The Harmony Chronicle and Order of the New Testament, Part 1 · Section 77 – Section 78

The Harmony Chronicle and Order of the New Testament · Part 1 · Section 77 – Section 78

p. 58SECTION LXXVII.

Tribute to Cesar. The resurrection asserted in the Law. The great Commandment. Christ how Davids sonne. Wo against the Scribes and Pharisees.

THe Evangelists are so clear in their order, both here and a good way forward, that there can be no scrupling in it.

The question proposed, Whether it were lawfull to give tribute to Cesar, proceeded from that old maxime among them, upon mistake of Deut. 17.15. that they ought not to be subject to any power or potentate, which was not of their own blood or Religion: the holding to which maxime, cost them the ruine of their City and Nation.

His answer from the Image of Cesar upon their coin, was according to their own concessions. The Ierusalem Talmud doth personate David and Abigail talking thus. Abigail said, What evil have I done or my children, or my cattell? David saith to her, Because thy husband vilified to Kingdom of David. She saith, Art thou a King then? He saith to her, Did not Samuel anoint me King? She saith to him, foreign The Coin of our Lord Saul is yet current: In Sanhedr. fol. 20. col. 2. Maym. in Gezelah per. 5. A King that cuts down the trees of any owner, and makes a bridge of them, it is lawfull to go over it, &c. How is this to be understood? Of a King whose Coin is current in these Countries, for the men of the Country do thereby evidence, that they acknowledge him for their Lord and themselves his servants: But if his Coin be not current, then he is a robber, &c.

The topick from whence he argueth the resurrection against the Sadduces, is also acknowledged by the Writers of that Nation: Tanchum. fol. 13. col. 3. The holy blessed God doth not joyn his Name to the Saints while they are alive, but when they are dead: as it is said, To the Saints which are in the earth, &c. But behold we finde that he joyns his Name to Isaac [meaning, he cals himself the God of Isaac] while he was alive, &c. Jerus. in Beracoth fol. 5. col. 4. Whence is there proof that the righteous are called living when they are dead, &c.

He poseth the Pharisees in their very Catechism: they used it as a common name for the Messias to call him the son of David, and yet when they are put to it to observe that David cals him Lord, they are so farre nonplust, that they have not only not what to answer, for the present, but this silenceth them from future disputes. Now therefore he fals upon them with their deserved character and doom, and as in Matth. 5. he had pronounced beatitudes, so here in Matth. 23. he denounceth woes, and curseth these men from Isa. 65.15, &c.

This Chapter as it is a speech to and of the Scribes and Pharisees, and treateth of their doctrines and demeanours, so from their own Pandects and Authors may it be explained from point to point: those speaking out their doctrines and practises to the full.

Their sitting in Moses chair, ver. 1. meaneth them as Magistrates, to whom Christ injoyneth all lawfull obedience. Vid. Sanhedr. per. 1. halac. 6.

Their heavy burdens ver. 4. translates their foreign of which they speak so much and so highly.

Their Tephillin are called Phylacteries, ver. 5. which meaneth not only Observatives, because they were memorials of their duty and devotions [being four portions of the Law written in two parchments, and the one worn upon their forehead and the other upon their left arm] but Preservatives, as being reputed by them a fence against evil p. 59spirits, Ierus. Beracoth fol. 2. A man hath need to say over his Phylacteries every evening in his house, to fright away evil spirits.

They loved to be called Rabbi Rabbi, ver. 7. R. Ahibah said to Eliezer, Rabbi Rabbi, Jerus. Meed. Ka…on fol. 81.1. And yet they had this rule against it, Love the work, but hate the Rabbiship, Maym. in Talm. Torah. per. 3.

Call no one father, ver. 9. in that sense as they owned their Doctors by the title foreign relying upon the authority of humane doctrines.

Their permitting and practising to swear by the Temple, ver. 16. came into a common custom, Juchas. fol. 50. col. 1. Baba ben Bota sware by the Temple, and so did Rabban Simeon ben Gamaliel, and this was a custom in Israel.

Their tithing mint, annise and cummin, ver. 23. explained in the Talmudish treatises Demai, whited sepulchers, ver. 27. Shekalim per. 1. halac. 1. In the monethmonth Adar they whited the sepulchers. And the reason is given by the Gomarists, that people hereby might have the better discovery of them, the better to avoid defilement by them: which well observed, sets on Christs invective against these wretches the more. Gomar. utrius que Talm. in loc. & Ierus. in Maasar Sheni. fol. 55.3.

Their decking of Sepulchers in honour of those that lay in them, ver. 29. handled in Ierus. in Moed Katon fol. 80. col. 3, & 4.

He concludeth his speech with the intimation of what shame and guilt lay upon them for the blood of the former Prophets slain by their fathers, filled up by their own wickednesse in persecuting those that he did or should send to them. He calleth them Serpents from Gen. 3.15. and teacheth us to look upon them as the seed of the Serpent in an eminent degree, if any degree of that nature may be called eminent. He doomes all the Prophets to be required of that generation, because they by their transcendent abuse of those whom God sent, even of Messias himself, did justifie and exceed all the evil their fathers had done against the Prophets: Yea all the blood shed before the blood of Zacharias, and his, though they held that to have been satisfied for, by the destruction, slaughter and captivity by the Babylonians, Ierus. in Taanith fol. 69. col. 2. His changeth the name of his father, and so doth Targ. in Lament. cap. 2. ver. 20. And concludes with a sad denunciation of destruction, and that they should no more see him till they should say, Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord: which very words he had uttered also a great while before this, Luk. 13.34, 35. and the multitude had said, Blessed be he that cometh, &c. when he rode into Ierusalem upon an Asse. But the same words now uttered by him, are of somewhat doubtfull interpretation, whether they mean, their no more seeing of him till the night and time of the Passeover, [for at the Paschal meal every company rehearsed this saying, Blessed be he that cometh, &c. in their great Hallel as they called it] or that they should no more see him at all, because they had not learned to entertain him, as coming from God. See Joh. 5.43.

SECTION LXXVIII. MARK Chap. XII. Ver. 41, 42, 43, 44. LUKE Chap. XXI. Ver. 1, 2, 3, 4. The poor widows mites.

THe Jews before their prayers in the Temple, or their Synagogues, used to give something by way of alms or offering, that Charity and piety might go together. Maym. in Mattanath Anijim. per. 6. Now in the Court of the women at the Temple [as we have observed elswhere in the description of that place] there were severall chests, which the Jews call Shoper…th, into which the people put the money they offered, some to buy one thing for the service of the Temple, some another, &c.