NEW TESTAMENT TIMES
was just like the general registrations of a few years later in Egypt, for the correction of land registry, or whether it was for taxation, or had the Jewish registration system taken into account; the event shows that there were various registration centers in Palestine, such as are well known in Egypt very shortly after this time, and in which the registered documents were kept in libraries under the care of librarians, "book-guardians" while copies were sent to the central archives ("libraries"). There are many Talmudic references to these public "archives," in Graeco-Roman times, the Greek word being simply transliterated. It is commonly spoken of as the "Gentile archive" in distinction apparently from the Jewish.
The typical library of Palestine in New Testament times was not, however, the temple library, nor the public Greek library but the Synagogue library. These
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