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BIBLICAL CRITICISM.
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Mr . S ~ Benntit in Heply to II ; T . on , Observations on John xii . 23—32 . Sir , WOULD not obtrude upon the I pages of your Monthly Repository , if I had ^ not been called upon by an inquiry which was made in page 488 ,
by one of your literary correspondents : ** I find it ( said he ) difficult to reconcile the opinion given by your learned correspondent Solomon Bennett , in p . 22 £ , or * * present volume , that * during the whole great period of the
second temple , the numerous synagogues and colleges of the Ykebrews of their then great dispersion , had mothikg to do with the sacrifices of the temple at Jerusalem , ' with the testimony of several ancient and approved authorities of Jewish affairs . A
variety of proofe ( continued"he ) might be collected df the veneration which the whole nation had for the temple at Jerusalem , ' * &c . And for which authorities he quoted instances out of Philb and Josephus . Par be it from me to contradrct
historical truths , which are the most essentia ? points in human affairs ; and more so when they touch on points of pure religion-. On the contrary , I shall enhance his difficulty from authorities deduced from the documents
of the Mishnah , to shew that the dispersed Israelites possessed a veneration aud zeal for their Mother country in general ; yet the more we shall discover them to have been dependent in some , measure , the more it wilt
strengthen my argument respecting tbe system of the sacrificial lavrs ( as demonstrated in my " Discourse on Sacrifices" at large ) . The first great point which may indicate a dependency , we observe in Mish&ah Rouh-hasrrana / h , ( Sect . ] . Lesson 4 . ) in which we read as follows : ** On account of two months
the sabbath day was propbafied ; ( meaning , deviated in some measure from its strictness ); on account of Ntean ( answering to that' of Marcti ) , and Thiahry ( SeVtetribier ) , in which months messeug ^ rs \ vere dispatched to Syria j « ccording > to wf ^ rch the annual festivals were regulated by . the dispersed . * ' The Talmud adds
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thus , " and from Syria the messengers proceeded to Babylon / ' From this document we obtain a knowledge , that the annual calendar of the dispersed in the East , did depend on the
observations a « d calculations performed by the grand assembly ( the Sanhedrim ) of the temple at Jerusalem . —In Mishnah Shekolim , sect . S , we read that there were in . the temple three chests , treasured with shekels
which were sent from all the provinces to Jerusalem , and at different times in the year were disposed of thus : ( Sect . 1 . Lesson 4 . ) " The first chest was treasured up in the name of
Palestine ; tne second chest was treasured up in the rrame of the cities afar off front Jerusalem ; and the third in the name of Babylon , Media and the distant countries . " Hence we obtain ,
the information that the Hebrews of the Eastern dispersion did send their annual shekels as a donation to the temple of Jerusalem , from which issued the whole expenditure of the temple , as well as the necessary improvements of the metropolis , Jerusalem . From other rabbinical
documents we are informed that all the colleges of the dispersed , arid their Presidents ( viz ; tbeir chief Rabbies *) did depend and were sanctioned by that grand assembly presiding at the temple of Jerusalem . This veneration and obedience paid to the supremacy of the temple atid Jerasaietw , lasted about five centuries after the
destruction of the same ; at which * period ( on account of the tumults and wars wtecn raged at th&t barbarous time , and caused great dissensions in ovtr hemisphere , aud obstructed an orderly communication between the Eastern
and Western Hebrew colleges ) , the above-mentioned cfc > lleg 6 & then became independent , and every college subsisted by itself in itareapeetive ^ ountry * Ntrtvfithstoftfdmg the above-mentioned authorities , if d © e » not prove an argument of an absolute deperidenew of
as whether by dint of the la * r , wrtfch we hare n © authority what * eve * in the Mislmah and Taimud tlitf indicat e ** that the crMfxrfced were ^ T 9 Ofc * tely < bound to ¦ camtrib « to& ito ^« tw Uie ex > p « riditurfcH > ette Mother cbontM * Tor could it have been a political
Biblical Criticism.
BIBLICAL CRITICISM .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1817, page 676, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2470/page/36/
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