and the works of the devil deftroyed. Beacharith Heyamim, the end of days, or last days, is, by a general rule, given by the most learned Rabbins, meant of the Mefias. So Kimchi on Ifa. ii. 2.—and Abarbriel and R. Mofes Nachm on Gen. xlix. 1. inform us.

It is likewife very remarkable, that the Targum of Jerufalem, and that of Jonathan Ben Uziel, apply this place to the coming of the Meffias. They give the words the following fenfe. I will put enmity between thy feed and her feed: when the fons of the woman keeping my law, they shall bruife thy head, and when they break my law, thou fhalt bruise their heel; but the wound given to the feed of the woman, shall be healed, but thine fhall be incurable; they fhall be healed in the last days, in the days of the Meffias. -Such is the opinion of the most learned Jews:-and from thence it follows, that the Chriftians have not put their fense upon the text I have cited to ferve their own turn; the Rabbins, we fee, give the very fame meaning to the place.

Again in Numb. xxiv. 17. we have the famous prophecy of Balaam: There fhall come a far out of Jacob, and a fceptre fhall rife out of Ifrael.-In Ifaiah xi. I. it is written; And there fhall come forth a rod out of the ftem of Feffe, and a branch shall grow out of his roots, and the Spirit of the Lord shall reft

upon

upon him. And in Jeremiah xxiii. 5. 6. Behold the days fhall come, faith the Lord, that I will raife unto David a righteous branch,—and this is his name whereby he shall be called, The Lord our Righteoufness. That the Chriftians apply these texts to the Meffias, I need not inform the reader: but it must be grateful to obferve, that the paraphrafes of Onkelos, Jonathan, and Jerufalem, all of them exprefsly attribute the prophecy of Balaam to the Meffias. And Rabbi Mofes Hadarfan and Maimon, fay, he is here called a Star, (which fignifies what Malachi expreffes by the Sun of Righteousness. Mal. iv. 2. and Zechariah by the East. I will bring forth my fervant the Eaft. Zach. iii. 8. as it is tranflated in the Vulgar, Septuagint, Arabic, and Syriac) is. here, fay thefe Rabbins, called a Star, because he should come and destroy idolatry, among the heathen nations, by becoming a light to the gentiles, and the glory of Ifrael.

As to the other two texts, the Jews do likewife attribute them to the Mefias. Rabbi Jofeph Albo, fpeaking of the words, The Lord our Righteoufnefs, in particular, says exprefsly, that this is one name given to the Meffias. Albo, Sep. ikker. lib. 2. c. 28. Thus do the Jews concur with us in the application of texts to the Meffias. But what is become of this Meffias, they cannot tell. They

are

are amazed, perplexed, and confounded a bout him. They dispute on the article, and have the wildeft fancies in relation to it. Whereas the Chriftians give a clear and confiftent account of the Meffias, and by every argument that can be defired by a rational, prove the truth of christianity.

Again: in Ifa. ix. 6. we have these words: Unto us a child is born, unto us a fon is given, and the government fall be upon his fhoulders: and his name fhall be called Wonderful, Counfel lor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Or as the Alexandrian MS. hath it, He fhall call his name the Angel, Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty, the Governor, the Prince of Peace, the Father of the age to come. This is thought by all Chriflians to be a plain declaration of the Mejias; for to apply it to any mere mortal, as to Hezekiah, or Ifaiah's fon, cannot be done without the greatest absurdity: and therefore Ben Maimon (epift. ad Afric.) fairly yields that thefe words belong to the Melias, and fo doth Jonathan Ben Uziel in his Chaldee paraphrafe. The Talmud itfelf allows it. Tract. Sanhedrim. that it relates to a perfon not come in the time of the prophets, but to the man, whofe name is the Branch, which was to come forth out of the ftem of effe, and to grow out of his roots. My fervant the Branch. Behold the man whofe name is the Branch. Zech. iii. 8. and ch. xii.

and Ifa. iv. 1. Even the perfon that shall be fent; Shilo, that remarkable perfon God had promised to his people. So fays the Talmud.

But further; as to the birth of the Meffias, in refpect of the manner and the place, it is thus fet down by the prophet Micah, v. 2. And thou Bethlehem Ephrata, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee fhall come forth unto me, that is to be ruler in Ifrael; whofe goings forth have been of old, even from everlasting. And in Ifa. vii. 14. are these words, Behold a virgin fhall conceive, and bring forth a fon, and call his name Immanuel. In thefe two texts, (the Chriftians fay) the place of the birth of the Meffias, and the manner of it, are as plainly described as words can do; and if they cannot, without abfurdity, be explained as relating to any other perfon, then it must be perverting the meaning of the records, to oppose this explication but this the Jews are far from doing. The place is acknowledged in the Talmud, in the Chaldee paraphrafe of Jonathan, and all their moft famous masters declare with one voice, that Bethlehem indifputably belongs to the Meffias. Exte Bethlehem coram me prodibit Meffias, ut fit dominium exercens in Ifrael, cujus nomen dictum eft ab æternitate, a Diebus feculi. (Talmud. lib. Sanhedrim, et Midrafch. The billinic Rabbi Selemob. paraph. Jonath. in Loc. Rabbi David Kimchi.)And as to

the

the manner, tho' it be true that fome Jews fay, the Hebrew word Gnalma fignifies a young woman as well as a virgin; yet Kimchi, Farchi, and Selemah, three of their greatest Rabbins, confefs that here is fomething wonderful prefaged in the birth and generation of this perfon, and that he was not to be born as other men and women are born. What can we defire more, in the cafe, from an enemy? And in truth, the behold, or wonder, with which the text begins, would be nothing, if it was only that a young woman fhould have a child: - and as to the Hebrew word Gnalmah, if it ever does fignify a young woman, which I very much doubt, yet in the tranflation of the Seventy, who well understood the original furely, they render the word by parthenos, Tage in Grac; which always fignifies a virgin in the ftrict propriety of the phrafe. And in the Punic language, which is much the fame as the Hebrew, the word Alma fignifies a virgin, virgo intacta, and never means a young woman.

Such are the advantages we may gain by reading the books of the Rabbins; and to me it is pleafing to see these great Hebrew masters granting fo much to us for our Meffias, while they hate our holy religion beyond every thing. Even the gay among the Jews, (if I have been truly informed by one who danced a night with them) have, in contempt and ab

horrence