Adonijah: A Tale of the Jewish Dispersion.

by Jane Margaret Strickland

In the writings of the philosophers of the period Adonijah vainly sought for any allusion to the patriarchal religion which had existed before the giving of the Law to his own people, and which must once have subsisted among the Gentile nations. They appeared to have discovered a First Cause, to whom they paid neither reverence nor worship. His own religion he found regarded with contempt, its rites derided, and adherence to its customs styled “a sullen hatred of all mankind;” the bringing forth of his people from the land of Egypt, disguised and vilified by the most absurd fables, by men who possessed great wisdom in treating all other matters, though in this respect they were indeed fools. To believe in the existence of a God, and yet to assert that He cares nothing for the creatures He has made, is to liken him to a cruel father who abandons a child in infancy, leaving him to find his way in the wilderness of that world through which he is destined to pass, without a precept and without a guide. “No gods, or gods that care not for mankind,” was the real creed of many at that period, who, according to the words of St. Paul, “professing themselves to be wise, became fools.”

A synagogue beyond the Tiber afforded Adonijah the privilege of worshipping after the manner of his fathers. The seven-branched candlestick used by the Jewish congregation has been discovered in modern times on the spot where once it stood. Adonijah, who had learned to hate the Christians before he came to Rome, found his detestation strengthened by his fellow-worshippers. The persecution in the twelfth year of Nero had banished the converts to the new faith to the dark recesses of the Arenaria, so that though the sect was known to exist in Rome it was maintained in the greatest privacy.

As many Roman proselytes had been made in Judea, before the commencement of the war, to the Jewish religion, Adonijah did not despair of making a convert of his patron, for whom he had conceived a great affection. Still, in defiance of his own zeal for religion, and the deep interest he took in the deadly struggle in which his country was then engaged, he could not forbear watching for the chariot of the vestal Lucia, or lingering round the temple of Vesta to catch a glimpse of her figure. As no image was worshipped in that fane, he hoped that, if he could win the brother from his unsettled notions, the sister, who appeared to worship an abstract idea, might be gained over to the true faith. Thus religion, wherever it exists in a revealed form, is a benevolent principle, leading its votaries to diffuse its blessings as widely as possible, but still selecting the dear ties of friendship and kindred as its first objects.

Although secretly planning the destruction of Nero and the freedom of his country, Lucius Claudius took much pleasure in the society of Adonijah. Frank and open in his temper, he boldly avowed his contempt for his country’s gods; and, though he by no means seemed inclined to treat the God of Adonijah with more veneration when speaking of Him, he felt curious respecting a religion whose followers were distinguished from all people on the face of the earth, by the peculiarity of their laws and worship. Leaning upon the arm of Adonijah as they walked together in the delightful gardens of his villa at Tivoli, he suddenly asked the Hebrew “what evidence he could bring of the actual existence of the God he worshipped.”

Adonijah naturally quoted those sacred books which contain the earliest revelations of God to man.

The heathen soldier did not appear to think the evidence he deduced conclusive, for he demanded a proof that should be at once apparent to his outward senses and convincing to his understanding.

“Such a demonstration I am prepared to give,” replied the Jew. “ ‘Behold, the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handy work. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge: there is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard.’ It is the hand of Omnipotence that hath placed these lights in the firmament, and by them still claims the worship due to the Creator from man.”

Lucius looked up at the glorious starry dome of heaven, and then down on the enthusiastic countenance of the slave, and smiled sceptically. “Chance or accident has placed these lights on high, Adonijah, which you superstitiously ascribe to the hand of an unknown God. This world and all things it contains, whether animate or inanimate, owes its existence to a fortuitous union of atoms, mysteriously attracted towards each other by some incomprehensible influence.”

“What gave rise to the atoms of which thou sayest all things were compounded, before they arranged themselves into form or being?” demanded the slave. “Even your belief in matter admits, of necessity, a First Cause, which you miscall Fate, Chance, Accident, but that the Hebrews acknowledge as the creative power of God. All that we see was the work of that Almighty Being whom we Hebrews adore under the name of Jehovah; worshipping Him by faith, not profaning His glory with likening Him to anything in heaven or earth, but serving Him according to the revelation He has made of Himself from the beginning of time; believing that the same Wisdom that called all things into being supports and governs them, and will continue to do so for ever.”

“I am ready to allow that you have reason on your side with respect to the existence of a First Cause, which many of the philosophers of Greece, with Seneca in our own day, have acknowledged; but then if He really cares for the creatures He has made, why is a Nero suffered to prosper while the virtuous and good are slain or sent into exile? What, then, is the use of worshipping a Being who cares nothing for the creatures He has made?”