Our purpose in this chapter is to ascertain what manner of women they were who took a part in the incomparable event of the life of Christ, what their part was in that event, and how it affected their position and their existence. The whole history of the Jewish race and all the circumstances relating thereto abundantly justify the application to the Jews of the term "a peculiar people." A branch of the great Semitic division, in many ways they were yet most radically distinguished from every other part of the human family. By many centuries of inspired introspection they had developed a religion, a racial ideal, and national customs which entirely differentiated them from all other Eastern peoples. The Jew is one of the most remarkable figures in history. First there is his magnificent contribution to religion and world-modifying influences, so wonderfully disproportionate to his national importance; then there is the marvellous persistency of his racial continuity. That which set apart the Jews from other nations was mainly their religion. These peculiar people, inhabiting at the time of Christ a small tract of country scarcely larger than Massachusetts, deprived of national autonomy, being but a second-class province of the Roman Empire, nevertheless presumed to hold all other races in contempt, as being inferior to themselves. This religious arrogance, manifesting itself in a vastly exaggerated conception of the superiority, both of their origin and of their destiny, surrounded the Jews with an impenetrable barrier of reserve. That national pride which in other peoples is based on the memory of glorious achievements on the battlefield, on artistic renown, or on commercial importance, found its support among the Jews in their religious history, in their divinely given pledges, and in laws of supernatural origin. And indeed they were a race of religious geniuses; they were as superior in this respect as were the Greeks in the realm of art and the Romans in that of government. These facts, which are so universally acknowledged as to need no further reference here, warrant a closer study of the manner of life of the ancient Jewish women than that to which we can afford space.