why they used not Altars and Incense because they were strangers and under the Government of Kingdomes and States that would not suffer them to have that libertie But this he answers to that it is no good reason for Kings and States that suffer them to have Synagogues and meetings and communion in a Jewish manner would permit them this also as well as the former they who grant a greater thing in all likelihood will not deny them a lesser matter So that the conclusion he would make is this God in his anger hath bereft us of King Priest Temple Altars Sacrifice the great things of our Law therefore he would have us leave all other our Iewish Rites also because it is manifest for our sinnes he would have us deprived of all and besides turn us to Christ who hath put an end to all Iudaicall observances Many of the Jews acknowledge that Sacrifices and Ceremonies were not to be perpetuall but to continue for a time onely and by the Messias to be abrogated In their Talmud they have this to that purpose In the world to come all sacrifices shall be annihilated except the sacrifice of Confession i. e. of praise So the Aegyptian Moses writes that in the time of the Messias all things shall be licensed which were prohibited According to that saying The Lord looseth them that are bound up and there cannot be a greater proof than this that even mulier menstruata shall be licensed by God at that time In the Talmud speaking of unclean things as the Sow it is questioned Why is a Sow called Hazer It is answered Because God will return it once to Israel that is give them libertie to eat of it Hazire signifying reversion or returning Wherefore by the judgement of divers of their Doctors they doe at this day unlawfully in counting any meats unclean by the old Rule of their Law seeing the Messias was beleeved should set these very Creatures at libertie that they should not be bound up from free use by any Bond of Ceremoniall uncleannesse as they were heretofore When the Vail of the Temple was rent all Legall Ceremonies were to be rent also The Jews acknowledge they have nothing to do now with Sacrifices as their Ancestors had because they are scattered from their own land and their Temple is destroyed which was the place destined for Sacrifices to be offered up to God yet instead of Sacrifices they will do something they redeem their Sacrifices with words and comfort themselves with this as if God did accept it as well as any Sacrifice that they read over Gods precepts in the Law about the kindes and manner of Sacrificing and so they make use of or rather abuse those words of the Prophet We will offer up to God the calves of our lips Which were a good Sacrifice if they were good lips confessing Christ and guided by holy hearts onely relying and trusting in the all-meriting Sacrifice of Christs blood Their R. Simeon saith they despised three things and cast them off in that speech We have no part in David nor have we inheritance in the sonne of Iesse 1. The Kingdome of Heaven 2. The house of David 3. The Temple of the Lord. But the later Jews have cast off these three things farre more despitefully in casting off Christ And having thrown off God and his Temple why may he not throw away them and their sacrifices The conclusion is against the Jews that they do against ground and reason retain some part of their Jewish service and let other parts be lost as that of Altars oyntment and sacrifice If one be good all is good because all is of the same root If God have abolished some he would have them abolish all and he grants the Jews are non-plust and have nothing to say in this argument when it is urged by the Christians CHAP. III. IN this Chapter the Translator tells us he findes much diversity in the Phrases of the Scripture as they are in the Originall Hebrew and as he findes them quoted by his Rabbi Samuel who being among the Turks follows the Arabicke Bible and therefore he would have the Reader note that he quotes the Scriptures according to R. Samuels Book that he may prove himself a faithfull interpretour It is a pretie note of R. Samuel that the first Captivitie is called but a Transmigration or a passing over into another Land which seems to be a word of hope that promised them they should come back again But this last is named by a hopelesse name a desolation to let them see it is a perpetuall Captivity That of transmigration or removing may bee seene 2 King 17. 23. 2 King 24. 3. But this is a desolation Dan. 9. 27. and the abomination of desolation A twofold misery he findes to pursue this Captivitie more than the other 1. In the other they had Prophets in Babylon to comfort them Ezekiel Haggai Zacharie but in this Captivity no true Prophets preach deliverance Prophecie and Vision ceaseth 2. Again in that other Captivity they were all together in one Kingdome and company of known friends Countrey-men breaks the strong waves of an evill but here they are dispersed into all Countries and can converse with few of their own but meer strangers both by Countrey and Religion And this is a sad thing that they sit solitary like a Sparrow upon the house top This the Lord threatned to make their Chaine heavy The Lord shall scatter thee among all the people from one end of the earth even to the other c. This Samuel acknowledges and calls Daniel a Prophet of God which divers of the great and learned Jews will not admit yet he all over honours him and quotes his Prophecie in this matter of the Messia It seems this man had rather cleave to Christ who calls him a prophet Matth. 24. 15. then to his great Talmudists and Rabbies who will needs be great by lessening some of Gods greatest Prophets Porchetus a great and deep inquirer into Hebrew Learning proves by Jewish Tradition that Daniel was held by them a Prophet and be further faith that among the Jews none could be found so strangely foolish to deny the Spirit of Prophesie to Daniel but onely one wicked Sadduce called Porphyrius who being convict with the clearnesse of his Prophecie concerning Christ he falls like a bitter Dogge a barking against the truth and sanctitie of Daniels Propheticall testimony Of this Porphyrie Hierome speaks in his Epistle proaemiall to the Comment on Daniel to Pammachius and Marcella where he saith this Porphyrie writt his twelfth Book against Daniel whom Eusehius confuted in three Volumes But besides Porphyrie Porchetus might have seen some more denying Daniel properly to be called a Prophet of God as the great Moses Ben Maimon who saith our Nation with an unanimous consent hath placed the book of Daniel in Kethubhim among the holy Writers but not among
the Prophets And the same account and reckoning they make of Davids Psalms Salomons Books Esther Iob and the Books of Chronicles They say these were writt as they were moved by the holy Spirit but it was not vera pura Prophetia But who will may see against this Daniel proved to be a Prophet of God out of Moses Ben Maimons own Characters of a Prophet by Constantine L' Emperour Against this opinion which makes Daniel a Prophet but metaphorically or by way of Translation Guil. Vorstius may be lookt after also in his Annotations on Maimonides de fundam Legis ad cap. 7. Cunaeus de Repub. Hebr lib. 3. cap. 7. CHAP. IV. HE rightly speaks of the blindnesse of the Jews so their estate in the new Testament is called For judgment am I come into this world saith our Saviour that they which see not might see and that they which see might be made blinde God hath given them the spirit of slumber eyes that they should not see c. Blindnesse in part is hapned unto Israel untill c. That which is here said that it is perpetuall Paul saith better for them then R. Samuel It shall not be alwayes but till the fulnesse of the Gentiles be come in and then all Israel shall be saved CHAP. VI. IN this Chapter he is very earnest to apply that prophecie of Amos the selling of the Righteous for Silver to be Israels sinne in selling Jesus the Righteous Sonne of God for thirty pieces of Silver Our Christian interpretors and Expositors do not go that way to apply it onely to Christ but make it to be the sin of injustice cruell oppression against the poor and needy selling away their person and Cause for Bribes Some have a glance at this Jewish exposition yet cannot fully like it though this Jew found the Christians in his dayes much bent to expound it as he does and let him be wittie this way to apply all to the Jews sinne if so be it may heal their sore CHAP. VII THe seventh Chapter arises out of his former discourse and he layes it downe that the Prophet Amos his Just man sold for silver is Jesus the Just the Saviour of the Christians he beleeves it is meant of no other This indeed is true 1. That Jesus the Just was sold for silver 2. That this was the Jews sinne 3. That this sinne of selling and murdering Jesus is the Gate that lets in all their miserie Onely here the Jew in a fourth thing has us not so fully agreeing that the Prophet Amos doth directly and especially point at this sin in this place Here the Jew is more against his own Jews than the Christians are and it shews his pious intention to finde out the grievousnesse of their sinne that takes up any Scripture that may seem to indigitate it to bring his people to repentance In this Chapter he admirably and with a Beam of Christian light applies the 53 of Esay to Jesus Christ as a Christian Expositor opens divers things in it As likewise that excellent and Torchlike place of Zacharie which gives clear light in this truth undenyably looking at Christ For other Scriptures look at his good meaning and pardon his Application That 53. of Esay exceedingly straitens the learned Jews and puzzles them in their Expositions to make it fit for some other rather than Christ Jesus but divers of them are enforced to apply it to Christ Of the Application of the 53 of Esay to Christ the Messias Hieronymus de sancta fide a converted Iew gives us his sure word that divers of their Rabbins go that way as R. Osua in Sanhedrin and R. Jose Galiaeus in a Book called Zifrat Lord Morney brings in others of their Doctors fitting this Chapter to him as R. Vla veniat sed absit ut videam Let him come but farre be it from me that I should see him meaning his wounds and sufferings will be so grievous as men will hide their faces from him And upon Ruth on these words Dip thy morsell in the Vinegar their Midrasch or Commentary hath it The morsell is the bread of the King Messias who shall be broken for our sinnes and shall indure great torments as was foreteld by Esay To stop the mouthes of all Iewes R. Simeon the sonne of Johni a chiefe one of them writes as if he were cloathed with the Sunne Wo saith he to the men of Israel for they shall slay the Christ And God shall send unto them his sonne cloathed with mans flesh that he may wash and cleanse them and they shall slay him R. Iohanan pitches truly upon the very time of Iesus Christs exercising his Ministery upon earth agreeable to the Historie Evangelicall of his life Three years and a half saith he the presence of God did crie upon Mount Olivet Seek the Lord while he may be found and call upon him while he is near Which is â—ust the common computation of the time of Iesus Christs preaching from his Baptisme to his Passion Here let it be noted once for all that this Doctour doth altogether call Christ the Iust or Righteous One an excellent name agreeing with the Scripture that calls him so proving in him there was no sinne no unrighteousnesse â—o guile and therefore he was fit to be Jehovah Tsidkenu The Lord our Righteousnesse Peter preaching to the Iews concerning Christ saith They denyed the holy One and the Iust and Stephen in his Sermon calls him the Iust One. So Ananias called Christ that Iust One. Among the Iewish Doctours it is ordinary to call Christ by this name by way of excellency The earth saith one of them standeth but upon one Pillar and the Iust One is his Name as it is in the Book of Proverbs Chap. 10. In the end of the Chapter the Iew alledges the agreement of the Gospels relation to the Prophets prediction concerning Christs death wherein like a Christian he flies from the Iews and cloaths himself with the Christians Armour of light beleeving the Gospell which professed Iews hate with an indeleble hatred CHAP. IX X XI IN these Chapters he proves that Christ shall have a double comming First in basenes and humility then secondly in Majesty and glory Sometimes onely he teaches Scripture to speak more then is intended as in that place of Esay because it is said Awake Awake twice he will have it to mean Christs double Comming And that of David For he commeth for he commeth is twice repeated because Christ shall twice appear saith R. Samuel But the truth is clearer then that he need these witty though sometimes weak allegations That Christs second comming shall be to judgement and with Fire and glorious Majestie he rightly and Orthodoxly holds and proves It is a rare Testimony to the credit of our Christian Baptism that he
interpretation that if they finde not great things yet they wil accept good indeavors of him that would gladly teach himself if he by these cannot teach others these being the rapt houres or the harmlesse Scholler-rapines from his preaching Studies in which I hope to finde some that will give mee the Eloquent and holy Pelusiots censure He that knows not how to teach but is very willing to learn he is worthy to be accepted And however some doe like that of the Preaching King the best that of making and so of reading many books there is no end and much study is a wearinesse of the flesh yet we may with as good reason hearken to Paul as wise as Salomon to give all attendance to reading neither doth the one crosse the other for Salomon 't is thought did not intend a non-tearm about the reading of Divine things of which his Father had said the blessed man should meditate day and night but the Books that hee draws from his Son or his Student are Gentile Volumes and Heathenish writings on which he should not be too eagerly bent for therein would be more wearinesse to the body than profit to the soule and yet even they are to be used so as they may be Giâ—eonites help to cleave wood or draw water for the Sanctuarie Next to Scripture Jewish state and Jewish â—earning is to be sought into as an help to us as a weapon against them after both which wee doe but grope with a great deal of purblindnes in this Tract yet I furnish my self with some considerations of their condition and call upon others to see how the judgements of God are a great deepe The work in the Originall is none of mineâ— Alieno thuribulo rem sacram facio I doe but with the Tailor translate the old garment and make it new yet that has some labour because it is an old peece and is brought out of rudenesse being from good Arabick translated into mean Latin whence I have it The Annotations have the more labour calling me to peruse divers Authors to explaine and fullier to declare Jewish matters and to shew how admirably this converted Jew kisses Jesus What ever wee desire bee accomplished upon earth this I am sure would make wonderfully for our comfort and Christs glory that all Jews were converted and spoke with one Lip as our Rabbi Samuel of Marocco that the great sin of sins is the rejecting of Jesus Christ that all are and shall be cursed as the Jews that will not beleeve in him and that this is life eternall to know God and whom he hath sent Iesus Christ O the blessedness of those times of the Church of the Jews and Gentiles sweetly commixt in one when they shall all speake the same Language Hosanna's to the Son of David this will be as the Resurrection from the dead O Jesus the fulnesse of Grace and Truth bring in the fulnesse both of Jews and Gentiles I make sometimes a digression in the Notes but I dare say who duely weighs it will not say it is a transgression for it is to good purpose to bring in something which may allure and benefit the Reader both with variety and with utilitie And surely I never look into these records of Jewish misery and Divine Justice but I seeme to be amazed with the Justice of God and the hard-heartednesse of that people that now seem as if they had never known God nor any of their Seed were ever known of him O that they would read these Books of their owne converted Brethren who deale with them by the old Testament with weapons out of their own Armorie which they honour and almost adore How cursed are they that must either pull out their own eyes or pull in peeces the Scriptures or they can no way maintain that Jesus is not the Christ the promised Messias He mentions very little of the new Testament for that is Apocryphall to the Jew We must deal with Heathens that are rude by reason libro creaturae we must deal with Philosophers and learned Atheists by reason and arguments spunn upon the best Wheele of Wit and approved Authors and witnesses ex libro literaturae but with Jews ex libro Scripturae the Book of Scripture of Moses and Prophets is our onely Shield Sword Spear and Bow which never return in vain from the Battell These our Authour uses abundantly and never strikes but speeds leaving the Jewes dead upon the place and slaine with their own weapons I request the readers eyes but his heart and judgement also to goe along with them he shall finde some addition to his knowledge or some exuscitation to his affections he may in the end conclude there is some profit by the translation notes as well as by the Authors first draught and it may be he never had heard of the autographon but by the Translator I conclude with that Jewish Apologue The Clusters of Grapes sent out of Babylon to implore favour for the Leaves of the Vine for if there were no Leaves you haâ— lost the Grapes Let Rabbi Samuels be the Clusters and the Translatours the Leaves yet remember you had not most of readers met with his grapes but for the Translators Leaves The Lord perswade Christians to open their eyes and earnestly to lay to heart the Jewish blindnesse and as earnestly to pray that the Lord would perswade Shem to come and dwell in the Tents of Japhet and take away the Hebrew Vail from the heart that they may be turned to the Lord that there may be one Fold and one Shepherd But who shall live when God doth this The Preface to the Booke together with a large Diatriba or Discourse concerning the estate of the Jews and and their miserie all over the World By the English Translatour NO way out of the way will it be in a prefatory Discourse to render the Reasons of putting out a Treatise concerning the State Condition and Doctrine of the Jewes in these times in which the Hearts of men are much erected to looke after and beleeve a Chiliasme and the Reigne of a thousand years in glorious posture upon earth which is much applauded and expected and that upon too many Jewish Grounds and Arguments I would wish none of these times begin to imbrace divers things in consonancy with them and some as madd as Iulian bend their faith or fancie rather to thinke of a re-edification of the long-ruined Jerusalem and judge it were none of the worst enterprizes to go to that unholy Land and be taken up into Heaven there of which imaginations I cannot thinke but that of the judicious Philosopher must needs be given in advice unto such Keep at a good distance these waxen opinions from the hot beams of the Sun of Truth lest they become liquid and you lose them running away in the melting How is the Creation Sabbath taken up and that
Lord of Hosts mighty in battell is the Prince of Glory Certain and plain it is O Master that this righteous Lord of Hosts had no battell but in his first comming for in his last comming who shall dare fight with him for when he shall sit on his Seat of judgement and a fire round about him shall flame and burn up his enemies and shall purifie the righteous by fire as it were silver and all this in his last comming then none shall fight against him no place shall there be for any to resist him by battell Of the exaltation of this Righteous One the Prophet Esay speaks Who is that that commeth from Edom with garments dyed red from Bozrah this that is glorious in his apparell And the righteous One thus makes answer I that speak righteousnesse a Defender to salvation mighty to save The Angels then say unto him Why are thy garments red like him that treadeth the Wine-fat He answers them again I have trodden the Winepresse alone and there was not a man with me See here O Master how properly Esay speaks yea I fear the answer of this righteous one much toucheth us and none but us when he saith I have trod them in mine anger and their blood is sprinkled upon my garments and I have stained all my raiment For the day of vengeance is in my heart and the yeer of retribution is come O where have we any hopes in that Righteous One when we see that he complaines of us to the Angels in Heaven and makes knowne to them that he trod the Winepresse alone Whom as it that he trod in his wrath but us who after the Battell in his first comming hath thrown us down and we lie prostrate and trampled under foot now a thousand yeers and still there is a black day of vengeance waits for us in his last comming and a year of retribution is in his heart I would to God O Master when we with murderous hands slew the Prophet Esay wee had laid hands upon this Prophecie also and quite blotted out this fair authoritie out of his Booke that no eye might ever have beheld or read it against us And you may observe that which David cals a Battell The Lord of Hosts mighty in Battell Esay calls a Wineptesse Alas for us O Master we drink that new sweet Wine of which Iacob the Patriarch and Prophet speaks in the Book of the Generation of the Creatures that is Children of Judah He washed his cloathes in the blood of the Grape as it is falne out in us at the first comming of the Messiah that is We washed our garments in his Blood But what shall we wretches do in his last comming when all men shall stand before this man comming to judgement and a furious fire shall be ready to devour them round about him against whom he shall pronounce sentence Then is the time of Battell ceast he shall be no more then trod in the Winepresse then shall there be neither place nor time for repentance all refuge shall then fail onely Justice shall remain that as he was unjustly judged when they found no sinn in him so he shall justly judge all sinners For God saith in the Prophesie of Salomon If the righteous receive judgement where shall be the wicked and the sinner If the righteous scarcely be saved what shall then become of the ungodly CHAP. XIII He more strongly proves the corporall Ascension of Christ FEar as a Furie haunts me O Master and possesses me with this that those Testimonies recited by me out of the Prophets are all as points drawn from the Circumference and meeting all in that Just One as their Center viz. That he was sold for silver as the Prophet Amos avouches That he trod the Winepresse as Esay averrs That he was in battell with our Fathers as David affirms That he was caught as in a Net by our sins as Jeremie alledges That he was wounded in his hands as Zacharie asserts That upon his Vesture they cast Lotts as David assents That he ascended into Heaven as the same Prophet and others with an unanimous testimonie give up Which is not compatible nor can it stand with meer God considered in his Divine Essence and nature for the Deitie has neither Resurrection Exaltation Descension or Session properly Out of what hath been said this must issue with a necessary consequence That this Righteous one is already come to whom all the foresaid things very aptly agree and are fitly accommodated to his corporeall and humane nature which he assumed Now because O Master I know how hardly this enters into thy beliefe as a most improbable paradox that a man should bodily ascend into Heaven ponder these authorities and examples which we meet with in Scripture which underprop and confirm this truth In the first place I rank the Prophet David who saith God hath ascended on high he hath led captivitie captive and given gifts to men Again he speaketh of his Ascension Sing unto God and glorifie his name make way for him that ascendeth from the Western parts the Lord is his name Again David speaks of him in that Psalm which thou hast in thine heart Sing praises to God that ascends above the heaven of heavens to the East After him the Prophet Amos in like manner saith It is the Lord that hath built his Seat on high Of him again the Prophet David God is gone up with a shout the Lord with the sound of a Trumpet Likewise the Prophet Aser in his second Chapter saith I saw a man descending from the midst or heart of the Sea and he came up to heaven But because we want that Prophecie I omit to write many other things which that Prophet hath concerning this And yet wee have that Prophet but he knew not then that he who is Aggaeus in Latine is the same with Aser in the Arabick tongue Moses in his Song saith I lift up my hand to Heaven So Esay Awake or Arise arise O Arm of the Lord. Hannah the Mother of Samuel sings The Lord shall give strength unto his King and exalt the Horn of his Anointed David again The Lord ascended upon the wings of the winde These authorities have I met with in Scripture serving to prove the corporeall Ascension of Christ into heaven Many more there are to this purpose as thou O Master very well knowest Now will I annex some examples out of our Law to follow these Authorities being a thing so convenient for the establishing our belief in the point of Christs bodily ascent into Heaven This in the first place must be taken into consideration that the true and glorious God hath assumed and translated to himself out of the earth many holy men among our forefathers as the Law and Prophets will witnesse and if we doubt not of the ascent of these induced to beleeve it for the sanctitie of the men
these sonnes of strangers which came to the house of God but the Gentiles who serving Idols were meer strangers to God they their Princes and their Kings of whom God said They shall walk in the light of his holy house and we thrust out shall remain in darknesse and we indeed are in darknesse and have beene fearfully benighted a thousand years and upward Still that Prophet of that people Behold thou shalt call a Nation that thou knowest not and Nations that knew not thee shall runne unto thee Now our eyes de facto do testifie it a thousand years and more have worne out themselves since the Christ came that was sent according to the Law given to us And the Gentiles which knew not the Law they came to him and he has given them a new a pure an holy law Besides this in the five and fortieth Chapter They agreed together and their Kings were gathered together in the beliefe of God I much fear O Master that is meant of them Assemble your selves come and draw near ye that are escaped of the Nations and I am found of them that sought me not Jeremie speaks of them The Nations shall be gathered to the Name of the Lord in his holy House nor shall they walk any more after the imagination of their evill heart The same Prophet To thee shall all the Gentiles come from the utmost ends of the earth saying Our fathers have inherited iniquitie and lies Zephanie the Prophet follows this stream The Gentiles shall all call on the name of the Lord and shall serve him with one shoulder every man from his place and all the Isles of the Nations Zacharie brings his part to this truth Sing and rejoyce O daughter of Zion lo I come and will dwell in the midst of thee saith the Lord and many Nations shall be joyned to the Lord. Again in the 8. Chapter Thus saith the Lord of Hosts many nations shall come from many places and every man shall say to his neighbour Let us go and seek the Lord our God for good All these things O Master are now fulfilled and the effects of them abide plainly before our eyes you see people and languages brought home to God and studying the Law all the Prophets and Book of Psalmes to which they were strangers and have left their Idols to imbrace the Truth None of them are brought to this belief by the hand of Moses or Aaron or any of our Prophets And since their hearts were turned to beleeve in that Righteous One of whom Habackuk saith Thou wentest forth for the salvation of thy people with thine Anointed they have utterly abdicted and abandoned all their Idols no Idolatry since that has remained amongst them CHAP. XVII Of the quickning and giving life to Gentiles and slaying the Jews MY fears O Master beat as continually as my Pulse and in this I tremble to think that the powerfull and glorious God as with one hand hee gives life to the Gentiles by faith so with the other hand he slayes us in our incredultie Doth not Esay indigitate and point out this Because when I called ye did not answer when I spake ye did not hear therefore thus saith the Lord God Behold my servants shall eat but ye shall be hungry behold my servants shall drink but ye shall be thirsty behold my servants shall sing for joy of heart but ye shall crie for sorrow of heart and howle for vexation of spirit and God shall slay thee O Israel and shall call his servants by another name in which he shall blesse them who is blessed upon the earth Amen for in truth And alas we see how exceedingly they are blessed upon the earth by God who have received this new name but for us we flie like dispersed dust before the winde of Gods wrath scattered through the four quarters of the world in a sad Captivitie To this day a thousand years have â—unne over us and trod with heavy feet upon our heads In us expressely appears the deep impressions of the footsteps of Gods wrath not for chastisement onely and instruction â—ut to our destruction This is that slaying which the Lord threatned that he would slay Israel and the nations which he would keepe â—live whom he calls his servants shall receive that good name he hath promised but yet â—he order is thus wee must first lose our â—ame and then they shall receive their new â—ame The funerals of our name must make 〈◊〉 way for the resurrection of theirs as the veâ—y order of Esay's words declare And as for â—â—e hunger and thirst the Lord threatens wee shall be vexed withall it is not that common â—amine of bread and thirst of water but that â—orse sterility and spirituall barrennesse which torments the souls and hearts of us a â—amine of the Word of God as Amos makes appear in his eight Chapter But you my Master Plough with a more skilfull Heifer in these mysteries than I and better understand these things However in all these storms of wrath and what ever falls on us we belong unto God CHAP. XVIII How the Gentiles quickned by faith have purâ— observances in their new Law I Cannot but fear O Master that the Gentiles are quickned and brought to life The Annuall circlings of the Sunne have made up a thousand years from the time that Jesus dyed at Jerusalem and we know there was noâ— good thing at all to be found among the Gentiles before they came to beleeve in God iâ— Christ and the Apostles so as they seemed to be the Prophet Habackuks fishes and creeping things that had no Ruler But now these Gentiles being purified by faith are ruled by fastings and other observances of their new Law yea they want nothing pertaining to cleannesse and purity so much spoken of in the old Law You see how in every language and place whether you look to the Orientall or Occidentall utmost Fringes of the world wide garment that the Gentiles confesse the Name of the Lord. Neither do they beleeve in him through Moses or any of the Prophets although they bee studious in the Law and the Propheticall Writings but God hath called them to himself another way even by the Disciples of that Righteous One who went forth with God for the salvation of his people as the blessed and glorious God hath foretold by the mouth of the Prophet Habackuk yea those very Disciples of his who by another name are known among them being called Apostles they were Children that sprung out of the same Root with us and were the sons of the sons of Israel Ah how my poor heart is Palsied through fear when it judges that these same Apostles are they of whom God means in Davids Psalm when he saith Their sound is gone out into all the earth and their words into the ends of the world The Prophets words carry an expresse demonstration in
to Christianitie and became Physitian to Pope Benedict 13. at the instigation of the Pope he writ a book to confute the Iews which he called Hebraeomastix The Iews Whip or Hebrews scourge in which he acutely and substantially sets upon them whipping them with their own Talmud and best Rabbins making their own Authors prove Iesus Christ to be the onely Messias and that he is already come When he publish'd the book in Spain it is said by the clearnesse of his conviction above five thousand Iewes were turned to the Faith as is mentioned in the Frontispice of the Booke This last we have from Gerhards testimonie for though the Booke is among us yet that I have seen wants the Title and the Epistle or Preface if it had any With his own Writing he hath joyned that which Lyra also writt against the Iews One Paulus Ricius in the Court of the Emperour Maximilian of a Iew converted to Christianitie writ many things against his old misbelief Antonius Margarita converted in heart and Baptized converts his Hand and Pen against the Iews Ernestus Ferdinandus of a Iew became a Beleevet in Christ writes a Flagellum Iudaeorum A Whipp for the Iewes There is Christianus Gerson Ioannes Isaac and our excellent Emanuel Tremelius born at Ferraria in Italie that sacrificed his holy knowledge so well to the Translation of the Bible and one Paulus Weidnerus hath by Writings called upon his Backsliding Brethren the Iews having found Iesus himselfe to bid them come and see besides there are Christians that never were Iews that have sufficiently discovered and refuted the vanitieâ— of this Apostate Seed of Israel who have iâ— their Writings upon and against their Books at large proved the truth of the Gospell and Christian verities as Porchetus de Salvaticis in his incomparable Writings de victoria contra Hebraeos out of whom Galatinus and others seem to have borrowed the most they have as also Rajmundus Martinus who writ Pugionem a Book so named against the Hebrews Such a path hath Munster walked in in his Annotations on the Hebrew Gospell of Matthew Buxtorfius the father and sonne to whose Iewish Synagogue is added a Treatise of Ludovious Carretus a converted Jew whose calling to Christ was begun and occasioned by a Vision which gives his Book the name of Visorum Divinorum Our Rabbi Samuel of Marocco is not altogether to be neglected who hath brought better stuffe than Yarn or Badgers Skins towards the Furniture of the Christian Tabernacle Such an one doubtlesse there was though in the naming of the Rabbins and those of that name Samuel we cannot finde him mentioned though many Samuels be found as Rabbi Samuel Alkali Arcuvolto Aben Tybbon Vzeda Iom Toff c. however and upon what envious grounds soever the Jews conceale his name and a long â—ime kept hid his Writing yet our Christian Writers make mention of him as doth Gesâ—er Gerhard Glassius and Alsted who ranks him among Christian Divines about the year 1090. The Book was first Writ in Arabick as an Epistle of Samuel to Rabbi Isaac intreating him to answer his much troubled heart about his fear that the Jews are accursed for Crucifying Christ and that he and no other is to be expected for the Messias It was Translated out of Arabicke into Latine by one Alphonsus Boni hominis a Spanyard and Friar Predicant out of which Latine our English Translation is derived Three Copies have I seen of it one a very old one as I remember Printed at Paris in which there are but 25 Chapters the Book being lesse by two Chapters than the other Editions which have 27 Chapters In that ancient one there is an Epistle of Alphonsus to Friar Hugo Master of the Order of the Preaching Friars which we shall give Translated after this Preface The other two Copies came out at Basil both put forth by Henric. Petri one of them is the Book called Micropresbeuticon a collection of the Witings of above 30 ancient Fathers and Christian Doctors some Greek some Latine all little or short Works among which R. Samuel is one this came forth Anno 1550. Another Book that hath of ancient little Fathers more than the other came out at Basil some five years after 1555. has this Samuel joyned with them also the old Translation calls him Samuel the Israelite born at Fer a Citie of the King of Marocco and R. Isaac to whom he writes it is said to be Master of the Synagogue that is in Subinlincia in the same Kingdome the Copie in Micropresbeuticon calls it Subiulmenta now in the Kingdome of Marocco we can finde no such City as Fer there may be mistake it may bee it should be Fez which is the principall City of all Barbarie the Metropolis of Mauritania and has the Kingdome of Fez belonging to it and named from it There may be some mistake also for Fez and Marocco are two distinct Kingdoms and are both in Numidia All the places almost that the Turk hath conquered have either lost their names or changed their names as Damascus is now called Sham Constantinople Stambolda Sychar Napolis Ierusalem is called Cuts or Kuds Beersheba is now named Beer Engannim Jenine Argier by the Turks is called Jezaier and Hyppo in Africa where Austin lived is at this day called Cape Bonne that which was heretofore Hierapolis is now Aleppo nay very rivers have changed their names for Tygris is now called Tygil and Euphrates Frat and the Countrey Babylonia goes under the name of Caldar wherefore it is no marvell if in these dayes we cannot finde the old names of places seeing either the places are quite destroyed or their names are changed For Subinlincia or Subjulmenta wee finde no such names in the most exact describer of those Kingdomes Iohn Leo the African yet we finde there is a river called Subu that runs but six miles from Fez there is a Castle called Subeica with a Town and another called Subeita whether it be Printers mistake or some Cities and Towns may be destroyed and their names lost in ashes that then were known by these names or how it is we cannot divine we therefore leave this Geographicall scruple seeing the most exact Africanus doth not help us in it nor Ptolomie in his Tables of Africa It is well known there are and since Jewish dispersions there have ben great store of them among the Moors in Africa there is an exceeding great number in the Citie of Fez the most of their Goldsmiths are Jewes there and in the whole Countrey the number is very great When Ferdinand drove the Jews out of Spaine a world of them came into Africa being born Moors though by religion Jews We trouble not our selves to finde out who this R. Isaac was seeing he is not set out with any word of distinction from other Isaacs of
three Angels as Lilith taught them The Chaldee Paraphrast spares not to spread this in Cantic 8. 3. bringing in the Israelitish Synagogue thus speaking I am chosen above all people because I binde Thephiliâ—s to my head and my left hand and a paper is affixed to the right side of my door the third part of which looks towards my bed-chamber that Devils and evill spirits may have no power to hurt me Is not this a Magicall paraphrase of that Theologicall Text His left hand should be under my head and his right hand should imbrace me The same Targum on Cantic 4. 6. calls it artem justorum Patrum The art of the righteous Fathers and Patriarcks No marvell if the Jews love Magique when they make Abraham as well a father of Magicians and skilled in it as the father of the faithfull As for Salomon they will prove in his booke of Confessions that he confesses his use of Magique I gave my heart to know wisdome and madnesse and folly Eccles 1. 17. Their chiefe Senate the Sanhedrin among other excellent parts they say must be Artists in this unlawfull Art The originall of that conceit to spring from weaknesse in the Jewes imagination of this required skill in their Judges may be seen in Cunaeus Hitherto we have had witnesse sufficient of their sinnes and wickednesse and truly their miserie follows their sinnes hot foot Such things as these have made Kingdoms cast them out and throw them forth like poysons and sometimes murder them like beasts Such vertues as these have made it a much canvased question in politickes whether the Jews and Iewish Sanagogues are to be suffered in Christian Commonwealths and there are many reasons urged by some why they should not be endured There is a proverb used to this purpose Happy is that Commonwealth in which there is neither an Abraham a Nimrod nor a Naaman that is Which is neither troubled with a Iew nor a Tyrant nor a Leper The Iesuite resolves the case but such kinde of resolving dissolves the conscience A Prince say some may suffer Iews to exercise Vsury if it be expedient for the Commonwealth and compell the people to pay them and keep touch with them which opinion saith hee doth not displease me Mark what a cleanly and Iesuit-like reason he gives for saith he it is lawfull to permit or tolerate lesser evills to avoid greater as is apparent in whoredome O the Divinitie of Rome as Whores are suffered to prevent a greater evill so are Iews to be suffered There are some reasons why they should be suffered behaving themselves quietly and honestly not oppressing Christians not cursing them not seducing them not speaking evill of the Gospell without punishment not hindring Iews from turning Christians not marrying with Christians not having any Offices or places of honour and justice not refusing to be subject to Magistracy distinguished from Christians by dwelling place and otherwayes thus somewhere it is fit they should be suffered think the Civilians For what ever they be though a people that seem to be the Saltest Pillar of Gods wrath to all the world yet we may look on them as a Book of our Saviours Passion and when we see a bloodie Iew remember our bleeding Iesus They may be to us the Looking-glasse of Divine vengeance and better than a Crucifix They are to be pitied by men because there is a promise of mercy from God there must be a blessed revocation and an happy re-union of Jews and Gentiles We should not utterly cast off whom God has not utterly cast off Hath God cast away his people God forbid No hee hath a remnant according to the election of grace How lavish heaven and earth hath been of their blood I could at large relate and shew their blood streaming upon the earth all over the knowne world divers times After Christs Ascension especially their first fluxes of Blood were the fearfullest that ever was heard of Zonaras will tell us large numbers of slaine in Jewish warres to puzzle pretty Arithmeticians to cast up in figures But we have Lipsius exactly and shortly telling us the number in every place so many thousands slain in civill warrs in seven years so many in open war with Romans part of them famisht part drowned neck-broken self-murdered slaine with the sword in all twelve hundred thousand besides ninetie and seven thousand that were taken prisoners by the Romans As they bought Christ for thirty pence so thirty of them were sold so dogg cheape as one penny was the price of so many heads when they fell into the hands of the Romans Gods justice measuring out agreeable to their sin iâ— a Divine proportion that they might reade the vengeance in a proportionable punishment See but how many thousands were slain by Emperors Adrian and Trajan they banishâ— Jerusalem commanded not so much as to look back to it it was not lawfull for them Nâ— quidem specula paternum solum cernere Let all the world take notice of what happened to them under the Emperour Iulian the Apostate This sonn of Perdition to make the words of Christ a lie concerning the Temple at Jerusalem that one stone should not bee left upon another did give the Jewes leave to goe and build up the Temple again They give notice of it to all their Countreymen all over the world they flock to Jerusalem from all parts every one is free to give much wealth to this Worke Iulian himselfe was liberall to them that he might do something to oppose Christ and vexe the Christians So earnest were they on this work that every one would doe something almost an infinite multitude of men digged and wrought all the day it so pleased them that they had made Spades Baskets Troughs Shovels and such like Instruments all of silver and made great provision of all materialls But see the event a terrible Earthquake rends the earth and tears up the very old low-laid Foundation of the Temple a grievous whirlwinde scatters all their Lime Chalk and materials Lightning flames from Heaven burnt up their Instruments yea many men perished others were much hurt by the Fire Christ fighting from heaven against these foolish Builders There were on the night time the figures of the Crosse formed in their garments which spying in the day-light as they knew not how they came there so by no no means knew they how to get them out for they washed and rubbed yet nothing would take out these Crosses At length the Lord following them with wrath and thus accursing their Work they gave over and many were forced to confesse that this was that God who was nailed to the Crosse by their forefathers After Iulian some of the Emperours drove away the Jews from Ierusalem would not let them so much as abide there or enter the Citie so that under Theodosius and Valentinian their custome
this our last Captivity we may be devout in observing all our Legalities and yet the Lord will not accept any of our Works Greater therefore for certain is our sinne than that which carryed our Fathers into Babylon and thence it is that the wrath of God is greater which is upon us and consequently our works are lesse acceptable and we in the eyes of the Lord more abhominable The slaughter of Prophets the worship of Idols procured them their seventy years captivity and no more but we are captives for a great sinne yea surely ours is the greatest sin which is thus punished with a chiliad of years and makes us miserable millenaries and more Without doubt O Master the Prophet Daniel speaking from the Lord means of our Captivity when he calls it the Desolation He shall make it desolate even till the Consummation and that determined shall bee powred upon the desolate The first Captivity is called but a transmigration because after a short time they were brought back with honour to Ierusalem but this is called a perpeâ—uall Desolation in which for certain God will â—ot have mercy on us as he had on our Fathers in Babylon And this is two wayes evident 1. The Prophets ceased not to comfort â—hem and give them promises of deliverance 2. Though they were in captivitie yet were â—hey all together and company alleviates an â—vill Now for the first we finde not a sylâ—able of any Propheticall promise for us And for the second our case is aggravated to make â—s higher graduates in misery we are not â—ondslaves in company of one another but â—e are a dispersion thorow all the Kingdoms of the World Notwithstanding we are in â—ll events the Lords CHAP. IV. He sheweth the Jews are blinde A Marvellous thing to me is this O Master that all of us are brimm full with continuall hopes of our freedome from our captivitie our Lipps doe alwayes mention it our Tongues know no vacation but are ever talking of our return to Ierusalem wherein we are â—o other than blinde men or meer deceivers of â—he simple For look to the time since our dispersion by Titus and where did any Prophet appear with any prediction or promise of our return nay did any Prophet since that seventy years hard apprentiship name any other end of our Captivity than the Worlds end The consummation of the World must onely consummate our Captivity and Daniel to that purpose names it an endlesse desolation This this o Master is still my fear our sinâ— is the greatest because our smart is the sorest a sin which farre exceeds Idol-worship and Butchering of Prophets for which our Fathers before were punished And if God will shew no mercy to us living we persevering in the same sin so will his mercy be farre from us dying also Yet this nothing can prevent that we belong to the Lord in every event CHAP. V. The Iews deceive themselves and others ME thinks O Master we notably gull both our selves and others because in the Books of the Law and the Prophets we have the Lords promise frequently of freeing our Nation and of gathering us together again from all our scatterings Now these promises lookt into with a well advised minde it will appear they were all 1 Either compleat before and in the seventy years or 2 that these promises were totally hindred from fulfilling the sins of them to whom they were made being an impediment to their impletion An instance O Master I give in those few words spoken by Ezechiel If ye will do my judgements and keep my Commandements then Will I gather you from the foure corners of the earth I will lift you up and bring you thorow the Sea yea I will make you return unto your holy House Behold that which the Lord promiseth us by Ezechiel in these words and other places of his Prophecie it was many times fulfilled before the seventy years captivitie as all such promises of the Lords whether greater or lesser contained in divers places of the sacred Volume were compleat and fulfilled before we fell into this last captivity which has no bottome though we have been more than a thousand years in it yet in none of the Prophets can wee finde it has a bottome And where any promise of God treats of freeing and gathering together it is not to be understood of this perpetuall bondage but of those tribulations and dispersions before the seventy years but after them there is not the least inkling of a promise to gather us from our scattered estate Of necessity therefore we must take it to us that we have committed that great sinne since the forementioned years in which sin we now are and obstinately persist for which the Lord so endlesly punisheth us else the Lords wrath could not so long time have held in his mercy from us Through the course of Scriptures we may perceive our forefathers punisht for their sins before seventy years out of many I select these few examples Our Elders sinned before that time who came out of Aegypt the Promise therefore made to them had no place in them for they perisht in their sins in the wildernesse Moses sinned at the Waters of strife and that sinne bolted him out from entring the promised Land Aaron sinned and he bore his punishment Eli the Priest sinned and he broke his Neck for breaking Gods Command and his Posterity lost the Priesthood though God had promised it them for ever Such promises as these are to be understood with this caution alwayes they shall be fulfilled unlesse for their sins they promerit another reward as is plaine in the Kingdome of David when his Posterity after the flesh fell short of the Scepter even as the true and glorious God promised Abraham and his Seed they should possesse the Land for ever yet they often were at a losse of it for their sins and the Lord often restored it to them again untill this last great losse of it Now a thousand years and above are gone over our heads and our hopes of recovery are vanisht with them because we still abide in that sinn by which our Land is lost and forfeited This is among wonderfull things a grand one O Master that all of us with one Lip consent to this that since the sore Servitude in Babylon it must needs be that we have sinned against God some great sinne and yet none can pick out what this great sinn is for which we have been laden with such a masse of misery Or if any of us have knowledge of the cause and our sin which hath thus engulphed us in these deep evils yet what are we the better The secret sticks in his owne breast he doth not declare it to his neighbour Or what is himself the better for knowing it whiles he turns it not to his own profit for we all do still lie flat upon the ground Clearly we do all see that in
the foresaid Captivity God remained with our Fathers in his Prophets Ieremie and others he gave them Salathiel for a Leader or Captain they had both Princes and Priests which went with them out of Babylon after the time of their repentance or doing Penance was finisht and having got their God appeased they built Ierusalem the Temple and other Cities and the Lord powred upon them his mercie◠plenteously In this our Captivitie all appears with a stranger face it is manifest that both God and Prophet hath forsaken us neither of these are with us Wherefore O Master this will I make my task I will exactly enquire and uncessantly search out what that great sin is which hath cast us into this thousand years slavery and more in which we are cloathed with desolation being without Prophet without King without Priest without Altar without Sacrifice without Oyntment without Incense without our Purifications yea in one word we have ingrossed to our selves the abhorring of God in heaven and the contempt and abomination of us with the whole world and all men on earth Yet for all this misery that reignes in our estate pride reignes in our heart in our own conceits we preferre our selves before all the world besides Concerning which thing what my judgement is O Master I will make known to thee Neverthelesse what ever fall out from God we cannot finally fall off CHAP. VI. What that sin is for which the Iews are in Captivitie NOw O my Master I am in great fear that that sin for which we are in this desolating Captivitie is that of which God speaks by his Prophet Amos saying For three transgressions of Iudah I will turn or translate Israel note that our Bibles have it I will turn away here he hath it I will transfer or translate and it is better so for his purpose and for the fourth I will not translate them because they sold the righteous for silver We indeed O Master according to our Doctrine make this righteous One to be Ioseph the son of Iacob who was sold by his Brethren into Aegypt and this would I hold for true also but that the Sacred Writ makes this sin of selling the fourth for number among the sins or transgressiōs of Israel The Christians themselves to whom the studie of Sacred Volumes seems to be delivered committed of God do answer to our foresaid interpretation that the selling of Ioseph by his Brethren is the first and not the fourth of Israels sins or transgressions The second sin they make the worshipping of the Calf in Horeb The third transgression is the slaughter of the Prophets for which we served as slaves seventy years in Babylon But the fourth transgression of Israel the selling of the Righteous this they say is plainly meant of JESUS who was according to the very letter sold after that aforesaid transmigration And we O Master if we mean to maintain as Authenticall our own Doctrine and stop the Christians mouthes with a sufficient answer this of us must be undertaken and made good that divers transgressions of Israels did precede this of Josephs selling so as to make it fall in the fourth number Which thing we cannot uphold the testimony of the Book of Genesis making sore against us which sets the selling of Joseph as the first transgression of the Children of Israel The Prophet Amos also expressely makes appear that the fourth sinne was the selling of the righteous One for which we have been Captives and of which the Lord with a fearfull Commination speaks that he will never bring us backe again into the Land of Promise saying And for the fourth I will not translate them because they sold the righteous for silver To me it is more then manifest that for the selling the Righteous the fourth sin we are righteously punisht and now more than a thousand years are past and gone in all which time we do no good nor prosper at all among the Gentiles nor remains there any hope that we shall do any good at all CHAP. VII That the Just Jesus the God of the Christians was unjustly sold A Marvellous horrour O Master hath surprized me and I quake to think that this Righteous one sold for silver according to the Prophet Amos is JESUS whom the Christians worship And further I fear that the testimonies which I meet withall in the Prophets are concerning him and the Christians in their Doctrine do very apertly and aptly apply them to him Esay the Prophet saith Ah sinfull nation a people laden with iniquity a seed of evill doers they have forsaken the Lord they have provoked the holy One of Israel to anger they are gone away backward The same Prophet saith As a sheep led to the slaughter is dumb so he opened not his mouth He saith hee was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief he was despised of men and for this we esteemed him not he was offered up because so his will was He was taken from prison and judgement and who shall declare his generation For the transgression of my people have I smitten him and he made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death and he shall give those that injured him for his burying and the rich for his death I fear O Master that these injurious doers were our Fathers and these rich ones were Pilate and Herod Annas and Caiaphas according to that the Prophet David saith The Kings of the earth set themselves and the Rulers take counsell together against the Lord and against his Anointed By the Kings we understand the aforenamed by the Rulers our Fathers and Ancestors I fear O Master this JESUS is he who was sold and chopt and changed for Silver of whom Zacharie Amos and other Prophets write Of him Esay the Prophet speaks He bare the sinns of many and made intercession for the transgressours I fear O Master that this JESUS is that righteous One of whom David speaks They gather themselves together against the soule of the righteous and condemn the innocent blood and for this God shall cut them off yea the Lord our God shall cut them off Again I fear O Master JESUS is that Just One of whom Jeremie speaks saying He is the man and who is there that understands him or knows what he is In his Lamentations also The beautie of our countenance Christ our God was taken for our sins otherwise with us The breath of our nostrils the Anointed of the Lord was taken in their pits of whom we said Vnder his shadow we shall live among the heathen I fear this is that Just One of which Zacharie speaks It shall be said in that day VVhat are these wounds in thy hands And he shall answer Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends and my shepherd lift up his sword upon me With us it is Awake O sword against
my shepherd The same Prophet hath They shall in that day look upon me whom they have pierced and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his onely begotten sonne I fear O Master this is that Just One of whom Habakkuk speaks He had hornes coming out of his hand and there was the hiding of his power And the Gospell of the Christians where the death of JESUS is related agrees with this where it is said When they came to JESUS they found him dead and they pierced him with a spear O Master I fear this is that Righteous One of whom Habakkuk speaks Thou wentest forth for the salvation of thy people with thine Anointed or with thy CHRIST CHAP. VIII How the dispersion of the Jews according to Daniel came to passe after the death of Iesus FEar hath seazed on my spirit O Master about those words of the Prophet Esay who that righteous One should be that is without sin and who that righteous One is that in the Prophet Amos is said to be sold for silver as is above testified that for their fourth sin hee will not bring them back into the Land of Promise any more It seems O Master the Prophecie of Daniel in his ninth Chapter is fulfilled where he saith After threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off but not for himself and the people of the Prince that shall come shall destroy the Citie and the Sanctuary and they shall condemn it and the Sacrifice shall cease and the perpetuall destruction shall have its consummation All doubting set apart O Master this destruction and perpetuall desolation is nothing else but our long lasting Captivitie which is now a thousand years standing And very full of mark is it that the Prophets words have a Candle of plain indigitation and pointing it out saying This perpetuall Desolaâ—â—on shall be after that Messiah is cut off Just so comes in our Desolation assoon as Jesus was put to death neither did God threaten us this everlasting destruction till after Christs death But suppose we would fain prove that before Christs death the Deluge of our desolation had drowned us this the Christians with their answer will easily take away saying That which is but for seventy years is not perpetuall but before Christs death the desolation had but a seventy years perpetuity and after those years were worne out wee were carryed backe into our own land of Promise and were highly both favoured and honoured of God Verily Master my eyes fail me nor can I spie any evasion whereby we can either slip out or slip off that Prophesie seeing it is proved that 72 weeks and a year above which are 433 years are compleat from the re-edifying of the Temple at that term of time was Jesus cut off by our Fathers after came Prince Titus and the Romanes and they dealt with us according to the tenure of that Prophesie Now at this day we lie under the waves of a thousand years misery and more neverthelesse though we be under the wrath of God yet still we fixe our hopes on him What if we argue thus for our selves That our Messiah will come though he be not yet come and when he comes he will re-estate and re-possesse us of our Land of Promise then shall our Citie rise out of her ruines and be re-edified God will bestow both favour and honour upon us in our Land and this desolation shall not be perpetuall To this allegation the Christians will answer that this Assertion must bring from us this confession that then the Messiah is yet to be cut off that Titus and the Romanes are still to come and these things performed that there is a worse desolation will ensue it that has more degrees of misery in it than this in which we have continued a thousand years Wo is me O master for us our excuses and evasions are addle and want all consonancy to truth CHAP. IX That there are two Advents or commings of Christ MUch am I possest with fear O Master that Christ the Messiah is already come and hath fulfilled his first Advent because in Scripture we finde a double comming of his This first comming of Christ is described by the Prophets to be in great poverty and humility the second in glory and Majestie Of both these commings of Christ I will propound what occurs in Sacred Writ Of the first comming by Zacharies mouth God speaks thus Rejoyce greatly O daughter of Zion behold thy King commeth unto thee poore and riding on an Asse In this first comming Esay sets him out as a man despised Daniel as one cut off or slain Zachary and Amos as one that was sold And these things were even after this manner fulfilled in Christ as I have in this little Booke declared and will further declare We did not esteem him that is we knew him not as saith the Prophet Esay yea we despised him and prevailed against him But his glory and Majestie shall be manifest enough in his second comming when flaming fire shall go before him and shall burn and lick up his enemies that are round about him as God by the mouth of the Prophets David and Esay hath spoken I fear O Master that Christ will judge us with fire unto death because we have slain all the Prophets who spoke of him to us God himselfe so testifies against us by the mouth of his Prophet Elias Thus did we slay that Just One for whose death we lie thus bound under the Lords endlesse wrath Notwithstanding all this still we are Gods people CHAP. X. Of the first comming of Christ I Fear O Master God describes two commings of Christ by the mouth of the Prophet Esay saying Arise arise put on strength O Arme of the Lord. In that he saith twice Arise arise he saith surely of purpose to denote Christs double comming In the fiftieth and through the whole Bodie of the 53. chapter he particularly and perspicuously makes a Declaration of the first comming of Christ so farr as concerns his Passion and extreame dejection to the lowest ebbe of misery especially when he saith He hath no form or comelinesse and when we see him there is no beautie that we should desire him His first comming is set our in that of Esay To us a Childe is born presently upon that his second comming is subjoyned in which he calls him A mighty God who shall sit upon the Throne of David to order and stablish it for ever Zachary with his Propheticall Pencill effigiates him in form of a poor one riding upon an Asse and what else by any deduction can we draw hence but that the Prophet by it understands the first appearance of Christ in marvellous debasement and humilitie and his second that is in Power and Majestie according to Daniels description I considered and beheld in a Vision of the night and one like
thus though they did fully transgresse the Law worshipt Idols and slew the Prophets yet drunk they not of such a Cup of Indignation and Judgement as we their Children CHAP. XV. The Jews blindnesse and incredulity about Christ was foretold by the Prophets THis O Master dives me deep under the waters of fear that our not beleeving in that Righteous One hath caused that to be fulfilled and to fall upon us which the Lord spoke by the mouth of Esay The vision shall bee as the words of a Booke that is sealed which shall be given to one that is learned to a Reader saying read this I pray thee and hee saith I cannot for it is sealed And the Book is delivered to him that is not learned saying Read this I pray thee and he saith I am not learned What greater and closer sealing up of the Book can there be found O Master than this wherewith the Lord hath sealed and fast closed up our blinde hearts and we have now been a thousand years and more as miserable Truants in learning this one lesson of the comming of this Righteous One propounded to us in the Prophets and yet we know it not nor have taken it out This is it which blows the Prophets Trumpet with that threatning blast Ierusalem shall be desolate and their holy house shall fall down He further said Our Countrey is desolate and their holy house shall fall down He further said Our Countrey is desolate our Cities burnt with fire and Zion is left as a Cottage in a vineyard This this is the evill O Master which has now the age of a thousand years and more on the back of it According to this Esay further saith O Lord God I will exalt thee for thou hast made a Citie an heap an house to be confusion a defenced Citie to be a ruine for ever He shall break the people in pieces like the breaking of the Potters Vessell which shall be broken so as there shall not be found a sheard to take fire from the hearth or to take water withall out of the pit Daniels words are also fulfilled that after the Messias is cut off there shall follow a perpetuall desolation in which desolation we now are and have been cast deep into this flood of miseries a thousand years and more Esay goes on to spinne the thred of our wo Solitarinesse shall be left in the midst of the City or desolation and their Land shall hisse with a perpetuall hissing After him Jeremie saith Call ye them reprobate silver for the Lord hath rejected them Esay again Walk you in the light of your own fire and in the flames sparks which you have kindled In these flames we as miserable Salamanders have now lain a thousand years more Amos comes with like threats The house of Israel shall fall and none shall raise her up To me verily O Master it seems we are falne indeed and ruine is come on us since the comming of that Righteous One yea God hath brought it on us seeing since that time no Prophet has risen amongst us neither shall there be any as is foretold and prophesied of us for we remain still in our incredulitie we maintain an obstinate negative of that Righteous One and do not beleeve in him Hosea therefore saith When the woman conceived and bare a daughter God said call her name Loruhamah without mercy for I will no more have mercy on the house of Israel And if thus it be that the Lord hath quite cast us off and will have no mercy on us as we have felt by the miserable experience of a thousand years and upward to what end or what profit is it for us to retain our old Ordinances the Law Sabbath and Circumcision Esay saith Bring forth the blinde people as the true glorious God hath now brought us forth of our Land and made us strangers to it more than a thousand years Besides all this he saith The old errour is gone away what can we pick out of this O Master what is the old thing but our Law which is gone away from us yea we have lost King Sacrifice Incense Altars Was there any worse thing in the whole predicament of calamity that could have befaln us What prey or bootie of hope have we for our winged expectations to flie after Do we not see wo unto us that wee see it that the Lord hath scattered and disperst us thorow the four quarters of the world as Moses Jeremie and other Prophets foretold us Yet for all God we are thine and to this God we have our recourse in every event CHAP. XVI He shews the Jews reprobation for perfidiousnesse and the Gentiles election by faith MY soul is not free from this fretting fear O Master that whereas you and I betwixt our selves can boldly say and affirme that we are the sons of Jacob and Israel that for all this God may have fulfill'd that which he spoke by Esay God shall slay thee O Israel and call his servants by another name I quake to think that we should be of those servants on whom that name shall be imposed as Moses writes in Deuteronomie The Nations shall be the Head and the unbeleeving people the Tail as we now are and have been the hindmost the very Tail of all the World for 1000 years and more Of these Nations Jeremie speaks The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of God as the waters that cover the Seas Salomon hath of them this O Lord God when a stranger which is not of thy people Israel shall come to thy holy house and call upon thy blessed Name then hear thou O Lord my God that all the earth may learn to fear thy Name as doth thy people Israel What have wee O Master wee proud beggars of the Jews that we can boast in Why should we contemne and hold the Gentiles in scorn seeing Salomon the Prophet hath joyned them as partners with us in the fear of God and in his holy House And peradventure God hath shut us out of his House as unworthy ones and hath given our room to them as more worthy as Moses hath spoken of them Thus saith the Lord God the whole earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord. After him David All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord and all the kindreds of the Nation or a thousand generations shall worship before thee Of them spoke Esay O holy house of David thy light is come and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee The Gentiles shall come to thy light and Kings to the brightnesse of thy rising Lift up thine eyes round about thee and see all they gather themselves together they come to thee thy sons shall come from frare The sons of strangers shall build up thy walls and their Kings shall minister unto thee And who I pray O Master are
them against us that he speaks of them and not of us when he saith There is no Tongue or Language wherein their voyce is not heard and this cannot be taken of our Hebrew Language For what Gentiles are there which obey the precepts of Moses and Aaron seeing they slew the Gentiles put them to flight and drove them from them But these Gentiles at this day are acquainted with Moses and the Prophets they know God they keep their new Law after the prescript form of the Apostles teaching Notwithstanding all this yet we belong to God CHAP. XIX Of choosing the Apostles in place of the Prophets MY soul converseth in the region of fear and I am troubled about that place of Zacharie I will smite the Shepherd and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered I fear that was fulfilled when wee smote the Shepherd of those holy Children the Apostles for ever since that time we like miserable sheep run dispersed and stragling thorow the whole world and the Apostles which were our children are risen up in stead of our Prophets This appears as a Noon-tide truth seeing from that time God hath not sent us one Prophet nor given us any Divine notice or heavenly provision by the way of Vision O Master I fear that the Apostles are those Children Ioel meaneth of Your old men shall dreame dreams and your young men shall see visions For a certaintie O Master our Prophets are the Old men that dreamed of the faith of the Gentiles which these young men the Apostles have attained unto and seen it more clearly even in plain Visions Of these Children spoke David the Prophet Come ye Children hearken unto me I will teach you the fear of the Lord. Besides this when God speaks of us â—e doth not name us commonly Children in â—he Plurall number but he stayes in the Singular naming us Israel his first born In another Psalm these young men are called Children Thy Children shall be like Olive Plants â—ound about thy Table Of Israel O Master God spoke by the mouth of Esay The Vineâ—ard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel I â—ooked it should bring forth Grapes and it â—rought forth wilde Grapes therefore I will break down the wall thereof and it shall be troden down Of these aforesaid Children of God by Esay he further saith Iacob shall not now be â—shamed neither shall his face waxe pale But it shall be then when he shall see his children the â—ork of mine hands sanctified before his eyes Now if those Children O Master were sanctified in our sight according to the way of our Law it could not be said of us that we were â—shamed and our Faces Vermilion'd with â—lushes and for that cause we should hide â—hem but rather would it shape for us glory â—nd resplendency of face But hence comes â—his confusion of the faces of Iacobs children â—nd this is the desolation that those Children the work of Gods own hand were sanctified in our sight and yet they have this honour another way than we it comes not as our sanctification by the Law Thus God would give us to understand that our Law is not their Law So much imports he by the mouth of Ieremie In that day they shall not say Our fathers have eaten sowre Grapes and their Childrens teeth are set on edge as if he meant thus The infidelitie of the Jews doth no way hurt the faith of the Apostles nor shall it hurt For this is added for that cause As I live saith the Lord this shall be no more a proverb in Israel And this is observable never any of the Apostles after they had received the faith of Christ did returne backe to imbrace our faith Thus are they free from tasting the bitternesse of our infidelity notwithstanding our teeth are set on edge with the sinnes of our Fathers Further O Master God by Esay delivers more concerning these children the Apostles From whom shall I passe away but from my people the children that are unfaithfull but God shall be their Saviour in all their afflictions his face and countenance shall keep them in his love in his pitie he hath redeemed them and shall be mercifull unto them for length of dayes This hath all truth in it O Master that these Children of whom we speak doth alwayes abide firm and stedfast neither hath God at any time left them and passed away from them since that Righteous one their King and Master hath redeemed them but he hath gone away from us though he abide with them alwayes Of these children the Apostles that wise Jesus the sonne of Sirach hath spoken in his book Hear me your Father O dear children and do thereafter that ye may be safe for the Lord hath given the father honour over the Children After what manner this honour is understood God declareth by the mouth of the Prophet Malachie God shall send Elias who shall turn the hearts of our Fathers to the Children O Master seeing this turning is to be understood of beleeving and turning to the faith if God would have turned the hearts of the Children viz. the Apostles to the Fathers that is to us then the Apostles had moved with us in the same fearfull orbe of miserie and should have been companions with us in this Captivitie that knows no end as we and our Fathers are involved in it But now seeing Gods Ordinance turnes the wheele another way that the hearts of the Fathers shall be turned to the Children what good is there O good Master for us to expect or what glasse of hope can we look in to see a face of comfort If wee shall go about to affirm that these must bee other Children not the Apostles of whom these aforesaid things are meant then must they be in Captivitie as well as we because they did not follow the way of that Righteous One whom the Apostles not onely have stedfastly followed but have also earnestly taught this way should be followed herein attaining to the honour to be named and accounted Fathers in that it is said The fathers should be turned to them Wherefore O Master seeing our Children attained to faith in God before us if our hearts were turned to the Children then the hearts of the children should be turned to us also as the most high God saith They shall be one people and one heart in the glorious and powerfull God For this is to be confessed that we are not to understand it of any other conversion then of turning from infidelitie to the faith and doctrine of that Just One who is the Teacher of salvation to all that beleeve in him As David hath said of him that his Priesthood is an everlasting Priesthood after the Order of Melchisedech who offered a Sacrifice of bread and Wine and this Melchisedech was the Priest of the most High God before Aaron Now here O
this notwithstanding O Master if God have slain Israel as the Prophet Esay is plain in it then was the totall subversion of the Synagogue which was the elder and it was brought to serve the Gentiles which were the younger that the word might be fulfilled which God spake to Rebecca One people shall be stronger than the other For the glorie of the Church God spoke by the mouth of David The Kings daughter stands at thy right hand in a vesture of gold wrought about with divers colours The right exposition of this O Master begets this sence that the Church of the Gentiles is here honoured with the name of a Queen and the divers Colours of the garment wherewith she is adorned signifie and set forth the diversitie of Languages and people by which she is served For all Tongues and Languages in the Church conspire with a concordance of a true exposition of the Law the Psalter and the book of all the Prophets As for out Synagogue it hath but one Tongue or Language and her garment is not set out with many Colours but onely one colour that of her own Hebrew idiome and language CHAP. XXIII He proveth the same thing by the words of the Prophet Malachie THose words of the Prophet Malachie so often brought O Master I cannot so shift as to rid my memory of them thence springs my fear that God should say to the Synagogue I have no pleasure in your sacrifices for from the rising of the Sunne c. For Water Wine and fine Flour the Elements of the Gentiles sacrifice are clean things of their own nature and need none of our cleansings and purifying potions to prepare them and make them ready But our Synagogue must of necessitie have continuall imployments in washing the Flesh of Sacrifices and cleansing the Entrals of Beasts which are to be sacrificed Nay and there must be many purifyings of the Altar and place of the sacrifice to make clean from the fatt and blood of other sacrifices otherwise it would breed a loathsome abhorring to see them and meddle with them This of Bread and Wine and Water is a neat and cleanly sacrifice subject to none of these indecencies and loathsome turpitude For my part O Master I must confesse that Gods meaning is of this sacrifice in Salomons Proverbs Better is a morsell of bread with love then a stalled Oxe with hatred This Morsell of love O Master is that morsell of the Gospell commended to us meeknes that is reciprocall and mutuall forgiving of injuries one to pardon another the fat Ox with hatred is our practise of eye for eye secret slaying of our enemies And from these premises I draw this conclusion that the Churches bread is better than the Synagogues Oxe the one being a sacrifice of love the other of hatred of which God saith Better is a morsell c. Another way God fitly likens the Church to a loving Hinde by the mouth of Salomon Let her be as the loving Hinde and pleasant Roe let her breasts satisfie or inebriate thee at all times and bee thou ravisht alwayes with her love The Church is this Hinde so beloved of God of whom it is written she is the most dearly beloved Hinde and hath no equall in nobilitie and favour He adds O Master Let her breasts satisfie thee at all times and be thou ravisht alwayes with her love In which words is delivered a plain significancie of the lastingnesse of the Churches sacrifice for all times and that it shall abide for ever Here also God compares the Church to a mother giving suck to Children and in this that he saith Let her Breasts at all times satisfie thee and make thee drunken he clearly denotes the matter of the Sacrament in one of the Elements which is Wine though in a spirituall way And by Breasts he notes the rest of the substance of the Sacrament that it contains pleasant nourishment and is a sufficient Sacrament as the Mothers Breasts are sufficient for the Childe which sacrifice the Church at this present enjoyes and is ravisht with it As for us our Synagogue has remained a widow this thousand years quite deprived of her sacrifice This dear respect which God bears to the Church comes from Christ the Lord His are the breasts from whence run those streamy fluents of Wine and from thence flows everlasting joy Here is not a word or title of giving flesh or fat or blood the ingredients of our laborious ahd toilsome sacrifice The Synagogue as a miserable widow had another husband even God himself but now she hath lost both her holy house and her holy husband The Church on the other side like a straying Hinde ranged in the Desart and had no husband yet God has found her and is become in stead of an husband to her As the strong and glorious God speaks by the Prophet Esay Moe are the children of the desolate than the Children of the married wife That Prophet again saith I will make rivers in the wildernesse to give drink to my chosen people But thou hast not called upon me O Iacob but thou hast been weary of me O Israel Even thus O Master have we shaken off all obedience we have been earlesse and would not hear eyelesse and would not see which hath produced this Captivity that with a drowning flood hath runne over us a thousand years I am afraid O Master for our Law which gives way to revenge and has furious anger made ready in calling for eye for eye c. whereas the beloved Hinde having one dear Lover is ruled by a sweeter rule which he hath given her in his glorious Gospel the fift Chapter by Matthew If any smite thee on one cheek turn to him the other also David speaks in the Psalm O how great is thy goodnesse which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee and which thou hast wrought for them that trust in thee before the sons of men It is clear O Master that the people of the Synagogue stood in fear of those Legall penalties an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth because execution did presently wâ—it upon the Offender How much better do the people of the Church that trusting in the goodnesse of God being smitten on the face they do not answer with their Fist smiting again wherefore God hath graciously laid up for those Gentiles his abundant goodnesse which he altogether hideth from the Jews Notwithstanding we are Gods people CHAP. XXIIII He shews the Christians manner of singing is acceptable to God I Stand in fear O Master of that speech of Esay for he seems to speak it of the Apostles They shall sanctifie the holy One of Iacob they shall manifest and they shall fear the God of Israel They shall preach or publish the God of Israel They that erred in spirit shall come to understanding and they that murmured shall learn doctrine or
the Musicians shall learn the Laws We see it with mid-dayes clearnesse O Master that now for a thousand years the ignorant Musicians are become Doctors and Teachers of our Law Who are the ignorant ones but the Gentiles Who are these Musicians but the Christians who chant and sing our Book of Psalmes and the Prophets in their Churches Of the Musicians and singers we have God speaking by David Sing unto the Lord a new song for he hath done marvellous things What I beseech you O Master is this new song but the new Testament and what is the old song but our old Law Of these Musicians God speaks more by the Prophet David Sing unto the Lord all the whole earth sing a Psalm of praise to his Name Againe All the families of the earth shall sing and praise thy Name or All the families of the Nations Where this carries a marke of speciall note that it is not singularly said All the families of Israel but the phrase universally spreads it self to all the families of the Gentiles Of this musicall and Psalm-singing people are Davids words in another place Blessed are the people that knows the song ours â—ath it That knows the joyfull sound they shall walk in the light of thy countenance That also is to the same purpose The Gentiles or Nations shall sing a song to thee in the house of â—y God In this place he names a Song by way of Antonomasia naming a Song in generall â—ut intending their particular kinde of singing As for us we have lost our musick it is now 〈◊〉 thousand years since we Jews sung a Song 〈◊〉 our holy House Of these singers speaks David They shall sing praises in the house of God for ever The 137 Psalm questioned our singing How shall they sing the Lords song in a strange Land Alas O Master for the vacuity and emptinesse of our vain hopes who think of a name and a Countrey when we have lost both God himself tels us this by the Prophet Amos Israel is falne she shall rise nâ— more the virgin Israel is forsaken upon heâ— Land there is none to raise her up The same Prophet in the ninth Chapter saith There shaâ— come such tribulation that he who escapeth shaâ— not be delivered though they hide themselves iâ— the top of Carmel I will search and take theâ— out thence though they be hid from my sight iâ— the bottome of the sea thence will I command the serpent and he shall bite them Though they go intâ— captivity before their enemies thence will I command the sword and it shall slay them And 〈◊〉 will set mine eyes upon them for evill and noâ— for good This has the Lord said and done to us and now for a thousand years of miserieâ— we have hung by our Harpes and left all ouâ— singing of Psalms mourning befitting us more then musick Notwithstanding though weâ— cannot sing yet this we can say God is our God and we are his people CHAP. XXV The Jews unjustly finde fault with the Christians practise of singing GOD hath spoken O Master of the Christians singing by the mouth of David the sweet singer of Israel saying Clap your hands all ye people sing unto God in the voyce of melody In another place Make a joyfull noise unto the Lord all ye lands serve the Lord with gladnesse and come before his presence with a song In another place Sing unto the Lord all the whole earth declare his salvation from day to day I am under great feare O Master by that which God speaks in the mouth of Ieremie Teach your daughters wailing and every one her neighbour lamentation for death is come up into our windows Together with this of our learning that sad lesson of mourning he speaks of those Musicall children by the Prophet David Kings of the earth and all people princes and all judges of the earth young men and maidens old men and Children let them praise the name of the Lord. And who so offereth praise he glorifieth me As if he plainly said The sacrifice of the flesh of Goats such was our sacrifice doth not honour me but in the sacrifice of praise such as is the Gentiles am I glorified The Prophet Esay agrees with it when he saith The musicians shall learn the Scriptures and all the Psalmes of David shall they sing in a metricall way as it is varied by musicall Tones some Acute and Sharp some Grave About all which whiles I labour with the strength of my best consideration me thinks I judge with the least errour when I conclude we are in a great errour about their Sacrifice of praise which they offer up by singing in the Church of God Especially when I further discern that there are precepts of and examples for this singing in the Law of Moses and in the Prophet David who hath called for the praising God with Organs and Harp and with loud Cymbals and Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord Jesus Christ That for Precept Example is not awanting for David danced before the Ark with his Harpe having his head uncovered for which his rash-tongued wife Michol was bold to reprove him but she got this sharp and tart reply from him O foolish woman doth not the Lord see thee despising me whiles I sing praises to him The Children of Israel also sounded a Trumpet whiles they bore the Arke Now tell me O Master what parts act we Are not we the foolish Michol that mock and jeet at the Christians singing solemnities And do not the Christians act Davids part dancing and rejoycing before the Lord in their Humiditie Especially considering how God propounds it Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord. If it had been precisely thus written let every Israelite praise the Lord then our insultation over others might have had some better ground Neither is that of Esay any disadvantage to them that he saith The Nations or Gentiles are before God as nothing For this is to be applyed to the Gentiles in their first estate as they once were drowned in darknesse and ignorance of God before the comming of the Just One. Then indeed they were Pagans and Idolatrous people and none of those Nations that have found the Lord which offer unto him every day a pure offering in the East and West as above out of the Prophet Malachie hath been alledged And certainly O Master we are heirs of a great errour about this thing Notwithstanding all this we belong unto God CHAP. XXVI He proves the Apostasie of the Jews from God UNder an oppression of no small fear I fall prostrate O Master and this troubles me that like wicked Apostates we fell off from God at the first comming of that Just One according to all those Authorities hitherto alledged to which expressely do consent all that we finde written in the Books of the Law and the Prophets From this
out Apostasie is it that God stretches out our miserie to such a length of dayes and hath brought upon us this Captivitie whiles wee in vaine expect another Saviour besides that Just One which nothing avails nor is any thing to the purpose Herein we have a signe with plenary evidence that this generall captivity is laid upon us for some generall sinne which all of us have had our hands in which sinne while it abides and sticks with us unrepented of fierce wrath must needs abide upon our Nation and we remain hopelesse Yet we look for some other Saviour But oh the idlenesse and inanitie of our expectations how little do they profit us Suppose we go about to affirm that ours is not a generall Captivitie and that in some part of the world we have a King and Prince over us we shall quickly be proved worthy to be reproved for lyars convict by our owne Law for if we Jewes should have a King and Prince over us in any part of the world go to then let us see what he is he must be descended of some one Tribe if of any it should be of the Tribe of Judah Of Judahs Tribe it cannot be God having definitively determined against it that there should be no King of Judah out of that Tribe for ever Whence Jeremie the Prophet saith The sinne of Judah is writ with a Penne of Iron and the Point of a Diamond it is graven upon the Table of their heart That which is written with such a Pen as Iron in such a Book as an Adamantine stone how can we look that it should ever be expunged It shall never bee blotted out seeing the strong and glorious God hath thus spoken by the mouth of the Prophet Esay The Lord the Lord of Hosts taketh away from Jerusalem and Judah the Judge and the Prophet and the Prince Likewise the Prophet Hosea saith of us The Children of Israel shall abide without a King without a Prince without a sacrifice without an Image without an Ephod without Teraphim We know well O Master that from the beginning of the world God had alwayes some Saints of great account and holy before him Towards the beginning of the world the lives of men are reckoned up with many figures and extended to many yeers as Mâ—thusalem Enoch and the rest yet none of these ever came to be Millenaries either reaching to or above a thousand years Yet we have large reckoning amongst our selves finding our Messias or Christ promised to us to out-strip that unattained number We please our selves with saying that our Messias was born in Babylon in the seventie yeers Captivitie which by computation will arise to an higher number of years for by this at this day he must be a thousand and fiftie yeares old This Fable and Fallacie for it is no Prophecie though we know not how with any weapons of reason to defend yet with bold assertions we averre it for a truth in our Synagogues when we are none but Jews together and not a stranger among us But you may hear the publique doctrine of the Christians saying otherwise Of Zion it shall be said this and that Man was born in her and the most High shall establish her In these words he names Mary the Ladie under the name of the Citie and saith a man was born in her He saith that man emphatically was born in her he doth not say this or that Israelite Whereby he gives light to us to understand that the Son of Marie never was in the Loyns of any man In the second Book of Samuel and the seventh Chapter God manifestly declares this when he saith to David When thy dayes be fulfilled and thou shalt sleep with thy Fathers I will set up thy Seed after thee which shall proceed out of thy Bowels and I will be his Father and he shall be my Sonne It was never among possibilities O Master that â—ny should come out of the Bowels of his Father therefore to this end is it here set down â—o expresly to shew that Christ was not to â—e conceived in woman after the ordinary â—ay of other men by any Seed which should â—roceed from the Loyns of man as the rest â—f men do descending from David or others â—o the same effect God speaks by David â—rom the Womb before the morning have I beâ—otten thee As if the great and glorious God â—â—ould say From the wombe that is of his â—wn will he begot his Christ the operation â—f the Holy Ghost effecting it without the â—eed of man not after the common regular â—urse of humane generations This is that doctrine of veritie of the Christians faith â—hich is hid as a mysterie from us and our â—ow apprehensions will not give it entrance â—â—d beliefe For our infidelitie in this point 〈◊〉 all this falne on us that we groan under â—his is the gate that lets in our miserie Afâ—â—r the same manner doth David set forth Christ to be borne The Lord hath sworne in â—uth unto David Of the fruit of thy Body will â—set upon thy Throne Notwithstanding all â—is we belong to God CHAP. XXVII He concludes with alledging some sayings of the Saracens touching Iesus and Marie his Mother VErily O Master though the Christian do not fight against us with swords taken out of the Saracens Scaberds and whaâ— the Alcoran and the expositions thereof havâ— for their defence which they neglect to doe knowing our faith feeds not upon Saracen Chaffe neither do they themselves give any credit to it yet they might finde something which might much weary and weaken us anâ— fortifie themselves by the allegation of the Sarazens Doctrine concerning Jesus and Marâ—â— his blessed Mother It is the generall voice 〈◊〉 all the Saracens that Jesus was the Messiaâ— whom the foregoing Prophet foretold should come and as touching his Genealogie and 〈◊〉 degree they preferre him before their own God Mahomet They stick not to confesseâ— that the Parents of Mahomet were Idolaters anâ— wicked ones and at the best blazon theâ— Arms but among the Children of Hagar thâ—â— Bond-maid from whom they sprung Yet willingly they grant that the Messias by a direâ—â— Line draws his Pedegree from Isaac whoâ—â— Sonne he was to the Prophets and just men and so he descends to the blessed Marie his Virgin mother In the Alcoran this testimonie of the Family of Adamar is found touching Marie The Angel Gabriel said to Marie O Marie God hath chosen thee and taught thee grace and hath in his choice preferred thee before all other women of all ages and hath placed thee as a new medium or meane dividing betwixt earthly men and the Angels of God in the Paradise of delights Moreover all the Saracens speak-it for a truth That Christ or the Messias had power from God to work Miracles to heale every disease and infirmitie to cast out Devils raise the dead to know the secrets of all hearts yea they
from corruption and losse even in corrupting and losing times and are as woodden Candlesticks to the Gentiles holding out the light of the Law He quotes the 49 Chapter of Genesis which he calls the Booke of the Generation of the Creatures of Iudah that is Of the Children and Off-spring of Iudah Well may I here take occasion to give a reason why men onely sometimes are called the Creation and the Creatures and whence it arises To which purpose our understandings may well and soundly take hold on this that the word which signifies creatures properly in common use among the Hebrews signifies onely men sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as being the excellentest of subsolar Creatures The same Phrase and manner of speaking is much taken up in the Orientall Languages I shall call in my Witnesse and he may stand for two or three he is of such standing and perfection in the Academie of most exquisite learning it is Hortibonus or Casaubon In the Arabick Geographie saith he in abundance of places we finde the frequencie and fulnesse of Cities thus described the Author saith that in them there are many Creatures that is to say Men. This may well agree with our Samuel who writ in Arabick and this may be a good note affixed to the latter end of the 16 Chapter of Marks Gospell to the illustration of it Go into the whole World and preach the Gospell to every Creature CHAP. XIII THe corporall Ascension of Christ he goes about to prove by those Scriptures that speaks of the exaltation and elevation of God which he saith must properly be meant of Christ according to his humane nature because the meer Deitie is subject to none of these Sites or Postures That of Psalm 68 is applyed to the Ascension of Christ by S. Paul so that R. Samuel the Jew is not ashamed to follow S. Paul the Apostle of the Gentiles in beleeving and asserting the same truth He quotes something out of the Prophet Aser in his second Chapter but he forbears the prosecution of it upon this reason because that Prophesie is lost and is not to be found The Translatour he brings his judgement about the Prophet Aser and reproves the ignorance of R. Samuel that he should think the Prophet Aser to be lost when he is not And his reason is that the Prophet Aser and Haggai are all one onely Haggai is the Hebrew Name and Aser the Arabicke name of the same Prophet which R. Samuel did not know or at least did not call to minde when he writ so Now it were good to unpire the matter betwixt Alphonsus the Spanyard and Samuel the Jew and upon looking into it the Translator will be found in some fault Suppose there be some agreement betwixt Haggai and Aser in their signification Haggai signifying one that solemnizes and keeps a holy and joyfull day of solemnities that rejoyces festivally and Aser comming of a Verbe that signifies to make blessed and happy which may accord in this that the dayes of re-edifying the Temple and Jerusalem in which times Haggai prophecied were holy festivall and blessed dayes Though there be some similitude must there be Identitie How doth Alphonsus know that Aser and Haggai in the Arabick Tongue are the same Prophet This may be disproved two wayes 1. Because R. Samuel writ in Arabick lived among the Arabians and being both a Jewish and an Arabick Doctor he was likely to know as well as Alphonsus the names of Prophets in the Old Testament both in Hebrew and Arabick 2. If Aser and Haggai be all one then let the Spanyard shew us this that he quotes in the Prophecie of Haggai of a man ascending from the midst of the Sea and comming up to Heaven He must coyn a new Prophecie of Haggai if he will finde this in it for our Old Prophet neither in first or second 〈…〉 Chapter has any such thing However we speake of this obscure Prophet Aser which cannot be found what he was yet we may well conclude for the Authour against the Translatour that these words are not to be found in the Prophet Haggai Since these Notes I have found something that is like this which is quoted but neither in R. Samuels obscure Aser nor Alphonsus the Translators Haggai chap. 2. but in the Apocryphals of Esdras Lo there arose a winde out of the sea and lo that man waxed strong with the thousands of heaven Iunius reads it Quidam ut ventus A certain man as the winde came from the sea It should be translated a Man not a winde that did rise out of the Sea so the third Verse intimates that man waxed strong not that winde For rising of the winde is not the thing but the comparison accompanying and illustrating the appearance of the man I think pardoning the errour of the Authors and Translators Quotation both of the Name and the Book and Chapter I am the Oedipus of this Riddle And it may well be his meaning was of this place for in this book he doth besides this make use of the Apocrypha as Chap. 19. he quotes a place out of Jesus the sonne of Syrach and in chap. 20. he has out of the same Book Besides he is subject to some mistakes for in that 20 chapter he cals it Salomons writing when it is the Sonn of Syrachs and in this 13 chapter he quotes a place in Esay when it is in Ieremie Aliquando bonus dormitat Hebraeus calling Esdras Aser Among those were assumed into heaven he names Methusalem and takes it for a thing granted and known among the Jews But we must beleeve Moses who saith that Methusalem when he had lived nine hundred sixty nine years dyed he doth not say he was translated which he had newly said of Enoch his Father The Greeks errour is that he lived 14 years after the floud and was with Noah in the Ark which errour comes out of the Septuagints false computation And some of the Jews it seems are in this errour that because his Father was taken into heaven in his body and soul so was Methusalem too But they that compute and reckon according to the Hebrew numbring of the years do agree that Methusalem dyed that very year the flood came Others think he dyed six years before the floud He concludes the Chapter with asserting the wonderfull birth of Christ born of a Virgin without a man to be a very truth and plainly foretold by the Prophets of God Wherin he grants for a truth one of those six things which are the main Controversies betwixt the Jews and Christians He takes indeed one place to prove the birth of Christ by a Virgin which I dare not say flatly that the Prophet did speak it with any relation to the birth of Christ It is that of Ieremies The Lord shall create a new thing upon the earth a woman shall compasse a man I know the stream of Expositours
time one Iesus a wise man if it be lawfull to call him a man Mark how this Jew inclined to think there was a Deity in Christ and something super humane He proceeds This same Iesus did bring to passe incredible works and he was a Master to men that did receive the truth with much delight and pleasure in it Many Iews and many Greeks did he draw unto him This is he that was called Christ whom when Pilate had caused to be crucified being accused of the chief of our Iewish Nation yet they that loved him at first would never give over loving him and cleaving to him A rare testimony is this of the constancy of Christian Disciples and Followers of Christ I omit that he saith of him that he appeared alive again after three dayes according as the Divine Prophets had foretold these and many other admirable things concerning him Is not Iosephus here turned Christistian too making this to be him the Prophets spoke on CHAP. XX. IN the twentieth Chapter he commends the purity and cleannesse of the Christian Rites and service by Bread and Wine and preferâ—s it before the medling with the flesh and fat of Beasts slaughtered for Sacrifice by Jews He makes Scriptures of the Old Testament plainly before-hand point at the bread and Wine in our Sacrament of the Lords Supper Onely he puts in Water as well as Bread and Wine into that Sacrament and will make good that new practise of mixt Wine by an old proof from Salomons Proverbs where Wisdome propounds mixt Wines and so it was applyed to his hand long before him by S. Cyprian And Cyprian indeed doth speak of mixing Wine with the Water in the Sacrament and in that Epistle Dominica Traditio servetur at which the Papists shout for joy more then Boyes when they have found the black in the Bean as imagining this to be a strong ground for their weak opinion of unwritten Traditions But herein our Romanists run away like Boyes with a wrong errand for though Cyprian commend the mixing of Wine Water as Dominicam Traditionem yet doth he not mean an unwritten Tradition for he goes to prove it from the Scriptures as from that of Water and Blood issuing from our Saviours side on the Crosse And he saith at the Institution our Saviour gave a mixed Cup. You may see Durands and the Papists foolish mysteries in their mixing of water with their Wine In vino sanguis Christi in aqua populus repraesentatur And it is very true the Fathers in former times of old did use Vinum baptizatum or Crama Eucharisticum Wine tempered with Water as some call it because in the places where they lived the Wine was so strong it had need to be well-tempered with water at those times especially when they studyed the most sobriety and temperance in drawing near into fellowship with Christ Now Cyprians intent was not so much to prove that we ought to use Water with our Wine as to disprove the judgement and practise of the Water-Heretiques the Aquarii that did contend onely water was to be used in the Sacrament and so did celebrate These Aquarij were also called Hydroparastatae an ancient Heresie that defended water was onely to be used in the Sacrament The Armonians that said onely Wine without water was to be used were both in ancient times counted Hereticks Moreover beyond all this the Ancients some of them did not onely mixe cold Water but which some not acquainted with antiquity will wonder at they did mixe hot water or boyling water with the Wine And this hot water they thus infused in way of devout significancy to minde the faith of the Receivers that the Blood and water which flowed from Christs Side were not dead and cold Elements but that they were lively and effectuall even hot water and blood issuing from one had yet the heat of life in him CHAP. XXIII HE hath a notable way to follow Allegories and indeed the Genius of those times made many Christians in their writings on Scripture altogether Allegoricall That of Salomon Better is a morsell of Bread with love then a stalled Oxe with hatred is a Pool well fisht when he can catch this Fish in it that it means the Christians bread in the Sacrament is more acceptable to God then the Jews killing a fat Oxe for a Sacrifice This Jew as ouâ— Saviour said of the young man that came to him and answered prudently may well have it said of him Verily he is not farre from the Kingdome of Heaven for here he commends the New Testament and gives an Epithite as high as he can to the Gospel of S. Matthew calling it The glorious Gospell And in it he praises that Statute of patience our Saviour will have observed by his subjects If any man smite thee on the one Cheek turne to him the other also This is better testimony and fairer language then the rabble of the Rabshakeh Jews both cursing and cursed do commonly give who call the Gospell which is Evangelium in scorn Aven Gillaion the Volume of lies or vaâ—ities His perfidious fellow Rabbins will â—ot thank him for writing so to the credit of the Gospell or praising any of the Preâ—epts or Lessons of Christ they can read â—im another Lecture out of a Book among â—hem called Toledoth Iesus wherein they â—each to blaspheme high enough and then they speak as they think well enough of Christ That book is full of blasphemies calling Christ Talui A Gallows Clapper or A hanged Thief Mariam Harriam Mary the blessed mother of Christ they call An â—heap of Dung. In their calling Mary as my Author has it Harriam I know not whether he doe not rather meane Chorim which is obscene and filthy in the sense of it As for Hariah it signifies A woman great with Childe and if they call her so they do it to blot her Virginity as if she were begot with Childe by man and so with mouthes running over with blasphemy and lies they call her Sonah a Whore or unchaste woman the polluted one of the world The Apostles and Martyrs of Christ they call Lenones the Bread in the Sacrament A polluted Body the Church Errour and Preaching Howling They call our Festivall of the Lord Day the day of ruine and destruction the Christians little ones they call Vermine or creeping things They are commanded when they passe by the Churches or Oratories of Christians to say this The Lord destroy these houses of Office Out of the word Jesu they make the number by the Letters of 316. and there they have Curses and blasphemies scarce to be named Oâ— the patience of the just Jesus that endures these wretches Hellish Blasphemies doth not suddenly let the Ocean of his wrath on earth carry them with a strange Wave to the Ocean of everlasting fire in Hell CHAP. XXVI
Esay 11. 3. That is he shall judge by smelling who is innocent and who is guiltie Let us see therefore whether thou beest able to judge by smelling and when they saw his smelling was without this judgement they slew him This will scarce agree with so great a slaughter of Barcozbi and all his people by Adrians Forces But certain it is many Jews were now sacrificed to the Romans furie by their sword that the Lord might thorowly execute his wrath upon them This false Christ they say his reign and rule was some thirty years and a half and some make it foretold in those words of Daniel paraphrasing them thus Now when they shall fall that is the Israelites in the destruction of the Temple under Titus they shall be holpen with a little help in the Kingdom of Bitter which remained to the 52 year after the destruction of the Temple and many Israelites shall joyne with them in Bitter but with flatteries c. Of this Barcozbi all our writers make mention that speak of those times and say he tormented Christians whiles he had power with all kinde of punishments and put many to death if they would not deny and blaspheme Christ He is called by Eusebius Barchochebas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He is called by Hierome in his Catalogue of Church Doctors that were Writers of Books in the life of one Agrippa surnamed Castor Chocibus and in that Book made Greek by Sophronius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 others call him Cuziba but under all these names is meant this sonn of a lie Barcozbi who named himself the son of a starre if he were it was like the bitter Starr Absynthites or Wormwood that in the Citie Bitter brought such sore destruction upon his Countreymen And yet Rabbi Lipman the most blasphemous of all Jewish Doctors was not ashamed to write that this Bencozbi was one of the lawfull and right Princes of Israel and of the familie of David and his reason is because when he said I am the Messias the Rabbins never asked him Art thou of the Family of David He judges they took it for granted that he was so But this may well beseem the lying lip of Lipman who hath writ a Book called Nitzachon or his book of victory and triumph over the Gospell of Christ in which the blasphemous Spider will needs finde lies falshoods and vain things and poysonous untruths to make Christ and our Religion ridiculous Some learned Christians have answered blasphemous Hebrew aud his Nitzachon as Munster in his Annotations to the Hebrew Gospell of Matthew Postellus follows Munster and we shall shortly see with us the learned Constantine L'Emperour fully confuting this Nitzachon so as to make such blaspheming Jewes leave all their cursed croaking and coaxation and make them as mute as the Seriphian Froggs and give no croaking sounds at all Of Rabbi Akiba they write that his Companions some nine were taken with him when Gozbi perisht and they were put to cruell deaths for Akiba if we durst beleeve them was put to death by an Iron Comb with which his flesh was torn off his body And thus farr we have gone to shew the Tragedy of Bencochab and Jewish dotage In the Reign of Theodosius the second came Moses of Crete to act his part of a false Saviour giving out he was sent from Heaven and was a second Moses he would lead al the Jews that followed him thorow the sea to the Continent dry-shod For a year together he perswaded them in their Cities and Townes to leave all their riches and follow him he would carry them to the promised Land At an appointed day to passe the Sea great multitudes of men women and Children repaire to him whom he brings to an high Promontory hanging over the Sea he bidds them cast themselves down which multitudes did and perisht being dasht in pieces on the Rock or drowned in the Sea Many were saved that were about to cast themselves down by some Christian Merchants and Fishers that disswaded them from so madd and murderous an Act and who helpt to draw many out of the Sea and saved them from drowning The Jews seeing the great Delusion thought to lay hands upon the Impostor but their false Moses as if he had been a true Devill was gone and vanisht they knew not whether nor how This was an occasion to bring many Jews to embrace the Christian faith and to leave the way of Judaism subject to such dangerous and costly deceits Of another false Prophet Moses Mamonides makes mention who arose in the Southern parts and told the people he was the fore-runner of the Messias and that in those parts he should shortly appear and he invited them Come ye with me and let us goe meet the Messias for he hath sent me unto you that I may prepare the way before him After a year he was taken they that did cleave to him fled away and an Arabian King that took him asking him why he did this and he answering I did it by command from God he further demanded What Miracle or wondrous thing canst thou do to confirme this He replyed My Lord the King cut off my head and after that I will rise again and live as I did before The King said Thou canst not do a greater thing then this bring but this to passe and then I and all the world shall beleeve thy sayings are true and good and that our Ancestors have inherited vanity and lies which profited them not His head by the Kings appointment was cut off but he never yet was as good as his word to appear alive again though some Jews are so devoid of judgement as to expect his reviving and look for his appearing There was Rex Thaborius one called the King of Thabor that would needs be a Messias whom Charles the fift caused to be burnt Maimonides reckons up four more obscure false Christs that did arise among the Jews in Spain and France and brought misery upon themselves aud the Jews Among these Impostors was David El-David or David Elroi in the Citie Omadia subject to the King of Persia he had some Power by Praestigiation and Magique whereby he did work great Signes and marvellous things and gathered people to make warre with all Nations Some said this great power of his was from the speciall vertue of God in him and as he called himself so they counted him the Messias as he said to the King of Persia I am the Messias and God hath sent me to deliver the Children of Israel The King cast him in Prison and said If thou canst deliver thy self I shall know thereby whether thou be the Christ or no if thou dost not deliver thy self I will put thee to death because thou art a fool But the Jugler got from Bonds and though the King sent Horsmen and