A more definite testimony respecting the canon is given by Josephus towards the end of the first century A.D. “For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, ... but only twenty-two books, which contain the records of all the past times; which are justly believed to be divine. And of them five belong to Moses.... But as to the time from the death of Moses till the reign of Artaxerxes, king of Persia, the prophets who were after Moses wrote down what was done in their times in thirteen books. The remaining four books contain hymns to God and precepts for the conduct of human life. It is true our history has been written since Artaxerxes very particularly, but has not been esteemed of the like authority with the former by our forefathers, because there has not been an exact succession of prophets since that time: and how firmly we have given credit to these books of our own nation is evident by what we do; for during so many ages as have already passed, no one has been so bold as either to add anything to them, to take anything from them, or to make any change in them; but it has become natural to all Jews immediately and from their very birth, to esteem these books to contain divine doctrines, and to persist in them, and if occasion be, willingly to die for them.”(55) This list agrees with our present canon, showing that the Palestinian Jews were tolerably unanimous as to the extent of the collection. The thirteen prophets include Job; the four lyric and moral books are Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and Canticles. It is not likely that the Hasmonæan senate had a long existence. It was replaced by the Sanhedrim, a more definite and state institution, intended as a counter-balance to the influence of the Hasmonæan princes. The notices of the latter reach no further back than Hyrcanus I., _i.e._, about 135 B.C.(56) Josephus speaks of it under Hyrcanus II.(57) It cannot be referred to an earlier period than Hyrcanus I. Frankel(58) indeed, finds a notice of it in 2 Chronicles xix. 8, 11; but the account there is indistinct, and refers to the great synagogue. The compiler having no certain information about what was long past, transfers the origin of the court he speaks of to Jehoshaphat, in order to glorify the house of David. It is impossible to date the Sanhedrim, with Frankel, in the Grecian era, in which case it must have been dissolved during the Maccabean insurrection, and afterwards reconstructed; it was not constituted till about 130 B.C. Whether it was modeled after the great synagogue or the Hasmonæan senate, is uncertain. The idea of it may have been suggested by the latter rather than the former, for its basis was aristocratic. The Hasmonæan _gerusia_ must have been less formal and definite than the Sanhedrim; though the latter arose before the family ceased to be in power, and differed materially from its predecessor. It continued from 130 B.C. till A.D. 180, surviving the terrible disasters of the nation.(59)