The Jews were perpetually reminding the Samaritans that they were “Cuthites,” mere “strangers from Assyria.” They loved to call them “proselytes of the lions” (2 K. xvii. 25), and to accuse them of worshipping the idol-gods buried long age under the oak of Shechem (Gen. xxxv. 4). To such an extent did they carry their dislike, that they cursed them publicly in their synagogues; declared their testimony was naught, and could not be received; affirmed that any who entertained a Samaritan in his house was laying up judgments for his children; that to eat a morsel of his fare was to eat swine’s flesh[180]; refused to receive him as a proselyte, and declared that he could have no part in the resurrection of the dead. Moreover they would have no dealings with them that they could possibly avoid, and in travelling from the South to the North preferred to take the long circuit through Peræa rather than pass through their hated country. On the other hand, the Samaritans were not behind-hand in recriminations. They would refuse hospitality to the pilgrim companies going up to the feasts at Jerusalem (Comp. Lk. ix. 53), and sometimes even waylay and murder them[181]. On one occasion certain of them are said to have entered the Temple at Jerusalem, and defiled it by scattering on the pavement human bones[182]. One special mode of annoyance was frequently practised. The Jews were in the habit of communicating to their numerous brethren in Babylon, the exact day and hour of the rising of the Paschal moon, by means of a system of beacon fires, which telegraphed the welcome news from the Mount of Olives, through Auranitis, to those who _sat by the waters of the Babylon_. The Samaritans would, therefore, annoy the watchers on the mountain-tops by kindling a rival flame on the wrong day, and thus perplex them, and introduce confusion. NOTE. _The Expectation of the Messiah._ From the earliest period of their national history the Jews had been pre-eminently “the people of the future,” and at the period we have now reached they were filled with the expectation that an extraordinary Being would appear, and prove Himself the Messiah or Deliverer. But though in the Temple of Prophecy[183] there had from the beginning ever been heard two Voices mysteriously blended, one jubilant and glad, telling of victory and of triumph, the other subdued and mournful, whispering of shame and suffering, yet to one of these Voices only had attention been really paid. The characteristics attributed by the nation to the Messiah were (i) _regal_, and (ii) _prophetic_.