SEPTUM
554
SEPULCHRE
This passover is our Saviour and our refuge ; and if ye consider and it enter into j'our heart that we shall, by a figure (h'tTi]i.tti(ij, i. e. the cross), afflict him and after- wards hope in him, this i)lace shall not be made desolate to all time, saith the Lord God of Hosts. But if ye be- lieve him not, and hear not his preaching, ye shall be- come a spoil for the Gentiles" {Dial. c. 72). This pas- sage, which is also quoted by Lactantius {Instit. Diciti. iv, c. 18), is not to be found in the book of Ezra, and may probably have been interpolated according to the Apocryphal Ezra (vi, 21) into the copies of the Sept. by some Christian. The second (from Jer. xi, 19) had, he sai<l, been but recently erased from certain copies, and was retained in others which were preserved in the syn- agogues. This, however, is found entire in all our pres- ent copies. The third passage is said to be taken also from .Jeremiah: "And the Lord God remembered his dead, who were fallen asleep in the dust of their tombs, and descended to them to declare unto them the good tidings of his salvation." Those words are remarkable from their resemblance to those of 1 Pet. iv, G {vsKpolg ivt]yyi\i(T^r]. The passage of Jeremiah, as alleged by Justin MartjT, read KuTfjir] Trpog avrovg tvayyeXirra- cf^at). "If a genuine passage," says Churton, "the apostle's words seem to contain an allusion to them as well as to the doctrine enunciated in the preceding chapter of his epistle. If interpolated by a Christian convert from some traditional saying of the prophet, or adapted from Peter's words, it seems that the person who introduced them into the text of the Sept. took the words of the apostle in their literal sense, and not as later commentators have conjectured, that the per- sons called viKpoi were alive at the time of the preach- ing." The fourth and last passage is from Psa. xcvi, 10 : " Declare among the heathen that the Lord hath reign- ed from the tree" {Dial. c. 73). Out of this passage the Jews are accused of having erased the last words, aTro TOii ^vXov. The words c'nro tov S,v\ov are quoted again by Justin Martyr in his Ajmlor/i/ ; they are also quoted by Tertullian {Adr. Jiid. c. 10), Ambrose, Augustine, Leo, Gregory, and others. Yet the words occur in no Greek or Hebrew MS., and the probability is that they were added by some Christian. Under these circum- stances we can very well understand the feeling of the Jews towards a version which brought such accusations against them ; and this, it seems, gives us the real clue to the Talmudic passage which regarded the day of the translation of the Bible into Greek as a great ca- lamity. See Frankel, Vorstudien zi/r Sepiuayinta, p. 25 sq. ; Geiger, Urschrift der Bibcl, p. 439 sq. ; Masechet Snferim (ed. Midler, Leips. 1878), p. 12 sq. ; Ginsburg, Introduction to the Rabbinic Bible, p. 70 sq. ; Churton, The Influence of the iSeptuagint Version, p. 41 sq. ; Reinke, Beitrdfie zur Erkliirunrj des A lien Testaments, vii, 292 sq. ; Friedliinder, Patristiscke und talniudische Studien (Vienna, 1878), p. 133 sq. (B. P.)
Septum, a term used by certain 17th-centnry An- glican writers for the fixed or movable rail ]daced on each side of the entrance of the sanctuary to support the communicants when they knelt to receive the Lord's body and blood.
Sepulchre (13|?, l-eber, or tTlsinp, heburuh.a. bury- ing-place or (jrave, as sometimes rendered ; ra<^oq, a tond), as elsewhere rendered; also fivtifia or fxv^nthn', a mon- ument, likewise rendered "grave" or "tomb"). Blan- kind in all ages have been careful, indeed of necessity, to provide suitable resting-places for the dead. In treating of the Hebrew usages in this respect, we free- ly use all appropriate matter found in the Dictionaries of Kitto and Smith. See Burial,
I. Generid Principles of Sepulture. — 1. The Duty. — The Jews uniformly disposed of the cor|)sc by entomb- ment where possible, and, failing that, by interment; extending this respect to the remains even of the slain enemy and malefactor (1 Kings xi, 15; Dent, xxi, 23), iu the latter case by express provision of law. Since
this was the only case so guarded by ]Mosaic precept, it may be concluded that natural feeling was relied on as rendering any such general injunction supertiuous. Similarly, to disturb remains was regarded as a barbar- ity, only justifiable in the case of those who had them- selves outraged religion (2 Kings xxiii, 16, 17; Jer. viii, 1,2). The rabbins quote the doctrine "dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return" as a reason for pre- ferring to entomb or inter their dead ; but that prefer- ential practice is older than the Mosaic record, as trace- able in patriarchal examples, and continued unaltered by any Gentile influence; so Tacitus {Hist, v, 5) notices that it was a point of Jewish custom potius corpora condere quam cremare. See Corpse.
The precedent of Jacob's and Joseph's remains being returned to the land of Canaan was followed, in wish at least, by every pious Jew. Adopting a similar notion, some of the rabbins taught that only in that land could those who were buried obtain a share in the resurrec- tion which was to usher in the Messiah's reign on earth. Thus that land was called by them "the land of the living," and the sepulchre itself " the house of the liv- ing." Some even feigned that the bodies of the right- eous, wherever else buried, rolled back to Canaan under- ground, and found there only their appointed rest (Ni- colaus, De Sepult. Heb. xiii, 1). Tombs were, in popular belief, led by the same teaching, invested with tradi- tions. Thus Machpelah is stated (Lightfoot, Centuria Choi-og7-aphica,fi. V. ^^ Hebron") to have been the burial- place not only of Abraham and Sarah, but also of Adam and Eve; and there was probably at the time of the New Test, a spot fixed upon by tradition as the site of the toml) of every prophet of note in the Old Test, To repair and adorn these was deemed a work of exalt- ed piety (Matt, xxiii, 29). The scruples of the scribes extended even to the burial of the ass whose neck was broken (Exod. xxxiv, 20), and of the first-born of cat- tle (Maimon. De Primogen. iii, 4, quoted by Xicolaus, De Sepult. Heb. xvi, 3, 4). See Grave.