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Julius Africanus

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Introductory Notice to Julius Africanus.

[1051] Several mss. read ἀρχιπροσηλύτων for ἄχρι προσηλύτων, whence some conjecture that the correct reading should be ἄχρι τῶν ἀρχιπροσηλύτων, i.e., back to the “chief proselytes,”—these being, as it were, patriarchs among the proselytes, like Achior, and those who joined the Israelites on their flight from Egypt.

[1052] This word occurs in the Septuagint version of Ex. xii. 19, and refers to the strangers who left Egypt along with the Israelites. For Israel was accompanied by a mixed body, consisting on the one hand of native Egyptians, who are named αὐτόχθονες in that passage of Exodus, and by the resident aliens, who are called γειῶραι. Justin Martyr has the form γηόραν in Dialogue with Trypho, ch. cxxii. The root of the term is evidently the Hebrew רג, “stranger.”

[1053] The word δεσπόσυνοι was employed to indicate the Lord’s relatives, as being His according to the flesh. The term means literally, “those who belong to a master,” and thence it was used also to signify “one’s heirs.”

[1054] προειρημένην. Nicephorus reads προκειμένην.

[1055] ἐκ τε τῆς βίβλου τῶν ἡμερῶν. By this “Book of Days” Africanus understands those “day-books” which he has named, a little before this, ἱδιωτικὰς ἀπογραφάς. For among the Jews, most persons setting a high value on their lineage were in the habit of keeping by them private records of their descent copied from the public archives, as we see it done also by nobles among ourselves. Besides, by the insertion of the particle τε, which is found in all our codices, and also in Nicephorus, it appears that something is wanting in this passage. Wherefore it seems necessary to supply these words, καὶ ἀπὸ μνήμης ἐς ὅσον ἐξικνοῦντο, “and from memory,” etc. Thus at least Rufinus seems to have read the passage, for he renders it: Ordinem supradictæ generationis partim memoriter, partim etiam ex dierum libris, in quantum erat possibile, perdocebant (Migne).

VI.

[1056] [Elucidation I.]

II.—Narrative of Events Happening in Persia on the Birth of Christ.

[1057] Edited from two Munich codices by J. Chr. von Aretin, in his Beiträge zur Geschichte und Literatur, anno 1804, p. ii. p. 49. [I place this apocryphal fragment here as a mere appendix to the Genealogical Argument. An absurd appendix, indeed.]

[1058] Which is extant in two mss. in the Electoral Library of Munich, and in one belonging to the Imperial Library of Vienna.

[1059] The mss. read γάρ, for.

[1060] The term in the original (ἀλκλαρίαις) is one altogether foreign to Greek, and seems to be of Arabic origin. The sense, however, is evident from the use of synonymous terms in the context.

[1061] There is a play upon the words, perhaps, in the original. The Greek term for Juno (῞Ηρα) may be derived from ἔρα, terra, so that the antithesis intended is, “She is no longer called Earthly, but Heavenly.”

[1062] i.e., Fountain, Spring, or Stream.

[1063] The initial letters of the Greek ᾽Ιησοῦς Χριστὸς Θεοῦ Υἱὸς Σωτήρ, i.e., “Jesus Christ the Son of God the Savior,” when joined together, make the word ἱχθύς, i.e., fish; and the fathers used the word, therefore, as a mystic symbol of Christ, who could live in the depth of our mortality as in the abyss of the sea. [Vol. ii. p. 297.]

[1064] i.e., as sea, land, and sky

[1065] θείας τύχης σύλλημμα.

[1066] ἔλλραφος.

[1067] ἐμπράκτου.

[1068] The text gives θροβαδεῖ, for which Migne proposes θορύβηθι.

[1069] πρακτικοὺς φόρους.

[1070] τί τὸ ἐπόμενον, perhaps meant for, What business brings you?

[1071] ὑπὲρ μαντείας ἀρίστης ὥσπερ κατατοξευόμενοι.

 

 

 

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