Ancient China of the first century B.C., like ancient Greece, possessed more than one religion. There was the national state religion, worshipping the Supreme One (Tai-yi—, also called Heaven [Tien] and the Lord on High [Shang-di]), the Five Lords on High (Wu-di or Wu-shang-di), the imperial ancestors, and other divinities, whose sacrifices were supported by the imperial government. For the educated, there were two philosophical religions, Confucianism and Daoism. For the common people, there were gods, spirits, and ghosts of various sorts, whose care was attended to by such professionals as shamans (mostly female), fortune-tellers, physiognomists, mediums, and exorcists. Such animistic cults were despised by the more intelligent Confucians, who considered them as mere superstition. The famous Confucian, Sün-dz (ca. 320–ca. 235 B.C.), had indeed denied the existence of all spirits.

In “Philo on Free Will,” n. 48 (preceding issue of this Review, p. 140), with regard to the fourfold classification of the ten plagues in Philo and the Shibbale ha-Leḳet, the same classification is to be found in Tanḥuma, Wa-Era 14, and Shemot Rabbah 12. 4 and 15. 27. See Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, V, p. 426, n. 170.

Jonathan Edwards believed that the crucial point which divided Calvinists and Arminians was the freedom of the will; that by establishing the doctrine of moral necessity, the Calvinists would have a firm basis from which to confute Arminian objections to the doctrines of total depravity, efficacious grace, absolute, eternal, and particular election, and the perseverance of the saints. His treatise on the Freedom of the Will was intended to give a final and crushing reply to his opponents, and in preparation for it he read widely and thought deeply. He believed that he had answered all objections, stopped all crevices in the argument, and written an unanswerable work. It appeared in 1754.

One of the great handicaps confronting the student of Christian origins is the paucity of specific information about Palestine in the period of Jesus and the early Church. The student can learn much that has an indirect bearing upon Palestine by acquainting himself with the history and antiquities of Syria, Transjordan and Egypt. He can obtain an adequate picture of the general course of events in Palestine itself from Josephus, and can recreate the outlines of its changing scene and changing conditions by piecing together many bits of unrelated information from earlier and later periods. But when it comes to strictly contemporary Palestinian remains and specific contemporary Palestinian events, he has to admit that his knowledge is regrettably limited and fragmentary. The cities, the towns, the public buildings, the private houses and their household effects in the Palestine of the days of Jesus and his apostles are known only imperfectly and vaguely, in the main from literary sources. The complete excavation of even one site with datable contemporary strata would clarify the picture tremendously. For a knowledge of contemporary events our most productive source is still Josephus, and from the allimportant procuratorship of Pontius Pilate, 26–36 A.D., Josephus has only three episodes to narrate. They are the episode of the standards, the episode of the new aqueduct, and the episode of the sacred vessels supposedly buried on Mt. Gerizim.

In an article published in the Harvard Theological Review, XXXI, pp. 291–317, I endeavored to show that the Midrash based on Deuteronomy 26. 5–8, which forms the core of the Passover Haggadah (hereinafter M) was composed in pre-Maccabean times, probably in the third century B.C., when Palestine was ruled by the Ptolemies. I propose in the present article to consider three other parts of the Haggadah, which I believe are likewise pre-Maccabean. They are (1) the opening passage (hereinafter A); (2) the alternative opening (hereinafter B) prescribed by Rab in the third century of the Christian Era, and included in extant rituals after A; and (3) the poem Dayyenu, “it would have been ample for us” (hereinafter D). Evidence will be presented associating B and D particularly with the high priesthood of Jason, the son of Simeon the Righteous, and high priest in Jerusalem from 175 to 172 B.C. In connection with the discussion of these passages, it will be necessary to study also (4) the Baraita of the Four Sons (hereinafter E), which has also been incorporated into the Passover Haggadah. (A baraita is a formulated, normative statement, originating with the earlier Rabbinic scholars, i.e. those of the Mishnaic or tannaitic period, ending about the year 220 of the Christian Era; but not included in the Mishna itself.)