school, nor to overwork him when there. For this purpose the school- hours were fixed,
and attendance shortened during the summer-months.
87. Ab. v. 21.
88. Altingius (Academic. Dissert. p. 335) curiously suggests, that this was done to teach a
child its guilt and the need of justification. The Rabbinical interpretation (Vayyikra R. 7)
is at least equally far-fetched: that, as children are pure and sacrifices pure, it is fitting
that the pure should busy themselves with the pure. The obvious reason seems, that
Leviticus treated of the ordinances with which every Jew ought to have been acquainted.
The teaching in school would, of course, be greatly aided by the services of the
Synagogue, and the deeper influences of home - life. We know that, even in the troublous
times which preceded the rising of the Maccabees, the possession of parts or the whole of
the Old Testament (whether in the original or the LXX. rendering) was so common, that
during the great persecutions a regular search was made throughout the land for every
copy of the Holy Scriptures, and those punished who possessed them. 89 After the triumph
of the Maccabees, these copies of the Bible wo uld, of course, be greatly multiplied. And,
although perhaps only the wealthy could have purchased a MS. of the whole Old
Testament in Hebrew, yet some portion or portions of the Word of God, in the original,
would form the most cherished treasure of every pious household. Besides, a school for
Bible-study was attached to every academy,90 in which copies of the Holy Scripture
would be kept. From anxious care to preserve the integrity of the text, it was deemed
unlawful to make copies of small portions of a book of Scripture.91 But exception was
made of certain sections which were copied for the instruction of children. Among them,
the history of the Creation to that of the Flood; Lev. i.-ix.; and Numb. i.- x. 35, are
specially mentioned.92
89. 1 Macc. i. 57; comp. Jos. Ant. xii. 5. 4.
90. Jer. Meg. iii. 1, p. 73 d.
91. Herzfeld (Gesch. d. V. Isr. iii. p. 267, note) strangely misquotes and misinterprets this
matter. Comp. Dr. Müller, Massech. Sofer. p. 75.
92. Sopher. v. 9, p. 25 b; Gitt. 60 a; Jer. Meg. 74 a; Tos. Yad. 2.
It was in such circumstances, and under such influences, that the early years of Jesus
passed. To go beyond this, and to attempt lifting the veil which lies over His Child-
History, would not only be presumptuous,93 but involve us in anachronisms. Fain would
we know it, whether the Child Jesus frequented the Synagogue School; who was His
teacher, and who those who sat beside Him on the ground, earnestly gazing on the face of
Him Who repeated the sacrificial ordinances in the Book of Leviticus, that were all to be
fulfilled in Him. But it is all 'a mystery of Godliness.' We do not even know quite
certainly whether the school-system had, at that time, extended to far-off Nazareth; nor
whether the order and method which have been described were universally observed at
that time. In all probability, however, there was such a school in Nazareth, and, if so, the
Child-Saviour would conform to the general practice of attendance. We may thus, still
with deepest reverence, think of Him as learning His earliest earthly lesson from the
Book of Leviticus. Learned Rabbis there were not in Nazareth - either then or