| IHϹΟΥϹ | = Jesus. |
| ΧΡΙϹΤΟϹ | = Christ. |
| ΘΕΟΥ | = of God. |
| ΥΙΟϹ | = Son. |
| ϹΩΤΗΡ | = Saviour. |
[142] See especially Heb. xiii. 20; 1 Pet. ii. 25–v. 4; S. Luke, xv. 4, 7, and above all S. John x. 11, 16.
[143] Dean Stanley of Westminster, Christian Institutions, chaps. xiii., xiv.
[144] Dean Stanley (Christian Institutions) calls attention to the curious fact that the popular religion of the first two centuries, as shown in the catacomb witnesses, ran, in some particulars, in different channels from the contemporary writers whose reliquiæ have been preserved, and also from the paintings and writers of a later period; for instance, the “Good Shepherd” is very little alluded to even by the writers of the second and third and fourth centuries; e.g. Irenæus and Justin, Athanasius and Cyprian. If we come down much later, scarcely any notices of the “Shepherd” occur in the Summa of Thomas Aquinas; none in the Tridentine Catechism; none in the Anglican Thirty-nine Articles; none in the Westminster Confession.
[145] Mommsen, Renan, and Ramsay without hesitation ascribe the statement quoted here as taken by Sulpicius Severus (fourth century) from the lost portion of the Histories of Tacitus.
[146] Talmud (Bab.), treatise “Gittin,” 56A.
[147] The arch was completed by Domitian after the death of Titus.
[148] The golden relics were deposited in the Temple of Peace, which Vespasian built opposite the Palatine; it was dedicated A.D. 75. The temple in question was destroyed completely by fire in the reign of Commodus. The temple copy of the Torah was taken to the imperial palace. The Emperor Severus, who built a synagogue for the Roman Jews, handed over this precious MS. to the Jewish community in Rome. The MS. has disappeared, but a list of some of the readings of this venerable codex has been preserved in the Massorah, and is still available for use.
[149] The authorities for the details of this terrible and protracted war are Dion Cassius and the notices in the Talmud, especially in the treatise “Gittin.”
[150] But these numbers, as we have stated, although derived from contemporary authorities, are evidently very much exaggerated.