avers that only two are to be met with in all the Old Testament.

Of all the various readings the most important are those that occur in the Hebrew and Samaritan Pentateuchs, upon which point Dr. Kennicott makes the following excellent observations: "One ancient copy has been received from the Jews, and we are truly thankful for it; another ancient copy is offered by the Samaritans; let us thankfully accept that likewise. Both have been often transcribed; both, therefore, may contain errors. They differ in many instances, therefore the errors must be many. Let the two parties be heard without prejudice; let their evidences be weighed with impartiality; and let the genuine words of Moses be ascertained by their joint assistance. Let the variations of all the manuscripts, on each side, be carefully collected; and then critically examined by the context and the ancient versions. If the Samaritan copy should be found, in some places, to correct the Hebrew, yet will the Hebrew copy, in other places, correct the Samaritan. Each copy, therefore, is invaluable; each copy, therefore, demands our pious veneration and attentive study. The Pentateuch will never be understood perfectly till we admit the authority of both."

REAPING. See AGRICULTURE; HARVEST; Hus

BANDRY.

REBEKAH, р the wife of Isaac, and daughter of Bethuel, was the mother of Esau and Jacob. Her history is given at some length in the 22nd and three succeeding chapters of the Book of Genesis.

"Rebekah's covering herself with a veil, when Isaac came to meet her, which is mentioned in Genesis 24. 65, is to be considered rather as a part of the ceremonial belonging to the presenting a bride to her intended husband, than an effect either of female delicacy or desire to appear in the most attractive form. The Eastern brides are wont to be veiled in a particular manner, when presented to the bridegroom. Those that give us an account of their customs, at such times, take notice of their being veiled all over. Dr. Russell gives us this circumstance in his account of a Maronite wedding, which he says may serve as a specimen of all the rest, there being nothing materially different in the ceremonies of the different sects." Harmer.

REBEL, TO, is to cast off lawful authority, or make war against a superior. (Numb. 16. 1,2; 2Sam. 15. 20.) Men rebel against God when they contemn his authority and do what he forbids. (Numb. 14. 9.) They rebel against his Spirit, when they resist his motions and slight reproofs. (Isai. 63. 10.) They rebel against his word, when they refuse to believe his promises, receive his offers, or obey his laws. (Psalm 107. 11.)

RECEIPT OF CUSTOM. It was from this occupation that Our Lord saw fit to choose one of his Apostles, (Matt. 9.9,) a man whose office was held in peculiar detestation by his countrymen. (See PUBLICAN.) Matthew was a tax-gatherer, or as we should say, a customhouse officer. The publicans had houses or booths built for them at the foot of bridges, at the mouth of rivers, and by the sea shore, where they took toll of passengers that went to and fro. Hence we read of the tickets or seals of the publicans, which, when a man had paid toll on one side of a river, were given him by the publican to show to him that sat on the other side, that it might appear he had paid. On these were written two great letters, larger than those in common use.

Arriving at Persepolis, Mr. Morier observes, "Here is station of rahdars, or toll-gatherers, appointed to levy a toll upon kafilahs or caravans of merchants; and who in general exercise their office with so much brutality and extortion, as to be execrated by all travellers. The collections of the toll are farmed, consequently extortion ensues; and, as most of the rahdars receive no other emolument than what they can exact over and above the prescribed dues from the traveller, their insolence is accounted for, and a cause sufficiently powerful is given for their insolence on the one hand, and the detestation in which they are held on the other. Baf-gah, means the place of tribute: it may also be rendered the receipt. of custom; and perhaps it was from a place like this that Our Saviour called Matthew to follow him.”

At Smyrna the mirijee sits in the house allotted to him, as Matthew sat at the receipt of custom (or in the custom-house of Capernaum): and receives the money which is due from various persons and commodities entering the city. "The exactions and rude behaviour of these men," says Mr. Hartley, "are just in character with the conduct of the publicans mentioned in the New Testament. When men are guilty of such conduct as this, no wonder that they were detested in ancient times, as were the publicans; and in modern times, as are the mirijees."

RECHABITES, O

a nomadic tribe, probably Kenites, who pressed by the arms of Nebuchadnezzar forsook their deserts and took refuge in Jerusalem, in the days of Ahab. (Jerem. ch. 35.) On their arrival at Jerusalem, the prophet Jeremiah was divinely sent to them to offer them wine to drink, for a trial of their obedience.

But they said, "We will drink no wine:

for Jonadab, the son of Rechab our father, commanded us, saying: Ye shall drink no wine, neither ye, nor your sons for ever." (Jerem. 35. 6.) Then the Lord commanded the prophet to upbraid the Jews for their disobedience; comparing their ungrateful conduct with the unshaken obedience of the Rechabites; denouncing his anger on the one, and declaring his solemn blessing on the other. "Therefore thus saith the Lord God of Hosts, the God of Israel: Behold I will bring upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, all the evil that I have pronounced against them; because I have spoken unto them, but they have not heard; and I have called unto them, but they have not answered. And Jeremiah said unto the house of the Rechabites, Thus saith the Lord God of Hosts, the God of Israel; Because ye have obeyed the commandment of Jonadab your father, and kept all his precepts, and done according unto all that he hath commanded you: therefore thus saith the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel; Jonadab, the son of Rechab, shall not want a man to stand before me for ever."

The Rechabites are by many writers considered as a class of holy persons, who, like the Nazarites, separated themselves from the rest of the Jews, in order that they might lead a more pious life. But this is evidently a mistake; for they were not Israelites or Jews, but Kenites or Midianites, who used to live in tents, and traverse the country in quest of pasture for their cattle, as the Nabathæan Arabs anciently did, and as the

modern Arabians and Tartars still do. Their manner of living was not the result of a religious institute, but a mere civil ordinance, grounded upon a national custom. They derived their institutions from Jonadab, the son of Rechab, a man of eminent zeal for the pure worship of God against idolatry, who assisted King Jehu in destroying the house of Ahab and the worshippers of Baal. (2Kings 10. 15,16,23.) It was he who gave the rule of life to his children and their posterity, which is recorded by the Prophet Jeremiah (35. 5-7,) and which consisted of these three articles: (1,) that they should drink no wine; (2,) that they should neither possess nor occupy any houses, fields, or vineyards; and (3,)| that they should dwell in tents. In these regulations he appears to have had no religious, but merely a prudential view, as appears from the reason assigned for them, viz.: that they should live many days in the land where they were strangers.

It appears from the concurrent testimony of successive travellers, that the Rechabites still exist; a striking example of the completion of promised blessings to a thousand generations, on those who love the Lord and keep his commandments. They were first discovered by Benjamin of Tudela, a learned Jew, who travelled. through Arabia about the year 1161: he says that they were very numerous, and possessed a large tract of country in the northern mountains of Al-Yemen, surrounded by a desert; they lived independent under a prince of their own; and were oppressed by no foreign power, but held in great terror by the neighbouring Arabs. They were first brought into notice in modern times by Mr. Samuel Brett, who wrote a narrative of the proceedings of the great council of the Jews in Hungary, A.D. 1650. He says of the sect of the Rechabites, "that they observe their old rules and customs, and neither sow nor plant, nor build houses; but live in tents, and often remove from one place to another with their whole property and families."

Niebuhr, who visited Arabia in 1761, makes mention of a body of Jews in the mountains north-east of Medina; who he says are most remarkable, though but little known. They are called the "Beni-Kheiber," or sons of Heber, who was a Kenite, one of the descendants of Jethro, and live under independent sheikhs of their own, being divided into three tribes; they have but little intercourse with the Jews dispersed over Asia, and are greatly feared by the surrounding Arabs. They have subsisted in the same district for more than twelve centuries, and valiantly opposed Mohammed and the first Caliphs. Niebuhr thought them to be the same people mentioned by Benjamin of Tudela. The Beni-Kheiber still inhabit the same territory; and it is affirmed that the Jews of Jerusalem and those of Yemen, as well as the Mohammedans, believe them to be the descendants of those Rechabites who went to Jerusalem in the time of Jeremiah: they assert themselves to be so, and dwell in three numerous tribes in the neighbourhood of Mecca and Medina; still living in tents as their father commanded them. They continue true to the worship of the God of Israel; and refer for their existence and prosperity, to the blessing of the Lord of Hosts, pronounced upon their forefathers by the Prophet Jeremiah. This blessing continues to follow the filial obedience of the Rechabites, who still keep the precepts of their father; and the faithful performance of "the first commandment with promise,” (Eph. 6. 2,) has been rewarded in the preservation of the posterity of Jonadab, the son of Rechab: it is more than four and twenty centuries since it was pronounced, and his men still stand before the Lord, although in the very heart of a country of unbelievers.

Another writer states, "The Beni-Rechab, sons of Rechab, still exist, a distinct and equally distinguishable people. They boast of their descent from Rechab, profess pure Judaism, and they all know Hebrew. Yet they live in the neighbourhood of Mecca, the chief seat of Mohammedanism, and their number is stated to be 60,000."

The notice in Niebuhr having attracted the attention of Joseph Wolff, the well-known Jewish missionary, he was led to make inquiries on the subject at Jerusalem. On asking a well-informed Jew, Rabbi Mose Secot, whether he knew anything of the Jews near Medina, the Rabbi said, "Yes, they were the Beni-Kheiber." Delighted at this information, Wolff further asked whether they ever came to Jerusalem. The Rabbi replied, “No; but they came there in the time of Jeremiah the prophet." On being asked how he knew this, he referred to the 35th chapter of Jeremiah, the eleven first verses of which they read together. Mr. Wolff then proceeds, "You see by this that Rabbi Mose Secot is quite certain that the Beni-Kheiber are the descendants of the Rechabites. To this present moment they drink no wine; and have neither vineyard nor field, nor seed, but dwell like Arabs in tents, and are wandering nomades. They believe and observe the law of Moses by tradition, for they are not in possession of the written law." He further ascertained that the Rabbi considered the name Kheiber to be the same as that of Heber, denoting their descent from that Kenite. Afterwards the Rabbi showed him a passage in the Talmud which describes the Beni-Kheiber as descended from Jethro, their remote ancestor.

RECORDER, UD mazkir. (2Sam. 8. 16.) In the margin of our larger English Bibles, this officer in the Jewish court is termed a remembrancer, or writer of chronicles.

The office was of no mean estimation in the Eastern world, where it was customary for kings to keep daily That its registers of all the transactions of their reigns. holder might discharge this trust with effect, it was necessary that he should be acquainted with the true springs and secrets of action, and consequently be high in the confidence of the sovereign. Accordingly, Jehoshaphat, the son of Ahilud, who was David's recorder or historiographer, (2Sam. 8. 16,) and appears to have been also retained by Solomon, is mentioned as one of his princes. (2Kings 4. 3.) Joah, the son of Asaph, was recorder of the pious King Hezekiah. (2Kings 18. 18-37; Isai. 36.3.) In Esther 6.1, and 10.2, mention is made of the "records of the chronicles," written by an officer of this nature.

RECORDS, N sepher dachranaya. (Ezra 4. 15.) This phrase means the book of records, or the chronicles of the Persian empire compiled by the recorder.

In the account of the symbolical purchase of a field at Anathoth by the Prophet Jeremiah, we have a circumstance stated regarding the preservation of the records of the transaction, which at first sight appears hard to be accounted for, but when investigated proves to be identical with the custom of the East at the present day. "I took the evidence of the purchase, both that which was sealed according to the law and custom, and that which was open..... and put them in an earthen vessel." (Jerem. 32. 11,14.)

The insecurity of property has in all ages prompted the Orientals to resort to various methods of conceal

lish term Red Sea is a mere translation, as Erythrus is of the Hebrew Edom, the name of one of the most celebrated countries on its shores. See EDOM.

The Red Sea, called also the Arabian Gulf, is a branch of the Indian Ocean, which commencing at the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, runs in a north-westerly course for more than fourteen hundred miles, between Ethiopia and Egypt on the west, and Arabia on the east. Its width greatly varies in different places, but is, on an average, one hundred and fifty miles; it is also of vast depth, but its shores are fringed with reefs of coral, and from the great prevalence of strong winds, its navigation is exceedingly difficult and dangerous. At its northern part it divides into two branches, which running northeast and north-west, inclose the peninsula of Sinai, the scene of so many memorable transactions. Of these branches, the eastern, now called the Gulf of Akabah, is one hundred miles long by fifteen broad; it is the Gulf of Elath of antiquity, where was the station of the fleets of Solomon. (See ELATH.) The western arm, the Heroopolitic Gulf, now termed the Gulf of Suez, is one hundred and eighty miles in length and twenty in breadth; it was the scene of the destruction of Pharaoh's host, (see RED SEA, PASSAGE OF,) and therefore requires a somewhat extended notice, which may be best given in the words of our most recent authority, Professor Robinson:

"The Gulf of Suez, as seen from the adjacent hills, presents the appearance of a long strip of water, setting far up, like a large river through a desert valley of twenty or thirty miles in width; the shores skirted sometimes by arid plains, and sometimes interrupted by naked mountains and promontories on either side. The whole configuration reminded me strongly of the valley of the Nile on a larger scale; except that there the noble river bears fertility on its bosom, and scatters it abroad in lavish profusion; while here desolation reigns throughout. The gulf becomes narrower towards Suez, and terminates in a line of coast extending from the town westward nearly to Jebel 'Atâkab, a distance of six or eight miles. Further south, this mountain runs quite down to the sea, forming the promontory called Ras 'Atâkah; beyond which opens the broad mouth or plain of Wady Tawârik; and then follows Jebel Deraj or Kulâlah, and the long chain of African mountains. On the east side of the gulf, the parallel ridge of mountains, called Er-Râhah, is here twelve or fifteen miles distant from the coast. Around the head of the gulf extensive shoals stretch out southwards far into the sea, and are left bare at low water; except a narrow winding channel like a small river, by which light vessels come quite up to the town. We saw these shoals twice while the tide was out. They extend a mile and a half or two miles below Suez; are quite level and hard, thinly covered with sea-weed; and are composed apparently of sand, mingled perhaps with coral. persons walking upon them quite near the southern extremity. Larger vessels and the steamers lie off in the road below these shoals, more than two miles distant from the town.

We saw

"The desert plain behind Suez, extending west as far as to 'Atâkah, and north to 'Ajrûd, is composed, for the most part, of hard gravel; and is apparently of no recent formation, but as old as the adjacent hills and mountains. Just at Suez a narrow arm runs up northwards for a considerable distance from the north-east corner of the gulf: in the state in which we saw it, the water extended up about two miles; but the depression or bed of it continues beyond the mounds of the ancient canal, and as far as the eye can reach. Opposite Suez this arm is about eleven hundred and fifty yards wide, according to

Niebuhr; but higher up and opposite Tell Kolzum, it is broader, and has several low islands or sand-banks, which are mostly covered at high water. It is here and around the northern part of this arm that there are evident traces of a gradual filling up of this part of the Red Sea. I am not aware of any circumstances which go to show that the level of the sea itself has been changed; but the change, if any, has been brought about solely by the drifting-in of sand from the northern part of the great desert plain, which here extends to the eastern mountains. This plain is ten miles or more wide. Burckhardt crossed it in 1812 in six hours from the wells of Mab'ûk at the foot of the mountains to the mounds of the canal, and says it was full of moving sands which covered the plain as far as he could discern, and, in some places, had collected into hills thirty or forty feet in height.' Such it was as we also saw it on our left in passing around the head of the bay; and the sand driven by the strong north-east wind, which often prevails, is continually carried towards and into the water, and the process of filling up is still going on. There can be little room for doubt that the islands above Suez were formed in this manner, since, in former days, vessels probably lay at Kolzum, which they now cannot reach. Around the head of the inlet there are also obvious indications that the water extended much further north, and probably spread itself out over a wide tract towards the north-east. The ground bears every mark of being still occasionally overflowed; and our Arabs said it was often covered by the sea, especially in winter, when the south winds prevail. The soil of this part is a fine sand, like that of the adjacent desert, only rendered more solid by the action of the waves. In some parts it was covered with a saline crust, and occasionally exhibited strips white with shells. Whether the shoals south of Suez were formed in the same manner it is more difficult to decide; though they would seem now to have a firmer consistence.

"We were told that the tide rises at Suez, and upon these shoals, about seven English feet. According to the French measurements, the average rise of the tides in their time was five and a-half Paris feet, though it sometimes exceeded six feet. Niebuhr found it to be only three feet and a-half. It must obviously vary much with the direction of the wind; since a strong wind from the northern quarter would have the effect to drive the tide out, and prevent its return; while a south wind would produce the contrary results. Opposite Suez there is a ferry; and higher up at Tell Kolzum, a ford, which is sometimes used at low water, leading over two of the sandy islands. Niebuhr's guide passed this ford on foot, and the water came scarcely up to their knees. An island just below the ford is called Jezirat el-Yehûdîyeh, 'Jews' Island.' There is also another ford south of Suez, near the edge of the shoals, where a long narrow sand-bank extends out from the eastern shore. Here at low tides the Arabs sometimes wade across the channel; the water being then about five feet deep, or, as they said, coming up to the chin."

The Red Sea is early mentioned in the Scriptures, and its shores have a strong interest for the Biblical student. A modern traveller says, "After a tedious passage from India, we entered the Straits of Jubal [at the mouth of the Gulf of Suez]; and few countries present themselves to the imagination of the traveller under circumstances so well calculated to awaken a deep and lasting interest as those around us. From the earliest dawn of history, the northern shores of the Red Sea have figured as the scene of events which both religious and civil records have united to render memorable. Here Moses and the patriarchs tended their flocks, and put in motion those springs of

civilisation which from that period have never ceased to urge forward the human race in the career of improvement. On the one hand, the valley of the wanderings commenced near the site of Memphis, and opening upon the Red Sea, conducts the fancy along the track pursued by the Hebrews during their flight out of Egypt. On the other hand are Mount Sinai, bearing still upon its face the impress of miraculous events; and beyond it that strange, stormy, and gloomy looking sea, once frequented by Phoenician merchants' ships, by the fleets of Solomon and Pharaoh, and those barks of later times which bore the incense, the gold, the gems, and spices of the East, to be consumed or lavishly squandered upon favourites at the courts of Macedonia or Rome. "But the countries lying along this offshoot of the Indian Ocean have another kind of interest, peculiar perhaps to themselves. On the Arabian side we find society much what it was four thousand years ago; for amidst the children of Ishmael it has undergone but trifling modifications. Their tents are neither better nor worse than they were when they purchased Joseph of his brethren on their way to Egypt; the sheiks possess no other power or influence than they possessed then; the relations of the sexes have suffered little or no changes; they eat, drink, clothe themselves, educate their children, make war and peace, just as they did in the days of the Exodus.

But on the opposite shores all has been change, fluctuation, and decay. While the Bedouins have wandered with their camels and their flocks, unaspiring, unimproving, they have looked across the gulf, and beheld the Egyptian overthrown by the Persian, the Persian by the Greek, the Greek by the Roman, and the Roman in his turn by a daring band from their own burning deserts. They have seen empires grow up like Jonah's gourd. War has swept away some; the vanities and luxuries of peace have undermined and brought others to the ground; and every spot along these shores is celebrated."

RED SEA, PASSAGE OF THE. The main features of this wondrous transaction having been already noticed in the article EXODUS, we shall here chiefly confine ourselves to an examination of the locality of the event, which, after much discussion, seems now to be really ascertained.

The Israelites, thrust out from Egypt, would naturally have pursued the most direct way to Canaan, and left the Red Sea to the southward; but, Divinely directed, they encamped upon its shores at Pihahiroth, in a situation where all escape from the pursuit of Pharach seemed hopeless. They murmured, and reproached Moses with bringing them out to perish in the wilderness; but he answered them, "Fear ye not; stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show to you to-day; for the Egyptians whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more for ever. The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace." Upon this, that mysterious pillar-of cloud by day, and of fire by night-which had hitherto appeared in advance of the Israelites, shifted its position to their rear, and stood up between them and the pursuing Egyptians. Then Moses, by Divine command, stretched out his hand over the arm of the sea which ran before the camp, and immediately a strong east wind began to blow, the waters were driven back, and a dry passage appeared throughout, to the other side of the gulf. Along this awful pass the Hebrews marched during the night, and by the morning light were all safely arrived on the opposite coast.

The Egyptians had witnessed this wonderful escape

1135

of their imagined victims, and in their blindness and fury, followed them into the miraculous path. But now their appointed hour was come. In the words of the sacred text, " It came to pass that in the morning watch the Lord looked unto the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians, and took off their chariot-wheels, that they drave them heavily; so that the Egyptians said, 'Let us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fighteth for them against the Egyptians.' Then the Lord said unto Moses, 'Stretch out thine hand over the sea, that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and upon their horsemen.'

Niebuhr, the Danish traveller, thinks the place of the passage was near Suez. At this point the water is about two miles across, and Niebuhr himself forded it. But he says that the sea must have been deeper in old time, and extended further towards the north. Burckhardt agrees with Niebuhr; others place its site about thirty miles lower down. Still, wherever the passage was effected, the Mosaic account cannot, by any fair interpretation, be explained without miraculous agency. Moses, an eye-witness, expressly declares that the agency was direct, immediate, and foretold of God; and how can there be any room for explaining this away without at once denying the veracity of the sacred historian himself?

Bruce, the traveller, has well observed that the doubts of its having been done by miracle do not merit any particular attention to solve them. "This passage," says he, "is told us by Scripture to be a miraculous one; and if so, we have nothing to do with natural causes. If we do not believe Moses, we need not believe the transaction at all, seeing that it is from his authority we derive it. If we believe in God that He 'made' the sea, we must believe He could divide' it, when He sees proper reason; and of that He must be the only judge.

"It is no greater miracle to divide the Red Sea than to divide the river Jordan. If the Etesian wind, blowing from the north-west in summer, could keep up the sea as a wall on the right, or to the south, of fifty feet high; still the difficulty would remain of building the wall on the left hand, or to the north. Besides, water standing in that position for a day must have lost the nature of fluid. Whence came that cohesion of particles which hindered that wall to escape at the sides? This is as great a miracle as that of Moses. If the Etesian winds had done this once, they must have repeated it many a time before and since from the same causes.

"Were all these difficulties surmounted, what could we do with the 'pillar of fire?' The answer is, we should not believe it. Why, then, believe the passage at all? We have no authority for the one, but what is for the other: it is altogether contrary to the ordinary nature of things; and if not a miracle, it must be a fable."

There are on the spot traditions of this memorable event still existing. The wells or fountains in the neighbourhood are still called by the names of Moses and Pharaoh. "Whenever," says Niebuhr, "you ask an Arab where the Egyptians were drowned, he points to the part of the shore where you are standing. In one bay they pretend to hear, in the roaring of the waters, the wailings of the ghosts of Pharaoh's army;" and Diodorus Siculus, who lived about the commencement of the Christian era, relates a tradition derived by the Ichthyophagi (the ancient inhabitants of this coast) from their forefathers, that once an extraordinary reflux took place, the channel of the gulf became dry, the green bottom appearing, and the whole body of water rolling