IMPOSTORS, false Messiahs, false prophets, seducers, hypocrites, wolves that come to us in sheeps cloathing, to seduce us. Moses precautions the Hebrews against impostors Deut. xiii. 1, 2, &c.and false prophets, saying, If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee; saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, but shalt put him to death; because he hath spoken to turn you away from the Lord your God, &c. And in another Deut. xviii. 10,11,20, 21.passage, There shall not be found among you that useth divination, or an inchanter, or a necromancer; for all that do these things are an abomination to the Lord—— The prophet which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other Gods, even that prophet shall die.
These laws were very ill observed in Israel: no nation ever more abounded in Impostors than that of the Hebrews. This volatile, inconstant, and superstitious people was almost always the Dupe of such as had a mind to impose upon them, particularly in matters of religion. Their propensity to idolatry, and their love of novelty, disposed them to adopt all the abominations and impieties of their neighbours. The most famous, as well as eldest impostor that appeared among them with reputation, was Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who having advanced himself to the throne of Israel by rebellion against his lawful Prince, believed he could not maintain himself there, without changing the ancient religion, and introducing the worship of the golden calves in his dominions.
From that time false prophets and impostors were frequent in the land. Queen Jezabel supported four hundred and fifty 1 Kings xviii. 19.prophets of Baal, and four hundred prophets of Astarte the Goddess of the groves. King Ahab being upon the point of marching with Jehoshaphat king of Judah against Ramoth- 1 Kings xxii. 6,7,8.Gilead, consulted his four hundred Is. ix. 14, 15.prophets concerning the success of his expedition: they all promised him victory, and a happy return. Micaiah the son of Imlah was the only one who contradicted them, and foretold, that the King would lose his life in this journey. Isaiah speaks of false prophets, who reported lies to those who consulted them. Propheta docens mendacium. And Jeremiah complains of certain prophets, who prophesied Jer. xi. 8.in the name of Baal, and worshipped idols. Prophetæ prophetaverunt in Baal, & idola secuti sunt; and that these prophets prophesied falsehoods, and were applauded by the priests. And in another place, that the prophets Jer. v. 31. Jer. xiv. 14.prophesied falsely in the name of God, who did not send them. The whole book of Jeremiah abounds with reproaches of the like nature, against those false prophets, who spoke as they were prompted by their own spirit: Prophetant de corde suo.
Ezekiel inveighs against them with still more vehemence: Say unto the prophets who 23, 24.prophesy out of their own hearts, hear ye the word of the Lord, Thus saith the Lord God, wo unto the foolish prophets that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing. O Israel, thy prophets are like the foxes in the deserts——Mine hand shall be upon the prophets that use vanity and devise lies. And elsewhere, the false prophets are like those who raise a wall without mortar, they devise lies; saying, Thus saith the Lord God, when the Lord hath not spoken. Hosea speaks likewise of those mad prophets, who were a snare, and an occasion of falling to all those who hearkened to them. And Micah mentions those greedy and avaritious prophets who sold their prophesies for money, seduced the People, and declared enmity to all those who did not fill their mouths. Zephaniah speaks of them, not at all more to advantage: Her prophets are light and treacherous persons. And Zachary, in that day the prophets shall be ashamed every one of his vision, when he hath prophesied; neither shall they wear a rough garment to deceive.
This is a tradition and successive series of impostors and false prophets in Judah and Israel, till after the captivity of Babylon. Under the New Testament Jesus Christ foretold, that false prophets should come, who should seduce many persons. There shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that if it were possible, they should deceive the very elect. These predictions did not continue long without the visible effect of them. Simon the magician gave out in Samaria, soon after the death of our Saviour, that he was the great power of God. Josephus mentions several impostors who appeared about the same time. One Theudas or Theodas Joseph. Antiq. l. xx. c. 2.odas set up in Judea, in the time of Cuspius Fadus Governor of this province, about the year of J. C. or of the vulgar Æra 45. He gave himself out to be a prophet, and deceived many Jews, persuading them to forsake their fortunes and follow him as far as Jordan, promising them that they should pass it dry-shod, as Joshua had done formerly. But he was taken and killed with many of those who followed him.
Another Theudas, mentioned by Gamaliel in the Acts of the Apostles, appeared some time before our Saviour’s death: about four hundred men joined him; but he was killed, and all they who followed him were dispersed. Ten years after an Egyptian, by religion a Jew, persuaded Joseph. l. xx. c. 6.the people to follow him to the mount of Olives, assuring them that he would make the walls of Jerusalem fall before them, and introduce them into the city through the Id. l. ii. de bello, c. 12.breach. Another impostor drew a great number of people into the wilderness, promising them a general deliverance from all evils. Judas the Galilean, author of the sect of the Herodians, asserted, that the Jews ought to acknowledge none but God for their master; and that they could not Joseph. Antiq. l. xviii. c. 1.pay tribute to Cesar, without being Cowards, and offending God. His sons inherited his spirit, and in the war with the Romans encouraged very much the spirit of rebellion in their countrymen the Jews. When this war was ended, one Jonathan, by trade Joseph. de bello, l. vii. c. 31.a weaver, appeared in the Cyrenaica, and seduced a great number of Jews by tricks and false miracles, with which he amazed them in the wilderness, whither he had drawn them. Catullus governor of Lybia Pentapolitana dispersed them, and from thence took an opportunity to plunder the richest Jews of that country. But the most famous of all the Impostors, who appeared after the destruction of the Temple, was Barchochebas, who stir’d up an insurrection of the Jews against the emperor Adrian, and brought upon them the forces of the Empire, which reduced them to a condition, from which they were never able to recover. See above, Barchochebas. I take no notice here of the false Messiahs who have appeared at several times among the Jews. See the title Messiah.
The state of oppression to which the Jews are reduced in almost all countries in the world, and the expectation of the Messiah, who, they presume, will deliver them out of all their calamities, makes them more credulous, more liable to be deceived by the promises of Impostors, and more susceptible of the hopes, which these inspire them with of recovering their liberty. As in the age wherein our Saviour manifested himself, the whole east was in expectation of the Messiah, and the deliverer so long waited for, and so often foretold; so this age produced more Impostors than any other, because of the ready admission they were sure to find in the hearts of people prepossessed, and easy to be persuaded. They who were thought to be the most crafty of them, would have made this a handle to reject even Jesus Christ, by confounding him with the seducers, who had appeared, and were from day to day appearing in their nation. This deceiver, they cried, said, that in three days he would rise again. Our Saviour’s Apostles were treated in the same manner by the obstinate Jews, As deceivers and yet true, &c.
But what is scarce credible, there have been people among Christians, and that too after so many wonders wrought by Jesus Christ, after so many persecutions endured by the Church, after so many books written by Infidels and Hereticks, which have been destroyed and utterly confuted by Catholick writers, it is scarce credible, I say, that after this, there should be people who could either say or write, that Moses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet were three eminent Impostors. All the world talks of a famous book published, as they say, under the Title, De tribus impostoribus Mose, Christo & Mahomet. Some maintain it to be a spurious work, and that no such was ever published; others are positive that such an one is in being, and there are some who have boasted that they have seen it. Alberic a Monk of the Cistertian order, in the Diocess of Chalons on the Marne, who lived in the middle of the thirteenth Century, informs us in his Chronicle under the year 1339, that seventeen cases were offered against the Emperor Frederick II. among which one was against the Christian Religion, and was mentioned by the Pope in his Books to the Archbishop of Sens, and this is, that there have been three Impostors in the world, namely, Moses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet; Tres fuerunt Baratores, seu Guillatores, in mundo, Moyses, Christus, & Mahometes. Alberic is an author contemporary with Frederick II. and his Chronicle is very well esteemed.
But if what is said by John Bayon, a Dominican, who wrote the history of the Abby of Moyenmoutier, and lived in the fourteenth Century, be true, the Emperor Frederick is not the first who uttered this blasphemy. This historian’s account of the matter is as follows: I thought, says he, that I was obliged to insert in this work what I learnt while I was at Paris, from the report of people of veracity and probity: about the year one thousand twenty two, there was a Doctor of Divinity at Paris, very conceited of his knowledge, and very much abounding with vanity and ostentation, who being one day in his pulpit, taught publickly, that three Impostors, namely, Mahomet, Moses, and Jesus Christ, had deceived all the world. Tres homines, videlicet Mahometes, Moyses & Christus, totum ad se trahentes deceperunt mundum. But he was struck immediately by the hand of God, and from that moment forgot all that he had known, and lost the use of Speech.
Peter de Vignes, Secretary and Chancellor to the Emperor Frederick II. confesses, that the Emperor his master was accused of speaking this blasphemy. The Pope in a circular letter adressed to all the princes and Petrus de Vineis, epist. p. 211. edit. Schardii.prelates,a advances this accusation against Frederick, and says, that proof should be made of it in proper time and places. Matthew Parisb relates also what was said of this blasphemy concerning the three Impostors; a Apud Rainold. An. 1239. n. 12. the letter bears date the 1st of July, in this Year. b pag. 408. c Apud Rainold. An. 1239. n. 28.but he speaks of it as a calumny imputed to Frederick by his enemies. The author of the life of Gregory IX.c who was a contemporary, affirms, that the Emperor was led into this mistake by his conversation with the Greeks and Arabians, who by their knowledge of the stars, promised him the universal Monarchy; that he believed himself to be a God under the appearance of a man; that Mankind had been seduced by three Impostors, but for his part he was to destroy a fourth Imposture, tolerated by the ignorance of people, which was the authority of the Pope.
Frederick did not suffer these accusations to pass unanswered. He wrote to the Cardinals Pet. de Vineis, l. 1. p. 32.to make his apology, as to the three Impostors; he professed publickly his belief, which was correct and catholick as to the Divinity of Jesus Christ, and the Mystery of the Incarnation, and spoke of Moses and Mahomet as a Christian should do.
Here is an accusation very solemnly formed against the Emperor, and positively contradicted by the accused. Hitherto the question is only about words; but it is affirmed by some, that there is a book really in being, intitled, of the three Impostors, &c. Some suppose Muret to be the Author of it, others Bernardin Ochinus, others Peter Aretin, others Poggbius the Florentine, others Postellus a learned Fanatick of the sixteenth century; others Arnaud de Villeneuve1, others the Emperor Frederick I. surnamed Barberossa,2 and others Frederick II.
Hist. de l’ Heres. l. 2. c. 16.Florimond de Raymond says, that he remembers, when he was a child, to have seen a copy of this famous book in the college of Presle, in the hands of Ramus. Father Mersennus speaks of it in his Comment upon Genesis, p. 1830. M. Deshouges Dean of the advocates belonging to the Great Council in Paris, says, in a note under his own hand, which I have read, that he was informd by one of his friends, who was a learned man, that he had seen this detestable book in the private library of one of the most powerful princes in Germany; but, however, under a different title from that De tribus Impostoribus. He adds, that another of his friends, whom he describes only by these three Letters, A. A. L. and with whose Probity and love of Truth he was very well acquainted, assured him, that he found this famous piece in a Bookseller’s shop at Genoa, in 1666, and that he had bought it if he had not been prevented by another who purchased it. The late M. Alliot, heretofore first Physician to his Royal Highness of Lorrain, told me, that this Book had formerly been put into his hands, but that he would not read it. Christian Kortholt, in the preface to a book composed by him, under the title of De tribus Impostoribus, which was printed at Kiel in 1680, and at Hamburg in 1700, cites some persons, who said they had seen that which we are here speaking of: but for Kortholt’s, it has not the least regard to Moses, Jesus Christ, and Mahomet; but the three Impostors attacked by him, are Edward Herbert, Thomas Hobbs, and Benedict Spinoza. He says that M. Bayle wrote to him on the 7th of April 1699, that the famous book concerning the three Impostors was not in Baldus’s library at Rotterdam; and he believes, that all they who boast that they had seen it, are very much to be suspected, either for want of honesty or exactness. Another author has given the same title to a work composed against three Catholick writers of the best reputation. This author is M. Morin, and his book is intitled Vincentii Panurgi Epistola de tribus Impostoribus ad Clariss. Vir. Joan. Baptistam Morinum D. M. atque Regiæ Mathesèos Professorem, Parisiis 1654. The three pretended Impostors whom he attacks are, Gassendi, Nevreus, and Bernier. Gibert Voet, in his dispute about Atheism, says, that in 1614, or 1615, one Nactegaël was driven from the Hague, and sent into banishment, for uttering some impieties concerning the three Impostors. M. de la Monnoye is believed to have made a Dissertation on this matter. Some say3, that there is still another piece with this title, Of the three Impostors; but these three Impostors are Zabathai Tzevi, Mahomet Bey (otherwise John Cigala) and Padre Ottomano.
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