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On both sides the motive is strong to disclaim the alliance; and it is especially so on the part of the Jews, who are evidently chagrined that such an apostacy should have taken place from their ancient faith.

The antipathy existing between the Jews and the Nestorians is mutual and strong; so that there can be no motive on the part of either to wish to be regarded as of the same origin. The state of feeling they cherish towards each other is much like that which existed between the Jews and the Samaritans.

Some of the learned Mohammedans also testify to the Hebrew origin of the Nestorians; but they are not all informed upon the subject. Many of those living in Ooroomiah came from the region of Khorassan, where a part of their race still remain. When the Gospel was first preached here, a great proportion, if not the whole, of the people were followers of Zoroaster, and the religion of the Magi prevailed extensively till the days of Mohammed. Hence we cannot expect the Persians generally to be in possession of definite information regarding the ancestry of their Christian neighbours. But it is interesting that any of them are able to add their positive testimony to the Hebrew origin of the Nestorians.

CHAPTER III.

The Places to which the Ten Tribes were deported: Assyria, Halah, Habor, Gozan, Hara, Media.-Now occupied by the Nestorian Christians.-But few nominal Jews in these Places.

"SEARCH for a thing where it was lost," is a maxim which every child understands and practices. But, in relation to the lost tribes, we have acted directly contrary to this maxim, and sought for them everywhere except in the place where they were lost, while this remained unexplored. The shepherd whose flock has strayed away seeks them where they were lost. God's sheep have been carried away into the wilderness and lost. But, happily, we are told just where they were placed. They were not left to wander, for they still had keepers over them, who placed them in particular pastures; keepers who were doubtless too much interested in securing the fleece to allow them to stray away. These keepers were the kings of Assyria. The first was Tiglath-pileser, who "carried them away (even the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh), and brought them unto Halah, and Habor, and Hara, and to the river Gozan, unto this day."-1 Chron., v., 26. Shortly after, Shalmaneser, another "king of Assyria, took Samaria, and carried Israel away (i. e., the remaining tribes) into As

syria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor, by the river of Gozan, unto this day."—2 Kings, xvii., 6, and xviii., 4.

It is very remarkable, that, though carried away by different conquerors at an interval of about 19. years, they were all settled in the same place. The only difference in the account is, that in 1 Chron. the name Hara is inserted, in addition to the places mentioned in 2 Kings. "The insertion of this name," says Professor Robinson, "may be an error of transcribers, as the reading of 2 Kings, xvii., 6, seems correct and appropriate."* His opinion is confirmed by the fact that this name is not found either in the Septuagint or the Syriac versions. The word Hara, in Hebrew, signifies "mountains, or mountainous regions;" and as the country to which the ten tribes were deported, and where most of the Nestorian Christians now reside, is, as we have seen, one of the most mountainous in the world, the word Hara was very naturally added as a gloss or marginal explanation, and finally became a part of the text. How else can we account for its differing from the Greek and Syriac, the two best versions for correcting false readings in the Hebrew text? On the very natural supposition that it was added as a gloss or explanation, as there are abundant examples in other passages, it very materially aids us in settling

* Robinson's Calmet, art. Gozan.

the topography of the country which became the future abode of the ten tribes; while, at the same time, it harmonizes the accounts of the inspired writers. We have, then, in three different places, the testimony of inspiration, that "the king of Assyria did carry away Israel into Assyria, and put them in Halah and in Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes."

Assyria was bounded, according to Ptolemy, on the north by part of Armenia and Mount Niphatis; on the west by the Tigris; on the south by Susiana; on the east by part of Media, and the mountains of Choatra and Zagros. The country within these limits is called by some of the ancients Adiabene (or, rather, Adiabene was included in Assyria), and by others Aturia or Atyria. Assyria is now called Koordistan, from the descendants of the ancient Karduchi, who occupied the northern parts. It lies between Media, Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Babylon. It is admitted that, at the period of its greatest prosperity, the Assyrian empire stretched beyond the limits generally assigned to it by both ancient and modern writers. But, at the time the ten tribes were carried thither, it had again become reduced within these defined boundaries,* the Medes having re

2

* This occurred seven years from the building of Rome, and in the second year of the eighth Olympied, which was the 748th before Christ.-Diod. Sic., l. ii. Athenæus, l. xii. Herodotus, lib. i., Justin, 1. i., c. iii.

volted, and Babylonia being then a separate kingdom.*

The name Aturia or Atyria, as is observed by Dion Cassius (xviii., c. 28), is a mere dialectic variety of pronunciation instead of Assyria; and the province thus designated probably was the original central point from which the power as well as the name of Assyria subsequently spread farther to the south and west. After the dissolution of the Assyrian monarchy through the revolt of the Medes, the name Assyria was again restricted to this northern province, while the southern parts received the appellation of Babylonia from the principal town, or Chaldea from the name of its inhabitants.t

Assyria in

be seen

That the province of Adiabene was once included under the name of Assyria is distinctly asserted by Pliny (Hist. Nat., v., c. 12). The sacred historians of that age evidently used its proper or more limited sense, as may by reference to Isaiah, xi., 11, where Elam and Shinar are mentioned as being without the bounds of Assyria. The kings who carried away the ten tribes and put an end to the kingdom of Israel were the first who reigned at Nineveh after the destruction of the first Assyrian empire, when the * Rollin, book iii., chap. ii.

†That Babylon and Nineveh were then under separate kings, is evident from a comparison of 2 Kings, xix., xx., where both kings are named. Also Herodotus, i., c. 95, 102, 106.

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