that the same gods, as worshiped at different places, were supposed to be endowed with different attributes and affinities, and to require different rites of worship. Thus, Zeus Olympius, Jupiter Capitolinus, and Jupiter Amon, were looked upon as the same deity; but revealing one character, as on Olympus he was worshiped by the tribes of Greece; another, as, on the Capitoline hill he presided over the destinies of mighty Rome; and yet another to the dark tribes who assembled at his temple in Thebes in Upper Egypt. Such was the idolatry which the supposed rite would have tended to confirm in the mind of Naaman. To all this we are to add the fact that the very purpose of the miracle wrought by Elisha was to let the Syrian “know that there is a prophet in Israel.”—2 Kings v, 8. Not, certainly, that Elisha thus proposed to glorify himself: but to announce himself a prophet and witness, for the only living and true God, the God of Israel, whose sanctuary was in Zion. (Compare Ib. 15-18.) 8. The fact that no administrator is mentioned, but Naaman is said to have “baptized himself,” is no embarrassment to our position. The self-baptism implied by the phrase, in the English translation, is not required by the form of the Greek nor of the Hebrew. The same kind of expression is used, in the directions originally given as to the water of separation. “If he purify not _himself_ the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean. Whosoever toucheth the dead body of any man that is dead, and purifieth not _himself_ ... the water of separation was not _sprinkled on him_; he shall be unclean.... A clean person shall _sprinkle on the unclean_ on the third day and on the seventh.”—Num. xix, 12, 13, 19. The form of expression is intended to emphasize the responsibility of the person in the matter of his own cleansing, and is equivalent in meaning to the phrase,—“cause himself to be sprinkled.” Although he can not cleanse himself, he is not therefore irresponsible. He must seek to the cleansing, if he would enjoy it. The same form is used by Paul, who speaks of Ananias as saying to him (_Anastas_, _baptisai_), “Rising, baptize thyself, and wash away thy sins.”—Acts xxii, 16. In the parallel account, we are told that “he arose and was baptized.”—Acts ix, 18. It has been shown already that, in the epistle to the Hebrews, _baptismoi_ means the sprinklings ordained in the law for defilements of which leprosy was one. In our next section, it will appear that the sprinkling of the water of separation, upon those defiled by the dead, was familiarly known as a _baptizing_. And as to the case of Naaman, the considerations here presented render it certain that _baptizo_ is there used in the same sense. He was not immersed, but sprinkled seven times, according to the law. _Tābal_ is here used, not in a modal sense, but to express a cleansing, without defining the manner of it. SECTION XXXIX.—“_Baptized from the Dead._”