that belonged to Amalek, no not any small number of them, to be sacrificed to himself; neither was it enough that Achan himself was stoned, but that his moveables were also consumed and brought to ashes.

SECT. IV.

Of the vain and malicious reports of heathen writers touching the ancient Jews.

OF the original of the Jews, profane writers have conceived diversely and injuriously. Quintilian speaks infamously of them, and of their leader; who, saith he, gathered together a pernicious nation. Diodore and Strabo make them Egyptians. Others affirm, that while Isis governed Egypt, the people were so increased, as Jerosolymus and Judas led thence a great multitude of that nation, with whom they planted the neighbour regions; which might be meant by Moses and Aaron: for the name of Moses was accidental, because he was taken up and saved out of the waters. But m Justin, of all other most malicious, doth derive the Jews from the Syrian kings; of whom Damascus, saith he, was the first; and to him succeeded Abraham, Moses, and Israel. He again supposeth (somewhat contrary to himself) that Israel had ten sons, among whom he divided the land of Juda; so called of Judas his eldest, who had the greatest portion. The youngest of the sons of Israel he calleth Joseph; who being brought up in Egypt, became learned in magical arts, and in the interpretations of dreams and signs prodigious; and this Joseph, saith he, was father to Moses; who with the rest, by reason of their foul diseases, and lest they should infect others, were banished Egypt. Further, he telleth how these men thus banished, when in the deserts they suffered extreme thirst and famine, and therein found relief the seventh day, for this cause ever after observed the seventh day, and kept it holy; making it a law among themselves, which afterwards became a branch of their religion. He addeth also, that they might not marry out of their own tribes, lest discovering their uncleanness they might also be expelled by m Justin. 1. 36.

other nations, as they were by the Egyptians. These and like fables hath Justin.

Cornelius Tacitus doth as grossly belie them in affirming, that in the inmost oratory of their temple they had the golden head of an ass, which they adored. But herein Tacitus forgetteth himself, having in the fifth book of his own history truly confessed of the Jews, that they worshipped one only God; and thought it most profane to represent the Deity by any material figure, by the shape of a man or any other creature; and they had therefore in their temples no image or representation, no not so much as in any city by them inhabited. Somewhat like this hath Alexander Polyhistor, in Stephanus; who also makes Judas with Idumæa the first parents of the Jews.

n Claudius Iolaus draws them from Judæus, whose parents were Sparton and Thebis; whence it came, that the Spartans or Lacedæmonians challenged kindred of the Hebrews but they did it as descended of Abraham, saith Josephus. Some of these reports seem to have been gathered out of divine letters, though wrested and perverted according to the custom of the heathen. For so have they obscured and altered the story of the creation, of paradise, of the flood; and given new names to the children of Adam in the first age; to Noah and his sons in the second; and so to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Moses, and the rest of the fathers and leaders of the Hebrews; all which feignings, as touching the Jews and their originals, Josephus against Appion and Tertullian have sufficiently answered. For that the Hebrews were the children of Arphaxad and Heber, no man doubteth: and so Chaldeans, originally taking name either of Heber the son of Sale, or else, saith Montanus, of wandering, as is before remembered. And therefore doth Stephanus, the Greek grammarian, derive the Hebrews or Jews from PAbrabon; having mistaken the name of Abraham, who was the son of Heber, in the sixth descent. Their ancient names were first changed by the two grandchildren of Abram; for after Jacob, otherwise Israel, the chief part n Cited by Stephanus in Judæa. • Tert. in Apol. P Caleb. f. 63.

were called Israel, another part after Esau, or Edom, Edomites; at length the remnant of Jacob, being most of the tribe of Juda, honoured the name of Judas, the son of Jacob, and became Judeans or Jews; as also for a time in the name of Ephraim the son of Joseph, the chief of the patriarchs of the ten tribes, the rest of the ten tribes were comprehended, but were first rooted out when the kingdom of Israel fell. The Judeans continued their names, though they suffered the same servitude not long after, under Nabuchodonosor.

The government which this nation underwent was first paternal; which continued till they served the Egyptians. They were secondly ruled by their captains and leaders, Moses and Joshua, by a policy divine. Thirdly, they subjected themselves to judges. Fourthly, they desired a king, and had Saul for the first; of whom and his successors before we entreat, we are first to speak of their government under judges, after the death of Joshua; with somewhat of the things of fame in other nations about these times.

CHAP. XIII.

Of the memorable things that happened in the world from the death of Joshua to the war of Troy; which was about the time of Jephtha.

SECT. I.

Of the interregnum after Joshua's death; and of Othoniel. WHEN Joshua was now dead, who with the advice of the seventy elders and the high priest held authority over the people, and ordered that commonweal; it pleased God to direct the tribe of Juda (in whom the kingdom was afterwards established) to undertake the war against the Canaanites, over whom (with God's favour, and the assistance of Simeon) they became victorious.

In the first attempt which they made, they not only slew 10,000, but made Adonibezek prisoner; the greatest and

cruellest commander both of the Canaanites and Perizzites. This tyrant's cruelty, as elsewhere hath been signified, they returned in the same kind upon his own head: and so, by the torments which he now felt in his own person, (before no otherwise known unto him but by his malicious imagination,) made him confess and acknowledge God's just judg ment against himself.

The tribes of Juda and Simeon did also master and possess, during this interregnum, (or, as some think, before the death of Joshua,) the cities of Azotus, Askalon, Ekron, and Jerusalem, which they burnt, and the Jebusites afterwards reedified. They took also the cities of Hebron, Debir, or Kiriath-sepher, and Zephath, afterwards Horma. And although it be not set down in express words that any one person commanded in chief over the people, as Moses and Joshua did; yet it seemeth that Caleb was of greatest authority amongst them, and that he with the advice of Phinees directed and ordered their wars. For if any think that they proceeded without a chief, the good success which followed their undertakings witnesseth the contrary. And it was Caleb, even while Joshua governed, as appears Josh. x. 39, that propounded the attempt of Debir to the rest of the captains; for the performance of which enterprise he promised his daughter Achsah; which he performed to Othoniel his younger brother after the conquest; whose behaviour in that service was such, as (next unto the ordinance of God) it gave him the greatest reputation among them, and may be esteemed the second cause of his preferment and election for their first judge soon after. But while those of Juda made war with their borderers, from whom they only recovered the mountainous countries, (for they could not drive out the inhabitants of the valleys, a because they had chariots of iron,) the rest of the tribes sought also to enlarge and establish their own territories, in which war they laboured with variable success; for as the house of Joseph recovered Bethel, or Luz, from the Hittites, so did the Amorites recover from Dan all the plain Judg. i. 25, 32.

a Judg. i. 19.

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countries, and forced them to save themselves in the mountains. And now the Israelites, unmindful of God's benefits, and how often he had miraculously aforetime defended them, and made them victorious over their enemies, (the elders being also consumed, who better advised them in the interregnum,) did not only join themselves in marriage with the heathen nations; but (that which was more detestable) they served the idols of Baal and Asteroth, with other the dead gods of the Canaanites and Amorites. And therefore did the Lord God, whom they had provoked with their idolatry, deliver them into the hands of the Aramites of Mesopotamia, whom Chushan Rishathaim at that time commanded. But after they had felt the smart of God's displeasure against them eight years, it pleased him to have compassion on his people, and to raise up Othoniel to be their judge and leader; who, by God assisted, delivered his brethren from oppression, and enforced the Aramites to return into their own deserts, and into Mesopotamia adjoining; after which the Israelites had peace forty years, during all the time of Othoniel's government. This Othoniel is thought by Tostatus to have been the younger brother of Caleb, forasmuch as in the book of Judges he is twice called Othoniel the son of Cenaz, Caleb's younger brother. Others do rather interpret those words (Caleb's younger brother) as if they signified the meanest of his kindred. Indeed it is not likely that Caleb's daughter should marry with her own uncle; yet it follows not therefore that Othoniel should have been the meanest of the kindred. Wherefore we may better think that he was the nephew of Caleb, (as some learned men expound it,) and as the very words of scripture seem to enforce. For Caleb was the son of Jephunneth, and Othoniel the son of Cenaz, Caleb's younger brother; that is, he was not brother to Caleb, but his younger brother's son; to whom it was not only lawful, but commendable, to marry with his cousin-german Caleb's daughter.

How long it was from the death of Joshua to the government of Othoniel, it cannot be found; but it seems to have Judg. iii. 10.

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