Isaac Jaquelot - Dissertations sur le Messie où l'on prouve aux Juifs que Jésus-Christ est le Messie promis et prédit - 1699

JAQUELOT (Isaac). Dissertations on the Messiah, where it is demonstrated to the Jews that Jesus Christ is the promised and predicted Messiah in the Old Testament. In The Hague, at Étienne Foulque, 1699. 1 volume in-8, frontispiece engraved, [26] p., 304 p., brown morocco, spine with raised bands ornamented with gilded foliate compartments, title in gold (binding of the period).

Original edition fairly uncommon.

Pastor at Wassy in Champagne, Isaac Jaquelot (1647-1708) left France at the Revocation, passed through Heidelberg, then settled in The Hague. There he preached at the Walloon Church before becoming in 1702 the French minister of Frederick I of Prussia (1657-1713) in Berlin. A rational apologist and future opponent of Pierre Bayle (1647-1706), he here, as announced in the preface, provides the natural continuation of his Dissertations on the Existence of God (1697).

Illustrated edition with a copper-engraved frontispiece showing Christ pointing to heaven in front of Moses kneeling near the Tables of the Law. Also visible are the brazen serpent, the dove accompanied by the words “Celuy cy est mon fils bien-aimé” and angels bearing the cross.

The work opens with a dedicatory epistle to the Nobles of Holland and West Friesland, in which the author says he has written for the instruction of Jews living in these Provinces. A preface follows on the dispute about the age of the world among Greek philosophers, Jews and Christians. Next comes the First Dissertation, which intends to prove that Jesus Christ is the Messiah promised to the Jews. It at once dispenses with the opinion of doctors who placed his coming in the time of King Hezekiah.

Overall condition: trimmed headcaps and small leather losses, spine joints split, corners worn, damp-stains and persistent fungal traces; not suitable for bibliophiles. An important work nevertheless for Judaica themes, the history of the Refuge, Protestant apologetics, and the Judaeo-Christian controversies in Spinoza’s era.