[7] The words of the Vulgate in this place, are, _flagellati sunt_,
which signify, were lashed with rods or whips: and in v. 16,
_flagellis cædimur_, which has the same meaning.
[8] The Hebrew words in the text are: בקרת תהיה the Greek words
for these, in the LXX. are, ἐπισκοπὴ ἔσται αὐτοῖς.--As I do not
understand Hebrew, I shall not try to make any remark on the above
Hebrew words, but trust for that to the sagaciousness of the reader;
however, with respect to the Greek words that follow them, I think I
should be greatly wanting in my duty to the Public, in my capacity
of Commentator, if I did not communicate to them an observation with
which those words supply me, which is, that there is a material error
in the passage above recited, in our common translation of the Bible;
for the Reader may see that the punishment of scourging, in case
of fornication, is confined, in that passage, to the Woman solely;
whereas the word αὐτοῖς, which is a plural word, shews that both the
Man and Woman were to be punished alike; and instead of _she shall_,
as our Bible is worded in that passage, it ought to be, _they shall_
be scourged. This remark on the above singular alteration of the
true sense of the Bible, to the prejudice of Women (supposing it is
not an error of the press) naturally leads me to take notice here of
the unjust disposition of Men towards Women in general, in all that
relates to the mutual intercourse of the Sexes: a disposition that
has induced them in modern times to impose humiliating penalties on
such Women as are guilty of sins which the Men themselves commit with
the utmost freedom, and thus to establish a mortifying difference, in
that respect, between the two sexes, instead of that amiable equality
which obtained between them under the Jewish law, according to which
the Man and Woman who had committed together the sin of Fornication,
were lashed with equal numbers of stripes.
[9] The _Miserere_ is the 51st Psalm; and the _De Profundis_ is the
130th, which is none of the shortest.
The singing of the _Miserere_ seems to be particularly appropriated,
among Catholics, to regulate both the duration of religious
flagellations, and the _time_ to which they are to be performed,
as we may conclude from the above passage of our Author; and also
from a passage of M. de Voltaire in his _Candide_, in which he says,
that, when _Candide_ was flagellated at Lisbon, by order of the
Inquisition, he was all the while entertained with a _Miserere en
faux bourdon_; which is a kind of Church Music.
[10] The expressions of the _Vulgate_ are, _fui flagellatus_, _I have
been whipped_. The _Vulgate_ of the Old Testament is a very ancient
Latin version of it from the Hebrew, corrected afterwards by St.
Jerom, which is followed in all Catholic Countries.
[11] The Talmud is the Tradition, or _unwritten_ law of the Jews,
the Law of Moses being their _written_ Law. This Tradition has,
in process of time, been set down in writing; and two different
Collections have been made of it: the one, in the Jerusalem School,
about three hundred years after Jesus Christ, which is called the
_Jerusalem_ Talmud; the other, in the Babylonian School, five hundred
years after Jesus Christ, and is called, the _Babylon_ Talmud. The
latter is that which is usually read among the Jews; and when they
simply say, the _Talmud_, they mean the Babylon Talmud.
[12] Buxtorf, the Author from whom the above facts are drawn,
is mentioned with great praise in the _Scaligerana_, which is a
Collection, or mixture, of Notes, partly French, partly Latin, found
in the papers of J. Scaliger, and printed after his death. Buxtorf
is called, in one of these Notes, the only Man learned in the Hebrew
language; and Scaliger adds, that it is surprising how the Jews can
love him, though he has handled them so severely; which shews that
he has been impartial in his accounts. _Mirum quomodo Buxtorsius
à Judæis ametur, in illâ tamen Synagogâ Judaicâ illos valdè
perstringit._
[13] It is to be supposed, that the Jew Priests had been well freed
for the above benign interpretations they gave of the law of Moses.