have to do with do very confidently affirm any thing that comes into their heads be it never so little probable so they may thereby give any plausible Solutions of the Difficulties in which they find themselves entangled and perplext and they are much given to vaunt of their unanswerable Arguments so they call them which are many times but weak Objections such as Men of Learning and Wit should be ashamed of For this reason I thought it necessary to prevent as far as it was possible all that they can object against my Position of the Opinions the Old Jews held concerning those Doctrines which were exactly followed and fully declared by the Apostles and first Christians And because I foresee some Objections may arise I will shew that nothing can be more absurd than to imagine that the Jews or the first Christians borrowed their Notions about the Trinity or the Divinity of Christ from Plato's Disciples whereas Plato hath in truth followed the Jewish Notions of those things After this I shall make it appear that however some of the Modern Jews have changed their Opinions in these Articles yet the Socinians can make no advantage thereof because the Jews have in reality much alter'd their belief since Christ's time and are guilty of great Disingenuity as is common to all those who are obstinately set upon the maintaining of erroneous Doctrines In fine I shall plainly shew that the Socinians to defend themselves against the Orthodox have been forced to imitate those Modern Jews and have much out done them in changing and shifting their Opinions when they dispute with Christians I hope to manage this Controversy with the Socinians so plainly and fully as to satisfy the Reader That as on the one side they most falsly accuse the Church of having corrupted the New Testament to favour the Doctrines of the Trinity and of Christ's Godhead So they cannot on the other side get any ground upon the Jews in their Disputes with them though they fancy they got a great way towards their Conversion by rejecting those Doctrines In a word both the Ancient and Modern Jews do so far agree in those things which make on the Church's side against the Socinians that if they appeal to the Jews they are sure to lose their Cause which when they have better considered they will find it their best way for the maintaining of their Opinions to abandon the Jews altogether as Men that understood not their own Scriptures viz. the Old Testament and to reject both as they have gone a great way towards it in rejecting that traditional sense of the Old Testament for which it was quoted in the New and without which it would have signified little or nothing to those purposes for which it was quoted And so it will appear that for all their brags of the Aptness and even Necessity of their way for the Conversion of the Jews they have taken the direct way to harden them by giving up that sense of the Old Testament Scriptures which Christ and his Apostles made use of for the converting of their Forefathers But we have the less reason to complain of them for this when we see how apt they are to question the Authority of the Books of the New Testament as oft as they find them so clearly opposite to their Doctrines that they cannot obscure the Light of them by any tolerable Exposition To shew that I do not say this without cause I shall show some instances in the last Chapter of this Book CHAP. II. That in the times of Jesus Christ our Blessed Saviour the Jews had among them a common Explication of the Scriptures of the Old Testament grounded on the Tradition of their Fathers which was in many things approved by Christ and his Apostles THE Jews have to this day a certain kind of Tradition received from their Forefathers which contain many precepts of things to be done or avoided on the account of their Religion This they call their Oral Law by which name they distinguish it from the written Law which God gave them by Moses They make five Orders of such a Tradition which are explained by Moses de Trano in his Kiriat Sepher Printed at Venice Anno 1551. The first is of the things which they infer from Moses and the Prophets by a clear consequence and they are certainly of the same Authority as the rest of the Revelation although they call it a Tradition We are not such Enemies to Names as not to like such a sort of Tradition and we receive it with all imaginable reverence we like very well the Judgment of Maimonides who leaves as uncertain whatsoever the Jewish Doctors speak upon many things as being without ground when their Tradition is not gathered from Texts of Scripture de Regib c. 12. The second Order is of the Ceremonies and Rites which they keep as coming from Mount Sinai but of which there is not a word in the Law The third Order is of the Judiciary Laws upon which the two Schools of Hillel and Shammai were divided The fourth is of some Constitutions of the Ancients which they look upon as an hedge to the Law The last is of their Customs which are various in several places of their dispersion Tho' in many things they cannot but see that those last four Orders of Tradition do not agree with the Law of Moses or are quite unknown in it yet they seem to like it never the worse Nay their Rabbins professedly ascribe a much greater Authority to this Oral Law than to the Law of Moses They say in the Talmud Avoda zara c. 1. fol. 17. Col. 2. that a Man who studies in the Law alone without these Traditions is a Man which is without God according to the Prophecy of Azariah 2 Chr. 15.3 Of this sort were all the Traditions which were condemned by our Lord Jesus Christ He plainly calls them the Commandments of Men Mat. XV. 9. and has purposely directed several of his Discourses against them because even where their observing these Traditions would not consist with their Obedience to God as particularly in the case of Corban Mat. XV. 3. yet they gave Tradition the preference and so as our Saviour there tells them Ver. 9. They made the Commandments of God of no effect by their Tradition The Author of these Traditions or new Laws as one may term them did almost all of them live since the time that the Jews were under the power of the Seleucidae and they were the Leaders of those several Sects that corrupted their Religion by adding to it a great number of Observations which were perfectly new We have therefore no reason to look upon this sort of Tradition as the fountain from whence the Jews in Christ's time took their measures of the sense and meaning of the Writings of the Old Testament But for the Interpreting of their Scriptures the Jews in Christ's time had some other kinds of Traditions much different from
those which Christ so severely condemned And these I shall explain more particularly giving some examples of their use and also of their Authority 1. They had by Tradition the knowledge of some Matters of fact which are not recorded in their Scriptures and of other things they had more perfect and minute accounts than are recorded in the Writings of Moses and the Prophets Particularly Philo the Jew writing of the Life of Moses declares that what he had to say of him was taken partly out of Scripture and partly received by Tradition from their Forefathers * De vita Mosis pag. 468. Edit Genev. Ib. p 470. F. Of this latter sort was the long account he there gives of Moses being brought up in all the Learning of the Egyptians for there is nothing of this in the Old Testament Therefore when St. Stephen says the same thing Act. VII 22. we know that he also had it not from Scripture but from Tradition Hence also it is that St. Paul has gathered the names of Jannes and Jambres Magicians that resisted Moses and the Truth 2 Tim. iv 8. for their names are no where in Scripture but they are in Jonathan's Targum on Exod. i. 15. vii 11. from whence also they are taken into Talmud Sanhedrin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 9. Hence also St. Paul knew that the Pot wherein Moses laid up the Manna was made of Gold Heb. ix 4. which also the Seventy and Philo the Jew de congr quaer er gr pag. 375. Ed. Gen. do assure us of Mechil fol. 20. Col. 1. Tanchumah fol. 29. Col. 4. And tho' the Modern Jews deny this and say the Pot was of Earth yet it is acknowledg'd by the Samaritans that is was Golden This must have been from Tradition because there is no such thing said in Scripture It was from hence that the Apostle had that saying of Moses when he saw the dreadful appearance of God upon Mount Sinai Heb. xii 21. So terrible was the sight that Moses said I exceedingly fear and quake And another that writ soon after Paul's death namely Clemens Bishop of Rome in his Epistle to the Corinthians cap. 17. has other like words that Moses said I am the Steam upon the Pot. Both these sayings being no where in Scripture they could not have known them otherwise than from the Jewish Tradition From hence also St. Jude ver 9. had that passage of the dispute that Michael the Arch-Angel had with the Devil about the Body of Moses Which Body as Josephus probably says Ant. iv 8. if any Relick of it had been kept would have drawn the people into Idolatry That passage we are told by some of the Fathers was taken out of an Apocryphal Book call'd the Analepsis of Moses Clem. Alex. in Jud. Origen peri Archon iii. 2. Grotius tells us the Jews have the like things in their Midrash on Deut. in the Aboth of R. Nathan and in other of their Books It was from hence that St. Paul understood that some of the Prophets were sawn asunder Origen Respons ad African Heb. xi 37. though he spoke in the Plural he meant it only of one saith Origen namely of the Prophet Esay who was Sawed asunder by the Command of Manasses according to the Jewish Tradition Which also is mentioned by Justin Martyr as a thing out of dispute between him and Tryphon the Jew and it is taken notice of in the Gemara tr Jevamot Ch. iv It was from hence that Christ took what he said of the Martyrdom of Zechary the Son of Berachiah who was killed between the Temple and the Altar Orig. Ib. p. 232 c. Mat. xxiii 35. which Origen there also mentions as a Jewish Tradition tho' he says they supprest it as being not for the Honour of their Nation I do not deny but that there might be some ancient Authors besides the Canonical Writers to keep up the memory of these names of Persons and other matters of fact As for example Joseph Ans. l. 10. c. â—â— that there were eighteen High Priests who Officiated in the first Temple although they are not all mention'd in Scripture But if there were any such Authors it is very probable that they were lost in the Captivity or in the bloody Persecutions of the Jewish Church long before the time of our Blessed Saviour and his Holy Apostles Josephus who lived in that Age and writ the History of the Jews makes no mention of them and gives a very lame account of the things which passed under several Kings of Persia 2. Besides the Canonical Books they had Writings of a less Authority wherein were inserted by the great Men of their Nation several Doctrines that came from the Prophets which were in very high esteem and veneration though not regarded as of equal Authority with the Writings of the Prophets It is not improbable that St. Matthew had respect to some Book of this nature when he quoted that which is not found in express words in any of the Writings of the Prophets That the Messias should be called a Nazarene Mat. ii 23. if he doth not allude to the Idea of the Jews who referred to the Messias the Netzer or Branch spoken of by Isa xi 1. So Christ himself may seem to have alluded to a passage in one of these Books Joh. vii 38. where he saith He that believeth on me as saith the Scripture out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water for there is nothing perfectly like this in any of the Canonical Books that are come to our hands St. Paul the Apostle as Jerom in Ephes v. 14. observes has cited divers such Apocryphal Books accommodating himself no doubt to the Jews who gave much deference to their Authority Thus he did Rom. ix 21. and perhaps in some other places of his Epistles from the Book of Wisdom which is still extant in our Bibles Elsewhere he has Quotations out of Books that are lost as 1 Cor. ii 9. out of an Apocryphal Book that went under the name of the Prophet Elias and Ephes v. 14. out of an Apocryphal piece of the Prophet Jeremy as we are told by Georgius Syncellus in his Chron. p. 27. A. But the most express Quotation of this kind is that which is alledged by St. James iv 5 6. For these words The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to Envy are not in any Books of the Old Testament nor are the following words God resisteth the proud but giveth grace to the humble And yet both these sayings are quoted as Scripture by the Holy Apostle Of the first he saith plainly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Scripture saith Then he goes on to the other and of that he saith also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without any Nominative Case but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before mentioned which implies that the Scripture saith this also Now what Scripture could he mean for it is certain that neither of these
Prince to conquer and to avenge them of their Enemies They removed from their thoughts the accounts of his Death as contrary to those Glorious descriptions which suited better with their minds They expected the Messias should come to restore presently the Kingdom unto Israel and in a word following their own Desires and Imaginations they confounded Christ's first coming with his second and then confirmed themselves in this mistake partly because the Prophets seemed to describe the Kingdom of the Messias very carnally partly because they knew not what to think of a Coelestial or Spiritual Kingdom such as his should be who was to sit on the Throne of God And these false conceits of theirs joined with the worldly Interests of their Leaders brought them to reject the true Messias at his Coming But after all it is certain 1. That the contrary opinions concerning the Spiritual sense of the Prophecies was the constant ancient Doctrine of their Nation 2. That those Jews that were converted to Christianity by the Ministry of Jesus Christ and his Apostles were converted upon these Maxims which were then the Maxims of the wisest and the Religiousest part of their Nation 3. That the Apostles in their Writings as well as Christ Jesus in his Discourses cited the Texts of the Old Testament according to the commonly received sense of the Synagogue And in truth the authority of these proofs in that received sense did not a little contribute to the Conversion of both Jews and Gentiles In order to make the Reader of my mind I intreat him to take in good part my entring a little further into the examination of what the most studious Jews in the Holy Scriptures do commonly propose under the name of Tradition Let them be lookt upon by some Men as dreaming Authors that busie themselves in Enquiries altogether vain and fruitless yet it is no hard task to vindicate them from this hard Imputation 1. I have this to say for them That that which appears so phantastical because not understood by most of those which have been accustomed to the Greek Methods of Teaching ought not therefore to be despised and wholly rejected None but Fools will think this a sufficient reason why all Pythagoras his Doctrines ought to be contemned because that he having been a Scholar of Pherecydes the Syrian and other learned Men in Egypt and Chaldea did borrow thence his way of teaching Theology by Symbols which is attainable only by few and those of no common Capacity 2. I observe that most of the true Jewish Doctors that followed the Tradition of their Schools had this design principally in their eye to make Men fully understand the Secrets of God's Conduct for the Restoration of fallen Mankind To this in particular they bend their Thoughts and in this they endeavour'd to instruct their Readers explaining to them according to this sense some places of Scripture which at first sight seem not immediately to regard so important a Subject 3. I observe that oftentimes where they attribute these Interpretations of Scripture to a Tradition delivered down to them from their Fathers it is only in order to render their Reflections on the Scriptures so much the more venerable to their Hearers For it is plain enough in some places that an attentive Meditation on the Words might have discover'd the same things which they refer to Tradition For Example They remark that God said concerning Adam See Reuchlin Cabalae l. 1. p. 628. Gen. iii. 22. And now lest he stretch out his hand and eat of the tree of life and live for ever therefore God as it follows drove him out Paradise From hence they infer that God gave Adam hopes of becoming one day immortal by eating of the Tree of Life which they thought should be obtained for him by the Messias Now it appears that our Blessed Saviour did allude to this common Opinion of the Jews which was then esteemed as a Tradition Rev. ii 7. To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the Tree that is in the Paradise of God And this Notion is repeated Rev. xxii 2 14. Again they remark that God said Behold Adam is become like one of us Gen. iii. 22. And they maintain that he speaks not this to the Angels who had no common likeness to the Unity or Essence of God but to him who was the Celestial Adam who is one with God As Jonathan has also observed in his Targum on these words of Genesis calling him the only-begotten in Heaven Now it is plain that St. Paul has described Jesus Christ as this Heavenly Adam 1 Cor. xv They assert that the first Prophecy Gen. iii. 15. was understood by Adam and Eve of the Saviour of the World and that Eve in prospect of this being delivered of her first Son Gen. iv 1. Reuchl Ibid. p. 629. she called him Cain saying I have got a man or this man from the Lord believing that he was the Promised Messias They tell us farther that Eve being deceived in this expectation as also in her hopes from Abel asked another Son of God who gave her Seth of whom it is said that Adam begot another Son after his own Image another with respect to Abel that was killed not to his Posterity by Cain for they bear the Image of the Devil rather than that of God They maintain the Name of Enos to have been given Seth's Son upon the same account Reuchl Ibid. p. 630 631. because they thought him that excellent man whom God had promised They make the like Remarks on Enoch Noa and Sem and Noah's Blessing of Sem they look'd on as an Earnest Wish that God in his Person would give them the Redeemer of Mankind They affirm that Abraham had not been so ready to offer up his Son Isaac a Sacrifice Reuchl Ibid. p. 632. but that he hoped God would save the World from Sin by that Means and that Isaac had not suffered himself to be bound had he not been of the same belief And they observe that it was said to Abraham and afterwards to Isaac on purpose to shew them the mistake of this Opinion In thy Seed shall all the nations of the Earth be blessed A plain Argument that the Jews anciently thought that these words did relate to the Messias as did also St. Paul Gal. iii. 16. They maintain Reuchl Ib. p. 633. that Jacob believed that God would fulfil to him the first Promise made to Adam till God undeceived him by inspiring him with a Prophecy concerning Judah Gen. xlix 10. and by signifying to him which also Jacob tells his Sons that the Messias should not come but in the last days v. 1. when the Scepter was departed from Judah and the Law-giver from between his Feet v. 10. Reuchl Ib. p. 633. They declare that ever since this Prophecy the Coming of the Messias for the Redemption of Mankind has been the Entertainment of all the Prophets to
THE JUDGMENT OF THE Ancient JEWISH Church Against the VNITARIANS IN The Controversy upon the Holy Trinity and the Divinity of our Blessed Saviour With a Table of Matters and a Table of Texts of Scripture Occasionally Explain'd By a Divine of the Church of England LONDON Printed for Ri. Chiswell and are to be sold at the Rose and Crown and at the Rose in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCXCIX THE PREFACE ALTHOVGH the Jews by mistaking the Prophecies of Scripture concerning the Kingdom of their Messias expected he should have a Temporal Kingdom and because our Lord Jesus was not for that therefore they would not acknowledge him fâ—â— their Messias yet all things considered there is no essential difference between our Religion and theirs We own the very same God whom they formerly Worshipp'd the Maker of the World and their Lawgiver We receive that very Messias whom God promised them by his Prophets so many Ages before his coming We own no other Spirit of God to have Inspired the Apostles besides the Holy Ghost who spoke by the Prophets and by whose manifold Gifts the Messias was to be known as one in whom all Nations should be Blessed This plainly appears in the way and method which both Christ and his Apostles followed in preaching the Gospel They endeavoured to take off the prejudices the then Jews laboured under concerning the Nature of the Messias and the Characters by which he was to be known For they argued all along from the Books of Moses and the Prophets and never proposed any thing to their Disciples but what was declared in those Writings which the Jews acknowledged as the Standard of their Religion which may be seen in Christ's Discourse to the Jews John v. 46. and to his Disciples after his Resurrection Luke xxiv 47 and 44. in the words of St. Peter Acts x. 43. and of St. Paul Acts xxvi 22. The truth is in those Sacred Books although One only God be acknowledged under the Name of Jehovah which denotes his Essence and therefore is incommunicable to any other yet not only that very Name is given to the Messias but also all the Works Attributes and Characters peculiar to Jehovah the God of Israel and the only true God are frequently bestowed on him This the old Jewish Authors as Philo and the Targumists do readily acknowledge For in their Exposition of those places of the Old Testament which relate to the Messias they generally suppose him to be God whereas the Modern Jews being of a far different Opinion use all Shifts imaginable to evade the force of their Testimonies The Apostles imitated in this the Synagogue by applying to Christ several places of the Old Testament which undoubtedly were primarily intended of the God of Israel But because they sometimes only touch at places of the Old Testament without using them as formal Proofs of what they then handled Socinus and his Disciples have fancied that those Citations out of the Old Testament which are made use of by the Apostles though they represent the Messias as being the same with the God of Israel yet for all this are but bare Allusions and Accommodations made indeed by them to Subjects of a like nature but not at all by them intended as Arguments and Demonstrations Nothing can be more injurious to the Writings of the New Testament than such a Supposition And there can hardly be an Opinion more apt to overthrow the Authority of Christ and his Apostles and to expose the Christian Religion to the Scorn both of Jews and Heathens For the bare Accommodation of a place of Scripture cannot suppose that the Holy Ghost had any design in it to intimate any thing sounding that way and consequently the Sense of that Scripture so accommodated is of no Authority Whereas it is a most certain truth that Christ and his Apostles did design by many of those Quotations to prove that which was in dispute between them and the Jews To what purpose should Christ exhort the Jews to search the Scriptures of the Old Testament because they testified of him John v. 39. if those Scriptures could only give a false Notion of him by intimating that the Messias promised was the God of Israel This were to suppose that Christ and his Apostles went about to prove a thing by that which had no Strength and no Authority to prove it And that the Citations out of the Old Testament are like the Works of the Empress Eudoxia who writ the History of Christ in Verses put together and borrowed from Homer under the Name of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or that of Proba Falconia who did the same in Verses and Words taken out of Virgil. It follows at least from such a Position That in the Gospel God gave a Revelation so very new that it has no manner of Affinity to the Old although he caused this old Revelation to be carefully written by the Prophets and as carefully preserved by the Jews to be the Standard of their Faith and the Ground of their Hopes till he should fulfil his Promises contained in it and although Christ and his Apostles bid the Jews have recourse to it to know what they were to expect of God's promises The Christian Church ever rejected this pernicious Opinion And although her first Champions against the Ancient Hereticks did acknowledge that the new Revelation brought in by Christ and his Apostles had made the Doctrines much clearer then they were before which the Jews themselves do acknowledge when they affirm that hidden things are to be made plain to all by the Messias yet they ever maintained that those Doctrines were so clearly set down in the Books of the Old Testament that they could not be opposed by them who acknowledge those Books to come from God especially since the Jews are therein told that the Messias when he came should explain them and make them clearer This Observation is particularly of force against those who formerly opposed the Doctrine of the Blessed Trinity and that of our Saviour's being God These Hereticks thought they followed the Opinion of the old Jews Therefore they that confuted them undertook to satisfy them that the Christian Church had received nothing from Christ and his Apostles about those two Articles but what God had formerly taught the Jews and what necessarily followed from the Writings of Moses and the Prophets so that those Doctrines could not be rejected without accusing the Divine Spirit the Author of those Books of shortness of Thought in not foreseeing what naturally follows from those Principles so often laid down and repeated by him These old Writers solidly proved to those Hereticks That God did teach the Jews the Vnity of his Essence yet so as to establish at the same time a Distinction in his Nature which according to the Notion which himself gives of it we call Trinity of Persons And that when he promised that the Messias to come was to be Man at the very same time he
sayings is any where else in our Scriptures He must therefore mean it of one or other of the Apocryphal Books And one of the Fathers that was born within a hundred years after his death gives us a very probable guess at the Book that he intended It is Clement of Alexandria who saith of the latter Quotation These are the words of Moses Strom. iv p. 376. meaning in all likelihood of the Analepsis of Moses which Book is mentioned by the same Clement elsewhere on Jude v. 9. as a Book well known in those times in which he lived Therefore in all likelihood the words also of the former Quotation were taken from the Analepsis of Moses and it was that Apocryphal Book that S. James quoted and called it Scripture This can be no strange thing to him that considers what was intimated before that the Jews had probably these Books join'd to their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Hagiographa and therefore they might well be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without any addition The Apocryphal Books that are in our Bibles were commonly call'd so by the Primitive Fathers Thus Clement before mention'd Strom. v. p. 431. B. quotes the words that we read in Wisdom vii 24. from Sophia in the Scriptures And the Book of Ecclesiasticus is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 seven or eight times in his writings Paed. i. 10. ii 5. ver 8 vis 10 vis iii. 3. 11. So it is quoted by Origen with the same Title Orig. in Jerem. Hom. 16. p. 155. D. There are many the like Instances to be found in the writings of the Ancientest Fathers They familiarly called such Books The Scriptures and sometimes The Holy Scriptures and yet they never attributed the same Authority to them as to the Books that were received into the Canon of the Old Testament which as the Apostle saith were written by Divine Inspiration 2 Tim. 3.16 The same is to be said of the Prophecy of Enoch out of which St. Jude brings a Quotation in his Epistle vers 14 15. Grotius in his Annotations on the place saith This Prophecy was extant in the Apostles times in a Book that went under the name of the Revelation of Enoch and was a Book of great credit among the Jews for it is cited in their Zohar and was not unknown to Celsus the Heathen Philosopher for he also cited is as appears by Origen's Answer to him Orig. in Cels lib. V. Grotius also shews that this Book is often cited by the Primitive Fathers and he takes notice of a large piece of it that is preserved by Georg. Syncellus in his Chronicon And whereas in this piece there are many fabulous things he very well judges that they might be foisted in as many such things have been thrust into very Ancient Books But whether his Conjecture in this be true or no it is certain that the piece which is quoted by St. Jude was truly the Prophecy of Enoch because we have the Apostle's Authority to assure us of the Historical truth of it 3. It is clear that the Jews had very good and authentic Traditions concerning the Authors the Use and the Sence of divers parts of the Old Testament For Example St. Mat. Chap. xxvii 9. quotes Jeremy for the Author of a passage which he there transcribes and which we find in Zechary xi 12. How could this be but that it was a thing known among the Jews that the four last Chapters of the Book of Zechary were written by Jeremy Medes Works p. 709. and 963. and 1022. as Mr. Mede has proved by many Arguments It is by the help of this Tradition that the Ancient Interpreters have added to the Psalms such Titles as express their design and their usage in the Synagogue Certainly these Titles which shew the design of many of the Psalms contribute much to make us understand the sense of those Psalms which a man that knows the occasion of their Composing will apprehend more perfectly than he can do that reads the Psalms without these Assistances And for the Titles of several Psalms in the Septuagint and other of the Ancient Translations which shew on what days they were sung in the publick Worship of the Jews as Ps xxiv 48 81 82 93 94 c. tho' these Titles are not in the Hebrew and therefore are not part of the Jews Scripture yet that they had the knowledge of this by Tradition we find by Maimonides who tho' a stranger to those Translations De cultu divino tract de sacrificiis jugibus c. 6. Sect. 9. yet affirms that those several Psalms were sung on such and such days and he names the very days that are prefixt to them in the said Titles It is from the same Tradition that they have these Rules concerning the Psalms I. This Rule to know the Authors of them namely that all Psalms that are not inscribed with some other name are David's Psalms although they bear not his name a Maxim owned by Aben-Ezra Praefat. in Psalmos and David Kimchi and we see an Instance of this Rule in that Quotation of Ps xcv 7. which is ascribed to David in Heb. iv 7. II. From hence they have learnt also another Rule by which they distinguish between the Psalms spoken by David in his own name Tehillim Rabbat in Ps 24. Fol. 22. col 2. and as King of Israel and those which he spoke in the name of the Synagogue without any particular respect to his own time but in a prospect of the remotest future times Tehillim Rab. Ib. From thence they have learned to distinguish between the Psalms in which the Holy Ghost spoke of the present times and those in which he speaks of the times to come viz. of the time of the Messias So R. David Kimchi and others agree that the Psalms 93 94. till the Psalm 101. speak of the days of the Messias So they remark upon Ps 92. whose Title is for the Sabbath-day that it is for the time to come which shall be all Sabbath Manasseh Ben. Is in Exod. q. 102. By the help of Tradition also they clear the Text Ex. xii 40. where it is said That the sojourning of the Children of Israel who dwelt in Aegypt was 430 years It would be a great mistake of these words to think the meaning of them should be that the Children of Israel dwelled in Aegypt 430 years For in truth they dwelled there but half the time as the Jews themselves reckon and all Learned men do agree to it But the Jews understand by these words that the sojourning of the Children of Israel all the while they dwelled in Aegypt and in the Land of Canaan they and their Fathers was 430 years Thus all the Rabbins do understand it and thus it was anciently explained by putting in words to this sense in the Samaritan Text and in the Alexandrian LXX That they were in the right we see by the Apostle's reckoning
did very much contribute whence they called their Traditions the Hedge and the Rampart of the Law To conclude We ought carefully to take notice 1. That St. John Baptist did not find it needful to correct the Errors in Opinions that reigned among the People but only exhorted them to Repentance for their Sins and immoral Actions 2. That one of the chief Concerns of our Lord Jesus Christ in his Discourses with the Jews was to purge them of all that Corruption which their drowsy Casuists had introduced into their Morals with which he charges the Scribes and Pharisees in particular 3. That the Doctrine of the Sadducees which he refutes on some occasions had but a few Followers 4. That the Essens and their Party who applied themselves altogether to Piety and the Study of the Law had a great Authority with all the People that loved Religion This we may learn from Philo in some Pieces of his Works especially Lib. quod omnis Probus sit liber p. 678. 5. That the Jews though they have received very gross Ideas concerning a Temporal Kingdom of the Messias and though to support these Ideas they have confounded the Sense of divers Prophecies endeavouring to reconcile them to their carnal Notions and in bringing in new Explications of the Old Testament yet have they not been able quite to extinguish their ancienter Ideas and Principles Their new Ideas passing for no more at best than the Opinions of their celebrated Doctors which another Doctor may oppose if he will especially when he is backt with those that are ancienter and of greater Authority CHAP. III. That the Jews had certain Traditional Maxims and Rules for the Vnderstanding of the Holy Scripture WHat I have now said concerning the Traditions of the Synagogue will I believe be scarcely disputed by any Learned Man I am sure he will have less reason to oppose it that considers the Rules which as appears to us were followed by the Jews in explaining the Prophecies concerning their Promised Messias 1. It is certain that the Jews held this as a Maxim That all the Prophets did speak of the Messias and were raised up by God for this very end This we find more than once in their Talmud Beracoth c. 1. fol. 3. Sanhed c. 11. and that it was common among them in Christ's time we see in many places of the Gospel No doubt what they did in setling this Rule was not without a due and serious Examination of it first And here we cannot but deplore the rashness of some Criticks among Christians who instead of making use of the Confessions of the Old Jews upon places of the Old Testament which they referr'd constantly to the Messias whereas some of the Modern Jews endeavour to wrest them in another sense not only follow the new ones but give occasion by these means to despise Prophecies and the clearer ones as things quite insignificant What was the Absurdity of Grotius who in the 53d of Isaiah by the Servant which is spoken of absolutely understands Jeremy the Prophet whereas the Old Jews refer that Chapter directly to the Messias as you can see in the Old Midrash Chonen in the Targum in the Talmud Sanhed fol. 98. c. 2. and that is acknowledg'd by R. Alshek in h. l. to be the sense of the ancient Jews And indeed they hold as a Maxim That whensoever it is spoken absolutely of the Servant the place must be understood of the Messias Zohar in Exod. fol. 225. and by consequence they explained that Prophecy of Isaiah as concerning the Messias I can say the same upon another Maxim of the Old Jews which is of great Use That whatsoever it is spoken of the King absolutely the place must be understood of the Messias Zohar in Gen. fol. 235. If Grotius had known it he never would have related the 72d Psalm and some others to Salomon in his literal sense as he hath done but would have referred it as it must be directly to the Messias Certainly that shews us that many of the Old Jews understood the Prophets much better than to their shame such Criticks now do I wonder many times Divines who confess they cannot give any tolerable account of the Song of Songs and look upon it as a Piece composed by Salomon upon the occasion of his Marriage with the Daughter of Egypt whereas the Jews look upon it constantly as the last Piece he composed after his Repentance and we have reason enough to believe when we compare it with the 45th Psalm and the 5th of Isaiah that Salomon spoke then of the Messias the Essential Word spoken of by him Prov. 8. chiefly when we see the ancient Jews do agree to it See Philo de Colon. apud Grot. in Prov. viii 22. Bresch Rabba par 1. the first Words and Midrash in shir hash in Mercessu But let us come back to our Subject 2. I say 2dly That it is reasonable to judge that the later Prophets having considerably cleared the Prophecies of those that went before them by diffusing throughout their Writings a much greater Light they who read the later Prophets were not so careless as to neglect these Helps for the understanding of the more ancient Prophecies whose sense was otherwise not a little obscure In these Cases it was necessary to begin with the Prophets that writ last and by their Light to clear the ancient Prophecies According to this Method the Paraphrases ascribe to the Messias what we read of the Seed of the Woman Gen. iii. 15. and what Balaam prophecied Numb xxiii and xxiv And no one can doubt but that after that great Light that Isaiah gave them concerning the Messias and his Unction in his Prophecy Chap. xi they referred to him those words also of Moses Deut. xviii 18. God shall raise thee up a Prophet like unto me which is cited by St. Peter as spoken of the Messias following herein the Principles of the Synagogue Act. iii. 22. 3. It is not to be doubted but that Experience was a great help towards their understanding of Prophecies If it had not been for this the Jews would have lookt no farther than to Isaac for the fulfilling of that Prophecy Gen. xviii 18. In thy seed shall all the nations of the Earth be blessed and likewise to Salomon for that which we read 2 Sam. vii 16. and Psal lxxvi But seeing the Prophecies were not accomplished in their Persons nor did answer to their Characters and it is impossible that the Prophecies should be false the Jews were convinced as they had reason that they ought to refer these Prophecies to the Messias as also St. Paul did according to the way of his Nation 4. It is clear there were certain general Characters of the Messias which wheresoever they were found were commonly thought to denote that that place should be understood of the Messias And it is worth observing that the Light still encreasing from one Age to the other and
one compare Job xxviii 20. Psal xxxiii 6. Prov. viii 12 22. with what is written Wisdom vi 24 22. and so on till Chap. viii 11. and he will find a great likeness if not the very same Notions and words 4. Through the same neglect they have quite lost the Works of other ancient and famous Jews as namely of Philo the Jew who was in such reputation amongst them as to be chosen the Agent or Deputy of the Alexandrian Jews in their Embassy to the Roman Emperour and of Aristobulus who lived in the time of the Ptolomees and Dedicated to one of them his Explication of the Law of which we have a fragment in Eusebius which shews that his Notions were the same with Philo's and that they did generally prevail in Egypt before Christ's Incarnation as well in the time of Philo. It is no hard matter to give some reasons of this neglect For 1. their first destruction by Titus and after by Hadrian involved with it a great part of their Books They thought then only of saving their Bibles with which it seems their Targum was joined and so this came to be preserved with the Scriptures This was by the great care of Josephus as he himself relates desiring of Titus this favour alone that he might preserve the Sacred Books 2. After their second destruction by Hadrian they applied themselves straight to gather their Traditions and Customs which now make the Body of their Misna or Second Law as they call it This spent them a deal of time For to compose such a work it was necessary to collect the several pieces in the hands of several men who had drawn certain Memoirs for the observation of every Law that did more immediately concern them 3. They then began to increase their hatred for the study of the Greek Tongue abandoning themselves wholly to the study of their Traditions This we see in the Misna Mas sota c. 9. § 14. 4. About this time being pressed with Arguments out of these Books by the Christians that disputed against them they thought best to reject the Works themselves And because the Christians used the LXX Version against them they invented several Lyes to discredit it as we see in the Gemara of Megilla and lest that should not do they made it their business to find out some that were able to make a new Version such as Aquila in the time of Hadrian and Symmachus and Theodotion who turn'd Jews toward the end of the Second Century These Three Interpreters were designed to change the Sense of those Texts which the Christians according to the Old Jewish Traditions did refer to the Messias Of this Justin Martyr has given some Instances in his Dialogue with Trypho R. Akiba's great Friend and we see that St. Jerom Ep. 89. complains of the same And now what wonder is it if the Jews in this humour did neglect or rather rejected those Apocryphal Books whose Authority in some points were set up against them by the Christians as were the Books of Baruch Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus As for Philo tho he wrote in a lofty Stile and after an Allegorical way and therefore we find in the Rabboth several Thoughts common to him and the Cabalists and other Allegorical Authors whose Notions are gathered in the Rabboth yet the Jews soon lost all esteem for his Works First Because he writ in Greek which was a Language most despised by them at this time they having establish'd it as a Maxim That he who brought up his Children in the Greek Tongue was cursed as he who fed Swine Bava kama fol. 82. col 1. Sota fol. 49. col 2. Secondly Because some Christians challenged him for their own For finding some of his Principles to be agreeable to those of the Christian Religion it came into their head tho it is a Fancy without any Foundation that he while he was at Rome was converted by St. Peter The same thing befel Josephus as soon as the Christians began to use his Authority against the Jews notwithstanding that the Jews have no better Historian than Josephus Thirdly Because the Jews had then almost forsaken the study of the Holy Scriptures and given themselves up entirely to the study of their Traditions or Second Law as they call it The Catalogue of their Ancient Commentators is very small Their first literal Commentator is R. Saadiah who writ his Comments on the Scripture in the beginning of the Tenth Century As for the others that were long before him as Zohar Siphre and Siphri Siphra Mechilta Tanchuma and the Rabboth they all make it their business to explain allegorically or to establish their Traditions As to the Targum we see how heat of Dispute hath carried the Jews to such strange extremities that now they reject no small part of those Interpretations that were Authentick with their Forefathers It may not be amiss to give some Proofs of this to shew that we do not accuse them without cause And in general there is not a more idle Romance than that which the Jews have devised touching two Messias's that are to come unto the World One must be of the Race of Joseph by Ephraim and called Nehemiah the Son of Husiel who as they will have it after a Reign of many Years at Jerusalem and after having sack'd Rome is at last to be killed himself at Jerusalem by a King of Persia The other Messias is to be Menahem the Son of Hammiel who is to appear for the delivery of the Jews being sent from God on that Errand according to Moses's Prayer Exod. iv 13. For the time of this second Messias's coming shall be when the Mother of the deceased Messias the Son of Joseph having gathered the Jews dispersed from Galilee to Jerusalem shall be there besieged by one Armillus the Son of Satan who is to proceed out of a Marble Statue in Rome and who in this close Siege shall be at the very point of destroying them Then they say Messias the Son of David shall come with seven Shepherds to wit the Three Patriarchs Moses David and Elias and eight of the principal Fathers or Prophets who are to rise before the rest They say That Moses at the head of them shall convert the Jews without working any Miracle and then all the Jews shall rise at the sound of a Trumpet passing under ground till they come to Mount Olivet which shall cleave in two to let them out Then the Jews shall come from all Quarters to form the Messias's Army and the Messias the Son of Joseph shall be raised from the dead to come in among the rest and so the two Messias's shall reign without jealousy of one another only the Son of David shall have the chief Power reigning from one end of the Earth to the other and that for Forty Years All this time the Jews shall continue in Feasting and Jollity using the other Nations as Slaves And then Gog the King of
and forced sense on them But with what face the Mahometans can object this I know not when they themselves do so grosly pervert the passages in Deut. xxxiii 33. Hab. iii. 3. Deut. xviii and xxxiv in favour of Mahomet and his Law and in favour of Mahomet only many Texts in Isaiah Ezekiel Zephany and other Prophets as you may see them alledged by Hazzadaula in his Fourth Book but especially when they urge all those places in St. John's Gospel where the Paraclete is spoken of as so many Promises of Mahomet's coming I must confess some warm indiscreet Mahometans in dispute with the Christians have given them occasion to believe that the Mahometans generally accused the Christians with falsifying their Scriptures Just as the petty Controvertists of the Church of Rome have impudently averred the Scripture to be corrupt in many places the better to establish their Church's Authority And thus we find Ahmed the Mahometan charging both Jews and Christians with altering of their Bibles Hotting Hist p. 364. But as there are in the Roman Church Men wiser and calmer that see the consequences of so rash an Accusation and have therefore proved unanswerably the Integrity of the Sacred Text so are there among the Mahometans more wary and cautious Disputants who despise and disallow those false Charges advanced by some of their party against the Jews and Christians Such a one was Hazzadaula in the Book before cited who solidly proves that by the care the Masorite Jews took to ascertain the Text of the Old Testament it was impossible they should be willing to corrupt it and that if they had been willing yet they were divided into so many Sects of unreconcileable hatred to one another as rendred it impossible for them to do it He then shews that the difference which is between the several Versions as between the Seventy and Syriack for Example was no prejudice to the Purity of the Text it self but that this arose from the several Views the Interpreters then had from the different Notions and senses they affixed to the Original words He then passes to the Examination of the various Readings which our Unitarians triumph in and shews that neither their number nor variety ought to diminish the Authority of the Originals He gives Reasons for his preference of the Jewish Bible to that of the Samaritans He proves the corruption of the Books of the Old Testament could not be made before Jesus Christ's time since he never reproached them for it which he would certainly have done had they been guilty of it nor could the corruption come in after Christ's time because the Jews and Christians who are such mortal Enemies have had these Books in keeping and daily read them though they interpret them very differently In a word we cannot easily meet with a more perfect Treatise on this Subject nor one more proper to refute the bold insinuations of some who under the name of Christians and Men skilled in Critical knowledg have undertaken to shake the Foundations of the Christian Religion and for this purpose would discredit the Authority of the Holy Scripture under the disguise of making it rest on the Authority of Tradition The Reader will I hope reflect on what I have said concerning the conduct of the Socinians in their Disputes with us relating to the Divinity of Christ To which I may add that some of them less modest though more sincere than Socinus being convinced that no Answer could be given to the Quotations from the Old Testament that were used in Proof of our Lord's Divinity thought fit to reject the Epistle to the Hebrews which contains those Quotations as an Apocryphal Piece This Enjedinus has done and thought it a quick way to deliver himself at once of many difficulties from which otherwise he could not extricate himself For had he believed Socinus's Answers Satisfactory he had never betaken himself to this last and desperate shift Others of whom Mr. N. is one do suppose that whatever makes for the advantage of the Trinitarians Cause is all forged And so they abandon the fanciful Explications Socinus has given of the first Chapter of St. John's Gospel as having no need of them so long as they can make one believe that the Trinitarians have foisted into the New Testament whatever they pleased This is still a shorter answer than the former The first rendred one particular Book only useless to the Trinitarians but this makes all those Books of the New Testament useless from whence any Objection may be drawn against the Unitarians What end the Socinians have in these dangerous attempts whether to facilitate the Conversion of the Jews as they pretend or to do service to the Atheists and Deists as it seems to be their real design is worthy every Christian 's serious enquiry If they intend the Conversion of the Jews we may well demand of them what way they will take to effect it Smalcius one of their chief Writers has affirmed that the Books of the Old Testament are of little use to convert the Jews De Div. Chr. c. x. already quoted His reason is because if we interpret any Text in the Old Testament of Jesus Christ we must interpret it Mystically that is according to quite another sense than that which the words do naturally import And now admitting this to be true what use can a Socinian make of the Old Testament against the Jews Sommerus and Francis David whose Opinions as to the denial of the Worship of Jesus Christ are embraced by Mr. N. being forced to own that the Author of the Book of Proverbs did ascribe a Son to God ch xxx 4. and yet being not willing to acknowledg it as a truth took the readiest way to defeat the Authority of this Book and placed it among the Apocryphal Writings One should wonder how such Socinians are like to be Converters who call the Jews Canon of the Scriptures into question and consequently leave no Books from whence as from a common Principle they may on each side deduce their reasonings As for the Books of the New Testament what use can they make of them Yes very great saith the Socinian If the Books of the New Testament were reformed and those Patches intirely taken from them which were never written by the Apostles though added under their Names such as the Epistle to the Hebrews which was brought in after the year 140. of Christ and stuffed with Doctrines of a Trinity and Christ's Divinity contrary to the Faith of Jesus Christ and his Apostles and the Primitive Christians then we might hope to have success in the Conversion of the Jews But in truth they are not likely to succeed with their reformed Socinian Gospel so well as they would have us believe For 't is reasonable to think that every Jew of common sense would retort the Book on themselves and tell them frankly This is not the Christians Gospel from whence you offer to convince me this
Creature But his Disciples building upon this firm Maxim of Scripture that God alone is to be adored justly concluded against him that he was not to be adored since strictly speaking he was but a Creature and no God This Division was plainly occasioned by the strength of Scripture-proofs which on the one hand clearly shew that none can be a Christian without adoring Christ and on the other positively affirm that none but the True God ought to be adored Thus these two opposite Parties did unwillingly do the business of the true Church which ever opposed to the Enemies of the Trinity and of the Godhead of Christ the Authority of the Holy Scripture which teaches that Christ ought to be adored and withal convinces the Arians of Idolatry who adored Christ without owning him to be the true God though they bestowed on him a kind of a Godhead inferior to that of the Father I cannot but admire that they who within these few years have in this Kingdom embraced Socinus his Opinions should consider no better how little success they have had elsewhere against the truth and that upon the score of their Divisions which will unavoidably follow till they can agree in unanimously rejecting the Authority of Scripture Neither doth it avail them any thing to use Quibbles and Evasions and weak Conjectures since they are often unanswerably confuted even by some of their Brethren who are more dextrous than they in expounding of Scriptures But being resolved by all means to defend their Tenents some Chief men amongst them have undertaken to set aside the Authority of Scriptures which is so troublesome to them And the Author of a late Book intitled Considerations maintains that the Gospels have been corrupted by the Orthodox Party and suspects that of St. John to be the work of Cerinthus It is no very easy Task to dispute against men whose Principles are so uncertain and who in a manner have no regard to the Authority of Scripture It was much less difficult to undertake Socinus himself because he owned however the Authority of Scripture and that it had not been corrupted But one knows not how to deal with his Disciples who in their Opinion seem to be so contrary to him and one another They do now affirm the adoration which is paid to Christ is Idolatrous thus renouncing Socinus his Principles who lookt upon it as an essential piece of Christianity So that they can no longer be called Socinians and themselves affect the name of Unitarians And as their chief business seems to be to accuse the sincerity of Scripture-writers so the main work of them who undertake to confute them must be the establishing both the Sincerity and Authority of it which is no very hard task For even Mahometans though they take some of the same Objections that the Socinians are so full of against the Divinity of Christ yet are so far from accusing Christians of having corrupted the Scripture that they furnish us with Weapons against the Unitarians of this Kingdom as the Reader will find at the end of this following Book And although there be but small hopes of bringing to right again Men of so strange Dispositions and Notions yet they ought by no means to be left to themselves They have been often confuted by them that argued from the bare Principles of Christianity that is the Authority of Scriptures of the Old and New Testament which are the very Word of God And it has been plainly shewed them that what Alterations soever they have made in Socinus's Opinions yet their new Conceits are neither more Rational than his nor more agreeable to Divine Revelation I say that their Opinions are not more agreeable than his to right Reason For when all is done to affirm That Christ received from God an Infinite Power to govern the World without being essentially God is to affirm a downright Contradiction viz. that without partaking of the Divine Essence he received one of the Attributes which are Essential to God It is true some Popish Divines allow the Soul of Christ to be all-knowing by reason of its immediate Vnion to the Divine Nature wherein they do much service to the Socinians in holding as they do that a Creature is capable of receiving such Attributes But Protestant Divines reject this Notion as altogether false as false as many of the Schoolmens Speculations even the absurdest of them that are exploded by the Socinians They have been also further refuted as to what they aver that Justin Martyr was the first that taught the Doctrines of the Trinity of Christ's Eternal Godhead and of his Incarnation And at last that Learned Divine Dr. Bull having observed that the Jewish Tradition was favourable to those Doctrines of which the Socinians make Justin to have been the first Broacher Howsoever M. N. treats him for this neither like a Scholar nor a Christian I shall venture his displeasure in making out this Observation without meddling at all with his Arguments drawn from the Fathers to shew clearly that the like Exceptions of M. N. against Philo as being a Platonick and against the Ancient Jews and their Tradition can help him no way in the Cause he has taken in hand The Doctrine of our Church being the same which was taught by Christ and his Apostles it will be an easy matter to prove it by the same places of Scripture by which Christ and his Apostles converted the Jews and the Gentiles over to the Christian Faith and by which the Hereticks were confuted who followed or renewed the Errors which the Jews have fallen into since Christianity begun But I will go farther and prove that the Ancient Jewish Church yield the same Principles which Jesus Christ and his Apostles builded upon and by this Method it will plainly appear That the Socinians or the Unitarians let them call themselves what they please must either absolutely renounce the Authority of Scripture and turn downright Deists or they must own those Doctrines of the Trinity and the Divinity of Christ as being taught us by God himself in the Holy Scriptures and acknowledged by the Ancient Jewish Church THE TABLE OF THE CHAPTERS THE Preface Chap. I. The Design of this Book and what Matters it Treats of Page 1. Chap. II. That in the times of Jesus Christ Our Blessed Saviour the Jews had among them a common Explication of the Scriptures of the Old Testament grounded on the Tradition of their Fathers which was in many things approved by Christ and his Apostles Page 11. Chap. III. That the Jews had certain Traditional Maxims and Rules for the understanding of the Scripture Page 32. Chap. IV. That Jesus Christ and his Apostles proved divers points of the Christian Doctrine by his common Traditional Exposition received among the Jews which they could not have done at least not so well had there been only such a Literal Sense of those Texts which they alledged as we can find without the help of such
some of the Jews that held the Transmigration of Souls and say particularly That the Soul of Adam went into David and the Soul of David was the same with that of the Messias I say to pass by that the true Reason of such use of the Names of David and Elias is this because David was an excellent Type of the Messias that was to come out of his Loins Act. ii 30 31. And for John Baptist he came in the Spirit and Power of Elias Luk. 1.17 That is he was inspired with the same Spirit of Zeal and holy Courage that Elias was formerly acted with and employ'd it as Elias did in bringing his People to Repentance and Reformation 5. We ought to do the Jews that Justice as to acknowledge that from them it is that we know the true sense of all the Prophecies concerning the Messias in the Old Testament Which sense some Criticks seem not to be satisfied with seeking for a first accomplishment in other persons than in the Messias The Jews meaning and applying those Prophecies to the Messias in a mystical or a spiritual sense is founded upon a Reason that offers it self to the Mind of those that study Scripture with attention Before Jacob's Prophecy there was no time fixed for the Coming of the Messias but after the giving of that Prophecy Gen. xlix 10. there was no possibility of being deceived in the sense of those Prophecies which God gave from time to time full of the Characters of the Messias It was necessary 1. That the Kingdom should be in Judah and not cease till the time about which they expected the Coming of the Messias 2. That the lesser Authority called here the Law-giver should be also established in Judah and destroyed before the Coming of the Messias which we knew came to pass by the Reign of Herod the Great and some years before the Death of our Saviour And indeed the Talmudist say that forty years before the Desolation of the House of the Sanctuary Judgments of Blood were taken away from Israel Talm. Jerus l. Sanhedr c. dine mammonoth Talm. Bab. C. Sanhedr c. Hajou Bodekim And Raymondus Martini who writ this Pugio at the end of the XIIIth Century quotes Part III. Dist 3. c. 16. § 46. One R. Rachmon who says that when this happened they put on sackcloth and pull'd off their hair and said Wo unto us the Scepter is departed from Israel and yet the Messias is not come And therefore they who had this Prophecy before them could not mistake David nor Solomon nor Hezekiah for the Messias Nor could they deceive themselves so far as to think this Title was applicable to Zorobabel or any of his Successors In short there appeared not any one among the Jews before the Times of our Blessed Saviour that dared assume this Title of Messias although the Name of Anointed which the word Messias signifies had been given to several of their Kings as to David in particular But since Jesus Christ's coming many have pretended to it These things being so it is clear that the Prophecies which had not and could not have their accomplishment in those upon whose occasion they were first delivered were to receive their accomplishment in the Messias and consequently those Prophecies ought necessarily to be referred to him We ought by all means to be perswaded of this For we cannot think the Jews were so void of Judgment as to imagine that the Apostles or any one else in the World had a right to produce the simple words of the Old Testament and to urge them in any other sense than what was intended by the Writer directed by the Holy Ghost It must be his Sense as well as his Words that should be offered for proof to convince reasonable Men. But we see that the Jews did yield to such Proofs out of Scripture concerning the Messias in which some Criticks do not see the force of those Arguments that were convincing to the Jews They must then have believed that the true sense of such places was the literal sense in regard of the Messias whom God had then in view at his inditing of these Books and that it was not literal in respect of him who seems at first-sight to have been intended by the Prophecy And now I leave it to the Consideration of any unprejudiced Reader that is able to judge Whether if these Principles and Maxims I have treated of were unknown to the Jews the Apostles could have made any use of the Books of the Old Testament for their Conviction either as to the Coming of the Messias or the Marks by which he was distinguishable from all others or as to the several parts of his Ministry But this is a matter of so great importance as to deserve more pains to shew that Jesus Christ and his Apostles did build upon such Maxims as I have mentioned And therefore any that call themselves Christians should take heed how they deny the force and authority of that way of Traditional interpretation which has been anciently received in the Jewish Church CHAP. IV. That Jesus Christ and his Apostles proved divers points of the Christian Doctrine by this common Traditional Exposition received among the Jews which they could not have done at least not so well had there been only such a Literal Sense of those Texts which they alledged as we can find without the help of such Exposition IF we make some reflections which do not require a great deal of Meditation it is clear that Jesus Christ was to prove to the Jews that he was the Messias which they did expect many Ages ago and whose Coming they look'd on as very near He could not have done so if they had not been acquainted with their Prophetical Books and with those several Oracles which were contained in them Perhaps there might have been some difference amongst them concerning some of those Oracles because there were in many of them some Ideas which seem contrary one to another And that was almost unavoidable because the Holy Ghost was to represent the Messias in a deep humiliation and great suffering and in a great height of Glory But after all the method of calling the Jews was quite different from the method of calling the Gentiles They had the distinct knowledge of the chief Articles of Religion which the Heathen had not They had all preparations necessary for the deciding this great question Whether Jesus of Nazareth was the Messias or not They had the Sacred Books of the Old Testament they were acquainted with the Oracles as well as with the Law They longed after the coming of the Messias They had been educated all along and trained up in the expectation of him They had not only those Sacred Books in which the Messias was spoken of but many among them had gathered the Ideas of the Prophets upon that subject as we see by the Books of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus And indeed we see that Jesus
the Son of the Free-woman and Israel according to the Flesh by Ishmael the Son of the Bond-woman and having thus brought unbelieving Israel into Ishmael's place he proceeds upon the Old Jewish Nation recited in Baal-Hatturim that Ishmael should pierce Isaac with an Arrow which they illustrate by Gen. xvi 12. instead whereof the Text saith only that he laughed at or mocked Isaac We see St. Paul Rom. x. 6. applies to the Gospel those words of Deut. xxx 11 12 13 14. which seem to be spoken of the Law given by Moses to the Jews But then the Old Synagogue applied these words of Moses to the times of the Messias as is clear from Jonathan's Targum on the place which is enough to justify St. Paul's Usage of the words We read in the Song of Zacharias Luk. 1.69 that these words are referred to the Messias he hath exalted the horn of his Anointed The very same words are pronounced by Hannah the Mother of Samuel 1 Sam. ii 10. where the Targum referrs them in like manner as the sense of the Synagogue The same Targum understands of the Messias that passage 2 Sam. xxiii 3. And the lxx have the like Idea with the Targum which is a farther Confirmation of the Tradition of the Synagogue It is certain this Notion of the Messias was very common among the Jews otherwise they would not have thrust it into their Targums on places where naturally it ought not to come in For instance It is said 1 Kings iv 33. That Solomon discoursed of all the Trees from the Cedar of Libanus even to the Hyssop that springeth out of the Wall Now the Remark of the Targum hereupon is this And he prophecied touching the Kings of the House of David which should rule in this present World as also in the World to come of the Messias 6. We see our Lord Jesus Christ was careful to instruct the Pharisees of the two different Characters of the Coming of the Messias Luk. xvii 20. Of which the one was to be obscure and followed with the Death of the Messias the other was to be glorious and acknowledged by the whole World Christ instructed them in this the rather to remove their mistakes through which they confounded his two Comings Though in truth they were both of them confessed by the Jews for some time after Christ's ascension into Heaven 7. We see that Christ himself Matth. xxi 16. and also his Apostle St. Paul 1 Cor. xv 27. Eph. i. 21. Heb. ii 6 7 8. apply the words of Psal viii to the Messias How could they do it were it not before the sense of the Synagogue Now that such was the sense of the Synagogue ye see till this day if we read what they say in their Rabboth upon the Song of Songs ch iv 1. and upon Ecclesiastes ch ix 1. that the Children were to make Acclamations at the Coming in of the Messias the second Redeemer according to those words of Psal viii 3. Ex ore infantium c. Lastly We see St. Paul Rom. x. 18. does refer the words of Psal xix 4. to the Preaching of the Apostles and saith Their sound went over all the Earth and their words to the end of the World What would an unbelieving Jew have said to this that Paul should apply the Psalmist's words in this manner But the Apostle was secure against this or any other Objection from the Jews if he used the words in the sense of their Synagogue And that he did so there is little reason to doubt The Encomiums which David gave to the Law of Moses they would most readily apply to the Law of the Messias And they expected he should have his Apostles to carry his Law throughout the World To this expectation of theirs the Psalmist's words were very applicable That the Divine Word is called the Sun Philo plainly affirms and if I take R. Tanchum aright he understands that it was the Messias that was called the Sun of Righteousness Mal. iv 2. St. John saw Christ in that figure of the Sun and his Apostles as twelve Stars and that in Heaven which to him is the state of the Gospel Rev. xxi 1. According to this figure in this Psalm the Sun of Righteousness is described as a Giant which rejoyceth to run a Race v. 5. And here is a description of his Course together with that of his Disciples and of the manner by which they made their Voices to be heard This Idea shocked R. Samuel in a Book he writ before his Conversion ch 18. which he communicated with a Rabin of Morocco And whoever considers that Idea of the Writer of the Book of Wisdom xviii 5. shall find it is no other than that of this xixth Psalm mixed a little with that Idea in the Canticles which the Old Jews refer to the Messias and with that of the Song of Isaiah v. touching the Messias which served the Jews for a Commentary to understand the Song of Solomon by I could gather a much greater number of Remarks on this Head but having brought as many here together as I take to be sufficient for the proving of what I have said I think I ought not to enlarge any further So I come next to search out the Store-house where we may find these Traditions of the Jews which Jesus Christ and his Apostles made use of either in explaining or confirming the Doctrines of the Gospel They must be found in the ancient Books of the Jews which remain among us such as the Apocryphal Books the Books of Philo the Jew and the Chaldee Paraphrases on the Old Testament The Authority of all these ought to be well established Let us begin by the Apocryphal Books some of which Mr. N. hath ridiculed very boldly Then we shall consider what he has said to Philo whose Writings Mr. N. hath endeavoured to render useless in this Controversy How justly we shall consider in the next Chapters CHAP. V. Of the Authority of the Apocryphal Books of the Old Testament ALthough the Protestants have absolutely rejected the Apocryphal Books of the Old Testament which the Church of Rome make use of in Controversies as if they were of the same authority with the Books of the Law and Prophets notwithstanding they keep them as Books of a great antiquity And we make use of their authority not to prove any Doctrine which is in dispute as if they contained a Divine Revelation and a decision of an inspired Writer but to witness what was the Faith of the Jewish Church in the time when the Authors of those Apocryphal Books did flourish Any body who sees the Socinians making use of the Authorities of Artemas or of Paulus Samosatenus to prove that the Christian Church was in their opinion must grant the same authority to the Books of Wisdom Ecclesiasticus and the like touching the Sentiment of the Jewish Church in the age of those Writers Grotius a great Author for the Socinians was
so well satisfied of the truth of what I advance that he thought fit to Comment those very Apocryphal Books and to shew that they followed almost always the Ideas and the very words of the Authors of the Old Testament But as he was a Man of a deep sense seeing that they might be turned against the Socinian cause which he favoured too much he did things which he judged fit to make their authority useless against the Socinians And first he advanced without any proof that those things which were so like to the Ideas of the New Testament had been inserted in those Books by Christians according to their notions and not according to the notions of the Synagogue 2ly He endeavoured to give another sense to the places which some Fathers in the second and third Century had quoted from these Books to prove the Doctrine of the Trinity and the Divinity of our Saviour Now since the Socinian Authors have employed against the authority of these Apocryphal Books the very Solutions which Grotius made use of to lessen their authority it is necessary being resolved to quote them for the settling of the Jewish Tradition to shew how much Grotius whose steps the Socinians trod in was out in his Judgment 1. Then I suppose with Grotius that those Apocryphal Books were written by several Jewish Authors many years before Jesus Christ appeared The third Book of the Macchabees which is indeed the first hath been written by a Jew of Egypt under Ptolomaeus Philopater that is about two hundred years before the Birth of our Saviour It contains the History of the Persecution of the Jews in Egypt and was cited by Josephus in his Book de Macchabaeis The first Book of Macchabees as we call it now hath been written in Judea by a Jew and originally in Hebrew which is lost many Centuries ago We have the translation of it which hath been quoted by Josephus who gives often the same acccount of things as we have in that Book It hath been written probably 150. years before the Birth of our Saviour The second Book of Macchabees hath originally been written in Greek in Egypt and is but an extract of the four Books of Jason the Grecian a Jew of Egypt who had writ the History of the Persecutions which the Jews of Palestina suffered under the Reign of Antiochus Epiphanés and his Successors The Book of Ecclesiasticus hath been written Originally in Hebrew by Jesus the Son of Syrac about the time of Ptolomy Philadelphus that is about 280. years before Jesus Christ and was Translated in Greek by the Grandson of Jesus the Son of Syrac under Ptolomy Euergetes Some dispute if that Ptolomy is the first or the second which is not very material since there is but a difference of 100. years R. Azaria de Rubeis in his Book Meor Enaiim ch 22. witnesseth that Ecclesiasticus is not rejected now by the Jews but is received among them with an unanimous consent and David Ganz saith that they put it in old times among the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Hagiographes So in his Tsemac David ad A. 3448. The Book of Wisdom according to Grotius his Judgment is more ancient having been written in Hebrew under Simon the High-Priest who flourished under Ptolomeus Lagus Grotius thinks that the Greek Translation we have of that Book was made by some Christian who hath foisted into that Book many things which belong more to a Christian Writer than a Jew He raises such an accusation against the Translator of Ecclesiasticus But it is very easie to confute such a bold Conjecture First because that Book was in Chaldaick among the Jews till the Thirteenth Century as we see by Ramban in his Preface upon the Pentateuch and they never objected such an Interpolation but lookt upon it as a Book that was worthy of Salomon and probably his Works It was the Judgment of R. Azarias de Rubeis in the last Century Imre bina ch 57. The Epistle of Baruch and of Jeremy seem to Grotius the Writings of a Pious Jew who had a mind to exhort his People to avoid Idolatry And 't is very probable that it was Penned under the Persecutions of Antiochus when it was not sure to any to write in favour of the Jewish Religion under his own name The Book of Tobith seems to have been writ originally in Chaldaick and was among the Jews in St. Jerom's time who knowing not the Chaldaick Tongue called for a Jew to his assistance to render it into Hebrew that so he might render it in Latin as he saith in his Preface to Chromatius and Heliodorus Grotius supposes the Book to be very ancient Others believe but without any ground that it was Translated into Greek by the Seventy So that it would have been writ more than 250. years before Jesus Christ Whatsoever Conjecture we may form upon the Antiquity of it it is certain it was in great esteem among Christians in the second Century since we see that Clemens Alexandrinus and Irenaeus have followed his fancy of seven created Angels about the Throne of God and took that Doctrine for a Truth although we see no such Idea among the Jews who have the Translation of that Book but do not now consider it very much Grotius thinks that the Book of Judith contains not a true History but an Ingenious Comment of the Author who lived under Antiochus Epiphanés before the Profanation of the Temple by that Tyrant to exhort the Jewish Nation to expect a wonderful Deliverance from such a Tyranny which they groaned under And we see no reason to discard such a Conjecture although R. Azarias thinks Imre bina ch 51. that this History was alluded to in the Book of Esdras ch 4.15 He judges the same of the Additions to the Book of Daniel viz. the Prayer of Azaria the Song of the Three Children in the Furnace and of the History of Susanna he looks upon them as written by some Hellenist Jew So the Additions to the Book of Esther he judges to be the work of some Hellenist who invented the Story which were afterwards admitted among the Holy Writings because they were Pious and had nothing which could be lookt upon as contrary to the Jewish Religion Grotius saith nothing of the third and fourth of Esdras and hath not judged them fit to be Commented probably because they are not accounted in the Canon of the Church of Rome And indeed the fourth is only extant in Latin But after all a Man must have viewed the third with very little judgment who cannot perceive first that it is certainly the work of an ancient Jew before Jesus Christ his time 2ly That it was among the Jews as a Book of great Authority Josephus p. 362. follows the Authority of that third Book of Esdras in the History of Zorobabel We have not ancienter Writers than Clemens Alexandrinus St. Cyprian and St. Ambrose who have quoted the 4th Book of
thus 1. we find in many places the connexion of one History with another which is very often the imagination of a Rabbin who fancied what he pleased and fathered it upon Moses 2. We find Explications in these later Targums different from the former ones yet added to the former with an impudence not to be endured and this in several places 3. We there find long Narrations which have no other foundation than their method of explaining Scripture by the way of Notarikon as they call it as where we read of the five Sins of Esau which he committed on the same day in which he sold his birthright to Jacob and in pursuance of their manner of explaining Scripture by Gematria of which Rittangel on Jetzira has given some examples p. 31 32 33. But all this makes nothing against the authority of those places in the Paraphrase where they do little more than render the Text out of Hebrew into Chaldee In them there was no occasion to shew any more than the sense of the words such as the Paraphrasts had received by Tradition from their Forefathers Whereas the Authors of those Additions thereby made a shew of Learning out of the common road and gave themselves the pleasure to see their own fictions come into such credit that they were received as the Oracles of God But beyond that we must take notice that as on one hand those Targums have been enlarged by so many Additions so on the other hand they have been altered in many places and new Ideas substituted to the old To shew the alteration which was made in those Targums by Modern Jews we can remark a thing which hath been often taken notice of by Buxtorf in his Lexicon Talmud viz. that there are many places cited from those Targums 500 years ago by the Author of Aroule that are not to be found in them as they are now in Print So we can prove clearly that new Ideas have been put in instead of the old chiefly upon the points controverted between Jews and Christians For in many places where St. Jerome in his Comments upon the Prophets brings the common explication of the Jews as agreeing with the explication of Christians we find the Targum brings an explication quite different from what it was to be according to St. Jerome's account It appears by this the Jews have done in their Books the same thing which Papists have done in the Books of the Fathers They have added many things to help their Cause and they have cut out many places which might have done great service to Truth As for the Additions then I will scarce cite any of them but when it is evident that they speak the sense of the Ancients and truly whatever one may say of the Corruptions of these Jewish Paraphrases I will maintain that it is as easie for an attentive Reader to distinguish these Corruptions from the ancient Text which it seems Arias Montanus had a design to do in a particular Treatise as it is for one that looks on an old Pot or Kettle to tell where the Tinker has been at work and to distinguish his Clouts from the Original metal The ancient pieces have a sort of simplicity that makes them to be valued and which easily shews their antiquity The Additions are the rambling fancies of bold Commentators which they devised in later times as occasion required and thrust them upon the ancient Paraphrasts who lived in those times when there was no such occasion nor could they foresee that there would be any such in after-times As for example we do not find that the Jews before Christ's time ever spoke of two Messias the one the Son of David who was to reign gloriously the other a suffering Messias the Son of Joseph of the Tribe of Ephraim The reason is plain for they had no occasion for that fancy of a suffering Messias That arose upon their Disputes with the Christians who proved that the Sufferings of Christ were no other than what the Messias was to suffer according to the Prophecies of Scripture At first the Jews tried other ways to avoid the force of these Prophecies but when no other would do they came to this to devise another Messias the Son of Joseph and to give him the Sufferings which the Scripture attributes to the Messias the Son of David In a word all these Conceits of which the greatest part of these Additions do consist do so evidently demonstrate their Novelty that when one is acquainted with a little of the History of the World as well as that of the Jews it is scarce possible that he should take them for the Text of Jonathan or of the ancient Paraphrasts Besides all this in the Modern Paraphrases themselves we find very often these words Another Targum and sometimes yet Another Targum which shews that the following words are not the ancient Targum but are the Additions of some Modern Authors whom the Copyers of the Paraphrasts have joyned as a new light to the ancient Whether the Jews's inserting such things into their Paraphrases has been out of fondness of these Discoveries which appeared to them new or whether they have found it turn to account to insert these Additions in the Body of their ancient Paraphrases thereby to enhance the value of them or whether they thought by publishing them under the Names of those ancient Commentators whose Authority is so venerable to wrest from the Christians all the advantages they might draw from any thing in their Paraphrases the things that they added being oftentimes contrary to what the Ancients did teach is a secret among the Jews but a secret little worth since the Providence of God has preserved the Apocryphal Books and the Books of Philo which can give us so much light into the knowledg of what is ancient and what is modern in these Paraphrases I will add nothing upon this matter but this that we see in the most ancient Books of the Jews as in the Books call'd Rabboth Mechista and in their old Midrashim almost all composed before the 7th Century and in the Talmud of Babylon the same Ideas and the same Doctrine which we meet in the Apocryphal Books and in Philo's Writings And those Ideas have been constantly followed by the most considerable part of the Jews those very Men who have their name from their constant sticking to the old Tradition of their Forefathers CHAP. VIII That the Authors of the Apocryphal Books did acknowledg a Plurality and a Trinity in the Divine Nature HAving finished our General Reflexions on the Traditional Sense of the Scriptures which was receiv'd among the Jews before the time of our Lord Jesus Christ and of the Books wherein we can find such a Tradition it is time we should come to the chief matter we designed to treat of The Question is Whether the Jews before Christ's time had any notion of a Trinity For the Socinians would make us believe that Justin
thou Bethlehem Ephratah though thou be little among the thousands of Judah yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel whose goings forth have been from of old from everlasting The Jews can't deny this But then to evade what is there spoken of his Eternity they pretend it means no more than his descent from David as if the distance of time from David to Jesus Christ could be called Eternity This is the way Manasseh ben Israel q. 5. on Micah takes to get over this difficulty Before him others took another way and affirmed that God decreed before the Creation of the World to send the Messias and that in this respect it is said in Micah that his goings forth are from the days of eternity Jeremy ch xxiii 26. saith very expresly that the Messias shall be called the Jehovah our Righteousness and he repeats the same ch xxxiii 15 16. In those days and at that time will I cause the Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the Land In those days shall Judah be saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely And this is the Name wherewith he shall be called The Lord our Righteousness R. David Kimchi owns it and quotes the Authority of two Eminent Rabbins for it namely R. Aba Bar Caana and R. Levi in Eccha Rabati But they will none of them own that this Name Jehovah belongs any otherwise to him than it doth to the Ark which is altogether impertinent for the Ark is never called Jehovah nor doth Menasseh prove that it is with all his talking q. 18. in Isaiah Jonathan as well as Philo ascribes to the Messias the Prophecies Zech. vi 12 13. And so Jonathan applies to the Messias what is said in the same Prophet But many of the Modern Jews among whom R. Salomon is one do refer them to Zorobabel These several places I have now mentioned may serve as a Sample of the confusion the Jews are in while they attempt to interpret the ancient Prophecies and I may confidently affirm that all those other places which I have omitted that intimate a Trinity or the Divinity of the Messias or the time when he should come into the World are in like manner explained so very triflingly and forcedly as that oftentimes their own Authors convinced by the Evidence of the Texts themselves have refuted them and given a new Interpretation of them Whence it comes to pass that their Reader can find no certain sense of those Texts to rest on but his understanding continues in an entire darkness and unsetledness This ill luck they have of Explications is not of yesterday as I have already observed Soon after Jesus Christ's time they set themselves to oppose what the Christians held of the two Comings of the Messias though so distinctly described one of them Zech. ix 9. and the other Dan. vii 13. And still to this day do they reject that Notion of his two Comings as may be seen in Menass on Zech. ix p. 185. But others of them who found it impossible to deny that the Scripture speaks of two Comings of the Messias whom they expected thought it better to make two Messias's than to acknowledg that the Messias whom they expected was to be a suffering Messias And thus they thought they removed the difficulties in the other opinion that made but one Coming of the Messias by owning the Messias the Son of Joseph should be a Man of sorrows but Messias the Son of David was to be a Glorious Deliverer As the Jews Disputes with the Christians encreased they advanced certain Characters of the Times of the Messias and all of them very miraculous which they inferred from some Allegorical Descriptions in the Prophets concerning the Times of the Messias These they run up to ten as we see in Shemoth Rabba Parascha 15. And they make a great use of those Miracles which they conceive should have been in the time of Jesus Christ if he had been the true Messias Notwithstanding all which Menasse q. 7. on Isaiah finds himself obliged to assure us that David Kimchi and Abarbanel and many Interpreters explain most of these passages as Allegorical Descriptions of the Times of the Messias And Maimonides is of this opinion that when the Messias comes there shall be no change in the Order of Nature Jad Chaz Lib. de Regibus And in that he follows the opinion of one Rabbi Samuel that is quoted in the Talmud Tit. Beracoth where he saith that there shall be not any difference between the Times of the Messias and the other Times of the World but the subduing of the Kingdoms by the Messias To conclude the Jews being so often deceived in their Expectations of the Messias and finding themselves abused by a great number of false pretenders to that Character have almost lost their hopes of his Coming And finding his Coming to be a thing uncertain few of them do regard the Promise of the Messias with that assurance with which the Ancients did expect it Indeed it is observable that though Maimonides professes to own the Messias and hath inserted the hope of it among the Articles of the Jewish Faith which he hath given us yet he otherwhere speaks very indifferently of it In one place he asserts the observation of Moses's Law and the recompenses annexed to it to be the chief end of the Jews enquiry and not the time of the Messias's appearance as we are informed by the Author of the Chain of the Cabala The same judgment may be made of Joseph Albo who writ with great bitterness against the Christians For 1. he maintains in his Book of the Principles that R. Hillel was no Apostate though he denied the coming of any other Messias but of Hezekiah who was already come And Albo gives this reason for it because the Coming of the Messias is no Fundamental Article of the Jewish Religion Orat. 1. chap. 1. Nothing can be more wretched than this excuse of his For if the Messias had come before the Babylonian Captivity as R. Hillel would have it in the Person of King Hezekiah and if no other was to be expected why did the Jewish Church take those Books into her Bible that were written by the Prophets that lived under the second Temple and why did not R. Hillel and his Followers declare against them as false Prophecies that spoke of the Messias as being yet to come namely Zechary Haggai and Malachy who did all Prophecy of the Messias as has been abundantly shewn with Proofs out of the Targums of those Books and the general consent of Jewish Writers 2. The same Albo is not afraid to assert That the Article of the Messias has no other foundation than the authority of Tradition For saith he there is not any Prophecy either in the Law or in the Prophets that foretells his Coming by any necessary Exposition of it with respect to