unto the LORD. The author of the Book of Ecclesiasticus observes concerning the moon, that the month is called after her name ; but this was not so to an ancient Israelite. In our English language the words moon and month may have this relation; and a like thought is to be supported in the Greek tongue, in which the author of Ecclesiasticus wrote his Book. May, the month, may be a contraction from the moon; though I think it more natural to derive un

μην, than μην from μηνη.

k

from

However in the

Hebrew, yareach, or, lebanah' are the words which signify moon; and chodesh," is the word for month; and these have no such affinity to one another. 4, Indeed, in the Hebrew Bible, there is, I think, no one text either in the Books of Moses, or in any

Ecclus. xliii. 8.

Vid. Gen. xxxvii. 9. Deut. iv. 19. Josh. x.12. Job xxxv. 5. Psalm viii. 4. Ecclus. xii. 2. Isaiah xiii. 10. Jer. viii. 2. Ezek. xxxii. 7. Joel ii. 10, &c. 'Cantic. vi. 10. Isaiah xxiv. 23. xxx. 26.

Gen. viii. 4. Exod. xii. 2. Levit. xxiii. 24. Deut. i. 3. 1 Kings iv. 7, &c.

YOL. III.

other of the Books of the Old Testament, which intimate that the Israelites observed the day of the new-moon in any of their festivals. The Israelites were to offer their burnt offerings unto the LORD in the beginning, not of their moons but (0ɔwan w~) be-rashei chadsheichem, on the beginning of their months," and the expression is the the same, Numb. x. 10. The Israelites are there commanded to blow with the trumpets... on the beginning of their months; but nothing relating to the moon is suggested to them. And this expression runs through all the texts of Scripture, in which the LXX have used the word or one or we in English, the new-moons. When the Shunamite would have gone to the Prophet, her husband said unto her, wherefore will thou go to him to day? It is neither, (we render the place,) new-moon, nor sabbath; the Lxx say Η νεομηνια εδε σαββατον; but the Hebrew words are loa chodesh ve loa shabbath, it is not the month-day, nor the sabbath. Thus again the Psalmist directs, to

"Numb: xxviii. 11.

• 2 Kings iv. 23.

blow up the trumpet, not as we render it, in the new-moons, nor, as the LXX EV VEμva; but, ba chodesh, upon the month day.

In

› Psalm 1xxxi. 4. The latter part of the verse is thought by some writers to intimate something contrary to what I am offering. Blow up the trumpet, says the Psalmist, on the month day, after which follows, un, baccaseh lejom chaggenu. The word ceseh, they say, is derived from the verb casah to cover, so that bacceseh may signify at the covering, or when the moon is in conjunction with the sun, covered, as it were, so as to give no light. Thus these writers think this verse intimates that the newmoon had been a solemn festival. But I would observe, the expression thus taken is so singular, unlike any thing to be met with, in any other place of Scripture, notwithstanding the frequent mention of the festival here intended, that I think we cannot safely build upon it. Others derive the word cesch from DD casas, to number out; and accordingly render baccesch, upon the appointed day: but were this the sense of the place, the word would, perhaps, have been written not, bacceseh, but so baccesea, see Proverbs vii. 21. The reader may see what has been offered upon this text in Scalig. de Emendat. Temp. lib. 3. p. 153. Cleric. Comment. in loc. and will, after all, find the passage to be obscure, at most but doubtfully explained by those who have written upon it.

none of the texts that suggest this festival, is there any mention ha yareach or hal lebanah of the moon; for not the first day of the moon, but the first day of the month was the day observed by them. It is remarkable that this signification of the Hebrew texts was so undeniable to the Jewish Rabbins, that they could not but own, that their observing the first days of months upon new-moons did not arise from any direction of the words of the law,' they say it was one

הן הסכת .21 .See Proverbs vii .ביום is the same as ליום

is the known expression for the feast of tabernacles. Deut. xvi. 13. And I have been apt to suspect that transcribers have misplaced the letter in the word caseh, and wrote instead of non i. e. bacceseh for hassuccoth. In the Hebrew the letters of the one word might readily be written for the letters of the other. And if we may make this emendation, hasuccoth lejom haggenu, will signify on the day of our feast of tabernacles; and the Psalmist will appear to recommend the observing two solemn feasts, which fell almost together in the same month; the one the month-day, or, first day of the seventh month, on which was to be a memorial of blowing of trumpets, Levit. xxiii. 24. the other the first day of the feast of tabernacles. See ver. 34.

'Maimonid, more Nevoch. p. 3. c. 46.

of the matters which Moses was taught in the mount, and by tradition was brought down to them. It is, I think, undeniable, that the Jews did admit the use of a new form of computing their year some time after the captivity, which differed in many points from their more ancient method; and which obliged them in time to make many rules for the translation of days and feasts; an account of which we may find in the writers of their antiquities. But the law, as Moses or Joshua left it to the observance of their fathers, or as it was observed until after David's or Solomon's time, seems to have been a stranger to all these regulations. I might perhaps say, that the Jews in following these were in many points led contrary to Moses' directions. When our Saviour was betrayed, he was apprehended on the night of the passover after he had eaten the passover with his disciples, and carried early in the evening to the high

Abarb. in Parasch. and Aaron, lib. 3. c. 7. &c. Mark xiv. 12.-27, &c.

See Godwin's Moses Matt. xvii. 17.-31, Luke xxii. 7.-34, &c.