all over the face of the earth. What nation hath suffered so much, and yet endured so long? what nation hath subsisted as a distinct people in their own country, so long as these have done in their dispersion into all countries? and what a standing miracle is this exhibited to the view and observation of the whole world?

Here are instances of prophecies, prophecies delivered above three thousand years ago, and yet as we see fulfilling in the world at this very time: and what stronger proofs can we desire of the divine legation of Moses? How these instances may affect others, I know not; but for myself I must acknowledge, they not only convince, but amaze and astonish me beyond expression. They are truly, as Moses foretold they would be, "a sign and a wonder for ever," ver. 45, 46. "Moreover all

these curses shall come upon thee, and shall pursue thee and overtake thee, till thou be destroyed; because thou hearkenedst not unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep his commandments, and his statutes which he commanded thee: and they shall be upon thee for a sign and for a wonder, and upon thy seed for ever."

VIII.-PROPHECIES OF OTHER PROPHETS CONCERNING

THE JEWS.

BESIDES the prophecies of Moses, there are others of other

prophets, relative to the present state and condition of the Jews. Such are those particularly concerning the restoration of the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin from captivity, and the dissolution of the ten tribes of Israel; and those concerning the preservation of the Jews, and the destruction of their enemies; and those concerning the desolation of Judea; and those concerning the infidelity and reprobation of the Jews; and

* See Basnage, b. 6, c. 1, § 2.

those concerning the calling and obedience of the Gentiles. And it may be proper to say something upon each of those topics.

I. It was foretold, that the ten tribes of Israel should be carried captive by the kings of Assyria; and that the two remaining tribes of Judah and Benjamin should be carried captive by the king of Babylon: but with this difference, that the two, tribes should be restored and return from their captivity, but the ten tribes should be dissolved and lost in theirs. Nay not only the captivity and restoration of the two tribes were foretold, but the precise time of their captivity and restoration was also prefixed and determined by the prophet Jeremiah, (xxv. 11 :) "This whole land shall be a desolation, and an astonishment; and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years:" and again, (xxix. 10,) "Thus saith the Lord, that after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon, I will visit you, and perform my good word towards you, in causing you to return to this place." This prophecy was first delivered, (Jer. xxv. 1,) "in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah king of Judah, that was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon." And this same year it began to be put in execution; for Nebuchadnezzar invaded Judea, besieged and took Jerusalem, made Jehoiakim his subject and tributary, transported the finest children of the royal family and of the nobility to Babylon, to be bred up there for eunuchs and slaves in his palace, and also carried away the vessels of the house of the Lord,

2

1

pro

put them in the temple of his god at Babylon. Seventy years from this time will bring us down to the first year of Cyrus, (2 Chron. xxxvi. 22, Ezra i. 1,) when he made his clamation for the restoration of the Jews, and for the rebuilding of the temple at Jerusalem. This computation of the seventy years' captivity appears to be the truest, and most agreeable to Scripture. But if you fix the commencement of these seventy years at the time when Jerusalem was burned and destroyed, their conclusion will fall about the time when Darius issued his decree for rebuilding the temple, after the work had been stopped and suspended. Or if you fix their commencement at the time when Nebuzaradan carried away the last remainder of the peopel, and completed the desolation of the land, their conclusion will fall about the time when the temple was finished and dedicated, and the first passover was solemnized in it. 'So that,' as Dean Prideaux says, 'taking it which way you will, and at what stage you please, the prophecy of Jeremiah will be fully and exactly accomplished concerning this matter.' It may be said to have been accomplished at three different times, and in

1 See Usher, Prideaux, and the Commentators on 2 Kings xxiv. 2 Chron. xxxiv. and Dan. i.

2 Prideaux Connect. Part. i. b. 3, Anno 518, Darius 4.

Prideaux ibid. Anno 515, Darius 7.

three different manners, and therefore possibly all might have been intended, though the first without doubt was the principal object of the prophecy.

But the case was different with the ten tribes of Israel. It is very well known that Ephraim being the chief of the ten tribes is often put for all the ten tribes of Israel; and it was predicted by Isaiah, (vii. 8,) "Within threescore and five years shall Ephraim be broken, that it be not a people." This prophecy was delivered in the first year of Ahaz king of Judah: for in the latter end of his father Jotham's reign, (2 Kings xv. 37,) Rezin king of Syria and Pekah king of Israel began their expedition against Judah. They went up towards Jerusalem to war against it in the beginning of the reign of Ahaz; and it was to comfort him and the house of David in these difficulties and distresses, that the prophet Isaiah was commissioned to assure him, that the kings of Syria and Israel should remain only the heads of their respective cities, they should not prevail against Jerusalem, and within sixty and five years Israel should be so broken as to be no more a people. The learned Vitringa is of opinion, that the text is corrupted, and that instead of sixty and five, it was originally written sixteen and five. Sixteen and five, as he confesseth, is an odd way of computation for one and twenty; but it designs perfectly the years of Ahaz and Hezekiah. For Ahaz reigned sixteen years, and Hezekiah five years alone, having reigned one year jointly with his father and it was "in the sixth year of Hezekiah," (2 Kings xviii. 10, 11,) that "Shalmaneser took Samaria, and carried away Israel unto Assyria." Then indeed the kingdom of Israel was broken and the conjecture of Vitringa would appear much more probable, if it could be proved that it had ever been usual to write the numbers or dates of years partly in words at length and partly in numeral letters. But without recourse to such an expedient the thing may be explicated otherwise. For from the first of Ahaz compute sixty and five years in the reigns of Ahaz, Hezekiah, and Manasseh, the end of them will fall about the twenty-second year of Manasseh, when Esarhaddon king of Assyria made the last deportation of the Israelites, and planted other nations in their stead; and in the same expedition probably took Manasseh captive, (2 Chron. xxxiii. 11,) and carried him to Babylon. It is said expressly that it was Esarhaddon who planted the other nations in the cities of Samaria: but it is not said expressly in Scripture, that he carried away the remainder of the people, but it may be inferred from several circumstances of the story. There were other deportations of the Israelites made by the Kings of Assyria before this time. In the reign of Ahaz, Tig• See Usher, Prideaux, &c.

Comment. in locum.

5

lath-pilezer took many of the Israelites, "even the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, and all the land of Naphtali, and carried them captive to Assyria, and brought them unto Halah, and Habor, and Hara, and to the river Gozan," (1 Chron. v. 26; 2 Kings xv. 29.) His son Shalmaneser, in the reign of Hezekiah, took Samaria, and carried away still greater numbers "unto Assyria, and put them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, (the same places whither their brethren had been carried before them,) and in the cities of the Medes," (2 Kings xviii. 11.) His son Sennacherib came up also against Hezekiah, and all the fenced cities of Judah; but his army was miraculously defeated, and he himself was forced to return with shame and disgrace into his own country, where he was murdered by two of his sons, (2 Kings xviii. 19.) Another of his sons, Esarhaddon, succeeded him in the throne, but it was some time before he could recover his kingdom from these disorders, and think of reducing Syria and Palestine again to his obedience: and then it was, and not till then, that he completed the ruin of the ten tribes, carried away the remains of the people, and, to prevent the land from becoming desolate, "brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Hava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria, instead of the children of İsrael," (Ezra iv. 2, 10; 2 Kings xvii. 24.) Ephraim was broken from being a kingdom before, but now he was broken from being a people. And from that time to this what account can be given of the people of Israel as distinct from the people of Judah? where have they subsisted all this while? and where is their situation, or what is their condition at present?

We see plainly that they were placed in Assyria and Media; and if they subsisted any where, one would imagine they might be found there in the greatest abundance. But authors have generally sought for them elsewhere: and the visionary writer of the second book of Esdras, (xiii. 40, &c.) hath asserted that they took a resolution of retiring from the Gentiles, and of going into a country which had never been inhabited; that the river Euphrates was miraculously divided for their passage, and they proceeded in their journey a year and a half, before they arrived at this country, which was called Arsareth. But the worst of it is, as this country was unknown before, so it hath been equally unknown ever since. It is to be found no where but in this apocryphal book, which is so wild and fabulous in other respects, that it deserves no credit in this particular. Benjamin of Tudela, a Jew of the twelfth century, hath likewise assigned them a large and spacious country with fine cities; but nobody knoweth to this day where it is situated.

For these particulars the reader may consult Basnage's Hist. of Jews, b. 6, c. 2, 3.