“The predictions, you will say, have the appearance of being fulfilled. But where is the wonder, that a people, distinguished by a singular religion, and above measure addicted to it, should continue to exist under that distinction, and should be every where known by it? That a people, on account of their profession, more than commonly obnoxious to the other religious sects, among whom the earth hath been chiefly parcelled out—to the Heathen, for their unconquerable aversion to idolatry—to the Christians, for the atrocious murder of their founder—to the Mahometans, for the constant rejection of their prophet—should be the scorn and outcast of all three; and that, being excluded from the only country, to which they have any attachment, they should be vagabonds on the earth, and should disperse themselves indifferently through every quarter of it, as caprice, or interest, or convenience, invites them? that, lastly, being thus distinguished from all men, and thus at enmity with all, they should never be suffered to enter into any other civil community, or to establish a distinct community of their own?”
But the wonder doth not lie, altogether, where these questions seem to place it. That the Jews, while they profess themselves such, should be thus treated, may be natural enough: but that they should continue, for so many ages, under such treatment; every where and always spurned, reviled, oppressed; yet neither worn out by this usage; nor induced by it to renounce their offensive profession, and take refuge in the mass of people among whom they live; that neither time, nor custom, nor suffering, should get the better of their bigotry or patience; but that they should still subsist a numerous, a distinct, a wretched people, as they do, to this day—all this hath something prodigious in it, which the common principles of human nature will not easily explain[92].
We, who admit the divine origin of their religion; and, adore, with them, the extraordinary providence, by which their polity was so long administered and upheld; can, better than any others, explain this difficulty. For, what so likely to produce an invincible attachment to their Law, as the abundant evidence, they had of its authority? But neither will this account of the matter be found satisfactory. For, as if on purpose to discredit this solution, their history informs us, That ten, of the twelve tribes, which originally composed their nation, did, in fact, disappear under their last captivity, and were, in a good measure at least, absorbed in it. If such, then, was the fate of Israel in its dispersion, within the compass of not many generations, and yet the relics of Judah are still preserved in all countries to this day, what better or other reason can we assign for this difference of fortune in two branches of the same people, equally attached to the same divine Law, than that the former were left to the natural consequences of a dispersion, and that the latter were purposely kept from being affected by them, as the prophecies had distinctly foretold?
If it be still said, “That there is nothing more extraordinary in this continuance of the Jews, under their dispersion, than of other religionists in like circumstances; of the Christians for instance, under the Turkish dominion;” the cases (to say nothing of the difference in point of time) are, in many respects, entirely unlike.
The Asiatic Christians derive a confidence, and some degree of protection, from the many flourishing Christian empires, which subsist in other quarters of the world.
They, can perform all the duties of their religion, as perfectly in the countries, where they reside, as in any other.
They, have the future hopes of the Gospel, the proper sanction of their Law, to support them in all the distresses, to which their Christian profession may, at present, expose them. What is it to them, as St. Austin well observed in a like case, that they suffer for a season in a strange land; when even in their own, that is, a Christian country, they are still obliged, by the principles of their religion, to consider themselves, as strangers and pilgrims on the earth[93]?
The condition of the Jews, on the other hand, is widely different. They, profess a religion, founded on temporal promises, only: and how miserably these have failed them, the experience of many ages hath now shewn.
The Jews, are shut out from the only country in the world, where the several rites and ordinances of their religion can be regularly and lawfully observed.
The Jews, have, besides, the sensible mortification of knowing, that all their brethren of the dispersion are every where in equal distress with themselves; and that there is not one Jewish state or sovereignty subsisting on the face of the whole earth.