St. Paul in Crete, after his first imprisonment at Rome, to "set in order the things that were wanting, and to ordain elders in every city." (Titus 1.5.) It is probable that he went from thence to join St. Paul at Nicopolis, (Titus 3. 12,) that they went together to Crete, to visit the churches there, and thence to Rome. During St. Paul's second imprisonment at Rome, Titus went into Dalmatia, (2Tim. 4. 10;) and after the apostle's death he is said to have returned to Crete, and to have died there, in the ninety-fourth year of his age. Titus is often called bishop of Crete by the ecclesiastical writers, who speak of him with great respect; but a higher tribute to his character is, that St. Paul always mentions him in terms of high regard, and entrusted him, as we have seen, with commissions of the greatest importance.

TOB, a small district of Canaan, eastward of Jordan, to the north of the possessions of the half tribe of Manasseh. Here Jephthah took refuge when expelled by his brethren; and thither the elders of Gilead repaired to him when the incursions of the children of Ammon upon the Israelites obliged them to solicit the assistance of that bold chieftain, who had placed himself at the head of a predatory band of "vain men" in the land of Tob. P.

TOBIAH, an Ammonite and enemy to the Jews. He united with Sanballat in opposing the rebuilding of the Temple, and was able to give much annoyance to Nehemiah, because his marriage with the daughter of Shechaniah, a Jewish chief, enabled him to form a party in Jerusalem itself. (Nehem. 6. 18.) C.

TOGARMAH, COUNTRY OF. Togarmah was the third son of Gomer, and the grandson of Japheth. (Gen. 10.3; 1Chron. 1.6.) Sacred and profane historians seem to agree in indicating that his descendants occupied the regions of Pontus and Cappadocia, in Asia Minor; Ptolemy calls them Trocmi; Cicero, Trogmi; and Stephanus, Trocmeni. The Prophet Ezekiel points out the district inhabited by "the house of Togarmah," when he describes them as "of the north quarter;" their country, stretching from the confines of Syria to the Black Sea, being directly north of Judea. The Togarmi carried on considerable traffic with Tyre: "They of the house of Togarmah traded in thy fairs with horses, and horsemen, and mules." (Ezek. 27.) P.

TOMB. See SEPULCHRE.

TOPAZ, pitdah, a precious stone of a pale green, and sometimes of a yellow colour. It is mentioned Exodus 28. 17; Job 28. 19; and Revelations 21. 10. C.

TOPHET. This was the name of a valley to the south of Jerusalem, also called the valley of Hinnom; employed metaphorically to designate the place of eternal punishment. In the New Testament it is called Gehenna (Teevva), a corruption from Ge (valley), and its ancient name, Hinnom: "Vocabulum Hebraicum ex duobis compositum vallem Hinnom declarat, in qua olim Israëlitæ, superstitionibas vicinarum gentium addicti, filios suos diis adolebant, inaudita quadam immanitate. Inde factum ut acciperetur pro loco cruciandis in æternum reprobis destinato, atque adeò pro ipso supplicio et crucitatu quo afficiuntur cum Satana et angelis ipsius sicut Erasmus, et alii multi annotarunt." (SCAPULA.) Tophet is the name still applied to a frightful flinty precipice in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, which rises out of the valley of Hinnom.

Tophet was infamous on account of the sacrifices

offered there to Moloch. The Jews, in violation of the commands of God, the penal enactments of the Mosaic law, and the constant warnings of the prophets, upon many occasions lapsed into the idolatrous abominations of the surrounding nations, and abandoned themselves to the worship of this bloody idol; which they celebrated in Tophet: "And they have built the high places of Tophet, which is in the valley of the son of Hinmon, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which I commanded them not, neither came it into my heart. Therefore shall the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall be no more called Tophet, nor the valley of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter: for they shall bury in Tophet till there be no place." (Jerem. 7. 31,32.) King Josiah we are told (2Kings 23. 10,) defiled the place of Tophet, where the temple of Moloch had been erected by the apostate Israelites, "that no man might make his own son, or his daughter, pass through the fire to Moloch." Tophet thus became a polluted place where carcases were cast which were refused burial. If we are to credit the Rabbins, the idol of Moloch was made of brass; and when his votaries would offer victims at his shrine, the statue was heated to an intense degree, and the cruel parent cast his helpless offspring into his fearful embrace: "It was a large statue of brass, rendered as hideous as the Jews could make it. They heated this statue red hot in a large fire, although they had very little fuel, and cast their children into the belly of the god, as our cooks cast living lobsters into the boiling water of their cauldrons. Such were the ancient Celts and Tudescans, when they burned their children in honour of Teutates and Hirminsule. Such the Gallic virtue and the German freedom!" (VOLTAIRE.) That the cries of the children might not be heard during their immolation, a hideous noise was made with drums around the idol: the name of Tophet is supposed to be derived from this practice; toph, signifying a drum. л

First, Moloch, horrid king, besmear'd with blood Of human sacrifice, and parents' tears; Though, for the noise of drums and timbrels loud, Their children's cries unheard that pass'd through fire To his grim idol. Him the Ammonite Worshipp'd in Rabba and her watery plain, In Argob, and in Basan, to the stream Of utmost Arnon; nor content with such Audacious neighbourhood, the wisest heart Of Solomon he led by fraud to build His temple right against the temple of God, On that opprobrious hill; and made his grove The pleasant valley of Hinnom, Tophet thence, And black Gehenna, called, the type of hell. The vale was watered by the brooks of Kedron and Siloam, and was, perhaps, naturally, what Milton describes it, a "pleasant valley," but from the horrid rites practised there, Tophet was regarded as the most hideous and abominable of all places. M. Voltaire compares Tophet to the "Calmar of Paris," a place where all the rubbish and carrion of the city were deposited. In after times, when the sacrifices to Moloch were utterly suppressed, Tophet was polluted with every species of filth, the carcases of animals, the dead bodies of malefactors, the refuse of their slaughter-houses, &c.; and, in order to avert the pestilence which such a mass of corruption would occasion, constant fires were kept burning there. Isaiah, in prophesying the destruction of the Assyrian army, says, "For Tophet is ordained of old, yea, for the king it is prepared; he hath made it deep and large; the pile thereof is fire and much wood; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it." (Isai. 30. 33.) It was probably in their encampment in Tophet that the host of Sennacherib was miraculously destroyed by the angel of the Lord. P.

TORCH

TORCH. A flaming torch is sometimes quoted by the prophets as the symbol of great anger and destruction. Thus Zechariah, (12. 6,)

In that day will I make the leaders of Judah

As a hearth of fire among wood,

And as a torch of fire in a sheaf;

And they shall devour on the right hand and on the left
All the people round about.

So also Isaiah (7. 4,) compares Rezin, king of Syria, and the king of Israel, two bitter enemies to Ahaz, king of Judah, to "two tails of smoking firebrands." C.

TORTOISE, tzab. Commentators are generally agreed that this word, which occurs only in Leviticus 11. 29, signifies not a tortoise, but a species of lizard, called in Arabic, dab or dhub. It is about eighteen inches in length, and four inches broad across the back; it is not venomous, and when chased, it conceals itself by rapidly burrowing in the earth. Jackson asserts that it lays eggs like the tortoise, and that the Moors regard it with superstitious reverence. C.

TOWER. The frontiers both of Egypt and Palestine were occupied by nomade tribes, whose whole delight was in marauding expeditions. Other enemies, whether conquered or defeated, were quiet when the campaign was ended;

Not so the Borderer,-bred to war,
He knew the battle's din afar,

And loved to hear it swell.
His peaceful day was slothful ease;

Nor harp, nor pipe, his soul could please
Like the loud slogan yell.

In consequence of the dangers to be dreaded from these marauders, the frontiers were studded with watch-towers, on which sentinels were placed,

Whose thrilling trump might rouse the land,
When fraud or danger were at hand;

or who might fire a beacon to give warning of the advancing foe. Great trust was reposed in the guardians of these towers, and a heavy responsibility was attached to their due discharge of their duties, which required constant vigilance and attention. Hence Isaiah compares the negligent Jewish priests to blind or careless watchmen: "His watchmen are blind; they are all ignorant, they are all dumb dogs, they cannot bark; sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber." (Isai. 56. 10.) Ezekiel forcibly describes the duty of a sentinel on a frontier tower. "Son of man, speak to the children of my people, and say unto them, When I hang a sword upon the land, if the people of the land take a man of their coasts and set him for their watchman; if when he seeth the sword come upon the land, he blow the trumpet and warn the people; then whosoever heareth the sound of the trumpet and taketh not warning; if the sword come and take him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet and took not warning: his blood shall be upon him. But he that taketh warning shall deliver his soul. But if the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchman's hand." (Ezek. 33. 2-5.)

The duties imposed on the sentinels who had charge of the watch-towers were very harassing and onerous. One is introduced by Isaiah, declaring, "I stand continually upon the watch-tower in the day-time, and I am set in my ward whole nights.” (Isai. 21. 8.) This complaint

is precisely similar to that of the sentinel described by
Eschylus, who was to keep watch for the signal that
had been appointed to announce the capture of Troy.
For ever thus! O keep me not, ye gods,
For ever thus, fixed in the lonely tower
Of Atreus' palace, from whose height I gaze
O'erwatch'd and weary, like a night-dog, still
Fix'd to my post: meanwhile the rolling year
Moves on, and I my wakeful vigils keep
By the cold starlight sheen of spangled skies.
Agamemnon 1-7.

On the other hand, the nomade tribes erected towers and fortresses for the protection of their booty, on the tops of hills and in the mountain-fastnesses. Jeremiah appears to allude to the crimes and cruelties of such marauders, when he says, "Gather up thy wares out of the land, O inhabitant of the fortress." (Jerem. 10. 17.) Jerusalem when it was possessed by the Jebusites, a plundering tribe, appears to have been a simple tower or fortalice erected on Mount Zion; but the natural strength of its position was so great, that the garrison insultingly vaunted that they would entrust the defence of the place to their sick and wounded. (2Sam. 5. 6-8.)

From their frequent wars with the Hycksos, and the other nations of Syria and Arabia, the Egyptians, in the time of the prophet Ezekiel, had acquired great skill in the construction, defence, and attack of towers and other fortified places. This was one of the reasons why Zedekiah, king of Jerusalem, contrary to the divine command, revolted against the king of Babylon, at the instigation of the Egyptian Pharaoh. The prophet Ezekiel distinctly foretold that the Pharaoh would withhold his assistance in the hour of need. "Neither shall Pharaoh with his mighty army and great company make for him in the war, by casting up mounts, and building towers to cut off many persons; seeing he despised the oath by breaking the covenant, when, lo, he had given his hand." (Ezek. 18. 17,18.) From this passage it appears that these towers were erected to secure lines of road, and to command the communications

They were also

through the defiles of Palestine. employed in the siege of cities, as appears from the king of Babylon to determine his line of march into the same prophet's account of the divination used by the kingdom of Judah: "At his right hand was the divination for Jerusalem, to appoint captains, to open the mouth in the slaughter, to lift up the voice with shouting, to appoint battering rams against the gate, (Ezek. 21. 22.)

and to build a tower."

In the figurative language of prophecy, towers are used for defenders and protectors, whether by counsel or strength, in peace or in war. Thus, the Psalmist,

Thou hast been a shelter for me,

And a strong tower from the enemy.-Psalm 61. 3.

Again in a very remarkable passage,

The name of Jehovah is a strong tower,
The righteous cometh into it and is safe.
Psalm 18. 10. C.

TRACHONITIS. A small canton on the south of Damascus, anciently called Argob. (Deut. 3. 14.) It was called Trachonitis (from Tpaxus, rough,) by the Greeks, on account of its rugged and craggy mountains. This province together with Iturea, in Our Saviour's time, made one tetrarchy or division of the kingdom of Herod the Great. Its boundaries were Arabia Deserta on the east, Batanea on the west, Iturea on the south, and the country of Damascus on the north. The rocky fastnesses of Trachonitis afforded shelter to vast numbers of robbers who infested the country. C.

TRADITION. The Jews pretended that besides their written law contained in the Pentateuch, Moses had delivered an oral law which was handed down from generation to generation; this, however, was not the only source of their traditions; various decisions of learned doctors on points which the law had left doubtful or passed over in silence, were regarded as not less valid than the law of Moses. These uninspired ordinances were not always based on principles consistent with the Mosaic institutions, and hence Christ reproached the Jews with having made void the commandments of God by their traditions.

It is probable that in the Jewish church traditions began to be important after the canon of the Old Testament closed, just as in the Christian church traditions began to be regarded when the last of the inspired writers ceased to communicate instruction. Appeals were often made to oral tradition by Irenæus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, and others of the early fathers, as a test by which the doctrines of cotemporary teachers might be tried and the errors of heretics confuted. They describe it as being instruction received from the mouth of the Apostles by the first Christian churches, transmitted from the apostolic age, and preserved in purity until their own times. St. Augustine, however, established the maxim that implicit reliance should not be placed on tradition, in the ever increasing distance from the age of the apostles, except where it was universal and consistent with itself. C.

TRANSFIGURATION. This is the name given to the miraculous change in Our Saviour's appearance when He showed three of his disciples a foretaste of his future glorification. (Matt. 17.) C.

TREASURE. In Scripture, the term "treasure" is applied to anything collected together in stores. Thus we read of a treasure of corn, of wine, of oil; treasures of gold, silver, and brass; of coin and jewels. Snow, wind, rain, and hail, are said to be in the treasures of God. (Psalm 135. 7.) We also meet such expressions as a treasure of good works; treasures of iniquity; to lay up treasures in heaven; to bring forth good or evil from the treasures of the heart; and St. Paul speaks of heaping up a treasure of wrath against the day of wrath. (Rom. 2. 8.) C.

TREE. In Eastern countries trees are not only graceful ornaments in the landscape, but essential to the comfort and support of the inhabitants. Many Oriental trees in their native soil flower twice in the year, and bear ripe fruit all the year round, and the fruits which are thus abundant, are also the most useful, for they contain cooling juices which are good in fevers and the common diseases of the country. The shady foliage too, with which the God of Providence has generally furnished all trees in these climates, affords a most refreshing and grateful protection to those who seek shelter from the direct and injurious rays of a tropical sun.

In the earlier structures erected by men, whether for houses or temples, trees were used for pillars; and hence, in symbolical language, they frequently represent, according to their respective bulk and height, the several degrees of great and rich men, or the nobles of a kingdom. Thus the prophet:

Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars;

Howl, O fir-tree, for the cedar is fallen,

Because all the mighty are spoiled.

Howl, O ye oaks of Bashan,

For the forest of the vintage is come down.-Zech.11.1,2.

Homer, whose poems frequently display traces of Oriental imagery, compares his heroes to trees. Thus, in the description of the death of Euphorbus:—

As the young olive in some sylvan scene,
Crown'd by fresh fountains with eternal green,
Lifts the gay head in snowy flowerets fair,
And plays and dances to the gentle air;
When lo! a whirlwind from high heaven invades
The tender plant, and withers all its shades;
It lies uprooted from its genial bed,
A lovely ruin now defaced and dead;

Thus young, thus beautiful, Euphorbus lay,

While the proud Spartan tore his arms away.-Iliad xvii. A remarkable passage in the book of Deuteronomy shows the great importance of fruit trees in Palestine, and at the same time affords a signal instance of the prudent humanity with which the Mosaic code tempered the horrors of war. "When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an axe against them; for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down (for the tree of the field is man's life,) to employ them in the siege; only the trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee until it be subdued." (Deut. 20. 19,20.)

It deserves to be remarked that this prohibition against injuring fruit-trees is repeated in the ninth chapter of the Apocalypse, which commentators generally believe to be a prediction of the Saracenic conquests: "There came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth; and unto them was given power as the scorpions of the earth have power. And it was commanded to them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree, but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads." (Rev. 9. 3,4.) The words of the Apostle are almost precisely identical with the Caliph Abu Bekr's instructions to his general Abu Sofian when he sent him to invade Syria: "Neither cut down palmtrees, nor burn any fields of corn. Spare all fruit-trees: slay no cattle but such as are required for your own use: cleave the skulls of the members of the synagogue of Satan who shave their crowns."

Homer's description of the gardens of Alcinous contains a beautiful enumeration of the trees which were most valued in the horticulture of Eastern Europe and Western Asia.

Close to the gate a spacious garden lies,

From storms protected and inclement skies,
Four acres was the allotted space of ground.
Fenced with a green inclosure all around
Tall thriving trees confess'd the fruitful mould,
The reddening apple ripens here to gold.
Here the blue fig with luscious juice o'erflows,
With deeper red the full pomegranate glows;
The branch here bends beneath the weighty pear,
And verdant olives flourish round the year.
The balmy spirit of the western gale
Eternal breathes on fruits untaught to fail,
Each dropping pear a following pear supplies,
On apples, apples, figs on figs arise:
The same mild season gives the bloom to blow,
The buds to harden and the fruits to grow.
Here order'd vines in equal ranks appear
With all the united labours of the year:
Some to unload the fertile branches run,
Some dry the blackening clusters in the sun.
Others to tread the liquid harvest join,
The groaning presses foam with floods of wine.
Here are the vines in early flower descried,
And there in autumn's richest purple dyed;
Beds of all various herbs for ever green,

In beauteous order terminate the scene.-Odyssey vii. C.

TRIAL. The forms of trial in the East have | varied very little since the patriarchal times. The case is generally stated by the injured person or prosecutor, and his witnesses give their testimony orally; the accused or defendant makes an oral reply, and the matter is at once decided either by a single judge or by the council. Among the Jews it was customary for the spectators of a trial to give their opinions and try to influence the verdict; we learn from Homer, in his description of the ornaments on the shield of Achilles, that a similar practice prevailed in ancient Greece during the heroic ages:

There in the forum swarm a numerous train,
The subject of debate, a townsman slain,
One pleads the fine discharged, which one denied,
And bade the public and the laws decide;
The witness is produced on either hand,
For this or that the partial people stand;
The appointed heralds still the noisy bands,
And form a ring with sceptres in their hands;
On seats of stone within the sacred place
The reverend elders nodded o'er the case,
Alternate each the attesting sceptre took,
And rising solemn each his sentence spoke.

As the Jews possessed a written code of laws, very little discretion was left to the tribunals in pronouncing sentence, and in fact, the sentences for each crime were so firmly established in the criminal legislation of the Mosaic law, that some have doubted whether a power of mitigation and pardon was conceded to the judges or even to the sovereign. We shall therefore give a list of the sentences which were ordained to be pronounced on those who were convicted on trial of certain specified crimes.

Sentence of death was pronounced in the following cases: viz., blasphemy, (Levit. 24. 23,) in which we may include profaneness and sacrilege. (Levit. 7. 21; 19. 8.) Idolatry, (Levit. 20. 12; Deut. 13. and 17,) in which is included Sabbath-breaking. (Exod.31.14; Numb. 15. 32,35.) See art. SABBATH. Also, false prophesying. (Deut. 13. 5; 18. 20.) Murder, (Numb. 35. 16-21,) under which head comes keeping a vicious ox that gores a man to death. (Exod. 21. 29.) But this capital sentence was not irremissible, it might be commuted for a sum of money. Contumacious rebellion against lawful and constituted authorities; as when a man obstinately refused obedience to a supreme court of judicature or sanhedrim, (Deut. 17. 12;) and when a son determinedly and malignantly persisted in rebellion against his parents, or uttered curses against them. (Levit. 20. 9; Deut. 21. 18.) Adultery. (Levit. 20. 10.) Foul crimes. (Levit. 20.) Witchcraft. (Levit. 20. 6.)

The highest capital sentence was burning; but this was only adjudged in case of a particular incest, (Levit. 20;) and in that of the priest's daughter being a harlot, (Levit. 21. 9,) and was sentenced in her case only, to show how heinous a crime was the bringing shame on the priesthood, (for other offenders in this kind of sin were stoned, which was a lesser punishment.) The Rabbins generally do not understand this execution to mean burning at the stake with fagots, according to our received idea of the punishment. They say, the body was not burned with fire, but the criminal was buried up to the knees, and then a handkerchief placed round the neck was tightly pulled by the witnesses till the person gaped, when molten lead was poured down the throat, which the Jews considered a more expeditious, and consequently a more merciful kind of death than the lingering one of burning. We find no authority in Scripture for this tradition; which, however, is a universal thing among the Talmudists. Rabbi Eleazar Ben Zadoc, who lived at the time of the destruction of

1299

Jerusalem, said, that when he was a little boy, he saw a priest's daughter who had been convicted of harlotry, burned at a stake with fagots. But the Rabbins say, that must have been when the sanhedrim was chiefly composed of Sadducees, who were more severe than the Pharisees, and who followed the exact letter of Scripture. The next capital sentence, and the most usual, was stoning; as in the cases of an idolater, blasphemer, adulterer, wizard, and wicked and rebellious son. As a mark of infamy in particular instances, a heap of stones was raised over the grave of the person who had suffered the punishment, as in the case of Achan. (Josh. 7. 26.) Stones were also heaped over the grave of Absalom to show that he had deserved to be stoned for his rebellion to his father. (2Sam. 18. 17.)

A similar custom obtained amongst the Arabs, and traces of it exist to this day among European nations, in the custom of raising a heap on the spot where a murder has been committed, each passer by flinging a stone upon it.

Strangling was another capital sentence: it was inflicted on murderers. The Rabbins always understand that when the words "the death" were used indefinitely, without description of the kind of death, they were permitted to construe it in the most merciful manner, and to use strangling (not hanging up alive). But when the Scripture added "his blood be on his head," they were obliged to understand it of stoning.

Hanging a criminal alive on a gibbet, or tree, was not practised among the Jews, but hanging up the dead body after execution, as a mark of infamy. This was done only in cases of great crimes. (Deut. 21. 22.) “If a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree:" here the death precedes the hanging, and this death the Jewish doctors understand to be stoning, which they say is indicated by the expression "worthy of death." And the word chattah, is put to designate a great and remarkable degree of wickedness, conformable to Hosea, (12. 8,) "In all my labours they shall find none iniquity (V gnain) in me that were sin,” on chatlah, where sin is shown as a higher degree of evil than iniquity. Deuteronony 21. 23, continues, concerning the hanging up of the dead criminal, "His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in anywise bury him that day, for he that is hanged is accursed of God." The above shows why he was accursed; not because he was hanged, but because his crime was of so great and cursed a degree, that he was hanged up a spectacle of infamy after death; and this explains Galatians 3. 13: "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law, being made a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree;" shewing that in the nature of the death Christ died for us, he suffered not only the greatest pain, but the greatest ignominy, according to the views of the Old Testament, not according to the views of the Gentiles as some write, because crucifixion was an ignominious punishment among the Romans (with whose customs and manners Christ had nothing to do), but because it was infamous among the Jews for a dead body to be hanged up for any time. The verse of Deuteronomy above quoted, commanding the body to be taken down before night and buried, "lest the land be defiled," meant, according to the Rabbins, to do away the memory of the foul crime as soon as the end of the exposure was answered. Wherefore, says the treatise Sanhedrim, the instrument of punishment and the tree itself was to be burned, that no memorial of so foul a thing be left in the world. So, for the complete fulfilment of all types and all Scriptures, the body of