F. Loots (Leitfaden zum Studium der Dogmen- geschichte*, 1906, p. 83) agrees in the main with the above account, but thinks that too sharp a distinction is draw-n between the Nazarenes and the Ebionites. He holds that the recognition by the latter of the Holy Spirit who fell on Christ at the Baptism, and who is pre-existent and Divine, comes near to the acknowledgment of Deity in Christ. But this implies that Christ was not Divine before and became Divine through the descent of the Spirit. Does the same effect follow in us? Both writers agree that the sects ran to seed in the syncretism of the day and in mythological speculations. To Irenteus the Ebionites were heretics. The Elke- saites were an otl'shoot from the same trunk, and appealed to the book Elkesai as a new revelation, bringing new forgiveness of sins, even the grossest, and new remedies of disease. Alcibiades of Apamea about A.D. 220 appeared in Rome as the apostle of tliis gospel, and met with temporary success. The Clementine romances were still later products of the same movement.
(The Nazirites had no connexion, linguistic or other, with Nazareth and the Nazarenes. See HDB and i^Bi, s.v. ' Nazirite ' ; also following
article.)
LiTKRATimB. — Art. 'Ebionism' in ERE and DAC; A. Hil- genfeld, Die Kelzerqehi'hiclite rft's Urchristrntiims, Leipzitf, 1SS4. pji. 420 f., 43.1,'443; H. L. Mansel, Giiuslic UeirxiiS, London, IST."!, p. 125 ; J. A. W. Neander, llistm-j/ of the Vltris- lia/l lieliijwn and Church, Eni;. tr., ls;n-41, ii. 18; E. B. Nicholson, The Go$pel according to the Hebrews, London, 1ST9.
J. S. Banks.
NAZARETH.— The ' city called Nazareth ' (Mt 2''), in which Jesus lived from (tliildhood to man- hood, lay in a beautiful valley of Southern Galilee, due west of the southern end of the Lake of Galilee, and about midway between that Lake and the Mediterranean. A f ter the Gospels, it is expressl j' mentioned only in the plirase'lTjcroi/i' t6i' djrd No{a- pi6, ' Jesus of Nazareth ' (Ac 10™), but an equivalent of this expression, 'iT/ffoOs 6 Naj'wporos, also translated 'Jesus of Nazareth,' but lit. 'the Nazar,iean,' or ' Nazarene,' is found six times in Acts ; while the followers of Jesus are once called 'the Nazarenes' (ol tHa^wpatoi, 24^). The name 'Jesus of Nazareth' has various shades of meaning, according to the spirit in which it is uttered. On the Day of Pente- cost St. Peter uses it with an amazed sense of the identity of the lowly Nazarene, who met a felon's death, with the glorious Being who. Risen and Exalted, has been made Lord and Christ ('2-- ; cf. 36 410J 'pije accusers of Stephen refer with con- temptuous anger to ' this Jesus the Naz.arene ' (6'*), wiiom the heretic would fain set above Moses. St. Paul recalls the time when his unenlightened con- science drove him to take active measures against ' Jesus the Nazarene,' a name which he used at that time with fierce scorn (26"). But on the road to Damascus he learned its true meaning, when his question 'Who art thou. Lord?' was answered, 'I am Jesus the Nazarene' (22*). The Galila^an town, valley, and hills were for ever graven on the Saviour's heart, and His own use of the familiar title made it doubly sacred. His followers could never object to be named ' the Nazarenes,' as they were, e.g., by Tertullus (24*), just as they could not but glory in being called 'the Christians' (11-''). \\'hile the former name was of Jewish origin, and came to be their standing designation among the unbelieving Jews, the latter was a Gentile coinage. ' The Nazarene ' and ' the Nazarenes ' correspond to the terms which are used in the Talmud — "isijri (Sank. 43r/, 1076 ; Sot. ila) and D-)si3.T (Tcian. 27A)'; and to the present day tlie word N6sri is habit- ually applied in Jewish literature to Jesus' follow- ers, whom a strict orthodoxy can no more name ' Christians' than it can call their leader 'Christ.' The name 'Nazarenes' still designates the Chris- tians in all Muslim lands.
It is a significant fact that Nazareth, which is so dear to Christendom, is never named in the OT, Josephus, or the Talmud. Though it was a city (iriXis, Mt 2^), not a village {Kwfi-n), it was a place without a history, and Nathanael of Cana — who may not have been quite free from the jealousy of neighbourhood — had great difficulty in imagining that it might produce the Messiah (Jn I'"'). But many things have been said, and uncritically re- peated, about Nazareth, which are not well grounded on fact; e.g., that Jesus lived for thirty years 'in the deep obscurity of a provincial village . . . not only in a despised province, but in its most disre- garded valley ' (F. W. Farrar, The Life of Christ, new ed., 1894, p. 41), and that 'probably public opinion looked upon the little town as morally degenerate' (Meyer on Jn I'"). There is no reason to believe that the Nazarenes were less brave, less devoted to their country's cause, less zealous for the law, less inspired by Messianic hopes than the other Galiheans. And one of the hills that ' girdle quiet
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NAZIRITE
NAZI RITE
Nazareth ' was a perfect watch-tower, set in tlie iniilst of the Holy Land and the mighty Konian Kinpire, for tlie young Prophet who was to give the city so great a place in liistory. His feet clinihed its summit easily and — as His love of hills would indicate — probahiy often ; and while His eyes ranged over one of the fairest prospects on earth, He had 'ears to hear' the niurniur of the world. \l His youth was inwardly, it could scarcely he out- wardly, peaceful. He loved solitude, and the words ' in secret ' {4" ri} KpvTrrif, Mt 6'' °) were dear to Hiiu ; yet He was destined for society, an<l His early years were passed in no backwater, but in the full current of the events of His time. He was never far from the crowds, often (such were Koman oppression and Jewish sedition) the madding crowds of Galilee, and ' all the rumour of the Empire entered Palestine close to Nazareth ' {O. A. Smith, HGHL, 1897, p. 434 ; cf. Selah Merrill, Galilee in the Time of Christ, 1885, p. 123 f.). All the time that His talent (if the word may here be used) was growing in stillness. His character was being formed in the stream of the world. Nazareth was in truth the best of all places for the education of the Messiah (cf. W. M. Karasay, The Education of Christ-, 1902).