(13) Genealogy. This case is of some im portance from the ground which it offers for tne opinion of those who account for the difference between the pedigree of Christ as given by Mat thew, and that in Luke, by supposing that the former is the pedigree through Joseph, his sup posed father, and the latter through his mother Mary. This opinion, which will be examined in another place (see GENEALOGY), supposes that Mary was the daughter of Heli, and that Joseph is called his son (Luke iii :23), because he was adopted by Heli when he married his daughter. who was an heiress, as is proved by the fact of her going to Bethlehem to be registered when in the last stage of pregnancy.
(14) Theological. In John viii :36, 'If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed,' is supposed by Grotius and other commentators to refer to a custom in some of the cities of Greece, and elsewhere, called d5cX00E0-0-ta, si'a , whereby the son and heir was per mitted to adopt brothers and admit them to the same rights which he himself enjoyed. But it seems more likely that the reference was to the more familiar Roman custom, by which the son, after his father's death, often made free such as were born slaves in his house.
In Gal. iv :5, 6, there is a very clear allusion to the privilege of adopted slaves to address their former master by the endearing title of Abba, or Father. Slaves were not allowed to use this word in addressing the master of the family to which they belonged, nor the corresponding title of Mama, mother, when speaking to the mistress of it. But this adoption believers have received ;
and the evidences of it consist in the indwelling of the Holy Ghost testifying that they are God's children, enabling them to say "Abba, Father," and as children to keep their father's command ments, and abound in supplication (Rom. viii :15 17 ; Jer. :i9; John i :12).
ad-o-rah' yim. two mounds, or dwellings), a town in the south of Judah, enumerated along with Hebron and Mareshah, as one of the cities fortified by Rehr, boarn (a Chron. xi.M. Under the name of Adura it is mentioned in the Apocrypha (i Macc.
xiii :20, and also often by Josephus, Antiq. viii :to, ; xiii :6, 4, 4; Bell. Jud. i:2, 6, 8, 4), who usually connects Adora with Maressa, as cities of the later Idumwa. It was captured by Hyrcanus at the same time with Maressa, and rebuilt by Gabinius (Joseph. Antiq. xiii :9, I ; xiv :5, 3). This town does not occur in any writer after Josephus, until the recent researches of Dr. Robinson, who discovered it under the name of Dura, the first feeble letter having been dropped. It is situated five miles W. by S. from Hebron, and is a large village, seated on the eastern slope of a cultivated hill, with olive groves and fields of grain all around. There are no ruins (Robinson's Bib. Researches, iii :2-5).