in London; and that the Italian Jews did the same; and because the greatest number of them were Libertini, their synagogue was therefore called the synagogue of the Libertines.

In support of the second opinion above noticed, viz. that the Libertines derived their name from Libertus or Libertina, a city in Africa, it is urged that Suidas in his Lexicon, on the word Aßeptivos, says, that it was oropa Ovovs, a national appellative; and that the Glossa interlinearis, of which Nicholas de Lyra made great use in his notes, has, over the word Libertini, e regione, denoting that they were so styled from a country. Further, in the acts of the celebrated conference with the Donatists at Carthage, anno 411, there is mentioned one Victor, bishop of the church of Libertina; and in the acts of the Lateran council, which was held in 649, there is mention of Januarius gratia Dei episcopus sanctæ ecclesiæ Libertinensis, Januarius, by the grace of God, bishop of the holy church of Libertina; and therefore Fabricius in his Geographical Index of Christian Bishoprics, has placed Libertina in what was called Africa propria, or the proconsular province of Africa. Now, as all the other people of the several synagogues, mentioned in this passage of the Acts, are called from the places whence they came, it is probable that the Libertines were denominated in like manner; and as the Cyrenians and Alexandrians, who came from Africa, are placed next to the Libertines in that catalogue, the supporters of this opinion think it probable, that they also belonged to the same country. But we have no evidence to show that there were any natives of this place at Jerusalem, at the period referred to in the Acts of the Apostles. On the contrary, as it is well known that, only about 15 years before, great numbers of Jews, emancipated slaves, or their sons, were banished from Rome, it is most likely that the Libertines mentioned by Luke were of the latter description, especially as his account is corroborated by two Roman historians.

II. It does not appear from the New Testament that the synagogues had any peculiar FORM. The building of them was regarded as a mark of piety (Luke vii. 5.); and they were erected within or without the city, generally in an elevated place, and were distinguished from the proseucha by being roofed. Each of them had an altar, or rather table, on which the book of the law was spread; and on the east side there was an ark or chest, in which the volume of the law was deposited. The seats were so disposed that the people always sat with their faces towards the elders, who occupied the easternmost rows of seats: which, as being placed nearer the ark, were accounted the more holy, and hence they are in the New Testament termed the chief seats in the synagogue; which the Pharisees affected, and for which our Lord inveighed against them. (Matt. xxiii. 6.) A similar precedency seems to have crept into the places of worship even of the very first Christians, and hence we may account for the indignation of the apostle James (ii. 3.) against the undue preference that was given to the rich. The women were separated from the men, and sat in a gallery inclosed with lattices, so that they could dis

tinctly see and hear all that passed in the synagogue, without themselves being exposed to view.1

III. For the maintenance of good order, there were in every synagogue certain OFFICERS, whose business it was to see that all the duties of religion were decently performed therein. The following officers are mentioned, or referred to, in the New Testament:-

1. The 'Apxiovváywyos, or Ruler of the Synagogue. (Luke xiii. 14. Mark v. 22.) It appears from Acts xiii. 15., collated with Mark v. 22., and John vi. 59., that there were several of these rulers in a synagogue. They regulated all its concerns, and gave permission to persons to preach. They were always men advanced in age, and respectable for their learning and probity; and they had the power of inflicting punishment on those whom they judged to be rebellious against the law; in allusion to which circumstance Christ forewarned his disciples that they should be scourged in the synagogues. (Matt. x. 17.)

2. Next to the Ruler of the Synagogue, was an officer, whose province it was to offer up public prayers to God for the whole congregation. By Jewish writers we are informed that he was called Sheliach Zibbor, that is, the angel or messenger of the congregation; because, as their messenger, he spoke to God for them. In allusion to this officer, probably, in Rev. ii. iii. the presiding ministers of the Asiatic churches are termed angels or messengers.

3. The Reader, or Chazan, who was either a stated officer or one especially appointed for the purpose. His duty was to read in Hebrew, out of the law and the prophets, the proper lesson for the day. The office of reader in the synagogue at Nazareth was performed by Jesus Christ. (Luke iv. 16.)

4. The Tπnρέτns, or Minister, mentioned in Luke iv. 20. was an inferior attendant or servant of the synagogue. He had the charge of the sacred books; which he produced from the chest wherein they were kept, delivered to the reader, from whom he received them back, and returned them to their proper place of deposit.

IV. The SERVICE of the synagogue was performed in the following manner:

1. The people being seated, the angel or messenger of the congregation first offered up the Public Prayers, the people rising from their seats, and standing in a posture of deep devotion. (Matt. v. 5.; Mark xi. 25.,; Luke xviii. 11. 13.) According to Dr. Prideaux, the Jews had liturgies, in which are all the prescribed forms of the synagogue worship. The most solemn part of these prayers are the SHEMONEH ESREH, or the eighteen prayers, which, according to the rabbins, were composed and instituted by Ezra, in order that the Jews, whose language after the captivity was corrupted with many barbarous terms

In some very ancient synagogues, as at Carpentras and Avignon (in the south of France), it appears that the women occupied the lowest story, the ground floor of the building, and the men the second and third story. In these cases the middle of the area of the second floor was covered by an iron frame, which had apertures large enough to allow the women to see the roll of the law exposed, and to hear the service, although they were not exposed to view. [For this note the author is indebted to the courtesy of a late learned Jew, Mr. A. Asher, of Berlin.]

borrowed from other languages, might be able to perform their devotions in the pure language of their own country. Such is the account which Maimonides gives, out of the Gemara, of the origin of the Jewish liturgies; and the eighteen collects, in particular, are mentioned in the Mishna. However, some better evidence than that of the talmudical rabbies is requisite, in order to prove their liturgies to be of so high an antiquity; especially since some of their prayers, as Dr. Prideaux acknowledges, seem to have been composed after the destruction of Jerusalem, and to have reference to it. It is evident they were composed when there was neither temple nor sacrifice; since the seventeenth collect prays, that God would restore his worship to the inner part of his house, and make haste, with fervour and love, to accept the burnt sacrifices of Israel', &c. They could not, therefore, be the composition of Ezra, who did not receive his commission from Artaxerxes to go to Judæa, till more than fifty years after the second temple was built, and its worship restored. The probability is, that the forms of prayer for the synagogue worship were at first very few, and that some were in use in the time of Jesus Christ, the number of which was subsequently increased. To the eighteen prayers above mentioned, another was added, a short time before the destruction of the second temple, by Rabbi Gamaliel, or, according to some writers, by Rabbi Samuel, one of his scholars. It is directed against apostates and heretics, under which appellations are designated all Christians, whether of Jewish or of Gentile descent. This additional prayer is now inserted as the twelfth, and the number is nineteen. They are required to be said by all Jews without exception, who are of age, three times every day, either in public, at the synagogue, or at their own houses, or wherever they may happen to be. As some readers may be curious to see them, they are subjoined, at the end of this section.2

2. The second part of this synagogue service is the Reading of the Kirioth-Shema, which consists of three portions of Scripture, viz., Deut. vi. 6-9.; Deut. xi. 13-21.; Numb. xv. 37-41. As the first of these portions commences with the word shema, that is, hear, they are collectively termed the Shema, and the reading of them is called Kirioth-Shema, or the reading of the Shema. This reading or recital is preceded and followed by several prayers and benedictions; and, next to the saying of the nineteen prayers above noticed, is the most solemn part of the religious service of the Jews; who, believing the commands in Deut. vi. 7. and xi. 19. to be of perpetual obligation, repeat the Shema daily, every morning and evening.3

The fifth, tenth, eleventh, and fourteenth collects have the same allusion and reference as the seventeenth. See the original prayers in Maimonides de Ordine Precum, or in Vitringa (de Synag. vetere, lib. iii. part ii. cap. 14. pp. 1033-1038.) who observes that the Talmudists will have the seventeenth collect, which prays for the restoration of the temple worship, (reduc ministerium Leviticum in Adytum Domus tuæ, as he translates it,) to have been usually recited by the king in the temple at the feast of tabernacles; which is such an absurdity that it confutes itself, and shows how little the Jewish traditions concerning the antiquity and use of their liturgies are to be depended upon. 2 See pp. 285-288., infrà.

Before the modern Jews come to the Kirioth-Shema, the following prayer is offered "for their in-gathering from the four corners of the earth:”—“And bring us in peace

3. The third part of the synagogue service was the Reading of the Scriptures, which included the reading of the whole law of Moses, and portions of the prophets, and the Hagiographa or holy writings.

(1.) The Law was divided into fifty-three, according to the Masorets, or, according to others, fifty-four Paraschioth or sections: for the Jewish year consisted of twelve lunar months, alternately of twenty-nine or thirty days, that is, of fifty weeks and four days. The Jews, therefore, in their division of the law into Paraschioth or sections, had a respect to their intercalary year, which was every second or third, and consisted of thirteen months; so that the whole law was read over this year, allotting one Paraschá or section to every Sabbath; and in common years they reduced the fifty-three or fifty-four sections to the number of the fifty Sabbaths, by reading two shorter ones together, as often as there was occasion. They began the course of reading on the first Sabbath after the feast of tabernacles; or rather, indeed, on the Sabbath day before that, when they finished the last course of reading, they also made a beginning of the new course; that so, as the rabbies say, the devil might not accuse them to God of being weary of reading his law.

(2.) The portions selected out of the prophetical writings are termed Haphtoroth. When Antiochus Epiphanes conquered the Jews about the year 163 before the Christian æra, he prohibited the public reading of the law in the synagogues, on pain of death. The Jews, in order that they might not be wholly deprived of the word of God, selected from other parts of the Sacred Writings fifty-four portions, which were termed HAPHTORAS (HаPHTOROTH), from 705 (PaTaR), he dismissed, let loose, opened-for though the Law was dismissed from their synagogues, and was closed to them by the edict of this persecuting king, yet the prophetic writings, not being under the interdict, were left open; and therefore they used them in place of the others. It was from this custom of the Jews, that the primitive Christians adopted theirs, of reading a lesson every Sabbath out of the Old and New Testaments. The following tables exhibit the paraschioth or sections of the law, and the haphtoroth or sections of the prophets (which were substituted for the former), as they have been read together ever since the days of the Asmonæans or Maccabees, and as they continue to be read in the various synagogues belonging to the English, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch, and German Jews.

from the four corners of the earth, and lead us in safety to our land: for thou art a God working salvation, and thou hast chosen us from every nation and tongue, and thou hast drawn us near to thy Great Name for ever with faithfulness. We give thanks unto thee, and are united unto thee with love. Blessed art thou, O Lord, who chooseth his people Israel through love."- -"When they come to this prayer, they collect the fringes from the four corners of the Talith" (a vestment with fringes at the four corners), between the little finger and the next to it, and hold it opposite to the heart, in supposed accordance with the injunction in Deut. vi. 6. (And these words which I command thee shall be in or upon thine heart.) And they are held so during the repetition of the Kirioth-Shema. When they come to the passage, And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes (Deut. vi. 8.), they touch both phylacteries, and kiss their hands in the place where they touched the phylacteries: and whenever they repeat the word Zuzoth, or fringes, they touch their eyes with the fringes, and then kiss them."Margoliouth's "Fundamental Principles of Modern Judaism investigated," pp. 81, 82.

A TABLE OF THE PARASCHIOTH, OR SECTIONS OF THE Law, as read IN THE DIFFERENT JEWISH SYNAGOGUES FOR EVERY SABBATH OF THE YEAR.1

This and the following table are copied from Dr. A. Clarke's Commentary on Deut. xxxiv., who states that he has in general followed the divisions in the best Masoretic Bibles, from which our common English Bibles in some cases will be found to vary a little. On the above tables, Dr. Clarke remarks, that though the Jews are agreed in the sections of the law that are read every sabbath, yet they are not agreed in the haphtoroth, or sections from the prophets; since it appears that the Dutch and German Jews differ in several