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A BIBLICAL AND THEOLOGICAL
DICTIONARY:


EXPLANATORY OF THE
HISTORY, MANNERS, AND CUSTOMS OF THE JEWS,
AND NEIGHBOURING NATIONS.
WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE MOST REMARKABLE PLACES AND PERSONS
MENTIONED IN SACRED SCRIPTURE;
An Exposition
OF THE
PRINCIPAL DOCTRINES OF CHRISTIANITY;
AND NOTICES OF JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN SECTS AND HERESIES.
BY RICHARD WATSON.
[REVISED BY THE AMERICAN EDITORS.]

[An intimate acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures is a secure haven, and an impregnable bulwark, and an immovable tower, and imperishable glory, and impenetrable armour, and unfading joy, and perpetual delight, and whatever other excellence can be uttered.]

NEW-YORK,
PUBLISHED BY B. WAUGH AND T. MASON,
FOR THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, AT THE CONFERENCE
OFFICE, 14 CROSBY-STREET.

J. Collord, Printer.
1832.
A
BIBLICAL AND THEOLOGICAL DICTIONARY.



T



TABERNACLE, in Hebrew, , in Greek, s, a word which properly signifies a tent, but is particularly applied by the Hebrews to a kind of building in the form of a tent, set up by the express command of God, for the performance of religious worship, sacrifices, &c, during the journeyings of the Israelites in the wilderness; and after their settlement in the land of Canaan made use of for the same purpose, till the temple was built in Jerusalem. The tabernacle was covered with curtains and skins. It was divided into two parts, the one covered, and properly called the tabernacle, and the other open, called the court. The covered part was again divided into two parts, the one called holy, and the other called the holy of holies. The curtains which covered it were made of linen of several colours embroidered. There were ten curtains, twenty-eight cubits long, and four in breadth. Five curtains together made two coverings, which, being made fast together, enveloped all the tabernacle. Over the rest there were two other coverings, the one of goat’s hair, and the other of sheep skins. These vails or coverings were laid on a square frame of planks, resting on bases. There were forty-eight large planks, each a cubit and a half wide, and ten cubits high; twenty of them on each side, and six at one end to the westward; each plank was supported by two silver bases; they were let into one another, and held by bars running the length of the planks. The holy of holies was parted from the rest of the tabernacle by a curtain, made fast to four pillars standing ten cubits from the end. The whole length of the tabernacle was thirty-two cubits, that is, about fifty feet; and the breadth twelve cubits, or nineteen feet. The end was thirty cubits high; the upper curtain hung on the north and south sides eight cubits, and on the east and west four cubits. The court was a place a hundred cubits long, and fifty in breadth, inclosed by twenty columns, each of them twenty cubits high, and ten in breadth, covered with silver, and standing on copper bases, five cubits distant from each other, between which there were curtains drawn, and fastened with hooks. At the east end was an entrance twenty cubits wide, covered with a curtain hanging loose. In the tabernacle was the ark of the covenant, the table of shew bread, the golden candlestick, and the altar of incense; and in the court opposite to the entrance of the tabernacle, or holy place, stood the altar of burnt-offerings, and the laver or bason for the use of the priests.

The tabernacle was finished on the first day of the first month of the second year after the 901departure out of Egypt, A. M. 2514. When it was set up, a dark cloud covered it by day, and a fiery cloud by night. Moses went into the tabernacle to consult the Lord. It was placed in the midst of the camp, and the Hebrews were ranged in order about it, according to their several tribes. When the cloud arose from off the tabernacle, they decamped; the priests carried those things which were most sacred, and the Levites all the several parts of the tabernacle. Part of the tribes went before, and the rest followed after, and the baggage of the tabernacle marched in the centre. The tabernacle was brought into the land of Canaan by Joshua, and set up at Gilgal. Here it rested till the land was conquered. Then it was removed to Shiloh, and afterward to Nob. Its next station was Gibeah, and here it continued till the ark was removed to the temple.

The word also means a frail dwelling, Job xi, 14; and is put for our bodies, 2 Cor. v, 1.

TABERNACLES, Feast of, a solemn festival of the Hebrews, observed after harvest, on the fifteenth day of the month Tisri, Lev. xxiii, 34–44. It was one of the three great solemnities, wherein all the males of the Israelites were obliged to present themselves before the Lord; and it was instituted to commemorate the goodness of God, who protected them in the wilderness, and made them dwell in tents or booths after they came out of Egypt. (See Feasts.) This feast continued eight days, of which the first and last days were the most solemn, Lev. xxiii, 34, &c. It was not allowed to do any labour on this feast, and particular sacrifices were offered, which, together with the other ceremonies used in celebrating this festival, were as follows: The first day of the feast, they cut down branches of the handsomest trees, with their fruit, branches of palm trees, and such as were fullest of leaves, and boughs of the willow trees that grew upon the sides of brooks, Neh. viii, 16. These they brought together, and waved them toward the four quarters of the world, singing certain songs. These branches were also called hosanna, because when they carried them and waved them, they cried Hosanna; not unlike what the Jews did at our Saviour’s entry into Jerusalem, Matthew xxi, 8, 9. On the eighth day they performed this ceremony oftener, and with greater solemnity, than upon the other days of the feast. They called this day hosanna rabba, or “the great hosanna.”

TABLES OF THE LAW. Those that were given to Moses upon Mount Sinai were written by the finger of God, and contained the decalogue or ten commandments of the law, as they are rehearsed in Exodus xx. Many questions have been started about these tables; about their matter, their form, their number, he that wrote them, and what they contained. Some oriental authors make them amount to ten in number, others to seven; but the Hebrews reckon but two. Some suppose them to have been of wood, and others of precious stones. Moses observes, Exod. xxxii, 15, that these tables were written on both sides. Many think they were transparent, so that they might be read through; on one side toward the right, and on the other side toward the left. Others will have it, that the lawgiver only makes this observation, that the tables were written on both sides, because generally in writing tables they only wrote on one side. Others thus translate the Hebrew text: “They were written on the two parts that were contiguous to each other;” because, being shut upon one another, the two faces that were written upon touched one another, so that no writing was seen on the outside. Some think that the same ten commandments were written on each of the two tables, others that the ten were divided, and only five on one table, and five on the other. The words which intimate that the tables were written by the finger of God, some understand simply and literally; others, of the ministry of an angel; and others explain them merely to signify an order of God to Moses to write them. The expression, however, in Scripture always signifies immediate divine agency. See Decalogue.

TABOR, a mountain not far from Kadesh, in the tribe of Zebulun, and in the confines of Issachar and Naphtali. It has its name from its eminence, because it rises up in the midst of a wide champaign country, called the Valley of Jezreel, or the great plain. Maundrell tells us that the area at the top of this mountain is enclosed with trees, except to the south, from whence there is the most agreeable prospect in the world. Many have believed that our Lord’s transfiguration took place on this mountain. This place is mentioned, 1 Sam. x, 3. It is minutely described by both Pococke and Maundrell. The road from Nazareth lies for two hours between low hills; it then opens into the plain of Esdraelon. At about two or three furlongs within the plain, and six miles from Nazareth, rises this singular mount, which is almost entirely insulated, its figure representing a half sphere. “It is,” says Pococke, “one of the finest hills I ever beheld, being a rich soil that produces excellent herbage, and is most beautifully adorned with groves and clumps of trees. The ascent is so easy, that we rode up the north side by a winding road. Some authors mention it as near four miles high, others as about two: the former may be true, as to the winding ascent up the hill. The top of it, about half a mile long, and near a quarter of a mile broad, is encompassed with a wall, which Josephus says was built in forty days: there was also a wall along the middle of it, which divided the south part, on which the city stood, from the north part, which is lower, and is called the meidan, or place, being probably used for exercises when there was a city here, which Josephus mentions by the name of Ataburion. Within the outer wall on the north side are several deep fosses, out of which, it is probable, the stones were dug to build the walls; and these fosses seem to have answered the end of cisterns, to preserve the rain water, and were also some defence to the city. There are likewise a great number of cisterns under ground for preserving the rain water. To the south, where the ascent was 902most easy, there are fosses cut on the outside, to render the access to the walls more difficult. Some of the gates, also, of the old city remain, as Bab-el-houah, ‘the gate of the winds,’ to the west; and Bab-el-kubbe, ‘the arched gate,’ a small one to the south. Antiochus, king of Syria, took the fortress on the top of this hill. Vespasian, also, got possession of it; and, after that, Josephus fortified it with strong walls. But what has made it more famous than any thing else is the common opinion, from the time of St. Jerom, that the transfiguration of our Saviour was on this mountain.” Van Egmont and Heyman give the following account: “This mountain, though somewhat rugged and difficult, we ascended on horseback, making several circuits round it, which took us up about three quarters of an hour. It is one of the highest in the whole country, being thirty stadia, or about four English miles, a circumstance that rendered it more famous. And it is the most beautiful I ever saw, with regard to verdure, being every where decorated with small oak trees, and the ground universally enamelled with a variety of plants and flowers, except on the south side, where it is not so fully covered with verdure. On this mountain are great numbers of red partridges, and some wild boars; and we were so fortunate as to see the Arabs hunting them. We left, but not without reluctancy, this delightful place, and found at the bottom of it a mean village, called Deboura, or Tabour, a name said to be derived from the celebrated Deborah mentioned in Judges.”

Pococke notices this village, which stands on a rising ground at the foot of Mount Tabor westward; and the learned traveller thinks, that it may be the same as the Daberath, or Daberah mentioned in the book of Joshua, as on the borders of Zabulon and Issachar. “Any one,” he adds, “who examines the fourth chapter of Judges, may see that this is probably the spot where Barak and Deborah met at Mount Tabor with their forces, and went to pursue Sisera; and on this account, it might have its name from that great prophetess, who then judged and governed Israel; for Josephus relates, that Deborah and Barak gathered the army together at this mountain.”

“From the top of Tabor,” says Maundrell, “you have a prospect which, if nothing else, will reward the labour of ascending it. It is impossible for man’s eyes to behold a higher gratification of this nature. On the northwest you discern at a distance the Mediterranean, and all round you have the spacious and beautiful plains of Esdraelon and Galilee. Turning a little southward, you have in view the high mountains of Gilboa, fatal to Saul and his sons. Due east you discover the sea of Tiberias, distant about one day’s journey. A few points to the north appears that which they call the mount of Beatitudes. Not far from this little hill is the city Saphet: it stands upon a very eminent and conspicuous mountain, and is seen far and near.” Beyond this is seen a much higher mountain, capped with snow, a part of the chain of Antilibanus. To the south-west is Carmel, and on the south the hills of Samaria.

TADMOR, a city built by Solomon, 1 Kings ix, 18, afterward called Palmyra; situated in a wilderness of Syria, upon the borders of Arabia Deserta, inclining toward the Euphrates. Josephus places it two days’ journey from the Euphrates, and six days’ journey from Babylon. He says there is no water any where else in the wilderness, but in this place. At the present day there are to be seen vast ruins of this city. There was nothing more magnificent in the whole east. There are still found a great number of inscriptions, the most of which are Greek, and the other in the Palmyrenian character. Nothing relating to the Jews is seen in the Greek inscriptions; and the Palmyrenian inscriptions are entirely unknown, as well as the language and the character of that country. The city of Tadmor preserved this name to the time of the conquest by Alexander the Great: then it had the name of Palmyra given to it, which it preserved for several ages. About the middle of the third century, it became famous, because Odenatus and Zenobia, his queen, made it the seat of their empire. When the Saracens became masters of the east, they restored its ancient name of Tadmor to it again, which it has always preserved since. It is surrounded by sandy deserts on all sides. It is not known when, nor by whom, it was reduced to the ruinous condition in which it is now found. It may be said to consist at present of a forest of Corinthian pillars, erect and fallen. So numerous are these, consisting of many thousands, that the spectator is at a loss to connect or arrange them in any order or symmetry, or to conceive what purpose or design they could have answered. “In the space covered by these ruins,” says Volney, “we sometimes find a palace of which nothing remains but the court and walls; sometimes a temple, whose peristyle is half thrown down; and now a portico, a gallery, or triumphal arch. Here stand groups of columns, whose symmetry is destroyed by the fall of many of them; there we see them ranged in rows of such length, that, similar to rows of trees, they deceive the sight, and assume the appearance of continued walls. If from this striking scene we cast our eyes upon the ground, another almost as varied presents itself On all sides we behold nothing but subverted shafts, some whole, others shattered to pieces or dislocated in their joints; and on which side soever we look, the earth is strewed with vast stones half buried, with broken entablatures, mutilated friezes, disfigured reliefs, effaced sculptures, violated tombs, and altars defiled by dust.”

It is probable, says Mansford, that, although Tadmor is said to have been built by Solomon, or, in other words, to have been erected by him into a city, it was a watering station between Syria and Mesopotamia before; with perhaps accommodations suited to the mode of travelling in those times, as we read of palm-trees being found there, which are not trees that come by chance in these desert regions. 903The mere circumstance of wholesome water being afforded by any spot in such a country was sufficient to give it importance, and to draw toward it the stream of communication, for whatever purpose. This was probably the condition of Tadmor long before it received its name and its honours from Solomon. But, after all, what motive could there be to induce a peaceable king, like Solomon, to undertake a work so distant, difficult, and dangerous There is but one which at all accords with his character, or the history of the times,--commercial enterprise. Solomon was at great pains to secure himself in the possession of the ports of Elath and Ezion-Geber on the Red Sea, and to establish a navy for his Indian commerce, or trade to Ophir,--in all ages the great source of wealth. The riches of India, thus brought into Judea, were from thence disseminated over those countries of the north and west at that time inhabited or known; while the same country, Judea, became, for a season, like Tyre, the point of return and exchange of the money and the commodities of those countries, the centre of communication between the east and the west.

TALENT, a measure of weight among the ancients, equivalent to sixty maneh, or one hundred and thirteen pounds ten ounces one pennyweight and ten grains. The value of a talent of silver was three hundred and forty-two pounds three shillings and nine-pence, and a talent of gold was equal to five thousand four hundred and seventy-five pounds sterling. In the writings of the evangelists, the term is employed to denote the various gifts or opportunities for usefulness which the Lord of heaven confers upon his servants, and for which he will call them to give in their account at the last day, Matt. xxv, 15; Luke xix, 12.

TALITHA-CUMI, the words that Jesus Christ made use of when he raised up the daughter of Jairus, chief of the synagogue of Capernaum. They are not pure Hebrew, but Syriac, and signify, “My daughter, arise,” Mark v, 41.

TALMUD. See Jews.

TARE, Matt. xiii, 25–27, 29, 30, 36, 38, 40. It is not easy to determine what plant or weed is here intended, as the word zizania is neither mentioned in any other part of Scripture, nor in any ancient Greek writer. Some Greek and Latin fathers have made use of it, as have also Suidas and Phavorinus: but it is probable that they have all derived it from this text. As this Gospel was first written in Syriac, it is probably a word belonging to that language. Buxtorf gives several interpretations, but at last concludes with submitting it to the decision of others. In a treatise in the Mishna, called “Kilayim,” which treats expressly of different kinds of seeds, a bastard or degenerate wheat is mentioned by the name of , which the very sound, in pronouncing, proves to be the same as the zizanion; and which may lead to the true derivation of the word, that is, from the Chaldee , “a kind,” or “species” of grain, namely, whence the corrupt Hebrew or Syriac , which in the ancient Syriac version answers to the Greek a, Matt. xiii, 25, &c. In Psalm cxliv, 13, the words , are translated, “all manner of store;” but they properly signify “from species to species.” Might not the Chaldee word , and the Greek word , come from the psalmist’s , which might have signified a “mixture” of grain of any kind, and be here used to point out the mixing bastard or degenerate wheat among the good seed-wheat Mintert says, that “it is a kind of plant, not unlike corn or wheat, having at first the same sort of stalk, and the same viridity, but bringing forth no fruit, at least none good:” and he adds, from John Melchior, “ does not signify every weed in general which grows among corn, but a particular seed, known in Canaan, which was not unlike wheat, but, being put into the ground, degenerated, and assumed another nature and form.” Parkhurst, and Dr. Campbell, render it “the darnel,” “lolium temulentum.” The same plant is called “zizana” by the Spaniards; as it appears to be zuvan, by the Turks and Arabs. “It is well known to the people at Aleppo,” says M. Forskal; “it grows among corn. If the seeds remain mixed with the meal, they occasion dizziness to those who eat of the bread. The reapers do not separate the plant; but after the threshing, they reject the seeds by means of a van or sieve.” Other travellers mention, that in some parts of Syria, the plant is drawn up by the hand in the time of harvest, along with the wheat, and is then gathered out, and bound up in separate bundles. In the parable of the tares, our Lord states the very same circumstances. They grew among the grain; they were not separated by the tillers, but suffered to grow up together till the harvest; they were then gathered from among the wheat with the hand, and bound up in bundles.

TARGUM. See Jews.

TARSHISH, a country of this name, whither Solomon sent his fleets, 1 Kings x, 22; 2 Chron. ix, 11. There is a multitude of different opinions concerning this country. Josephus, and the Chaldee and Arabic paraphrasts, explain it of Tarsus, a city of Cilicia; the Septuagint, St. Jerom, and Theodoret, understand it of Carthage. The Arabian geographer will have it to be Tunis in Africa. Bochart makes it to be Tartessus, an island in the Straits of Gades. By Tarshish, M. Le Clerc understands Thassus, an island and city in the Ægean sea. Grotius thinks that the whole ocean was called Tarshish, because of the famous city of Tartessus, now mentioned. Sanctius believes the sea in general to be called Tarshish, and that the ships of Tarshish were those that are employed in voyages at sea, in opposition to the small vessels that are used only in most navigable rivers. The LXX. translate Tarshish sometimes by “the sea;” and the Scripture gives the names of ships of Tarshish to those that were fitted out at Ezion-Geber, on the Red Sea, and which sailed upon the ocean, as well as to those that were fitted out at Joppa, and in the ports of the Mediterranean. Therefore, when we see ships fitted 904out upon the Red Sea, or at Ezion-Geber, in order to go to Tarshish, we must conclude one of these two things, either that there were two countries called Tarshish, one upon the ocean, and another upon the Mediterranean, or that ships of Tarshish in general signifies nothing else but ships able to bear a long voyage; large merchant ships, in opposition to the small craft intended for a home trade in navigable rivers.

TARSUS, the capital of Cilicia, and the native city of St. Paul, Acts ix, 11; xxi, 39. Some think it obtained the privileges of a Roman colony because of its firm adherence to Julius Cæsar; and this procured the inhabitants the favour of being acknowledged citizens of Rome, which St. Paul enjoyed by being born in it. Others maintain that Tarsus was only a free city, but not a Roman colony, in the time of St. Paul, and that his privilege as a Roman citizen was founded upon some other right, perhaps gained by his ancestors.

TEARS. The prayer of David, “Put my tears into thy bottle,” is unintelligible without an acquaintance with ancient customs. “This passage,” says Burder, “seems to intimate that the custom of putting tears into the ampullæ, or urnal lachrymales, so well known among the Romans, was more anciently in use among the eastern nations, and particularly the Hebrews. These urns were of different materials, some of glass, some of earth; as may be seen in the work of Montfaucon, where also may be seen the various forms or shapes of them. These urns were placed on the sepulchres of the deceased, as a memorial of the distress and affection of their surviving relations and friends. It will be difficult to account for this expression of the psalmist, but upon this supposition. If this be allowed, the meaning will be, ‘Let my distress, and the tears I shed in consequence of it, be ever before thee, excite thy kind remembrance of me, and plead with thee to grant the relief I stand in need of.’”

TEMPLE, the house of God; properly the temple of Solomon. David first conceived the design of building a house somewhat worthy of the divine majesty, and opened his mind to the Prophet Nathan, 2 Sam. vii; 1 Chron. xvii; xxii, 8, &c. God accepted of his good intentions, but refused him the honour. Solomon laid the foundation of the temple, A. M. 2992, completed it in 3000, and dedicated it in 3001, 1 Kings viii, 2; 2 Chron. v, vi, vii. According to the opinion of some writers, there were three temples, namely, the first, erected by Solomon; the second, by Zerubbabel, and Joshua the high priest; and the third, by Herod, a few years before the birth of Christ. But this opinion is, very properly, rejected by the Jews; who do not allow the third to be a new temple, but only the second temple repaired and beautified: and this opinion corresponds with the prophecy of Haggai, ii, 9, “that the glory of this latter house,” the temple built by Zerubbabel, “should be greater than that of the former;” which prediction was uttered with reference to the Messiah’s honouring it with his presence and ministry. The first temple is that which usually bears the name of Solomon; the materials for which were provided by David before his death, though the edifice was raised by his son. It stood on Mount Moriah, an eminence of the mountainous ridge in the Scriptures termed Mount Zion, Psalm cxxxii, 13, 14, which had been purchased by Araunah, or Ornan, the Jebusite, 2 Sam. xxiv, 23, 24; 1 Chron. xxi, 25. The plan, and the whole model of this superb structure, were formed after that of the tabernacle, but of much larger dimensions. It was surrounded, except at the front or east end, by three stories of chambers, each five cubits square, which reached to half the height of the temple; and the front was ornamented with a magnificent portico, which rose to the height of one hundred and twenty cubits: so that the form of the whole edifice was not unlike that of some ancient churches, which have a lofty tower in the front, and a low aisle running along each side of the building. The utensils for the sacred service were the same; excepting that several of them, as the altar, candlestick, &c, were larger, in proportion to the more spacious edifice to which they belonged. Seven years and six months were occupied in the erection of the superb and magnificent temple of Solomon, by whom it was dedicated, A. M. 3001, B. C. 999, with peculiar solemnity, to the worship of the Most High; who on this occasion vouchsafed to honour it with the Shechinah, or visible manifestation of his presence. Various attempts have been made to describe the proportions and several parts of this structure; but as scarcely any two writers agree on this subject, a minute description of it is designedly omitted. It retained its pristine splendour only thirty-three or thirty-four years, when Shishak, king of Egypt, took Jerusalem, and carried away the treasures of the temple; and after undergoing subsequent profanations and pillages, this stupendous building was finally plundered and burnt by the Chaldeans under Nebuchadnezzar, A. M. 3416, or B. C. 584, 2 Kings xxv, 13–15; 2 Chron. xxxvi, 17–20.

After the captivity, the temple emerged from its ruins being rebuilt by Zerubbabel, but with vastly inferior and diminished glory; as appears from the tears of the aged men who had beheld the former structure in all its grandeur, Ezra iii, 12. The second temple was profaned by order of Antiochus Epiphanes, A. M. 3837, B. C. 163, who caused the daily sacrifices to be discontinued, and erected the image of Jupiter Olympus on the altar of burnt-offering. In this condition it continued three years, 1 Mac. iv, 42, when Judas Maccabæus purified and repaired it, and restored the sacrifices and true worship of Jehovah. Some years before the birth of our Saviour, the repairing and beautifying of this second temple, which had become decayed in the lapse of five centuries, was undertaken by Herod the Great, who for nine years employed eighty thousand workmen upon it, and spared no expense to render it equal, if not superior, in magnitude, splendour, and beauty, to any thing among mankind. Josephus calls it a work the most admirable of any that had ever been seen or heard of, both for its curious 905structure and its magnitude, and also for the vast wealth expended upon it, as well as for the universal reputation of its sanctity. But though Herod accomplished his original design in the time above specified, yet the Jews continued to ornament and enlarge it, expending the sacred treasure in annexing additional buildings to it; so that they might with great propriety assert, that their temple had been forty and six years in building, John ii, 20.

Before we proceed to describe this venerable edifice, it may be proper to remark, that by the temple is to be understood not only the fabric or house itself, which by way of eminence is called the temple, namely, the holy of holies, the sanctuary, and the several courts both of the priests and Israelites, but also all the numerous chambers and rooms which this prodigious edifice comprehended; and each of which had its respective degree of holiness, increasing in proportion to its contiguity to the holy of holies. This remark it will be necessary to bear in mind, lest the reader of Scripture should be led to suppose, that whatever is there said to be transacted in the temple was actually done in the interior of that sacred edificeedifice. To this infinite number of apartments, into which the temple was disposed, our Lord refers, John xiv, 2; and by a very striking and magnificent simile, borrowed from them, he represents those numerous seats and mansions of heavenly bliss which his Father’s house contained, and which were prepared for the everlasting abode of the righteous. The imagery is singularly beautiful and happy, when considered as an allusion to the temple, which our Lord not unfrequently called his Father’s house.

The second temple, originally built by Zerubbabel after the captivity, and repaired by Herod, differed in several respects from that erected by Solomon, although they agreed in others.

The temple erected by Solomon was more splendid and magnificent than the second temple, which was deficient in five remarkable things that constituted the chief glory of the first: these were, the ark and the mercy seat; the shechinah, or manifestation of the divine presence, in the holy of holies; the sacred fire on the altar, which had been first kindled from heaven; the urim and thummim; and the spirit of prophecy. But the second temple surpassed the first in glory; being honoured by the frequent presence of our divine Saviour, agreeably to the prediction of Haggai, ii, 9. Both, however, were erected upon the same site, a very hard rock, encompassed by a very frightful precipice; and the foundation was laid with incredible expense and labour. The superstructure was not inferior to this great work: the height of the temple wall, especially on the south side, was stupendous. In the lowest places it was three hundred cubits, or four hundred and fifty feet, and in some places even greater. This most magnificent pile was constructed with hard white stones of prodigious magnitude. The temple itself, strictly so called, which comprised the portico, the sanctuary, and the holy of holies formed only a small part of the sacred edifice on Mount Moriah, being surrounded by spacious courts, making a square of half a mile in circumference. It was entered through nine gates, which were on every side thickly coated with gold and silver; but there was one gate without the holy house, which was of Corinthian brass, the most precious metal in ancient times, and which far surpassed the others in beauty. For while these were of equal magnitude, the gate composed of Corinthian brass was much larger; its height being fifty cubits, and its doors forty cubits, and its ornaments both of gold and silver being far more costly and massive. This is supposed to have been the “gate called Beautiful” in Acts iii, 2, where Peter and John, in the name of Christ, healed a man who had been lame from his birth. The first or outer court, which encompassed the holy house and the other courts, was named the court of the Gentiles; because the latter were allowed to enter into it, but were prohibited from advancing farther. It was surrounded by a range of porticoes, or cloisters, above which were galleries, or apartments, supported by pillars of white marble, each consisting of a single piece, and twenty-five cubits in height. One of these was called Solomon’s porch, or piazza, because it stood on a vast terrace, which he had originally raised from a valley beneath, four hundred cubits high, in order to enlarge the area on the top of the mountain, and make it equal to the plan of his intended building; and as this terrace was the only work of Solomon that remained in the second temple, the piazza which stood upon it retained the name of that prince. Here it was that our Lord was walking at the feast of dedication, John x, 23; and that the lame man, when healed by Peter and John, glorified God before all the people, Acts iii, 11. This superb portico is termed the royal portico by Josephus, who represents it as the noblest work beneath the sun, being elevated to such a prodigious height, that no one could look down from its flat roof to the valley below, without being seized with dizziness; the sight not reaching to such an immeasurable depth. The south-east corner of the roof of this portico, where the height was the greatest, is supposed to have been the te, pinnacle, or extreme angle, whence Satan tempted our Saviour to precipitate himself, Matt, iv, 5; Luke iv, 9. This also was the spot where it was predicted that the abomination of desolation, or the Roman ensigns, should stand, Daniel ix, 27; Matt, xxiv, 15. Solomon’s portico was situated in the eastern front of the temple, opposite to the mount of Olives, where our Saviour is said to have sat when his disciples came to show him the grandeur of its various buildings, of which, grand as they were, he said, the time was approaching when one stone should not be left upon another, Matt, xxiv, 1–3. This outer court being assigned to the Gentile proselytes, the Jews, who did not worship in it themselves, conceived that it might lawfully be put to profane uses: for here we find that the buyers and sellers of animals for sacrifices, and also the moneychangers, 906had stationed themselves; until Jesus Christ, awing them into submission by the grandeur and dignity of his person and behaviour, expelled them; telling them that it was the house of prayer for all nations, and was not to be profaned, Matt. xxi, 12, 13; Mark xi, 15–17. Within the court of the Gentiles stood the court of the Israelites, divided into two parts, or courts; the outer one being appropriated to the women, and the inner one to the men. The court of the women was separated from that of the Gentiles by a low stone wall, or partition, of elegant construction, on which stood pillars at equal distances, with inscriptions in Greek and Latin, importing that no alien should enter into the holy place. To this wall St. Paul most evidently alludes in Eph. ii, 13, 14: “But now in Christ Jesus, ye, who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ: for he is our peace, who hath made both one, (united both Jews and Gentiles into one church,) and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us;” having abolished the law of ordinances, by which, as by the wall of separation, both Jews and Gentiles were not only kept asunder, but also at variance. In this court was the treasury, over against which Christ sat, and beheld how the people threw their voluntary offerings into it, for furnishing the victims and other things necessary for the sacrifices, Mark xii, 41; John viii, 20. From the court of the women, which was on higher ground than that of the Gentiles, there was an ascent of fifteen steps into the inner or men’s court: and so called because it was appropriated to the worship of the male Israelites. In these two courts, collectively termed the court of the Israelites, were the people praying, each apart by himself, for the pardon of his sins, while Zacharias was offering incense within the sanctuary, Luke i, 10. Within the court of the Israelites was that of the priests, which was separated from it by a low wall, one cubit in height. This enclosure surrounded the altar of burnt-offerings, and to it the people brought their oblations and sacrifices; but the priests alone were permitted to enter it. From this court twelve steps ascended to the temple, strictly so called; which was divided into three parts, the portico, the outer sanctuary, and the holy place. In the portico was suspended the splendid votive offerings made by the piety of various individuals. Among other treasures, there was a golden table given by Pompey, and several golden vines of exquisite workmanship, as well as of immense size; for Josephus relates, that there were clusters as tall as a man. And he adds, that all around were fixed up and displayed the spoils and trophies taken by Herod from the barbarians and Arabians. These votive offerings, it should seem, were visible at a distance; for when Jesus Christ was sitting on the mount of Olives, and his disciples called his attention to the temple, they pointed out to him the gifts with which it was adorned, Luke xxi, 5. This porch had a very large portal or gate, which, instead of folding doors, was furnished with a costly Babylonian veil, of many colours, that mystically denoted the universe. From this the sanctuary, or holy place, was separated from the holy of holies by a double veil, which is supposed to have been the veil that was rent in twain at our Saviour’s crucifixion; thus emblematically pointing out that the separation between Jews and Gentiles was abolished; and that the privilege of the high priest was communicated to all mankind, who might henceforth have access to the throne of grace through the one great Mediator, Jesus Christ, Heb. x, 19–22. The holy of holies was twenty cubits square: into it no person was admitted but the high priest, who entered it once a year on the great day of atonement, Exod. xxx, 10; Lev. xvi, 2, 15, 34; Heb. ix, 2–7.

Magnificent as the rest of the sacred edifice was, it was infinitely surpassed in splendour by the inner temple, or sanctuary. Its appearance, according to Josephus, had every thing that could strike the mind, or astonish the sight: for it was covered on every side with plates of gold; so that when the sun rose upon it, it reflected so strong and dazzling an effulgence, that the eye of the spectator was obliged to turn away, being no more able to sustain its radiance than the splendour of the sun. To strangers who were approaching, it appeared at a distance like a mountain covered with snow; for where it was not decorated with plates of gold, it was extremely white and glistering. On the top it had sharp-pointed spikes of gold, to prevent any bird from resting upon it, and polluting it. There were, continues the Jewish historian, in that building, several stones which were forty-five cubits in length, five in height, and six in breadth. “When all these things are considered,” says Harwood, “how natural is the exclamation of the disciples, when viewing this immense building at a distance: ‘Master, see what manner of stones’ (tap , ‘what very large ones’) ‘and what buildings are here!’ Mark xiii, 1: and how wonderful is the declaration of our Lord upon this, how unlikely to be accomplished before the race of men who were then living should cease to exist! ‘Seest thou these great buildings There shall not be left one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down.’ Improbable as this prediction must have appeared to the disciples at that time, in the short space of about thirty years after it was exactly accomplished; and this most magnificent temple, which the Jews had literally turned into a den of thieves, through the righteous judgment of God upon that wicked and abandoned nation, was utterly destroyed by the Romans A. D. 70, or 73 of the vulgar era, on the same month, and on the same day of the month, when Solomon’s temple had been razed to the ground by the Babylonians!”

Both the first and second temples were contemplated by the Jews with the highest reverence. Of their affectionate regard for the first temple, and for Jerusalem, within whose walls it was built, we have several instances in those Psalms which were composed during the Babylonish captivity; and of their profound veneration for the second temple we have 907repeated examples in the New Testament. They could not bear any disrespectful or dishonourable thing to be said of it. The least injurious slight of it, real or apprehended, instantly awakened all the choler of a Jew, and was an affront never to be forgiven. Our Saviour, in the course of his public instructions, having said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up again,” John ii, 19, it was construed into a contemptuous disrespect, designedly thrown out against the temple; his words instantly descended into the heart of the Jews, and kept rankling there for some years; for, upon his trial, this declaration, which it was impossible for a Jew ever to forget or to forgive, was immediately alleged against him, as big with the most atrocious guilt and impiety: they told the court they had heard him publicly assert, “I am able to destroy this temple,” Matt. xxvi, 61. The rancour and virulence they had conceived against him for this speech, was not softened by all the affecting circumstances of that wretched death they saw him die; even as he hung upon the cross, with triumph, scorn, and exultation, they upbraided him with it, contemptuously shaking their heads, and saying, “Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself! If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross!” Matt. xxvii, 40. It only remains to add, that it appears, from several passages of Scripture, that the Jews had a body of soldiers who guarded the temple, to prevent any disturbances during the ministration of such an immense number of priests and Levites. To this guard Pilate referred, when he said to the chief priests and Pharisees who waited upon him to desire he would make the sepulchre secure, “Ye have a watch, go your way, and make it as secure as ye can,” Matt. xxvii, 65. Over these guards one person had the supreme command, who in several places is called the captain of the temple, or officer of the temple guard. “And as they spake unto the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them,” Acts iv, 1; v, 25, 26; John xviii, 12. Josephus mentions such an officer.

TENT MAKER. St. Paul, according to the practice of the Jews, who, however opulent, always taught their children some trade, appears to have been a tent maker. This, however, is understood by some moderns to mean a maker of tent cloth, St. Paul being a Cilician, a country which produced a species of rough-haired goats, from which the Cilicians manufactured a thick and coarse cloth, much used for tents. The fathers, however, say that he made military tents, the material of which was skins.

TERAPHIM. It is said, Gen. xxxi, 19, that Rachel had stolen the images (teraphim) of her father. What then were these teraphim The Septuagint translate this word by “oracle,” and sometimes by “vain figures.” Aquila generally translates it by “figures.” It appears, indeed, from all the passages in which this word is used, that they were idols or superstitious figures. Some Jewish writers tell us the teraphim were humanhuman heads placed in niches, and consulted by way of oracles. Others think they were talismans or figures of metal cast and engraven under certain aspects of the planets, to which they ascribed extraordinary effects. All the eastern people are much addicted to this superstition, and the Persians still call them telefin, a name nearly approaching to teraphim. M. Jurieu supposes them to have been a sort of dii penates, or household gods; and this appears to be, perhaps, the most probable opinion.

TESTAMENT. The property or estate of the father fell, after his decease, into the possession of his sons, who divided it among themselves equally, with this exception, that the eldest son had two portions. The father expressed his last wishes or will in the presence of witnesses, and probably in the presence of the heirs, 2 Kings xx, 1. At a more recent period the will was made out in writing. The portion that was given to the sons of concubines depended altogether upon the feelings of the father. Abraham gave presents to what amount is not known, both to Ishmael and to the sons whom he had by Keturah, and sent them away before his death. It does not appear that they had any other portion in the estate. But Jacob made the sons whom he had by his concubines heirs as well as the others, Gen. xxi, 8–21; xxv, 1–6; xlix, 1–27. Moses laid no restrictions upon the choice of fathers in this respect; and we should infer that the sons of concubines, for the most part, received an equal share with the other sons, from the fact, that Jephtha, the son of a concubine, complained that he was excluded without any portion from his father’s house, Judg. xi, 1–7. The daughters not only had no portion in the estate, but, if they were unmarried, were considered as making a part of it, and were sold by their brothers into matrimony. If they had no brothers, or if they had died, the daughters then took the estate, Num. xxvii, 1–8. If any one died intestate, and without offspring, the property was disposed of according to Num. xxvii, 8–11. The servants or the slaves in a family could not claim any share in the estate as a right; but the person who made a will, might, if he chose, make them his heirs, Gen. xv, 3. Indeed, in some instances, those who had heirs, recognized as such by law, did not deem it unbecoming to bestow the whole or a portion of their estates on faithful and deserving servants, Prov. xvii, 2. The widow of the deceased, like his daughters, had no legal right to a share in the estate. The sons, however, or other relations, were bound to afford her an adequate maintenance, unless it had been otherwise arranged in the will. She sometimes returned back again to her father’s house, particularly if the support which the heirs gave her was not such as had been promised, or was not sufficient, Gen. xxxviii, 11. See also the story of Ruth. The prophets very frequently, and undoubtedly not without cause, exclaim against the neglect and injustice shown to widows, Isa. i, 17; x, 2; Jer. vii, 6; xxii, 3; Ezek. xxii, 7; Exod. xxii, 22–24; Deut. x, 18; xxiv, 17.

908TESTIMONY, a witnessing, evidence, or proof, Acts xiv, 3. The whole Scripture or word of God, which declares what is to be believed, practised, and expected by us, is called God’s “testimony,” and sometimes in the plural “testimonies,” Psalm xix, 7. The two tables of stone on which the law or ten commandments were written, which were witnesses of that covenant made between God and his people, and testified what it was that God had required of them, have the same title, Exod. xxv, 16, 21; xxxi, 18.

TETRARCH, a sovereign prince that has the fourth part of a state, province, or kingdom under his dominion, without wearing the diadem, or bearing the title of king, Matt, xiv, 1; Luke iii, 1, 19; ix, 7; Acts xiii, 1.

THEOPHILUS, one to whom St. Luke addresses the books of his Gospel and Acts of the Apostles, which he composed, Acts i, 1; Luke i, 3. It is doubted whether the name Theophilus be here the proper name of a man, or an appellative or common name, which, according to its etymology, may stand for any good man, or a lover of God. Some think this name is generic, and that St. Luke’s design here is to address his work to those that love God; but it is much more probable that this Theophilus was a Christian to whom the evangelist has dedicated those two works; and the epithet of “most excellent,” which is given to him, shows him to have been a man of great quality. Œcumenius concludes from thence that he was governor or intendant of some province, because such a personage had generally the title of “most excellent” given to him. Grotius conjectures he might be a magistrate of Achaia, converted by St. Luke.

THERAPEUTÆ. One particular phenomenon which resulted from the theosophico-ascetic spirit among the Alexandrian Jews, was the sect of the Therapeutæ. Their head quarters were at no great distance from Alexandria, in a quiet pleasant spot on the shores of the Lake Mœris, where they lived, like the anchorites in later periods, shut up in separate cells, and employed themselves in nothing but prayer, and the contemplation of divine things. An allegorical interpretation of Scripture was the foundation of their speculations; and they had old theosophical writings which gave them this turn. They lived only on bread and water, and accustomed themselves to fasting. They only ate in the evening, and many fasted for several days together. They met together every Sabbath day, and every seven weeks they held a still more solemn assembly, because the number seven was peculiarly holy in their estimation. They then celebrated a simple love-feast, consisting of bread with salt and hyssop; theosophical discussions were held, and the hymns which they had from their old traditions were sung; and mystical dances, bearing reference to the wonderful works of God with the fathers of their people, were continued, amidst choral songs, to a late hour in the night. Many men of distinguished learning have considered this sect as nothing but a scion of the Essenes, trained up under the peculiar influence of the Egyptian spirit.

THESSALONIANS, Christians of Thessalonica, to whom St. Paul sent two epistles. It is recorded in the Acts, that St. Paul, in his first journey upon the continent of Europe, preached the Gospel at Thessalonica, at that time the capital of Macedonia, with considerable success; but that after a short stay he was driven thence by the malice and violence of the unbelieving Jews. From Thessalonica St. Paul went to Berea, and thence to Athens, at both which places he remained but a short time. From Athens he sent Timothy to Thessalonica, to confirm the new converts in their faith, and to inquire into their conduct. Timothy, upon his return, found St. Paul at Corinth. Thence, probably in A. D. 52, St. Paul wrote the First Epistle to the Thessalonians; and it is to be supposed that the subjects of which it treats, were suggested by the account which he received from Timothy. It is now generally believed that this was written the first of all St. Paul’s epistles, but it is not known by whom it was sent to Thessalonica. The church there consisted chiefly of Gentile converts, 1 Thess. i, 9. St. Paul, after saluting the Thessalonian Christians in the name of himself, Silas, and Timothy, assures them that he constantly returned thanks to God on their account, and mentioned them in his prayers; he acknowledges the readiness and sincerity with which they embraced the Gospel, and the great reputation which they had acquired by turning from idols to serve the living God, 1 Thess. i; he reminds them of the bold and disinterested manner in which he had preached among them; comforts them under the persecutions which they, like other Christians, had experienced from their unbelieving countrymen, and informs them of two ineffectual attempts which he had made to visit them again, 1 Thess. ii; and that, being thus disappointed, he had sent Timothy to confirm their faith, and inquire into their conduct; he tells them that Timothy’s account of them had given him the greatest consolation and joy in the midst of his affliction and distress, and that he continually prayed to God for an opportunity of seeing them again, and for their perfect establishment in the Gospel, 1 Thess. iii; he exhorts to purity, justice, love, and quietness, and dissuades them against excessive grief for their deceased friends, 1 Thess. iv; hence he takes occasion to recommend preparation for the last judgment, the time of which is always uncertain; and adds a variety of practical precepts. He concludes with his usual benediction. This epistle is written in terms of high commendation, earnestness, and affection.

It is generally believed that the messenger who carried the former epistle into Macedonia, upon his return to Corinth, informed St. Paul that the Thessalonians had inferred, from some expressions in it, that the coming of Christ and the final judgment were near at hand, and would happen in the time of many who were then alive, 1 Thess. iv, 15, 17; v, 6. The principal design of the Second Epistle to 909the Thessalonians was to correct that error, and prevent the mischief which it would naturally occasion. It was written from Corinth, probably at the end of A. D. 52. St. Paul begins with the same salutation as in the former epistle, and then expresses his devout acknowledgments to God for the increasing faith and mutual love of the Thessalonians in the midst of persecution; he represents to them the rewards which will be bestowed upon the faithful, and the punishment which will be inflicted upon the disobedient, at the coming of Christ, 2 Thess. i; he earnestly entreats them not to suppose, as upon authority from him, or upon any other ground, that the last day is at hand; he assures them, that before that awful period a great apostasy will take place, and reminds them of some information which he had given them upon that subject when he was at Thessalonica; he exhorts them to steadfastness in their faith, and prays to God to comfort their hearts, and establish them in every good word and work, 2 Thess. ii; he desires their prayers for the success of his ministry, and expresses his confidence in their sincerity; he cautions them against associating with idle and disorderly persons, and recommends diligence and quietness. He adds a salutation in his own hand, and concludes with his usual benediction.

THESSALONICA, a celebrated city in Macedonia, and capital of that kingdom, standing upon the Thesmaic Sea. Stephen of Byzantium says that it was improved and beautified by Philip, king of Macedon, and called Thessalonica in memory of the victory that he obtained over the Thessalians. Its old name was Thesma. The Jews had a synagogue here, and their number was considerable, Acts xvii.

THIEF. Among the Hebrews theft was not punished with death: “Men do not despise a thief if he steal to satisfy his soul when he is hungry. But if he be found, he shall restore sevenfold; he shall give all the substance of his house,” Prov. vi, 30, 31. The law allowed the killing of a night-robber, because it was supposed his intention was to murder as well as to rob, Exod. xxii, 2. It condemned a common thief to make double restitution, Exod. xxii, 4. If he stole an ox he was to restore it fivefold; if a sheep, only fourfold, Exod. xxii, 1; 2 Sam. xii, 6. But if the animal that was stolen was found alive in his house he only rendered the double of it. If he did not make restitution, they seized what was in his house, put it up to sale, and even sold the person himself if he had not wherewithal to make satisfaction, Exod. xxii, 3.

THOMAS, the Apostle, otherwise called Didymus, which in Greek signifies a twin, Matt. x, 3; Luke vi, 15. We know no particulars of his life till A. D. 33, John xi, 16; xiv, 5, 6; xx, 24–29; xxi, 1–13. Ancient tradition says, that in the distribution which the Apostles made of the several parts of the world, wherein they were to preach the Gospel, the country of the Parthians fell to the share of St. Thomas. It is added, that he preached to the Medes, Persians, Carmanians, Hircanians, Bactrians, &c. Several of the fathers inform us that he also preached in the East Indies, &c.

THORN. A general name for several kinds of prickly plants. 1. In the curse denounced against the earth, Gen. iii, 18, its produce is threatened to be “thorns and thistles,” , in the Septuagint a a t. St. Paul uses the same words, Heb. vi, 8, where the last is rendered “briers;” they are also found Hos. x, 8. The word kutz is put for “thorns,” in other places, as Exod. xxii, 6; Judges viii, 7; Ezek. ii, 6; xxviii, 24; but we are uncertain whether it means a specific kind of thorn, or may be a generic name for all plants of a thorny kind. In the present instance it seems to be general for all those obnoxious plants, shrubs, &c, by which the labours of the husbandman are impeded, and which are only fit for burning. If the word denotes a particular plant, it maybe the “rest-harrow,” a pernicious prickly weed, which grows promiscuously with the large thistles in the uncultivated grounds, and covers entire fields and plains, in Egypt and Palestine. From the resemblance of the Hebrew dardar, to the Arabic word dardargi, Scheuchzer supposes the cnicus to be intended. 2. , from its etymology, must be a kind of thorn, with incurvated spines, like fish hooks, similar to those of the North American “witch hazel.” Celsius says that the same word, and of the same original in Arabic, is the “black thorn,” or “sloe tree,” the prunus spinosa of Linnæus. 3. . It is impossible to determine what plants are intended by this word. Meninski says that serbin, in the Persic language, is the name of a tree bearing thorns. In Eccles. vii, 6, and Nahum i, 10, they are mentioned as fuel which quickly burns up; and in Hosea ii, 6, as obstructions or hedges; it may be the lycium Afrum. 4. , mentioned Josh. xxiii, 13; Ezek. ii, 6, xxviii, 24. From the vexatious character ascribed to this thorn in the places just referred to, compared with Num. xxxiii, 55; Judges ii, 3; it is probably the kantuffa, as described by Bruce. 5. By , Num. xxxiii, 55, may be intended goads, or sharp-pointed sticks, like those with which cattle were driven. 6. The , Isa. v, 6; x, 17, must mean some noxious plant that overruns waste grounds. 7. The word , Num. xxxiii, 55; Josh. xxiii, 13; Isa. v, 5. It seems, from its application, to describe a bad kind of thorn. Hiller supposes it to be the vepris. Perhaps it is the rhamnus paliurus, a deciduous plant or tree, a native of Palestine, Spain, and Italy. It will grow nearly to the height of fourteen feet, and is armed with sharp thorns, two of which are at the insertion of each branch, one of them straight and upright, the other bent backward. 8. , translated “briers,” Judges viii, 16. “There is no doubt but this word means a sharp, jagged kind of plant: the difficulty is to fix on one, where so many offer themselves. The Septuagint preserves the original word. We should hardly think Gideon went far to seek these plants. The thorns are expressly said to be from the wilderness, 910or common hard by; probably the barkanim were from the same place. In our country this would lead us to the blackberry bushes on our commons; but it might not be so around Succoth. There is a plant mentioned by Hasselquist, whose name and properties somewhat resemble those which are required in the barkanim of this passage: “Nabka paliurus Athenæi, is the nabka of the Arabs. There is every appearance that this is the tree which furnished the crown of thorns which was put on the head of our Lord. It is common in the east. A plant more proper for this purpose could not be selected; for it is armed with thorns, its branches are pliant, and its leaf of a deep green like that of ivy. Perhaps the enemies of Christ chose this plant, in order to add insult to injury by employing a wreath approaching in appearance that which was used to crown emperors and generals.” In the New Testament, the Greek word translated “thorn,” is aa; Matt. vii, 16, xiii, 7, xxvii, 29, John xix, 2. The note of Bishop Pearce on Matt. xxvii, 29, is this: “The word a may as well be the plural genitive case of the word a, as of aa; if of the latter, it is rightly translated ‘of thorns,’ but the former would signify what we call ‘bear’s foot,’ and the French branche ursine. This is not of the thorny kind of plants, but is soft and smooth. Virgil calls it mollis acanthus. So does Pliny: and Pliny the elder says that it is lævis, “smooth;” and that it is one of those plants that are cultivated in gardens. I have somewhere read, but cannot at present recollect where, that this soft and smooth herb was very common in and about Jerusalem. I find nothing in the New Testament concerning this crown which Pilate’s soldiers put on the head of Jesus, to incline one to think that it was of thorns, and intended, as is usually supposed, to put him to pain. The reed put into his hand, and the scarlet robe on his back, were meant only as marks of mockery and contempt. One may also reasonably judge by the soldiers being said to plat this crown, that it was not composed of such twigs and leaves as were of a thorny nature. I do not find that it is mentioned by any of the primitive Christian writers as an instance of the cruelty used toward our Saviour before he was led to crucifixion, till the time of Tertullian, who lived after Jesus’ death at the distance of above one hundred and sixty years. He indeed seems to have understood a in the sense of thorns, and says, Quale oro te, Jesus Christus sertum pro utrogue sexu subiit Ex spinis, opinor, et tribulis. [What kind of a crown, I beseech you, did Jesus Christ sustain One made of thorns and thistles, I think.] The total silence of Polycarp, Barnabas, Clemens Romanus, and all the other Christian writers whose works are now extant, and who wrote before Tertullian, in particular, will give some weight to incline one to think that this crown was not platted with thorns. But as this is a point on which we have not sufficient evidence, I leave it almost in the same state of uncertainty in which I found it.” See Garden.

THRESHING FLOORS, among the ancient Jews, were only, as they are to this day in the east, round level plats of ground in the open air, where the corn was trodden out by oxen, the libycæ areæ of Horace. Thus, Gideon’s floor, Judges vi, 37, appears to have been in the open air; as was likewise that of Araunah the Jebusite; else it would not have been a proper place for erecting an altar and offering sacrifice. In Hosea xiii, 3, we read of the chaff which is driven by the whirlwind from the floor. This circumstance of the threshing floor’s being exposed to the agitation of the wind seems to be the principal reason of its Hebrew name; which may be farther illustrated by the direction which Hesiod gives his husbandman to thresh his corn in a place well exposed to the wind. From the above account it appears that a threshing floor (rendered in our textual translation “a void place”) might well be near the entrance of the gate of Samaria, and that it might afford no improper place in which the kings of Israel and Judah could hear the prophets, 1 Kings xxii, 10; 2 Chron. xviii, 9; Psalm i, 4.

THRONE is used for that magnificent seat on which sovereign princes usually sit to receive the homage of their subjects, or to give audience to ambassadors; where they appear with pomp and ceremony, and from whence they dispense justice; in a word, the throne, the sceptre, the crown, are the ordinary symbols of royalty and regal authority. The Scripture commonly represents the Lord as sitting upon a throne; sometimes it is said that the heaven is his throne, and the earth his footstool, Isaiah lxvi, 1. The Son of God is also represented as sitting upon a throne, at the right hand of his Father, Psalm cx, 1; Heb. i, 8; Rev. iii, 21. And Jesus Christ assures his Apostles that they should sit upon twelve thrones, to judge the twelve tribes of Israel, Luke xxii, 30. Though a throne and royal dignity seem to be correlatives, or terms that stand in reciprocal relation to each other, yet the privilege of sitting on a throne has been sometimes granted to those that were not kings, particularly to some governors of important provinces. We read of the throne of the governor of this side the river; the throne, in other words, of the governor for the king of Persia of the provinces belonging to that empire on the west of the Euphrates. So D’Herbelot tells us that a Persian monarch of aftertimes gave the governor of one of his provinces permission to seat himself in a gilded chair, when he administered justice; which distinction was granted him on account of the importance of that post, to which the guarding a pass of great consequence was committed. This province, he tells us, is now called Shirvan, but was formerly named Serir-aldhahab, which signifies, in Arabic, “the throne of gold.” To which he adds, that this privilege was granted to the governor of this province, as being the place through which the northern nations used to make their way into Persia; on which account, also, a mighty rampart or wall was raised there.

911In the Revelation of St. John, we find the twenty-four elders sitting upon as many thrones in the presence of the Lord; “and they fall down before him that sat on the throne, &c, and cast their crowns before the throne.” Many of the travellers in eastern countries have given descriptions highly illustrative of this mode of adoration. Thus Bruce, in his Travels, says, “The next remarkable ceremony in which these two nations (of Persia and Abyssinia) agreed is that of adoration, inviolably observed in Abyssinia to this day, as often as you enter the sovereign’s presence. This is not only kneeling, but absolute prostration; you first fall upon your knees, then upon the palms of your hands, then incline your head and body till your forehead touches the ground; and, in case you have an answer to expect, you lie in that posture till the king, or somebody from him, desires you to rise.” And Stewart observes, “We marched toward the emperor with our music playing, till we came within about eighty yards of him, when the old monarch, alighting from his horse, prostrated himself on the earth to pray, and continued some minutes with his face so close to the earth, that, when we came up to him, the dust remained upon his nose.”

The circumstance of “casting their crowns before the throne” may be illustrated by several cases which occur in history. That of Herod, in the presence of Augustus, has been already mentioned. (See Herod.) Tiridates, in this manner, did homage to Nero, laying the ensigns of his royalty at the statue of Cæsar, to receive them again from his hand. Tigranes, king of Armenia, did the same to Pompey. In the inauguration of the Byzantine Cæsars, when the emperor comes to receive the sacrament, he puts off his crown. “This short expedition,” says Malcolm, “was brought to a close by the personal submission of Abool Fyze Khan, who, attended by all his court, proceeded to the tents of Nadir Shah, and laid his crown, and other ensigns of royalty, at the feet of the conqueror, who assigned him an honourable place in his assembly, and in a few days afterward restored him to his throne.”

THYATIRA, a city of Lydia, in Asia Minor, and the seat of one of the seven churches in Asia. It was situated nearly midway between Pergamos and Sardis, and is still a tolerable town, considering that it is in the hands of the Turks, and enjoys some trade, chiefly in cottons. It is called by that people Ak-hisar, or White Castle.

TIBERIAS, a city situated in a small plain, surrounded by mountains, on the western coast of the sea of Galilee, which, from this city, was also called the sea of Tiberias. Tiberias was erected by Herod Antipas, and so called in honour of Tiberius Cæsar. He is supposed to have chosen, for the erection of his new city, a spot where before stood a more obscure place called Chenereth or Cinnereth, which also gave its name to the adjoining lake or sea.

TIMBRELS. See Music.

TIMOTHEUS, commonly called Timothy, a disciple of St. Paul. He was a native of Lystra in Lycaonia. His father was a Gentile; but his mother, whose name was Eunice, was a Jewess, Acts xvi, 1, and educated her son with great care in her own religion, 2 Tim. i, 5; iii, 15. To this young disciple St. Paul addressed two epistles; in the first of which he calls him his “own son in the faith,” 1 Tim. i, 2; from which expression it is inferred that St. Paul was the person who converted him to the belief of the Gospel; and as, upon St. Paul’s second arrival at Lystra, Timothy is mentioned as being then a disciple, and as having distinguished himself among the Christians of that neighbourhood, his conversion, as well as that of Eunice his mother, and Lois his grandmother, must have taken place when St. Paul first preached at Lystra, A. D. 46. Upon St. Paul’s leaving Lystra, in the course of his second apostolical journey, he was induced to take Timothy with him, on account of his excellent character, and the zeal which, young as he was, he had already shown in the cause of Christianity; but before they set out, St. Paul caused him to be circumcised, not as a thing necessary to his salvation, but to avoid giving offence to the Jews, as he was a Jew by the mother’s side, and it was an established rule among the Jews that partus sequitur ventrem. Timothy was regularly appointed to the ministerial office by the laying on of hands, not only by St. Paul himself, but also by the presbytery, 1 Tim. iv, 14; 2 Tim. i, 6. From this time Timothy acted as a minister of the Gospel; he generally attended St. Paul, but was sometimes employed by him in other places; he was very diligent and useful, and is always mentioned with great esteem and affection by St. Paul, who joins his name with his own in the inscription of six of his epistles. He is sometimes called bishop of Ephesus, and it has been said that he suffered martyrdom in that city, some years after the death of St. Paul.

The principal design of St. Paul’s First Epistle to Timothy was to give him instructions concerning the management of the church of Ephesus; and it was probably intended that it should be read publicly to the Ephesians, that they might know upon what authority Timothy acted. After saluting him in an affectionate manner, and reminding him of the reason for which he was left at Ephesus, the Apostle takes occasion, from the frivolous disputes which some Judaizing teachers had introduced among the Ephesians, to assert the practical nature of the Gospel, and to show its superiority over the law; he returns thanks to God for his own appointment to the apostleship, and recommends to Timothy fidelity in the discharge of his sacred office; he exhorts that prayers should be made for all men, and especially for magistrates; he gives directions for the conduct of women, and forbids their teaching in public; he describes the qualifications necessary for bishops and deacons, and speaks of the mysterious nature of the Gospel dispensation; he foretels that there will be apostates from the truth, and false teachers in the latter times, and recommends to Timothy purity of 912manners and improvement of his spiritual gifts; he gives him particular directions for his behaviour toward persons in different situations in life, and instructs him in several points of Christian discipline; he cautions him against false teachers, gives him several precepts, and solemnly charges him to be faithful to his trust.

That the Second Epistle to Timothy was written while St. Paul was under confinement at Rome, appears from the two following passages: “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner,” 2 Timothy i, 8. “The Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus; for he oft refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain; but when he was at Rome, he sought me out very diligently, and found me,” 2 Tim. i, 16, 17. The epistle itself will furnish us with several arguments to prove that it could not have been written during St. Paul’s first imprisonment. 1. It is universally agreed that St. Paul wrote his epistles to the Ephesians, Colossians, Philippians, and to Philemon, while he was confined the first time at Rome. In no one of these epistles does he express any apprehension for his life; and in the two last mentioned we have seen that, on the contrary, he expresses a confident hope of being soon liberated; but in this epistle he holds a very different language: “I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day,” 2 Tim. iv, 6, &c. The danger in which St. Paul now was, is evident from the conduct of his friends, when he made his defence: “At my first answer no man stood with me, but all men forsook me,” 2 Tim. iv, 16. This expectation of death, and this imminent danger, cannot be reconciled either with the general tenor of his epistles written during his first confinement at Rome, with the nature of the charge laid against him when he was carried thither from Jerusalem, or with St. Luke’s account of his confinement there; for we must remember that in A. D. 63, Nero had not begun to persecute the Christians; that none of the Roman magistrates and officers who heard the accusations against St. Paul at Jerusalem thought that he had committed any offence against the Roman government; that at Rome St. Paul was completely out of the power of the Jews; and, so little was he there considered as having been guilty of any capital crime, that he was suffered to dwell “two whole years,” that is, the whole time of his confinement, “in his own hired house, and to receive all that came in unto him, preaching the word of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no man forbidding him,” Acts xxviii, 30, 31. 2. From the inscriptions of the epistles to the Colossians, Philippians, and Philemon, it is certain that Timothy was with St. Paul in his first imprisonment at Rome; but this epistle implies that Timothy was absent. 3. St. Paul tells the Colossians that Mark salutes them, and therefore he was at Rome with St. Paul in his first imprisonment; but he was not at Rome when this epistle was written, for Timothy is directed to bring him with him, 2 Tim. iv, 11. 4. Demas, also, was with St. Paul when he wrote to the Colossians: “Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas, greet you,” Col. iv, 14. In this epistle he says, “Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world, and is departed into Thessalonica,” 2 Tim. iv, 10. It may be said that this epistle might have been written before the others, and that in the intermediate time Timothy and Mark might have come to Rome, more especially as St. Paul desires Timothy to come shortly, and bring Mark with him. But this hypothesis is not consistent with what is said of Demas, who was with St. Paul when he wrote to the Colossians, and had left him when he wrote this second epistle to Timothy; consequently the epistle to Timothy must be posterior to that addressed to the Colossians. The case of Demas seems to have been, that he continued faithful to St. Paul during his first imprisonment, which was attended with little or no danger; but deserted him in the second, when Nero was persecuting the Christians, and St. Paul evidently considered himself in great danger. 5. St. Paul tells Timothy, “Erastus abode at Corinth, but Trophimus have I left at Miletum sick,” 2 Tim. iv, 20. These were plainly two circumstances which had happened in some journey which St. Paul had taken not long before he wrote this epistle, and since he and Timothy had seen each other; but the last time St. Paul was at Corinth and Miletum, prior to his first imprisonment at Rome, Timothy was with him at both places; and Trophimus could not have been then left at Miletum, for we find him at Jerusalem immediately after St. Paul’s arrival in that city; “for they had seen before with him in the city Trophimus, an Ephesian, whom they supposed that Paul had brought into the temple,” Acts xxi, 29. These two facts must therefore refer to some journey subsequent to the first imprisonment; and, consequently, this epistle was written during St. Paul’s second imprisonment at Rome, and probably in A. D. 65, not long before his death. It is by no means certain where Timothy was when this epistle was written to him. It seems most probable that he was somewhere in Asia Minor, since St. Paul desires him to bring the cloak with him which he had left at Troas, 2 Tim. iv, 13; and also at the end of the first chapter, he speaks of several persons whose residence was in Asia. Many have thought that he was at Ephesus; but others have rejected that opinion, because Troas does not lie in the way from Ephesus to Rome, whither he was directed to go as quickly as he could. St. Paul, after his usual salutation, assures Timothy of his most affectionate remembrance; he speaks of his own apostleship and of his sufferings; exhorts Timothy to be steadfast in the true faith, to be constant and diligent in the discharge of his ministerial office, to avoid foolish and unlearned questions, and to practise and inculcate the great duties of 913the Gospel; he describes the apostasy and general wickedness of the last days, and highly commends the Holy Scriptures; he again solemnly exhorts Timothy to diligence; speaks of his own danger, and of his hope of future reward; and concludes with several private directions, and with salutations.

TIN, , Num. xxxi, 22; Isa. i, 25; Ezek. xxii, 18, 20; xxvii, 12; a well-known coarse metal, harder than lead. Mr. Parkhurst observes, that Moses, in Num. xxxi, 22, enumerates all the six species of metals. The Lord, by the Prophet Isaiah, having compared the Jewish people to silver, declares, “I will turn my hand upon thee, and purge away thy dross, and remove all , thy particles of tin:” where Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion have asste s, and the Vulgate stannum tuum, “thy tin;” but the LXX. µ, wicked ones. This denunciation, by a comparison of the preceding and following context, appears to signify that God would, by a process of judgment, purify those among the Jews who were capable of purification, as well as destroy the reprobate and incorrigible, Jer. vi, 29, 30; ix, 7; Mal. iii, 3; Ezek. xii, 18, 20. In Ezek. xxvii, 12, Tarshish is mentioned as furnishing ; and Bochart proves from the testimonies of Diodorus, Pliny, and Stephanus, that Tartessus in Spain, which he supposes the ancient Tarshish, anciently furnished tin. As Cornwall in very ancient times was resorted to for this metal, and probably first by the Phenicians, some have thought that peninsula to be the Tarshish of the Scriptures; a subject which, however, from the vague use of the word, is involved in much uncertainty. See Tarshish.

TITHES. We have nothing more ancient concerning tithes, than what we find in Gen. xiv, 20, that Abraham gave tithes to Melchisedec, king of Salem, at his return from his expedition against Chedorlaomer, and the four kings in confederacy with him. Abraham gave him tithe of all the booty he had taken from the enemy. Jacob imitated this piety of his grandfather, when he vowed to the Lord the tithe of all the substance he might acquire in Mesopotamia, Gen. xxviii, 22. Under the law, Moses ordained, “All the tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land, or of the fruit of the tree, is the Lord’s; it is holy unto the Lord. And if a man will at all redeem aught of his tithes, he shall add thereto the fifth part thereof. And concerning the tithe of the herd, or of the flock, even of whatsoever passeth under the rod, the tenth shall be wholly unto the Lord,” Lev. xxvii, 30–32. The Pharisees, in the time of Jesus Christ, to distinguish themselves by a more scrupulous observance of the law, did not content themselves with paying the tithe of the grain and fruits growing in the fields; but they also paid tithe of the pulse and herbs growing in their gardens, which was more than the law required of them. The tithes were taken from what remained, after the offerings and first fruits were paid. They brought the tithes to the Levites in the city of Jerusalem, as appears from Josephus and Tobit, i, 6. The Levites set apart the tenth part of their tithes for the priest; because the priests did not receive them immediately from the people, and the Levites were not to meddle with the tithes they had received, before they had given the priests such a part as the law assigned them. Of those nine parts that remained to the proprietors, after the tithe was paid to the Levites, they took still another tenth part, which was either sent to Jerusalem in kind, or, if it was too far, they sent the value in money; adding to it a fifth from the whole as the rabbins inform us. This tenth part was applied toward celebrating the festivals in the temple, which bore a near resemblance to the agapæ, or love feasts of the first Christians. Thus are those words of Deuteronomy understood by the rabbins: “Thou shalt truly tithe all the increase of thy seed, that the field bringeth forth year by year. And thou shalt eat before the Lord thy God, in the place which he shall choose to place his name there, the tithe of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thy oil, and of the firstlings of thy herds and of thy flocks: that thou mayest learn to fear the Lord thy God always,” Deut. xiv, 22, 23. Tobit i, 6, says, that every three years he punctually paid his tithe to strangers and proselytes. This was probably because there were neither priests nor Levites in the city where he dwelt. Moses speaks of this last kind of tithe: “At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and shalt lay it up within thy gates. And the Levite, (because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee,) and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest,” Deut. xiv, 28; xxvi, 12. It is thought that this tithe was not different from the second kind before noticed, except that in the third year it was not brought to the temple, but was used upon the spot by every one in the city of his habitation. So, properly speaking, there were only two sorts of tithes, that which was given to the Levites and priests, and that which was applied to making feasts of charity, either in the temple of Jerusalem, or in other cities. Samuel tells the children of Israel, that the king they had a mind to have over them would “take the tenth of their seed, and of their vineyards, and give to his officers, and his servants. He will take the tenth of your sheep, and ye shall be his servants,” 1 Sam. viii, 15, 17. Yet it does not clearly appear from the history of the Jews, that they regularly paid any tithe to their princes. But the manner in which Samuel expresses himself, seems to insinuate that it was looked upon as a common right among the kings of the cast. At this day, the Jews no longer pay any tithe; at least they do not think themselves obliged to do it, except it be those who are settled in the territory of Jerusalem, and the ancient Judea. For there are few Jews now that have any lands of their own, or any flocks. They only give something for the redemption of the first-born, to those who have any proofs of their being 914descended from the race of the priests or Levites. However, we are assured, that such among the Jews as would be thought to be very strict and religious give the tenth part of their whole income to the poor.

TITUS. It is remarkable that Titus is not mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles. The few particulars which are known of him, are collected from the epistles of St. Paul. We learn from them that he was a Greek, Gal. ii, 3; but it is not recorded to what city or country he belonged. From St. Paul’s calling him “his own son according to the common faith,” Titus i, 4, it is concluded that he was converted by him; but we have no account of the time or place of his conversion. He is first mentioned as going from Antioch to the council at Jerusalem, A. D. 49, Gal. ii, 1, &c; and upon that occasion St. Paul says that he would not allow him to be circumcised, because he was born of Gentile parents. He probably accompanied St. Paul in his second apostolical journey, and from that time he seems to have been constantly employed by him in the propagation of the Gospel; he calls him his partner and fellow-helper, 2 Cor. viii, 23. St. Paul sent him from Ephesus with his First Epistle to the Corinthians, and with a commission to inquire into the state of the church at Corinth; and he sent him thither again from Macedonia with his Second Epistle, and to forward the collections for the saints in Judea. From this time we hear nothing of Titus till he was left by St. Paul in Crete, after his first imprisonment at Rome, to “set in order the things that were wanting, and to ordain elders in every city,” Titus i, 5. It is probable that he went thence to join St. Paul at Nicopolis, Titus iii, 12; that they went together to Crete to visit the churches there, and thence to Rome. During St. Paul’s second imprisonment at Rome Titus went into Dalmatia, 2 Tim. iv, 10; and after the apostle’s death, he is said to have returned into Crete, and to have died there in the ninety-fourth year of his age: he is often called bishop of Crete by ecclesiastical writers. St. Paul always speaks of Titus in terms of high regard, and intrusted him, as we have seen, with commissions of great importance. It is by no means certain from what place St. Paul wrote this epistle; but as he desires Titus to come to him at Nicopolis, and declares his intention of passing the winter there, some have supposed that, when he wrote it he was in the neighbourhood of that city, either in Greece or Macedonia; others have imagined that he wrote it from Colosse, but it is difficult to say upon what ground. As it appears that St. Paul, not long before he wrote this epistle, had left Titus in Crete for the purpose of regulating the affairs of the church, and at the time he wrote it had determined to pass the approaching winter at Nicopolis, and as the Acts of the Apostles do not give any account of St. Paul’s preaching in that island, or of visiting that city, it is concluded that this epistle was written after his first imprisonment at Rome, and probably in A. D. 64. It may be considered as some confirmation of that opinion, that there is a great similarity between the sentiments and expressions of this epistle and of the First Epistle to Timothy, which was written in that year. It is not known at what time a Christian church was first planted in Crete; but as some Cretans were present at the first effusion of the Holy Ghost at Jerusalem, Acts ii, 11, it is not improbable that, upon their return home, they might be the means of introducing the Gospel among their countrymen. Crete is said to have abounded with Jews; and from the latter part of the first chapter of this epistle it appears that many of them were persons of very profligate lives, even after they had embraced the Gospel. The principal design of this epistle was to give instructions to Titus concerning the management of the churches in the different cities of the island of Crete, and it was probably intended to be read publicly to the Cretans, that they might know upon what authority Titus acted. St. Paul, after his usual salutation, intimates that he was appointed an apostle by the express command of God, and reminds Titus of the reason of his being left in Crete; he describes the qualifications necessary for bishops, and cautions him against persons of bad principles, especially Judaizing teachers, whom he directs Titus to reprove with severity; he informs him what instructions he should give to people in different situations of life, and exhorts him to be exemplary in his own conduct; he points out the pure and practical nature of the Gospel, and enumerates some particular virtues which he was to inculcate, avoiding foolish questions and frivolous disputes; he instructs him how he is to behave toward heretics and concludes with salutations.

TIZRI, or TISRI, the first Hebrew month of the civil year, and the seventh of the sacred year, answering to the moon of September. On the first day of this month was kept the feast of trumpets, because the beginning of the civil year was proclaimed with the sound of trumpets.

TOB, a country of Palestine, lying beyond Jordan, in the northern part of the portion of Manasseh. To this district Jephthah retired, when he was driven away by his brethren, Judges xi, 3, 5. It is also called Tobie, or Tubin, 1 Mac. v, 13; and the inhabitants of this canton were called Tubieni. It is supposed to be the same as Ishtob, one of the small principalities of Syria, which appears, like the other little kingdoms in its neighbourhood, to have been swallowed up in the kingdom of Damascus. This principality furnished twelve thousand men to the confederacy formed by the Syrians and Ammonites against David, 2 Sam. x.

TOBIAH, an Ammonite, an enemy to the Jews. He was one of those who strenuously opposed the rebuilding of the temple, after the return from the captivity of Babylon, Neh. ii, 10; iv, 3; v, 1, 12, 14. This Tobiah is called “the servant,” or “slave,” in some parts of Nehemiah; probably because he was of a servile condition. However, he was of great consideration in the land of the Samaritans, 915of which he was governor with Sanballat. This Tobiah married the daughter of Shechaniah, one of the principal Jews of Jerusalem, Neh. vi, 18, and had a powerful party in Jerusalem itself, who were opposed to that of Nehemiah. He maintained a correspondence by letter with this party against the interest of Nehemiah, vi, 17–19; but that prudent governor, by his wisdom and moderation, defeated all their machinations. After some time, Nehemiah was obliged to return to Babylon, subsequent to having repaired the walls of Jerusalem. Tobiah took this opportunity to come and dwell at Jerusalem; and even obtained of Eliashib, who had the care of the house of the Lord, to have an apartment in the temple. But at Nehemiah’s return from Babylon, some years after, he drove Tobiah out of the courts of the temple, and threw his goods out of the holy place, Neh. xiii, 4–8. From this time the Scripture makes no farther mention of Tobiah. It is probable he retired to Sanballat at Samaria.

TOGARMAH, the third son of Gomer, Gen. x, 4. The learned are divided as to what country he peopled. Josephus and St. Jerom were of opinion, that Togarmah was the father of the Phrygians: Eusebius, Theodoret, and Isidorus of Seville, that he peopled Armenia: the Chaldee and the Talmudists are for Germany. Several moderns believe that the children of Togarmah peopled Turcomania in Tartary and Scythia. Bochart is for Cappadocia: he builds upon what is said in Ezekiel xxvii, 14, “They of the house of Togarmah traded in thy fairs,” that is, at Tyre, “with horses and horsemen and mules.” He proves that Cappadocia was famous for its excellent horses and its asses. He observes also, that certain Gauls, under the conduct of Trocmus, made a settlement at Cappadocia, and were called Trocmi, or Throgmi. The opinion, says Calmet, which places Togarmah in Scythia and Turcomania, seems to stand upon the best foundation.

TOKENS, TESSERÆ, or TICKETS, were written testimonials to character, much in use in the primitive church. By means of letters, and of brethren who travelled about, even the most remote churches of the Roman empire were connected together. When a Christian arrived in a strange town, he first inquired for the church; and he was here received as a brother, and provided with every thing needful for his spiritual or corporeal sustenance. But since deceivers, spies with evil intentions, and false teachers abused the confidence and the kindness of Christians, some measure of precaution became necessary, in order to avert the many injuries which might result from this conduct. An arrangement was therefore introduced, that only such travelling Christians should be received as brethren into churches where they were strangers, as could produce a testimonial from the bishop of the church from which they came. They called these church letters, which were a kind of tesseræ hospitales, [tickets of hospitality,] by which the Christians of all quarters of the world were brought into connection, epistolæ, or literæ formatæ, [formal letters,] µµata tetpµea, because, in order to avoid forgery, they were made after a certain schema, (tp, forma,) or else, epistolæ communicatoriæ, [epistles of fellowship,] µµata , because they contained a proof that those who brought them were in the communion of the church, as well as that the bishops, who mutually sent and received such letters, were in connection together by the communion of the church; and afterward these church letters, epistolæ clericæ, were divided into different classes, according to the difference of their purposes.

TONGUE. This word is taken in three different senses. 1. For the material tongue, or organ of speech, James iii, 5. 2. For the tongue or language that is spoken in any country, Deut. xxviii, 49. (See Language.) 3. For good or bad discourses, Prov. xii, 18; xvii, 20. Tongue of the sea signifies a gulf. To gnaw the tongue, Rev. xvi, 10, is a token of fury, despair, and torment. The gift of tongues was that which God granted to the apostles and disciples assembled at Jerusalem on the day of pentecost, Acts ii. The tongue of angels, a kind of hyperbole made use of by St. Paul, 1 Cor. xiii, 1.

TOOTH. It was ordered by the law of retaliation, that they should give tooth for tooth, Exod. xxi, 24. The opinion that it is every man’s right and duty to do himself justice, and to revenge his own injuries, is by no means eradicated from among the Afghans, a people of India, to the southward of Cashmere, and according to a paper in the Asiatic Researches, supposed to be descended from the Jews; and the right of society, even to restrain the reasonable passions of individuals, and to take the redress of wrongs and the punishment of crimes into its own hands, is still very imperfectly understood; or, if it is understood, is seldom present to the thoughts of the people; for although, in most parts of their country, justice might now be obtained by other means, and though private revenge is every where preached against by the mollahs, priests, and forbidden by the government, yet it is still lawful, and even honourable in the eyes of the people, to seek that mode of redress. The injured party is considered to be entitled to strict retaliation on the aggressor. If the offender be out of his power, he may wreak his vengeance on a relation, and, in some cases, on any man in the tribe. If no opportunity of exercising this right occurs, he may defer his revenge for years; but it is disgraceful to neglect or abandon it entirely; and it is incumbent on his relations, and sometimes on his tribe, to assist him in his retaliation. To gnash the teeth is a token of sorrow, rage, despair, Psalm xxxv, 16, &c. God breaks the teeth of the wicked, Psalm iii, 7. Cleanness of teeth denotes famine, Amos iv, 6. The wicked complain, that the “fathers have eaten sour grapes, and their children’s teeth are set on edge,” Ezek. xviii, 2, to signify, that the children have suffered for their transgressions.

TOPAZ, , Exod. xxviii, 17; xxxix, 10; Job xxviii, 19; Ezek. xxviii, 13; tp, Rev. 916xxi, 20; a precious stone of a pale dead green, with a mixture of yellow; and sometimes of fine yellow, like gold. It is very hard, and takes a fine polish. We have the authority of the Septuagint and Josephus for ascertaining this stone. The oriental topazes are most esteemed. Those of Ethiopia were celebrated for their wonderful lustre, Job xxviii, 19.

TOPHET. It is thought that Tophet was the butchery, or place of slaughter, at Jerusalem, lying to the south of the city, in the valley of the children of Hinnom. It is also said, that a large fire was constantly kept there for burning carcasses, garbage, and other filth brought thither from the city. It was the place where they burned the remains of images and false gods, &c, Isa. xxx, 33. Others think the name Tophet was given to the valley of Hinnom, from the beating of drums, (the word toph signifying a drum,) which accompanied the sacrifices of infants that were offered there to the god Moloch. For the manner of performing those sacrifices in Tophet, see Moloch.

TOWER. “The tower of the flock,” or the tower of Ader, Micah iv, 8. It is said this tower was in the neighbourhood of Bethlehem, Gen. xxxv, 21, and that the shepherds, to whom the angel revealed the birth of our Saviour, were near to this tower, Luke ii, 8, 15. Many interpreters assert, that the passage of Micah, in which mention is made of the tower of the flock: “And thou tower of the flock, the strong hold of the daughter of Zion,” is to be understood of the city of Bethlehem, out of which our Saviour was to come. Others maintain, that the prophet speaks of the city of Jerusalem, in which there was a tower of this name, through which the flocks of sheep were driven to the sheep-market. “From the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city,” 2 Kings xvii, 9. This form of speaking expresses in general all the places of the country, from the least to the greatest. The towers of the watchmen, or of the shepherds, stood alone in the midst of the plain, in which the shepherds and herdsmen who looked after the flocks, or watchmen, might lodge. King Uzziah caused several towers to be built for the shepherds in the desert, and made many cisterns there, because he had a great number of flocks, 2 Chronicles xxvi, 10. The tower of the flock, and that which Isaiah, v, 2, notices, which was built in the midst of a vineyard, were of the same kind.

Tower of Babel. See Babel.

Tower of Shechem was a citadel, or fortress, standing upon a higher ground than the rest of the city, and capacious enough to contain above a thousand persons. This tower, filled with the inhabitants of Shechem, was burned by Abimelech down to the very ground, together with those who had taken refuge in it.

TRACHONITIS, Luke iii, 1. This province had Arabia Deserta to the east, Batanea to the west, Iturea to the south, and the country of Damascus to the north. It belonged rather to Arabia than Palestine; was a rocky province, and served as a shelter for thieves and depredators.

TRADITION. See Cabbala.

TRANSFIGURATION OF CHRIST. This event relates to a very remarkable occurrence in the history of our Lord’s life, which is recorded by three of the evangelists, Matthew xvii; Mark ix; Luke ix. The substance of what we learn from their accounts is, that upon a certain occasion Jesus took Peter, James, and John, into a high mountain apart from all other society, and that he was there transfigured before them; his face shining as the sun, and his raiment white as the light; that moreover there appeared unto them Moses and Elias, conversing with him; and that while they spake together on the subject of his death, which was soon afterward to take place at Jerusalem, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice out of the cloud proclaimed, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” The Apostle Peter, adverting to this memorable occurrence, says, “We have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of his majesty. For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount,” 2 Peter i, 16–18. This event is to be considered: 1. As a solemn confirmation of the prophetic office of Christ. 2. As designed to support the faith of the disciples, which was to be deeply tried by his approaching humiliations; and to afford consolation to the human nature of our Lord himself, by giving him a foretaste of “the joy set before him.” 3. As an emblem of humanity glorified at the resurrection. 4. As declaring Christ to be superior to Moses and Elias, the giver and the restorer of the law. 5. As an evidence to the disciples of the existence of a separate state, in which good men consciously enjoy the felicity of heaven. 6. As a proof that the bodies of good men shall be so refined and changed, as, like Elias, to live in a state of immortality, and in the presence of God. 7. As exhibiting the sympathy which exists between the church in heaven and the church on earth, and the instruction which the former receives from the events which take place in the latter:--Moses and Elias conversed with our Lord on his approaching death, doubtless to receive, not to convey information. 8. As maintaining the grand distinction, the infinite difference, between Christ and all other prophets: he is “THE SON.” “This is my beloved Son, hear him.” It has been observed, with much truth, that the condition in which Jesus Christ appeared among men, humble, weak, poor, and despised, was a true and continual transfiguration; whereas, the transfiguration itself, in which he showed himself in the real splendour of his glory, was his true and natural condition.

TRANSUBSTANTIATION. The Lord’s Supper being observed in commemoration of the death of Christ, which was the sacrifice offered for the sins of men, the idea of a sacrifice 917was early conjoined with it; and finally, it came to be regarded not merely as the symbol of a sacrifice, but in some sense a sacrifice itself. There was also another cause which contributed to this belief. It was the anxious wish of some of the fathers to give to their religion a degree of splendour, which might make a powerful impression upon the senses. Under the Jewish economy, the numerous sacrifices that were offered, in a remarkable degree riveted the attention; and, with reference to this, it became customary to hold forth the Lord’s Supper as the great sacrifice in the Christian church. This mode of speaking quickly gained ground; it is often used by Cyprian, although he plainly understood it in a mystical sense; and the ordinance of the supper was not unfrequently styled the eucharistical sacrifice. It was very early the practice to hold up the elements, previous to their being distributed, to the view of the people, probably to excite in them more effectually devout and reverential feelings; and this laid the foundation for that adoration of them which was, at a subsequent period, as we shall soon find, extensively introduced.

For several ages, says Dr. Cook, the state of opinion respecting the sacramental elements was, that they were memorials of Christ’s death, but that, agreeably to his own declaration, his body and blood were, in some sense, present with them. The questions, however, what was the nature of that presence and what were the physical consequences as to the bread and the wine however much we may conceive these points to have been involved in the opinion actually held, or the language actually used, seem not to have been for a long period much agitated, or, at all events, not authoritatively decided, although the Roman Catholic writers gladly and triumphantly bring forward the expressions that were so often used from the earliest age, in support of the tenet which their church at length espoused. But it was not to be supposed that the curiosity of man would be permanently arrested at the threshold of this most mysterious inquiry; and accordingly a definite theory, with respect to it, was, in the ninth century, avowed, and zealously defended. Pascasius Radbert, a monk, and afterward abbot of Corbey in Picardy, published a treatise concerning the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, in which he did not hesitate to maintain the following most extraordinary positions: “That after the consecration of the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper, nothing remained of these symbols but the outward form or figure under which the body and blood of Christ were really and locally present; and that this body so present was the identical body that had been born of the Virgin Mary, had suffered on the cross, and had been raised from the dead.” The publication of notions so decidedly at war with all which human beings must credit, excited, as might have been expected, astonishment and indignation; and, accordingly, many writers exerted their talents against it. Among these was the celebrated Johannes Scotus, who laid the axe to the root of the tree, and, shaking off all that figurative language which had been so sadly abused, distinctly and powerfully stated, that the bread and wine used in the eucharist were the signs or symbols of the absent body and blood of Christ. The light of reason and truth was, however, too feeble to penetrate through the darkness which during this age was spread over the minds and understandings of men. No public declaration, indeed, as to the nature of the sacramental elements was made; and even the popes did not interpose their high and revered authority with regard to it; but there seems little doubt that the opinion of Pascasius was adopted by the greater part of the western church, although it is not likely that much deference was paid to his explanations of it. The question was again agitated, and attracted more notice than it had ever before done, in the course of the eleventh century. Several theologians, distinguished for the period at which they lived, shocked with the grossness and absurdity of the conversion which had been defended, strenuously opposed it. Among these Berenger holds the most conspicuous place, both on account of the zeal and ability which he displayed, and the cruel and unchristian manner in which he was resisted. About the commencement of the century, he began to inculcate that the bread and wine of the eucharist were not truly and actually, but only figuratively, and by similitude, the body and blood of Christ; and a doctrine so rational obtained many adherents in France, Italy, and England. He was, however, encountered by a host of opponents, numbers of whom possessed the highest situations in the church; and the church itself, either from having perceived that the doctrine which he laboured to confute was grateful to the people, or, what is more likely, tended to exalt the powers and to increase the influence and wealth of the priesthood, declared against him, various councils having been assembled, and having pronounced their solemn decrees in condemnation of what he taught. The councils did not rest their hope of overcoming Berenger upon the strength of the reasoning which they could urge against him: they took a much more summary method, and threatened to put him to death if he did not recant. At one synod held at Rome, under the immediate eye of the pope, the fathers of whom it consisted so successfully alarmed Berenger, that, not having sufficient vigour of mind to stand firm against their cruelty, he confessed that he had been in error, and subscribed the following declaration composed by one of the cardinals: “The bread and wine which are placed on the altar are, after consecration, not merely a sacrament, symbol, or figure, but even the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is handled by the hands of the priests, and broken and chewed by the teeth of the faithful.” He had no sooner escaped from the violence which he had dreaded, than he shrunk from the tenet to which he had been forced to give his assent, and he again avowed his original sentiments; but he was afterward 918turned aside from his integrity by the arts and the infamous persecution of new councils, although he died adhering to the spirituality of Christ’s presence in the eucharist. From this time the strange opinion of Pascasius rapidly gained ground, being supported by all the influence of popes and councils; but there had not yet been devised a term which clearly expressed what was really implied in that opinion. In the next century, the ingenuity of some theologian invented what was wanting; the change that takes place on the elements after consecration having been denominated by him transubstantiation. Still, however, some latitude was afforded to those who interpreted the epithet; but this in the thirteenth century was taken away, a celebrated council of the Lateran, attended by no fewer than four hundred and twelve bishops, and eight hundred abbots and priors, having, at the instigation of Innocent the Third, one of the most arrogant and presumptuous of the pontiffs, explicitly adopted transubstantiation as an article of faith, in the monstrous form in which it is now held in the popish church, and denounced anathemas against all who hesitated to give their assent. The opposition which after this was made to a doctrine so revolting to the senses and the reason, was very feeble, insomuch that it may, in consequence of the decree of the Lateran council, be considered as having become the established faith of the western church. In the Greek church it was long resisted, and, indeed, was not embraced till the seventeenth century, a time at which it might have been thought that it could not have extended the range of its influence.

After transubstantiation was thus sanctioned, a change necessarily took place with respect to various parts of the service used in administering the eucharist. That solemn service was now viewed as an actual sacrifice or offering of the body of Christ for the sins of men, and the elevation of the host was held forth as calling for the adoration and worship of believers; so that an ordinance mercifully designed to preserve the pure influence of the most spiritual and elevated religion, became the instrument, in the hands of ignorant or corrupt men, of introducing the most senseless and degrading idolatry. When the Reformation shook the influence of the church, and brought into exercise the intellectual faculties of man, the subject of the eucharist demanded and received the closest and most anxious attention. It might have been naturally supposed, that when Luther directed his vigorous mind to point out and to condemn the abuses which had been sanctioned in the popish church, he would not have spared a doctrine the most irrational and objectionable which that church avows, and that he would have vindicated the holy ordinance of the Lord’s Supper from the abomination with which it had been associated. He did, indeed, object to transubstantiation, but he did so with a degree of hesitation truly astonishing, although that hesitation was displayed by many of the first reformers. He declared that he saw no warrant for believing that the bread and wine were actually changed into the body and blood of Christ; but he adhered to the literal import of our Saviour’s words, teaching that his body and blood were received, and that they were in some incomprehensible manner conjoined or united with the bread and wine. It is quite evident, that although this system got rid of one difficulty by leaving the testimony of the senses as to the bread and wine unchallenged, yet it is just as incomprehensible as the other, assumes as a fact what the senses cannot discern, and involves in it difficulties equally repugnant to the plainest dictates of reason. Powerful accordingly as most deservedly was his ascendency, and great as was the veneration with which he was contemplated, he was upon this point happily opposed; his colleague, the celebrated Carlostadt, openly avowing, that when our Lord said of the bread, “This is my body,” he pointed to his own person, and thus taught that the bread was merely the sign or emblem of it. Luther warmly resisted this opinion; Carlostadt was obliged, surely in little consistency with the fundamental principle of Protestantism, in consequence of having professed it, to leave Wirtemberg; and although it procured some adherents, yet as it rested upon an assertion of which there could be no proof, it was never extensively disseminated, and was ultimately abandoned by Carlostadt himself. The discussion, however, which he had commenced stimulated others to the consideration of the subject, and led Zuinglius, who had previously often meditated upon it, and Œcolampadius, two of the most distinguished reformers, to submit to the public the doctrine, that the bread and wine are only symbols of Christ’s body and blood, but that the body of our Lord was in heaven, to which after his resurrection he had ascended. Luther composed several works to confute the opinions of Zuinglius. At the commencement of the controversy respecting the eucharist among the defenders of the Protestant faith, there seem to have been only two opinions, that of Luther, asserting that the body and blood of Christ were actually with the bread and wine, and that of Zuinglius, Œcolampadius, and Bucer, that the bread and wine were the emblems or signs of Christ’s body and blood, no other advantage being derived from partaking of them than the moral effect naturally resulting from the commemoration of an event so awful and so deeply interesting as the crucifixion of our Redeemer. Calvin soon published what may be regarded as a new view of the subject. Admitting the justness of the interpretation of our Lord’s words given by Zuinglius, he maintained that spiritual influence was conveyed to worthy partakers of the Lord’s Supper, insomuch that Christ may be said to be spiritually present with the outward elements. The sentiments of this most eminent theologian made a deep impression upon the public mind; and although the churches of Zurich and Berne long adhered to the creed of Zuinglius, yet, through the perseverance and dexterity of Calvin, the Swiss Protestant 919churches at length united with that of Geneva in assenting to the spiritual presence of Christ in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. In other countries, too, he saw many adhering to what he had taught, and carrying to as great length as it could be carried what, under his system, must be termed the allegorical language which he recommended. The French Protestants in their confession thus express themselves: “We affirm that the holy supper of our Lord is a witness to us of our union with the Lord Jesus Christ, because that he is not only once dead and raised up again from the dead for us, but also he doth indeed feed and nourish us with his flesh and blood. And although he be now in heaven, and shall remain there till he come to judge the world, yet we believe that, by the secret and incomprehensible virtue of his Spirit, he doth nourish and quicken us with the substance of his body and blood. But we say that this is done in a spiritual manner; nor do we hereby substitute in place of the effect and truth an idle fancy and conceit of our own; but rather, because this mystery of our union with Christ is so high a thing that it surmounteth all our senses, yea and the whole order of nature, and in short, because it is celestial, it cannot be comprehended but by faith.” Knox, who revered Calvin, carried into Scotland the opinions of that reformer; and in the original Scottish confessions, similar language, though somewhat more guarded than that which has been just quoted, is used: “We assuredly believe that in the supper rightly used, Christ Jesus is so joined with us, that he becometh the very nourishment and food of our souls. Not that we imagine any transubstantiation,--but this union and communion which we have with the body and blood of Christ Jesus in the right use of the sacrament, is wrought by the operation of the Holy Ghost, who by true faith carrieth us above all things that are visible, carnal, and earthly, and maketh us to feed upon the body and blood of Christ Jesus. We most assuredly believe that the bread which we break is the communion of Christ’s body, and the cup which we bless is the communion of his blood; so that we confess and undoubtedly believe, that the faithful in the right use of the Lord’s table so do eat the body and drink the blood of the Lord Jesus, that he remaineth in them and they in him; yea, that they are so made flesh of his flesh, and bones of his bones, that as the eternal Godhead hath given to the flesh of Christ Jesus life and immortality, so doth Christ Jesus’s flesh and blood, eaten and drunken by us, give to us the same prerogatives.” The church of Scotland, which did not long use this first confession, seems to have seen, in the course of the following century, the propriety, if not of relinquishing, yet of more cautiously employing the phraseology now brought into view; for in the Westminster confession, which is still the standard of faith in that church, there is unquestionably a great improvement in the style which has been adopted in treating of this subject. In it the compilers declare, that “the outward elements in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper duly set apart to the uses ordained by Christ, have such relation to him crucified, as that truly, yet sacramentally only, they are sometimes called by the name of the things they represent; namely the body and blood of Christ, albeit in substance and nature they still remain truly and only bread and wine, as they were before.” Then after most powerfully exposing the absurdity of transubstantiation, representing it as repugnant not to Scripture alone, but to reason and common sense, they proceed: “Worthy receivers, outwardly partaking of the visible elements in this sacrament, do then also inwardly by faith, really and indeed, yet not carnally and corporally, but spiritually, receive and feed upon Christ crucified, and all benefits of his death: the body and blood of Christ being then not corporally or carnally in, with, or under the bread and wine, yet as really but spiritually present to the faith of believers in that ordinance, as the elements themselves are to their outward senses.” The church of England was in its first reformation from popery inclined to adhere to the Lutherans; but in the time of Edward the Sixth, a more correct and Scriptural view seems to have been taken. In the thirty-nine articles, the present creed of the English church, it is said of this ordinance: “The supper of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that Christians ought to have among themselves one to another, but rather it is a sacrament of our redemption by Christ’s death; insomuch that, to such as rightly, worthily, and with faith receive the same, the bread which we break is a partaking of the body of Christ, and likewise the cup is a partaking of the blood of Christ.” This strong language is, however, in the same article, so modified, as to show that all which was intended by it was to represent the spiritual influence conveyed through the Lord’s Supper; for it is taught, “that the body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten in the supper, only after a heavenly and spiritual manner.” The idea of Zuinglius, that the Lord’s Supper is merely a commemoration of Christ’s death, naturally producing a moral effect upon the serious and considerate mind, has been held by members of both the established churches in Great Britain. It was vigorously defended, about the beginning of last century, by Bishop Hoadly, in a work which he entitled, “A plain Account of the Nature and Ends of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper;” and it has more recently been supported by Dr. Bell, in a treatise denominated “An Attempt to ascertain the Authority, Nature, and Design of the Lord’s Supper.” The ingenuity of particular individuals has been exerted in giving other peculiar illustrations of the subject. Cudworth and Bishop Warburton, for example, represented the sacrament of the supper under the view of a feast upon a sacrifice; but such speculations have not influenced the faith of any large denomination of Christians.

TRAVELLING. The mode in which the patriarchs performed their pastoral migrations 920will be illustrated, with several differences in circumstances, by the following extract from Parsons’ Travels: “It was entertaining enough to see the horde of Arabs decamp, as nothing could be more regular. First went the sheep and goat herds, each with their flocks in divisions, according as the chief of each family directed; then followed the camels and asses, loaded with the tents, furniture, and kitchen utensils; these were followed by the old men, women, boys, and girls, on foot. The children that cannot walk are carried on the backs of the young women, or the boys and girls; and the smallest of the lambs and kids are carried under the arms of the children. To each tent belong many dogs, among which are some greyhounds; some tents have from ten to fourteen dogs, and from twenty to thirty men, women, and children, belonging to it. The procession is closed by the chief of the tribe, whom they call emir and father, (emir means prince,) mounted on the very best horse, and surrounded by the heads of each family, all on horses, with many servants on foot. Between each family is a division or space of one hundred yards, or more, when they migrate; and such great regularity is observed, that neither camels, asses, sheep, nor dogs, mix, but each keeps to the division to which it belongs, without the least trouble. They had been here eight days, and were going four hours’ journey to the north-west, to another spring of water. This tribe consisted of about eight hundred and fifty men, women, and children. Their flocks of sheep and goats were about five thousand, beside a great number of camels, horses, and asses. Horses and greyhounds they breed and train up for sale: they neither kill nor sell their ewe lambs. At set times a chapter in the Koran is read by the chief of each family, either in or near each tent, the whole family being gathered round, and very attentive.” Instead of the Koran of modern times, let us conceive of Abraham, and other patriarchal emirs, collecting their numerous dependents and teaching them the true religion, and we then see with what truth they are called the Lord’s “prophets.”

TREASURE. The Hebrew word signifies any thing collected together, provisions, or magazines. So they say, a treasure of corn, of wine, of oil, of honey, Jer. xli, 8; treasures of gold, silver, brass, Ezek. xxviii, 4; Dan. xi, 43. Snow, winds, hail, rain, waters, are in the treasuries of God, Psalm cxxxv, 7; Jer. li, 16. The wise men opened their treasures, Matt. ii, 11, that is, their packets, or bundles, to offer presents to our Saviour. Joseph acquainted his brethren, when they found their money returned in their sacks, that God had given them treasures, Genesis xliii, 23. The treasures of the house of God, whether in silver, corn, wine, or oil, were under the care of the Levites. The kings of Judah had also keepers of the treasures both in city and country, 1 Chron. xxvii, 25; and the places where these magazines were laid up were called treasure cities. Pharaoh compelled the Hebrews to build him treasure cities, or magazines.

TREE is the first and largest of the vegetable kind, consisting of a single trunk, out of which spring forth branches and leaves. Heat is so essential to the growth of trees, that we see them grow larger and smaller in a sort of gradation as the climates in which they stand are more or less hot. The hottest countries yield, in general, the largest and tallest trees, and those, also, in much greater beauty and variety than the colder do; and even those plants which are common to both arrive at a much greater bulk in the southern than in the northern climates; nay, there are some regions so bleak and chill, that they raise no vegetables at all to any considerable height. Greenland, Iceland, and similar places, afford no trees at all; and the shrubs which grow in them are always little and low. In the warmer climates, where trees grow to a moderate size, any accidental diminution of the common heat is found very greatly to impede vegetation; and even in England the cold summers we sometimes have give us an evident proof of this in the scarcity of produce from all our large fruit trees. Heat, whatever be the producing cause, acts as well upon vegetation one way as another. Thus the heat of manure, and the artificial heat of coal fires in stoves, are found to supply the place of the sun. Great numbers of the eastern trees, in their native soil, flower twice in a year, and some flower and bear ripe fruit all the year round; and it is observed of these last, that they are at once the most frequent and the most useful to the inhabitants; their fruits, which always hang on them in readiness, containing cool juices, which are good in fevers, and other of the common diseases of hot countries. The umbrageous foliage, with which the God of providence has generally furnished all trees in warm climates, affords a most refreshing and grateful shade to those who seek relief from the direct and hurtful rays of a tropical sun.

The Land of Promise cannot boast, like many other countries, of extensive woods; but considerable thickets of trees and of reeds sometimes arise to diversify and adorn the scene. Between the Lake Samochonites and the sea of Tiberias, the river Jordan is almost concealed by shady trees from the view of the traveller. When the waters of the Jordan are low, the Lake Samochonites is only a marsh, for the most part dry and overgrown with shrubs and reeds. In these thickets, among other ferocious animals, the wild boar seeks a covert from the burning rays of the sun. Large herds of them are sometimes to be seen on the banks of the river, near the sea of Tiberias, lying among the reeds, or feeding under the trees. Such moist and shady places are in all countries the favourite haunts of these fierce and dangerous animals. Those marshy coverts are styled woods in the sacred Scriptures; for the wild boar of the wood is the name which that creature receives from the royal psalmist: “The boar out of the wood doth waste it; and the wild beast of the field doth devour it,” Psalm lxxx, 13. The wood of Ephraim, where the battle was fought between the forces of 921Absalom and the servants of David, was probably a place of the same kind; for the sacred historian observes, that the wood devoured more people that day than the sword, 2 Sam. xviii, 8. Some have supposed the meaning of this passage to be, that the soldiers of Absalom were destroyed by the wild beasts of the wood; but it can scarcely be supposed, that in the reign of David, when the Holy Land was crowded with inhabitants, the wild beasts could be so numerous in one of the woods as to cause such a destruction. But, supposing the wood of Ephraim to have been a morass covered with trees and bushes, like the haunts of the wild boar near the banks of Jordan, the difficulty is easily removed. It is certain that such a place has more than once proved fatal to contending armies, partly by suffocating those who in the hurry of flight inadvertently venture over places incapable of supporting them, and partly by retarding them till their pursuers come up and cut them to pieces. In this manner a greater number of men than fell in the heat of battle may be destroyed. It is probable, however, that nothing more is intended by the sacred historian, than the mention of a fact familiar to military men in all ages, and whatever kind of weapons were then employed in warfare,--that forests, especially such thick and impassable forests as are common in warm countries, constitute the very worst ground along which a discomfited army can be compelled to retreat. Their orderly ranks are broken; the direction which each warrior for his own safety must take is uncertain; and while one tumultuous mass is making a pass for itself through intervening brushwood and closely matted jungle, and another is hurrying along a different path and encountering similar or perhaps greater impediments, the cool and deliberate pursuers, whether archers or sharp shooters, enjoy an immense advantage in being able to choose their own points of annoyance, and by flank or cross attacks to kill their retreating foes, with scarcely any risk to themselves, but with immense carnage to the routed army.

Several critics imagine that by , rendered “goodly trees,” Lev. xxiii, 40, the citron tree is intended. -, rendered “thick trees” in the same verse, and in Neh. viii, 15; Ezek. xx, 28, is the myrtle, according to the rabbins, the Chaldee paraphrase, Syriac version, and Deodatus. The word , translated “grove” in Gen. xxi, 33, has been variously translated. Parkhurst renders it an oak, and says, that from this word may be derived the name of the famous asylum, opened by Romulus between two groves of oak at Rome. On the other hand, Celsius, Michaelis, and Dr. Geddes render it the tamarisk, which is a lofty and beautiful tree, and grows abundantly in Egypt and Arabia. The same word in 1 Sam. xxii, 6; xxxi, 13, is rendered “a tree.” It must be noted too, that in the first of these places, the common version is equally obscure and contradictory, by making ramah a proper name: it signifies hillock or bank. Of the trees that produced precious balsams there was one in particular that long flourished in Judea, having been supposed to have been an object of great attention to Solomon, which was afterward transplanted to Matarea, in Egypt, where it continued till about two hundred and fifty years ago, according to Maillet, who gives a description of it, drawn, it is supposed, from the Arabian authors, in which he says, “This shrub had two very differently coloured barks, the one red, the other perfectly green; that they tasted strongly like incense and turpentine, and when bruised between the fingers they smelt very nearly like cardamoms. This balsam, which was extremely precious and celebrated, and was used by the Coptic church in their chrism, was produced by a very low shrub; and it is said, that all those shrubs that produced balsams are every where low, and do not exceed two or three cubits in height.”

Descriptions of the principal trees and shrubs mentioned in Holy Writ the reader will find noticed in distinct articles under their several denominations.

TRIBE. Jacob having twelve sons, who were the heads of so many great families, which altogether formed a great nation; every one of these families was called a tribe. But Jacob on his death bed adopted Ephraim and Manasseh, the sons of Joseph, and would have them also to constitute two tribes of Israel, Gen. xlviii, 5. Instead of twelve tribes, there were now thirteen, that of Joseph being divided into two. However, in the distribution of lands to each which Joshua made by the order of God, they counted but twelve tribes, and made but twelve lots. For the tribe of Levi, which was appointed to the service of the tabernacle of the Lord, had no share in the distribution of the land, but only some cities in which to dwell, and the first fruits, tithes, and oblations of the people, which was all their subsistence. The twelve tribes continued united under one head, making but one state, one people, and one monarchy, till after the death of Solomon. Then ten of the tribes of Israel revolted from the house of David, and received for their king Jeroboam, the son of Nebat; and only the tribes of Judah and Benjamin continued under the government of Rehoboam. This separation may be looked upon as the chief cause of those great misfortunes that afterward happened to those two kingdoms, and to the whole Hebrew nation. For, first, it was the cause of the alteration and change of the old religion, and of the ancient worship of their forefathers. Jeroboam the son of Nebat substituted the worship of golden calves for the worship of the true God; which was the occasion of the ten tribes forsaking the temple of the Lord. Secondly, this schism caused an irreconcilable hatred between the ten tribes, and those of Judah and Benjamin, and created numerous wars and disputes between them. The Lord, being provoked, delivered them up to their enemies. Tiglath-Pileser first took away captive the tribes of Reuben, Gad, Naphtali, and the half tribe of Manasseh, which were beyond Jordan, and carried them beyond the Euphrates, 2 Kings xv, 29; 1 Chron. v, 26; A. M. 3264. Some years after, Shalmaneser 922king of Assyria took the city of Samaria, destroyed it, took away the rest of the inhabitants of Israel, carried them beyond the Euphrates, and sent other inhabitants into the country to cultivate and possess it, 2 Kings xvii, 6; xviii, 10, 11. Thus ended the kingdom of the ten tribes of Israel, A. M. 3283. As to the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, who remained under the government of the kings of the family of David, they continued a much longer time in their own country. But at last, after they had filled up the measure of their iniquity, God delivered them all into the hands of their enemies. Nebuchadnezzar took the city of Jerusalem, entirely ruined it, and took away all the inhabitants of Judah and Benjamin to Babylon, and the other provinces of his empire, A. M. 3416. The return from this captivity is stated in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. See Jews.

TRIBUTE. The Hebrews acknowledged none for sovereign over them but God alone; whence Josephus calls their government a theocracy, or divine government. They acknowledged the sovereign dominion of God by a tribute, or capitation tax, of half a shekel a head, which every Israelite paid yearly, Exod. xxx, 13. Our Saviour, in the Gospel, thus reasons with St. Peter: “What thinkest thou, Simon of whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute of their own children, or of strangers” Matt. xvii, 25, meaning, that as he was the Son of God, he ought to be exempt from this capitation tax. We do not find that either the kings or the judges of the Hebrews, when they were themselves Jews, demanded any tribute of them. Solomon, at the beginning of his reign, 1 Kings xi, 22, 33; 2 Chron. viii, 9, compelled the Canaanites, who were left in the country, to pay him tribute, and to perform the drudgery of the public works he had undertaken. As to the children of Israel, he would not suffer one of them to be employed upon them, but made them his soldiers, ministers, and chief officers, to command his armies, his chariots, and his horsemen. Yet, afterward, toward the end of his reign, he imposed a tribute upon them, and made them work at the public buildings, 1 Kings v, 13, 14; ix, 15; xi, 27; which much alienated their minds from him, and sowed the seeds of that discontent which afterward appeared in an open revolt, by the rebellion of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat; who was at first indeed obliged to take shelter in Egypt. But afterward the defection became general, by the total revolt of the ten tribes. Hence it was, that the Israelites said to Rehoboam the son of Solomon, “Thy father made our yoke grievous; now therefore, make thou the grievous service of thy father, and the heavy yoke which he put upon us, lighter, and we will serve thee,” 1 Kings xii, 4. It is needless to observe, that the Israelites were frequently subdued by foreign princes, who laid great taxes and tribute upon them, to which fear and necessity compelled them to submit. Yet in the latter times, that is, after Archelaus had been banished to Vienne in France, in the sixth year of the vulgar era, and after Judea was reduced to a province, Augustus sent Quirinius into this country to take a new poll of the people, and to make a new estimate of their substance, that he might thereby regulate the tribute that every one was to pay to the Romans. Then Judas, surnamed the Galilean, formed a sedition, and made an insurrection, to oppose the levying of this tribute. See in St. Matthew xxii, 16, 17, &c, the answer that Jesus Christ returned to the Pharisee, who came with an insidious design of tempting him, and asked him, whether or not it was lawful to pay tribute to Cæsar and in John viii, 33, where the Jews boast of having never been slaves to any body, of being a free nation, that acknowledged God only for master and sovereign.

TRINITY. That nearly all the Pagan nations of antiquity, says Bishop Tomline, in their various theological systems, acknowledged a kind of Trinity, has been fully evinced by those learned men who have made the Heathen mythology the subject of their elaborate inquiries. The almost universal prevalence of this doctrine in the Gentile kingdoms must be considered as a strong argument in favour of its truth. The doctrine itself bears such striking internal marks of a divine original, and is so very unlikely to have been the invention of mere human reason, that there is no way of accounting for the general adoption of so singular a belief, but by supposing that it was revealed by God to the early patriarchs, and that it was transmitted by them to their posterity. In its progress, indeed, to remote countries, and to distant generations, this belief became depraved and corrupted in the highest degree; and he alone who brought “life and immortality to light,” could restore it to its original simplicity and purity. The discovery of the existence of this doctrine in the early ages, among the nations whose records have been the best preserved, has been of great service to the cause of Christianity, and completely refutes the assertion of infidels and skeptics, that the sublime and mysterious doctrine of the Trinity owes its origin to the philosophers of Greece. “If we extend,” says Mr. Maurice, “our eye through the remote region of antiquity, we shall find this very doctrine, which the primitive Christians are said to have borrowed from the Platonic school, universally and immemorially flourishing in all those countries where history and tradition have united to fix those virtuous ancestors of the human race, who, for their distinguished attainments in piety, were admitted to a familiar intercourse with Jehovah and the angels, the divine heralds of his commands.” The same learned author justly considers the first two verses of the Old Testament as containing very strong, if not decisive, evidence in support of the truth of this doctrine: Elohim, a noun substantive of the plural number, by which the Creator is expressed, appears as evidently to point toward a plurality of persons in the divine nature, as the verb in the singular, with which it is joined, does to the unity of that nature: 923“In the beginning God created;” with strict attention to grammatical propriety, the passage should be rendered, “In the beginning Gods created,” but our belief in the unity of God forbids us thus to translate the word Elohim. Since, therefore, Elohim is plural, and no plural can consist of less than two in number, and since creation can alone be the work of Deity, we are to understand by this term so particularly used in this place, God the Father, and the eternal Logos, or Word of God; that Logos whom St. John, supplying us with an excellent comment upon this passage, says, was in the beginning with God, and who also was God. As the Father and the Son are expressly pointed out in the first verse of this chapter, so is the Third Person in the blessed Trinity not less decisively revealed to us in Gen. i, 2: “And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters:” “brooded upon” the water, incubavit, as a hen broods over her eggs. Thus we see the Spirit exerted upon this occasion an active effectual energy, by that energy agitating the vast abyss, and infusing into it a powerful vital principle.

Elohim seems to be the general appellation by which the Triune Godhead is collectively distinguished in Scripture; and in the concise history of the creation only, the expression, bara Elohim, “the Gods created,” is used above thirty times. The combining this plural noun with a verb in the singular would not appear so remarkable, if Moses had uniformly adhered to that mode of expression; for then it would be evident that he adopted the mode used by the Gentiles in speaking of their false gods in the plural number, but by joining with it a singular verb or adjective, rectified a phrase that might appear to give a direct sanction to the error of polytheism. But, in reality, the reverse is the fact; for in Deut. xxxii, 15, 17, and other places, he uses the singular number of this very noun to express the Deity, though not employed in the august work of creation: “He forsook God,” Eloah; “they sacrificed to devils not to God,” Eloah. But farther, Moses himself uses this very word Elohim with verbs and adjectives in the plural. Of this usage Dr. Allix enumerates many other striking instances that might be brought from the Pentateuch; and other inspired writers use it in the same manner in various parts of the Old Testament, Job xxxv, 10; Joshua xxiv, 19; Psalm cix, 1; Ecclesiastes xii, 3; 2 Samuel vii, 23. It must appear, therefore, to every reader of reflection, exceedingly singular, that when Moses was endeavouring to establish a theological system, of which the unity of the Godhead was the leading principle, and in which it differed from all other systems, he should make use of terms directly implicative of a plurality in it; yet so deeply was the awful truth under consideration impressed upon the mind of the Hebrew legislator, that this is constantly done by him; and, indeed, as Allix has observed, there is scarcely any method of speaking from which a plurality in Deity may be inferred, that is not used either by himself in the Pentateuch, or by the other inspired writers in various parts of the Old Testament. A plural is joined with a verb singular, as in the passage cited before from Genesis i, 1; a plural is joined with a verb plural, as in Gen. xxxv, 7, “And Jacob called the name of the place El-beth-el, because the Gods there appeared to him;” a plural is joined with an adjective plural, Joshua xxiv, 19, “You cannot serve the Lord; for he is the holy Gods.” To these passages, if we add that remarkable one from Ecclesiastes, “Remember thy Creators in the days of thy youth,” and the predominant use of the terms, Jehovah Elohim, or, the “Lord thy Gods,” which occur a hundred times in the law, (the word Jehovah implying the unity of the essence, and Elohim a plurality in that unity,) we must allow that nothing can be more plainly marked than this doctrine in the ancient Scriptures.

Though the august name of Jehovah in a more peculiar manner belongs to God the Father, yet is that name, in various parts of Scripture, applied to each person in the holy Trinity. The Hebrews considered that name in so sacred a light, that they never pronounced it, and used the word Adonai instead of it. It was, indeed, a name that ranked first among their profoundest cabala; a mystery, sublime, ineffable, incommunicable. It was called tetragrammaton, or the name of four letters, and these letters are jod, he, vau, he, the proper pronunciation of which, from long disuse, is said to be no longer known to the Jews themselves. This awful name was first revealed by God to Moses from the centre of the burning bush; and Josephus, who, as well as Scripture, relates this circumstance, evinces his veneration for it, by calling it the name which his religion did not permit him to mention. From this word the Pagan title of Iao and Jove is, with the greatest probability, supposed to have been originally formed; and in the Golden Verses of Pythagoras, there is an oath still extant to this purpose, “By Him who has the four letters.” As the name Jehovah, however, in some instances applied to the Son and the Holy Spirit, was the proper name of God the Father, so is Logos in as peculiar a manner the appropriated name of God the Son. The Chaldee Paraphrasts translate the original Hebrew text by Mimra da Jehovah, literally, “the Word of Jehovah,” a term totally different, as Bishop Kidder has incontestably proved, in its signification, and in its general application among the Jews, from the Hebrew dabar, which simply means a discourse or decree, and is properly rendered by pithgam. In the Septuagint translation of the Bible, a work supposed by the Jews to have been undertaken by men immediately inspired from above, the former term is universally rendered , and it is so rendered and so understood by Philo and all the more ancient rabbins. The name of the third person in the ever blessed Trinity has descended unaltered from the days of Moses to our own time; for, as well in the sacred writings as by the Targumists, and by the modern doctors of the Jewish church, he is styled Ruach Hakhodesh, the Holy Spirit. 924He is sometimes, however, in the rabbinical books, denominated by Shechinah, or glory of Jehovah; in some places he is called Sephirah, or Wisdom; and in others the Binah, or Understanding. From the enumeration of these circumstances, it must be sufficiently evident to the mind which unites piety and reflection, that so far from being silent upon the subject, the ancient Scriptures commence with an avowal of this doctrine, and that, in fact, the creation was the result of the joint operations of the Trinity.

If the argument above offered should still appear inconclusive, the twenty-sixth verse of the first chapter of Genesis contains so pointed an attestation to the truth of it, that, when duly considered, it must stagger the most hardened skeptic; for in that text not only the plurality is unequivocally expressed, but the act which is the peculiar prerogative of Deity is mentioned together with that plurality, the one circumstance illustrating the other, and both being highly elucidatory of this doctrine: “And God (Elohim) said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” Why the Deity should speak of himself in the plural number, unless that Deity consisted of more than one person, it is difficult to conceive; for the answer given by the modern Jews, that this is only a figurative mode of expression, implying the high dignity of the speaker, and that it is usual for earthly sovereigns to use this language by way of distinction, is futile, for two reasons. In the first place it is highly degrading to the Supreme Majesty to suppose he would take his model of speaking and thinking from man, though it is highly consistent with the vanity of man to arrogate to himself, as doubtless was the case in the licentiousness of succeeding ages, the style and imagined conceptions of Deity; and it will be remembered, that these solemn words were spoken before the creation of any of those mortals, whose false notions of greatness and sublimity the Almighty is thus impiously supposed to adopt. In truth, there does not seem to be any real dignity in an expression, which, when used by a human sovereign in relation to himself, approaches very near to absurdity. The genuine fact, however, appears to be this. When the tyrants of the east first began to assume divine honours, they assumed likewise the majestic language appropriated to, and highly becoming, the Deity, but totally inapplicable to man. The error was propagated from age to age through a long succession of despots, and at length Judaic apostasy arrived at such a pitch of profane absurdity, as to affirm that very phraseology to be borrowed from man which was the original and peculiar language of the Divinity. It was, indeed, remarkably pertinent when applied to Deity; for, in a succeeding chapter, we have more decisive authority for what is thus asserted, where the Lord God himself says, “Behold, the man is become as one of us;” a very singular expression, which some Jewish commentators, with equal effrontery, contend was spoken by the Deity to the council of angels, that, according to their assertions, attended him at the creation. From the name of the Lord God being used in so emphatical a manner, it evidently appears to be addressed to those sacred persons to whom it was before said, “Let us make man;” for would indeed the omnipotent Jehovah, presiding in a less dignified council, use words that have such an evident tendency to place the Deity on a level with created beings

The first passage to be adduced from the New Testament in proof of this important doctrine of the Trinity, is, the charge and commission which our Saviour gave to his apostles, to “go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,” Matt. xxviii, 19. The Gospel is every where in Scripture represented as a covenant or conditional offer of eternal salvation from God to man; and baptism was the appointed ordinance by which men were to be admitted into that covenant, by which that offer was made and accepted. This covenant being to be made with God himself, the ordinance must of course be performed in his name; but Christ directed that it should be performed in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; and therefore we conclude that God is the same as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Since baptism is to be performed in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, they must be all three persons; and since no superiority or difference whatever is mentioned in this solemn form of baptism, we conclude that these three persons are all of one substance, power, and eternity. Are we to be baptized in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, and is it possible that the Father should be self-existent, eternal, the Lord God Omnipotent; and that the Son, in whose name we are equally baptized, should be a mere man, born of a woman, and subject to all the frailties and imperfections of human nature or, is it possible that the Holy Ghost, in whose name also we are equally baptized, should be a bare energy or operation, a quality or power, without even personal existence Our feelings, as well as our reason, revolt from the idea of such disparity.

This argument will derive great strength from the practice of the early ages, and from the observations which we meet with in several of the ancient fathers relative to it. We learn from Ambrose, that persons at the time of their baptism, declared their belief in the three persons of the Holy Trinity, and that they were dipped in the water three times. In his Treatise upon the Sacraments he says, “Thou wast asked at thy baptism, Dost thou believe in God the Father Almighty and thou didst reply, I believe, and thou wast dipped; and a second time thou wast asked, Dost thou believe in Jesus Christ the Lord thou didst answer again, I believe, and thou wast dipped; a third time the question was repeated, Dost thou believe in the Holy Ghost and the answer was, I believe, then thou wast dipped a third time.” It is to be noticed, that the belief, here expressed separately, in the three persons of the Trinity, is precisely the same in all. Tertullian, 925Basil, and Jerom, all mention this practice of trine immersion as ancient; and Jerom says, “We are thrice dipped in the water, that the mystery of the Trinity may appear to be but one. We are not baptized in the names of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, but in one name, which is God’s; and, therefore, though we be thrice put under water to represent the mystery of the Trinity, yet it is reputed but one baptism.” Thus the mysterious union of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, as one God, was, in the opinion of the purer ages of the Christian church, clearly expressed in this form of baptism. By it the primitive Christians understood the Father’s gracious acceptance of the atonement offered by the Messiah; the peculiar protection of the Son, our great High Priest and Intercessor; and the readiness of the Holy Ghost to sanctify, to assist, and to comfort all the obedient followers of Christ, confirmed by the visible gift of tongues, of prophecy, and divers other gifts to the first disciples. And as their great Master’s instructions evidently distinguished these persons from each other, without any difference in their authority or power, all standing forth as equally dispensing the benefits of Christianity, as equally the objects of the faith required in converts upon admission into the church, they clearly understood that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, were likewise equally the objects of their grateful worship: this fully appears from their prayers, doxologies, hymns, and creeds, which are still extant.

The second passage to be produced in support of the doctrine now under consideration, is, the doxology at the conclusion of St. Paul’s Second Epistle to the Corinthians, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, be with you.” The manner in which Christ and the Holy Ghost are here mentioned, implies that they are persons, for none but persons can confer grace or fellowship; and these three great blessings of grace, love, and fellowship, being respectively prayed for by the inspired apostle from Jesus Christ, God the Father, and the Holy Ghost, without any intimation of disparity, we conclude that these three persons are equal and Divine. This solemn benediction may therefore be considered as another proof of the Trinity, since it acknowledges the divinity of Jesus Christ and of the Holy Ghost. The third passage is the following salutation or benediction in the beginning of the Revelation of St. John: “Grace and peace from Him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven spirits which are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ.” Here the Father is described by a periphrasis taken from his attribute of eternity; and “the seven spirits” is a mystical expression for the Holy Ghost, used upon this occasion either because the salutation is addressed to seven churches, every one of which had partaken of the Spirit, or because seven was a sacred number among the Jews, denoting both variety and perfection, and in this case alluding to the various gifts, administrations, and operations of the Holy Ghost. Since grace and peace are prayed for from these three persons jointly and without discrimination, we infer an equality in their power to dispense those blessings; and we farther conclude that these three persons together constitute the Supreme Being, who is alone the object of prayer, and is alone the Giver of every good and of every perfect gift. It might be right to remark, that the seven spirits cannot mean angels, since prayers are never in Scripture addressed to angels, nor are blessings ever pronounced in their name. It is unnecessary to quote any of the numerous passages in which the Father is singly called God, as some of them must be recollected by every one, and the divinity of the Father is not called in question by any sect of Christians; and those passages which prove the divinity of the Son and of the Holy Ghost separately, will be more properly considered under those heads. In the mean time we may observe, that if it shall appear from Scripture, that Christ is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, it will follow, since we are assured that there is but one God, that the three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, by a mysterious union, constitute the one God, or, as it is expressed in the first article of the church of England: “There is a Trinity in Unity; and in the unity of this Godhead there be three Persons of one substance, power, and eternity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”

The word Trinity does not occur in Scripture, nor do we find it in any of the early confessions of faith; but this is no argument against the doctrinedoctrine itself, since we learn from the fathers of the first three centuries, that the divinity of the Son and of the Holy Ghost was, from the days of the Apostles, acknowledged by the catholic church, and that those who maintained a contrary opinion were considered as heretics; and as every one knows that neither the divinity of the Father, nor the unity of the Godhead, was ever called in question at any period, it follows that the doctrine of the Trinity in Unity has been in substance, in all its constituent parts, always known among Christians. In the fourth century it became the subject of eager and general controversy; and it was not till then that this doctrine was particularly discussed. While there was no denial or dispute, proof and defence were unnecessary: Nunquid enim perfecté de Trinitate tractatum est, antequam oblatrarent Ariani But this doctrine is positively mentioned as being admitted among catholic Christians, by writers who lived long before that age of controversy. Justin Martyr, in refuting the charge of atheism urged against Christians, because they did not believe in the gods of the Heathen, expressly says, “We worship and adore the Father, and the Son who came from him and taught us these things, and the prophetic Spirit;” and soon after, in the same apology, he undertakes to show the reasonableness of the honour paid by Christians to the Father in the first place, to the Son in the second, and to the Holy Ghost in the third; and says, that 926their assigning the second place to a crucified man, was, by unbelievers, denominated madness, because they were ignorant of the mystery, which he then proceeds to explain. Athenagoras, in replying to the same charge of atheism urged against Christians, because they refused to worship the false gods of the Heathen, says, “Who would not wonder, when he knows that we, who call upon God the Father, and God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, showing their power in the unity, and their distinction in order, should be called atheists” Clement of Alexandria not only mentions three divine persons, but invokes them as one only God. Praxeas, Sabellius, and other Unitarians, accused the orthodox Christians of tritheism, which is of itself a clear proof that the orthodox worshipped the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and though in reality they considered these three persons as constituting the one true God, it is obvious that their enemies might easily represent that worship as an acknowledgment of three Gods. Tertullian, in writing against Praxeas, maintains, that a Trinity rationally conceived is consistent with truth, and that unity irrationally conceived forms heresy. He had before said, in speaking of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, that “there are three of one substance, and of one condition, and of one power, because there is one God:” and he afterward adds, “The connection of the Father in the Son, and of the Son in the Comforter, makes three united together, the one with the other; which three are one thing, not one person; as it is said, I and the Father are one thing, with regard to the unity of substance, not to the singularity of number:” and he also expressly says, “The Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God;” and again, “The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, believed to be three, constitute one God.” And in another part of his works he says, “There is a Trinity of one Divinity, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost.” And Tertullian not only maintains these doctrines, but asserts that they were prior to any heresy, and had, indeed, been the faith of Christians from the first promulgation of the Gospel. To these writers of the second century, we may add Origen and Cyprian in the third; the former of whom mentions baptism (alluding to its appointed form) as “the source and fountain of graces to him who dedicates himself to the divinity of the adorable Trinity.” And the latter, after reciting the same form of baptism, says that “by it Christ delivered the doctrine of the Trinity, unto which mystery or sacrament the nations were to be baptized.” It would be easy to multiply quotations upon this subject; but these are amply sufficient to show the opinions of the early fathers, and to refute the assertion that the doctrine of the Trinity was an invention of the fourth century. To these positive testimonies may be subjoined a negative argument: those who acknowledged the divinity of Christ and of the Holy Ghost, are never called heretics by any writer of the first three centuries; and this circumstance is surely a strong proof that the doctrine of the Trinity was the doctrine of the primitive church; more especially, since the names of those who first denied the divinity of Christ and of the Holy Ghost, are transmitted to us as of persons who dissented from the common faith of Christians.

But while we contend that the doctrine of the Trinity in Unity is founded in Scripture, and supported by the authority of the early Christians, we must acknowledge that it is not given to man to understand in what manner the three persons are united, or how, separately and jointly, they are God. It would, perhaps, have been well, if divines, in treating this awful and mysterious subject, had confined themselves to the expressions of Scripture; for the moment we begin to explain it beyond the written word of God, we plunge ourselves into inextricable difficulties. And how can it be otherwise Is it to be expected that our finite understandings should be competent to the full comprehension of the nature and properties of an infinite Being “Can we find out the Almighty to perfection,” Job xi, 7; or penetrate into the essence of the Most High “God is a Spirit,” John iv, 24, and our gross conceptions are but ill-adapted to the contemplation of a pure and spiritual Being. We know not the essence of our own mind, nor the precise distinction of its several faculties; and why then should we hope to comprehend the personal characters which exist in the Godhead “If I tell you earthly things, and you understand them not, how shall ye understand if I tell you heavenly things” When we attempt to investigate the nature of the Deity, whose existence is commensurate with eternity, by whose power the universe was created, and by whose wisdom it is governed; whose presence fills all space, and whose knowledge extends to the thoughts of every man in every age, and to the events of all places, past, present, and to come, the mind is quickly lost in the vastness of these ideas, and, unable to find any sure guide to direct its progress, it becomes, at every step, more bewildered and entangled in the endless mazes of metaphysical abstraction. “God is a God that hideth himself.” “We cannot by searching find out God.” “Behold, God is great, and we know him not,” Job xxiii, 9; xi, 7; xxxvi, 26. “Such knowledge is too wonderful and excellent for us; it is high; we cannot attain unto it,” Psalm cxxxix, 6. It is for us, simply and in that docile spirit which becomes us, to receive the testimony of God as to himself, and to fix ourselves upon that firmest of all foundations, and most rational of all evidence, “Thus saith the Lord.”

TRIUMPHS, Military. The Hebrews, under the direction of inspired prophets, celebrated their victories by triumphal processions, the women and children dancing, and playing upon musical instruments, and singing hymns and songs of triumph to the living and true God. The song of Moses at the Red Sea, which was sung by Miriam and the women of Israel to the dulcet beat of the timbrel, is a majestic example of the triumphal hymns of 927the ancient Hebrews. The song of Deborah and Barak, after the decisive battle in which Sisera lost his life, and Jabin his dominion over the tribes of Israel, is a production of the same sort, in which the spirit of genuine heroism and of true religion are admirably combined. But the song which the women of Israel chanted when they went out to meet Saul and his victorious army, after the death of Goliath, and the discomfiture of the Philistines, possesses somewhat of a different character, turning chiefly on the valorous exploits of Saul and the youthful champion of Israel: “And it came to pass, as they came, when David was returned from the slaughter of the Philistine, that the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing, to meet King Saul with tabrets, with joy, and with instruments of music: and the women answered one another as they played, and said, Saul hath slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands,” 1 Sam. xviii, 6, 7. But the most remarkable festivity, perhaps, on the records of history, was celebrated by Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, in a succeeding age. When that religious prince led forth his army to battle against a powerful confederacy of his neighbours, he appointed a band of sacred music to march in front, praising the beauty of holiness as they went before the army, “and to say, Praise the Lord, for his mercy endureth for ever.” After the discomfiture of their enemies, he assembled his army in the valley of Beracha, near the scene of victory, where they resumed the anthem of religious praise: “Then they returned, every man of Judah and Jerusalem, and Jehoshaphat in the fore front of them, to go again to Jerusalem with joy; for the Lord had made them to rejoice over their enemies. And they came to Jerusalem with psalteries, and harps, and trumpets, unto the house of the Lord,” 2 Chron. xx, 21, 27. Instead of celebrating his own heroism, or the valour of his troops, on this memorable occasion, that excellent prince sung with his whole army the praises of the Lord of hosts, who disposes of the victory according to his pleasure. This conduct was becoming the descendant and successor of David, the man according to God’s own heart, and a religious people, the peculiar inheritance of Jehovah.

The Roman conquerors used to carry branches of palm in their hands when they went in triumph to the capitol; and sometimes wore the toga palmata, a garment with the figures of palm trees upon it, which were interwoven in the fabric. In the same triumphant attitude, the Apostle John beheld in vision those who had overcome by the blood of the lamb, standing “before the throne, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands,” Rev. vii, 9. The highest military honour which could be obtained in the Roman state, was a triumph, or solemn procession, in which a victorious general and his army advanced through the city to the capitol. He set out from the Campus Martius, and proceeded along the Via Triumphalis, and from thence through the most public places of the city. The streets were strewed with flowers, and the altars smoked with incense. First went a numerous band of music, singing and playing triumphal songs; next were led the oxen to be sacrificed, having their horns gilt, and their heads adorned with fillets and garlands; then, in carriages, were brought the spoils taken from the enemy; also golden crowns sent by the allied and tributary states. The titles of the vanquished nations were inscribed on wooden frames; and images or representations of the conquered countries and cities were exhibited. The captive leaders followed in chains, with their children and attendants; after the captives came the lictors, having their faces wreathed with laurel, followed by a great company of musicians and dancers, dressed like satyrs, and wearing crowns of gold; in the midst of whom was a pantomime, clothed in a female garb, whose business it was, with his looks and gestures, to insult the vanquished; a long train of persons followed, carrying perfumes; after them came the general, dressed in purple, embroidered with gold, with a crown of laurel on his head, a branch of laurel in his right hand, and in his left an ivory sceptre, with an eagle on the top, his face painted with vermilion, and a golden ball hanging from his neck on his breast; he stood upright in a gilded chariot, adorned with ivory, and drawn by four white horses, attended by his relations, and a great crowd of citizens, all in white. His children rode in the chariot along with him; his lieutenants and military tribunes, commonly by his side. After the general followed the consuls and senators, on foot; and the whole procession was closed by the victorious army drawn up in order, crowned with laurel, and decorated with the gifts which they had received for their valour, singing their own and their general’s praises. The triumphal procession was not confined to the Romans; the Greeks had a similar custom; for the conquerors used to make a procession through the middle of their city, crowned with garlands, repeating hymns and songs, and brandishing their spears; the captives followed in chains, and all their spoils were exposed to public view.

The great Apostle of the Gentiles alludes to these splendid triumphal scenes in his Epistle to the Ephesians, where he mentions the glorious ascension of his Redeemer into heaven: “When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men,” Eph. iv, 8. These words are a quotation from the sixty-eighth Psalm, where David in spirit describes the ascension of Messiah in very glowing colours: “The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels: the Lord is among them, as in Sinai, in the holy place. Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive,” or an immense number of captives; “thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also; that the Lord God might dwell among them. Blessed be the Lord, who daily loadeth us with his benefits, even the God of our salvation. Selah,” Psalm lxviii, 17–19. Knowing the deep impression which such an allusion is calculated to make on the 928mind of a people familiarly acquainted with triumphal scenes, the Apostle returns to it in his Epistle to the Colossians, which was written about the same time: “Having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it,” Col. ii, 15. After obtaining a complete victory over all his enemies, he ascended in splendour and triumph into his Father’s presence on the clouds of heaven, the chariots of the Most High, thousands of holy angels attending in his train; he led the devil and all his angels, together with sin, the world, and death, as his spoils of war, and captives in chains, and exposed them to open contempt and shame, in the view of all his angelic attendants, triumphing like a glorious conqueror over them, in virtue of his cross, upon which he made complete satisfaction for sin, and by his own strength, without the assistance of any creature, destroyed him that had the power of death, that is, the devil. And as mighty princes were accustomed to scatter largesses among the people, and reward their companions in arms with a liberal hand, when, laden with the spoils of vanquished nations, they returned in triumph to their capital; so the Conqueror of death and hell, when he ascended far above all heavens, and sat down in the midst of the throne, shed forth blessings of his grace and Holy Spirit, upon people of every tongue and of every nation.

The officers and soldiers, also, were rewarded according to their merit. Among the Romans, the noblest reward which a soldier could receive, was the crown, made of leaves. Alluding to this high distinction, the Apostle says to his son Timothy, “I have fought a good fight; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing,” 2 Tim. iv, 7, 8. And lest any one should imagine that the Christian’s crown is perishable in its nature, and soon fades away, like a crown of oak leaves, the Apostle Peter assures the faithful soldier of Christ that his crown is infinitely more valuable and lasting: “Ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away,” 1 Peter v, 4. And this account is confirmed by St. James: “Blessed is the man that endureth temptation; for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him,” James i, 12. The military crowns were conferred by the general in presence of his army; and such as received them, after a public eulogium on their valour, were placed next his person. The Christian also receives his unmerited reward from the hand of the Captain of his salvation: “Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life,” Rev. ii, 10. And, like the brave veteran of ancient times, he is promoted to a place near his Lord: “To him that overcometh, will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father on his throne,” Rev. iii, 21.

TROAS, a city of Phrygia, or of Mysia, upon the Hellespont, having the old city of Troy to the north, and that of Assos to the south. Sometimes the name of Troas is put for the province, wherein the city of Troy stood. St. Paul was at Troas, when he had the vision of the Macedonian inviting him to come and preach in that kingdom, Acts xvi, 8. Beside this, the Apostle was several times at Troas; but we know nothing particular of his transactions there, Acts xx, 5, 6; 2 Cor. ii, 14; 2 Tim. iv, 13.

TROPHIMUS, a disciple of St. Paul, and an Ephesian by birth. He came from Ephesus to Corinth with the Apostle, and kept him company in his whole journey from Corinth to Jerusalem, A. D. 58, Acts xx, 4. When St. Paul was in the temple there, the Jews laid hold of him, crying out, “Men of Israel, help; this is the man that teacheth all men every where against the people, and the law, and this place; and farther, brought Greeks also into the temple, and hath polluted this holy place,” Acts xxi, 28, 29. And this they said, because certain Jews of Ephesus having seen Trophimus with St. Paul in the city, whom they looked upon as a Gentile, imagined that St. Paul had introduced him into the temple. The whole city was immediately in an uproar, and St. Paul was secured. Trophimus afterward accompanied St. Paul; for that Apostle writes to Timothy, that he had left Trophimus sick at Miletus, 2 Tim. iv, 20.

TRUMPET. The Lord commanded Moses to make two trumpets of beaten silver, to be employed in calling the people together when they were to decamp, Num. x, 2, 3, &c. They also chiefly made use of these trumpets, to proclaim the beginning of the civil year, the beginning of the Sabbatical year, and the beginning of the jubilee, Lev. xxv, 9, 10. Josephus says, that these trumpets were near a cubit long; and had a tube, or pipe, of the thickness of a common flute. Their mouths were only wide enough to be blown into, and their ends were like those of a modern trumpet. At first there were but two in the camp, but afterward a greater number were made. Even in the time of Joshua there were seven of them, Joshua vi, 4. At the dedication of the temple of Solomon six-score priests sounded as many trumpets, 2 Chron. v, 12. Beside the sacred trumpets of the temple, the use of which was restrained to the priests only, in war there were others, which the generals sometimes employed for gathering their troops together. For example, Ehud sounded the trumpet, to assemble the Israelites against the Moabites, who oppressed them, and whose king Eglon he had lately slain, Judg. vi, 27. Gideon took a trumpet in his hand, and gave every one of his people one, when he assaulted the Midianites, Judges vii, 2, 16. Joab sounded the trumpet, to give the signal of retreat to his soldiers, in the battle against those of Abner’s party, and in that against Absalom; and lastly, in the pursuit of Sheba the son of Bichri, 2 Sam. ii, 28; xviii, 16; xx, 22. The feast of trumpets was kept on the first day of the seventh month of the sacred year, the first of the civil year. See Music.

929TRUTH is used, 1. In opposition to falsehood, lies, or deceit, Prov. xii, 17, &c. 2. It signifies fidelity, sincerity, and punctuality in keeping promises; and to truth taken in this sense is generally joined mercy or kindness, as in Gen. xxiv, 27, and other places of Scripture. 3. Truth is put for the true doctrine of the Gospel, Galatians iii, 1. 4. Truth is put for the substance of the types and ceremonies of the law, John i, 17.

TUBAL, the fifth son of Japheth. The Scripture commonly joins together Tubal and Meshech, which makes it thought that they peopled countries bordering upon each other. The Chaldee interpreters, by Tubal and Meshech understand Italy and Asia, or rather Ausonia. Josephus accounts them to be Iberia and Cappadocia. St. Jerom affirms that Tubal represents the Spaniards, heretofore called Iberians. Bochart is very copious in proving, that by Meshech and Tubal are intended the Muscovites and the Tibarenians.

TUBAL-CAIN, or THUBAL-CAIN, son of Lamech the bigamous, and of Zillah, Gen. ix, 29. The Scriptures tell us, that he was the father and inventor, or master, of the art of forging and managing iron, and of making all kinds of iron-work. There is great reason to believe that this was the Vulcan of the Heathens.

TURTLE, , t, Gen. xv, 9; Lev. i, 14; v, 7, 11; xii, 6, 8; xiv, 22, 30; xv, 14, 29; Num. vi, 10; Psalm lxxiv, 19; Cant. ii, 12; Jer. viii, 7; t, Luke ii, 24. We have the authority of the Septuagint, the Targum, and of all the ancient interpreters, for understanding this of the turtle. Indeed, it is one of those evident instances in which the name of the bird is by onomatopœia formed from its note or cry. The turtle is mentioned among migratory birds by Jeremiah viii, 7, and in this sense differs from the rest of its family, which are all stationary. The fact to which the prophet alludes is attested by Aristotle in these words: “The pigeon and the dove are always present, but the turtle only in summer: that bird is not seen in winter.” And in another part of his work, he asserts that the dove remains, while the turtle migrates. Varro, and other ancient writers, make the like statement. Thus Solomon, Cant. ii, 12, mentions the return of this bird as one of the indications of spring: “The voice of the turtle is heard in the land.” See Dove.

TYCHICUS, a disciple of St. Paul, whom the Apostle often employed to carry his letters to the several churches. He was of the province of Asia, and accompanied St. Paul, when, in A. D. 58, he made his journey from Corinth to Jerusalem, Acts xx, 4. It was he that carried the epistle to the Colossians, that to the Ephesians, and the first to Timothy. St. Paul did not send him merely to carry his letters, but also to learn the state of the churches, and to bring him an account of them. Wherefore he calls him his dear brother, a faithful minister of the Lord, and his companion in the service of God, Eph. vi, 21, 22; Col. iv, 7, 8. He had thoughts also of sending him into Crete, to preside over that church in the absence of Titus, iii, 12.

TYPE. This word is not frequently used in Scripture; but what it signifies is supposed to be very frequently implied. We usually consider a type as an example, pattern, or general similitude to a person, event, or thing which is to come: and in this it differs from a representation, memorial, or commemoration of an event, &c, which is past. The Spirit of God has adopted a variety of means to indicate his perfect foreknowledge of all events, and his power to control them. This is sometimes declared by express verbal prophecy; sometimes by specific actions performed by divine command; and sometimes by those peculiar events, in the lives of individuals, and the history or religious observances of the Israelites, which were caused to bear a designed reference to some parts of the Gospel history. The main point, says Chevallier, in an inquiry into these historical types, is to establish the fact of a preconcerted connection between the two series of events. No similarity, in itself, is sufficient to prove such a correspondence. Even those recorded in Scripture are recorded under very different circumstances. If the first event be declared to be typical, at the time when it occurs, and the second correspond with the prediction so delivered, there can be no doubt that the correspondence was designed. If, before the occurrence of the second event, there be delivered a distinct prophecy, that it will happen, and will correspond with some previous event; the fulfilment of the prophecy furnishes an intrinsic proof, that the person who gave it spake by divine inspiration. It may not, from this fact, follow, that the two events were connected by a design formed before either of them occurred: but it certainly does follow, that the second event, in some measure, had respect to the first; and that whatever degree of connection was, by such a prophet, assumed to exist, did really exist. If, again, no specific declaration be made, respecting the typical character of any event or person, until after the second event has occurred, which is then declared to have been prefigured; the fact of preconcerted connection will rest solely upon the authority of the person who advances the assertion. But, if we know, from other sources, that his words are the words of truth, our only inquiry will be, if he either distinctly asserts, or plainly infers, the existence of a designed correspondence. The fact, then, of a preconcerted connection between two series of events, is capable of being established in three ways: and the historical types may be accordingly arranged in three principal divisions. Some of them afford intrinsic evidence, that the Scriptures, which record them, are given by inspiration of God; the others can be proved to exist only by assuming that fact: but all, when once established, display the astonishing power and wisdom of God; and the importance of that scheme of redemption, which was ushered into the world with such magnificent preparations. In contemplating this wonderful system, we discern one 930great intention interwoven, not only into the verbal prophecies and extraordinary events of the history of the Israelites, but into the ordinary transactions of the lives of selected individuals, even from the creation of the world. Adam was “the figure of him that was to come,” Romans v, 14. Melchisedec was “made like unto the Son of God,” Heb. vii, 3. Abraham, in the course of events in which he was engaged by the especial command of Heaven, was enabled to see Christ’s day, John viii, 56; and Isaac was received from the dead “in a figure,” Heb. xi, 19. At a later period, the paschal lamb was ordained to be sacrificed, not only as a memorial of the immediate deliverance, which it was instituted to procure and to commemorate, but also as a continued memorial of that which was to be “fulfilled in the kingdom of God,” Luke xxii, 16. Moses was raised up to deliver the people of Israel; to be to them a lawgiver, a prophet, a priest; and to possess the regal authority, if not the title of king. But, during the early period of his life, he was himself taught, that one great prophet should be raised up like unto him: before his death he delivered the same prophecy to the people: and, after that event, the Israelites continually looked for that faithful prophet, who should return answer to their inquiries, 1 Macc. iv, 46; xiv, 41. Their prophets all pointed to some greater lawgiver, who should introduce a new law into their hearts, and inscribe them upon their minds, Jer. xxxi, 33. The whole people of Israel were also made, in some instances, designedly representative of Christ: and the events, which occurred in their national history, distinctly referred to him. During their wanderings in the wilderness, God left not himself without witness, which should bear reference to the great scheme of the Gospel. They ate spiritual meat. It was an emblem of the true bread of life, which came down from heaven, John vi, 32. “They drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ,” 1 Cor. x, 4. They were destroyed of serpents; and a brazen serpent was lifted up on a pole, that whosoever looked might live. It was a sensible figure of the Son of man, who was, in like manner to be lifted up; “that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life,” John iii, 15. Beside, their religious ordinances were only “a figure for the time then present,” Heb. ix, 9. Their tabernacle was made after the pattern of heavenly things, Heb. viii, 5; Exod. xxv, 9, 40; and was intended to prefigure the “greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands,” Heb. ix, 11. The high priest was a living representative of the great “High Priest of our profession,” Heb. iii, 1: and the Levitical sacrifices plainly had respect to the one great sacrifice for sins. Joshua the son of Nun represented Jesus in name: and by his earthly conquests in some measure prefigured the heavenly triumphs of his Lord. In a subsequent period, David was no indistinct type of “the Messiah the Prince,” Dan. ix, 25, for a long time humbled, and at length triumphant over his enemies. And the peaceable dominion of Solomon prefigured that eternal rest and peace, which remaineth to the people of God. In a still later age, the miraculous preservation of the Prophet Jonah displayed a sign, which was fulfilled in the resurrection of Christ. And when the temple was rebuilt, Joshua, the son of Josedech, the high priest, and his fellows, were set forth as “men of sign,” representatives of the Branch, which should, in the fulness of time, be raised up to the stem of Jesse, Zech. iii, 8; Isa. xi, 1. The illustration, then, to be derived from the historical types of the Old Testament, is found diffused over the whole period, which extends from the creation of the world, to the time when vision and prophecy were sealed. And all the light, which emanates from so many various points, is concentrated in the person of Christ.

TYRANNUS. It is said in Acts xix, 9, that St. Paul being at Ephesus, and seeing that the Jews to whom he preached, instead of being converted, were rather more hardened and obstinate, he withdrew from their society, nor went to preach in their synagogue, but taught every day in the school of one Tyrannus. It is inquired, Who was this Tyrannus Some think him to have been a prince or great lord, who accommodated the Apostle with his house, in which to receive and instruct his disciples. But the generality conclude, that Tyrannus was a converted Gentile, a friend of St. Paul, to whom he withdrew.

TYRE, or Tyrus, was a famous city of Phenicia. Its Hebrew name is or , which signifies a rock. The city of Tyre was allotted to the tribe of Asher, Joshua xix, 29, with the other maritime cities of the same coast; but it does not appear that the Asherites ever drove out the Canaanites. Isaiah, xxiii, 12, calls Tyre the daughter of Sidon, that is, a colony from it. Homer never speaks of Tyre, but only of Sidon. Josephus says, that Tyre was built not above two hundred and forty years before the temple of Solomon; which would be in A. M. 2760, two hundred years after Joshua. Tyre was twofold, insular and continental. Insular Tyre was certainly the most ancient; for this it was which was noticed by Joshua: the continental city, however, as being more commodiously situated, first grew into consideration, and assumed the name of Palætyrus, or Old Tyre. Want of sufficient attention to this distinction, has embarrassed both the Tyrian chronology and geography. Insular Tyre was confined to a small rocky island, eight hundred paces long, and four hundred broad, and could never exceed two miles in circumference. But Tyre, on the opposite coast, about half a mile from the sea, was a city of vast extent, since many centuries after its demolition by Nebuchadnezzar, the scattered rains measured nineteen miles round, as we learn from Pliny and Strabo. Of these, the most curious and surprising are, the cisterns of Roselayne, designed to supply the city with water; of which there are three still entire; about one or two furlongs from the sea, so well described by Maundrell, for their 931curious construction and solid masonry. Old Tyre withstood the mighty Assyrian power, having been besieged in vain, by Shalmaneser, for five years; although he cut off their supplies of water from the cisterns; which they remedied by digging wells within the city. It afterward held out thirteen years against Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and was at length taken; but not until the Tyrians had removed their effects to the insular town, and left nothing but the bare walls to the victor, which he demolished. What completed the destruction of the city was, that Alexander afterward made use of these materials to build a prodigious causeway, or isthmus, above half a mile long, to the insular city, which revived, as the phœnix, from the ashes of the old, and grew to great power and opulence, as a maritime state; and which he stormed after a most obstinate siege of five months. Pococke observes, that “there are no signs of the ancient city; and as it is a sandy shore, the face of every thing is altered, and the great aqueduct is in many parts almost buried in the sand.” Thus has been fulfilled the prophecy of Ezekiel: “Thou shalt be built no more: though thou be sought for, yet shalt thou never be found again,” Ezek. xxvi, 21. The fate of insular Tyre has been no less remarkable. When Alexander stormed the city, he set fire to it. This circumstance was foretold. “Tyre did build herself a strong hold, and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets. Behold, the Lord will cast her out, and he will smite her power in the sea, and she shall be devoured with fire,” Zech. ix, 3, 4. After this terrible calamity, Tyre again retrieved her losses. Only eighteen years after, she had recovered such a share of her ancient commerce and opulence, as enabled her to stand a siege of fourteen months against Antigonus, before he could reduce the city; but after this, Tyre fell alternately under the dominion of the kings of Syria and Egypt, and then of the Romans, until it was taken by the Saracens, about A. D. 639, retaken by the Crusaders, A. D. 1124; and at length sacked and razed by the Mamelukes of Egypt, with Sidon, and other strong towns, that they might no longer harbour the Christians, A. D. 1289.

The final desolation of Tyre was thus foretold: “I will scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock: it shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord God.” “I will make thee like the top of a rock: thou shalt be a place to spread nets upon: thou shalt be built no more; for I the Lord have spoken it, saith the Lord God.” Nothing can be more literally and astonishingly executed than this sentence. Huetius relates of one Hadrianus Parvillerius, that “when he approached the ruins of Tyre, and beheld the rocks stretched forth to the sea, and the great stones scattered up and down on the shore, made clean and smooth by the sun and waves and wind, and useful only for the drying of fishermen’s nets, many of which happened at that time to be spread thereon, it brought to his memory the prophecy of Ezekiel concerning Tyre, that such should be its fate.” Maundrell, who visited the Holy Land, A. D. 1697, describes it thus: “This city, standing in the sea upon a peninsula, promises at a distance, something very magnificent; but when you come to it, you find no similitude of that glory for which it was so renowned in ancient times, and which the Prophet Ezekiel describes, xxvi, xxvii, xxviii. On the north side it has an old Turkish ungarrisoned castle; beside which, you see nothing here but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, &c; there being not so much as one entire house left! Its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches harbouring themselves in the vaults, and subsisting chiefly by fishing: who seem to be preserved in this place by Divine Providence, as a visible argument how God has fulfilled his word concerning Tyre, namely, that it should be as the top of a rock; a place for fishers to dry their nets upon, Ezek. xxvi, 14.” Hasselquist, who saw it since, in A. D. 1751, observes as follows: “None of those cities which were formerly famous are so totally ruined as Tyre, now called Zur; except Troy. Zur now scarcely can be called a miserable village, though it was formerly Tyre, the queen of the sea. Here are about ten inhabitants, Turks and Christians, who live by fishing.” Bruce, who visited this country about eighty years after Maundrell, says, that “passing by Tyre from curiosity, I came to be a mournful witness of the truth of that prophecy, that Tyre, the queen of nations, should be a rock for fishers to dry their nets on.” Mr. Buckingham, who visited it in 1816, represents it as containing about eight hundred substantial stone-built houses, and from five to eight thousand inhabitants. But Mr. Jowett, on the authority of the Greek archbishop, reduces this number to less than four thousand; namely, one thousand two hundred Greek Catholics, one hundred Maronites, one hundred Greeks, one thousand Montonalis, and one hundred Turks. Mr. Jowett observed numerous and beautiful columns stretched along the beach, or standing in fragments half buried in the sand, that has been accumulating for ages: “the broken aqueduct, and the ruins which appear in its neighbourhood, exist as an affecting monument of the fragile and transitory nature of earthly grandeur.” Mr. Joliffe states, that there now exist scarcely any traces of this once powerful city. “Some miserable cabins, ranged in irregular lines, dignified with the name of streets, and a few buildings of a rather better description, occupied by the officers of government, compose nearly the whole of the town. It still makes, indeed, some languishing efforts at commerce, and contrives to export annually to Alexandria cargoes of silk and tobacco; but the amount merits no consideration. The noble dust of Alexander, traced by the imagination till found stopping a beer barrel, would scarcely afford a stronger contrast of grandeur and debasement, than Tyre, at the period of being besieged by that conqueror, and the modern town of Tsour erected on its ashes.”

932As commercial cities, says Mansford, ancient Alexandria and London may be considered as approaching the nearest to Tyre. But Alexandria, during the whole of her prosperous days, was subject to foreign rule; and London, great as are her commerce and her wealth, and possessing as she does almost a monopoly of what has in all ages been the most enviable and most lucrative branch of trade, that with the east, does not centre in herself, as Tyre did, without a rival and without competition, the trade of all nations, and hold an absolute monopoly, not of one, but of every branch of commerce. For the long period of a thousand years, not a single production of the east passed to the west, or of the west to the east, but by the merchants of Tyre. Nor for many ages were any ships found but those of Tyre daring enough to pass the straits of the Red Sea on one side, or of the Mediterranean on the other. While the vessels of other countries were groping along their coasts, clinging to their landmarks, and frightened at a breeze, the ships of Tyre were found from Spain, if not from Britain, on the west, to the coast of Malabar and Sofala on the east and south. No wonder that her merchants were princes, and that they lived in a style of magnificence unknown in any other country in the same age; or that she should be considered a desirable prey by the conquerors of the times. But enterprise and wealth did not alone complete the character of the Tyrians; they had an undoubted claim to valour of no common order. Their city, which possessed scarcely any territory beyond their own walls, maintained a siege of thirteen years (the longest in history except that of Ashdod) against the whole power of Babylon; and another of seven months against Alexander, whose successes had afforded no instance of similar delay. And in neither case had the captors much to boast of, as the Tyrians had shipped off their most valuable property to Carthage; and in the former particularly, as has been already related, they so effectually secured or sacrificed the whole, that the soldiers of Nebuchadnezzar found nothing to reward them for their length of labour, during which, by excessive toil and heat, “their heads were made bald, and their very shoulders peeled,” but vacant streets, and houses already sacked. Carthage, Utica, and Cadiz, are celebrated monuments of the power of Tyre on the Mediterranean, and in the west. She extended her navigation even into the ocean, and carried her commerce beyond England to the north, and the Canaries to the south. Her connections with the east, though less known, were not less considerable; the islands of Tyrus and Aradus, (the modern Barhain,) in the Persian Gulf. The cities of Faran and Phœnicum Oppidum, on the Red Sea, in ruins even in the time of the Greeks, prove that the Tyrians had long frequented the coast of Arabia and the Indian Sea. But, through the vicissitudes of time, Tyre, reduced to a miserable village, has no other trade than the exportation of a few sacks of corn and raw cotton, nor any merchant, says Volney, but a single Greek factor in the service of the French Saide, (Sidon,) who scarcely makes sufficient profit to maintain his family. In allusion to Tyre in her better days, Forbes observes, when speaking of Surat, “The bazars, filled with costly merchandise; picturesque and interesting groups of natives on elephants, camels, horses, and mules; strangers from all parts of the globe, in their respective costume; vessels building on the stocks, others navigating the river; together with Turks, Persians, and Armenians, on Arabian chargers; European ladies in splendid carriages, the Asiatic females in hackeries drawn by oxen; and the motley appearance of the English and nabob’s troops on the fortifications, remind us of the following description of Tyre, “O thou that art situate at the entry of the sea, which art a merchant of the people for many isles,” &c, Ezek. xxvii, 3. This is a true picture of oriental commerce in ancient times; and a very exact description of the port and the bazars of Surat, at the present day.”

Dr. Vincent has given the following able illustration of the trade of Tyre as described in Ezek. xxvii, which must be considered as one of the most ample and early accounts extant. The learned author has rendered the Hebrew names into others better known in the geography of more recent times:--Tyre produced from Hermon, and the mountains near it, fir for planking; and from Libanus, cedars for masts. From Bashan, east of the sea of Galilee, oaks for oars. From Greece, or the Grecian isles, ivory to adorn the benches or the waists of the galleys. From Egypt, linen, ornamented with different colours, for sails, or flags, or ensigns. From Peloponnesus, blue and purple cloths for awnings. From Sidon and Aradus, mariners; but Tyre itself furnished pilots and commanders. From Gebal, or Biblos, on the coast between Tripolis and Berytus, caulkers. From Persia and Africa, mercenary troops. From Aradus, the troops that garrisoned Tyre with the Gamadim. From Tarshish, or by distant voyages toward the west, and toward the east, great wealth, iron, tin, lead, and silver. Tin implies Britain or Spain, or at least a voyage beyond the Straits of Hercules. From Greece, and the countries bordering on Pontus, slaves, and brass ware. From Armenia, horses, horsemen, and mules. From the Gulf of Persia, and the isles within that gulf, horns (tusks) of ivory, and ebony. The export to these isles was the manufacture of Tyre. From Syria, emeralds, purple, broidered work, fine linen, coral, and agate. The exports to Syria were the manufactures of Tyre in great quantities. From Judah and Israel, the finest wheat, honey, oil, and balsam. From Damascus, wine of Chalybon, (the country bordering on the modern Aleppo,) and wool in the fleece. The exports to Damascus were costly and various manufactures. From the tribe of Dan, situated nearest to the Philistines, the produce of Arabia, bright or wrought iron, cassia or cinnamon, and the calamus aramaticus. In conducting the 933transport of these articles, Dan went to and fro, that is, formed or conducted the caravans. By one interpretation, they are said to come from Uzal; and Uzal is said to be Sana, the capital of Yemen, or Arabia Felix. From the Gulf of Persia, rich cloth for the decoration of chariots or horsemen. From Arabia Petræa and Hedjaz, lambs, and rams, and goats. From Sabea and Oman, the best of spices. From India, gold, and precious stones. From Mesopotamia, from Carrhæ, and Babylonia, the Assyrians brought all sorts of exquisite things; that is, fine manufacture, blue cloth, and broidered work, or fabric of various colours, in chests of cedar bound with cords, containing rich apparel. If these articles were obtained farther from the east, may they not be the fabrics of India, first brought to Assyria by the Gulf of Persia, or by caravans from Karmania and the Indus, and then conveyed by the Assyrians, in other caravans, to Tyre and Syria In this view, the care of package, the chests of cedar, and the cording of the chests, are all correspondent to the nature of such a transport. From Tarshish the ships came that rejoiced in the markets of Tyre: they replenished the city, and made it glorious in the midst of the sea, Ezek. xxvii, 5–25. Dr. Vincent observes, that from the Tarshish last mentioned the ships returned to the ports in the Red Sea; as from the nineteenth to the twenty-fourth verse every particular relates to the east, while that referred to in the twelfth implies the west--Spain, or beyond. We have here some light thrown on the obscurity which surrounds the situation of this distant and unknown place. There is, indeed, a clear reference to two distinct places, or parts of the world, denominated Tarshish; perhaps from those very circumstances, their distance, and the little that was known respecting them. That one was situated westward, and reached by a passage across the Mediterranean, is certain from other parts of Scripture; that the other was eastward, or southward, on the coast of Arabia, India, or Africa, is equally certain. See Tarshish, and Ophir.