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behind him in writing , as God had pointed them out to him ; so that those who read his predictions , and see how they have been accomplished , wonder at the honour which God conferred upon him . " * The writings of the twelve minor prophets , it is well known , were formerly i %
^^ r jm 41 g regarded as one book , on account of their being generally written upon one roll , and this division of them appears to have prevailed in the time of Josephus ; for we find him speaking of them as u the other prophets , who were twelve in number . " In this collective form , however , he alludes to them no more
than once , and that in the most incidental manner possible : f nor does he mention more than four of them by name in the whole of his writings . Jonah he styles a prophet ; and he gives the particulars of his history as related in the book which now goes under the name of Jonah , referring his readers to " the Hebrew books , " as his authority . J Nahum he also styles a prophet ; and from him he quotes a long passage relating to the destruction
of Nineveh , ( Nahum ii . 8—13 , ) introducing , however , according to his general practice , such verbal alterations as he deemed necessary to adapt it to the taste of his Heathen readers , § for whose use his " Antiquities" were composed , and to please whom he has often made additions to the concise and simple language of the sacred writings , which tend rather to obscure and disfigure than to embellish his narrative . In the eleventh book of his
Antiquities , (| he mentions Haggai and Zechariah b y name , as two prophets who flourished after the return of the Jews from trie Babylonish captivity ; and describes the difficulties which his countrymen experienced in rebuilding the temple and city of Jerusalem , and the encouragement which they received from these two prophets , but makes no direct quotation from the books which we now have under their names .
The above testimonies , brief and incidental as they are , possess no small value , as coming from a writer who was thoroughly acquainted with the books esteemed sacred among the Jews , and who not only regarded the writings attributed to the prophets as the genuine productions of those whose names they bear , but was also fully impressed with an idea of their great importance as vouchers for the truth and divine origin of the Jewish religion . But the evidence in favour of the authenticity and credibility of the
prophetical books of Scripture , contained in the works of Josephus , though not so full and circumstantial as we may now wish , is just such as the nature of the works themselves would have led us previously to expect . A Christian , writing for the information of Christians , or a Jew addressing himself exclusively to Jews , would have proceeded in a more systematic manner ; and , if he had found it necessary to allude to the fulfilment of predictions contained in the writings of the prophets , would have done it in a more confident and triumphant tone : but a Jew engaged in the composition of a work ,
the professed object of which was to interest strangers in the history of his own nation , would naturally and almost necessarily pursue the plan which Josephus has pursued , not forcing upon the attention of his readers those parts of the narrative which partake of a miraculous character , but glancing at them sparingly and with caution , and even apologizing , on some occasions , for their introduction . Hence it is that Josephus bo frequently has recourse to such qualifying expressions as the following , whenever he finds himself called upon to make any allusion to the writings of the prophets : " I cannot
? Antiq . Lib . x . C . x . xi . $ Lib . xli , C . vii . § 6 . f Ibid . Lib . x * C . ii . § 2 . X Ibid . Lib . ix . C . x . § 1 , 2 . § Ibidft Lib . ix . C . xi . § 3 . || Cap . iv . § 5 .
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334 Canonical Authority of the Books of the Prophets ,
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1827, page 334, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1796/page/22/
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