Two Epistles in the Year 1599

TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE THE TEMPORAL LORD'S OF the Q. of Englandes most excellent privey Counsel.

I t is high time (right honorable) that some order were taken for that matter which the Q. Ambassador of Byzāttium judged likely to turn to the good of Cristēdome by right usage. An entrance into which business standeth in answering D. Abraham Reuben the Hebrew his Epistle. which to pas over in silence any indifferent will judge it great profaneness. He speaketh glorious things of God's goodness upon us. unto which if we give no acclamation, we may justly be counted godless. The Q. also is highly extolled by him for extraordinary breading of rare knowledge. Where, as it is profitable for the realm that she should be counted in truth no less then in title defendour of the faith, (which defense standeth chiefly in breeding rare skil for the truth & clearness of the holy Scripture) so it is needful to confirm the Jews praising in that her Divines show in work all which his words tell: whereby the Ambassador be not counted a Thraso for his nation, but honorable in sage speech. Moreover the Jew made a petition honorable for the Q. to perform: and such as she may not deny without open contempt of Christianity: That one might be sent to Constātina able to direct the Jews willing to learn Christianity. It is reported in Germany that this Doctor hath turned full many to our faith: who if they be not well directed will turn to many by ways. And the nation that settleth them should find Eternal blessing of God, and honor among men. An other petition also he hath as profitable for our nation: as nedeful for Jews: and pleasant for a man of Learning to undertake. He requesteth a full treatise for the Scripture & against the Law of traditions or Talmud. Here great matter of infinite use might be handled, for both testaments, their tongues & copy, (how they show God's wisdom and quick eye) and their story pithily compact, with Christianity breathing through all. So for Jews traditions, the Yerushalmi Talmud might be printed, with approbation for their examininge of much text, but in such pointes as Rabbin's wrest, to defeat S. Stephen, Acts. 7. who truly saith that after Idolathrous Terah’s death Abraham was called from Charan: and to disgrace S. Paul geving Saul and Samuel 40. years they most impudently give Samuel but 11. and Saul bare two: against their own grant upon Midras tillin Psalm. 24. So to defeat the Jubilees that they fall not upon our Lord's death, which one point falling out from the partition of the Land by fifties unto redemption makes all past gainsaying, here to work disturbance they confound all. So where Gabriel telleth an end of Circumcision, sacrifice, and all Moses and the Gentiles calling into equal covenant: there of malice they wander exceedingly. And for the family of David to disgrace S. Luke and S. Matthew, they forge vanity. For all such they should be confuted. And generally for all their traditions: whereof they that once were lawful, had express limitation when they should ende. And all their own additions were foolish or nedeles. For these every Massecheth or treatise might be confuted. This far reacheth the Jews Epistle, that which I have seen. His desire of awnswer appeareth in that he wrote a second: which the Post of Strasburge hath lost. The journeys of it are so far examined. Your honors must show what you mean to do in this case. Religion with policy, as I trow, forbid you to neglect it. If your honors think otherwise; that I may discharge myself, and make away for other states to think upon this same cause, I trust your Lordships will not be offended that I print this Letter in sundry languages. Thus I commend your HH. to God, as you regard his H. & Christianity commended unto you. BASIL, 29. Iulij, 1599.

TO THE METROPOLITANE, THE NEXT in England to the Queen▪ exalted may be her Majesty.

YOur soul knoweth full well how often you have beheld my Letters for the affairs of a man of esteem Rabbi Abraham Reuben an Hebrew, a special Lawyer in Jews Lerning: whom we must regard, as he loveth our nation, and affordeth honorable speeches of our Queen, more then any one of milions: & also seeketh the honor of our nation, and estimation for the learning of our people in singular hartiness. Notwithstanding until this very day I heard no word from you, but that which others spake upon heresay: whereon no hold is to be taken, that you would give me allowance sufficient to awnsweare the Jew. And now because I have been long a pilgrome without awnsweare now these two years days: & could have made a great volume before this, & left mine own business to be employed for the use of the Church, I thought good to demand of you before the Eyes of this soonne what you purpose for awnswear to the people of the King of Thogarma· And I will stay yet a little tine while, watching what you will speak in the end. Although he wrote unto my baseness, I am not of authority to answer, because his writing went upon matters of your trade. And all the while you hold your peace, none may meddle with this business. Therefore I am in great expectation that you will not hold your peace: but take the matter in hand: or will say, that you find none in the Kingdom which be men of understanding, and of settled affection for this work: & will search for them from some other place where they may be found. For he is not a speaker of light matter: & his speech is not of ēmpty & vain sound: but he mindeth things of chief regard: his heart uttereth good matter: he desireth in his works the kingdom of heaven: & his pen is the tongue of an amiable writer.

Your eyes have ben the beholders of sundry former letters, & you have marked them. Yet you may here also consider the effect of his words: that you may perceive whether great blame were in ye for delay hitherto as though ye had bē weak of judgment, & you will weigh my words whether they give advertisement of right. In the beginning he speaketh highly of God his blessing upō us, in the corners of the earth: how he createth the fruct of lips to heavens peace, a far off: & from the corners of the earth he hath heard of songs of honor in true justice. Should not we all for this join to him with as good speech in the prophets allegories & say of God. He hath geven in the wilderness Ceder, The Tabernacles Sittah tree, & mirtle, & oil wood, & set in the desert, the Pitys & the Box also: that we may see and understand, and mark, and perceive that the hand of the Eternal hath done this for us. It was our duty to have uttered with sage carriage: that the mercies of God upon us pass all speech: and it hath not been done under the heaven as God's cōpassions were shown upon the people of Britanie: if God had gevē us an heart to consider his doings. The Rock of my heart knoweth that since I received the little book of the human Rabbin I have ben ready to take the matter in hand: as in hand it must needs be taken. And if I went to the couch of my bed, if I geve sleep to my eyes, or slumbering to my liddes without thinking upō an awnswear unto the Jew for the praises of our God, let my hand forget to rule a pen, & let my toungue cleave to the ruff. But it was not for me to speak, as with the realms consent, much or little, without public authority: nor to prevēt you in your own office. Furthermore, the party hath writ ten most honorable praises concerning the Prince among nations, our sovereign Lady: & he would make her the glory of all the earth. There hath ben none, there is none, there will be none hereafter, a prayser of her highness, such as he shown himself. And although my pen found her all this praise, with the children of the East, yet I am not fit to awnswer for the majesty of the Q. because I am of no place among you, notwithstanding the many & great preferments the Queen had to give: & sent me word from the LL. by S. Iul. C. that I should chose honorable preferments. Notwithstanding if it be the Queens pleasure to appoint me for this charge: then will I go about heartily, to set forth the honor of her highness, as the golden head of her kingdom: & I will not suffer the sons of the East to be amazed: that there is no Patron to this cause among all sturdy hearts of Britanie.

Lo, This answer is plain. Now I will return to translate: how in the former the Jew talketh of our happiness through the blessings of the all sufficient: & of the high & great dignity of our Q. 〈◊◊〉 (by him) as the sun▪ & as terrible as a camp. After this the Jew maketh a petitiō for a matter grateful to him, thankful among us: a matter honorable, & nothing onerable. His soul desired to obtain from England some teachers of justice: which might guide all Hebrews who delight in the shelter by Christ. & flee to repose all their hope under the wings of the Eternal majesty. For it is to be feared lest their way-paths turn to be crooked, for want of a guide and directer: & come to be of no worth, and decline in their voyage with tottering feet, & seek not the Eternal by the right path. Oh that his petition befell him, & Oh that the Mighty would give him his desire. Truly gref parcheth me that the Brestcare of judgment is gone from us, that we keep back speech of holy truth, & contemn his petition, & restrain the request of his tongue: & withhold the Manna from his meaning. Oh that my ways wer fit for a journey as this my soul brayeth after the streams of water, for the honor of our natiō, & for the divine glory of our ends of the earth, the possessiō of the Sone in whō so many as trust are sure of happiness. How honorable is the name of Constantine for his diligence & care & busi thoughts to call nations unto the mountain of the Lord, the celestial Siō, & unto the Ierusalē which cometh down from an high: our histories show how he wrote & sent to Spain & India, careful for East & Weast. If we come of his mothers kindred, flesh of his flesh, & bone of his bone, shall not we go after his steppes in the steppes of Christ? Is not our soveraī Lady our motherlik Sarah, & a new Helena? Ther must be sent a messinger to the Virgin sea of Elisa that shall be a builder of the holy city. My hope is the L. will not despise, nor your Grace. she will not disdain to send unto the city of Cōstātin an Orator that can handle the Law, aD. of divinity & an Evāgelist. For the mighty Emperor the king of Thogarmah desired to know the force of our religiō & to see how the high Ierusalē is built among us, which is paved with all preciousnes: her stones make a foundation of Sapphires: The windows are of the Chaldee Chalcedon or Carbuncle: & the gates of Crystal stones: & pleasant stones are in all her borders. When he seeth how beautiful our city is, he will have a desire to dwell with us in peace. Your wisdom knoweth well what the words of the Ambassador closely touched concerning an hope exceeding great. We might bring all to pass by the help of God, and our purpose should not be hindered. And if we could turn him to our side, what goodly dwellinges had we recovered, what pleasant soils had come again to us: as streams spread abroad: as a garden upon a river. As the Santall which God planted: as the Cedres by the waterside. We feel that he is a mighty King: & hath the strength of the Rhinoceros. The mountains of the East obey him & principal nations have ben tamed of him. And who would linger, or faint, or be weary in affairs for so great a personage. If we set one, the Almighty will furnish with strength: & will increase might, where little at the first was. And if our success be good, we should rid our side of much harm: & his strength would turn to be our perpetual mighty strength. And touching this Jew, news upon news run & tidings upon tidings, shown by letters that this Rabbin hath drawn many with him to hear the whistling of the flocks of Christ. If that be true, our duty requireth we settle them: & to confirm them, lest their feet stumble, and their steppes slide, and some of them turn unto heresies. Moreover I think that the second Epistle which perished at Strawesburge, declared more oboundantly the counsel of the heart of the Rabbin, & cried out to find some coning doctor, to teach readily the frame of all the bible. And it were an easy matter to teach them all this: & it should be a glory for our Queen, & as longe as the Mone primeth forever and ever. And this much for the journey unto the City of Constantina.

At the last the Hebrews desire was to find so much favor as that he might have from us a treatise of the written word: what consent & perfection the Bible had. The handling of this requireth also a confuting of the Talmud geven, as Jews say, by word of mouth from man to man. Here he made an high petition, & requested very depe matter And he knew well enough what costly studies must be joined together for this compass of learning. At the first all the Scripture must be abridged, & the accidents: the incorruption of the text: what tongues the Bible hath: what ground we have for understanding the tongue of the Law: and the joining of all books into one body: and how the glory of Christ & his salvation doth breath through every several parcel. After this must come the Talmudics, Jews works: upon the Law, Prophets, & Hagiographa. So the ground of translatiō soundly should be manifested. It is known & famous how the congregation of Romistes fighteth to overthrow the pureness of the Text: also they deny the Hebrew characters form now, to be Mosaical, and deny the vowels to be Mosaical, & say, the eight hundredth forty eigh margent readinges, check the text as corrupt And thus before the simple folk, the Pope hath fell, cast down, & overthrow̄ the glory of the Prophets. Against such dealings we should set forth the honor of the volumes writ̄, by the Messingers of God, our doctor, & our teacher of justice: and to combat with them which say there is corruption or alteration in the Prophets Text. And their speech doth spare a truth. For the congregation of the learned Jews returned from Babel, men of light, pure, abundant, mighty, have set up marks & a wall about the Law to keep it sincere & sound. The Jew knoweth this full well. Yet to show our consent with him, this matter must be handled. So we shall besene not to have any mind of agreement and fellowship with them which say, the Original, (Hebrew or Greke) is corrupted. Moreover touching the New Testament we must needs declare wherefor it was written in the tongue of the sons of Japheth: & how God acquainted the Jews by little & little to take the tongue of their neighbors. So Ezra recordeth certain Epistles in the tongue of Aram Gen. 10. used in Chaldea & Persia. So Daniel wrote half his book in Arams tongue. And afterwards the Septuaginta did set over the holy volume into the tongue of Javan. notwithstanding all this the Jews do greatly marvel even unto this day why the New Testament was not written in the Jews language: (or tongue of Canaan. Es. 19.) and thy have forgotten what their old Doctors say: in the Talmud Yerushalmi, in Megilah fol. 71. They shall in time speak in the tongue of Japheth in the house of Sem. This thing is a great matter: & goodly to be shown how it is come to pass. So, to show directly all the drift of the Scripture, this labor will require travel. For the Jews in this argument rely upon the Misnayoth or Talmudics. But you & your fellows upon our S S. Doctoures. And if you so deal with the Jew, he and his people would despise us all. Here I will show my poor opinion, what should be done for declaration of the wisdom of our faith, according to the expectation of the King of Turkey handled in the Jews Epistle. For I have reason to think that by the Kings commandment, & not of himself, he would write as he did. Thus the case standeth. When we expound the Law, we must search carefully, the proper force of every word so well as we can: & so we must bring the best sense that we can. For every commandment little or great, must be weighed with the balance of the heart. For the heart hath common judgment planted from the wisdom of the Eternal God. Now if common judgment cannot bear the speech: or if it go against common sense, then must we seek a trope from some other place of the Law or holy scripture. For the common judgment graven in the mind, that is the ground of all expositions. And all nations agree in that. For the Angel betwixt man & God is the light wherewith he was lightened at his coming into the world. And upon this ground all our religion is settled. And we must needs handle this fully for the Eastern nations. And this much for the Scriptures, how the meaning should be opened. There remaineth a labor of longe wings, for joining of all the books: from their beginning with the creation of the world, unto the end of the last book: which is called the Revelation of S. John, which sealeth up all. The joining of the curtines in the Tabernacle was not better fastened with stringes or clasping together, then all the books one enter into the other. And three books specially are full of the brightness of Christ, & beams of his glory: the book of Daniel, The foreworke Gospel, & the vision of S. John. How denty unto the palate be their words? how sweet unto the soul be their speeches? They are more worth then Gold, & much Fess Ore, & sweter then honey & the dropping of the comb. For Daniel shown how Michael stood for his people under Babel, Madaj, Macedon & the Kings of the North, with the Kings of Egypt. how they walked in an image; became as chaff: were eaten up of fire. But the people of Christ was still saved, & they who feared God were more honored in Babel then ever any should have been under the Kings of Judah. Also they were taught of the very day when Christ who was holy above the sons of David, should consecrate himself for us. Yea all nations knew, whē the King of glory should come into the worle. Also, Flavius Josephus, beside his testimony that Christ arose again the third day, he confesseth that in his days expectation was of a King who should reign over all the world. Also Romans wrote in the same sort. And all this bred from the book of Gracious Daniel, whose vesiones are sweteness itself, & his expositions are as clear as crystal, concerning what should befall the Jews, until the Redeemer came into the world. Also the Greeks record all that Daniel prophesied, to have fallen out. And as he himself shown in work the force of his name, when he transposed one Letter to make Balat Esh, tzar, he hath broken out a fire to the foe, & shown that there none Bel, Tash, Azzar, Bel a storer of wealth: but Bel he is a fire of sorrow to his worshippers & the God of Heavē is Tash Atzar, the storer of wealth: as he calleth his name & the Chaldeās King his name how they agree with God's present judgment then: that the very letters placing should be regarded: so Heathen stories record, that his prophecies be true, & the matters which he wrote of be famously know̄ among them: as the fall of Babel, of Paras, of Alexanders house, and all the wars of the Kings of the North, & the Kings of Egypt: and all their marriages how they were mingled in the seed of man, and cleaveth not together till the Romans bestript them of their Kingdoms by the yere that Christ came into the world, and was borne in Bethlechem Iehuda, in the reign of Augustus. Any simple man might see the wisdom of our faith, if a ready Doctor should teach him the Prophecy of Belat Esh Tzar. Daniel Tash Aozar, had laid up store full great: & he is, as it were a bridge from the end of the captivity unto the days of Christ. And thence springes the Gospel of the four Evangelistes, Matthew, Marc, Luke, John. They are as the four beasts, in the head of whose books is the similitude of the Throne, of the Kingdom of David: and on the similitude of the Throne, the similitude of a man in deed. He is Christ. They have declared in few words the perfect knowledge of God with the Spirit of fire & judgments & a fiery Law was with their disciples. How goodly are the steppes of Christ in their story, how precious are his works & wonders: his right hand wrought valiantly to subdue the old enemy, that he should not deceive the sons of Adam. They have gathered all the sweetenes of all the Prophets to honor the honorable in strength, since the coming of the son of man with the clouds of heaven: and after his resurrection, he went unto the ancient of days, and was brought before him, and to him was geven power and honor and kingdom, and all people nations and tongues worshipped him. Those things have they writ̄, and their true words be as light spread upon the mountains. Also John in the Revelation buildeth the high Jerusalem: after that Christ had destroyed the lower. And he testifieth that the covenant for all nations made them the servants of God in every country under Heaven. Only as in Daniel the saints of the most high Trinity, wer always in affliction, so while the world endureth, all that desire life of the world to come, the world of recompense, shall be whittened & purified, through distress & anguish. Moreover he comprehendeth the four beasts of Daniel a new by like dealings in one beast compoūded of the four first: & the dealings of this beast will be stirring until light and darkness have their end. These things gracious John setteth forth. Your high honor shall wonderfully advaunce the glory of the Gospel if you afford a declaratiō of these three works in particular concerning the brightness of the light of Christ: whose glory covereth the heavens, and his praise filleth the Earth. And furthermore of Christ you hav an heavenly matter of speech. His bars reach through all the curtines of the holy Scriptures: Into which, breath of life is inspired, unto salvation: as he hath been the hope of the ancient Fathers since Adam was set upon the earth: a bruser of the old serpentes head. Also he is properly Melchizedek, King of Justice and King of peace: in whom all the families of the Earth should be blessed. And he is the unblemished Lamb, and by his blood we are redeemed: and God gave him for our sins: but he shall sit upō the Throne of David forever: and he at the time prefixed was killed to make reconciliation for sin: & he confirmed the covenant for the many, that is, for all nations, & he arise & destroyed city & temple, to make an heavenly city that Jerusalem which cometh down from heaven. Great grace may be shown in a true narration for all these points. The joy of heart in all the readers will be pleasant & permanent, when they go throw Law, Prophet, & Hagiographa. No old gold can match the price; no silver can be weighed to the value, it cannot be peised with Ophirs Cethem, with the precious Beryl or (Isachars) Sapphire. Doubtless a learned man, & eloquent Orator, one of a thousand, which could expound from the Apostles according to the brightenes of their words, how all dependeth upon the salvation of Christ: & how there is no other name under heavē for which God gave charge to give honor for the world to come, by one book of direction here, should be of high price, & delightful full of comfort and esteem. The joys and price would match all Jewels: & vessels of Fess Gold would be geven for it. The gold and Crystal would not match it: the Ramoth and Gabish stones should not be regarded as it. And all this doth the learned Rabbin comprehend: who listened what will be awnsweared from England, & geveth all heed of attention. The last petitions cōteyned closely the Talmudics. For them a learned book should be made, to allow the right, and to damn the wrong: while the Apostles manner is shown: how they handle Moses 613 Laws: and all their speeches are called to those comō places: so to show all their words, rule upon rule, rule upon rule: line upon line, line upon line, how they rule the Talmudics. A lively man of good valor would perform all this. The King of Togarmah or Turkey, wished, desireth, and would have the knowledge of our faith: the Queens Ambassador is the reporter: a Jew wrote it again and again: we hahe the praises of our God and of our Queen: he calleth for a guid: he hath geven us the honor asking instruction of us.

And now the eyes of all look upon you, low & high mark you, what you will awnswear for the glory of our God and Kingdom, & wisdom of our nation. All Kings in the world will mark, how you will carry this matter: whether to glory & honor forever, or to eternal shame & reproach.