Note 154 — Chapter XI · THE JEWISH PROPAGANDA

There is no direct evidence about the extent of proselytizing in pre-Maccabean times. But there are two forms of proselytizing which always seemed natural and even inevitable to a man of ancient times. The slave, and the stranger actually resident under the roof of a head of a household, were, however foreign in blood, practically members of that household, and it was a small step when they were brought formally into it by appropriate ceremonies. So the first Biblical reference to circumcision especially notes that not merely Abraham but all his household, the slaves born there and those bought of strangers, were circumcised (Gen. xvii. 23, 27).

The גר, μέτοικος, the sojourning stranger, is expressly held to the observance of the religious prohibitions. Ex. xii. 43; Lev. xvii. 12. And the relative frequency with which such a stranger became a full proselyte is indicated by Ex. xii. 48, and Num. ix. 14. It is true that the נכר or “stranger in blood” is treated with extreme rigor by Nehemiah, xiii. 30, but it is this same נכר who is referred to as a proselyte in Deutero-Isaiah (Is. lvi. 3, 6).