APPENDIX TO LECTUREI.A.Thefollowing is an extract from a letter I received from the governor of Dartmouth, A. H. Holdsworth,Esq., a man of great research and scientific attainments. I have every reason to believe that its perusal may prove interesting to some, as well as instructive to others; I offer no apology, therefore, for giving it so largely. The letter I allude to was dated “Brookhill, October15th,♦1845:”—♦‘1485’ replaced with ‘1845’My dear Sir—I believe that man, as he was created, had a mind in that state of perfection which we can best understand by the term ‘civilized’—that is, capable of discerning the means of gratifying every wish and providing for every want, whether bodily or intellectual, that circumstances brought upon him, until society became so corrupt that the Almighty found it necessary to destroy the whole human race, except Noah and his family, whom he preserved in the ark, and that through them the same civilized mind was transmitted to those that were born to them, and to those who descended from them; and that all the heathen nations (as they are now termed) have fallen off from that state in which their forefathersexisted, and that as the local distance increased which divided their several families from the parent stock, so did their minds become more degraded and ignorant, until they arrived at the state in which they are now found, endued with sufficient intellect to enable them to avail themselves of the means which nature has placed around them to supply their bodily wants, but continuing from father to son in the same state of mental ignorance, and devoid of all improvement or intellectual enjoyment. I was first impressed with this view of the heathen nations from finding that the same canoes exist at this time, the same rafts or balzas are seen on the same coasts as were found there when those coasts or islands were first visited by our earliest navigators, although our own ships have been so much improved during the same space of time as to be most sensibly distinguishable.“These facts induced me to ask myself this question. If we can trace the same unimproved canoes through such a series of years, how happened it that ships were ever built? How did those persons who first discovered the people possessing these canoes, get the ships which conveyed them to those distant regions? Or why should one set of men turn their canoes into ships (if our ships grew out of canoes), and other sets of men never make any improvement in theirs? Why have not the natives of the coasts of Africa turned their canoes into ships, as well as the natives of Britain? To solve these questions I had to trace back the history of shipping from century to century—rising and falling with the nations to which it belonged, varying in size and form asadopted by newly civilized countries, but maintaining the same principle of construction; and when I searched from nation to nation in the Mediterranean, and thence up the Nile to Thebes, I could not find any period of time in which it did not appear that ships have existed—that is, vessels composed of ribs and planks with beams and decks, as are seen at the present day. We may pass over the more recent time and go back 1000 years before the birth of Christ. We then find Solomon with a fleet of ships in the Red Sea, and we read in the1stof Kings—‘And Hiram sent in the navy his servants, shipmen that had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of Solomon.’ Hiram, therefore, had long possessed a fleet; and 450 years before Solomon’s time we find Balaam saying—‘And ships shall come from the coast of Chittim and shall afflict Asshur,’ from which it is clear that Balaam must have known that those whom he addressed understood what he meant by ships, or his prophecy would have been useless. But there is little doubt but that at that time there was a large fleet of ships in the Red Sea. Sesostris is said to have had about four hundred sail of war ships, with which he carried his army to the conquest of various countries down the coast, and which are represented on the walls of his palace at Thebes. The pictures on the walls of the tombs also afford much information on this subject, as well as some on the inside of mummy cases.“The size of these vessels is to a certain extent ascertained by the number of men which are represented within them, but more accurately by themodels of two vessels which were found in a tomb, and brought to England byMr.Salt. These were bought for the British Museum at the sale of his Egyptian relics. I have measured them, and taking the figures on the deck as a scale, and calling them six feet, I make the vessel to be thirty feet long, six feet wide, and four feet deep; and when to the size is added the form, which is that of an irregular half-moon, it is clear that such vessels could not be made out of a single tree, but must have been regularly built with ribs, planks, and beams to support the deck. And as these were said to have been found in an early tomb, it is clear to my mind that the persons who built them must have been in a state of civilization, that they had a thorough knowledge of the art, and that it affords a proof that those persons who established themselves at Thebes at a very short space of time after the Mosaic flood, had no difficulty in constructing vessels, when such machines were found necessary to them. If the facts are, as I believe them to be—viz., that the canoes of the uncivilized nations or tribes are in the same state as when first seen by our earliest navigators, and if we cannot find any trace that canoes were used by the Thebans before they constructed vessels or ships, although we can find boats or smaller vessels of different sorts existing at the same time with such ships or vessels upon the waters of the Nile, have we not a right to believe that the ship is the work of a civilized mind, and that it has been constructed where it has been required by the civilized inhabitants of our globe from the earliest periods of its existence? Much mightbe added as to the state of shipping at the various periods of history, as nations rose into eminence and fell again into obscurity, and as nations became civilized and adopted the usages of those who had preceded them in civilization; but this is not necessary to the subject at present. There are a variety of other things which are to be found equally curious and worthy of notice, indirectly connected with this subject, but leading to very different considerations; I will not, therefore, touch upon them.”B.“His perlectis non puto quemquam esse qui non videatTarsis, vel esse Hispaniam, vel Hispaniæ partem, quam Tyrii maxime frequentabant, Gades nimirum et Tartessum, in loco Ezechielis quo Tyrum ita compellat,cap. 27,v. 12.Tarsis negotiatrix tua præ copia omnium divitiarum: argento, ferro, stanno, et plumbo negotiati sunt in nundinis tuis; cum his ipsis metallis divitem fuisse Hispaniam, et hanc illecebram Tyrios eo terrarum pellexisse, jam abunde probaverimus. Tartessus aliis est Carteia civitas prope Calpe unde initium freti Herculei, aliis insula Gades in Oceano, aliis denique insula et urbs interamna inter duo Bætis ostia, qui et ipse Tartessus dicitur ab Aristotele, Strabone, Pausania et Avieno. Inde et Straboni Tartessis est regio circa Bætis ostia. Circa hæc loca videtur fuisseTarsis.“Quin et nomen HebræumTarsispotuit a Phœnicibus mutari inTartessum, vel prima geminata perpleonasmum, vel inתרשישTarsisalteroשidתmutato, ut cumאתורAturiadicitur proאשורAssyria, etבתנןBatanæaproבשןBasan.”—Bochart,vol. i.,p. 170.C.Villalpando and others have it thus:—זהואכבר אדונירם עבד המלך השלמו.שבא לגבת את חמס ונפטר יום . .A slight acquaintance with the Hebrew language will show that the transcribers knew very little or nothing of that language, and it is therefore natural that they should make such mistakes.D.“Ex quibus omnibus aperte demonstrari potest Hebræos olim usque a Davidis, et Salmonis ætate totum pene terrarum orbem replenisse: eosdemque tributa, nec pauca, nec parvi precii quot annis manu supremi tributorum Principis misisse Hierosolymam.”—Villalpandus in Ezechielum,vol. ii., partii.,p. 544.E.Polybius, Ptolemy, Pliny, and Strabo have mentioned a people inhabiting Andalusia and the modern Algarve, differing from all their neighbours, speaking a peculiar language, using refined grammatical rules,and possessing inscribed monuments of antiquity, as also poems, and even laws in verse. Strabo mentions that they say “their laws are of 6,000 years.” Palmerius proposes to read “six thousand verses,” by♦introducingἐπῶνinstead ofἐτῶν. Men of great erudition and research maintained that that people was a Jewish population, descendants of the old colonists in the times of Solomon, Amaziah, and Nebuchadnezzar. They also maintained that the books of Genesis, Exodus, and Deuteronomy contained poems, to which may be added the Psalms and Proverbs. The above-mentioned district also included Tarshish; and many other arguments were advanced to prove that it was a Jewish colony. However, the theory is rejected by others, and I must say that I think on too slender grounds. It is argued that “these people are denominated Turdetani and Turduli, by authors whose information was extensive upon national peculiarities, and who were at least so well acquainted with the Jews as to have been able to pronounce at once, if warranted by facts, that these Andalusians were of that nation.” Now, it might as well be argued that the people whom Haman sought to destroy were no Jews, because he did not pronounce them so at once. He only “said unto King Ahasuerus, there is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all people, neither keep they the king’s laws, therefore it is not for the king’s profit to suffer them.”—Estheriii.8. The acquaintance of the heathen authors with the history of the Jews, is nothing more than an assumption.Trogus Pompeius, a writer in the time of Augustus, professes to have been best acquainted with the Jews, indeed, at that time he ought to have been so. He wrote the history of all nations in forty-five volumes, of which we have only an abridgment by Justin. Judge from the following chapter of the acquaintance which the heathen had with Jewish history:—♦‘iutroducing’ replaced with ‘introducing’“Namque Judæis origo Damascena, Syriæ nobilissima civitas; unde et Assyriis regibus genus ex regina Semirami fuit. Nomen urbi a Damasco rege inditum; in cujus honorem Syrii sepulcrum Arathis uxoris ejus pro templo coluere, deamque exinde sanctissimæ religionis habent. Post Damascum Azelus, mox Adores et Abraham et Israhel reges fuere. Sed Israhelem felix decem filiorum proventus majoribus suis clariorem fecit. Itaque populum in decem regna divisum filiis tradidit, omnesque ex nomine Judæ, qui post divisionem decesserat,Judæosappellavit; colique ejus memoriam ab omnibus jussit, cujus portio omnibus accesserat. Minimus ætate inter fratres Joseph fuit; cujus excellens ingenium veriti fratres, clam inceptum peregrinis mercatoribus vendiderunt. A quibus deportatus in Ægyptum, cum magicas ibi artes solerti ingenio percepisset, brevi ipsi regi percarus fuit. Nam et prodigiorum sagacissimus erat, et somniorum primus intelligentiam condidit; nihilque divini juris humanique ei incognitum videbatur: adeo, ut etiam sterilitatem agrorum ante multos annos providerit; perissetque omnis Ægyptus fame, nisi monitu ejus rex edicto servari per multos annos fruges jussisset; tantaque experimenta ejus fuerunt, ut non ab homine,sed a Deo responsa dari viderentur. Filius ejus Moses fuit, quem præter paternæ scientiæ hereditatem, etiam formæ pulcritudo commendabat. Sed Ægypti, quum scabiem et vitiliginem paterentur, responso moniti, eum cum ægris, ne pestis ad plures serperet, terminis Ægypti pellunt. Dux igitur exsulum factus, sacra Ægyptiorum furto abstulit: quæ repetentes armis Ægyptii, domum redire tempestatibus compulsi sunt. Itaque Moses Damascena antiqua patria repetita montem Synæ occupat; quo septem dierum jejunio per deserta Arabiæ cum populo suo fatigatus, cum tandem venisset, septimum diem more gentisSabbatumappellatum in omne ævum jejunio sacravit, quoniam illa dies famem illis erroremque finierat. Et quoniam metu contagionis pulsos se ab Ægypto meminerant, ne eadem causa invisi apud incolas forent, caverunt, ne cum peregrinis communicarent: quod ex causa factum paulatim in disciplinam religionemque convertit. Post Mosen etiam filius ejus Aruas, sacerdos sacris Ægyptiis, mox rex creatur; semperque exinde hic mos apud Judæos fuit, ut eosdem, reges et sacerdotes haberent; quorum justitia religione permixta, incredibile quantum coaluere.”—Justini,lib. xxxvi.,cap. ii.F.“Et Britanniam Strabo passim appellatΒρεττανικην, et uno TΒρετανικην. PorroBretanicamihi quidem nihil videtur esse aliud quamברת־אנךBarat-anac, id est,ager, seu terrastanni et plumbi.בראbara, et in regimineברתbaratSyris agrum esse sciunt omnes, et ex Daniele abunde notum.... Etאנךanacstannum aut plumbum Hebræi explicant in Amos 7, 7. Nempe utrumque significat.... Mihi docuisse sufficit ab horum metallorum fœcunditate has insulas, ut a Græcis Cassiteridas, ita a Phœnicibus dictas fuisseברת־אנךbarat anacagrum stanni et plumbi.”—Samuel Bochart,vol. i.,col.647–650.G.“I may instanceRiceorRees(written in GreekΡησα—see Luke,iii.27), Davis, Jones, Lewis,&c., which are names greatly abounding in Wales, and only later corruptions, as I apprehend, of Jewish patronymics. The finalsis, I believe, admitted to be, inmostproper names, not the sign of the plural number, but of the genitive case, and is one way of signifying the son of the person, and thus we have David’s-son, David’s, Davis;—Jonah’s-son, Jonah’s, Jones;—Levis’-son, Levis’, or Lewis.“Levi, by the writers of the New Testament, is writtenΛευϊ, and alsoΛευις, which is the identical Levvis of the Welch, and possibly a corruption of the Greek genitive for the nominative, by a similar process with the above, and perhaps alsoΙωνας. The other Welch form of denoting a man’s son—viz., by the wordap, as Davis-ap-Rees, or Rice, whence it slides into the word itself, and from ap-Rice becomesPrice, is probably Hebrew also; since the sacred historian tells us that Ab-ner is son of Ner.Abindeed signifiesfatherrather than son, and it would appear, from many of their names, that they were in the habit of recognizing a man by the person whom hehad for his father; but it comes practically to the same thing as if it literally meant son: for we can scarcely avoid saying of him of whom we would speak as having Ner for his father, he is Ner’s son.”—Abdielin the Jewish Expositor, 1828,pp.126, 127.H.ודעו כי שלח אגוסטוס קיסר בעצת אנטונינוס חברו בכל ארצות ממשלתו עד מעבר לים הודו ועד מעבר ארץ בריטאניאה והיא ארץ ים אוקיאנוס. ויצו את כל מקום אשר בו איש או אשה מזרע היהודים עבד או אמה לשלחם חפשים בלא פדיון במצות הקיסר אגוסטוס ואטונינוס חברו׃I.תשעה תו הקיסר אגושטי היה איש חסיד וירא אלהים והיה עושה משפט וצדקה ואוהב ישראל׃ ומה שכתוב בראש ספר שבט יהודה שקיסר אגושטי עשה הרג רב ביהודיס הלא המגיד כיחש לו כי לא מצאתי רמז מזה בכל הקרוניקים שראיתי מימי אדרכא בכל ספרי זכרינתיהם גם ביוסיפין פר טו כתב שהיה אוהב נאמן לישראל גם בפּרק מז כתב שהקיסר הזה שלח כתב לים הודו ולמערב עד מעבר ארץ בריטוניאה׃ (חיא מדינת אנגאלטירה הנקרא בלא ענגל לנד׳)׃
APPENDIX TO LECTUREI.
A.
Thefollowing is an extract from a letter I received from the governor of Dartmouth, A. H. Holdsworth,Esq., a man of great research and scientific attainments. I have every reason to believe that its perusal may prove interesting to some, as well as instructive to others; I offer no apology, therefore, for giving it so largely. The letter I allude to was dated “Brookhill, October15th,♦1845:”—
♦‘1485’ replaced with ‘1845’
My dear Sir—I believe that man, as he was created, had a mind in that state of perfection which we can best understand by the term ‘civilized’—that is, capable of discerning the means of gratifying every wish and providing for every want, whether bodily or intellectual, that circumstances brought upon him, until society became so corrupt that the Almighty found it necessary to destroy the whole human race, except Noah and his family, whom he preserved in the ark, and that through them the same civilized mind was transmitted to those that were born to them, and to those who descended from them; and that all the heathen nations (as they are now termed) have fallen off from that state in which their forefathersexisted, and that as the local distance increased which divided their several families from the parent stock, so did their minds become more degraded and ignorant, until they arrived at the state in which they are now found, endued with sufficient intellect to enable them to avail themselves of the means which nature has placed around them to supply their bodily wants, but continuing from father to son in the same state of mental ignorance, and devoid of all improvement or intellectual enjoyment. I was first impressed with this view of the heathen nations from finding that the same canoes exist at this time, the same rafts or balzas are seen on the same coasts as were found there when those coasts or islands were first visited by our earliest navigators, although our own ships have been so much improved during the same space of time as to be most sensibly distinguishable.
“These facts induced me to ask myself this question. If we can trace the same unimproved canoes through such a series of years, how happened it that ships were ever built? How did those persons who first discovered the people possessing these canoes, get the ships which conveyed them to those distant regions? Or why should one set of men turn their canoes into ships (if our ships grew out of canoes), and other sets of men never make any improvement in theirs? Why have not the natives of the coasts of Africa turned their canoes into ships, as well as the natives of Britain? To solve these questions I had to trace back the history of shipping from century to century—rising and falling with the nations to which it belonged, varying in size and form asadopted by newly civilized countries, but maintaining the same principle of construction; and when I searched from nation to nation in the Mediterranean, and thence up the Nile to Thebes, I could not find any period of time in which it did not appear that ships have existed—that is, vessels composed of ribs and planks with beams and decks, as are seen at the present day. We may pass over the more recent time and go back 1000 years before the birth of Christ. We then find Solomon with a fleet of ships in the Red Sea, and we read in the1stof Kings—‘And Hiram sent in the navy his servants, shipmen that had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of Solomon.’ Hiram, therefore, had long possessed a fleet; and 450 years before Solomon’s time we find Balaam saying—‘And ships shall come from the coast of Chittim and shall afflict Asshur,’ from which it is clear that Balaam must have known that those whom he addressed understood what he meant by ships, or his prophecy would have been useless. But there is little doubt but that at that time there was a large fleet of ships in the Red Sea. Sesostris is said to have had about four hundred sail of war ships, with which he carried his army to the conquest of various countries down the coast, and which are represented on the walls of his palace at Thebes. The pictures on the walls of the tombs also afford much information on this subject, as well as some on the inside of mummy cases.
“The size of these vessels is to a certain extent ascertained by the number of men which are represented within them, but more accurately by themodels of two vessels which were found in a tomb, and brought to England byMr.Salt. These were bought for the British Museum at the sale of his Egyptian relics. I have measured them, and taking the figures on the deck as a scale, and calling them six feet, I make the vessel to be thirty feet long, six feet wide, and four feet deep; and when to the size is added the form, which is that of an irregular half-moon, it is clear that such vessels could not be made out of a single tree, but must have been regularly built with ribs, planks, and beams to support the deck. And as these were said to have been found in an early tomb, it is clear to my mind that the persons who built them must have been in a state of civilization, that they had a thorough knowledge of the art, and that it affords a proof that those persons who established themselves at Thebes at a very short space of time after the Mosaic flood, had no difficulty in constructing vessels, when such machines were found necessary to them. If the facts are, as I believe them to be—viz., that the canoes of the uncivilized nations or tribes are in the same state as when first seen by our earliest navigators, and if we cannot find any trace that canoes were used by the Thebans before they constructed vessels or ships, although we can find boats or smaller vessels of different sorts existing at the same time with such ships or vessels upon the waters of the Nile, have we not a right to believe that the ship is the work of a civilized mind, and that it has been constructed where it has been required by the civilized inhabitants of our globe from the earliest periods of its existence? Much mightbe added as to the state of shipping at the various periods of history, as nations rose into eminence and fell again into obscurity, and as nations became civilized and adopted the usages of those who had preceded them in civilization; but this is not necessary to the subject at present. There are a variety of other things which are to be found equally curious and worthy of notice, indirectly connected with this subject, but leading to very different considerations; I will not, therefore, touch upon them.”
B.
“His perlectis non puto quemquam esse qui non videatTarsis, vel esse Hispaniam, vel Hispaniæ partem, quam Tyrii maxime frequentabant, Gades nimirum et Tartessum, in loco Ezechielis quo Tyrum ita compellat,cap. 27,v. 12.Tarsis negotiatrix tua præ copia omnium divitiarum: argento, ferro, stanno, et plumbo negotiati sunt in nundinis tuis; cum his ipsis metallis divitem fuisse Hispaniam, et hanc illecebram Tyrios eo terrarum pellexisse, jam abunde probaverimus. Tartessus aliis est Carteia civitas prope Calpe unde initium freti Herculei, aliis insula Gades in Oceano, aliis denique insula et urbs interamna inter duo Bætis ostia, qui et ipse Tartessus dicitur ab Aristotele, Strabone, Pausania et Avieno. Inde et Straboni Tartessis est regio circa Bætis ostia. Circa hæc loca videtur fuisseTarsis.
“Quin et nomen HebræumTarsispotuit a Phœnicibus mutari inTartessum, vel prima geminata perpleonasmum, vel inתרשישTarsisalteroשidתmutato, ut cumאתורAturiadicitur proאשורAssyria, etבתנןBatanæaproבשןBasan.”—Bochart,vol. i.,p. 170.
C.
Villalpando and others have it thus:—
זהואכבר אדונירם עבד המלך השלמו.שבא לגבת את חמס ונפטר יום . .
זהואכבר אדונירם עבד המלך השלמו.שבא לגבת את חמס ונפטר יום . .
זהואכבר אדונירם עבד המלך השלמו.שבא לגבת את חמס ונפטר יום . .
A slight acquaintance with the Hebrew language will show that the transcribers knew very little or nothing of that language, and it is therefore natural that they should make such mistakes.
D.
“Ex quibus omnibus aperte demonstrari potest Hebræos olim usque a Davidis, et Salmonis ætate totum pene terrarum orbem replenisse: eosdemque tributa, nec pauca, nec parvi precii quot annis manu supremi tributorum Principis misisse Hierosolymam.”—Villalpandus in Ezechielum,vol. ii., partii.,p. 544.
E.
Polybius, Ptolemy, Pliny, and Strabo have mentioned a people inhabiting Andalusia and the modern Algarve, differing from all their neighbours, speaking a peculiar language, using refined grammatical rules,and possessing inscribed monuments of antiquity, as also poems, and even laws in verse. Strabo mentions that they say “their laws are of 6,000 years.” Palmerius proposes to read “six thousand verses,” by♦introducingἐπῶνinstead ofἐτῶν. Men of great erudition and research maintained that that people was a Jewish population, descendants of the old colonists in the times of Solomon, Amaziah, and Nebuchadnezzar. They also maintained that the books of Genesis, Exodus, and Deuteronomy contained poems, to which may be added the Psalms and Proverbs. The above-mentioned district also included Tarshish; and many other arguments were advanced to prove that it was a Jewish colony. However, the theory is rejected by others, and I must say that I think on too slender grounds. It is argued that “these people are denominated Turdetani and Turduli, by authors whose information was extensive upon national peculiarities, and who were at least so well acquainted with the Jews as to have been able to pronounce at once, if warranted by facts, that these Andalusians were of that nation.” Now, it might as well be argued that the people whom Haman sought to destroy were no Jews, because he did not pronounce them so at once. He only “said unto King Ahasuerus, there is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all people, neither keep they the king’s laws, therefore it is not for the king’s profit to suffer them.”—Estheriii.8. The acquaintance of the heathen authors with the history of the Jews, is nothing more than an assumption.Trogus Pompeius, a writer in the time of Augustus, professes to have been best acquainted with the Jews, indeed, at that time he ought to have been so. He wrote the history of all nations in forty-five volumes, of which we have only an abridgment by Justin. Judge from the following chapter of the acquaintance which the heathen had with Jewish history:—
♦‘iutroducing’ replaced with ‘introducing’
“Namque Judæis origo Damascena, Syriæ nobilissima civitas; unde et Assyriis regibus genus ex regina Semirami fuit. Nomen urbi a Damasco rege inditum; in cujus honorem Syrii sepulcrum Arathis uxoris ejus pro templo coluere, deamque exinde sanctissimæ religionis habent. Post Damascum Azelus, mox Adores et Abraham et Israhel reges fuere. Sed Israhelem felix decem filiorum proventus majoribus suis clariorem fecit. Itaque populum in decem regna divisum filiis tradidit, omnesque ex nomine Judæ, qui post divisionem decesserat,Judæosappellavit; colique ejus memoriam ab omnibus jussit, cujus portio omnibus accesserat. Minimus ætate inter fratres Joseph fuit; cujus excellens ingenium veriti fratres, clam inceptum peregrinis mercatoribus vendiderunt. A quibus deportatus in Ægyptum, cum magicas ibi artes solerti ingenio percepisset, brevi ipsi regi percarus fuit. Nam et prodigiorum sagacissimus erat, et somniorum primus intelligentiam condidit; nihilque divini juris humanique ei incognitum videbatur: adeo, ut etiam sterilitatem agrorum ante multos annos providerit; perissetque omnis Ægyptus fame, nisi monitu ejus rex edicto servari per multos annos fruges jussisset; tantaque experimenta ejus fuerunt, ut non ab homine,sed a Deo responsa dari viderentur. Filius ejus Moses fuit, quem præter paternæ scientiæ hereditatem, etiam formæ pulcritudo commendabat. Sed Ægypti, quum scabiem et vitiliginem paterentur, responso moniti, eum cum ægris, ne pestis ad plures serperet, terminis Ægypti pellunt. Dux igitur exsulum factus, sacra Ægyptiorum furto abstulit: quæ repetentes armis Ægyptii, domum redire tempestatibus compulsi sunt. Itaque Moses Damascena antiqua patria repetita montem Synæ occupat; quo septem dierum jejunio per deserta Arabiæ cum populo suo fatigatus, cum tandem venisset, septimum diem more gentisSabbatumappellatum in omne ævum jejunio sacravit, quoniam illa dies famem illis erroremque finierat. Et quoniam metu contagionis pulsos se ab Ægypto meminerant, ne eadem causa invisi apud incolas forent, caverunt, ne cum peregrinis communicarent: quod ex causa factum paulatim in disciplinam religionemque convertit. Post Mosen etiam filius ejus Aruas, sacerdos sacris Ægyptiis, mox rex creatur; semperque exinde hic mos apud Judæos fuit, ut eosdem, reges et sacerdotes haberent; quorum justitia religione permixta, incredibile quantum coaluere.”—Justini,lib. xxxvi.,cap. ii.
F.
“Et Britanniam Strabo passim appellatΒρεττανικην, et uno TΒρετανικην. PorroBretanicamihi quidem nihil videtur esse aliud quamברת־אנךBarat-anac, id est,ager, seu terrastanni et plumbi.בראbara, et in regimineברתbaratSyris agrum esse sciunt omnes, et ex Daniele abunde notum.... Etאנךanacstannum aut plumbum Hebræi explicant in Amos 7, 7. Nempe utrumque significat.... Mihi docuisse sufficit ab horum metallorum fœcunditate has insulas, ut a Græcis Cassiteridas, ita a Phœnicibus dictas fuisseברת־אנךbarat anacagrum stanni et plumbi.”—Samuel Bochart,vol. i.,col.647–650.
G.
“I may instanceRiceorRees(written in GreekΡησα—see Luke,iii.27), Davis, Jones, Lewis,&c., which are names greatly abounding in Wales, and only later corruptions, as I apprehend, of Jewish patronymics. The finalsis, I believe, admitted to be, inmostproper names, not the sign of the plural number, but of the genitive case, and is one way of signifying the son of the person, and thus we have David’s-son, David’s, Davis;—Jonah’s-son, Jonah’s, Jones;—Levis’-son, Levis’, or Lewis.
“Levi, by the writers of the New Testament, is writtenΛευϊ, and alsoΛευις, which is the identical Levvis of the Welch, and possibly a corruption of the Greek genitive for the nominative, by a similar process with the above, and perhaps alsoΙωνας. The other Welch form of denoting a man’s son—viz., by the wordap, as Davis-ap-Rees, or Rice, whence it slides into the word itself, and from ap-Rice becomesPrice, is probably Hebrew also; since the sacred historian tells us that Ab-ner is son of Ner.Abindeed signifiesfatherrather than son, and it would appear, from many of their names, that they were in the habit of recognizing a man by the person whom hehad for his father; but it comes practically to the same thing as if it literally meant son: for we can scarcely avoid saying of him of whom we would speak as having Ner for his father, he is Ner’s son.”—Abdielin the Jewish Expositor, 1828,pp.126, 127.
H.
ודעו כי שלח אגוסטוס קיסר בעצת אנטונינוס חברו בכל ארצות ממשלתו עד מעבר לים הודו ועד מעבר ארץ בריטאניאה והיא ארץ ים אוקיאנוס. ויצו את כל מקום אשר בו איש או אשה מזרע היהודים עבד או אמה לשלחם חפשים בלא פדיון במצות הקיסר אגוסטוס ואטונינוס חברו׃
I.
תשעה תו הקיסר אגושטי היה איש חסיד וירא אלהים והיה עושה משפט וצדקה ואוהב ישראל׃ ומה שכתוב בראש ספר שבט יהודה שקיסר אגושטי עשה הרג רב ביהודיס הלא המגיד כיחש לו כי לא מצאתי רמז מזה בכל הקרוניקים שראיתי מימי אדרכא בכל ספרי זכרינתיהם גם ביוסיפין פר טו כתב שהיה אוהב נאמן לישראל גם בפּרק מז כתב שהקיסר הזה שלח כתב לים הודו ולמערב עד מעבר ארץ בריטוניאה׃ (חיא מדינת אנגאלטירה הנקרא בלא ענגל לנד׳)׃