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In New Testament times Palestine was a Roman province, and its divisions were no longer tribal. East of Jordan were the districts of Perea Batanæa, Trachonitis, Auranitis, Paneas, and Gaulonitis. In this chapter, however, we have to do chiefly with Western Palestine. On this side the central position was held by Samaria, with Galilee north of it, Judea south, and in the extreme south Idumea.

The Samaritans were not pure Hebrews in blood, and not purely Jewish in their worship. When the ten tribes of Israel had been crushed, and their principal families carried into captivity, the Assyrian conquerors brought men from Cuthah, Sepharvaim, and other places in the far east, and set them down in Samaria. Of various nationalities themselves, these people intermarried with the poorer Jews who had been left behind, and so their descendants were of mixed blood. Naturally also, there was at first some admixture of religious beliefs and practices, and some confusion of dialects (2 Kings, xvii.).

But eventually the various elements of the population coalesced, and the Samaritans settled down as a people, speaking a language allied to that of the Jews, and accepting the Books of Moses as their guide. But they rejected all the later books excepting Joshua, and claimed that Mount