l of Jews, whose sacred books were in Hebrew,] "and swear to
the Lord of hosts; one" [or the first] "shall be called, The City of
Destruction," Isaiah 19:18. A strange-name, "City of Destruction," upon
so joyful occasion, and a name never heard of in the land of Egypt, or
perhaps in any other nation. The old reading was evidently the City of
the Sun, or Heliopolis; and Unkelos, in effect, and Symmachus, with
the Arabic version, entirely confess that to be the true reading. The
Septuagint also, though they have the text disguised in the common
copies, and call it Asedek, the City of Righteousness; yet in two or
three other copies the Hebrew word itself for the Sun, Achares, or
Thares, is preserved. And since Onias insists with the king and queen,
that Isaiah's prophecy contained many other predictions relating to this
place besides the words by him recited, it is highly probable that these
were especially meant by him; and that one main reason why he applied
this prediction to himself, and to his prefecture of Heliopolis, which
Dean Prideaux well proves was in that part of Egypt, and why he chose
to build in that prefecture of Heliopolis, though otherwise an improper
place, was this, that the same authority that he had for building
this temple in Egypt, the very same he had for building it in his own
prefecture of Heliopolis also, which he desired to do, and which he did
accordingly. Dean Prideaux has much ado to avoid seeing this corruption
of the Hebrew; but it being in support of his own opinion about this
temple, he durst not see it; and indeed he reasons here in the most
injudicious manner possible. See him at the year 149.

[6] A very unfair disputation this! while the Jewish disputant, knowing
that he could not properly prove out of the Pentateuch, that "the place
which the Lord their God shall choose to place his name there," so often
referred to in the Book of Deuteronomy, was Jerusalem any more than
Gerizzim, that being not determined till the days of David, Antiq. B.
VII. ch. 13. sect. 4, proves only, what the Samaritans did not deny,
that the temple at Jerusalem was much more ancient, and much more
celebrated and honored, than that at Gerizzim, which was nothing to the
present purpose. The whole evidence, by the very oaths of both parties,
being, we see, obliged to be confined to the law of Moses, or to the
Pentateuch alone. However, worldly policy and interest and the multitude
prevailing, the court gave sent