19 Q Was the law the same for the servant or slave, and for the freeman, in case of maiming and of murder? A. Not entirely the same; for in some cases of maiming or killing a slave, the offender was not punishied to the same degree as if the injured person had been a freeman. Exod. xxi. 20, 26.

20 Q. What were some of the usual punishments of criminals appointed in the Jewish law?

A. A fine of money or cattle to be paid, a cutting off from the people or congregation, scourging or beating, at most with forty stripes, the loss of a limb, or the loss of life. Exod. xxi. 19, 22, 36. Lev. xix. 20, chap. xxiv. 17-20.

21 Q. What is the meaning of being cut off from the people, or the congregation?

A. In some greater crimes, such as presumptuous rebellion against the laws of God, wilful sabbath-breaking, &c. it may signify capital punishment or death by the hands of the magistrate. Numb. xv. 30, 31. Exod. xxxi. 14. In some cases it may intend a being devoted to some judgment by the immediate hand of God. Lev. xvii. 10, and xx. 5, 6. But in some lesser crimes, perhaps, it may signify no more than to be excommunicated, or shut out of the congregation of Israel, and the privileges thereof; as for eating leavened bread at the time of the pass-over, Exod. xii. 15, or for a man's going unto the holy things with his uncleanness upon him. Lev. xxii. 3, where it is expressed, that that soul shall be cut off from the presence of God. But this question hath some difficulties in it, and learned men differ about the sense of these words, being cut off.

22 Q. If the Jews were permitted to give forty stripes, how came Paul five times to receive but forty stripes save one from the Jews, who so much hated him? 1 Cor. xi. 24.

A. Because they pretended to be very scrupulous in observing the law exactly, and therefore they never inflicted more than thirty-nine stripes, lest they should happen to mistake in the tale while they were inflicting forty, and thus transgress the law.

23 Q. What were their most common ways of putting criminals to death?

A. By hanging them on a tree, or by stoning them with stones. Numb. xxv. 4. Deut. xxi. 23, xiii. 9, 10. Numb. xv. 35.

1

24 Q. How many witnesses were necessary to condemn a criminal to death ?

A. At the mouth of two or three witnesses shall he that is worthy of death be put to death, but not at the mouth of one witness. Deut. xvii. 6, 7.

25 Q. What was the design of God in giving them so many peculiar laws about their civil or political af

fairs?

A. (1.) To let them know that God was their King as well as their God, and to keep them distinct and separate from the rest of the nations, as his own people and kingdom.

(2.) Many of these laws were in themselves excellently suited to the advantage of that people, dwelling in that country, and under those circumstances.

(3.) Some of these laws had a moral or spiritual meaning in them, which might partly be known at that time, and which was further discovered afterwards.

26 Q. What instances can you give of moral lessons taught by these political laws?

A. Thou shalt not take the dam with the young, Deut. xxii. 6, 7, is to teach men mildness and compassion. Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treads out the corn, Deut. xxv. 4, is to shew that ministers, who provide us spiritual food, ought to be maintained themselves, 1 Cor. ix. 9, 10, for so the apostle Paul has explained it.

CHAP. VII.

Of the Sins and Punishments of the Jews in the Wilderness.

I Q. AFTER all this accouut of the moral, ceremonial, and judicial laws, can you tell me whether the children of Israel obeyed them or no?

A. No; they often broke the laws of God, and sinned against him, and were often punished. Isa. Ixiii. 10. Psalm 1xxviii. 32-34.

2 Q. What were the most remarkable sins against God in the wilderness?

A. Besides their murmurings at some difficulties in the beginning of their journey, their first remarkable and notorious crime was their making a golden calf, and worshipping it at the foot of Mount Sinai. Exod. xxxii. 4, 8.

3 Q. What temptation, or what pretence could they have for such a crime?

A. Moses was gone up into Mount Sinai, and tarried there so many days longer than they expected, that they wanted some visible token of God's presence among them; and so they constrained Aaron to make this golden image, to be a representation of the presence of God, but without God's appointment. Exod. xxxii. 1.

Note. It is scarcely to be supposed that this was the mere image of a common calf, or that the Jews could fall down and worship such an image; or that they could suppose an ox or calf, which was the idol of their enemies the Egyptians, was a proper emblem of the God of Israel, their deliverer from Egypt. Probably therefore it was the image of a cherub, partly in the form of a winged ox. And since God was represented immediately afterward by Moses as dwelling among the cherubims on the mercy-seat, this might be a common opinion or notion beforehand among the people even of that age.* And it might be made as a visible representation of the presence of God, for they proclaimed a feast to Jehovah, ver. 5, in the same manner as Jeroboam, long afterward, made perhaps the same sort of images for the same purpose, which are called calves. But both this and that being done without God's appointment, it was all idolatry, and in a way of the utmost contempt, it was called worshipping a calf; and was accordingly punished as highly criminal. See Chap. v. Q. 37.

*There were some things relating to the worship of God which that people had some general notion of, before Moses went up into the mount to learn all the particulars from God: as for instance, they had altars, and sacrifices, and sprinkling of blood. xxiv. 4, 6, 8. They had priests, Exod. xix. 22, 24, and a tabernacle, or moveable chapel. Exod. xxxiii. 6, 7. And they might

Exod.

4 Q. How did God punish them for the golden calf? A. The children of Levi were commanded to slay their brethren, and they slew three thousand of the children of Israel. Exod. xxxii. 27, 28.

5 Q. What was another of their remarkable sins? A. In the next stage, after Sinai, they loathed the manna, which God sent them, and murmured for want of flesh. Numb. xi. 4.

6 Q. How was the murmuring punished?

A. God gave them the flesh of quails in abundance, and sent the plague with it. Numb. xi. 31, 33.

7 Q. What was their third remarkable sin ?

A. Being discouraged by the spies who searched out the land of Canaan, and brought an ill report of that promised land, they were for making a captain to return to Egypt. Numb. xxii. 32, and xiv. 3, 4, 36.

8 Q. How was this rebellion chastised?

A. Ten of the spies died immediately of a plague, and all the people were condemned to wander forty years in the wilderness, till all those who were above twenty years old should die by degrees in their travels. Numb. xiv. 29-37.

9 Q. Who of the spies were saved?

A.

None but Caleb and Joshua, who followed the Lord fully, and gave a good account of the land of promise. Numb. xiv. 6, 23, 24, 37, 38, and xxvi. 65.

a

10 Q. What was their fourth remarkable sin? A. When Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, stirred up rebellion against Moses and Aaron. Numb. xvi. 1, &c. 11 Q. What was the occasion of this rebellion of Korah and his companions?

A. They pretended that all Israel were holy, and that Aaron and his family had no more right to the priesthood than they; and that Moses took too much upon him to determine every thing among them. Numb. xvi. 3, 10.

know that God dwelt among angels, or some glorious winged beings, as his attendants. And these cherubs might be sometimes figured as flying men with calves' feet, or as flying oxen, as part of the equipage or attendants of God.

12 Q. How were Korah, Dathan and Abiram pun ished?

*

A. They and their families were swallowed up by an earthquake, and their two hundred and fifty companions were burnt by a fire which came out from God, ver. 31, 35, and when the congregation murmured against Moses and Aaron for the death of these sinners, God smote above fourteen thousand of them, and they died of the plague. ver. 41-50.

13 Q. What miracle did God work to shew that he had chosen Aaron's family to the priesthood?

A. He bid the heads of the people choose twelve rods for the twelve tribes of Israel, and write Aaron's name upon Levi's rod, and lay them up in the tabernacle till the morrow at which time they took each man his rod, and Aaron's rod blossomed and yielded almonds. Numb. xvii. 2-6-10.

14 Q. What was done with this rod of Aaron ?

A. It was laid up in the ark to be a lasting testimony against these rebels, ver. 10, and to confirm Aaron's right to the priesthood.

15. What was a fifth remarkable sin of the peo

ple?

A. They murmured because of the length of the way, and for want of better food than manna. Numb. xxi. 4, 5.

16 Q. How was this new murmuring punished? A. God sent fiery serpents among them which destroyed many of them. Numb. xxi. 6.

17 Q. How were the people healed which were bitten by the serpents ?

A. By looking up to a serpent of brass, which Moses put upon a high pole at God's command. Numb. xxi. 8, 9.

18 Q. What was the sixth remarkable sin of Israel? A. Whoredom and idolatry; for they loved the Midtanitish women, and worshipped their gods. Numb. XXV. 1, 2.

Yet in Numb. xxvi. 11, the sons of Korah are excepted.