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and sometimes with the Cherem, which yet I do not suppose was always thus horrid and fierce.

§ 25. To add to the terror of this sentence, they used to accompany the pronouncing of it with the sound of trumpets and horns, as the Targum says that Barak did in his cursing of Meroz, Judges v. 23. He shammatized him with four hundred trumpets. And herein have they been imitated by the Church of Rome, in their shaking of candles, and ringing of bells on the like occasion.

I have not reported these things, as though for matter and manner, they wholly belonged to the law as penalties of divine institution. Many things in the manner of their performance, as they are now expressed by the Rabbins, were certainly of their own arbitrary invention. When the use of these first began amongst them is unknown; though it be not improbable, that sundry things of this nature were practised by them before the destruction of the second temple; for then they had mixed many of their own superstitions with the worsl:ip of God, as is evident from the gospel.

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§ 26. But this also is certain, that God in sundry cases had appointed that some transgressors should be separated from the congregation, devoted to destruction, and cut off. An instance of the execution of which institution we have, Ezra x. 7, 8. They made a proclamation throughout Judah and Jerusalem unto all the children of the captivity, that they should gather themselves together unto Jerusalem, and that whosoever would not come within three days, according to the counsel of the princes, and the elders, all his substance should be divided, and himself separated from the congregation of those that had been carried away.". A double penalty is here threatened to disobedient persons; the one concerned the person of such a one,

IIe shall be separated from the הוא יבדר מקהל הגולה

congregation of the captivity", that is of Israel then returned out of captivity. And this was the Niddui or expulsion from sacred communion which we have before described: He should be esteemed as a heathen man. Secondly, as to his substance

by, "All his substance, his goods and possessions, should be anathematized," devoted, put under Cherem, taken away for sacred uses. Hence some have made this distinction between the three degrees of excommunication.

First, The Niddui concerned only the person, and his separation from sacred offices. Cherem had also confiscation of goods attending it, the substance of the transgressor being devoted. And Shammatha was accompanied with the death of the devoted person. Now these carnal penalties being removed, under the New Testament dispensation, that great and sore revenge which disobedient sinners are to expect

from the hand of God at the last day, is substituted by our a postle in the room of them all, Heb. x. 28, 29.

§ 27. Civil punishments next succeed, and they were of three sorts. First, corporeal: Secondly, such as respect the outward estate and condition of the offender: Thirdly, capital.

First, corporeal. The only corporeal punishment was that of stripes, not exceeding the number of forty, Deut. xxv. 23. An account of the opinions of the Jews, and of the manner of their inflicting this punishment, is given us by many; in particular, it is given very exactly by Buxtorf in his preface to his Bibliotheca Rabbinica, to which I refer the reader. They call

,מלקות ארבעים or beating by strokes, and sometimes מלקות it

the beating of forty, or with forty. And he that was liable unto it was on ja, filius plagarum. Many crimes doubtless rendered persons obnoxious to this penalty; but they are not directly expressed in the law. The Jews now reckon up seven instances of unlawful copulation with women free and unmar ried, (for adultery, as is known, was capital by the express sentence of the law.) As, 1. With a sister. 2. A father's sister. 3. A mother's sister. 4. A wife's sister. 5. A brother's widow. 6. An uncle's widow. 7. A woman separated. Under this head they also reckon up many other crimes with reference to ceremonial institutions, as eating of fat, and blood, and leaven on the passover, making an oil like the holy oil; indeed they here include all such transgressions as are threatened with punishment, but have no express kind of punishment annexed to them.

§ 28. Secondly, Punishments respecting state and condition, were of two sorts. First, pecuniary in a quadruple restitution in case of theft. Secondly, personal in banishment, or confinement to the city of refuge for him that had slain a man at unawares, Num. xxxv. 25.

$29. Thirdly, Capital punishments they inflicted four ways. First, by strangulation, which was inflicted on six sorts of transgressors. 1. Adulterers. 2. Strikers of parents. 3. Men-stealers. 4. Old men exemplarily rebellious against the law. 5. False prophets. 6. Prognosticators by the names of idols. Secondly, burning, Lev. xx. 14. And this the Jews say was inflicted by pouring molten lead into their mouths; and the crimes for which this punishment was inflicted, were, 1st, the adultery of the priest's daughter. 2d, Incest, 1. With a daughter. 2. With a son's daughter. 3. A wife's daughter. 4. A wife's daughter's daughter. 5. A wife's son's daughter. 6. A wife's mother. 7. The mother of her father. S. The mother of her father-inlaw. Thirdly, death was inflicted by the sword, Deut. xx. 21. 1. On the voluntary man-slayer. 2. On the inhabitants of any city that fall to idolatry. Fourthly, By stoning: which was in

flicted for incest. 1. With a mother. 2. A mother-in-law. 3. A daughter-in-law. 4. Adultery with a betrothed virgin. 5. Unnatural uncleanness with men. 6. With beasts by men. 7. With beasts by women. 8. Blasphemy. 9. Idolatry. 10. Of fering to Moloch. 11. A familiar spirit of Ob. 12. Of Jiedeoni. 13. On impostors. 14. On seducers. 15. On enchanters or magicians. 16. Profaners of the Sabbath. 17. Cursers of father or mother. 18. The dissolute and stubborn son: concerning all which it is expressly said, that they shall be stoned.

$30. To the execution of these penalties there was added two cautionary laws. First, That they who were put to death, for the increase of their ignominy, and terror of others, should be hanged on a tree, Deut. xxi. 21. Secondly, That they should be buried the same day, ver. 23. And this is a brief abstract of the penalties of the law, as it was the rule of the polity of the people in the land of Canaan.

EXERCITATION XXII.

1. The building of the tabernacle. 2, 3. Moses' writing and reading the book of the covenant. § 4. Considerations of the particulars of the fabric and utensils of the tabernacle. Omitted. § 5. One instance insisted on. The ark. The same in the tabernacle and temple. The glory of God in what sense. § 6. The principal sacred utensil. § 7. The matter whereof it was made. § 8, 9. The form of it. § 10. The end and use of it. § 11. The residence and motions of it. § 12. The mercyseat that was upon it. 13. The matter thereof. § 14, 15. Of the cherubims. Their form and fashion. § 16, 17. The visions of Isaiah and Ezekiel compared. Difference in them, and reason thereof. § IS. Two other cherubim also in the temple.

$1. THE HE people having received the law in the wilderness, and the foundation of their future church state and worship, which was to continue until the times of reformation, Heb. ix. 10. being thus laid; there was also assigned to them, by God's direction, a place and building for the seat of that worship. This was the tabernacle erected in the wilderness, in a manner suited to their then changing condition. When they had attained a fixed station in the land of promise, the temple built by Solomon, came in the room of this tabernacle. Our apostle, in treating of the ordinances of that church, as first instituted by Moses, of which the Hebrews boasted as their privilege, and to the observances of which they obstinately adhered, insists only on the tabernacle, from which the temple and its services were derived, and to which they were conformed. And this he doth principally, ch. ix. 1-5. “Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service, and a worldly sanctuary. For there was a tabernacle made, the first wherein was the candlestick, and the table, and the shew-bread, which is called the sanctuary. And after the second veil, the tabernacle which is called the holiest of all, which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant, overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant; and over it the cherubim of glory shadowing the mercy-seat."

§ 2. The preparation for the directions which God gave for the building of this tabernacle is declared, Exod. xxiv. The body of the people having heard the law, that is the ten com

mandments, which were written on two tables of stone, and the people no more than these, Deut. ix. 10. they removed to a greater distance from the mount, Exod. xx. 18, 19. After their removal, Moses continued to receive from the Lord that summary of the whole law, which is expressed, ch. xxi. 22, 23. And all this, as it should seem, at the first hearing, he wrote in a book from the mouth of God. For it is said, ch. xxiv. 4. that he wrote all the words of the Lord. And, ver. 7. that he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people.

§3. The Jewish masters suppose that it was the book of Genesis that is there intended. For, say they, the rest of the law was not yet written; for this took place before God himself had written or engraven the ten words on the two tables of stone. But this is a fond imagination, seeing the book which Moses read contained the form and tenour of the covenant made with that people at Horeb, and is expressly so called, and as such was then solemnly confirmed and ratified by sacrifice. It may therefore be rather supposed, that there is a prolepsis used in the recording of this story, and that indeed the confirmation of the covenant by sacrifice, which was accompanied with the reading of the book, was not until after the third return of Moses from the mount with the renewed tables. But this also may well be doubted, seeing this sacrifice was prepared and offered by the young men of the children of Israel, ver. 5. that is, the first-born, whose office was superseded upon the separation of Aaron and his sons unto the priesthood, which God had designed before that last descent of Moses from the mount. We must then leave things in the order in which they are recorded. It appears therefore that Moses wrote the law as he received it from God. This being done, he came down and read it in the ears of the people. And he proposed it to them, as containing the terms of the covenant that God would have them enter into. This they solemnly engaged to the performance of, and thereby had their admission into a new church state. This being done, the whole was confirmed by sacrifice, and the sprinkling of blood, to prefigure the great confirmation of the new covenant by the blood of Christ, as we shall see afterwards.

§ 4. Things being thus settled, Moses goes up again into the mount to receive directions for that worship of God, which he appointed and enjoined to them in that church state into which they were newly admitted. And here, in the first place, the Lord instructs him respecting the frame and whole fabric of the tabernacle, as that which was an eminent type of the human nature of Christ, and so indispensably necessary to the solemn worship then ordained, that no part of it could be rightly performed but with respect thereunto. This therefore, with all the

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