HOUSEHOLD DUTIES.

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the rules and customs of good, law-loving Hebrews. The law was their guide. Though lowly born and humbly reared, as she herself has said,* Mary was an exalted (52) woman in Israel, and learned in all things becoming a Jewess of the highest rank.

Therefore Jesus, as her son, was early taught to pray, walk in the ways of the fathers, to pronounce blessings on all food -as was His custom in after days, with His disciples-and fulfil the law, but not to follow traditions. The Pharisees once said to Him

'Why do thy disciples transgress the traditions of the elders?"

To which Jesus replied

"Why do ye transgress the commandments of God?"

It may be observed that through His ministry, Jesus answered those hypocrites in like.

their own ground.

He always took them on

"Is it lawful to give tribute to Cæsar?"

"Give to Cæsar what is his, and to God what is due to God."

It was His custom to wash before meals, and He rebuked Simon of Nain for not having furnished Him water and towel for this purpose, as duty bound.—Luke 7: 44.

Like other mothers in Israel of her station, Mary spun flax and wool and wove them into garments for herself and family; she cooked the food for them, and of her abundance or penury she never forgot those more needy (Prov. 31). At evening in common with the other women of the village she would visit the fountain, with her earthen pitcher, carried upon one shoulder, and bring home the water necessary for a day.

Of the few things of which we are made certain, is this, that Jesus was brought up to attend church! Many things. we have had to deduce, arrive at from custom of the day, and from after results and habits. Habits formed in youth never depart. When Jesus revisited Nazareth (Luke 4: 16), after

* For He hath looked upon the low estate of His bond-woman.-Luke 1: 48.

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EFFECT OF EARLY HABITS.

His baptism, etc., He went on the Sabbath, into the (one) synagogue, "as was His custom."

He doubtless went to school there, also. The Chazan was also the school-master.-Lightfoot. It was he who handed Jesus the book to read. Jesus read, as He had often done before. It was not this act, but His comment on the book, which offended the Nazarenes at that time.

He had outgrown them!

"Mysterious as it seems to us, we must not forget that, as a child, He passed through the same stages as other children." -Geikie.

And now we turn over a leaf, and come to the one living and true anecdote of His boyhood life.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE FIRST PASSOVER.-A JOURNEY ON FOOT.

TIME.-April, A. D. 8. A. U. C. 761.

PLACE.-Nazareth to Jerusalem and return.

RULERS. Augustus, at Rome, toward end of his reign-Coponius, governor of Judea-Herod Antipas, Galilee and Perea.

Distance eighty miles.

OSEPH and Mary went every

Reference. Luke 2: 41-52.

year up to Jerusalem to the feast called the passover.

At the passover, occurring April 7 to 14, or 14 to 21, when Jesus was twelve years and three months old, His parents took Him up with them to the feast at Jerusalem.

The reader is aware of the error in our calendar which begins to count the Christian era four years too late. Hence, when Jesus was twelve years old, it is only reckoned as the year of our Lord 8.

The "preparation day" called "feast of unleavened bread," begins at 6 P. M. of the 13th April (Andrews). The distance from Nazareth to Jerusalem, through Samaria, was about eighty miles.

In order to arrive in Jerusalem on the 13th, or early on the 14th, the Galilean pilgrims must needs start from home by Tuesday morning, or four days before the beginning of the passover.

Of the preparation before the start we know nothing, therefore we shall begin with the route.