Judaism

JUDAISM

IRAIM LEVINE.M.A

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THEPEOPLE'S BOOKS

PRINCIPAL

W. R. TAYLOR

COLLECTION

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Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2011 with funding from

University of Toronto

http://www.archive.org/details/judaismleviOOIevi

THE

PEOPLE'S

BOOKS

JUDAISM

T?.H

JUDAISM

By EPHRAIM LEVINE, M.A.

521535

LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK
67 LONG ACRE, W.C., AND EDINBURGH
NEW YORK: DODGE PUBLISHING CO.

PREFACE

The following chapters are nothing more than an
attempt to give the general reader interested in Judaism
some idea of the various stages through which that
religion has passed, and of the many tendencies that
have reacted and still react upon it. A subject so vast
and complicated must of necessity be difficult to pre-
sent in so brief a compass. The Bibliography, however,
which is appended, will it is hoped enable the student
to pursue his studies by referring to the important
volumes there mentioned.

The writer is greatly indebted to the Very Reverend
Dr. M. Gaster for much valuable help, and desires to
take this opportunity of expressing his thanks.

CONTENTS

CHAP.

PAGE

I. THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 9

II. JUDAISM, HELLENISM, AND THE DAWN OF

CHRISTIANITY 22

m. RABBINIC JUDAISM 39

IV. MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 53

V. MODERN JUDAISM 67

VI. JUDAISM OF TO-DAY AND ITS PROBLEMS .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

91
93

«l

JUDAISM

CHAPTER I

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM

The history of the religion of the Jew dates from a time
far back in the mists of antiquity, and looks forward to
an epoch when the belief of all mankind in the one
and only God will be the final consummation. It is
thus almost synonymous with the history of man.
From those far-away days when a horde of slaves left
Egypt till our own time, the Jewish people have been a
wonder and a problem to the world — a wonder because
of the chequered nature of their history, a problem
because of the uncertainty that prevails as to the reasons
for their continued existence. The problem is thus not
new, though it is as perplexing in the twentieth century
as it has ever been. A study of Judaism is therefore
of great importance, for in the nature and history of this
religion lies the solution of the problem. The Jew has
persisted because Judaism persists. The modern man
asks, Why does Judaism persist ? What differentiates
the Jew from the rest of mankind ? Is there any reason
why the Jews should remain distinct as a religious
people ? The answer to these and similar questions
will be set forth in the following pages. It will be
shown that Judaism is not an effete religion but a living

10 JUDAISM

force, the result of centuries of continuous growth. Its
origin is the Bible, the Book which more than any
other has shaped the character and destiny of the
Jewish people.

(a) The Book

The Bible is the most complete record of Israel's
early History and Religion. Commencing with the
story of the Creation it brings us as far as the days of
Ezra and his reformation. Without entering here into
the question of the dates of the various books, and the
general trend of Biblical criticism, it is safe to say that
in the Bible the Jew recognises references to events
which bring his history down as far as the Maccabean
struggle, i.e. 165 B.C. Divided into three main headings,
(a) Law, (b) Prophets, (c) Writings, the Bible is to-day
the basis of the Jewish Creed.

The Law, or Torah, comprises the Five Books of
Moses, with the story of the beginning of the world,
and its history till the death of the great Lawgiver.
Modern conservative Judaism adheres to the belief that
the whole of the Pentateuch is from the hand of Moses,
written by the inspiration of God. With the excep-
tion of the last few verses of Deuteronomy describing
the death of Moses, no question of its authenticity ever
perturbed the Jewish mind. The Torah forms the bMM
of Judaism, and on the principles and laws outlined
there, is built up the whole structure which we under-
stand by the word Judaism. The Torah is the written
law, containing 613 precepts covering the whole Sphere
of mans life. The importance of the Pentateuch.
therefore, cannot bo over-estimated. Its sanctity re-
mains, and its iniluenee is dominant. At an early

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 11

period in Israel's history, the Torah was divided up into
sections, and a cycle of readings for every Sabbath of
the year was arranged. It is maintained that the
original division was into a three-year cycle, the com-
plete law being read once during that period. The
practice that now obtains is to read the Pentateuch
from Genesis to Deuteronomy once every year. The
division is thus into some fifty-four weekly portions (the
length of the Jewish year varying by the addition of a
whole month in leap years). It was the custom, too,
to read the Law on Mondays and Thursdays, these
being the days when the people would assemble for
marketing purposes. The Torah is read on Festivals
and Fast Days, special passages being assigned for each
occasion. The modern usage has varied little amongst
orthodox communities, but sections of Liberal or Re-
form Jews complete the reading in three years, or read
passages of their own choice without reference to
custom. But for all bodies of Jews, the Torah occupies
a foremost place, though Reform communities are not
bound by the same ideas of inspiration and immuta-
bility as are claimed by the conservative or orthodox
wing. The Law is read from a scroll made of parch-
ment, which must be written by hand, by accredited
scribes who are proficient in their work. It is unpointed
and unpunctuated. The strictest accuracy is necessary,
no scroll which has been found to be at fault even in
the most minute detail, being considered Kosher or fit
for religious service.

" The Prophets " comprise both the historical books
and the writings of the prophets. In the Hebrew Bible
they are subdivided into (1) former. (2) latter prophets.
By the former are meant such books as Joshua, Judges,

12 JUDAISM

Kings ; by the latter are meant the three greater pro-
phets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and the twelve
Minor Prophets. Almost all these books still occupy a
place in the Synagogue Service. The practice of read-
ing a passage from the prophetic writings dates from
an early period. The readings embrace most of the
books, though there are some which are never included
in the ritual. Curiously enough, a book like Haggai,
important as it is, is never read as part of the service.

The third division of the Bible is " the Writings," in-
cluding everything not comprised under the two former
headings, viz. The Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of
Solomon, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther,
Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and the two Books of
Chronicles. It should be remarked that Daniel does
not come to be considered among the Prophets. The
Writings find a place in the Synagogue readings, the
Psalms forming a large part of the liturgy. The five
Megilloth, i.e. Canticles, Ruth, Esther, Lamentations,
and Ecclesiastes, are assigned to special days which
make their recital appropriate. Thus Ruth is read on
Pentecost in the early summer, Esther on the Feast of
Purim, Lamentations on the ninth of Ab the anniversary
of the Temple's Fall, Canticles on Passover, and Eoclegi-
astes on Tabernacles.

(b) The Teaching

From the foregoing it will be seen thai the Bible
means much to the Jew. It is venerated as the Book,
which has been handed down from generation to genera-
tion. The antiquity that can carry Jewish history Car
back into the ix-Lrinninirs of the workl. added t^ the
thought that oountlees generations o4 men and women

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 13

have drawn their inspiration from its pages, gives the
Bible a special sanctity to the Jew. But he does not
base his reverence on these reasons alone. The Bible
is the treasury of the finest and most sublime thoughts ;
it is a moral and ethical compendium, containing a
scheme of life, pointing the way to goodness and fellow-
ship with God. It is the word of God communicated
to His people, by lawgiver, prophet, and sage. It is
the covenant which binds Israel to God. Its teaching
is not of to-day, but for all time. The Immutability
of the Law still remains one of the Thirteen Articles of
Faith drawn up by Maimonides in the twelfth century,
and embodied in one of the present-day Synagogue
hymns. At the root of the teaching lies the one
supreme idea- — Faith in God. In a passage in the
Talmud one of the Rabbis sums up the matter some-
what as follows : There were 613 precepts communi-
cated to Moses on Sinai. The writer of the 15th Psalm
compressed them into eleven, Isaiah (chap, i.) com-
pressed them still further, Micah (chap. vi. 8) nar-
rowed them down to three, " to do justice, love mercy,
and walk humbly with God," and Habakkuk con-
densed them into one (chap. ii. 4), " The righteous
shall live by his faith." It gives an index of the stress
laid on faith. The Bible, however, does not enjoin
faith as a commandment. It lays emphasis on know-
ledge as the way to faith. It thus teaches first, and
through knowledge one comes to belief. " Know there-
fore and consider this day in thy heart that the Lord
He is God, there is none other."1 The first article of
the creed is the belief that God is one, alone and incom-
parable. When this actual belief was first thoroughly
1 Deut. iv. 39.

14 JUDAISM

understood by Israel, is matter upon which Biblical
critics are not agreed. Yet we may assume that,
accepting as Judaism does the record of revelation as
outlined in the Bible, even in the very early days the
people to whom the Law was delivered from Sinai were
deeply imbued with the conception. It is difficult to
understand how and by what means Israel forged
ahead of other peoples in its conception of God. Yet
the Pentateuch from the Exodus is monotheistic, and
the serving of other gods is the gravest offence against
God. The lapses which are recorded were the cause of
a heavy visitation upon Israel. Aaron's sin in yielding
to the people's request to have a visible representation
of a deity in the shape of a golden calf, the result, no
doubt, of the memory of Egyptian experiences, was
regarded as a terrible moral lapse. In later times, too,
the sin of idolatry denounced again and again by the
prophets, was the inevitable prelude to civic degrada-
tion and moral decrepitude. Jeroboam, the son of
Nebat, is a typical sinner against God, because he led
Israel astray by means of a species of idolatry. There
is no more wonderful tribute to the abhorrence of
Israel for idols, than is to be found in the latter half of
the Book of Isaiah, where the prophet in words of biting
satire denounces the fashioning of so-called gods, and
contrasts the helplessness and unreality of a figure cut
from wood or stone, with the grandeur and illimital-ility
of the power of the one God. It is Israel's legacy to
mankind to have been the first monotlu -i>tic people,
and at no time in the history of (he religion Wftfl thil
idea ever threatened. Judaism, by reason of the
vieiasitadeB through which its adherents have passed,
has taken over and assimilated much from different

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 15

sources, but the doctrine of the Unity of God, which
stands in the forefront of the Jewish belief, has ever
remained intact. The first words that a Jewish child
is taught to lisp are : " Hear, 0 Israel, the Lord is Our
God, the Lord is One."

Closely allied to the belief in the unity of God, is the
Love of God. '"And thou shalt love the Lord thy God
with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy
might." The love is reciprocal. God has selected
Israel to be a peculiar treasure, a witness to the truth
of revelation. His care for the people, His guardian-
ship of Israel — these are signs of the covenant between
God and man. The Love, however, demands allegiance
in return. But it must be allegiance that emanates
from love. This lesson is written on every page of the
Bible. To the Jew, therefore, the ideal to strive for, is
the imitation of God. God is good, righteous, just,
and merciful. Man must be good, righteous, just, and
merciful. As the Rabbis express it : " The Torah
commences with a loving act of God — ' He made them
garments ' ; and closes with a loving act — He (God)
buried him (Moses). Just as God clothes the naked
and buries the dead, so do ye Israelites likewise." From
birth till death, every action should be modelled on the
example of God. The Jew's life must be a living testi-
mony to his religion with the love of God present at
every step. Thus it is not merely the expression of
life arising in the heart and remaining in the heart, but
it is a love that calls forth a zealous response to the
dictates of the heart. Belief in God and love of God
lead to a proper life. Life is the sum of a series of
actions no one of which can be other than Godlike, if
the belief and love mean anything. Man is governed

16 JUDAISM

by the will of God, but he is also a free agent. His
knowledge, on which his faith is to rest, enables him to
distinguish between right and wrong, and thus he is
responsible for his actions and their moral quality.
Revelation and responsibility are closely related. The
right way to live has been shown to man, and man is
accountable to God for his deeds — " He has shown
thee, O man, what is good. What does the Lord thy
God require of thee, except to do justice, love mercy,
and walk humbly with God."1 But God is not a stern
and implacable Judge. The relationship is rather that
of Father and Son. A child turns instinctively to his
father for help and love. So the Israelite to God the
heavenly Father.

The relationship between man and God thus postu-
lated, carries us to that between man and his neighbour.
The truly religious man is he who seeks to find grace
in the eyes of God and man. Judaism, as seen in the
Bible, lays down the code of actions that shall govern
the intercourse of man with his neighbour. Respect
for human life, regard for our neighbour's property, care
for his good name, honesty, chastity — are some of the
necessary concomitants of the belief in God. The
ethical value of the Bible is kept to the fore in Judaism,
This must needs be emphasised, because Judaism has
often been charged with being a religion of ceremonial.
and lacking in that real moral and spiritual worth which
the advent of Christianity la Said to have introduced into
the world. This oreafrai an erroneous impression, for the
whole leaching of the prophets is a condemnation of a

performance of ceremoni;il observance, divorced from a
truly Bmoere and religions heart. The moral virtues

1 Micah \i. a

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 17

have ever been cherished by the Jew — and this in spite
of the buffeting and wandering which have been his lot.
Chastity, especially, has been a Jewish treasure, and
few will doubt that the beauties of Jewish family life
are unsurpassed amongst any other nation.

Mention has just been made of ceremonial. This is
an aspect of Jewish teaching and custom which, although
developed in later times, takes its origin from the Bible.
The law is incumbent on each man as an individual
unit. A number of units becomes a society, and it is
clear from the time of the call of Abraham that the
Hebrews were to form themselves into one united body,
acting with the same knowledge and spreading the
truths they had received. Religion, if it is to have
any permanent force, must become systematised. Mere
abstract principles must often be translated into con-
crete actions. The Tabernacle in the wilderness served
as a visible dwelling-place of the Divine presence. The
religion had a centre whither its adherents might come
to seek advice on any matter that perplexed them.
The Temple in later days served as a rallying point in
Jerusalem. There, the Priests and Levites were the
human agents of C4od, administering His will and teach-
ing His behests to the people. The sacrifice was a
material representation of the Israelite's sincerity in his
relation to God. The sacrificial system is too often
misunderstood. To modern eyes the slaughtering of
animals to appease the Deity seems to savour of bar-
barism and superstition. It must be remembered, how-
ever, that the mind of a people does not develop quickly.
Ideas take long to root themselves in the mind and
mature, and the sacrificial system was not meant to be
an end in itself, but simply the means to an end. If a

B

18 JUDAISM

man sinned against God or against his neighbour, to
receive pardon he had to present himself before the
altar, and offer a sacrifice. In Leviticus the details of
the various sacrifices required on different occasions,
are given at length. The sacrifice had to be accompanied
by an expression of regret on the part of the offender.
Without this contrition the offering was useless and a
mockery. From the sacrificial system is the Jewish
doctrine of atonement to be traced. There was no
agent to be employed in offering a sacrifice to obtain
pardon. The offender himself had to bring it. No
intermediary between man and God was required ; but
the forgiveness of the wronged party must first have
been obtained.

Ceremonial, however, played a large part hi Jewish
life, and continues to this day. From the Bible come
the observance of the Sabbath, the institution of the
Festivals, and the origin of the innumerable ritual
customs which are the outward expressions of the
religion. The Sabbath is the day of rest, a covenant
between Israel and God, enjoined several times in the
Pentateuch, and to this day one of the corners of
Judaism. The Festivals divinely ordained in
Jewish mind, commemorate the great events of the
people's history. The Passover, with all its ceremoi
recalls the Exodus and the events that led Dp to it ;
Pentecost in the early summer is as~ ; with the

w ; Tal autumn, tho

ol tho ingathering of the ban
with the Suecah or temporary booths in which tho
9 dwelt in fcl the Day ol Re-

membrarj • ot I

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 19

gone ; and the Day of Atonement is set apart as a day
of fasting and prayer, whereby man, if he is sincere in
his penitence, can obtain pardon from God and strength
to begin a new life. From the Bible, too, originate such
celebrations as Purim or the Feasts of Lots, commemo-
rating the deliverance recorded in the Book of Esther,
and the institution of Fasts referred to in Zechariah.
Later, Judaism added the feast of Chanucah, to celebrate
the victory of the Maccabees over Syria.

Other ceremonies there are, which regulate Jewish
life. In the eleventh chapter of Leviticus will be found
a list of animals that may be eaten, and specific men-
tion of those that are forbidden. The Dietary Laws, as
they are binding on the Jew, have been elaborated in
the Talmud, as we shall see. It is difficult to over-
estimate the important part these laws play in the life
of the Jew. They have served as a differentiating mark
between Jew and non-Jew, and much of the very
strength of Judaism lies in their observance. It is not
too much to say that a total abrogation of these laws
would mean a speedy end to Jewish separatism, and the
beginning of the end of Judaism. Obedience to these
laws meant purity of body. Purity would promote
holiness, and Israel was to be a holy nation. The
people distinguished from other nations by such pro-
hibitions, were to consecrate their lives to holy service.
There may be nothing irreligious in the eating of for-
bidden foods in these days when modern hygienic
methods ensure the purity of man's food ; but hygiene
was not the only purpose of the dietary laws. Their
aim was, by promoting purity of body, to promote purity
of mind. They lead to self-sacrifice and self-denial, and
inculcate virtues of self-control. To observe such laws

20 JUDAISM

was to help to master unholy desires and impure
passions, and to be able to resist temptation of every
kind. " The Dietary Laws," says Maimonides (More
Nebuchim, iii. 25), " are designed to train us in self-
control ; they make us able to curb carnal desires ;
they condemn sensual pleasures." As such, their re-
tention in Judaism is of the utmost importance.

Reference has been made to separatism, and therein
lies the secret of Jewish strength. The work of Israel in
the world is to disseminate the knowledge of God, and
to mediate the truths that have been communicated
to them. Tins can only be done by a stringent ad-
herence to the conception of Israel as a people distinct
from other peoples with a mission to the rest of mankind.
How far Israel has been faithful to that mission, does
not effect the general truth that the mission is the
inevitable result of Biblical teaching. Allegiance to
Judaism is the first duty of the Jew, and so long as the
Jew wishes to work for the welfare of mankind qua
Jew, he must bear in mind the value of separatism.
Modern Judaism is apt to neglect this aspect of the
religion, and the Jew like many another, in the general
tide of worldly affairs often is satisfied to see the
mission floating away from himself to others. Yet it
cannot be forgotten that the permanent worth of
Judaism depends on the place the Jew occupies in
religious life of the WOrkL Content to follow blindly in
tbfl wake of every new idea, he loses his individuality

and jeopardises the heritage of oenturies. On the other

hand, if he y.i-alously maintains the separal
p<-u|>l<\ and binds himself as an indispensable link
to the I* n i uc chain that stretches from Biblical time

our own day, the necessity for taking the lead in the

THE BIBLE IN JUDAISM 21

religious teaching of the world must force itself upon
his mind. The world is still far from the elementary
conceptions of a true life as outlined in the Bible.
Truth, Justice, and Equity are, in many quarters,
theories which require to be called into practice. There
is thus room for the Jew to carry on his mission ; but
this will require a deeper consciousness of the import-
ance of the brotherhood of the Jewish people. It is the
lesson that emerges from the teaching of the prophets.
Again and again, prophet urged upon his people, that
the observance of the ceremonial law was meant to
bind them together as servants of God. Its aim was
to produce good and upright men living one life in
the sight of God and man. Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and
Jeremiah, are sometimes quoted as rigid opponents of
ceremonialism. This is not accurate. Their teaching
denounced mechanical observance when religion was
absent. They preached a purification of the heart, a
moral and spiritual cleansing as the necessary prelude
to religious sendee. Ceremonial bound the nation
together and helped them to understand what their
mission was. That mission, when properly understood,
they were to announce to the world. The message of
the Bible is the record of a people acquiring a gradual
knowledge of God, believing in God as the only One,
serving Him with zeal, living under laws that make for
a perfect life, and from these coming to the realisation
of the idea, that the chosen people were only chosen in
the sense that they were singled out from all nations
to be the first to understand the great truths of religion,
which, communicated to them by God, they in turn
are to communicate to all God's creatures.

CHAPTER II

JUDAISM, HELLENISM, AND THE DAWN OF CHRISTIANITY

The Babylonian Exile was not an unmixed evil. The
Temple fell, and the people of Israel were carried into
captivity, but the religion continued to exist, and even
became permeated with higher spiritual energy. The
sojourn in Babylon was not of long duration, but it
was long enough to enable them to adopt Babylonian
customs and Babylonian culture. Soon, Persia con-
quered Babylon, and became master of the Jews. Under
the Persian sovereignty there was little oppression, and
the Jews could attend to their own spiritual life. The
advent of Cyrus upon the scene, however, wrought a
complete change in the Jewish condition. The exiles
were allowed to return and rebuild their temple. Once
again they succeeded in establishing a nationality, a
remarkable phenomenon paralleled by no other people
of history. That they were able to do this, is di;
the fact that they were something more than a nation,
they were a religious community bound together by an
i I'-a. of which nationality was but one expression.
Prophecy was not dead. Once again men aiOf
frrect in prophetic strains the returned exiles, and t<>
inspire a new life into the people. Baggai, Zeohariah,

sounded the last notes of prophecy ; the
i former hurnV.l on the work <>f rebuilding : Malachi's

closed with the appeal to remember the law of

at an end. but

HELLENISM AND CHRISTLaNITY 23

something else was to arise and take its place. Tradi-
tion may be said to have filled the gap. Tradition has
been defined as " the developing power which continues
in Judaism as an invisible, creative agent, as a certain
ennobling something that never obtains its full expres-
sion, but ever continues to work, transform, and create.
Tradition is, like revelation, a spiritual energy that ever
continues to work, a higher power that does not proceed
from man, but is an emanation from the Divine Spirit,
a power that works in the community, chooses its own
ministers, manifests itself by its ever purer and riper
fruits, and thus preserves vitality and existence itself." 1
With Tradition began the second period in Judaism,
and if the Temple fell again, and the nation once more
went into exile, the four hundred years that separated
Ezra and his school of scribes from the birth of Chris-
tianity, were years fraught with more significance in
the development of Judaism than any subsequent
period in its history.

(a) Scribes and Men of the Great Synagogue
In the tractate of the Mishna, known as " The Ethics
of the Fathers," there is the following passage : " Moses
received the Law on Sinai and handed it to Joshua,
Joshua to the Elders, the Elders to the Prophets, and
the Prophets to the Men of the Great Synagogue." Here
is indicated what is known as the chain of tradition, be-
ginning with Moses on Sinai and stretching through the
centuries. From the time of Ezra, who was regarded as
the first scribe, there sprang up a body of scribes, whose
duty was to interpret the Law to the people. The period
at which Ezra flourished witnessed what is regarded as a
1 Geiger.

24 JUDAISM

reformation in Israel. The return from exile was not
followed by the realisation of all the hopes which the
people had anticipated. With the rebuilding of the
Temple, the services and sacrifices were once more
resumed, but it was not long ere a spirit of laxity and
indifference began to prevail. The Book of Malachi
exhibits the state of Israel's worship, and the moral
lapse of the priesthood from a proper conception of
their high office is more than once hinted at. Again,
the question of intermarriage and divorce seemed to
perplex those of the people who had taken strange
wives. The Book of Ezra attempts to grapple with
the problem. If the people were to understand the
necessity for maintaining their separatism as a religious
body, by keeping their stock pure from foreign ad-
mixture, it was obvious that they must have a closer
and more intelligent knowledge of the demands of their
religion. Modern criticism of the Bible attaches much
weight to the work of Ezra. It is maintained that the
Pentateuch, in its present form, is the work of his hands.
While orthodox Judaism adheres to the belief of the
Mosaic authorship of the Torah, Jews recognise the
immense debt owed to Ezra and his school of scribes.
"The Law was forgotten," say the Rabbis, "but I
restored it." Certain it is, that he inspired new life into
the teaching of the Law. According to tradition, the
scribes were the teachers of the people, Ezra being
reckoned the first, and Simon the Just the last. Ti
have been identified with the Men of the Greet 83

gogue. Many acts are ascribed to them. Tart of their
work was devoted to the fixing of the canon of the
Bible. The Books of Biekiel, Daniel. Esther, and the

Twelve .Minor Prophets were by them included in the

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 25

canon. In addition to completing the canon, they
were anxious to introduce a scientific treatment of
interpretation. They are credited by some authorities
with having divided the study of the Mishna into the
three aspects — Midrash, Halacha, and Agada, though
R. Akiba is more generally believed to have been the
originator of this system. Again, they instituted the
observance of the Feast of Purim. They probably had
a definitely-fixed ritual and Prayer Book, it being
generally agreed that the prayer known as the Eighteen
Benedictions to be found in the authorised Prayer Book
was embodied by them in the liturgy.

In the Ethics of the Fathers, to which reference has
already been made, three characteristic sayings are
attributed to them — Be careful in delivering judgment,
raise up many disciples, and make a fence round the
Torah. Who was the author of this saying, is not
known, but it seems to crystallise the general trend of
their aims and teachings. Their words were addressed
more to the religious guides than to the body of the
people. The three ideas attributed to them sum up
their contribution to the development of Judaism.
Deliberation in judgment — accuracy in getting at the
meaning of the law and expounding its purpose. By
law, it should be mentioned, was meant not only the
Pentateuch, but the whole body of religious truth,
study, and practice. The raising up of disciples ensured
the handing on of the tradition, and by making a fence
round the law, they were able zealously to guard its
sanctity and observe its every detail. Thus in the
Persian period they were able to preserve Judaism as
the custodians of the religion which, later on, the
Pharisees were to defend by their accuracy in legalistic

26 JUDAISM

matters, their assiduity in founding schools, and their
formation of rules and prohibitions to point the way to
correct obedience to the Law.

The second birth, so to speak, which this epoch
witnessed, was not easy of accomplishment. The State
being merely a province under the rule of Persia, the
Priesthood came into greater prominence than the repre-
sentative of the House of David. Corruption speedily
set in among the priestly families, many of whose
members, under the garb of sanctity, concealed the
worst of human passions. Oppression became rife,
internal life was decadent, and the political life of the
nation seemed to remain stationary. When there is no
development discontent and impotence appear. Yet,
with all its heavy burdens, Judaism did not sink.
There was one thing that could raise the Jewish people
from their lethargy. When the religion was threatened,
the best in the nation made its appearance. The oppor-
tunity of exhibiting the staying power of Judaism and
its living force to regenerate the Jew, arrived when the
religion came into conflict with Hellenism. There was
a hard struggle, but Judaism emerged strengthened and
more alive than before. It was in Egypt that the
scene was enacted, the land so bound up with the early
history of Israel.

(6) Hellen:

Till quite recently, the long period from ths tin*

Ezra till the days of Alexander the Great, 1

ae a blank as Ear aa Jewiafa history ia oonoerned. T1r

»very, however, a fa of a number of

papyri in the bland of Elephantine, proved that in

»t lay tl. of much that ia of vital into i

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 27

In Egypt, at the very time that the exiles were return-
ing from Babylon to Judea, there was a large and influ-
ential community of Jews. Probably they emigrated
there with Jeremiah after the destruction of the Temple.
But they were certainly there, and soon became acclima-
tised both to the life and the language. Greek even
became the language of Judaism. At Leontopolis they
erected a temple modelled on the Temple in Jerusalem,
not because they wished to secede, but actuated by the
thought that there they were in a new country, of
which they were a part, free and untrammelled. The
Temple of Onias, as it was called after its founder,
supplied a visible resting-place for the glory of God.
Soon, too, the Bible was translated into Greek, the
famous Septuagint version being completed about
200 B.C. Legend relates how seventy translators, iso-
lated one from another, arrived at exactly the same
rendering ; but legendary as the tradition is, it at
least proves the sanctity and reverence that must have
attached to the version. Thus with the advance of the
Greek language among the Jews, the knowledge of
Hebrew steadily decreased, and even distinguished
scholars like Philo had little more than an elementary
acquaintance. It was only natural that Judaism should
assimilate some of the culture of Hellenism. Judaism
has ever had a tendency to grasp new ideas and adopt
them, while reconciling them with traditional belief.

It was not long before this desire manifested itself.
Judaism and Hellenism were bound to clash, but
opposed to each other as they were, it was necessary to
effect some sort of a compromise. The difference be-
tween the two conceptions is apparent. Judaism is the
result of evidence and experience, and requires or asks for

28 JUDAISM

no proof. Hellenism, on the other hand, has its founda-
tion in research or investigation, beginning with the
physical and striving to reach the Higher Idea. To
attempt to reconcile such wholly divergent ideas was
almost to attempt the impossible. Yet attempts were
made, and so much was Judaism modified thereby, that
it almost lost its distinctive character. As a writer has
expressed it in a recent valuable work on the subject : l
" Judaism cannot be a religion of compromise. To be
both Greek to the Greeks and Hebrew to the Hebrews
is an impossible task for the Jew. Judaism can only
be one form of that divine, eternally true universal
religion at one particular time to all the world." Judaism
had to reassert the old views, and thus arose the
Apocryphal literature. The Wisdom of Solomon sought
to correct the already existing Book of Ecclesiastes by
maintaining the impossibility for Jews to favour Hellen-
istic philosophy. There can be little doubt that the
original language of the book was Greek. The argu-
ment is that only in Judaism is true wisdom to be
found. An earlier book than tins is the Wisdom of
Jesus the son of Sirach, called Ecclesiasticus, written
originally in Hebrew, fragments of which were di
by Dr. Schcchter in 1896. In this book the divine
attribute of wisdoin plays an important part. Wisdom
"came forth from the mouth of the Most Ili.Lfh M and
" covered the earth as a mist." Wisdom was a areatioo
of God, and was prominent in tine providential history
of [grael. These two books of the Apocrypha, to men-
tion no others, date from thai period, and if they :
shadow BOme of the ideas which afterward* germio

in ( by, it musA he remembered that their oi

» ] i !er.

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 29

was on Grecian soil, and that many of their conceptions
were repudiated by Palestinian Judaism.

Mention must be made of Philo, the most distin-
guished philosopher of the Judaso-Alexandrian period,
whose idea of the Logos presents a fascinating intro-
duction to the subsequent development of that doctrine
in New Testament times. Philo is often assailed with
the charge of being un- Jewish, yet it is more gene-
rally conceded that he was a believing and zealous
Jew. For him, Judaism was true and required no
proof ; but the doctrines of Judaism had to be examined,
and he could not divorce his conception of the moral
purity of the religion from symbolical interpretation
characteristic of the Greek philosophy in which he was
saturated. Hence the doctrine of the Logos emerges.
The Logos is the creation of the world, the first creation
of God, emanating from Him as thought, producing
the world and sustaining it as animating and trans-
forming energy. How differently the Fourth Gospel
understands the Logos will be seen when Judaism and
Christianity came into conflict.

Thus far Egypt. In Palestine, too, Judaism met
Hellenism. The Syrio-Greeks were at a lower stage of
culture than their brethren in Alexandria. Palestine
was under the dominion of Syria, and though, for a
time, all went well, the accession of the madman
Antiochus Epiphanes to the throne, soon disturbed the
calm. The events of the period that led up to the
Maccabean struggle have been told again and again.
The part the Maccabees played in saving Judaism from
absorption in Paganism cannot however be over-
estimated. Judaism had undergone many trials with-
out complaining, but it was too much to expect that

30 JUDAISM

the attempt to annihilate it and substitute in its place
Greek ideas and Greek customs would be allowed to
pass unchallenged. There is a certain power in Judaism
which at times is apt to lie dormant. Like the Shula-
mite in the Song of Songs, " it is asleep, but its heart is
awake." The innate strength appears when an on-
slaught is made to strike at its very vitals. This is
what Antiochus wished to do. The image of Jupiter
was to be placed in the Temple ; contributions were to
be paid to the heathen temple ; Grecian games were to
be established in Judaea ; and in other ways Greek
customs were to dominate Israel's life. Many of the
people yielded all too willingly. The rulers by vacilla-
tion, the priests by tacit obedience, would have allowed
the king to have his way. But from the heart of the
people stubborn resistance was soon offered. A zealous
band of Hasmoneans, gathered together by one priestly
family, sounded the call to arms. Mattathias and his
five sons at first, and later on Judas Maccabseus at the
head of his brethren, determined to strike a blow fur
the freedom of Judaism. It was not long before they
were joined by other zealots, and after a Strug
victory after victory was gained and the menace passed
away. To the everlasting glory of the band of warrior
Jews, Hellenism received a deadly blow and Judaism
survived, whereas the Syrian empire soon sank into
obscurity and perished. To this day. the Jewish
synagogue oommemorates the Maccabees, though the
church has almost forgotten them.

For a time quiet reigned. The Aiaceabean family,
backed by the people, deposed the ruling olsnnoo and
game ' km of the kingship and priesthood. But

the peaco was not for Long. Internecine strife

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 31

warfare undid much of the good that had been accom-
plished, and the dynasty beginning so well ended
disastrously. The value of their sen-ices lay in the
impetus which was given to Judaism, and in the books
that date from that period. But the many sects and
factions into which the people were broken up, precluded
the continuation of a healthy national life. The history
of the time makes sorry reading ; the political govern-
ment was always uncertain, and the religious life was
gradually being sapped by the misuse made of the
priesthood. Matters came to a head when Christianity
appeared and threatened Judaism.

(c) Christianity

It was inevitable that Judaism should come into
conflict with Christianity. The meeting, however, was
gradual rather than sudden. Christianity at first was
nothing more or less than a part of Judaism. Jewish
writers distinguish between the teachings of Jesus and
Christianity. The latter is regarded as the work of
Paul. True, it is maintained by Christian scholars
that the preaching of Paul is in every way a develop-
ment or amplification of the work of Jesus, that it is
not a new theology, but a restatement of the old under-
stood in the fight of the sayings of Jesus, and the re-
ported doings of his earthly life. The Jew, on the
other hand, is drawn to the conclusion that the divorce
between the two religions could not have been con-
summated without the abrogation of the ceremonial law
which was the work of Paul. It is not within our
compass to detail the events that led to the cleavage
between Judaism and Christianity, but no survey of
Judaism would be complete without a consideration,

32 JUDAISM

however brief, of the process which culminated in that
religion's assertion of its independence, and rejection of
the new teaching which developed into Christianity.

Reference has already been made to sects within
the Jewish people. Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes and
Zealots are the most common, though they were only a
few of the man}^ that flourished. Their growth was
gradual, and their strength varied at different times.
To the Gospel writers is due the misconception that still
commonly prevails with reference to the Pharisees, who
are depicted as a body of hypocrites, who strained at a
gnat and swallowed a camel. In other words, they are
represented as a body of men who made a parade of
the outward forms of their religion, and neglected the
spiritual teachings that make for a pure and healthy
life. It is late in the day to attempt to correct this
misrepresentation. Of recent years, writers both Jewish
and non-Jewish have whitewashed the character of the
Pharisees as the synoptists conceived them, and the
time may come when impartial students of Judaism
will understand that the general condemnation of a
body of earnest, pious men, for the sins of a few, is
neither a true picture of Pharisaism nor a just estimate
of the inner work of its adherents. The Pharisees aimed
at observing the law in all its details. They were com-
posed of those God-fearing sons of Israel who i
t'n- highest sen ioe to he the service of God. Ceremonial
rvanoe was the only ^av to ensure oontinuaJ inter-

OOUne with God. If Judaism were to dominate life, it
( sanctify life at every hour and with every action.
Spirituality is well enough, but religion requin
thing more. The body ifl the oomplemenl of the spirit

no less than the spirit is of the body. Heart 1

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 33

not enough. It requires certain outward ceremonies to
express its spiritual cravings. This was not a pheno-
menon of those times only. It is true also to-day.
The Pharisee was essentially religious, and strove to
regulate every action of his life by religion. There is,
however, a danger. A systematised religion from its
very nature may become formal ; the husk may over-
shadow the kernel. Outward form may obscure inner
conviction. In other words, opportunity is afforded the
hypocrite to cloak his hypocrisy under the guise of
religion. It would be untrue to nature to maintain
that all Pharisees were perfect. There may have been.
and there probably were, some who, in their zeal to
appear God-fearing outwardly, were really sinners in
secret. What must be remembered is, that ceremonial
practice is not incompatible with spiritual and moral
cleanliness — it is designed as a necessary prelude to it.
A hypocritical Pharisee, here and there, is not sufficient
to malign a body of pious men. The point that matters
is, that the essence of Pharisaic doctrine and belief was
Godliness. They believed in a future life, and were
content to suffer the inequalities of the world, firm in
their hope that, hereafter, the pious would come to
their own.

Different were the Sadducees, comprising the party^-
that favoured Hellenism, and the rich upper classes.
They were, too, anxious to further Judaism. Vested
as they were, with powers, in virtue of their office of
priesthood, or their connection with the court, they
wielded great influence, though in the actual preserva-
tion of Judaism from the catastrophe which afterwards
overtook the religion when the Temple was destroyed,
they played but little part. The Sadducees were content

C

34 JUDAISM

with the present. They are commonly declared to have
repudiated the belief in a future life and the resurrec-
tion of the body. That one should, on this account,
deny them the shelter of Judaism, is to place too much
importance on this doctrine. Men situated in happy
circumstances, with their lines fallen in pleasant places,
and enjoying power in this world, are not tempted to
turn their eyes to the future. It may be that the hard-
ships under which the Pharisees lived prompted them
to despair of ever effecting any change in their worldly
condition, and to peer hopefully into the future, assured
that wrongs would be righted. It is a natural transi-
tion. Another idea of Sadduceeism was to insist upon
the letter of Scripture as binding, ignoring the work of
traditional interpretation.

Another sect was that of the Essenes — pious ones —
spiritual descendants of those very people who had
borne the brunt in the Maccabean wars. They were a
mystical sect living in seclusion, in a sort of ascetic
brotherhood, anxious to avoid the stain of worldlim
and preferring to remain as hermits in the wilder] i
More strict than the Pharisees in their adherence to
the law because they believed that the latter did not go
far enough, they were naturally opposed to the Sadduo
whose views on the joy of living in this world would ill
accord with communism and seclusion. The general
idea of asceticism has never found inueh favour in
Judaism; their is nothing of the cloistered oell or the

hermit's cave. Religious ecstasy there was in many

forms. Judaism h.i> its numher of mystios, hut it I

a mysticism that, found expression in the joys <>f earth,

in abstention from them. If in later times the

( nanfrirtim, in the i ighteenth century, came near I

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 35

stepping the moral boundary, there was enough spiritual
work in their doctrine to distinguish God in the beauties
of nature as the all-pervading presence of the world He
had created.

The Zealots, too, might be reckoned as a sect, though
of a different nature from the others. Jewish national-
ists determined to defend the State at all costs ; men of
burning faith they were, ready to sacrifice all to per-
petuate Judaism. To them it appeared that the best
means lay in defiance of the foreigner. They came
into prominence when Roman rule dominated Judaea.
Josephus tells many tales of their zeal and the lengths
to which they went ; and though accuracy cannot always
be distinguished from bias in that historian, it is fairly
certain that the Zealots regarded it as almost criminal
to obey Rome and pay taxes to the Imperial authority.
By the time of the Temple's fall in 70 a.d. the Zealots
were a power.

The existence of parties holding such divergent views
cannot be said to point to the dying embers of Judaism.
Yet writers on the origin of Christianity usually com-
mence with the statement that Judaism was in a state
of moribundity, and that some divine communication
was expected. The conditions may not have been
satisfactory, but they were at least indicative of vitality.
Jesus came from Galilee, where much of his ministration
took place among a people intellectually lower than
their brethren in Judaea. He speedily attracted fol-
lowers ; every movement that makes an appeal to the
people, and promises better conditions than they already
enjoy, will gain adherents. Jesus did not come with
a new religion. He saw that much that was good in
Judaism was being lost sight of, and like inany an

36 JUDAISM

inspired preacher, he pointed out faults and sought to
remedy them. Regarded from a Jewish standpoint, the
life of Jesus was passed in accordance with the Torah.
It was a religious mission to reassert the beauties of
Judaism, not to repudiate them. Had the political
situation of Juda?a been otherwise, the religious mission
of Jesus would, in all probabilit}', have remained such
and nothing more. The assumption, however, of the
claim to be the Messiah, the descendant of the House
of David, gave a political significance which pointed to
the desire to re-establish the Kingship. " The King of
the Jews " would be a menace to the Roman State,
and Rome regarded the mission as political. His subse-
quent death on the Cross was the work of Rome.
Jewish law would not have sanctioned it, though the
crime is often laid at the door of the Pharisees. The
truth is, however, that Jesus did not offend the
Pharisaic party, many of whom were attracted by his
preaching, as evidenced in Acts xv., where the Phar:
are said to be on the side of the Christians. Too much
stress cannot be laid on the innocence of the PharJei
the subsequent history assumes a different aspect if it
is kept in mind that, at the death of Jesus, religious
differences had not created Christianity as a sect apart
from Judaism. If the Gospels are pointed to as proof
of Jewish hostility, it should be remembered that the
first three, to say the least, date from after the death of
is, while the Fourth Gospel was probably written

towards the close of the century, and influenced by the

events that had transpired since the fall of the Jewish
State, after the destruction of the Temple b

It is subsequent to the death of Jesus thai we
the beginning of ■ sohism. The men*

HELLENISM AND CHRISTIANITY 37

on in his disciples. His death, and the belief in his
rising from the tomb, formulated the conception of
divinity with which the disciples endowed him. Soon
Paul conceived the idea of developing the work of
Jesus by enlarging Judaism, and making it a universal
religion. Here the difficulties commenced. If Judaism
were to maintain circumcision and the other ceremonial
laws, the number of converts must needs be limited.
The question was discussed in the Epistle to the
Galatians. The abrogation of the ceremonial law was
not long delayed, and once that was rejected, a cleavage
was imminent. Yet the separation was not immediate.
It began with the Apostolic conference in the year 50 ;
after 70 a.d., the Jews, deprived of their Temple, were
without a visible centre at Jerusalem. The Fourth
Gospel is decidedly anti-Jewish, with its idea of the
Logos as a man-Christ. Yet there was still a definite
schism. It was not till the year 135 a.d., when the
Jews, under Bar-Cochba, made their last desperate stand
to recover their national independence, that the breach
was complete. Thus, for fully one hundred years after
the death of Jesus, the two religions were working side
by side ; Judaism, though not a proselytising faith,
carried on an active missionary movement in Rome
towards the end of the first century, but there were
ideas in the new religion which were incompatible with
the observance of the old.

A word is necessary as to the reasons which made a
severance inevitable. Jesus' claim to be the Messiah
could not be supported by Jews unless the proof that
he was a lineal descendant of the House of David could
be established. As genealogy was reckoned through
the father, and miraculous birth was claimed for Jesus,

38 JUDAISM

the unbelief was not remarkable. Again, the Messianic
age, as heralded by the Prophets, did not arrive with the
Messiah. War was still rampant, and swords had not
been beaten into ploughshares. Vicarious atonement
which Jesus brought to mankind, is an idea opposed to
the spirit of Judaism. The belief of the Jew was, and
is, that every man shall die for his own sin, that no
intermediary between himself and God is required ; God
being a God of justice and mercy, delights when the
wicked turns from his evil ways and seeks pardon. It
is unnecessary to point to the insistence laid upon this
by the writers of the Old Testament. It is an idea, part
of Judaism, necessary to Judaism. The doctrine of
original sin is im- Jewish, due allowance being made for
the reference in the Apocryphal Book of 2 Esdras.
Finally, the incarnation, and doctrine of the Trinity
made the Unity of God unintelligible to the Jew. It
is on the Unity of God that Judaism rests. This tenet
of the faith has been kept pure and unmistakable.
The Jew recognises the debt the world owes to Chris-
tianity, but at the same time he believes the breach
between the two religions was necessary. The history
of the centuries that have followed is sufficient proof
of the contention that neither of the two religions has
yet finished its part in the world. They both work on
different lines, yet they both strive to reach the Bamfl
goal.

CHAPTER III

RABBINIC JUDAISM

The dissolution of the Jewish. State, and the destruction
of the Temple, did not annihilate Judaism. Important
as the Temple had been in the religious life of the
nation, that religious life was too firmly embedded in
the mind of the people to allow it to be overwhelmed by
the catastrophe. Just as the exile brought into play
the factors that rejuvenated the religion in the time of
Ezra, so now, too, new factors Were to arise, new ideas
were to develop, and a new birth was to be witnessed.
The cessation of sacrificial service, the disappearance of
the priesthood, and the absence of any outward visible
centre of the religion such as the Temple had been,
prepared the way for the formulation of a new con-
ception of worship, with prayer as the all-important
element. From a theological standpoint the Temple
had outgrown sacrifice and priesthood ; the outward
forms did not succeed in imbuing the people with the
inner worth of the religion. So long as conditions were
at hand for this preservation, the service in the Temple
would in all probability have continued. Had there
been any strong desire to maintain the old forms, the
rebuilding of another Temple hi another place would
have soon taken definite shape. But such was not the
case. Judaism underwent a complete reorganisation.
There were, of course, manv who were anxious to re-

39

40 JUDAISM

build the Temple, and who looked forward to the time
when the sacrificial service would be restored. Yet as
time went on, the idea receded further and further
from the mind. Whatever be the longings of Jews
to-day for Palestine and a renascence of Jewish
nationality in that country, the re-establishment of a
Temple ritual on the old lines, is seldom, if ever, con-
templated. Prayers for a return to Zion, and a restora-
tion of the Temple Service, are still included in the
liturgy of the orthodox community, but they are more
a survival of ancient custom than a passionate desire
for the Temple Service. The truth is, that there is a
visible development at work in Judaism. Different
periods mark successive stages. The Temple had conse-
crated the assemblage of Israelites who made their
periodical pilgrimages to Jerusalem. Henceforth Israel
was to show that a band of men meeting together for
worship could consecrate that worship, that religion
depended not on place or condition, but that the all-
important factor was the heart of the worshippers. In
other words, prayer, contemplation, and instruction
were henceforth to be the worship of God. It was not
an altogether new idea ; already it had been said : 1
" In every place where I cause my name to be mentioned,
there will I come and bless thee." The future hi
of Judaism was to exemplify the truth of the Divine
promise given to the Lawgiver.

What waa the actual state of the different factions
after the year To ? The Sadduoees almost disappeared.

Without the Temple, and without the pri.Mlv office to
Strive after, deprived tOO of the possibility of political

preferment, their continued exist I an

• I 81,

RABBINIC JUDAISM 41

impossibility. The Zealots, also, were powerless to
effect much. Anger could avail nothing in the face of
the Imperial power. For a time they nurtured plans
of revenge, and sought to annoy the Empire. But such
policy could not endure for long. The end was bound
to come ; and after 135, at the close of the Bar-Cochba
insurrection, they disappeared from the pages of Jewish
history. A crusade against the powers that be, ignoring
the spirit of history and attempting to conserve old
conditions in the face of new circumstances, was destined
to fail. Asceticism, too, as seen in the Essenes, was not
likely to wield an influence over the general body of
the people. Sects like these have then time and their
place in the general scheme of history. Theirs, however,
is not a policy that endures when conditions alter.
They help as contributing factors in building up the
foundation of the edifice, but once their work is accom-
plished, they must give place to changed circumstances.
Israel's task, after 70 a.d., was not to remain a priestly ^i
caste, or a political entity, or a band of hermits, but to
be a religious brotherhood with a mission to the world.

It was thus left to the remnant of the Pharisees to"!
reorganise Judaism, and make it live with renewed
vigour. There were men with the spirit of Hillel, the
great teacher who had lived in the time of Jesus, and
had carried on the tradition of the elders. Hillel's
work was along the lines of accepted revelation, but it
kept in prominence the necessity of making Judaism
alive to changing conditions, allowing for new move-
ments, while at the same time being content to be
guided in the formation of new laws, by traditional
ordinances. How revered his name is, may be gathered
from a glance at the pages of the Talmud, where legends

42 JUDAISM

are related to attest the humility that distinguished all
his efforts. His followers, in spirit, were actuated by
similar ideas. To them, conviction was more important
than outward ceremonial. The visible bond might be
broken, but the spirit would endure.

The salvation came from the schools. Even before
the fall of the Temple, teachers had rallied pupils
round them to expound the Law. Jochanan ben Zakkai.
during the war with Rome, had advocated a policy of
peace. Round his name there has circled a legend that
it was owing to the high favour in which he was held
by the Emperor that he was permitted to leave Jeru-
salem, and transfer his college to Jamnia, where he
set up the Sanhedrin as it had been in Jerusalem. In
the vineyards of Jamnia was the central authority that
decided all questions that affected the religious life of
the people, endowed with all powers such as were vested
in the ancient Sanhedrin. Jochanan was the President,
and the supreme authority, but there was no idea of
infallibility or arbitrariness. The injunction to rear up
many disciples was the chief aim of Jochanan. Thus
he surrounded himself with students whom he imbued
with zeal for the Law. Many of his disciples became
famous teachers. It should be mentioned that there
was no professional class of Rabbis or teachers. The
great names are those of men who earned on the study
the Law from motives of love, while they had a
worldly occupation. It was one of the commandf

Hill.-l to make no worldly 086 of the crown of the
Torah. Jochanan was a man of tin-; type, and the
ideal was followed by his disciples. The study oi
Law was to be the aim of the Israelite: QOTWaS there

anything meritorious in the pecfozmanoe of what wi

RABBINIC JUDAISM 43

duty. " If thou hast acquired much knowledge of the
Law, boast not of it, for to this end wast thou created/'
To his school only zealous students were admitted, and
they set themselves to frame a sort of Jewish Theology.
Judaism had two laws, one the complement of the
other. The Pentateuch or written Law had been given
to Moses on Sinai and had been committed to writing.
In addition to this, there was the Oral Law, i.e. pre-
cepts and customs handed down from generation to
generation, and believed to have been given by word of
mouth to Moses. The Oral Law was not yet written
down. The different precepts were communicated from
one generation to the following, the sayings of any one
Rabbi being carefully treasured by his pupils, and re-
corded orally by them in turn, to then pupils. A
minute study of the Pentateuch, with the strictest
accuracy given to every verse, would often reveal
parallels, and contradictions, and it was the work of
the teacher and his pupil to reconcile differences, and
formulate a definite standard of Law. These decisions
were called halachas ; and as there was no written record
of halachas, to retain them in the memory was no easy
task. A saying or a decision was handed down in the
name of the man who was responsible for it. It became
necessary to formulate these halachas into a systematised
code. This code came to be known as the Mishna.

The Mishna in its present form was compiled about
the year 200 a.d. The meaning of the word is " repe-
tition," or " teaching by repetition." What the old
law had laid down, briefly, was here repeated and ex-
panded. Rabbi Judah, the Prince, set the final seal
on the work. The Mishna is divided into six sections,
and deals with Divine Service, the Festivals, Marriage

44 JUDAISM

Relations, Civil Law, and the like, and regulations
regarding the soil, sacrifices, cleanliness and uncleanli-
ness. An attempt had been made at a codification
some sixty years earlier by Akiba, one of the greatest
influences in Rabbinic Judaism, who has left his mark
on the religion. It was Akiba who was to reconcile
the apparently antagonistic conceptions — the immuta-
bility of the Law, and its power of development.

Midrash, though not codified into Law, was another
form of interpretation, homiletic as well as legalistic.
It is the application of history to the condition of Israel
at any period, or to their future hopes. The Bible
supplied the texts on which the discourses were based.
Midrash made the heroes of the Bible prototypes, and in
the fight of the memory of the past it illumined the
darkness of Israel's present. There have come down
to us many different Midrashim comprising homiletic
and exegetical interpretations. Their study reveals the
wide ramifications of Israel's genius. Their value lies
not in their methods of Biblical exegesis, so much as
in the interesting light they throw upon the idea of
the continuity of Israel's history from Biblical time*
such time as will witness the advent of the future
Messiah. The greatest modern Master of Mi. hash study
Zunz, whose admirable summing up is well worth
quoting: "The value of Midrashic literal ure lay not
in literal interpretation, and in natural henneneutics.
but in the application of Scripture to contemporary
views and needs: everything that was \ I and

beloved by the present generation, was connected with
the sacred, though limited, field <»f tin This

method of in i in many v,

the obvi e of the Biblical passage was Eolloi

RABBINIC JUDAISM 45

or the inner meaning of the text, to the exclusion of
the literal sense, was considered ; or recourse was had
to the traditional agada. But this liberty wished
neither to falsify Scripture nor to deprive it of its natural
sense, for its object was the free expression of thought,
and not the formulation of a binding Law."' 1

With the completion of Rabbi Judah's Mishna, in
the year 200, the scene of Jewish activity moves from
Palestine. That country was no longer a safe place for
the Jew. Babylon again became the home of the
Jewish religion. Here Ezra had risen, and here, too,
Hillel had grown up. Now schools were established in
Sura, Pumbeditha, and Xeherdea, and in many other
places, and a renewal of religious activity was begun.
Whatever longing the Jew might have for Palestine,
here in Babylon he found a quiet haven of refuge far
from the interference of Rome, and here his religious
work could develop, untrammelled by persecution and
intolerance. The Law of the Land became binding
because the Law was founded on legitimate principles.
Study was not restricted to the Torah only ; Science
and Astronomy began to interest the scholars, and their
influence was seen in the fixing of the Calendar. In
Palestine it was the custom to fix the festivals by the
appearance of the new moon, and to send messengers
to announce the date fixed. In Babylon the want was
felt to be independent of the arrangement in Palestine.
Calculation took the place of seeing the new moon, and
in some cases the days of the festival were shifted.
Sabbath and the Day of Atonement could not follow
each other ; the Day of Atonement could not fall on
a Friday or a Sunday in order that conditions of life
1 See article Midrash (Jewish Encyclopaedia).

46 JUDAISM

should not be interfered with. In other ways, too,
Babylon asserted its independence of Palestine without
completely emancipating itself from its influence, and
the Judaism of later times was the outcome of the
deliberations of the Babylonian Schools. Till the sixth
century the discussions went on in the schools, the
result of which we have in the Talmud or Gemara of
Babylon, which, in its present form, dates from that
time. The Gemara or completion, or learning, as the
word has been interpreted, is the record of the debates
on the Laws of the Mishna. There are two recensions
of the Talmud, the Babylonian and the Palestinian.
The latter was probably completed a century or two
earlier than the former.

The Talmud is thus the result of the deliberations of
Rabbis, extending over a period of some six or seven
centuries. It is not a book, but a literature. It is not
the work of one or of several authors, but the result of
the labour of generations. The Babylonian Talmud is
divided into six treatises, comprising about thirty-.-
tractates dealing with the many matters affecting re-
ligion and life. The order is as follows : First, their ii
a section of the Mishna with the decision on a certain
point enunciated. The language of the Mishna is
Hebrew, not quite the Hebrew of the Bible, but a
Hebrew of later date which includes in its vocabulary
words of late origin. After the Mishna there follows
the discussion, with the views of different authorities
cited. The language of the Gemara is Aramaic, and,
though related to Hebrew, is an entirely different
dialect. One might have a full an«l comprehensive
p of the Hebrew of the Bible and yet be totally
unable to decipher a few lines of the Qemara. The

RABBINIC JUDAISM 47

nature of the language is concise, and compressed :
there are no punctuation marks, no marks of interro-
gation, no stops except at the end of a discussion. It
thus requires great familiarity with the idiom and the
style of the Gemara to make much headway. A glance
at a page of the Babylonian Talmud is interesting. In
the middle of the page, is set out the Mishna and the
discussion on it in large bold type. One column con-
tains the Commentary of Rashi (to whom reference will
be made in the following chapter), and the other the
work of a school of exegetes known as the Tossaphists.
Without the brilliant work of Rashi, the understanding
of the Talmud would be almost impossible. The assi-
duity with which it is studied by modern students of
Judaism is sufficient testimony to the importance it
occupies in the development of the religion.

Rabbinic Judaism is the Judaism of the Talmud. It
covers religion and life, on the one hand, laying down
guidance for man in his relations with God ; and on the
other, reflections for his dealings with his fellow man.
It centres round the idea of " making a fence round the
Law." It is an amplified commentary on the Bible,
attempting to get to the root of every Biblical Law and
so examine it, as to show forth its application in every
circumstance of life. To modern ideas many of the
Rabbinic Laws are obsolete. The terms casuistic, hair-
splitting, and such-like, have often been applied to the
Rabbinic arguments, and volumes have been written
mocking at the minute care given to questions of appa-
rently trivial importance. Though the retort that the
Rabbis have not the monopoly of such casuistry might
be adduced, the real answer is, that only those who
understand the worth of the Rabbis and the importance

48 JUDAISM

of their teaching, can justly appraise the value of the
Talmud. Loose criticism generally emanates from
ignorance or slipshod knowledge. In a literature so
vast as the Talmud, we are bound to come across much
that is useless, but the same may be said of every
literature. Just as in a discussion the arguments of
every speaker are not of the same worth, so too in the
Talmud. And it must be borne in mind that we have
there reported discussions, with every view stated, and
that the tutored mind can separate the wheat from the
chaff.

Nor is Talmudic Judaism narrow, as is frequently
alleged. To the Jew, religious Law comprised all the
circumstances of life. Rabbinic Judaism takes note of
the various branches of human knowledge — astronomy
and medicine, mathematics and law, anatomy and
botany — thus affording valuable scientific knowledge.
It is not insular in any sense. It recognises that the
best way to understand the workings of God is through
the intellect. Faith, valuable as it is, is more valuable
when supported by knowledge. The Bible is the basis
of all knowledge, but Judaism demands more than a
knowledge of the Bible. Human experiences often run
contrary to religious laws. Problems present them-
selves which seem to contradict acoepted ideas of the
goodness of God and the justice of the world. Judaism
takes note of these and seeks to reconcile apparent dis-
crepancies in life with the scheme of a divinely-governed
universe. But the great principle lies in the factors that
men contribute to the sum total of the world's prog]
It is through a life ordained by law and governed by
religious principles that the reconciliation take- pfa

Thus Rabbinic Judaism may be a id to repr

RABBINIC JUDAISM 49

religion as law. But the statement must be taken
tentatively. Ordinary life is regulated by law, else
society would not endure. No one will maintain that
life is harder and more exacting because society ordains
that honesty, morality, chastity, and respect for human
life are necessary for the preservation of national life.
Religion is law in the same sense as these charac-
teristics of a people are law. It is a common occur-
rence to meet with such a statement as that of the
" burden of the Jewish Law." The whole conception
is erroneous. Law is only a burden when it is unneces-
sary and when it entails hardship on those whom it
dominates. Rabbinic Judaism was not irksome or
burdensome. The service of God was regarded as a
privilege and a pleasure. What grander idea could
there be than that every action of life should be con-
secrated to Divine service ? Divine service includes
service of man. As has been pointed out in the first
chapter, the two ideas are interdependent. Only one who
understood how to carry himself fearlessly in the sight
of man could be pure in the sight of God. The Law,
far from being a burden, was a precious treasure to be
carefully guarded.

Another feature of Rabbinic Judaism is its univer-
sality. In the later books of the Bible the idea that
all nations have a share in God's goodness marks a
stage of development. The Book of Jonah exhibits
the readiness with which the heathen men of Nineveh
listened to the call to repentance. The latter half of
the Book of Isaiah looks forward to the time when the
truths of religion will be grasped by all mankind. And
the last of the prophets, Malachi, spoke of God as the
One Father, the Creator of all. Rabbinic Judaism

D

50 JUDAISM

carries on this grand conception. It holds to the view
that all religions, if carried out properly, are doing a
serviceable work in the world. It maintains that the
righteous of all nations have a share in the world to
come. Though not a proselytising faith, Rabbinic
Judaism did not deprecate the admission of converts.
It was only when the admission was threatened by the
onward progress of Christianity, that proselytism was
regarded as a step to be avoided. Converts have been
few, comparatively speaking, for Judaism regards its
mission more in the light of a people, by virtue of its
very separateness as a holy nation, influencing the rest
of the world. Its goal is the day when all mankind
will arrive at the perception of the truth that God is
One and His Xame One. For that reason the stringency
of Talmudic laws demanded a people separated and
consecrated, as a permanent witness to the truths of
Judaism. Judaism, however, recognises that the time
is not yet ; the consummation must be delayed till
such time as the world is ready to listen. The question
will be referred to in the last chapter when the modern
problem of Zionism and its relation to the Messianic
hope is disotu

The future life is often referred to in Rabbinic Judaism.
The subject of the future state, of the resurrection of
the body, of reward and punishment, is too tog
admit of treatment in so brief a space. Yet it ma

amotion of the 1
the existence of a hell, and torments for the sma i
i to the spirit of Judaism '

rt <«f the right* per-

plexing. On the one hand men apparently good

ind unji:

RABBINIC JUDAISM 51

No religion has ever succeeded in affording a solution.
Judaism has attempted it, but the only solution must
lie in the belief in a future world when men will receive
the reward of their earthly labours from God — the
righteous will be rewarded and the wicked will be
punished. But there is no idea of eternal punishment
and damnation. Even in the Bible, there is no refer-
ence to such a place as hell. The word employed,
sheol, is not meant to convey anything more than a
place where the dead await translation to a happier
life. At the root of Judaism lie? the idea that man
is a free agent. The nature of man is prone to error,
and it would be impossible for him to avoid the many
temptations that beset his path. Thus, if he falls into
sin, he must extricate himself. Punishment will follow
for commission of sin, but it will be a punishment de-
signed to heal and not to avenge. Punishment will be
spiritual and reward will be spiritual. Heaven is not a
place, but a state, and its joys are spiritual, not physical.
Rabbinic Judaism was content to keep the future in
the secret of God. Only God knows what is in the
world to come. Its secrets are reserved for those who
make themselves worthy to penetrate to the presence
of God, by a religious observance of duty during their
life on earth.

Rabbinic Judaism is a term which we have employed
in its narrower sense. We have taken it to mean the
Judaism of the Rabbis of the Talmud, and we have
limited its application to the period of the Talmudic
teachers. It is not complete Judaism. Just as the
Talmud represents a development of what had gone
before, so later ages developed and elaborated the
teaching of the Rabbis. But it is safe to say that

52 JUDAISM

modern Judaism, as practised by its rigid adherents, is
the Judaism of the Talmud in essence. The subsequent
codes are the logical outcome of the Talmud. In the
midst of much that has no application to modern times,
there is still more that dominates the religious life of
the Jew and lives in the Jewish heart.

CHAPTER IV

MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM

The story of the Judaism of the Middle Ages derives
its chapters from the various lands of the diaspora —
Africa, Italy, Spain, France, German}- — to mention
some of the countries in which the Wandering Jew for
a time found a resting-place. The completion of the
Talmud marked a new stage in Israel's religion. It
seemed as though the well of inspiration was dried up :
but Judaism is a living spring, that yields its waters to
continue to fertilise life. The redaction of the Talmud
only meant that now there was a definite manifestation
of the spirit of Judaism which was henceforth to be the
intellectual equipment of the Jewish mind. So the Jew
set himself to study its contents, to saturate his mind
with its secrets, to stimulate his religious nature with
its spiritual lessons, and to live for it as the one priceless
possession of existence. The study of the Talmud
spread rapidly through all countries of the diaspora.
If Rabbinic Judaism is creative, Mediaeval Judaism is
preservative. The latter period, of course, had its
creative geniuses, but the Talmud was the source of
their study, and from its pages they learned to think
and understand, and begin the process of investigation.
Mediaeval Judaism meets with teachers, codifiers, com-
mentators, polemic writers, and philosophers. There
is a common starting-point to all their speculations —

53

54 JUDAISM

the Talmud. From its pages they could glean every-
thing.

The first serious menace to the supremacy of the
Talmud came about the middle of the eighth century,
with the rise of a sect known as the Karaites. The
name is new, though the idea is old. In a sense the
Karaites were akin to the old Sadducees, but the dis-
repute into which the name had fallen necessitated the
creation of a new. It should be noted that almost
every age gave birth to a new name. Thus the genera-
tion of the Mishna witnessed the Tannaim or teachers ;
that of the Gernara, the Amoraim or speakers ; after-
wards came the Saboraim or givers of opinion, then
followed the Gaonini or heads of the schools and
academies. " The Karaites " was the name given to
the followers of Anan, the founder of the sect. Their
plea was for rejection of tradition and a closer allegiance
to the written letter of Scripture. They were not in
any sense a reform movement as later Judaism wit-
nessed ; that is, they were not influenced by the results
of science and, in consequence, advocates of progressive
or liberal thought. Karaism, in fact, upheld much of
Rabbinic Judaism, though it borrowed from Moham-
medan and other sources. But it was a retro
movement attaching importance to ideas long since
dead, and seeking to revive an antiquated conception
of a narrow Judaism. The rejection of tradition could
not be complete. Just as to-day oertain reform sections
Which take thfllr stand on Iiil>lioal Judaism ON
divorce themselves altogether from tradition

pretaiion. so the Karaiti One instance

by the Talmudieal laws regulating the slaughter of

animals which a: :. in the Bible. Tl

3MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 55

they observed in detail. The laws of clean and unclean
were scrupulously carried out, and in many cases the
Karaites went beyond even the Rabbinical exposition
of the Biblical injunction. Details of their agreement
and disagreement with tradition cannot be cited here.
It is enough to say that though the movement gained
many adherents and rapidly extended through Egypt,
Palestine, Syria, Babylonia, and Persia, and though
Karaites are alive in Russia to-day, the very essence of
their creed being to stand still, made it a theology
devoid of life and little likely to attain to a permanent
position among the Jews. It would stop up the very
life-stream of progress, striking at the theory that
revelation does not stand still, by insisting that the
Bible is the complete record of God's intercourse with
Israel. At this Judaism would rebel. Revelation took
its rise in the Bible, but it is a never-ending stream that
flows on, gathering strength in its course, and one that
will continue to flow till it empties its lessons into the
great river of eternity.

Yet Karaism was not devoid of purpose. One useful
result was the impetus it gave to Biblical study. If
they attached so great weight to the Scriptures, the
Karaites opened the minds of the nation to the necessity
of re-examining the Bible. Curiously enough, the
Karaites themselves contributed little of any value to
this study. The best came from Rabbinite sources
where the forces of spiritual development were at work.
From the time of the rise of Islam, Jews began to take
their part as grammarians, translators, and scientific
workers in every field of learning. The Arabians had
fixed their grammar and had endeavoured to establish
a system of vowel punctuation, in order that the reading

56 JUDAISM

of the Koran should be clear and unmistakable.
Hebrew is a language with consonants only. The
vowels are supplied by means of signs written above
or under the consonant. Till this time the Bible had
been written with the consonants, the pronunciation
being left to oral tradition. Now the Jews, following
in the wake of the Arabs, began to formulate a vowel
system. So carefully did they set to work that of the
two systems which they evolved, the Babylonian and
the Palestinian, the latter is still in use. Work of this
nature proves that a spirit of industry must have pre-
vailed. In many other ways, too, the beginning and
progress of Mohammedanism stimulated Jewish litera-
ture.

One of the greatest figures was Saadia, the Gaon.
born in Egypt in 892. As a young man he composed
an argument against the Karaites, which unfortunately
has not come down to us. His work consisted in re-
conciling Scripture, tradition, and reason. A man of
broad culture and acquainted with Arabic philosophy,
he wrote in that language. Scripture, although at
times miraculous, is not repugnant to reason. This
he proves by examination of the miracles in the Bible.
The same reconciliation he attempted to bring about
between tradition and reason. Here lay hifl important
oi the standpoint adopted by the Karaites,
u the latter denied the right of the Talmud to
formulate laws, against, as they thought, the lotto i

ladia attempted to bring all the tradition-
ally develop into line with Scripture, Tim

a philosophical basis for the Tal-
mudioal oonoeption of religion. The fact that he wrote
in A ant. for it payed the way f

MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 57

union of the consciousness of the time with religious
custom. His translation of the Bible was another sign
of the times. Curiously enough, whenever Judaism
came into conflict with an alien culture the call for a
translation of the Bible was felt. Saadia's translation
may not be scientifically all that is perfect, but it took
its origin from the rise of a new culture and a devoted
attachment to Judaism. Another work was Beliefs
and Dogmas (Emunoth Vedeoth), which presented Tal-
mudical Judaism from a scientific point of view.
Saadia's life lasted but fifty years, but it was a full
life which gave a great stimulus to Jewish learning and
marked the commencement of a new epoch. In Cairo
there was a galaxy of Jewish intellect, and in Spain
Jewish scholars arose, the like of whom had not been
seen for many a day.

The brilliant epoch dawned in Spain, where Jewish
culture was to reach a height it had never previously
attained. Jews took the lead in all branches of science,
in philosophy, astronomy, mathematics, and medicine.
The phenomenon is all the more remarkable, when it
is remembered that they were comparatively few in
number, and continually the target of persecutors,
despised often, even by those who availed themselves of
tbeir learning and medical skill. For all that, they
surpassed every other nation in Europe. It speaks much
for the influence of Judaism that its adherents could
achieve so much. It is unnecessary to detail the various
historical events that led to the sojourn of the Jews in
Spain. Judaism in the Middle Ages finds many a
home. Now it is in North Africa, now in Spain, now
in Germany, now in Holland and France. Wherever
they went the Jews took their learning with them.

58 JUDAISM

There is a wonderful power innate in Judaism. It can
rise to any occasion. In times of stress and sorrow, the
study of his religion could comfort the Jew. In times
of gladness and joy, the finger of God seemed to have
pointed the way. Yet it is true that the Jew has given
the best defence of his creed in times of oppression.
"When prosperity is his lot and the barriers that separate
him from his neighbour have been removed, the resultant
of these forces is often seen in the throwing aside of the
study of Jewish literature. If this be a fair contention,
then the Middle Ages must have been very productive
in the domain of such literature. From one place to
another, exiled hither and thither, tossed to and fro
on the unfriendly sea of an unfriendly world, their story
is one of continuous oppression and long drawn-out
misery. From time to time a respite was granted.
For a brief space there would be peace and quiet : but
the fury was only to break out with renewed force.
The " holy " wars of the Crusades brought misery to
the Jew. The fanatics on both sides made him a
target. The fires of the Inquisition and the tort'
of the rack degraded him still further. No record of
all the Jewish miseries could be set down. The marvel
is that he survived them all, and could turn his heart
to the words of his religion and live and glory in the
elucidation of that faith.

In face of these considerations, are we not ju
ID believing that a certain providenti
1 to allow the Jew t<> be IHD1M
i must have felt that his time WBfl not yet. His
faith told him that C d had DTOl hi forth his fa:'

from slavery to freedom. The same miracle would

i. What though the pie dull and

MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 59

the sky overclouded, the future held out the bright
promise of a new deliverance. So, sweet singers like
Gabirol who had magnified the beauties of Judaism in
poetry, could be appealed to. The Messianic hope, too,
kept them alive. Pseudo-Messiahs arose in every age
and contrived to win over the people till as late as
1665, when Sabbathai Zevi claimed to be the promised
deliverer. A people situated in such circumstances
produced a literature which has astonished the world.
It was the mediaeval Jew who carried about philosophy
and acted as the intermediary between the Arabic
masters and the rest of the world. As Lecky has said
in his History of Rationalism ; " While the intellect of
Christendom, enthralled by countless superstitions, had
sunk into a deadly torpor, in which all love of inquiry
and all search for truth were abandoned, the Jews were
still pursuing the path of knowledge, amassing learning
and stimulating progress with the same unflhiching
constancy that they manifested in their faith. They
were the most skilful physicians, the ablest financiers,
and among the most profound philosophers."

Who were the men who have left their mark on the
history of Judaism ? It is impossible to enumerate
them all, but a few must be mentioned to exhibit the
various fields which their researches covered. Jehuda
Halevi (1080-1140), a poet of the most fervid depth of
heart, poured forth his passionate longing for Palestine
in words of matchless sublimity. The sacredness of
Palestine for the Jew even in its devastation is ever his
theme. To him, the ruins of Jerusalem are sacred,
shedding their fight over the world. More important
than his poems is his philosophical treatise known as
the Kusari. One of the most notable events of mediaeval

60 JUDAISM

Judaism had been the conversion of a Tartar race — the
Chazars — to Judaism. The idea of this work of Halevi
starts with the King of the Chazars. He is perplexed
in his mind. In a dream an angel had appeared to the
King telling him : " Thine intentions are good, but thy
works are not good." He therefore sends for the priests
and advocates of the different religions. Judaism is
the mother religion, and the Jewish teacher, in a dia-
logue with the King, has, put into his mouth by
Jehuda Halevi, the conception of Judaism which that
philosopher had evolved. Jewish apologetics against
the claims of opposing religions were common in those
days. Readers of early Church history will remember
that as far back as the second century, Justin Martyr
is said to have debated with a Jew on the relative
merits of his religion and Judaism in the famous Dia-
logue with Trypho. The Kusari is one of the most
fascinating works of this nature. Written in Arabic, it
was afterwards translated into Hebrew, and now there
is a fine rendering in English.1 Jehuda Halevi was
not, strictly speaking, representative of his country-
men. His views deprecate the argument from intelli-
gence, for he seems to lay greater stress on the importance
of accepting the Law, than on the attempt to reason it
out. His passion for Palestine runs through his philo-
sophy, and it is not surprising that he hastened to the
promised land and spent the remaining years of his life
in that consecrated spot towards which his eyes had
always turned

A century earlier Baohya ibn Faknda had published
his famous work <>n the DutUs of the II<<n-i. one ol
most important ethical treatises on Judaism thai wa

1 llv Dr. II. II:: ! | ,ut Iclgc).

MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 61

have. But the most important contribution to Judaism
came from Moses Maimonides (1135-1205), the greatest
intellect in Jewry in the Middle Ages. As a second
Moses he was regarded. He was born in Cordova,
where his father held a high position in the community.
Maimonides was a great Talmudist and a scholar in
secular branches of learning. His profession was that
of a physician, and the wide ramifications of his know-
ledge were a source of marvel to his contemporaries.
His great work — the Mishne Torah, or Yad Chazakah —
brought the whole mass of traditional law into syste-
matic order and remained an accepted authority for
subsequent generations. It was a sort of new '; Oral
Law " which could dispense with all books except the
Torah. The work is wonderful, but Maimonides aimed
too high. As has been said : 1 "It did not look like a
collection of laws that existed before, but like a book
of laws made by one man. No source was given, no
authority mentioned : verification was therefore not
easy. Maimonides even deviated at times from the
Talmudic decision and did not say why. It did not
encourage study and free research, and the Jew loves
study and independent investigation. After suffering
many attacks from a great number of scholars, it
became an authority of the first importance on ritual
decisions. But it did not become the people's code, the
code."

A more practical work was the More Nebuchim, or
Guide to the Perplexed, a philosophical treatise on
Judaism, designed to reconcile Judaism with philosophy
and science. The Bible and Aristotle are the two
sources of his investigation. They both teach the same
1 Dr. S. Daiches in his article " Codes and Codifiers."

62 JUDAISM

in different ways. Whatever his critics said regarding
his object hi writing the Mishne Torah, all are agreed
that in this work Maimonides showed what a deep
master he was of philosophy ; and this work gained
the respect of subsequent ages, its influence not being
confined to Jewish circles. His great book on ethics,
called The Eight Chapters, revealed another phase of
his fertile mind.

Mention must be made of the influence of Maimonides
on the Jewish creed. The thirteen articles of faith, still
a part of the Prayer Book, and embodied in one of the
hymns, are to be found in the introduction to one of
the chapters of his commentary already referred to.
The articles of faith are : (1) the existence of God,
(2) God's unity, (3) God's spirituahty, (4) God's eternity,
(5) God alone the object of worship, (6) the truth of
the revelation through the prophets, (7) the pre-eminence
of Moses among the prophets, (8) the Law was given
on Mount Sinai, (9) the immutability of the Law,
(10) God's foreknowledge of the actions of men, (11) the
belief in retribution, (12) the belief in the coming of the
Messiah, (13) the belief in the resurrection of the dead.
This creed did not meet with general acceptance. Subse-
quent scholars reduced the articles to three : (1) Exist-
ence of God, (2) Revelation, (3) Retribution. The latter
creed has been held by Jews of all Motions. The foot
that the articles a* drawn op by Maimonides are found
in the P Book ia due to (heir con and

comprehensiveness. They are still learned by Jewish
children among the first bile the

hymn to which i been made forms part of

the daily service of bl tgOgUO. Mairaoi.

the teacher of the Middl I ■ iiiitl

MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 63

that came after him gladly acknowledged the debt
owed to the genius and stimulus of his writings.

Another giant of the time was Gershom, who nourished
at the end of the tenth and begiiining of the eleventh
century. A great Talmudical scholar, his influence on
Judaism is due to the edict under his name forbidding
polygamy. Judaism understands the dignity of woman.
It therefore demands marriage of one man to one wife.
It does not favour polygamy. Even in Biblical times
the idea of marital faithfulness and monogamy seems
to be tacitly implied. Such a chapter as Proverbs xxxi.
10-31 could only have been written on the supposition
of a monogamous household. Or again, the last chapter
of Malachi clearly defines the relation of one man and
one wife. The same may be said of the Talmud. Even
under Islam, Judaism remained constant to this idea.
How many of the poems of Jehuda Halevi and other
singers celebrate the beauties of a marriage, and the
joyous union of man and his wife ! The custom was
prevalent, though it had not been codified into law.
Gershom and his learned brethren met together and
transformed the custom into law, putting the ban on
polygamy. Other important regulations dealt with
divorce, the law ordaining that divorce could not take
place without the consent of the wife. The Jewish
divorce laws are often misrepresented in quarters where
they are not understood. Their object was to make
for purity and goodness, not to promote or foster im-
morality. Judaism has always recognised that a happy
marriage is the perfect state for man and woman. If
reasons for divorce are more numerous hi Jewish Law
than in modern Church Law, it must be remembered
that a legalised freedom from irksome bonds is more

64 JUDAISM

likely to produce desirable results than the wilful con-
tempt of marriage vows and its concomitant unchastity.
Greater than Gershom was Solomon ben Isaac,
commonly known as Rashi (1040-1105), the prince of
commentators. Rashi, who lived in Troyes, wrote a
commentary on the entire Talmud, and another on the
Bible. What the reading of the Talmud would be
without the enlightenment which Rashi has shed upon
it, it would be difficult to say. He adheres closely to
the text, points out difficulties that may arise, and in
simple words removes the stumbling-block from the
student. Rashi is a true commentator ; he adheres to
the subject, and resists the temptation to digress. His
work on the Bible is interspersed with legend, the result,
probably, of his Talmudical training. It is, however, lit
up with many a bright ray of grammatical speculation,
and to tins day it serves as a valuable aid to the student.
Rashi's work as a commentator was imitated by others.
The works of David Kimchi included commentaries on
the books of the Bible as well as grammatical (zeal
So important is Kimchi's aid to the elucidation of Scrip-
ture that his influence is apparent in the Autho:
Version of 1611. Other commentators were Abraham
ibn Esra and Moses ibn Esra, both abfc :ors.

Nachmanides, besides being a keen controversialist and
philosopher, was a Bible commentator, and Rabl
Jacob Tarn founded the school of the Tossaphi
existed in France and Germany for over two bund

ad who, in i dialectical way, wso(
the Talmud and created new norms. Tney stimul
a new briefest in the Talmud, and by their zeal and
<i<>ii collected material from partly remote works
tag on passages in the Bible,

MEDIAEVAL JUDAISM 65

After the work of the Tossaphists, in the thirteenth
century, Nachmanides in his writings combined the
influence of the Spanish and French methods. His
pupil, Meir of Rothenburg, was the greatest authority
of his age. Commentators and codiners there were in
great numbers, and many works have come down to
us. But it was not till the sixteenth century that
Joseph Caro collected all the existing material, and
making use of all former codes gave to the world the
book called the Shulchan Aruch, which remained the
standard guide in Jewish life. Thus, nearly 1000
years after the completion of the Talmud, the final
code-form was presented. Since that code there has
been no other. Scholars have written their criticism,
but the work remains. It is the object of Jews to pre-
serve the code, study it, pore over its contents till such
time as another shall arise to supersede it. The trend
of thought in these days is pointing in this direction.
Many of the regulations laid down in the Shulchan Aruch
have little or no application to modern times. The
changed conditions under which Jews live, tend to em-
phasise the difficulty of a complete allegiance to its
laws. If Judaism, as we believe, is a progressive re-
ligion, the era of revelation and inspiration is not over.
God speaks to His servants in every age, and the time
may come when one with authority may arise to codify
once again the regulations that, summed up. go to the
making of Judaism.

These are some of the results of mediaeval writers on
Judaism. Only a few names have been singled out,
from the midst of numbers. The workers in the vine-
yard were many, and the harvest is abundant. After
the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, their lot was

E

C6 JUDAISM

terrible. The era of persecution was long and furious,
and the establishment of the Ghetto came as a relief.
Not that the Ghetto prevented the onslaught of the
tormentor. But there, the Jew could live his own life
among his own people, buried in the memories of the
past. In his Jewish Life, in the Middle Ages, Mr. Israel
Abrahams, the Reader in Rabbinic Literature at Cam-
bridge, has given us a brilliant exposition of what life
meant to the Jew in those days. Amid sorrows that
were at times overwhelming, there were seasons of joy
and thanksgiving. The family were drawn closely to-
gether. Oppression and hatred from without fostered
harmony and love within. The nature of the Jewish
calendar, with its alternation of joy and sorrow as exem-
plified by the various Festivals and Fasts, typified the
life of the Jew. Weeping might endure for the night,
but joy would come in the morning. The home became
a temple, with respect, love, and chastity as its pillars.
If the world were inhospitable and cruel, the little world
of his own compensated. In the literature of his people
the Jew read the meaning of God's dealings with Israel.
The people that walked in darkness would, one day.
behold a great light. With this comforting assurance
they were content to bear the present, happy in the
knowledge that the future would dawn. The dawn
waa long in coming, but when it did break, it brought
the beginning of a new era fraught with important eon-
sequences to the Jew and his religion.

CHAPTER V

MODERN JUDAISM

The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries witnessed a
complete decay in Central Europe. The Holy Roman
Empire was nothing more than a name. Germany was
divided into a number of small Principalities with no
central authority. In the conflicts between one Princi-
pality and another, the Jews came in for their share of
persecution and could make little headway. In Poland,
where there were a heady large numbers of Jews, the
intellectual atmosphere was not favourable enough to
allow them to advance. In consequence, they had to
concentrate on Rabbinic literature, the Talmud form-
ing the beginning and end of their mental equipment.
By this, it is not meant that they were intellectually
reduced, but they had come to a standstill, and their
state of development at the end of the eighteenth
century was no further advanced than it had been at
the end of the sixteenth. Thus the Jews of the
eighteenth were like those of the sixteenth century.
Literature had no impetus. To the Jew, those who
were the representatives of Christian civilisation were
his persecutors, and, as such, their learning was looked
upon as taboo. This explains the apparent Jewish
shrinking from Christian intercourse. It was only
friendship and sympathy that could induce the Jew to
accept Christian learning. The first signal for change

67

68 JUDAISM

was given in two countries and came about in two
ways, each characteristic and distinct. Literary
emancipation came from Germany, and political eman-
cipation from France.

The literary emancipation started with Moses Mendels-
sohn. This great philosopher was born at Dessau in
1728, and after a youth of struggle and poverty, handi-
capped by physical deformity, he attained to the position
of being regarded as one of the greatest thinkers of his
time. The German Socrates, as he was called, in
addition to his acquaintance with classical literature:
was well versed in the literature of Germany. At
that time the intellectual circles of Berlin were per-
meated with liberal ideas, and the presence of a cultured
Jew in the society of the learned did much to remove
the impression that the Jews were a nation of renegades,
and a people wholly wrapped up in the accumulation
of wealth. Mendelssohn has been immortalised by
Lessing as the Jew in Nathan tM Wise. To him it
became apparent that it was necessary to bring German
culture to the rest of his co-religionists. With this
object in view, he translated the Bible into pure German,
which he wrote with Hebrew characters. The .1
had many translations in the vernacular, but the
language which they spoke was the old German dialect
of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Their Bible
read like the pre-Lutheran. The new translation by
Mendelssohn had almost the same i : • that by

Luther ; not that it produced a reformation, but it
to a break with the past. Th< ng of

Mian broke down a barrier that Separated the

Jew from German culture, and soon books poured forth

00 all Subjects, written in pu: Spirit of

MODERN JUDAISM 69

modern civilisation penetrated the masses. In some
quarters it was welcomed, to others it gave a shock,
and stirred up opposition. The learned and the pious
realised that they were face to face with a new spirit
antagonistic to their own old ideas. Henceforth the
fight would be between the old and the new, and this
continues to this very day.

The literary change would not have produced such
tremendous effects were it not that in another place
political events were tending in a similar direction.
The French Revolution had not only proclaimed liberty
and equality but had acted upon these principles.
Though in England in 1747 a Bill had been passed for
the removal of Jewish disabilities, the storm that had
been aroused had caused the Bill to be withdrawn. It
was left to the French Revolution to apply the prin-
ciple, and to give the Jews complete liberty. Public
opinion had been stirred up, and when the question of
emancipating the Jews was discussed, there was no
opposition. One can imagine the delight with which
such privileges were hailed. No sacrifice on the part
of the Jew would have been too great, for the sake of
true devotion to France. Napoleon fanned their en-
thusiasm still more by his endeavour to establish a
real and lasting relationship between the Jews and their
fellow-Frenchmen. Thus he convoked the Sanhedrin
in 1806. This was an idea that worked like magic.
For the first time, the Jews were invited to send
delegates to Parliament, to discuss Jewish affairs.
Prominent Rabbis took part hi the deliberations.
Delegates came from France, Italy, and Alsace, and in
1807 there was an imposing assembly. Questions were
put to the Sanhedrin intended to define the relation

70 JUDAISM

between Jew and non-Jew. Thus it was asked : Could
a Jew be a good Frenchman ? The answer was in the
affirmative : " The Israelite is bound to consider the
land of his birth or adoption as his fatherland, and shall
love and defend it when called upon." Some twelve
questions in all were put before them, and the decisions
were formulated in nine articles, which clearly showed
that there was no discrepancy in the Jew regarding
himself as a loyal citizen of France while remaining
faithful to his religion. Later on, the victorious French
armies broke down the barriers of the Ghetto, in Rome.
Frankfurt, and other places, and wherever they went
they took with them the new ideas of political life.

Thus both these forces worked a great transformation
on the Jews. While the Jew had formerly pored over
his books, now the whole world was open to him.
With the widening of the area came new problems.
There came the struggle between the old and the new.
How was the Jew to reconcile his new patriotism — his
devotion to the country which had given him citizen-
ship— with the old aspiration for a return to Palestine ?
How could he retain his love for the old Hebrew language
and consider it as holy, to the exclusion of any other '(
Which was he to sacrifice, and what would that
rifice entail ? Very often force of circumstances put
the questions. The situation was perplexing, and the
dilemma was rendered more serious when it is re-
membered that the only weapon the Jew had was his
intellectual equipment. Many of them frit that their
old traditions were a burden. The only thing to do
i «1 to he. to nfonn the old. All the f<>iv<

dilation were tending in that direction. Now they
were to be French and German. They had to find a

MODERN JUDAISM 71

definition for Judaism. Did Judaism signify a nation-
ality or a faith ? What was it ? To answer the
question, an examination of Judaism was begun, and a
difference was drawn between what was binding, ancient,
and immutable, and what was transitory and the result
of Rabbinic legislation. The revolt against Rabbinic
authority came from progress. The Karaite revolt in
the eighth century had been the result of a desire to
stand still. The onward march of progress has always
created this problem for the Jew. These forces, re-
conciliation of the old with the new, and recasting the
old in the light of the new, have been at work ever
since, and a clear miderstanding will help to explain
the modern situation.

The first step in the direction of assimilation was
taken by Israel Jacobsohn of Sessen, who introduced the
German language into the service of his synagogue and
started the elimination of all the allusions to Zion and
the restoration to Palestine, which are found in the
Prayer Book. The Jews in Germany had been deeply
affected by the outcome of Mendelssohn's activity in
his own immediate family. In Mendelssohn's time, it
must be remembered, though literary culture was
spreading, the idea of a complete Jewish political
emancipation was as far removed from the people as
the moon. The result of the new awakening was, that
many members of Mendelssohn's inner circle became
so completely identified with German culture as to
become estranged from their fellow Jews into whose
minds that new development had not yet penetrated.
Their Christian friends on the other hand still considered
them as Jews, and they, in their turn, in order to
efface all traces of distinctiveness, embraced Christianity.

72 JUDAISM

But they created a gulf between themselves and their
former co-religionists. The mass of the Jews refused
to follow, but clung to their Judaism. Still, they wished
to be German patriots, and to this end they adapted
the religion to their needs by instituting changes which
had a far-reaching effect on the subsequent develop-
ment of the Judaism of that time. A number of
prominent Rabbis followed the example of Jacobsohn,
and soon, tradition and ceremonial were considered as
antiquated in face of the modern tendencies that
separated Jews from their fellow men, and had there-
fore to be eliminated from Judaism. Changes came
about in the Synagogue service, an organ was intro-
duced (an innovation still rigidly condemned in orthodox
circles), sermons were preached in the vernacular, and
the Prayer Book underwent so thorough an expurga-
tion at their hands, that at last very little was left.
Even the Sabbath was to be transferred to Sunday, and
in fact every difference was to be obliterated except the
Cross.

It was not till about the jTear 1842 that a synod of
Rabbis was held at Brunswick, attended by Holdheim
and Phillipsohn among others, to introduce some
system into the anarchy where each Rabbi was a law
unto himself, and to lay down the fundamental prin-
ciples of the Reform Movement. The original draft
was found to be so drastic, and went bo deeply to the
root of Judaism, that it had to be modified. The
strongest opposition was manifested in other qua:
against these ten which, if oarried out to their

Logical conclusion, would have proved disastrous,

other currents, too, political and literary, had come

to the BUrfaoe and reacted on the-e tendencies which

MODERN JUDAISM 73

had already gone too far. After the fall of Napoleon,
the liberties granted to the Jews, especially in Germany,
weie speedily withdrawn by the Prussian and other
governments. As far as possible they attempted to
re-establish the Ghetto, but men like Duhm and others
led the opposition. Ruhs, too, took up the challenge
and opposed the withdrawal of political rights, though
his object was to win over the Jews to Christianity.
Jews had given Heine to the German nation, and in all
branches of life they had taken advantage of the spell
of freedom granted to them, to identify themselves with
every movement. A large number of them had fought
as soldiers in the so-called war of liberation, and these
felt it bitterly when, after peace had been declared,
their claims to recognition were ignored. While they
had been fighting, their liberties had been taken away,
and all their services to the State were recompensed
in much the same way as Russia recompenses those of
her Jewish subjects who take their share in fighting
her battles. This, on the one hand, contributed to
check the headlong rush to submersion and assimi-
lation.

But another counter move came from the influence of
Jewish science, which took its rise from the great schools
and universities, where there were many Jewish students.
Jewish science was developed, and tended to elucidate
the past and to answer some of the problems which
circumstances had evolved. Now there was an attempt
to solve the new problems, but on different lines from
those adopted by the lovers of assimilation, who had
tried to eliminate everything which seemed to stand in
their way. The question was put : What was old, and
what was new ? Secondly, the problem was pro-

74 JUDAISM

pounded : How had they come to all that which they
possessed ? Could any historical development be
traced ? Could anything be shown to be old by irre-
futable documents ? Who were the authors of these
documents ? What claim, if any, did they have for
obedience and respect ? To answer questions such as
these, was to show that Judaism still had the living
power to regenerate man. Thus a new stimulus was
given to the study of Jewish history, Jewish literature,
Jewish philology, Jewish theology, or rather Jewish
philosophy, which were pursued with keen investiga-
tion, and fortunate were the Jews, that at that time a
band of men arose the like of whom had not been seen
in Jewry for many a century. Nachman Krochmal. a
merchant of Brody in Galicia, had laid the foundation
with his Guide to the Perplexed of the Time, a work which
revealed a comprehensive knowledge of the develop-
ment of Israel's religion, and which served as a guide
to Jewish science in the nineteenth century. Greatest
of all the scholars of the time was Leopold Zunz.
Krochmal tried to investigate ; Rappaport laid the
foundations of historical biography ; Zunz unravelled
and brought order and system into the history of the
homiletic interpretations of the Bible, a book not t<>
be surpassed, and for the first time he laid bare the
secrets and intricacies of the hymns and poems of the
Hebrew liturgy, extending over a period of close upon
1800 yean. Zunz was a pioneer <>f unrivalled depth,
of remarkable strength of oharaoter, and <>f ah
unlimited scholarship. Merita Stemsohneider, the
"Nestor" of .Jewish scholarship, discovered the Jewish
bibliography, and among other men who contributed
to the awakening <>f Jewish learni]

MODERN JUDAISM 75

Sachs, who revised the liturgy in classical German, and
Mnnk, who unearthed Arabic philosophers. But two
men stand out prominently not only in letters, but in
the part they took in moulding the future development
of the religion — Zecharias Frankel and Hirsch Graetz.
Frankel in 1845 had protested, in a powerful letter,
against the vagaries of the Reform Rabbis sitting in
conference in Frankfurt, and he could not join a body
which recommended the substitution of the vernacular
for Hebrew as the language of the synagogue. For
years he continued to enunciate his views of moderate
conservatism in his periodical known as the Zeitschrift
fur die Religibsen Interessen des Judenthums. He was
Rabbi of Dresden and had already written a book
removing the existing impression that Jewish Law pre-
vented a Jew being trusted in his evidence before a
Civil Court. He had also written on the Septuagint
with the object of showing how the Alexandrian Jews
were dominated by Rabbinic exegesis. The changed
times had brought about a demand for Jewish Rabbis,
who by a combination of academic secular education
and Rabbinical knowledge, would be able to reconcile
the new conditions with the teaching of the Rabbis
and their development of Jewish law. The work of
these great giants was to dissipate the fictions of the
Reform School, and to place on a sound basis the his-
torical development of the Jewish literature and the
Jewish law. The real history of the Jews was practi-
cally unknown. Jost was the first to write a compen-
dious history, but this was eclipsed by Graetz, whose
monumental History of the Jews remains the most
reliable and beautiful survey of the various phases
through which Jewish history and learning have passed

76 JUDAISM

from the time of the second Temple till the middle of
the nineteenth century.

A new school had to be established in which account
was to be taken of these modern tendencies, and to
provide Rabbis to cope with them. The first seminary
of this kind was established at Breslau in 1854 through
the munificence of Jonas Frankel. The first President
was Zecharias Frankel, and among the first professors
were Graetz and Joel. Frankel' s standpoint being that
of a moderate, he was opposed by representatives of
the two camps of extreme liberalism and extreme ortho-
doxy. But the seminary rapidly attracted students,
and it is a significant fact that the greatest Jewish
scholars in Europe are mostly products of Breslau.
Thus a new element was introduced. There were scien-
tifically equipped Rabbis taught to keep the middle
path. With the establishment of the Breslau seminary
the waves of reform began to be rolled back. And
during all the time that the literary development had
gone on, the political had grown apace. The cry for
emancipation grew fainter till it died out in 1870
when, nominally, the Jews obtained freedom in
Germany.

The Reform Movement, however, had not spent its
entire force in Germany. Several Rabbis favouring the
tendencies of assimilation had emigrated to America,
where they found a large number of their German
religionists. These had followed in the wake of the
Spanish and Portuguese settlers in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, and preceded the rush of Russian

and Polish immigrants at the end of the nineteenth.

The soil was thus ready lor sowing the seed. The

German ' oread all over America and intnxl

MODERN JUDAISM 77

reforms. So rapidly has the movement developed in
that country that America has contributed to a very
large extent to disintegrate the religious life of the Jews
and to lead them away from Judaism to Unitarianism
and apostasj7. There was no force to check the de-
velopment, and therefore reform had assumed a wide
scope before the influx of the new elements brought about
a change. In America the example of Germany was
followed, and a seminary was established in Cincinnati,
more, however, for propagating their views than for up-
holding traditional Judaism.

To England, too, came the Reform Movement, and
the Reform Synagogue was established in 1841. But
the contributing causes were not quite on a par with
those in Germany. In England the Spanish and Portu-
guese Synagogue established in the middle of the seven-
teenth century had adhered rigidly to the old tenets
and would not sanction the slightest alteration even of
outward forms. A few members seceded, and what was
originally intended merely as a protest, and had as its
object slight changes in the ritual, became a centre of
much more extended movement. Taking its lessons
from Germany the Reform Synagogue endeavoured to
introduce some of the fundamental alterations of German
Reform, by eliminating allusions to the return to Pales-
tine and references to sacrifices, and by calling in
question the binding character of Rabbinic law. The
original idea of the movement was to substitute the law
made by laymen in accordance with their own pre-
dilections and knowledge, for the traditional law as
handed down through the ages and represented by the
Rabbi as the only authority. Here in England the
community on the whole was very conservative and this

78 JUDAISM

movement was kept within narrow limits. The seventy
years of the history of the Reform Synagogue are com-
paratively uneventful, though one or two branch sjma-
gogues were established in Bradford, Manchester, and
other towns.

It was not till a few years ago that a more ad-
vanced Reform body came into being. This new move-
ment, known as the Liberal Synagogue, conducts
its services mostly in the vernacular and recognises
little of traditional law as binding. It was formed
primarily to win back many of those who had drifted
away altogether from Judaism. Though its existence
has been of short duration it has achieved its object in
this direction, and many have joined its ranks. It
owes much of its success to the efforts of Mr. Claude
Montefiore, a great scholar and a great philanthropist,
and a man of an intensely religious nature.

To return to Germany. There, the Reform school
having eliminated legalism had to find some new idea
to take its place. Wherein was the necessity for the
continued existence of Judaism ? Thus Judaism be-
came, to them, almost nothing more than an ethical
creed, and the preservation of the Jew v. ary

only to further what they called " a mission to the
Gentile." The Jew was to propagate the ethical to
ings of his religion and each Jew was to beoon*
missionary for his faith — a faith sublimated without a
definite binding character. This I ooimtern*

it. Borne of the conservative Rabbis and Boholan
sought to counteract the tendency, but it produced
another i ctreme. A new school o! thought ai
which though adopting ■ modern form olung t<> every

minute detail <>f ceremonial, paying at tin.

MODERN JUDAISM 79

attention to the detail than to the spirit. The degrees
in the binding character of the laws were obliterated.
Roughly speaking, almost everything in the traditional
law, whatever its historical origin may have been, and
whether of a local or a general character, was placed in
the same category of reverence and holiness. The
slightest deviation from a code much more rigid than
the official code was not to be tolerated. Its attitude
towards historical investigation was almost negative.
It claimed obedience to the letter more even than to
the spirit. With it was combined a high degree of sin-
cerity and devotion, kindled by genuine enthusiasm
and love, and it is this that has given to this extreme
movement some of the strength and some of the charm
by which it has been able, within its narrow limits, to
achieve the amount of good it has effected. The great
protagonist was a man whose name is still revered in
Frankfurt, where he founded his congregation. Samson
Raphael Hirsch combined with great erudition an over-
powering eloquence, and he was able to rally roimd him
a number of Rabbis and communities which did not see
eye to eye with the more temperate attitude of the leaders
of the seminary in Breslau. Thus a new factor arose
in Germany almost simultaneously with the synod of
Reform Rabbis of Brunswick, which marks the parting
of the ways.

As an outcome of this movement a seminary was
established in Berlin which was to serve as a place for
educating Rabbis, under Dr. Hildesheimer, more in
harmony and sympatlry with the more extreme views
of stricter orthodoxy. It must, however, be made clear
that in Judaism there is no dogmatic separation, nor
is there any definite standard by which the theology of

80 JUDAISM

any Jew could be measured. Men, who in the west of
Europe might be considered as Jews of extreme ortho-
doxy, would perhaps be looked at askance by Rabbis
in Hungary ; while on the other hand representatives
of the conservative view would be more in complete
agreement with some of the enlightened Rabbis in
Russia. It is all a matter of degree, and no rigid
standard can be set up nor can any line of demarcation
be drawn between orthodox and unorthodox. England
is regarded as a centre of conservative Judaism, though
many are ready to deny English Jews the right to such
a claim.

The example set by Breslau was soon followed in
many centres of Jewish life. Not only was a seminary
established in Cincinnati, but in London a Jews' College
was opened in 1856 as an institution for the training of
preachers, teachers, and Rabbis, of the Jewish religion,
remotely resembling the real seminaries of the Continent.
It was intended to serve local purposes and was adapted
to different needs. For many years it was presided
over by a man of saintly character and great learning,
the late Dr. Michael Friedlander, under whom most of
the men now occupying positions as ministers in English-
speaking communities here and abroad, received their
training. His successor, the present principal, Dr. A.
Biichler, an encyclopaedic scholar, during the 6
he has bold the office has done much to raise the College
in the esteem of the general community, and to
kindle the embers of Jewish learning which have some-
how never burned very brightly in this country. It
is safe to assume that, given proper support and
OOnragement, the only .Jewish seminary in England will
one day rank with any on the Continent.

MODERN JUDAISM 81

Other seminaries have been established in Vienna,
Buda-Pest, and Florence, and in many other places, most
of the teachers being pupils of Breslau. In this way a
certain levelling of Jewish life has been produced which
has deeply influenced the modern position of the Jew,
and may be the means of solving the many problems
which are facing Jewry in all parts of the world.

CHAPTER VI

JUDAISM OF TO-DAY AND ITS PROBLEMS

The tendencies which affected Judaism in the nineteenth
century, as we saw in the last chapter, are now the
dominant forces in Jewry. On the one hand, there is
the desire to be faithful to the ancient traditions of the
religion, and at the same time to assimilate as much as
is best in modern civilisation, but not at too great a
cost. This desire demands great sacrifices, and as the
claims of modern life are so great, education has to
run on parallel lines for the Jew, i.e. Jewish education
combined with secular study. The whole system of
education in recent years has undergone a change, and
is still being changed. Instead of being fed on purely
Hebrew literature, as in the past, the Jew of to-day
finds most of his time absorbed by the literature of
the various countries in which he lives. This tendency
has been going on for years. The result has been, that
a gradual dwindling of a knowledge of Hebrew amount
Jews has been noticed. The partial elimination of
Hebrew from the Divine Service has brought with it a
growing ignorance of the great poetical, historical,
legal, and spiritual treasures of that literature. Thus
the bonds which kept the Jew to the past arc gradually

being sundered, and his strength to resist the inroads

of modern life grows weaker and weaker. Such has
been, and is the case, even amongst those who adhere

JUDAISM OF TO-DAY : ITS PROBLEMS 83

strictly to ancient tradition, and who, in consequence,
find themselves hemmed in on all sides in the attempt
to harmonise the past with the occurrences of every-
day life. Thus, the keeping of the Sabbath entails a
heavy burden. The modern pressure of business and the
growth of competition make it almost impossible for
a strictly Sabbath- observant Jew to compete with his
Gentile neighbours. Recent Sunday-observance legis-
lation has intensified this difficulty in many quarters.
Again, the dietary laws are felt by many to be what
they really are intended to be, a means of separation
of the Jew from his neighbour, and they are not under-
stood any longer to be a means of preservation. The
Jew, therefore, is confronted everywhere with the diffi-
culty of living in strict accord with these regulations.
The weakening of these two commands in itself, creates
an intolerable strain on the allegiance of the Jew to
the faith and to the strict observance of Jewish
ceremonial.

Such is the state of mind in one section. It is, how-
ever, still more acute in the other, which deliberately
sets to work to cast overboard the binding character
of these ceremonies, eliminates Hebrew from prayer,
and being unwilling to bring too many sacrifices to a
conflict in which it feels it is worsted, makes of moral
weakness a moral strength and proceeds apace on the
road of unchecked assimilation. Yet even these cannot
entirely free themselves, nor are they willing to free
themselves from the ties of Nationality. They cling to
Judaism, even if it is only a name. Some are even
proud to be Jews, but Jews who enjoy the pleasures of
the world without taking upon themselves the obliga-
tions imposed by Judaism. They do not like to sever

84 JUDAISM

their connection entirely, and they remain Jews, though
at times they are Jews in name only. It must not,
however, be imagined that only apathy and indifference
produce this type of Jew. Other causes have contri-
buted to weaken the force of Jewish observance. There
is the educated type, who believes that Science and the
criticism of the Bible, even when he himself has never
taken the trouble to investigate the results either of
the one or the other, have shattered the foundations of
Judaism. Cloaking himself under the opinion of others,
he straightway throws off the yoke of his religion and
joins the ranks of the unobservant.

Hence there is a conflict continuing all along the line,
giving to Jewry a chequered appearance ; and to those
who cannot see beneath the surface, it presents the
appearance of being rent in many pieces, and divided
into many factions. The communal organisation of the
Jews in modern times differs very little from that which
has prevailed in the past. The absence of dogmatic
teaching has fostered a tendency of Home Rule all
round. The boundaries of Judaism are drawn very
wide, and it is extremely difficult to say when a Jew is
not a Jew. A Jew remains a Jew so long as he has
not publicly renounced his faith. Hence, in spite of
profound differences amongst sections, there is still a
real unity, and in spite of the various independent com-
munal organisations, there is still a spiritual centralisa-
tion which goes back to very ancient times. The real
leader of the community is the Rabbi, who ifl the spiritual
guide, although he is only, strictly speaking, I layman,
his scholarship aluno giving him the position, net any

outward ordination. Ee has do priestly runetioi]

perform, there being no distinct priestly oaste in modern

JUDAISM OF TO-DAY: ITS PROBLEMS 85

Judaism. The Rabbi is the teacher and judge, and stands
on a plane of absolute equality with every fellow-
Rabbi. Superiority is readily granted to the scholar,
independent of the place where he resides or of the size
of the community over which he holds sway. Hence,
he becomes in time the real guide, the final authority —
of course, only of a moral kind — in all matters of religion.
Centralisation has been attempted in France through
Napoleon, who used the clergy for political purposes,
and made all the priests, of whatever faith, ministers of
the State. The effect has been a deadening one. This
system has prevented scholarship from flourishing, and
when such is the case in a community, the standard of
its religious life is correspondingly low. All throughout
Jewry, however, the old system of independent com-
munal government has been maintained, and thus, a
free and elastic expression has been secured everywhere.
But even this state of things has undergone a change
under the stress of circumstances. The demands of
modern life have turned the mind of the Jew from the
study of his religion, and in consequence, ignorance and
indifference have become rife, breeding a want of respect
for the authority wielded by the Rabbi. The effect of
this has been to divert authority from the Rabbi to the
ordinary Lay-leaders of the community, who, basing
their claim on considerations other than those of Jewish
scholarship, for the most part shape and mould the
development of the religion in accordance with their
own views. It is easy, therefore, to understand how
modern Judaism presents such a peculiar aspect ; for
the unified force of faith, tradition, and scholarship, has
a hard battle to fight with ignorance, indifference, and
assimilation.

86 JUDAISM

Such was the state of affairs a few years ago. The
living forces in Judaism, however, had not spent their
vitality and strength in fighting the onslaught of re-
form and in attempting to blend modern knowledge
with ancient faith. They reasserted themselves when
matters seemed to have reached their lowest ebb.
The ideals which had been banished from the temple
of Judaism during the last century came to life again
with a new movement in which the national unity of
Jewry was proclaimed, and attempt was made to replant
the Jewish people in their ancient home in Palestine.
It was first an attempt at colonisation in Palestine, but
later on it expanded into a wider movement, aiming at
the re-establishment of an autonomous state in that
country. The proclamation of such views produced a
great stir, especially amongst those Jews who had been
weaned from their allegiance to Zion, and a new current
stirred the depths of troubled Jewry. Parties were
formed and are formed, but whatever the ultimate
success of Zionism may be, it has no doubt focussed the
attention of the Jews on some of the essential features
of Judaism. It has brought home to the conscience of
Jewry the fact that Judaism is neither nationality nor
religion, but both together, indissolubly united ; and the
problem which is now facing the Jews has been made
more concrete since the birth of Zionism than it ever
was at any previous time. The causes which have con-
tributed towards the rise of the Zionist movement are
not only the internal changes which have affected tho
spiritual rights of the Jews, but just as, at the beginning
of tho nineteenth century, political tendePOJefl from
without have been active. With the political emanci-
pation of tho Jews in 1870 in Germany, tho barriers W I re

JUDAISM OF TO-DAY : ITS PROBLEMS 87

supposed to have been removed, but this was a fal-
lacy. Rights conferred upon the Jews by constitutional
methods often turned out to be only paper rights. A
society which had accustomed itself to the segregation
of Jews for centuries, could not easil}- acquiesce in a
complete change ; especially as the causes which had
led to that segregation were not removed by legal
decree. Hence, in lieu of the legal barriers, social
barriers began to be erected, and what could no longer
be done by law was done by custom and practice.
Thus, the antagonism existing against the Jews assumed
a different shape, and became known as anti-Semitism.
It was a great disillusionment to those Jews who
had thrown themselves heart and soul into reform and
assimilation, to find that only baptism admitted them to
the full rights of citizenship — and often insufficiently;
and that all the sacrifices they were ready to bring,
and had brought, far too lavishly, went for nothing.
This had a sobering effect in one direction, whilst in
another it fostered apostasy to a larger degree than
had formerly been the case, when all the forces of the
State were directed towards weaning the Jew away from
his faith. It was the revolt against the social oppression,
together with a deepening of consciousness, combined
with religious problems, which helped in evolving
Zionism with all the consequences that followed from
that new movement. Zionism drew the Jews of East
and West together ; it removed some of the barriers
which had been created by differences of language and
by various standards of civilisation adopted by the
Jews in the countries where they lived. It taught them
to strip off the accidental forms and to recognise the
essential unity of the Jewish people. It had also, as a

88 JUDAISM

sequel, the revival of the Hebrew language, for it is
recognised that a nation without a language is like a
body without a soul. Revival of Hebrew has gone on
at a great pace in recent years ; books in great numbers,
dealing with all subjects, have been poured forth, and
the new method of learning Hebrew as a living lan-
guage has entered some of the Jewish schools and
religious classes of this country, usually with very satis-
factory results. Zionism, in addition, brought about a
renewed activity in settling Jews in Palestine and estab-
lishing industries there, and in many other similar ways
it sought to establish in Palestine a legally safeguarded
home for the Jew. It must not be forgotten, that there
are still countries in Europe and elsewhere, such as
Russia, Roumania, and the East, where Jews are sub-
ject to severe persecution and live under great dis-
abilities. The continued recurrence of pogroms in
Russia has been the cause of the great Jewish exodus
from that country in recent years, and the growing
numbers of immigrants to England and America has
served to create what is known as a Jewish problem.
Here, in England, the Jew, since the removal of civic
disabilities, has lived on an equal footing with his
fellow-men, engaging in all pursuits and enjoying all the
rights and privileges of Englishmen ; while, at the same
time, he has ever been willing to take his share in bear-
ing the burdens of the country. The eminence to which
Jews have attained in all departments of State and civic
life, is sufficient testimony to their complete identifica-
tion with England. Thus, the passing of an Aliens Bill
some few years ago darkened the serene horizon of
political liberty and disturbed the calm tenor of Jewish
life in England.

JUDAISM OF TO-DAY : ITS PROBLEMS 89

It will be seen, therefore, that the Jews to-day are
confronted with many serious problems, religious, politi-
cal, economic, and social, and Judaism presents an
appearance of being in a kind of melting-pot. It would
be difficult to gauge as yet the form which this process
will take, and the result of the conflicting tendencies
which are working in every direction ; but a more
systematic and comprehensive view is now being taken
by Jews themselves of their own position, and of the
responsibility which rests upon them, as well as of the
gravity of the problems with which they are face to
face. No less keen is the determination to solve these
problems in a manner more in harmony with the past,
and with a better outlook for the future. "What the Jew
wants to-day is rest, peace, calmness of mind, freedom
from agitation, and the opportunity of working out his
own destiny for his own spiritual freedom, and in ac-
cordance with his own inspiration and his own hopes.
The Jew by maintaining his own distinctiveness is not
a menace to Western civilisation. Even those who
refuse to admit that Zionism has any part to play in
the life of the Jew, are ready to affirm that the Bible
prophecies and promises point to a time when his con-
tinued existence shall be justified by the events of
history. Thus Jews of whatever section, national or
otherwise, feel that there is still a mission to the rest
of the world which they are to be instrumental in
carrying. But that mission can only be carried out by
the Jew taking his rightful place in the van of rehgious
progress and standing before the world as a model of
virtue, of integrity, of chastity, and morality. No one
will affirm that the world is near the realisation of all
these ideals. Till these virtues prevail, the work of

90 JUDAISM

the Jew must remain unfulfilled. The Jews gladly join
with their fellow-men of all religions in promoting the
welfare of humanity, but they believe that there is
something distinct in Judaism which the world has not
yet grasped. When the consummation will be, no one
can foretell ; but till the day arrives, when God's Spirit
will be poured out over all flesh, the children of Israel
will continue to carry on the work which began on
Sinai, and which will only be completed when the unity
of God is recognised by all His creatures.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books on the Bible are innumerable ; special mention
should be made of the writings of Robertson-Smith,
The Dictionary of the Bible (T. & T. Clark), The Century
Bible (Jack), The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Col-
leges, The International Critical Commentaries (Clark).

Judaism, Hellenism, and Christianity. — Important
books are : Pharisaism, by Travers Herford (Williams
and Norgate) ; The Synoptic Gospels, by C G. Monte-
fiore (Macmillan) ; Rev. G. Friedlander's works — Jewish
Sources of the Sermon on the Mount (Routledge) ; and
Hellenism and Christianity (Vallentine). The Parting of
the Roads (Arnold, 1912), with special reference to the
essays by W. 0. E. Oesterley and E. Levine. The
Religion and Worship of the Synagogue, by Box and
Oesterley (Pitman).

Specific books on Judaism are : The Jewish Religion,
by M. Friedlander ; Judaism as Creed and Life, by
Rev. Morris Joseph — a moderate conservative book, the
most brilliant work on the subject. Liberal Judaism,
by C G. Montefiore (Macmillan) ; Judaism, by
I. Abrahams (Constable) ; S. Schechter's Studies in
Judaism, in two volumes ; and Aspects of Rabbinic
Theology (A. & C. Black).

The Jewish Encyclopaedia should be consulted on
most of the subjects that arise from a study of Judaism.
Hastings' Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics (Clark),
contains many articles of great value by Dr. Gaster,

91

92 BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Abrahams, H. M. Loewe, Rev. Morris Joseph, and
other Jewish writers.

General books are : The History of the Jews, by H.
Graetz (English edition in five volumes) ; Lazarus'
Ethics of Judaism (Macmillan), and G. F. Abbott's
Israel in Europe (Macmillan).

Of modern works The Jewish Review (Routledge),
published every two months, contains discussions of cur-
rent Jewish topics, while the twenty volumes (1888-1908)
of The Jewish Quarterly Review are a mine of infor-
mation.

The Prayer Book is the Authorised Prayer Book edited
by the late Rev. S. Singer (Eyre & Spottiswoode).

The Prayer Book according to the rite of the Spanish
and Portuguese Jews, in five volumes. Edited by Dr.
Gaster, with English translation, 1901-7 (Clarendon
Press, Oxford).

INDEX

Abrahams, I., quoted, 66

Akiba, 44

America, Preform movement in, 7*

Amoraim, 54

Anan, 54

Antiochus Epiphanes, 29

Apocrypha, 28

Atonement, Day of, 18, 45

Atonement, vicarious, 38

Babylon, schools in, 45
Bachya, 60
Bar-Cochba. 37, 41
Benedictions. Eighteen, 25
Bible, divisions of, 10

— ethical value of, 16

— its teaching, 12 ff.

Calendar, in Babylon, 45
Canon, Biblical, 24
Ceremonial, 17 ff.

— prophets and, 21
Chanucah, 19
Chassidim, 34
Christianity, 16, 28

— and Judaism, 31 ff.
Crucifixion, the, 36
Crusades, the, 5S
Cyrus, 22

Daiches, Dr. S., quoted, 61

Diaspora, the, 53

Divorce, Jewish laws of, 63

Ecclesiastes, 28
Ecclaiasticus, 28
Elephantine^ papyri of, 26
England, Beform movement in,

Ksdras IT., 38

Esra, Abraham ibn, 04

Esra, Moses ibn, 64

Essenes, 34

Ethics of the Fathers, 23, 25

Exile, Babylonian, 22

Ezra, 23, 24, 26

Faith, Thirteen Articles of, 13, 62
Frankel. Z., 75, 76
Frencill in Judaism, 15
Friedlander, Rev. G., quoted, 28
Eriedlander, 31., SO

r Galatian-s, Epistle to, S7

; Gaoiim, 54

I Oemara, language of, 46

! Gershom, 63

I God, Love of, 15

God, Unity of, 38, 14 ff.

Gospels, 36

Gospel, Fourth, 29, 3T

Graetz, H., 75

Halacka, 43
Halevi, Jehuda. 59, 63
Hellenism, 26 ff.
Hillel, 41
Hirsch, S. R, 79

Idolatry, 14

Isaiah, 49

Israel, mission of, 20, 89

Jacobsohn I. (of Sessen), Tl
Jesus, 31 ff.
Jews' College, 80
Jonah, Book of, 49
Josephus, 35
Jost, 75
Judah, R., 45
Justin Martyr, 60

Karaism, results of, 55
Karaites, 54 f.
Kinichi, 64
Krochraal, 74
Eusari, the, 59, 60

Law, oral. 43

Law, religion as, 49 f.

Laws, dietary. 19, 83

Learning, Jewish, in 19th century, 74

Lecky, quoted, 59

Leontopolis, Temple of Onias, 27

Leasing. 88

Life, future. 50

Logos, 29

MACCABEES, 19, 29
3Iaimonides, 13, 20. 61 ff.
Malaehi, Book of, 24, 40, 63

Meir of Eotbenimrg, 65
Mendelssohn, Moses, 68, 71

K

94

INDEX

Messiah, Jesus' claim, 37 f.
Midrash, 44
Mishna, 25, 43 ff.
Monotheism, 14
Monteflore, C. G., 78
Morality, Jewish, 16
More Sebuchim, 20

NACHMAKIDES, 64, 65
Napoleon, 69
Nationality, Jewish, 83 f.
New Year, 18

Passover, 18

Paul, 31 ff., 37

Pentateuch, 24, 43

Pentecost, 18

Pharisaism, worth of, 32, 33

Pharisees, 25, 32 ff., 41

Philo, 27, 29

Polygamy, prohibition of, 63

Prayer-Book, 25

Priesthood, 26

Prophets, 12

Proselytism, 50

Proverbs (xxi. 10-31), 63

Punishment and reward, 51

Purim, 19, 25

Rabbi, status of, 85

Rappaport, 74

Rashi, 47, 64

Reform, its origin and development,

71 ff.
Revelation, 23, 55
Revolution, French, 69

SAABIA, 56 f.
Sabbath, 18, 83

Saboraim, 54

Sacrifices, 17 ff.

Sadducees, 33 ff., 40

Sanhedrin, 42 ; Napoleon's, 69

Scribes, 23, 24

Seminaries, Jewish, 81 ; Ereslau, 76-'

Cincinnati. 77
Separatism, Jewish, 19
Septuagint, 27, 75
Sheol, 51

Shulchan Amen, 65
Simon the Just, 24
Sin, original, 38
Spain, Jewish culture in, 57
Steinschneider, 74
Suffering, problem of, 51
Synagogue, Men of the Great, 23 L

Tabernacles, Feast of, 18

Talmud, 46 ff., 53 ; teaching of, 47 f.

Tannaim, 54

Temple, the, 39

Torah, 10. See Pentateuch

Tossaphists, 47, 65

Tradition, 23, 34, 54

Trinity, doctrine of the, 38

Universality, JudaUm and, 49

VOWELS, Hebrew system of, 56

Wisdom of Solomon, 28
Writings, the, 12

Zakkai, Jochanan ben, 42

Zealots, 35, 41

Zevi Sabbathai, 59

Zionism, 50, 86 f. ; results of, S3

Zunz, 74 ; quoted, 44

3/13

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*i. The Foundations of Science . . By \V. C. D. Whetham, F.R.S.
*2. Embryology— The Beginnings of Life By Prof. Gerald Leighton, M.D.

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10. Heredity By J. A. S. Watson, B.Sc.

11. Inorganic Chemistry .... By Prof. E. C. C. Balv, F.R.S.

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guards for Boys and Girls . . ^ G. E. C. Pritchard, M.A.. M.D.

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Judaism By Ephraim Levine, B.A.

Theosophy By Annie Besant.

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Bismarck By Prof. F. M. Powicke, M.A.

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Julius Caesar By Hilary Hardinge.

History of England-

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Luther and the Reformation
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Dante

Ruskin

Common Faults in Writing English

A Dictionary of Synonyms .

Classical Dictionary

History of English Literature

Browning .

Charles Lamb

Goethe

Balzac

Rousseau .

Ibsen.

Tennyson

R. L. Stevenson

ShHloy

William Morris

By the Rev. L. MacLean Watt.
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By A. Blyth Wei iter, M.A.
By Prof. A. R. Skemp, M.A.
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; v A. Com] ..- Ri< kett.

emp, M.A.
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v Pi ■(. C. H. HerfrJ, Litt.D.
1 v Frai '^ 1 1.irris.
By H. S. .Cher.
By Hilary Hardinge.
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By Sydoc M.A.

th Webster. M.A.

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