pass through Samaria, as he was going to Jerusalem to keep one of the annual feasts at the temple, the Samaritans would give him no entertainment on his journey, not merely because he was a Jew, but because, designing to keep the feast at Jerusalem, he plainly preferred that temple above theirs; Luke ix. 52, 53. As to what Godwin advances, that the Samaritans allowed of no commerce with the Jews, which he grounds on the forecited passage, concerning the surprise of the woman of Samaria, that Christ, being a Jew, asked drink of her, who was a Samaritan; and its being added as the reason of this, "for the Jews have no dealings with ou ovyxpwvrai, the Samaritans, John iv. 9;-I say, the opinion, that the Samaritans permitted no kind of commerce with the Jews, is evidently confuted by our being informed, that while this conversation passed between our Saviour and the woman, "the disciples were gone into the city" of Samaria, "to buy meat;" ver. 8. Nothing can be meant, therefore, by ou ovyxpwvrai, but that they would have no friendly intercourse, nor perform acts of mutual civility.*

* See, concerning the Samaritans, Reland. Dissertat. Miscellan. vol. ii. dissert. vii. de Samaritanis; Prideaux's Connect. part i. book vi. sub anno 409 ante Christum.

CHAPTER XII.

OF THE ESSENES.

THE Essenes, though no notice is taken of them, at least by name, in any part of the Scripture history, were yet a considerable sect among the Jews, of whom both Josephus and Philo have given a large account; the former in the twelfth chapter of his second book of the Jewish war, where he professedly treats of the three principal sects of the Jews, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes. He likewise speaks of them occasionally in several other parts of his works. Philo, in his book entitled Omnis probus Liber,* gives a very particular account of the dogmata and manners of this sect, nearly, though not quite, the same with that of Josephus. It is very possible there might be some little difference between the Essenes in Egypt and those in Judea; and Philo, who was an Alexandrian Jew, was acquainted only with the former; Josephus, an inhabitant of Judea, only with the latter. Pliny, the natural historian, hath left us some account of the Essenes in the seventeenth chapter of the fifth book of his history.+

These are the only ancient writers who speak of the Essenes, on whose narratives, as they were cotemporary with them, we may depend. As for what Epiphanius, and other ancient and modern authors have said of them, it can only be by conjecture, any farther than they have taken their

materials from those above-mentioned.

The etymology of the name has given grammarians and critics no little trouble. Josephus is silent upon it. Philo derives it from oσtos, holy, because of the extraordinary sanctity of the Essenes, though he confesses that derivation is not

* See also Philo de Vitâ Contemplativâ.

+ The several accounts are inserted at large in Dr. Prideaux's Connect. part ii. book v. sub fin.

grammatical.* Epiphanius goes the farthest for the etymology of any, deriving the name from Jesse, the father of David. Salmasius fetches it from a city called Essa, mentioned by Josephus, from whence he imagines this sect first sprung.‡ Serarius hath given us, at least, a dozen different etymologies. So various and uncertain are the conjectures of the learned on this subject.

Godwin derives it from the Syriac word NDN asa, which signifies to heal or cure, because Philo calls those of the Essenes, who devoted themselves to a contemplative life, OɛpaTurat, therapeuta, which is naturally derived from patEVELv, sanare; yet not, as Godwin erroneously says, because they studied physic, according to the common acceptation of that word; but because, saith Philo, they cure men's souls of those diseases which they have contracted by their passions and vices. Or otherwise, as he adds, they have this name, because they have learnt to worship and serve that Being, who is better than good, more uncompounded than the number one, and more ancient than unity itself:|| for the word Departurns signifies a worshipper, or servant, as well as a physician.

These therapeuta are distinguished from those whom Philo calls Practical Essenes, who were employed in the labours of husbandry and other mechanic arts; though only in such as belonged to peace, for none of them would ever put their hands to the making swords or arrows, or any other instruments of war.**

Both Josephus and Philo give a surprising account of their

* Philo in tractat. Omnis probus Liber, Oper. p. 678, C. Colon. Allobr. 1613; vid. Serar. Trihæres. lib. iii. cap. i. p. 109; J. Scaliger. Elench. Trihares. Serar. cap. xviii. in init.

+ Epiphan. Hares. xix. lib. i. tom. ii. sect iv. p. 120, edit. Petav.

{ Salmas. Plinian. exercitat. in Solinum, cap. xxxv. p. 432, edit. Ultraject. § Serar. Trihæres. Judæor. lib. iii. cap. i. p. 106-110, edit. Trigland.

1703.

|| Philo de Vitâ Contemplativâ, ab init. Oper. p. 688, B, C; Valesius, in his notes on Eusebius's Eccles. Histor. lib. ii. cap. xvii. p. 66, not. 3, endeavours to prove, against Scaliger, that the Therapeutæ, so largely described by Philo, are not to be reckoned in the number of the Essenes.

f Vid. Lexic. Constantin. in verb.

** Philo Tractat. quod Omnis probus Liber, Oper. p. 678, E, D.

Y

austere way of life. Their houses were mean; their clothes made of wool without any dye; they never changed their clothes or shoes, till they were quite worn out: their food was plain and coarse, and their drink water: they neglected all bodily ornaments, and would by no means anoint themselves with oil, according to the fashion of those times. Nay, if any one of them happened to be anointed against his will, he would presently wipe off the oil, and wash himself, as from some pollution. They lived in sodalities, and had all their goods in common; their morals were very exact and pure, and they kept the sabbath more strictly than any of the Jews.*

In the account which Godwin gives of the dogmata of this sect, collected from Josephus and Philo, he asserts, that the Pythagoreans forbad oaths, and so, saith he, did the Essenes.+ But this, I apprehend, is a mistake as to the Pythagoreans, and perhaps, also, as to the Essenes. The former, it is well known, used an oath on important occasions, and held it to be most sacred; swearing by the number four, which they wrote by ten dots, in the form of a triangle; so that each side consisted of four dots, thus: Some have imagined Py

thagoras took the hint of this from the Nomen Tetragrammaton of the Jews; and that, having likewise acquired some notion of the Trinity, he intended to express it by the triangle, which is called his Trigonon Mysticum.

As for the Essenes, Josephus saith, that before any are admitted to eat at the common table, they bind themselves by solemn oath to observe the rules of the society.§

Godwin likewise maintains, that the Pythagoreans used

* Philo, ubi supra, p. 678-680; Joseph. de Bello Judaic. lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. ii.-xiii. p. 160-165.

In the former passage,

↑ Joseph. de Bell. Jud. ubi supra, sect. vi.; Philo, ubi supra, p. 679, C. Diog. Laert. in Vità Pythag. lib. viii. segm. xxxiii.; Lucian. Dialog. Vitarum Auctio, Oper. tom. iii. p. 103, cum Annot. Cognati, p. 131, edit. Basil.; et Galei Philosoph. General. lib. ii. cap. iii. sect. ii. p. 173. 175. § Joseph. de Bell. ubi supra, sect. vii. p. 163. sect. vi., his expression is, το δε ομνύειν αυτοίς περισταται, χειρον τι της επιορχίας ὑπολαμβάνοντες, though here he saith, πριν δε της κοινής αψασθαι τροφής, όρκους αυτοίς όμνυσι φρικώδεις, κ. τ. λ. And in sect. viii. he speaks of them as τοις όρκοις και τους έθεσε ενδεδεμένοι, and the like in other places.

only inanimate sacrifices; and so, saith he, did the Essenes ; they sent gifts to the temple, but did not sacrifice. But how will this account of the Pythagoreans agree with the story mentioned by Diogenes Laertius and others,* that Pythagoras himself sacrificed a hecatomb, upon his discovering what is called the Pythagoric theorem, namely, that in a right-angled triangle, the square of the hypothenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the sides? As for the Essenes, it is not easy to reconcile their not using animal sacrifices with the profound veneration which they professed for the five books of Moses, in which so many animal sacrifices are enjoined. Josephus indeed saith, they send their gifts, ava≈nuara, to the temple, but offer no sacrifices there, by reason of the different rules of purity which they have instituted among themselves. And therefore, being excluded the common temple, they sacrifice apart by themselves ; τας θυσίας επιτελουσι : the word θυσίας imports animal sacrifices that were slain.†

3dly. Godwin saith, the Essenes worship toward the rising sun; and this he grounds on a passage in Josephus; on the authority of which some have charged them with worshipping the sun itself. The words are, Προς γε μην το θείον ιδιως ευσεβείς πριν γαρ ανασχειν τον Ήλιον, ουδεν εγγονται των βεβηλων, πατριους δε τινας εις αυτον ευχας, ώσπερ ικετεύοντες avareida. If 'Hov, indeed, be the antecedent to avrov, it must imply that they prayed to the sun itself. But this is not necessarily the construction; for though ro is of the neuter gender, cannot be the antecedent to avrov,

aov, which

* Diog. Laert. de Vitis Philosophorum, lib. viii. Vit. Pythagor. segm, xii. p. 497, Amstel. 1692. Cicero represents Cotta as giving no credit to this story, because, as he apprehends, Pythagoras never used animal sacrifices; Cicer. de Natura Deorum, lib. iii. cap. xxxvi. But it is related also by Athenæus, Deipnosoph. lib. x. p. 418, F, edit. Casaub. 1598. See also Plutarch. in Comment. non posse suaviter Vivi secundum Epicur. Oper. tom. ii. p. 1094, B, Francof. 1620.

+ Joseph. Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. v, p. 871. Yet Dr. Ibbotson (see his note in loc.) renders the word, εφ' αυτών τας θυσίας επιτελουσι, very differently from the translation used above, which is that of Dr. Prideaux : his version is, "in seipsis sacrificia peragunt, i. e. sese ipsos Deo vovebant et consecrabant," edit. Haverc.

↑ Joseph. de Bello Judaic. lib, ii. cap. viii. sect. v. p. 161, 162.