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out of the town; but I had scarcely arrived at my own house at Cochin, when the persons who had permitted me to take the manuscipts, came in evident agitation, and told me I must restore them immediately to calm the popular rage. Others had gone to complain to the Chief Magistrate, Thomas Flower, Esq. And now I had lost my spoil, but for the friendly counsel and judicious conduct of Mr. Flower. He directed that all the manuscripts should be delivered up to him, and, that there should be no further proceedings on the subject without his authority. To this the Jews agreed. There was some plea of justice on my side, as it was understood that I had given a valuable consideration. In the mean time he allowed a few days to pass, that the minds of the people might become tranquil, and he then summoned some of the more liberal men, and gave them a hearing on the subject. In the mean time I thought it prudent to retire from Cochin, for a day or two, and went to Cranganor, about sixteen miles off, to Colonel Macaulay, the British Resident at Travancore, who was then at the house of Mr. Drummond, the Collector of Malabar. On my return to Cochin, Mr. Flower informed me that all the manuscripts were to be returned to my house; that I was to select what was old, and of little use to the Jews, and to give back to them what was new. The affair ended, however, in the Jews permitting me generously to retain some part of the new.

I have since made a tour through the towns of the Black Jews in the interior of the country, Tritoor, Paroor, Chenotta, and Maleh. I have procured a good many manuscripts, chiefly in the Rabbinical character, some of

which the Jews themselves cannot read; and I do not know what to say to their traditions. A copy of the Scriptures belonging to Jews of the East, who might be supposed to have had no communication with Jews in the West, has been long considered a desideratum in Europe; for the Western Jews have been accused by some learned men of altering or omitting certain words in the Hebrew text, to invalidate the argument of Christians. But Jews in the East, [remote from the controversy, would have no motive for such corruptions. One or two of the MSS. which I have just procured, will probably be of some service in this respect. One of them is an old copy of the Books of Moses, written on a roll of leather. The skins are sewed together, and the roll is about forty-eight feet in length. It is, in some places, worn out, and the holes have been sewed up with pieces of parchment. Some of the Jews suppose that this roll came originally from Senna, in Arabia; others have heard that it was brought from Cashmir. The Cabul Jews, who travel into the interior of China, say that in some Synagogues the Law is still written on a roll of leather, made of Goats' skins dyed red; not on vellum, but on a soft flexible leather; which agrees with the description of the roll above mentioned.'*

* Mr. Yeates, formerly of All Souls College, Oxford, and editor of the Hebrew Grammar, has been employed by the author for the last two years, at Cambridge, in arranging and collating the Hebrew and Syriac MSS. brought from India. His collation of the Roll of the Pentateuch above mentioned, is now finished, and will form a volume in quarto. The University has, with great liberality, resolved that this

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• Ever since I came among these people, and heard their sentiments on the prophecies, and their confident hopes of returning to Jerusalem, I have thought much on the means of obtaining a version of the NEW TESTAMENT in the Hebrew language, and circulating it among them and their brethren in the East. I had heard that there were one or two translations of the Testament in their own possession, but they were studiously kept out of my sight, for a considerable time. At last, however, they were produced by individuals in a private manOne of them is written in the small Rabbinical or Jerusalem character; the other in a large square letter. The history of the former is very interesting. The translator, a learned Rabbi, conceived the design of making an accurate version of the New Testament, for the express purpose of confuting it. His style is copious and elegant, like that of a master in the language, and the translation is in general faithful. It does not indeed appear that he wished to pervert the meaning of a single sentence; but depending on his own abilities and renown as a scholar, he hoped to be able to controvert its doctrines, and to triumph over it by fair contest in the presence of the world. There is yet a mystery about the circumstances of this man's death, which time will perhaps unfold: the Jews are not inclined to say much to me about him. His version is complete, and written with greater freedom and ease towards the end than at

book shall be printed at the expence of the University, for the benefit of Mr. Yeates; and Dr. Marsh, the learned Editor of Michaelis, has written a Note on the antiquity and importance of the manuscript, which will form a Preface to the work.

the beginning. How astonishing it is that an enemy should have done this! that he should have persevered resolutely and calmly to the end of his work! not indeed always calmly; for there is sometimes a note of execration on the Sacred Person who is the subject of it, to unburden his mind and ease the conflict of his labouring soul. At the close of the Gospels, as if afraid of the converting power of his own translation, he calls heaven to witness that he had undertaken the work with the professed design of opposing the Epicureans;' by which term he contemptuously means the Christians.

'I have had many interesting conferences with the Jews, on the subject of their present state; and have been much struck with two circumstances; their constant reference to the DESOLATION of Jerusalem, and their confident hope that it will be one day REBUILT. The desolation of the Holy City is ever present to the minds of the Jews, when the subject is concerning themselves as a Nation; for, though without a king, and without a country, they constantly speak of the unity of their nation. Distance of time and place seems to have no effect in obliterating the remembrance of the Desolation. I often thought of the verse in the Psalms, If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.' They speak of Palestine as being close at hand, and easily accessible. It is become an ordinance of their Rabbins in some places, that when a man builds a new house, he shall leave a small part of it unfinished, as an emblem of ruin, and write on it these words, Zecher Lachorchan, i. e. In MEMORY of the DESOLATION.

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Their hopes of Rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, the THIRD and LAST time, under the auspices of the Messiah, or of a second Cyrus, before his coming, are always expressed with great confidence. They have a general impression, that the period of their liberation from the Heathen is not very remote ; and they consider the present commotions in the earth as gradually loosening their bonds. It is,' say they, a sure sign of our approaching restoration, that in almost all countries there is a GENERAL RELAXATION of the persecution against us.' I pressed strongly upon them the prophecies of Daniel. In former times that Prophet was not in repute among the Jews, because he predicted the coming of the Messiah at the end of the seventy weeks;' and his book has been actually removed from the list of prophetic writings, and remains, to this day, among the Hagiographa, such as Job, the Psalms, the Proverbs, Ruth; but he now begins to be popular among those who have studied him, because he has predicted that the final 'accomplishment of the indignation against the holy people' is near at hand. The strongest argument to press upon the mind of a Jew, at this period, is to explain to his conviction Daniel's period of 1260 years; and then to shew the analogy which it bears to the period of the Evangelist John, concerning the Papal and Mahomedan powers; with the state of which the Jews are well acquainted.

'I passed through the burial-ground of the Jews the other day. Some of the tombs are handsomely constructed, and have Hebrew inscriptions in prose and This mansion of the dead is called by the Jews, Beth Haïim, or, The House of the Living,'

verse.

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