Five disputations of church-government and worship

1. It is apparent that the Jews Synagogues were particular Congregational Churches, having each one their several Rulers, and as many Learned men suppose, they had an Ecclesiastical Judicature of Elders, belonging to each of them, where fit men could be found, and this distinct from the Civil Judicature: Or as others think, they had a Sanhedrin which had power to judge in both Causes, and one of these was in every City, that is, in Places of Cohabitation. For in every City of Israel which had one hundred and twenty families (or free persons say others) they placed the Sanhedrin of twenty three. And in every City which had not one hundred and twenty men in it, they set the smallest Judicature of three Judges, so be it there were but two wise men among them, fit to teach the Law and resolve doubts. See A•nsworth on Numb. 11.16. citing Talmud. Bab. & Maimonides, more at large. And doubtless many of our Country Villages, and almost all our Parishes have more then 120. and every Country Village may come in, in the lesser number below 120. which are to have three Elders: and that say some, was every place where were ten men. And that these were under the great Sanhedrin at Jerusalem, is nothing to ⟨p. 77⟩the matter; For so we confess that such particular Churches as we mention, have some such General officers over them de jure, as the Apostolical men were in the Primitive Church; but not that any of these Synagogues were under other Synagogues; though one were in a great City, and the other but in a small Town. And that these Synagogues were of Divine institution, is plain in divers texts, particularly in Lev. 23.1, 2, 3. where a convocation of holiness, or a holy Convocation is commanded to be on every Sabbath in all their dwellings, which most plainly could be neither the meeting at Jerusalem at the Temple, nor yet in single families: and therefore it is not to much purpose that many trouble themselves to conjecture when Synagogues began, and some imagine it was about the Captivity: For as their controversy can be but about the form of the meeting place, or the name, so its certain that some place there must be for such meetings; and that the meetings themselves were in the Law commanded by God: and that not to be tumultuary confused ungoverned Assemblies. If the scourging in the Synagogues prove not this power (which is much disputed,)