pose that these returned christians were residing at Jerusalem, or more properly at Elia, at the same time that Aquila was residing there as overseer of the emperor's works. Let not the public be abused by any cavils which ignorance or fraud may raise about the chronology of the return."

But certainly it must be of consequence to know, whether Aquila was residing at Jerusalem after the destruction of that city by Adrian; and this is more than Epiphanius says, or is at all probable in itself. For the rebuilding of Jerusalem by Adrian, in which Aquila. was employed by him, was undertaken in the 18th year of his reign, a year before the revolt of the Jews; and it was not till the 18th of Adrian that they were entirely subdued.

According to Epiphanius, Aquila, after his conversion to christianity by the descendants of the Jewish caristians who were returned from Pella, (retaining his former practices,) was excommunicated by them. After this he became a Jew, and, applying himself to the study of the scriptures, made a translation of them into Greck. This translation Cave supposes to have been made A. D. 128 or 129, the 11th or 12th of Adrian. His conversion to christianity, therefore, was probably prior to the reign of Adrian: and yet that is the only circumstance that proves any intercourse he ever had with Jewish christians returned from Pella. On which side then is the ignorance, I say nothing of the fraud, of which you suspect me in this business? You must, Sir, dig deeper than you have yet done, for the foundation of this favourite church.

1 am, &c.

LETTER IV.

Of the Evidence from Jerom in favour of the Existence of a Church of Orthodox Jewish Christians at Jerusalem after the Time of Adrian.

REV. SIR,

I COME now to the two passages which you have quoted from Jerom. That on which you lay the greatest stress you introduce in the following manner. "But I give him Origen:" "I will rest the credit of my seventh position upon the mention which occurs. in Jerom's Commentary upon Isaiah, of Hebrews believing in Christ, as distinct from the Nazarenes. Jerom relates two different expositions of the prophecy concerning Zabulon and Naphtali, delivered in the beginning of the 9th chapter of Isaiah, of which expositions he ascribes the one to the Hebrews believing in Christ, the other to the Nazarenes. The character given of these Hebrews, that they believed in Christ, without any thing to distinguish their belief from the common belief of the church, without any note of its error or imperfection, is a plain character of complete orthodoxy."

It is somewhat remarkable, that having before maintained that those whom Jerom called Nazarenes, in his epistle to Austin, were orthodox christians, you should now allow that, by the same term, he here means heretics; and that the phrase believing in Christ should now be a character of complete orthodoxy, when in that epistle it is predicated of the heretical Ebionites. What clue can we have to any man's meaning, if he be sup

posed to use terms in such different and even opposite senses? When neither himself nor any other writer ever says that there were two such very different kinds of Nazarenes, what right can you have to assert that there were?

The passage in Jerom on which though you lay so much stress, you do not quote, is as follows. In his interpretation of Isaiah ix. 14, (cited in Matt. iv. 6,) he says, "Galilee of the Gentiles Aquila translates as of the Gentiles, and Symmachus the boundaries of the Gentiles. By was we understand heaps of sand on sea coasts or shores. The Hebrews believing in Christ interpret the passage in this manner. in this manner. At first these two tribes, Zabulon and Naphtali, were taken by the Assyrians, and carried into their enemies' country, and Galilee was destroyed; which the prophet now says was relieved because he bore the sins of the people. But afterwards not only the two tribes, but the rest that dwelled beyond Jordan, in Samaria, were carried captive. And this they say the scripture now declares, that the country whose people were first carried captive, and began to serve the Babylonians, and which was first involved in the darkness of error, was the first to see the light of Christ preaching to them, and from it the gospel was preached to all other nations. The Nazarenes, whose opinion I have given above, thus endeavour to explain the passage. Christ coming, and his preaching shining forth, in the first place the country of Zabulon and Naphtalim, being delivered from the error of the Scribes and Pharisees, shook from their necks the heavy yoke of Jewish traditions; but afterwards, by the preaching of the apostle Paul, who was the last of the apostles, the preaching was increased,

or multiplied, and the gospel of Christ shone to the utmost boundaries of the Gentiles, and of the ocean. Then all the world, which before walked, or sat, in darkness, and was held in the chains of idolatry and death, saw the clear light of the gospel *."

Before you can show that this passage, on which you lay so much stress, is at all to your purpose, you must prove the three following things. First, that the Hebrews believing in Christ were different from the Nazarenes. Secondly, that the former were completely orthodox; and thirdly, that those orthodox Jewish christians resided at Jerusalem. And it appears to me that not one of these suppositions is at all probable.

That by Nazarenes Jerom did not intend any other than the Hebrews believing in Christ, but only meant

*Pro Galilea Gentium Aquila Sivas gentium, Symmachus, terminos gentium interpretati sunt: Sivas autem tumulos intelligimus arenarum, qui vel in littoribus vel in ripis sunt. Hebræi credentes in Christum hunc locum ita edisserunt. Primo tempore hæ duæ tribus Zabulon et Nephtalim ab Assyriis captæ sunt et ductæ in hostilem terram, et Galilæa deserta est, quam nunc propheta dicit alleviatam esse, eo quod peccata populi sustineret. Postea autem non solum duæ tribus, sed et reliquæ quæ habitabant trans Jordanem in Samaria, ductæ sunt in captivitatem. Et hoc, inquiunt, scriptura nunc dicit, quod regii cujus populus primus ductus est in captivitatem et Babiloniis servire cœpit, et quæ prius in tenebris versabatur erroris, ipse primum lucem prædicantis viderit Christi, et ex ea in universas gentes sit evangelium seminatum. Nazaræi, quorum opinionem supra posui, hunc locum ita explanare conantur. Adveniente Christo, et prædicatione illius coruscante, prima terra Zabulon et terra Nephtalim scribarum et pharisæorum est erroribus liberata, et gravissimum traditionum Judaicarum jugum excussit de cervicibus suis. Postea autem per evangelium apostoli Pauli, qui novissimus apostolorum omnium fuit, ingrayata est, i. e. multiplicata prædicatio, et in terminos gentium et viam universi maris Christi evangelium splenduit. Denique omnis orbis, qui ante ambulabat vel sedebat in tenebris, et idololatriæ ac mortis vinculis tenebatur, clarum evangelicum lumen aspexit. Opera, vol. iv. P. 33.

to vary his mode of expression, is probable from this consideration; that, after giving a translation of the passage by Aquila and Symmachus, both Ebionites, he speaks of the interpretation of the prophecy by the Hebrew christians in general, and then says, the Nazarenes, whose opinion he had given above, explained or illustrated it in the manner that has been represented. The opinion to which he referred, as given above, was therefore, probably, that of the Hebrews believing in Christ. And the explanations of the passage are not at all different from one another, but the latter a further illustration of the former; the one being an interpretation of the prophecy, and the latter a more particular application of it to the time of Christ and the gospel.

This passage, therefore, which you have quoted as decisively in your favour, instead of proving that the Hebrews believing in Christ were different from the Nazarenes, furnishes an additional argument that, in the idea of Jerom, they were the very same people; if it does not also prove that their opinions were the same with those of Aquila and Symmachus, or of the Ebionites.

You may indeed say that the opinion of the Nazarenes, to which Jerom refers, as given above, was that account of the Nazarenes which is found in his commentary on the preceding chapter, viz. " their so receiving Christ as not to abandon the old law." But the remoteness of the passage, and its having no relation to the subject of which he is treating in his com. mentary on the ninth chapter, make it improbable.

2. Admitting that Jerom alluded to some difference between the Hebrews believing in Christ and the Nazarenes, it is far from following that the former were