What began to prevail about this time? What is idolatry? A. Worshipping of idols, or images. What do you understand by idols? A. False gods, or images of the true God. Why did God choose a peculiar people? Whom did he call for this purpose? Where did Abraham live? What place did God appoint him to leave? What did he engage him to do? To what land did he command him to go ? What did he promise to give to his descendants? Was his posterity to be multiplied? What is meant by "multiplying his posterity?" A. That his children should increase to great numbers. What remarkable person did he promise should be born of his race or family? How long did the call of Abraham happen after the flood? CHAPTER III. What time is described in the 3rd chapter of this book? With whom did Abraham tarry or dwell, when he came into the land of Canaan ? countries. Idolatry began about this time to prevail, and then God was pleased to chuse a people, among whom the true religion might be preserved. For this purpose he called Abraham, who lived in the city of Ur, in Chaldea. He appointed him to leave the country wherein he was born; and engaged him to serve him and fear him; he commanded him to go into the land of Canaan, and he promised to give that country to his descendants, to multiply his posterity; and that the Messias should be born of his race. The call of Abraham happened four hundred and twenty-seven years after the flood. CHAPTER III. Of the Time between the Call of Abraham, and the going of the Children of Israel out of Egypt. Abraham (a) being come (a) Gen. xii. &c. into the land of Canaan, tarried there sometime with Lot his nephew, without having any child. This country was then inhabited by the Canaanites, who were an idolatrous and a very wicked people; particularly the inhabitants of Sodom, (where Lot dwelt) were so wicked, (a) and had committed sins so horrible, that God destroyed that city, after that, he had brought Lot with his wife and daughters out of it. Fire from heaven fell down, upon Sodom and Gomorrah, so that these cities ties with their inhabitants, and all the neighbouring country, were burnt to ashes. When Abraham was an hundred years of age, Isaac his son was (b) born by a supernatural power; Isaac was the father of Jacob; and Jacob had twelve sons, who were the heads of the twelve tribes or families of the children of Israel. The two most considerable of these tribes were afterwards the tribe of Levi, from which the priests or ministers of religion were taken; and the tribe of Judah, which was the most powerful; which was for a great while possessed of the royal autho - Which was the most powerful of the two tribes? Of what was it possessed? How long was it to subsist? From what tribe was Jesus Christ to be born? Who was Joseph ? To what situation did By whose means? What was the name of the king of the country? A. Pharaoh. What constrained Jacob and his family to go and sojourn in Egypt?: What do you mean by "constrained?" A. Compelled-forced. What do you mean by "sojourning?" A. Dwelling any where for a time. With whom did Jacob sojourn or dwell in Egypt? Who lived about this time? For what was he famous or illustrious? How did the children of Israel increase and multiply in Egypt? Joseph (a), one of the sons of Jacob, having been sold and carried into Egypt through the jealousy and hatred of his brethren, God raised him up to the chiefest dignity of that kingdom, by the means of the king of the country. Some years after, Jacob, the father of Joseph, was constrained by the famine that was in the land of Canaan, to go and sojourn in Egypt, with all his family. About this time lived Job, a man illustrious for his piety and patience under afflictions. After the death of Jacob (b) and Joseph, the children of Israel increased and multiplied so exceedingly in Egypt, that king Pharaoh became jealous of them, and endeavoured to destroy them. But God sent Moses who having wrought many miracles, and smote Egypt with ten plagues, obliged Pharaoh to let the children of Israel go out of his territories. This departure of Who became jealous of the children of Israel out of them? What did Pharaoh endea vour to do? Whom did God send? What did Moses work among them? Egypt, happened four hun (a) Gen. xxxvii. &c. (b) Exod. i. &c. CHAPTER IV. What time is contained in the 4th chapter of this book? What did the children of dred and thirty years after the call of Abraham. CHAPTER IV. Of the time between the going out of Egypt, and the building of Solomon's Temple. The children of Israel Israel walk upon when they being come out of Egypt, came out of Egypt ? Through what sea? : What did God then work in favour of the Israelites? A. A miracle. Who pursued them? What happened to Pha raoh ? walked upon dry (a) land through the Red Sea! and Pharaoh, who pursued them, attempting to go through after them, was there drowned with all his army. Fifty days after the deliverance from Egypt, God published the (b) ten commandments of the Law upon Mount Sinai. He afterwards gave the political laws to Moses, as also the ceremonial laws which the Israelites were to observe. God did not suffer the children of Israel to enter into the land of Canaan immediately after their coming out of Egypt, but they stayed in the wilder." ness forty years, under the conduct of Moses. VISIT (a) Exod. xii. xiv. &c. (b) Exod. xx. &c. * What did God not suffer the children of Israel to do. immediately? Where did they stay? Why were they to remain so long in the wilderness? A. As a punishment for their disobedience. Under whose conduct or guidance? When did Moses die ? Who succeeded Moses? What did Joshua do when he had subdued the nations and kings that inhabited the land of Canaan ? By whom were the people governed after the death of Joshua? Who was the last of these Judges? Whom did Samuel set up as the first king of the Israelites? Who reigned after Saul? a king? Moses dying at the end of these forty years (a) Joshua succeeded him; and after having subdued the nations and kings that inhabited the land of Canaan, he settled the Israelites in their stead. After the death of Joshua, this people were governed by the Judges that God raised from time to time, until the prophet Samuel (who was the last of the judges) set up Saul, the first king of the Israelites. After Saul reigned David, who was both a king and a pro What do you mean by phet; to whom succeeded a prophet? Who succeeded David? What did Solomon build? How long after the coming out of Egypt was the temple built? How long before the coming of Jesus Christ? CHAPTER V. What space of time is contained in the 5th chapter ? Who was set on the throne after Solomon's death? Solomon his son, who built the temple of Jerusalem, four hundred and fourscore years after the coming out of Egypt, and about a thousand years before the coming of Jesus Christ. (a) Josh. i. &c. CHAPTER V. of the time between the building of Solomon's Temple, and the Captivity of Babylon. I 2 |