In a pretended letter of Lentulus, a senator and a distinguished historian, to the Roman senate, there is a description of the personal appearance of Jesus. The letter itself, written in horrid Latin, is pronounced a bare-faced forgery; but we find therein an expression which suggests many thoughts. Albeit a forgery it is evident that whosoever invented it has nevertheless tried to follow tradition as closely as possible. The hair of Jesus is represented in it as “wavy and curling ... flowing down upon his shoulders,” and as “_having a parting in the middle of the head after the fashion of the Nazarenes_.” This last sentence shows: 1. That there was such a tradition, based on the biblical description of John the Baptist, the _Nazaria_, and the custom of this sect. 2. Had Lentulus been the author of this letter, it is difficult to believe that Paul should never have heard of it; and had he known its contents, he would never have pronounced it a _shame_ for men to wear their hair long,[253] thus shaming his Lord and Christ-God. 3. If Jesus did wear his hair long and parted in the middle of the forehead, after the fashion of the Nazarenes (as well as John, the only one of his apostles who followed it), then we have one good reason more to say that Jesus must have belonged to the sect of the Nazarenes, and been called NASARIA for this reason and not because he was an inhabitant of Nazareth; for they never wore their hair long. The Nazarite, who _separated_ himself unto the Lord, allowed “no razor to come upon his head.” “He shall be holy, and shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow,” says _Numbers_ (vi. 5). Samson was a Nazarite, _i.e._, vowed to the service of God, and in his hair was his strength. “No razor shall come upon his head; the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb” (_Judges_ xiii. 5). But the final and most reasonable conclusion to be inferred from this is that Jesus, who was so opposed to all the orthodox Jewish practices, would _not_ have allowed his hair to grow had he not belonged to this sect, which in the days of John the Baptist had already become a heresy in the eyes of the Sanhedrim. The _Talmud_, speaking of the Nazaria, or the Nazarenes (who had abandoned the world like Hindu yogis or hermits) calls them a sect of physicians, of wandering exorcists; as also does Jervis. “They went about the country, living on alms and performing cures.”[254] Epiphanius says that the Nazarenes come next in heresy to the Corinthians whether having existed “before them or after them, nevertheless _synchronous_,” and then adds that “all Christians at that time were equally called _Nazarenes_!”[255]