28. That the Jews of all ages so understood the text may be 
seen by this. Demetrius,* * * § who flourished in the third centurv 
B.C., reckons 215 years from the call of Abraham to the going 
down into Egypt, 135 years from this last epoch to the birth of 
Moses, and 80 years from that to the Exode, which adds up, 
215 + 135 + 80 = 430. Josephus, in the first century A.D., 
expressly says that “the children of Israel left Egypt in the 
month Xanthicus, on the 15th day of the month, 430 years 
after our forefather Abraham came into Canaan, but 215 years 
only after Jacob removed into Egypt.”f Both the Talmuds J 
speak of the sojourning of the Israelites as including that “ in 
Egypt and in all lands” besides. Aben Ezra interprets the 
words, as also does Joseph Ben Gorion, a Rabbinical writer of 
the tenth century, in the following way : “ The sojourning of 
the children of Israel in Egypt and in other lands was 430 
years. Notwithstanding they abode in Egypt only 210 years, 
according to what their father Jacob told them — ‘ descend/ 
which in Hebrew signifies 210. Furthermore, the computation 
of 430 years is from the year that Isaac was born, which was 
the holy seed unto Abraham.” § 
29. The testimony of the early Christian writers is to the 
same effect. Eusebius|| distinctly says that it is “ by the unani- 
mous consent of all interpreters ” that the text should be so 
understood. Augustine,^) in his forty-seventh question on the 
book of Exodus, as well as in his work “ On the City of God,” 
taught that the 430 years included the sojourn in Canaan as 
well as in Egypt. And the historian Sulpicius** Severus says 
“ from the entrance of Abraham into Canaan until the Exode 
were 430 years.” These Christian interpreters of the Old 
Testament doubtless understood an argument, which some in 
the present day have strangely overlooked, that if the 430 years 
is to be counted only from the time of Jacob’s descent into 
Egypt until the Exode, the mother of Moses would have borne 
him 262 years a fter her father’s death, according to the Biblical 
computation, which all admit is a physical impossibility. On 
which Clinton has justly observed : “ Some writers have very 
* Demetrius, apnd Euseb. Prcep. Evang., ix. 21, p. 425. 
f Josephus, Antiq., ii. xv. § 2. 
X T. Hierosol. Megillah, fol. 71, 4. T. Babyl. Megillah. fol. 9, 1. 
§ Historic of the latter Tymes of the Jeives Common Weal , by Joseph 
Ben Gorion. Translated by Peter Morwing. Oxford, 15G7, pp. 2, S. 
|| Eusebius, Chron. Canon. Liber Prior , § 19. 
*' August., Dc Civitat. Dei, lib. xvi. § 24. 
'** Sulpic. Sever., Hist. Ecclcs., I. xxvi. 4. 
