THE ESSENES.
30
temple or
offer sacrifices, and,
though believing in the immortality of the
they did not
soul,
believe in the resurrection of the body.
The
identity of
many
and practices of Essenism and Christianity is pointed
we might naturally expect, would be the case, when it is
of the precepts
out by Dr Giusburg, which, after all,
remembered that the former was founded on the Divine law of the Old Testament
;
but when
from the fact that Christ, with the exception of once, was not heard of in
he goes on
public till his thirtieth year and though he frequently rebuked the Scribes, Pharisees, and
to argue
;
Sadducees, he never denounced the Essenes
fraternity,
—the
inference he draws
Saviour remained with
His
is
parents,
—that
he lived in seclusion as a member of this
Our
one which the actual facts do not substantiate.
and was obedient
in
all
things,
until
His public
ministration.^
The
when
precise date
this
order of Judaism
ascertained, nor from the nature of things
accounts of this
ever
will.
itself
has not yet been
In looking through the
—
regards the cqrpcarance of the Essenes
on the
with respect to their disappearance.
To deal first of all with their antiquity
field of history,
but not, as I shall show later on,
"
"
according to Philo, the fellowship was instituted
need concern ourselves very little with this estimate, since, in the first place,
by Moses but we
the treatise from which
;
one of the
likely that
developed
it
which are given by ancient writers, three only, says Dr Ginsburg, are
namely Philo's, Josephus's, and Pbny's. This is no doubt correct as
sect,
independent ones,
is it
first
;
Apology for the Jews "), as Graetz has shown, is evidently
fathered upon the Jewish- Alexandrian philosopher ^ and
writings
would seem that the tracing of this brotherhood to the Jewish lawgiver, is in
it is
quoted
("
many apocryphal
in the second,
it
;
accordance with the practice among the Jews, of ascribing the origin of every law, mystical
doctrine or system, which ever came into vogue, either to Ezra, Moses, Noah, or Adam.^
Pliny informs us "Towards the west (of the Dead Sea) are the Essenes. They are a
—
hermitical society, marvellous beyond all others throughout the whole earth.
They live without any women, without money, and in the company of palm trees.
Their ranks are daily
made up by multitudes of new comers who resort to them, and who, being weary of life, and
driven by the surges of ill-fortune, adopt their manner of life.* Tlaus it is that, through
thousands of ages {per swculorum millia), incredible to relate, this people prolongs its existence
without any one being born among them, so fruitful to them are the weary lives of others." *
"
ever since the
Josephus expresses himself in very general terms, saying that they existed
'
Graetz maintaius that Jesus simply appropriated to himself the essential features of Essenism, and that primitive
was nothing but an offshoot from Essenism (Geschichte der Judeu, 1S63, vol. iii., pp. 216-252).
Clu-istianity
-
Graetz, Geschichte der Juden, 1863, p. 464.
The Carmelites, who were really founded in the
Ginsburg, The Essenes their History and Doctrines, p. 36.
of the thirteenth century, on Mount Carmel, claim, however, to have originated with Elijah, and to have
beginning
continued, through the Sons of the Prophets', Kechabites, and the Essenes, to the present time.
Together with the
'
:
extravagant pretensions of
''
Much
many
other sects, this has been effectually demolished by Papebrochius.
would apply, mutatis mutandis, to a noted secret society in Japan,
of Pliny's description
now
extinct or in
This fraternity served as a refuge to any person who had committed a deed of bloodshed,
abeyance, viz., that of the Komos6.
After due examination, if it appeared
or otherwise offended, so as to render it necessary for him to leave his own district.
that this crime was not of a disgraceful nature (adultery, burglary, or theft), he was received into the society, and bound
by oath not to reveal its rites and ceremonies. No women were admitted, and travelling Komos6 challenged one another
hy
signs.
*
(From an
article in the
Natural History, Book
v.,
Japan Weekly Mail, August
chap. xvii.
30, 1879,
by Mi-
T.
M. M'Latchie.)