‘Adonijah no longer saw in the person of Lucia Claudia
the beautiful and beloved object of his secret affections,
but an idolatrous heathen priestess.’
ADONIJAH,
A TALE OF THE JEWISH DISPERSION.
BY
MISS JANE MARGARET STRICKLAND.
“Oh weep for those who wept by Babel’s stream,
Whose shrines are desolate—whose land a dream
Weep for the harp of Judah’s broken shell,
Mourn where their God hath dwelt—the godless dwell.”
Byron.
“Hebrew, come forth! dread not the light of day,
Dread not the insulter’s cry.
The arch that rose o’er thy captivity,
No more shall turn thee from thy destined way.”
Sotheby.
LONDON:
SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, AND CO.
IPSWICH: J. M. BURTON AND CO.
PREFACE.
The period included in the reigns of Nero, Galba,Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian, was remarkable for twomemorable events in the annals of ecclesiastical history;the first persecution of the Christian Church bythe sixth Roman sovereign, and the dissolution of theJewish polity by Titus.
The destruction of Jerusalem was stupendous, notonly as an act of divine wrath, but as being the proximatecause of the dispersion of a whole nation, uponwhich a long series of sorrow, spoliation, and oppressionlighted, in consequence of the curse the Jews had invoked,when in reply to the remonstrances of Pilatethey had cried out, “His blood be upon us and ourchildren.” The church below, represented in Scriptureas a type of the heavenly Jerusalem above, and havingits seat then in the doomed city, was not to continuethere, lest the native Jews composing it should gatherround them a people of their own nation, in a placedestined to remain desolate till the time when thedispersed of Israel should be converted, and rebuildtheir city and temple. The city bearing the ancientname of Jerusalem does not indeed occupy the samesite, being built round the sacred spot where the gardenonce stood, in which a mortal sepulchre received thelifeless form of the Saviour of the world.
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