The Nazirhood, a kind of voluntary priesthood, enjoining abstinence from wine, flesh, and other sensual enjoyments, had, in the troublous times of anti-Syrian agita tion, and the general upheaving of society, found numerous adherents (Tosifta c. 4; Taint. Babli Berach. 48, a. 1; Mace. ii. 49; Jos. Antig. xviii. 1); and gradually there sprang up (contrary to the Bible, which restricts this asceticism to a certain period) a host of men calling themselves `` Nazirs forever"—Nazire olam (Nazi'''. 4, a.). Phari sees of a spiritual and contemplative bias, with no natural taste for the conflicts and activity of political or public life, or wearied, perhaps, with the vanity of human aims, took this vow of Nazirship for life, and constituted themselves into a sort of religious club. Levitical purity in its strictest and highest sense made them draw closer and closer the innumerable "fences" which the traditional law had erected round the bibli cal law. Any one, friend or foe, could, at any moment, by having touched something impure, disturb this purity for the time, and necessitate new and endless purifications. Thus it became (490§,ary, or at least expedient, among Wpm who could break all ties of friendship and family, should retire into' Selittide approach able by a stranger to their community. Food, again, could not be prepared save by those of the brethren who knew and strictly obeyed the hyper-traditional injunctions. Their dress, every implement of daily use, had to be made under similarly stringent laws of purity. A natural consequence of this their exalted notion of outward priest hood, was.the different phases of woman's life taken into consideration—their general celibacy. (The explanation given by Josephus—the fear of the corruption of both towns and women—is entirely gratuitous, and utterly in discordance with the Jewish notions of the time.) In this state of voluntary isolation, trading was out of the question; they tilled the ground, and lived on the fruits of the earth. Taking their meals, and these of the coarsest and plainest description, in common, they idealized the table into an altar, and, prayer having been said, they remained standing silently round it during the repast. That they had no individual property, follows of course, and their communis tic motto, which the Mishna (Aboth) has preserved to us—" Mine is thine, and thine is mine"—explains itself. We need not enlarge further on their small eccentricities—on the white linen garment, the apron (kenaphaim), the scoop or shovel; they are, one and all, signs and symbols of Levitical purity, the scoop reminding us of a certain Mosaic ordinance during the wanderings in the desert, the apron becoming necessary from the frequent ablution of their hands. Every morning, they bathed, like the priests who ministered in the temple, in pure spring water. They abhorred blood as a source of impurity, and for this reason, probably, some of them abstained also from going up to the temple, where sacrifices were daily offered; others we find present at a festival in the temple (Suceah, 51, 53). Their offerings were sent alive under the care of messen gers. But these were but outward signs of purity, stepping-stoucs to inner piety, to communion with God, which was only to be acquired, according to their notion, by solitude and an ascetic life. The belief in the efficacy of the most rigid simplicity. and willing self-sacrifice, they held iu common with the Pharisees; their horror of oaths, their frequent prayers, their occupation with mystical doctrine, were their own. Untroubled by the noise of war or the strife of parties, leading a life divided between the bath, ablutions, contemplation, and prayer; despising the body and bodily wants; what more natural than that by degrees they should be led into a kind of mystical enthusiasm and fanaticism. They allegorized, they symbolized; and their efforts cul
minated iu seeing the unseen. Absorbed in the attempt to fathom the mysteries of the nature of God, one of their principal occupations was the study of the name of God; of that unpronounceable name which only the high-priest dared utter once a year in the holy of holies during the most awful and solemn service on the day of Atonement. The knowledge of that name in four, in twelve, and in twenty-four letters, would give them the power of prophecy and of "receiving the Holy Ghost." Angelology, derived from the Magi, formed a prominent feature of their creed. In course of time, they were looked upon by the vulgar as saints and workers of miracles. A wonderful book of cures (Sepher Refuoth), which Talmudic, Arabic, and Byzantine authorities alike ascribe to Solomon, was in their hands, and with this, "by the aid of certain roots and stones," by the imposition of hands, and certain whisperings—a prac tice strongly condemned by the Pharisees (Synhedr. 90, a.)—they cast out demons, and healed the sick. Philosophy they regarded in so far only as it treated of the existence of God. Jehovah is the original light; from him proceed a number of spirits (the Pla tonic ideas), and at their head stands the wisdom, or logos, into which, after death, the soul is again absorbed. Their code of ethics was threefold—the love of God, of virtue, and of man; their scale of perfectibility reaching its acme in the communion with the Holy Ghost (Ruach Halcodesh), (Mishn. Sota, 99). In fine, mixing up, in the strangest manner, the most exalted and the most puerile notions, they became the forerunners of the Christian Gnostics and of the Jewish cabalists, and, it may be, of many secret, still existing orders, who may have derived from this source their ceremonies and the gradations of initiation.
They seem never to have numbered more than 4,000, including even those Nazirs or E. who remained in their own families. Their colony appears to have been estab lished chiefly near the Dead sea, and it is undoubtedly this colony which has served Josephus as a basis to his romantic E. republic. But, however distant from each other they might be, a constant intercommunication was kept up through a body of delegates, or angels (Malachim). As they had sprung from the Pharisees, so they again merged into them—part of them, we should rather say; the remaining part became Therapeutm, or Christians. See THERAPEUTtE and JEWISH SECTS. The Talmud gives a distinct account of their ceasing to exist as a separate community (Bechorot, 27), and so soon after their extinction did they fall into oblivion, that in the third century we find a Jewish sage asking who these Hemerobaptists hatl been (Berachot, 22, 1).
Much has been written and said of a certain literature which they possessed; on this we are unable to decide, deprived as we are of all trustworthy authority. One frag ment only remains; it is quoted in the Talmud (Jeruseh. Berachoth. End) in the follow ing words: "It is written in the book of the Chasidim, If thou leavest it (the divine law) for one day, it will leave thee for two." In addition to the Talmud and Midrash, we refer the reader to Joseph. Antiq. xv. 10, xviii. 1, Jets. War, ii. 7, 8; Philo, Quad ,Qmnis Prob. lib. 12; Plinius, Hist. Hahn.. v.
17; Epiphan. 11,931VA.. Chrysost., etc. Beekermann, Ueber die Ess. (1821); the histories of the Jews by lost, Ewald, and Gratz; articles by Franckel; Sprenger's I,eben, Hohammad's (1861); and Leutbecher's Die Essaer (1857).