(2) On the rite of circumcision (Acts xv:t, 2) we find in this Epistle equal incorrectness. The writer denies that circumcision was a sign of the covenant. 'You will say the Jews were circum eked for a sign, and so are all the Syrians and Arabians, and all the idolatrous priests.' I lerodo tus (ii:37), indeed, asserts that the Syrians in Palestine received the practice of circumcision from the Egyptians; but Josephus, both in his Antiquities and Treatise against A PiOlf remarks that he must have alluded to the Jews, because they were the only nation in Palestine who were circumcised (Antiq. viii :to, sec. 3: Contr. .4pion. 1:22). 'How,' says !lug, 'could Barnabas, who traveled with Paul through the southern prov inces of Asia Minor, make such an assertion re specting the heathen priests?' (3) Referring to the goat (chap. vii.), either that mentioned in NUM. xix or Lev. xvi, he says, 'All the priests, and they only, shall cat the un washed entrails with vinegar.' Of this direction, in itself highly improbable, not a trace can be found in the Bible, or even in the Talmud.
(4) In the same chapter, he says of the scape goat that all the congregation were commanded to spit upon it, and put scarlet wool about its head; and that the person appointed to convey the goat into the wilderness took away the scarlet wool and put it on a thorn-bush, whose young sprouts, when we find them in the field, we are wont to eat : so the fruit of that thorn only is sweet. On all these particulars the Scriptures are silent.
(5) In chap. viii. our author's fancy (as Mr. Jones remarks) seems to grow more fruitful and luxuriant. In referring to the red heifer (Num. xix.), he says that men in whom sins are come to perfect but Up oh eitutpriat rerNewu) wet e to bring the heifer and kill it; that three youths were to take up the ashes and put them in vessels; then to tie a piece of scarlet wool and hyssop upon a stick, and so sprinkle every one of the people 'This heifer is Jesus Christ : the wicked men that were to offer it are those sinners who brought him to death: the young men signify those to whom the Lord gave authority to preach his Gos pel, being at the beginning twelve, because there were twelve tribes of Israel.' But why (he asks) were there three young men appointed to sprinkle? To denote Abraham. Isaac, and Jacob. And why was wool put upon a stick? Because the king dom of Jesus was founded upon the cross, etc.
(6) He interprets the distinction of clean and unclean animals in a spiritual sense. 'Is it not ok--see Dr. Hefele's valuable note, p. 85) the command of God that they should not eat these things ?—(Yes.) But Moses spoke in spirit (iv rvetitLart). He named the swine, in order to say, Thou shalt not join those men who are like swine, who, while they live in pleasure, forget their Lord,' etc. He adds—'Neither shalt thou eat of the hyena ; that is, thou shalt not be an adulterer.' If these were the views entertained by
Barnabas, how must he have been astonished at the want of spiritual discernment in the Apostle Peter, when he heard from his own lips the ac count of the symbolic vision at Joppa, and his reply to the command : 'Arise, Peter, slay and eat. But I said, Not so, Lord, for nothing com mon or unclean hath at any time entered into my mouth' (Acts xi :8) ? (7) In ch. ix he attempts to show that Abraham, in circumcising his servants, had an especial refer ence to Christ and his crucifixion:—'Learn, my children, that Abraham, who first circumcised in spirit, having a regard to the Son (in Jesum, Lat. Vers.), circumcised, applying the mystic sense of the three letters rpiwv wat4uircuy Sow:Ara den gekeimen Shin dreier Buckstaben enwendend, Hefele). For the Scripture says that Abraham circumcised 318 men of his house. What then was the deeper insight imparted to him? Mark first the 18, and next the 300. The numeral letters of 18 are I (Iota) and II (Eta), I = io, H = 8; here you have Jesus Ilicrotly; and because the cross in the T (Tau) must express the grace (of our redemption), he names Soo; therefore he signi fied Jesus by two letters, and the cross by one.
It will be observed that the writer hastily as sumes (from Gen. xiv :14) that Abraham circum cised only 318 persons, that being the number of 'the servants born in his own house,' whom he armed against the four kings; but he circumcised his household nearly twenty years later, includ ing not only those born in his house (with the addition of Ishmael), but 'all that were bought with money' (Gen. xvii :23). The writer evi dently was unacquainted with the Hebrew Scrip tures, by his committing the blunder of suppos ing that Abraham was familiar with the Greek alphabet some centuries before it existed.
(6) Integrity. Our limits will not allow us to enter into the question of the integrity of the epistle in its present form, but this and several other topics are discussed very fully and with great ability in Dr. Hefele's Treatise, to which, and the other works mentioned below, the reader is referred.
A New and Full Method of Settling the Canon ical Authority of the New Testament, by the Rev. Jeremiah Jones, Oxford, 1827, vol. ii, part Hi. chap. 37-43: Das Sendschreiben des Apostels Bat nabas atzfs IVezre untersucht, tibersetzt, und erk IOW, von Dr. Carl Joseph Hefele, Tubingen, 184ct Patrum Apostolicorum Opera, edidit C. J. Hefele, Tubingte, 1839; Lardner's Credibility of the Gos pel History, part ii. chap. i. ; Neander, Allgemcine Geschichte der Christlichen Religion und Kirche, i. 653, Imo, or, History of the Christian Religion and Church, translated by the Rev. J. H. Rose, 1841, vol. ii, pp. 329-331 ; Lives of the Most Emi nent Fathers of the Church, by William Cave, D. D., Oxford, 184o, vol. i, pp. 9o-to5. (See BAR NABAS.) J. E. R.