cumcised, nor did they conform to the Mosaic rites and ordinances, being obliged only to observe the laws, which the Jews call the seven precepts of Noah; they were however allowed to offer up their prayers in the temple and in the synagogues, but not to enter farther into the temple than the outer court, which was called the court of the Gentiles; and in the synagogues they had places assigned them separate from the Jews themselves." The term, Proselytes of the Gate, is derived from an expression frequent in the Old Testament, namely, "the stranger that is within thy gates;" but I think it evident that "the strangers" were those Gentiles who were permitted to live among the Jews under certain restrictions, and whom the Jews were forbid "to vex or oppress," so long as they lived in a peaceable manner. I must own that there appears to me no ground whatever in Scripture for this distinction of Proselytes of the Gate, and Proselytes of Righteousness. According to

These were, according to the Rabbis, 1st, To abstain from idolatry; 2dly, from blasphemy; 3dly, from murder; 4thly, from adultery; 5thly, from theft; 6thly, to appoint just and upright judges; 7thly, not to eat the flesh of any animal cut off while it was alive. Maimonides says, that the first six of these precepts were given to Adam, and the seventh to Noah; but they are not even mentioned by Onkelos, Philo, or Josephus.

Naaman the Syrian, Cornelius the centurion, the Ethiopian eunuch, and the "devout men," mentioned in the Acts, are conconsidered by Godwin, Benson,

d

and many others, as Proselytes of the Gate.

C

They were to abstain from idolatry; they were not to blaspheme the God of Israel; and they were to observe the Jewish Sabbath.

On the contrary, it is contended by learned men that in the time of Christ and his Apostles, proselytes were found every where, in great numbers, some circumcised, and some uncircumcised, and that the former were called just or righteous proselytes, the latter, proselytes of the gate. In the New Testament, it is added, we find a number of epithets applied to the

my idea, Proselytes were those, and those only, who took upon themselves the obligation of the whole Mosaic law, but retained that name till they were admitted into the congregation of the Lord, as adopted children. Gentiles were allowed to worship, and offer sacrifices to the God of Israel, in the outer court of the temple; and some of them, persuaded of the sole and universal sovereignty of the Lord Jehovah, might renounce idolatry, without embracing the Mosaic Law; but such persons appear to me never to be called Proselytes in Scripture, or in any ancient Christian writer."

X. The Karaites have their name from the Chaldee word Kara, Scriptura sacra, because they adhered to the Scripture as the whole and only rule of faith and practice, admitting the authority of tradition only when it agreed with the written word of God. Upon the dissension between Hillel the president of the Sanhedrim, and Shammai the vice-president, about thirty years before Christ, their respective scholars formed two parties and took different names.

latter class of proselytes, as evλaβεῖς, εὐσθεῖς, σεβόμενοι τὸν θεὸν, φοβούμενοι τὸν θεὸν, the pious, the devout, the reverential. Acts, ii. 5., x. 2. 22., xiii. 16., xviii. 7. Compare 2 Kings, v. 17-19. The ancient Kenites, it is said, may be reckoned with this class of proselytes, since they worshipped the one true God, while they refused to submit to the law of Moses. Numbers, x. 29. Judges, i. 16. iv. 11. 1 Sam. xv. 6. Jer.

Those who adhered to

but

Scripture only were called Karaim, or Scriptuarii, and were followers of Shammai; and those who were zealous for the traditions taught by the Scribes or Rabbis, were called Rabbanim, Rabbanists, and were followers of Hillel. The Karaites, however, justly boasted the high antiquity of their principles, as being the followers of Moses and of the prophets, in opposition to human tradition; when the doctrines of the Rabbis were generally adopted among the Jews, the Karaites were considered as schismatics. They seem to have remained for some time in obscurity; but about the year of our Lord 750, Anan, a Jew of Babylon, of the stock of David, and Saul his son, both men of learning, publicly disclaimed the authority of the traditionary doctrines of the Talmud, asserted the Scriptures to be the sole rule of faith, and became heads of the Karaites or Scriptuarii, who again grew into repute, and increased in numbers. There are now some of this sect in Poland and Russia, but they chiefly reside in Turkey and Egypt; few or none are to be found in these western countries. Thus it appears that a remnant has been always left, who confided their faith to the written word of God, and that the absurdities of the Talmud revived the spirit of true religion among the Jews; for the Karaites are universally reckoned men of the best learning, of the greatest piety, and of the purest morals of the whole nation.

a Vide Prideaux.

a

PART II.

CHAPTER THE FIRST.

-II. OF THE

1. OF THE CANON OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. INSPIRATION OF THE BOOKS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.

I. THE Canon of the New Testament consists of twenty-seven books, which were written by eight different authors, all of whom were contemporary with our Saviour. These books were written at different times, and at places remote from each other; and when the latest of them was published, the Gospel had been preached, and churches founded, in many parts of Asia, Europe, and Africa. Different churches at first received different books, according to their situation and circumstances; their canons were gradually enlarged, and it was not long, though the precise time is not known, before the same, or very nearly the same, books were acknowledged by the Christians of all countries.

The persecutions, under which the professors of the Gospel continually laboured, and the want of a national establishment of Christianity, prevented, for several centuries, any general assembly of Christians for the purpose of settling the canon of their

Scriptures. Since, therefore, there could be no declaration by public authority upon this subject for so long a period, recourse must be had to ecclesiastical writers for the earliest catalogues of the books of the New Testament; and we have the satisfaction of finding an almost perfect agreement among them.

a

The first writer who has left us a regular catalogue of the books of the New Testament is Origen, who lived in the beginning of the third century, although, as it will hereafter appear, they are all mentioned separately by much earlier authors. This catalogue is the same as our present canon, except that it omits the epistles of St. James and St. Jude; but Origen, in other parts of his writings, refers to these epistles as the productions of those Apostles. In the following century we have catalogues in the remaining works of Eusebius, Athanasius, Cyril, Epiphanius, Gregory Nazianzen, Philaster, Jerome, Ruffin, and Augustine, and those settled at the provincial councils of Laodicea and Carthage. Of these eleven catalogues, seven exactly agree with our canon; and the other four differ only in these respects, namely, three

a

b

"This canon (that is, of the New Testament) was not determined by the authority of councils, but the books, of which it consists, were known to be the genuine writings of the Apostles and Evangelists, in the same way and manner that we know the works of Cæsar, Cicero, Virgil, Horace, Tacitus, to be theirs; and the canon has been formed upon the

ground of an unanimous, or generally concurring testimony, and tradition."-Lardner, vol. vi. p. 27. This was indeed a point so little disputed, that we do not find any catalogue of canonical books in the decrees of the early general councils.

This was the third council at Carthage.