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IX.

LUKE, ii. 42.-" And when he was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem, after the custom of the feast."

I AM aware that commentators upon this text quote the Rabbins, to show that children of twelve years old, amongst the Jews, were considered to be entering the estate of manhood, (see Wetstein,) and that on this account it was that Jesus was taken at that age to the passover. Such may be the true interpretation of the passage. I cannot, however, forbear offering a conjecture which occurred to me in reading the history of Archelaus.

The birth of Christ probably preceded the death of Herod by a year and a half, or thereabout. (See Lardner, vol. i. p. 352. 8vo edit.) Archelaus succeeded Herod, and governed the country, it should seem, about ten years. "In the tenth year of Archelaus' reign, the chief governors among the Jews and Samaritans, unable any longer to endure his cruelty and tyranny, accused him before Cæsar." Cæsar upon this sent for him to Rome, and

"as soon as he came to Rome, when the Emperor had heard his accusers, and his defence, he banished him to Vienne in France, and confiscated his goods." (Antiq. xvii. c. 15.) The removal, therefore, of this obnoxious governor, appears to have been effected in our Lord's twelfth year. Might not this circumstance account for the parents of the child Jesus venturing to take him to Jerusalem at the passover when he was twelve years old, and not before? It was only because "Archelaus reigned in Judea in the room of his father, Herod," that Joseph was afraid to go thither on his return from Egypt; influenced not merely by motives of personal safety, but by the consideration that the same jealousy which had urged Herod to take away the young child's life, might also prevail with his successor; for we do not find that any fears about himself or Mary withheld him from subsequently going to the passover, even during the reign of Archelaus, since it is recorded that "they went every year." I submit it, therefore, to my readers' decision, whether the same apprehensions for the life of the infant Jesus, which prevented Joseph from taking him into Judea, on hearing that Archelaus was king, did not, very probably, prevent

him from taking him up to Jerusalem, till he heard that Archelaus was deposed.

X.

LUKE, vi. 13.-" And when it was day, he called unto him his disciples; and of them he chose twelve, whom also he named Apostles."

x. 1.—“ After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face," &c.

THERE is something in the selection of these numbers which indicates veracity in the narrative. They were, on several accounts, favorite numbers amongst the Jews; the one (to name no other reason) being that of the Tribes, the other (taken roundly) that of the Elders. Accordingly we read in Josephus, that Varus, who held a post in the government under Agrippa, "called to him twelve Jews of Cæsarea, of the best character, and ordered them to go to Ecbatana, and bear this message to their countrymen who dwelt there: Varus hath heard that you intend to march against the king; but not believing the report,

he hath sent us to persuade you to lay down your arms, counting such compliance to be a sign that he did well not to give credit to those who so spake concerning you." "He also enjoined those Jews of Ecbatana to send seventy of their principal men to make a defence for them, touching the accusation laid against them. So when the twelve messengers came to their countrymen at Ecbatana, and found that they had no designs of innovation at all, they persuaded them to send the seventy also. Then went these seventy down to Cæsarea, together with the twelve ambassadors." (Life of Josephus, § 11.)

This is a very slight matter, to be sure, but it is still something to find the subordinate parts of a history in strict keeping with the habits of the people and of the age to which it professes to belong. The Evangelist might have fixed upon any other indifferent number for the apostles and first disciples of Jesus, without thereby incurring any impeachment of a want of veracity; and, therefore, it is the more satisfactory to discover marks of truth, where the absence of such marks would not have occasioned the least suspicion of falsehood.

XI.

LUKE, Xxiii. 6.-" When Pilate heard of Galilee, he asked whether the man was a Galilean. And as soon as he knew that he belonged unto Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him to Herod, who himself ALSO was at Jerusalem at that time."

THE fair inference from this last clause is, that Jerusalem was not the common place of abode either of Herod or Pilate. Such is certainly the force of the emphatic expression, "who himself also was at Jerusalem at that time," applied, as it is, directly to Herod, but with a reference to the person of whom mention had been made in the former part of the sentence. The more circuitous this insinuation is, the stronger does it make for the argument. Now, that Herod did not reside at Jerusalem may be inferred from the following passage Josephus.

in

"This king" (says he, meaning the Herod who killed James, the brother of John.-Acts, 12) "was not at all like that Herod who reigned before him, (meaning the Herod to

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