empire-2. when it reaches yet forty-five years further, i. e. at the epoch of about A. D. 1865, it meets the secondary terminating epoch of the 1260 years, calculated from that which may be deemed a secondary commencement of them in the Popedom-favouring Decree of Phocas. These concurrences, as having been previously discussed, need but a cursory re-mentioning.-3. The third synchronism that I have to notice, and which will detain us longer, is that of the probable termination of the world's 6000th year, dated from the Creation, just at about the same interval of seventy-five years from the year 1790 of our æra: in other words, the concurrence at that chronological point of the opening epoch of the world's seventh millennary, and therefore (as would seem probable) of that of the sabbatism of rest promised to the saints of God. For, as I have just hinted in the preceding chapter,2 the apostle Paul's use of the word raßßarioμos, sabbatism, to designate the saints' expected glorious rest with Christ, may be not unreasonably considered as almost an apostolic recognition of the early and well-known Jewish4 See Vol. iii. pp. 254, 255. 2 p. 218 suprà. "De quâ requie sempi So Osiander, about the time of the Reformation. ternâ ad Hebræos, cap. 4, ita loquitur Apostolus, ut hoc ipsum mysterium nobis, veluti digito, commonstrare videatur." So the Rabbi Eliezer, cap. xviii. p. 41, as Whitby on Heb. iv. 9, quotes him : "The blessed Lord created seven worlds (i. e. aιwvas, ages;) but one of them is all sabbath, and rest in life eternal." "Where," adds Dr. Whitby, "he refers to their (the Jews) common opinion that the world should continue 6000 years, and then a perpetual sabbath begin, typified by God's resting the seventh day, and blessing it." For perpetual, Whitby should have perhaps said a millennial sabbath; it being awvios in the sense in which the awves, or ages, before mentioned, were each millennial. So in the Midras Till. p. 4, the same Rabbi Eliezer says, "The days of Messiah are 1000 years."-And so too Bereschith Rabba, quoted also by Whitby; "It we expound the seventh day of the seventh thousand years, which is the world to come, the exposition is, 'He blessed it,' because that in the seventh thousand all souls shall be bound up in the bundle of life. So our Rabbins of blessed memory have said in their Commentaries on, 'God blessed the seventh day,' the Holy Ghost blessed the world to come, which beginneth in the seventh thousand of years."-Whitby also adds that Philo is copious on the same subject; stating that the sabbaths of the law were allegories, or figurative expressions. With which view we may compare St. Paul's declaration in Col. ii. 16, 17, "in respect of the sabbath-days, which are a shadow of things to come.” σκια των μελλόντων. The general opinion of the Jews was, that the world was to be 2000 years without the law, 2000 under the law, and 2000 under the Messiah. This is still called by the Jews "a tradition of the house of Elias," an eminent Rabbi that opinion that Messiah's kingdom of blessedness would occupy the seventh millennium of the world, agreeably with the type of the seventh days's sabbatism of rest after the six days of creation: especially seeing that it was Hebrew Christians whom he was then addressing; and that by them the word thus chosen could not but be almost necessarily associated, alike from its etymology and use, with some chronological septenary. In fact among the Christian fathers that succeeded on the apostolic age, this view of the matter was universally received and promulgated.2-Which being so, the chronological lived before the birth of Christ; who also taught that in the seventh millennary the earth would be renewed, and the righteous dead raised, no more again to be turned to dust: also that the just then alive should mount up with wings as eagles: so that in that day they would not need to fear, though the mountains (Psalm xlvi. 2) should be cast into the midst of the sea. Mede, Book iv. p. 951, 1 Insomuch that, as Schleusner observes on the word, Σαββατον, the Septuagint translation sometimes render the word by Bdouas.—It is a word applied to the seventh year of rest in the Mosaic law, as well as to the seventh day of rest. See Lev. xxν. 4, &c. 2 I may specify the pseudo-Barnabas (a writer of unquestionably a very early age in the Church) Irenæus, Cyprian, Lactantius. 1. Barnabas. Και εποίησεν ὁ Θεος εν ἓξ ἡμεραις τα έργα των χειρών αυτό, και συνετέλεσεν εν τῃ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ ἑβδομη, και κατέπαυσεν εν αυτῇ' και ἡγίασεν αυτην. Προσέχετε τεκνα τι λεγει το συνετέλεσεν εν ἐξ ἡμέραις τετο λέγει ότι συντελει δ Θεός Κύριος εν ἑξακισχιλίοις ετεσι τα παντα. Η γαρ ήμερα παρ' αυτῳ χιλια ετη. αυτος δε μαρτυρει λεγων, 188 σημερον ἡμερα εσαι ώς χίλια έτη. Ουκέν τεκνα εν έξ ἡμεραις, εν εξακιςχιλίοις έτεσι, συντελεσθήσεται τα παντα. Και κατέπαυσε τη ήμερα τη έβδομῃ. Τέτο λέγει όταν ελθων ὁ Υἱος αυτέ, και καταργήσει τον καιρον ανόμε, και κρίνει τις ασεβείς, και αλλαξει τον ήλιον, και την σεληνην, και τις ασέρας, τότε καλως καταπαύσεται εν τῇ ἡμερᾳ τῇ έβδομῃ. 2. Irenus. Οσαις ἡμεραις εγενετο ὁ κόσμος, τοσούτοις χιλιοντασι συντελείται. Και δια τετο φησιν ἡ γραφη, Και συνετελέσθησαν ὁ κρανος και ἡ γη, και πας ὁ κοστ μος αυτών και συνετέλεσεν ὁ Θεος εν τῃ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ Σ' τα έργα αυτό & εποίησε, και κατέπαυσεν ὁ Θεός εν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ ζ' απο παντων των έργων αυτό. Τετο δ' εσι των προγεγονότων διηγησις, και των εσομενων προφητεια : ἡ γὰρ ἡμερα Κυριε ὡς χιλια Adv. Hær. v. ad fin. ετη. 3. Cyprian. "Primi in dispositione divinâ septem dies annorum septem millia continentes." De Exh. Mart. 11. 4. Lactantius. " 'Quoniam sex diebus cuncta Dei opera perfecta sunt, per secula sex, id est annorum sex millia manere in hoc statu mundum necesse est. Et rursus quoniam perfectis operibus requievit die septimo, eumque benedixit, necesse est ut in fine sexti millesimi anni malitia omnis abolcatur è terrâ, et regnet per annos mille justitia.” vii. 14. 5. Ambrose. " Quia cum septimo die requieverit Deus ab omnibus operibus suis, post hebdomadam istius mundi quies diuturna promittitur. In Luc. viii. 23. For notices to the same effect from Jerome and Augustine see my Vol. i. pp. 372, 373.-Feuardentius in his Note on the passage quoted above from Irenæus, adds Hilary on Matt. xviii, and the Author of the Quæst. ad Orthodor Quæst. 71. It is to be observed that the anti-premillennarian fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries explained the sabbatical seventh day as typical, not of a seventh sabbatS VOL. IV. question on which I have now to enter, becomes one of really important bearing on the point in hand; I mean the question, what the world's present age, dated from Adam's creation, and when the termination of its sixth millennary. Nor is there wanting the evidence requisite for our attaining a near approximation to this notable epoch. Mr. Clinton, in his Essay on Hebrew Chronology, appended to the third volume of his late learned work entitled Fasti Hellenici, has greatly elucidated the subject. Setting aside the many mundane chronologies, such as Hales has enumerated, based (if such a word may be used) on the baseless foundation of authorities that altogether lack authority, our only real appeal is to Scripture. And here, on the great primary disputed question of the Patriarchal chronologies, and whether it be the Hebrew text with its shorter chronology, that has by fraud been robbed of eleven centuries, or the Septuagint with its longer, that has had them fraudulently added,' (for that the difference is the result of design is ical Millennium of rest, but an eternal sabbath :-a view generally adopted afterwards. 1 The following tabular schemes exhibit the variations; the numbers expressing the parent's age at the son's birth, except in the cases of Noah and Shem. Antediluvian Patriarchs. Postdiluvian Patriarchs. Jerom (Vol. ii. p. 573) in his Letter to Evangelius about Melchisedek, thus gives and reasons on the numerals. They say that Shem was 390 years when Abram was born. For Shem at 100 begat Arphaxad, and lived 100 years after. .... .... .... Salem. Rehu.. Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Nahor..... 70 And Abraham died at 175. Therefore Shem overlived him 35 years. a thing evident, and long since noted by Augustine,') the answer seems on every account to be in favour of the Hebrew text:-considering first, the superior reverence and almost superstitious care with which the Hebrew text was watched over, as compared with the Septuagint; 2-next, the wonderful uniformity of the numerals of the Hebrew text, in all its multitudes of manuscripts existing in different parts of the world, contrasted with the varieties and uncertainty of the numerals in the Septuagint and Samaritan; 3-considering further the general agreement of the Samaritan with 1 In the Antediluvian Table (where the question is between the Hebrew and Josephus), the years before the son's birth and the residues agree in all cases with the totals of the lives; except that in the Samaritan the residues in the sixth, eighth, and ninth are shortened, to adapt them to the shorter period between Jared and the flood. Thus, This can only have been by design. So Augustine Civ. Dei. xv. 13; Videtur habere quamdam, si dici potest, error ipse constantiam; nec casum redolet sed industriam." And so Mr. Clinton. serves ; 2 The Jews even counted the letters of their Bible. 3 Professor Baumgarten, of Halle, in his Remarks on Universal History, obBoth the Samaritan copy and the Greek version abound in various readings, with respect to their different chronologies, and frequently contradict themselves: whereas the Hebrew is uniform and consistent in all its copies." And Mr. Kennedy, in his Chronology of the World, says, that in examining the Hebrew Text he "was not able to discover one various reading in that multitude of numeral words and letters which constitute the scriptural series of years from the Creation to the death of Nebuchadnezzar." I quote this from a Paper on the subject, in the Christian Observer for May 1802, p. 287; and, in further illustration of the uniformity of the Hebrew copies in respect of their numerals, may add that the Chaldee Paraphrase of Onkelos, written about the time of Christ, agrees with the Hebrew chronologies,-that the same are recognized in the two Talmuds,-and that Dr. Wolff informs me that "in the ancient manuscripts which he saw at Bokhara, the chronological notices of the length of lives both of the antediluvian and the postdiluvian patriarchs were exactly according to the received Hebrew text, though the letters of the manuscripts resembled Samaritan." It is to be observed further that the manuscript from which our Samaritan Pentateuch was published, being written about A. D. 1400, was consequently not nearly so old as many Hebrew manuscripts. And in earlier existing copies of it we know that there were certain variations to the numerals, more accordant with the Hebrew. See Note1p. 260. Of the errors of the Septuagint numerals in many copies a notable example is given by Augustine, ibid. For it seems that in almost all the copies then extant, Methuselah was made to have begotten Lamech at the age of 167, and to have lived 802 years after that is, fourteen years after the flood, on the Septuagint chronology itself, though we know that no men but Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japhet, were preserved alive through it! the Hebrew in the chronology of the antediluvian patriarchs, and its thus fixing the fraud in that table at least, and by probable consequence in the postdiluvian table also, on the Septuagint :-considering moreover the better agreement of historical fact with the Hebrew than with the Septuagint; and the more easily supposable object with the Septuagint translators than with the keepers of the Hebrew text, as well as better opportunity, 2 1 Viz. in the cases of all but the sixth, eighth, and ninth Patriarchs. Here the Samaritan residues are shortened to adapt them to the shorter period, made by the shorter genealogies corresponding between Jared and the flood; to the intent that these Patriarchs might not be thought to have been involved in it. But we are told by Jerome (so the compilers of our English Universal History have remarked) that in his time there were some Samaritan copies which made Methuselah's and Lamech's ages, at the birth of their sons, the same as the Hebrew. 2 On the two points alleged in their own favour by the advocates of the Septuagint Chronology, Mr. Clinton quite turns the tables against them.—1st, as to the age of the maidoyovia, which these writers have placed after the lapse of one third of life, Mr. C. says that it appears from Scripture to have been in the Patriarchial age as early as it is now; Judah being at forty-eight a great-grandfather, Benjamin having at thirty, eleven sons, &c.-2. As to the Dispersion at Babel, which the Septuagintarians say implies a mundane population such as could not have been according to the Hebrew postdiluvian chronology, Mr. C. answers, that under favourable circumstances even now it has been calculated that population may be doubled in ten years; that cases are known where it has doubled for short periods in less than thirteen years; and that in the older case of the Israelities in Egypt, and later of certain parts of the North American colonies, the population doubled itself in fifteen years :—that the circumstances of the first families after the flood were precisely the most favourable to increase of population, with all the arts of the antediluvian world, unoccupied land to a boundless extent before them, and lives extended to 500, 400, and 200 years :-that thus we may reasonably assume twelve years, at the most, as that of the population doubling itself: on which assumption the population of the earth, derived from the stock of six parents, would in 276 years amount to above fifty millions, and in 300 years to two hundred millions. Even at the rate of fifteen years it would have reached two hundred millions in 373 years from the flood, i. e. in the twentyfourth year of Abraham.-Now at the time of the Dispersion, had the world's population then amounted to many millions, men would have been forced by their wants to disperse; whereas the Sacred History tells us that it took place contrary to the wishes of men, who desired all to dwell together. A population of about 50,000 would just answer the probabilities of the case. And this number must have been reached within 160 years from the flood; i. e. about the sixtieth years of Peleg (according to the Hebrew chronology); in whose days it is said, Gen. x. 25, that the Dispersion occurred. 3 Jackson allows that it is difficult to see the motives of the Jews in shortening the patriarchal genealogies. On the other hand the Septuagint translators had an obvious motive for enlarging the chronology. The Chaldeans and Egyptians (whose histories were about this time published by Berosus and Manetho) laid claim to a remote antiquity. Hence these translators of the Pentateuch might have been led in a spirit of rivalry to augment the amount of the generations of their ancestors, alike by the centenary additions, and by the interpolation (as Hales himself allows it is) of the second Cainaan. 4 Augustine, whose four chapters on this subject (C. D. xv. 10-14) well de |