CHAP. and indeed there was a kind of softened Oriental

II.

The

ism, probably derived by Plato from his master
Pythagoras, by Pythagoras from the East, which
readily assimilated with the mystic interpretations
of the Egypto-Jewish theology. The Alexandrian
notions of the days of the Messiah are faintly
shadowed out in the book "of the Wisdom of
Solomon," in terms which occasionally remind us
of some which occur in the New Testament.
righteous Jews, on account of their acknowledged
moral and religious superiority, were to "judge the
nations," and have "dominion over all people."
But the more perfect development of these views
is to be found in the works of Philo. This
writer, who however inclined to soar into the
cloudy realms of mysticism, often rests in the
middle region of the moral sublime, and abounds
in passages which would scarcely do discredit to his
Athenian master, had arrayed a splendid vision of
the perfectibility of human nature, in which his
own nation was to take the most distinguished
part. From them knowledge and virtue were to
emanate through the universal race of man.
whole world, convinced at length of the moral
superiority of the Mosaic institutes, interpreted,
it is true, upon the allegorical system, and so
harmonised with the sublimest Platonism of the
Greeks, was to submit in voluntary homage, and
render their allegiance to the great religious
teachers and examples of mankind. The Jews

* Wisdom, iii. 8.; v. 16.; viii. 14.

The

II.

Messiah,

to Alexan

drian Jews.

themselves, thus suddenly regenerated to more than CHAP. the primitive purity and loftiness of their Law, (in which the Divine Reason, the Logos, was as it were embodied,) were to gather together from all quarters, and under the guidance of a more than human being, unseen to all eyes but those of the favoured nation* (such was the only vestige of the Messiah) Reign of to re-assemble in their native land. There the great according era of virtue, and peace, and abundance, productive ness of the soil, prolificness in the people, in short, of all the blessings promised in the book of Deuteronomy, was to commence and endure for ever. This people were to be invincible, since true valour is inseparable from true virtue. By a singular inference, not out of character with allegoric interpreters who, while they refine the plainest facts and precepts to a more subtle and mystic meaning, are apt to take that which is evidently figurative in a literal sense, the very wild beasts in awe and wonder at this pure and passionless race, who shall have ceased to rage against each other with bestial ferocity, were to tame their savage hostility to mankind. Thus the prophecy of Isaiah, to which Philo seems to allude, though he does not adduce the words, was to be accomplished to the letter; and that paradisaical state of amity between brute and man, so beautifully described by Milton, perhaps from this source, was finally to be renewed. And as the Jewish philosopher, contrary to most of his own countrymen, and to some of the Grecian

* De Execr. ii. 435, 436.

VOL. I.

G

† De Præm, ii. p. 422,

II.

CHAP. sects, denied the future dissolution of the world by fire, and asserted its eternity*, he probably contemplated the everlasting duration of this peaceful and holy state.

Belief dif

ferent ac

character

of the

believer.

Such, for no doubt the Alexandrian opinions cording to had penetrated into Palestine, particularly among the Hellenist Jews such were the vast, incoherent, and dazzling images with which the future teemed to the hopes of the Jewish people.t They admitted either a part or the whole of the common belief, as accorded with their tone of mind and feeling. Each region, each rank, each sect; the Babylonian, the Egyptian, the Palestinian, the Samaritan; the Pharisee, the lawyer, the zealot, arrayed the Messiah in those attributes which suited his own temperament. Of that which was more methodically taught in the synagogue or the adjacent school, the populace caught up whatever made the deeper impression. The enthusiasm took an active or contemplative, an ambitious or a religious, an earthly or a heavenly tone, according

* De Mundi Incorruptibilitate, passim.

The following passages from the apocryphal books may be consulted; I do not think it necessary to refer to all the citations which might be made from the Prophets: The faithful prophet" is mentioned, 1 Macc. xiv. 41. ; the discomfiture of the enemies of Israel, Judith, xvi. 17.; universal peace, Ecclesiast. 1. 23, 24.; the re-assembling of the tribes, Tobit, xiii. 13-18. Baruch, ii. 34, 35.; the conversion of many nations, Tobit, xiii. 11. xiv. 6, 7. see par

ticularly the second apocryphal book of Esdras, which, although manifestly Judæo-Christian, is of value as illustrating the opinions of the times,- "Thou madest the world for our sakes; as for the other people, which also come of Adam, thou hast said that they are nothing, but be like unto spittle; and hast likened the abundance of them unto a drop that falleth from a vessel. ** If the world now be made for our sakes, why do we not possess an inheritance with the world? how long shall this endure? 2 Esdras, vi. 56-59.

to the education, habits, or station of the believer; and to different men the Messiah was man or angel, or more than angel; he was king*, conqueror, or moral reformer; a more victorious Joshua, a more magnificent Herod, a wider-ruling Cæsar, a wiser Moses †, a holier Abraham ‡; an angel, the Angel of the Covenant, the Metatron, the Mediator between God and man §; Michael, the great tutelar archangel of the nation, who appears by some to have been identified with the mysterious Being who led them forth from Egypt; he was the Word of God; an Emanation from the Deity; himself partaking of the divine nature. While this was the religious belief, some there were, no doubt, of the Sadducaic party, or the half-Grecised adherents of the Herodian family, who treated the whole as a popular delusion; or, as Josephus to Vespasian, would not scruple to employ it as a politic means for the advancement of their own fortunes. While

*The Gospels, passim ; 2 Esdras, xii. 32.

Thou wilt proclaim liberty to thy people, the house of Israel, by the hand of Messias, as thou didst by the hand of Moses and Aaron, on the day of the Passover. Chald. Par. on Lament. ii. 22. quoted by Lightfoot, v. 161.

Among others to the same purport, the following, of a later date, is curious. Moses came out of the wilderness, and King Messias out of the midst of Rome; the one spake in the head of a cloud, and the other spake in the head of a cloud, and the Word of the Lord speaking between these, and they walking together. Targ. Jer. on Exod. xii.

my servant King Messiah, exalted,
lofty, and very high: more exalted
than Abraham, for it is written of
him, I have lifted up my hand to
the Lord (Gen. xiv. 22.); and more
exalted than Moses, for it is writ-
ten of him, He saith of me, take him
unto thy bosom, for he is greater
than the fathers." Jalkut Shamuni;
see Bertholdt, 101.

Some of the titles of the Messiah,
recognised by general belief and
usage, will be noticed as they occur
in the course of the history.

§ Sohar, quoted by Bertholdt, p. 121. 133.

Many of the quotations about the Memra, or divine Word, may be found in Dr. Pye Smith's work on the Messiah.

"Behold, glorious shall be

CHAP.

II.

the robber chieftain looked out from his hilltower to see the blood-red banner of him whom he literally expected to come "from Edom with dyed garments from Bozrah," and "treading the winepress in his wrath," the Essene in his solitary hermitage, or monastic fraternity of husbandmen, looked to the reign of the Messiah, when the more peaceful images of the same prophet would be accomplished, and the Prince of Peace establish his quiet and uninterrupted reign.

In the body of the people, the circumstances of the times powerfully tended both to develop more fully, and to stamp more deeply into their hearts, the expectation of a temporal deliverer, a conqueror, a king. As misgovernment irritated, as exaction pressed, as national pride was wounded by foreign domination, so enthusiasm took a fiercer and more martial turn: as the desire of national independence became the predominant sentiment, the Messiah was more immediately expected to accomplish that which lay nearest to their hearts. The higher views of his character, and the more unworldly hopes of a spiritual and moral revolution, receded farther and farther from the view; and as the time approached in which the Messiah was to be born, the people in general were in a less favourable state of mind to listen to the doctrines of peace, humility, and love, or to recognise that Messiah in a being so entirely divested of temporal power or splendour. In the ruling party, on the other hand, as will hereafter appear, the dread of this inflammable state of the public mind, and the dangerous po