faith drew from His lips words of precious commendation (Matt 15:28; Mark 7:29). It was

chiefly a heathen district where the Saviour spoke the word of healing, and where the

woman would not let the Messiah of Israel go without an answer. She herself was a

Gentile. Indeed, not only that district, but all around, and farther on, the territory of

Philip, was almost entirely heathen. More than that, strange as it may sound, all around

the districts inhabited by the Jews the country was, so to speak, fringed by foreign

nationalities and by heathen worship, rites, and customs.

Properly to understand the history of the time and the circumstances indicated in the

New Testament, a correct view of the state of parties in this respect is necessary. And

here we must guard against a not unnatural mistake. If any one had expected to find

within the boundaries of "the land" itself one nationality, one language, the same

interests, or even one religion publicly professed, he would have been bitterly

disappointed. It was not merely for the presence of the Romans and their followers, and

of a more or less influential number of foreign settlers, but the Holy Land itself was a

country of mixed and hostile races, of divided interests, where close by the side of the

narrowest and most punctilious Pharisaism heathen temples rose, and heathen rites and

customs openly prevailed. In a general way all this will be readily understood. For, those

who returned from Babylon were comparatively few in number, and confessedly did not

occupy the land in its former extent. During the troubled period which followed, there

was a constant influx of heathen, and unceasing attempts were made to introduce and

perpetuate foreign elements. Even the language of Israel had undergone a change. In

the course of time the ancient Hebrew had wholly given place to the Aramaean dialect,

except in public worship and in the learned academies of theological doctors. Such

words and names in the gospels as Raka, Abba, Golgotha, Gabbatha, Akel-Dama,

Bartholomaios, Barabbas, Bar-Jesus, and the various verbal quotations, are all

Aramaean. It was probably in that language that Paul addressed the infuriated multitude,

when standing on the top of the steps leading from the Temple into the fortress Antonia

(Acts 21:40; 22:1ff). But along with the Hebraic Aramaean--for so we would designate

the language--the Greek had for some time been making its way among the people. The

Mishnah itself contains a very large number of Greek and Latin words with Hebraic

terminations, showing how deeply Gentile life and customs around had affected even

those who hated them most, and, by inference, how thoroughly they must have

penetrated Jewish society in general. But besides, it had been long the policy of their

rulers systematically to promote all that was Grecian in thought and feeling. It needed

the obstinate determinateness, if not the bigotry, of Pharisaism to prevent their success,

and this may perhaps partly explain the extreme of their antagonism against all that was

Gentile. A brief notice of the religious state of the outlying districts of the country may

place this in a clearer light.

In the far north-east of the land, occupying at least in part the ancient possession of

Manasseh, were the provinces belonging to the tetrarch Philip (Luke 3:1). Many spots

there (Mark 8:22; Luke 9:10; Matt 16:13) are dear to the Christian memory. After the Exile

these districts had been peopled by wild, predatory nomads, like the Bedawin of our

days. These lived chiefly in immense caves, where they stored their provisions, and in

case of attack defended themselves and their flocks. Herod the Great and his successors

had indeed subdued, and settled among them, a large number of Jewish and Idumaean

colonists --the former brought from Babylon, under the leadership of one Zamaris, and

attracted, like the modern German colonists in parts of Russia, by immunity from

taxation. But the vast majority of the people were still Syrians and Grecians, rude,

barbarous, and heathens. Indeed, there the worship of the old Syrian gods had scarcely

given way to the more refined rites of Greece. It was in this neighbourhood that Peter

made that noble confession of faith, on which, as on a rock, the Church is built. But

Caesarea Philippi was originally Paneas, the city devoted to Pan; nor does its change of

name indicate a more Jewish direction on the part of its inhabitants. Indeed, Herod the

Great had built there a temple to Augustus. But further particulars are scarcely

necessary, for recent researches have everywhere brought to light relics of the worship

of the Phoenician Astarte, of the ancient Syrian god of the sun, and even of the