OF FOREST-TREES. 



323 



he designed an express place for God's divine service : for there, says BOOK IV. 



the sacred text, he planted a grove, and called upon the name of the Lord. 



Such another tuft we read of, (for we must not always restrain it to one 



single tree,) when the patriarch came to miQ E,lon Moreh, ad 



Quercetum Moreh : but whether that were the same under which the 



high-priest reposited the famous stone, after the exhortation mentioned, 



Joshua xxiv. 26, we do not contend : under an Oah, says the Scripture, 



and it grew near the sanctuary, and probably might be that which his 



grandchild consecrated with the funeral of his beloved Rebecca, Gen. 



xxxv. For it is apparent, by the context, that there God appeared to 



him again : so Grotius, upon the words, " subter Quercum," says, Illam 



ipsam cujus mentio, Gen. xxxiv. 4, in historia Jacobi et JudcB ; and adds, 



Js locus in honor em Jacobi diu pro templofuit : " that the very spot was 



long after used for a temple in honour of Jacob." This was the place 



which Sozomen calls Terebinthum, from certain trees growing there ; 



these, says Josephus, de Bell. Jud. 1. v. were as ancient as the world 



itself. Some report that this Oak sprung from a staff, which one of 



the angels, who appeared to the patriarch, fixed in the ground : so 



Geor. Syncellus in Chronico. Mirum verb est (says Valesius on this 



passage of Eusebius) cum Quercus ibidem fuerit, sub qua Abraham Ta- 



hernaculum posuerit, ( ut legitur in Gen. xviii.) cur locus ipse a Tere- 



bintho potius quam a Quercu nomen acceperit. In the mean time, as to 



the prohibition, Deut. xvi. 21, whether this patriarchal devotion in 



groves, and under arboreous shades, was approved by God, till there 



was a fixed altar, and his ceremonial worship confined to the tabernacle 



and temple, I think needs be no question *, AnakcS°sS 



F.xcurs. xiii. 



If we, therefore, now would tract the religious esteem of trees and 

 woods yet farther in holy writ, we have that glorious vision of Moses in 

 the fiery thicket ; and it is not to abuse or violate the text, that Mon- 

 casus and others interpret it to have been an entire grove, and not a 

 single bush only, which he saw as burning, yet unconsumed. Puto ego 

 (says my author) rubi vocabido non quidem rubum aliquem unicum et soli- 

 tarium significari, verum rubetum totum, aut potius fruticetum, quomodo 

 de QuercH Mambre pt^o Qiierceto toto docti intelligunt. Now that they 

 worshiped in that place soon after their coming out of Egypt, the fol- 

 lowing story shews. The feast of tabernacles had some resemblance 

 of patriarchal devotion under trees f , though but in temporary t Lev. xxxiii. 

 groves and shades in manner of booths, yet celebrated with all the 



40, 



