THE GREAT SYNAGOGUE

THE GREAT SYNAGOGUE, the name given to a council at Jerusalem, consisting of 120 members, there assembled about the year 410 B.C. to give final form to the service and worship of the Jewish Church. A Jewish tradition says Moses received the law from Sinai; he transmitted it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, the elders to the prophets, to the men of the Great Assembly, who added thereto these words: "Be circumspect in judgment, make many disciples, and set a hedge about the law." To them belong the final settlement and arrangement of the Jewish Scriptures, the introduction of a new alphabet, the regulation of the synagogue worship, and the adoption of sundry liturgical forms, as well as the establishment of the FEAST OF PURIM, and probably the "schools" of the Scribes.