ASYLUM1. This word signifies a Sanctuary, whither unhappy people might retire to secure themselves from the violence of their Enemies, and whence no one could force them against their wills. It is supposed that Hercules’s Grandsons were the first Authors of these places of refuge2: for they apprehending the resentment of those whom Hercules in his life time had used ill, set up an Asylum, that is to say, a Temple of Mercy, at Athens. Cadmus erected another at Thebes, and Romulus another at Rome, upon Mount Palatine. That of Daphne near Antioch, is very famous; hither, as we read in the Maccabees, 2 Macc. iv. 34. In the Year of the World 3834. before J. C. 168 before the vulgar Æra 172. 1 Kings ii. 28,29, 34.Onias III. High Priest of the Jews, retired, and thought himself to be here in a place of safety; whereupon Andronicus, being corrupted by Menelaus, fraudulently persuaded him to go out of it, and immediately killed him.
The Altar of Burnt-Sacrifices, and the Temple of the Lord, were likewise inviolable Sanctuaries. Thither Joab retired to secure himself, but Solomon observing that he would not quit the Altar, which he embraced closely, ordered him to be killed upon the place. Moses commands, Exod. xxi. 14.that any one who had committed any voluntary murder, and should fly for protection to the Altar, should be drag’d from thence. Sanctuaries are not made for the benefit of wicked men, as is acknowledged even by profane Authors3, but in favour of the good and innocent, who are attacked unjustly. When Villains retired to the Sanctuary of the Temple, they were either starved to death there, or were forced from thence by fires kindled every where about them. We shall speak of the Cities of Refuge in another place. These were appointed in the land of Israel by God himself, in favour of those who by accident had committed an involuntary murder. See REFUGE, CITY OF REFUGE.
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