Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

veneration of the sacred stones, called bactyli, so celebrated in all pagan antiquity, were derived. These baetyli were stones of a round form; they were supposed to be animated, by means of magical incantations, with a portion of the deity: they were consulted on occasions of great and pressing emergency, as a kind of divine oracles, and were suspended, either round the neck, or some other part of the body. Thus the setting up of a stone by this holy person, in grateful memory of the celestial vision, probably became the occasion of the idolatry in succeeding ages, to these shapeless masses of unhewn stone, of which so many astonishing remains are scattered up and down the Asiatic and the European world.

MAURICE'S Indian Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 355.

No. 17.-xxix. 2. A great stone was upon the well's mouth.] In Arabia, and other places, they cover up their wells of water, lest the sand, which is put into motion by the winds, should fill, and quite stop them up. (Chardin.) So great was their care not to leave the well open any length of time, that they waited till the flocks were all gathered together, before they began to draw water: and when they had finished, the well was immediately closed again. HARMER, vol. i. p. 113.

No. 18.-xxix. 24. And Laban gave unto his daughter Leah, Zilpah his maid, for an handmaid.] Chardin observes that none but very poor people marry a daughter in the East, without giving her a female slave for an handmaid, there being no hired servants there as in Europe. So Solomon supposes they were extremely poor that had not a servant. Prov. xii. 9. HARMER, vol. ii. p. 366.

VOL. I.

[ocr errors]

No. 19.-xxx. 32. I will pass through all thy flocks to day, removing from thence all the speckled and spotted cattle, and all the brown cattle among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the goats; and of such shall be my hire.] The following extract from the Gentoo laws, p. 150, is remarkable for its coincidence with the situation and conduct of Jacob; and demonstrates that he acted with propriety, if the regulations here mentioned existed in his time; and of their very great antiquity there is no doubt. "If a person without receiving wages, or subsistence, or clothes, attends ten milch cows, he shall select, for his own use, the milk of that cow which ever produces most; if he attends more cows, he shall take milk after the same rate, in lieu of wages. If a person attends one hundred cows for the space of one year, without any appointment of wages, he shall take to himself one heifer of three years old; and also, of all those cows that produce milk, whatever the quantity may be, after every eight days, he shall take to himself the milk, the intire product of one day. Cattle shall be delivered over to the cowherd in the morning: the cowherd shall tend them the whole day with grass and water, and in the evening shall re-deliver them to the master, in the same manner as they were intrusted to him: if, by the fault of the cowherd, any of the cattle be lost, or stolen, that cowherd shall make it good. When a cowherd hath led cattle to any distant place to feed, if any die of some distemper, notwithstanding the cowherd applied the proper remedy, the cowherd shall carry the head, the tail, the forefoot, or some such convincing proof, taken from that animal's body, to the owner of the cattle; having done this, he shall be no farther answerable; if he neglects to act thus, he shall make good the loss." Probably this last circumstance is alluded to in Amos iii. 12.

No. 20.-xxxi. 27. Wherefore didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me, and didst not tell me, that I might have sent thee away with mirth and with songs, with tabret and with harp?] The Easterns used to set out, at least on their longer journeys, with music. When the prefetto of Egypt was preparing for his journey, he complains of his being incommoded by the songs of his friends, who in this manner took leave of their relations and acquaintance. These valedictory songs were often extemporary. If we consider them, as they probably were used not on common but more solemn occasions, there appears peculiar propriety in the complaint of Laban. HARMER, vol. i. p. 435.

No. 21.-xxxi. 34. The camel's furniture.] PocOCKE informs us, that "one method of conveyance, still used in the East, is by means of a sort of round basket, slung on each side of a camel, (with a cover) which holds all their necessaries, and on it (the camel) a person sits crossed-legged." Mr. Moryson, whose travels were printed in the year 1596, mentions (p. 247.) in his journey from Aleppo to Constantinople, "two long chairs, like cradles covered with red cloth, to hang on the two sides of the camel, which chairs the Turks used to ride in, and sleep upon camels backs." Mr. Hanway likewise mentions (Travels, vol. i. p. 190.) kedgavays, "which are a kind of covered chairs, which the Persians hang over camels in the manner of panniers, and are big enough for one person to sit in."

-

No. 22. xxxi. 40. In the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night.] "In Europe the days and nights resemble each other with respect to the qualities of heat and cold; but it is quite otherwise in the East. In the Lower Asia in particular, the day is always hot; and as soon as the sun is fifteen

[ocr errors]

degrees above the horizon, no cold is felt in the depth of winter itself. On the contrary, in the height of summer the nights are as cold as at Paris in the month of March. It is for this reason that in Persia and Turkey they always make use of furred habits in the country, such only being sufficient to resist the cold of the nights." (Chardin in Harmer, vol. i. p. 74.) Campbell (Travels, part ii. p. 100,) says, sometimes we lay at night out in the open air, rather than enter a town; on which occasions I found the weather as piercing cold as it was distressfully hot in the day time." Hence we may clearly see the force and propriety of Jacob's complaint.

No. 23. xxxi. 46. And Jacob said unto his brethren, gather stones, and they took stones and made an heap, and they did eat there upon the heap.] Niebuhr relating his audience with the Imam of Yemen, says, "I had gone from my lodgings indisposed, and by standing so long found myself so faint, that I was obliged to ask permission to quit the room. I found near the door some of the principal officers of the court, who were sitting, in a scattered manner, in the shade, upon stones, by the side of the wall. Among them was the nakib (the general, or rather master of the horse), Cheir Allah, with whom I had some acquaintance before. He immediately resigned his place to me, and applied himself to draw together stones into an heap, in order to build himself a new seat." This management might be owing to various causes. The extreme heat of the ground might render sitting there disagreeable. The same inconvenience might arise also from its wetness. It was certainly a very common practice; and as it appears from the instance of Jacob, a very ancient one. HARMER, vol. iii. p. 215.

No. 24. xxxiii. 13. And he said unto him, my lord knoweth that the children are tender, and the flocks and herds with young are with me: and if men should overdrive them one day, all the flocks will die.] Prepared as the Arabs are for speedy flight, a quick motion is very destructive to the young of their flocks. "Their flocks," says Chardin, "feed down the places of their encampment so quick, by the great numbers which they have, that they are obliged to remove them too often, which is very destructive to their flocks, on account of the young ones, which have not strength enough to follow." This circumstance shews the energy of Jacob's apology to Esau for not attending him.

HARMER, vol. i. p. 126.

No. 25.-xxxiii. 19. An hundred pieces of money.] There is very great reason to believe that the earliest coins struck were used both as weights and money: and indeed, this circumstance is in part proved by the very names of certain of the Greek and Roman coins. Thus the Attic mina and the Roman libra equally sig(stater) of the Greeks, so

nify a pound; and the orary called from weighing, is decisive as to this point. The Jewish shekel, was also a weight as well as a coin: three thousand shekels according to Arbuthnot, being equal in weight and value to one talent. This is the oldest coin ⚫of which we any where read, for it occurs, Gen. xxiii. 16. and exhibits direct evidence against those who date the first coinage of money so low as the time of Croesus or Darius, it being there expressly said, that Abraham weighed to Ephron four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant.

Having considered the origin and high antiquity of coined money, we proceed to consider the stamp or impression which the first money bore. The primitive race of men being shepherds, and their wealth consisting

« AnteriorContinuar »