did but ill suit the dignity and gravity which ought to be uni. formly maintained by a rabbi, or doctor of their law. Admit that the passages in proof of this, produced by Lightfoot, from the Talmud and rabbinical writers, are unaccountable and stupid, as Dod. angrily calls them, they are sufficient evidence that such a sentiment, however unaccountable and stupid, prevailed among them. Now it is the fact, the prevalence of the sentiment, and not its reasonableness, with which the interpreter is concerned. Further, that the disciples were not, in any thing, superior to the prejudices of the age, is manifest from the whole of their history. That the woman was a Samaritan, doubtless, made the thing more astonishing.

29. Is this the Messiah? μnti &tos e51vXgisos; E. T. Is not this the Christ? see Mt. xii. 23. N. The reason given by Knatchbull for preferring the common version, is far from being deci sive. Though the woman's opinion had been (as probably it was) that our Lord was the Messiah: still it was more becoming iu her to put the question simply to the men of the city, Is this the Messiah? than in the other way, Is not this the Messiah? which plainly suggested her own opinion, before she heard their's. The internal evidence, arising from the scope of the passage is, therefore, to say the least, as favourable to this interpretation as to the other; and the external evidence arising from use, which, in this case, ought to preponderate, is entirely in its favour.

42. The Messiah, Xgisos. This is wanting in two or three MSS. and in the Vul. Cop. Arm. Ethiop. and Sax. versions.

44. [But not to Nazareth]. There is a probability that something to this purpose has been very early omitted in transcribing. The causal conjunction yag, which introduces the verse, shows that it contains the reason of what had immediately preceded. As, however, in regard to the clause itself, we have nothing more than conjecture from the scope of the place, and the known historical facts, I have enclosed in crotchets, the words which I thought it necessary to supply.-By his country, wargis, is commonly meant Nazareth, supposed to be his native city, and in fact the place of his early residence.

46. Officer of the court, Bariinos. E. T. Nobleman. The Sy. and Ara. render it a servant, or minister of the king; that

is, of Herod the tetrarch of Galilee, commonly in that country (whose language did not supply words corresponding to all the distinctions made by the Greeks) styled king. The Vul. says regulus; but, in the judgment of the best critics, the word then implied no more than regius, and denoted in general an eminent officer of the court. The Eng. word nobleman conveys the notion of hereditary rank and certain dignities, to which there was nothing in Palestine, or even in Syria, that corresponded. Yet all the late Eng. versions have in this implicitly followed the common translation; and it is remarkable, that not one of the foreign versions I have seen, has adopted a term answering to that Eng. word. Diss. VII. P. I. § 5, 6.

54. This second miracle Jesus performed after returning from Judea to Galilee, τοτο παλιν δεύτερον σημείον εποίησεν ὁ Ιησός, ελθών εκ της Ιδδαίας εις την Γαλιλαίαν. E. T. This is again the second miracle that Jesus did, when he was come out of Judea into Galilee. The words of the historian do not necessarily imply more than that this, which was the second of our Lord's miracles in that country, was performed after returning from Judea to Galilee; the first miracle being understood to be that of turning water into wine at the marriage in Cana. From the way in which it is expressed in the common version, we should conclude that both miracles were after the return to Galilee, which is not agreeable to the fact as related in the preceding part of this history. The word w, whatever be the interpretation, must be placed differently. I arrange the words in this manner: T&t. δεύτερον σημείον εποιησεν ὁ Ιησές, παλιν ελθών εκ της Ιεδαίας εις την Γαλία λαίαν. It is agreeable to a rule of universal grammar, that, in construing a sentence, the adverbs be joined to the verbs or the participles. There are here but two of these, emointev and fadwr. To join a to the former would be absurd, because it would represent the same individual miracle as twice performed. It must, by consequence, be joined to the latter.

CHAPTER V.

2. There is, 56. The Sy. seems to have read, as it is rendered in that version in the past. Cyril, Chr. and The. favour this reading, so does Nonnus. If tolerably supported, it would be accounted preferable, as this Gospel was written after the destruction of Jerusalem.

2 Nigh the sheep-gate, ini în #pofarinn. E. T. By the sheepmarket. This clause is omitted in the Sy. and Sax. versions. The learned reader will observe that there is nothing in the Gr. which answers to either gate or market; but the word used, be ing an adjective, requires some such addition to complete the sense. Now, we have good evidence, that one of the gates of Jerusalem was called the sheep-gate. See Nehem. iii. 1. & 32. xii. 39. But we have no evidence that any place there was call. ed the sheep-market. Be. renders the words ad portam pecuariam; Dio. presso della porta delle pecore; P. R. Beau. L. Cl. près de la porte des brebis; in Eng. the An. Hey, and Wes. by the sheep-gate. The Vul. seems to have read differently. The preposition επι is omitted, and the words προβατική κολυμβήθρα are read as adjective and substantive, in the nominative case, est autem probatica piscina quæ cognominatur Hebraice Bethsaida. With this Cas. partly agrees and partly differs. He reads the preposi. tion as in the Gr. and προβατική κολυμβήθρα, as agreeing in the dative, est autem Hierosolymis apud oviaricam piscinam ea quæ Hebraice Bethesda nuncupatur. The reading in the Vul. is quite unsupported, and therefore not worthy of regard. Cas. assigns two reasons for his interpretation. One is, that poαTi

would be without a substantive. Now it is a known idiom in Gr. to employ an adjective alone, when the substantive to be supplied is easily suggested by the import of the adjective, or by frequent use. Thus the names of most arts and sciences in Gr. are the feminines of adjectives, whose meaning easily suggests the word understood. Marx, for instance, atginn, μadnuation, Tx being understood to each of the two former, and sun to the last. The frequent conjunction of a particular substantive with a particular adjective, produces the same effect. Now, if one

of the gates of Jerusalem was ever called ʼn #gobatiun wvàn, as we know from the O. T. that it was, nothing could be more natural in those who spoke Gr. than to drop vλ as superfluous, and name it simply barinn. This would happen still more readily, if the adjective was in a manner appropriated to that single use. Now it is remarkable, that the adjective #gobaixos occurs nowhere in the N. T. but in this passage; and never in the Old, but where mention is made of the sheep-gate of Jerusalem. 'Huɛpa zugian occurs once in the N. T. and is properly rendered the Lord's day (Rev. i. 10.). The frequent appropriation of this distinction to the first day of the week, and the custom arising thence, of conceiving up as closely connected with xvpian, brought people gradually to drop nga as unnecessary, being what the hearers knowledge and habits would readily supply. In this manner zupan alone in Gr. and dominica in Lat. came to signify the Lord's day. Baixos, in the former chapter, which signifies an officer of the court, is properly an adjective in the masculine, answering to regius in Lat. and royal in Eng. To make the expression complete, we must supply avgas. In like manner Barilov (L. vii. 25.), the neuter gender of Baλos, an adjective of the same signification, has come to denote a royal palace. The word orgiev, or some other neuter of the same import, has been joined with it at first, but afterwards overlooked as useless. Take the following examples for a specimen from the Gospels, Mt. vi. 3, napisega, scilicet xg, the left hand, x. 42. wormpiev foxg, scilicet úderos, a cup of cold water. L. i. 39. tis any opeivny, scilicet χώραν, into the hill country. J. xx. 12. Ev Aɛuxaig, scilicet ipations, in white garments. Castalio's other objection against the common rendering is, that it appropriates the name Bethesda, which signifies the house of mercy, improperly to a pool or bath, which cannot, in any sense, be denominated a house. I answer, first, that though Beth, the first part of the name Bethesda, denotes commonly a house; yet when such terms are compounded with others in forming a proper name, they ought not to be so strictly interpreted. The place to which Jacob first gave the name Bethel, that is, the house of God, Gen. xxviii. 10, &c. was evidently at the time a place in the open fields, where he had slept all night, with a stone for his pillow, and had the dream of the ladder. That there was then in the vicinity, or afterwards perhaps upon the spot, a city which was first called Luz, and

probably after the division of the country by Joshua, Bethel, in memory of what had there happened to the Patriarch, is readily admitted. When Beth made part of the name of a city, there was a plain deviation from the primitive meaning of the word. Yet nothing was more common. Bethlehem, the city of David, de. notes the house of bread. What was called by the Greeks Heliopolis, the city of the sun, was in Heb. Bethshemesh, the house of the sun. I answer, 2dly, That we ought not to confine the signification of xovμndpa to the water collected, but ought to consider it as including the covered walks, and all that had been built for the accommodation of those who came thither. In this extent the word bath is familiarly used by ourselves. I have preferred the name bath to pool, as more suitable to the purpose to which this water was appropriated.

κυριό.

4. Several MSS. to ɑyyɛños add followed by the Arm. and Sax. versions.

Vul. Angelus Domini,

This

16. And sought to kill him, xa int&v autov añoXTEIVAI, clause is not in the Cam. and some other MSS. of note. It is wanting also in the Vul. Cop. Arm. and Sax. versions.

18. By calling God peculiarly his Father, had equalled himself with God, πατέρα ίδιον έλεγε τον Θεον, ισον έαυτον ποιων τω Θεώ. Vul. Patrem suum dicebat Deum, æqualem se faciens Deo. E. 'T. Said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God. On a little reflection it must be evident that the sense is, in both these versions, imperfectly expressed. For how could those men say that Jesus, by calling God his father, made himself equal with God? There must, therefore, be here some. thing peculiar and energetic in the word dies. The expression in most familiar use would have been watɛga iavis. And, though I am far from saying that there are not many cases in which either expression may be used indifferently, there are some in which dog is more emphatical, and others in which it would not be strictly proper. Be.'s explanation of the word is very just; suum, idov, id est sibi proprium ac peculiarem. In this view the. import of the words is, that God is father to him in a sense wherein he is father to no other. Let it be observed, however, that if the scope of the context did not necessarily lead to this conclusion, I should not infer so much from the mere applica. tion of the word dos: for though this is strictly the import of