the study of the law. Whereas the study of the law is equivalent to all
the commandments: for study leads to practice. Therefore, study always
goes before good deeds.” (Hilchoth Talmud Torah.) The one with his
money, therefore, and the other with his books, can effect a balance in
his favour; but what is to become of the poor labouring classes, who
have no money to buy righteousness, and no time for study, which is
equivalent to all the other commandments? For them to turn the balance
is impossible—they have not the means; and therefore, according to the
oral law, they stand but a poor chance when the final account comes to
be made up. This of itself would prove that the doctrine of the oral law
cannot be true. God is a righteous judge, and he accepts no man’s money
and no man’s learning. He takes no bribes, and will not wrest the
judgment of the poor. The true mode, therefore, of appearing just before
God, is some other than that pointed out by the oral law, and one
according to which the poor sinner will stand on equal terms with his
rich brother.
There is, however, another point to which we wish to direct attention.
The oral law says, if a man’s merits exceed his sins, he is just and
sealed unto life; but if his sins exceed his merits, then he is sealed
unto death: what then are we to think of all who die in each succeeding
year? It is plain that they have not been sealed unto life, for then
they could not have died. Then they were sealed unto death; then we must
conclude that their sins exceed their merits; and as all die, then we
must conclude, further, that all die in their sins—that their sins are
more than their merits; and so, after all, this rabbinical doctrine
comes to nothing. It tells a man that by having his merits greater than
his sins, he is righteous, and will be sealed unto life; and yet, after
all his almsgiving and good works, he dies like other men, and it turns
out that he is not a just man, nor even one of the intermediate class,
but one of the wicked. How can any rational man put his faith in such a
system, which promises a great deal, but does not keep its promise?
Above all, how can he trust his soul’s everlasting welfare upon a
promise which each successive year proves to be false? Many an one has
passed into eternity already before the New Year, and of all such the
oral law says they have died in their sins. Many more may pass into
eternity between the New Year and the Day of Atonement. If the oral law
be true, all such belong to the decidedly wicked who did not deserve the
ten days’ grace. Their friends and relations must, therefore, stamp
their memory with the brand of the impenitently wicked, or if they
entertain a hope that such persons have not died in their sins, they
must declare of the oral law that it is false. If they would have a
promise that will not and cannot deceive, let them take up the law and
the prophets. The reader of this paper is still alive, but who can tell
how soon his turn must come, and come it will, and that soon in every
case. What consolation, then, will he have on his dying bed? Will he
begin to balance his account of merit and sin? Alas! there is no use in
that. If the oral law be true, it was balanced on the last Day of
Atonement, and the sins were found to outweigh the merits, as his
approaching death testifies. Where then will he flee for refuge or for
consolation? In the agony and feebleness of a death-bed hour there is no
time for doing good works, and poverty may cut off the rabbinic hope of
purchasing salvation. In the oral law there is no hope. Can he find it,
then, in the law of Moses? That law requires perfect and universal
obedience, and pronounces the sinner accursed. As an accursed sinner,
then, he must stand at the bar of God, unless there be some other way
and some other hope. When Jacob was on his death-bed he had another
hope. He could say—
לישועתך קויתי ה׳ ׃
“I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord.” (Gen. xlix. 18.) Oh! let the
reader seek this salvation in time, that when his last hour comes, he
may be as calm, as happy, and as full of hope as his pious forefather.
He died in a foreign land, but he died happy, trusting not in his own
righteousness, but in the salvation of God. He had learned by experience
that man cannot deliver himself from mere temporal trouble, but that
even there God is his only refuge and his hope, and still more so in the
hour of death and the day of judgment. But he had learned also to
believe in המלאך הגואל the Angel who had redeemed him from all evil, and
was persuaded that He would not forsake him in the great transition from
time to eternity. He had not put off the consideration of salvation to
the last. He could say, “I _have_ waited for thy salvation, O Lord,” and
therefore when the awful moment arrived, he could in perfect
tranquillity gather his children about him, and tell them of Shiloh who
was to come, and of the salvation which he had expected.
No. XXXIV.
NEW YEAR, CONTINUED.
All who believe in Divine Revelation look forward to a great day, when
the secrets of all hearts shall be revealed, and a righteous sentence
pronounced upon all the sons of men. The most important thing in the
world, then, for us to know is, the way of acceptance with God, at that
solemn hour. And if men are bound as rational beings to examine the
grounds of their opinions and belief on other subjects, they must be
considered as altogether devoid of reason, who do not thoroughly examine
and weigh the doctrines which have been taught them with regard to
justification at the bar of God. A mistake on other subjects may be
endured, but a mistake here is fatal and irreparable. What will be the
horror of those who find that they have through their own want of
consideration been trusting in a delusive hope, and have rejected,
wilfully rejected, that way of acceptance which God has appointed. If
there be any one point of difference between Jews and Christians, which
requires profound and attentive consideration, it is this. We Christians
believe that, on this all-important point, the oral law is utterly
mistaken, and that all who trust their salvation to the hope which it
holds out, will find themselves awfully mistaken if Moses and the
prophets speak truth. We have endeavoured to show that the hope of
justification by merits is contrary to the Word of God. But we shall now
proceed to show that the oral law by this doctrine contradicts itself,
and that therefore it is most unsafe to rest our salvation upon any of
its assertions. In that law, which teaches that if a man’s merits exceed
his sins, he is justified, we also find the following parable, intended
to explain God’s dealings in the judgment of the New Year:—
משל למדינה שחייבת מס למלך ולא נתנה לו בא אליה בחיל לגבותו , כשנתקרב אליה
בי׳ פרסאות יצאו גדולי המדינה לקראתו ואמרו לו אין לנו מה ליתן לך הניח להם
שליש , כיון שנתקרב יותר יצאו בינוני העיר לקראתו הניח להם שליש השני ,
כשנתקרב יותר יצאו כל בני העיר לקראתו הניח לחם הכל , כך המלך זה הקב׳׳ה ,
בני המדינה אלו ישראל שמסגלין עוונות כל השנה ערב ראש השנה הגדולים מתענין
ומוותר להם שליש עוונותיהם , בי׳ ימים בינונים מתענין ומוותר להם שני
שלישים , ביום הכפורים הכל מתענין ומוותר להם הכל ׃
“A parable. There was a certain city, which owed tribute to the king,
but did not pay it, whereupon he came upon it with an army to collect
it. When he came within ten leagues of it, the great men of the city
went forth to meet him, and said to him, We have nothing wherewith to
pay thee, so he forgave them one-third. When he approached nearer still,
the middle classes of the city went forth to meet him, and he forgave
them a second-third. When he approached still nearer, all the population
of the city went forth to meet him, and he forgave them all. The King
here is the Holy One, blessed be He. The inhabitants of the city are
Israel, who accumulate sins all the year. On the eve of the New Year,
the great men fast, and one-third of their sins is remitted to them. In
the ten days, the intermediate class fast, and two-thirds are remitted.
On the Day of Atonement all fast, and all is remitted to them.” (Orach
Chaiim, 581.) Now this representation is quite at variance with the
doctrine that those are justified whose merits exceed their sins. This
parable, in the first place, represents all as in debt, and secondly,
that they have nothing to pay, and thirdly, that the King forgives them
freely and for nothing. Now this statement is directly contrary to the
notion of merit. If a man has more merits than sins, and is on that
score accounted just, he cannot be said to be in debt, and he needs no
remission. But if it be true of the great men as well as the middle
class, that they are in debt and have nothing wherewith to pay, then it
is certain that they have no merits, and cannot be considered as just,
but as sinners. Merit and forgiveness are as essentially opposed as
payment and debt. The man who has paid his creditor all his demands can
have no debt, and so the man who has kept God’s commands so as to have
merit, needs not forgiveness. But he who has nothing to pay, that is, he
who has no merits, must either be condemned, or he must have a free
forgiveness of all; and this the parable says is the case of Israel.
They have nothing to pay, and God forgives them all. Merit is therefore
altogether out of the question, and if this statement be true, then the
doctrine of justification by merits is false, and therefore the oral law
contradicts itself. How then can the Israelite trust his everlasting
welfare to a system at variance with itself?
The prayers for the New Year are equally decisive against the doctrine
of justification by merits. Out of many passages which deny the
existence of merit, and asserts the necessity of a free forgiveness, we
cite the following:—
קהלות ורבבות ואלפים , אשר לפנינו עברו חלופים , ולא יכלו להצטדק היות חפים
, הן שמים בעינו לא זכו , וכל לגיוני שחק כפשתה דועכו , ונתעב ונאלח מה
יזכו , קובץ מרמה ומסתתר בעיניו , אם יאמר בלבו מי יעידני לפניו , קורותיו
ורהיטיו ועציו ואבניו , טהור עינים ברע מראות , הצלל חטאינו בעמקי מחבואות
, ועשה עמנו לטובה אות ׃
“Thousands and ten thousands of congregations, which have persecuted us
and are vanished, were not able to justify themselves in purity. Lo! the
heavens are not pure in his sight, and all the heavenly angels are as
beaten flax: how then can he that is filthy and abominable be pure? He
gathereth riches by deceit; and working in secret, he says in his heart,
Who can bear witness against me before him? Even the beams, rafters,
planks, and stones of his house. O Thou who art too pure of sight to
view evil, sink our sins in the deepest recesses, and work the good sign
for us.” (Prayers for the New Year, p. 149.) Here is an express
acknowledgment that the congregations of old could not justify
themselves by merit, an assertion in the words of the Psalm, that all
men are filthy and abominable, and a prayer, not for payment of deserts,
but for forgiveness of sins. If this prayer contain the sentiments of
truth, and be offered in sincerity, then Israel has no merits, and the
doctrine, that any man is justified by the superabundance of his merits,
is a mere fiction. The man who will venture to offer this prayer, and
yet hope to be saved by his good deeds, is a hypocrite, or is not right
in his mind. Here again, then, the oral law is inconsistent with itself:
for here it places the hope of salvation not in merit, but in the free
and undeserved mercy of God. It is the duty of every Israelite,
therefore, to ascertain which of the two ways is in accordance with the
declaration of Moses and the prophets. It is impossible that they should
both be true. The fact appears to be, that the authors of the oral law,
like all other men, loved the honour and glory of personal
righteousness, and hoped that all those deeds, and fasts, and
almsgiving, which were so lovely in their own eyes, and gained them so
much credit amongst men, would also be duly acknowledged at the bar of
God’s judgment. At the same time their conscience was continually
awakened and terrified by the plain declarations of the Word of God, and
therefore, to quiet their conscience, they were driven even against
their wills to acknowledge their guilt, and to seek for a quietus. This
they partly found in the hope of free mercy, but partly in inventions of
their own. They placed no small dependence upon fasting and almsgiving,
but their troubled conscience was not satisfied with these, and they
have therefore fled for refuge to observances the most trivial, and
hopes the most childish. By blowing the horn the whole month of Elul,
they hope to deceive Satan, so that he may not know which is the first
day of the new year, and may not be able to accuse them:—
לכן התקינו חז׳׳ל שיהיו הוקעין בר׳׳ח אלול בכל שנה ושנה וכל החודש כדי
להזהיר את ישראל שיעשו תשובה שנאמר אם יתקע בשופר וגו׳ וכדי לערבב השטן ׃
“Therefore our wise men of blessed memory have ordained that the horn
should be blown on the first day of the month of Elul every year, and
during the whole month, to warn Israel to repent, as it is said, ‘Shall
a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid?’ (Amos
iii. 6), and also to confuse Satan.” How can any man of understanding
believe that a law teaching such absurdity is from God? We are told in
Zechariah and Job, that Satan does accuse the people of God: but how can
any one, who has been taught by the Word of God, imagine that Satan is
to be deceived by blowing the horn at a wrong time, or that even if he
did not accuse at all, that God is ignorant of man’s sins, or that he
will judge unjustly unless he is reminded by Satan? In accusing sinners,
Satan gratifies his own malignity, but his accusation is not wanted at
the bar of God to convict man of sin. When men appear there they will be
seen as they are. All their transgressions will be as visible as is now
their bodily presence. The eye of God will penetrate every secret recess
of the soul, and the conscience itself will testify and condemn the
impenitent. It is therefore most absurd and irrational to hope to escape
by confounding the accuser; and it is to us serious matter of
astonishment how such an absurdity could have been tolerated for so many
centuries, and how a people of such intellect as the Jews confessedly
are, should remain the disciples of such senseless superstition.
But the rabbies expect not only to confound Satan by blowing the horn at
the wrong time, but to obtain God’s mercy by blowing it at the right
time. Thus we are told in Vaijikra Rabbah—
בשעה שישראל נוטלין את שופריהן ותוקעין לפני הקב׳׳ה עומד מכסא הדין ויושב
בכסא רחמים דכתיב ה׳ בקול שופר ומתמלא עליהם רחמים ומרחם עליהם והופך עליהם
מדת הדין לרחמים אימתי בחודש השביעי ׃
“At the hour in which Israel take their horns, and sound before the Holy
One, blessed be He, He rises from the throne of judgment and sits on the
throne of mercy, as it is written, ‘The Lord, with the sound of the
trumpet’ (Ps. xlvii. 5); and he is filled with mercy towards them, and
has pity upon them, and changes the attribute of judgment which was
against them into mercy. When does this happen? In the seventh month.”
(Vaijikra Rabbah, sect. 29.) This then is one of the means whereby the
rabbies try to quiet a guilty conscience. If true, it would no doubt be
very convenient for a man who has spent the year in iniquity, and who
has not repented, and does not intend to repent, to get rid of all his
sins by blowing a horn on the new year, and thus turning God’s wrath
into mercy. But it is a statement altogether opposed to the Word of God,
and derogatory to his character for mercy and for justice. No mere
ceremonial act can atone for sin, neither does God need the blowing of a
horn to remind him of mercy. To suppose, that such a miserable ceremony
can stop God in his course of justice, and make him reverse his
determinations, is to deprive him of all the attributes of Deity, and to
represent him as exceeding in imbecility the weakest of all the sons of
men that ever occupied the judgment-seat. And yet this most absurd and
unscriptural hope is not merely a rabbinic legend, or an allegory, but
is in the prayers of the synagogue gravely inserted as a devout
petition:—
תחנה לתוקע לפני התקיעה , יהי רצון מלפניך יי אלהי ואלהי אבותי אלהי השמים
ואלהי הארץ אלהי אברהם אלהי יצחק ואלהי יעקב האל הגדול הגבור והנורא שתשלח
לי המלאכים הקדושים והטהורים נאמנים משרתים ונאמנים בשליחותם חפצים ורוצים
לזכות את ישראל ואת המלאך הגדול פצפציה הממונה להוציא זכיותיהן של ישראל
בעת שהם תוקעין בשופר ואת המלאך הגדול תשבש הממונה להשמיע זכיותיהן של
ישראל ולהבעית השטן בתקיעתם ואת השרים הגדולים הממונים על השופר אנקתם פסתם
ומלאכים הגדולים הדרניאל וסנדלפון הממונים על תקיעתנו המעלים תקיעתנו לפני
כסא כבודך ואת המלאך שמשיאל הממונה על התרועה ואת המלאך פרסטא הממונה על
קשר׳׳ק להיותם מזומנים בשליחותם להעלות תקיעתנו לפני הפרוכת ולפני כסא
כבודך והמלא על עמך ישראל ברחמים ותכנס להם לפנים משורת הדין ותתנהג עם
בניך במדת רחמים ותעלה תקיעתנּו לפני כסא כבודך וכו׳ ׃