any where given respecting the mode of killing animals, they affirm that the words," as I have commanded thee," (though it is not the Lord who is here the speaker, but Moses,) mean, as I commanded thee orally in Mount Sinai :" the specific directions therefore are not to be sought in the Written, but in the Oral Law, that is, in their traditions; from which source they draw them in great abundance, and have composed bulky treatises on the subject.

Of the numerous observances with which their weddings are solemnized, we will mention but one. The bride is led three times round the bridegroom, because it is written, "A woman shall compass a man." [Jer. xxxi. 22.]†

The relatives who attend the funeral of a person deceased, when they return, are to sit bare footed on the ground for seven days, neither eating meat nor drinking wine, but exhibiting the utmost wretchedness; and for thirty days they are to wear mournful and squalid apparel, neither washing themselves nor any of their clothes. Nothing about the duration of mourning is said in their Law; but they find it clearly defined there notwithstanding. It is written in Amos, "I will turn your feasts into mourning :" [Ch. viii. 10:] hence they conclude, as the duration of a festival was seven days, that the duration of the deepest mourning must be the same. But the thirty-days neglect of their persons, a part of which consists in not combing or dressing their hair, depends for its sanction on Cabbalistic ingenuity. Aaron and his two remaining sons, when his two eldest were struck dead, were commanded "not to uncover their heads;" [Lev. x. 6;] that is, the Rabbins say, not to clip their hair, but to let it grow. But how does this point to the number of thirty days? Because the Nazarite was also commanded to let his hair grow, and prohibited from clipping it, all the days of his vow; [Num. vi. 5 ;] and this was a period of thirty days. How do they gather this, when still the number is not mentioned? From its being added, [ver. 8,] "All the days of his separation, he shall be holy to the Lord;" where the concluding word, when its letters are reckoned as numerals, makes the number 30. By plain consequence, then, the days of separation were thirty; and by a consequence equally plain, the same should be the days of mourning!‡

Some apology may seem requisite for detaining the reader so long among such a wilderness of absurdities; which, however, cannot fail to afford him some amusement: but when the object was, to establish a tendency to ceremonial observances as belonging to the national character of the Jews, it was necessary to produce more than a few instances, which might be regarded as isolated and accidental.

* Cap. xxxvi.

+ Cap. xxxix.

Cap. xlix.

Enow, surely, have now been given, fully to prove our position Buxtorf furnishes a great number more. How striking a comment do they afford upon the Lord's words; "Laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups; and many other such like things ye do!" But, as observed in the Lecture," this disposition of that people to neglect essentials and to cleave to formalities, if it disqualified them from constituting an interior church themselves, eminently adapted them to be made the representatives of such a church, and to have their affairs overruled, so as to be subservient to such representation." And surely the indubitable fact, that such was their distinguishing genius, affords, by itself, an argument of no inconsiderable weight, that the designs of Providence in selecting them from all other nations, were purely those which we have endeavoured in this Lecture to develope, and were not connected with any partial favour to them, but solely regarded the general benefit of all future generations of mankind.

No. VI. (Page 482.)

CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF JEPHTHAH'S Vow.
Judges xi. 31.

As some modern writers have thought they have succeeded in clearly establishing the more pleasing view of the fate of Jephthah's daughter from the very words of the vow; and I have nevertheless stated, that I think that the most unforced inference from the language of the original, and from the history in general, is, that the sacrifice took place; it seems necessary to give a view of the progress and present state of opinion upon the subject, and critically to examine the various renderings which have been proposed.

Four different senses, in ages distant from each other, have been given to the words of the Hebrew original.

J. The first is this: "WHOSOEVER cometh out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall be the Lord's, and I will offer HIм up for a burntoffering."

2. The second is that adopted in the text of the common English Bible: "WHATSOEVER cometh out of the doors of my house, &c.-shall be the Lord's, AND I will offer IT up for a burnt-offering."

3. The third is that given in the margin of the English Bible: "WHATSOEVER cometh out of the doors of my house, &c.-shall be the Lord's, OR I will offer IT up for a burnt-offering."

4. The fourth was proposed about sixty years ago by Dr. Randolph, and is this: "WHOSOEVER Cometh out from the doors of my house, &c. shall be the Lord's; and I will offer (to) Him [namely, the Lord,] a burnt-offering."

These shall be called, in the following remarks, the first, second, third, and fourth renderings or translations.

I. How the transaction was understood by the Jews while Hebrew was their vernacular language, it is impossible to determine; but certain it is, that, in the most remote period to which our means of ascertaining their sentiments extend, they understood the vow in the first of the above senses: they believed that a human sacrifice was intended by Jephthah from the beginning, and that his daughter was actually put to death. Thus the Greek version commonly called that of the Septuagint, which was made by Jews between two and three hundred years before the Christian era, gives the pronouns in the masculine gender: ο εκπορευομενος ος αν εξέλθη εκ των θυρων τε οικου με,εται το κυρίου, και ανοισω αυτόν ολοκαυτωμα: of which the FIRST RENDERING given above is an exact translation in English. With this, also, the Latin Vulgate, supposed to have been made from the Septuagint in the first century, and corrected by Jerome from the Hebrew in the fourth, completely coincides.

Josephus, the next ancient Jewish testimony, gives a sense agreeable to our SECond renderinG, or that of the text of the English Bible: he makes Jephthah promise "to offer in sacrifice what living creature soever should first meet him," and he affirms that the vow, in that sense, was executed by him: "he sacrificed his daughter as a burnt-offering, offering such an oblation as was neither conformable to the law nor acceptable to God."* The same sense is given in the Targum, or Chaldee Paraphrase, which was written later. One or other of these two renderings, was received, for many ages, by all who read the Scriptures, both Jews and Christians.

The celebrated Rabbi, David Kinchi, who flourished in the twelfth century, seems to have been the first who proposed the THIRD TRANSLATION, or that given in the margin of the English Bible. This has been since adopted by many commentators and translators: and the discussions on the subject were for a long time confined to the question, which of these two renderings, (our second and third,) should be preferred. The arguments pro and con, may be seen at large in Poole's Synopsis, and in many other works: but as a specimen of * Ant. B. v. Ch. vii. § 10.

the nature of the discussions which are included in this inquiry, and as a remarkable instance of the great obscurity which hangs over the whole question, we will give some observations of Noldius on the subject.

This learned writer, in his Concordantia Particularum EbræoChaldaicarum, among the instances in which the Hebrew partiele }, which commonly signifies and, bears the sense of or, adduces this vow of Jephthah; on which he adds this note. Kimchi in hoc loco, &c. -"Kimchi on the place, and in his Michlol, says, &c.—It shall be sucred to Jehovah, if it be not fit for sacrifice; OR I will offer it as a sacrifice, if it be fit for sacrifice. This is a right distinction: for many things might be consecrated to God, (Lev. xxvii. 2 to 9, 11, 14, 16;) but only these five might be sacrificed; viz. oxen, sheep, goats, doves, and pigeons. (Lev. i. 2, 10, 14.) The meaning then is, that the daughter of Jephthah, as she could not lawfully be sacrificed, was consecrated to the peculiar worship of God.Whether or not she was put to death, is, however, a question of great difficulty. Capellus, in his Diatribe on Jephthah's vow, contends for the affirmative: because it is said, (Lev. xxvii. 29,) “Every thing devoted (Cherem) shall surely be put to death:" from which he gathers, because (ver. 28) men, as well as other things in our power are mentioned as liable to be devoted by Cherem, that children might lawfully be devoted and put to death by their parents, and servants by their masters. A harsh and unreasonable assertion! nor is it much softened by Hachspan and Maimonides, who only allow this right to be possessed by the Israelites over their Canaanitish slaves. For though the servitude of these was perpetual, and they were not, like Hebrew servants, to be emancipated in the seventh year or in the year of jubilee; yet they were under the common protection of the laws, which provided that they should not be ill-treated, (Ex. xxii. 21, and xxiii. 9, Lev. xix. 33, Deut. x. 19, Zech. vii. 10;) and even pronounced a curse against those who should oppress them: (Deut. xxvii. 19; comp. Mal. iii. 5, and Num. xv. 16, 29:) hence the Jews could not assume over them, much less over their own children, the right of life and death: and the Scriptures afford no example of their doing so. As to the passage, Lev. xxvii. 28, 29, by which Capellus defends his opinion, Maimonides rightly distinguishes between the Cherem of God and the Cherem of the priests, (Num. xviii. 14,) which Leusden more clearly designates as the destructive and the common Cherem. The former kind includes such things as were either to be put to death in honour of God, as clean animals for sacrifice, (Lev. xxvii. 28,) or to be destroyed as abominable, (Num. xxi. 2, 3; Deut. vii. 26; Jos. vi. 7, 18, and vii. 12, 13; 1 Sam. xv. 3;

1 Ks. xx. 42; Is. xxxiv. 5 & 43; Zech. xiv. 11; Mal. iv. 6; Ezr. x. 18: This is called Anathema, Rom. ix. 3; 1 Cor. xii. 3; Rev. xxii. 3.) The latter kind includes whatever was destined to sacred uses, never more to return to its former owner, (Lev. xxvii. 28; Num. xviii. 4; 1 Sam. ii. &c.) It is in vain that Capellus adduces the words, EVERY Cherem, [Lev. xxvii. 29] to support his opinion; what is meant is, EVERY DESTRUCTIVE Cherem. Thus it is said [Num. xviii. 14,] "EVERY Cherem shall be given to the priests;" and yet that which was killed must be excepted; viz. that which was anathema,-the hostile and the sacrificial Cherem, &c.-for this, being taken out of existence, cannot be said to be given to the priests. Universal propositions are not always absolute, but the subject must always be such as suits the predicate. The execution of Jephthah's vow was postponed for two months: and who can believe, in all this time, even if the people did not interfere, as they did in the similar case of Saul and Jonathan; (1 Sam. xiv. 44, 35;) that the priests would not have prevented the perpetration of such a parricide? which they might have done by a simple statement of the law upon the subject." Having offered these arguments, with so much appearance of conviction, against the idea of the execution, our learned author here pauses, and then proceeds thus: "These were our first thoughts upon this question; but upon re-examining them, I am almost brought to follow the reasons advanced on the other side, and to acknowledge the actual immolation. For beside that this is steadily affirmed by so many Fathers, Rabbins, and Divines; I do not see how Jephthah, who was a pious and prudent man, could have been so deeply moved (ver. 35,) for the mere consecration of his daughter to the service of God, if she was to suffer nothing worse. But further: we never read of any such custom among the Jews, as that of vowing perpetual virginity: on the contrary, to be childless was esteemed by them a reproach (1 Sam. i. 10, 11, Luke i. 25:) wherefore this was what the daughter of Jephthah lamented (ver. 37). Nor do we read that females ever undertook the Nazariteship; and yet even the Nazarites were not restricted to celibacyt; as may be seen in the cases of Sampson and Samuel, [who were dedicated to God from their birth.] Finally, the long continued

These two kinds of Cherem are better illustrated in Dr. Randolph's discussion of the subject.

+ This argument is met by Dr. Randolph with an observation which is certainly of considerable weight: He remarks, that devotement of females, differently from that of males, must have included abstinence from marriage, because the latter engagement would abrogate the former, and the domestic duties of the wife and mother would be incompatible with a constant attendance on the sanctuary.