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on the Pentateuch, known as that of Onkelos, 'was begun CHAP. to be committed to writing about the end of the second century, A.C. . . . We shall not be far wrong in placing the work of collecting the different fragments with their variants, and reducing them into one finally authorised version, about the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth century, and in assigning Babylon to it as the birthplace. It was at Babylon that about this time the light of learning, extinguished in the blood-stained fields of Palestine, shone with threefold vigour. The Academy at Nahardea, founded, according to legend, during the Babylonian exile itself, had gathered strength in the same degree, as the numerous Palestinian schools begun to decline. And when in 259 A.C. that most ancient school was destroyed, there were three others simultaneously flourishing in its stead: Tiberias, whither the college of Palestinian Jabneh had been transferred in the time of Gamaliel III. (200); Sora, founded by Chasda of Kafri (293); and Pumbadita, founded by R. Jehuda b. Jecheskeel (297). And in Babylon for well nigh a thousand years "the crown of the law" remained, and to Babylon, the seat of the "Head of the Golah" (Dispersion), all Israel, scattered to the ends of the earth, looked for its spiritual guidance.'

sion.

We are now in a position to assert that the principles Concluof apocryphal or secret tradition were essentially the same in Palestine and in Egypt, and that the Jewish Targum, or the Hidden Wisdom among the Jews, has many points in common with the Aryan tradition, known to us through the Zend-Avesta.

If then we have succeeded in establishing the probability, that the record in Genesis about Adam, Cain and Abel refers to the separation of two Aryan tribes in the time. of Zoroaster, the great Aryan reformer, the similarity between the Jewish and the Aryan tradition may be accounted for in two ways. It may be assumed, that the

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CHAP. Zendavesta, containing writings either directly or indirectly attributed to Zoroaster, has at a certain period to such an extent been assimilated to the most ancient Jewish records, that the similarity of religious conceptions can be thus explained. We do not anticipate that such an argument will be seriously raised. Unless therefore the figurative interpretation of the Adamitic record can be shown up as a fallacy, the Japhetic tradition in the Avesta must either be regarded as the source of the Semitic tradition in the Bible, or we must assume that the revelation made to Adam and to Abraham was distinct from, though mainly identical with, the revelation made to Zoroaster. On the whole, it may not be unreasonable to suppose, that Zoroaster and Adam' are identical persons, and that the revelation to Abraham previously to his leaving Ur of the Chaldees,' and 'four hundred and thirty years' before the law was given to Moses,' was made not without the instrumentality of the Aryan tradition as transmitted by the Chaldees, the adherents of the Zoroastrian religion. If this be admitted, then it is proved that the Jewish tradition, Israel's pearl of great price, was not based on a fiction, but that it originated with 'Adam,' whilst Abraham and Moses were its first great prophets.

6

The reform of the national faith seems to have commenced during the period of the Babylonian captivity. The Apocrypha of the Septuagint prove, that the principles of the Hidden Wisdom were committed to writing, if not in the fourth, at least in the third and second centuries before the commencement of the Christian era. But the writings of the great unknown prophet of the Babylonian captivity, which form the last twenty chapters of the book of Isaiah, are a sufficient proof that at the time when the Jewish nation came into nearer contact with the Chaldæans, the principles of secret tradition, whether more developed during that period or not, ceased

1 Gal. iii. 17.

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to be confided to the few, and gradually formed part of CHAP. the national faith. This view is confirmed by the writings of all the prophets during and after the captivity, whilst the writings of Jeremiah prove, that even before this eventful epoch new elements of doctrine had been ingrafted on the national faith. The verbal law was added to the written law, not only as a supplementary charter, but as the standard of interpretation for the records of the past. These were edited at a time when it had become advisable, if not necessary, to harmonise the verbal with the written law. The second law, or Deuteronomy, seems to have been composed at some earlier period, probably in the time of Jeremiah, with a view to the attainment of so important an object. Only the record, and not the contents were new. What the Israelites could not have borne in the days of Moses; what the great prophet and lawgiver had secretly revealed to the chosen few; what the faithful guardians of secret tradition had transmitted ever since the days of Moses, of Abraham, and of 'Adam,' was gradually proclaimed to the people from the days of Josias to the days of Daniel and of Christ. The Aryan or Japhetic traditions being known to the people of the Chaldæans, the guardians of the secret Semitic tradition were forced to reveal the same to the people, and thus to show in how far the one agreed with the other. It is quite possible, and even probable, that to a certain extent the one tradition was enriched by the other. But both the Chaldæan as well as the Israelitic tradition went back to Abraham, the inhabitant of Ur of the Chaldees,' if not to Zoroaster, the Aryan reformer, and the Adam' of the Bible. Like the Divine glory, veiled by the cloudy pillar, the Divine grace and truth, veiled by secret tradition, has in all ages led the exodus of mankind.

6

It is a necessary preliminary to the right understanding of the preaching of Jesus Christ, to trace out the gradual

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CHAP. development of the Jewish reform, that is, of Jewish gnosticism, up to the time of Christ's advent. In order to complete the above investigations on apocryphal literature, we now proceed to point out the last pre-Christian development of Judaism in Egypt. The writings of Philo show to what contradictions the Jews of Alexandria were driven by the unscrupulous attempt to harmonise the old standard of 'it is written,' with the new standard of 'it is taught.'

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CHAPTER III.

PHILO OF ALEXANDRIA.

DEVELOPMENT OF JEWISH GNOSTICISM.

'Keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: which some professing have erred concerning the faith.'-1 Tim. vi. 20, 21.

PHILO lived from twenty years before till fifty years after the commencement of the Christian era, and was therefore the contemporary and the survivor of Christ. By his numerous and distinguished works he has transmitted to us a comprehensive account of the last phase in the development of pre-Christian Jewish gnosticism. Born in Alexander's city, which soon after its foundation in the year 332 B.C. became the great city of the west;' this Jewish philosopher was a shining light among the descendants of the Hebrew race, which in Philo's time numbered nearly one million. Many circumstances had combined in remoulding the Jewish character on Egyptian soil. Living together with Greeks and Egyptians, and with representatives of almost every nation, they had abandoned the language of their fathers; and the new words of the Greek language, which they but imperfectly learnt, helped to convey to their minds new ideas. As it was, a great reformation in the faith of the Jewish nation had taken place in Babylon, and the new doctrines which

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