John Wilson, 1877
THIRTY-FIRST. "The Welsh certainly
are a most remarkable people, and the Cymri [ABCOG: Cymry is western Wales]
were evidently Baal-worshippers."
REPLY. - And you might have added that in
this way they be identified with Israel, who were likewise noted for similar
idolatry.
In the ruins of Nineveh a marble slab has
been found, which bears on this point of the discussion, and has been
translated as follows:- "SARGON MARCHED AGAINST THE CITY OF SAMARIA, AND
AGAINST THE TRIBE OF THE BETH KUMRI, OF WHICH HE TOOK AWAY 27,280 FAMILIES INTO
ASSYRIA." And in the British Museum is to be seen a black basalt obelisk
five feet high, on which this has been deciphered: "The tribute of
Yahua ab-il Khumry;" i.e., of Jehu the son of Omri:- "silver,
gold, vessels, goblets, pitchers, and other things, all of gold, have I
received." And one of the baked clay hexagonal prisms also tells that in
the reign of Esarhaddon the Kimmerians were under the leadership of one TUISPA.
Now the Israelites of Samaria were often
called "Kumri," because of their idolatrous priests called
"Chemarim." The Kimbri, Cimbri, Cumry, or Cymri, are always mentioned
by Tacitus as making part of the great Germanic race. As
"Scythians," they have occupied Denmark, a small part of the north of
Germany, and Great Britain, where the Cambrian Scythians and Cymri are called
"Welsh;" from Goer (Heb.), "a stranger," which next became
"Goel," and then "Woel."
Herodotus says (Book 4., s. xi.), that the Cimmerians came
from the region called Kimmerion (the country of the Khumri Israelites).
Pliny says that the Saccasani gave to their country the name of Saccasena
(Saxonia). Sunna signifies "son" (and also the Hebrew Shanah,
a repetition). Now the Sacae were the most celebrated of the Scythians
(wandering tribes or dwellers in booths.)
NOTE. - The Hebrew word "Chemarim"
occurs only three times in the Old Testament: 2 Kings 23:5, where it
is translated "idolatrous priests;" Hos. 10:5, where it is
simply "priests;" and Zeph. 1:4, where the word is given
untranslated. In the German Bible the word "Camarim" is retained in
all three passages. The letter m, at the end, being merely part of the
masculine plural termination, the real word stands KMRY.
For further information, consult Layard's
"Nineveh," Rawlinson's "Herodotus," "Western Asiatic
Inscriptions," and "Parkhurst's Hebrew Lexicon."
THIRTY-SECOND. "If they had been
Jews, must have brought their rites with them; but they did not bring
one."
REPLY. - What rites? The Ten Tribes were not
"Jews" as we now understand the term. They had forsaken the
Law of Moses after the death of Solomon; and God granted them their choice,
gave them a bill of divorce, and sent them away; while He retained Judah under
the old marriage covenant (Jer. 3; Hos. 1., &c.).
ISRAEL never belonged to the synagogue
worship adopted by the Jews after their return from Babylon. They had been
given over to worship "the host of heaven, the sun and moon, and new
gods," such as were worshipped by the Kymri and Saxons, the
remembrance of which we retain in the days of our week. But it is not correct
to say that in their corrupted form of religion our forefathers were without
evidence of their having sprung from ancient Israel. As noticed in the work on
"Our Israelitish Origin," in their places, times, and manner of
worship, as well as in their forms of government, arts of peace and war,
physical, moral, and intellectual constitution, and in their language, which
is a gathering up of all the languages spoken between this and Egypt, along the
routes by which they have come into Western Europe; by all these - but
especially as fulfilling the destiny of Israel when out of the Land - may we
know these people to be "The outcasts of Israel," to whom
the Lord hath been showing the mercy promised unto our forefathers; and, as in
the case of Abraham, simply through faith.
For thus it was to be, "That the
promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the
Law" (Rom. 4:16) under which the Jews were, while ISRAEL was divorced
and sent away (Jer. 3:11-17). The Promises were not only to the Jewish portion
of Israel, but to "that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is
the father of us all." Israel were to be cut off, cast away, and to
appearance lost. But the people nominally lost as "children of
Israel," were in truth to be found "sons of the living
God" (Hos. 1, 2).
It is nothing against this to maintain that
our history is dark, and that previous to our submission to the rightful Heir
of David's throne, many of our ancestors were fierce pagans. It is far more to
the prejudice of our argument that we now act so little like "sons of
the living God," and are so feebly employed in conveying blessing to
the nations. Yet so it is, that if the Lord have a people upon the earth, they
are to be found among the English; and if there be a ministration of blessing
at all to the nations, it is through their instrumentality. Soon may we fully
awake to the duties of our high calling in Christ Jesus, and as truly realize
our oneness in Him in the outpouring of His Spirit, as we have in the past
fulfilled the other predictions respecting Israel! Soon may the Tribes of
Israel unite in calling for the Return of their King! It is meet that our
preparation should precede HIS coming.
THIRTY-THIRD. "We are not Jews. We
have not their peculiar manners, customs, or physiognomy."
REPLY. - ISRAEL never were Jews. Also the
Jews have acquired their religious peculiarities since Ephraim separated from
them; and more particularly since the Babylonian captivity. Joseph was
mistaken, after only a few years' separation, for "a man of the
country," by his own brother. And if Judah did not know Joseph, much
less is it to be expected that the Jews should recognize us after the families
have been separated for thousands of years. And yet many of us bear the
peculiar features of the Abrahamic race, even more prominently than the Jews -
beauty, activity, integrity, invention, and progress. Our political
arrangements and social manners also bear the impress of the institutions of
Moses; while our loss of circumcision and seeming change of language may be
accounted for by the analogous case of the Jews (Nehemiah 13:24). -
"Watchmen of Ephraim," 1:202, 381, &c.
When the destruction of Jerusalem by the
Romans took place, Israel had been 800 years divorced from that old Covenant,
of which Circumcision was regarded as the outward sign. Comp. Jer. 3:8 with 1
Kings 18., Hos. 1. Why, then, should they be looked for as retaining it in
their longer wanderings in the Northern Wilderness, when all the time of their
sojourn in the Wilderness of Sinai, under the leadership of Moses, they left it
altogether unobserved? (Josh. 5:7.) Then they expected soon to enter the Land
of Promise; but now they had been given a "bill of divorce," and sent
away, bereft even of the name and other outward tokens of being the Lord's
people. Besides, was it not clearly foretold that ISRAEL, as distinct from Judah,
should be "utterly taken away," and that they should be made
"Not His People"? (Hos. 2, 3, &c.)
THIRTY-FOURTH. In no particular can I
see any feature which resembles the peculiarities of the Jews; but very many
that are common to the heathen races of Europe and Asia.
REPLY. - To do justice to our argument we
should not look for the peculiarities of the people called "Jews;"
but for those characteristics which the God of our fathers declared it was His
purpose to impress upon the people He intended to make use of for conveying His
truth and manifesting His goodness to all nations. Let the English especially
be judged of in this light - not, indeed, according to the rule of absolute
perfection, but as being compared with others, in regard to physical, moral,
and intellectual qualities, and whatever may be needful to a race designed for
universal stewardship. There is a genial vigor in the Anglo-Saxons, which, of
course, best develops under the influence of Protestantism; but it was
manifested in its own way before they were nominally acquainted with
Christianity; and when converted by Roman missionaries they became the most
active and successful belonging to that church. Other races had high
civilization, and received the Gospel pure from the teaching of the Apostles; but
if they have not retrograded, they have for many centuries made comparatively
little advance; whereas the Anglo-Saxons received it when it was being overlaid
with superstition, and thus have been privileged to bring it forth in truth for
the blessing of all nations. They are partially mixed with the Romanized
portions of European population; but where this is least, integrity of
character and practical goodness are the most conspicuous; and such as we do
not find even among other Christian nations, whether civilized or barbarous,
previous to their conversion.
The writer of "Our Israelitish
Origin" was not singular in recognizing Israelitish customs in those of
Britain. One of the most intelligent writers upon the Land of Israel says,
"The land was held, like that in our own country, in the times of our
Davids and Williams, by military tenure or service. Every Israelite of age was
liable, by his feudality, to be called out to bear arms in defence of his
country. Each tribe had its own 'elder,' who administered the laws, and led the
forces to battle. His subordinate officers were the heads of families, as the
emirs and sheiks are among the Arab population of the present day."Hundred
Days in the East," by the late Rev. A. P. Black.
THIRTY-FIFTH. "The Anglo-Saxons had
a plurality of deities; and I am under the impression, at least, that human
sacrifices were not infrequently offered up to their deities."
REPLY. - It is true that the Israelites
ought not to have become idolaters; but there would not then have been the
necessity for their expatriation. One of the principal reasons for Moses
teaching the children of Israel the words of his remarkable song is thus stated
(Deut. 31:29) "For I know that after my death ye will utterly corrupt
yourselves, and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you, and evil
will befall you in the latter days; because ye will do evil in the sight of the
Lord, to provoke Him to anger, through the work of your hands." He
also predicted that in "the latter days" it would be said of them
(chap. 32:16, 17),-
"They provoked Him to jealousy with
strange gods,
With abominations provoked they Him to
anger.
They sacrificed to devils, not to God
To gods whom they knew not,
To new gods that came newly up,
Whom your fathers feared not."
The Druids, it is said, offered up human
sacrifices; but this order of men did not belong to the Anglo-Saxons. Some
people are as apt to confound the ancient Britons with the Anglo-Saxons as they
are to call the house of ALL ISRAEL "Jews." Only confusion of idea
can be expected from such confounding of terms. But even supposing the
Anglo-Saxons were guilty of offering up their children in sacrifice, those who
expect to find Ephraim by Jewish marks should not object, seeing that "the
Jews" were accustomed to cast their children to Moloch, even in the
neighborhood of their national Temple at Jerusalem, where Josiah had also to
put down "the idolatrous priests" of Baal.
THIRTY-SIXTH. "But we have not been
dealt with in Judgment, according to the threatenings against Israel"
REPLY. - Our forefathers were so dealt with,
that, as Israel under the [penalty of the] Law, they were "destroyed"
(Hos. 13:9). Then fell they back into "the Everlasting Arms,"
to be dealt with according to the free promises made to the Fathers, and which
Paul identifies with the Gospel (Rom. 15:8). The term of Israel being forsaken
by the Lord was to be comparatively "for a small moment"
(Isa. 54:7). She was to be followed into the wilderness, and there spoken to "comfortably"
by the Lord (Hos. 2:14). When the working of God in Providence is considered in
the light of His Word, it will be found that He has been the God of all the
families of Israel in their generations (Jer. 30:24; 31:1). And at the time of
Israel's restoration Ephraim, the Lord's "Firstborn," is to be
discovered AMONG THE GENTILES as "a seed the Lord hath blessed"
(Isa. 61:9), as having been corrected in measure, and not left altogether
unpunished (Jer. 30:11). God covenanted with Abraham to be the God of his
posterity "in their generations" (Gen. 17:7; 28:13-15). The
New Covenant, or Testament, was promised to the same people with whom the
former Covenant was made (Jer. 31.); and finally, the Bride inhabiting the
Heavenly City is found to be more especially of the twelve tribes of Israel
(Rev. 21:12).
PREVIOUS TO THEIR RESTORATION Israel are
recognized as possessing great political power and abundant means of temporal
and spiritual blessing (Isa. 58.). The promises made to the Fathers, their
opening up by the Prophets, and the indications of the New Testament, all
require that Israel should be found A PEOPLE CALLED BY THE NAME OF THE LORD - a
Christian people, - AND AMONG THE CHIEF MEN OF THE EARTH (Isa. 41:9).
THIRTY-SEVENTH. - "The Hebrew
nation is positively to dwell alone, and is not to be numbered with other
nations. A plain distinction is to be, kept up; not a vague, uncertain, or
casual separation. The Jew is to be a Jew, without ambiguity or question."
REPLY. - The Hebrew verb Ghah-shev
(Numb. 23:9) is found in this place only in the reflexive form, and the passage
should be read "And shall not reckon itself among the
nations." So long as Israel were permitted to continue in the Land of
Promise, they exulted in their separation from other nations. It was not with
their own will that this distinctiveness ceased to exist. It was God's act,
consequent upon their disobedience. Yet it may be said the prophecy of Balaam
here alluded to regards the number of the people of Israel rather than the distinction
of race (ver. 10.) "Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number
of the fourth part of Israel?" If Israel were to be altogether distinct,
as some have supposed the Jews to be, of course they could be reckoned up.
The words are not so applicable to
the Jews, who during nearly the whole Christian dispensation have been without
a country of their own, as to ISRAEL; who, besides dwelling here in the British
Isles in "a place of their own," are infinitely spread out
among the nations of the earth. WE cannot be reckoned up. "The dust of
Jacob" cannot be counted.
It is not correct to say that no actual
admixture with other nations has taken place with regard to the Jews. Facts are
opposed to such a theory. They are a very mixed people. They mingled with the
people of the Land as soon as they entered it. Even Salmon, prince of Judah,
married Rahab, a Canaanitess. In the same line we find Ruth the Moabitess. But
such actual admixture of races did not vitiate our Saviour's genealogy. He was
the promised "Seed of Abraham."
In the time of the Maccabees the Jews
subdued the Edomites and forced them to become Jews (Josephus, B. XIII., c. ix.
§. i.; Prideaux Conn. Vol. iii., 413,) so that when our Saviour was born, the
king of the Jews [Herod] was an Edomite. Herod mingled his blood with that of the
highest priestly family of the nation, which by some has been supposed to be
altogether apart from other nations. If they were to be apart from any
particular people, surely it should be from that against which the Lord said He
would have "indignation for ever" (Mal. 1:4.) Yet these
Edomites were merged with the Jewish people.... [ABCOG: Wilson's speculation
about Edom omitted].
Not only have other peoples been mixed with
the Jews. The germs of the first churches were Jewish, and left their
descendants not among the people known as Jews, but among the Christians who
have been reckoned Gentiles. Are not "all the promises of God yea and
amen in Christ Jesus?" Or are those promises respecting Israel's
glorious future sure to only the descendants of the Jews who rejected Christ -
that Blessed One through whom alone the blessing can come?
THIRTY-EIGHTH. "That no actual
admixture of races is sufficient to constitute a claim to Jewish privileges is
evident from the case of the Samaritans, who as a mongrel race were classed by
our Lord with Gentiles, not to be visited by His disciples. Israel was to be a
peculiar people, and will be so to the end of time."
REPLY. - It has been already shown that even
in our Saviour's genealogy an actual admixture of races did take place. It may
be questioned whether it was merely "mongrel" descent that prevented
the Samaritans from being regarded with favor by the Jews, who received
proselytes from among the Gentiles, and even compelled many to become Jews. The
mere fact of doubtful descent, or even of undoubted Gentile descent, would not
have kept the Samaritans apart from the Jews. It was because they said, "Our
fathers worshipped in this mountain" (Gerizim), while the Jews
maintained that "Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship;"
it was because they had a different center of unity, and were acting in
disobedience to the command that Israel should have one altar; it was
because they did not conform to the law, and not on account of their being a
mongrel race, that they were in separation from the Jews.
Had the Samaritans conformed to the Jewish
system, they might as well have been merged into the Jewish nation as the
Edomites, or such portion of the Canaanites as the Gibeonites, who were brought
almost as near to God in the Temple worship, as the Levites. The Jebusites also
appear to have remained in Jerusalem, and to have been built up in the capital
of the Jews. On the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite, the avenging angel
stayed his hand when the people of Israel were being hewn down by pestilence.
This afterwards became the site of the Temple - the center of unity for all
Israel.
There is some mistake with regard to the
claim of Jewish privileges being made on behalf of the English. We only show
that the blessings we have enjoyed have not come by chance, but are according
to God's appointment, as indicated in the mystery of Jacob's blessing the sons
of Joseph. We only claim to use the blessings which God promised to a people
distinct from "the Jews," and which have actually come to us, not by
right of natural descent, but by adoption and grace. God has been marvelously
dealing out the blessings of the Firstborn to us who have eyes but see not, and
ears but hear not; who have been employed in opening the ears of others to the
great things of God, but have not been hearing what He has been saying
respecting our own peculiar case - the most remarkable in the, Providence of
God, both as regards His cause and the destinies of mankind.
In the future Israel is not to be unmixed
any more than in the past. The stranger is not to say, "The Lord hath
utterly separated me from His People" (Isaiah 56:3, 6-9; Ezekiel
47:22, 23). He is to be received into God's house, and to have inheritance equally
with Israel.
THIRTY-NINTH. In what sense can
"the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel," be from Joseph, as stated by
parenthesis in Jacob's prophecy, Gen. 49:24? Is not Christ the Good Shepherd of
Israel (Ezek. 34:11; John 10:11, 12); "the Tried Stone" (Isa. 28:16;
Matt. 21:44)?
REPLY. - In all cases of disputed
interpretation of Scripture we should endeavor to ascertain the primary meaning
of the Hebrew or Greek words used; and when we do so here, we find that the
whole controversy has arisen out of the supposed divine inspiration of the
artificial vowel points introduced by the Jewish commentators, called
MASORETES, who ranged from about A.D. 200 to 950, which are a continual
gloss upon the meaning of the Law and the Prophets, and whose one great
aim seems to have been to baffle the New Testament (as in this case) and to
hinder the Christian conversion of the Jews by false construction of several
parts of the Old Testament which are referred to or translated in the New.
The greatest of uninspired teachers have
always appealed to the common sense, or human powers of comparison and
judgment, of their hearers. But in a matter of this kind, where so much depends
upon a competent knowledge of an unfamiliar language, educated conscience also
requires to be in active exercise, carefully to ascertain the meaning by
personal scholarship, or by a true appreciation of the force of competent
testimony. Self-sufficient, idle carelessness is easily satisfied.
What then is the true meaning of these three
letters, M-SH-M, translated "from thence" in Gen. 49:24?
M which is here rendered "from,"
in the immediately preceding clause is translated "by," and might
just as well or better have been in this case; and SH-M, Shem,
"name," as of a person, which either out of carelessness, or for the
reason previously stated, has been here given the vowel of Sham,
signifying "there," or a place. The primary cause of the two
significations of the same word may have been that SHEM had his dwelling at
Damascus, which to this day is called by the Arabs EL SHAM, or "the place
of Shem." Shem, as applied to the Name of the Lord, is used
throughout the Old Testament, as in Mal. 1:11, 14; 4:2. Hence this passage
should rather be translated "The arms of his hands were made strong by the
hands of the Mighty God of Jacob " (Psa. 144:4), BY THE NAME OF THE
SHEPHERD (Familiar Friend) OF ISRAEL (Psa. 23:1; Prov. 18:10).
FORTIETH. Were the Anglo-Saxons one and
the same with the Teutonic peoples?
REPLY. - No; the Sakai and KADUSI were
distinct, though allied peoples in the time of Cyrus. They went up with him to
the siege of Babylon, predicted 170 years previously by Isaiah (13:3). (See
Xenophon's " Cyropaedeia," B.v., 2, 25.) The latter was one of the
inspired designations of the people of God, as in Exod. 19:6, where it is
promised that if they would obey the Voice of God they should be to Him Goyi
Kadosh = "a Holy Nation." From its first and second syllables
come the words GOD (Saxon), Deus (Latin), and Theos (Greek); as also the
Chaldaic forms of the same, as applied to the peoples = GOTH and TEUT. The
other nearly synonymous designations, Germani, "the numbered
strangers" (Gen. 15:13), mentioned by Herodotus as among the Persians, and
Allemani, "all the numbered," are likewise Hebrew, as well
as the Sakai (or bowmen, Kashi) of Joseph, and the Angli or Engli (bullocks),
of Ephraim (Mal. 4:2; Jer. 31:18).
from Sixty
Anglo-Israel Difficulties Answered. Chiefly from the Correspondence of the
late John Wilson, compiled by his daughter. London: S. W. Partridge and Co.,
9, Paternoster Row. 1877
John Wilson, 1877. Sixty Anglo-Israel
Difficulties Answered