for these are the qualities by which the children of Israel are
known. Let also all their thoughts and meditations be always
directed to the service of the Lord, and be as charitable and
benevolent as possible, for this is all that remains to man of his
labour. They shall also endeavour to regulate their diet according
to the rules laid down by Rabbi Moses (b. Maimon, or Maimonides),
so as to fulfil the words of Scripture: “The righteous eateth to
the satisfying of his soul.” And let them always be careful not to
take the name of God in vain, to be honest in all business
transactions, and let their yea be always yea. They shall always
be under the obligation to train their children to the Study of
the Torah, but one shall devote his life exclusively to the study
thereof. And it shall be incumbent upon his brothers to support
this one, and to invest his moneys, and to provide for him that he
and his family may live respectably, so that he be not distracted
by worldly cares from his studies. Let also the elder love the
younger brothers as their own children, and the younger respect
the elder as a parent. Thus they may always bear in mind that they
are of a God‐fearing family. Let them love and honour scholars,
thus to merit the honour of having scholars for their sons and
sons‐in‐law. This will they shall themselves read weekly, and
shall also make it incumbent upon their children, from generation
to generation, to read weekly, in order to fulfil what is written
(Gen. xviii. 19), “For I know him that he will command his
children,” etc., and also the words of Isaiah (lix. 21), “And this
is my covenant,” etc. But as often as they shall read this will,
they shall also read the two letters below written, which Rabbi
Moses ben Nachman sent to his sons, with a view of being
serviceable to them in many respects. Should, heaven forbid, they
be by any sad accident prevented from fulfilling the injunctions
above laid down, they must fine themselves by not drinking wine on
that day, or by eating one course less at the dinner, or by giving
some fine in charity....
And this is the letter which the above‐mentioned Rabbi sent from the Holy
Land to Castile, when his son was staying before the king (in his
service):—
“... May God bless you and preserve you from sin and punishment.
Behold, our master, King David, had a son, wise and of an
understanding heart, like unto whom there was never one before or
after. Nevertheless he said to him (1 Kings ii. 2): ‘And keep the
charge of the Lord thy God,’ etc. He also said to him: ‘And thou,
my son, know the God of thy father’ (1 Chron. xxviii. 9). Now, my
son, if thou wilt measure thyself with Solomon, thou wilt find
thyself a worm—not a man, merely an insect; nevertheless, if thou
wilt seek God, he will make thee great; and if thou wilt forsake
him, thou wilt be turned out and forsaken. My son, be careful that
thou read the _Shema_(105) morning and evening, as well as that
thou say the daily prayers. Have always with thee a Pentateuch
written correctly, and read therein the Lesson for each
Sabbath.... ‘Cast thy burden upon the Lord,’ for the thing which
thou believest far from thee is often very near unto thee. Know,
again, that thou art not master over thy words, nor hast power
over thy hand; but everything is in the hand of the Lord, who
formeth thy heart.... Be especially careful to keep aloof from the
women [of the court?]. Know that our God hates immorality, and
Balaam could in no other way injure Israel than by inciting them
to unchastity. [Here come many quotations from Malachi and
Ezra.]... My son, remember me always, and let the image of my
countenance be never absent from before thine eyes. Love not that
which I hate.... Let the words of the Psalmist be always upon thy
lips, ‘I am a stranger in the earth: hide not thy commandments
from me’ (Ps. cxix. 19); and God, who is good and the dispenser of
good, shall increase thy peace and prolong thy life in peace and
happiness, and promote thy honour according to thy wish and the
wish of thy father who begat thee, Moses ben Nachman.”
V. A JEWISH BOSWELL
There is a saying in the Talmud “Nothing exists of which there is not some
indication in the Torah.” These words are often quoted, and some modern
authors have pressed them so far as to find even the discoveries of
Columbus and the inventions of Watt and Stephenson indicated in the Law.
This is certainly misapplied ingenuity. But it is hardly an exaggeration
to maintain that there is no noble manifestation of real religion, no
expression of real piety, reverence, and devotion, to which Jewish
literature would not offer a fair parallel.
Thus it will hardly be astonishing to hear that Jewish literature has its
Boswell to show, more than three centuries before the Scottish gentleman
came to London to admire his Johnson, and more than four centuries before
the Sage of Chelsea delivered his lectures on Hero Worship. And this
Jewish Boswell was guided only by the motives suggested to him in the old
Rabbinic literature. In this literature the reverence for the great man,
and the absorption of one’s whole self in him, went so far that one Rabbi
declared that the whole world was only created to serve such a man as
company.(106)
Again, the fact that, in the language of the Rabbis, the term for studying
the Law and discussing it is “to attend” or rather “to serve the disciples
of the Wise” may also have led people to the important truth that the
great man is not a lecturing machine, but a sort of living Law himself.
“When the man,” said one Rabbi, “has wholly devoted himself to the Torah,
and thoroughly identified himself with it, it becomes almost his own
Torah.” Thus people have not only to listen to his words but to observe
his whole life, and to profit from all his actions and movements.
This was what the Jewish Boswell sought to do. His name was Rabbi Solomon,
of St. Goar, a small town on the Rhine, while the name of the master whom
he served was R. Jacob, the Levite, better known by his initials Maharil,
who filled the office of Chief Rabbi in Mayence and Worms successively.
The main activity of Maharil falls in the first three decades of the
fifteenth century. Those were troublous times for a Rabbi. For the
preceding century with its persecution and sufferings—one has only to
think of the Black Death and its terrible consequences for the Jews—led to
the destruction of the great Schools, the decay of the study of the Law,
and to the dissolution of many congregations. Those which remained lost
all touch with each other, so that almost every larger Jewish community
had its own _Minhag_ or ritual custom.(107)
It was Maharil who brought some order into this chaos, and in the course
of time his influence asserted itself so strongly that the rules observed
by him in the performing of religious ceremonies were accepted by the
great majority of the Jewish communities. Thus the personality of Maharil
himself became a standing Minhag, suppressing all the other Minhagim
(customs).
But there must have been something very strong and very great about the
personality of the man who could succeed in such an arduous task. For we
must not forget that the Minhag or custom in its decay degenerates into a
kind of religious fashion, the worst disease to which religion is liable,
and the most difficult to cure. It is therefore an irreparable loss both
for Jewish literature and for Jewish history, that the greatest part of
Maharil’s posthumous writings are no longer extant, so that our knowledge
about him is very small. But the little we know of him we owe chiefly to
the communicativeness of his servant, the Solomon of St. Goar whom I
mentioned above.
Solomon not only gave us the “Customs” of his master, but also observed
him closely in all his movements, and conscientiously wrote down all that
he saw and heard, under the name of _Collectanea_. It seems that the bulk
of these _Collectanea_ was also lost. But in the fragments that we still
possess we are informed, among other things, how Maharil addressed his
wife, how he treated his pupils, how careful he was in the use of his
books, and even how clean his linen was. Is this not out‐Boswelling
Boswell?
The most striking point of agreement between the Boswell of the fifteenth
and him of the eighteenth century, is that they both use the same passage
from the Talmud to excuse the interest in trifles which their labours of
love betrayed. Thus Solomon prefaces his _Collectanea_ with the following
words: “It is written, His leaf shall not wither. These words were
explained by our Sages to mean that even the idle talk of the disciples of
the wise deserves a study. Upon this interpretation I have relied. In my
love to R. Jacob the Levite, I collected everything about him. I did not
refuse even small things, though many derided me. Everything I wrote down,
for such was the desire of my heart.”
Thus far Solomon. Now, if we turn to the introduction to Boswell’s _Life
of Johnson_, we read the following sentence: “For this almost
superstitious reverence, I have found very old and venerable authority
quoted by our great modern prelate, Secker, in whose tenth sermon there is
the following passage: ‘Rabbi Kimchi, a noted Jewish commentator who lived
about five hundred years ago, explains that passage in the first Psalm,
“His leaf also shall not wither” from Rabbins yet older than himself, that
even the idle talk, so he expressed it, of a good man ought to be
regarded.’ ”
Croker’s note to this passage sounds rather strange. This editor says:
“Kimchi was a Spanish Rabbi, who died in 1240. One wonders that Secker’s
good sense should have condescended to quote this far‐fetched and futile
interpretation of the simple and beautiful metaphor, by which the Psalmist
illustrates the prosperity of the righteous man.” Now Kimchi died at least
five years earlier than Croker states, but dates, we know from Macaulay’s
essay on the subject, were not Croker’s strong point. But one can hardly
forgive the editor of Boswell this lack of sympathy. Had he known what
strong affinity there was between his most Christian author and the humble
Jew Solomon, he would have less resented this condescension of Archbishop
Secker.
As for the Jewish Boswell himself, we know very little about him. The only
place in which he speaks about his own person is that in which he derives
his pedigree from R. Eleazar ben Samuel Hallevi (died 1357), and says that
he was generally called “Der gute (the good) R. Salman.” He well deserved
this appellation. In his Will we find the following injunction to his
children: “Be honest, and conscientious in your dealing with men, with
Jews as well as Gentiles, be kind and obliging to them; do not speak what
is superfluous.” And wisdom is surely rare enough to render inappropriate
a charge of superfluousness against the work of those who in bygone times
spent their energies in gathering the crumbs that fell from the tables of
the wise.
VI. THE DOGMAS OF JUDAISM
The object of this essay is to say about the dogmas of Judaism a word
which I think ought not to be left unsaid.
In speaking of dogmas it must be understood that Judaism does not ascribe
to them any saving power. The belief in a dogma or a doctrine without
abiding by its real or supposed consequences (_e.g._ the belief in
_creatio ex nihilo_ without keeping the Sabbath) is of no value. And the
question about certain doctrines is not whether they possess or do not
possess the desired charm against certain diseases of the soul, but
whether they ought to be considered as characteristics of Judaism or not.
It must again be premised that the subject, which occupied the thoughts of
the greatest and noblest Jewish minds for so many centuries, has been
neglected for a comparatively long time. And this for various reasons.
First, there is Mendelssohn’s assertion, or supposed assertion, in his
_Jerusalem_, that Judaism has no dogmas—an assertion which has been
accepted by the majority of modern Jewish theologians as the only dogma
Judaism possesses. You can hear it pronounced in scores of Jewish pulpits;
you can read it written in scores of Jewish books. To admit the
possibility that Mendelssohn was in error was hardly permissible,
especially for those with whom he enjoys a certain infallibility. Nay,
even the fact that he himself was not consistent in his theory, and on
another occasion declared that Judaism _has_ dogmas, only that they are
purer and more in harmony with reason than those of other religions; or
even the more important fact that he published a school‐book for children,
in which the so‐called Thirteen Articles were embodied, only that instead
of the formula “I believe,” he substituted “I am convinced,”—even such
patent facts did not produce much effect upon many of our modern
theologians.(108) They were either overlooked or explained away so as to
make them harmonise with the great dogma of dogmalessness. For it is one
of the attributes of infallibility that the words of its happy possessor
must always be reconcilable even when they appear to the eye of the
unbeliever as gross contradictions.
Another cause of the neglect into which the subject has fallen is that our
century is an _historical_ one. It is not only books that have their fate,
but also whole sciences and literatures. In past times it was religious
speculation that formed the favourite study of scholars, in our time it is
history with its critical foundation on a sound philology. Now as these
two most important branches of Jewish science were so long neglected—were
perhaps never cultivated in the true meaning of the word, and as Jewish
literature is so vast and Jewish history so far‐reaching and eventful, we
cannot wonder that these studies have absorbed the time and the labour of
the greatest and best Jewish writers in this century.
There is, besides, a certain tendency in historical studies that is
hostile to mere theological speculation. The historian deals with
realities, the theologian with abstractions. The latter likes to shape the
universe after his system, and tells us how things _ought to be_, the
former teaches us how they _are_ or _have been_, and the explanation he
gives for their being so and not otherwise includes in most cases also a
kind of justification for their existence. There is also the _odium
theologicum_, which has been the cause of so much misfortune that it is
hated by the historian, whilst the superficial, rationalistic way in which
the theologian manages to explain everything which does not suit his
system is most repulsive to the critical spirit.
But it cannot be denied that this neglect has caused much confusion.
Especially is this noticeable in England, which is essentially a
theological country, and where people are but little prone to give up
speculation about things which concern their most sacred interest and
greatest happiness. Thus whilst we are exceedingly poor in all other
branches of Jewish learning, we are comparatively rich in productions of a
theological character. We have a superfluity of essays on such delicate
subjects as eternal punishment, immortality of the soul, the day of
judgment, etc., and many treatises on the definition of Judaism. But
knowing little or nothing of the progress recently made in Jewish
theology, of the many protests against all kinds of infallibility, whether
canonised in this century or in olden times, we in England still maintain
that Judaism has no dogmas as if nothing to the contrary had ever been
said. We seek the foundation of Judaism in political economy, in hygiene,
in everything except religion. Following the fashion of the day to esteem
religion in proportion to its ability to adapt itself to every possible
and impossible metaphysical and social system, we are anxious to squeeze
out of Judaism the last drop of faith and hope, and strive to make it so
flexible that we can turn it in every direction which it is our pleasure
to follow. But alas! the flexibility has progressed so far as to classify
Judaism among the invertebrate species, the lowest order of living things.
It strongly resembles a certain Christian school which addresses itself to
the world in general and claims to satisfy everybody alike. It claims to
be socialism for the adherents of Karl Marx and Lassalle, worship of man
for the followers of Comte and St. Simon; it carefully avoids the word
“God” for the comfort of agnostics and sceptics, whilst on the other hand
it pretends to hold sway over paradise, hell, and immortality for the
edification of believers. In such illusions many of our theologians
delight. For illusions they are; you cannot be everything if you want to
be anything. Moreover, illusions in themselves are bad enough, but we are
menaced with what is still worse. Judaism, divested of every higher
religious motive, is in danger of falling into gross materialism. For what
else is the meaning of such declarations as “Believe what you like, but
conform to this or that mode of life”; what else does it mean but “We
cannot expect you to believe that the things you are bidden to do are
commanded by a higher authority; there is not such a thing as belief, but
you ought to do them for conventionalism or for your own convenience.”
But both these motives—the good opinion of our neighbours, as well as our
bodily health—have nothing to do with our nobler and higher sentiments,
and degrade Judaism to a matter of expediency or diplomacy. Indeed, things
have advanced so far that well‐meaning but ill‐advised writers even think
to render a service to Judaism by declaring it to be a kind of enlightened
Hedonism, or rather a moderate Epicureanism.
I have no intention of here answering the question, What is Judaism? This
question is not less perplexing than the problem, What is God’s world?
Judaism is also a great Infinite, composed of as many endless Units, the
Jews. And these Unit‐Jews have been, and are still, scattered through all
the world, and have passed under an immensity of influences, good and bad.
If so, how can we give an exact definition of the Infinite, called
Judaism?
But if there is anything sure, it is that the highest motives which worked
through the history of Judaism are the strong belief in God and the
unshaken confidence that at last this God, the God of Israel, will be the
God of the whole world; or, in other words, Faith and Hope are the two
most prominent characteristics of Judaism.
In the following pages I shall try to give a short account of the manner
in which these two principles of Judaism found expression, from the
earliest times down to the age of Mendelssohn; that is, to present an
outline of the history of Jewish Dogmas. First, a few observations on the
position of the Bible and the Talmud in relation to our theme.
Insufficient and poor as they may be in proportion to the importance of
these two fundamental documents of Judaism, these remarks may nevertheless
suggest a connecting link between the teachings of Jewish antiquity and
those of Maimonides and his successors.
I begin with the Scriptures.
The Bible itself hardly contains a command bidding us _to believe_. We are
hardly ordered, _e.g._, to believe in the existence of God. I say hardly,
but I do not altogether deny the existence of such a command. It is true
that we do not find in the Scripture such words as: “You are commanded to
believe in the existence of God.” Nor is any punishment assigned as
awaiting him who denies it. Notwithstanding these facts, many Jewish
authorities—among them such important men as Maimonides, R. Judah Hallevi,
Nachmanides—perceive, in the first words of the Ten Commandments, “I am
the Lord thy God,” the command to believe in His existence.(109)
Be this as it may, there cannot be the shadow of a doubt that the Bible,
in which every command is dictated by God, and in which all its heroes are
the servants, the friends, or the ambassadors of God, presumes such a
belief in every one to whom those laws are dictated, and these heroes
address themselves. Nay, I think that the word “belief” is not even
adequate. In a world with so many visible facts and invisible causes, as
life and death, growth and decay, light and darkness; in a world where the
sun rises and sets; where the stars appear regularly; where heavy rains
pour down from the sky, often accompanied by such grand phenomena as
thunder and lightning; in a world full of such marvels, but into which no
notion has entered of all our modern true or false explanations—who but
God is behind all these things? “Have the gates,” asks God, “have the
gates of death been open to thee? or hast thou seen the doors of the
shadow of death?... Where is the way where light dwelleth? and as for
darkness, where is the place thereof?... Hath the rain a father? or who
hath begotten the drops of dew?... Canst thou bind the sweet influences of
Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?... Canst thou send lightnings, that
they may go, and say unto thee, Here we are?” (Job xxxviii.). Of all these
wonders, God was not merely the _prima causa_; they were the result of His
direct action, without any intermediary causes. And it is as absurd to say
that the ancient world believed in God, as for a future historian to
assert of the nineteenth century that it believed in the effects of
electricity. We _see_ them, and so antiquity _saw_ God. If there was any
danger, it lay not in the denial of the existence of a God, but in having
a wrong belief. Belief in as many gods as there are manifestations in
nature, the investing of them with false attributes, the misunderstanding
of God’s relation to men, lead to immorality. Thus the greater part of the
laws and teachings of the Bible are either directed against polytheism,
with all its low ideas of God, or rather of gods; or they are directed
towards regulating God’s relation to men. Man is a servant of God, or His
prophet, or even His friend. But this relationship man obtains only by his
conduct. Nay, all man’s actions are carefully regulated by God, and
connected with His holiness. The 19th chapter of Leviticus, which is
considered by the Rabbis as the portion of the Law in which the most
important articles of the Torah are embodied, is headed, “Ye shall be
holy, for I the Lord your own God am holy.” And each law therein
occurring, even those which concern our relations to each other, is _not_
founded on utilitarian reasons, but is ordained because the opposite of it
is an offence to the holiness of God, and profanes His creatures, whom He
desired to be as holy as He is.(110)
Thus the whole structure of the Bible is built upon the visible fact of
the existence of a God, and upon the belief in the relation of God to men,
especially to Israel. In spite of all that has been said to the contrary,
the Bible _does_ lay stress upon belief, where belief is required. The
unbelievers are rebuked again and again. “For all this they sinned still,
and believed not for His wondrous work,” complains Asaph (Ps. lxxviii.
32). And belief is praised in such exalted words as, “Thus saith the Lord,
I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals,
when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown”
(Jer. ii. 2). The Bible, especially the books of the prophets, consists,
in great part, of promises for the future, which the Rabbis justly termed
the “Consolations.”(111) For our purpose, it is of no great consequence to
examine what future the prophets had in view, whether an immediate future
or one more remote, at the end of days. At any rate, they inculcated hope
and confidence that God would bring to pass a better time. I think that
even the most advanced Bible critic—provided he is not guided by some
modern Aryan reasons—must perceive in such passages as, “The Lord shall
reign for ever and ever,” “The Lord shall rejoice in his works,” and many
others, a hope for more than the establishment of the “national Deity
among his votaries in Palestine.”
We have now to pass over an interval of many centuries, the length of
which depends upon the views held as to the date of the close of the
canon, and examine what the Rabbis, the representatives of the prophets,
thought on this subject. Not that the views of the author of the _Wisdom
of Solomon_, of Philo and Aristobulus, and many others of the Judæo‐
Alexandrian school would be uninteresting for us. But somehow their
influence on Judaism was only a passing one, and their doctrines never
became authoritative in the Synagogue. We must here confine ourselves to
those who, even by the testimony of their bitterest enemies, occupied the
seat of Moses.