really, Sir, the labour of my Family Expositor, added to the other necessary business daily incumbent upon me, as a pastor and tutor, with the necessity I have been under of answering letters, of which I have since last Christmas received between four and five hundred, has so entangled me, that it is but very lately I have been able to secure the pleasure which that excellent volume had in store for me. And now my journey is so near, that it may seem almost superfluous to write to you; and yet, under the load of such obligations to so worthy a friend, I cannot bear to see his face till I have made this poor acknowledgment of his goodness; accept it, dear Sir, with your usual candour, and be assured, that though I am not able to express it as I would, I do actually feel a constant and deep sense of your goodness to me, and, which is much more, of your continual readiness to serve the public with those distinguished abilities, which God has been pleased to give you; and which have rendered your writings so great a blessing to the christian world. And I heartily pray they may be yet more abundantly so, for promoting the cause of virtue and piety, christian principles, and a christian temper. In the interpretation of particular texts, and the manner of stating particular doctrines, good men and good friends may have different apprehensions; but you always propose your sentiments with such good humour, modesty, candour, and frankness, as is very amiable and exemplary; and the grand desire of spreading righteousness, benevolence, prudence, the fear of God, and a heavenly temper and conversation, so plainly appears, particularly in this volume of sermons, that were I a much stricter Calvinist than I am, I should honour and love the author, though I did not personally know him. As to what you say of the council of Nice, I do not doubt but it will give umbrage to some who look on its decrees as the great bulwark of the orthodox faith; but I see nothing solid that can be objected to your remarks, and I think, there would have been much less Arianism in the world, and much less mischief done by that which there is, if it had been conducted in that more catholic manner you describe, as what might have been wished; and I have never seen any good done by severe anathemas, and secular punishments, so awkwardly listed into the service of christianity, opposite as they are to its true genius. Neither my time nor my paper will allow me to enlarge, &c. XCIV APPENDIX, No. IX. LETTER FROM DR. CHANDLER TO DR. LARDNER, WITH THE DOCTOR'S ANSWER. Reverend and dear Sir, Old Jury, December 4th, 1764. WHEN I received your proposals, I determined to purchase the work immediately on its publication, but am extremely obliged to you for ordering it as a token of your respect to me, on whose friendship and esteem I set, as I ought to do, the highest value. I have read the whole through with care, and to my great satisfaction and improvement. The only thing in which I am not fully satisfied, is your opinion about the testimony of Josephus concerning our blessed Saviour, which I have always been inclined to think, as to the far greatest part of it, genuine. I have not time to answer all the objections that are urged against the genuineness of the testimony, but you will give me leave to make two or three observations on the testimony itself. That it is introduced with great propriety, as what happened under Pilate's administration, and as what was one occasion of the disturbances amongst the Jews in his time. He testifies that he was a wise man.' Is uncertain whether he was not something more than a common man,' which is the meaning of the words, uyɛ avopa avrov deyev xpn; for Josephus, upon Jewish principles, could not but think him a man, though he was uncertain whether he was not somewhat greater; a more extraordinary person, than any mere man. And your own quotation from Josephus, about Moses, that 'he was a man superior to his own nature,' page 158, accounts for the character given to Jesus. He says he was παραδοξων έργων ποιητης. That the Jews themselves, his contemporaries and enemies, acknowledged. Matt. xiii. 54.-xiv. 2, &c. He was a teacher of such men as received the truth with 'pleasure.' You ask, would he call the christian religion the truth? Yes certainly, as to the moral precepts of christianity; which is all, I suppose, that Josephus knew or regarded of it. Matt. xxii. 16. 'He drew over to him many Jews and Gentiles.' This was true in the time when Josephus wrote. I refer you to page 169 of your own excellent work, which justifies the expression. • This was the Christ. Ὁ Χρίτος ετος ην. I render the words, This, viz. Jesus, was the famous, or remarkable Christ,' Jesus was a common name, and would not have sufficiently pointed him out to the Greeks and Romans. The name by which he was known to them was, Chrestus, or Christus; as in Suetonius and Tacitus; and if Tacitus had read Josephus, as you justly think he had, I imagine he took this very name from Josephus. Josephus did not certainly believe him to be the Messiah, and therefore, when he wrote this history, he could never mean by Christus the Jewish Messiah, of which the Greeks and Romans knew nothing; but that he was the remarkable Christ, who was the founder of that people who were called christians. This appears to me to be the real meaning of the expression, and as such it was intelligible to the Heathens. In the period that follows: When Pilate at the instigation, &c.' to the words, 'did not cease to adhere to him;' the whole is true, and what might be said by any man, though not a christian, who was acquainted with his history. The next words, for on the third day, &c.' if he speaks only of what were the common sentiments of his followers, they may be allowed to be this. But, to speak my mind freely, I think them rather an interpolation of Eusebius, or some other christian and that the connexion in Josephus runs thus. : They who before had conceived an affection for him, did 'not cease to adhere to him; and the sect of christians, so called 'from him, (the 'O Xpísoç,) subsists to this day.' Such an addition he could not well avoid : As to the remarks on the expression των Χρίσιανων φυλον, that puλor is here put for sect, or must necessarily signify sect, I am not thoroughly clear in it. Josephus certainly uses the word pulov frequently for nation, but I think also sometimes with greater latitude. Thus in a quotation from Strabo, he tells us, τοπον εκ ετι ραδίως εύρειν της οικεμενης, ὡς & παραδεδεκται τέτο το φύλον, not this nation,' which is too extensive, but as it is in the Latin version,hoc genus hominum,' line 14. cap. 7. page 695. I also find in Dion Cassius, τις βελευτικό φύλο γεγενημένες. 'Qui sunt senatoria origine.' Vol. ii. page 912, edit. Reimari. Yevoç. Hesychius. Why then may we not render the words in Josephus Xpistavov pulov, the sort of people called christians?' And I think it is not unlikely that Josephus should add, ' that 'they subsisted to his own time,' when he wrote this history, A. C. 93. Φύλον εθνος Give me leave just to add, that this paragraph, concerning Jesus, doth not seem to me so much to interrupt the course of the narration as is complained of; it is introduced under the article of Pilate, and placed between two circumstances which occasioned disturbances. And was not the putting of Jesus to death, and the continuance of the apostles and disciples after him, declaring his resurrection, another very considerable circumstance, which created very great disturbances? And though Josephus does not expressly say this, and perhaps had good reasons for not saying it, yet he intimates it, by placing it between the two causes of commotion, by giving so honourable a testimony to Jesus, and telling us, that he was crucified at the instigation of the chief persons of the nation. It would scarce have been decent in him to have said more on this head. I have sometimes thought that this passage was originally in Josephus, and that Josephus himself omitted it afterwards in some other copies, at the desire of some of his own nation, as containing too honourable an account of Jesus, or that they falsified some other copies by omitting it; and I think, as you allow, with great reason, his testimony to the Baptist to be genuine, it is not to be accounted for, that he should wholly omit to say any thing of Jesus. But I beg your pardon for giving you the trouble of so long a letter, especially as what I have urged may appear to be of little weight. I own I cannot wholly give up the passage, and yet I feel the weight of your objections against it. Your book will ever remain a solid proof of your learning, candour, and good judgment; and I pray God continue your life till you have finished your design, and every other view for the service of religion. I am, with the sincerest affection and esteem, Reverend and dear Sir, Your greatly obliged, and most humble Servant, SAMUEL CHANDLER. To this Dr. Lardner answered: Reverend and dear Sir, I AM much obliged to you for your friendly and valuable letter of December 4, and for all your arguings therein upon the subject; which you have urged with great force, and to the best advantage and 1 will further consider. In the mean time, you may be sensible, that I cannot be easily moved from an opinion, which I have long held agreeable to the sentiments of very judicious critics. : The testimony of Josephus to the fulfilment of our Saviour's predictions in the destruction of Jerusalem, is invaluable. His accounts of the state of things in Judea, before the commencement of the war, and during the ministry of our Saviour and his apostles, are also very valuable, indeed above all price. But I do not perceive, that we at all want the suspected testimony to Jesus, which was never quoted by any of our christian ancestors before Eusebius. Nor do I recollect that he has any where mentioned the name, or word, Christ, or Messiah, in any of his works, except the testimony above mentioned, and the passage concerning James the Lord's brother. If you recollect any place, where Messiah is mentioned by him, let me know it. If that word is never to be found in him elsewhere, he must have designedly and studiously declined it; for he had many occasions to mention it. It therefore is unlikely he should produce that word in speaking of Jesus. Explain the term as you please, it must be unaccountable, that it should be brought in here. This I now mention to you; but, as before said, I will further weigh your reasons. You seem to be well acquainted with an argument proposed in a Dissertation, &c. published at Oxford some years ago, and ascribed to Dr. Nathaniel Foster. I shall be obliged to you, if you have leisure, to inform me whether that Dr. Foster be still living, and what are his preferments: if he be dead, what was his station, and of what other works was he author. For possibly I may be obliged publicly to make some remarks upon his discourse. If I do, a farther acquaintance with the writer of it will be expedient. For there have been several of that name, Foster. Wishing you continued success in your studies and public labours, I remain, with the sincerest regard, THE testimony of Josephus concerning CHRIST having been considered in a new point of view, since the death of Dr. Lard Է |