This Essay is printed in the sixth Number of

the CLASSICAL, BIBLICAL, and ORIENTAL

JOURNAL, (a Quarterly Publication) with some few alterations.

Dissertation

ON THE

FORTY-NINTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.

JEHOVAH

EHOVAH appears to have selected Abraham and his posterity from the rest of mankind, for the purpose of preserving among them the knowledge of the true religion; but this knowledge, it would seem from the 6th chapter of Exodus, was not bestowed on the Patriarchs in all its plenitude. "And Elohim spake unto Moses, and said unto him, I Am Jehovah; and I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, by the name of El Shadai, but by my name Jehovah was I not known unto them." The meaning is, that the true import

of the word was not explained to the Patriarchs; for had they understood it, they would have known that there was no God but Jehovah. Now that Jacob did not possess this knowledge is evident from his words:-" And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, if Elohim will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father's house in peace, then shall Jehovah be my God." No man, who entertained just ideas of the existence of the Deity, could have thought of making such a bargain with Omnipotence; nor if Jacob had comprehended the name of Jehovah,' would he have fancied, that he might

'Jehovah implies the Supreme Being, or the Being xar oxv. It has been absurdly pretended by some of the Pagan writers, that the Jews worshipped their God under the form of an Ass in the temple of Jerusalem. In order to support this idle fable, they remark, on the authority of Apion, who was an Egyptian, that ', which without the Masorah answers to the letters IHVH, signified an Ass. They say, that Jehovah was pronounced JAO, or IEO, and that this meant an Ass in Egyptian. They further remark, that we continually meet with Pi-Jao (nın' 'D, Phi Jehovah) the mouth of the

choose the God, whom he should adore. We must not be surprised, then, if we find traces of idolatry in the early history of the house of Israel:-if Rachel stole the Teraphim from her father Laban; -and if Jacob hid the strange Gods of his household under the oak of Sechem.

But since it appears from the Bible itself, that the Patriarchs were not acquainted with the divine nature in the same degree with Moses, and that they were not absolutely untinctured with polytheism, it cannot appear extraordinary, that they were influenced by minor superstitions, and that, with all their neighbours, they were addicted to divination and astrology. We know, that Joseph was a diviner; and there are many circumstances from which we may conclude, that Jacob was an astrologer. The streaked rods which were set up by

Lord: Thus repeatedly in the ninth chapter of Numbers we find by, which is translated, "at the commandment of the Lord;" and it is pretended that Pi, or Phi, is nothing else than the Egyptian article, and that, therefore ''D should be rendered the ass. The absurdity of this reasoning needs not to be pointed out.

the latter, in order to produce the breeding of the cattle, seem to have been formed in imitation of the rod which is held by the man, who occupied the sign of the Balance in the Egyptian zodiac, and who presided in the kingdom of Omphtha over flocks and herds. It appears from Eusebius,' that tradition, at least, represented Israel as an astrologer, who believed himself under the influence of the planet Saturn. Even at this day, the three great stars in Orion are called Jacob's staff, and the milky way is familiarly termed Jacob's ladder. This Patriarch had twelve sons, and tradition has allotted to each a sign of the zodiac. Kircher and Dupuis have pretended that the emblems, which were painted on the standards of the tribes in the camp of the Hebrews, were no other than the zodiacal signs; and Dupuis has endeavoured to corroborate this opinion, by the references which he has made to the 49th chapter of Genesis.

I have to lament that Kircher, with all his Oriental learning; and Dupuis, with all his