of Philip, and to be named Bar-Tolmai, from his father Tolmai, or Ptolemy) visited Mesopotamia, where he contributed to the establishment of the Gospel: they say also, that the apostle Thomas passed through Mesopotamia, and spread the Gospel in its vicinity; in which service he was assisted by the apostle Jude, the brother of James. Whether these fellow Evangelists acted in conjunction, whether the times of their labours were concurrent, is not easily ascertained, nor is it of moment here. Yet we attach some importance to the proposition that the apostle Jude laboured far eastward, because it contributes to explain the similarity of his epistle with some parts of the Second of Peter; which seems strongly to confirm the idea that both were addressing much the same people. In fact, the style of imagery, elevation, and metaphor, which they adopt, is altogether Oriental; a phraseology to which the western world reconciles itself with difficulty, and rarely sanctions in regular and correct composition.

Jude certainly had preached previously, in various parts of Syria; at Antaradus, Laodicea, Palmyra, Callinicum, now Racca, and Circeum now Kerkisieh: then, as we have said, he visited Thomas in Mesopotamia, whence they excursed into Media and Parthia; after which Jude returned to Mesopotamia and Syria, but Thomas, who appears to have devoted his life to the service of the Gospel in the east, remained in Parthia; or continued pressing on still farther eastward, till he reached India, where he first propagated the doctrine of the Cross. But here it is proper to inquire what, and where, was this country denominated India -and this we shall attempt to determine, by considering the application of the name in the Bible, rather than among Heathen writers.

The first, and indeed the only mention (as usually understood) of India, in Scripture, is Esther i. 1. where we read, that Ahasuerus ruled from India eastward, to Cush westward. Bactria was, usually, the most eastern province of the Persian empire; but that, under some fortunate sovereigns, the Persian dominion included the bank of the Indus, may readily be granted: beyond this its possessions rarely, if ever, extended. Semiramis, indeed, crossed the Indus at Attock (the prohibited river) but was defeated. Alexander also crossed the Indus, and advanced some distance beyond it, but a perpetual succession of obstacles, mountain after mountain, and river after river, disheartened his troops and enforced his return. We conclude, therefore, that Ahasuerus did not rule over India, meaning Hindoostan, but his empire might include a province beyond Bactria, on the bank of the Indus, and deriving its name from that river. Nor should we forget that the original India of the Hindoos, or the primary settlement of the Bramins, was not the modern India: into this country they came, as they acknowledge, through the pass of Hurdwar; nevertheless, the name India, if derived from them, might distinguish the regions where they had been established, north and west of their present situation; and such a province might at times form part of the Persian territories. This would restrict the appellation India to a province west of the Indus, while it favours the supposition that the spread of the Gospel was co-extensive with the power of the Persian empire.

This hypothesis is consistent with those opinions which have hitherto been reckoned discordant, namely, that St. Matthew is by some reported to have extended his labours to India, while others confine them to Assyria: for the reader will recollect that we have placed the original Assyria, if not absolutely in the same country as the original India, yet in its vicinity.

These parts were inhabited by Jews who, though in captivity, occasionally

furnished zealous adherents to their country, and to their Kaaba, who willingly suffered no little fatigue to manifest their attachment to the law of Moses, and their endeavours to fulfil all righteousness. These, having heard the Gospel at Jerusalem, at the great national feasts, would be partly prepared to receive the apostles at their own residence; while the apostles would naturally choose to visit countries of which they had some previous knowledge, and where they might flatter themselves in favour of their nation, that the good seed might fall on good ground. They would also, no doubt, offer the Gospel, in the first instance to Jews, wherever they went and (not excluding the Gentiles), probably, would expect their chief harvest of converts among those whom they still regarded as their countrymen.

It is likely that Matthew, Peter, Thomas, and Jude, though equally inspired with Paul, less openly opposed Judaism than he did they considered themselves as apostles of the circumcision, and paying some deference to institutions indifferent in regard to the Gospel, they might less excite opposition than the apostle of the Gentiles, who magnified his office, not without incessant hazard to his person, principally from his own countrymen. We may, we think, conclude also, that, however some of these distant residents might defy difficulties when their religion was concerned, yet, that the main body of the dispersion would feel a diminished regard to places which they never could behold, and to services which they never could partake. So that by combination of this abated zeal with apostolic moderation, the propagators of the Gospel eastward might experience fewer perplexities, less severe sufferings, perhaps too, less animosities and contentions, on the whole, than their fellow labourers in the west; notwithstanding that some of them ended their lives by martyrdom.

If it be asked, whether the course of the Gospel absolutely terminated at the Indus, the question is difficult to answer. There is an obscure report that China itself received the Gospel very early [vide THOMAS, in the Dictionary]; but the authority on which it rests is slender, and the true country understood by that appellation is uncertain. Though perfectly willing to admit the possibility of the fact, yet it must be allowed that the same passage of Isaiah which has been quoted as mentioning the land of Sinim, or Tsin, that is, China, might be the chief stay of such report. More might be said in favour of that opinion which supposes the Gospel to have reached the peninsula of India, the coast of Malabar particularly, where we trace an ancient establishment of Christianity under the title of "Christians of St. Thomas." But after considering all circumstances, we incline to place this Thomas as a missionary, later than the apostle of that name; and to terminate the personal labours of the apostles with the boundary of the Persian empire. To this boundary they had the company of their nation, the protection of the same government as protected that nation, the same language, manners, observances religious and civil, with the innumerable facilities derivable from that "more sure word of prophecy," which furnished a proper introduction on all occasions, private or public. If farther progress were really made eastward, so early, we may attribute it to converts deputed for that purpose, rather than to the personal exertions of the apostles.

No. DCII. FURTHER INQUIRIES WHETHER INDIA WERE

KNOWN TO THE HEBREWS.

IT has been customary among nations, in all ages, to bestow on certain commo dities imported from foreign parts the name of the country whence they were originally VOL. IV.

2 L

brought, by way of commemorative distinction; hence among ourselves, we called a part of the dress worn by our boys while in petticoats the Jam, from the Indian Jamah, or muslin robe, of the Hindoos; and a loose kind of surtout we called a Banyan, or Banian, from its imitation of the garment worn by the Banians of India. Our terms muslin, calico, &c. are also Indian, and might be quoted in support of the proposition. It is self-evident, that without intercourse with India, mediately or immediately, or had we continued in perfect ignorance of that country, we could never have adopted these modes of dress, or have naturalized the names by which they were distinguished. We presume, by the same mode of reasoning, to infer allusions to India in certain passages of the Old Testament, which have not been so understood. The reader will recollect our notice of two brothers, Hind and Sind, as heads of nations in India; also, that in the only passage of Scripture where mention of Hind occurs, the N is omitted in writing the name, and it is spelled Hiddu, not Hindu; yet every version and interpreter without scruple pronounces it Hindu. In like manner, Scripture mentions repeatedly the Sidin as a kind of garment; but though this, too, is written in the Hebrew without the N, yet every version and commentator pronounces it Sindin. This conformity strongly leads to the inference that this name is derived from Sind, the country watered by the river Sindus, by us called Indus; which should be carefully distinguished from Hindoostan. The Sindin was an external garment; it was worn by both sexes; and being originally brought from India, might retain the name of its country long after imitations of it were manufactured in the west of Asia.

We would not be certain, that our shawl is not the Sindin. The true shawl came originally (and still comes) from the country of Cashmire, which is on the upper part of the Indus; and many of them cost from 50l. to 60l. each.-This article is imitated in our own manufactories, and very great attention has been paid both to its texture and its embellishment; yet it still retains the Indian name. Now shawls are worn by both sexes in Syria and Arabia, as external garments, and are decorated at a great expense.

In Judges xiv. 12, 13. Samson promises thirty Sindinim-shawls; that is, handsome exterior coverings. The virtuous woman (Prov. xxxi. 24.) makes Sindi, shawls, which she sells to the merchant, when ornamented. Sindi-shawls, are enumerated among the articles of female dress (Isaiah iii. 23.), and perhaps no part of dress, equally common to the sexes, can be mentioned as more likely to be the garment intended. It is remarkable that the Evangelist Mark (chap. xiv. 57.) says, the young man who followed Jesus had "a Sindon cast around his naked body:"-a shawl of the ordinary size might easily be cast around him, yet his body still be naked; which could not be said of any night-gown, or surtout, by which this Sindon has been usually explained. Our argument is, that the recurrence of this name in Scripture proves a derivation from India, with more or less knowledge of that country. It is probable that the Tyrians traded largely in Cashmire shawls; and that these are alluded to by Martial, when he says, "A man in a Syrian Sindon may laugh at wind and rain :" perhaps they are the warmest and lightest garments in the world:

No. DCIII. FARTHER INQUIRIES WHETHER CHINA MIGHT
BE KNOWN TO THE HEBREWS.

UNDER the article MAGOG, in the Dictionary, the reader will observe that the Orientals by Tsin and Matsin, understand the Chinese of the north and those of the south. It appears, therefore, probable, that the Jews intended the same people by the dual form (or plural) of their Sinim. As we have no history of China that can be depended on for showing the extent of this kingdom westward, at different periods, it is not easy to say how far into China the knowledge of the Jews might extend; but, if their communication at any time included the countries east of Tibet and the Burhampooter, there is nothing to hinder them from acquiring information of the Chinese empire. It is probable, however, that it could be only general, and perhaps by report: indeed, if that empire were at that time as strict in the admission of foreigners as it is at present, such a superficial knowledge must have contented distant nations; as we ourselves, notwithstanding the considerable traffic of Britain with that country, had no more knowledge of the interior of China, till the time of Lord Macartney's embassy, than we had of the wilds of Tartary, and the various hordes of that scattered and wandering race of men.

No. DCIV. OF A COLONY OF JEWS IN CHINA.

WHATEVER may be thought of the notion, that in the days of the prophets (e. gr. Isaiah), China was known to the Hebrews, there appears to be credible evidence that later migrations of the Jews eastward extended very far into Asia. Their dispersions, in consequence of repeated captivities, seem to have affected them with a kind of indifference as to their habitation; becoming also familiar with a roving life by means of the Scythian nations, with whom they were conversant, actuated by discontent or disaffection, and possibly urged by persecution, in some of its forms, not a few of the Jewish families sought peaceable settlements in the most distant regions. These were, of course, soon forgotten by the connections they had left; and what information reaches us concerning them may be looked on as a discovery; of which our present subject is an instance.

The very early period at which the Jews had arrived and settled in China, is a remarkable circumstance in the history of that people. In the year 73 of the Christian æra, of course, very shortly after the destruction of Jerusalem [A. D. 70.], according to some writers of strict veracity, seventy Jewish families, taking their route from Persia, through Chorasan and Samarcand, settled in China. That inquisitive writer, Paulus, nearly forty years ago (in a letter to Eichhorn), compared this alleged date of the arrival of the Jews in China, with a chronological account, discovered among the Jews at Cochin, respecting some of their brethren who had settled in the Mogul territory 187 years before the birth of Christ. By the comparison of these accounts with each other, he has proved the probable authenticity of both. The merits of the Jesuists in modern times in their endeavours to propagate Christianity in that vast empire, are well known. That industrious and indefatigable sect deserve our thanks for their communications respecting the Jews there, the most remarkable of which comprises an account of the sacred writings preserved in the Synagogue of Kai-fong-fu, the metropolis of the province of Honan. The first remarks on this subject are by Murr, in the 7th part of his Journal of Arts and Literature, under the title of Notitia quædam P. Ignati Koegleri de Bibliis Judæorum

in Imperio Sinensi. The original was published by him with additions in 1805, and it has since been translated into German, and published at Halle, with remarks by the editor, elucidations by de Sacy, and O. G. Tychsen, and a letter of P. Gozani.

This account of the sacred writings in possession of the Chinese Jews may be abridged into the following statement.

They preserve their Hebrew documents in their public Synagogue at Kai-fong-fu, which was built in the year 1163. In the most holy place are seen thirteen rolls of parchment containing the Thorah (the law) placed on tables, like tabernacles; each is provided with a covering; twelve are placed in honour of the twelve tribes, and one in honour of Moses. The latter is the only one now remaining of the old copies. The others were consumed in a great conflagration which happened about 200 years ago. All the books of the Synagogue perished in that disaster, except this one copy, which was saved, though greatly damaged. The twelve mentioned above are copies, afterwards transcribed from that which was saved. The other Hebrew books are preserved in side closets, which are always kept locked. The Jews have some other Hebrew books; but most of these are much damaged, and some of them are totally illegible. The Thorah has but 52 Paraschoth (divisions, or sections), the 52d and 53rd being reckoned but one. The biblical books are divided into four classes, (1.) The Pentateuch. (2.) The Supplement, viz. Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, and the Psalms. (3.) The Book of Ceremonies, or the Ritual Book; the Prophets, and the Books of Chronicles. (4.) The historical Books, Esther, Ezra, Nehemiah, and the two Books of the Maccabees, also in Hebrew. The Proverbs, Job, Solomon's Song, and Ecclesiastes, they have not: however, they may, perhaps, says Koegler, have more books than they acknowledge, or more than they themselves know of, as they are exceedingly ignorant, and do not seem to evince the least inclination for literature or science; neither will they suffer any person to take any books away from their places, and it is impossible to run them over singly in the Synagogue; as they lie there in the greatest confusion.

The pronunciation of the Hebrew language by these Jews is very different from that of the European Jews:-For example, n, they pronounce Thoulaha, or

; Piemizepaul במדבר ; ajekelo ויקרא ; Shmotze שמות ; Pieleshitze בראשית ; Thoulaze

O Teveliim; &c.

[This mode of pronunciation has manifestly arisen from their organs of speech having been circumscribed, in consequence of their long residence in China; for the Chinese have no B, R, Th, or D in their orthoepic system, and are constrained to substitute P, L, Ts, and T respectively for those letters.]

Copies of these Hebrew Scriptures, extant in China, not omitting the First and Second Books of the Maccabees in Hebrew, might prove of considerable consequence to sacred literature; their addition might gratify us with phrases hitherto found but once in what we already possess (and therefore difficult), elucidated by position or by connection; or words, which now, to speak Hebraically, " have neither friend nor brother," might receive their true sense, from their cognates, in these historical documents. If the Greek translations that we already possess are faithful, these novelties will offer but little difficulty; if they present additional facts, that will be so much gain to general history and to a period of history which we are previously acquainted with, and on which we can judge, by means of the Greek writers.

Our readers will observe for themselves, the alleged deficiencies of the books preserved by these Jews, with the damaged state of the most valuable; but as great obscurity reigns over the whole account, that particular may justly be doubted. Not every applicant was likely to be favoured with a confidential