were also set up to the knees in a dunghill, with a towel around their necks, which was drawn till they were forced to open their mouths, to receive the melted lead that was to be poured into them. And the persons to be stoned to death, commonly received their doom in the following manner: they were brought to a little eminence without the city, two cubits high, with their hands bound, where was a large stone at the bottom; and when four cubits from it they received the stupifying draught, were stripped almost naked, and dashed backwards, by the first witness who had condemned them, on the stone at the bottom of the eminence; if not killed by that, the second witness was ready with another large stone to throw it upon their breasts while they lay; and if still alive after all this, the people present rushed forward and stoned them till they died. This may lead us to understand what is meant by the witnesses laying down their garments, or upper robes, at Saul's feet, when they were going to stone Stephen; and also what our Saviour meant when he said, "Whosoever shall fall upon this stone shall be broken; and on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." The persons condemned to be stoned were first dashed upon a stone, and then stones were thrown upon them.

All the stoned were also hanged on a tree; but after hanging a certain time, they were buried in the buryingplace allotted for such persons: for there were two of that description at Jerusalem, the one for the strangled and beheaded, as being the less notorious; and the other, for those who were burnt and stoned. But when the flesh was wasted in these public cemeteries, the bones were gathered and buried in the grave of their fathers. The minor punishments inflicted by order of the Jew

⚫ Acts vii. 58.

Matt, xxi. 44. C

Lightf, Harm. N. T. part i. § 86.

ish tribunals were commonly whipping and the stocks," the last of which were similar to those at present in use, by which the feet are confined for a certain time in the market-place; and the first was inflicted with a whip of three cords thirteen times repeated, for they were forbidden by the law to exceed forty, and by this contrivance they limited it to thirty-nine; which may serve to explain to us what the apostle means when he says"Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes, save

one."b

Concerning the number of presidents, Dr. Lightfoot mentions the names of sixteen, between the return from the seventy years' captivity, and the time when they ceased to exist. Ezra, of whom so much is said in Scripture, was the first, during whose life the Sanhedrin was composed of very eminent members, such as Zerubbabel, Joshua, Nehemiah, Seriah, Mordecai, &c. and hence it is called by the Jews the Great Synagogue.—Simeon the Just, was the second: it was his brother, Eleazer, to whom, when high priest, Ptolemy Philadelphus is said to have sent respecting the Septuagint.-The third was Antigonus of Soco: one of whose scholars, named Sadoc, is thought to have broached the errors of the Sadducees. -The fourth was Joseph-ben-Joezer.-The fifth, Joshua, the son of Perehiah.-The sixth, Judah, the son of Tabbai, whose vice-president built the chamber of Gezith.The seventh, Shemaiah.-The eighth, Hillel, one of the most eminent they ever had: his presidency began twenty-eight years before our Saviour's birth, and his death happened in the twelfth year of our Saviour's age: Jonathan-ben-Uzziel, the Chaldee paraphrast was one of his scholars.-Rabban Simeon, Hillel's son, was the ninth : he was the first who was dignified with the name of

* Deut. xxv. 2, 3. Jer. xx. 2.

b2 Cor. ii. 24.

Rabban, and is supposed to have been the Simeon who took our Saviour in his arms: he began his presidency about the thirteenth year of Christ; and appears, like Nicodemus, to have been one of those in the Sanhedrin who believed on him."-The tenth was Rabban Gamaliel, Simeon's son, under whom Paul was educated: he was president when Christ was arraigned, and lived twenty-two years after; but it is probable that he repented of the part he took, and that the good instructions of his father had revived in his mind; for when the Sanhedrin wished to take violent measures with the apostles and the Christian cause, he appeared as their advocate. The eleventh president of the Sanhedrin was Rabban Simeon, the son of Gamaliel; he was slain at the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. But although the city was destroyed, the Sanhedrin did not cease to exist, for it moved about from place to place, having the following presidents: viz. Rabban Jochanan-benZaccai, the twelfth president, who held the Sanhedrin at Jabneh.-Rabban Gamaliel, of Jabneh, the thirteenth ; the son of Rabban Simeon Gamaliel, the eleventh president.-Rabban Simeon, the son of Rabban Gamaliel, of Jabneh, the fourteenth.-The fifteenth was Rabbi Judah, the son of the former; the compiler of the Mishna, called by way of distinction Haccadosh, or the Holy.-And the sixteenth was Rabban Gamaliel, the son of Rabbi Judah, with whom the title of Rabban ceased, and the Sanhedrin expired.

We have been thus long in our details concerning the chamber Gezith, in consequence of the Sanhedrin having sat there for so long a time; but it should not be forgotten, that the time of their leaving it, according to their own confession, happened at the death of our Sa

viour, when the power of judging in civil matters was taken from them, and their discussions were confined to those which were entirely of a religious nature. It was then that they retired from the chamber Gezith, and held their meetings in that above the east gate in the outer wall, or the gate Shushan, where a council of twenty-three formerly sat. The following is the list of places to which they successively removed:-1st. from Gezith to Heniuth, over the gate Shushan; 2d. from Heniuth to Jerusalem; 3d. from Jerusalem to Jabneh ; 4th. from Jabneh to Ausha; 5th. from Ausha to Jabneh; 6th. from Jabneh to Ausha again; 7th. from Ausha to Sheperom; 8th. from Sheperom to Bith Shaarim; 9th. from Bith Shaarim to Tsipperas in Gallilee; and 10th. from Tsipperas to Tiberius.

Such were the buildings in the south-east corner of the Court of Israel: advancing forward along the south wall towards the Water Gate, we come to the house or chamber for the draw-well, (marked No. 5, in Plate II.) because a well was sunk there, and a wheel placed over it, by which they drew water to serve every purpose in the Court of the Priests-as filling the laver, filling the cisterns for the priests to bathe in, washing the sacrifices, boiling the offerings, and even washing the Court itself. But as an immense quantity of water was required for these purposes, and we never find a deficiency of it complained of; it may be proper to observe, that the requisite supply was not obtained from a spring in the rock, but from the spring Etam or Nephtoah, which lay four furlongs to the westward of the temple, and was conveyed to it by means of pipes along that place, which was known by "the coming down of the waters." At the west end of the draw-well chamber was the gate

a Joshua xviii, 15.

called The Water Gate: it had a priest's guard stationed at it, and gave a direct entry from the Court of the Gentiles and Sacred Fence, into the Court of the Priests, opposite the brazen altar; but it was not called by that name on account of its being in the neighbourhood of the reservoir for water. The Talmudists assign another reason: they say, that it obtained its name on account of its being the gate through which the water was brought from Siloam, that was poured out at the feast of tabernacles. We read of a Water Gate in Neh. viii. 3, but that was in the city, not in the temple, as is evident from Neh. iii. 26. Immediately above the Water Gate of the temple, was the chamber Abtines, or incense chamber, so called from a person of that name, who had been much esteemed while in office; in like manner, as the wardrobe chamber was called the Chamber of Phineas.

The receipt for making the incense used in the temple on the golden altar was as follows:-Of stacte, onycha, galbanum, and frankincense, each seventy-one pounds weight, or two hundred and eighty-four pounds in all; of myrrh, cassia, crocus, and ana, sixteen pounds each, or sixty-four pounds in all; of costus, twelve pounds; cinnamon, nine pounds; and cloves, three pounds-in all three hundred and sixty-eight pounds. The first four of these ingredients, but not their specific quantities, are to be found in Exod. xxx. 34; the rest were added by the traditions. Each of these articles was pounded by itself, in the mortar called "the mortar of the sanctuary," which was carried to Rome when the city was sacked; they were then carefully mixed, and to the mixture were added some salt of Sodom, amber of Jordan, and an herb of an odoriferous smoke, with which very few were acquainted. The proportion for each day was a pound, and the three pounds that remained at the end of the year (except a handful that the high priest