wards.70 So far as a single work can be relied on, as indicating the popular sentiments of the time, it goes to show that the Palestine Jews had about the same views as formerly, of the state of the dead. The author speaks of the depths of the belly of hades;' and, in a song of thanksgiving for deliverance, says, that in a recent scene of great personal danger, his life drew near to Hades beneath."71 It was from Hades that Elijah brought up the deceased son of the Shunamite woman, when he raised him from the dead.72 This was the common receptacle of all the deceased: Fear not the sentence of death,' says he ; ' remember them that have been before thee, and that come after; for this is the sentence of the Lord over all flesh. And why art thou against the pleasure of the Most High There is no inquisition in Hades, whether thou have lived ten, or an hundred, or a thousand years."73 There, the dead remain in the same inactive condition as represented by the old prophets: Who shall praise the Most High in Hades, instead of them which live and give thanks? Thanksgiving perisheth from the dead, as from one that is not: the living and sound in heart shall praise the Lord. . . . . For all things cannot be in men ; because the son of man is not immortal.'74 " 'Weep for the dead,' says he; for he hath lost the

70 For the dates of the Apocryphal books, and the countries in which they were written, &c., I depend on Eichhorn, (Einleitung in die apokryphischen Schriften des A. Test.) and Horne, (Introduction, &c. vol. iv.) without consulting the older authors, such as Prideaux, &c.

71 Ecclus, li. 5, 6. 74 xvii, 27-30

72 xlviii. 5.

73 xli. 3, 4,

light; and weep for the fool, for he wanteth understanding. Make little weeping for the dead, for he is at rest; but the life of the fool is worse than death.'75 'When the dead is at rest, let his remembrance rest; and be comforted for him, when his spirit is departed from him."76 The author intimates no resurrection from this state, notwithstanding the very plan of his book must have led him repeatedly to introduce the subject, had he been acquainted with it. And that he had no thought of a retribution in Hades, is evident, both from the tenor of the representations just quoted, and from the circumstance that in his numerous descriptions of rewards and punishments, he speaks of such only as are experienced in this world, or in the hour of death, or in the fortune of one's posterity.77 As examples of Jewish phraseology in relation to the temporal judgments appointed to the wicked, it may be useful to notice some expressions he uses: the time of their punishment, whensoever it arrives, is called the day of vengeance; they are reserved to the mighty day of their punishment; they are exhorted to think of the wrath that shall be at the end, and the time of vengeance, when the Lord shall turn away his face; the vengeance on the ungodly is fire and worms; in the congregation

75 Ecclus. xxii. 11.

76 xxxviii. 23

6

77 For his description of rewards and punishments, see i. 9-14; v. 6, 7 ; ix 11, 12, xi. 26-28; xii. 6; xix. 2, 3 ; xxi. 9, 10, (where the pit of hell' is literally the pit of hades,') xxiii. 3, 11, 21-28 ; xxvii. 25—30 ; xxix. 9—13 ; xxxi. 10, 11; xxxiv. 13–17 ; xxxv. 16-20 ; xxxix. 9-12, 26-30; xl. 5-15; xli. 6-13; xliv. 8-23; and the five chapters from xlv. to 1.

of the ungodly, a flame is kindled, and in a rebellious nation, wrath is set on fire; the congregation of the wicked is like tow wrapped together, and the end of them is a flame of fire to destroy them; let the heathen nations be consumed by the rage of fire; an evil tongue burneth as a flame of fire, and shall not be quenched; the lewd shall be a heritage to moths and worms; they kindle a fire in their flesh; a hot mind is as a burning fire, which will never be quenched, till it be consumed; a foolish father shall gnash his teeth in the end; in the day of death the Lord rewarded a man according to his works,78 &c. All these expressions, several of which bear a close affinity with some of the controverted figures in the New Testament, are here applied to the fortune of the wicked in this life, or to the circumstances of their death.

The first book of Esdras, and the book of Tobit, though their dates cannot be fixed with certainty, may be placed between the years 230 and 150 before Christ. The former appears to have been written by a Jew of Egypt; and perhaps the latter was composed in the same country; but possibly in Palestine, possibly in Babylon. From neither, however, do we obtain any important materials for our present inquiry. The following passage in the book of Tobit may refer to the subject: having been vexed till he was weary of life, he says, in his prayer, Command my spirit to be taken from me, that I may be dismissed,

; xvi.

78 Ecclus. v. 7 ; vii. 17; ix. 11, 12; xi, 26; xii. 6 ; 6; xix. 3; xviii. 24 ; xxi. 9; xxiii. 16; xxviii. 22, 23; xxx. 9, 10; xxxvi. 9.

and become earth; for it is profitable for me to die rather than to live, because I have heard false reproaches, and have much sorrow: command, therefore, that I may now be delivered out of this distress, and go into the everlasting place,"79

ing, perhaps, Hades. From several descants, which he introduces, on the rewards of piety, and the motives to virtue, it is evident that he did not trace the retributions of Heaven beyond the present life; and it is probable, from his silence, that he had no knowledge of a resurrection. We may add, that, on other subjects, his book betrays the influence of Greek and oriental notions.

It was within the period last marked out, (between the years 230 and 150 before Christ,) that the Septaugint Version of most, if not all, of the remaining books of the Old Testament, was probably composed by different individuals among the Jews of Egypt. The same remarks that we have made with regard to the version of the Pentateuch, may be repeated, with little modification, here: Sheol, in the original, is still translated by the corresponding Greek term, Hades with one exception, however, where it is rendered death. It is indeed true, that six or seven circumlocutions in the Hebrew, are likewise contracted into that term; but in all these cases, the original reference to Sheol is too plain to be mistaken; as in the expressions, the stones of the pit, 'the gates of death, the pit,' the way of death. '80 It would seem, also, that the translators had not yet become acquainted with the doctrine of a resurrec80 See Trommii Concordantiæ,

79 Tobit iii. 6.

tion from the dead; for, notwithstanding the liberties which they not unfrequently take with the text, they never favor that idea, even in those figurative passages the most likely to suggest it. On the contrary, they often give them a different turn. For reasons that will at once appear, it is important to observe, that they use the compound Hebrew word Gehenna, or, as they spell it, Gaihenna, as the name of the valley of Hinnom'; and another word, compounded in the same way, Gebenhinnom, to express the valley of the son of Hinnom.' 81 Aionios commonly occurs in those texts in which our authorized English version exhibits the word everlasting.

It was within the same period, also, that the Jewish sects of Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes, arose in Palestine; since the earliest notice of them is about the year 150 before Christ, when they were already flourishing.82 The two former were probably of native growth; the last was, perhaps, a branch of the Jewish Therapeute of Egypt. Judging from the account of Josephus, our sole authority, they were, at present, divided only on three questions: the authority of traditions, or the obligation barely of the written law; the doctrine of fate, or that of free-will; and the social, secular life, or solitude and abstinence.

81 Josh. xviii. 16, 2 Chron. xxviii. 3, xxxii. 6. See Universalist Expositor, vol. ii. Art. xxxiv. pp. 355-359.

82 Joseph. Antiq. B. xiii. ch. v. 9, is the earliest notice. Jahn, who is usually very careful and correct, says (Bib. Archæol § 317,) that Josephus remarks, that even then they had existed for a great while. This is a mistake: Josephus makes the remark when treating of the Jewish affairs, about A. D, 11. Antiq. B. xviii. ch. i. 2.