was made a captive: for, after the last taking of it, in the eleventh of Zedekiah, Baruch could not be in Babylon; for, after that, he went into Egypt with Jeremiah, from whence it is not likely that he did ever return. And farther, it is said, in this very book of Baruch, that after the reading of his book, as aforesaid, a collection was made at Babylon of money, which was sent to Jerusalem, to Joakim, the high priest, the son of Hilkiah, the son of Shallum, and to the priests, and to all the people that were found with him at Jerusalem, to buy burnt-offerings, and sin-offerings, and incense, and to prepare the mincha, and to offer upon the altar of the Lord their God; nothing of which could be true after the last taking of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans: for then the city and temple were burnt and utterly destroyed; and after that there was no high priest, altar, altar-service, or people, to be found at Jerusalem, till the return of the Jews again thither, after the end of their seventy years captivity. And, if there were any such person as Joakim (for he is no where else named,) since he is here said to be the son of Hilkiah, the son of Shallum, he must have been the uncle of Seraiah, who was high priest at the burning of the temple, and grandson to the same Hilkiah; and therefore he must have been high priest before Seraiah, if there were any such person in that office at all: for it is certain, there were none such in it after him, during the life of Jeconiah. But of what authority this book is, or by whom it was written, whether any thing related therein be historically true, or the whole of it a fiction, is altogether uncertain. Grotiusd thinks it wholly feigned, by some hellenistical Jew, under Ba-. ruch's name, and so do many others; and it cannot be denied, but that they have strong reasons on their side. The subject of the book is an epistle sent, or feigned to be sent, by king Jehoiachin, and the Jews in captivity with him at Babylon, to their brethren, the Jews that were still left in Judah and Jerusalem; with an historical preface premised, in which it is related, how Baruch, being then at Babylon, did, in the name of the said king, and the people by their appointment, d In Comment. ad Baruch. draw up the said epistle, and afterwards read it to them for their approbation; and how that, the collection being then made, which is abovementioned, the epistle, with the money, was sent to Jerusalem. There are three copies of it, one in Greek, and the other two in Syriac; whereof one agreeth with the Greek, but the other very much differs from it. But in what language it was originally written, or whether one of these be not the original, or which of them may be so, is what no one can say. Jerome rejected it wholly, because it is not to be found among the Jews, and calls the epistle annexed to it. Eudove pov, i. e. a false or feigned writing. The most that can be said for it is, that Cyril, of Jerusalem, and the Laodicean council, held A. D. 364, both name Baruch among the canonical books of holy Scripture; for, in both the catalogues which are given us by them of these canonical books, are these words, Jeremias, cum Baruch, Lamentationibus, et Epistola, i. e. "Jeremiah, with Baruch, the Lamentations, and the Epistle;" whereby may seem. to be meant the prophecies of Jeremiah, the lamentations of Jeremiah, the book of Baruch, with the epistle of Jeremiah, at the end of it, as they are all laid together in the vulgar Latin edition of the Bible. The answer given hereto is, that these words were intended by them to express no more than Jeremiah's prophecies and lamentations only; that by the epistle is meant none other than the epistle in the twenty-ninth chapter of Jeremiah; and that Baruch's name is added, only because of the part which he bore in collecting all these together, and adding the last chapter to the book of his prophecies; which is supposed to be Baruch's, because the prophecies of Jeremiah end with the chapter before, that is, the fifty-first, as it is positively said in the last words of it; and it must be said, that since neither in St. Cyril, nor in the Laodicean council, any of the other apocryphal books are named, it is very unlikely, that, by the name of Baruch in either of them, should be meant the apocryphal book, so named; which hath the least pretence of any of them to be e In Præfatione ad Jeremiam, 'canonical, as it appeared by the difficulty which the Trentine fathers found to make it so. An. 594. Zedek. 5. In the fifth year of Zedekiah, which was also the fifth year of Jehoiachin's captivity, and the thirtieth from the great reformation made in the eighteenth year of king Josiah, Ezekiel g was called of God to be a prophet among the Jews of the captivity. And this same year he saw the vision of the four cherubims, and the four wheels, which is related in the first chapter of his prophecies. The same year were also relvealed unto himh the three hundred and ninety years of God's utmost forbearance of the house of Israel, and the forty years of God's utmost forbearance of the house of Judah, and the judgment which, after that, God would inflict upon both; as the whole is contained in the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of his prophecies. In the same yeari died Cyaxares, king of Media, after he had reigned forty years; and Astyages his son, who in Scripture is called Ahasuerus reigned in his stead. In the same year* died also Psammis, king of Egypt, in an expedition which he made against the Ethiopians; and Apries his son, the same who in Scripture is called Pharaoh Hophra, succeeded him in that kingdom, and reigned twenty-five years. In the same year Ezekiel, being in a vision, was carried to Jerusalem, and there shewn all the several sorts of idolatry which were practised by the Jews in that place, and had revealed unto him the punishments which God would inflict upon them for those abominations; and this makes up the subject of the eighth, 'ninth, tenth, and eleventh chapters of his prophecies. But at the same time, God promised to those 1of the captivity, who, avoiding these abominations, kept themselves steady and faithful to his service, that he would become a sanctuary unto them in the strange land where they were carried, and bring them back again unto the land of Israel, and there make them flourish f The History of Trent, book 2, p. 144. g Ezek. i, 1, 2, 3, &c. Ezek. iv, 4, 5, 6, &c. i Herod. lib. 1. k Herod. lib. 26. 1 Ezek. xi, 15-21. in peace and righteousness, as in former times. All m which the prophet declared to the Jews at Babylon, among whom he dwelt. In the seventh year of Zedekiah, God did, both by types and words of revelation, foreshew unto An. 592. Ezekiel the taking of Jerusalem by the ChalZedek. 7. deans, Zedekiah's flight from thence by night, the putting out of his eyes, and his imprisonment and death at Babylon; and also the carrying away of the Jews at the same time into captivity, the desolation of their country, and the many and great calamities which should befall them for their iniquities: and this is the subject of the twelfth chapter of his prophecies, And what is contained in the seven following chapters was also the same year revealed unto him, and relates mostly to the same subject. At this time Daniel was grown to so great a perfection and eminency in all righteousness, holiness, and piety of life, in the sight both of God and man, that he is by God himself equalled with Noah and Job, and reckoned with these two to make up the three, who of all the saints that had till then lived upon the earth, had the greatest power to prevail with God in their prayers for others. And yet he was then but a young man; for, allowing him to be eighteen when he was carried away to Babylon, among other children, to be there educated, and brought up for the service of the king, (and a greater will not agree with this character,) thirty-two at this time must have been the utmost of his age. But he dedicated the prime and vigour of his life to the service of God; and that is the best time to make proficiency therein. Zedekiah, having in the seventh year of his reign An. 591. sent ambassadors into Egypt, made a confedZedek. 7. eracy with Pharaoh Hophra, king of Egypt; and therefore, the next year, after breaking the oath of fidelity which he had sworn in the name of the Lord his God unto Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, he rebelled against him; which drew on him that war which ended in his ruin, and in the ruin of n Ezek. xiv, 14, 20. o Ezek. xvii, 15. m Ezek. xi, 25. An. 590. Zedek. 9. all Judah and Jerusalem with him, in that calamitous destruction in which both were involved hereby. In the ninth year of Zedekiah,P Nebuchadnezzar, having drawn together a great army out of all the nations under his dominion, marched against him, to punish him for his perfidy and rebellion. But on his coming into Syria, finding that the Ammonites had also entered into the same confederacy with Egypt against him, he was in a doubt for some time which of these two people he should first fall upon, them, or the Jews; whereon he committed the decision of the matter to his diviners, who, consulting by the entrails of their sacrifices, their terephim, and their arrows, determined for the carrying of the war against the Jews. The way of divining by arrows was usual among these idolaters. The manner-of it, Jeromer tells us was thus: They wrote on several arrows the names of the cities they intended to make war against, and then putting them pro miscuously all together into a quiver, they caused them to be drawn out thence in the manner as they draw lots; and that city, whose name was on the arrow first drawn, was the first they assaulted. And by this way of divination, the war being determined against Judah, Nebuchadnezzar immediately marched his army into that country, and in a few days took all the cities thereof, excepting only Lachish, Azekah, and Jerusalem: whereon, the Jews at Jerusalem, being terrified with these losses, and the apprehensions of a siege, then ready to be laid to that place, made a shew of returning unto the Lord their God, and entered into a solemn covenant, thenceforth to serve him only, and faithfully observe all his laws. And in pursuance hereof, proclamation was made, that every man should let his man-servant, and every man his maid-servant, being an Hebrew or an Hebrewess, go free," according to the law of God; and every man did according hereto. p 2 Kings xxv, 1. 2 Chron. xxxvi, 17. Jer. xxxix, 1; lii, 4. q Ezek. xxi, 19-24. In comment. in Ezek. xxi. u Deut. xv, 12. VOL. I. 27 s Jer. xxxiv, 7. |