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CHAP. VIII.

OF THE DAY OF EXPIATION.

GODWIN styles this day the feast of expiation, whereas it was altogether a fast, a day of deep humiliation, and of "afflicting their souls*." Nevertheless he is so inconsistent with himself, that he understands the fast mentioned in the account of St. Paul's voyage to Rome, Acts xxvii, 9, to be meant of the day of expiation. It is true there is no express injunction in the law of Moses, nor anywhere in the Old Testament, to fast on this solemnity. But that it was understood to be a fast by the Jews appears from Josephus+ and Philo, who both style this day saa," the fast." The rabbies commonly distinguish it by the name of 7 NY tsoma rabba, the great fast §. Tertullian likewise, speaking of the two goats that were offered on this day, saith, jejunio offerebantur, they were offered on the fast.

As for the fast mentioned in the account of St. Paul's voyage, and concerning which it is said, that "sailing was now dangerous, because the fast was now past," Acts xxvii, 9; Castalio, not being able to conceive what a Jewish fast could have to do with sailing, supposes there is an error in the Greek copy, and that instead of νησειαν it should be νηνεμίαν, which signifies calm weather; and according to him the meaning is, that sailing was now dangerous, because the fine weather, or calm season, was now over. However, all the manuscripts and ancient versions remonstrate against this emendation; and indeed there is no need of it, to support even

* See an account of the institution of this annual solemnity, Lev. xvi, and chap. xxiii, 27—32.

+ Joseph. Antiq. lib. iii, cap. x, sect. iii, p. 172.

↑ Philo de Vitâ Mosis, lib. ii, Oper. p. 508, F. edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. § Midrasch Ruth. xlvi, 4, et Echa Rabbati, lxxx, 1, quoted by Reland. Antiq. part. iv, cap. vi, sect. i, p. 492.

Tertullian adversus Judæos, cap. xiv, Oper. p. 201, C. edit. Rigalt.

Castalio's own sense of the passage; for this Jewish fast being kept on the tenth day of the month Tisri, a little after the autumnal equinox, it is in fact the same thing to say the fast was already past, or the calm season of the year was over.

Before the invention and use of the compass, sailing was rarely practised in the winter months; and it was reckoned very dangerous to put to sea after the autumnal equinox. Hesiod observes, that at the going down of the Pleiades navigation is dangerous*; and the going down of the Pleiades, he saith, was in autumn, when after harvest they begin to plought. Again, speaking of safe and prosperous sailing, for which he allots fifty days after the summer solstice, he admonishes to make haste, and get home before the time of new wine, and the autumnal storms, which make the sea difficult and dangerous. Philostratus, in his Life of Apollonius Tyaneus §, saith, that at the latter end of autumn the sea was more unsettled. And Philo speaks of the beginning of autumn as the last season that was fit for navigation ||. These testimonies sufficiently demonstrate, that when the sacred historian declares, that "sailing was now dangerous, because the fast was already past," he speaks according to the common sense and apprehension of those times; and he likewise ascertains the season of the year, when this fast was kept, to be about or soon after the autumnal equinox; which, answering to the time of the day of expiation among the Jews, renders it highly probable, that this was the particular fast to which the writer of the Acts refers. As to the objection of Erasmus Schmidius, that it is improbable these Alexandrian mariners should denominate the seasons of the year from Jewish fasts or festivals, he should have observed, that the passage under consideration is not the words of the Alexandrian mariners, but of Luke the historian, who was a Jew by nation, and no doubt, therefore, denominated the seasons from some Jewish fast, according to the custom of his country.

* Hesiod. Opera et Dies, lib. ii, 1. 236–240.

+ Hesiod. lib. ii, 1. 2.

Hesiod. lib. ii, 1. 281-295.

§ Philostrat. in Vitâ Apollonii, lib. iv, cap. iv, p. 168, A. edit. Paris,

1608.

|| Philo. Legat. ad Caium, Oper. p. 770, B. edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. Erasmus Schmidius in loc.

Scaliger conceives the fast here referred to was that in the month Tebeth, or the tenth month, answering to our December or January; which fast is mentioned by the prophet Zechariah, chap. viii, 19, and was kept in memory of Nebuchadnezzar's sitting down before Jerusalem, to besiege it, on the tenth day of the month, 2 Kings xxv, 1. Scaliger has been followed in this opinion by several others: but is confuted by Hasæust, who shows, that sailing was absolutely disused, both by the Romans and Greeks, in the depth of winter. The Romans shut up the sea, or forbad sailing, from the third of the ides of November to the sixth of the ides of March; that is, from November the twenty-second to March the twenty-first; and it appears by Theophrastust, that the Greeks opened the sea at their Dionysia, or feast of Bacchus, which was kept in March. It is, therefore, altogether improbable, or rather incredible, that the ship in which Paul sailed should put to sea soon after the fast of the tenth month. It remains, then, that the fast here intended must be the day of expiation, which fell out in our September or October.

This account from Hasæus will likewise explain the reason of Paul and his companions stopping three months at Melita, before they could get a passage to Italy. "After three months we departed in a ship of Alexandria, which had wintered in the isle," Acts xxviii, 11. Now, supposing they first put to sea at the beginning or middle of October, yet sailing slowly, and much time being spent before their shipwreck, Acts xxvii, 7, 9, probably they did not arrive at Melita till the middle of December; and there they were forced to stay till the sea was opened in the spring, or till the law allowed them to put to sea again in March.

Upon the whole, as there is great reason to conclude that the fast, which was lately past at the beginning of Paul's voyage, was the day of expiation; we may from hence infer, that this day was kept as a fast by the Jews; though, as we before observed, fasting is not expressly enjoined in the Mo

* De Emendat. Tempor. cited by Wolfius, Cure Philolog. in Act. xxvii, 9.

See his Discourse de Computatione Mensium Paulini Itineris, in the Bibliotheca Bremensis, class. i, p. 17, et seq.

Theophrast. Charact. Ethic. cap. iv, alias iii.

saic institution, unless it was included, or, as some have thought, directly intended in the words "Ye shall afflict your souls," Lev. xvi, 29. This seems to be the meaning of the same expression in the following passage of Isaiah, "Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord?" Isa. lviii, 5. Among the several external rites here particularly specified, as belonging to a fast, and as carefully observed by the hypocritical Jews, there is nothing said of their abstinence from food, which undoubtedly belonged to a fast, and might naturally have been expected to have been mentioned on this occasion, unless it be intended by the phrase, "afflicting their souls." By the soul we may understand the sensitive part of man, which is afflicted by fasting. Accordingly David saith, that he had "humbled his soul with fasting," Psal. xxxv, 13. The word here translated humbled is the same which in Leviticus is rendered afflicted. And if by the soul we understand the rational soul, or mind, some have observed a natural connection betwixt afflicting the soul with a deep penitential sense of sin, and bodily fasting; inasmuch as great grief never fails to pall the appetite, and incline men to fast; and therefore "afflicting their souls" very naturally implies abstinence from food. Hence, perhaps, the light of nature hath led men to practise fasting, as a proper token and evidence of inward contrition. Thus the Ninevites, though heathens, proclaimed a fast of strict abstinence from food, when they were threatened with speedy destruction, Jonah iii, 5, 7. We find, indeed, no scripture example of religious fasting before the institution of this annual fast by Moses; yet this silence concerning it will by no means prove it was never practised. But from the time of Moses the Jewish history abounds with instances and examples of this sort. After the unexpected defeat before Ai, Joshua and all the elders of Israel continued prostrate before the ark from morning to night, Josh. vii, 6; which must therefore be without eating. The same was practised by the eleven tribes, upon the desolation which had befallen the tribe of Benjamin; they "wept, and sat there before the Lord, and fasted that day until evening," Judg. xx. 26.

And again by all the people at Mizpeh, in token of their repentance for having served Baalim and other strange gods, 1 Sam. vii, 6; and particularly by David, in hopes of saving the life of the child which he had by Bathsheba, 2 Sam. xii, 16; and on other occasions, when, as he saith in the beforecited passage, he "humbled his soul with fasting."

Besides the annual fast in the seventh month, we read of three others kept by the Jews after their return from the captivity; one in the fourth month, another in the fifth, another in the tenth, Zech. viii, 19. The later Jews had so multiplied them, that they filled almost half their calendar.

According to the rabbies, the fast we are now speaking of was to be observed with extraordinary strictness: they mention six things in particular, which they were that day to abstain from; namely, eating, drinking, washing, anointing themselves, wearing shoes, at least those made of leather, and the use of the marriage bed*.

This fast being called a sabbath, and being kept like a sabbath, by their abstaining from all servile work (Lev, xvi, 31), as probably their other fasts were, might occasion the error of those heathen writers, who represent the Jews as fasting on their weekly sabbaths. Suetonius cites Octavius saying, in an epistle to Tiberius, " Ne Judæus quidem, mi Tiberi, tam diligenter sabbatis jejunium servat quam ego hodie servavi :" a Jew does not observe the fast of his sabbath so carefully as I have done to-day+. And Justin saith of Moses, "Quo (sc. ad montem Synæ) septem dierum jejunio per deserta Arabiæ cum populo suo fatigatus, cum tandem venisset septimum diem, more gentis sabbatum appellatum, in omne ævum jejunium sacravit, quoniam illa dies famem illis erroremque finierat:" that, arriving at Mount Sinai, after wandering and fasting in the deserts of Arabia seven days, he consecrated every seventh day, called the sabbath, for a perpetual fast, because that day had put a period to their wandering and hunger.

* Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. viii, sect. i, tom. ii, p. 252, Surenhus.

+ Sueton. in Vit. Octav. cap. lxxvi, p. 473, 474, tom. i, edit. Pitisci, Traject. ad Rhen. 1690.

↑ Justin. lib. xxxvi, cap. ii, sect. xiv, p. 524, edit. Grævii, Lugd. Bat.

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