OF THE ANCIENT ISRAELITES: CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF THEIR PECULIAR CUSTOMS AND CEREMONIES, THEIR LAWS, POLITY, RELIGION, SECTS, ARTS AND TRADES, WITH A SHORT ACCOUNT OF THE ANCIENT AND MODERN SAMARITANS. WRITTEN ORIGINALLY IN FRENCH BY CLAUDE FLEURY, ABBE OF ARGENTEUIL, AND MEMBER OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY, PARIS. THE WHOLE MUCH ENLARGED FROM THE PRINCIPAL WRITERS ON BY ADAM CLARKE, LL. D. F. S. A. FROM THE SECOND LONDON EDITION. NEW-YORK, PUBLISHED BY J. EMORY AND B. WAUGH, FOR THE METHODIST EPIscopal church, AT THE CONFERENCE J. Collord, Printer. 1832. PREFACE. EVERY attempt to illustrate the BIBLE, the oldest and most important book in the world, a book that has God for its Author, and the eternal happiness of the human race for its end, deserves the most serious attention of all those who profess the Christian religion. It is granted on all hands that this book has many difficulties; but this is not peculiar to the Jewish Scriptures: all ancient writings are full of them and these difficulties are generally in proportion to the antiquity of such writings; for the customs, manners, and language of mankind are continually changing; and were it not for the help received from the records of succeeding ages, which are only accessible to the learned, many valuable works of primitive times must have remained in impenetrable obscurity. Scholars and critics have exerted themselves in the most laudable manner to remove or elucidate the difficulties occurring in ancient authors; and (thanks to their industry) they have rendered the study of these writers not only easy but delightful; and brought the literature of ancient Greece and Rome within the reach even of our children. But the Heathen writers have not been the only objects of regard in the grand system of critical disquisition. A host of the most eminent scholars that ever graced the republic of letters, or ennobled the human character, have carefully read, and diligently studied, the Sacred Writings; have felt their beauties, and prized their excellencies; and, by their learned and pious works, have not only recommended them to mankind at large, but rendered them useful to all who wish to read so as to understand. Some of these have been addressed to the infidel, others to the scholar, and some to the plain unlettered Christian. The number of the latter, it is true, has not been great; but what is deficient in quantity, is supplied by the very accurate information they impart. Such works want only to be generally known, to become universally esteemed. In the first rank of such writers the Abbé Fleury, and Father Lamy, stand highly and deservedly distinguished; the former by his treatise entitled Mœurs des Israelites, (the book now before the reader) and the latter by his well known work called Apparatus Biblicus. The former is the most useful treatise on the subject I have ever met with. In 1756 the Mœurs des Israelites was translated by the Rev. Ellis Farneworth, and dedicated to the bishop of Litchfield and Coventry. How it was received I cannot tell, being long before my time; but if it sold in proportion to the merit of the work, and the fidelity of the execution, a considerable number must soon have been disposed of. When I first thought of preparing a new edition of this work for the public, I intended to retranslate the original; but on reading over the translation of Mr. Farneworth, I was satisfied that a better one, on the whole, could scarcely be hoped for. In general the language is simple, pure, and elegant; and both the spirit and unction of the original are excellently preserved. I therefore made no scruple to adopt it, reserving to myself the liberty to correct what I thought amiss, and to add such notes as I judged necessary to the fuller elucidation of the work. As some judicious friends thought the original work rather too concise, and hinted that several useful additions might be made to it on the same plan, I was naturally led to turn to Father Lamy for materials, whose work above mentioned I considered as ranking next to that of the Abbé Fleury. From Mr. Bundy's edition, much of the fourth part of the present volume is extracted. Those points which I suppose the Abbé had treated too concisely to make intelligible, I have considered more at large; and some subjects of importance, which he had totally omitted, I have here introduced. To the whole I have added a copious Index, by which any subject discussed in the work may at once be referred to. I have now reason to hope, that every serious Christian, of whatever denomination, will find this volume a faithful and pleasant guide to a thorough understanding of all the customs and manners, civil and religious, of that people to whom God originally entrusted the sacred Oracles. Without a proper knowledge of these, it is impossible to see the reasonableness and excellency of that worship, and those ceremonies, which God himself originally established among the Israelites; and by which he strongly prefigured that glorious revelation under which we have the happiness to live. The late excellent bishop of Norwich, Dr. Horne, recommends this work in the following terms. "This little book contains a concise, pleasing, and just account of the manners, customs, laws, polity and religion of the Israelites. It is an excellent introduction to the reading of the Old Testament, and should be put into the hands of every young person."-Discourses, vol. i. This recommendation will have its due weight both with the learned and the pious. |