they taught that the traditions were to be preferred to the law: but Christ resorted to no such authorities, called no man master, rejected their traditions, and restored the precepts to their primitive purity. In the second place, their teaching in their Bithmedresh, or schools of divinity, was commonly about external, carnal, and trivial rites; but his was about regeneration, repentance, faith, love, charity, self-denial, and the other weighty matters of the law and of the gospel. 3dly, Their teaching was often so various, and even so contradictory, that the people were at a loss what to follow; but his had a clearness and consistency that carried conviction along with it. 4thly, They were only servants, and with all their desire to do good, could not command success: Christ was a lord in his own house, and taught savingly so as to profit. It was already noticed that the scribes composed a third part of the Jewish sanhedrim.

As for the elders, they were different from the scribes, for they were lay-men, deeply versant in the laws and usages of their country, whose judgment had great weight. They were commonly also chief men in the tribes, and composed the remaining third part of the sanhedrim.

The Lawyers are commonly classed in the gospels with the Pharisees and Scribes, and derived their name from their having devoted themselves to the study of the law, and teaching it to the people; but burdened with the load of their numberless traditions. Hence are they severely reproved by our Lord in Luke ii. 45, 52.

As for the publicans, although they were rather a civil than religious class of men, yet they deserve to be noticed. Their office was to collect the tribute which the Romans imposed upon Judea, after it became a Ro

man province, but it was an unpleasant task for the following reasons: in the 1st place, the Jews disliked to be accounted subject to the Romans, and, therefore, those who collected the tax (let them do it as impartially as they might,) were considered as enemies to the independence and honour of the nation; and, 2dly, as the Roman revenues were often farmed to the highest bidder, this gave room for extortion and injustice, which, though bad in a foreigner, was accounted doubly criminal in a descendant of Abraham.

SECT. V.

Jewish Proselytes.

1st. Slaves embracing Judaism without obtaining their liberty. 2nd. Proselytes of the gate: the seven precepts of Noah; their conformity to the apostolic rescript in Acts xv. 20, 29. 3d. Proselytes of righteousness; their privileges; how initiated; their instruction, circumcision, and baptism. Children of these proselytes entitled to their privileges. Proselytes of righteousness on their admission offered a sacrifice, and changed their name. The Jews divide the history of Proselytism into six periods; these mentioned.

ALTHOUGH the Jewish religion was peculiarly adapted to the Jewish nation, yet it was not confined to it, for leave was given them to make proselytes, and certain privileges were granted to those who became such.-Of the Jewish proselytes there were three classes; 1st, Those slaves who embraced Judaism without receiving their freedom; 2dly, The proselytes of the gate; and, 3dly, The proselytes of righteousness.

As for the slaves, who embraced Judaism without receiving their liberty, they were persons who were natives of other countries, but came into the families of the Jews either by conquest, or purchase, or gift. These quitted their heathen practices, and conformed to the religion of their masters, sometimes from necessity, and sometimes from choice. Of this kind was Eliezer, of

Damascus, the steward of Abraham's house, and to this does God compare Israel, when he says in Jer. ii. 14. "is he a home-born slave, why is he spoiled ?"

The proselytes of the gate were persons who, without undergoing circumcision, or observing the Mosaic ritual, engaged to worship the true God, and observe the seven precepts which were said to have been imposed on the children of Noah. The following is a list of these precepts: 1st. Of foreign worship, (y by, ol obidè zerè) in which was forbidden the worship of idols and false gods. 2d. Of blessing the name of God, (wn by, ol berecè eshem) under which were comprehended the opposite sins of blasphemy, swearing, and perjury. 3d. Of the effusions of blood, (007 13' by, ol shepicuth demim) or the prohibition of murder. 4th. Of chastity, (my baby, ol gelui oriuth) de revelatione pudendorum, Deut. xxii. 15. 17. under which were forbidden fornication, adultery, incest, and unnatural copulations. 5th. Of theft, (an by, ol egezel) under which was comprehended every species of dishonesty. 6th. Of courts of judicature, (by ol edinin) prescribing the nature and form of civil government, and the administration of justice. 7th.

על אבר מן התי),Of the members of living creatures

ol aber men ethi) de membro e vivo, in which was forbidden eating flesh with the blood, or things strangled. Such are the celebrated commandments of Noah, which the Jews so often mention, (although their authenticity has been called in question) and which, according to them, composed a summary of religious duty to all mankind, before the giving of the law from Mount Sinai: But be they true or false, they laid the foundation of that distinction of proselytes of which we are speaking;

pre

since the proselytes of the gate came bound to observe them, whether they resided in the land of Judea or in heathen lands. Naaman the Syrian, and Cornelius the centurion, are thought to have belonged to this class, and in reviewing the seven precepts of the Noachidæ, one is struck with their conformity with that singular letter which the church at Jerusalem issued in Acts xv. when the question before them was, whether an observance of the Mosaic law was essential to the salvation of those who had become Christians? Or, in other words, whether Christianity of itself could not save its adherents without the aid of Judaism? The question was proposed to them by two classes of persons, viz. those who from heathens had become Christians, and those who had viously been proselytes of the gate? And the answer was such as to satisfy the doubts of both these classes. With respect to the first, or those who from heathens became Christians, the meaning of the apostolic rescript evidently is, "We see no occasion for your being circumcised. It is not indispensable to salvation; only as you have disclaimed idolatry, you must henceforth abstain from meats offered to idols: to prevent giving of fence to the Jews, you must keep from blood, and from things strangled; and to keep you from offending God, and returning to your former state, you must be on your guard against fornication and all impurity, as hateful to a pure and holy God, and but too much practised within the precincts of the heathen temples." Thus was it both a quieting of their fears on an important point; a solemn warning against those vices, to which, from their connexion with their heathen neighbours, they were daily exposed; and an excellent lesson of self-denial in matters indifferent to conciliate the minds of the Jews to the gospel. But if this was the meaning of the apostolic letter, as addressed to those who from being Heathens had be

come Christians; it was equally satisfactory to those who had been proselytes of the gate before they became Christians, for it relieved them from the fear of the Jewish yoke, and evidently contained the precepts of the Noachida; or, if any of them were omitted, it was because they were judged by the Apostles to be unnecessary. Thus, the words in the letter which enjoined them to "abstain from meats offered to idols," comprehend the 1st and 2nd of Noah's commandments: for he who takes his share in the sacrifices of idols is guilty both of idolatry and profanation of the name of God. The second prohibition, viz. that " of blood," relates to the third commandment of Noah, which forbids the effusion of blood or of murder: for it appears to me that these words ought to be interpreted thus, and not in the sense they are commonly taken of refraining from blood; because the eating of blood is evidently forbidden in the following words, which prohibit the use of things strangled; and it is not very probable that in so short a decree as this, the same thing would be expressed in two different clauses.-With respect to abstaining from "things strangled," this is exactly the seventh commandment of Noah, which regards the members of living creatures, signifying that no flesh of any living creature should be eaten; for a creature strangled with the blood in it, was reputed among the Jews to retain its life, because the blood is expressly said by God himself to be the life. The last thing in the decree is the "abstaining from fornication," and it corresponds with the fourth commandment of Noah against illegal cohabitations. So that there are only two of the commandments of Noah wanting in the decree of the apostles; viz. the fifth against theft, and the sixth concerning right judgment by the courts of judicature; but these might have been thought unnecessary, because the one was punished by