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its followers to drink wine to excess on this occasion. It sets before them the example of one of the greatest Rabbies committing murder in his drunkenness, and so far from reprobating this sin, it gravely tells us that God interposed by a miracle to prevent the ill consequences; and that the Rabbi, far from being cured of his propensity, or making any declaration of his intention to amend, continued in that state of mind, that his colleague found it imprudent to trust himself at his table. Now every body that is acquainted with the Jews, knows that they are a temperate and sober people; and because they are so, we ask them whether the above command can be from God? and whether they believe that the Talmud speaks truth in giving the above narrative? It says not merely that men may get drunk with impunity, but that to get drunk is an act of piety, and obedience to a command! Here, again, the Talmud is directly at issue with the New Testament, which says, "Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess." (Ephes. v. 18.) "Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and the cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. (Luke xxi. 34.) The New Testament holds out to us no hope, that if in our drunkenness we should commit murder, a miracle will be wrought in order to deliver us from the consequences; but tells us, that "neither murderers nor drunkards shall inherit the kingdom of God." (1 Cor.

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in order to save a drunkard and a murderer from that punishment, which He had himself commanded to be visited upon either of these crimes. The story of the miracle is therefore a palpable falsehood, contradictory to the law of Moses, and derogatory to the honour of God. How, then, can the Talmud be of God? If you attempt to distinguish, as some do, between the Talmud and the oral law, and say that though the Talmud contains the oral law, yet it is not all inspired, then we ask, how can you rely upon the testimony of a wit. ness convicted of wilful, gross, and flagrant falsehood? If you do not believe in the above miracle of the drunken Rabba, you denounce it as a liar. If it lie, then, upon this solemn occasion in relating a miracle, in handing down the law of God, how can you depend upon it at all? If it does not scruple to forge miracles, what warrant have you for believing that it does not forge laws also?

But suppose, which is far more probable, that Rabbi Zira, when killed by Rabba, had not come to life again, would Rabba, in the eye of the modern Jewish law, be considered as a murderer, and guilty of death, or as an innocent person, who might safely be permitted to go at large, and pursue his usual avocations? This is a question well deserving an answer from some of your learned men, and naturally suggested by some principles asserted and implied in the following decisions of the oral law:

God? if death should come upon the feast of Purim ?

קריאת המגלה בזמנה מצות עשה מדברי סופרים • והדברים ידועים שהיא תקנת הנביאים • והכל חייבים | vi. 9, 10.) Now which of these two doctrines בקריאת' אנשי ונשים וגרים ועבדים משוחררי' • ומהנכין | is the most agreeable to the revealed will of את הקטנים לקרותה - ואפילו כהנים בעבודותן מבטלין ,How would you desire to meet death תור' לשמוע מקרא מגילה קל וחומר לשאר מצות של | Would you wish the angel of death to find עבודתן ובאין לשמוע מקרא מגלה • וכן תורה שכולן נדחין מפני מקרא מגלה • ואין לך דבר שנדחה מקרא מגלה מפניו חוץ ממת מצוה שאין לו | briety and thoughtfulness prescribed by Jesus

מנטלי' תלמוד

קוברין שהפוגע בו קוברו תחלה ואחר כך קורא :

you, in obedience to the oral law, insensible from overmuch wine? or in that state of so

of Nazareth? Does not the inward tribunal of the heart decide that Jesus of Nazareth is right, and that the Talmud is wrong? And does not the Old Testament confirm the sentence? Isaiah says, "Wo unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them! and the harp and the viol, the tabret and pipe, and wine are in their feasts; but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands. Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge; and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst." (Isaiah v. 11-13.) And so Moses commands the parents that should have a son "a glutton and a drunkard," to bring him to justice, and to have him stoned. (Deut. xxi. 20.) The Talmud, then, manifestly contradicts the Old Testament; it therefore cannot speak truth when it narrates that God wrought a miracle

"The reading of the Megillah (the book of Esther) in its time is an affirmative precept according to the words of the scribes, and it is known that this is an ordinance of the prophets. The obligation to read it rests upon all, men, women, and proselytes, and manumitted slaves. Children also are to be accustomed to the reading of it. Even priests in their service are to neglect their service, and to come to hear the reading of the Megillah. In like manner the study of the law is to be omitted, in order to hear the reading of the Megillah, and a fortiori all the remaining commandments of the law, all of which give way to the reading of the Megillah: but there is nothing to which the reading of the Megillah gives way, except that particular class of dead person called the dead of the commandment, who has none to bury him. He that happens upon him is first to bury him, and afterwards to read." (Hilchoth Megillah, c. i. 1.) On

this extract we have several remarks to make, but at present we request the attention of our readers to the reason given why the reading of the Megillah is more important than any of the commandments. It is this. According to the oral law, "the study of the law is equivalent to all the commandments, and the other commandments are to give way to this study." But according to the passage before us, the study of the law is to give way to the reading of the Megillah. The reading of the Megillah, therefore, being greater than the greatest of the commandments, is of course greater than all the inferior ones. Now apply this reasoning to the above command to get drunk, and you will prove that getting drunk at Purim feast is the greatest of all the commandments. In order to get drunk, it is plain that the study of the law must give way. The man who cannot distinguish between "Cursed be Haman and blessed be Mordecai," certainly cannot study, neither can he bury the dead. The commandment, therefore, to which the study of the law and the burying of the dead give way, must be the greatest of all the commandments; i.e., the getting drunk on Purim is the greatest of all the commandments. This conclusion, which inevitably follows upon Talmudic principles, necessarily shows that those principles are false. But that is not the object for which I have exhibited this conclusion; it is with reference to the case of Rabbah abovementioned. Having got drunk according as the oral law commanded, and having thereby obeyed the greatest of the commandments, | and one to which all others are necessarily in abeyance, was he guilty or innocent in having murdered R. Zira? It certainly seems a very hard case to condemn him to death for an act, which resulted from his obedience to the greatest of all the commandments. He might urge that he had a great dislike to drunkenness-that he had overcome his natural aversion simply to satisfy the rabbinical requirements that by the time that he had arrived at the prescribed incompetency to distinguish between Haman and Mordecai, he had lost all power of distinguishing between right and wrong-that, therefore, he had not done it with malice propense; what sentence, therefore, does the Talmud pronounce against a murderer of this sort? If Rabbah was allowed to go at large, as would appear from his invitation to Rabbi Zira the following year, a repetition of the same offence was possible, a repetition of the miracle in R. Zira's opinion highly improbable. Thus Rabbah might go on from year to year killing one or more with impunity, and would be a far more dangerous neighbour than "the ox that was wont to push with his horn." If, on the other hand, he is to be punished capitally, then the oral law is plainly not from God; for obedience to

the greatest of its commandments makes it possible for a man to commit the greatest of crimes, and to subject himself to the extremity of punishment. But we object, secondly, to the exaltation of a mere human ordinance above the Word of God. The reading of the book of Esther at the feast of Purim, is no doubt a very appropriate, and may be a very profitable exercise. But it is confessedly of human appointment. It is of the words of the scribes; the time and the mode are altogether rabbinical ordinances. Why, then, "are all the remaining commandments of the law to give way to the reading of the Megillah?" The priest was to neglect the service to which God had appointed him, in order to obey a mere human institution. And the Israelites to neglect the duties of love and charity, to fulfil a mere ceremonial commandment. Here is a plain token that the oral law is not from God, but is the offspring of human invention and superstition. The human mind exalts ceremonies above moral duties. God declares that all outward observances are secondary. "I desired mercy and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt-offerings." (Hos. vi. 6.) "He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" (Mic. vi. 8.) And so the New Testament says in the very same spirit, "The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, &c. This is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these." (Mark xii. 29-31.) The oral law, on the contrary, tells us that "all the commandments, except the burying of the dead, are to give way to the reading of the Megillah," to a mere ceremony; and that not even of God's appointment. God prefers mercy before the sacrifices which He himself has instituted. The Talmud prefers a human institution to all God's commandments. A more striking instance of genuine superstition, and a stronger proof of the human origin of the oral law cannot be found.

The book of Esther appears to have been a peculiar favourite of the rabbies. The reading of it takes precedence of all other duties but one, and is considered as obligatory even upon the women, who are declared exempt from the study of the law. It is true that it contains a very notable warning for disobedient wives, and a striking instance of the deliverance of Israel by the instrumentality of a woman; but when we consider that the name of God does not occur once in the whole book, and that the law contains the account of man's creation and fall, the ten commandments, the deliverance from Egypt, and all those events

of primary interest to women as well as men, it becomes of some importance to consider why the women, who are not bound to study the law of God, are bound to read the book of Esther. The authors of the oral law appear to have attached uncommon importance to this book, as appears from this circumstance, and still more so from the following startling declaration of Maimonides:

name to occur in the whole book-just as he did not permit David to build him a temple, so he would not have his name associated with deeds of personal revenge. But, however that be, we can discover no other reason for the decided preference which the oral law gives to the book of Esther. And we think that after the specimens which we have already given of their spirit towards idolaters we do them no injustice especially as, in this particular case, the oral law breathes this spirit aloud.

כל ספרי הנביאים וכל הכתובים עתידין ליבטל לימות המשיח חוץ ממגלת אסתר והרי היא קיימת כחמשה חומשי תורה וכהלכות של תורה שבעל פה שאינן בטלין צריך שיאמר ארור המן ברוך מרדכי ארורה זרש

ברוכה אסתר ארורים כל עכ"ום ברוכים כל ישראל :

לעולם:

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"All the books of the prophets, and all the Hagiographa, except the roll of Esther, will cease in the days of Messiah. But it is perpetual as the five books of the written law, and the constitutions of the oral law, which shall never cease." 99 (Hilchoth Megillah.) Some of the rabbies say that this is to be taken conditionally, 66 although they were all to cease, yet this would not cease.' But this still attributes a decided superiority to the book of Esther above all the other books. What then is there in it, that gives this book such a peculiar favour, and makes the history of Esther more important than that of the conquest of Canaan, or of the glory of Solomon, or of the restoration of the house of the Lord ? Is there more devotion and piety to be found in it than in the Psalms of David ? Does it contain more wisdom than the Proverbs of Solomon ? Is there a sublimer flight of divine poetry, a more heavenly afflatus than in the visions of Isaiah? more open revelation of the mysteries of the Deity than is to be found in Job, or Daniel, or Ezekiel ? Why do the rabbies pronounce it worthy of preservation, whilst they contemplate without emotion the loss of all the other books? We cannot possibly discover, unless it be that it furnishes more gratification to the spirit of revenge so natural to all the children of Adam, whether they be Jew or Gentile. To forgive is to be like God --and God alone can teach forgiveness either speculatively or practically. But the book of Esther contains an account of the revenge which the Jews took upon their enemies, not like the destruction of the Canaanites, fulfilling the commands of God upon His enemies, but taking personal and individual revenge on their own. And this very fact may be one reason why God did not permit his most holy

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"It is necessary to say, cursed be Haman, blessed be Mordecai, cursed be Zeresh, blessed be Esther, cursed be all idolaters, blessed be all Israel." (Orach Chaiim, sec. 690.) Why this is necessary, is not told us. It appears not to bring glory to God, nor any blessing to man. Haman and Zeresh have long since passed into eternity, and received from the just Judge the reward of their deeds. Mordecai and Esther have in like manner appeared before the God of Israel, and received according to their faith. To these, then, the voice of human praise or reproach is as nothing. But to curse a dead enemy, to pursue with unrelenting hatred those who have already fallen into the hands of the living God, is certainly not a divine ordinance, and cannot be an acceptable act of worship in poor sinners, who themselves stand so much in need of forgiveness. To curse the dead is bad, but to curse the living is, in one sense, still worse. "Cursed be all idolaters." According to our calculation, there are 600 millions of idolaters-according to the Jewish account, there must be more. Why, then, should they be cursed? That will not convert them from the error of their ways. It will not make them more happy, either in this world or in the next. We are not aware, even if God were to hear this execration and curse the idolatrous world, that it would be productive of any blessing to Israel. Why make a day of thanksgiving for mercies received an oppor tunity of invoking curses upon the majority of mankind? The Word of God teaches a very different petition for the heathen. "God, be merciful to us, and bless us, and cause his face to shine upon us. That thy way may be known upon earth, thy saving health among all nations. Let the people praise thee, O God; yea, let all the people praise thee." (Ps. lxvii.)

London:-Sold at the London Society's Office, 16, Exeter-hall, Strand; by James Duncan, Paternosterrow; and B. Wertheim, 57, Aldersgate-street. This publication may be had by applying at No. 5, No. 7, or No. 13, Palestine-place, Bethnal-green.

עמדו על דרכים וראו ושאלו לנתבות עולם • ירמיה ו' טז'

"THE OLD PATHS."-JER. vi. 16.

NUMBER 8.]

FRIDAY, MARCH 4, 1836.

THE noblest inquiry, to which the mental powers can be directed, is, Which religion comes from God? The most satisfactory mode of conducting such an inquiry, independently of the external evidence, is to com

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were allowed to reside in the land of Israel, and that their piety consisted in receiving and practising the seven commandments. What these commandments were, we are informed in the next chapter of the same treatise.

standard, if such there be, and this is what we

על ששה דברים נצטווה אדם ראשון - על ע'ז' ועל | pare the principles of one system with those of ברכת השם • ועל שפיכת דמים ועל גלוי עריות • ועל | the other, and both with an acknowledged הגזל • ועל הדינים • אף על פי שכולן הן קבלה בידינו | are endeavouring to do in these papers. We ממשה רבינו : והדעת נוטה להן : מכלל דברי תורה לנח אבר מן החי הוסיף יראה שעל אלה נצטווה • שנאמר אך בשר בנפשו דמו לא תאכלו - נמצאו שבע | thers, but to show them that their traditional

מצות • וכן היה הדבר בכל העולם עד אברהם •

by no means wish to make the modern Jews responsible for the inventions of their forefa

argument for rejecting Christianity, and that is the example of the high priest and the Sanhedrim, is of no force; inasmuch as these same persons, who originally rejected Jesus of Nazareth, were in great and grievous error in the fundamental principles of religion, whilst He who was rejected taught the truth. To do this we must appeal to the oral law, and discuss its merits. We have shown already that those persons did not understand at least one half of the law; that their doctrines were in the highest degree uncharitable. It has, however, been replied, that the Talmud is more tolerant than the New Testament, for it allows "that the pious of the nations of the world may be saved;" whereas the latter asserts that" whosoever believeth not shall be

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damned." We must, therefore, inquire into the extent of toleration and charity contained in that Talmudic sentence. The first step this inquiry, is to ascertain who are the persons intended in the expression "The pious of the nations of the world." The oral law tells us, as quoted in No. 6, that the Israelites are commanded to compel all that come into the world to receive the seven commandments of the sons of Noah, and adds,

והמקבל אותם הוא הנקרא גר תושב בכל מקום •

"He that receives them is called universally a sojourning proselyte." And a little lower down it says plainly,

"The first Adam was commanded concerning six things-idolatry, blasphemy, shedding of blood, incest, robbery, and administration of justice. Although we have all these things as

a tradition from Moses, our master, and reageneral tenour of the words of the law, it son naturally inclines to them, yet, from the appears that he was commanded concerning these things. Noah received an additional animal, as it is said, But flesh in the life command concerning the limb of a living thereof which is the blood thereof, ye shall commandments, and thus the matter was in (Gen. ix. 4.) Here are the seven all the world until Abraham." (Ibid. ix. 1.)

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the command given to Noah, we cannot help Now, without stopping to dispute about saying that the above tradition is very defective, and certainly not derived from Moses, for it is opposed to the history which he himself has given us. command, on which the oral law lays such In the first place, that stress, "Be fruitful and multiply," was originally given to Adam (Gen. i. 28), and was renewed to Noah, after the deluge. If the rabbies reckon this as a separate command in the case of the Jews, as may be seen in the Hilchoth Priah Ureviah, it is only fair to reckon it as a separate command in the case of the Gentiles, and thus we get an eighth" command. In the second place, God ordained "The Lord God said, it is not good that man should be alone : I will make him an help meet for him." "And the rib which the Lord God had taken from man made he a woman, and brought her unto the man." Here is God's holy institution, and in the following verses we have the obligations of marriage distinctly "And Adam said, This is acknowledged.

כל המקבל שבע מצות ונזהר לעשותן הרי זה מחסידי

.marriage as a holy state | אומות העולם • ויש לו חלק לעולם הבא •

"Whosoever receives the seven commandments, and is careful to observe them, he is one of the pious of the nations of the world, and has a share in the world to come." (Hilchoth Melachim, c. viii. 10.) From these two declarations, then, we learn that "the pious of the nations of the world" are the "the sojourning proselytes," who

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now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh : she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh." Here then is a ninth commandment. We know, indeed, that the oral law gives a different account, but its doctrine is false and pernicious. In the face of the above plain narrative, it teaches as follows::

of marriage. What would have been the state of the world, if the oral law had attained supreme power, and the Gentiles had been instructed in the above law as divine? What would result from the doctrine that every man may turn out his wife, and every woman leave her husband, whenever they like? The peace and well-being of Gentile society would be at an end. The frightful state of disorder and misery that would ensue, as well as the words of the original institution, plainly show that this doctrine is not

קודם מתן תורה היה אדם פוגע אשה בשוק אם

from God. But the effect upon the believers | רצה הוא והיא לישא אותה מכניסה לתוך ביתו ובועלה .in the oral law is still worse | בינו לבין עצמו ותהיה לו לאשה •

"Before the giving of the law, a man might happen to meet a woman in the street; if they both agreed on marriage, he took her to his house, and cohabited with her, and she became his wife." (Hilchoth Ishuth, c. i. 1.) Now, not to speak of profane history, there is not in the law of Moses a single passage

With reference to them, the marriage of Gentiles is no marriage at all. The oral law says distinctly

אין אישות לגוים •

There is no matrimony to the Gentiles." (Hilchoth Melachim, viii. 3.) And again—

אין אישות אלא לישראל או לגוים על הגוים אבל לא | to give colour to this statement, unless it be

לעברים על העבדים ולא לעבדים על ישראל •

the following::-" And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose." But, whatever is meant by "Sons of God," it is plain that this conduct is mentioned, not as having the sanction or approval of God, but as a proof of antediluvian wickedness, for it is immediately added, "And the Lord said, My Spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh.' But it is not simply an error of judgment, it is most pernicious as it regards both Gentiles and Jews, for it completely annuls the sanctity and obligation of the marriage tie. It teaches that as the marriage of Noahites is contracted without solemn espousals, so it may be dissolved without the formality of a divorce.

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"There is no matrimony except to Israel, or to Gentiles with respect to Gentiles; but not to slaves with respect to slaves, nor to slaves with respect to Israel." (Hilchoth Issure Biah, c. xiv. 19.) Here, then, the oral law directly makes void the law of God, and pronounces that a command given to Adam in paradise, and therefore equally binding on all his descendants, is in particular cases of no force at all. The oral law, therefore, is certainly not from God.

We have already made out nine commandments; in sacrifice we find a tenth. Cain and Abel brought sacrifices, and the only reason that can be assigned is, that they had received a command to that effect. Sacrifice was either a divine command or the dictate of their own reason. But it was not the dictate of reason, for reason says, that the Creator of all things has no need of gifts,

slaughter of an innocent animal.

It must,

ומאימתי תהיה אשת חבירו כגרושה שלנו? משיוציאנה

and, least of all, such gifts as imply the | מביתו וישלחנה לעצמה או משתצא היא מתחת רשותו .therefore, have been of divine command | ותלך לה שאין להם גירושין בכתב • ואין הדבר תלוי בו The reason why the rabbies excluded this לבד אלא כל זמן שירצה הוא או היא לפרוש זה מזה

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"When is his (the Noahites) neighbour's wife to be considered in the same light, as a divorced woman with us? From the time that he sends her forth from his house, and leaves her to herself. Or from the time that she goes forth from under his power, and goes her way; for they have no divorces in writing, neither does the matter depend upon that alone; but whenever he or she please to separate one from the other, they separate." (Hilchoth Melachim, c. ix. 8.) We Gentiles have great reason to be thankful that Jesus of Nazareth has taught us a different doctrine, according with the original institution * Instead of 7 alone, there is another reading,

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command is plain. They did not choose that there should be acceptable sacrifices offered any where but amongst themselves. But that this doctrine is altogether of a recent date is plain. It was not known to Job. says nor a word about the seven commandments, and he was in the habit of offering sacrifices. "And it was so when the day of their feasting was gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all." (Job i. 5.) And the Lord himself expressly commanded Job's friends to do so likewise. And it was so, that after the Lord had spoken these words unto Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath is kindled against thee,

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