ACHAN tery of St. Innocents at Paris, by the cemetery at Naples, and, we may add, that of the Campo Santo at Pisa. The plot of ground originally bought to bury strangers in,' seems to have been early set apart by the Latins, as well as by the Crusaders, as a place of burial for pilgrims. In the fourteenth century it belonged to the Knights-Hospitallers. Early in the seventeenth century it was in the possession of the Armenians, who bought it for the burial of their own pilgrims. The erection of the charnel-house is ascribed to them. In the time of Maundrell they rented it at a sequin a day from the Turks. Corpses were still deposited there; and the traveller observes that they were in various stages of decay, from which he conjectures that the grave did not make that quick despatch with the bodies committed to it which had been reported. The earth, hereabouts, he observes, is of a chalky substance; the plot of ground was not above thirty yards long by fifteen wide; and a moiety of it was occupied by the charnel-house, which was twelve yards high. Richardson affirms that bodies were thrown in as late as 1818; but Dr. Robinson alleges that it has the appearance of having been for a much longer time abandoned: "The field or plat is not now marked by any boundary to distinguish it from the rest of the hill-side; and the former charnel-house, now a ruin, is all that remains to point out the site....An opening at each end enabled us to look in; but the bottom was empty and dry, excepting a few bones much decayed.' ACHATA, a region of Greece, which in the restricted sense occupied the north-western portion of the Peloponnesus, including Corinth and its isthmus. By the poets it was often put for the whole of Greece, whence Achaioi, the Greeks. Under the Romans, Greece was divided into two provinces, Macedonia and Achaia, the former of which included Macedonia proper, with Illyricum, Epirus, and Thessaly; and the latter, all that lay southward of the former. It is in this latter acceptation that the name of Achaia is always employed in the New Testament (Acts xvii. 12, 27; xix. 21; Rom. xv. 26; xvi. 5; 1 Cor. xvi. 15; 2 Cor. i. 1; ix. 2; xi. 10; 1 Thess. i. 7, 8). Achaia was at first a senatorial province, and, as such, was governed by proconsuls. Tiberius changed the two into one imperial province under procurators; but Claudius restored them to the senate and to the proconsular form of government. Hence the exact and minute propriety with which St. Luke expresses himself in giving the title of proconsul to Gallio, who was appointed to the province in the time of Claudius (Acts xviii. 12). ACHAICUS, a native of Achaia, and a follower of the apostle Paul. He, with Stephanus and Fortunatus, was the bearer of the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians, and was recommended by the apostle to their special respect (1 Cor. xvi. 17) A'CHAN (troubler); in 1 Chron. ii. 7 written ACHAR. From the peculiarly appropriate sig nificance of the name, it is supposed to have been imposed after the occurrence of the facts which rendered it notorious. The city of Jericho, before it was taken, was put under that awful ban, whereby all the inhabitants (except ing Rahab and her family) were devoted to destruction, all the combustible goods to be consumed by fire, and all the metals to be consecrated to God. This vow of devotement was rigidly observed by all the troops when Jericho was taken, save by one man, Achan, a Judahite, who could not resist the temptation of secreting an ingot of gold, a quantity of silver, and a costly Babylonish garment, which he buried in his tent. But God made known this infraction, which (the vow having been made by the nation as one body) had involved the whole nation in his guilt. The Israelites were defeated, with serious loss, in their first attack upon Ai; and as Joshua was well assured that this humiliation was designed as the punishment of a crime which had inculpated the entire people, he took immediate measures to discover the criminal. As in other cases, the matter was referred to the Lord by the lot, and the lot ultimately indicated the actual criminal. The conscience-stricken offender then confessed his crime to Joshua; and his confession being verified by the production of his ill-gotten treasure, the people, actuated by the strong impulse with which men tear up, root and branch, a polluted thing, hurried away not only Achan, but his tent, his goods, his spoil, his cattle, his children, to the valley (afterwards called) of Achor, north of Jericho, where they stoned him, and all that belonged to him; after which the whole was consumed with fire, and a cairn of stones raised over the ashes. The severity of this act, as regards the family of Achan, has provoked some remark. Instead of vindicating it, as is generally done, by the allegation that the members of Achan's family were probably accessories to his crime after the fact, we prefer the supposition that they were included in the doom by one of those sudden impulses of indiscriminate popular vengeance to which the Jewish people were exceedingly prone, and which, in this case, it would not have been in the power of Joshua to control by any authority which he could under such circumstances exercise. A'CHAR. [ACHAN.] A'CHISH (called Abimelech in the title of Ps. xxxiv.), the Philistine king of Gath, with whom David twice sought refuge when he fled from Saul (1 Sam. xxi. 10-15; xxvii. 1-3). The first time David was in imminent danger; for he was recognised and spoken of by the officers of the court as one whose glory had been won at the cost of the Philistines. This talk filled David with such alarm that he feigned himself mad when introduced to the notice of Achish, who, seeing him scrabbling upon the doors of the gate, and letting his spittle fall down upon his beard,' rebuked his people sharply for bringing him to his presence, asking, "Have I need of madmen, that ye have brought this fellow to play the madman in my presence? Shall this fellow come into my house? After this David lost no time in quitting the territories of Gath. About four years after, when the character and position of David became better known, and when he was at the head of not less than 600 resolute adherents, he again repaired with his troop to King Achish, who received him in a truly royal spirit, and treated him with a generous confidence, of which David took perhaps rather more advantage than was creditable to | him [DAVID]. ACRABATENE timony, taken in connection with this fact, and with such a monument in a place where Jews have been permanently resident, is better evidence than is usually obtained for the allocation of ancient sepulchres. The tomb is in charge of the Jews, and is one of their places in pilgrimage. History notices another Ecbatana, in Palestine, at the foot of Mount Carmel, towards Ptolemais, where Cambyses died. It is not mentioned by this or any similar name in the Hebrew writings. A'CHOR, a valley between Jericho and Ai, which received this name (signifying trouble) from the trouble brought upon the Israelites by the sin of Achan (Josh. vii. 24) [ACHAN]. con AC'HSAH (an anklet), the daughter of Caleb, whose hand her father offered in marriage to him who should lead the attack on the city of Debir, and take it. The prize was won by his nephew Othniel; and as the bride was ducted with the usual ceremony to her future home, she alighted from her ass, and sued her father for an addition of springs of water to her dower in lands. It is probable that custom rendered it unusual, or at least ungracious, for a request tendered under such circumstances by a daughter to be refused; and Caleb, in accordance with her wish, bestowed upon her the upper and the nether springs' (Josh. xv. 16-19; Judg. i. 9-15). AC'HSHAPH, a royal city of the Canaanites (Josh. xi. 1), has been supposed by many to be the same as ACHZIB, both being in the tribe of Asher. But a careful consideration of Josh. xix. 25 and 29, will make it probable that the places were different. There is more reason in the conjecture that Achshaph was another name for Accho or Acre, seeing that Accho otherwise does not occur in the list of towns in the lot of Asher, although it is certain, from Judg. i. 31, that Accho was in the portion of that tribe. ACHMETHA (Ezra vi. 2; in the Apocrypha 2 Macc. ix. 3; Judith i. 1, 2; Tob. iii. 7; Joseph. Antiq. x. 11, 7; xi. 4, 6; also, in Greek authors, Ecbatana), a city in Media. The name seems to have been applied exclusively to cities having a fortress for the protection of the royal treasures. In Ezra we learn that in the reign of Darius Hystaspes the Jews petitioned that search might be made in the king's treasure-house at Babylon, for the decree which Cyrus had made in favour of the Jews (Ezra v. 17). Search was accordingly made in the record-office (house of the rolls), where the treasures were kept at Babylon (vi. 1): but it appears not to have been found there, as it was eventually discovered 'at Achmetha, in the palace of the province of the Medes' (vi. 2). In Judith i. 2-4, there is a brief account of Ecbatana, in which we are told that it was built by Arphaxad, king of the Medes, who made it his capital. It was built of hewn stones, and surrounded by a high and thick wall, furnished with wide gates and strong and lofty towers. Herodotus speaks of it in similar terms, and ascribes its foundation to Dejoces, who was probably the same with the Arphaxad of Judith. Ecbatana has been usually identified with the present Hamadan, which is still an important town, and the seat of one of the governments into which the Persian kingdom is divided. It is situated in north lat. 34° 53', east long. 40°, at the extremity of a rich and fertile plain, on a gradual ascent, at the base of the Elwund Mountains, whose higher summits are covered with perpetual snow. Some remnants of ruined walls of great thickness, and also of towers of sun-dried bricks, present the only positive evidence of a more ancient city than the present on the same spot. Heaps of comparatively recent ruins, and a wall fallen to decay, attest that Hamadan has declined from even its modern importance. The population is said by Southgate to be about 30,000, which, from what the present writer has seen of the place, he should judge to exceed the truth very considerably. It is little distinguished, inside, from other Persian towns of the same rank, save by its excellent and well-supplied bazaars, and the unusually large number of khans of rather a superior description. This is the result of the extensive transit trade of which it is the seat, it being the great centre where the routes of traffic between Persia, Mesopotamia, and Persia converge and meet. Its own manufactures are chiefly in leather. Many Jews reside here, claiming to be descended from those of the Captivity who remained in Media. Benjamin of Tudela says that in his time the number was 50,000. Modern travellers assign them 500 houses; but the Rabbi David de Beth Hillel, who was not likely to understate the fact, and who had the best means of information, gives them but 200 families. He says they are mostly in good cir- ACRABATE'NE, a district in that portion cumstances, having fine houses and gardens, of Judæa which lies towards the south end of and are chiefly traders and goldsmiths. In the the Dead Sea, occupied by the Edomites during midst of the city is a tomb, which is said to be the Captivity, and afterwards known as Idumæa. that of Mordecai and Esther. As Ecbatana was It is mentioned in 1 Macc. v. 3; Joseph. Antiq. then the summer residence of the Persian court, xii. 8. 1. It is assumed to have taken its name it is probable enough that Mordecai and Esther from the Maaleh Akrabbim, or Steep of the Scordied and were buried there; and traditional tes-pions, mentioned in Num. xxxiv. 4, and Josh. AC'HZIB. There were two places of this name, not usually distinguished. 1. ACHZIB, in the tribe of Asher nominally, but almost always in the possession of the Phonicians; being, indeed, one of the places from which the Israelites were unable to expel the former inhabitants (Judg. i. 31). In the Talmud it is called CHEZIB. The Greeks called it ECDIPPA; and it still survives under the name of ZIB. It is upon the Mediterranean coast, about ten miles north of Acre. It stands on an ascent close by the sea-side, and is described as a small place, with a few palm-trees rising above the dwellings. 2. ACHZIB, in the tribe of Judah (Josh. xv. 44; Mic. i. 14), of which there is no historical mention, but, from its place in the catalogue, it appears to have been in the middle part of the western border-land of the tribe, towards the Philistines. This is very possibly the Chezib of Gen. xxxviii. 5. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES xv. 3, as the southern extremity of the tribe of ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. This is the title of one of the canonical books of the New Testament, the fifth in order in the common arrangement, and the last of those properly of an historical character. Commencing with a reference to an account given in a former work of the sayings and doings of Jesus Christ before his ascension, its author proceeds to conduct us to an acquaintance with the circumstances attending that event, the conduct of the disciples on their return from witnessing it, the outpouring on them of the Holy Spirit according to Christ's promise to them before his crucifixion, and the amazing success which, as a consequence of this, attended the first announcement by them of the doctrine concerning Jesus as the promised Messiah and the Saviour of the World. After giving the history of the mother-church at Jerusalem up to the period when the violent persecution of its members by the rulers of the Jews had broken up their society and scattered them, with the exception of the apostles, throughout the whole of the surrounding region; and after introducing to the notice of the reader the case of a remarkable conversion of one of the most zealous persecutors of the church, who afterwards became one of its most devoted and successful advocates, the narrative takes a wider scope and opens to our view the gradual expansion of the church by the free admission within its pale of persons directly converted from heathenism and who had not passed through the preliminary stage of Judaism. The first step towards this more liberal and cosmopolitan order of things having been effected by Peter, to whom the honour of laying the foundation of the Christian church, both within and without the confines of Judaism, seems, in accordance with our Lord's declaration concerning him (Matt. xvi. 18), to have been reserved, Paul, the recent convert and the destined apostle of the Gentiles, is brought forward as the main actor on the scene. On his course of missionary activity, his successes and his sufferings, the chief interest of the narrative is thenceforward concentrated, until, having followed him to Rome, whither he had been sent as a prisoner to abide his trial, on his own appeal, at the bar of the emperor himself, the book abruptly closes, leaving us to gather further information concerning him and the fortunes of the church from other sources. Respecting the authorship of this book there can be no ground for doubt or hesitation. It is, unquestionably, the production of the same writer by whom the third of the four Gospels was composed, as is evident from the introductory sentences of both (comp. Luke i. 1-4, with Acts i. 1). That this writer was Luke has not in either case been called in question, and is uniformly asserted by tradition. From the book itself, also, it appears that the author accompanied Paul to Rome when he went to that city as a prisoner (xxviii.). Now, we know from two epistles written by Paul at that time, that Lake was with him at Řome (Col. iv. 14; 2 Tim. iv. 11), which favours the supposition that he was the writer of the narrative of the apostle's journey to that city. It was rejected by certain heretics in the primitive times, such as the Marcionites, the Severians, and the Manicheans, or we should rather say, it was cast aside by them because it did not favour their peculiar views. A complaint made by Chrysostom would lead us to infer that in his day, though received as genuine, the Acts was generally omitted from the number of books publicly read in the churches, and had consequently become little known among the people attending those churches. Many critics are inclined to regard the Gospel by Luke and the Acts of the Apostles as having formed originally only one work, consisting of two parts. But this opinion is at variance with Luke's own description of the relation of these two writings to each other (being called by him, the one the former and the other the latter treatise); and also with the fact that the two works have invariably, and from the earliest times, appeared with distinct titles. Of the greater part of the events recorded in the Acts the writer himself appears to have been witness. He is for the first time introduced into the narrative in_ch. xvi. 11, where he speaks of accompanying Paul to Philippi. He then disappears from the narrative until Paul's return to Philippi, more than two years afterwards, when it is stated that they left that place in company (xx. 6); from which it may be justly inferred that Luke spent the interval in that town. From this time to the close of the period embraced by his narrative he appears as the companion of the apostle. For the materials, therefore, of all he has recorded from ch. xvi. 11, to xxviii. 31, he may be regarded as having drawn upon his own recollection or on that of the apostle. To the latter source, also, may be confidently traced all he has recorded concerning the earlier events of the apostle's career; and as respects the circumstances recorded in the first twelve chapters of the Acts, and which relate chiefly to the church at Jerusalem and the labours of the apostle Peter, we may readily suppose that they were so much the matter of general notoriety among the Christians with whom Luke associated, that he needed no assistance from any other merely human source in recording them. With regard to the design of the evangelist in writing this book, a prevalent popular opinion is, that Luke, having in his Gospel given a history of the life of Christ, intended to follow that up by giving in the Acts a narrative of the establishment and early progress of his religion in the world. That this, however, could not have been his design is obvious from the very partial and limited view which his narrative gives of the state of things in the church generally during the period through which it extends. As little can we regard this book as designed to record the official history of the apostles Peter and Paul, for we find many particulars concerning both these apostles mentioned incidentally elsewhere, of which Luke takes no notice (comp. 2 Cor. xi.; Gal. i. 17; ii. 11; 1 Pet. v. 13). Some are of opinion that no particular design should be ascribed to the evangelist in composing this book beyond that of furnishing his friend Theophilus with a pleasing and instruc tive narrative of such events as had come under his own notice; but such a view savours too much of the lax opinions which these writers unhappily entertained regarding the sacred writers, to be adopted by those who regard all the sacred books as designed for the permanent instruction and benefit of the church universal. Much more deserving of attention is the opinion that the general design of the author of this book was, by means of his narratives, to set forth the co-operation of God in the diffusion of Christianity, and along with that, to prove, by remarkable facts, the dignity of the apostles and the perfectly equal right of the Gentiles with the Jews to a participation in the blessings of that religion.' Perhaps we should come still closer to the truth if we were to say that the design of Luke in writing the Acts was to supply, by select and suitable instances, an illustration of the power and working of that religion which Jesus had died to establish. In his Gospel he had presented to his readers an exhibition of Christianity as embodied in the person, character, and works of its great founder; and having followed him in his narration until he was taken up out of the sight of his disciples into heaven, this second work was written to show how his religion operated when committed to the hands of those by whom it was to be announced to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem' (Luke xxiv. 47). Respecting the time when this book was composed it is impossible to speak with certainty. As the history is continued up to the close of the ACTS, SPURIOUS second year of Paul's imprisonment at Rome, it could not have been written before A.D. 63; it was probably, however, composed very soon after, so that we shall not err far if we assign the interval between the year 63 and the year 65 as the period of its completion. Still greater uncertainty hangs over the place where Luke composed it, but as he accompanied Paul to Rome, perhaps it was at that city and under the auspices of the apostle that it was prepared. The style of Luke in the Acts is, like his style in his Gospel, much purer than that of most other books in the New Testament. The Hebraisms which occasionally occur are almost exclusively to be found in the speeches of others which he has reported. His mode of narrating events is clear, dignified, and lively; and, as Michaelis observes, he has well supported the character of each person whom he has introduced as delivering a public harangue, and has very faithfully and happily preserved the manner of speaking which was peculiar to each of his orators.' Whilst, as Lardner and others have very satisfactorily shown, the credibility of the events recorded by Luke is fully authenticated both by internal and external evidence, very great obscurity attaches to the chronology of these events. Our space will not permit us to enter at large into this point, we shall therefore content ourIselves with merely presenting, in a tabular form, the dates affixed to the leading events by those writers whose authority is most deserving of consideration in such an inquiry. ADAM said to have written to Agbarus, king of Edessa, in answer to a request from that monarch that he would come to heal a disease under which he laboured. Some few historians have maintained the genuineness of these letters, but most writers, including the great majority of Roman Catholic divines, reject them as spurious; and there is good reason to believe that the whole chapter of Eusebius which contains these documents is itself an interpolation. ACTS OF THE APOSTLES, SPURIOUS. Of these several are extant, others are lost, or only fragments of them are come down to us. The following is a catalogue of the principal spurious Acts still extant: The Creed of the Apostles.-The Epistles of Barnabas, Clement, Ignatius, and Polycarp.-The Recognitions of Clement, or the Travels of Peter.-The Shepherd of Hermas.-The Acts of Pilate (spurious), or the Gospel of Nicodemus.-The Acts of Paul, or the Martyrdom of Thecla.-Abdias's History of the Twelve Apostles.-The Constitutions of the Apostles-The Canons of the Apostles.-The Litargies of the Apostles.-St. Paul's Epistle to the Laodiceans-St. Paul's Letters to Seneca. ADAD is the name of the chief deity of the Syrians, the sun. The name of this Syrian deity is most probably an element in the names of the Syrian kings Benhadad and Hadadezer. ADAD-RIM'MON, properly HADAD-RIMMON (a garden of pomegranates), a city in the valley of Jezreel, where was fought the famous battle between King Josiah and Pharaoh-Necho (2 Kings xxiii. 29; Zech. xii. 11). Adad-rimmon was afterwards called Maximianopolis, in honour of the emperor Maximian. It was seventeen Roman miles from Cæsarea, and ten miles from Jezreel. A'DAH (adornment, comeliness): 1. one of the wives of Lamech (Gen. iv. 19); 2. one of the wives of Esau, daughter of Elon the Hittite (Gea. xxxvi. 4). She is called Judith in Gen. xxvi. 34. ADAM, the word by which the Bible designates the first human being. It is evident that, in the earliest use of language, the vocal sound employed to designate the first perceived object, of any kind, would be an appellative, and would be formed from something known or apprehended to be a characteristic property of that object. The word would, therefore, be at once the appellative and the proper name. But when other objects of the same kind were discovered, or subsequently came into existence, difficulty would be felt; it would become necessary to guard against confusion, and the inventive faculty would be called upon to obtain a discriminative term for each and singular individual, while some equally appropriate term would be fixed upon for the whole kind. Different methods of effecting these two purposes might be resorted to, but the most natural would be to retain the original term in its simple state, for the first individual: and to make some modification of it by prefixing another sound, or by subjoining one, or by altering the vowel or vowels in the body of the word, in order to have a term for the kind, and for the separate individuals of the kind. This reasoning is exemplified in the first applications of the word before us: (Gen. i. 26), Let us make man [Adam] in our image;' (i. 27), And God created the man [the Adam] in his own image.' The next instance (ii. 7) expresses the source of derivation, a character or property; namely, the material of which the human body was formed: And the Lord God [Jehovah Elohim] formed the man [the Adam] dust from the ground [the adamah]. The meaning of the primary word is, most probably, any kind of reddish tint, as a beautiful human complexion (Lam. iv. 7); but its various derivatives are applied to different objects of a red or brown hue, or approaching to such. The word Adam, therefore, is an appellative noun made into a proper one. It is further remarkable that, in all the other instances in the second and third chapters of Genesis, which are nineteen, it is put with the article, the man, or the Adam. The question arises, Was the uttered sound, originally employed for this purpose, the very vocable Adam, or was it some other sound of correspondent signification? This is equivalent to asking, what was the primitive language of men? That language originated in the instinctive cries of human beings herding together in a condition like that of common animals, is an hypothesis which, apart from all testimony of revelation, must appear unreasonable to a man of serious reflection. There are other animals, besides man, whose organs are capable of producing articulate sounds, through a considerable range of variety, and distinctly pronounced. How, then, is it that parrots, jays, and starlings have not among themselves developed an articulate language, transmitted it to their successive generations, and improved it, both in the life-time of the individual and in the series of many generations? Those birds never attempt to speak till they are compelled by a difficult process on the part of their trainers, and they never train each other. Upon the mere ground of reasoning from the necessity of the case, it seems an inevitable conclusion that not the capacity merely, but the actual use of speech, with the corresponding faculty of promptly understanding it, was given to the first human beings by a superior power: and it would be a gratuitous absurdity to suppose that power to be any other than the Almighty Creator. In what manner such communication or infusion of what would be equivalent to a habit took place, it is in vain to inquire; the subject lies beyond the range of human investigation: but, from the evident exigency, it must have been instantaneous, or nearly so. It is not necessary to suppose that a copious language was thus bestowed upon the human creatures in the first stage of their existence. We need to suppose only so much as would be requisite for the notation of the ideas of natural wants and the most important mental conceptions; and from these, as germs, the powers of the mind and the faculty of vocal designation would educe new words and combinations as occasion de |