What has been said applies, perhaps, in a special manner, to the Western, rather than to the Eastern 'dispersion.' The connection of the latter with Palestine was so close as almost to seem one of continuity. In the account of the truly representative gathering in Jerusalem on that ever-memorable Feast of Weeks, [a Acts ii. 9-11] the division of the 'dispersion' into two grand sections, the Eastern or Trans-Euphratic, and the Western or Hellenist, seems clearly marked. [7 Grimm (Clavis N.T. p. 113) quotes two passages from Philo, in one of which he contradistinguishes 'us,' the Hellenist Jews, from 'the Hebrews,' and speaks of the Greek as 'our language.'] In this arrangement the former would include 'the Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and dwellers in Mesopotamia,' Judaea standing, so to speak, in the middle, while 'the Bretes and Arabians' would typically represent the farthest outrunners respectively of the Western and the Eastern Diaspora. The former, as we know from the New Testament, commonly bore in Palestine the name of the 'dispersion of the Greeks," [a St. John vii. 35.] and of'Hellenists' or 'Grecians." [b

Acts vi. l;ix. 29; xi. 20.] On the other hand, the Trans-Euphratic Jews, who 'inhabited Babylon and many of the other satrapies,'[c Philo ad Cajum, p. 1023; Jos. Ant. xv. 3.1.] were included with the Palestinians and the Syrians under the term 'Hebrews,' from the common language which they spoke.

But the difference between the 'Grecians' and the 'Hebrews' was far deeper than merely of language, and extended to the whole direction of thought. There were mental influences at work in the Greek world from which, in the nature of things, it was impossible even for Jews to withdraw themselves, and which, indeed, were as necessary for the fulfillment of their mission as their isolation from heathenism, and their connection with Jerusalem.