Jerusalem; a treatise on ecclesiastical authority and Judaism

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MENDELSSOHN'S JERUSALEM,

VOL. I.

LONDON;

PRINTED BY JOHN WERTHEIMEK AND CO.

CIRCUS PLACE, FINSBURY CIRCUS.

JERUSALEM :

A TREATISE ON

ECCLESIASTICAL AUTHORITY
AND JUDAISM.

BY MOSES MENDELSSOHN.

TRANSLATED FROM THE GEUMAN

BY M. SAMUELS,

AUTHOR OF "the MEMOIRS OF MOSES MENDELSSOHN.

VOL. L

LONDON :
LONGMAN, ORME, BROWN AND LONGMANS.

MDCCCXXXVIII.

ISAAC LYON GOLDSMID, ESQUIRE,

■ F.R.S.

A FIRM AND CONSISTENT SUPPORTER OF LIBERAL PRINCIPLES
BOTH CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS,

THESE VOLUMES

ARE RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED

OBLIGED AND HUMBLE SERVANT,

THE AUTHOR

344913

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Polak, M. H., Esq. Amsterdam
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LIST OF SUBSCRIBERS,

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teinthal, Lewis, Esq. Manchester,
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chmidt, J. J., Esq. Ditto
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Yates, Saul, Esq. Bury Court

PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

Every nation has its own disposition and exi-
gences, its own notions and aptitudes ; they have
their root in its first origin, their substantiality and
continuance in its mode of organization; and as
essential properties, they are, therefore, inseparable
from its existence. An unbiassed observer of
mankind will not look for those properties in things
secondary and incidental, nor is it in the general
human character that he will frivolously strive to
discover the cause of their being ; for there he will
find only Man, — and not the Accidental, the Na-
tional, which distinguishes one set of men from
another.

There is not, therefore, any nation which can be
pronounced utterly incapable of cultivation, or of
improvement and refinement in manners. If it can
be proved that the elements of its character were
originally good, and that its matter and form suited
with its intrinsic worth ; no one will dispute, but
that it could only be the particular circumstances
in the long vicissitudinous course of its history.

11 PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

which, having by little and little put the Jewish
nation out of its right point of view, have re-
modelled the whole, and made it appear in an
altered, and, not unfrequently, a disadvantageous
shape. Remove those disadvantages, and the
Jewish polity will at once assume an attitude of
dignity and respect. Only the training must
go forth from the nation itself ; and the germ of
self-cultivation must expand itself anew, else all
our endeavours will be fruitless. Salutary effects
may only then be reasonably expected, when in-
nate though dormant powers are stimulated afresh ;
then shall we have the pleasure of beholding in
the great garden of God, the flower, once ready
to sink down, bloom again, raise her drooping
head, and go on flourishing by the side of — and
in the best harmony with — her sparkling sisters :
whereas foreign cultivation, or that introduced
from without, whether forced on or borrowed,
would either annihilate her altogether, or at least
suppress and deform her. Neither individual man
nor entire nations will admit of being re-fashioned
after foreign patterns. Organizing Nature has
assigned to every kind of matter, as well as to
every climate, its particular capabilities and pro-
ductions ; and Art can eflect nothing except it
fall back upon the indigenous soil.

Hence the great men of all nations, once seized

PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR. Ill

with the ardour of perfectioning their contempo-
raries, have founded their intended improvements
on maxims already extant. Acquainted with the
human heart, they considered it a paramount duty
to be as tender as possible, with that which was
held most sacred by the people they had to deal
with. The old was merely made to assume a
more modern form, and, by a new and better
appearance, which they well knew how to give it,
adapted to their noble design, in conformity to
times and local situations. They did not despo-
tically deviate from whatsoever was generally re-
cognized, and generally venerated ; it was not
everything that they condemned and arbitrarily
declared unfit ; that only which was really harm-
ful, which outraged God and man, they vigor-
ously sought to put down. Detrimental abuses
hallowed by superstition, erroneous opinions lead-
ing astray, immoral proceedings varnished over by
zealots with the colour of religion, were marked
as infirmities in social man, and removed on
account of their noxiousness. It was thus that
those Philosophers succeeded in becoming useful to
the age they lived in, knowing, like a certain
Rabbi,* wisely to separate the bitter husk from

* Talmud tells us that Rabbi Meir, who had himself a great
number of scholars, whom he instructed in the Law, nevertheless
visited every day his own former teacher, to whom he was in-

IV PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

the savoury kernel. And if the excellent axioms
which they strove to diffuse were not received
with equal alacrity everywhere, yet time has
vindicated the tendency of their undertaking,
upon the whole ; while posterity is ejaculating
thanks and blessings on the mem.ory of those
guardian angels of humanity.*

There was a time when the Hebrew people,
faithful to the bliss-fraught religion of their fore-
fathers, could count themselves among the happiest

debted for education, accomplishment, and knowledge, in order
still to learn from him much of what was good and useful,
although the latter had been long known as an apostate who
had forsaken the Law. — Rabbi Meir's Pupils, to whom their
Professor's tolerant spirit as well as his converse with what
they esteemed a depraved person, seemed highly pernicious,
expressed to him their surprise at it. " I found a savoury nut,"
replied he, ''of which I keep the kernel, and throw away the
shell."

* Nor did Providence fall short in its liberality, in this
respect, to the Hebrew nation ; but bestowed on it meritorious
characters who, with love of truth, vanquishing all fear of man,
and frequently at no small sacrifice, took care to introduce a
more eligible way of thinking amongst their co-religionists, and
thus wrought good, as far as their limited sphere would permit.
The names of Maimonides, Aben Ezra^ Manasseh Ben Israel^
&c. &c. are indelibly fixed in the memory of the Hebrew nation;
their works are replete with instructive truths and useful infor-
mation.

I shall have frequent occasion, in the course of this work,
both to quote the writings of those great men, and to insert
sketches of their lives, and leading characteristics.

PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR. V

nations on earth. Manners and customs then
qualified them as a people consecrated to God, who
by their moral and political constitution most glo-
riously distinguished themselves from any other
Nation then existing. At that happy period it
was, that, favoured by temporary circumstances,
the Israelitish people attained a certain high de-
gree of perfection, nationality exalting itself to
general philanthropy, while, under the auspices of
a pacific Monarchy the salutary effect of peace to
the nation failed not to manifest itself. With that
wisdom which the pious idea of an eternal and
universal Father alone could support, they widened
the horizon, and enlarged their sympathies for
those of a different opinion;* and toleration, con-
tent, peace and happiness, pervaded the mind of
the nation. And whence did they derive that
pious spirit ? From Religion ; from her who,
throughout, lays the greatest stress on brotherly
love and the moral worth of man ; from her, with
whom reason and eternal truth, virtue and justice,
are the main rule and constant aim.

But not only to the flourishing house of Jacob,
did Religion offer tenets and laws conducive to
salvation ; in her there are, besides, peculiar com-
forting and encouraging promises to the dispersed

* I scarcely need refer to the tolerant prayer offered up by
King Solomon at the Dedication of the Temple.

vi PREFACE BY TME TRANSLATOR.

flock of Israel. When the national independence
ceased, and the emigrant members of the nation
wandered about all parts of the world, they took
away with them, of all their treasures, nothing
but their religion. She wandered with them in
all directions; with her, those poor victims of
tyranny sought and found aid and consolation.
Despite of all scoffing and contumely, despite of
the many persecutions they had to endure for
her sake, they continued true to her, the more
true, the greater the cruelties exercised toward
them.

After overcoming many sufferings, after va-
rious revolting and barbarous treatment, which
rendered mankind more and more hateful to
those tormented men, they returned into the
bosom of the Divine One, there to gather fresh
strength, fresh resolution, firmly to encounter
still more cruel destinies lowering with crushing
v/eight over their heads. — But wherefore these
gloomy pictures of former ages ? The noble-
minded turn away disgustingly from these ap-
palling scenes, to where more agreeable objects
tempt his view. Then let me throw a veil over
this horrid part, and skip that page in the records
of our hapless ancestors, lest I should again de-
press our spirits now raised by modern and better
scenes to the most pleasing expectation. A new

PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR. Vli

chapter commences in the history of the Jews
opening with gladder events, and becoming more
and more cheerful and pleasant as it proceeds.
The minds of most nations are now regulated by
the rules of Equity ; the iron barrier which sepa-
rated the hearts of men for thousands of years past,
the spirit of toleration has pulled down. Humanity
is the watchword sounding from every tongue, and
approximating to each other the hearts of all men.
On the Jewish nation, too, this change is exerting
a very salutary influence. Men begin to think of,
and feel sympathy for, the Jew, too, being well
aware of the wrong done him in former ages, by
debarring him from his just share of the common
stock of humanity ; well aware of the aggravated
wrong done him, in ousting him, at the same time,
of the means whereby he might participate of that
common stock. Thank God ! the times are over,
when the ideas of Jew and Man were considered
heterogeneous. The Jew, too, now feels his worth
as a man ; and he feels it with thanks to his fellow-
men. His inner consciousness tells him, that he
too is destined by nature to apply his faculties for
the welfare of the whole.

But all the obstacles are not removed yet. The
wild bee of raw uncultivated ages has left a dan-
gerous sting behind in innermost mankind, which
cannot be extracted but with the wisest caution.

VIU PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR.

On the one part, they think they have discovered
in the Jews' system of conduct, nothing but
immoral motives, and absolutely set them down
as an isolated set of men. On the other hand,
much remains yet to be done ; many a notion
wants refining : much of what is defective requires
to be supplied ; and a world of misapprehension
to be explained and set to rights.

To elucidate the foregoing assertions by historical
and literary data, is in a great measure the object
of the present undertaking, which, as far as the
"Jerusaleni" is concerned, I had been advised
twelve years ago to consign to the press, by
several individuals who honored my '^ Memoirs of
Moses Mendelssohn'' with their approbation.
Now the want of leisure, which then prevented me
from following their suggestion has, alas ! changed
into too great an abundance, and I have deemed
it expedient in presenting a translation of ''Jeru-
salem" to the British Public, to accompany the
same with those publications which were the
cause of that extraordinary production, some of
which have become very scarce; and to add
thereto, in the form of notes, a selection of the
most approved articles' by several Jewish authors,
all more or less connected with, or bearing on the
main subject. Perhaps it may be as well here to
observe to the generality of my readers of either

PREFACE BY THE TRANSLATOR. IX

religious persuasion, that, in the character of a
Disciple, as I fairly may be supposed to be, of the
leading system of this work, I do not (with the
exception of a very few interspersed remarks of my
own), by any means hold myself accountable for
every thesis, doctrine, or opinion, broached or laid
down in the same. Too obscure for a censor, too
timid for a reformer, and too conscious of my own
defects for a satirist, my ambition, in this instance,
soars no higher than the hope of having furnished
a tolerable translation ; and even in this I may be
disappointed, unless, on being arraigned for innacu-
racy of style, an indulgent Public would, in ex-
tennuation, admit my plea : that I am not — what,
without any disparagement of my own country,
I should esteem an honour — a native of this.

VINDICI^ JUDiEORUM:

OR,

A LETTER IN ANSWER TO CERTAIN QUESTIONS PRO-
POUNDED BY A NOBLE AND LEARNED GENTLEMAN,
TOUCHING THE REPROACHES CAST ON THE
NATION OF THE JEWS; WHEREIN ALL
ORJECTIONS ARE CANDIDLY AND
YET FULLY CLEARED.

BY RABBI MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL,

A DIVINE AND A PHYSICIAN.

PRINTED IN 1656.

VINDICIiE JUD^ORUM

Most Noble and Learned Sir,

I HAVE received a letter from your worship,
which was welcome to me ; and I read it, because
yours, with great delight, if you will please to
allow for the unpleasantness of the subject. For
I do assure your worship, I never met with any-
thing in my life which I did more deeply resent,
for that it reflects upon the credit of a Nation,
which amongst so many calumnies, so manifest
(and therefore shameful) I dare to pronounce in-
nocent. Yet I am afraid, that whilst I answer to
them, I shall offend some, whose zeal will not
permit them to consider that self-vindication, as
defensive arms, is natural to all ; but to be wholly
silent, were to acknowledge what is so falsely
objected. Wherefore, that I may justify myself
to my own conscience, I have obeyed your
worship's commands ; for your request must not
be accounted less, at least by me. I presume
your worship cannot expect either prolix or polite
discourses upon so sad a subject; for who can be

B 2

4 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

ambitious in his own calamity ? I have therefore
despatched only some concise and brief relations,
barely exceeding the bounds of a letter : yet such
as may suffice you, to inform the rulers of the
English nation of a truth most real and sincere,
which I hope they will accept in good part,
according to their noble and singular prudence
and piety. For innocence being always most free
from suspecting evil, I cannot be persuaded, that
any one hath either spoken or written against us,
out of any particular hatred that they bare us,
but that they rather supposed our coming might
prove prejudicial to their estates and interests,
charity always beginning at home. Yet, notwith-
standing, I propounded this matter under an argu-
ment of profit (for this hath made us welcome in
other countries), and therefore I hope I may prove
what I undertake. However, I have but small
encouragement to expect the happy attainment of
any other design, but only that truth may be
justified of her children. I shall answer in order
to what your worship hath proposed

The First Section.

And in the first place, I cannot btit weep
bitterly, and with much anguish of soul lament,
that strange and horrid accusation of some
Christians against the dispersed and afflicted Jews

M ANASS EH BEN ISRAEL. Ö

that dwell among them, when they say (what I
tremble to write) that the Jews are wont to cele-
brate the Feast of Unleavened Bread, fermenting*
it with the blood of some Christians whom they
have for that purpose killed : when the calum-
niators themselves have most barbarously and
cruelly butchered some of them, or, to speak
more mildly, have found one dead, and cast the
corpse, as if it had been murdered by the Jews,
into their houses or yards, as lamentable experi-
ence hath proved in sundry places : and then
with unbridled rage and tumult they accuse the
innocent Jews, as the committers of this most
execrable fact : which detested wickedness hath
been sometimes perpetrated, that they might
thereby take advantage to exercise their cruelty
upon them ; and sometimes to justify and pa-
tronize their massacres already executed. But
how far this accusation is from any semblable
appearance of truth, your worship may judge
by these following arguments.

1. It is utterly forbid the Jews to eat any
manner of blood whatsoever, Levit. vii, 26, and
Deut. xii, where it is expressly said, DT7D1 '' And
ye shall eat no manner of blood ;" and in obedience
to this command, the Jews eat not the blood of any
animal. And more than this, if they find one drop
of blood in an egg, they cast it away as prohibited.

ß MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

And if, in eating a piece of bread, it happens to
touch any blood drawn from the teeth or gums, it
must be pared and cleansed from the said blood,
as it evidently appears in Sulhan Haruch, and our
ritual book. Since, then, it is thus, how can it
enter into any man's heart to believe that they
should eat human blood, which is yet more detest-
able ; there being scarce any nation now remaining
upon the earth so barbarous as to commit such
wickedness ?

2. The precept in the Decalogue, ^' Thou shalt
not kill," is of general extent ; it is a moral com-
mand. So that the Jews are bound not only not
to kill one of those nations where they live, but
they are also obliged, by the law of gratitude, to
love them. They are the very words of Rabbi Moses
of Egypt in Yad Hachazaka, in his Treatise of
Kings, the tenth chapter, in the end : '' Concerning
the nations, the ancients have commanded us to visit
their sick, and to bury their dead, as the dead of Is-
rael, and to relieve and maintain their poor, as we do
the poor of Israel, because of the ways of peace ; as
it is written, ' God is good to all, and his tender mer-
cies are over all his works,' Psal. cxlv. 9." And in
conformity hereto, I witness before God (blessed for
ever,) that I have continually seen in Amsterdam,
where I reside, abundance of good correspondence,
many interchanges of brotherly affection, and sun-

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 7

dry things of reciprocal love. I have thrice seen,
vs^hen some Flemish Christians have fallen into the
river in our ward called Flemburgh, our nation
cast themselves into the river to them, to help
them out and to deliver their lives from death.
And certainly he that will thus hazard himself to
save another, cannot harbour so much cruel malice
as to kill the innocent, whom he ought out of the
duty of humanity to defend and protect.

3. It is forbid, Exod. xxi, 20. to kill a stranger :
'* If a man smite his servant, or his maid with a rod,
and he die under his hand, he shall surely be
punished ; notwithstanding, if he continue a day or
two, he shall not be punished, for he is his money.''
The text speaks of a servant that is one of the Gen-
tile nations, because that he only is said to be the
money of the Jew, who is his master, as Aben Ezra
well notes upon the place. And the Lord com-
mands, that if he die under the hands of his master,
his master shall be put to death ; for that as it
seems he struck him with a murderous intent.
But it is otherwise if the servant dies afterwards ;
for then it appears, that he did not strike him
with a purpose to kill him ; for if so, he would
have killed him out of hand : wherefore he shall
be free, and it may suffice for punishment that he
hath lost his money. If therefore a Jew cannot
kill his servant or slave that is one of the nations,

8 MANASSEri BEN ISRAEL.

according to the law, how much less shall he be
empowered to murder him that is not his enemy,
and with whom he leads a quiet and peaceable
life ? And therefore how can any good man
believe that, against his holy law, a Jew (in a
strange country especially) should make himself
guilty of so execrable a fact ?

4. Admit that it were lawful (which God
forbid!), why should they eat the blood ? And
supposing they should eat the blood, why should
they eat it on the Passover ? Here, at this feast,
every confection ought to be so pure, as not to
admit of any leaven, or anything that may fer-
mentate, w^hich certainly blood doth.

5. If the Jews did repute and hold this action
(which is never to be named without an epithet of
horror) necessary, they would not expose them-
selves to so imminent a danger, to so cruel and
more deserved punishment, unless they were
moved to it by some divine precept, or at least
some constitution of their wise men. Now we
challenge all those men who entertain this dreadful
opinion of us, as obliged, in point of justice, to cite
the place of scripture, or of the Rabbins, where
any such precept or doctrine is delivered. And
until they do so, we will assume so much liberty,
as to conclude it to be no better than a malicious
slander.

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 9

6. If a man, to save his life, may break the
Sabbath, and transgress many of the other com-
mands of the law, as hath been determined in the
Talmud, as also confirmed by Rabbi Moses of
Egypt, in the fifth chapter of his Treatise of the
Fundamentals of the Law ; yet three are excepted,
which are Idolatry, Murder and Adultery, life
not being to be purchased at so dear a rate, as the
committing of these heinous sins ; an innocent
death being infinitely to be preferred before it.
Wherefore, if the killing of a Christian, as they
object, were a divine precept and institution
(which far be it from me to conceive), it were
certainly to be annulled and rendered void ; since a
man cannot perform it, without endangering his
iown life, — and not only so, but the life of the
whole congregation of an entire people : and yet
more, since it is directly a violation of one of those
three precepts, '* Thou shalt do no murder ," which
is intended universally of all men, as we have said
before.

7. The Lord (blessed for ever) by his prophet
Jeremiah, xxix, 7. gives it in command to the
captive Israelites that were dispersed among the
Heathens, that they should continually pray for,
and endeavour the peace, welfare and prosperity
of the city wherein they dwelt, and the inhabitants
thereof. This the Jews have always done,' and

iO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

continue to this day in all their synagogues, with
a particular blessing of the prince or magistrate
under whose protection they live. And this the
Right Honourable my Lord St. John can testify,
who, when he was ambassador to the Lords the
States of the United Provinces, was pleased to
honour our synagogue at Amsterdam with his pre-
sence, where our nation entertained him with
music, and all expressions of joy and gladness, and
also pronounced a blessing, not only upon his
Honour then present, but upon the whole common-
wealth of England, for that they were a people in
league and amity , and because we conceived some
hopes that they would manifest towards us, what
we ever bear towards them, viz. all love and
affection. But to return again to our argument,
if we are bound to study, endeavour and solicit,
the good and flourishing estate of the city where
we live and the inhabitants thereof, how shall we
then murder their children, who are the greatest
good, and the most flourishing blessing that this
life doth indulge to them ?

8. The children of Israel are naturally merciful,
and full of compassion. This was acknowledged
by their enemies, 1 Kings xx, 31, when Ben-
hadad, king of Assyria was discomfited in the
battle, and fled away, he became a petitioner for his
life to King Ahab, who had conquered him ; for he

INIANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. II

understood that the kings of the House of Israel
were merciful kings : and his own experience con-
firmed it, when for a little affection tbaf he pre-
tended in a compliment, he obtained again his life
and fortunes, from which the event of the war had
disentitl'ed him. And when the Gibeonites made
that cruel request to David, that seven of Saul's
sons, who were innocent, should be delivered unto
them, the prophet says, *' Now the Gibeonites
were not of the children of Israel." 2 Sam. xxi.
2. As if he had said, in this cruelty, the piety of
the Israelites is not so much set forth as the
tyranny and implacable rage of the Gentiles, the
Gibeonites ; which being so, and experience
withal declares it, viz. the fidelity which our
nation hath inviolably preserved towards their
superiors ; then most certainly it is wholly incom-
patible and inconsistent with the murdering of
their children.

9. There are some Christians, that use to in-
sult the Jews as Christian homicides, that will
venture to give a reason of these pretended mur-
derous practices : as if the accusation were then
most infallibly true, if they can find any semblance
of a reason why it might be so. As they say,
that this is practised by them in haired and detest-
ation of Jesus of Nazareth ; and that therefore
they steal Christian children, buffetting them in

12 MANASSEH BEN ISUAEL.

the same manner that he was bufFetted, thereby
to rub up and revive the memory of the aforesaid
death. And likew^ise they imagine that the Jew^s
secretly steal away crosses, crucifixes, and such
like graven images, which Papists privately and
carefully retain in their houses; and every day the
Jews mainly strike, and buffet, shamefully spitting
on them, with suchlike ceremonies of despite, and
all this in hatred of Jesus. But I admire what
they really think, when they object such things as
these, laying them to our charge : for surely we
cannot believe that a people, otherwise of suffi-
cient prudence and judgment, can persuade them-
selves into an opinion that the Jews should
commit such practices, unless they could conceive
they did them in honour and obedience to the God
whom they worship. And what kind of obedi-
ence is this they perform to God (blessed for ever),
when they directly sin against that special com-
mand, '' Thou shalt not kill" ? Besides, this can-
not be committed without the imminent and
manifest peril of their lives and fortunes, and the
necessary exposing themselves to a just revenge.
Moreover, it is an anathema to a Jew to have any
graven images in his house, or anything of an idol,
which any of the nations figuratively worship,
Deut. vii. 2G.

10. Matthew Paris, p. 532, writes, that in

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 13

the year 1243, the Jews circumcised a Christian
child at Norwich, and gave him the name Jurnin.
and reserved him to be crucified, for which cause
many of them were most cruelly put to death.
The untruth of this story will evidently appear,
upon the consideration of its circumstances. He
was first circumcised; and this perfectly consti-
tutes him a Jew. Now for a Jew to embrace a
Christian in his arms, and foster him in his bosom,
is a testimony of great love and affection. But if
it was intended that shortly after, this child should
be crucified, to what end was he first circumcised?
If it shall be said, it was out of hatred to the
Christians, it appears rather, to the contrary, that
it proceeded from detestation of the Jews, or of
them who had newly become proselytes to em-
brace the Jewish religion. Surely this supposed
prank (storied to be done in Popish times) looks
more like a piece of the real scene of the Popish
Spaniards' piety, who first baptized the poor
Indians, and afterwards, out of cruel pity to their
souls, inhumanly butchered them, than of strict
law- observing Jews, who dare not make a sport
of one of the seals of their covenant.

11. Our captivity under the Mahometans is far
more burdensome and grievous than under the
Christians ; and so our ancients have said, ^' It is
better to inhabit under Edom than Ismael," for

14 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

they are a people more civil and rational, and of
a better policy, as our nation have found experi-
mentally. For, excepting the nobler and better
sort of Jews, such as live in the court of Constan-
tinople, the vulg*ar people of the Jews, that are
dispersed in other countries of the Mahometan
empire, in Asia and Africa, are treated with
abundance of contempt and scorn."* It would
therefore follow, if this sacrificing of children be
the product and result of hatred, that they should
execute and disgorge it much more upon the Maho-
metans, who have reduced them to so great calamity
and misery. So that if it be necessary to the cele-
bration of the passover, why do they not as well
kill a Mahometan? But although the Jews are
scattered and dispersed throughout all those vast

* In the present times, it may be true that, in Christian states,
the condition of the Jews is better than in Mahometan ; but in
the latter, they have never been so cruelly persecuted, murdered,
tormented, burnt, despoiled of their all, and driven out in a state
of nakedness, as they were by the Christian governments, and
ministers of religion in the middle ages. Even now, the Jews
pay but a moderate poll-tax, in the Turkish territories, and
endure not much more than the other inhabitants, or than is
concomitant with the despotic government. The number of Jews
in the Mahometan states, probably, is greater than in the
Christian. It is there, that they more frequently attain wealth
and distinction by excelling as physicians, or even statesmen.
The present prime-minister of the Emperor of Morocco is a Jew,
named Sumbul.

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL, 15

territories, notwithstanding all their despite against
us, they never yet, to this day, forged such a calum-
nious accusation. Wherefore it appears plainly,
that it is nothing else but a slander, and such a
one, that, considering how the scene is laid, I
cannot easily determine whether it speak more of
malice, or of folly : certainly Sultan Selim made
himself very merry with it, when the story was
related him by Moses Amon, his chief physician.

12. If all that which hath been said is not of
sufficient force to wipe off this accusation, because
the matter on our part is purely negative, and so
cannot be cleared by evidence of witnesses, I am
constrained to use another way of argument, which
5iyY the Lord (blessed for ever) prescribed, Exod. xxii,
^^ which is an oath : wherefore I swear, without any
deceit or fraud, by the most high God, the creator
of heaven and earth, who promulged his law to the
people of Israel upon mount Sinai, that I never yet
to this day saw any such custom among the people
of Israel, and that they do not hold any such
thing by divine precept of the law, or any ordi-
nance or institution of their wise men, and that
they never committed or endeavoured such wicked-
ness (that I know, or have credibly heard, or
read in any Jewish authors), and if I lie in this
matter, then let all the curses mentioned in Levi-
ticus and Deuteronomy come upon me; let me

16 MANASSEH BEX ISRAEL.

never see the blessings and consolations of Zion,
nor attain to the resurrection of the dead. By
this I hope I may have proved what I did intend ;
and certainly this may suffice all the friends of
truth, and all faithful Christians, to give credit to
what I have here averred. And, indeed, our adver-
saries, who have been a little more learned, and
consequently a little more civil than the vulgar,
have made a halt at this imputation. John Hoorn-
beek in that book which he lately writ against our
nation, wherein he hath objected against us, right
or wrong, all that he could anyways scrape to-
gether, was, notwithstanding, ashamed to lay this
at our door, in his Prolegomena, p. 26. where he
says, *' An autem verum sit quod vulgo in historiis
legatur, &c." i. e. '' Whether that be true, which is
commonly read in histories, to aggravate the Jews'
hatred against the Christians, or rather thö Chris-
tians against the Jews, that they should annually,
upon the preparation of the passover, after a cruel
manner, sacrifice a Christian child, privily stolen,
in disgrace and contempt of Christ, whose passion
and crucifixion the Christians celebrate, I will not
assert for truth : as well knowing, how easy it was
for those times, wherein these things are mentioned
to have happened (especially after the Inquisition
was set up in the popedom,) to forge and feign ;
and how the histories of those ages, according to

manassp:h ben Israel. 17

the affection of the writers, were too much addicted
and given unto fables and figments. Indeed I
have never yet seen any of all those relations that
hath by any certain experiment proved this fact ;
for they are all founded either upon the uncertain
report of the vulgar, or else upon the secret accu-
sation of the monks belonging to the inquisition,
not to mention the avarice of the informers, wick-
edly hankering after the Jews' wealth, and so
with ease forging any wickedness. For in the
first book of the Sicilian Constitutions, tit. 7. we
see the Emperor Frederick saying, ' Si vero
Judseus vel Saracenus sit, in quibus, prout certo
perpendimus, Christianorum persecutio multum
abundat ad pr^sens ;' ' But if he be a Jew or a
Saracen, against whom, as we have weighed, the
persecution of the Christians doth much abound,
&c ' thus taxing the violence of certain Christians
against the Jews. Or if perhaps it hath sometimes
happened, that a Christian was killed by a Jew,
we must not therefore say that in all places where
they inhabit, they annually kill a Christian child.
And for that which Thomas Cantiprsetensis, lib. ii,
cap. 23, affirms, viz. that it is certainly known,
that the Jews every year, in every province, cast
lots what city or town shall afford Christian blood
to the other cities ; I can give it no more credit

c

18 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

than his other fictions and lies wherewith he hath
stuffed his book.'* Thus far John Hoornbeek.

13. Notwithstanding all this, there are not
wanting some histories that relate these and the
like calumnies against an afflicted people : for
which cause the Lord saith, *' He that toucheth
you toucheth the apple of my eye.'* Zech. ii. 6.
I shall cursorily mention some passages that have
occurred in my time, whereof I say not that I
was an eye-witness, but only that they were of
general report and credence, without the least
contradiction. I have faithfully noted both the
names of the persons, the places where, and the
time when they happened, in my continuation of
Flavins Josephus; I shall be the less curious
therefore in reciting them here. In Vienna, the
metropolis of Austria, Frederick being emperor,
there was a pond frozen, according to the cold of
those parts, wherein three boys (as it too fre-
quently happens) were drowned. When they
were missed, the imputation was'castupon the Jews;
and they were incontinently indicted for murdering
them to celebrate their passover. And being im-
prisoned, after infinite prayers and supplications
made to no effect, three hundred of them were
burnt. When the pond thawed, these three boys
were found, and then their innocency was clearly

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 19

evinced, although too late, after the execution of
this cruelty.

In Saragoza, about thirty years ago, there was a
Christian woman, into whose house there came a
little girl (of eleven years of age, daughter to a
neighbouring gentleman), richly adorned with
jewels: this wretched woman, not thinking of a
safer way to rob her than by killing her, cut her
throat, and hid her under her bed. The girl was
presently missed ; and by information they under-
stood that she was seen to go into that house.
They call a magistrate to search the house, and
find the girl dead. She confessed the fact; and as
if she should have expiated her own guilt by de-
stroying a Jew, though ever so innocent, she said
she did it at the instigation and persuasion of one
Isaac Jeshurun, for that the Jews wanted blood to
celebrate their feast. She was hanged, and the
Jew was apprehended, who being six times cruelly
tortured, (they employing their wits in inventing un-
heard-of and insufferable torments, such as might
gain Perillus the estimation of merciful and compas-
sionate,) still cries out of the falsehood of the accusa-
tion, saying, that that wickedness which he never
committed, no not so much as in his dreams, was
maliciously imputed to him ; yet, notwithstanding,
he was condemned to remain close prisoner for
twenty years (though he continued there only

c 2

20 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

three), and to be fed there through a trough, upon
the bread and water of affliction, being close
manacled, and naked, within a four-square wall
built for that purpose, that he might there perish
in his own dung. This man's brother, Joseph
Jeshurun, is now living at this time in Hamburgh.
This miserable man calling upon God, beseeching
him to show some signal testimony of his inno-
cence, and citing before his divine tribunal the
senators, who had, with no more mercy than justice,
thus grievously and inhumanly afflicted him, the
blessed God was a just judge ; for the prince died
suddenly at a banquet, the Sunday next ensuing
the giving of the sentence : and during the time of
his imprisonment, the aforesaid senators by little
and little dropt away, and died, which was pru-
dently observed by those few that yet remained ;
wherefore they resolved to deliver themselves by
restoring him to his liberty, accounting it as a
particular divine providence. This man came out
well, passed throughout all Italy, where he was
seen, to the admiration of all that had cognizance
of his sufferings, and died a few years since at
Jerusalem.

14. The Act of the Faith, (which is ordinarily
done at Toledo) was done at Madrid, Anno 1632,
in the presence of the King of Spain, where the
inquisitors did then take an oath of the King and

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 21

Queen, that they should maintain and conserve the
Catholick faith in their dominions. In this act
it is found printed, how that a family of our nation
was burnt, for confessing upon the rack, the truth
of a certain accusation of a maid-servant, who
(provoked out of some disgust) said, that they had
scourged and whipped an image, which by the
frequent lashes issued forth a great deal of blood,
and crying with an out-stretched voice, said unto
them, *'Why do you thus cruelly scourge me?"
The whole nobility well understood that it was all
false ; but things of the Inquisition all must hush.
15. A very true story happened at Lisbon,
Anno 1631. A certain church missed one night,
a siver pix or box, wherein was the Popish Host.
And, forasmuch as they had seen a young youth
of our nation, whose name was Simao Pires Solis,
sufficiently noble, to pass by the same night not
far from thence, who went to visit a lady, he was
apprehended, imprisoned, and terribly tortured.
They cut off his hands, and after they had dragged
him along the streets, burnt him. One year
passed over, and a thief at the foot of the gallows,
confessed how he himself had rifled and plundered
the shrine of the host, and not that poor innocent
whom they had burnt. This young man's brother
was a friar, a great theologist and a preacher ;

22 MANASSEH BEX ISRAEL.

he lives now a Jew in Amsterdam, and calls him-
self Eliazar de Solis.

16. Some perhaps will say, that men are not
blame-worthy for imputing to the Jews that which
they themselves with their own mouths have con-
fessed. But surely he hath little understanding of
racks and tortures that speaks thus. An Earl of
Portugal, when his physician was imprisoned for
being a Jew, requested one of the Inquisitors by
letter, that he would cause him tobe set at liberty,
for that he knev^ for certain that he was a very
good Christian ; but he, not being able to undergo
the tortures inflicted on him, confessed himself a
Jew and became a Penitentiary. At which the
Earl, being much incensed, feigns himself sick,
and desires the Inquisitor, by one of his servants,
that he would be pleased to come and visit him.
When he came, he commanded him that he should
confess that himself was a Jew, and further, that
he should put it down in writing with his own
hand ; which when he refused to do, he charges
some of his servants to put a helmet that was red-
hot in the fire (provided for this purpose) upon
his head ; at which he, not being able to endure
this threatened torment, takes him aside to confess ;
and also he writ with his own hand that he was a
Jew. Whereupon the Earl takes occasion to

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 23

reprove his injustice, cruelty and inhumanity,
saying, '' In like manner as you have confessed,
did my physician confess ; besides that, you have
presently only out of fear, not sense of torment,
confessed more." For this cause, in the Israelitish
senate no torture was ever inflicted, but only every
person was convicted at the testimony of two
witnesses. That such-like instruments of cruelty
may enforce children that have been tenderly
educated, and fathers that have lived deliciously,
to confess that they have whipped an image, and
been guilty of such- like criminal offences, daily
experience may demonstrate.

17. Others will perchance allege, these are
histories indeed ; but they are not sacred or cano-
nical. I answer, '* Love and hatred," says Plu-
tarch, ''corrupt the truth of every thing, as ex-
perience sufficiently declares it ; when we see
that which comes to pass, that one and the same
thing, in one and the same city, at one and the
same time, is related in different manners. I my-
self, in my own negociation here, have found it so.
For it hath been rumoured abroad, that our nation
had purchased St. Paul's church, for to make it
their synagogue, notwithstanding it was a temple
formerly consecrated to Diana. And many other
things have been reported of us, that never entered
into the thoughts of our nation ; as I have seen a

24 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

fabulous narrative of the proceedings of a great
council of the Jews, assembled in the plain of
Ageda in Hungary, to determine whether the
Messiah were come or no.

18. And now, since it is evident that it is for-
bidden the Jews to eat any manner of blood, and
and that to kill a man is directly prohibited by our
law, and the reasons before given are consentane-
ous and agreeable to every one's understanding ;
I know it will be inquired by many, but especially
by those who are more pious and the friends of
truth, how this calumny did arise, and from whence
it derived its first original. I may answer, that
this wickedness is laid to their charge for divers
reasons.

First. Rufinus the familiar friend of St. Jerome,
in his version of Josephus's second book that
he wrote against Apion the grammarian (for
the Greek text is there wanting), tells us how
Apion invented this slander to gratify Antiochus,
to excuse his sacrilege, and justify his perfidious
dealing with the Jews, making their estates supply
his wants. '* Propheta vero aliorum est Apion,
&c." ** A})ion is become a prophet, and says that
Antiochus found in the temple a bed, with a man
lying upon it, and a table set before him, furnished
with all dainties both of sea and land, and fowls ;
and that this man was astonished at them, and

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 25

presently adores the entrance of the king, as
coming to succour and relieve him ; and prostrating
himself at his knees, and stretching out his right
hand, he implores liberty : whereat the king com-
manding him to set down and declare who he was,
why he dwelt there, and what was the cause of
this his plentiful provision, the man with sighs and
tears lamentably weeps out his necessity, and tells
him he is a Grecian, and whilst he travelled about
the province to get food, he was suddenly appre-
hended, and caught up by some strange men, and
brought to the temple, and there shut up, that he
might be seen by no man, but there be fatted with
all manner of dainties ; and that these unexpected
benefits wrought in him at first joy, then'suspicion,
after that astonishment ; and last of all, advising
with the minister that came unto him, lie under-
stood that the Jews every year, at a certain time
appointed, according to their secret and ineffable
law, take up some Greek stranger, and after he
hath been fed delicately for the space of a whole
year, they bring him into a certain wood, and kill
him. Then, according to their solemn rites and
ceremonies, they sacrifice his body, and every one
tasting of his entrails, in the offering up of this
Greek, they enter into a solemn oath, that they
will bear an immortal feud and hatred to the Greeks.
And then they cast the relics of this perishing

26 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

man into a certain pit. After this, Apion makes
him to say, that only some few days remained
to him before his execution, and to desire the king
that he, fearing and worshipping the Grecian Gods,
would revenge the blood of his subjects upon the
Jews, and deliver him from his approaching death.
" This fable (saith Josephus), as it is most full of all
tragedy, so it abounds with cruel impudence." I
had rather you should read the confutation of this
slander there, than I to write it in this place. You
will find it in the Geneva edition of Josephus,
p. 1066.

Secondly. The very same accusation and horrid
wickedness of killing children and eating their
blood, was of old by the ancient Heathens charged
upon the Christians, that thereby they might make
them odious, and incense the common people
against them, Tertullian, in his Apologia contra
Gentes, Justin Martyr in Apologia 2 ad Anton»
Eusebius Csesariensis, 1. v, cap. 1 and 4. Pineda,
in his Monarchia Ecclesiastica, 1. xi. cap. 52. and
many others, as is known sufficiently. So that the
imputation of this cruelty, which as to them con-
tinues only in memory, is to the very same purpose
at this day charged upon the Jews. And as they
deny this fact, as being falsely charged upon them^
so in like manner do we deny it ; and I may say
perhaps with a little more reason, forasmuch as

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 27

we eat not any manner of blood, wherein they do
not think themselves obliged.

Now the reason of this slander was always the
covetous ambition of some, who, desiring to gain
their wealth and possess themselves of their
estates, have forged and introduced this enormous
accusation, to colour their wickedness under the
specious pretence of revenging their own blood.
And to this purpose, I remember that when I re-
proved a Rabbi (who came out of Poland to Am-
sterdam) for the excess of usury in Germany and
Poland, which they exacted of the Christians, and
told him how moderate they in Holland and in
Italy were ; he replied, '* we are of necessity con-
strained to do so, because they so often raise up
false witnesses against us, and levy more from us
at once, than we are able to get again by them in
many years." And so, as experience shews, it
usually succeeds with our poor people under this
pretext and colour.

19. And so it hath been divers times ; men
mischieving the Jews to excuse their own wicked-
ness ; as to instance one precedent in the time of
a certain king of Portugal. The Lord (blessed for
ever), took away his sleep one night (as he did
King Ahashuerus) and he went up into a balcony
in the palace, from whence he could discover the
whole city, and from thence (the moon shining

28 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL,

clear) he espied two men carrying a dead corpse,
which he cast into a Jew's yard. He presently
dispatches a couple of servants, and commands
them, yet with a seeming carelessness, they should
trace and follow those men, and take notice of
their house ; which they accordingly did. The
next day there is a hurly-burly and a tumult in
the city, accusing the Jews of murder. There-
upon the king apprehends these rogues, and they
confess the truth ; and considering that this busi-
ness was guided by a particular divine providence,
he calls some of the wise men of the Jews, and asks
them how they translate the fourth verse of the
121st Psalm; and they answered, ''Behold he
that keepeth Israel will neither slumber nor
sleep." The king replied, ^' If he will not slumber,
then much less will he sleep ; you do not say well,
for the true translation is, ' Behold the Lord doth
not slumber, neither will he suffer him that
keepeth Israel to sleep.' God who hath yet a
care over you, hath taken away my sleep, that I
might be an eye-witness of that wickedness which
is this day laid to your charge.'' This, with many
such like relations, we may read in the book called
Shehet Jehuda, how sundry times, when our nation
was at the very brink of destruction for such forged
slanders, the truth hath discovered itself for their
deliverance.

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL 29

20. This matter of blood hath been heretofore
discussed and disputed before one of the Popes at
a full council, where it was determined to be
nothing else but a mere calumny : and hereupon
he gave liberty to the Jews to dwell in his coun-
tries, and gave the princes of Italy to understand
the same, as also Alfonso the wise, king of Spain.
And suppose any one man had done such a thing,
as I believe never any Jew did so, yet this were
great cruelty to punish a whole nation for one
man's wickedness.

21. But why should I use more words about
this matter, seeing all that is come upon us was
foretold by all the prophets ? Moses, Deut. xxviii,
61. " Moreover, every sickness and every plague
which is not written in the book of this law, them
will the Lord' bring upon thee, &c. because thou
hast not hearkened to the voice of the Lord thy
God." David, in the xliv Psalm, makes a doleful
complaint of those evils and ignominious reproaches
wherewith we are environed round about in this
captivity, as if we were the proper centre of
misery; saying, ** For thy sake are we killed all
the day long, we are counted as sheep for the
slaughter." The same he speaks in Psalm Ixxiv,
and in other Psalms.

Ezekiel more particularly mentions this calumny ;
God (blessed for ever) promising, Chap, xxxvi, 13.

30 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

that in time to come, the devouring of men, or the
eating of man's blood shall no more be imputed to
them, according to the true and proper exposition
of the learned Don Isaac Abarbanel. The blessed
God, according to the multitude of his mercies,
will have compassion upon his people, and will
take away the reproach of Israel from off the
earth, that it may be no more heard, as is prophe-
sied by Isaiah. And let this suffice to have
spoken as to this point.

The Second Section.

Your worship desired jointly to know what cere-
mony or humiliation the Jews use in their syna-
gogues, toward the Book of the Law ; for which
they are by some ignorantly reputed to be idolaters
I shall answer it in order.

First. The Jews hold themselves bound to
stand up when the Book of the Law written upon
parchment is taken out of the desk, until it is
opened on the pulpit, to show it to the people, and
afterwards to be read. We see that observed in
Nehemiah viii. 6, where it is said, ''And when he
had opened it, all the people stood up." And this
they do in reverence to the word of God, and that
sacred book.

For the same cause, when it passes from the

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 31

desk toward the pulpit, all that it passes by, bow
down their heads a little with reverence ; which
can be no idolatry, for these following reasons.

First. It is one thing, adorare, to adore; and
another, venerari, to worship. For adoration is for-
bidden to any creature, whether angelical or
earthly ; but worship may be given to either of
them, as to men of a higher rank, commonly styled
worshipful. And so Abraham, who in his time
rooted out vain idolatry, humbled himself, and
also prostrated himself before those three guests,
which then he entertained for men. As also
Joshua, the holy captain of the people, did pros-
trate himself to another angel, which with a sword
in his hand made him afraid at the gates of
Jericho. Wherefore if those were just men, and
if we are obliged to follow their example, and they
were not reprehended for it ; it is clear, that to
worship the Law in this manner as we do, can be
no idolatry.

Secondly. The Jews are very scrupulous in
such things, and fear in the least to appear to
give honour or reverence to images. And so it is
to be seen in the Talmud, and in Rabbi Moses of
Egypt in his Treatise on Idolatry: ** That if by
chance any Israelite should pass by a church that
had images on the outside, and at that time a
thorn should run into his foot, he may not stoop

32 MÄNASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

to pull it out, because he that should see him,
might suspect he bowed to such an image." There-
fore according to this strictness, if that were any
appearance of idolatry to bow to the Law, the
Jews would utterly abhor it ; and since they do
it, it is an evident sign that it is none.

Thirdly. To kiss images is the principal worship
of idolatry, as God saith, in 1 Kings xix. 18. '* Yet
I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the
knees that have not bowed unto Baal, and every
mouth that hath not kissed him." But if that
were so, it would follow that all men, who kiss
the testament after they are sworn, should be
idolaters. But because that is not so, since that
act is but a simple worship, by the same reason it
will follow, that to bow the head cannot be re-
puted for idolatry.

Fourthly. Experience shews, that in all nations,
the ceremonies that men use mutually one towards
another, is to bow the head ; and also there are
degrees thereof, according to the quality of the
person with whom they speak : which shews, that
in the opinion of all nations it is no idolatry ; and
therefore much less to reverence the Law with
bowing of the body.

Fifthly. In Asia (and it is the same almost in
all the world) the people receiving a decree, or
order of the king, they take it, and kiss it, and set

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 33

it upon the head. We owe much more to God's
word, and to his divine commandments.

Sixthly. Ptolomaeus Philadelphus, receiving the
seventy- two interpreters with the Book of the Law
into his presence, rose from his seat and, prostrat-
ing himself seven times, worshipped it (as Aristseus
assures us). If a Gentile did this to a Law which
he thought did not oblige him, much more do we
owe reverence to that law which was particularly
given unto us.

Seventhly. The Israelites hold, for the articles
of their faith, that there is a God who is one in
most simple Unity, Eternal, Incorporeal ; who
gave the written Law unto his people Israel by
the hand of Moses, the prince and chief of all the
prophets ; whose providence takes care for the
world which he created ; who takes notice of
all men's works, and rewards or punishes them.
Lastly, that one day Messias shall come to gather
together the scattered Israelites, and shortly after
shall be the resurrection of the dead.

These are their doctrines, which I believe con-
tain not any idolatry ; nor yet in the opinion of
those that are of other judgments. For as a most
learned Christian of our time hath written in a
French book, which he calls the Rappel of the
Jews (in which he makes the king of France to
be their leader when they shall return to their

D

34 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

own country), '* The Jews," saith he, '' shall
be saved: for yet we expect a second coming
of the same Messias ; and the Jews believe that
that coming is the first, and not the second;
and by that faith they shall be saved : for the
difference consists only in the circumstance of the
time.

The Third Section.

Sir, I hope I have given satisfaction to your
worship touching those points. I shall yet further
inform you with the same sincerity concerning the
rest. Sixtus Senensis, in his Bibliotheca, lib. 2.
Titulo contra Talmud, and others, as Biatensis,
Ordine 1. Tract 1. Titulo B erachot, aver, out of
the Talmud, cap. 4. **That every Jew thrice a day
curses all Christians, and prays to God to confound
and root them out, with their kings and princes.
And this is especially done in the synagogue, by
the Jews' priests, thrice a day." I pray let such
as love the truth, see the Talmud in the quoted
place, and they shall find nothing of that which is
objected; only there is recited in the said fourth
chapter, the daily prayer, which speaks of Minim,
that is heretics, ordained in Tabne, (that is a town
not far from Jerusalem, between Gath and Gazim,
&c.) the Talmud hath no more. Hence Sixtus

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 35

Senensis, by distillation, draws forth the foresaid
calumny, whenas what the Talmud rehearses
briefly to be made only by the wise men in the
said town, he saith was a constitution in the
Talmud long after.

Now let us see what was done by those wise
men in the said town ; and let us examine, whether
that may justly offend the Christians.

1 . There is, in the daily prayers, a certain chapter
where it is thus written, " la-Mumarim, &c.'^ that
is, ''For apostates let there be no hope; let all
heretics be destroyed, and all thine enemies ; and
all that hate thee let them perish. And thou
shalt root out the kingdom of Pride forthwith,
weaken and put it out, and in our days." This
whole chapter speaks nothing of the Christians
originally, but of the Jews, who fell in those times
to the Sadducees and Epicureans, and to the
Gentiles, as Moses of Egypt saith. Tract. Tephila
cap. 2. For by apostates and heretics are not
to be understood all men that are of a diverse
religion, or heathens, or Gentiles, but those rene-
gado Jews who did abrogate the whole law of
Moses, or any articles received thence ; and such
are properly by us called heretics. For according
to the law of Christians, he is not properly an
apostate or heretic, who is originally bred a
scholar, and a candid follower from his youth, of a

D 2

36 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

diverse law, and so continues : otherwise native
Jews and Hagarenes, and other nations that are no
Christians, nor ever were, should be properly
called apostates and heretics in respect of Chris-
tians, which is absurd ; as it is absurd for the Jews
to call the Christians apostates or heretics. Where-
fore it speaks nothing of Christians, but of the
fugitive Jews, that is, such as have deserted the
standard, or the sacred law.

2. Lastly, neither the kingdom, nor kings that
are Christians, or Hagarenes, or followers of other
sects are cursed here, but namely the kingdom of
Pride. Certain it is, that in that time (wherein
our wise men added to the daily prayers the fore-
said chapter) there was no kingdom of Christians.
What therefore that kingdom of Pride was, should
any man ask, who can plainly show it ? So much
as we can conjecture by it, it is the kingdom of
the Romans which then flourished, which did rule
over all nations tyrannically and proudly, especi-
ally over the Jews.* For after that, Vespasian,

* If by the '' Kingdom of Pride" in this passage, we are to
understand a certain empire on earth, I do not see that any other
can be meant but the Roman, under the tyranny of which the
Jews lived at the period when that prayer was introduced. But
how does this chime with what the Rabbi affirms, in the sequel,
and proves with quotations from Josephus and Philo, namely,
that the Jews have been offering sacrifices, and ordaining prayers
for the welfare of the Roman emperor, and the empire ? Cer-

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 37

with his son Titus, had dissipated all Judea. And
though some Roman em.perors after that became
Christians, or had a good opinion of Christianity,
yet the kingdom of the Romans was heathenish,
and without distinction was proud and tyrannical.

tainly, according to the sentence of the Rabbins in general,
** Sin is to be execrated, but not the sinner."

Methinks here there is, evidently, an ambiguity in the word-
ing, which the Rabbi, with his profound knowledge of Hebrew,
ought to have perceived. The hing dorn of pride may, indeed,
mean the same as the proud kingdom. It is a peculiarity of the'
Hebrew language, that it expresses the property of things more by
abstract substantives than by adjectives; whereas in other known
languages, the Ahstracta are almost generally wont to be formed
of the adjective. Men of justice, days of happiness, voice of
strength, is as much as to say, just men, happy days, strong voice,
as is soul of life, living soul. In this derivative mode of significa-
tion of abstract substantives, government of pride means the same
as proud government, and consequently means some particular
government ; and then there is no longer a question which.

But the nomen abstractum has not, therefore, in the English
language, entirelylost its original signification. The ' dominion of
Pride,' may also mean merely pride, the vehemence ofthat passion
generally, and particularly the sovereigns addicted to it, who
govern their fellow-creatures with arrogance and supercilious-
ness. In this particular sense, therefore, no particular king-
dom on earth is execrated here, no downfall wished to any par-
ticular government ; and thß formula of the prayer may very
well be construed into the following harmless ejaculation :
*' Let arrogance (or the arrogant) no longer reign over men ; but
let the dominion of pride be weakened and put down, and those
addicted to it be humiliated forthwith, and in our days." Who
does not, with all his heart, cry Amen to this ?

38 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

And however the Jews repeated the same words
of the prayer when the prince was very good, and
they lived under a just government, that they did
only of an ancient custom, without any malice
to the present government. And now truly, in all
their books printed again, the foresaid words are
wanting, lest they should now be unjustly objected
against the Jews ; and so for apostates and heretics,
they say, '* secret accusers or betrayers of the
Jews;^' and for the kingdom of pride, they substi-
tute *' all Zedim," that is, proud men.

3. After this manner, to avoid scandal, did the se-
venty-two interpreters, whocoming, in Leviticus, to
''unclean beasts," in the place of A?^nebeth, which
signifies the hare, they put AaavTnda, that is. Rough-
foot ; leaving the name, and retaining the sense.
They would not retain the FI ebrew word J.^'-^^eZ'e^/z, as
they have done in some other appellatives, lest the
wife of Ptolemy, whose name was Arnebet, should
think the Jews had mocked her, if they should
have placed her name among the unclean beasts.
Neither would they render it Aaywov Lagoon, or Aayov
Lagoji, which, in the Greek language, signifies a
hare, lest Ptolemy himself, who was the son and
ne phew of the Lagi, should be offended to see
the name of his family registered among the
creatures that were unclean. Besides, Plutarch
records how it was deeply resented, as a very high

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 39

affront and contempt, when one asked Ptolemy,
who was Lagus's father ; as if it scoffingly reflected
upon his obscure extraction and descent.

4. The very like calumny fell out concerning
the very same chapter of our prayer. When Mulct
Zidan reigned in Morocco, a certain fugitive Jew,
to show himself constant in the Mahometan re-
ligion, and an enemy to his own nation, accused
the Jews before this king, saying, *'that they
prayed to God for his destruction, when they
mention in their prayers all Zedim ; as though they
would have all the family of Zidan destroyed . They
excused themselves with the truth, and affirmed,
in praying against Zedim, that they prayed only
against proud men (as that word in the Hebrew
language properly signifies) and not against his
majesty. The king admitted of their excuse, but
said unto them, that because of the equivocation
of the word, they should change it for another,

4. For certain, the Jews give no occasion that
any prince or magistrate should be offended with
them ; but contrariwise, .as it seems to me^ they
are bound to love them, to defend, and pro-
tect them ; for by their Law and Talmud, and the
inviolable custom of the dispersed Jews every-
where, upon every sabbath day, and in all yearly
solemnities, they have prayers for kings and princes,
under whose government the Jews live, be they

40 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

Christians, or of other religions. I say, by their
Law, as Jeremiah (chap, xxix,) commandeth, viz.
'* Seek ye the peace of the city whither I have
caused you to be carried away captives, and pray
for them unto the Lord, &c." By the Talmud,
Ord. 4, Tract. 4. Abodazara, cap. L there is a
prayer for the peace of the kingdom, from custom
never intermitted of the Jews. Wheresoever they
are on the sabbath-day, and their annual solemni-
ties, the minister of the synagogue, before he blesses
the people of the Jev/s, doth with a loud voice bless
the prince of the country under whom they live,
that all the Jews may hear it; and they say,
Amen. You have seen the form of the prayer in
the book entitled, '' The Humble Addresses."

6. In like manner, the ancients observe, that
whereas God commands in Num. xxix. J 3, that
seventy bullocks should be sacrificed upon the
seven days of the Feast of Tabernacles, that this
was in respect of the seventy nations (who shall
one day come up to Jerusalem, year after year,
to keep this Feast of Tabernacles, Zech. xiv. 16,)
for whose conservation they also sacrificed. For
they say, '' that all the nations of the earth shall be
blessed in Abraham and his seed, not only spiritu-
ally, and in the knowledge of the One First Cause,
but also that at this time they shall enjoy temporal
and earthly blessings by virtue of that promise.

MAXASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 41

And so in the time of the second temple, they
offered up sacrifices for their confederate nations,
as may appear by these ensuing instances.

In Megilat Tahanit, cap. 9, it is reported, that
when Alexander the Great, at the instigation of
the Samaritans that inhabited Mount Gerizim,
went with a resolution to destroy the temple,
Simeon the Just met him in the way, and, amongst
divers reasons that he urged to divert him from his
purpose, told him, ** This is the place we pray
unto God for the welfare of yourself, and of your
kingdom, that it may not be destroyed ; and shall
these men persuade you to destroy this place ?"

The like we find in the first book of the Macca-
bees, cap. vii. 33, and in Josephus's Antiq. lib. 12.
cap. 17, when Demetrius had sent Nicanor, the
general of his army, against Jerusalem, the priests,
with the elders of the people, went forth to salute
him, and to shew him the sacrifice which they
offered up to God for the welfare of the king.

In the same history, lib. 2, 3, and in Josephus
Gorionides, lib. 3. cap. 16, we may read, that when
Heliodorus, general to Seleucus, came to Jerusalem
with the same intent, Onias, the high-priest, be-
sought him not to destroy that place, where they
prayed to God for the prosperity of the king and
his issue, and for the conservation of his kingdom.

In the first chapter of Baruch, the disciple of

42 MANASSEH BEN^ ISRAEL.

Jeremiah, we find that the Jews, who were first
carried captive into Babylon with Jechonias, made
a collection of money, according to every one's
power, and sent it to Jerusalem, saying, *' Behold
we have sent you money, wherewith ye shall buy
offerings, and pray for the life 'of Nebuchadnezzar,
and for the life of Baltasar his son ; that their days
may be upon earth as the days of heaven, and that
God would give us strength, and lighten our eyes,
that we may live under their shadow, that we may
long do them service, and find favour in their sight.

The Jews in Asia did the same, as is reported
by Josephus Gorionides, lib. 3. cap. 4, they sent
letters, with a present to Hircanus the high priest,
desiring that prayers might be made for the life of
Augustus Caesar, and his companion Marcus An-
tonius.

Philo Judeeus, in the book of his embassage to
Caius, making mention of a letter which Caius
sent, requesting his statue to be set up in the
sacred temple, and Agrippa's answer thereupon
unto the said emperor, reports, that there were
these words in it, viz. " The Jews sacrifice for the
prosperity of your empire, and that not only upon
their solemn feasts, but also every day."

The like is recorded by Josephus (lib. 2. cap. 9.
de Bello Judaico) : — The Jews said to Patronius,
general to the Emperor Caius. '' We daily offer up

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 43

burnt offerings unto God, for the peace of the
emperor and the whole people of Rome." And
in his second book against Apion, he says, *' We
Hebrews have always been accustomed to honour
emperors with particular sacrifices.'^

Neither was this service entertained unthank-
fully, as appears by the decree of Cyrus, Ezra vi.
3. where also Darius commands, that of the king's
goods, even of the tribute, expences should be
forthwith given unto the elders of the Jews, &c.
and that which they had need of, both young-
bullocks and rams, and lambs for the burnt-offer-
ings of the Lord of Heaven, and wheat, salt, wine,
and oil, &c. that they might offer sacrifices of a
sweet savour unto the God of Heaven, and pray
for the life of the king and of his sons.

The same also was commanded afterwards by
Artaxerxes, who also conferred liberally many large
gifts, as well towards the building of the temple, as
the maintaining of the sacrifices. As for Alexander
the Great, he lighted down out of his chariot, and
bowed himself at the feet of the high priest, de-
siring him to offer up sacrifice to God on his
behalf. And who can be ignorant of Ptolemy
Philadelphus, how richly he endowed the temple,
as is recorded by Aristeeus ? Nor did Antiochus,
king of the Greeks, unlike this, when, by a public
edict, he forbid that any stranger should enter the

44 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

temple, to profane that place, which the Hebrews
had consecrated to religion and divine worship
(Josephus lib. 12. cap. 3). Demetrius did the like
(Josephus lib. 13. cap. 5. 6). To which may be
added, that when they of Jerusalem contended
with them of Samaria, about the honour and dig-
nity of the temple before Alexander the Great, the
Jerusalem priest, in his plea, urged, *' That this
temple was ever had in great reverence by all the
kings of Asia, and by them enriched with sundry
splendid and magnificent gifts." In the second
book of Josephus against Apion, we read, that
Ptolomy Euergetes, when he had conquered Syria,
offered up eucharistical sacrifices, not to idols and
false gods, but to the true God at Jerusalem,
according to the manner of the Jews. Pompey
the Great, as is mentioned by Josephus de Bello
Judaico, lib. 1. cap. 5, durst not spoil, no nor so
much as touch the treasures of the temple ; not
because (as TuUy in his oration for Plancus sup-
poses, to whom Augustin, in his book de Civitate
Dei, assents) he feared lest he might be thought too
avaricious (for this seems in comparison very ridicu-
culous and childish, for military law would soon have
acquitted him for this), but because of the reverence
to the place with which his mind was so affected.
Philo Judseus, p. 102-6, relates a letter of Agrip-
pa s, where he writes, that Augustus Caesar had

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 45

the temple in so great reverence, that he com-
manded a sacrifice of one bullock and two lambs
to be offered up every day out of his ov^n revenues.
And his wife, Julia Augusta, adorned it with golden
cups and basons, and many other costly gifts.
Neither did Cleopatra, queen of Egypt, fall short
of her liberality. Tiberius, throughout the twenty-
two years of his empire, commanded sacrifices to
be offered up unto God out of his own tribute. The
like did Nero, till the unadvised rashness of Ele-
azar, in refusing his sacrifice, alienated the mind
of the emperor, that he became the cause of a
bloody persecution.

And by all this, we may the better interpret
that eleventh verse of the first chapter of Malachi
(who flourished in the second temple) the words
are, '' From the rising of the sun, even unto the
going down of the same, my name shall be great
among the Gentiles ; and in every place incense
shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering ;
for my name shall be great among the heathen,
saith the Lord of Hosts.^' For besides that the
heathens termed the temple the house of the great
God, Ezra v. 8, they and their monarchs and em-
perors, both of Persia, Greece, and Rome, de-
sired, as we have heard, to have sacrifices and
incense offered for them in God's name.

9. And let the reader be pleased further to

46 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

observe, that the Jews were accustomed not only
to offer up sacrifices and prayers to God for the
emperors, their friends, confederates and allies,
but also generally for the whole world. It is the
custom (saith Agrippa to Caius according to Philo,
p. 1035) for the high priest, at the day of atone-
ment, to make a prayer unto God for all mankind,
beseeching him to add unto them another year,
with blessing and peace. The same Philo Judseus,
in his second book of monarchy, saith, '^ The
priests of other nations pray unto God only for the
welfare of their own particular nations, but our
high priest prays for the happiness and prosperity
of the whole world." And in his book of sacrifices,
p. 836, he saith, '' Some ^sacrifices are offered up
for our nation, and some for all mankind. For the
daily sacrifices twice a day, viz. at morning and
evening, are for the obtaining of those good things,
which God, the chief good, grants unto them at
those two times of the day."

And in like manner, Josephus, in his second
book against Apion, saith, *' We sacrifice and pray
unto the Lord, in the first place, for the whole
world, for their prosperity and peace, and after-
wards more particularly for ourselves ; forasmuch
as we conceive that prayer, which is first ex-
tended universally, and is afterwards put up more
particularly, is very much acceptable 'unto God."

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 47

Which words are also related by Eusebius Cse-
sariensis in his Praeparatio Evangelica, lib. 8.
cap. 2.

10. 'Tis true that no outward material glories
are perpetual ; and so the temple had its period ;
and with the paschal Lamb all other sacrifices
ceased: but in their stead, we have at this day
prayer, and as Hosea speaks, chap. xiv. 2. " For
bullocks, we render the calves of our lips." And
three times every day this is our humble supplica-
tion and request to God : *' Fill the whole world,
O Lord, with thy blessings ; for all creatures are
the works of thy hands :" as it is written, '' The
Lord is good to all, and his tender mercies are
over all his works." Psal. cxlv. 9.

IL Yea, further, we pray for the conversion
of the nations,* and so we say in these most ex-

* Conversion certainly was not the word which the Rabbi
wanted to use, neither does it suit. In all the extracts from the
new year's day's, and day of atonement's service, there is not the
slightest allusion to a conversion to Judaism, or to a universal
consent to embrace its laws and tenets ; whereas, nothing short
ofthat can be called proper conversion ; and we may be sure
that such a kind of conversion never entered King Solomon's
mind when he composed the memorable passage of his dedication,
quoted on this occasion. Besides, such a prayer would have
been but an equivocal proof of charity and forbearance. At
every Auto da Fe they fervently pray for the conversion of
heretics, who, if the prayers have not the desired effect, are
forthwith committed to the flames. According to the true spirit

48 MAXASSEH BEN" ISRAEL,

cellent prayers, upon Rosh hashana and the day of
atonement, — " Our God, and the God of our

of Judaism, we hope for times when the knowledge of God, as
the sole and universal creator, preserver, and ruler of heaven and
earth, will extend to all nations ; when all who have the divine
breath in their nostrils will acknowledge him, prostrate them-
selves before him, and worship him. Conformably to the design
of Providence, a multiplicity of modes of external worship,
always must, and always will continue to exist. Proper Judaism,
or the system of Jewish rites, laws and testimonies, are to be for
the Jews, and Israelites only, an inheritance of the congregation of
Jacob, The rest of the nations will call on God after their own
manner ; but they will recognize the majesty and infinite good-
ness of the true One God, and cast away their idols. It is the
speedy coming of those golden times that we pray for, in our
daily orisons, and particularly on new year's day, and on the
day of atonement. " We, therefore, hope" say we at the conclu-
sion of our daily prayers, — " we, therefore, hope in thee, O Lord,
our God ! speedily to behold thy glorious power remove the
abominations out of the earth, and cause all the idols to be
utterly destroyed, and establish the universe under the sole
dominion of the Almighty ; so that all flesh may invoke thy
name ; all the wicked of the earth turn unto thee ; and all the
inhabitants of the world together know and acknowledge that
unto thee every knee must bow, and every tongue swear ; before
thee, O Lord, our God ! they shall kneel and fall prostrate ; they
shall ascribe honour to thy glorious name : and all of them shall
^dllingly submit to the power of thy dominion. Deign thou,
therefore, to reign over them speedily for ever and ever ; for the
kingdom is thine, and thou shalt eternally reign in glory ; as it
is written in thy law: " On that day the Lord alone shall be ac-
knowledged, and his name shall also be one."

Here is not the question of an amalgamation of sundry doc-
trines and laws, and still less of a so called religious junction.

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 49

fathers, reign thou over the whole world in thy

glory, and be thou exalted over ail the earth in

thine excellency ; cause thy influence to descend

upon all the inhabitants of the world, in the

glorious majesty of thy strength ; and let every

creature know that thou hast created him ; and let

every thing that is formed understand that thou

hast formed it ; and let all that have breath in

their nostrils say. The Lord God of Israel reigneth,

and his kingdom is over all dominions," And

again, '* Let all the inhabitants of the earth know

and see, that unto thee every knee shall bow, and

every tongue swear ; before thee, O Lord our God,

let them bow and prostrate themselves : let them

The latter leads straightway to odious intolerance. All perse-
cutions have, from the beginning, been exercised in the name, and
on behalf of that religious junction ; and it is to be shunned,
and prevented with might and main, as the most dangerous
enemy of mankind, and of their happiness ; for if it caji ever be
attained, it would indubitably raise up again barbarism of old,
together with the terrible spirit of persecution. Chevalier Mi-
chaelis, in his miscellaneous works, has published some highly
interesting letters on that subject, for which every lover of truth,
and freedom of thinking, is not a little indebted to him.— -I ask
pardon for the length of this note ; but it was necessary, in order
to anticipate a misconstruction, of which the Rabbi's words may
prove the means. If I am not mistaken, it is even in contem-
plation in some places, to bring this confusion of ideas into vogue,
and to seek to lead, or rather to mislead, the tolerant mind of the
great on a religious junction.

E

50 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

give honour to the honour of thy name, and let
them all take upon them the yoke of thy kingdom,
&c." And again, '' Put thy fear, 0 Lord our God,
upon all thy works, and thy dread upon all that
thou hast created ; let all thy works fear thee,
and let all creatures bow down before thee, and
let them all make themselves one handful, (that is,
with joint consent) to do thy will with a perfect
heart, &c." A most worthy imitation of the wise
King Solomon, who, after he had finished the
building of the temple, in that long prayer, 1st
Kings viii. was not unmindful of the Gentiles ;
but verse 41, he saith, ^'Moreover, concerning a
stranger, that is not of thy people Israel, but
Cometh out of a far country for thy name's sake,
for they shall hear of thy great name, and of thy
strong hand, and of thy stretched-out arm ; when
he shall come and pray towards this house, hear
thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and do accord-
ing to all that the stranger calleth to thee for ;
that all people of the earth may know thy name
to fear thee, as do the people of Israel, and that
they may know that thy name is called upon in
this House which I have builded.'* Where it may
be observed, that when the Israelites come to pray,
he saith, ver. 29. ^' And give every man according
to his ways;'* but upon the prayer of a stranger
he saith, ''And do according to all that the

MANASSEH BE^J ISRAEL. 51

stranger calleth to thee for." And this distinction
is made to this end, that by the evident and appa-
rent return and answer of their prayers, all gen-
tiles might effectually be brought into the truth,
and knowledge, and fear of God, as well as the
Israelites.

12. Moreover, since the holy prophets made
prayers and supplications for all men, as well for
the nations as the Israelites, how should not vv^e do
the same for the nations among whom we inhabit,
as engaged by a more special obligation, for that
we live under their favour and protection ? In
Deut. xxiii. 7. God commands, "Thou shalt not
abhor an Egyptian, notwithstanding the heavy
burdens they afflicted us with, only because thou
wast a stranger in his land ;" because that, at the
first they entertained and received us into their
country.

As on the other side, Ezek. xxiii. 11, he saith,
'' As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure
in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked
turn from his way and live." We ought therefore
to imitate his actions, and not to hate any man,
upon the mere account of religion, but to pray to
the Lord for his conversion ; and this also without
giving offence, or any kind of molestation. To
detest or abhor those, to v/hom we owe that pros-
perity which we enjoy, or who endeavour their

E 2

52 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

own salvation, is a thing very unworthy and ill-
becoming ; but to abhor their vices and sins, is not
so. It was a very excellent observation of a most
wise and virtuous lady, Beroria, who (as it is
recorded in the Talmud. Berachot, cap. 1.) when
her husband Rabbi Meir was about to pray to
God to destroy some of his perverse and froward
neighbours, that had no less grievously than mali-
ciously vexed and molested him, gave him this
seasonable admonition, that such a thing ought not
to be done in Israel ; but that he should rather
make his prayer that they might return, and break
off their sins by repentance : alleging that text,
Psal. civ. 35. '* Let sin be consumed out of the
earth (it is not said * sinners', but ' sins') ; and then
the wicked shall be no more."

13. We have now in this section shewn, that
it is a mere calumny to imagine, that we Jews
should pray to God, so as to give an offence to the
Christians, or cause scandal by any thing in our
prayers, unless it be that we are not Christians.
We have declared, on the contrary, — how we daily
pray for them ; as also that during the time of
the temple, we offered up sacrifices for nations
confederate with us, and how all emperors desired
this ; yea, and we offered sacrifices, not only for
particular princes, but for all mankind in general —
how, since sacrifices ceased with the temple, we

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 53

at this day do the same in our prayers — and how
we beseech God for their salvation, without giving
any scandal or offence in respect of religion, — and
how we think ourselves obliged to perform all this
by the Sacred Scripture; by all which laid to-
gether, I hope I have sufficiently evidenced the
truth of that I have asserted.

The Fourth Section.

By consequence, the accusation of Buxtorfius,
in his Bibliotheca Rabbinorum, can have no ap-
pearance of truth, concerning that which he puts
upon us, viz. ' That we are blasphemers.' I will
set down the prayer itself: —

'' We are bound to praise the Lord of all things:
to magnify him who made the world, for that he
hath not made us as the nations of the earth, nor
hath he placed us as the families of the earth, nor
hath he made our condition like unto theirs, nor
our lot according to all their multitude. For they
humble themselves to things of no worth and
vanity, and make their prayers to gods that cannot
save them ; but we worship before the King of
Kings, that is holy and blessed, that stretched
forth the heavens, and framed the earth : the seat
of his giory is in heaven above, and his divine
strength in the highest of the heavens. He is our

54 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

God, and there is no other ; he is truly our king,
and besides him there is no other, as it is written
in the Law. And know this day, and return into
thine own heart, because the Lord is God in heaven
above, and upon the earth beneath, there is no
other."

Truly, in my opinion, it is a very short and most
excellent prayer, and worthy of commendation.
The sultan Selim, that famous conqueror and em-
peror of the Mahometans, made so much account
of it, that he commanded his doctor, Moses Amon,
(who translated the Pentateuch into the Arabian
and Persian languages) that he should translate
our prayers. And when he had delivered them to
him in the Turkish tongue, he said to him, '' What
need is there of so long prayers ? " Truly this one
might suffice, he did so highly esteem and value it.
This is like another prayer which was made at
that time, viz.

*' Blessed be our God, who created us for his
honour, and separated us from those that are in
error, and gave unto us a law of truth, and planted
amongst us eternal life. Let him open our hearts
in his law, and put his love in our hearts, and his
fear, to do his will, and to serve him with a perfect
heart ; that we may not labour in vain, nor beget
children of perdition. Let it be thy will, O Lord
our God, and God of our fathers, that we may keep

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 55

thy Statutes and laws in this world, and may de-
serve, and live, and inherit well, and that we may
attain the blessing of the world to come, that so
we may sing to thy honour without ceasing. O
Lord my God, I will praise thee for ever."

But neither the one nor the other is a blasphemy,
or malediction against any other gods, for these
reasons following :

1. It is not the manner of the Jews by their
law to curse other gods by name, though they be
of the Gentiles. So in Exod. xxii, 27. *'Thou
shalt not revile the gods." Hebrew D'TlSi^, that is,
Gods,^or God, as Philo Judaeus, in Libro de Monar-
chia, doth interpret; and not judges, as Onkelos
and Jonathan translate in their Chaldee paraphrase.
Where Philo adds this reason, which is, lest they
hearing their ovv^n gods blasphemed, should in a
revengeful way of retaliation blaspheme the true
God of Israel. And we have examples enough,
how the idolatrous heathen used to revile and
defame each other's gods, both in Cicero and
Juvenal.

And in that sense, Flavins Josephus, in his book
written against Apion, hath these words : '' As it is
our practice to observe our own, and not to accuse
or revile others; so neither may we deride or
blaspheme those which others account to be Gods.
Our lawgiver plainly forbad us that, by reason of

56 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

that compellation, Gods.'' According to this, by
our own religion we dare not do that which Bux-
torfius chargeth us with. And upon this account
the Talmudists tell us, that we ought to honour
and reverence not only the kings of Israel, but all
kings, princes, and governors in general ; foras-
much as the holy scripture gives them the style of
gods, in respect of the dignity of their office.

2. The time wherein these, as also the other
prayers were composed and ordered, was in the
days of Ezra, who, with 120 men, amongst whom
were three prophets, Haggai, Zechary, Malachi,
composed them, as we have it in the Talmud.
Wherefore he cannot say, that there is any thing
intended against the honour and reverence of
Christ, who was not born till many years after.

Moreover, the Jews, since that calumny was
first raised, (though that was spoken of the Gen-
tiles and their vain Gods, humbling themselves to
things of no worth and vanity) because they desire
to decline, and avoid the least occasion of scandal
and offence, have left off to print that line, and do
not in some books print any part thereof. As John
Hoornbeek also witnesses, in his forementioned
Prolegomena; and Yv^illiam Dorstius in his obser-
vations upon Rabbi David Gawz, p. 269, and
Buxtorf in his Book of Abbreviatures. And per-
haps it will be worthy our observation, that all

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 57

these three witnesses say, that it was first made
known to them by one Antonius Margarita, who
was a Jew converted to the Christian faith, that
this part of the prayer was intended (contra idola
Papatus) against the Popish idols, which they
therefore, as by a necessary consequence, interpret
as against Christ ; but how justly, let the unpre-
judiced and unbiassed reader judge.

3. If this be so, how can it be thought, that in
their synagogues they name him with scornful
spitting ? (far be it from us !) The nation of the
Jews is wise and ingenious : so said the Lord,
Deut. iv. 6. '' The nations shall say, Surely this is
a wise and an understanding people." Therefore
how can it be supposed, that they should be so
brutish in a strange land, when their religion de-
pends not upon it ? Certainly, it is much con-
trary to the precept we speak of, to show any
resemblance of scorn. There was never any such
thing done (as it is well known) in Italy and
Holland, where ordinarily the synagogues are full
of Christians, who with great attention stand con-
sidering and weighing all their actions and motions.
And truly they should have found great occasion
to find fault withal, if that were so. But never
was any man heard thus to calumniate us,
wherever we dwell and inhabit ; which is a reason
sufficiently valid to clear us. Wherefore I suppose,

58 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

that I have sufficiently informed you concerning
our prayers, in which we purpose nothing but to
praise God and ask spiritual and temporal bless-
ings ; and by our service and worship, implore the
divine benevolence, protection, and defence.

The Fifth Section.

But forasmuch as it is reported, that we draw and
seduce others to our religion, &c.

1. Never unto this day in any part hath this
been suspected, where the Jews are dispersed, nor
can it find place here. Truly I have held friend-
ship with many great men, and the wisest and
most eminent of all Europe ; and also they came
to see me from many places at my house, and I
had many friendly discourses with them ; yet did
not this give occasion to make us suspected of any
such things. Yea, Caspar Barleus, (the Virgil of our
time,) and many others, hath written many verses
in my commendation, which I mention, not for
vain-glory (far be it !) but for vindication of my
innocent repute.

2. By our ritual books we are clear of this
seducing : for if any man offer to become a Jew,
of what nation soever he be, before we receive him
and admit him as a member of our synagogue, we
are bound to consider, whether he be moved by

-MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL 59

necessity to do it, or if it be not for that he is in
ove with some of our nation, or for any other
worldly respect. And when we find no reason to
suspect him, we have yet another obligation upon
us, which is, to let him know the penalties he
subjects himself unto if he breaketh the Sabbath,
or eateth blood, or fat, which is forbidden, Levit. iii.
17, or disannulleth any precept of the Law, as may
be seen in the Targum upon Ruth. And if he
shew himself constant and zealous, then is he ad-
mitted and protected. Wherefore, we do not
seduce any one, but contrarily, avoid disputing
with men concerning religion, not for want of
charity, but that we may, as far as it is possible,
avoid scandal and hate ; and, for this cause, we
refuse to circumcise them that come to us, because
we will give no offence. Yea, I have known some,
that for this reason have circumcised themselves.
And, if Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of
Castile, did make an order to expel the Jews,
because they seduced many Christians, and some
of the nobility to become Jews ; this was but a
pretence and colour for their tyranny, and only, as
it is well known, having no other thing to object
against us. Truly I do much commend that
opinion, not only of Osorius de Rebus Immanuelis,
but of our Flavins Josephus, the most famous of

60 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

all historians ; which he relates in his history of
his own life : —

** At that time (saith he), there came unto me
two noblemen of the Trachouites, subjects of the
king, bringing with them horsemen, with arms and
money. These, when the Jews would compel to
be circumcised, if they would live amongst them, I
would not suifer them to trouble them ; maintain-
ing that every man ought to serve God of his own
free will, and not be forced thereto by others. For
should we do this thing (saith he), it might make
them repent that they ever fled unto us. And so,
persuading the multitude, I did abundantly afford
unto these men their food, according to their diet."

Truly, this was an action worthy of a noble and
wise man, and worthy of imitation, for defending
common liberty ; leaving the judgment and deter-
mination to God alone. The Spanish Inquisitions,
with all their torments and cruelties, cannot make
any Jew that falls into their power become a
Christian. For unreasonable beasts are taught by
blows ; but men are taught by reason. Nor are
men persuaded to other opinions by torments, but
rather on the contrary, they become more firm and
constant in their tenets.

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 61

The^ Sixth Section.

Having thus discussed the main exceptions, I
will now proceed to smaller matters, though less
pertaining to my faculty, that is, to business of
merchandize. Some say, that if the Jews come
to dwell here, they will draw unto themselves the
whole negociation, to the great damage of the
natural inhabitants. I answer, that it hath been
my opinion always (with submission to better
judgment), that it can be no prejudice at all to the
English nation ; because, principally in trans-
porting their goods, they would gain much, by
reason of the public payments of customs, ex-
cise, &c.

Moreover, they would always bring profit to the
people of the land, as well in buying of commodi-
ties, which they would transport to other places,
as in those they would trade in here. And if by
accident any particular person sh9uld lose by it,
by bringing down the price of such a commodity,
being dispersed into many hands ; yet, by that
means the commonwealth would gain, in buying
cheaper, and procuring it at a lesser rate.

Yea, great emolument would grow to the natural
inhabitants, as well in the sale of all provision, as
in all things else that concern the ornaments of the

62 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

body. Yea, and the native mechanics also would
gain by it, there being rarely found among us any
man that uses such an art.

2. Add to this, that as our nation hath sailed
into almost all parts of the world, so they are
always herein profitable to a nation, in a rea-
diness to give their opinions in favour of the
people amongst whom they live ; besides that all
strangers do bring in new merchandizes, together
with the knowledge of those foreign countries
wherein they were born.

And this is so far from damnifying the natives,
that it conduces much to their advantage ; because
they bring from their countries new commodities,
with new knowledge. For the great work-master
and creator of all things, to the end to make
commerce in the earth, gave not to every place all
things, but hath parted his benefits amongst them ;
by which way, he hath made them all wanting the
help of others. This may be seen in England,
which being one of the most plentiful countries
that are in the world, yet wants divers things for
shipping, as also wine, oil, figs, almonds, raisins,
and all the drugs of India ; things so necessary for
the life of man. And besides, they want many other
commodities, which are abundant in other countries
with more knowledge of them ; though it be true,
that in my opinion there is not in the world a more

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 63

understanding people for most navigations, and
more capable of all negociation than the English
nation are.

3. Farther, there may be the companies made
of the natives and strangers (where they are more
acquainted) or else factors. All v^hich, if I be not
deceived, will amount to the profit of the natives.
For which many reasons may be brought, though
I cannot comprehend them, having always lived a
sedentary life, applying myself to my studies,
which are far remote from things ofthat nature.

4. Nor can it be justly objected against our
nation, that they are deceivers ; because the gene-
rality, cannot in any additional way, be condemned
for some particulars. I cannot excuse them all,
nor do I think but there may be some deceivers
amongst them, as well as amongst all other nations
and people, because poverty bringeth baseness
along with it.

5. But, if we look to that which we ought, by
our religion, the moral precept of the decalogue,
*'Thou shalt not steal," it belongs in common to
all Jews towards all Gentiles : As may be seen in
Rabbi Moses of Egypt, Tract. Geneba, cap. 1. and
Gazella, cap. L ' It is a sin, (saith he,) to rob any
man, though he be a Gentile.' Nor, can that be
alleged out of the Sacred History, concerning the
jewels and household-stuff, of which the Israelites

64 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

spoiled the Egyptians, as 1 have heard it sometimes
alleged by some, to some men ; because that was a
particular dispensation, and a divine precept for
that time. So it is recorded in the Talmud, in the
tract of the Sanhedrim, cap. 11. that in the time
of Alexander the Great, those of Alexandria ac-
cused the Jews for being thieves, and they de-
manded restitution of their goods. But Guebia
Ben Pesria answered them, '' Our fathers went
down into Egypt but seventy souls, there they
grew a numerous nation, above six hundred thou-
sand, and served them in base offices for the space
of two hundred and ten years ; according to this,
pay us for our labour, and make the accounts even,
and you shall see you are yet much in our debt."
The reason satisfied Alexander, and he acquitted
them.

6. By consequence, the Jews are bound not to
defraud, nor abuse in their accounts, negociation,
or reckonings, any man whatsoever, as it may be
seen expressly in Rabbi Moses of Egypt, and
Rabbi Moses de Kosi in Samag.

7. Yea, they farther say, that by restitutions
there is a result to the praise of God, and the
Sacred Law. Whence that holy and wise man,
Rabbi Simeon Ben Satah, having bought an ass
of a Gentile, the head-stall whereof was a jewel
of great value, which the owner knew not of.

MANASSE?! BEN ISRAEL. " 65

Afterwards he found it, and, freely and for nothing,
he restored it to the seller who knew not of it,
saying, ''I bought the ass, but not the jewel."
Whence there did accrue honour to God and his
Law, and to the] nation of the Jews, as Medras
Raba reports in Parasot Hekel.

8. After the same manner they command, that
the oath which they shall make to any other nation,
must be with truth and justice, and must be kept
in every particular. And for proof thereof, they
quote the history of Zedekias, whom God punished
and deprived of his kingdom, because he kept not
his word and oath, made to Nebuchadnezzar in
the name of God, though he were a Gentile, as it
is said, 2 Chron. xxxvi, 13. ''And he also rebelled
against Nebuchadnezzar, who made him swear by
God."

9. These are the laws and obligations which
the Jews hold. So that the law that forbids the
Jews to kill any Gentiles, forbids them also to
to steal from them : yet every one must look to it,
for the world is full of fraud in all nations. I re-
member a pretty story of what passed in Morocco,
in the court of the king of Mauritania. There was
a Jew that had a sort of false stones, &c. He,
making a truck with a Portugal Christian for some
verdigrease that he had, which was much sophis-
ticated (as they are wont to do there), being all

66 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

falsified with earth, one of the Portugal's friends
laughed at him, saying, *' The Jew fitted thee well."
He answered, '* If the Jew hath stoned me, I have
buried him." And so they ordinarily mock one
another.

This I can afiirm, that many of the Jews, be-
cause they would not break with other men's
goods, were very poor at Amsterdam, and lived very
poorly ; and those that did break with other men's
goods, by necessity, became so much the more
miserable, that they were forced to live on alms.

And whereas, in the time of King Edward I.
the Jews were accused of clipping the King's coin,
it appears that this accusation drew its original
mainly from the suspicion and hatred the Christians
bare against the Jews, as appears in the story, as
it is set forth by Mr. Prynne, in his second part of
'' A Short Demurrer to the Jews," &c. p. 82. where
quoting Claus. 7. E. 1. n. 7. De fine recipiendo a
Judöeis, brings in the King writing to his Judges
in Latin, in these words : *' Rex dilectis et fidelibus
suis Stephano de Pentecester, Waltero de Helyn,
et Th. de Cobham, Justiciariis ad placita trans-
gressionis monetae audienda, salutem. Quia omnes
Jiidsei nuper rectati, et per certam suspicionem
indictati de retonsura monetae nostree, et inde con-
victi cum ultimo supplicio puniuntur ; et quidam
eorum eadem occasione, omnia bona et catalla sua

MANASSEH BEX ISRAEL. 67

satisfecerunt, et in prisona nostra liberabantur, in
cadem ad voluntatem nostram detinendi» Et cum
accepimus, quod plures Christiani ob odium Jadee-
orum, propter discrepantiam fidei Christianse et
ritus Judseorüm, et diversa gratia minus per ipsos
Judaeos Christianis hactenus illata, postquam
Judseos nondum rectatos et indictatos de trans-
gressione monetae, per leves et voluntarias accusa-
tiones accusare, et indictare de die in diem nituntur
et proponunt, imponendas eis ad terrorem ipsorum,
quod de ejusmodi trangressione culpabiles existunt
super ipsos Judseos faciendse, et sie per minas
hujusmodi accusationis, ipsos Judseos metu incu-
tiant, et pecuniam extorqueant ab eisdem : ita
quod ipsi Judsei super hoc ad legem suam saepe
ponuntuf in vitse suse periculum manifestum. Vo-
lumus quod omnes Judsei qui ante primum diem
Maii proximi prseterit indictati, vel per certam
suspicionem rectati non fuerunt de transgressione
monetae predictse, et qui facere voluerint finem
juxta discretionem vestram, ad opus nostrum
facere pro sie, quod non occasiorentur, etc. hujus-
modi trangressionibus factis ante primum diem
Maii propter novas accusationes Christianorum
post eundem diem inde factas non molestentur, sed
pacem inde habeant in futurum. Proviso, quod
Judsei indictati, vel per certam suspicionem, rec-
tati de hujusmodi transgressione ante prsedictum

F 2

68 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

diem Mail, judicium subeant coram vobis, juxta
formam prius inde ordinatam et provisam. Et
ideo vobis mandamus, quod fines hujusmodi capi-
atis, et praemissa fieri et observari faciatis in forma
praedicta." Teste Rege apud Cantuar, 8 die Mail,

The Seventh Section.

And now, by this time, I presume (most noble Sir),
I may have given abundant satisfaction (so far as
the nature of an epistle v^ill permit,) to all your
objections, without giving just ground of offence
or scandal to any. And, forasmuch as you are
further desirous to know somewhat concerning the
state of this my expedition and negociation at
present, I shall now only say, and that briefly,
that the communication and correspondence I have
held, for some years since, with some eminent
persons of England was the first original of my
undertaking this design. For 1 always found by
them, a great probability of obtaining what I now
request ; whilst they affirmed, that at this time the
minds of men stood very well affected towards us,
and that our entrance into this island would be
very acceptable and well-pleasing unto them.
And, from this beginning, sprang up in me a
semblable affection, and desire of obtaining this

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 69

purpose : for, for seven years on this behalf, I have
endeavoured and solicited, by letters and other
means, without any interval. For I conceived
that our universal dispersion was a necessary cir-
cumstance to be fulfilled, before all that shall be
accomplished, which the Lord hath promised to
the people of the Jews, concerning their restoration,
and their returning again into their own land ;
according to those words, Dan. xii. 7. '* When he
shall have accomplished to scatter the power of
the holy people, all these things shall be finished."
As also that this our scattering by little and little,
should be amongst all people, '' from the one end
of the earth even unto the other," as it is written
Deut. xxviii. 64. I conceived that, by ''the end of
the earth," might be understood this island. And
I knew not, but that the Lord, who often works by
natural means, might have designed and made
choice of me, for the bringing about this work^
With these proposals, therefore, I applied myself,
in all zealous affection, to the English nation, con-
gratulating their glorious liberty, which at this day
they enjoy, together with their prosperous peace.
And I addressed my book, named ''The Hope of
Israel," to the First Parliament, and the Council
of State ; and withal declared my intentions. In
order to which, they sent me a very favourable
passport. Afterwards, 1 directed myself to the

70 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

Second, and they also sent me another. But at
that juncture of time, my coming was not pre-
sently performed, for that my kindred and friends,
considering the chequered and interwoven vicissi-
tudes and turns of things here below, embracing
me, with pressing importunity earnestly requested
me not to part from them ; and would not give
over, till their love constrained me to promise that
I would yet a while stay with them. But, not-
withstanding all this, I could not be at quiet in
my mind (I know not, but that it might be through
some particular Divine Providence), till I had
a-new made my humble addresses to his Highness,
the Lord Protector, whom God preserve. And
finding that my coming over would not be alto-
gether unwelcome to him, with those great hopes
which I conceived, I joyfully took my leave of my
house, my friends, my kindred, all my advantages
there, and the country wherein I have lived all my
lifetime, under the benign protection and favour of
the Lords, the States General, and magistrates of
Amsterdam : In fine, I say, I parted with them all,
and took my voyage for England ; where, after my
arrival, being very courteously received, and treated
with much respect, I presented to his most Serene
Highness a petition, and some desires, which for
the most part were written to me by my brethren
the Jews, from several parts of Europe, as your

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 71

worship may better understand by former relations.
Whereupon it pleased his Highness to convene an
assembly at Whitehall, of divines, lawyers, and
merchants, of different persuasions and opinions ;
whereby men's judgments and sentences were
different ; insomuch, that as yet we have had no
final determination from his most Serene Highness.
Wherefore, those few Jews that were here, despair-
ing of our expected success, departed hence. And
others who desired to come hither, have quitted
their hopes, and betaken themselves, some to Italy,
some to Geneva, where that Commonwealth hath
at this time most freely granted them many and
great privileges.

Now, O most High God, to thee I make my
prayer; even to thee, the God of our fathers.
Thou, who hast been pleased to style thyself,
*' The Keeper of Israel ;" Thou who hast graciously
promised, by thy holy prophet Jeremiahj chap. 31.
** That thou wilt not cast off all the seed of Israel,
for all the evil that they have done." Thou, who
by so many stupendous miracles didst bring thy
people out of Egypt, the land of bondage, and
didst lead them into the Holy Land : graciously
cause thy holy influence to descend down into the
mind of the prince (who, for no private interest or
respect at all, but only out of commiseration to our

72 MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

affliction, hath inclined himself to protect and
shelter us ; for which extraordinary humanity,
neither I myself, nor my nation, can ever expect
to be able to render him answerable and sufficient
thanks,) and also into the minds of his most illustri-
ous and prudent council, that they may determine
that which, according to thine infinite wisdom, may
be best and most expedient for us. Formen, O
Lord, see that which is present ; but thou, in thy
Omniscience, seest that which is afar off.

And to the highly honoured nation of England
I make my most humble request, that they would
read over my arguments impartially, without pre-
judice and devoid of all passion, effectually re-
commending me to their grace and favour, and
earnestly beseeching God that he would be pleased
to hasten the time promised by Zephaniah, wherein
we shall all serve him with one consent, after the
same manner, and shall be all of the same judg-
ment; that as his name is one, so his fear may be
also one ; and that we may all see the goodness of
the Lord (blessed for ever!), and the consolations of
Zion. Amen, and Amen.

Froiii my Study in London,
April iOth (in the year from the Creation,) 5416,
(and in the year, according to the vulgar account,) 1636.

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 73

As to give satisfaction to your worship, being
desirous to know what books have been written
and printed by me, or else are almost ready for
the press ; may you please to take the names of
them in this catalogue.*

* See Appendix.

6i

PREFACE TO THE GERMAN
TRANSLATION

OF

VINDICIiE JUDiEORUM:"

BY

MOSES MENDELSSOHN,

MENDELSSOHN'S PREFACE TO
'^VINDICIiE JUDiEORUM."

Thank kind providence, that I live to see yet, in
my old days, the happy period, M^hen the Rights
of Man are beginning to be taken to heart, in their
true extent.! When, hitherto religious toleration
and mutual forbearance amongst mankind have
been in question, it was the weaker and oppressed
party which sought relief under the protection of
reason and humanity. The dominant party either
had no sense of those qualities, or, from experience,
alas ! but too common, presumed that with an
equal share of power and opportunity, the other
would not act a whit better, and thereon founded
a suspicion that it was only intended to wrest the
haft out of its hand, in order to direct the point of
the weapon at itself. They seemed not to con-
sider, that such suspicions could not but perpetuate
animosity and discord amongst men ; that the
spirit of conciliation, as well as of charity, require
the first step to be made by the stronger. It is
he, who must wave his superiority, and make

78 Mendelssohn's preface

the offer, if the weaker is at all to gain, and return
confidence. If it be the design of Providence,
that brethren shall love one another, it is evidently
the duty of the stronger to make the first proposal,
open his arms, and, like Augustus, cry out, ''Let
us be friends." However, all that has been
hitherto written and argued about toleration, con-
cerned only the three religious parties favoured in
the German empire, and, at most, some of their
collateral branches. Of Pagans, Jews, Mahome-
tans, and Theists, either no notice at all was taken,
or, at most, for the sake of rendering the argument
in favour of universal toleration the more disput-
able. '' According to your principles," said the
opponents, *' we should not only have to entertain
and tolerate Jews and Theists, but to let them
participate in all the rights and offices of citizens,
into the bargain V^ And, really, it was a woeful
sight, how its advocates did wind and twist to keep
clear of that objection. For aught I know, the
editor of ' The Fragments' was the first German
writer who claimed toleration even for Theists^.
Both Lessing and Dohm, the former a philosophical
poet,* the latter a philosophical statesman,-)- con-
ceived the grand aim of providence, viz. the destin-

* Nathan der Weiset a dramatic poem, in five acts.
-I- On the Civil Improvement of the Jew^s. Die hürgeliche Ver-
hesseruncj der Juden.

TO MANASSEH BEN" ISRAEL. 79

ation of man, conjointly with the rights of man.
And, at the same time, an admirable monarch
not only followed the same principles, but also
formed a plan commensurate to his vast sphere of
action, the carrying into execution of which seems
to require more than human powers ; and he is
now setting to the work.

I am at too great a distance from the closets of
the great and whatever has any influence there,
to be able to take any part, or co-operate in that
great work. I live in a country, in which one of
the wisest sovereigns that ever ruled over men
made the arts and sciences flourish, and rational
liberty of thinking become so universal, that the
effects thereof extend to the humblest inhabitant
of his realm.^ Under his sceptre, I met with
opportunity and inducement to cultivate my mind,
meditate on my own destination, as well as on
that of my brethren, and inquire, as far as I
was able, into man, destiny, and providence. But
from the great, generally, and from any commerce
with them, I have always been far removed. I all
along lived retired, and felt neither inclined, nor
called upon, to intermeddle with the affairs of the
active world; and, from the beginning, my society
has been confined to a small circle of friends, who
pursued the same road with me. At that obscure
distance, I still stand, awaiting with dutiful pa-

80 Mendelssohn's preface

ti^nce, what it may please an all- wise and all-kind
Providence, to let result from this.

In the meanwhile, I take pleasure in speculating,
with Mr< Dohm, not only on the reasons, which a
philanthropist may have to favor the political and
civil admission of my brethren, but also on the
multifarious difficulties with which it is attended,
and, perhaps, will be, partly, thrown in the way of
it, by the nation itself whom it is to improve ; and
in comparing them to the benefits which may
accrue to the state which should succeed, first, in
converting those native aliens into citizens, and, in
rendering serviceable a number of heads and hands
born to serve it. As a philosophical statesman,
methinks Mr. Dohm has nearly exhausted the
subject, and left but scanty gleanings for others.
It is not a vindication of Judaism, or of the Jews
either, that he wants to write. He merely con-
ducts the cause of mankind, and defends their
rights. And fortunate will it be for us, if that
cause become at once ours ; if there be no such
thing as urging the rights of mankind, without at
once claiming ours.'* The philosopher of the
eighteenth century takes no notice of difference of
dogmas and opinions, he beholds in man man
only. Let us compare to this, what a Rabbi of
the seventeenth century, who is conducting the
cause of his nation before the British senate.

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 81

advances in their vindication, and by what argu-
ments he seeks to prevail on it to receive his
brethren in England. It is know^n, that in the
reign of Edward I, the Jews were driven out of
England, and not until under Cromwell, did they
obtain leave to return thither. It was Rabbi Ma-
nasseh who effected this.^ He was a man of
great rabbinical learning, also well versed in other
sciences, and withal inspired with ardent zeal for
the welfare of his brethren. He obtained at Am-
sterdam, where he resided as Chachani, or chief
Rabbi, of the Spanish and Portuguese congregation,
the necessary passports; and, accompanied by some
friends, repaired to London, to support the cause
of his people with the Lord Protector (by whom
he had been long held in esteem), and before
the Parliament. The difficulties he met with,
were, however, greater than he had anticipated ;
and he composed this tract at a time when he
almost despaired of prospering in his undertaking.
Nevertheless he succeeded at last ; and the Jews
were re-admitted, on what may be called bearable
terms. About the same time, a certain Edward
Nicholas published *'' Apologia per los Judaeos,"
and Toland too is known to have taken up the
pen in their defence. At the present juncture,
when so much is said and written both for and

82 Mendelssohn's preface

against the Jews, the Rabbi's tract appears to me
well worth translating.

It is curious to observe how prejudice assumes
the forms of all ages, on purpose to oppress us, and
put obstacles in the way of our civil admission.
In former superstitious days, it was wantonly de-
filing sacred things : stabbing crucifixes and setting
them bleeding ; secretly circumcising Christian
babes, and then feasting our eyes with mangling
them ; using Christian blood at our Passover ;
poisoning wells, &c. &c. ; unbelief, stubbornness,
witchcraft, and all manner of diabolical doings,
which were imputed to us, and for which we were
despoiled of our property, driven into exile,
stretched on the rack, and even put to death.
Now, times are altered ; those calumnies have no
longer the desired effect. Now, it is even super-
stition and ineptitude; want of moral feelings,
taste, and good manners ; unfitness for the arts,
sciences, and useful trades, and particularly for
the military and civil services ; an unconquerable
proneness to cheating, usury, and all nefarious
practices, which have come in the place of those
grosser vituperations, for the sake of excluding us
from the mass of efficient citizens, and casting us
out of the maternal bosom of the state. Formerly,
all imaginable pains were taken with us, and

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 83

several establishments provided for the purpose of
making of us — useful citizens ? O, no 3 — Chris-
tians ! And our being so very obstinate and stiff-
necked, as not to let ourselves be converted, was
held a sufficient reason to pronounce us a useless
burden on society, and to invent, of such reprobate
monsters, every possible horror and infamy, v^^hich
might subject us to the contempt and abhorrence
of the rest of mankind. ^ Now, the zeal for con-
verting has abated, and we are utterly neglected.
We are still kept far removed from arts, sciences,
useful trades, and the professions of mankind ;
every avenue to improvement is still blocked up
to us, and the want of refinement made a pretence
for our oppression. They tie our hands, and
scold us for not making use of them.

Of those inhuman accusations of the Jews,
which bear the characteristics of the times and
the cloistral cells in which they were hatched,
Mr. Dohm, with great tact, scarce takes a cursory
notice. With the class of readers for whom Mr.
Dohm takes up his pen, those monstrous charges
cannot find belief, and much less require serious
refutation. He, therefore, strictly confines himself
to the rebutting of such as are more in keeping
with these, our highly civilised and cultivated
times ; and to the encountering of philosophical
prejudices with philosophical soundness. Yet,

G 2

84 Mendelssohn's preface

neither the intelligence, nor the spirit of enquiry
of our a^e, have trodden down all the tracks of
barbarism., in history. Many a legend of those
times stood its ground, because no one took it
into his head to doubt it. Some are backed by
such weighty authorities, that every one has not
the face to declare them downright figments and
slander ; others still live in their effects, notwith-
standing they themselves have been discredited
long ago. But calumny, in general, is of that en-
venomed nature, that it will leave behind an im-
pression on men's minds, though its falsity be ever
so palpable, and admitted on every hand. In
many a good city of Germany, even now, none of
the circumcised, though he have paid excise on
his body [SeibjoU] at the gate, is suffered to go
about in broad-day without a soldier by his side,
for fear he should decoy a Christian child, or
poison a well. At night, though ever so strictly
guarded, he is not trusted at all within its walls,
on account of his known commerce with evil
spirits. Who does not recollect having read in the
history of Brandenburg, that the elector Joachim
the second was poisoned by Lippold the Jew, his
physician in ordinary ? This has been so often
told and retold by annalists, that the most intelli-
gent man could not but take its authenticity for
granted, and set it down as an historical fact. That

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 85

the legend has, for all that, been traced to the true
source, is owing to the inquiring genius of Dr.
Mochsens, the present physician in ordinary.*
It appears that the story is so far true, that the
elector Joachim the second did die, and that at the
time, there was a Jew called Lippold. As for the
remainder, Lippold was not a physician, and the
elector was everything but poisoned, as Dr.
Mochsens substantiates by proofs impossible to
suspect. Lippold was the elector's valet, and mas-
ter of the Mint, two court-offices, which seldom
gain a Jew many friends. According to the unani-
mous declaration of contemporary records and origi-
nal minutes, the elector died of an open ulcer on one
of his legs, the discharge of which had been stopped
by his having caught a cold. The valet and master
of the Mint was accused of fraud in his accounts, and
arrested. But when the investigators found him
innocent of the charge, and his liberation could no
longer be deferred, they had recourse to accusa-
tions of quite a different nature. Some burgher-
militia-men pretended to have heard Lippold's wife,
when quarrelling with her husband, cry out to him,
in a passion : ** If the elector did but know what
a wicked knave thou art, and what villanies thou
art capable of achieving, by means of that magic

* Geschichte der Wissenschaften in der Marie Brandenburg f p.
513, et seq.

86 Mendelssohn's preface

book of thine, thou wouldst have been a cold
corpse long ago :" and so Lippold was delivered
over to the criminal judge. What Dr. Mochsens
observes, on this occasion, in excuse of the sove-
reigns of those times, is very just. '^In those
days," says he, ''princes were satisfied with having
fully done their duty, when they left the indict-
ments and examinations to counsellors versed in
the law ; and these, on their part, believed they
acted conformably to the laws, when they fulfilled
them to the letter." In this manner, barbarous
laws certainly are more pernicious than no laws
at all. According to the criminal Corpus Juris of
the emperor Charles V. §. 44, Lippold was de-
livered over to the public executioner, to be ques-
tioned by him on the rack ; and that functionary
acquitted himself so well in his task, that the
culprit acknowledged every thing they wanted
to get out of him ; namely, that he had managed
by magic to win the elector's favour, and finally
poisoned him. This confession, it is true, he, a
long while refused to repeat publicly ; but the
executioner contrived to make him do even that.
In consequence of which, '* he was torn with red-
hot pincers, in ten different parts of the town;
then broken on the wheel, by a blow on each leg
and arm. His body was quartered, and his
entrails burnt, along with the magic book, on a

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 87

stage built for that purpose in the new market at Ber-
lin, "t^ A more than ordinary great mouse,* which
came running forth from underneath the stage,
and which no one could take for anything else
but the demon of sorcery, delivered the spectators
from all remaining doubt that the delinquent had
been condignly dealt with. Lippold's supposed
crime, Dr. Mochsens further tells us, had a great
influence on the Jewish community at large in
the marquisate of Brandenburg. They were in-
dicted, tried, and found guilty. *'They were
obliged to sell their possessions, pay to the court,
inventorizing and examining dues, as also the
withdrawing tax,^ and forthwith to leave the coun-
try.^' And thus the story, that the Jews had been
driven out of the land for having poisoned the
elector Joachim the second, has passed from one
person to another, and maintained itself even in
our enlightened times.

Nor does that enlightenment extend so far yet
as to render those grosser charges quite inno-
cuous. It is not long since the Jewish commu-
nity at Posen were accused of having murdered
a Christian child for the celebration of Passover.
Two pious Rabbins, as the leading men amongst
the congregation, were thrown into a dungeon,

* Mr. Mochsens quotes the author, who preserved that im-»
portaut circumstance for posterity.

88 Mendelssohn's preface

and questioned on the rack, as is the custom
in that country. I shall spare the humane feel-
ings of my readers, the details of these tortures:
they were the most horrible that barbarity ever
indulged itself in. Yet the sufferers were firm
enough not to let them wring a confession from
them, although they were tormented until they
expired under the hands of the fiends. Merciful
God ! these men were innocent of the murder of
the child, if really a murder had been commit-
ted, which remains yet very doubtful— as innocent
as I and my readers are. Still, that congregation
has to pay off the enormous sum they were ob-
liged to borrow, partly to defray law expences,
and partly to avert even more heavy calamities.
Only a few years ago, the same thing would have
been repeated in the vicinity of Warsaw, if the
wise king of Poland and some enlightened mag-
nates had not, fortunately, suspended the legal
proceedings, until the Jews succeeded in bringing
the calumny to light. I have had an opportunity
of conversing with many intelligent, and, in other
respects, not illiberal Christians, from Poland
and other Catholic countries, who could not en-
tirely divest themselves of those prejudices against
my brethren. They would always appeal to the
regular legal form, in which trials of that kind had
so often been conducted \ to the unexceptionable

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 89

character of the judges who managed them ; and
to the accused's own confession, which is said to
have agreed frequently too well with circum-
stances and with the depositions of witnesses, to
to have been a mere fiction suggested by the
torture of the rack. Candid minds, like these,
may, perhaps, be induced to entertain different
opinions by Rabbi Manasseh's arguments; and
still more by the awful expurgation-oath which he
takes in the name of the whole Jewish nation,
and which I am ready to repeat after him with a
clear conscience. For, that barbarous laws are of
the most terrible consequences the more legally
the proceedings are conducted, and the more rigidly
the judge pronounces after the letter, is an import-
ant truth which cannot be too often inculcated.
The only way of amending unwise laws, is by de-
viating from them ; as one would correct mistakes
in calculation by other wilful mistakes. Both
Galas and Waser were, perhaps, condemned by un-
exceptionable judges, and in a very legal form too. 9
But all our arguments and oaths are vain, when
our opponent is determined not to hear — when by-
ends resist conviction — or when his mind is so
biassed by prejudice that he refuses to pay the
requisite attention to your reasoning. You may
cut through all the roots of an antiquated prejudice,
and yet not entirely deprive it of nutriment, it

90 Mendelssohn's preface

will, at all events, suck it out of the air. Did not
a reviewer of Mr. Dohm's work, in the Gcittingen
Advertiser, bring charges against us, right or
wrong, charges which one would not expect to
hear from an author of our age, at least of one living
at that true seat of the Muses ? He is not ashamed
even of reproaching us, the present living Is-
raelites, and laying to our charge the wicked-
ness of which our forefathers were guilty in the
Desert; without considering that, notwithstand-
ing those remarkable vices, legislating God, or,
to speak more fashionably, legislating Moses, still
found a possibility of transforming that rude horde
into a regular and flourishing nation — a nation
which can produce sublime laws, an excellent
polity, wise regents, valorous captains, upright
judges, and happy citizens ; without looking at
himself, and considering what sort of civilization
that of his own forefathers in the northern forests
and swamps might be, at the corresponding
period of time, from whom, nevertheless, reviewers
in the Göttingen Advertiser have sprung now-a-
days. In a word. Reason and Humanity raise their
voices in vain ; for hoary Prejudice has completely
lost its hearing.

But while reasonable arguments are unanimous
in adjudging to the Jews also, a participation in
the rights of man, it is not thereby understood

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 91

that even in their present debased condition, they
may not be useful to the state, or that their increase
might possibly become injurious to it. On this,
too, Rabbi Manasseh's reasoning in this tract, well
deserves attention, since in his days, he could seek
for none but a very qualified admission of his
brethren in England. Holland alone affords an
example which may remove all doubts on that
head. There, the increase of the Jews has never
yet been complained of; although the means of
getting a living are almost as scantily doled out to
them, and their privileges almost as stunted as in
many a province of Germany. '^ Ay," it is said,
*' but Holland is a commercial country; and there-
fore cannot have too many trading inhabitants.*'
Agreed. But I should like to know, whether it
was commerce which drew people thither ; or
whether commerce was not rather drawn there by
the people ? How is it, that so many a city in
Brabant and the Netherlands, with equal or per-
haps superior commercial accommodations, comes
«o much behind the city of Amsterdam ? What
makes peopleso crowd together on a barren soil,
in marshes not intended by Nature to be inhabited;
and by industry and art metamorphose lone fens
into a garden of God, and invent resources for a
comfortable existence which excite our admi-
ration? What else but liberty, mild government.

92 Mendelssohn's preface

equitable laws, and the hospitable manner in
which men of all complexions, garbs, opinions,
manners, customs and creeds, are admitted, pro-
tected, and quietly allowed to follow their busi-
ness ? Nothing else but these advantages have
produced, in Holland, the almost superabundant
blessings and exuberance of prosperity, for which
that country is so much envied. ^^

Generally speaking, ** Men superfluous to the
state, men, of whom a country can make no use at
all," seem to me terms which no statesman should
make use of. Men are all more or less useful : they
may be employed in this or that way ; and more
or less promote the happiness of their fellow-
creatures and their own. But no country can,
without serious injury to itself, dispense with the
humblest, the seemingly most useless of its inhabit-
ants, and to a wise government, not even a pauper
is one too many — not even a cripple altogether
useless. Mr. Dohm, in the introduction to his
work, has, indeed, tried to determine the quantity
which population may not exceed, without overfill-
ing the country and becoming injurious to it. But
I think that, with any proviso whatever, no legislator
should give this the least consideration ; there is
no arrangement to oppose the accumulation of
souls, no measure to put a stop to increase, that
does not tend far more to injure the improvement

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 93

of the inhabitants, the destination of man and his
happiness, than is done by the apprehended over-
filling. In this, let them depend upon the wise
ordering of Nature. Let it quietly take its course,
and on no account place impediments in its
way, by unseasonable officiousness. Men will
flock to places where they can get a living ; they
multiply and crowd together where their activity
has free play. Population increases as long as
genius can discover new means of earning. When
the sources become exhausted, it instantly stops, of
course ; and if you make a vessel too full on one
side, it will, of itself, discharge the superfluity on
the other. Nay, I venture to assert, that such an
instance never occurs ; and that there never has
been a thinning or emigration of the people, which
was not the fault of the laws or the management of
them. As often as, under any government what-
soever, men become a nuisance to men, it is owing
to nothing but the laws or their administrators.

In some modern publications, there is an echo of
the objection,—'* The Jews are an unproductive
people ; they neither till the ground, cultivate the
arts, nor exercise mechanical trades ; and, there-
fore, do not assist Nature in bringing forth, nor
give her produce another form, but only carry
and transport the raw or wrought commodities
of various countries from one to another. They

94 Mendelssohn's preface

are, therefore, mere consumers, who cannot but
be a tax upon the producer." Nay, an eminent,
and, in other respects, a very acute author, the
other day, loudly complained* about the hardship,
of the producer having to maintain so many con-
sumers, to fill so many useless stomachs. Mere
common sense, thinks he, shews that the price of
the products of nature, and of the arts, must be
run up the greater the number of intermediate
buyers and sellers, who themselves add nothing to
the stock, yet will have them. Accordingly he
gives the State this advice and friendly admonition,
either not to tolerate Jews at all, or to allow them
to exercise agriculture and mechanical trades.

The conclusion may be heartily well meant, but
so much weaker are the premises, which appear so
plain and irrefutable to the author. According
to his ideas, who are precisely cdlled producers and
consumers ? If he alone produce who co-operates
in the composing of some tangible thing, or im-
proves it by the labour of his hands, the largest
and most valuable portion of the state consists
of mere consumers. According to those principles,
both the learned and military professions produce
nothing, unless the books written by the former
may be said to form an exception. From the
trading and working classes, there are first to be

* In the Ephemeriden der Memcheit.

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. ^

deducted, merchants, porters, carriers by land and
by water, &c. and at the upshot, the class of pro-
ducers, as they are called, will consist chiefly .of
ploughboys and j ourneymen mechanics. For land-
holders and master- manufacturers, now a-days,
rarely put their hands to the work themselves.
Thus, with the exception of that certainly useful,
but considerably minor portion of the population,
the state would be composed of individuals who
neither cultivate the productions of nature, nor
improve them by the labour of their hands — that is,
of mere consumers; and will it be therefore
said also, of useless stomachs which are a burden
to the producer ?

Here the absurdity is palpable : and as the con-
clusion is just, the error must lodge somewhere in
the antecedents. And so it does. Not only
making something but doing something also, is called
producing. Not he alone who labours with his
hands, but, generally, whoever does, promotes,
occasions, or facilitates anything that may tend
to the benefit or comfort of his fellow-creatures,
deserves to be called a producer ; and, at times,
he deserves it the more, the less you see him move
his hands or feet. Many a merchant, while quietly
engaged at his desk in forming commercial specu-
lations, or pondering, while lolling on his sofa, on
distant adventures, produces, in the main, more

96 Mendelssohn's preface

than the most active and noisy mechanic or trades-
man. The soldier too produces; for it is he
who procures the country peace and security.
So does the scholar produce, it is true, rarely
anything palpable to the senses, yet matters, at
least, equally valuable, such as wholesome advice,
information, pastime and pleasure. The expres-
sion, ''that there is more produced by any Paris
pastrycook, than by the whole Academy of
Science," could have escaped a man like Rousseau,
only in a fit of spleen. The well-being of a coun-
try at large, as well as of every individual in it,
requires many things both sensual and intellectual,
many goods both material and spiritual ; and he
who, more or less directly or indirectly, contributes
towards them, cannot be called a mere consumer ;
he does not eat his bread for nothing ; he produces
something in return.

This, I should think, places the matter in a far
clearer light to common sense. And as to inter-
mediate buyers or sellers, in particular, I will
undertake to maintain, that they are not only far
from prejudicial, either to the producer or con-
sumer, provided abuses be prevented, but very be-
neficial and almost indispensable to both ; nay, that,
through their agency, commodities become more
useful, more in demand, and also cheaper ; while
the producer gains more, and is thereby enabled

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 97

to live better and happier, without any extraordi-
nary exertion of his strength.

Imagine a workman who is obliged to go him-
self to the agriculturist for the raw material, and
also to take it himself to the warehouse-man in a
manufactured state ; who has to mind that he lays
in, at a certain season of the year, an adequate
stock of the former, and take the latter, as often as
he has occasion, to one who may just have a de-
mand for it, and wnll become a purchaser. Com-
pare to him, the workman to whom the intermediate
dealer brings the raw material into his house, sells
it to him for ready money or on credit, according
to his present exigency and circumstances. At
times he also takes the wrought articles off his
hands, and disposes of them to the shopkeeper, at
convenient opportunities. What a deal of time
and trouble must not the former save, which he
may devote to his in-door business, and which the
latter is obliged to waste in chance travelling and
tarrying about the country, in ever so many avo-
cations, or convivialities, which either he dare not
or cannot prevail upon himself to decline. How
much more, then, will the former, with the same
degree of exertion, work and produce ; and thus be
able to afford higher prices, and live comfortably
nothwithstanding? Will not, real industry be pro-
moted thereby, and does the intermediate dealer

H

98 Mendelssohn's preface

still deserve to be called a useless consumer?
This argument in favour of the petty buyer and
seller becomes still more forcible, when applied to
the wholesale dealer, to the merchant proper, who
removes and transports the productions of nature
and the arts from one country to another, from one
hemisphere to another. He is a real benefactor to
the state, to the human race at large, and there-
fore, every thing but a useless stomach living at
the producer's charge.

I said, *' provided abuses be prevented." These
principally consist in the manoeuvres and tricks
resorted to by the intermediate dealers in raw
materials, to get the grower's fate into their power,
and become the rulers of the prices of things, by
depressing them in the hands of the first holder,
and driving them up in their own. These are
great evils, which crush the producer's industry
and the consumer's enterprize, and which should
be counteracted by laws and by the police regu-
lations. Not indeed summarily, by prohibiting, ex-
cluding, or stopping ; and least of all, by granted
or winked-at monopoly or forestalling. Such
measures either aggravate the evils which it is
intended to avert by them, or bring on others still
more ruinous. Rather let them seek to abate, as
much as practicable, all restrictions, abolish all
chartered companies, abrogate all preferring and

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 99

excluding exceptions, grant the humblest dealer
and jobber in raw materials, equal rights and pri-
vileges, with the first house of commerce ; in one
word, let them every way promote competition, and
excite rivalry, and, amongst the intermediate deal-
ers, whereby the prices of commodities will be
kept in equilibrium, arts and manufactures en-
couraged on the one hand, and, on the other,
every one enabled to enjoy the industry of his
fellow-creatures without excessive exertion. The
consumer may live comfortably without luxury, and
the artist yet maintain himself respectably. It is by
competition only, by unlimited liberty, and equality
of the laws of buying and selling, that those ends
can be obtained ; and, therefore, the commonest
salesman or buyer-up, who takes the raw material
from the grower to the workman, or the wrought
from him to the grower, is of very considerable
utility to the prosperity of the arts, manufactures,
and commerce in general. He causes the raw
material to maintain its price to the advantage of
the grower, while, for the benefit of the workman,
and the prosperity of trades, he seeks to spread
the products of industry about in all directions,
and to render the comforts of life more known, and
more generally serviceable. On this consideration,
the pettiest trafiicking Jew is not a mere consumer,

H 2

100 Mendelssohn's preface

but a useful inhabitant (citizen, I must not say),
of the state — a real producer.

Let it not be said, that I am a partial advocate
of my brethren ; that I am magnifying everything
which may go in their favour, or tend to their re-
commendation. Once more I quote Holland. And
when the subjects treated of are industry and com-
merce, what country in the world caü be more
aptly quoted 1 It is merely through competition
and rivalry, through unlimited liberty and equality
of the privileges of buyers and sellers, of whatso-
ever station, quality, or religious persuasion they
be, that all commodities have their price there,
with but a moderate difference as to buying and
selling; while rivals and competitors bring both the
parties to a mean, which tends to their mutual
advantage. Hence, with a small sacrifice, you
can buy or sell any article whatsoever, at all
seasons of the year, and at all times of the day,
nowhere better, and with greater ease, than at
Amsterdam.

I have yet some remarks to make on the grant-
ing of Autonomy ^"^ and the administrating of it,
of which Mr. Dohm speaks, which I beg leave to
insert here. Autonomy, granted to a colony,
either extends to civil matters, or relates to re-

* Autonom]). Governing themselves by their own laws.

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 101

ligion, and ecclesiastical affairs. The former
concerns merely the Meum and Tuum amongst
the members of the colony. There every thing
depends on agreements. The rights to property,
and whatsoever is connected therewith, are alien-
able rights, which may be yielded and assigned to
others by voluntary determination and agreement ;
and when this is done on the required conditions,
they instantly become the property of him to whom
they have been yielded ; and he cannot be dispos-
sessed of them without injustice. There, every
thing may be left to the agreements and covenants
of the colony amongst themselves. If they think
it preferable to have the litigations of their mem-
bers amongst themselves decided by their own
laws, according to their own forms, the State evi-
dently may indulge them in it, without any pre-
judice to itself. Now, as Mr. Dohm very justly
observes — '' Since the Jews consider as divine com-
mandments also those written laws of Moses
which bear no reference to Judea, or to the ancient
juridical and ritual system, as well as the deduc-
tions from, and elucidations and interpretations of,
the same, either received by oral tradition, or got at
by methodical ratiocination, they maybe allowed
to bind their members amongst themselves by a
voluntary covenant, to have their disputes judged
and decided by their own laws.

102 MENDELSSOHN S PREFACE

" Are those decisions to be given by Jewish or
by Christian judges?" My reply is: '* By the
judges in ordinary ; no matter whether they
follow the Jewish or any other religion." When
the members of the State, whatever their opinions
may be on theological questions, equally enjoy
the rights of man, that difference cannot form the
least consideration. The judge is to be a consci-
entious man, and to perfectly understand the laws
after which he administers justice to his fellow-
men, let him think of theological subjects accord-
ing to what doctrine he pleases. If the govern-
ment deem him fit for the judicial office, and
appoint him to it, his legal decisions must stand
good. Do we not place our health, our life, in the
hands of a physician, without any regard to differ-
ence of religion ; why then not equally our pro-
perty in those of a judge ? A conscientious phy-
sician who values his art will treat to-day, after
all its rules, the very malefactor who is to be
executed to-morrow, and seek to cure him of his
complaint. So will a judge, if he have the feelings
of a man, bestow justice on all parties in respect
to the interests of this life, whether, according to
his own principles, they will be saved or damned
in the next. The above-quoted Göttingen re-
viewer, indeed, thinks that the Jews would have
no confidence in a Christian judge's knowledge of

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 103

their laws. Mr. Dohm, however, is borne out by,
and can produce the evidence of, learned Chris-
tians, who not only suppose the contrary, but de-
clare themselves to have frequently experienced it.
And if any distrust of that sort had really prevailed,
would it not have been natural ; as, hitherto, the
learned amongst the Christians so little concerned
themselves about our jurisprudence ?

But how is it to be in ecclesiastical matters, in
things which relate to the religion of the colony ?
How far is the jurisdiction of every colony in reli-
gious matters, and that of the Jewish in particular,
to extend over its members ? What authority may
it exert, what degree of force may it use, to compel
its members to analogy and purity of doctrine
and life ? How far may it stretch forth its eccle-
siastical arm, to correct or expel the refractory,
and put the stray and deviating again into the
right track ?

Ecclesiastical jurisdiction, ecclesiastical authority
and power ! I must confess, these are phrases which
convey to me no intelligible idea, nor does my
Adelung^ afford me any information there. I know
of no rights over either persons or things, which can
possibly have any connexion with, or dependance

* Adelung J once a celebrated lexicographer, and the Johnson
of Germany ; but long since thrown in the back-ground by Campe
and others.

104 Mendelssohn's preface

on doctrines,— of no rights which men acquire when
they concur in certain propositions relative to
immutable truths, or forfeit, when they cannot or
will not concur in them ; and, still less do I know
of any right and power over opinions, that are sup-
posed to be conferred by religion, and to belong to
the church. True divine religion arrogates no
dominion over thought and opinion ; it neither gives
nor takes away any claim to earthly goods, any
right to fruits, domain, or property ; it knows of
no other force than that of winning by argument,
of convincing and rendering blessed by conviction.
True divine religion needs neither arms nor fingers
for its use ; it is all spirit and heart.

By Right is meant the quality of doing or for-
bearing— the moral faculty of acting: namely, a
voluntary act is just and moral, when it consists
with the rules of wisdom and goodness, and that
by which this consistency is acknowledged to ex-
ist, is called a right — any possible use of our facul-
ties, any possible enjoyment of things, any possible
evincement of our industry, not inconsistent with
the laws of wise goodness. Now let me turn this
idea whichever side I will, I cannot discover in it,
any reference to dogmas and opinions, in respect to
immutable truths. How can my assenting, or not
assenting to general propositions extend or restrict
that quality, give me, or deprive me of, a moral

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 105

dominion over persons and things, over their use
and fruits ? In w^hich way does a modus acquireyidi,
(another quality to appropriate to ourselves certain
things, as means of our happiness, and use them at
our w^ill and pleasure), arise out of an opinion, or
yet out of the system of all opinions together?
What common characteristic have those tv^o dis-
parities right and opinion, that they can ever come
together, and be brought in connexion, in any pro-
position ? But if the lav^s of nature and of reason
admit a right, founded on the receiving or rejecting
of an opinion, there indispensably must be a w^ay
of uniting those tv^^o ideas in a proposition; and
of clearly shev^ing, from the approbation which I
give or refuse to a doctrine, why this or that
evincement of my industry is or is not due to me ;
why, according to the immutable laws of wisdom
and goodness, a certain use and enjoyment of the
goods of this world are or are not granted me. I
must confess, I do not see the possibility of the
union.

But mankind may, perhaps, render such a union
possible by positive laws and by covenants, or
they may, by expressed or tacit agreement, mutu-
ally assume rights supposed to be founded on
doctrine and opinion. And although such a thing
be unknown in the state of nature, may not the
state of society, the social compact, introduce such

106 Mendelssohn's preface

a regulation, or actually, have introduced it? Have
not covenants wrought so many changes in human
nature, and in the system of its offices and rights ?
Why might they not also originate rights, which
were not to be found in the state of nature ?

By no means, I should think. As little as
cultivation is able to accomplish a fruit of which
nature has not furnished the germ ; as little as art,
by practice and perseverance, can bring forth a
spontaneous motion, where nature has not placed a
muscle ; just as little can all the covenants and
agreements of mankind create a right, of which
the foundation is not to be met with in the state of
nature. By covenants merely, imperfect rights
may be changed to perfect ; — indeterminate duties
to determinate ones. What I am bound to perform
to the human race at large may, by a covenant,
be limited to a certain person; and thereby, the
indeterminate internal duty to mankind be trans-
formed into a determinate external duty to that
person. This same person, who had before only
an imperfect right to expect of the human race, or
of nature generally, a certain contribution towards
his happiness, acquires by the covenant, a perfect
external right to demand that contribution of me,
or of my substance, and to enforce it. But as, in
a state of nature, all positive duties of man to each
other, all obligations to act or perform, are mere

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 107

imperfect duties and obligations, many of them
may, and must be determined, further limited, and
transformed into perfect ones, in a state of society.
But where, without a covenant, neither duties nor
rights can be imagined, all the covenants between
men, all their understandings, are empty sounds
and nothing else, words spent in the air without
force or consequence. I do not, therefore, see
how the quality of attaching prerogatives to opi-
nions, a quality utterly alien to Nature, can belong
to human society.

And, moreover, a jurisdiction over opinions, over
our fellow-men's views of immutable, and neces-
sary truths ! What man, what society of men
dare to arrogate it ? As those opinions do not
immediately depend on our will, the only right
that belongs to us ourselves, is the right of ex-
amining them, of putting them to the rigid test
of reason, and suspending our judgment until it
has decided, and so on.

But that right is inseparable from the person ;
and, from its nature, can as little be alienated,
parted with or made over to others, as the right of
appeasing our hunger, or the liberty of breathing.
Covenants about it are absurd, contrary to the
nature and essence of pactions, and therefore,
without any consequence or effect. We may bind
ourselves by covenants, not to let certain volun-

108 Mendelssohn's preface

tary acts depend upon our own judgment and de-
termination, but to submit them to another man's
opinion ; and, thereby renounce in our own judg-
ment, as far as it may pass into an act, and be
attended with consequences. But our judgment it-
self is an inseparable, immoveable, and accordingly,
an unalienable property. That distinction, how-
ever nice it may seem, is of the utmost importance
here, if we would not confound ideas, and involve
ourselves in absurd conclusions and discrepancies.
Foregoing one's opinion so as not to act thereon,
is one thing ; and giving up one's opinion itself,
another. Acting rests immediately with our will
and pleasure; opinion does not. Thus the mother-
nation itself is not qualified to attach the enjoy-
ment of any worldly good or privilege to a doc-
trine particularly pleasing to it, or to reward or
punish the adopting or rejecting thereof; and how
can it concede to the colony that which is not in
its own power ?

I can scarcely conceive how a writer of Mr.
Dohm's great judgment could say : '' As all other
religious societies have a right of expelling mem-
bers, either for a limited time or for ever; the
Jewish should have it too ; and, in case of resist-
ance of the Rabbi's sentence, be supported by the
civil authorities." All societies have a right of
expelling members ; religious ones only have not:

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 109

for it runs diametrically contrary to their principle
and object, which is joint edification, and partici-
pating in the outpouring of the heart, by which we
evince our thankfulness to God for the many boun-
ties he bestows on us, and our filial trust in his
sovereign goodness and mercy. Then, with what
conscience can we deny entrance to dissenters,
separatists, misbelievers, or sectarians, and deprive
them of the benefit of that edification ? For
rioters and disturbers there is the law and the
police; disorders of that kind may, nay must, be
restrained by the secular arm. But a quiet and
inoffensive attendance at the meeting may not be
forbidden even to an offender, unless we purposely
want to bar to him every road to reformation. The
doors of the house of rational devotion require
neither bars nor bolts. There is nothing locked
up within, and, therefore, no occasion to be par-
ticular in admitting from without. Whoever
chooses to be a tranquil spectator, or even to join
in the worship, is right welcome to every pious
man, at the hour of his own devotions.

Mr. Dohm, on this occasion, has perhaps taken
things as they. are, and not as they should be.
Mankind seem to have agreed together to regard
the external form of divine worship, that is the
church, as a moral being, who has her own rights
and claims on duties ; and to grant to her more or

110 " Mendelssohn's preface

less authority to assert those rights, and enforce
them by external power. It is not thought con-
trary to common sense, to style, in every country,
one of those beings, The Dominant, who treats her
sisters just as the whim takes her; at times using,
to oppress them, the power delegated to herself,
and, at others, generous enough to tolerate them,
and concede to them as much of her own preroga-
tive, of her own pretensions and consequence, as
she thinks proper. Now as anathematizing and
excommunicating is always the first right with
which a dominant church enfeoffs tolerated ones,
Mr. Dohm claims, for the Jewish religion, the same
privileges which are granted to all other religious
societies. As long as these still possess the right
of expelling, he deems it an inconsistency, to put
the Jewish under greater restrictions in that re-
spect. But if, as it does evidently appear to me,
religious claims to worldly things, religious power,
and religious compulsory law, are words without
a meaning, — and if generally expelling must be
called irreligious, — then let us still be inconsistent,
rather than heap abuses.

I do not find that the wisest of our forefathers
ever did pretend to any such right as excluding
individuals from religious exercises.

When King Solomon had finished the building of
the temple, he included in his sublime dedication-

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. Ill

prayer, even strangers, a denomination in his days,
of course, synonymous with idolators. He spread
forth his hands towards heaven, saying : *' More-
over concerning a stranger that is not of thy
people Israel, but cometh out of a far country for
thy name's sake (for they shall hear of thy great
name, and of thy strong hand, and of thy stretched-
out arm) ; when he shall come and pray toward
this house; hear thou in heaven thy dwelling-
place, and do according to all that the stranger
calleth to thee for : that all people of the earth
may know thy name, as do thy people Israel ;
and that they may know that this house which I
have builded, is called by thy name."* In the same
manner our Rabbins directed the voluntary gifts,
and votive offerings of idolators to be accepted in
the temple, and not to turn away the sacrifice of
even an offender belonging to the nation itself,
as long as he had not positively abjured his reli-
gion ; in order, said they, that he may have an
opportunity and inducement to amend. f So they
thought at a period, when they had a little more
power and authority to be exclusive in religious
matters : and yet shall we presume to shut out
dissenters from our barely tolerated religious meet-
ings?

I shall forbear speaking of the danger there is

* 1 Kings, viii. 41—43, f Tract, Chullin, p. 5. Col. 1.

1J2 Mendelssohn's preface

in entrusting r/;2j/ one with the power of excommuni-
cating— with the abuse inseparable from the right of
anathema, as indeed with every other form of church
discipline, or ecclesiastical power. Alas ! it will
require ages yet, before the human race shall have
recovered from the blows which those monsters
inflicted on it. I can imagine no possibility of
bridling false religious zeal ; as long as it sees that
road open before it; for a spur will never be
wanting. Mr. Dohm fancies he is offering us an
ample guarantee from all the like abuses, by taking
for granted, that the right of anathema, entrusted to
the colony, '' will never reach beyond religious
society, and have no effect at all on the civil ; and
this, because an expelled member of any church
whatsoever may be a very valuable and estimable
citizen notwithstanding : a principle in universal
ecclesiastical law,'' (continues he) '^ which should
be no longer questioned in our days."

But if universal ecclesiastical law, as it is called,
at last acknowledges the important principle, in
which 1 concur with all my heart, ''that an ex-
pelled member of any and every church, may be a
very useful and respected citizen notwithstanding,"
the evil is far from being remedied by that weak
reservation. For, in the first place, this very esti-
mable and useful citizen, who, perhaps, is also
internally a very religious man, may not like

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 113

to be debarred from all meetings for worship, from
all religious solemnities; and may not like to be
entirely without external religion. Now, if he have
the misfortune to be thought a dissenter by the
congregation he belongs to, and his conscience
forbids him to join any other religious party estab-
lished or tolerated in the state; must not this very
useful and estimable citizen be exceedingly un-
happy when his own congregation is allowed to
exclude him, and he finds the doors of their reli-
gious assemblies shut against him ? And it is
possible, that he finds them so every where; for
every religious community would perhaps turn him
away by the same right. But how can the state
allow any one of its useful and estimable citizens
to be made unhappy by the laws ? Secondly, what
Church excommunication, what anathema is en-
tirely without secular consequences, without any
influence whatever on, at least, the civil respect-
ability, — on the fair reputation of the excommuni-
cated,— on the confidence of his fellow- citizens,
without which no one can exercise his calling
and be useful to the state ? As the boundary-laws
of this nice distinction between the civil and the
ecclesiastical are barely perceptible to the keenest
eye, it becomes truly impossible to draw them
so firmly and precisely, in any state, as to make
them obvious to every citizen, and cause them to

I

114 Mendelssohn's preface

have the desired effect in common civil life. They
v^ill ever remain dubious and undefined, and very
frequently expose innocence itself to the sting of
persecution, and blind religious zeal.

To introduce church-discipline, and yet not im-
pair civil happiness, seems to me a problejn, v^hich
yet remains for politics to solve. It is the answer
of the Most High Judge to Satan : '' He is in thine
hand but save his life,*" or, as the commentators
add : Demolish the cask, but let not the wine run
out,

I shall not enquire how far the complaints, of
late publicly made, about abuses of that kind,
which a certain eminent Rabbi thought proper to
commit, are or are not founded. The statement
being ex parte, I am willing to believe that many
a circumstance has been exaggerated ; that, on
the one hand, the guilt of the accused has been
softened down, the same as, on the other, the
harshness of the proceedings was studiously over-
rated. The case, it is reported, has been laid
before the regular authorities, who will investigate
it, and do the parties justice. However let the
affair terminate as it may, I wish the particulars,
as they figure on the protocols, may be published,
to make either the over-hasty Rabbi or his open
accusers ashamed of their conduct.

* Job ii, 6.

TO MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 115

But be this as it may, brotherly love has not
yet made that progress amongst men, that we may
disregard all fear and apprehension of this kind,
from the introduction of church-discipline. As
yet, there is not a clergy sufficiently enlightened,
that such a right (if it exist at all) may be en-
trusted to them without any harm. Nay, the
more enlightened they are, the less they will trust
themselves in this ; the more reluctant they will
be, to take in their hands an avenging sword,
which madness only thinks it can manage surely.
I have that confidence in the more enlightened
amongst the Rabbins, and elders of my nation, that
they will be glad to relinquish so pernicious a
prerogative, that they will cheerfully do away
with all church and synagogue discipline, and let
their flock enjoy, at their hands, even that kindness
and forbearance, which they themselves have been
so long panting for. Ah, my brethren, you have
hitherto felt too hard the yoke of intolerance, and
perhaps thought it a sort of satisfaction, if the
power of bending those under you to such another
yoke were allowed to you. Revenge will be
seeking an object ; and if it cannot wreak itself
on strangers, it even tortures its own flesh and
blood. Perhaps, too, you let yourselves be seduced
by the general example. All the nations of the
earth, hitherto, appear to have been infatuated by

I 2

116 Mendelssohn's preface.

the error, that religion can be maintained by iron
force — doctrines of blessedness inculcated by un-
blest persecution — and true notions of God, who,
as we all acknowledge, is love itself, communi-
cated by the workings of hatred and ill-will only.
You, perhaps, let yourselves be seduced to adopt
the very same system; and the power of persecut-
ing was to you the most important prerogative
which your own persecutors could bestow upon
you. Thank the God of your forefathers, thank
the God who is all love and mercy, that that error
appears to be gradually vanishing. The nations
are now tolerating and bearing with one another,
while to you also they are shewing kindness and
forbearance, which, with the help of Him who
disposes the hearts of men, may grow to true bro-
therly love. O, my brethren, follow the example
of love, the same as you have hitherto followed
that of hatred. Imitate the virtues of the nations
whose vices you hitherto thought you must imi-
tate. If you would be protected, tolerated and
indulged, protect, tolerate and indulge one another.
Love, and ye will he beloved,

Moses Mendelssohn.
Berliuy I9th Marchy 1782.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT;

AN EPISTLE TO MOSES MENDELSSOHN,

OCCASIONED BY HIS REMARKABLE PREFACE TO

RABBI MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL'S VINDICATION

OF THE JEWS.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT,

l^stimable Sir,

There was a time, when I could not help blaming
Lavater's obtrusion, in calling upon you in so
singularly solemn a manner to embrace his Faith ;
or, in the event of declining the proposal, demon-
strate the unsoundness of the Christian religion.
That step having been made in consequence of
what fell from you in the course of a friendly con-
versation, which, probably, was not meant to go
forth to the public, is what I shall never cease to
think unjustifiable.

Now, however, I scarcely can resist the tempta-
tion of wishing that Lavater would make another
attack on you, with all the force of his emphatic
adjuration, so as actually to make a convert of
you, or provoke you to refute a religion, which, it
seems, you are neither willing, nor (from convic-
tion) able to embrace.

At all events, certain candid expressions, in
your excellent Preface to '' Rabbi Manasseh Ben

120 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

Israel's Vindication of the Jews," give every
searcher for truth a right to expect of you some
further explanation ; lest you should appear unin-
telligible on a comparison w^ith former statements.

Moses, the lav^giver of the Jews — and also of
the Christian church, in so far as it sprang from the
most ancient of religions— Moses spoke to his people
with a veil on ; *' because," says tradition, '* the
children of Israel could not bear the radiance of
his face." The Christians boast, that at theEpocha
of the New Covenant, as it is called, they saw
Moses with his face uncovered. This figure of
speech, I suppose, means nothing more than that
there was a time, when the eyes of yet unen-
lightened nations could not bear truth in its full
purity ; and that another arrived, when they ven-
tured to look more steadily at the bright luminary,
and thought themselves competent enough to speak
out ; throw away the cloak, and promulgate un-
masked, what, until then, had been clothed in
hieroglyphics, and more than halfway wrapped up
in allegorical fancie-s.

When the indiscreet Lavater made rather too
free with private conversation, for the sake of eli-
citing from you an avowal of the genuine sentiments
of your heart respecting the Christian religion, to
which he fancied you to be secretly partial, you
too pinned a veil before your face, and spake to us

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 121

from behind a curtain, so that we could not have
a full view of you. Every one took an interest in
you, because of the unpleasantness you must, on
many accounts, have been put to by that fervent
enthusiast ; every one was anxious to see how
you would extricate yourself from the thorny pre-
dicament arising from so very direct and formal a
challenge ; and every one was pleased with the
manner in which you brought yourself off.

Rightly considered, it was only by dexterous
shifting, and by regular fencing tricks, that you
then eluded Lavater's questions, than which none
could be more pointed. We were satisfied with
your answer merely because we were dissatis-
fied with Lavater, and felt that he did not use you
well, in thus putting you publicly in embarrass-
ment.

Now the case is different. Now, you your-
self have openly given strong cause, why we
should fairly look to you for fuller explanation,
nay— why we should demand it. You yourself
came forth, a moment, from behind the curtain,
with looks beaming truth, and with no mask on.
You raised, in the friends of truth, hopes of at last
obtaining a full view of you, not a mere glimpse,
and yet you vanished again instantaneously like an
airy meteor. Can he, from whose lips one so
dearly longs to be thoroughly instructed, derive

122 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

any pleasure from knowing the public to be baffled
in their reasonable expectation, or, at any rate, un-
gratified ? Now, worthy Mr. Mendelssohn, now,
that you have, of your own accord, made the first
step, you must not refuse to make the next — that
of shewing yourself entirely. You bestowed on
us a preface, which shot, with the vividness of
lightning, through darkness ; give us now a com-
plete supplement; and with it, let the dawn of
truth break forth into bright daylight, that they
who love the light may walk in the light, and be
guided by truth, in order to make sure steps.

In your former reply to Lavater, you all along
insist on your adherence to the Faith of your Fore-
fathers. But you never tell us what you properly
mean by the Faith of your Forefathers. The sub-
stance of the Christian religion, too, is the Faith
of your Forefathers, transferred to us, weeded of
rabbinical institutions, and improved by additions,
new, indeed ; but nevertheless derived from the
faith of your forefathers, and, interpreted as the
consummation of Old-Testamentary prophecies.

In a wider sense of the term, the Faith of your
Forefathers is that which the Christians profess;
namely, the adoration of an only God ; the keeping
of the divine Ten Commandments delivered by
Moses ; and a belief in the gathering of all the
nations of the earth, in one flock, under the uni-

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 123

versal sceptre of a Messiah announced by the
prophets.

In a narrower sense, the expression, ' Faith of
your Forefathers,' comprises only the proper Jewish
ecclesiastical system, together with all scriptural
appointments, rabbinical interpretations thereof,
and statutory laws thereon, the whole constituting
the proper distinctive doctrine, which separates the
Jews from the faith of all other nations, and also
from Christians.

From that latter particular faith, my dear Mr,
Mendelssohn, you have, in your remarkable pre-
face, wrenched the corner-stone, by stripping, in
dry words, the synagogue of its original power ;
by denying it the right of expelling from the con-
gregation of the holy, the backslider from the faith
of your forefathers, entailing anathema and male-
diction on the heretic, and cutting him off from the
people of Israel. It may consist with reason, that
ecclesiastical law, in general, and the authority of
spiritual courts to enforce or restrict opinions, is an
inconceivable thing, — so that no case can be ima-
gined to prove the foundation of such law — that
art can create nothing of which Nature has not
brought forth the germ : but rational as all
you say about it may be, it is every way as
discrepant with the faith of your forefathers, in
a narrower sense, and with the principles of the

124 SEARCH POE LIGHT AND RIGHT.

church, not as merely assumed hy commentators,
but even as expressly established in the books of
Moses themselves. In common sense, religion
without conviction is not possible at all ; and every
forced religious act is no longer such. The keep-
ing of the divine commandments from fear of the
ecclesiastical penalties annexed to them is servile
compliance, v^hich, according to refined notions,
cannot be acceptable to God. Still, it will not be
denied, that Moses puts prohibitions and positive
punishments on the neglect of religious observ-
ances. His statutes ordain that the Sabbath-
breaker, the reviler of the divine name, and other
infringers of his law shall be stoned, and their
souls exterminated from amongst his people.

That rule, it is true, could be carried into
practice, only so long as the Jews had an empire
of their own ; so long as their Pontiffs were princes,
or such sovereign heads of the people, as created
princes, and governed them. But cease it must,
as did the sacrifices, upon the Jews having lost
territory and power, and, depending on foreign
laws, found their jurisdiction circumscribed by
very narrow limits. Still, that circumscription is
merely the consequence of external and altered
political relations, whereby the value of laws and
privileges, consigned to quiescence, cannot be di-
minished. The ecclesiastical law is still there,

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 125

although it be not allowed to be put into execution.
Your lawgiver, Moses, is still the drover, with the
cudgel, who leads his people with a rod of iron, and
would be sharp after any one who had the least
opinion of his own, and dared to express it by-
word or deed. According to the ecclesiastical
law, whoever presumed to speak against it, was,
by that law, condemned to suffer the punishment
of death and have his soul cut off from among his
people.

The side which ancient history, all along, shews
of that theocratical form of government is, that
punishment immediately followed error and differ-
ence of opinion.

The people's lusting, in the wilderness, after
the flesh-pots of Egypt, was, it is true, first grati-
fied by whole flocks of quails; but immediately
after punished by fiery serpents, because their
appetite displeased the Lord. Korah and his
faction considered themselves entitled to the pri-
vileges of the tabernacle, and of the priesthood, as
well as Aaron, and his sons ; and, behold, that nu-
merous sept was swallowed up by the earth, men,
women, children, and all ! — The church had a poison
of her own, the mysterious bitter water, or water of
jealousy, whereby a woman's violation of the fideli-
ty vowed to herhushand was elicited, and punished
on the spot with a marvellously fatal malediction.

126 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

Saul's disobedience in mistakingly sparing Agag's
life, and preserving the prime of the captured sheep
and oxen to sacrifice them to the Lord— though
his intention was good — cost him his kingdom.
David's ostentation in causing the people to be
numbered that he might ascertain his power, re-
duced him to the dire necessity of choosing one
out of three of the most horrible national calami-
ties proposed to him, and of seeing seventy thou-
sand of his subjects fall victims to a pestilence of
his own selection. So even the original theocracy
was a sort of tending with a rod of iron, and
a system of external coercion throughout, which
drove the nation collectively, and every individual
member thereof, by main force and punishments,
to adhere strictly to the precepts and statutes of
the church, and to forbear from in the least ex-
pressing any dissenting opinion, without forth-
with atoning for it in the most exemplary man-
ner.

The whole ecclesiastical system of Moses, was
not a mere instruction in, and a guide to, duties,
but there was at the same time, the most rigid
church-discipline attached to it. The arm of the
church was weaponed with the sword of male-
diction. It is written (Deut. xviii, 15 — 19), *' If
thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the Lord
thy God, &c. cursed shalt thou be in the city, and

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 127

cursed shalt thou be in the field ; cursed shall be
thy basket and thy store, &c. &c." And those
denunciations were in the hands of, and dispensed
by, the chief ministers of the church ; it was they
who inflicted stoning to death, and expulsion from
the community. And the final object of that ex-
pulsion was, not only that of being disqualified
for every holy office at divine worship, but likewise
of being lopped off from all civil relations and
natural sympathies. It was not allowed to bestow
bread or water on an excommunicated one, or to
come to his assistance when he happened to fall
in a pit, although he would unavoidably perish for
want of help. According to the law, whoever
had come in contact with a thing strangled, and
thereby defiled himself, might regain admissibility
to participation in divine worship, by the regularly
prescribed ablutions and sacrifices ; but he, who
held intercourse with an anathematized one, fell
himself under anathema, and was loaded with the
curses of the church. Anathema was the com-
pletest thing imaginable ; it was far prospective,
and not without influence on civil well-being either.
As no one durst commune with an anathematized
one, he, was of course thrown out of employ, and
of the means of earning a livelihood; he could
obtain neither food nor raiment ai the hands of
man ; neither aid nor deliverance in case of an

128 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

accident, in short, he was destined to perish, if
never a stone had been flung at him.

Agreed and most unqualifiedly granted, that
the foundation of such an ecclesiastical law is
the most inconceivable thing in the world ; * that
it does not answer the purpose of bringing the
strayed back into the bosom of the church ; but, on
the contrary, removes them from it; that its ob-
ject cannot be to reclaim, but to undo them; that
the rigour of ecclesiastical law, excommunication,
and anathema, cannot be exercised without the
most serious injury to civil happiness; that true
worship ought to be a spontaneous homage, founded
on one's own conviction, and practised out of love
to the Father of all beings, and with perfect filial
confidence in the mercy and goodness with which
he lets his sun shine even for the erring, and his
dew fertilise also the fields of the dissenter from
religious dogmas ; that servile awe, extorted by
penalties, cannot be an acceptable offering on the

* The anonymous author of the tract entitled: **On the
Abuses of Ecclesiastical Authority, and Secular Interference in
Religious Matters," written against the Altona chief rahbi, thinks,
that a limited church discipline might be allowed, provided it
have no influence on civil well-being, and consist simply in a de-
privation of spiritual benefits, and the benediction of the church.
He seems to consider ecclesiastical law a social compact, by
which one is bound to fulfil the conditions agreed upon, in order
not to be excluded from the corresponding advantages.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 129

altar of the God of Love. Granting and admitting
all this, it certainly is very true, that the church
has no need either of sword or scourge to bind the
sceptic beneath a yoke repugnant to the standard
of his intellect — to reconcile the dissenter to
articles of faith, or to ruin the rebellious. But
then, M^hat becomes of the rabbinical statutes,
passed into laws which Judaism is strictly bound
to obey ? What becomes of even the Mosaic law,
and of its authority derived immediately from God
himself? Armed ecclesiastical law still remains
the firmest groundwork of the Jewish polity, and
the master-spring of the whole machinery. Then,
good Mr. Mendelssohn, how can you profess
attachment to the religion of your forefathers,
while you are shaking its fabric, by oppugning the
ecclesiastical code established by Moses in conse-
quence of divine revelation ? The public, whose
attention you have excited, is entitled to both an
explanation of— and instruction in — so important
a point.

Or are we to presume that the present very re-
markable step of yours, is really one towards com-
plying with the wishes formerly expressed to you
by Lavater ? No doubt but that affair indu^ced
you to give Christianity a further consideration ;
and more nicely to weigh, with your peculiar pe-
netration, and the impartiality of an incorruptible

K ,

130 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

searcher after truth, the merits of its theology, as
you had it before you in all its forms and modifica-
tions. By this time, perhaps, you approximate to
Christianity, by shaking off the trammels of an
oppressive church, and by now preaching the re-
fined theory of a more liberal religion which is im-
pressed with the stamp of proper divine adoration ;
whereby we are to be emancipated from restraints
and burdensome observances, and which limits
true worship neither to Jerusalem nor to Samaria,
but which, as our Saviour said, recognises the
essence of religion in the creature's worship
his Creator and God in spirit and in truth. Or,
perhaps, the light in which you view the religion of
your forefathers, is that in which all religions from
the beginning must be viewed, namely, as a struc-
ture commenced in an age and clime of darkness,
and which is to be constantly continued, altered
and improved, until the yet far distant kingdom of
light ensues ; as a structure which must become
more and more perfect, in proportion as the tem-
porary structures of political expediency are de-
stroyed, and errors in the original design, though
well meant at the time, are corrected, till finally
nothing will remain but the temple itself, disencum-
bered of the paling and scaffolding, necessary and
useful in constructing it, but now being properly
cleared away, that the chaste edifice of genuine wor-

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 131

ship may no longer be disfigured, or the greater
portion of its beauty and majesty hidden from our
view.

Should this be the case, then, probably the
dangerous ecclesiastical law will not be the only
thing you would wish to be expunged from the re-
ligion of your forefathers. Allow me, good Sir, to
submit to your opinion a few remarks, which
appear to me of importance in the present age,
when a great revolution in favour of your nation
is dawning forth. You yourself speak, in your
preface, of the unjust persecutions which have
hung over the whole of your race ever since the
destruction of their Capital, and the dispersion of
the Jews amongst all the nations of the world.
The Christian's silly hatred and absurd contempt
of them, has, during many ages, denied them all
pretensions to the universal rights of man. Their
lives were sorely embittered ; the privilege of
walking on God's earth and breathing God's air,
enjoyed freely by the brute creation, they had to
purchase at an exorbitant rate. Here and there,
for an enormous consideration, they might barely
obtain a spot whereon to rest the soles of their
feet ; but the means of earning a reputable liveli-
hood were withheld from them ; while any fanatic
shaveling had only to impute to them the purloin-
ing of a baptised babe, the poisoning of a public

K 2

132 SEARCH FOn LIGHT AND RIGHT.

well, or even account for drought, famine, or any
other national calamity, as sent by God because
of them ; and, in not a few instances, they were, in
sportsman-like manner, hunted as so many wolves,
then plundered by Christian fellow- subjects of
their all, and every soul of them driven out of the
country. You rejoice, that at your advanced age,
you still live to see the times when Christians,
ruling over your nation, begin to be something like
men, and to look upon you too as men. To the
Prussian state, in which you have attained a tran-
quil and uninsulted old age, you acknowledge your-
self indebted for being what you are ; that is, a man
not so borne down by penury and care as to be
prevented from cultivating the nobler part of your-
self, your mind. You owe it to that more early
enlightened State, that general good sense duly ap-
preciates your talents, — that the sincere goodwill,
unalloyed with gloomy prejudice, which we bear
the virtuous man, whom we so highly respect in
you, animates you to become more and more a
valuable acquisition to society, — that we so atten-
tively listen to your instruction. — and that our
eagerness to learn, keeps spurring you on to be a
blessing to your contemporaries, and (perhaps, in a
still higher degree) also to posterity, by the univer-
sally acceptable truths which flow from your lips.
You rejoice at the happy change in the Austrian

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 133

dominions, where orphan Israel finds a father in
Joseph, who gives him also a share and inheritance
in his States, by placing him on the same step with
his other subjects, in the scale of humanity.

To your hitherto oppressed, persecuted, and
despised nation, this is, indeed, the dawn of a
happy era. But the rising sun does not illumine
all the globe at once. It first becomes visible to
only a part of the inhabitants of the earth, then
gradually ascends, and, when it has reached its
meridian, shines on a whole hemisphere. A time
will come, when benign toleration, now but dawn-
ing forth, will, like the sun, diffuse its genial heat
over all parts of the world, and when Christian
States will find Israelites as useful as the Barbary
States find them now.* Already the wise and
reasonable amongst the Christians are willing to
love as brethren the good amongst your nation.
This your own experience must tell you, Mr. Men-
delssohn. Do not Christian men, superior to nur-
sery, schoolboy, or popularly vulgar impressions,
come forward at this time, and openly plead with
frankness and energy, the cause of humanity on
behalf of your nation ; men, who make it their
business to couch the Christian rabble, both high
and low, for the cataract of old and inveterate in-
fection, in order to enable them to recognise Jews

* Jost, L. c. Vol. viii, p. 42. and Appendix, vol. ix.

134 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

as God's goodly and rational creatures ? Are there
not now sovereigns who listen to such appeals of
humanity, and give fair hopes that they will not
let all pious wishes remain unfulfilled, in their do-
minions.

To what may it be owing, that brotherly love
does not more generally unite two nations, both
of the same nature and substance,! both worship-
ing the same God, and both coinciding in the
fundamental points of their religion ?

The civil disabilities, the exclusion from common
privileges, and from a participation in the recipro-
cal offices of men and brethren — those hardships,
Mr. Mendelssohn, about which your nation can
feel only in a certain measure, justly aggrieved,
are not the fault of Christians. In the religion of
your forefathers itself, there is a tremendous breach
which keeps your nation far removed from an un-
qualified sharing in both the public and private
advantages of social life, which, in a state, are
enjoyed by all citizens alike. ^

I shall say nothing about your excessively strict
keeping of the Sabbath, which is not the Sabbath
of the nations amongst whom ye dwell. That in-
convenience, perhaps, may not be one that least
admits of mitigation, yet it will always be found
impossible entirely to remove the difficulties which
would attend the measure of employing Jews in

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 135

those capacities, whereby the state and the public
service must necessarily be sufferers, as long as
the duties thereof remain incompatible with the
uncompromising Sabbath Laws. It may, however,
be asked, whether the solemnization of the Rab-
binical Sabbath, with all its nervous niceties and
shivering scruples, should not be referred exclu-
sively to the former territory and polity of the Jews ;
and amidst different relations, and under foreign
dominion, be subordinate to the circumstances in
which Providence itself has placed them since the
abolition of their empire ? The laws of sacrifices,
I should think, were no less sacred and inviolable
than those of the Sabbath ; and yet they were
discontinued on the breaking up of the Jewish
State, because the practice could not be carried
on under foreign governments. Then, why may
not those of the Sabbath be equally subject to
some modification, at least, when times, circum-
stances, and local situations, as little admit of their
full observance ?

But of still greater importance is the obstacle
which the Jewish law places in the way of a
more general intermixture with Christians. The
very scorn and contumely which furnish the Jew
no unjust grounds of complaint against the Chris-
tian, form an article of faith of the Jewish religion ;
according to which all other nations are deemed

136 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

unclean creatures, by a social intercourse with
whom the people of God would be defiled.^ All
victuals, and certain drink prepared by the hands of
a Christian, are, by law, an abomination to a Jew.*

Those laws, no doubt, in former times, were
the offspring of pure precaution, to keep a people
so prone to idolatry from associating with their
pagan neighbours, and from being trepanned by
them into the worship of idols. But that precau-
tion has become quite supererogatory at present.
Christians are no idolators ; nor are the charac-
teristic dogmas of Christianity of that nature, that
by simple conviviality, a Jew might be brought to
acknowledge certain mysteries of the Christian
Church, which form the only distinction between
the Christian and himself.

That the Jews may be more intimately incor-
porated with the State than they have been
hitherto, in order that, considered as inhabitants
and citizens the same as the Christians, they
might enjoy equal benefits with them — it is essen-
tially necessary that every breach which keeps
the two persuasions at a distance from each other,
should be filled up as soon as possible.

In England, Jews are less excluded from the
privileges of natives than elsewhere. But, in
return, the Jew there keeps less aloof from civic
relations. In England, religion is no bar to a

SEARCH EOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 137

matrimonial alliance between any two persuasions.
There, marriage is no more than a civil contract ;
with the Roman Catholics only it is a sacrament.*
But here too, it may be asked ; *' How can Art pro-
duce anything of which Nature has not furnished
the germ ?'' In marriage, as an act of nature, or,
at most, as a civil treaty of alliance, surely, there
is not a particle of dogmatical matter, that differ-
ence of religion should be concerned in it, any
more than in an ordinary bill transaction between
a Christian and a Jew ! ^

Would it be a paralogism, to conclude from the
waving of one unessential point of religion, the
harmless repeal of another ? If it be possible to
suppress, without any detriment to pure Judaism,
ecclesiastical law, founded as it is on express
Mosaic Statutes, why then should mere rabbinical
reservations, subsequently devised, and opening so
injurious a breach between Jew and Christian,
not be set aside as well, for the good of the

* Vienna, too, already offers three remarkable instances of
marriages between Christian husbands and Jewish wives. There
is now an action pending, concerning y4rws^eiw, a converted Jew,
one of those three instances, who expressly demands to continue
cohabiting with his wife, still persevering in Judaism ; and it is
justly opined, that religious difference can form no cause of a legal
separation. According to the principles of wise Joseph, difference
of religious opinions is not likely to be allowed to stand in the
way of natural ties.

138 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

nation ? But if the ecclesiastical laws, assumed
to have been given by revelation, necessarily form
a part of the Jewish religion, we must admit those
Rabbinisms also to do so ; and, in that case, you,
good Mr. Mendelssohn, have renounced the religion
of your forefathers. One step more, and you will
become one of us.

As long as you forbear taking the other step,
now that you have taken the first, the public
is most justly entitled to expect of you, either a
reason for so glaring a discrepancy from the reli-
gion of your forefathers, or the statement of any
cause you may have to show why you should not
publicly embrace Christianity, or the production
of an argument against Christianity itself. Accord-
ing to your own principles, publicly enough
expressed, not even opinions about religious mat-
ters are subject to ecclesiastical control ; and in
its enquiries after truth, and in delivering its
judgment, the human mind brooks no dictation.
Constituted as our governments are, you may ex-
pect nothing but toleration even of dissentients, to
whichever sect they may belong ; persecution of
no one. The Priesthood of your own nation is
kept in order by the authority of the Sovereign ;
and many a one of the wise among them, even at
this time of day, by his own good sense and en-
lightened principles, (should you think proper to

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 139

abate, here and there, some of the minor points
in the religion of your forefathers), will honour
truth in you, even if it should turn out to the
prejudice of our ecclesiastical system. Self-
conceited fools will rejoice at having saved their
theory from you ; and at finding an opportunity of
eclipsing you with their lustre. They will, indeed,
be indignant at you, should you, unfortunately, be
no thorough orthodox preacher. However, that
indignation, in a mere declamatory tone, surely
you will be able to bear ; and arguments, even if
preponderating against you, must always be ac-
ceptable to you. The whole truth-loving public
expect of every inquirer, '' Light and Truth," and
long to hear an approved thinker speak, in the
evening of his life, without reserve, of the most
important human concerns. By a more particular
explanation, you either will use your endeavours
to relieve your nation from many an antiquated
and paralysing constraint, and to regenerate them
into freer, and less abashed beings, who will unite
themselves by mutual ties more closely to their
fellow-men of another persuasion — men who
already evince a strong and cordial disposition to
regard them too as men and brethren, in a greater
degree than heretofore, — or you will draw your
brethren nearer to us, or, by removing our errors,
ourselves to them. At all events, there will be.

140 S£y\RCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

at length, a foundation laid for our witnessing the
glorious accomplishment of the Prophecy (for it is
certainly more than a simple vision) — that, in the
latter days the Lord God will be the universal
she'pherd, and the whole rational creation only one
ßoch,^ Truth — truth alone may lead to this — truth,
either on your side, or on ours, or if we go to meet
one another, perhaps it will be found midway. The
present seems just to be the happy era, in which
prevailing liberty still allows truth to occupy her
proper station. In times of bigotry and inordinate
enthusiasm, the triumph of truth would not be so
easily achieved. Nay, even now the archdemon of
fanaticism is busily hatching fresh imps, which may
grow up so as to become extremely formidable to
futurity. Already Magnetizers, and Ghost-seers,*
are furtively conspiring, that, with rallied vigour,
they may once more trample free reason under foot.
And it wants only another Ferdinand and Isabella,
to let us see the spectre of the secretly working
Inquisition gambol on smoking pyres, and on the
yawning tombs of martyrs of truth ; and Phari-
saism as of old exhibit its miserable jugglery at the
corner of every street.

That, indeed, would no longer be a time in
which to seek truth. It would then be almost

* And in our days, Speakers of Unknown Tongues, South-
cotites, cum multis aliis. Ed.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 141

wisdom to bend one's neck to the yoke of super-
stition ; and, in the most odious sense of the term,
permit any creed forced upon one, however pre-
posterous, to make a captive of one's understand-
ing. But now, at the present remarkable junc-
ture, there is nothing whatsoever to deter you
from unfolding to us your sincere and real con-
viction. Now that you have so heroically battered
down the once impregnable steel gate of ecclesi-
astical authority, what should keep you from
celebrating your ovation in the very Penetrale of
truth, which has been so long shut up to us ?
You have put the hand to the plough, as the
saying is ; and a man, firm in his conviction, as you
are, and, on account of his extraordinary talents,
called by Providence itself to the service and
promulgation of truth, cannot possibly with-
draw it again, and deprive the world of the final
result of the long exercise of his mental energies,
after having already given it, in his preface to
Rabbi Manasseh Ben Israel's works, so beautiful
a specimen, as one of the most elegant and valu-
able presents from the vast museum of his learning
and information.

Your sincere admirer,

S.

Vienna, I2th June, 1782.

142 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

POSTSCRIPT.

Estimable Sir,

On reading with the most intense attention, and
with a great deal of pleasure, your exceedingly
remarkable preface to your translation from the
English of '* Rabbi Manasseh Ben Israel's Vindi-
cation of the Jews," I wished, with my whole
heart and soul, that you had stepped a little more
forward into the light, on that occasion, or that
it would yet be convenient to you, to take off the
veil behind which you still think proper to hide
yourself. At that time, however, it was very far
from my thoughts to express that desire, though
ever so ardent, before the public at large ; being in
hope that something to the same effect might come
from a more distinguished and more influential
pen than my own. This, to my great disappoint-
ment, did not take place ; and, accordingly, I let
the matter rest, until by mere chance I lately ob-
tained a sight of the manuscript of the prefixed
epistle addressed to you, before it was consigned
to the press. On me, at least, it had such an ex-
traordinary effect, that I could not for a moment
deny it, upon the whole, my perfect regard and
approbation. My former wishes instantaneously re-
vived, even more vividly and fervidly than at first ;

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 143

and notwithstanding the many scruples that arose
within me, I found it impossible any longer to
conceal from you the singular state of my mind,
in consequence of your (in some respects) interest-
ing ideas of religion. Do not, therefore, take it
amiss, dear Sir, — not that I presume humbly to
invite you, either to embrace the religion which
I myself profess, or at once to refute the same, in
case you should be incapable of embracing it — but
that I entreat you, in the name and for the sake
and benefit of all those who, like yourself, revere
truth, and have it at heart, to speak resolutely and
definitively of that which is, and always will be,
of the first and most vital importance to the re-
flecting and conscientious of all religions. It
never was a principle of mine, however it may
h^ve been of others, to tamper with those that have
been brought up to any religion of which the
leading features are, — the belief in a true and only
God, the Creator of heaven and earth, — and in a
future state — besides the inculcation of sincere
virtue, and universal charity and brotherly love.
And nothing would I eschew more, and with
greater horror, than ever to become, either directly
or indirectly, the instigator of arguments and ob-
jections to the religion in which I myself was
born and brought up, from which I derive genuine
happiness and contentment in this life, and fully

144 SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

expect ineffable and eternal felicity in the next.
But in the present case, your said remarkable
preface must, in your own eyes, serve as an apo-
logy for my request. In that preface it would
seem, at first sight, even to a not altogether at-
tentive reader, as if you were wiping off only
one of the blots which (as you yourself do not in
the least hesitate to own in your answer to Lava-
ter) deface the ancient religion of your forefathers.
But, as far as my humble judgment goes, I think
I have discovered in that very same preface certain
marks and characteristics, by which I feel myself
perfectly warranted to pronounce you as wide
from the religion in which you were born and
educated, as you are from the one which has been
transmitted to me by my own forefathers : and,
having done so, 1 shall not tax you with dissimula-
tion, for telling us, in the answer, that you are equal-
ly as little partial to either Judaism or Christia-
nity, but with being a contemner of revelation in
general. In order to show what grounds I have
for my assertion, I shall refer you to the first para-
graph of your preface, and to page J 09, where you
say, **The doors of the house of rational devotion
require neither bars nor bolts. There is nothing
locked up within, and therefore no occasion to be
particular in admitting from without. Whoever
chooses to be a tranquil spectator, or even to join

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 145

in the worship, is right welcome to every pious
man at the hour of his own devotions." Let me
add, that, on account of your personal merits, such
an explanation as 1 beg of you, may become the
occasion of meditations which speculative men
cannot make too often. I say meditations ; be-
cause, in religion, the infallible word of God can
alone be admitted as a rule.

What is there, worthy man, to deter you from
at once openly acknowledging to the world that
you are a Jew or a Christian, or neither one nor
the other? My request, indeed, is not important
enough to betray you into confessions ; still I
flatter myself, you will render to the call of truth,
that homage, to which myself, simply an honest
man, may not pretend.

Forgive my boldness, and be assured that it is
with the sincere consent of my heart, that I call
myself your reverer, although I have never yet
intruded upon you, to declare by word of mouth,
the esteem with which I am

Your &c.

MOERSCHEL.
Berlin, Srd Sept. 1782.

A LETTER BY MENDELSSOHN,

WRITTEN DURING HIS

CONTROVEUSY WITH LAVATER,
IN 1770.

L 2

A LETTER, &c.*

Sir,

I REPLY to you in the German Language, for al-
though I read and understand French, I do not
write it ; however, as the latter seems to come
readiest to your tongue, you will please still to
make use of it, whenever you mean again to afford
me the pleasure of your correspondence.

From the affair with Mr. Lavater, I derived the
advantage of becoming acquainted and getting
into amicable relations with some most excellent
men.

If we look only at what is said, written, and
thought in public, we shall, in serious moments,
almost be apt to fret at the slow progress of reason,
the still continuing difference of judgment and
opinion, amongst those who are accounted the

* Of the authenticity of the above letter there is not the least
doubt, as both the style and sentiments sufficiently warrant it,
although it cannot be ascertained to whom it was addressed. The
late Mr. Nicolai thought it was to a certain Count de Lynar.

150 menbelssohn's controversy

most intelligent, and give up all further hope.
But when, by a lucky chance, we gain the confi-
dence of men of real worth, we perceive, with
pleasure, a greater degree of harmony than one
would have imagined ; and that, with all their ex-
ternal variances, the good of all countries and
religions are much alike.

On the above-mentioned occasion I received
many very impertinent letters ; but also some,
which, like yours, 1 hold inestimable. Yet give
me leave to express myself rather hurt by one part
of it. You seem to think it something most extra-
ordinary, that I, a Jew, should speak in a respect-
ful manner of the religion of Jesus ; that I do not
hate the Christians, launch no invectives at them,
&c. I therefore, suppose, you give but few, if
any, of my brethren credit for that sort of dis-
cretion. But you will do us justice.

Aben Ezra throws down only a few cursory
remarks on the Christian religion ; Maimonides,
to my knowledge, never wrote against it ; Orobio
did :* but with a degree of moderation that does

* A contemporary of Spinosa, against whom he wrote. He was
born in Spain of Crypto Israelites, and died at Amsterdam, 1687,
in the Jewish faith. After having been immured a long time in
the dungeons of the Inquisition, he was fortunate enough to effect
his escape, and thereupon openly embraced the religion of his
forefathers. The fortunes of this man are very remarkable and
interesting. He was engaged in a public controversy with

WITH LAVATER 151

him credit. He might be no more of a philosopher
than his amicable antagonist Limborch. Which
of the two is the best interpreter of scripture text,
I shall not investigate now. But to me Orobio
seems to have proceeded with the greater love of
truth. One needs only read Limborch's Preface.
It is not for the sake of inquiry that those gentle-
men commence a controversy, but for the sake of
each having it his own way.

I readily and most cordially concur in what you
say of the morality of the New Testament. I
fully believe that Jesus himself did not teach, by
a good deal, what Christian Rabbins have been
preaching in his name for so many ages ; for the

Philip de Limborch, which the latter published under the title
of '* Philipi a Limborch Arnica Collatio cum Erudito Judaso," re-
printed at Basle, in 1740. There are still in the possession of
the family, four manuscripts, which were never published, en-
titled: ''Obras del Doctor Yshac Orobio de Castro, alias Don
Balthazar, Cathedratico de Metaphysica y Medicina en las Uni-
versidades de Alcala y Seville, Medico de la Camera del Duca di
Medina Cceli de la familia di Borgogna, y del Rei Philippi quarto,
Professor publico del Rei de Francia en la insigne Ciudad de To-
losa, y su conseyero major." This long, splendid, and no doubt
very lucrative alias, must have vanished, when Don Balthazar
returned to Judaism ; but "nul ne pent etre heureux s'il ne jouit
de sa propre estime," says Jean Jacques Roussseau. A work of
his translated into French by another Israelite, of the name of
Henriquez, and published in London, in 1770, under the title of
" Israel venge," is very interesting, and fully justifies Men-
delssohn's opinion of him .

152 Mendelssohn's controversy

sake of which they so frequently butchered
people, and, now and then, were butchered them-
selves.

Christianity like yours, Sir, if universally adopt-
ed would transform our earth into a Paradise.
And in so important a business, who would carp
at a name ? Shall the purest system of Ethics be
called Christianity ? Why not, if that answer any
good purpose ? But this Christianity is actually
an invisible church consisting of Jews, Mahome-
tans, and Chinese, in which Greeks and Romans
must principally be counted. How strangely in-
congruent our opinions at times are ! In history,
the Greeks and Romans are objects of our admi-
ration ; and on a comparison with their virtues, we
must think ver^^- meanly of ourselves. Yet, when-
ever the reward of virtue, or which is the same
thing, salvation, is to be awarded compendiously.
Pagans either are not thought of at all, or contu-
meliously turned away.

I was somewhat surprised at your question :
why do I not seek to make proselytes ? The duty
of converting evidently results from the principle,
that out of the pale of the converter's church no
salvation is to be expected. Since I, as a Jew,
am not bound to adopt that position, as according
to the doctrine of the Rabbins, it is possible that
the just and virtuous of every nation, shall enjoy

WITH LAVATER. 153

eternal felicity hereafter, the reason for proselyting
falls to the ground, nay, I am to forbear openly
oppugning a religion that has its good sides. *' La
religion," say you, ** est la culte du Dieu." So it
is. But every one knows that there is internal as
well as exttrnal religion, between which a careful
distinction must be made. The internal religion
of the Jews contains no other precepts than those
of the religion of Nature. These we are by all
means bound to propagate, and I endeavour to dis-
charge that duty so much as is in my power : not
to acknowledge it would be the height of unchari-
tableness ; although it also has its limits, and
admits of modification.

Our external religion, on the contrary, was never
designed to be propagated, for its precepts are
confined to a particular race, as well as to times
and circumstances. We certainly think ours the
best of all religions, because we believe it to be
divine ; but it does not hence follow that it is abso-
lutely the best. It is the best for us, and for our
posterity ; the best for certain times, under certain
circumstances, and with certain limitations. What
external religion may be best for other nations,
perhaps God has announced to them likewise
through prophets, or he has left it to their own
judgment to decide the question. I do not know
how that may be ; and cannot say anything positive

154 Mendelssohn's coxVtroveksy.

about it. But this I know, that no external religion
can be universal ; and that by making proselytes,
I am extending the religion of my forefathers, be-
yond the boundaries originally prescribed to it.

Finally, I know that I sincerely love all friends
of wisdom and virtue, and that I esteem you. Sir,
with all my heart, believing you to be really, what
you appear to me in your letter.

Moses Mendelssohn.

MOSES MENDELSSOHN'S REPLY

TO

CHARLES BONNET.

REPLY TO CHARLES BONNET.

INTRODUCTION.

The following letter has, so far as I know,
never been printed in full, and, therefore, did not
become known to the public. It may prove ac-
ceptable even to the learned, as it completes the
history of Lavater's over-zealousness ; and stamps
our philosopher's character with another mark of
love of truth. Bonnet was not privy to Lavater's
intention, or, probably, would have disapproved
of it. In his reply to the latter, Mendelssohn,
adverting to Bonnet's ** Evidences of the Christian
** Religion," says, that, 1st, most of that author's
philosophical hypotheses are of German growth,
2nd, his general observations are not the most
profound part of his work ; and 3rd, the greatest
part of his conclusions follow so loosely from the

158 Mendelssohn's reply

premises, that I myself would undertake to
vindicate, by the same reasonings, any religion
whatsoever." Those assertions, particularly the
last, somewhat nettled the Geneva philospher,
and it is supposed, betrayed him into a sharpish
letter to Mendelssohn, which, however, was not
found amongst his papers, but had elicited from
him the following answer. Perhaps it contains no
illustration, which he did not develop more masterly,
more perspicuously, and forcibly in subsequent
writings, particularly in his copious '' Jerusalem/'
Still, it may throw a stronger light on some sub-
jects, for which there was no opportunity in those
works ; and, on that account, it may not be with-
out some interest to the *' curious" reader, were it
even for mere completeness* sake. The learned, in
this respect, resemble the connoisseurs in art, who
admit into their collections, first ideas, sketches,
and proofs, although they are in possession of the
artist's finished performance. Nor will the anti-
quary despise an inferior coin which owes its
existence to some memorable event, because the
medallist has, at a later period, executed a more
elegant and more elaborate piece on the same
subject. In the present case, the main requisites
are genuineness and contemporaneousness. Both
can be warranted, if a guarantee be at all neces-
sary. For my co-religionaries, to whom this

TO CHARLES BONNET. 159

letter is especially dedicated, it contains very im-
portant ideas, offering ample matter for reflection.
And it would be a sad thought, indeed, that the
rising generation should no longer find pleasure or
interest in such enquiries..

David Friedlander.

Sir,
The wise moderation with which you express
yourself in your letter of the 12th instant, on the
unpleasant feelings given you by the occurrence
between Mr. Lavater and myself, deeply affected
me. It is singular that three good-natured
beings, sincerely wishing well to each other,
should, without any intention in the world, prove
a source of mutual vexation ! What made me
more ashamed than anything, is, that throughout
the whole affair, you were the only one who had
nothing to reproach himself with.

The Zurich Deacon has as good as acknow-
ledged his rashness. Nor did I, myself remain
quite free from indiscreetness. The mental ex-
citation, in consequence of his challenge, made me
express myself about you, with less reserve than
is due to your merits, and than ought to have
accompanied the consciousness of my own in-

160 Mendelssohn's reply

feriority. I saw the case in a light different from
that in which it appears to me now. The trans-
lator, thought I, would hardly have made that
extraordinary step, without consulting the author
of the original; the challenge must, therefore,
have been sanctioned by the writer of ' ' Palin-
genesy." And, now, judge yourself what con-
clusions might not be drawn from such a
misapprehension. I let some months go by, in
order to see whether a hint of the excellent
** Palingenesist" would set me to rights ; and not
until the end of December was I informed by
Mr. Lavater himself that you had disapproved of
his dedicatory epistle. But then my letter to him
was published, and already ten days on the road
to Zurich.

Forgive, wise philanthropist, both the Zurich
Deacon, and the Berlin Jew, the unpleasantness
they inadvertently caused you, and consign the
past to oblivion.

It is imbecoming every one of us, openly to
defy one another, and thereby furnish diversion to
the idle, scandal to the simple, and malicious
exultation to the revilers of truth and virtue.
Were we to analyse our aggregate stock of know-
ledge, we certainly shall concur in so mtmy
important truths, that, I venture to say, even few
individuals of one and the same religious per-

TO CHARLES BONNET, 161

suasion, would more harmonize in thinking. A point
here and there, on which, perhaps, we shall still
divide, might be adjourned for some ages longer,
without any detriment to the welfare of the
human race. The truths which we jointly admit,
have not yet spread so widely, that we may expect
any material benefit will arise to the good cause,
from the final decision of those debateable ques-
tions. But the denominations of '' Christianity,*'
and *' Judaism," are associated with them. Well,
and what does that signify ? To our ears they
sound not a whit more inimical than the denomin-
ations of '' Cartesian," or '' Leibnitzian." What
a world of bliss we should live in, did all men
adopt and practise the true principles, which the
best amongst the Christians and the best amongst
the Jews have in common ! You will easily
imagine, that with such sentiments, my talents, as
a polemic, cannot be of the first order ; nor do
you. Sir, seem, any more than myself, gifted by
nature for that occupation. Your mildness and,
if I may be allowed the expression, your almost
excessive modesty, disqualify you for the part of
a theological prize-fighter. I think the Zurich
deacon too much of a lover of truth, that he
would not copy your example in this ; and then
the business between you and me would soon be

M

162 Mendelssohn's reply

settled ; not, though, without being of inestimable
consequence to myself, as thereby I became
acquainted and got into correspondence with one
of the most celebrated philosophers of the age.

My never-to-be-forgotten friend Abbt, he who
first mentioned my name to you, possessed a
small portion of the same quality, for which you
find fault with Mr. Lavater, a quality, neverthe-
less, commendable in a young man of great hopes,
provided it be kept within due bounds. Full of
enthusiasm for every thing good and beautiful, he
extolled, with his whole heart, the least trace of
it ; without considering that praise answers the
less good, and is also the less pleasing, the more
unqualified it is bestowed. His preface to my
''Letters on Sensation,"* which he translated
into French under your superintendance, afford a
proof of this. While, on the contrary, the high
idea of both your character and judgment, which
he gave me in his friendly correspondence, was
fully confirmed by the Considh^ations sur les Corps
organis^es, which appeared at the time. And I
have ever since studied your works with profit
and pleasure.

Supposing your " Enquiry" intended for a re-
futation of other religions, I could not find it either

* Brieffe ueher die Empfindungen.

TO CHARLES BONNET. 163

profound or philosophic. Indeed, the positions
which you attribute to Christianity, one may
believe in, and still be a Jew or a Mahometan.
All the dogmas peculiar to that religion, and
which distinguish it from all others, even from the
religion of Nature, you designedly pass over in
silence, and, as you yourself state, from the most
charitable motive in the world, namely — not to
give offence to any sect. This made me, in some
measure, divine the true object of your ** Apology;"
and, accordingly, I signified as much in my letter
to Mr. Lavater. But the unlucky dedication
having once displaced the right point of view,
I was, justly enough, surprised at finding myself
opposed by dogmas, which must be admitted by
every religion, and which do not distinguish
Christianity even from the religion of savages, if
they have one. On this consideration, every
apology which goes into the dogmas peculiar to
Christianity, and seeks to make them consistent
with reason, must have appeared to me more pro-
found, and more philosophical than yours. We
Germans possess, besides the theological works of
the great Leibnitz, in which the most subtle meta-
physics are employed in defence of Christianity,
many of those apologies, of which I shall mention
only those by Canz^ Baumgarten, and Sack, But

M 2

164 Mendelssohn's reply

in the light in which I see your work now,
namely — as being, as you yourself allege, cal-
culated for putting better thoughts into the heads
of the unbelievers of your own church, who with
false philosophy would controvert the principles
of their faith — I cannot but retract my opinion.

As to what remains, you do me no more than
justice in admitting that, by saying, 7nost of the
author s philosophical hypotheses are of German
growth, I did not mean to accuse you of plagiarism.
The mere idea that my words might be thus mis-
construed, would have appeared to me highly
fantastical, had I not, the other day, casually read
in a German Literary Gazette, that such an
illiberal imputation has actually been thrown out
against you by some one else. I think, in meta-
physical matters, one cannot be too cautious in
insinuating things of that kind. Perhaps it is not
saying too much, that no new discoveries have
been made in that science for some ages past.
The for and against of all points, any way worth
investigating, have been so frequently argued,
that he who wants to start something quite novel,
must almost come out with something quite
absurd. Nay, according to the complaints of
a philosopher of antiquity, absurdity seems to
have been already, in his time, exhausted by

TO CHARLES BONNETT. 165

philosophers of an older date. Where have Leib-
nitz's opinions and hypotheses not been detected,
or pretended to have been detected ? He, himself,
seldom maintained a position, v^ithout ascribing it
(perhaps from too great a modesty) to some
ancient or other. I, for my own part, can point
out, in several passages of Maiinonides, in express
words, the hypothesis of preordinated miracles;
and in ancient cabalistical writers, whom, most
probably, you do not know even by name, that
of a subtle, organised, and ethereal tabernacle,
enclosed in this, our clay body, and being the
proper seat of the soul. The latter call that sub-
stance Ruach, '' Spirit," in contradistinction of
Neshamcih^ *' Soul," and say the Spirit is the
vehicle of the soul, &c. &c. But as you very
justly observe of yourself, that in metaphysics,
the merit of invention cannot be denied to him
who throws light on ideas, shows truth under a
new aspect, brings it in connexion with other
truths, and leads the human understanding on to
the most subtle speculations ; nothing was wider
from my thoughts than an attempt to dispute you
that merit ; and I proposed to take the first oppor-
tunity to declare as much openly. All I meant
(and so the context will show every intelligent
reader), was to intimate to Mr. Lavater, that
the philosophical principles, which he wants to

166 M ENDELSSOHN's REPLY

recommend to me for my conversion, are not new
to a German ; that subsequent to Leibnitz, all the
Monadists, and particularly those I named above,
arrived by argute reasoning, whither the Palinge-
nesist conducts one by the road of observation ;
and that, as a German, I had read the authors of
my nation. With that, I little thought of the
odious reflection you mention ; and, consequently,
saw no necessity for providing against it, or dis-
avowing it.

I have yet to render explanation about that
passage in my letter, at which you were so much
surprised. I said, '' Nor are, in my opinion, the
general observations, premised by the author, the
profoundest part of the work ; at least the use
and application he makes of them, for the
vindication of his religion, appears to me so
inadmissible and gratuitous, that I scarcely re-
cognise Bonnet in it.'' You seemed to believe
that I looked upon the modesty, with w^hich you
lay the result of your speculations before the
reader, as a sign of want of confidence. I go
on — '* The greatest part of his Consequents flow
so loosely from the Antecedents, that I venture to
vindicate, by the same reasoning, any religion
whatsoever." On that, you ask, would I
undertake to defend with the same arguments,
the system of Mahomet or Confucius? Might

TO CHARLES BONNET. 167

I not^ for proving the legation of Moses, and
the divineness of his laws, be in possession of
different arguments than those made use of by
yourself on behalf of Christianity ? You will
pardon me for being somewhat large in answering
those questions. Consistent with the frankness
you expect of me, I must tell you that in your
work, I was not mistaken in the Socratic modesty,
which, accompanied by firm internal conviction,
bears the external appearance of diffidence ; and
that it was in regard to the substance, much more
than of the form of your arguments, that I pro-
nounced them inadmissable and gratuitous.

So far as every revelation supposes an histori-
cal factj the truth of that revelation can be
substantiated no otherwise than by Tradition,
Testimotiks and Monuments. There we agree.
But you. Sir, with other apologists of Christianity,
receive miracles as an infallable criterion of truth,
and believe that when there appears to be credible
evidence of a prophet's having performed miracles,
there can be no longer any doubt of the divine-
ness of his mission ; whence you demonstrate,
indeed, by very sound logic, that there is nothing
impossible in miracles ; and that the testimony of
miracles may also deserve belief. It was of that
argument that I said, one may defend with it any
religion one pleases. Do you think, Sir, that we

168 MENDELSSOHN*S REPLY

(I am speaking of my own brethren in the faith)
can produce no testimonies of amazing miracles
wrought by extraordinary men of our nation, long
after the times of Jesus of Nazareth ? And those
testimonies are held, at least by us, as authentic
and venerable as you hold yours. Here, then,
there are testimonies against testimonies !

In Poland, on the borders of Ukrane, a Jewish
sect, persecuted by my co-religionaries them-
selves, pretended to have wrought miracles only
very lately ; and I am acquainted with respect-
able men, and for what I know, men of veracity,
who have confirmed those miracles from ocular
demonstration. The very adversaries and perse-
cutors of the sect admit the fact ; but, as usual,
attribute it to sorcery. All this is in print, black
on white, not by the sect itself (for I, at least,
have not seen any work of theirs), but by those
enemies themselves who denounce them as en-
ticers and sorcerers. The accusers have never
been refuted by any one ; and when our posterity
come to read those works, they must take the
thing for granted, and, if miracles are at all to
be trusted, conclude from it I scarcely know
what.^

At Paris, enlightened Paris, as both yourself,
and your translator observe with astonishment,
extraordinary things of that sort are said now to

TO CHAKLES BONNET. J 69

take place daily, which, if we believe the reports,
can be nothing else but miracles. The truth of
those circumstances has already been confirmed
and attested, under the signature and seal of whole
benches of Magistrates -, not to speak of a host of
witnesses, whose depositions no court will dis-
credit. What shall we advance against that
religious party ? * Shall we say all their witnesses
are either impostors or dupes. What right have
we to say so ? You argue, in your inquiry, that
those pretended miracles deserve no credit, be-
cause it is evidently not consistent with the
attributes of the Supreme being, to disturb the
order of nature for the sake of so futile a thing as,
whether or not certain theses are contained in a
certain book. Pardon me ; but I do not discover
there that strict justice, which, in all other re-
spects, the Palingenesist is wont to deny not even
his opponents. Might not a disciple of Jansenius
say : Remember that those miracles, if admitted,
will at once operate as indirect proofs of the
truth of the Roman church ; and that we should
thereby be enabled to refute, on evidence beyond
all contradiction and objection, every other sect
and opinion of mankind. And can this prospect
possibly be a matter of indifference to you ? Is

* The Abbe Paris.

170 Mendelssohn's reply.

it unbecoming the Supreme being to renew, in
these times of infidelity, the miracles whereby he
was pleased, heretofore, to plant faith ? Is it in-
compatible with his attributes, to reclaim, by the
undeniable evidence of the senses, the libertine
who will not believe unless he see, or those who
otherwise got astray through an abuse of reason ?
But if Sovereign wisdom may see the expediency
of letting miracles take place, it, most probably,
will select for that purpose, the religious sect
which comes nearest to truth, even in secondary
matters. For although the particular circum-
stance which distinguishes one sect from another,
be not very material of itself, we should remember
that it is certainly not consistent with the wisdom
of God, to support an untruth, whether of great
or small importance. If^ therefore, it will permit
miracles for any end best known to itself, it cannot
let them happen anywhere but amongst that sect,
which has truth on its side in every thing.

Both in the Old and New Testament we read
of miracles taking place on trivial occasions ; still
the object ultimately to be attained by them,
always was great, and worthy of the Supreme
Being. In the same manner, God may suffer
miracles to be wrought, in our days, in order to
confirm an unimportant doctrine, if you please ;
but at any rate, immediately to bring back into the

' TO CHARLES BONNET. 171

bosom of the church, infidels, heretics, &c. I
therefore ask again, what argument can we make
use of with those people, so long as we ourselves
are disposed to build our creed on miracles, or
even on the tradition of miracles ?

Would I undertake to defend the system of
Mahomet or Confucius with the same reasoning ?
I do not know that Confucius ever pretended to
have wrought miracles ; nor does his moral doctrine
require any vindication that I can offer. But as
Mahomet condescended — as he expressed himself
— to work miracles, and the Mussulmen are pro-
pagating the testimony thereof, by traditions and
monuments, how can we refute them ? If we
attempt to cast suspicion either on their original
testimonies, or on the propagation of them, is not the
way of retortion open to them ? In this case, our
own impartiality is hardly to be depended upon ; for
how can we pretend that others shall recognize
us as judges, while we ourselves are a party con-
cerned ? The Jewish, Christian and Mahometan
miracles oppose one another. In every religion
itself, the miracles boasted of by the different sects
of each, oppose one another. By what criterions
are v/e to distinguish truth from error, in a matter
of such importance ?

On the other hand, I find that in the times
of the ancient faith, miracles were not held an

172 Mendelssohn's reply

infallible proof of the divineness of a prophet's mis-
sion. False prophets too are said to have been
able to work miracles ; whether by sorcery, by
arts then but very partially known, or by abusing of
extraordinary talents and faculties, bestowed on
them for a less unworthy purpose, I will not take
upon myself to decide. Suffice it that the abilities
of working miracles was never considered an un-
erring criterion of truth. The lawgiver of the
Jews delivers his sentiments on this in very plain
terms, Deut. xiii. 2. and Jesus of Nazareth speaks
no less plainly, and if anything still more empha-
tically, of the fallibility of miracles, **For there
shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and
shall shew great signs and wonders," Mat. xxiv.
24. Then, as those two lawgivers have declared
that even false prophets may work miracles, I do
not see how the followers or advocates of either,
can act so directly against the words of scripture,
as to pronounce miracles an unerring test of tradi-
tion.

The Mosaic legation forms quite a different case \
it is an embassy not vouched for solely by miracles :
(for I say again, miracles at times are not to be de-
pended upon, and so says Moses himself) ; but, it
rests on a much safer foundation. The entire
mass of the people to whom the mission was di-
rected, beheld the divine manifestation with their

TO CHARLES BONNET. 173

own eyes, and heard with their own ears, that God
had appointed Moses his nuncio and herald.
The Israelites, therefore, were all and every one of
them, eye and ear-witnesses of the prophet's ex-
alted commission, and required no further proof
or testimony. Accordingly it is written : Exod.
xix. 9. '\ And the Lord said unto Moses, Lo ! I
come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the people
may hear when I speak unto thee, and believe
thee for ever;" and Exod. xiii. 12. '* And this shall
be a token unto thee. When thou hast brought
forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God
upon this mountain."

The openly giving of the law, was therefore the
strongest proof of the legation of Moses, whereby
all doubts and uncertainty, w^hich miracles alone
could not remove, were rendered impossible.
Moses certainly wrought very great miracles, but
not until after the giving of the law, and never as
a proof of the authenticity of his mission ; but only
when circumstances, and the exigencies of the
nation rendered them expedient. Whenever he
reproved the people for their want of faith, he
always referred them to the divine manifestation,
rather than to his own prodigious exploits.

The Israelites, it is true, are further directed by
the Lord, through Moses, to hearken to a prophet
working miracles, if he announce to them the

174 Mendelssohn's reply

divine commands. But according to our religious
system this is only a positive law, the same as that
which directs us to finally judge in law cases,
after the evidence of two witnesses. The evidence
of two witnesses is not therefore infallible, nor yet
is the evidence of miracles ; but a positive law
must speak definitively, and limit our doubts in
order that, whenever an instance of the same kind
occurs, we may have a standing rule to go by, a
rule not left to every one's discretion, but unalter-
ably fixed by the law. Agreeable to our religious
doctrine, belief from miracles is founded on the
law only, and not on the nature of the conviction ;
therefore whoever appeals to miracles, must state
as his ground, the law which enjoins that belief.
But when it is attempted to force upon us by
reasoning, miracles as a criterion of truth ; when
from an illimited faith in the evidence of miracles,
it is even proposed to annul our law, and substitute
a new one for it ; we justly relapse into disbelief;
compare together the miracles, which so many
nations and religions are boasting of; — array all
the rest against each of them respectively, and —
admit none.

These were nearly my thoughts, when I declared
I would undertake the defence of any, and all re-
ligions, by one and the same reasoning. You will
perceive, that those words are, in an equal measure,

TO CHARLES BONNET. 175

owing to the light in which your translator caused
me to see the original. I can therefore never make
use of them again, except perhaps in a defence
against Mr. Lavater, should that become unavoid-
able. However, when I shall have received the
copy of Palingenesy, with which you are favoring
me, I shall instantly read it a second time, in the
original idiom, whenn either the translator's dedica-
tory epistle, nor yet his comments, will put me out
of the proper point of view. And supposing we
should in the end, not coincide in some observations
occurring in your enquiry, I too well know, from
other productions, your not- to-be-mistaken merits,
ever to cease being your admirer.

In conclusion, I heartily accept your tender of
friendship ; it is the most precious gift that could
be bestowed on me ; and I dare not express, with-
out fearing to offend your modesty, how much I
feel obliged to you for it. Having cordially for-
given Mr. Lavater the vexation he caused me, I
ought now to be exceedingly thankful to him : for
it is through his enthusiasm that I enjoy the
happiness of calling myself the friend of Bonnet.
I shall endeavour to render myself more and more
worthy of that title ; and there is nothing I so
much wish for, as an opportunity to prove the
perfect regard and devotion, with which &c.

Moses Mendelssohn.

ADDENDA.

ADDENDA.

NOTES TO MENDELSSOHN S PREFACE.

Note 1.

An article in *'The Hessian Contributions to
Literature and the Arts," 1785, first part, entitled
" The Civil Improvement of the Jews," has the
following' passage : — *'As regards his creed, let
him continue a Jew ; let him have his boys cir-
cumcised ; let him firmly adhere to his notion of
the unity of God ; and as firmly rely on the
coming of a Messiah. The latter opinion, in par-
ticular, no more disqualifies him for the offices
and benefits of civil society, than any Portuguese
forfeits his right of citizenship, because, in his
pious simplicity, he is, to this day, expecting the
return of Doji Sebastian ^

It is worth remarking, that while the Jews
were most furiously driven out of France, in
1180, under Philip II; in 1253, under Lewis IX,

N 2

180 NOTES TO

called the Saint; in 1307, under Philip IV,
called the Fair; and in 1318, under Philip V;
they were constantly tolerated in the very heart
of the kingdom, namely — in the county of
Avignon j for that territory then belonged to the
Popes. Nor is it less singular, that while Christian
sovereigns, from perverted religious zeal, but in
most cases from rapaciousness, persecuted and
massacred them, or expelled them from their
dominions, the Popes, as the heads of Christianity,
indeed, highly commended the princes for their
pious sentiments, as the barbarous persecution
of unoffending subjects was then called, but
themselves, taking advantage of those both morally
\ and politically wrong measures, admitted the
Jews, powerfully and mildly protecting them.

Thus in 1040, Pope Alexander II, protected
the Jews in Spain against Ferdinand I.* And
when, in 1492, Ferdinand V. drove them out of
that kingdom and all his other dominions, with
horrible cruelty. Pope Alexander VI. f conferred
upon him the title of Catholic; but he himself
received 15,000 of these unfortunates at Rome.
*'I1 se moquoit," Basnage very justly observes,

* Basnage Histoire des Juifs. Lib. 7. Cap. 5. p. 1530.

•j- Limborch, Historia Inquisitionis L. 1. c. 24. Basnage

1. c. p. 1874. D>Db»b in:D-Tpn3 b«:n-a« pn'2> in Abar-

banel in his preface to Kings.

Mendelssohn's preface. 181

'* secretement de la folie d' un politique rafin6, qui
depeuploit ses etats d' un nombre considerable
d' habitans riches et habile au commerce ; pendant
qu'il donnoit de grands eloges ä sa pi^te." '*He
(the Pope) secretly laughed at the folly of a re-
fined statesman, who depopulated his states of a
considerable number of opulent subjects, clever
at commerce, while openly he bestowed on him
high praise for his piety." In the great general
persecution of the Jews all over Europe, in 1348
and 1349, Pope Clement VI. only powerfully
preserved the Avignon Jews from it.* Pope
Innocent XII. even lent the Roman Jews
100,000 Scudi at 3 per cent interest, to enable
them to pay their debts. f

The first bull issued by Alexander II., was for
abolishing the practice of compelling Jews to
embrace Christianity. J

Pope John XX. being expostulated with by his
own sister Sangijssa, that as Christ's vice-regent,
he ought not to tolerate Jews in his dominions,
replied : O stuporum Mulieris ! Quibus salvator
ipse pepercit et ut occuli sui pupillam tangui vetuit,

* Trithemius in Chronic. Hirsang. Tom. 2. f. 207 : Solus
Papa Clemens VI. Judseos in Avenione habitantes, al hac
internecione potenter servavit; also^O'p ^1 1'*^ 'jlD'^D MTin"^ ]^^W

t Theatr. Europ. Tom. xv. f. 5056.

■^ Palatinus, De Rebus Gestis Pontifice, Vol. II. Col. 347.

182 NOTES TO

iis non parcamus ? Sed nempe Mulier, colo suee
affixa, haec alta et sublima non capit.*

'' O for a foolish woman! Ought we not to
spare them whom the Saviour himself spared,
and whom he forbade us to injure no more than
his eyeball ? But a woman, in her place at the
spinning wheel only, comprehendeth not those
high and sublime things."

Under Pope Alexander ill., in 1161, a certain
Rabbi lachiel, is said to have been steward of all
the domains, and also major domo— the latter, an
office of great importance.^

And many Canonists are of opinion that Jews
may fill offices even at the Papal Court. The
Roman Canonist Vincent, theologian and mission-
ary, says: ''Cosa mirabile dicono i dottori che
stante lo statuto, che niuno sia eletto ad offici, che
non sia divoto alia santa romana chiesa, i Giudei,
in virtu di tale statuto, non vengono esclusi de
quegli offici, perch^ possono dirsi, fideli e divoti
della santa romana chiesa se pacincamente
convetsano et vi van o fra noi." "■ The teachers
hold forth a singular thing, namely — notwith-
standing the existence of a decree that no one
shall be eligible to an office who is not devoted to
the holy Roman church, Jews are not excluded
from offices in virtue of the said decree ; because

* Basnage. Liv. 7. § 6. p. 1798.

f Wagenseilii Pera Juvenilis. Tom. 2. L. 2. c. a. p. 129.

i

Mendelssohn's preface. 183

they may be called faithful and devoted to the
Roman church, as long as they keep commerce
with, and live peaceably amongst us."* The
learned Papal Jurisconsult de Sufanis, is of that
same opinion, when he says : '' Judeei dicuntur
sen dici possunt, fideles et devoti sanctee Romange
Ecclesiee" — *'the Jews are, or may be called,
faithful and devoted to the holy Roman church. "f

Barios, a Portuguese Jew, therefore j ustly ob-
serves : ''La pontificia Roma siempre los ha pa-
trocinado, des de que destruyo a Jerusalem su
General Tito." — '* Papal Rome always protected
them (the Jews), after Jerusalem was destroyed
by Titus the Roman General. J"

I take this opportunity to describe the ceremony
of the Roman Jews doing homage to a newly-
elected Pope.

The first time a newly-elected Pope proceeded
to the Lateran church, the Jews resident at Rome,
met him at Mount Jordanus, fell down on their
knees, and handed to him the law of Moses, at the
same time beseeching him for protection and grace.
The Pope then gave them the following answer in
the Latin Language, after a set form: ''Dear

* Giovanni Maria Vincent : 11 Messia venuto p. 7»
f Marquardus de Infanis : De Jiidseis et Usuris. Francofort,
]613. in 8. P. 2. c. 2. N. 2. p. 180.
\ Barrios Historia Universali Judaica, p. 13.

184

NOTES TO

Hebrews ! we praise and revere the holy law, as
it was transmitted to your ancestors from Almighty
God, by the hand of Moses : whereas we censure
and condemn both your foolish interpretation of
the same, and your ritual laws, inasmuch as the
apostolic faith teacheth that the Messiah whom
ye are still expecting, has come long since ; for
this faith was preached by Jesus Christ our Lord
and Saviour, who lives and reigns a God along
with the Father and the Holy Ghost, to all eter-
nity."* When Innocent II. fled to France, and
in the year 1246 entered Paris in state, the Jews
living there went to meet him with the Rolls of
the Law, as their highest patron and protector.
And the Pope indeed, gave them a gracious re-
ception, saying amongst others : '' O that God
would remove the veilf which prevents your see-
ing what this law contains. "J The account which
an ancient tourist gives of the ceremony which
the Jews of Rome observed at the installation of
Pope Innocent XII. in the year 1692, is also
interesting. When they handed over to him the

* Hoornbeekii Summarium Controversarium cum Judaeis, lib.
ii. p. 67 ; Mayeri Commentatio de electione Pontificum Roman-
orum, c. viii, p/218 ; Wagenseilii Pera Juvenilis. Tom. ii. cap. i.
p. 130.

-f- Basnage, Histoire des Juifs, lib. vii. cap. x. §. 2. p. 1645.

I Courieuse und vollständige' Reisz— Beschreibung von ganz
Italien. Erster Theil, ]4ter Brief, §. 306. &c.

Mendelssohn's preface. 185

Pentateuch, he said ; ** Legge buona ; ma popolo
maledetto." — '' A good law, but an execrable na-
tion!" On occasion of the Jews' proposing to
present a petition to Urbanus VIII, he issued the
following regulation, which Popes were to observe
ever after on admitting Jews in their presence.
Such audience is given in the antichamber only ;
and when the Jew is going to kiss his slipper, the
Pope draws back his foot, and the Jew must do that
homage to the spot of ground on which the foot
had been resting.* The petitioner is allowed to
speak only in an humble posture, with his head
inclined, and his eyes cast down. Urbanus VIII.
according to his own declaration, ordered this
ceremony : *'non a libris instructus, non a magis-
tro rituum monitus, sed coelitus illuminatus" — not
as taught by books, or advised ^by the master of
the ceremonies, but in consequence of an inspira-
tion from above !t

An instance of singular toleration, as well as a
proof of the great power of gold, was given by
Ferdinand, king of Castile, who once sold the

* This is by no means done as a humiliation, but merely on
account of the cross which is embroidered on the Pope's slippers.
Schudt, jüdische Merkwürdigkeiten. 3 Th. p. 159.

f Matth. Zimmermann Flori Legium Philologico Historicum.
Pars, ii. p. 430.

186 NOTES TO

bishopric of Tarentum for 13,000 ducats to a Jew,
for his son, who had beconie a Christian.*

Martin Luther, whom surely no one will charge
with partiality to the Jews, says : ** I think if the
Jews were kindly used and properly instructed in
holy writ, many of them would become good Chris-
tians, and return to their Fathers, Prophets, and
Patriarchs, from whom they grow more and more
estranged, by being constantly insulted, treated
with superciliousness and contempt, and absolutely
not suffered to be anything ! If the apostles, who
were Jews themselves every one of them, had
behaved towards us Gentiles as we Gentiles be-
have towards the Jews, not one Gentile would
have become a Christian. Then, as the Jewish
apostles acted brotherly by us, it behoves us to
act brotherly by the Jews. Whereas worrying
them, as we do, and imputing to them this and
that, and heaven knows what, how can we ever
expect to do any good with them ?'' This is lan-
guage worthy of the great reformer. There are
passages in his writings, it is true, where he
speaks quite differently of the Jews. But men

* Christoph. Besoldus in Sevile et succincta Narratione rerum
a regibus Hierosolymorum, Neapoleos, Siciliaque gestarum ex
variorum Historicorum collatione repraesentata. Argentorali, 1636,
in 8. c. viii. v. 9. p, 1153. ff.

I

Mendelssohn's preface. 187

ever so free from prejudice and superstition, do
not in all matters, soar above the age they live in ;
nor is it in their power to obliterate youthful im-
pressions.

The question, — whether nursery-maids and go-
vernesses have not contributed more towards the
prejudices against the Jews, than all the Fathers
of the Church together, is not quite so foolish a
one, as it may be imagined.

Note2.

In the Appendix to the Memoirs of Moses Men-
delssohn, (Longman and Co.), will be found a few
brief notices about the famous Wolfenblittle Frag-
ments. An anecdote of the editor of them, will
not be in the wrong place here.

The Vienna Diary of 23rd Nov. 1779, contains
the following article.

'* Lessing, whose talents are too well known and
appreciated to need praise from the feeble pen of
a journalist, has been presented by the Amsterdam
Jews with a purse of 1,000 ducats, in consequence
of certain '' Fragments" published by him. Events
ofthat kind deserve to be publicly noticed, not
only because they offer a convincing proof that
great genius will, at all times, and every where,
excite sensation, but also as a stimulus to others."

The article either must have been borrowed of

188 NOTES TO

soine foreign journal or other, or was without any
particularly sinister design forged by some mis-
chievous wag, who probably knew nothing about
the nature and tendency of the Fragments in
question. However, on the 27th of the same
month, the Diary again states.

*'In our last number, we stated that Lessing,
&c. — The report was perfectly correct. But
having been assured since, by an individual even
more credible than he of whom we had the
original account, that the said Fragments very
much scandalize the Christian religion, and that
Lessing has been severely reprimanded on account
of the publication, we herewith formally retract
whatever we may have said in his praise. The
more, as productions impugning the sanctity of
religion, though boasting ever so much of the
blandishments of learning, are not only undeserv-
ing of applause, but in the highest degree blame-
able."

At first, Lessing wanted his step-son who then
resided at Vienna, to contradict that fabulous
trash in the same paper that broached it. But
the receptacle of falsity, although ready to propa-
gate the defamation of a great man, could afford
no room for his vindication. He then proposed to
have an extra sheet published, for that specific
purpose ; the Vienna censorship however was too

MENDELSSOHN'S PREFACE. 189

much on the alert for him. Despite of the Vienna
censorship, it was at length published at Ratisbon,
andheaded: ''An Exact Statement about the Story
of the Thousand Ducats, or Judas Iscariot the
Second. Nov. 1779;" of which, some hundreds
of copies were smuggled into Vienna, in order
that Lessing's friends as well as an impartial public,
might have an opportunity of judging for them-
selves.

If there was any design at all in inventing and
publishing that romance, it would have been no other
than that of a humorous experiment on Austrian
gullibility. As if the Jews do not know how to
employ their ducats in a more profitable way than
by writing down the Christian or any other reli-
gion ! That it was got up on purpose to humiliate
or vilify Lessing cannot well be imagined ; yet he
replied to the hoax with a degree of seriousness,
far from what things of that kind deserve.

From the Life of Lessing, by his Brother.

Note 3.

''The State," said Frederick II., ''leaves every
one at liberty to gain heaven, after his own fashion ;
if he be but a good citizen on earth."

Note 4.
" Nay, I venture to set down as a commendable

190 NOTES TO

4

trait in the Jewish character, even their steadfast
obedience to the precepts given to their forefathers
by God himself; in which, I trust every one will
concur with me, who does not pretend that all the
world shall see things in the same light, in which
they were wont to be placed before himself from
his youth ; and who is not so fascinated by the
impressions of his own education, as to be unable
to make allowance for similar impressions in others.
That which is irrefragably clear and evident to a
Christian, will sometimes appear dark and incon-
ceivable to a Jew. That which in the latter is
detested as blindness and obduracy, is admired in
the former as virtuous perseverance in what he
believes to be divine revelation. If we want to
judge impartially, how can we blame a fellow-
creature for continuing faithful to certain truths,
so long as he has not arrived at the evidence of
others more sublime, an advantage which, as theo-
logians themselves teach, no man can procure
himself, but which must be the result of an opera-
tion from above, or of what is termed divine
grace?* Acting with even consistency upon
principles which one considers correct and whole-

* Q. What is Faith?

A. Faith is a gift of God infused into our souls, by which we
firmly believe all those things which God has any way revealed
to us. Roman Catholic Catechism.

1

Mendelssohn's preface. 191

some, is what stamps a man's moral worth. Then
who must not feel respect for the Jew, whom
nothing can prevail upon, to forbear or to do aught
that he was taught was commanded, or forbidden
by God ; and who will not despise the vile being,
who, for sordid interest, from false pride, or even
for the sake of gratifying animal passions, forsakes
the religion of his youth, his kindred and his
people, and desecrates and insults another worship
by externally observing its rites without being
internally convinced of its divine institution ?"

Dohm, On the Civil Improvement of the Jews, p. 94.

Note 5.

For particulars of the life of Manasseh Ben
Israel, see Jost, Geschichte der Israeliten 8^c, vol.
viii. p. 251.

When in 1650, Rabbi Manasseh transmitted to
the British Parliament, his celebrated treatise
" The Hope of Israel,'^ in which he petitioned the
admission of the Jews in England, E. S. Middle-
sex, a member of that house expressed his thanks
for the same in the most obliging terms, address-
ing him " To my Dear Brother, the Hebrew Philo-
sopher."* Mosenvale thereupon translated that
Treatise into English, and on that occasion a

* Pantheon Anabaptist, fol. 241.

192 NOTES TO

certain Hery Jersy even wrote a pamphlet under
the title of *' On the Union of the Jews and the
Christians."*

The high esteem in which Rabbi Manasseh, a
man of no less profound than enlightened mind,
was held by learned Christian contemporaries,
appears from the frequent honorable mention the
most eminent Literati made of him, which did no
less honour to themselves. Johannes Beveroviciusl
calls him, '' Vir natalibuset doctrinse nobilissimus,"
— noble both by birth and by learning. D. J.
Fsechtius designates him as '' Celebratissimus La-
tinis scriptis Rabinus," — a Rabbi celebrated for
his Latin works. Dillhern J extols his modesty as
the stamp of true merit, and rare amongst the
learned of his nation. How very beautifully Bar-
loeus sings of him !§

Note 6.
For no other reason but because we are Jews.

* Carol. Memor. Eccles. T. ii. p. 1. lib. vi, cap. v. p. 17.
t In the Appendix to his work, " De Terminae Vitae."
J Caroli I. c. Tom. cap. Ixx. p, 225*

§ Epigramma in Problemata clarissimi Viri Manassis Ben
Israel : De Creatione. How liberal-minded the concluding verse !
Si sapimus diversa, Deo vivamns amici,

Doctaque mens precio constet ubique suo.
Haec fidei vox summa meae est. Hsec crede Manasse,
Sic ego ChristiadeSf sic eris Ahramides.

Mendelssohn's preface. 193

Have such Christians (happily, all are not so) for-
gotten the times, in which, as Tertullian tells us,
the Pagans used to say : ** Bonus vir Caius Sejus,
sed malus tantum quod Christianus est," i. e.
'* Cajus Sejus, it is true, is a good man, but just as
worthless a one, for being a Christian." — TertuL
ApoL adv, Gentes pro Christ, cap. 3.

To exemplify the above quotation by kindred
feelings, we shall have to take only a short walk
back to the middle of the last century. That which
is now done daily and hourly was then considered
a dereliction, and source of scandal. The breach
between Jews and Christians was still so wide,
that the most estimable and liberal Berlin clergy-
men felt shy of holding personal intercourse with
Mendelssohn. They indeed highly respected one
another ; but meet they seldom did, and then as it
were by stealth. At present this will appear in-
credible ; but it is true enough.

Note 7.
Jost. L. c. Vol', viii. p. 214.

Note 8.

Abzugsgelder ; Abschosz. A tax paid by him
who removes with his property to another jurisdic-
tion, a tax tyrannical enough as it is, but most
abominable when people are driven out of a

194 NOTES TO

country, against their will. Quod non mortale
pectora cogif, auri sacra fames I

Note 9.

Jean Calas's fate is too well known to require
being retold. Not so Waser's. The son of a
baker at Zurich, and possessed of good natural
talents, he was intended for the pulpit, but made
also physic and mathematics his study. He ob-
tained in early life the living of Kreutz, but having
fallen out with his vestry at an audit of the Poor
fund, they lodged complaints against him with the
council of Zurich : though they are said not to have
been sufficiently founded, still he was dismissed ;
which bred in him a fierce hatred of the govern-
ment of his Canton. Thereupon he took up his
residence at his native town, subsisting on his
wife's fortune, and, when that became exhausted,
on the produce of his literary labours. His
passion for politics, and perhaps making himself
too busy in public affairs, rendered him obnoxious
to many of his fellow- citizens : yet being a man
of considerable abilities, there were some patri-
cians who would occasionally employ him in
diplomatic missions. It seems, however, that the
implacable grudge which he bore his country, led
him to neglect rather than promote its interest ; of
which several instances were laid to his charge.

Mendelssohn's preface. 195

About that time, Zurich was the scene of a singular
occurrence. A great number of people were taken
seriously ill soon after having been to the sacrament,
owing, as was conjectured, to some deleterious in-
gredient having been mixed up with the wine used
on that occasion ; which flagitious act was imputed
to Waser, but could never be brought home to him.
In the sequel, he attempted to embezzle a most
important state paper, which he had borrowed of
the keeper of the archives, ostensibly for a literary
purpose. For this, and also for having divulged, in
foreign periodicals, secrets relative to the affairs
of Switzerland, he was apprehended and put into
prison ; to escape from which he made a desperate
attempt, but did not succeed. After a lontrial,
he was found guilty of high treason by a very
small majority, and sentenced to be beheaded ;
which sentence he underwent with great fortitude,
the 27th of May, 1780. He was the author of a
valuable treatise on Diplomacy ; and he furnished
also a very clever translation of Lucian's works
from the Greek.

Note 10.
The remarkable will of the wealthy Portuguese
Jew Pinedo, formerly residing at Amsterdam, as
printed in '* Schudtii Memorabilia Judaica," lib.
iv. cap. 18, runs as follows : viz,

o 2

196 NOTES TO

1st. I bequeath to the city of Amsterdam,
after my demise, five hundred thousand guilders
(£41,500).

2nd. I lend the same, one million and a half
guilders, ten years, without interest.

3rd. I make a present of ten thousand guilders
to every Christian church at Amsterdam, and the
Hague ; and to South church,* twenty thousand
guilders.

4th. To every Christian asylum for orphans in
both towns, I make a present of fifteen thousand
guilders.

5th. To the poor, forty shiploads of turf.

6th. To the first orphan that shall regularly
leave the orphan-house, one thousand guilders,
and to the next, five hundred.

7th. I bequeath to the Portuguese synagogue
at Amsterdam two hundred and fifty thousand
guilders.

8th. To the Portuguese asylum for orphans,
thirty thousand guilders.

9th. I lend government one million of guilders,
at the rate of 3 per cent, per annum, on condition
that the interest shall be appropriated to the Jews

* There are four principal churches at Amsterdam, called the
East, West, North, and South churches. The latter is contiguous
to what was formerly called the Jews' quarter or precinct.

Mendelssohn's preface. 197

dwelling at Jerusalem. The principal to belong
to government in perpetuity.

10th. To the German synagogue at Amsterdam,
I bequeath five thousand guilders. To my cousin
Peter Ovis, I bequeath three millions one hun-
dred thousand guilders, together with my
dwelling-house in town, and my country-house.
To my wife, one million of guilders ; and to the
rest of my relations, ten thousand guilders. To
those of my neighbours who shall carry my body
to the grave, one hundred ducats, and to every
single man, one hundred guilders each. To the
readers in the synagogues at Amsterdam and the
Hague, one hundred and fifty guilders, and to the
assistants in the same, seventy-five guilders each.

NOTES TO THE SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT.

Note 1.
In a report on the political condition of the Jews,
laid before the national assembly of Holland,
in 1796, previous to its taking their future destiny
into consideration, it was demonstrated : 1st, that
the very revolution, founded as it was, on the
rights of man, demanded the immediate inclusion
of the Jews in the civil union : 2nd, that the
national assembly represented the Jews, the same
as it did all the other citizens ; and : 3rdly, that
by ignoring any part soever of the population, it
would vitiate its own legitimacy. That doctrine
having been firmly established, the old and thread-
bare arguments against Jewish emancipation were
marshalled into the field, but soon beaten out
of it again. It is the practice of every wise
state, observes the report, to receive aliens, who
take upon themselves all civic duties ; * and

* It is said in the Talmud, (Tract Chetuboth, fol. iii.) *' When
persecuted and exiled Israel departed from their native land,
and were dispersed amongst all the nations on earth, the Lord
made them swear that they would never seek to regain pos-

200

NOTES TO

recognize them as citizens, without any regard to
their former condition and relations. The dogma
of the Messiah is itself no impediment ; as may
be satisfactorily seen in a treatise by the late
David Friedrichsfeld,* which proves that it is
forbidden to use any efforts for accelerating the
figurative kingdom of the Messiah, and that a
malediction is entailed even on the calculators of
its coming, t

session of Jerusalem by main force ; that they would be good
and trusty subjects to the governments under which they might
happen to dwell, and never act in defiance of their laws. If ye
keep your vow, said the Lord, it will be well with ye ; but if
you do not, I shall leave ye a prey to your oppressors, like the
wild beasts of the forest. Thus, a serious threat is held out to
every Israelite, against violating the laws of any country in which
he may happen to live. Talmud, (Tract Baba Bathra, p. 54, 55)
positively says: "The laws of a king who is not an Israelite
are perfectly valid, and may not be disobeyed."

Maimonides, too, is very comprehensive on that subject, in
Tract Mathanah, (Sect. 4. Max. 11-14) where, amongst other
things, he says : "As to validity, there is not the least difference
between the laws of an Israelite king and those of a non-
Israelite one."

* Remarks on Professor Van Swinden's Speech. Rotterdam,
1796.

t Jost. L. c. vol. ix. p. 119. Samuel Jerichinse, a celebrated
Talmudist, and eminent physician, of whom >'W1 (R. Sal.
larchi) remarks, he had four by-names given him, viz :
1, Jerichince, great Astronomer, from ni*' Moon, and nM3
beautiful. 2, "l^pW Shakod, diligent Theologian. 3, ^inw
Arioch, king ; because his judgments, particularly in civil cases,
were considered by the Babylonish Jews, as final and binding as

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 201

Note 2.

One would suppose a critic, who borrows all
his weapons from the Pentateuch, better versed in

those of the sovereign ; and 4, niDbü Tl^tt? Sahur malca, which
means nearly the same thing, namely — that he was as highly
honoured as the Persian monarch himself. He lived towards
the end of the fortieth century from the creation, and thus
longer than 1,600 years ago. It was he who said Dbl2?n ^'^l ]*»M

mbn niDbü -nnis^a? «bw n^ts^xin mzs'^b ntn. Maimonides

says the same towards the end of Hilchath Melachim 1"1^N
yy^ pn ]'^S D^^S^n i. e. the just idea of a Messiah contains
neither more nor less than that a time will come, when the delivery
of the Jews from oppression and burdens will take place ; that is,
when they will participate in the rights of man, like other
civilized human beings.

This exposition, emanating from such competent judges, serves
as a Norma for rendering different other passages in the Talmud ;
and is, upon the whole, considered highly important. The
greatest Jewish literati concur in this opinion ; amongst
whom may be reckoned Maimonides, whose sentiments on
this vital point, are most interesting to theologians. He says :

b\a i2n3»D nnn bi£)n'' n^mzan miQ^ntr? nbn \v nbr*» b«
cbii: sb« / n'^tC'S-Q ntt?2?»n wr\>n rws '>it is / nbi3?

•^>nt»v bsnt^^ vn^a? nnnn v^^ : m^m btr?D / ioi v^-i'» >ia
: ^o^ ^rvnx£l^ sbi n^sn mb nbD intn^'i / loi ni:5ib

i. e. Let it not be thought, that in the days of the Messiah,
any thing will be done away with in the system of the world,
or that there will be any thing new in the creation ; but the
world will continue on the same system as it always was. And
as to what is said, (Isaiah xi. 6.) "the wolf also shall dwell
with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, &;c."
That is a simile and figure, the real meaning of which is, that
the Jews shall dwell in peace and safety; that they shall

202 NOTES TO

that work than to put the Sabbath on a parallel
with the rites of sacrifices. The former is one

all return to the true faith, and no longer hurt or destroy.
(Yad Hachasaka, vol. iv. Tract, Kings, chap, xii.) The Jew, who,
with Jerichinse and Maimonides, can conceive the promised re-
demption of Israel, without the hyperbolic adjuncts of signs and
prodigies, sylvan and marine monsters, &c. ; but simply as a
period when his nation will be more humanely treated in the
lands in which they dwell, less insulted, and put on an equality
with the rest of the inhabitants ; he, I say, who can conceive the
ultimate and universal emancipation in this national and rational
manner, must also know that a sudden and simultaneous com-
plete civilization and refinement of the Jews is not within the
range of possibility, particularly when their diiFerent habits and
manners in different countries are considered. Even the ancient
Talmudical authors were sensible of the futility of such an ex-
pectation. Accordingly, they declared that the deliverance of
the Jews, i. e. their promotion to the rank of citizens, and
respected beings, will, at some time or other, become universal
by degrees, the same as day gradually breaks forth after* the
dawn of morning has appeared.

/ m-n^b mman nbrab n^wM^ n^nn nsinn^n nb'j«an
b«nr»^ "^sn ntt?« v"^wn nisss 2?m«s / nan^b nD^DD
/ nn«b nn^ / t:j37^ tsijü nb'^vw •^^l^^-r nb^SD / uw anno»
nD i^t i^v itt?'))!2 TW1 / urn n^^i^'} nb<h n'Dwn i^v'Dn^w iv

I n'27 li^'n« npi?^ ^nn rb'^'^^ 'sn Tnn wii^wn cnb m-^^w i^
noi wiiwn lb nnri vm --^nmn nibi? 137 ^'n^J ti?^w p:i«"'i

i. e. the final redemption of Israel will be brought on step by
step, from one country to another, in the four quarters of the
globe, where the Israelites are dispersed ; and like the dawn of
morning, which breaks forth slowly and by degrees, until the
darkness of night subsides and daylight prevails, and then, yet
a short while elapses ere the sun shines ; the Israelites will be

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 203

of the Ten Commandments, and an institution no
less necessary than salutary, benevolent, and
merciful. It was given **für all generations,"
*'for a perpetual covenant,'' '* as a sign between
the Lord and the Children of Israel for ever,"
(Exod. xxxi. 16.), and to be wholly independent
of times and places. Whereas sacrifices were
ordained later, for the sake of weaning the people
from idolatrous worship ; and they could be law-
fully performed in the Temple of Jerusalem
only, and on no other spot, even in the land of
Judsea (Deut. xii). Thus they must, of ne-
cessity, cease upon the destruction of the second
and last temple. That, nevertheless, the public
sacrifices are being continued to this day, at the
regularly appointed times and seasons, if not
virtually, at least, commemoratively, is too much
to expect to be known by one who does not
belong to the congregation of Jacob.

Note 3.
The first part of that assertion, I shall content
myself with calling gratuitous ; although it might
deservedly be characterised by a certain emphatic

gradually retrieving tlieir rank as a nation, and, finally, the sun
of success will shine on them. This is glanced at (Gen. xxxii. 24.)
where it is said of the Patriarch Jacob (whom the Cabalists
regard as a type of the Hebrew nation,) "And there wrestled a
a man with him until the breaking of the day, &c. — and as he
passed over Penuel, the sun rose upon him,"

204 NOTES TO

monosyllable, were it not for fear of offending
polite ears. But let us see what the Reverend
A. L. Loe wen stamm, chief Rabbi at Emden, an
excellent Hebrew theologian of the modern
school, says on the subject.* Maimonides
teaches (Tract, Kings, Sect. 9) God gave Adam,
the first man, six commandments, viz : 1 , to
forbear worshipping idols; 2, reviling the true
God ; 3, shedding innocent blood ; 4, committing
incest; 5, stealing; and 6, perverting justice.
Properly speaking, we know this traditionally,
down from the times of Moses; but in the Talmud
it is further illustrated by references to Scripture.
Noah, however, received a seventh commandment:
'* Flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood
thereof, shall ye not eat." (Gen. ix. 4.)

He then goes on (Sect. 8.) — "Moses gave his
laws and precepts unto the Israelites only.'*
'* Moses commanded us a law, even the inheritance
of the congregation of Jacob." (Deut. xxxiii. 4.)
Any one belonging to another nation, and desirous
of embracing the Mosaic faith, is accepted as a
co-religionary ; but he who does not feel inclined
to do so, may not be persuaded, and much less
forced to go over to Judaism. But Moses cer-
tainly ordered in the name of God, to compel if

* Der Talmudist wie er ist, oder wir sind alle Menschen^
Emden, 1822. The Talmudist as he is, or we are all men alike.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 205

possible all the inhabitants of the earth, to acknow-
ledge the seven commandments given to Adam
and Noah. A stranger who acknowledged and
kept those seven Noachide precepts, was called :
Gher toshab, a resident stranger, according to the
best translations. For such strangers only were
allowed to domiciliate in the Holy Lsnd. The
Talmud further calls them, pious strängen ^ and
declares them participators of eternal life ; but
they must not have adopted those precepts from a
natural impulse, but on account of their being the
holy commandments of God.*

* Maimonides indeed still adds another clause, namely, that a
pious non-Israelite is bound to believe also that Moses taught
the seven Noachide commandments. But as that clause appears
no where in the Talmud, and is therefore a tenet of Maimoni^es's
only, to which, as such, no legal force is allowed, it might hare
been left unnoticed here. Yet, on the other hand, lest we be
charged with seeking to impose on the reader, by garbled and
trimmed quotations, by no means an uncommon practice with
theological writers, we thought it would be better to let it stand :
particularly as, on second consideration, Maimonides appears to
be right, because all religions are notoriously founded on the
Mosaic ; and universal history antecedent to Moses, and
the notion of a true God, would still be greatly involved in
darkness, but for the authenticity of the Mosaic records being
generally acknowledged. Consequently, there is no religious
person who does not believe in Moses and in his writings, although
none but an Israelite is bound to follow his precepts. Thus,
whoever acquiesces in the seven Noachide injunctions, cannot
but also take for granted that they were promulgated by Moses ;
the only circumstance of the clause not being found in the Tal-
mud, precluding its being considered as a law.

206 NOTES TO

Again (Sect. 10.) ^'Generally as to benevo-
lence and charity, which cement the consUMction
of human society, those pious strangers are con-
sidered perfectly the same as Israelites ; while any
thino- which the law contains of an exclusive
nature, refers to rank idolatrous Pagans only. And
as regards even them, the Talmud enjoins us to visit
their si<ik, bury their dead, and relieve their poor,
as if they were Israelites." Nay does not scrip-
ture expressly say, (Psalm cxlix. 9.) *' God is
good to all, and merciful to all his creatures."
And Solomon speaking of the Law, calls out (Prov.
ii. 17.) ''Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and
all her paths are peace."

Tiie golden rules found in those noble and phi-
Ifjnthropic sentiments of the great Maimonides, are
all derived from the Talmud of which he is the
faithful epitomizer; and from them it appears,
that the observance both of the written and oral
law of Moses, is an obligation on Israelites only,
an obligation which cannot cease as long as they
are Israelites. Whereas other nations are not only
not bound to follow them, but — as God's supreme
wisdom has deemed them fit for the Israelites
only — they must not even expect a divine reward
for a voluntary observance of them, if they do not
formally embrace the Jewish religion. The seven
Noachide precepts, on the contrary, every descen-

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT» 207

dant of Adam is bound to observe ; and whoever
obeys them is called a pious non- Israelite, v^ho
will be an heir to eternal bliss, and has an equal
claim with the Israelite to our beneficence ; and
generally to every tie of man in a state of society.
Hence, if the nations amongst whom we live had
descended from the Israelit] sh race, they would,
according to the Jewish system, have inherited
from their fathers the obligation to keep the
Mosaic law, and their acting against it might be
considered unlawful. But they did not. All the
Christians existing in our days, are of Pagan and
not of Jewish extraction. For besides that history
enumerates all the Pagan nations, who were the
parent stock of the Christians now dwelling around
us, Scripture also offers the strongest proof of it.
IntheActs of the Apostles, on occasion of a dispute
about w^hether Paul had been right in not intro-
ducing circurr.cision amongst the Gentiles, (Acts
XV. 13—14.) it is said : *' And after they had held
their peace, James answered, saying. Men and
brethren, hearken unto me : Simeon hath declared
how God at the first did visit the Gentiles to take
out of them a people for his name."' {Ibid, 19--^
20.) '^ Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble
not them which from among the Gentiles are
turned to God : but that we write unto them that
they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from for-

208 NOTES TO

nication, and from things strangled, and from
blood." And (chap. xxi. 20 — 21.) James says to
Paul : *' Thou seest, brother, how many thousands
of Jews there are which believe ; and they are all
zealous of the Law. And they are informed of
thee that thou teachest all the Jews, which are
amongst the Gentiles, to forsake Moses, saying,
that they ought not to circumcise their children,
neither to walk after the custom, &c." (^Ibid. 25.)
'' As touching the Gentiles which believe, we have
written and concluded that they observe no such
things, save only that they keep themselves from
things offered to idols, &c." And that Paul did
act upon that resolution, he clearly states in his
epistle to the Galatians (chap. ii. 8 — 9.) '* For he
that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship
of the circumcised, the same was mighty in me
toward the Gentiles, &c. They gave to me and
Barnabas the right hand of fellowship ; that we
should go unto the heathens, and they unto the
circumcision." And zealously as that intelligent
apostle declaims against circumcision, in his
epistles, particularly in that to the Romans, yet
he nowhere maintains that Israelites need not be
circumcised, but on the contrary, says : (Rom. ii.
25.) " For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou
keep the law, but if thou be a breaker of the law
thy circumcision is made uncircumcision." And in

1

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 209

this the apostle agrees with the Israelitish laws ;
for circumcision alone does not make a Jew, nor
does baptism alone make a Christian. The ordi-
nance of circumcision is only an initiation into Ju-
daism : for the remainder, every thing depends on
the circumcision of the foreskin of the heart. Thus
says Moses (Deut. xxx. 6.): *' And the Lord thy
God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of
thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine
heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayst live."
{Ibid, X. 19): ''Circumcise therefore the foreskin
of your heart and be no longer stiff-necked."
Likewise, (Jeremiah iv. 4): ''Circumcise yourselves
to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your
heart, ye men of Judah, and inhabitants of
Jerusalem, &c." and more the like. But that Paul
himself did never forsake the law of Moses, he ex-
pressly declares to Festus, (Acts xxv. 8) : " Nei-
ther against the laws of the Jews, neither against
the temple, nor yet against Csesar have I offended
any thing at all."

From the foregoing, it appears palpably true,
that of all the Israelites who at that time became
converts to Christianity, none ever went a step out
of the Mosaic law ; and that it was only the newly
converted Gentiles whom the apostles (and accord-
ing to the above- quoted doctrine of Maimonides
very justly) exonerated from that law.

210 NOTES TO

Thus the Christians of the present day who
notoriously follow the apostolic tenets, doubtlessly
are of Pagan race, and on no account bound to
keep the law of Moses ; nor may they expect
divine reward for voluntarily observing the same,
as long as they do not formally embrace the Jewish
religion. The seven Noachide precepts alone,
which the apostles themselves have enjoined, they
are bound to keep as divine commandments ; and
if they do keep them, they may, according to the
declaration of the Talmud, be sure of inheriting
eternal felicity.

That the Christian religion, in respect to doctrine,
is as wide from the Jewish as heaven is from earth,
is a fact too universally acknowledged to require
further demonstration. That an Israelite believes
his share of eternal felicity will be much greater
than that of a non-Israelite, can be as little found
fault with, as he himself can find fault with the
follower of any other religion, for also putting in a
claim to superlative beatitude. It is sufficient
that we know from the Talmud, our only code,
that the gates of heaven are open not only for an
Israelite but also for a Gentile, who, conformably
to the said divine commandments, walks in the
path of virtue and morality ; and that eternal
felicity will be the portion of the one as well as of
the other.

1

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 211

I said, a Gentile who conscientiously keeps the
seven Noachide precepts may expect eternal life.
Not so an Israelite, who should presume to dero-
gate from his duty by observing those seven pre-
cepts and none else of the Mosaic law : he will not
find the gates of heaven open to him, as they are to
the Gentile. Yes, my brethren, to the Gentile only,
to whom divine wisdom has deemed proper to give
no more than those seven commandments, and who
consequently by keeping them fully discharges his
duty ; to him^ I repeat, eternal felicity is allotted
in a degrte consistent with divine justice. But we,
Israelites born, who are in duty bound to regulate
our life and morals after the maxims contained
both in the law and in the Talmud, we are not at
liberty to palter with a duty imposed upon us by
the religion of our forefathers, because it may seem
burdensome to our weak judgments or our earthly
desires. The God of Faith will gravely visit every
disobedience to his paternal laws. Yes, we are all
sinners, every one of us, as the royal sage declares
(Prov. XX. 9): ''Who can say, I have made my
heart clean, I am pure from my sin ?'* But, on the
other hand, the great Psalmist pours healing balm
into the wounded heart by saying (Psal. ciii. 13,
14): '* Like as a father pitieth his children, so the
Lord pitieth them that fear him ; for he knoweth
our frame, he remembereth that we are dust." And

p 2

212 NOTES TO

even when the children incense their father, he
chastises them severely ; but still chastises them
like a father. But he who, by denying his father,
contumaciously and rebeliiously deserts from his
post — Oh, his end will be dreadful I The lamp of
life goes out ; no one attends him — no one cares —
no one mourns for him. Nor will he ever see the
dawn of ''that morning." (Psal. xlix. 14.) Besides,
my brethren, it has been shewn that, according to
the primitive spirit of the Christian religion. Pagans
only who embraced the same were exonerated
from Jewish observances ; but that its adoption by
Israelites, did not by any means release them from
the ceremonial duties of their fathers. And, ac-
cordingly, the apostles themselves continued to
observe the Mosaic statutes. For the apostle
James roundly declares: *' The Jews which be-
lieved were all zealous of the law."

Whereas, to the Christians (descended as has
been proved from Pagan race, and at no time sub-
jected to the law) who faithfully observe the seven
Noachide precepts, made incumbent on them by
God, we may, on the authority of the Talmud and
of Maimonides, guarantee eternal felicity.

And Christians certainly do keep the seven
Noachide precepts. For that the Christian wor-
ship cannot be called idolatry, must appear to
every one who is any way acquainted with the

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 213

New Testament, their principal book of faith. And
it is distinctly said in the book Orach Chayim,
(sect. 156), that the Christian religion is, anything
but idolatry.* This is not the place to engage in
such subtleties abstractedly ; nor am I at any time
given to meddle with them. All I would say is,
that from the true spirit of both the Jewish and the
Christian religion, they may be compared to two
pyramids of which the apices are perfectly alike ;
but from them downward they vary in a great
many respects.

Seeing that the Christians, 1st. do not practise
idolatry ; 2nd. do not revile the true God ; 3rd.
shed no innocent blood ; 4th. do not commit
incest ; 5th. nor theft ; 6th. uphold justice.
7th. eat not flesh with the life thereof; and are
thus ruled by the injunctions of the apostles, who
evidently borrowed all this from the laws of Moses. f

* The doctrine of Orach Chayim, that the Christian worship is
any thing but idolatry, applies of course only to Christians
sprung from Pagan race, to whose ancestors heathen Polytheism
was forbidden by the apostles. Israelites are just as accountable
for the slightest aberration from the unity system of their Old
Testamentary creed as for outright idolatry. And this is the soul
and substance of the Jewish religion. See Maimon. Tract. Tesoda
Hathora, Sect. 1. Dog. 6. and Tract Aboda Zara, Sect. 2. Dog. 1.

•f In this, methinks, I have discovered the reason why the Chris-
tians, contrary to the apostle's will in the above-quoted texts, do
not abstain from blood and things strangled. Because, as said

214 NOTES TO

then, what is a Christian, but a so called pious non-
Israelite, to whom both the Talmud and Maimo-
nides award eternal felicity, and to whom they en-
join us to shew kindness and charity, the same as
to our Israelitish brethren? And, according to the
latter, as to what regards taking interest, that rule
both of Moses and of the Talmud about dealing with
a foreigner "^n^^ (one who has no fixed settlement,
is here to-day and gone to-morrow) has not the
slightest reference to Christians, whom we certainly
cannot call co-religionaries, though we may call
them fellow-men and brethren, and are not in any
way whatsoever allowed to injure them.

Not but what the Christian religion has been
shockingly brutified in former ages ; and made to
appear not unlike idolatry : for nothing but idola-
try could have suggested the horrible deeds of the
Crusaders, — the night of Saint Bartholomew, —
the pyres of the sanguinary Inquisition, &c. &c.
as propitiatory of a God who is all mercy, who
requires no human sacrifices, no human blood*
But as the Christians were then not far enough

before, they were bound to keep only the seven Noachide pre-
cepts as true religious laws ; and the rest was added by the
apostles, merely in order to keep the Neophites to abstemious-
ness, as they themselves say (Acts xv. 29) : " From which if
ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well." And the latter Christian
preachers, therefore, thought it best to confine the duties of their
churches to the original precepts, without extending them.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 215

removed from their Pagan origin ; they still had a
hankering after that sort of worship ; the same as,
with the Israelites, the propensity of w^orshipping
calves notoriously, did not wear away until several
ages after the deliverance from Egypt.

Hence the Talmudists who lived in those woful
days, justly took Christianity for nothing else but
idolatrous worship, or remodelled heathen mytho-
logy ; and accordingly considered the laws made
against the latter, applicable also to the former.

But the farther the Christians got removed from
their origin, the more absurd the Pagan religion
began to appear to them, and the more congruent
their own. The dark clouds dispelled by degrees,
the sun-rays pierced through, and the Lord said :
'^ Let there be light!"

Well then, my brethren, idolatry has in a very
great measure disappeared from the earth. It is
only amongst inaccessible nations and amongst
savages that it does still exist ; and there are yet
countries where Christian politics and Christian
avarice, even now, do not blush to countenance and
protect it amongst the benighted aborigines. But
all the nations around us believe in one God, in the
Supreme Being, the Creator of heaven and earth.
He, our God, who gave us his Holy Law which, as
said before, we may on no account palter with or
depart from, is the same God who has deemed it fit

216 NOTES TO

for his wise and inscrutable purpose, to withhold
that law from the ancient Pagans, the progenitors
of the present Christians, and to limit them to
the above-mentioned seven Noachide precepts,
which constitute what is now technically called
the religion of nature, in contradistinction to
positive, i. e. revealed religion. The Christian
descendants of those Pagans, conscientiously
keep the seven precepts as the commands
of that great God ; and therefore are, to all in-
tents and purposes, pious non-Israelites, who may
expect eternal life, and who, as fellow-men, are our
brethren ; and the exercise of benevolence, charity,
and kind offices to them must not be ostentatiously
placed altogether to the score of the fine sensibi-
lities of nature, or to that of fashionable cosmopo-
lite philanthropy, but, according to the Talmud and
Maimonides, be, with us, the same that it would
be in respect to an Israelite ; namely, a sacred
duty dictated by the law. Therefore» my brethren,
God forbid that under the cover of the law meant
against the Pagans, we should, in the most indirect
manner deceive or prejudice our Christian brethren,
or do unto them aught which we would think
wrong to do to our brethren in the faith.

And ye, too, ye well-thinking amongst the
Christians, who, indeed, differ with us on doctrinal
points, yet, as men, have no reason to be ashamed

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 217

to call US brethren, let the sun now shining forth
never be darkened again ; let superstition and
prejudice no longer prevail over your better feel-
ings. Clear aw^ay the rubbish of nursery and
pedagogic reminiscences. Away with national
animosity ; dismiss from your thoughts the pre-
posterous idea of a vengeance which God never
commissioned you with, which God never will
reward you for. Let us give each other the hand
of fraternity. Why may we, who shall one day
live together, in regions above, an eternity without
hatred, controversy, or jealousy, not commence
so desirable a life already here below ? Why may
we not yet, in our times, exclaim with the great
king, (Psalm xlvii. 1. 2.) ' O clap your hands,
all ye people ; shout unto God with the voice of
triumph. For the Lord most high is terrible;
he is a great king over all the earth ? '

Note 4.

So they are to a Mahometan ; and the so much
extolled Hindoo will demolish, on the spot, any
cooking vessel of his that has been touched by a
Christian. A Jew does not reject viands, merely
for having been prepared by Christian hands, or
by any hands whatsoever ; but because they may
contain ingredients either altogether forbidden, or
not allowed to be made up together. Whatever

218 NOTES TO

he may lawfully eat at his own table, he may as
lawfully eat in company with, and even out of the
hands of Christians.

As to drink : — we certainly know that strictly
religious Jews will not drink wine that has not
been made by Jews. Such wine is called ^02 J^*»
or libation wine ; and the prohibition, probably,
aimed at keeping the Jews from carousing along
with their pagan neighbours, who, before they
entered upon their potations, notoriously used to
offer some of the liquor to Bacchus, or some other
deity, as a libation. In a country where the Jews
generally grew, and made their own wine, that
restriction, which does not affect any other
beverage, could not have been attended with
great inconvenience. But as the supposed motive
has long ceased to exist, the rule also is but very
partially observed ; and attended to only in re-
ligious ceremonies, which require the use of
wine.

Note 5.

This has never been disputed. With the Jews,
marriage is, and always was a civil contract, and
not merely an '* unessential point of religion,'^ as
the author of the ''Search," &c., calls it. According
to their marriage laws, laid down in the Talmud,
(Seder Nashim, Tract. Kediishim chap. 1), and

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 219

which are in force at the present day, there are
three modes of marrying, viz — money ; a deed ;
and cohabitation : and technical proof of any one of
those three processes constitutes a legal marriage.
Placing a ring on tlie finger of a marriageable
female,* with her consent, in the presence of two
witnesses, and at the same time pronouncing the
Formula: ''With this ring I wed thee according
to the Law of Moses and Israel," is also held a good
marriage. The Chuppa or Canopy, under which
the Rabbi> or Chazan, reads to the bridal pair a
'pro forma deed of settlement, in the ancient
Chaldee tongue, of which neither they nor any
one else present, and at times not even he who
reads it, understands a single Vv^ord ; the versicles
and benedictions which follow thereon, and, after
the wedding dinner, are introduced merely for the
sake of giving solemnity and publicity to the
transaction. The omitting of those ceremonies,
certainly, would be deemed indecent, but not by
any means vitiate the contract, ,or nullify the
marriage, which, according to the Jewish laws,
can be effected only by another civil process ; but

* The ring (which is likewise under the Chuppa placed on the
bride's finger, with the same formula) is nothing else but a symbol
or representative of a valuable consideration, one of the modi
acquirendi named above, and is therefore required to be of pure
gold. Probably the almost general custom of marriage rings is
of Jewish origin.

220 NOTES TO

not until after a patient and thorough consideration
of such reasons, circumstances, and conditions, as
are distinctly enumerated and fixed by those laws.
In Holland, too, marriage is a civil engagement,
which, in the first instance, must be entered into
before the secular authorities ; and may or may
not, at the option of the parties concerned, be
afterwards repeated, or hallowed in the Church,
Mosque, or synagogue. But all the Priests,
Ulemas, or Rabbis in the world cannot un-
bastardize the offspring of a mere Church, Mosque,
or Synagogue marriage, or make of the mother an
honest woman, as the saying is; whereas any
Justice of the Peace, without distinction of re-
ligion, can. Women are daily made honest (civilly
re-married) when the faculty of giving scandal has
been long extinct; and children re-born(legitimated)
when they are already with one foot in the grave.
Since the Revolution, they manage those things
in the same manner in France.

Note 6.
Religions are mere forms ; they change and
perish like all other terrestrial things. But
Religion is eternal, and always the same. The
exigencies of human nature, however, required
that the Eteimal should be blended with the
Evanescent. Marvel not, therefore, at the variety
of those forms— at their instability and decay.

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 221

Strip the spirit of its envelope, and you shall
discover, in all religions, only one eternal re-
ligion.— Schlachter, in Jedidia, 18 J 8.

Wote 7.

No age has been so barren that it did not pro-
duce, amongst the Jevv^s, some individual or other
distinguished for learning, genius, and talent.
Such an individual, hov^ever, generally lived in ob-
scurity— stood, as it were, alone in the w^orld, un-
noticed, unencouraged, unpatronised ; frequently
harrassed and oppressed ; if not alvv^ays by man-
kind, at least by adverse circumstances, and
mortifying positions — in a word, by the, in many
respects, absurd construction of society (an
invisible evil, and, on that account, all the more
pernicious to the lovers of truth) and was separated
from the rest of hisco-religionaries. As, on chang-
ing his religion, he almost invariably changes also
his name, he could no longer contribute to the
fame of Jewry, or be an ornament to it. If the
individual and his productions were not lost to
it, the glory was. How many illustrious names
of that description might be mentioned ? How
many of them creditably fill academical chairs
even now ? and how many hold high offices in
the state, who, though not born themselves in

222 NOTES TO

the Jewish faith, are directly descended of
Israelites ? *

Accordingly, neither the most inveterate bigot, nor
the most rancorous Jew-haters, ever pronounced
them destitute of intellec1;yal powers. On the
contrary, they ridiculously gave them credit for
more than natural sagacity, merely in order to
have an opportunity of bitterly inveighing against
the abuse they said they made of it, on all oc-
casions in ordinary life. In this, however, they
agreed, that it was utterly impossible that any
sense of morality could ever develop itself amongst
that people. And the insult was carried that
length, that, in a critique, in the Göttingen Literary
Advertiser, of Lessing's Drama, called '' The
Jews," the reviewer, without more ado, laid
down the axiom : There can he no such thing as an
honest m an amongst th e Jetos ! — M endelssohn
APPEARED. If, without a regular education,
without foreign culture, but solely by the sur-
prising energy of his mind, and by his native
genius, this Jew lad could soar to this height of
morality; if he can unite in his heart, true piety,

* An interesting literary task, to be recommended to an
Israelite, would be that of forming a catalogue of ex-Judeis, who
enriched the republic of letters with their works, only during
the last three centuries. Materials will not be wanting. He
might begin with the great Chancellor, Michael de VHopital, and
close with ; taking no notice of those still alive.

SEARCH FOR LIGNT AND RIGHT. 223

complete resignation to the divine will, and uni-
versal philanthropy, why may not many other lads
of his nation, equally as well ? — was one question
irresistibly forcing itself upon the reflecting.
Does not the glorious instance of this young man
prove beyond all contradiction, that with due
encouragement, proper education, and culture, the
mass of Jewry may be transformed into useful
subjects, and ultimately into respectable citizens ?
was another question naturally arising from the
former. Reason, experience, the example of
other nations, true, unadulterated holy religion,
all took thß Israelites' part. Those thoughts kept
germinating in the breasts of enlightened states-
men, under the government of some of the wisest
princes ; slowly, it is true, until, in the reign of
the friend and protector of justice and virtue, they
produced excellent fruit. The questions were
answered in the affirmative, and the cause of
humanity was decided. Heartless beings only,
partly from ignorance, partly from selfishness, and
fear of losing the monopoly of the rights and
advantages of citizens, dare, even in our days, to
vociferate No, No ! But they are not listened to ;
their coarse clamour dies away upon the air ; and
ere long, people will be as ashamed of doubting
the justness and propriety of the answer, as is,
already now, almost every village schoolmaster of

224 NOTES TO

repeating the axiom of the Göttingen Re-
viewer.

Mendelssohn's confidence in the force of truth
was unlimited, and not to be shaken. In all but
the circumspectness, which his peculiar position
prescribed in following his presumed destin-
ation, he was as wide from hypocrisy as from
fear of men. In this he resembled his highly
revered friend, whom he, to the last moment,
acknowledged as his teacher and model. Lessing's
opinions were to him oracles. '' I do not know,"
says Lessing, somewhere, *' I do not know
whether it is our duty to sacrifice happiness and
life to truth ; at least the courage and resolution
which that requires, are qualities which we cannot
give ourselves. But this I know, that if we want
to preach truth, it is our bounden duty to preach
it clearly and plainly, without inuendos. without
reservations, without want of confidence in its
power of convincing ; and the qualities which this
requires, are at our command. He who has taken
no pains to acquire those qualities, or, when ac-
quired, does not exert them, who seeks to divest
us of gross errors, while he withholds from us
the whole truth, and wants ta put us off with
something between that and falsehood, makes
himself but little deserving of the human under-
standing. For, the more palpable the error, the

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 225

shorter and straighter the road to truth ; refined
errors, on the contrary, may keep us for ever
removed from it, as they are so much more
difficult to be detected as such." Hence the
hypocritical and double-tongued, particularly the
religious, were extremely odious to him. He
would labour to find grounds of excuse, even for a
renegado, who acted openly and candidly; but
the dissembler he treated with ineffable con-
tempt. This, too, was in the spirit of his friend
Lessing, who says : *' He who is faithless to truths
when danger threatens, may be her ardent lover
notwithstanding ; and she will forgive the de-
fection, on consideration of the attachment.
Whereas, he who only strives to pass off truth,
under all sorts of masks and disguises, may be,
if any thing. Truth's pimp ; her lover, I am sure,
he never was. And I scarcely can imagine any
thing so vile as such a pimp to Truth."

His mode of, on the one hand, manfully con-
tending for the rights and privileges of reason, and
on the other, giving no offence to his orthodox
brethren, was properly understood by only a few
of his more confidential disciples. He quietly
pursued his course, and was fain to avoid collision.
As he held no office in his congregation, his con-
duct was not liable to the animadversions of

226 NOTES TO

either the strict or the free. Whenever reform
happened to be the topic in his circle, he fre-
quently would check the youthful and sanguine,
by, " Be not too hasty ; " and the timorous and
yielding, by, ** Despair not. There is a time and
season for every thing under the Sun." On those
maxims, he persevered in his labors, always in
good spirits, calm, and trusting in God. In his
Hebrew commentary on the book of Ecclesiastes,
which he published without naming himself, and,
as it is announced on the title-page, for the benefit
of indigent students, he ventured to arrange that
ancient work after a new division, and to inform
the reader, in the preface, with the elegance and
quaintness peculiar also to his oriental style : that
in this exposition he had availed himself of non-
Israelite authors as well.

i.e.'' seeing that our ancient doctors enjoined
us to receive the truth of whomsoever renders it, I
searched also the works of non-Israelite commen-
tators; and what of truth I found in them, I
saved for the glory of God, to whom it is dedi-
cated." A very bold declaration, in those days!
In the admirable preface to his translation of the

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 227

Five Books of Moses, he went yet a great step
farther, and under his own name too, namely-— he
recommended to his brethren, the reading of the
works of the very learned, but withal very inde-
pendently-thinking VvoiQ^^ox Eichhorn of Göttingen,
particularly his introduction to the Old Testament,
a work which has since become a source of know-
ledge and light to theological Tyros, and a guide
to the proper study of the sacred writings. It
was curious enough, that while ardent and cou-
rageous youth thought he had performed his
translation of the Pentateuch with too nervous a
diffidence, his more aged and soberer frien<is ap-
prehended the most unpleasant consequences from
the too great a latitude, they thought he had
taken. They only, who stood near enough to
him, and took an interest in watching the results
of his efforts, could form a correct judgment of
the liberality of his sentiments, and the harmony
of all his actions ; they only were able to solve
all the riddles, and to appreciate the soundness of
his principles. Every part of his conduct, even
that which seemed discrepant, both in general and
particular respects, resolved itself into concord,
and proved to be consistent either with his pru-
dence, or peculiar mode of thinking and feeling.
The noiseless diligence, shunning all notice, the

q2

228 NOTES TO

forethought with which he arranged his plans, and
above all, his practical wisdom, which indicated
a degree of knowledge of the world, hardly to be
expected of a man of his limited commerce, and
retired habits, appears conspicuous in the follow-
ing anecdote, taken from the twenty-first volume
of the Berlin Monthly Magazine.

In the year 1760, a certain V z, a Tal-

mudist, and native of Bohemia, lived, as private
tutor in the house of an opulent Jew, at Berlin.
Besides great Talmudical learning, he had ac-
quired also solid grammatical knowledge of the
Hebrew language, and was very fond of reading
the ancient philosophical authors, such as Mai-
monides, Bachai, &c. which being, for the greatest
part, translated from the Arabic, contain some
very difficult and dark passages. This induced
him to cultivate an acquaintance with Mendels-
sohn, who was more able than any one to in-
struct him, and throw light on all the obscurities.

V z proved a grateful pupil, and an ardent

admirer of his teacher.

After a lapse of some years, he resigned his
situation as tutor, removed to Prague, probably
his native city, took unto himself a wife, set up in
business as a money-changer, and in that capacity,
regularly attended the Leipzig fairs. His usual

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT. 229

learned pursuits, however, were not, therefore,
laid aside. On the contrary, he was as attached
to them as ever, and kept carrying on a literary
correspondence in the Hebrew language with
Mendelssohn. Perhaps he might not be suf-
ficiently master of the German, although the
works, either of Herder or Lessing were not, by
any means, unknown to hiin.* In the year 1778,
he got involved, probably at Leipzig, in an un-
toward affair ; namely, — he was suspected of being
concerned in an extensive robbery, at least, of
having bought the booty; and was sent to the
Fortress of Pirna, where he remained upwards of
ten months, heavily ironed, in a loathsome
dungeon. Indeed, he seemed to be entirely for-
gotten ; for neither trial nor sentence ensued on
the charge brought against him.f

Thus lingering in horrid suspense, without a
sympathising human being near him, he at length
succeeded in forwarding from within his prison
walls, a letter to his teacher and friend at Berlin,
in which he describes, with all the vividness of

* Those two authors were read with great avidity by the
Jews, who then began to get a taste for literature.

^ This should not seem incredible, or even improbable ;
since the Prussian Minister of State, Count von Arnim, quotes,
in his celebrated work, an instance which happened at Frankfort
on the Oder, where a Polish Jew died in prison, after four years
confinement, without having ever been examined I

230 NOTES TO

oriental phraseology, and in that, perhaps, not
exaggeratedly, his mishap and sufferings, fervently
imploring Mendelssohn's aid and intercession.
But what could the philosopher do on behalf of an
unfortunate, with the merits of whose case he was
totally unacquainted, and, consequently, could
not form an opinion of his guilt or innocence ?

The politic sage found means to effect his
client's liberation notwithstanding; and in the
following manner. He wrote him an answer;
but this time, designedly, in the German lan-
guage, addressed the same directly to him, and
sent it by the post. It ran thus : —
Sir,

*' I duly received your letter of ... . Knowing,
as I do, your principles and way of thinking, I
have not the least doubt but it is in your power to
exculpate yourself. You did not mention what
you are properly accused of ; but whatever it may
be, depend upon it innocence will come to light
at last, and right still be right. The steps of
justice to rescue innocence are slow, it is true;
but let us hope all the surer for that. Moreover,
as you bear your afflictions with such thorough
resignation to the divine will, 1 hope to the God of
our fathers, that the occurrence will not turn out
so calamitous to your commiserable family, as it
would seem at present. Whatever I can con-

SEARCH FOR RIGHT AN^D LIGHT. 231

tribute towards alleviating their cruel fate, shall
be done with alacrity and pleasure.

" In reply to your enquiry respecting the pas-
sage in Kosri, sect 4, § 1,* I think that neither
Muscata, in his commentary Kol Jehuda, nor
Buxtorfy has rendered it correctly. The obscurity
arises from the philosophical technical terms,
which the translator simply copied, without taking
the trouble of interpreting them. I give you my
own version of that passage ;| but deem it needless
to subjoin an explanation of the terms which occur,
p. 264, and which are very largely defined by
Muscata ; because I know you to be a practised
thinker, and that, in answer, a hint is sufficient to
keep you from missing the road to truth. J

* Kosri. A philosophical work in dialogues, by Jehuda Levi,
of Grenada, in Spain, originally written in Arabic, An. 1090, or
according to some, 1140. It has been twice translated into
Hebrew, by R. Jehuda Aben Tiben, 1166 ; and by R. Jehuda
Muscata, printed at Vienna, 1594. Vid. Wolfii. Biblioth. Hebr.
T. 1. p. 449 ; also Buxtorf's preface to his Latin translation
thereof. Basle, 1660.

t That passage containing learned by-matter, is here omitted.

J It is supposed that the literary enquiry in question was not
made at all. Indeed, how should a captive laden with chains,
in a German fortress, get hold of a Kosri, or even have a relish
for philosophical speculations. He had, perhaps, applied for
information at some previous period ; but in all probability,
Mendelssohn introduced the intricate passage of his own accord,
to serve as a vehicle for his letter.

232 NOTES TO

I wish from all my heart, that you may be
liberated soon ; and sincerely sympathising with
your sufferings, remain, &c.

Berlin, 1774.

The letter duly reached its destination, of
course; and answered every purpose for which
it was calculated. To foresee that it would be
sooner read by the magistrate than by him to
whom it was addressed, even less than Mendels-
sohn's penetration would have sufficed. However,
as if by magic, the poor Polander was unfettered,
uncaged, examined, acquitted, and discharged.

A pamphlet in Hebrew characters, anonymously

published by V z, under the title of '' Letters

by the celebrated Moses Mendelssohn/' (Vienna,
1794,) by Anton Schmidt, imperial privileged
Hebrew printer, contains also the above epistle.
That collection, most probably, has not acquired
much notoriety even amongst the Jews. The
late David Friedlander, Member of the Municipal
Council of Berlin, and the oldest and most ac-
complished of Mendelssohn's scholars, on com-
municating, in 1817, the present article to the

Jewish periodical called Jadidja, observes : V z

is still alive, but blind, and probably not in the
best circumstances. It may be acceptable to the
reader who finds this anecdote interesting, to

SEARCH FOR LIGHT AND RIGHT, 233

hear the victim of sluggish justice himself relate
the effect of our philosopher's expedient. I shall
give as close a translation of it as the two idioms
will permit.

** In my distress, I called on Mendelssohn ; he
answered me freely and openly, in the sight of the
counsellors of the city and of its inhabitants. It
did not escape his sharp-sightedness that they
would open his letter and read the contents. I
thereby acquired great consideration in their eyes,
and, indeed, they instantly came to me with the
said letter to visit me, and to speak comfort unto
me. They excused their proceedings with me in
the following words : * It is not to us that the
sufferings which you have undergone are owing,
but to your accuser, who was so much affected by
the loss of his money. But now that that dis-
tinguished man, Moses Mendelssohn, thinks you
are innocent, who dare any longer to suspect you?
If he take you for an honest man, who dare any
longer mistake you for the contrary. We are sorry
that God has led you into our hands in this
manner ; but we should be to blame if we did not
forthwith alleviate your fate ; if we did not use
our endeavours to deliver you with all possible
speed from this prison.' And, indeed, neither
had they rest, nor were they quiet, until they had
procured me my liberation. Thus I was restored

234 NOTES TO THE SEARCH.

to liberty, in the evening before the passover feast,
at the epocha of our exit from Egypt. With a
thankful heart I acknowledge, O Lord, and make
known the mercy which thou didst show me,
through the man who now resteth in Eden."

NOTES TO MENDELSSOHNS REPLY.
{Seepage 168.)

Poland was many years the grand seat of Tal-
mudical academies, and supplied the German Jews
all over Europe with Rabbis. The Portuguese
Jews always had their own seminaries, and Cha-
chamim, men of quite a different stamp and edu-
cation, chosen from their respective congregations.
Rabbinical seminaries after the Polish fashion, and
called Jashibeth, existed also at Prague, Nichols-
burg, Fuerth, and Frankfort on the Maine, where
the Talmud, and nothing but the Talmud, was
taught by Rabbis and assessors appointed for that
purpose. In the larger communities,' minor found-
ations under the names of Bet Hamedrash, Talmud
Thora, Clause, Dabar Tob, &c. were established by
endowments. The object of the teachers (nearly
all Polanders), was directed towards perfectioning
their pupils in the art of cavilling on Talmudical
passages and points, enabling theni to understand

236 NOTES TO

its numerous commentators ; and, if necessary, to
write fluently on it themselves in the Rabbinical
style. The Pentateuch, &c. which every boy was
made to learn from his earliest infancy, frequently
already in his fourth year, by a petty schoolmaster,
the synagogue-reader, the beast-killer, sometimes
by one serving in both capacities, or by a private
teacher, generally an indigent Talmudical student,
(Bachur) '' Bachelor," and through which he had
further to work his way, with the help of vile
German translations — the Pentateuch, was almost
wholly neglected in those schools, and so were
the more lucid commentators, such as Aben Ezra,
Levi Ben Gershon, Abarbanel and others, alike
with the Spanish philosophers, who were usually
reserved for the leisure hours of the few speculative
men amongst them. The cause of this was not
merely the great expenditure of time required for a
regular Talmudical course ; but also the Rabbins'
aversion to, or rather dread of, pure intellectual
study, while polemizing on visible subjects, was a
sort of amusement to them. The Rabbins at all
times considered philosophy a formidable enemy,
and at all times tried to crush it.

But what made those schools be in high estima-
tion amongst the Jews, that they supported them
so liberally and confided their boys to them for
some years; sensible though they were of the~

!

i

Mendelssohn's reply. 237

necessity of practical information as well, which for
all that they did not bestow upon them until they
became adults, and then bestowed it very niggardly
— is what we shall shew here, as it had a decisive
influence on the Jewish character.

The chief and most important object was as
formerly, to acquire a thorough knowledge of the
whole body of Jewish laws, to correctly observe
them, and be able to discourse on them with com-
petent judgment. As the Mosaic and biblical
records did not contain all that has been developed
from them in the Talmud, and as such developing
was out of the power of any one, no knowledge of
the law was possible without the Talmud, and its
study therefore a thing necessary of itself, nay,
necessary to every one, for every one had to
observe those laws. With them, un-Talmudical
Judaism was almost tantamount to heresy ; Carai-
tism — scarcely imaginable. Mere complying with
custom and blindly performing ceremonies, which
for the greatest part, one had been habituated to
from one's infancy, was held disgraceful and ac-
counted clownishness, however good a scholar one
might otherwise be. Hence the opulent fancied
they earned superlative merit by founding these
Talmudical seminaries. All other species of in-
formation, thought they, might be got amongst
Christians. There was yet another advantage

238 NOTES TO

ascribed to the Talmudical schools, an advantage
which has been frequently taken notice of in
modern times, and which appears somewhat curi-
ous. The Jews entertain an idea that the method
of teaching pursued in those schools, exceedingly
sharpens the intellectual faculties; and that the
sagacity in worldly affairs which certainly cannot
be denied them, as well as their keenness ; so
much animadverted on and deprecated, is even the
immediate fruit of that study. They therefore
send their sons thither to learn to think deeply,
that they may, with the greater ease, master any
other science they may have occasion to apply
themselves to, in the sequel, or manage their
commercial concerns with the more consummate
address and penetration. That second considera-
tion could not have been pleasant to the really
pious Rabbins, nor did they ever recommend the
study of the Talmud for that purpose. Still the
various instances of success, with which young-
men of a Talmudical education began to pursue
extraneous sciences, rendered the Rabbins both
proud of their Panacea, and indifferent to any
other species of learning, which they thought but
little of. Every Rabbi who had not already,
perhaps by other means, acquired a sufficient idea
of the mazes of the higher sciences, was and is still
of opinion, that the acquiring of both those of

MENDELSSOHN S REPLY. 239

Mathematics and physics would be mere boy's
play to a thorough Talmudist. The deeper that
opinion took root, the more strenuously the Rabbins
abided by the branch of study assigned to them,
not even deigning to cultivate grammatically holy
writ which they almost know by heart ; because
they consider grammar as impeding the rapid ac-
tion of thought generally required ; in which opinion
they are seconded by not a few of the Christian
learned, who justly lay more stress on sound-
ness. It is not our intention now, to write a criti-
cism of the Rabbis themselves, but merely to dis-
tinctly show the elements of their own education,
and of that which was brought into vogue by
them. For the rest, it is a matter of no small
pride to the admirers of the Talmud, that the most
erudite Christians wrecked on it.

But if the Rabbins were excessively smitten
with their Talmud, it is but justice to own, that
they saw the highest merit in the practice of its
precepts ; and penetrating into its true spirit
endeavoured to inculcate on their congregations,
along with theological dogmas, probity and internal
morality. They apprehended of other sciences,
neglect of religion and too much, worldliness.
Accordingly, in modern times, they were not so
prolific in writings, avoided all discussion on their
own religioji, which they considered as standing

^40 NOTES TO

firm enough without; but were the more diligent
in giving oral instruction when required, and in
applying to study themselves. The few Rabbini-
cal books, which appeared for the last hundred
years, consist either of short essays on Biblico-
Talmudical exegeses, of no material importance;
collections of decisions of ritual questions, or con-
troversies on points contested amongst themselves.
There were not many large and comprehensive
works brought out, if we except the compilation of
Talmudical laws, with which in Poland many a
one fills folios, as it were for pastime, and then
puts them into circulation ; productions which gain
their author an ephemeral reputation, but are
neither sought after nor indeed of any use for the
extension of regular study. Of the older classics,
they frequently got up new editions with comments
and emendations. On the other hand, there also
here and there appeared men, who, although quite
Rabbinically bred, took a fancy to Hebrew gram-
mar, and trying their strength in it, displayed
much industry and skill ; but on account of their
ignorance of the sister-dialects, could not do any
thing for the advance of the science.

The observation, that even the disciples of the
Talmud, either constrained or enticed by worldly
pursuits or ends, no longer so strictly attended to
the ceremonial law, as many ascetic Rabbis in

Mendelssohn's reply, 241

Poland considered necessary to constitute a holy
life, induced several of the latter to withdraw
still more from the world, and bear themselves so
mystically pious as to set their brethren a laudable
example. The seeds of this had been sown long-
before by the deep-rooted Cabala ; and it was
destined to retrieve, in a new sect, the triumph
which Christianity had already wrung from it, in
the Sabbathaians D''^^^ ^TCyü (Chassidim), There
had been existing in those parts long ago, men who
totally abstained from animal food, renounced all
sensual pleasures, and kept frequent fasts. As
this sort of piety suited the taste of but a few,
while, nevertheless, themysticalness in which it was
wrapped gained its votaries great reputation, and
here and there excited also a spirit of imitation,
nothing was wanted but a leader to collect the
like-minded individuals under one banner, and
form a regular sect of them. Such a one at
length appeared in Israel Baal Shem,* i. e. Man
of God— Worker of Miracles — who lived first at
Tlusdi in Poland, then at Mendiziboze in Podolia,
and whose life and fortunes are described in a

* In 1740. Peter Beer, Geschichte der Jüdischen Secten, voL
ii : Gregoire, Histoire des Sectes Religieuses. Israel Loebel, unter-
Rabbiner zu Novogrodeck in Lithauen. Nachrichte von der
Secte Chassidim genannt.

242 NOTES TO

reprint of a little book, written partly in the
rabbinical and partly in the Jewish-German idiom,
of which five editions were sold off within a few
years 1814 — 1818, but whose doctrines and maxims
were published by himself and by his followers.*
We shall mention only the most essential things
contained therein. In the opinion ofthat party,
Israel was the greatest wonder- doer that ever
existed, and particularly the cures which he wrought
are highly celebrated amongst them. They re-
cognize him as God's representative on earth ; and
his commands are followed as if given by God
himself. He principally recommends a contem-
plative life, — the greatest possible devotion during
prayers, — frequent bathing in running streams, —
and above all, passive obedience to the Zaddik
(pious man) i. e. the local chief, answering to the
Chacham or Rab elsewhere. The founder of the
sect himself was the first Zaddik in ofiice ; and on
his demise, three of his most distinguished disciples,
all his grandsons, were appointed as Zaddikim
each in a different district. Since which the sect
no longer forms a single body, but a confederacy
of several distinct congregations, which are more
and more increasing.

* He himself published Ziwaoth Ribs, i. e. " The Precepts of
R. I. B. S. (Rabbi Israel Baal Shem)." Kether Shem Tob,
(Crown of a good name) appeared after his death.

Mendelssohn's reply. 243

This is no wonder, seeing that from 10,000 souls,
which the sect mustered at the outset, its rolls after
a lapse of ten years, are said to have contained no
fewer than 40,000. In this, as in all analogous
cases, it was the leader's death which gave it its
full importance. For while the Baal Shem was
alive, his thoughts were bent on nothing else but
forming ascetics, and availing himself for that
purpose of the means afforded by their ignorant
sequaciousness. But after his death, it was found
in the books published about him, particularly in
**Toldoth Jacob Josef," (1780,)that he had ascended
to heaven, where he associates with the angels,
and could at all times act as mediator with the
Deity. That he grants absolution and remission
of sin, to every Jew who engages to bring up his
children after his (the Baal Shem's) principles, and
to a diligent study of Talmud and Cabala. The
adversaries of the sect affirm that he not only gave
his adherents plenary absolution of past sins, but
also indulgencies for all future ones ; which, by the
by, we think highly improbable, unless by future
sins, we are to understand inadvertent omissions
of ceremonial observances, or sins of ignorance, as
they are called. From the Zaddik's work, *'Li-
kuta Amorim" (Collection of Aphorisms), they
quote the rule, that every one should endeavour to
get into the highest state of sinfulness, in order to

R 2

244 - NOTES TO

approach the Deity on the opposite extreme. This
no doubt arises from some misunderstanding or
other, which the opposite party purposely keep up,
in order to cast an odium or ridicule on the sect.*
The members are all called Chassidim, i. e.
pious men, and their conduct and morality super-
intended by the Zaddik in office, who exercises

* Perhaps in the writings of Cardoso, who, according to
Zizath Nobel Zebi, p. 36 — 41, philosophises in a manner quite
peculiar to himself. " The Talmud," says he, *' teaches that the
Messiah will not come, until the Jews are either all condemned,
or all acquitted. It is easier to realize the former than the
latter ; now all the Jews in Africa are therefore requested to
become Mahometans for the good of the nation at large, and in
order to hasten the salvation of the world."

On this, Jost remarks (L. c. vol. viii. p. 479), "A degree of im-
becility is here imputed to the partly highly intelligent and well-
informed Talmudical doctors, which one hardly would expect
of the lowest of the people. Where is he that could prevail upon
himself to repudiate every thing he holds just and sacred, and
take all at once to a course of turpitude ? And suppose there
are fanatics who practise vice from a sense of religion, such an
hallucination cannot make proselytes of whole multitudes simul-
taneously, and for many years after. But it is all a mistake.
The sentence quoted from the Talmud does not refer to genera^
morality, consequently neither to virtue nor vice ; but the true sense
of it is, that a time will come when extremes shall prevail, and
all Jews either live in strict conformity with the law, or entirely
depart from it, so as to require a complete regeneration. And
even this version might convert but few : while the majority were
probably enticed by external allurements, or betrayed into it by
party spirit."

Mendelssohn's reply. 245

absolute control over them. Hence that dignity
tempts the ambition of many, for its incumbent is
not only highly reverenced, but also abundantly
supplied with finances, while his family and rela-
tions are looked upon as a kind of patrician order,
with whom the rich are eager to form matrimonial
alliances. According to their statutes, all differ-
ences arising at the election of a Zaddik, are left
to the decision of the other Zaddikim for the
time being. The mass of the people are kept as
much as possible in the dark, about the Zaddik's
domestic routine of life ; they are rarely admitted
into his presence, and then only on consideration
of liberal donations. But for the higher class, he
holds every Saturday afternoon a kind of circle,
when they sit down with him to the Hl^^D tl^"\bt^
or third Sabbathic meal. During that repast, to
which each guest comes provided with his own
provisions, the Zaddik delivers alio impi^oviso,
moral, cabalistic, and exegetic lectures on two or
more promiscuous scripture texts, given out by
the company ; between which texts he establishes
a connexion, so as to make them harmonise to-
gether. He never preaches publicly on any other
occasion, nor does he act in any other rabbinical
capacity, except as umpire in private litigations
if appealed to. He also, from time to time, makes
a journey through his district, on which occasion

246 NOTES TO

he is attended by a large retinue of young men
by way of a body-guard, to keep off the multitudes
that come flocking in every direction to obtain a
sight of him. In all other respects, the Chassidim
are Talmudical Jews; in their synagogues they
follow the Spanish and Portuguese liturgy, and
their songs and hymns are throughout cabalistic.
A Zaddik countenances and encourages mysticism
in every shape. Science and learning in general
he despises, as well as every thing else which may,
according to the notion prevailing amongst them,
be of no good but to disturb the contemplations of
the inward man, during his union with the deity ;
and so far as all that goes, we see nothing very
exceptionable in their fundamental system. The
abuses inseparably linked to passive obedience,
however became soon apparent in the sect, viz.
the cupidity of the Zaddikim, miracle jugglery,
keeping the ignorant and illiterate in the leading-
strings of new-fangled rites and religious exer-
cises, vitiating the people's minds by inculcating
the direct agency of good and evil spirits, and
every other sort of gross superstition. But what
renders that order of things most pernicious, is the
Zaddikim's absolutism, setoff as it is by something
like aristocratic external grandeur ; and so does
the distance between the Chassidim and the other
Jews, whereby amongst the former, servility and

MENDELSSOHN S REPLY. 247

pride go hand in hand, and all liberal education is
totally proscribed.

Their literature, as may be supposed, is thoroughly
mystic; and their standard works are: " Likute
Amorim ; Likute Amorim Tinjane ; Kitzur Likute
Amorim ; and Sepher Hamidoth," all published
between the years 1806 and 1811 by Rabbi Nach-
man, grandson of the great Baal Sliem, and which
contain the entire doctrines of the sect. But the
book which ranks highest with them, is the already
mentioned '* Shiveh Habesh," i.e." The Excellen-
cies of the Baal Shem," which in the space of a few
years was published in Hebrew, at Kapust, Ber-
diczow, and Lascerow ; and in Jewish- German, at
Lascerow, and at Ostrow, making in all five edi-
tions. Besides these there are quoted : *' Kether
ShemTob (see above); NoemElimelech, by Rabbi
Melech of Lezantst ; Yismech Lew ; and Igereth
Hakadesh. All these are considered by the mem-
bers as holy writ ; and it is from them that they draw
their grand principle p^^f^ nnt^pnm D^DDH n:n;D^
i. e. faith in the ancient Talmudical sages, and fealty
to the Zaddik. Accordingly he bears in those works
the most exalted titles, such as, Rab, Rabbi,
Rabbi Amiti, Zaddik, Zaddik Amiti, Zaddik Had-
dor, Zaddik Hassalom, Zaddik Haemmoth, Gadol,
Gadol Haddor, Gadol Amiti, Chacham, Chacham
Haddor, Chacham Haemmoth, Chacham Amiti,

248 NOTES TO

Nassi, and even Melecli. It is to that fealty that
they attribute the perfection of the soul, which it
illumines with a true knowledge of the Supreme Be-
ing, and causes the Dewekath, or its cleaving to God ;
and lest that be marred by ^2:i6'M^Ä, i. e. melancholy,
they are directed to keep a cheerful mind; for
which purpose the use of mead is recommended
to every Chassid, which he must drink on Fridays
after a hot bath (a very common practice in
Poland) in order that he may be in high spirits at
evening prayers. The Dewekath or copulation
with the Shechina, is mystically consummated by
prayer. Accordingly, at every service there is said,
a prayer called Leshem Yichod, i. e. To the name
of the Unity, which formula was, in the beginning,
censured (particularly in 1778), by Ezekiel Lan-
dau, a Rabbi at Prague. By that copulation they
tell you the Zaddik begot innumerable angels ; and
on that egregiously hyperbolical insinuation, they
subsequently founded their assumption of the title
of Chever^ae Kadeshciy i. e. holy society; which
title, however, they have dropped since. Neverthe-
less, the Zaddik himself, whose mediation can
effect every thing with God, is still accounted a
holy person, and his family enjoy the highest con-
sideration ; they are all Mejuchsim or '^ high-
born,'' and on them no curse or malediction can
ever take effect. The wearing apparel and imple-

Mendelssohn's reply. 249

merits left by a deceased Zaddik are, in their writ-
ings, recommended as preservatives against sinning,
— and on emergency also as means of propitiation.
Thus his cap is good for -pride, his sash for evil
propensities, his nether- garment for fornica-
tion, and his phylacteries for impudence. But
his tomb kept carefully locked and bolted,
and shewn only to pilgrims on making a hand-
some compliment to his widow or family, is
reckoned above all things propitiatory. The
highest degree of munificence to the Zaddik, is
expressly enjoined, in order that his thoughts may
not be diverted by worldly cares from more exalted
subjects. So also are the members directed to
undertake frequent journies to his see, for the sake
of being blessed by the effulgence of his light ;
while he, in return, is to pay occasional visits to
the different congregations in his diocese, by way
of diffusing salvation. Whoever accompanies him
on those circuits, or waits upon him, thereby gains
eternal life. The various duties of such a gratui-
tous menial include that of filling and lighting his
pipe (for the Zaddik is generally an inveterate
smoker), and that of porter at his chamber- door.
Fancies like these, coupled with abundance of
marvellous stories, operate in a most extraordinary
manner on the members' minds, and naturally push
their devotedness to the chief to an extreme.

250 NOTES TO

This effect shews itself more particularly at the
grand annual meeting in the month of Tisri, when
they repair in shoals to the Zaddik's place of resi-
dence, where the more noted amongst them are
regaled by him on plate, while listening enraptured
to his penitentiary sermons. Oratorical tricks,
gesturing, and other mystic expedients, have pro-
cured the sect a prodigious accession. In the
beginning they were found only in the deserts of
Ukrain, Wallachia, and the Carpathian mountains:
at present, they are scattered all over the Russian
empire, wherever Jews are permitted to sojourn,
and also in Gallicia and Hungary. Rabbi Salo-
mon Lozner alone presided over 80,000. The
number of leaders, as well as their astonishing
sumptuousness, is still on the increase: and it
certainly would be worth the while of governments,
to obtain a more correct knowledge of the intestine
condition of a fraternity like this, which is moreover
despised and disowned by the rest of the Jews.

Besides its mysterious exterior (the most catch-
ing of all epidemics; and to which more par-
ticularly the common people become a prey), there
is still another internal agency, which cements the
union of the order, and, despite of the very frequent
occasion for pecuniary oblations, not only preserves
it amongst the old members, but also contributes to
draw new ones: namely,— a prospect of the most

Mendelssohn's reply. 251

perfect peace of mind. An analogous feeling will
be found to prevail, wheresoever absolution of sin,
the tranquilisation of a turbulent conscience is of
easy procurement. There are no happier people
on earth, than those who, with unreserved con-
fidence, put themselves under the guidance of
another person, acting in the name of God. What-
ever their deeds, they concern the attorney only ;
it is his business to make every thing right with
God ; and, for the rest, he knows how to arrange
matters with his clients, who may be honest and
virtuous, knavish and wicked, just as suits their
convenience, without being overmuch put in mind
of themselves by their conscience. Nothing dis-
turbs their serenity; they relish their existence,
and are exposed to no untowardness, except per-
haps, too heavy a tax imposed upon them by the
Zaddik ; but who, in return, will avert all natural
afflictions, or, at least, vindicate them on religious
grounds, so that they may be born with the greater
patience and resignation.

When that sect first sprang up,* the Poland
Rabbins took it for an effluxion from Sahhathaism,
and, truly, in this they were not much mistaken.
They were highly scandalized at the excesses which
spread amongst the members thereof, | who medi-

* Thorath Hakiiaoth, p. 26. et bl,
t 1750.

252 NOTES TO

tated nothing less than the total suppression of the
Talmud; and, in a town in Podolia, a certain
Meshullam burned a copy of it, in the middle of
the Jews' street, on a holiday, while the rest of the
faction were handing about cabalistic tablets, as
Panaceae, and also amulets.* Accordingly, the
Rabbins hurled anathemas, at the persecutors of
the Talmud collectively ; but at the authors of
the cabalistic tablets individually, and by name.f
Him, however, whom they more especially perse-
cuted, was Rabbi Jojiathan Eibeschutzer, who, on
account of his already acknowledged great — nay,
according to some, prodigious — learning, displayed
in several extensive Rabbinical works, was called
from Prague to Metz, and thence to Hamburg, to
officiate as Rabbi of the three united congrega-
tions there, f notwithstanding he had been accused
formerly of cabalistic mystification. That very
numerous class, the Polish Rabbis, were ex-
tremely active on that occasion. They issued
pastoral letters to all congregations, recommending
the crushing of the new sect, strenuously protest-
ing against the cabalistic tablets in circulation,
ridiculing the author's ignorance, and, at the same
time, decrying the learned R. Jonathan, and his

* 1755.

"f Epist. var. ad Jacob Emden, in Lib* Sbimush.

X Hamburg, Altona and Wandsbeck.

Mendelssohn's reply. 253

pupil Chajim Lublin, as impostors. It is true, that
even he, notwithstanding his superior understand-
ing, was given to those absurdities, or, which is
more likely, imposing upon himself.* However,
his subsequent conduct, for aught we know, vv^as
blameless. Still R, Jacob Emden, grandson of
the shortly before deceased Limburg Rabbi of
great celebrity, (a most learned man, who had a
printing establishment in his house, and got up all
his own works,) did not forbear reviving the long-
forgotten charges, and from commencing a fierce
attack upon him. Eibeschutzer, firmly estab-
lished in his rabbinical chair, and acknowledged
as a theologian of the first order, deigned not to
repel those charges in a direct manner, but pub-
lished a book, not very creditable to his acute
mind, in which he gave out that the efficacy of
the cabalistical tablets had been satisfactorily de-
monstrated. That work met but with very partial
approbation, and upon the whole, bred him more
enemies than friends. It appeared at Altona, in
1755, under the title of Luchoth Eduth, and
deserved the sensation it excited, on account of
the skill with which, without at all entering into
the merits of the points proffered against him, he
dismisses his accusers, merely by reproaching them
with their own want of due form, with credulity,

* Eduth Bejacob, p, 32.

254 NOTES TO

and falsification ; on account of the thereunto
annexed letters addressed to him by a great many-
Rabbis, and finally, on account of his addictedness
to cabalistic quibbles, least to be expected of a man
like him. When we read of the extensive
measures of the public and epistolary transactions,
in all parts of Germany, the east of France, and
in Lithuania, we cannot but be astonished at the
wide range which that dispute had taken ; and
what adds not a little to our astonishment,
is, that we rarely meet in those measures and
correspondence with rude fanaticism ; but on
the contrary, notwithstanding the religious zeal,
not to be mistaken in them — that very zeal
exerting itself in the vindication of persecuted
innocence, in which the synodical decree of the
Polish rabbinical council of Jaroslaw, 1756, par-
ticularly distinguished itself. All the rest followed
that example, in consequence of which, the
accusatory publications were ordered to be
burned and prohibited, and R. Jonathan was
fully acquitted.

Disputatious R. J. Emden, however, was not
silenced by that work ; but wrote one against it,
entitled Eduth Bejacob ; in which he strove to
ridicule Eibeschutzer's productions, and expose his
intrigues. According to his rather prolix, and
withal very invective statement, the documents put

MENDELSSOHN S REPLY. 255

in by the other party, were either paltry, subditi-
tious, or forged. Eibeschutzer's conduct certainly
is open to censure, particularly his vindictive per-
secution of Jacob Emden, whom the elders of the
Hamburg congregation ordered to quit that city,
whereby he was obliged to withdraw to Amsterdam
until his proscription was revoked through the
powerful interest of the King of Denmark. The
most singular thing in Emden's book, is a formal
announcement of the above-mentioned Jaroslaw
Synod, dated the identical day of sitting, whereby
the same men (with the exception of a few
absentees) declare, that hitherto, their resolutions
and proceedings had not been free ; but that the
government had interfered in the affair, and
exerted its influence, particularly in the passing
of the final decree. Accordingly they would
not be responsible either for its tenour, or for
whatever might result from it. Rabbi Emden
also gives many extracts from the other party's
works. However, his renewed accusation proved as
ineffectual as the former, it being too notorious that
he opposed Eibeschutzer from mere personal ani-
mosity. Still, the debate itself kept attracting
several fresh partisans. Rabbi Heshel of Frank-
fort-on-the-Main, and Rabbi Samuel Heilmann
of Metz, enlisted under the Emden banner.
Rabbi Ezekiel Landau of Prague condemned the

256 NOTES TO

cabalistic tablets to the flames, and entailed
anathemas on whomsoever should place faith in
them ; but at the same time, declared Rabbi
Jonathan to be a pious man, and forbade to molest
him.* The Emden party then changed their
tactics, and indicted their antagonist to the Danish
government as a sorcerer , and the case wsls re-
ferred to the investigation of tv^o learned doctors.
One of them, Charles Anton, a converted Jew, and
professor of rabbinical literature at the University
of Helmstadt, reported in Eibeschutzer's favour;
although, according to Emden's versionf, that re-
port was elaborated by Eibeschutzer himself, who
for a valuable consideration got the referee to affi-
liate it. Against this report, the professor Me-
gerlin of Frankfort- on- the- Main, the other referee,
bitterly inveighed. He would shew Charles An-
ton's great ignorance, while with a great deal of
self-conceit, he contended that neither Sabbathaism
nor sorcery were anywhere discoverable in Eibes-
chutzer's writings, but that pure Christianity was;
inasmuch as the name of Jesus Christ was easily
to be deciphered on the tablets in question. In
thi^ manner too, he acquitted the accused, although
on quite different considerations. Eibeschutzer
let them go on as they pleased, and passed his life
in peace and tranquillity. Only Jacob Emden

* 1752. f Metheg. Lechamor, x. 110.

MENDKLSSOIIX'S REPLY. 257

kept crying out against those irregularities ; and not
unjustly neither.* For to this A^ery day Eibe-
schutzer is venerated by the followers of Sabbathai
Zebi, as one of their saints and apostles. And
in fact, he had several defenders amongst the
Polish and Moravian Rabbis, w^ho in the sequel,
were all found to be Sabbathaians. The affair
however gradually died away. It will be shown
further on, that the Polish Rabbis managed en-
tirely to eject Sabbathaism out of Jewry, so that
the great number of Sabbathaians, who have since

* The chiefs of the sect carry about them a badge or medal, by
which they make themselves known to one another and to the
members. It is of the size of a half-crown piece, and coined like
the Abraham coin mentioned in the Talmud. On one side it has

and on the other, the letters

W W
n *>
evidently the initials of npm 'OH'^'^ n*ltt? DmriM^^^ underneath
there appear again the letters

T >

with this difference that the ^ is a Shin, and not a Sin, and in-
stead of the Hesh there is a Daleth. Thus read :

''piz^inm ,^ny\>i >n^xDt n^bw

the four chiefs of the sect. Elijah the Prophet, Redeemer ; Sab-
bathai, Messiah; Jonathan (Eibeschutzer) — (This proves how
justly he was accused of heresy) —and Dobrushki, i. e. Frank ;
which latter name he only adopted in Germany, as did his two
nephews that of Frey, under which they resided at Paris, where
they were guillotined in the days of Terror.

258 NOTES TO

been residing in Poland known as followers of that
sect, and even holding high official situations, are
outwardly Roman Catholic Christians. But they
were not equally successful in their crusade against
the Chassidim, who for that very reason might be
induced to adopt a distinct constitution, inasmuch
as the Sabbathaians rejected the Talmud ; whereas
the Chassidim would not vow its total destruction ;
and because they just thereby formed a passage to
Christianity, the Rabbis abhorred them as most
dangerous schismatics. Rabbi Elijah of Wilna, a
man of distinguished abilities, celebrated for his
commentaries on the books of Moses, on some
passages of the Talmud, and on the Digest of Jewish
Laws, wrote point blank against them* In him
that sect found a most unrelenting adversary, even
before it had yet spread very far. Afterwards,
Rabbi Israel Loebel of Mohilow, both wrote and
preached against them ; he also engaged in a con-
troversial conference with one of their most eminent
members, and travelled about the country for the pur-
pose of checking the progress of the schism amongst
his brethren. Besides him, Ezekiel Landau, the
Prague Rabbi, notorious for his bigoted opposition
also to Moses Mendelssohn, wrote against them the

* Siphse Jeshcnim, continued up to 1806, contains a catalogue
of all the writings of the Ptabbis quoted on this occasion.

Mendelssohn's reply. 259

book ** Noda Beyuda;" so did Joseph Steinhart,
Rabbi at Fürth, in his '' Sichron Joseph ;" and the
chief Rabbi at Limburg, in his work " Merchebeth
Hamishna.' ^ All that, however, passed off without
any material consequences. The sect still main-
tains ^ itself in all its vigour (1828). At all the
great trading fairs they perform separate divine
worship, which is an object of burlesque to the
Rabbinists ; although in many places, the Austrian
government will not allow them to hold public
meetings.

The Rabbins know very well that they cannot
prevail against that sect, for they dare not venture to
condemn Cabala altogether. It is true they highly
disapprove of its practical application, or what is
called TW^IJÜ Thypy but they are not able to fix the
extent of its allowable influence on religious rites ;
and objections they can raise none, as long as they
themselves are dealing so much in it. A number
of cabalistic prayers, hymns, and formula have
crept into the Liturgy already in olden times. To
expunge them is what the Rabbis dare not do :
they themselves still believe in charms, adjuration
of good and evil spirits, and occasionally have re-
course to those practices. How then could they
contend against a sect, by whom Cabala is held in
still higher consideration ? No barrier was raised

s 2

260 NOTES TO

between utility and abuse.* Not but what there
might, though, if they had returned to the old
Spanish system of expounding holy writ as simply
and naturally as possible ; but then, in their
opinion, the Talmud must have got into jeopardy.
That schism, therefore, put the Rabbins to no small
dilemma. In Poland they cut through the Gordian
knot, now by anathema, now by stunning their
pupils with new Talmudico-exegetic works. But
in Germany, where meanwhile elementary educa-
tion had got into vogue, those productions no longer
met with anything like the former demand ; and
the Rabbins' conflict with Cabala just then being
at its height, students become bolder, went yet a
good step further, and overhauled even what their
teachers had left untouched. There was the more
necessity for this, as the Chassidim would, from
time to time, send forth emissaries to several con-
gregations, who preached in the synagogues to
deaf audiences, it is true, and all but laughing in
their faces. Bat reflection and enquiry were at

* About 1740, a protest by several Rabbis of Germany and
the north of Italy against a prayer in Machsor (High -festival
service) containing invocations of the angels, was dismissed by
Rabbi Simson Marpurgo, otherwise a very profound thinker, as a
dangerous innovation ; although he himself did not approve of
the like prayers, unless they were sanctioned by antiquity. —
Resp. Mob. S. Marjpurgo.

i:

I

MENDELSSOHN^S REPLY. 261

any rate excited ; and along with the hallucinations
of that sect, also many rabbinical redundances
were detected. Moreover the germ of an antidote
for hyper-rabbinism had already been supplied
independent of those excesses. For what the
Rabbins ought to have effected themselves, namely,
a revival of the grammatical study of Hebrew,
now burst forth impelled by minds of quite a dif-
ferent texture, who directed its lovers to quite a
different course. The mist of Rabbinism began to
disperse.

DEGENERACY OF SABBATHAISM. JACOB

FRANK, OR DOBRUSCHKI.

Berachia, the supreme head of the Sabbathaian
Sect, at Salonichi, was still living, when in 1760,
an adventurer called Jacob Frank, a native of
Poland, in his youth a distiller of brandy, and
subsequently renowned in the Crimea, and part
of Turkey, as a Cabalist, removed in his thirty-
eighth year to Podolia, where he preached Sab-
bathaism with prodigious success. Such was the
force of his oratory, and so preponderating his
interest over the clamour of decrying Rabbins,
that entire, congregations went over to him.* In

* Sepher Shimmush, p. 1. et seq.

262 NOTES TO

one of the Jews' streets, they burned a complete
copy of the Tahnud to ashes, and prevailed on
the bishop of Camentz to prohibit that work for
being of a dangerous tendency. It was the Sohar
which engrossed their veneration, and of which
they propagated copious extracts pressed into the
service of their system. Upon making the fol-
lowing public confession of faith, they obtained
of the bishop letters of protection, under the
denomination of Cabalists.^

Every Soharite (for so, also, the sect called
itself) is bound to believe : —

1 . That the adoption of the holy precepts of
religion must be founded on a perfect under-
standing of the Oral Law, as deduced from the
Written ; and on the conviction arrived at
thereby.

2. That religion must arise from the know-
ledge of God, else it is mere outward show. The
fear of God, and the love of God, is the fruit of
such knowledge, if deep. But for that depth,
those qualities could not strike root.

3. That there is a profound inward sense in
the maxims of Moses and the Prophets, which
must be searched after. None but idiots take the
garment for the body ; and sticking to mere dead
words is wrong and foolish.

* Shebet al gaf Chasillim. appen. ad superadit. lib.

Mendelssohn's reply. 263

4. That the interpretations made by the
Talmud are full of that error, inasmuch as they
lead to inferences which favour immorality.

5. That there is but one God, creator and
preserver of the universe.

6. That this God manifests himself under three
persons.

7. That God appeared on earth in a human
form 5 that he cast it off upon the fall of man, and
finally resumed it for the purpose of redemption.

8. That Jerusalem will never be rebuilt; nor
is any Messiah, in the flesh, to be expected ; but
that God will once more appear in the human
form, and redeem mankind from their sins.

This is, briefly, their confession of faith -, and,
no doubt, that for the sake of ingratiating them-
selves with the bishop, they mixed up with it
more Christian Momenti, than were ever taught
by their founder. So, also, is the apology
annexed to that confession, for the greatest part,
a mere echo of Christian theologians, and, hardly
applicable to the spirit of the sect. This, of itself,
is a degeneracy of Sabbathaism ; and that ex-
travagance was just what caused their ruin. The
prelate who patronized them, happening to die
shortly after, the Rabbins were not tardy in
taking advantage of that very confession, for
crushing them. They found it no difficult matter

264 NOTES TO

to show both the court of Warsaw, and the Pope's
nuncio, the hypocrisy which palpably characterised
that pretended confession ; and to abtain efficient
secular — and of the papal see, also spiritual —
aid, to remove the nuisance. The growing sect,
terrified by the stern proclamations, which, in
aggravated cases, even threatened its followers
with the stake as heretics, resolved upon emi-
grating to Moldavia. On the arrival of the first
caravan there, they were informed against, to the
pacha, as pretended Jews ; and being as such,
out of the pale of the Constantinople High Rabbi's
protection, the Turks plundered them of their
all. The rest, thereupon, embraced the Roman
Catholic religion. But as they did not refrain
from Judaizing, and still held secret meetings,
half their beards were shaved up to the skin, by
way of rendering them conspicuous for duplicity ;
and as many members as could be discovered,
were condemned to hard labour. Several, how-
ever, contrived to make their escape ; and of their
descendants, who keep from intermarrying with
those of other religions, many considerable men
are to this day, filling high offices in Poland, par-
ticularly at Warsaw. They all bear the best
character for integrity. Jacob Frank, who, after
having turned Christian, still persevered in his
practices, was, in consequence thereof, locked up

Mendelssohn's reply. 265

in the fortress of Czenstochow, where he remained
a prisoner for several years. But when, in 1773,
that fortress was taken by the Russians, they set
him at liberty, and he again travelled all over
Poland, Bohemia, and Moravia, promulgating his
religious tenet, on which occasion he collected
large sums of money amongst his disciples. The
report of this, soon swelled his party ; and he
travelled in a princely state, attended by a numer-
ous suite of Christianised Jews, amongst whom,
there were several learned Rabbis. In that pomp
and magnificence, he lived some time at Vienna,
which capital, however, he was ordered to quit in
1778, having become obnoxious to the police. He
removed to Briinn, in Moravia. Jewish youth
of both sexes kept continually joining him. He
even organised for himself a military guard, dressed
partly in green, partly in scarlet uniforms; for
which he was abundantly supplied with the means,
by his Jewish brethren in Poland, from whom
kegs full of golden ducats would arrive several
times a-year. Now and then, he would assemble
his household for prayer, in the open air ; and on
those occasions, was environed by his splendid
carriages, outriders, lancers, and standard-bearers
with gilt stags, eagles, suns, and crescents. That
solemnity was always concluded by an equestrian's
pouring water on the ground, from a skin bag with

266 NOTES TO

a ewer fastened to it, a rite of which the meaning
has never been discovered. Again he sought to
settle at Vienna, and again met with a repulse.
At last he tried (1785) Offenbach, near Frank-
fort on the Maine, where he obtained leave to
establish his head- quarters, with a retinue of fifty
persons. One of the most splendid mansions was
forthwith engaged; and here he took the title of
Ba7^on. Disliking being stared at, he led a
secluded life, seldom admitted strangers, and was
visible to the public only on Sundays, when
driving to a neighbouring Roman Catholic village
to hear mass. His body-guard were exercised
regularly every day in the fore-court of his
mansion, and in the evening they were made to
attend lectures on chymistry ; for what purpose,
is not known. For the rest, Frank was universally
respected. When at church, he performed his
devotions contrary to custom — covered, and pros-
trated full length on the ground, in the oriental
fashion — no one would ever think of interfering.
Himself, as well as those belonging to him, lived
in peace, and the best harmony with the towns-
people ; while to the little borough of Offenbach,
their presence proved a most valuable acquisition ;
as numbers of Sabbathaian Jews, constantly ar-
rived there from the Eastern countries, bringing
with them rich presents, and, in not a few in-

Mendelssohn's reply. 267

stances, returning to their homes ahuost penny-
less. Many of them would send their grown
sons and daughters thither, who, it is said, were
never after heard of. Generally those sectarians
bore a very fair character.

Frank's followers enjoyed that state of pros-
perity only a few years. He died of apoplexy, on
the JOth of August, 1791, at the age of seventy-
eight. His funeral was extremely grand, and
followed by upwards of eight hundred persons,
who, in him mourned for the bereavement of their
benefactor. He had not been dead long, ere his
two sons Rochus and Joseph, and his daughter
Eve, were unable to keep up the accustomed mag-
nificence, and the sect began more and more to fall
away. The subsidies from abroad entirely failed,
and when the Frankfort and other capitalists,
already considerably involved, hung back from \

further financial transactions wdth them, they sent
forth, in 1811, to all the congregations in Ger*
many, a circular letter in the Hebrew Eabbinical
idiom, and written with red ink. It contained an
invitation to embrace Christianity, once before
published by old Frank, in 1767, also a third
edition of a pastoral letter, full of denunciations,
of which the second had been got up by the same
in 1768 ; and finally, some hortatory pieces, the
substance of which it may be superfluous to insert

268 NOTES TO

here. The epistle was signed by three converted
Jews.

That experiment, notoriously, proved a failure.
The nearer connexions of the Frank family dis-
persed in various parts and the sect lost its
nucleus in Germany. The wreck thereof, which
still preserves itself in Russia, and chiefly in
Poland, forms, in the utmost secresy, a kind of
order, of which the pursuits bear the outward
appearance of mystic philosophy ; but the real
character of which, is still unknown. Nor does
the Turkish government seem any more to concern
itself about it. All its members who live amongst
Christians, have been baptized, and, therefore,
are part and parcel of Christianity ; their few
Judaizing customs will soon dwindle away to
nothing.

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN, &C.
BY J. M. JOST.

Notwithstanding Mendelssohn's thoroughly
Rabbinical attitude, we not only count him amongst
the opponents of Rabbinism ; but although his dis-
senting spirit escaped the notice of the most rigid
Rabbis, in his Hebrew writings, we think our-
selves justified in directly considering him the
beginner of that opposition. Nay more : that it
did not develope itself casually from his works,
and the use made of them in teaching youth ; but
that he was distinctly conscious of it, and directed
his endeavours to give the religion of the Jews
another foundation than it had to common appear-
ance ; to spiritualize and exalt it, and together
with it, draw his co-religionists out of darkness,
and rout many a prejudice. The inducement to
come forward thus openly with his views, he
found in Dohm's celebrated work '' On the Civil
Improvement of the Jews," which first appeared

270 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

in 1781, and excited a universal sensation. This
was by no means the fugitive attempt of an indivi-
dual, to bring a new idea into credit by its novelty ;
but the freely expressed result drawn from the
circumstances of the times, new principles of
government, prevailing philosophical doctrines,
as applied to this particular subject ; therefore the
work was so multifariously read, and now applauded
now disapproved of, but without asperity. The
treatise properly is in the line of statesmen, and
the Jews are only the subject of it. Dohm en-
deavours to contravert the objections hitherto
offered to the civil incorporation of the Jews ; to
substantiate by their own history, the complaints
made against the Jews themselves, so far as they are
founded on truth ; but at the same time to propose
just that civil emancipation as a remedy against
those complaints, and demonstrate its future
effects. He makes it to consist in, 1st. putting
them on an equality of rights with the rest of the
citizens ; 2nd. admitting them to all trades what-
soever, encouraging them to handicrafts in parti-
cular; and 3rd. to husbandry; 4th. drawing them
off as much as possible from commerce, but not
by force ; and where commerce is carried on, ob-
liging them to keep regular books and in the Ger-
man language ; 5th. allowing them to profess all
arts and sciences ; and even appointing some to public

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 271

offices ; 6th. providing for a better system of edu-
cation amongst them, and regulating their schools
in a more suitable manner; 7th. preventing the
offensive tampering of Christian teachers ; 8th.
granting them perfect freedom of worship, together
with the right, enjoyed by every other religious com-
munity, of eiyelling on the principles of universal
prevailing canon-law, either for a time or always,
dissenting members ; without, however, any preju-
dice to them in their quality of citizens ; and 9th.
granting them a certain autonomy in such civil
matters as are connected with ritual statutes.

The two last proposals roused our philosopher.
Anyhow as a disciple of the philosophers of his
times, the French in particular, (to whom, if he did
not owe his turn of thinking, he at all events owed
his manner of treating subjects) he hated every
description of ecclesiastical power and above all the
right of expelling ; and his sentiments thereon
were very well known. Had he been a Christian,
he certainly would have proposed to put the Jews
on an equality with the rest of their countrymen ;
and nothing but his position as a member of the
community interested, made him refrain from
writing on the subject. It was the less a matter
of indifference to him, since he felt besides highly
concerned in clearing up a great and widely spread
error. Both Jews and Christians were of opinion

I

272 REMARKS ON MENDE LSSO H ^^

that theological freedom of thinking is incompatible
with Judaism ; and that if a full scope be given to
it, real Judaism must fall at once. This had
already been a source of vexation to Mendelssohn,
in the strange conduct of Lavater, excusable only
from religious zeal, yvho took some verbal expres-
sions of his for proofs of an apostacy from Judaism ;
therefrom, either seriously or pretendingly, con-
cluded a bias to Christianity ; and scrupled not to
invite Mendelssohn, through the medium of the
printing press, to make a public confession of his
nevv^ faith. Every one murmured at that incon-
siderate act ; and every one v^as pleased to see
Mendelssohn reply to him v^ith the most perfect
composure, and v^ithout in the least committing
himself. This inspired Lavater with still higher
regard for him. But when Mendelssohn saw even
so liberal a man as Dohm fall into the same error,
he thought it time to deliver his own opinions on
canon-law, which then could not but of themselves
intrench on Rabbinism. This he did in his preface
to Manasseh Ben Israel's Vindication of the Jews,
which he had translated from the English, and
presented to the German reader as an appendix to
Dohm's work.

After quoting several passages from the preface,
Jost proceeds thus : '* We do not know whether
the Rabbins felt the full force of those assertions,

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN., 273

and particularly of the considerations on which
they are founded ; since they never were heard to
say anything publicly about them. The majority
probably passed over them with a good deal in-
difference, as Mendelssohn had just then published
his Translations only, and did not seem to aim at
any influence on Judaism; whereas the reading
part of the nation, who already felt the highest
regard for the philosopher, devoured his words
with the utmost avidity, and heard with pleasure,
one of the wisest men raise his voice against a
too rigid Rabbinism ; as they foresaw that the
latter would no longer, as formerly, throw ob-
stacles in the way of the more and more improving
education of youth. The learned amongst the
Christians, however, noticed, with so much the
stronger sensations and watchfulness, the import-
ance and great effect of those opinions never before
so seriously pronounced by a Jew ; and they rea-
sonably concluded that Mendelssohn designed to
crush the power of the Rabbins completely. But
how that could be consummated without a simulta-
neous dissolution of Judaism, was puzzling enough
to men used to the notion of the identity of
Judaism and Rabbinism ; the more so as, in his
external demeanour, Mendelssohn strictly adhered
to the Rabbinical statutes: fresh attacks would,
therefore, not fail to be tried.

T

274 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

Accordingly, the anonymous ''Search for Light
and Right," with its Postscript by a certain
Parson '* Moerschel," appeared, and was soon
succeeded by an addition to the same, by
D. J. B. Hesse.* The former, it is true, inserts
many a sarcastic and ironical comment ; but on
the main point, his is the opinion of several
individuals besides himself. The author of the
addition enters deeper into the subject ; he again
takes up the definition of the essence of religion,
in the same words in which Mendelssohn gave it,
without meaning the Christian religion ; and this
he does to show that this very definition fits the
Christian religion only, and that Mendelssohn,
according to his own declaration, certainly would
have consigned himself to Christianity, if he had
not been deterred by the abuses still pre-
vailing in that church. At all events, he plainly
enough states the grounds for his resistance to
ecclesiastical statutes ; and further vindication he
needs none. In the main point, namely — ecclesi-
astical restraint, every one will concur with him ;
and a great deal would be done, if in this the
opinions of both religious parties were approximat-
ing. But the more important step Mendelssohn
made, is his explaining the idea of religion as

* The Editor regrets that his efforts to procure the ''Addition,"
proved abortive.

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 275

being all spirit and heart. He is, therefore, yet
far from accepting the subsisting Christian con-
fession, unless it should remove all the objections
raised against it by true Jews ; and the Rabbinical
attitude of Mendelssohn, and other similarly
minded Israelites, may therefore very well con-
sist with their rejection of every description of
restraint.

Mendelssohn was much affected on reading
those publications ; and in the former, he was
rather vexed at the misapprehension, which, to
judge from the tone of the work, was de-
signedly worded captiously, in order to perplex
the philosopher. Such an important defiance he
could not pass over in perfect silence, however
he might wish that an enquiry of that sort had
been introduced in a pure scientific manner, and
without the odious intermixture of his own indi-
viduality. In order more distinctly to unfold his
views, he composed the Jerusalem, ^c. The most
important thoughts analysed in that very beautiful
work, as far as style is concerned, are the follow-
ing:-—

* * * * *

Taking into consideration the originality of
those most remarkable conclusions of one of the
greatest men in the Jewish world, and the in-

t2

276 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

fluence they had on readers, we cannot refrain
from somewhat further elucidating them, in order
to see more clearly through, and appreciate their
aim. That they are of no use either in con-
troverting Dohm, or for confirming the Jewish law
amongst the Jews, is obvious at the first view ;
and to believe that the philosopher who wrote that
work, was not aware of that himself, would be
giving him but little credit for consistent deduc-
tion. For, first, if Dohm will allow a Synagogue-
penal-right (although the right of excommunicating
might really be too severe, as Mendelssohn cor-
rectly shows), that does not necessarily imply the
punishing of opinions about religion; nay, ac-
cording to the view, that the Jews had only to
perform actions, ecclesiastical discipline would
even be more in its place there, than in the
Christian church ; since the Rabbis would have
to punish actions only, without confining, by their
constraint, freedom of thinking. Secondly, if, as
Mendelssohn says, the ancient Jewish law, inti-
mately and inseparably united Religion and State,
the entire law must expire along with the de-
struction of the state ; since there was no where
any distinction made between precepts for indi-
viduals, and precepts for the community at large.
Every individual to whom Mendelssohn grants
the privilege of self-enquiry, would just thereby

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 277

be justified in considering the downfall of the
Jewish state, the most formal abrogation of a
law, which, as Mendelssohn himself declares, none
but the God who teaches by nature and realities,
could have given ; and there would, at most,
remain to a Jew, the hopes of a future restoration .
Least of all, needed Mendelssohn to upbraid the
conscience of a Jew gone over to the Christian
religion, with an infraction of the law; since just
by his own freedom of thinking, it could not, ac-
cording to nature and realities, have been forbidden
to an Israelite, even during the existence of the
Israelitish empire, to join another people, and
adopt their laws. If birth deprive of that right,
every family which should constitute itself into a
petty state, would stand by itself, and the human
race would consist of all isolated families and
states. A Jew who secedes from his people, also
rejects their law ; and although Jesus might not
deem its abrogation absolutely requisite for his
times, states more advanced in civilization would
demand a recantation ; since legislation, combined
as it is with Christian views of religion, could not
retain the Mosaic form. And if, moreover, the
religious law which he is henceforth to obey, have
only for its object the maintaining of immutable
truths ; if it is to be only the shell for keeping the
kernell ; must it not tranquilise every one's con-

278 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

science, when there is given to him another, and,
according to his own views and enquiry, a better
and more durable depository, to save his treasure
in ? Mendelssohn must have perceived this evident
descrepancy ; and therefore his book appears para-
doxical.

However, on a more careful investigation of
his design in composing that work, and, ex-
cepting a rather too far carried wresting of
meaning, we see, that he avails himself of the
criticised proposal of Dohm, only as a vehicle to
deliver publicly his thoughts on constraint of
opinion, and to show the mistake of imagining
him to be a partisan of Christianity ; just as if a
setting in of self- consciousness must needs evidence
a simultaneous falling in with the Christian church!
He wants to prove that a scrupulous abiding by
the Jewish laws may subsist along with freedom
of thinking ; nay, that it is our duty to foster an
alliance between them : therefore, when we want
to form an opinion of Judaism and the Jews, we
must not refer to the standing religious forms ; for
the law is not the religion, but it only contained
formerly undertaken engagements to ritual ob-
servances, which preserved the notions of religion,
without opposing their more developed exposition.
This thought, though not original, has never been^
so seriously pronounced by a true believing Jew,

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 279

and its spreading could not but become highly
dangerous to Eabbinism. For, to say nothing of
the abolition of the mastery, and even despotism
of the Rabbis, he led the Jews to enquire more
deeply into the spirit of traditional forms, and ask
themselves, whether, even acknowledging the
revelation of a law, every thing extant really do
flow from the law before them ? Might not the
errors and fallibility of more ancient Rabbis de-
duce wrong or false inferences from it ? Might
not many abuses be introduced ? How much of
the law does, in fact, pertain to the ancient Is-
raelitsh soil, and how much to religion? Nay,
freedom of thinking being allowed, it was quite
natural to question even the binding force of the
ancient law in foreign countries ; although Men-
delssohn will not admit the question, since he
considers that point beyond all doubt. At all
events, even with his straightness of delineation,
observable in all the digressions, of the work, he
gained the object of referring his brethren to their
own doctrine ; of cautioning them against hypo-
critically confessing another faith, and of providing
or preparing a new standard to judge the Jews by.
The Rabbis did not read his works, and seldom
had any misgivings as to their effects ; and if they
had, they wanted the means of counteracting them.
The cultivated Jews took up the germs of the new

280 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

plantation, and irade them thrive. When the
translations of Holy Writ took root, they became
the principal study of the modern Jews ; and the
Rabbis no longer found the Talraudical schools
resorted to, either so prematurely or so numerously
as heretofore. This they ascribed more to the
nature of the times, than to Mendelssohn, and (a
few hostile ones excepted), they beheld in his
Hebrew writings, and his translations, a not
un-acceptable supply of their own confessedly
defective mode of teaching. His task was ac-
complished when death called him away. He
had become the most un-ostentatious and most
successful reformer of one of the most unbending-
religious communities : nay, he defended them
against their oppressors, with that philosophic
calmness, with that philanthropic warmth, and
withal irresistible eloquence, that even his most
zealous opponents did not deny him their high
respect ; many of them sincerely loved him, and
all who dwelt on the history of his life, acknow-
ledged at least the necessity of a reform of the
Jews, and declared for using efficient means for
bettering their condition. Moreover, his dis-
tinguished morality and rare virtues, gained him
the esteem of all; and his last controversial
writings, although already exposing weaknesses,
still excited great interest. His memory will

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 281

never die amongst the Jews ; and his writings
will produce glorious effects yet for a long time
to come.

As, even in the opinion of the Jews, the struc-
ture of Rabbinical power was undermined by the
writings of Mendelssohn and others — its fall was
certain. Many other bright geniuses co-operated
in it. In the year 1783, a society was formed at
Königsberg, for propagating knowledge and mo-
rality amongst the Jews, by means of a periodical
work called Meassef, '' The Gatherer," of which
Isaac Euchel, Simon Zacharias, Samuel Fried-
lander, and also Michael Friedländer, afterwards
a physician and celebratedman of letters at
Paris, were the principal managers. This peri-
odical, the first that was ever published by
Jews, inserted articles by accomplished Jews,
whether they contained Jewish affairs, or occur-
rences of the times, delineations of abuses, valu-
able hints, and generally instructive subjects,
even fictions, poetry, imitations, and translations,
provided they were written in good Hebrew, or
good German. Through the medium of that
periodical, as rich in matter, as it was inap-
preciable for its effect on the cultivation of the
Jews, and to which also Hartwig Wessely,* and

* Jost, L. c. vol. ix. p. 80.

282 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

David Friedränder,* were splendid contributors,
many other rising men of letters became known to
the world, some of whom highly distinguished
themselves ; while their less celebrated colleagues,
afterwards belonging to the mercantile class,
rendered themselves very useful by their attempts
at diffusing elementary sciences, such as the rudi-
ments of history, geography, and natural history.
As champions against Rabbinism, we shall princi-
pally enumerate : — Wolß teacher at Dessau, who
made a trial of writing a compendium of religion ;
Isaac Satnow, the rigorous grammarian at Berlin,
externally living in the Rabbinical style ; Mar-
dochia Gumpel, afterwards Professor Levisson at
Upsal ; Joel Loewe (called Bril) the commentator
and distinguished philologist, professor at the
Jewish William School, at Breslau, he who en-
gaged with the celebrated Consistorial Counsellor
Paulus, in a learned controversy about the chro-
nology of the Malabar Jews;f and who was
highly panegyrised by Campe, and other learned
characters, as a man of excellent genius ; Professor
Wolffsohn^ at the same academy ; Tohiah Boas,
physician at the Hague ; Marcus Herz, Professor
and Aulic-Counsellor at Berlin, celebrated as a

* Jost, L. c. vol. ix. p. 87.
f Eichorn Kritische Bibliothe!:.

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 283

physican, and natural philosopher ; David Franco
Mendes, at Amsterdam ; Herz Homberg, superin-
tendent, by imperial appointment, of all the new
schools then being instituted in the Austrian
states ; Theodor Joseph Veit, and Baruch Lindau,
at Berlin, &c. &c. Besides the many beautiful
specimens of poetry, which gave new life to the
Hebrew language, that periodical, published four
years at Königsberg, and afterwards three years
longer at Berlin, did a vast deal of good. Ani-
mated to efforts still more useful, the co-operating
members effected the establishment of elementary
schools at Prague, and new Bidschoff, in Bohemia,
at Presburg, and divers other places, extended
their salutary effects, and excited imitation. The
physicians therein recommended the innoculation
of small pox, then strenuously resisted by the
Jews ; they also wrote scientifically and soundly
against the Jewish practice of prematurely in-
terring the dead, which abuse was, after a great
deal of arguing for and against, at last totally
abolished in the Prussian dominions, through the
efforts of a society of Hebrew youths, established
at Berlin, in 1792, for the support of reduced and
sick members, for promoting propriety, regularity,
and a more becoming tone of conversation, and for
putting a stop to all Rabbinical pragmaticalness.
Great men of antiquity became more known

284 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

through that periodical, and their lives were held
up as an example ; evident perversities of the
Rabbis w^ere justly exposed; the fair sides,
the fine discourses, renunciation of prejudices,
and more enlightened views of some of them
interspersed as exemplary hints ; and thus that
institution may be considered as a school of true
cultivation for the Jews.

It is not altogether easy to delineate the in-
fluence which those labours, and particularly the
inception of scientific life, might exercise on the
religious opinions of truly cultivated Jews. The
introduction of religious compendiums had been
tried, but an air of two-fold embarrassment was
not to be mistaken in them. First, the detaching
ofthat subject from biblical instruction was quite
new, and on that account, it was difficult to üx on
a method which would have embraced the whole
province, while most of the teachers wanted suffi-
cient energy to beat themselves an even path.
They therefore mostly took Christian school-books
for their models, and as it was necessary to leave
out the doctrinal part, there remained for internal
religion only a small account of ideas, on which
there was but little to expatiate, and the vacuity
was obliged to be filled up with ethics. Secondly,
they seemed not to have made up their mind as to
how much they should leave to Judaism, and how

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 285

much of its consuetude they should condemn
as abuse. Moreover, there was a want of good
schools ; every father of a family, every youth
began to think on religious matters, particularly
on outward observances, when convictions of
the unessential ity of the ceremonial laws forced
themselves upon them, at the same time that no
one could tell what else to substitute for those
ceremonies, since youth had been trained to no-
thing else. Thus they found themselves in no
small dilemma. Pure Deism, it was appre-
hended, would soon degenerate into levity, be-
cause it offers no resting point; while, on the
other hand, they saw that existing Judaism no
longer kept place with the progress made. What
was to be done now? Which system was to
raise that embarassment?

We think we have observed that nevertheless the
following maxims, got by tacit agreement, as it
were, into credit with the thinking Jews, whereby
their constant predilection for Judaism still main-
tained itself, and those who lived ever so unre-
strainedly were deterred from going over to a
church where so many advantages beckoned them :
viz. — That the Jews were not a chosen people, in
the sense in which that term had been taken till
then, was admitted by every one ; and such liturgi-
cal expressions were considered merely a standing

k

286 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

form. Yet the Jew would maintain that he could
draw true religion nowhere but at the fountains
of Holy Writ accessible to him, provided they stood
the test of reason. The ideas of Christianity con-
tinued to appear absolutely strange to him, and no
one believed that it was possible ever to make a
confession of them conscientiously and free from
hypocrisy, without the convictions afforded by
education and habit. All the gold which all the
missionary societies dedicate to an object holy with
them, that of converting the Jews, will provide
only a proportionably small number of proselytes,
and amongst those but few convinced ones. The
stamina of Judaism is yet vigorous enough to be
sure of a still longer duration. That true religion
consisted in the convictions of the supernatural
revelation made to the patriarchs of Israel, to
Moses and the prophets, consequently in believing
that there is a God, and that he mediately made
himself known to men, for the purpose of instruct-
ing them, that God's providence rules the universe
and is specially mindful of man, whom he esti-
mates according to moral worth, and will here-
after render him according to his deeds, which
necessarily supposes the doctrine of the immorta-
lity of the soul. The morality of Holy Writ was
considered the only correct one, in as much as it
corresponded with the maxims to be received ; and

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 287

therefore not only a moral life was required, but
such a one as was constantly acting from a sense
of religion, and not from stale worldly philosophy.
On the other hand, they cleared away all discre-
pancies, and made circumstances account for every
statement of Holy Writ, which might divert from its
general morality ; so for instance of all actions of
the patriarchs that are censurable, according to our
notions, such as duplicity, craft, deeds of violence,
and the like, evasive explanations were given.
The same expedient they found themselves in-
duced to have more or less recourse to, with the
miracles which some would sophistically reason
away altogether, and some try to reduce to natural
causes ; but which certainly would not go down
quite generally. At all events a certain degree of
vacillation is not to be mistaken, and it was with
the education of youth where they were most irre-
solute how to proceed. As to the ceremonial law,
they never completely spoke their mind about it,
but no one could help agreeing with Mendelssohn
that they are nothing but the shell of the kernel ;
and in sifting the enormous rabbinical additions,
they soon began to make a distinction between
what was essential and what was not. As they
could not deny the Mosaic legislation a divine
origin, without oversetting Judaism altogether,
all the additions foisted upon it were discarded.

288 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

and they arrived at the conviction, that the greater
part of the laws still extant as seemingly applicable,
vi^ere not fulfilled in the sense of the legislation ;
because they were calculated for the original land
only, and could not be perfectly kept in other
countries. Again, that whatever had for its object
the keeping apart from idolatry and its sensual
followers, must not be extended to Christianity
and its followers ; that in foreign countries also,
many duties must turn up which are repugnant to
the legislation for a Jewish state, such as military
service, &c. In short, that until the not- to-be-
calculated restoration of the Israelitish empire by
the expected Messiah, only such precepts of the
law are to hold, as tend to, and serve for, the pre-
servation of the kernel of religion, and as are
adapted to form of its congregations a piously re-
ligious union, without their being hostile to exist-
ing relations or to the improvement of the mind.
In this manner, the religion still continued orthodox,
although not in a rabbinical sense. For upon those
principles, every individual who without levity
sought to get rid of old impressions, became in-
duced to preserve his children from all prejudices
against Christians, and from shunning an inter-
course with them ; to teach them to exercise
brotherly love without distinction of religion, reject
many ordinances for being unessential, discontinue

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 289

many customs for being superstitious, and in the
end, to respect, merely for the sake of preserving
the community, divine worship, the holidays par-
ticularly dedicated to it, and other indispensable
requisites of religion. They mainly adopted
the maxim ; *' For the individual there is in-
ternal, living, spirit-and-heart-inspiring-religion;
for the congregation external worship and forms,"
This was diametrically opposite to Rabbinism,
and no less so to the not altogether absolvatory as-
sertions of Mendelssohn, who maintained, that in the
present times and relations, the laws of the Jews
are duties and obligations undertaken by every
one of them individually.

Whilst we may thus take a pleasant retrospective
view at the progress made, we must not dissemble
that the wished-for change of Jewish thinking and
living did neither immediately nor every where
yield good fruit ; nay we cannot but agree with
the numerous ephemeral writers, who take their
subjects more from the follies of others than from
the sciences, that for want of proper guidance, the
striving to reform, and to strip off old defects pro-
duced fresh blots, which were noticed by all culti-
vated men. The middling class of Jews were but
just emerging into life, they had to pass through a
childhood and an adolescence. The Rabbis they
had got rid of; whereas there was a want of men

290 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

who knew how to teach religion with dignity, and
in a manner becoming the subject. The novice, to
whom the ancient sources were inaccessible, was
looking out for direction and instruction ; and at
length, he found with the French philosophers and
their German imitators, enlightening, as it was
called. The mind stripped off its fetters; there
was the freeman, it is true, but without having
served the necessary apprenticeship for the right use
of that freedom. Thence arose intestine discord,
which was screened by vanity only ; they kept aloof
from their homely brethren, sought more elegant
society, and by so doing only exposed themselves.
Nor did youth who, without regular preparation,
were studying the origin of religion fare any better;
for after all they were obliged to betake themselves
again to commerce.

Without having been at a finishing school, every
youth, every maiden once in possession of the
High German idiom, through the translations of
Holy Writ, was impressed with the necessity of
making still further proficiency. At any rate the
construction of society demanded more refined
language and politer manners. Wherever a youth
visited, the company discussed philosophy; the
Talmud did not supply him with the means of
taking a part himself; and to study the great Ger-
man philosophers, he either wanted books, or the

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 291

necessary preliminary knowledge. He, therefore,
had nothing left but a recourse to the Hebrew
philosophers ; Maimonides and Judah Hallevi were
his models; and the book Moreh, if need be, with
the addition of Solomon Maimon's Kanteism, Cosri,
Jedadya Hapnini, and others, were diligently read
and animated the philosophical spirit of the rabbini-
cal students. Inflated with those unsystematically
combined thoughts, which could not be methodized
by Mendelssohn's writings, many of them fancied
themselves philosophers and talked consequentially,
which ill-became them. He who got on so far
that he conceived himself qualified to figure in
public, would come forward now with so called
philosophical strictures on , now with a vindi-
cation of Judaism, now with moral extracts from
the Talmud, illustrations of scripture texts, &c.
&c. ; and the illiterate believed they heard and read
so many new Mendelssohns. Half-learned mer-
chants liked to see themselves noticed and mar-
velled at, in the company of accomplished Chris-
tians ; while the old-fashioned and less progressing
Jews found themselves isolated, and frequently
made a laughing-stock of by their own brethren, who
considered an entire waving of outward religious
observances commendable, and a sign of superior
education. However, as even that licentious party
had not yet by a good deal made such proficiency

u 2

292 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

as to enable them to justify their conduct with
satisfactory reasons ; but were only prompted by
childish vanity, they reaped nothing but disappro-
bation ; namely, on the part of the Rabbis for their
irreligion, of the estimable anti-rabbins for their
deviation from the straight road to knowledge, and
of Christians for their ridiculousness. Those irre-
gularities, moreover, called forth a multitude of
pamphlets and satirical caricatures ; which could
not fail causing a good deal of exasperation and
scandal. Nor could it well be otherwise. The
first reforming spirits towered too much above the
age they lived in, and with the exception of Men-
delssohn, who really knew how to let himself
down to the people, advanced at too swift a rate,
so that the more weak, for whom no suitable provi-
sion had been made, were obliged to stay behind.
Establishments for education were wanting both
for youth and adults, nor were there either teachers
or catechisms; and the defect was particularly
visible at divine worship, which was less and less
understood by the moderns, and not rendered heart-
bracing by proper instruction. Hence the syna-
gogues were deserted by those aspirers at further
refinement. Theological study neglected, religious
life disappeared, and along with it many an excel-
lent homespun virtue ; so did temperance, peace
of mind, and domestic happiness. From this there

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 293

also sprang that class of conceited half-bred lite-
rati, of which the Jewish nation can produce enow,
the fruit of that liberty and no liberty wherever it
does exist; and who are only the more encouraged
in their self-complacency by the indulgence of truly
learned men. However, when at length political
writers began to notice the nuisance, and sought to
remedy it by efficient means, it was too late with part
of the more informed Jews, who preferred Christi-
anity to that ambiguousness, and drew after them
many others, who think no more of shifting religion
than they do of shifting a coat.

Jewish education, at length, made considerable
progress in the Prussian states. That seeming
refinement with which we reproached the times
immediately succeeding the Mendelssohnian era,
was soon forced to make way for another spirit
more conscious of itself. Every source became
open to the Jews, and a way was paved to honour
and distinction for superior merits to those re-
quired only by success in trade. A truly scien-
tific career allured one, the arts another. Occa-
sional appointments in the civil department, the
admission of practised artists as members of the
Royal Academy, the placing of clever men into
municipal offices, and generally the encourage-
ment everywhere given to ability, could not but
spur the emulous to perfect themselves as useful

294 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

members of society. The pretensions of the half-
advanced were ridiculed and put to shame ; and even
the commonalty knew very soon how to discriminate
real merit, from outward shew and a parade of
words. Jewish painters of both sexes, formerly
a very extraordinary sight, now furnished distin-
guished specimens for the annual exhibition ; vir-
tuosi performed with applause at public concerts ;
some qualified themselves for private teachers of
mathematics, ancient and modern languages, and
some even proved no mean acquisition to the
stage.

But nothing is a stronger evidence of the pro-
gress made, than that the Jewish schools were
frequented by a considerable number of Christians ;
the Berlin free-school alone, had one-third of Chris-
tian children amongst its scholars ; while members
of the board of general education, as well as
clergymen, bestowed, in the public journals, praise
on the services rendered by that institution, then
supported by voluntary contributions. Still more
brilliant success crowned the efforts of that in-
defatigable tutor, Dr. Bock, at Berlin, whose
higher academic establishment met with universal
applause, and really deserved it for its admirable
regularity. During the short career allotted him,
he made the fabric of his own raising so to flourish,
that the first families at Berlin and other towns,

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 295

nay several titled ones, cheerfully entrusted their
children to his care ; and the promiscuous educa-
tion of Jews and Christians, not only gave no
offence, but was even honored with the sanction of
the consistory, and the visiting commissioners
appointed by the same. He died in the thirty-
second year of his life, universally lamented.
There were also other establishments for education
v^hich co-operated in the general introduction of a
better system of training youth ; and even the
rabbinical foundations began to see the expediency
of respecting, besides their principal study, pre-
paratory information also.

All that while, Ben David continued operating
with his writings, and David Friedländer braving
advanced age, was as vigorous and ready as ever
in devoting himself to the service of the community.
As elder of the congregation he had great influ-
ence ; and as a man of active habits he was em-
ployed also in municipal offices. Both his and his
worthy friend Lieberman Schlesinger's discreet ac-
tivity, gained them personally the highest esteem,
and contributed very much towards the amend-
ment of the Jewish lower class. The Hebrew
muse once more inspired Friedlander, for three
years longer in the new Gatherer, although still
sounding only in faint echoes. The German lan-
guage had too firmly established its ascendancy,

296 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

for modern spirits to prefer the oriental harp;
their feelings already belonged to a new father-
land, and found no longer any expression in the
defunct language. However pamphlet- writers
might declaim against the naturalization of the
Jews, it was completed ere yet the law sanctioned
it. Jews served in the national guard, their lives
were consecrated to their king and country ; they
entered the army and fought courageously , they
loved the soil and the empire, where they were
allowed to follow their tenets without humiliation.
They were no longer parted from the country ;
they frequented its gymnasiums, universities, and
the Ateliers of its artists. Husbandry and me-
chanical trades only were still denied them.
When, in March 1812, there appeared the wise
royal edict, completing the work of emancipation,
and deciding the many years' contested question,
by the following regulation.

The Jews in the ancient Prussian states are
considered natives and Prussian citizens, on con-
dition that they shall adopt family names, and, in
all transactions, make use of the German or some
other living language. They shall enjoy equal
rights and privileges with the Christians. They
shall be eligible to academical, and also to paro-
chial offices. They shall be at liberty to live in any
part of the state, acquire landed property, exer-

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN, 297

eise any lawful trade, and follow any lawful
business. The Jews shall have to pay no ad-
ditional taxes, but must bear all the charges and
duties alike with other citizens. They are sub-
ject to military service. Their marriages are not
liable to any impediments, only a foreigner cannot
acquire the right of citizenship by marrying a
native. They are not to have any separate laws,
except in matters of divine worship and ritual
usances ; but without a retrogressive force. They
shall not be allowed a jurisdiction of their own.
Finally the government reserves to itself the
necessary determinations about the conditions of
the church, and improving education amongst the
Jews, in considering of which, it shall avail itself
of the assistance of confessors of the Jewish re-
ligion, known for ability and integrity, and hear
their opinion.

This edict excited enthusiasm in the Jews
already sufficiently prepared. Now they were
natives,* and natives they would be, while the
holy warf offered them abundant opportunity to
manifest their love of their sovereign. Young

* The German word LandesJcinder, children of the country, is
far more expressive than the English word, natives. Natives
they had been, and their fathers before them ; but no children of
the country.

t The first French Invasion.

298 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

men joined the army : not one of them showed
cowardice ; many of them who had arrived at
preferment, and were decorated with tokens of
reward, died for their country ; many returned
home honoured and respected. Amongst the
general excitation, parents sacrificed their darling
children to danger, their substance to the wounded
and other sufferers by the war ; nay, their time
and health in nursing the sick. The name
''Prussian," extinguished all difference of religion,
and the king acknowledged the noble efforts of
all alike by praise and badges of honour.

Thus the dispositions were fused into brotherly
love; and also, during the succeeding leisure,
vulgar aspersion missed its aim. The second
period of war drew the bond of union among the
subjects still tighter ; and at the subsequent
general peace, the salutary effects of correct
statistical views became conspicuous in the new
relations of the Jews, and prospered more and
more.

The 16th article of the Act of the Congress of
Vienna, in 1815, runs thus: *'The Congress will
consider of the best possible manner of effecting a
uniform civil amelioration of the followers of the
Jewish religion throughout Germany ; and par-
ticularly of granting them the enjoyment of civil
rights in the allied states, in return for their taking

REMARKS OW MENDELSSOHN. 299

upon themselves all civic duties. Meanwhile it
guarantees unto the confessors of that faith, the
rights already granted them by single states of the
alliance." That article, although not yet gene-
rally carried into execution, establishes an epocha,
such as there never has been another in Jewish
history. The Jews are determined to deserve
what they have already gotten, or what they may
yet obtain,— the rights of man; they feel them-
selves urged to be their own reformers, that they
may conciliate their destiny. A reform of the
Jews, then, has set in, and it is being pursued
with consciousness ; it is already as evident in
Prussia and Austria, as it is in those countries
where once French sway sowed good seed, and
where, on the return of the legitimate sovereign,
the superior exotic shoots were not torn up again.
In Sardinia, and the Pope's dominions, the Jews
are retrograding along with the states themselves.
Not so in the greater states of Germany, particularly
in high-risen Prussia, where the Jews are willingly
suffered to refine, and freely unfold themselves.
There Mendelssohn's spirit is still about. In all
the provinces of the Prussian empire, not even
excepting the larger towns in the duchy of Posen,
there more or less prevails an active disposition to
reform ; and every where the fruit thereof, appears
very forward. Every where we behold small and

300 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

large societies uniting for the purpose of forming
good mechanics, husbandmen, and other useful
citizens ; and, within a few years, we find the
number of formally incorporated Jew master-
tradesmen, almost out of proportion, who all bear
a character for industry and integrity. No one
any longer wins the regard of his co-religionists
by the length of his purse, if his wealth be not
the product of industry, and its possessor's con-
duct irreproachable ; and although the influence
of pecuniary resources is the same all over the
world, they know better than to confound neces-
sity with esteem and respect : the latter are con-
sidered due to the useful and honourable man
only. But we also frequently meet with both
united, and many of the rich make sacrifices, for
the sake of having their brethren converted into
beings available for the public good ; and they so
highly value industry, arts and sciences, that they
destine also their own chidren to them, esteeming
the deficiency in capital, little in comparison with
what they accumulate of real worth. Youth,
who will not comply with that spirit, meet with
no preferment ; and the same as heretofore, the
term '* Jewish," was constantly applied by Chris-
tians to Jews with contumely, so the Jews now
make use of it themselves, by way of reproach to
those, who, from inherited prejudice, dislike to

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 301

work, pride, or other defects of education, will not
accommodate themselves to any employment for the
public good. Usurers are profoundly despised.

Animated by that spirit, the Jews have seen the
necessity of founding good elementary schools,
calculated to lead youth from subtle Talmudical
plodding, back to the simple elements of good
education, and render them fit for all regular
callings of life ; to preserve them from the silly
conceitedness which frequently makes Talmudists
think themselves in possession of universal know-
ledge ; and also to keep the less talented from
studies, which cannot be compassed without due
preparation, and, therefore, rather deaden the
mind than enliven it. In this the governments
seconded them, by suffering none but approved
teachers to be appointed ; and although there
still exists too great a lenity in this respect, yet
the Jews became more and more sensible of the
need of having better teachers, and gradually learn
to discriminate between fair and false pretensions.
Nay, the Talmudists themselves have already
seen the necessity of a reform of the instruction of
youth ; and at Berlin, the late Chief Rabbi, Weil,
assented to the establishing of a Rabbinical semi-
nary, with preparatory elemental classes, and
himself collected subscriptions for the same.

Meanwhile the Berlin free-school, too, has

302 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

passed into the hands of the congregation, and is
very diligent in giving boys an education suitable
for the middle and working class. Already good
elementary schools are, the same as there, estab-
lished in all rather numerous congregations
throughout the kingdom ; and where they had not
the means to do so, they endeavoured to introduce,
at least, better religious instruction ; and although
no fixed norma be established for the same, it is
every where easily founded on the books of holy
writ, which convey the purest and sublimest con-
ceptions even to youth, and guard them from
false enlightening.

In more liberally educated youths, who devote
themselves to the arts and sciences, one very
distinctly perceives the fruit of noble aspirings.
Self-taught geniuses, after the example of Men-
delssohn, formerly so abundant, but which, how-
ever admired, seldom advance to sound polymathy,
gradually disappear, and along with them, a
certain vain, and deservedly ridiculed self-suffici-
ency. They choose for youth the slower but
surer way of good schools and classic preparation.
As they mostly study from free choice only, they
distinguish themselves by their diligence ; and the
directors of gymnasiums give most Jewish students
a testimony of industry and propriety of conduct ;
the same as at the universities, they, upon the

I

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 303

whole, do not come behind others; and when
academical theses are proposed, such of them as
become competitors, now and then furnish dis-
tinguished performances, and carry off the prize.
Only those who come from Poland to study at the
German universities, are not always properly pre-
pared; and that very circumstance proves the
importance of judicious regulations on the part of
the state, and the advantages resulting from them
in respect to education.

Then as such a number of men of sound
faculties, and more and more commendable as-
pirings, lawfully exist in the state ; and as their
extinction cannot well be a statistical object, it
needs becomes the states province to make of the
whole body the most it may ; therefore to afford
it every means for its inner improvement, as also
facilitate the application of, and preserve from
abuse, every project consistent with the progress
of the times.

" Now look here, upon tins picture, and on this;"

The German Jews, generally, were of one and
the same character. With the exception of a few,
who had received at Vienna some external im-
pressions, and brought them with them to Berlin,
it may be said that they all bore one stamp,
whereby they certainly merited the name of '*a

304 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

People" independent of inner carnal affinity.
What that stamp consisted in, cannot be pre-
cisely said, as it formed the totality of several
appurtenances imperceptible themselves, the
blending of v^hich, only produced just that
quality. That it must not be sought for in the
tenets and maxims of Judaism, is evident from
the contrast between the German and Portuguese
and Oriental Jews, although their principles are
not unlike. They almost appear two different
original nations. With the former, the case of
their peculiar character is obvious. True national
pride, grounded on intelligence, conduct, and
knowledge ; or the surmounting of stupendous
fatalities it is, which, at all times, elevates the
mind, and the tradition of which serves as a means
to preserve the whole. This cannot be said of the
German Jews. They had to do with mediocrity
only; they never could unite for any grand
action ; they were always only individuals, every
one doing the best for himself, and out of the
individuals communities gradually arose. Whence
then their general character ? This question has
occupied many, both of the lettered and un-
lettered, and produced a number of works for and
against the Jews, in which mere single facts are
exhibited as characteristic, which, however, could
not be so. Since the beginning of the last century,

i

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 305

until beyond the middle of it, there was a deluge
of publications on the Jews, and principally on
their character ; nay, now and then, some very
voluminous ones ; * but none solved the question.
ChafFery, sharping, usury, and an aversion to
labour, has been almost every where given out as
a characteristic of the Jews ; and thus from the
trade of many amongst them, if not of all, from the
misdeeds of individuals, the absurd concessions of
governments on the one hand, and their cruel
restrictions on the other, false conclusions were
drawn. The innumerable ceremonies, antipathy
to Christians, stubbornness and other circum-
stances, were also included, and not altogether
unjustly, as appurtenances. That the picture
was not perfectly drawn, every one was sensible
of; and the more and more evident partiality
in the delineation, even caused that great number
of writings ; only they were all affected by the
same evil, and, in truth, there is nothing more
difficult than to fully characterize a mass of men,
just gone forth from a history of development,
that had been almost unknown ; who are not able
to delineate themselves, nor yet can be brought to
do it. However, the main point is this : the
German Jews became what they were, through

* See Wolff Bibl. Hebr. Script, an ti Jud. recent. -Schudt and
others.

X

306 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

the training of youth, which, under all circum-
stances, could not turn out otherwise.

Nor do we mean to venture on a complete and
minutely finished picture; we shall give only
some outlines which will sufficiently mark the
lights and shades. The German Jews are the
product of history ; and, therefore, upon the
whole, innocent of their character. They formed,
from the beginning, a passive mass, now quite
kept under, and now suffered to increase ; now
conglomerating and now scattered, containing
few component parts of its own, and always more
or less mixed with foreign. Their spirituality,
their religion, and the laws interwoven with it, they
had ; it was their inheritance ; and owing to books
imported from abroad, it tolerably well continued
the same ; it was the only thing on which they
were actively employed, equally with naturally
instinctive propagation. As such, they stood op-
posed to Christendom, not as hostile to the state,
as under the first Caesars ; not as persecutors of
the Christians, as in the times of the fathers of the
church; not as adversaries of Christendom, as in
Moorish Spain; not as slave-dealers, as in the
beginning of the middle ages ; not as marrers of
the progress of Christianity and abettors of heresy,
and certainly not as vagrants, rogues, bloodthirsty
and otherwise vicious men ; for the law itself en-

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 307

deavours to prevent all that; and truly, in all
other countries, the Jews were, on an average,
getting better livelihoods. They were admitted,
and tolerated — by the clergy, with a view of
converting them ; by statesmen, with a view of
availing themselves of them. The former could
not possibly succeed; for what nation has ever
been converted from its own religion to another by
mere instruction ? State regulations only will
change by force, or gradually the mind of a
nation, through educating youth for the purposes
of the state, through encouragement, reward of
success, and strict watchfulness. This was im-
possible with the Jews at large ; they were too
much scattered for that. The state tried it with
individuals ; but that had no effect on the whole :
it therefore judged best to avail itself of them,
just as it found them. The ancient councils had
dispossessed the Jews of landed property, they
intimidated and circumscribed them, threw them
upon themselves, and left them no other livelihood
than lending money on interest. The state allowed
them to take very high interest, in order that they
might disgorge the best part thereof to itself; they
seemingly fared well by it, were protected in re-
turn, and had not to work for their living ; they
were prepared for removing at a moment's notice,
if needs must be ; this was the case often enough,

X 2

308 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

and that rendered usury the dearer to them.
Rights they had none ; the legal recovery of their
contracts was more the concern of the state than
their own. They themselves could only breathe
and live.

This became odious to the Christian subjects,
they lost by it ; but the Jews got nothing by that
loss. At times, therefore, states and particularly
the free towns, felt little regret to drive away a
mass of Jews; and just as little did the Jews
collectively feel to leave parts where they earned
nothing, and where they rendered no services.
Individuals favoured by fortune or by their own
wits, would even soon regain admission ; and all
the policy they then had to observe, consisted in
subtilely concealing the public loss. Jews not
monied enough for usury, were allowed to go
about the country trafficking and peddling,
whereby the state got body-tolls, night-quarter-
money, safe-conduct-dues, &c. They were in
the most penurious condition, and led a life than
which nothing could be more wretched; they
even stood in the light of one another, and
brotherly hatred took sooner root amongst them
than brotherly love. To the richer, they were a
nuisance, and often also their tools. In short, in
that state, the Jews did not learn to know the
value of arts, sciences, and real industry ; the

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 309

value of money only was evident to them ; at that
only they w^ere suffered to aspire, and its acquisi-
tion made amends for suffering. A few Rabbis
sufficed for the care of religious affairs : they m ight be
cheaply enough imported from Poland, and they
had constantly to answer the questions of the
illiterate. Unacquainted with the spirit of religion,
every one was contented with being led by the
Rabbis, thinking that then he could not possibly
err. Hence the unlimited rabbinical sway.

Thus humbled as a slave, the Jew remained en-
tirely assigned to himself, a child of habit, and
subject to constant foreign influence, which how-
ever, could but slowly change the subsisting order
of things. Christian rancour revived at every re-
collection of the crucifixion of Christ;* it drew
nourishment from the just complaints of Jewish
practices. Taunted by children and insulted by
adults, the Jew was obliged partly to endure,
partly to seclude himself; his house was his fort-
ress, retirement his defence. Even the tenderest
infant observed his father constantly hide himself
and his effects ; it accordingly contracted the
character of cowardice and craftiness already at the
very first stage of life. How could a Jew venture
to give his child a fair, liberal humane education,
and send him to schools to be prepared for the
higher sciences ? He would thereby open his eye»

* See note at the end of this article.

310 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

to the prevailing calamity, render him still more
unfortunate by the consciousness of his ill-fate, ere
yet the power of bearing it was steeled by habit ;
or give him an opportunity to escape it. to desert,
and turn traitor to his religion and to his people.
Conformable to those circumstances thei'efore, the
education was homely, contracted, ritually-godly
to an extreme, and withal inuring to concealment.
With Christians, the Jew had intercourse mostly
for the purpose of business, which, with the settled
and seldom travelling Jews, consisted almost in
none but money transactions and frippery ; a few
carried on a wholesale trade in merchandize, by
special licence. Through the former business, the
Jew formed acquaintance with hardly any but
inordinately living Christians, who were in want of
means to carry on their concerns, having been
careless with their capital, or squandered their
superfluities, so that they were constantly hampered ,
and obliged to raise money at usurious interest, or
dispose of their effects far below their value. The
better sort of the nation have no need for such
shifts ; for the steadier a person is, the easier he
may command the needful for his business. The
Jews therefore came in contact only with the dissi-
pated part of the German nation ; they outweighed
them in sense and judgment, and thence learned
to look upon the Christian with contempt; his

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 311

abusing them was little cared about, knowing as
they did, that he was only venting his chagrin at
his own imbecility. This wrought in them a
certain pride, which cringing to their cowardice,
degenerated into that overweening for which they
have been so frequently censured.

The Jews therefore fain associated together in
their own streets, seeking no intercourse with
Christians, chuckling amongst themselves over their
preponderancy, caring little or nothing about the
manners of the world, purity of language, bodily
or mental cultivation, attending to the exercise of
their common religious observances only, and
sallying forth every day to look out for business.
The Hebrew language proved an auxiliary to them.
Knowing of German hardly any but the words
required in business, the deficiency was supplied
with corrupt Hebrew ; by which they concocted a
vile idiom of but small compass, wherein they ex-
pressed themselves with the most impact brevity ;
and which they brought the more into practice, as
they could converse in it in the hearing of Chris-
tians, without betraying themselves. Even their
books, letters, promissory notes and receipts were
all written in that idiom. Christians tried in vain to
penetrate into that secret, to compose Jewish-
German grammars, and revealed many an expres-
sion. To the citizens, it continued to remain

312 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

unintelligible. Yet in the middle of the last century,
a Jewish child's reading a German book was reck-
oned amongst the highest offences ; even the
Jewish German idiom was allowed to be written
.in Hebrew characters only ; whatever was put
into the hands of youth as exercises in reading,
contained either religious matters or the most
absurd legends. The Jewish-German paraphrase
of the Pentateuch, which Rabbi Jacob Ben Israel
published 200 years ago under the title of Zenah-
arenah was a work for the improvement of females,
and went through innumerable editions. It is the
zenith of preposterousness ; and a reference to any
part of the book, will shew how insensible one
must become to every taste of the polite world,
to whom the like appears agreeable if not sacred.
Through such means, then, the female sex was
debarred from reading German books, and did not
learn the German language, for which they never
had any occasion. Some made themselves mis-
tresses of pure Hebrew, and were highly pleased
with their learned outside.

Now, if it be considered that in the very same
country where all this took place, the ancient
Greek and Roman authors were read with avidity
by the Christians, the high-German tongue and its
beauties more and more cultivated, and the politer
manners and phraseology of their western neigh-

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 313

bours more generally adopted ; this retrogression
of the Jews must be the more striking, the more
numerous they were in the cities. The distance
between the two religious sects could not therefore
but appear immense in every respect. Was it not
already perceivable enough between those Jews
and their Portuguese brethren ?

That morals must suffer from this stifling of all
external and internal cultivation admits of no
doubt; even the established position of the Jews
with regard to the generality, was an immoral one.
How much more then must ignorance, separation,
and the perpetual conflict between craft and con
tempt, degrade all morality ? Seeing how rare it
is amongst the lower orders of the people, even
when well governed ; how much rarer then must
it be amongst a class of men so repudiated, so
abandoned to inward depravity ? That cheating,
knavery, thieving, and an addiction to gambling
was then observed in many of them, is not to be
denied. Who does not discover in this the efi*ects
of wrong state regulations ?

The more liberal-minded ecclesiastics thought
they might check the evil, by turning their atten-
tion to the conversion of the Jews. Their design
deserves acknowledgment, although religious zeal
frequently carried them too far. But they forgot
that in order to efl'ect frequent desertion to the

314 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

Christian faith, it should be preceded by a renun-
ciation of predominating nationality. In Spain,
formerly, highly cultivated Jews could with far
greater facility be gained for Christianity. When
baptized they instantly ceased to be Jews, and
became Spaniards ; their talents paved them the
way to high offices, and their accomplished man-
ners, to matrimonial alliances, and intercourse with
the great. Their former condition was soon con-
signed to oblivion. But what was a German Jew
of the usual cast after baptism? Letting alone
the feigned conversion, he mostly was, as to lan-
guage and manners, still a raw Jew, unfit both for
office and good society, and one who could not
possibly divest himself of earlier impressions. The
Jews had their own national customs, to which most
people are even stronger tied than to their religions,
Who has not felt the fascinating charm of frolics
regularly returning every year, the standing jests,
the usual games, particularly in a select and not
very numerous circle ? Even long after we have
ceased to participate in them, those joys live in our
memory ; and the solitarily living Jew, the invalid
confined to his room, the tottering greybeard, would
still delight in the reminiscences resuscitated at
every recurring season. To this must be added
certain national songs to set melodies, which, how-
ever barbarous the composition, will never die

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 315

away even with him of a subsequently more refined
taste. Again, on particular days, certain dishes
and drinks founded on some traditional jest, which
things one ever after continues partial to ; certain
puns and allusions, adages and quaint sayings,
which one is pleased with in those just about one,
because they are taken from real popular life and
not out of books ; nay a certain tone of voice, a
certain gait, and in general every thing which
characterises a distinct mass of men as such, and
of which not a single item will be found wanting
with the Jews in any part. Amongst such a mass,
speech, both as the enunciation of thoughts and
the enunciation of feelings, obtains a meaning of
their own; and in all its forms, except those
natural to the accepted phraseology of business,
the most vexing difference appeared, which spoiled
social intercourse, sometimes not unwished for.
When in the common outbreaking of joy or grief,
the Christian called upon the name of Jesus, he
excited horror in the breast of the Jew prepossessed
against the founder of Christianity ; and when in
similar cases, the Jew vented his emotions in half-
Hebrew or bad German exclamations, the Christian
could not refrain from laughing. Accordingly
they never coincided in feeling, if the subject were
ever so apt to excite the same sensation in either.
Tasteful relaxations of a higher order, as Plays,

316 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

Concerts, Balls, &c., the Jews did not fancy
much. Either too frugal, or too bigoted, or too
unsusceptible, and living for religion only, they con-
sidered all that {Hebet) folly. Still they did not by
any means spurn similar recreations amongst them-
selves, if concomitant with religious solemnities,
as at weddings, middle-holidays, &c. ; nay, at the
Purim festival, bands of them would perambulate
the streets in masquerade, not minding being un-
mercifully bantered by the rabble, so that they
could have their fun. Those masqueraders fre-
quently performed dramatic pieces, the subject of
which was the discomfiture of Haman ; most egre-
gious productions, in which the very hero, Mordecai,
figured as a buffoon of the lowest description. In
many places those fooleries occasioned disturbances,
particularly when the Purim feast happened to fall
in the Christian passion week, which made the
authorities put a stop to them. Still, such was the
reluctance to part with them, that the practice
maintained itself beyond the period alluded to, and
even unto our days. By those instances, we only
want to intimate, how estranged the Jews were to
the body of the German nation; and we think
we need not refer to other occasional customs,
such as at weddings, circumcisions, burials, &c.
for stronger proofs of the peculiarity of the Jewish
world.

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 317

All this, mere baptism could not wash off; it
could not even extinguish immorality. For expe-
rience teaches that a converted thief went on steal-
ing ; and a converted cheat was still a cheat, with
this difference, that he had been guilty of one more
imposture, in confessing another faith. The en-
deavors of a Wagenseil, an Edzard, a Kallenberg,
and other divines, were successful only with such
Jews as a school education had used already early
to think, and who, through intercourse with Chris-
tians, were in some measure withdrawn from their
own people. But German Jews sending their
children to Christian schools, or their being received
in them, must be placed among the extraordinaries.
Instances of exceptions, we meet at Frankfort-on-
the-Maine, where, in 1620, the two Jewish physi-
cians placed each a son in the Gymnasium, as did
in 1672, another physician there, and one at
Worms. In their own schools (if so they may be
styled), nothing was to be learned but reading and
writing, Hebrew and Jewish- German ; the first
rudiments was mostly taught by the reader, and
withal killer or butcher of the congregation, or by
persons absolutely unfit for any other calling.
Hence these pedagogues stood in no esteem at all,
and at times were obliged to lend themselves to
the meanest offices. At the higher seminaries at
Frankfort, Fuerth, and Prague, Talmud only was

318 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

studied. Even the works of the Spanish Hebrew
philosophers were reserved for private lucubrations.
The German Jews were in possession of only
a single art, which they brought to a wonderful
perfection ; namely, seal engraving, and li-
thography, in which some distinguished them-
selves to a high degree.* As a masterpiece in
that art, we name the renowned performance of
Levin Joseph, at Berlin, who in the reign of
Frederick I, most elaborately engraved the royal
arms surmounted by a crown, on a diamond of
twenty-five carats. He executed many more
magnificent articles, and several of his kinsmen
before and after him, were very skilful in that
art. Besides that, the Jews much cultivated also
calligraphy, although mostly for religious ends,
as for writing the Tor ah manuscripts used in the
synagogues, phylactery and doorpost scrolls
(Tphillim and Mesussoth) but here and there
also for secular purposes. It may be said that by
simplicity of taste, which, by the by, is prescribed

* Until the latter part of the last century, the whole process
of preparing raw diamonds and other precious stones for orna-
mental use, such as splitting, cutting, and polishing them, as
likewise the delicate and hazardous art of drilling pearls, was
almost exclusively exercised by the Amsterdam Jews, who were
employed by many a crowned head, and to whom several of the
celebrated dismonds now in existence, owe their external per-
fection.

HEMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 319

to them, they preserved the Hebrew character very
clear and distinct. However, through the multi-
plicity of that art (if it be acknowledged as one)
it declined in estimation, and, at last, a Sopher
(Calligrapher) was usually a poor man, and but
little thought of. There existed amongst the Jews
also performers on musical instruments, and other
artists of a minor rank ; and even in music they
did not, at that time, rise above mediocrity. Many
of those itinerant musicians travelled about the
towns and villages, earning a scanty livelihood by
their art, as is still the case in some parts of
Poland and Bohemia. As to singing, the Jews
boasted of being good vocalists; and although
there seldom was found amongst them a properly
cultivated voice, and hardly any acquaintance
with foreign compositions, still they possessed a
style of singing peculiar to themselves, which was
wont to adapt itself to synagogue service, and
which, with all the difficulty of criticising it by
the established rules of music, is not altogether
destitute of beauty ; where it has traditionally
preserved its original character, it is worth being
noticed by connoisseurs. Finally, the German
Jews (we never heard this of any other) had their
regular jugglers, jesters, and rhymsters, who at-
tended at all family festivities to entertain the
company. They were the ne plus ultra of ab-

320 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

surdity ; the more preposterous their farces, the
more nonsensical their extemporaneous versifying,
the more laughter they excited, and the more ex-
tended became the fame of those comic Improvisa-
tori, who even journied in their profession.*

As to the honour of the Jewish nation, the per-
fecting, or at least the polishing of the Hebrew
language, the further diving into the sense of Holy
Writ, the imitating of ancient authors in forcible
fictions, the transplanting of foreign philosophical
theories on Hebrew ground, the improving of the
art of printing, and several others, for which they
once were famed, as working in gold and silver,
silk and woollen weaving, &c., they mostly left
to their Portuguese brethren, and those in the
Barbary states and in Turkey, who accordingly
were more respected, and well deserved to be so.

The alteration which a good deal of all this has
undergone during a subsequent period, would
excite astonishment, if the cause of it were not
so very obvious, and at the same time appearing
in evidence, that suitable arrangements by philan-
thropic governments contain the best means of
transforming men. Now, the whole task set to
governments, consists merely in this : that the

* Every thing related here, the author knows from authentic
tradition ; and several remains of those times he yet saw himself.
So has the Editor.

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 321

feeling of natural fitness for the offices of a
citizen of the state, be awakened and raised in the
hitherto oppressed and neglected mass, by a free
and gradually widening sphere of civic activity ;
that in the regulations adopted, there be no con-
straint put upon conscience; and that the consolid-
ation of religious and civic principles do principally
arise from the education of youth. All this will
be so much clearer and plainer, when it is known
that the same circumstances still prevail, in those
parts where no such arrangements have been
made.

Note, — When, in the 14th century, the Cru-
saders returned home low-spirited from an un-
successful expedition, the Jews were the innocent
objects on whom they wreaked their anger;
and many who happened to dwell on their line
of march, fell deplorable victims to their fury.
All the chronicles of those times are full of the
atrocities perpetrated on the Jews on that occasion.
The magistracy of Worms, who were well disposed
towards the Jews, because they derived material
benefit from them, suggested to them a means of
bringing themselves off safe. A missive was

Y

322 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

forged, by which the Sanhedrin, or the Great
Council at Jerusalem, asked the opinion of the
sages of the city of Worms, how they should act
with regard to Christ. To which the Worms
sages replied, that they should not on any account
crucify Christ.* As the Worms magistrates con-
firmed the authenticity both of the missive, and
the answer thereto, and no such thing as historical
criticism being yet known in those days, the
Worms Jews were declared innocent, and left un-
molested. ''

That same letter has been a subject of great
research and controversy. Not to be mistaken,

* " Mais ceux de Worms pretendant avoir donne de bonnes
preuves ä I'Empereur et aux Etats de I'Empire, qu'ils n'ont
jamais eu de part au crucifixement de Jesus Christ ; c'est dans
cette vue qn'on a insere dans le Toldos Jeschu p. 92 I'extrait
d'une lettre que le Sanhedrin de Worms ecrivit au Roi de
Judee pour I'empecher de faire mourir Jesus Christ. * Laisser
aller ce Jesus, ne le tuez point, qu'on le nourisse jusqu'a ce
qu'il contracle quelque tache et qu'il se souille lui meme.'" i. e.
** However, the Worms Jews pleading that they had given the
Emperor and the states of the Emperor satisfactory proof that
they had never had a hand in the crucifixion of Christ ; there
was for this purpose inserted in Toldoth Jeschu, p. 92, an ex-
tract of a letter written by the Worms Sanhedrin to the King
of Judea, to prevent his putting Jesus Christ to death. ' Let
that Jesus alone, do not kill him ; let him be maintained until
he contracts some blemish, and defiles himself.'" — Basnage
Historie des Juifs. lib. vii. cap. ix. § 13. p. 258.

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 323

and evident, as the fabrication thereof may be, yet
it has been thought authentic by some ; and the
Worms Jews have so frequently told one another
that story, that most of them actually believe it,
and (suppressing the true particulars of the
case) caused it to be inserted in the book called
D'^D'^^ "^t^^D or an account of the marvellous events
v^hich happened at Spires, Worms, and Mayence,
written in Jewish German. Both Hulderich and
Basnage think that the letter was invented by
enemies of the Worms Jews, on purpose to
render them, odious and suspicious, as friends of
the Christians, to their own brethren, by whom
they were much esteemed. However, the story
seems most likely as it is told above. For the
rest, the Worms Jews stood particularly high
with the Christians; and their moral life gave
rise to the saying : ** Worms Jews, honest Jews."
They also had a Jew court of Law consisting of
members of their nation.

When the Jews at Ulm saw how fortunately
their co-religionists had got over their difficulties,
by means of an ingenious fiction, they also had
recourse to a falsehood, as a protection from the
savageness of their persecutors. They asserted
that they had been sojourning in those parts ever^
since the first destruction of the temple of Jeru-
salem ; and could, therefore, have had no share in

324 REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN.

the persecution and crucifixion of Jesus. As a
proof of it, they produced a letter, which they
pretended their ancestors had received from the
Jews at Jerusalem. It was originally written in
Hebrew; and the German translation ran thus : —

** To our brethren sojourning in the parts be-
yond the sea, to the Jews of Ulm, in Suabia, the
Jews dwelling at Jerusalem, in Judea, and in the
land of Canaan, send greeting.

*' We justly offer fervent thanks to God for having
delivered us from a great trouble. We make
herewith known unto you, that we have ex-
terminated from the number of the living, that
wicked enticer, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of
Joseph. As we could no longer bear with his
reviling and blasphemy, we accused him to the
Roman Praetor, who, after he had heard our ac-
cusation, and thought the same well-founded,
caused him to be well scourged, and to be
nailed to a cross, as he richly deserved. His
desciples were dispersed, and driven out of the
city."

We do not know whether this letter proved of
any service to the Ulm Jews. However, accord-
ing to some accounts, it is said to have been found,
when in the year 1348, they were burnt, and their
property was confiscated. Probably the unfoKr
tunate beings then sought to evade their fate by

REMARKS ON MENDELSSOHN. 325

producing the document, in order to demonstrate
that their ancestors could not possibly have been
accessary to the executing of the Saviour of the
Christians, and that, therefore, the rancour of the
latter had no grounds to justify it.

That the Ratisbon Jews also pretended to pos-
sess similar letters from Palestine is sufficiently
proved by several Ratisbon chronicles. When,
in 1529, the Jews were driven out of that city,
such letters are said to have been found, as also
a fragment of the stone tables of the law, which
Moses smashed to pieces.

Eusebius (ad Esaias cap. 18. v. 2.) recounts
that the Jerusalem Jews did notify to the syna-
gogues all over the world the execution of the
founder of Christianity.

A CATALOGUE

OF THE WORKS OF

MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL.

Page 73.

NisHMATH Chaim, four books concerning the Im-
mortality of the soul ; wherein many notable
and pleasant Questions are discussed and
handled, as may be seen by the Arguments
of the particular chapters, prefixed to the
book in Latin. Dedicated to the Emperor
Ferdinand III.

Pene Rabba, upon Rabot, of the ancient Rabbins ;
in Latin and Spanish.

Conciliatoris pars prima in Pentateuchum.

De Resurrectione mortuorum libri tres.

Problemata de Creatione.

De Termino Vitee.

De Fragilitate humana, ex lapsu Adami, deque
divino in bono Opere Auxilio.

328 CATALOGUE OF

Spes Israelis. This is also in English.
Orationes Panegyricae, quarum una ad illus-

trissimum Principem Aurantium, altera ad

serenissimam Reginam Sueciorum. In

Spanish only.
Conciliator; the second part, upon the first

Prophets; the third part, upon the latter

Prophets ; the fourth part, upon the Hagio-

graphia.
Chumosh, or the Pentateuch, with the several

precepts in the margin.
Thesoro de los Dinim ; five books of the Rites and

Ceremonies of the Jews, in two volumes.
Chumosh ; the Pentateuch, with a Commentary.
Piedra Pretiosa, of Nebuchadnezzar's Image, or

the fifth Monarchy.
Laus Orationes del Anno ; the Jews ; Prayers for

the whole year, translated out of the original.
De Cultu Imaginum contra Pontificios. Latin.
Sermois; Sermons in the Portuguese tongue.
Loci communes omnium Midrasim, which contains

the Divinity of the antient Rabbins ; in

Hebrew.
Bibliotheca Rabbinica ; together with the Argu-
ments of their Books, and my Judgment upon

their several Editions.
Phocylides, in Spanish verse ; cum Notis.
Hippocratis Aphorismi, in Hebrew.

WORKS BY MANASSEH BEN ISRAEL. 329

Flavius Josephus adversus Apionem, in Hebrew ;

Ejusdem Monarchia Rationis, in Hebrew.
Refutatio libri cui titulus Preeadamitse.
Historia sive Continuatio Flavii Josephi ad h^c

usque tempora.
De Divinitate Legis Mosaicae.
De Scientia Talmudistarum, in singulis facul-

tatibus.
Philosophia Rabbinica.
De Diseiplinis Rabbinorum.
Nomenciator Hebraicus et Arabicus,

THE END.

ERRATA.

Vol. 1. Page 130, line 12, for worship his, rearf worship of his
,, 195, „ 15. /or lontrial, reac? long trial
,, 264, „ 3. /or abtain, reac? obtain
J, 271, „ 7. for universal prevailing, read uni-
versally prevailing
J 5 285, ,, 1 . for how much of its consuetude, they
should condemn as abuse, read
how much to consuetude, and
how much they should condemn
as abuse
„ Ibid» „ 1 5. /or kept place, reac? kept pace
5, 304, „ 14. for knowledge ; or, read knowledge,
or

J. Wertlieimer & Co- Printers, Finsbury Circus.

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Mendelssohn, Moses,
Jerusalem; a treatise on ecclesi

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