plated by his permission to return was concerned, the rebuilding of Jerusalem was entirely ex Tapép you and κατὰ συμβεβηκός, in comparison of the rebuilding of the temple. And what was that rebuilding of Jerusalem, to which the permission of Cyrus to return and rebuild the temple seems to have led, per accidens as it was? The collection of a few settlers, more or less in number, on the site of what once was Jerusalem; and the construction of a few houses and dwellings for them to live in, even less numerous than the settlers. The city was not fully peopled with inhabitants, nor the defences about it effectually raised as before, until the time of Nehemiah; that is, there was neither street nor ditch, properly so called, at Jerusalem, for 92 years after this return. And what is a city, without street or wall, in comparison of its former self? or even of the essence of its being? Or how can that city be said to be yet in being, much less in the perfection of its being, which wants both these things-or possesses them only imperfectly? In a word, it appears from the Book of Ezra, that the Jews who came back with Zerubbabel considered themselves authorized by the decree of Cyrus to rebuild the house of God at Jerusalem; but it does not appear that they considered themselves empowered by it to rebuild the city. It does not appear, at least, that their enemies thought them to be so. The fourth chapter of Ezra shews that even these adversaries either did not attempt to stop, or did not succeed in stopping the work of the rebuilding of the temple; in which even they could not deny that the builders had the authority of the decree of Cyrus; until they were able to accuse them of combining with the rebuilding of the temple the design of rebuilding the city, that is, "to set up the walls, and to join the foundations :" Ezra iv. 11-16. Whether this accusation was a calumny on their part, or whether it was not, it proves alike that the only colourable pretence which they had, or were conscious of having, for denouncing the Jews to the king of Persia, was to have it in their power to lay to their charge not the actual rebuilding of the temple, but the alleged rebuilding of the city; the reason of which would appear at once, if the Jews, in attempting to rebuild their city as well as the temple, were exceeding, or might be made to appear to be exceeding, their commission from Cyrus, who had given permission for the one, but not for the other. Accordingly, neither was there any mention of the building of the temple in the accusation sent by them on this occasion to the king, but only of that of the city and its walls; neither is there any allusion to the former, in the answer of the king, forbidding the further progress of the work-but only to the latter; see iv. 21: though it is easy to see that to forbid the progress of the rebuilding of the city, under such circumstances, was virtually to forbid the continued rebuilding of the temple; and therefore, we need not be surprised that, after the receipt of this rescript of Artaxerxes, or the usurper Smerdis, the work of the temple also should have ceased, and fallen into abeyance for a time; Ezra iv. 24. In addition to the above considerations, there are others, which may be urged to a like effect; as follows. First, it would seem to be a natural inference from the analogy of the prophecy in the rest of its predictions, that the event which it alludes to, first of all, under the name of the going forth of the word or commandment, should still be something distant, compared with the time of its own delivery, like every thing else to which it relates. But according to one mode of reckoning the years of Cyrus*, the edict of Cyrus was either issued or on the point of being so, at *The mode in question is that which has the sanction apparently of the canon of Ptolemy, where the first of Cyrus is made to bear date B. C. 538. I have declared my opinion, however, with respect to this statement, (Appendix, Dissertation xii. vol. iii. 514.) that it is to be understood as merging the years of Darius at Babylon with those of Cyrus after him, though probably at Babylon also; and this explanation is strongly confirmed by the fact, that the difference between the common length assigned to the reign of Cyrus, as dated from B. C. 536, and the length assigned to it by the canon, dated from B. C. 538, amounts just to two years; and one or two years, but no more, would be the utmost length of time which there would be any reason from the testimony of the Book of Daniel to assign to the reign of Darius: for that book mentions no year of his reign but the first, though it mentions both the first and the third of Cyrus. It was very possible that Darius might reign just two years, at Babylon, but no more; being an old man at the time of his accession, or sixty-three years of age. In this case, Cyrus would actually succeed him, B. C. 536, just two years after the date in the canon, B. C. 538. The strongest argument after all is the fact that, according to the Book of Daniel, the first of Darius at Babylon must bear date B. C. 538. This fact is established by the testimony of the one and twenty days' interval between the first of his reign there, and the third of Belshazzar, B. C. 559; of which so much has been said, Appendix, Supplement to Dissertation xii. vol. iii. 547-584. On this principle, the first of Cyrus, at Babylon also, being made by the canon to bear date B. C. 538 likewise, the first of Darius and the first of Cyrus, both referred to their reigns at Babylon, either coincided and proceeded pari passu together, or the one has been merged in the other. The canon of Ptolemy is a chronological document, which had no object in view except to deduce with historical exactness the succession of time, through the various dynasties of the Babylonian, Persian, Grecian, Egyptian, and Roman kings or emperors, from the first year of the era of Nabo. nassar, B. C. 747, to his own time in the reign of Antoninus Pius. It would attain this object just the same, whether it specified the two years of Darius at Babylon, or not; provided it did not overlook them in the general account, but included them in some of the reigns before or after his. It is certain that it has not mentioned Darius by name; and it is certain also that it has not omitted to take into account the two years which should have been ascribed to him: and from both these facts together it becomes an highly probable conclusion that it has included them in the years which it assigns to Cyrus. the very time of this interview of the prophet Daniel with the angel Gabriel; and according to the common And this is the only solution which will reconcile the testimony of the canon with that of other ancient authorities, some of them entitled to just as much deference as the canon ; particularly that of Herodotus, with reference to the date of the capture of Babylon, from which the years of the reign of Cyrus, at Babylon, according to him, are necessarily to be reckoned. Ptolemy's reign of Cyrus is his reign at Babylon. It cannot be his reign ἁπλῶς—which a cloud of ancient authorities make a reign of 29 or 30 years, and not of nine; and date from Ol. 55. 1. B. C., and not from B. C. 538. Now a reign of nine years, dated from B. C. 538, would be just equivalent to a reign of seven, dated from B. C. 536, (the date which Herodotus assigns to the capture of Babylon,) both being supposed to expire B. C. 530 or B. C. 529. The first of Cyrus at Babylon, as neither earlier nor later than B. C. 536, appears to me to be indissolubly fixed by the term of years assigned to the captivity; which began in the third of Jehoiakim, and ended in the first of Cyrus. For if this term of years was to be seventy, and the third of Jehoiakim bore date B. C. 606, the first of Cyrus could not bear date earlier than B. C. 536. If it must bear date two years earlier, the captivity must come to a close two years earlier also; that is, the captivity could not be a seventy years' captivity, but only a sixtyeight years' one: which would be clearly inconsistent with what had been long before predicted of it. And it is but a sorry expedient, in order to get over this difficulty, to reckon the term of the captivity by current years, not by complete: for even seventy current years would suppose sixty-nine complete. It would be still more unjustifiable to endeavour to account for the difference, by reckoning the seventy years not as natural and common or solar years, but as lunar, or as prophetical; of which mode of reckoning future time, we have said enough heretofore. I should consider it far from improbable, that when Darius came to the throne of Babylon, being an old man, and the state of things, in all probability, one of danger and insecurity, he associated Cyrus in the empire with himself; and consequently that Cyrus' reign at Babylon too, as well as Darius', might actually bear date from B. Č. 538. But that, notwithstanding this, Darius for the rest of his life was not supreme, in some sense or other; more especially that Darius for the rest of his life was merely the viceroy or deputy of Cyrus; is a supposition so plainly contradictory to the Book of Daniel, that I am surprised it should ever have been proposed; which yet has been the case. It was absolutely essential to the fulfilment of prophecy, (see Daniel v. 28. viii. 3. 20, more particularly,) that the Babylonian empire should pass, mode of reckoning them, it could not be more than two years distant, at the same date: for the first of Cyrus is usually placed B. C. 536, and this prophecy, delivered as it appears from ix. 1. in the first of Darius, was delivered B. C. 538. Secondly, natural as the presumption may appear, that the first return of the Jews, or of any portion of them, to their own country, after the date of the prophecy, would most probably be the occasion contemplated by it, it is but a prejudice, after all*; and if we bona fide, to the Medes, if for ever so short a time, before it devolved upon the Persians; and it never did so pass, if it did not pass, though for ever so short a time, to Darius, before it was transmitted to Cyrus. It was equally necessary to the same fulfilment, that the kingdom so transmitted to Cyrus should be truly and bona fide the Babylonian; in other words, that Cyrus should be king of Babylon, as well as king of Persia. He is called by the first of these names accordingly, Ezra V. 13, 14. 17: as much as by the other, Ezra i. 1, 2. 8. iii. 7. iv. 3. 5. both later than the close of the captivity; that is, after B. C. 536. he is called by either indifferently. And that he was truly considered king of Babylon, even by profane history, appears from the canon itself, which gives him a place next in succession to the last of the kings of the purely Babylonian dynasty; and assigns him a reign which cannot possibly be mistaken for his reign in Persia, and therefore must be understood of his reign in Babylon. * And this prejudice, too, we may observe, in the minds of English readers at least, is very probably due to their familiarity with the terms of the English version. This version speaks of THE going forth, and of THE commandment, as if the going forth and the commandment intended, were something of either description Kar' ox and preeminently deserving of the name; but the prophecy itself speaks only of a going forth and of a commandment-a mode of describing the thing foretold which could not be justly understood, at least prima facie, to apply to one event of that description, or to one commandment, more than to another. In construing the terms of the prophecy throughout, it was very natural for our translators, perhaps imperceptibly to themselves, to be influenced by their knowledge, or their supposed knowledge, of the event-and therefore to understand many things with a special and definite reference, which the prophecy itself had left general and indeterminate. Among this number is the allusion to the going forth of the word or commandment, the first thing specified of all. The version of Theo |