Obrazy na stronie
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in the north of Spain; the Saxons, as the Jews interpret Ashkenaz, in Jer. li. 27, to be Germany.

2. Riphath (Diphath, 1 Chron. i. 6, a permutation of D and R, not unexampled). Rhibii, east of the Euxine; Tobata and other parts of Paphlagonia; Croatia; the Riphæan mountains, a very obscure name in ancient geography (Strabo, Virgil, Pliny, Mela), referring probably to the great chains of mountains from the north of Asia westwards (Hyperboreans, Steph. Byzant.), and therefore including vague knowledge of the Uralian, Hartz, and Alpine regions.

3. Togarmah. Peoples of Armenia and other parts of the Caucasian region. The Armenian traditions assign as their ancestor Haik, the son of Torgom and grandson of Noah.

ii. Magog. In Ezekiel this seems to be used as the name of a country, and Gog that of its chieftain. The Mongoles, Moguls; the great Tartar nation.

iii. Madai. The Medes; people of Iran, to whom the Sanscrit language belonged; primeval inhabitants of Hindustan.

iv. Javan. The Greeks, Asiatic and European. Iaones (Hom. Il. xiii. 685).

Sons of Javan :—

1. Elisha. Greeks, especially of the Peloponnesus; Hellas; Elis, in which is Alisium ('Aλelotov, Il. ii. 617).

2. Tarshish. The east coast of Spain, where the Phonician Canaanites afterwards planted their colony.

3. Kittim. Inhabitants of the isles and many of the coasts of the Mediterranean, particularly the Macedonians and the Romans, and those farther to the west.

4. Dodanim (Rhodanim, 1 Chron. i. 7). Dodona, a colony from which probably settled at the mouths of the Rhone, Rhodanus.

To this Javanian (Ionian) branch is attributed the peopling of the isles of the nations' (v. 5), a frequent Hebrew denomination of the western countries to which the Israelites, Tyrians, Egyptians, &c., had access by sea.

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1. Seba. Joined with Mizraim and Cush (Isa. xliii. 3), evidently denoting contiguity and affinity. This tribe or class is probably referred to Suba, a native name of Meroe upon the Nile, in the farthest south of Egypt, or the beginning of Ethiopia.

2. Havilah. Of this word vestiges are found in various names of places in Western Arabia, and the adjacent parts of Africa. It is quite distinct from the Havilah (ch. ii. 11) in or near Armenia, and probably from another (v. 29) in Arabia, unless we suppose a union of tribes, or one succeeded by the other.

3. Sabtah. Sabota or Sabbatha is the name of an ancient trading town of Arabia.

4. Raamah, y, Sept. Rhegma (Alex. Rhegehma), which, changing e into n, is the name of a port which the Egypto-Greek geographer Claudius Ptolemy (who flourished in the earlier part of the second century) places on the Arabian coast of the Persian Gulf. To this place Dr. Baumgarten (Kiel, 1843) refers the name: others take it to be Reama, a town of considerable importance in the south-western part of Arabia Felix, whose inhabitants are remarkably black; mentioned along with Sheba in Ezek. xxvii. 22, as a place of rich Oriental traffic.

Two sons of this Raamah are mentioned, Sheba and Dedan. We find these in the subsequent Scriptures distinguished for trade and opulence (Ps. lxxii. 10, 15; 1 Kings x. 2; Isa. lx. 6; Ezek. xxvii. 15, 20, 22). They both lie in the western part of Arabia. The queen of Sheba came to the court of Solomon. Dedan is not improbably considered as the origin of Aden, that very ancient sea-port and island at the mouth of the Arabian Gulf or Red Sea, which has very recently risen into new importance.

5. Nimrod, an individual. He built, besides Babel, his metropolis, three cities or towns in the great plain of Shinar-Erech, Accad, and Calneh, of which see the notes on v. 10.

ii. Mizraim, literally the two Egypts, the upper and the lower: each was called Misr, a word even now vernacular in that country. Of his descendants seven are specified under plural national names, some of which are well ascertained.

1. Ludim. Ludites, celebrated as soldiers and archers (Isa. lxvi. 19; Jer. xlvi. 9; Ezek. xxvii. 10; xxx. 5), and in those passages connected with other peoples known to be African. The Ludim probably lay towards Ethiopia. They must not be confounded with the Lydians of Asia Minor (v. 22).

2. Ananim. Very uncertain. Bochart supposes them to have been wandering tribes about the temple of Jupiter Ammon, where was an ancient people called Nasamones.

3. Lehabim. Perhaps inhabitants of a coast-district immediately west of Egypt. Probably the Lubim (2 Chron. xii. 3; Nahum iii. 9).

4. Pathrusim. The people of the Thebaid (Pathros) in Upper Egypt.

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5. Casluhim, out of whom came Philistim.' A people on the north-east coast of Egypt, of whom the Philistines were a colony, probably combined with some of the Caphtorim.

6. Caphtorim. Inhabitants of the island Cyprus. iii. Phut. This word occurs in two or three passages besides, always in connection with Africa. Josephus and Pliny mention an African river, Phutes. The great modern archæologist geographer, Ritter, says that hordes of people have been poured out of Futa, in the interior of Africa.

iv. Canaan. His descendants came out of Arabia, planted colonies in Palestine, and gradually possessed themselves of the whole country.

His children or posterity :

1. Sidon, his first-born, founded the city of that name. 2. Heth, the ancestor of the Hittites. The remaining nine are well known, and are here laid down in the singular of the patronymic, or patrial adjective-the Jebusite, the Emorite (Amorite), the Girgashite, the Hivite, the Arkite, the Sinite, the Arvadite, the Zemarite, and the Hamathite. All are assigned to Palestine, and the boundaries of the country are precisely laid down.

III. Sons of SHEM.

Children of Shem :

i. Elam. The ancestor of the Elamites or Elymæans, who possessed Elymais, a region between Susiana and Media, now called Khusistan. The Japhetian Persians afterwards entered that region and gained the ascendancy, and subsequently they were comprehended under the name of Elam.

ii. Ashur, the ancestor of the Assyrians.

iii. Arphaxad, a personal name in the Abrahamic line. The word, a remarkable compound, probably denotes Neighbouring to the Chasdim, i. e. Chaldeans. The name appears in Arrhapachitis, a province in Northern Assyria, the primitive seat of the Chasdim, and near to which, or in it, Abraham was born.

Children of Arphaxad :-

These are chiefly personal, and contribute to form the sacred pedigree which leads to the Messiah. In this line occur a grandson named Eber, and his two sons Peleg and Joktan.

Eber. The only circumstance that we can attach to him is the very important one (which seems, therefore, to imply something extraordinary in his personal history) of being the origin of the name Ebrew, or as it is commonly written, on account of the y, Hebrew, the ancient and universal name' of the nation, including Abraham himself (see Ewald's Hebr. Gramm., translated by Dr. Nicholson, p. 2).

Peleg, of whom it is said that in his time the earth was divided. Some suppose that the event commemorated by his name (which means 'division') took place at his birth;

but it seems more likely that, according to a custom of which there are other instances in Scripture, the name was applied in his maturer age, on account of some principal or leading concern which he had in the migratory distribution of men. It is to this that the 'division' is supposed to refer; but there have not been wanting those who imagine that the event thus signalized was an occurrence in physical geography, an earthquake, which produced a vast chasm separating considerable parts of the earth, in or near the district then inhabited by man.

Joktan. Universally acknowledged to be the father of the numerous tribes of Arabs in Yemen, or Arabia Felix. Of the founders of those tribes thirteen are specified. The first is evidently Modad, with the Arabic article: the second is Shaleph: and Ptolemy mentions a people of interior Arabia, the Salapeni. Hatzarmaveth is a fruitful district on the south coast, which still bears exactly the same name. That name signifies the Enclosure, Gate, or Court of Death, on account of its insalubrity, arising from the great abundance and mixture of powerful odours. Jerach signifies the moon; and on the west of this region is a gold-producing tract, in which are the Mountains of the Moon, which yet must be distinguished from a group in East Africa, very imperfectly known, and called also by Orientals the Backbone of the World. Hadoram, the Adramites of Ptolemy and Pliny, on the south coast. Uzal, mentioned in Ezek. xxvii. 19, which should be translated 'Vedan and Javan [perhaps Yemen ?] from Uzal.' The ancient name of a principal city of Yemen, now Sanaha. Obal (Ebal in 1 Chron. i. 22), unknown. Abimael, unknown; but Bochart adduces the Mali of Theophrastus and the Minai of Strabo, a tribe or tribes in Arabia, as possibly intended. Sheba, probably indicating an invasion of this tribe upon the Cushite Sheba and Dedan, Gen. x. 7, and see xxv. 3. From such mixtures much embarrassment often arises in ethnography. Sheba and Seba (x. 7) are often mentioned in the Old Testament as seats of great riches and traffic. Ophir, undoubtedly referring to the seaport in South Arabia, so celebrated for its traffic in gold, jewellery, and fine woods. The same name was probably given to places in India and East Africa, to which the mercantile ships of this Arabian Ophir resorted. A part of the south coast of Arabia is called Oman, and in it is a town called El-Ophir, with the article. Havilah: perhaps the Cushite_settlers were invaded by this Joktanite tribe. Jobab: Ptolemy mentions a people, Iobarita, on the east coast of Arabia. The r may be a mistake, or a dialectic variety, for b.

These thirteen tribes seem to have formed the confederacy of the independent and unconquerable Arabs, whose peninsular, desert, and mountainous country defended them from invasion: Ishmael and his descendants were united with them.

Our text concludes with describing a boundary line for the country of these tribes from Mesha to Sephar.' The former is probably the country Maishon or Mesene, at the north-west head of the Persian Gulf; and the latter, on the south-west coast of Arabia, where is found a Mount Sabber.

iv. Lud. From him the Lydians in Asia Minor derived their name.

v. Aram. From him the inhabitants of Syria, Chalonitis, and a considerable part of Mesopotamia.

Children or posterity of Aram:

1. Uz. In the northern part of Arabia, bordering upon Chaldæa: the land of Job.

2. Hul. The large flat district in the north of Palestine, through which lies the initial course of the Jordan, even now called the Land of Hûleh, and in which is the Lake Hûleh, anciently Merom, amply illustrated by Dr. Robinson, Researches, iii. 339-357.

3. Gether. East of Armenia; Carthara was a city on the Tigris.

4. Mash. A mountain region branching eastwards from the great Taurus ridge: the Masian mountains of the Greeks and Romans.

5. Isles of the Gentiles.'-To understand this expres

sion it is necessary to recollect the sense in which the word which we translate 'isle' was employed by the Jews. It was used to denote not only such countries as are surrounded on all sides by the sea, but countries which were so separated from them by water that people could not, or did not, usually go to them and come from them but by sea. Thus it meant all countries beyond sea; and the inhabitants of such countries were called islanders.' The term, therefore, applies to the countries west of Palestine; the usual communication with which was by the Mediterranean. Countries similarly situated with respect to Egypt appear to be here intended, for when this book was written, the Jews had not yet gained possession of Palestine, and had recently left Egypt. In a general sense the term may be understood to apply to Europe, so far as known, and to Asia Minor.

6. 'Mizraim'-See under this word in the above enumeration. To the fact there stated respecting the preservation or restoration of this ancient name of Egypt by the Arabs, let us here add the important remark of Dr. Prideaux respecting the part taken by that people:- These people being the oldest nation in the world, and who have never been by any conquest dispossessed, or driven out of their country; but have always remained there in a continued descent from the first planters until this day, and being also as little given to alterations in their manners and usages as in their country, have still retained the names of places which were first attached to them; and on these aboriginal people acquiring the empire of the East, they restored the original names to many cities after they had been lost for ages under the arbitrary changes of successive conquerors.' This accounts for the just importance which has lately been given to existing Arabic names in attempting to fix the sites of ancient places in Palestine and elsewhere.

8. Nimrod.'-It would be hard to find anything against Nimrod in these verses, unless by inference founded principally upon his name, which signifies a rebel.' 'The probabilities are in favour of the opinion that this chief, like most of the heroes of remote classical antiquity, addicted himself to hunting the wild beasts, and thus acquired qualities adapted to a warfare with men, his success in which was ensured by the number of bold and exercised men who had associated with him in the active occupations of the chase. The land in which Nimrod erected the first recorded kingdom in the world, is supposed by the Armenian writers to have been in the allotment of the sons of Shem; and this notion has been adopted by many European commentators. Under this view-which, however, appears to us very doubtful-Nimrod's revolt against the appointed distribution, and his violent encroachment upon the territory of another branch of the family of Noah, would form strong points on which to rest the name which is given to him and the evil character he bears. For the statements that Nimrod was the author of the adoration of fire, or of idolatrous worship rendered to men, and that he was the first persecutor on the score of religion, there is no evidence in the Bible. Eastern authors add that he was the first king in the world, and the first who wore a crown; and this may, or may not, be true.

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10. The land of Shinar.'-There are no data to enable us to fix the limits of this land with precision. It seems to us a great error to suppose that, if we could ascertain the sites of the towns mentioned in this verse, we should be able to define the boundaries of Shinar. Such knowledge would enable us to define the limits of Nimrod's kingdom, which was in the land of Shinar, but the boundaries of which are not said to be coincident with those of the land so called. We must be content to remain uncertain whether it comprehended the whole of the country between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, or was confined to the lower part of that territory, answering to Babylonia, and comprehending both banks of both rivers. That the latter territory, which nearly corresponds to the present Irak Arabi, is part of what was the land of Shinar, is admitted on all hands; the only question is, how far it extended northward in Mesopotamia Proper.

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— ' Babel-Erech-Accad-Calneh.'-These being the principal towns of Nimrod's kingdom might enable us to discover the limits of the earliest monarchy on record, if their sites could be precisely ascertained. As, a chapter or two farther on, we find the earliest kingdoms consisting of little more than a single town and a surrounding district, it is reasonable to conclude that the beginning of Nimrod's kingdom' was comprehended within narrow limits, and therefore, that these most ancient cities must be sought at no considerable distance from one another. We have been in Irak Arabi, and have found that Nimrod occupies a very conspicuous place in the traditions of the country, it being generally believed that this once fertile territory formed his kingdom. It is supposed, indeed, that his father Cush resided there; and in this opinion Dr. Hyde concurs, calling Irak the most ancient Cush, being the original seat of that son of Ham, whence his posterity migrated and carried the name into Arabia. It is admitted that the sites of the towns here named, are to be sought for in the Arabian Irak.

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· Babel.'-No one doubts that this first postdiluvian city of which we have any record was the original of that great city on the Euphrates (32° 25′ N. lat., and 44° E. long.), which afterwards acquired such fame as the capital of the Babylonian empire. The town founded there by Nimrod could have been but of little consequence, and that little it probably lost after the confusion of tongues recorded in the next chapter. For an account of the city in its palmy state, see the Note on Dan. iv. 30, Is not this great Babylon?' and for a description of its present desolation, we may refer to the Notes on those prophecies in which that desolation is foretold. The site of Babel being found, we must look in the same district for the other cities.

'Erech.'-According to the Rabbins, this is the same as the present Urfah, known in the Bible as Ur. But this is unreasonably distant from Babel, and would give too great extent to the kingdom of Nimrod. It is generally believed to have been a city of Chaldæa, which took from it its present name of Irak. Cities, the names of which are evidently formed from Erech, are mentioned by Herodotus, Ptolemy, and Ammianus Marcellinus. Mr. Bryant, on examining the matter, finds that there were two cities distinguished as And-Erech and Ard-Erech-the former in Susiana, near some fiery or bituminous pools, and the latter on the Euphrates below Babylon. This last probably occupied the site of the original Erech of the text.

'Calneh.'-A great mass of authority, ancient and modern, European and Oriental, concurs in fixing the site of this city at what was the great city of Ctesiphon, upon the eastern bank of the river Tigris, about 18 miles below Bagdad. Opposite to it stood Seleucia, which was built by the Greeks for the express purpose of ruining Babylon, and was made the capital of their empire east of the Euphrates. After the lapse of several centuries, Ctesiphon, which seems to have been in previous existence as a small town, began to assume importance as a rival to Seleucia, in the hands of the Parthians, the bitter and implacable enemies of the Greeks. It is said to have been first walled in the reign of Pacoras, king of the Parthians, who was contemporary with Mark Antony. Seleucia ultimately fell before the ascendancy of Ctesiphon and the Parthians, and became a sort of suburb to its rival under the name of Coche, and were both identified by the Arabs under the name of Al-Modain, or the cities.' Ctesiphon became a magnificent city, and the winter capital of the Persian empire under the native Sassanian dynasty, which threw off the Parthian predominance. The place was taken by the Arabs in the year 637 A.D., and from that time declined amazingly; and when the Caliph Al-Mansúr built Bagdad, the ruins of Al-Modain furnished the principal materials for the new city. Both sites the present writer has had an opportunity of examining with care. Of Seleucia nothing now remains but a portion of the wall; but evident traces of its former extent still exist in the now denuded surface, rendered uneven by extended mounds, which, in most cases, alone remain to mark the sites of the numerous

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cities with which this celebrated region teemed in ancient times. Ctesiphon has been rather more fortunate. Not only may the enormously thick walls of the city be traced to a considerable extent along the river, but a vast and imposing structure of fine brick still remains as an object of solitary magnificence in this desolate region, and is visible from a great distance. It is unlike any building in that part of the world, and is considered to have been built by Greek artists in the employ of the Persian kings. It presents a façade of 300 feet in length, pierced in the middle by an arch whose curve forms a large parabola rising from about half the height. The height of this arch from its apex to the ground is 1034 feet, and it leads to a vast hall of the same height, and 82 feet broad by 160 in depth. The vaulting of this hall is broken at the back, and there is a large fissure about 15 feet from the entrance. It is called Tuuk Kesra, or the arch of Khosroes,' and is believed to have been the palace of the Persian kings, and is presumed to be the white palace,' the magnificence and internal riches of which struck the barbarous conquerors from Arabia with amazement and delight.

-'Accad.'-The probabilities which have been allowed to operate in fixing Erech and Calneh, find equal, or more than equal, room in assigning Accad to the Sittace of the Greeks, and the Akkerkúf of the present time. It is situated about nine miles west of the Tigris, at the place where that river makes its nearest approach to the Euphrates. Sittace' retains some elements of the name Accad; and Akkerkúf has more similarity to the original name than will sometimes be found in analogies on which elaborate theories have been founded. The situation and the name being concurrently favourable, its identity with the ancient Accad finds another confirmation in the remarkable and primitive monument which is found there, and which the Arabs, to this day, call Tel Nimrúd, and the Turks, Nimrúd Tepasse; both which appellations signify the Hill of Nimrod.' It consists of a mound, surmounted by a mass of building which looks like a tower, or an irregular pyramid, according to the point from which it is viewed. It is 300 feet in circumference at the bottom, and rises 125 or 130 feet above the greatly inclined elevation on which it stands. The mound which constitutes the foundation of the structure is composed of a mass of rubbish formed by the decay of the superstructure. In the tower itself the different layers of sun-dried bricks, of which it is composed, may be traced very distinctly. The bricks are cemented together by lime or bitumen, and are divided into courses varying from 12 to 20 feet in height, and separated by layers of reeds, such as grow in the marshy parts of the country, and in a state of astonishing preservation. The solidity and loftiness of this pile, as well as the difficulty of discovering any other use for it, would indicate it to have been one of those immense pyramidal towers which were consecrated to the worship of the heavenly bodies, and which served at once as the temples and observatories of the primitive times. That this worship arose very early, we shall have occasion to state; and it is agreed on all hands that it originated in the country in which this pile is found. There seem to have been structures of this nature in all the primitive cities of this region; built, probably, more or less after the model of that in the metropolitan city of Babylon. The Tel Nimrúd, therefore, sufficiently indicates the site of a primitive town, which it is not presuming more than is usual, to suppose to have been Accad.

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11. Out of that land went forth Asshur.'-The form of expression in Hebrew gives equal authority to the marginal reading, which is Out of that land, he [Nimrod] went forth into Assyria;' and opinions are pretty equally divided as to which of the senses is to be preferred. Understood as in the text, it appears that Asshur, the son of Shem, on being driven out of Shinar by Nimrod, went and settled in Assyria; while the other reading makes Nimrod extend his original encroachments on the Shemites, by appropriating Assyria also; or else, that he relinquished his kingdom in Shinar for some unknown reason, and went to

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found another in Assyria. Some commentators build an excellent character for Nimrod on the superstructure which the last hypothesis offers, contending that this ancient hero, being disgusted with the mad project of the tower of Babel, withdrew from the country, to exonerate himself from the consequences: yet the common accounts make him the prime mover in that famous transaction. 'Nineveh. Whether Nimrod or Asshur founded this city, it does not appear to have been of much importance for many centuries afterwards. Indeed the text before us leads us to conclude that Resen was in its origin a more important city than Nineveh. It did not rise to greatness until subsequently, somewhere about 1230 B.C., when it was enlarged by Ninus, its second founder, and became the greatest city of the world and the mistress of the East. The testimony of most ancient writers concurs with the local traditions and the surviving name to fix Nineveh on the site of the village of Nunia, opposite the town of Mosul on the river Tigris, which formed the boundary of Assyria Proper. In the book of Jonah, it is emphatically called 'an exceeding great city;' and we must refer to the Note on that text for an account of its ancient greatness and present remains.

'Rehoboth, Calah, Resen.'-The site of Resen is indicated with more than ordinary precision in the text; but in seeking it, or those of the other two cities, we have no such evidence and strong probabilities as have helped in determining the sites of the towns of Nimrod's kingdom in Shinar. We can only conjecture that they existed on the Tigris, below, and perhaps above, Nineveh, at no great distance from each other. Most writers concur in placing Calah on the Great Zab, before it enters the Tigris, and Resen higher up on the latter river, so as to be between Nineveh and Calah. But Rehoboth has been shifted about everywhere. Some place it above Nineveh, others below Calah, while others fix it on the western bank of the Tigris, opposite Resen.

CHAPTER XI.

1 One language in the world. 3 The building of Babel. 5 The confusion of tongues. 10 The generations of Shem. 27 The generations of Terah the father of Abram. 31 Terah goeth from Ur to Haran. AND the whole earth was of one 'language, and of one 'speech.

2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.

3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and 'burn them throughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter.

4 And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.

6 And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

1 Heb. lip.

2 Heb. words.

16, 17, 18.-All these, as before (see Note on v. 6), are the names of tribes, not individuals.

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21. The brother of Japhet the elder.'-It is on the authority of this phrase, that many commentators have held that Japhet and not Shem was the eldest son of Noah; and it is hence conceived that Shem is usually named first by way of excellence, because the holy line descended from him. Without being insensible to the arguments in favour of this explanation, we feel obliged to withhold our assent from it. The words can hardly be rendered the brother of Japhet the elder,' in conformity with the grammatical analogies of the Hebrew language, nor is any other instance of such a construction to be found in the Scriptures. The elder brother of Japhet' is the plain and natural rendering, and is that given by the ancient versions, except the Septuagint, which lies under the suspicion of having been there corrupted. The intention of the sacred writer was evidently to mark the seniority and consequent superiority of Shem. He had already stated that Ham was the youngest, or at least a younger, son of Noah; and now is careful to inform us that Shem, the stem of the Hebrews, was older than Japhet. It has indeed been urged, in consideration of the interpretation to which we object, that as Noah was 500 years old when he began to have sons, and the Deluge took place in the 600th year of his age, his eldest son must at that date have been 100 years old, whereas we are informed in ch. xi. 10, that Shem was not 100 years old till two years after, when he begat Arphaxad. But this is of little weight, when we consider that the centuries appear to be sometimes given in round numbers, without exact regard to an odd year or two over or under. The incidents of life do not naturally run in centenary periods; and when such in any accounts recur, it needs but little reflection to teach us that the writer does not mean to be exact, but to say 'when he was about a hundred years old,' etc.

7 Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.

8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth and they left off to build the city.

9 Therefore is the name of it called 'Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.

10 ¶ "These are the generations of Shem: Shem was an hundred years old, and begat Arphaxad two years after the flood:

11 And Shem lived after he begat Arphaxad five hundred years, and begat sons and daughters.

12 And Arphaxad lived five and thirty years, and begat Salah :

13 And Arphaxad lived after he begat Salah four hundred and three years, and begat sons and daughters.

14 And Salah lived thirty years, and begat Eber:

15 And Salah lived after he begat Eber four hundred and three years, and begat sons and daughters.

4 Heb. burn them to a burning. 71 Chron. 1. 17.

3 Heb. a man said to his neighbour. 6 Wisd. 10. 5.

5 That is, confusion.

16 And Eber lived four and thirty years, and begat 'Peleg:

17 And Eber lived after he begat Peleg four hundred and thirty years, and begat sons and daughters.

18 And Peleg lived thirty years, and begat Reu:

19 And Peleg lived after he begat Reu two hundred and nine years, and begat sons and daughters.

20 And Reu lived two and thirty years, and begat Serug:

21 And Reu lived after he begat Serug two hundred and seven years, and begat sons and daughters.

22 And Serug lived thirty years, and begat Nahor:

23 And Serug lived after he begat Nahor two hundred years, and begat sons and daughters.

24 And Nahor lived nine and twenty years, and begat "Terah :

25 And Nahor lived after he begat Terah an hundred and nineteen years, and begat sons and daughters.

31 Chron. 1. 19. 9 Called, Luke 3. 35, Phalec. 10 Luke 3. 13 Nehem. 9. 7.

26 And Terah lived seventy years, and 12begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

27 Now these are the generations of Terah Terah begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran begat Lot.

28 And Haran died before his father Terah in the land of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees.

29 And Abram and Nahor took them wives the name of Abram's wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah.

30 But Sarai was barren; she had no

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35, Saruch. 11 Luke 3. 34, Thara. Judith 5. 7. Acts 7. 4.

12 Josh. 24. 2. 1 Chron. 1. 26.

Verse 1. One language.'-What the primeval language was is a point which has excited very much discussion. Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, Chaldee, Phoenician, Egyptian, Ethiopic, Greek, Sanscrit, and Chinese, have each had the priority of their claims warmly advocated. The weight of number and authority is in favour of the Hebrew and the Syriac, which were originally one and the same:1. Because the names of the letters, and the numeral values assigned to them, in Hebrew and Syriac, have been generally adopted by the rest, however unlike the letters may be formed. 2. That the superior antiquity of the Hebrew and Syriac letters (which had originally but one form) is demonstrated by the greater simplicity of their shapes. 3. From internal evidence-such as, that words derived from or identical with Hebrew words run through all the greater number of known languages; that all Oriental proper names of rivers, mountains, cities, persons, etc., are deducible from the Hebrew; that when Abraham 'the Hebrew' travelled in Palestine and Egypt, he was everywhere understood;—with other arguments of similar character and force.

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3. Brick.'-The want of stone in the plain watered by the Euphrates and Tigris, in the lower half of their course, rendered brick formerly, as it still is, the universal material in all the buildings of the country. The text will be best elucidated by observing what materials are employed in those masses of ruin which, whether belonging to the original city and tower or not, are undoubtedly among the most ancient remains in the world. The bricks are of two sorts, one dried in the sun, and the other burnt by fire. The size of the latter is generally thirteen inches square by three thick; there are some which do not exceed half those dimensions, and a few with shapes adapted to particular purposes, such as for rounding corners, etc. They are of several colours-white, approaching more or less to a yellowish cast, like our Stourbridge, or fire-brick, which is the finest sort; red, like our ordinary brick, which is the coarsest sort; and some that have a blackish cast, and

are very hard. The sun-dried brick is considerably larger, and in general looks like a clod of earth, in which are seen particles of broken reed and chopped straw, obviously intended to give compactness to the mass. When any considerable degree of thickness was required, the practice in the Babylonian structures seems to have been, to form the mass with sun-dried bricks, and then to invest it with a case of burnt bricks. The ruins exhibit evident traces of this mode of construction, although, in the course of ages, the external coverings of burnt bricks have been taken away for use in building. If we are to understand the text as meaning burnt bricks-which the original does not state so positively as our translation-it by no means follows that such only were used, as no large construction at Babylon was at any time wholly, or even principally, composed of burnt brick.

'Slime. They had bitumen for cement' would be a better translation of this passage; for the word in this place does undoubtedly denote that remarkable mineral pitch to which the name of bitumen is given, and which is supposed to have been formed in the earth from the decomposition of animal and vegetable substances. It is the

most inflammable of known minerals. There are two or three sorts, but having the same component parts. It is usually of a blackish or brown hue, and hardens more or less on exposure to the air. In its most fluid state it forms naphtha; when of the consistence of oil it becomes petroleum; at the next stage of induration it becomes elastic bitumen, then maltha, and so on, until it becomes a compact mass, and is then called asphaltum, the word by which the Septuagint renders the word chemar, which we have here as 'slime.' Herodotus states that the Babylonians derived their supplies of this substance from Is on the Euphrates. This is the modern Hit, a small mudwalled town, chiefly inhabited by Arabs and Jews, situated on the western bank of the river, and fixed by Rennell in 33° 43′ 15′′ N. lat. The principal bitumen pit has two sources, and is divided by a wall in the centre, on one side

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