Later Jewish notices connect the final discovery and the return of the lost tribes' with their conversion under that second Messiah who, in contradistinction to the Son of David' is styled the Son of Joseph,' to whom Jewish tradition ascribes what it cannot reconcile with the royal dignity of the Son of David,' and which, if applied to Him, would almost inevitably lead up to the most wide concessions in the Christian argument. [81] As regards the ten tribes there is this truth underlying the strange hypothesis, that, as their persistent apostasy from the God of Israel and His worship had cut them off from his people, so the fulfilment of the Divine promises to them in the latter days would imply, as it were, a second birth to make them once more Israel. Beyond this we are travelling chiefly into the region of conjecture. Modern investigations have pointed to the Nestorians, [82] and latterly with almost convincing evidence (so far as such is possible) to the Afghans, as descended from the lost tribes. [83] Such mixture with, and lapse into, Gentile nationalities seems to have been before the minds of those Rabbis who ordered that, if at present a non-Jew weds a Jewess, such a union was to be respected, since the stranger might be a descendant of the ten tribes. [84] Besides, there is reason to believe that part of them, at least, had coalesced with their brethren of the later exile; [85] while we know that individuals who had settled in Palestine and, presumably, elsewhere, were able to trace descent from them. [86] Still the great mass of the ten tribes was in the days of Christ, as in our own, lost to the Hebrew nation. __________________________________________________________________
[5] Such is the literal meaning of what is translated by shewbread.'
[6] 1 Macc. i. 54, 59; Jos. Ant. xii. 5. 4.
[7] After the deposition of Onias III. through the bribery of his own brother Jason, the latter and Menelaus outvied each other in bribery for, and prostitution of, the holy office.
[8] Modin, the birthplace of the Maccabees, has been identified with the modern El-Medyeh, about sixteen miles northwest of Jerusalem, in the ancient territory of Ephraim. Comp. Conder's Handbook of the Bible, p. 291; and for a full reference to the whole literature of the subject, see Schürer (Neutest. Zeitgesch. p. 78, note 1).
[9] On the meaning of the name Maccabee, comp. Grimm's Kurzgef. Exeget. Handb. z. d. Apokr. Lief. iii., pp. ix. x. We adopt the derivation from Maqqabha, a hammer, like Charles Martel.
[10] 1 Macc. iv. 52-54: Megill. Taan. 23.
[11] 1 Macc. l. 54.
[12] Alike the verb {hebrew} in Hebrew, and diaspero in Greek, with their derivatives, are used in the Old Testament, and in the rendering of the LXX., with reference to punitive banishment. See, for example, Judg. xviii. 30; 1 Sam. iv. 21; and in the LXX. Deut. xxx. 4; Ps. cxlvii. 2; Is. xlix. 6, and other passages.
[13] There is some truth, although greatly exaggerated, in the bitter remarks of Hausrath (Neutest. Zeitgesch. ii. p. 93), as to the sensitiveness of the Jews in the diaspor, and the loud outcry of all its members at any interference with them, however trivial. But events unfortunately too often proved how real and near was their danger, and how necessary the caution Obsta principiis.'
[14] St. Peter seems to have used it in that sense, 1 Pet. i. 1.
[15] Jew. W ii. 16. 4.
[16] vii. 3.3.
[17] Comp. the remarks of Schneckenburger (Vorles ü. Neutest. Zeitg. p. 95).
[18] Comp. Friedlieb, D. Sibyll. Weissag. xxii. 39.
[19] Orac Sibyll. iii. 271,272, apud Friedlieb, p. 62.
[20] Strabo apud Jos. Ant. xiv. 7.2: It is not easy to find a place in the world that has not admitted this race, and is not mastered by it.'