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Now, if we compare the language of the two apostles with these extracts from the Jewish historian; if we consider, that they describe a body

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of Jews, and Jews who flourished in Judea, a little before the destruction of that nation, we shall not hesitate to conclude, that they mean the same people. Of this conclusion we shall have no doubt, if we examine their character in a religious, moral, and political view.

The apostles represent them as denying or re.jecting the only true God, that is, as apostatizing from the religion of Moses and the prophets. Josephus, in effect, asserts the same thing: for he describes them as guilty of daring impiety against God*, as trampling on his laws, and deriding his prophets. Again, St. Peter's language holds them forth as persons who once believed in Christ, and even conformed to his gospel. "It had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it hath happened to them, according to the true proverb, The dog returns to his own vomit, and the sow that is washed, again wallows in mire." Now, this very language was

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Josephus says of John, όποια πραξειν εμελλεν ανθρω πος ηδη και τον θεον ασεβειν τετολμηκώς.

most applicable to the zealots, and to the followers of John of Gischala. For Josephus tells us, that they were Galileans, (the name by which the Jewish believers were commonly. called,) whom that wicked chief had corrupted, and whom he sanctioned in the commission of all. their crimes. Besides, he says, that they did not disbelieve the oracle which foretold the destruction of the city, yet employed themselves as the ministers of its accomplishment. They then did not disbelieve the prophecy delivered by Jesus, and recorded by the evangelists. But they could not believe this, without being at least nominal believers in the gospel. And undoubtedly it is to their madness and inconsistence, as professing christianity, that Josephus alludes.

If we consider the gnostics and the zealots in a moral view, they are identified by the same frightful features of turpitude and villainy. Amidst the general resemblance which presents itself in the description given by Josephus and the sacred writers, some circumstances are so minute, peculiar, and characteristic as to shew, that they must have had in view the same class of people. Thus, they painted their eyes, or had eyes of adultery*; they admired the persons of

* The words of Peter are οφθαλμους έχοντες μεσους Moixados, and may mean, that they had adulterated eyes,

men, and went in the way of Cain, by which is meant, that they persecuted and murdered their brethren; and their guilt in this respect Josephus states in the most emphatic manner. "The ties of consanguinity and friendship only made them more eager for the effusion of blood. Thinking it a timid and inglorious weakness to immolate only strangers and enemies, they coveted the glory of indulging a ferocious cruelty towards their nearest relations and friends*." Our Lord predicted that, before the destruction of the Jewish state, iniquity† would abound. This term does not, as the English reader might suppose, mean mere wickedness or unrighteousness, but

or lustful eyes. The apostle intended chiefly the last sense; but he probably glances at the practice which Josephus records, of adulterating their eyes with paint.

Ποια δε αυτους φιλια, ποια δε συγγένεια προς τους εφ έκαςης ημερας φόνους' ουχι θρασύτερους εποίησε; μεν γαρ τους αλλοτρίους κακως ποιειν αγεννούς εργον είναι πονηρίας ὑπελαμβανον, λαμπραν δε φέρειν επιδειξιν ήγνυντο την εν τοις οικειοτάτοις ωμότητα. Β. J. lib. 7.

c. 8. 1.

Η Δια το πληθυνθηκαι την ανομίαν, ψυγήσεται ἡ αγάπη των πολλων. Matt xxiv. 12. The words of Josephus are, Και την τελεωτατην εισηγαγον δια παντων ανομίαν, εν ή το ζηλωτων κληθέντων γενος ηκμαζεν.

that unawed and unrestrained licentiousness, which is founded in the rejection of all moral obligations, and of all laws human and divine. This prediction has been remarkably verified in the conduct of the sicarii and zealots. Josephus, using the very word, says, that they surpassed all other men in iniquity; and alluding to the sanctions of virtue and of a future state, which the prophets enforced, and which the gnostics denied, he further affirms, "that they derided the divine laws, and scoffed at the oracles of the prophets. For the prophets have given many precepts in favour of virtue and against vice, which the zealots violated, and thereby brought upon themselves the accomplishment of a prediction delivered against our country." These wicked men went even farther. In derision of truth and virtue, they sought to give their immoralities the form of a regular system, and the sanction of a law. Instead, therefore, of concealing their enormities, they proclaimed them; and, as St. "I shall not Paul says, gloried in their shame. omit," says Theodoret, "the force of law which they give to their system*. They admit the

Hær. Fab. lib. 1.

* Την δε ασελγειαν συγκαλυπτειν ουκ ανεχομενοι, αλλα νόμον την ακολασίαν ποιούμενοι. 5. To the same effect writes Josephus, Ta MEYISα TWY

transmigrations of the soul, but not on the principle taught by Pythagoras. For he said, that souls which have sinned are sent into bodies, to be duly punished and purified. But the gnostics say, that the cause of their being embodied is directly opposite to that assigned by Pythagoras, For human souls, affirm they, are sent into bodies in order to practice all manner of lewdness; that, therefore, those souls which fulfil this end, on being once immersed in a body, do not need, a second immersion: whereas those which have sinned in a small degree must be sent twice, thrice, and even oftentimes, until they have completed all sorts of baseness." The general spirit of this account is confirmed by the Jewish historian; "They assumed the name of zealots, as intending either to deride those who were the objects of their unjust and cruel treatment, or to pervert the nature of things, by ascribing to the greatest evils the sanction of good."

In the last place, if we consider the political conduct of the zealots, we shall conclude, that they are the same people with the gnostics; and in this view, the writings of Josephus throw

κακων αγαθά νομίζοντες, where the last word means sanctioning or enforcing by law, agreeably to the primary sense. οι νομίζω, as taken from νομος.

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