CHAPTER XIX. 477 himself, together with Ezra the scribe, having found a great want of the knowledge of the law among the people, did about this time, appoint the reading of the law in the several towns and cities : and on this occasion, it is supposed, that synagogues began to be built throughout the land, or at least to be restored and renewed, if there had been any built before. 2. Q. Where were these synagogues to be built ? A. Ac- cording to the account which theJews have;given us, they might be built in any town wheresoever they could find ten persons of full age, and of such condition and easy circumstances of life, as to be always at leisure to attend the service. 3. Q. What was the service performed in the synagogues ? A. Prayers and praises to God, reading the holy scriptures, and preaching and expounding them. 4. Q. Inwhat manner were the scriptures expounded ? A. The Jews and their posterity having lost much of their own lan- guage in Babylon, did not so well understand the scriptures in the the Hebrew tonguë : and therefore when Ezra read the law to the people, the sense was given to them inchaldee, by many levites who stood by, and caused them to understand the reading; Neh viii. 4 -8. And this manner of reading the scripture, verse by verse, and translating it into the chaldee, with some little }?araphrase upon it, was the manner of expounding used in the ancient synagogues. Note 1. This was the original of the Jewish targums, which word in chaldee signifies an irterpretation : for when synagogues were multiplied among the Jews, beyond the number of able in- terpreters, it became necessary that such translations of the He- brew into chaldee, should be made for the use of the teachers mid the people ; and that in private fainilies also, as well as in syna- gogues. There were anciently many of these targums, or trans- lations, or expositions, and that upon different parts of scripture, and of different sorts, as there were also many different versions of the scripture into Greek, in following ages, for the same pur- poses. Several of these targums are lost, through length of time ; but the chief of those which remain to this day, is the targum or chaldeeparaphrase of Onkelos, upon the law of Moses ; and the targum of Jonathan Ben Uzziel upon the prophets ; both Which, some learned men suppose, to be written before Christ, and are, by the Jews, valued as equal to the Hebrew text. As for the Jerusalem targum, it is an exposition upon the law, and others areon different parts of scripture ; but they are all of less esteem, and of much later date : but neither the one nor the other of the targums were muchknown to the primitive christian writers, though these expositions greatly favour the christian cause. 2 Among theJews, the books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings, &c. are sometimes called the former prophets ; and the book of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and tire twelve minor . x it 3
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