OF THE HOLY BIBLE: BEING A CONNECTED ACCOUNT OF THE REMARKABLE EVENTS AND DISTINGUISHED CHARACTERS CONTAINED IN THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS, AND IN JEWISH HISTORY DURING THE FOUR HUNDRED YEARS INTERVENING BETWEEN THE TIME OF MALACHI AND THE BIRTH OF CHRIST; INCLUDING ALSO THE LIFE OF CHRIST AND HIS APOSTLES: THE WHOLE EMBRACING A PERIOD OF FOUR THOUSAND YEARS, WITH NOTES CRITICAL, TOPOGRAPHICAL, AND EXPLANATORY. AUTHOR OF THE BY JOHN KITTO, D.D., F.S.A., (C EDITED BY ALVAN BOND, D.D., FORMERLY PROFESSor of bibLICAL LITERATURE IN THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY AT BANGOR, MAINE; AND FOR ASSISTED IN GEOLOGY BY PROF. C. H. HITCHCOCK, LATE OF Amherst COLLEGE. EMBELLISHED AND ILLUSTRATED BY ABOUT THREE HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS, Including accurate copies from the Nineveh Marbles, from Ancient Egyptian Paintings, and from articles now in PORTRAIT OF THE AUTHOR, ENGRAVED ON STEEL. NORWICH, CONN.: PUBLISHED BY HENRY BILL. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by HENRY BILL, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the District of Connecticut Rand, Avery & Frye, Electrotypers and Printers, Boston. PREFACE. IBLE History," says Dr. Lange, "differs from the general history of the kingdom of God, in that it delineates only the foundation of this kingdom by means of and during the course of revelation. It traces, in historical succession, the narrative contained in the Scriptures in all its essential features. In the Old Testament it shows us all the elements of the life of faith, and sets before us many a precious example of faith and patience for our imitation; while in the New Testament it exhibits the history of faith and salvation made perfect,' both in the miracles and triumphs of the Lord, and in the deeds of His apostles. Thus Bible history forms the basis of Church history." which is nowhere found but in the Old Testament. True, there are fabulous legends and cosmogonies in which may be found a confused intermingling of traditional lore and the inventions of the imagination, but they are wanting in all the essential elements of authentic history. The Bible supplies, either by express statement or obvious implication, facts and principles which constitute genuine history, and go far to give the past all the value which it can possess for the men of these times. The history of the pre-Christian era embraces, 1. The primeval ages till the deluge, and the re-settlement of Noah and his family in Armenia. 2. The dispersion of the posterity of Noah's three sons till the calling of As a department of useful knowledge, it Abraham. 3. The origin and establishment possesses an intrinsic value and interest, sur- of the Hebrew Theocracy, and its relations to passing whatever can be claimed for any the ancient empires of the world, comprising other history. It covers a long period in the the period from Moses to David the period age of human society, whose chronicles, in an of the kings from David to the Babylonian authentic form, have been nowhere else pre-exile - the period of sacerdotal rule under served. It runs back to the eventful epoch the Maccabæan administration, or what is whence the creation of the world, in its present organic state, dates its existence; and furnishes the only reliable record of the origin of man, of his primitive condition, his fall, his subsequent development, and the fortunes of his family. called the middle period. 4. Primitive Christianity to the close of the first century. Thus surveyed, it appears that Biblical history covers a period of four thousand years or more-from the morning of creafor-years tion to the establishment of Christianity in all parts of the Roman empire. When considered in respect to the infallible sources whence it is derived, and the long flight of ages which it embraces, it must be regarded as possessing the highest claims to our careful study. Biblical history is the source of all we know of the antediluvian period, and subsequent ages of the world down to the time of Herodotus, the father of history. It contains the only truthful account of the ancient and long since vanished civilizations. Herodotus was a contemporary of Ezra and Nehemiah, the last of the Old Testament historians. The antediluvian period, and that intervening between the Noachian deluge and the times of Nehemiah, embrace an era of about three thousand five hundred years, the history of Viewed merely as a literary production, the Bible," says the able and learned editor of Dr. Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scrip tures, "is a marvellous book, and without a rival. All the libraries of theology, philosophy, history, antiquities, poetry, law, and ix |