Jewish Theology Part 19

2. We would, however, misunderstand the spirit of all antiquity, including ancient Israel, if we consider this as an expression of universal love for mankind and the recognition of every human being as fellow-man and brother. Throughout antiquity and during the semi-civilized Middle Ages, a stranger was an enemy unless he became a guest. If he sought protection at the family hearth or (in the Orient) under the tent of a Sheik, he thereby entered into a tutelary relation with both the clan or tribe and its deity. After entering into such a relation, temporary or permanent, he became, in the term which the Mosaic law uses in common with the general Semitic custom, a _Ger_ or _Toshab_, "sojourner" or "settler," ent.i.tled to full protection.(1299) This relation of dependency on the community is occasionally expressed by the term: "thy stranger that is within thy gates."(1300) Such protection implied, in turn, that the _Ger_ or _protege_ owed an obligation to the tribe or community which shielded him.

He stood under the protection of the tribal G.o.d, frequently a.s.sumed his name, and thus dared not violate the law of the land or of its deity, lest he forfeit his claim to protection.

3. In accordance with this, the oft-repeated Mosaic command for benevolence toward the stranger, which placed him on the same footing with the needy and helpless, imposed certain religious obligations upon him. He was enjoined, like the Israelite, not to violate the sanct.i.ty of the Sabbath by labor, nor to provoke G.o.d's anger by idolatrous practices, and, according to the Priestly Code, to avoid the eating of blood and the contracting of incestuous marriages as well as the transgression of the laws for Pa.s.sover and the Day of Atonement. Naturally, in criminal cases such as blasphemy he was subject to the death-penalty just like the native.(1301) Still, the _Ger_ was not admitted as a citizen, and in the Mosaic system of law he was always a tolerated or protected alien, unless he underwent went the rite of circ.u.mcision and thus joined the Israelitish community.(1302)

4. With the transformation of the Israelitish State into the Jewish community-in other words, with the change of the people from a political to a religious status,-this relation to the non-Jew underwent a decided change. As the contrast to the heathen became more marked, the _Ger_ a.s.sumed a new position. As he pledged himself to abandon all vestiges of idolatry and to conform to certain principles of the Jewish law, he entered into closer relations with the people. Accordingly, he adopted certain parts of the Mosaic code or the entire law, and thus became either a partial or a complete member of the religious community of Israel. In either case he was regarded as a follower of the G.o.d of the Covenant. In spite of the exclusive spirit which was dominant in the period following Ezra, two forces favored the extending of the boundaries of Judaism beyond the confines of the nation. On the one hand, the Babylonian Exile had visualized and partially realized the prophecy of Jeremiah: "Unto Thee shall the nations come from the ends of the earth, and shall say: 'Our fathers have inherited naught but lies, vanity and things wherein there is no profit.' "(1303) For example, Zechariah announced a time when "many peoples and mighty nations shall come to seek the Lord of Hosts in Jerusalem and to entreat the favor of the Lord," and "Ten men shall take hold, out of all the languages of nations, shall even take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, 'We will go with you, for we have heard that G.o.d is with you.' "(1304) Another prophet said at the time of the overthrow of Babylon: "For the Lord will have compa.s.sion on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and set them in their own land, and the stranger (_Ger_, or proselyte) shall join himself with them, and they shall cleave to the house of Jacob."(1305) The Psalmists especially refer to the heathen who shall join Israel,(1306) so that _Ger_ now becomes the regular term for proselyte.(1307)

In addition to this inward religious desire we must consider the social and political impulse. The handful of Judaeans who had returned from Babylonia were so surrounded by heathen tribes that, while the Samaritans had attracted the less desirable groups, they were glad to welcome the influx of such as promised to become true worshipers of G.o.d. The chief problem was how to provide a legal form for these to "come over,"

_proselyte_ being the Greek term for "him who comes over." By such a form they could enter the community while accepting certain religious obligations. In fact, such obligations had been stated before in the Priestly Code, which admitted into the political community as "sojourners"

or "indwellers" those who pledged themselves to abstain from idolatry, blasphemy, incest, the eating of blood or of flesh from living animals, and from all violence against human life and property. They were debarred only from marriage into the religious community, "the congregation of the Lord." Henceforth _Ger_ and _Ger Toshab_ became juridical terms, the social and legal designation of those proselytes who had abjured heathenism and joined the monotheistic ranks of Judaism as "worshipers of G.o.d."

5. Thus the first great step in the progress of Judaism from a national system of law to a universal religion was made in Judaea. The next step was to recognize the idea of the revelation of G.o.d to the "G.o.d-fearing men" of the primeval ages, as described in the Mosaic books, and thus to open the gates of the national religion for heathen who had become "G.o.d-fearing men" or "worshipers of the Lord." Thus the Psalms, after enumerating the customary two or three cla.s.ses, "the house of Israel," "of Aaron," and "of Levi," often add the "G.o.d-fearing" proselyte.(1308) The Synagogue was especially attractive to the heathen who sought religious truth because of its elevating devotion and its public instruction in the Scripture, translated into Greek, the language of the cultured world. This sponsored a new system for propagating the Jewish faith. The so-called Propaganda literature of Alexandria laid its chief stress upon the ethical laws of Judaism, not seeking to submit the non-Jew to the observance of the entire Mosaic law or to subject him to the rite of circ.u.mcision. The Jewish merchants, coming into contact with non-Jews in their travels on land and sea, endeavored especially to present their religious tenets in terms of a broad, universal religion. As a universal faith forms the background of the entire Wisdom literature, particularly the book of Job, a simple monotheism could be founded upon a divine revelation to mankind in general, corresponding to the one to Noah and his sons after the flood.

The laws connected with this covenant, called the Noahitic laws, were general humanitarian precepts. We find these enumerated in the Talmud as six, seven, and occasionally ten. Sometimes we read of thirty such laws to be accepted by the heathen, probably founded upon the nineteenth chapter of Leviticus, at one time central in Jewish ethics.(1309) At any rate, the observance of the so-called Noahitic laws was demanded of all worshipers of the one G.o.d of Israel.

Strange to say, however, this extensive propaganda of the Alexandrian Jews during the two or three pre-Christian centuries left few traces in the history and literature of Palestinian Judaism. Two reasons seem at hand; the growth of the Paulinian Church, which absorbed the missionary activity of the Synagogue, and the effort of Talmudic Judaism to obliterate the old missionary tradition. To judge from occasional references in Josephus and the New Testament, as well as many inscriptions all over the lands of the Mediterranean,(1310) the number of heathen converts to the Synagogue was very large and caused attacks on Judaism in both Rome and Alexandria.

Josephus tells us that Jews and proselytes in all lands sent sacrificial gifts to Jerusalem in such abundance as to excite the avarice of the Romans.(1311) The Midrash preserves a highly interesting pa.s.sage which casts light on the earlier significance of the winning of heathen converts, reading as follows: "When it is said in Zephaniah II, 5: 'Woe to the inhabitants of the sea-coast, the nation of Kerethites'; this means that the inhabitants of the various pagan lands would be doomed to undergo _Kareth_, 'perdition,' save for the one G.o.d-fearing proselyte, who is won over to Judaism each year and set up to save the heathen world."(1312) In other words, the merit of the one proselyte whose conversion awakens the hope for the winning of the entire heathen world to pure monotheism, is an atoning power for all. Such was the teaching of the Pharisees, whom the gospel of Matthew brands as hypocrites because of their zeal in making proselytes.

6. This kind of proselytism was encouraged only by Alexandrian or h.e.l.lenistic Judaism. In Palestine, however, the social system of the nation was quite unfavorable to the simple "G.o.d-worshiper," who remained merely a tolerated alien, even though protected, and never really entered the national body. Legally he was termed _Ger Toshab_, "settler," which meant semi-proselyte. The type of this cla.s.s was Naaman, the Syrian general who was instructed by Elijah to bathe in the Jordan to cure his leprosy, and then became a worshiper of the G.o.d of Israel.(1313) Similarly, whatever the real origin of the proselyte's bath may have been, a baptismal bath was prescribed for the proselyte to wash off the stain of idolatry.(1314) He was regarded as one who had "fled from his former master" (in heaven) to find refuge with the only G.o.d;(1315) therefore he was legally ent.i.tled to shelter, support, and religious instruction from the authorities.(1316) Certain places were a.s.signed where he was to receive protection and provision for his needs, but he was not allowed to settle in Jerusalem, where only full proselytes were received as citizens.(1317) According to Philo, special hospices were fitted out for the reception of semi-proselytes.(1318)

7. In order to enjoy full citizenship and equal rights, the proselyte had to undergo both the baptismal bath and the rite of circ.u.mcision, thus accepting all the laws of the Mosaic Code equally with the Israelite born.

Beside this, he had to bring a special proselyte's sacrifice as a testimony to his belief in the G.o.d of Israel. In distinction from the _Ger Toshab_, or semi-proselyte, he was then called _Ger ha Zedek_ or _Ger Zedek_. This name, usually translated as "proselyte of righteousness,"

obviously possesses a deeper historical meaning. The Psalmist voices a pure ethical monotheism in his query: "O Lord, who shall be a guest (_Ger_, sojourner) in thy tent?" which he answers: "He that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness and speaketh truth in his heart."(1319) But the legal view of the priestly authorities was that only the man who offers a "sacrifice of righteousness" and pledges himself to observe all the laws binding upon Israel might become a "guest" in the Temple on Zion, an adopted citizen of Jerusalem, the "city of righteousness."(1320) In ill.u.s.tration of this view a striking interpretation to a Deuteronomic verse is preserved: "They shall call people unto the mountain, there shall they offer sacrifices of righteousness: that is, the heathen nations with their kings who come to Jerusalem for commerce with the Jewish people shall be so fascinated by its pure monotheistic worship and its simple diet, that they will espouse the Jewish faith and bring sacrifices to the G.o.d of Israel as proselytes."(1321)

The prominence of the full proselyte in the early Synagogue appears in the ancient benediction for the righteous leaders and Hasidim, the Soferim and Synedrion, the ruling authorities of the Jewish nation, where special mention is made of "the Proselytes of (the) Righteousness."(1322) These full proselytes pushed aside the half-proselytes, so that, while both are mentioned in the earlier cla.s.sification, only the latter are considered by the later Haggadah.(1323) With the dissolution of the Jewish State no juridical basis remained for the _Ger Toshab_, the "protected stranger."

R. Simeon ben Eleazar expressed this in the statement: "With the cessation of the Jubilee year there was no longer any place for the _Ger Toshab_ in Judaea."(1324) We read in Josephus that no proselytes were accepted in his time unless they submitted to the Abrahamitic rite and became full proselytes.(1325)

However, as Josephus tells us, a strong desire to espouse the Jewish faith existed among the pagan women of neighboring countries, especially of Syria.(1326) The same situation existed in Rome according to the rabbinical sources, Josephus, Roman writers, and many tomb inscriptions.(1327) Conspicuous among these proselytes was Queen Helen of Adiabene, who won lasting fame by her generous gifts to the Jewish people in time of famine and to the Temple at Jerusalem; her son Men.o.baz, at the advice of a Jewish teacher, underwent the rite of circ.u.mcision in order to rise from a mere G.o.d-worshiper to a full proselyte.(1328) The Midrash(1329) enumerates nine heathen women of the Bible who became G.o.d-worshipers: Hagar; Asenath, the wife of Joseph, whose conversion is described in a little known but very instructive Apocryphal book by that name;(1330) Zipporah, the wife of Moses; Shifra and Puah, the Egyptian midwives;(1331) Pharaoh's daughter, the foster-mother of Moses, whom the rabbis identified with Bithia (_Bath Yah_, "Daughter of the Lord");(1332) Rahab, whom the Midrash represents as the wife of Joshua and ancestress of many prophets;(1333) Ruth and Jael. Philo adds Tamar, the daughter-in-law of Judah, as a type of a proselyte.(1334)

8. Beside the term _Ger_, with its derivatives, which gave legal standing to the proselyte, the religious genius of Judaism found another term which ill.u.s.trated far better the idea of conversion to Judaism. The words of Boaz to Ruth: "Be thy reward complete from the Lord thy G.o.d of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to take refuge,"(1335) were applied by the Pharisean leaders to all who joined the faith as Ruth did. So it became a technical term for converts to Judaism, "to come, or be brought, under the wings of the divine majesty" (Shekinah).(1336) Philo frequently expresses the idea that the proselyte who renounces heathenism and places himself under the protection of Israel's G.o.d, stands in filial relation to Him exactly like the born Israelite.(1337) Therefore Hillel devoted his life to missionary activity, endeavoring "to bring the soul of many a heathen under the wings of the Shekinah." But in this he was merely following the rabbinic ideal of Abraham,(1338) and of Jethro, of whom the Midrash says: "After having been won to the monotheistic faith by Moses, he returned to his land to bring his countrymen, the Kenites, under the wings of the Shekinah."(1339) The proselyte's bath in living water was to const.i.tute a rebirth of the former heathen, poetically expressed in the Halakic rule: "A convert is like a newborn creature."(1340) The Paulinian idea that baptism creates a new Adam in place of the old is but an adaptation of the Pharisaic view. Some ancient teachers therefore declared the proselyte's bath more important than circ.u.mcision, since it forms the sole initiatory rite for female proselytes, as it was with the wives of the patriarchs.(1341)

9. The school of Hillel followed in the footsteps of h.e.l.lenistic Judaism in accentuating the ethical element in the law;(1342) so naturally it encouraged proselytism as well. The Midrash preserves the following Mishnah, handed down by Simeon ben Gamaliel, but not contained in our Mishnaic Code: "If a _Ger_ desires to espouse the Jewish faith, we extend to him the hand of welcome in order to bring him under the wings of the Shekinah."(1343) Both the Midrash and the early Church literature reveal traces of a Jewish treatise on proselytes, containing rules for admission into the two grades, which was written in the spirit of the h.e.l.lenistic propaganda, but was afterward rewritten and adopted by the Christian Church. The school of Shammai in its rigorous legalism opposed proselytism in general, and its chief representative, Eliezer ben Hyrcanos, distrusted proselytes altogether.(1344) On the other hand, the followers of Hillel were decidedly in favor of converting the heathen and were probably responsible for many Haggadic pa.s.sages extolling the proselytes. Thus the verse of Deutero-Isaiah: "One shall say, 'I am the Lord's,' and another shall call himself by the name of Jacob; and another shall subscribe with his hand unto the Lord, and surname himself by the name of Israel" is peculiarly applied in the Midrash. The first half, we are told, denotes two cla.s.ses of Israelites, those who are without blemish, and those who have sinned and repented; the second half includes the two cla.s.ses of proselytes, those who have become full Jews (_Gere ha Zedek_) and those who are merely worshippers of G.o.d (_Yir'e Shamayim_). A later Haggadic version characteristically omits the last, recognizing only the full converts (_Gere Emeth_) as proselytes.(1345) The following parable in the spirit of the Essenes ill.u.s.trates their viewpoint. In commenting upon the verse from the Psalms: "The Lord keepeth the strangers," the story is told: A king possessed a flock of sheep and goats and noted that a deer joined them, accompanying them to their pasture and returning with them.

So he said to the herdsmen: "Take good care of this deer of mine which has left the free and broad desert to go in and out with my flock, and do not let it suffer hunger or thirst." Likewise G.o.d takes special delight in the proselytes who leave their own nation, giving up their fellowship with the great mult.i.tude in order to worship Him as the One and Only G.o.d, together with the little people of Israel.(1346) Similarly the Biblical verse concerning wisdom: "I love them that love me, and those that seek me earnestly shall find me"(1347) is referred to the proselytes, "who give up their entire past from pure love of G.o.d, and place their lives under the sheltering wings of the divine majesty." All these Midrashic pa.s.sages and many others are but feeble echoes of the conceptions of the h.e.l.lenistic propaganda, which were so ably set forth by Philo and the Book of Asenath.

Indeed, Judaism must have exerted a powerful influence upon the cultured world of h.e.l.las and Rome in those days, as is evidenced both in the h.e.l.lenistic writings of the Jew and in the Greek and Roman writers themselves. Their very defamation of Judaism unwittingly gives testimony to the danger to which Judaism exposed the pagan conception of life, and to the hold it took upon many of the heathen.(1348)

10. The reaction against this missionary movement took place in Judea. The enforced conversion of the Idumeans to Judaism by John Hyrca.n.u.s benefited neither the nation nor the faith of the Jew, and turned the school of Shammai, which belonged to the party of the Zealots, entirely against the whole system of proselytism. On the whole, bitter experience taught the Jews distrust of conversions due to fear, such as those of the Samaritans who feared the lions that killed the inhabitants, or to political and social advantage, like those under David and Solomon, or in the days of Mordecai and Esther, or still later under John Hyrca.n.u.s.(1349) Instead, all stress was laid upon religious conviction and loyalty to the law. In fact, Josephus mentions many proselytes who in his time fell away from Judaism,(1350) who may perhaps have been converts to Christianity. The later Halakah, fixed under the influence of the Hadrianic persecution and quoted in the Talmud as Baraitha, prescribes the following mode of admission for the time after the destruction of the Temple, omitting significantly much that was used in the preceding period:(1351) "If a person desires to join Judaism as a proselyte, let him first learn of the sad lot of the Jewish people and their martyrdom, so as to be dissuaded from joining. If, however, he persists in his intention, let him be instructed in a number of laws, both prohibitory and mandatory, easy and hard to observe, and be informed also as to the punishment for their disobedience and the reward for fulfillment. After he has then declared his willingness to accept the belief in G.o.d and to adhere to His law, he must submit to the rite of circ.u.mcision in the presence of two members of the Pharisean community, take the baptismal bath, and is then fully admitted into the Jewish fold." It is instructive to compare this Halakic rule with the manual for proselytes preserved by the Church under the name of "The Two Ways," but in a revised form.(1352) The mode of admission in the Halakah seems modeled superficially after the more elaborate one of the earlier code, where the Shema as the Jewish creed and the Ten Commandments, possibly with the addition of the eighteenth and nineteenth chapters of Leviticus and the twenty-seventh chapter of Deuteronomy, seem to have formed the basis for the instruction and the solemn oath of the proselyte.

11. As long as the Jewish people possessed a flourishing world-wide commerce, unhampered by the power of the Church, they were still joined by numerous proselytes in the various lands and enjoyed general confidence.

Indeed, many prominent members of the Roman n.o.bility became zealous adherents of Judaism, such as Aquilas, the translator of the Bible, and Clemens Flavius, the senator of the Imperial house,(1353) and many prominent Jewish masters were said to be descendants of ill.u.s.trious proselytes.(1354) All this changed as soon as the Christian Church girded herself with "the sword of Esau." From that time on proselytism became a peril and a source of evil to the Jew. The sages no longer took pride in the prophetic promise that "the stranger will join himself to Israel," nor did they find in the words "and they shall cleave to the house of Jacob"

an allusion to the prediction that some of these proselytes would be added "to the priesthood of the Lord," as some earlier teachers had interpreted the pa.s.sage.(1355) R. Helbo of the fourth century, on the contrary, explained that proselytes have become a plague like "leprosy" for the house of Jacob, taking the Hebrew _nispehu_ as an allusion to the word _Sappahat_, "leprosy."(1356) Henceforth all attempts at proselytism were deprecated and discouraged, while uncirc.u.mcised proselytes,-probably meaning the persecuting Christians-were relegated to Gehinnom.(1357)

12. This view was not shared by all contemporaries, however. R. Abbahu of Caesarea, who had many an interesting and bitter dispute with his Christian fellow-citizens,(1358) was broad-minded enough to declare the proselytes to be genuine worshipers of G.o.d.(1359) Joshua ben Hanania encouraged the proselyte Aquilas and prognosticated great success for proselytes in general as teachers of both the Haggada and Halakah. So other Haggadists urged special love and compa.s.sion for the half-proselyte,(1360) and entertained a special hope of the Messianic age that many heathen should turn to G.o.d in sincerity of heart.(1361) At all events, it was considered a great sin to reproach a convert with his idolatrous past.(1362) Indeed, the phrase, "they that fear the Lord," used so often in the Psalms, is referred by the Haggadists to the proselytes; true, the chief stress is laid upon the full proselytes, the _Gere Zedek_, but a foremost place in the world to come is still reserved for G.o.d-worshipers like the Emperor Antoninus.(1363) Thus Psalm CXXVIII, which speaks of the "G.o.d-fearing man," was applied to the proselyte, to whom were therefore promised temporal bliss and eternal salvation, rejoicing in the Law, in deeds of love and bounteous blessing from Zion.(1364) While the Halakah remained antagonistic to proselytism on account of its narrow adherence to the spirit of the Priestly Code, the Haggadah exhibits a broader view.

Resonant with the spirit of prophecy, it beckons to all men to come and seek shelter under the wings of the one and only G.o.d, in order to disseminate light and love all over the world.

13. Modern Judaism, quickened anew with the spirit of the ancient seers of Israel, cannot remain bound by a later and altogether too rigid Halakah.

At the very beginning of the Talmudic period stands Hillel, the liberal sage and master of the law, who, like Abraham of old, extended the hand of fellowship to all who wished to know G.o.d and His law; he actually pushed aside the national bounds to make way for a faith of love for G.o.d and the fellow man. For this is the significance of his answer to the Roman scoffer who wanted to hear the law expounded while he was standing on one foot: "Whatever is hateful to thee, do not do to thy fellow man! That is the law; all the rest is only commentary."(1365) Thus the leaders of progressive Judaism also have stepped out of the dark prison walls of the Talmudic Ghetto and rea.s.serted the humanitarian principles of the founders of the Synagogue, who welcomed the proselytes into Israel and introduced special blessings for them into the liturgy. They declare again, with the author of Psalm Lx.x.xVII, that Zion, the "city of G.o.d," should be, not a national center of Israel, but the metropolis of humanity, because Judaism is destined to be a universal religion.(1366)

Not that Judaism is to follow the proselytizing methods of the Church, which aims to capture souls by wholesale conversion without due regard for the att.i.tude or conviction of the individual. But we can no longer afford to shut the gate to those who wish to enter, impelled by conviction or other motives having a religious bearing, even though they do not conform to the Talmudic law.(1367) This att.i.tude guided the leaders of American Reform Judaism at the rabbinical conference under the presidency of Isaac M. Wise, when they considered the admission of proselytes at the present time. In their decision they followed the maxim of the prophet of yore: "Open the gates (of Judaism) that a righteous nation may enter that keepeth the faith."(1368)

14. It is interesting to observe how Philo of Alexandria contrasts those who join the Jewish faith with those who have become apostates. The former, he says, become at once prudent, temperate, modest, gentle, kind, human, reverential, just, magnanimous, lovers of truth, and superior to the temptations of wealth and pleasure, whereas the latter are intemperate, unchaste, unjust, irreverent, low-minded, quarrelsome, accustomed to falsehood and perjury, and ready to sell their freedom for sensual pleasures of all kinds.(1369) In the times of h.e.l.lenic culture apostasy made its appearance among the upper cla.s.ses of the Jews. As the higher-minded among the heathen world were drawn towards the sublime monotheistic faith of the Jew, so the pleasure-seeking and worldly-minded among the Jews were attracted by the allurements of Greek culture to become faithless to the G.o.d of Israel, break away from the law, and violate the covenant. Especially under Syrian rule, apostasy became a real danger to the Jewish community, and many measures had to be decided upon to avert it. The desertion of the ancestral faith was looked upon as rebellion and treason against G.o.d and Israel.(1370) With the rise of the Christian Church to power and influence the number of apostates increased, and with it also the danger to the small community of the Jews in the various lands. In the same measure as the Church made a meritorious practice of the conversion of the Jews, whether by persuasive means or by force and persecution, the authorities of Judaism had to provide the Jew with spiritual weapons of self-defense in the shape of polemical and apologetic writings,(1371) and to warn him against too close a contact with the apostate, which was too often fraught with peril for the whole community. As a number of these apostates became actual maligners of the Jews under the Roman empire, a special malediction against sectarians, the so-called _Birkat ha-Minim_, was inserted in the Eighteen Benedictions under the direction of Gamaliel II.(1372) "Those who have emanated from my own midst hurt me most," says the Synagogue, referring to herself the words of the Sulamite in the Song of Songs.(1373) While every other offender from among the Jewish people is declared to be "brother,"

notwithstanding his sin,(1374) the apostate was declared to be one from whom no free-will offering was to be accepted,(1375) and to whom the gates of repentance and the gates of salvation are forever closed.(1376) The feeling of bitterness against him grew in intensity, as throughout Jewish history he often played the despicable role of an accuser of his former coreligionists and betrayer of their faith. The modern Jew also, though he sympathizes with every liberal movement among men and respects every honest opinion, however radically different from his own, cannot but behold in the att.i.tude of him who deserts the small yet heroic band of defenders of his ancient faith and joins the great and powerful majority around him, a disloyalty and weakness of character unworthy of a son of Abraham, the faithful. Since the beginning of the new era in the time of Mendelssohn, apostasy has made great inroads upon the numerical and intellectual strength of Judaism, especially among the upper cla.s.ses. It is no longer, however, of an aggressive character, but rather a result of the lack of Jewish self-respect and religious sentiment, against which measures tending to a revival of the Jewish spirit are being taken more and more. The Jews are called by the rabbis "the faithful sons of the faithful." The apostate must be made to feel that he is of a lower type, since he has become a deserter from the army of the battlers for the Lord, the Only One G.o.d of Israel.

Chapter LVII. Christianity and Mohammedanism, the Daughter-Religions Of Judaism

1. "It shall come to pa.s.s on that day that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the eastern sea and half of them toward the western sea.... And the Lord shall be King over all the earth; in that day shall the Lord be One, and His name one."(1377) These prophetic words of Zechariah may be applied to the two great world-religions which emanated from Judaism and won fully half of the human race, as it exists at present, for the G.o.d of Abraham. Though they have incorporated many non-Jewish elements in their systems, they have spread the fundamental truths of the Jewish faith and Jewish ethics to every part of the earth.

Christianity in the West and Islam in the East have aided in leading mankind ever nearer to the pure monotheistic truth. Consciously or unconsciously, both found their guiding motive in the Messianic hope of the prophets of Israel and based their moral systems on the ethics of the Hebrew Scriptures. The leading spirits of Judaism recognized this, declaring both the Christian and Mohammedan religions to be agencies of Divine Providence, intrusted with the historical mission of cooperating in the building up of the Messianic Kingdom, thus preparing for the ultimate triumph of pure monotheism in the hearts and lives of all men and nations of the world. These views, voiced by Jehuda ha Levi, Maimonides, and Nahmanides,(1378) were reiterated by many enlightened rabbis of later times. These point out that both the Christian and Mohammedan nations believe in the same G.o.d and His revelation to man, in the unity of the human race, and in the future life; that they have spread the knowledge of G.o.d by a sacred literature based upon our Scripture; that they have retained the divine commandments essentially as they are phrased in our Decalogue; and have practically taught men to fulfill the Noahitic laws of humanity.(1379) On account of the last fact the medieval Jewish authorities considered Christians to be half-proselytes,(1380) while the Mohammedans, being pure monotheists, were always still closer to Judaism.

2. In general, however, rabbinic Judaism was not in a position to judge Christianity impartially, as it never learned to know primitive Christianity as presented in the New Testament. We see no indication in either the oldest Talmudic sources or Josephus that the movement made any more impression in Galilee or Jerusalem than the other Messianic agitations of the time. All that we learn concerning Jesus from the rabbis of the second century and later is that magic arts were practiced by him and his disciples who exorcised by his name; and, still worse, that the sect named after him was suspected of moral aberrations like a few Gnostic sects, known by the collective name of _Minim_, "sectarians."(1381) As a matter of fact, the early Church was chiefly recruited from the Essenes and distinguished itself little from the rest of the Synagogue. Its members, who are called Judaeo-Christians, continued to observe the Jewish law and changed their att.i.tude to it only gradually.(1382) Matters took a different turn under the influence of Paul, the apostle to the heathen, who emphasized the antinomian spirit; the Judaeo-Christian sects were then pushed aside, hostility to Judaism became prominent, and the Church strove more and more for a _rapprochement_ with Rome.(1383) Then the rabbis awoke to the serious danger to Judaism from these heretics, _Minim_, when after the tragic downfall of the Jewish nation they grew to world-power as allies of the Roman Empire. Thus Isaac Nappaha, a Haggadist of the fourth century, declared: "The turning point for the advent of the Messiah, the son of David, will not come until the whole (Roman) Empire has been converted to Christianity (_Minuth_)."(1384) This is supplemented by the Babylonian Rabbah, who plays with a Biblical phrase, saying: "Not until the whole (Roman) world has turned to the Son (of G.o.d)."(1385) Henceforth Christian Rome was termed _Edom_, like pagan Rome from the days of Herod the Idumean. In fact, her imperial edicts showed the fratricidal hatred of Esau, with hardly a trace of the professed religion of love. No wonder the Haggadists identified Rome with the Biblical "Boar of the forest," and waited impatiently for the time when she would have to give up her rule as the fourth world-empire to the people of G.o.d, ushering in the Messianic era.(1386)

3. Meanwhile the relapse of Christianity from monotheism became more steady and more apparent. The One G.o.d of the Jew was pushed into the background by the "Son of Man"; and the Virgin-Mother with her divine child became adored like the Queen of Heaven of pagan times, showing similarity especially to Isis, the Egyptian mother-G.o.ddess, with Horus, the young son-G.o.d, on her lap. The pagan deities of the various lands were transformed into saints of the Church and worshiped by means of images, in order to win the pagan ma.s.ses for the Christian faith. The original pure and absolute monotheism and the stern conception of holiness were thus turned into their very opposites by the hierarchy and monasticism of the Church. How, then, could the Jewish people recognize the crucified Christ as one of their own? One whose preaching seemed to bring them only d.a.m.nation and death instead of salvation and life, even while speaking in the name of Israel's G.o.d after the manner of the prophets of yore? How could they see in the strange doctrines of the Church any resemblance to their own system of faith, especially as the very doctrines which repelled them were those most emphasized by Christianity? Maimonides considered the adherents of the Roman Church to be idolaters,(1387) a view which was modified by the Jewish authorities in the West, as they became better acquainted with Christian doctrines.(1388)

4. The world-empire of the Church was subsequently divided between Rome, which the Jewish writers called _Edom_,(1389) and Byzantium, which they named _Yavan_, but neither showed any real advance in religious views and ideals. On the contrary, they both persecuted with fire and sword the little people who were faithful to their ancient monotheism, and suppressed what remained of learning and science. As the Church had the great task of disciplining wild and semi-barbarous races, there was little room left for learning or for high ideals. At this time a rigorous avenger of the persecuted spirit of pure monotheism arose among the sons of Ishmael in the desert of Arabia in the person of Mohammed, a camel-driver of Mecca, a man of mighty pa.s.sions and void of learning, but imbued with the fire of the ancient prophets of Israel. He felt summoned by Allah, the G.o.d of Abraham, to wage war against the idolatry of his nation and restore the pure faith of antiquity. He kindled a flame in the hearts of his countrymen which did not cease, until they had proclaimed the unity of G.o.d throughout the Orient, had put to flight the trinitarian dogma of the Church in both Asia and Africa, and extended their domain as far as the Spanish peninsula. He offered the Jews inducements to recognize him as the last, "the seal," of the prophets, by promising to adopt some of their religious practices; but when they refused, he showed himself fanatical and revengeful, a genuine son of the Bedouins, unrelenting in his wrath and ending his career as a cruel, sensuous despot of the true Oriental type. Nevertheless, he created a religion which led to a remarkable advancement of intellectual and spiritual culture, and in which Judaism found a valuable incentive to similar endeavors. Thus Ishmael proved a better heir to Abraham than was Esau, the hostile brother of Jacob.(1390)

5. The important, yet delicate question, which of the three religions is the best, the Mohammedan, Christian or Jewish, was answered most cleverly by Lessing in his _Nathan the Wise_, by adapting the parable of the three rings, taken from Boccaccio. His conclusion is that the best religion is the one which induces men best to promote the welfare of their fellow men.(1391) But the question itself is much older; it was discussed at the court of the Kaliphs in Bagdad as early as the tenth century, where the adherents of every religion there represented expressed their opinions in all candor. For centuries it was the subject of philosophical and comparative investigations.(1392) Among these, the most thorough and profound is the _Cuzari_ by the Jewish philosopher and poet, Jehuda ha Levi. But the parable of the three rings also has been traced through Jewish and Christian collections of tales dating back to the thirteenth century, and seems to be originally the work of a Jewish author. Standing between the two powerful faiths with their appeal to the temporal arm, the Jew had to resort to his wit as almost his only resource for escape. Two Jewish works have preserved earlier forms of the parable. In Ibn Verga's collection of histories of the fifteenth century, it is related that "Don Pedro the Elder, King of Aragon (1196-1213), asked Ephraim Sancho, a Jewish sage, which of the two religions, the Jewish or Christian, was the better one. After three days' deliberation, the sage told the king a story of two sons who had each received a precious stone from their father, a jeweler, when he went on a journey. The sons then went to a stranger, threatening him with violence, unless he would decide which of the jewels was the more valuable. The king, believing the story to be a fact, protested against the action of the two sons, whereupon the Jew explained: Esau and Jacob are the two sons who have each received a jewel from their heavenly Father. Instead of asking me which jewel is the more precious, ask G.o.d, the heavenly Jeweler. He knows the difference, and can tell the two apart."(1393)

An older and probably more original form of the parable was discovered by Steinschneider in a work by Abraham Abulafia of the thirteenth century, running as follows: "A father intended to bequeath a precious jewel to his only son, but was exasperated by his ingrat.i.tude, and therefore buried it.

His servants, however, knowing of the treasure, took it and claimed to have received it from the father. In the course of time they became so arrogant that the son repented of his conduct, whereupon the father gave him the jewel as his rightful possession." The story ends by stating that Israel is the son and the Moslem and Christian the servants.

Beside this witty solution of a delicate problem, some Mohammedans made attempts very early, doubtless on account of discussions with learned Jews, to prove the justification of the three religions from the Jewish Scriptures themselves. Thus they referred the verse speaking of the revelation of G.o.d on Sinai, Mount Seir, and Mount Paran(1394) to the religious teachings of Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed. Naturally, the Jewish exegetes and philosophers objected vigorously to such an interpretation.

6. The question which religion is the best, has been most satisfactorily answered for Judaism by R. Joshua ben Hanania, who said that "the righteous of the heathen have also a share in the world to come."(1395) The question which religion is true, has been, alas, too long arbitrated by the sword, and will be decided peacefully only when the whole earth will be full of the knowledge of G.o.d. Our own age, however, has begun to examine the t.i.tle to existence of every religion from the broad standpoint of history and ethnology, a.s.signing to each its proper rank. In this large purview even the crude beliefs of savages are shown to be of value, and the various heathen religions are seen to have a historical task of their own. Each of them has to some extent awakened the dormant divine spark in man; one has aided in the growth of the ideal of the beautiful in art, another in the rise of the ideal of the true in philosophy and science; a third in the cultivation of the ideal of the good and in stimulating sympathy and love so as to enn.o.ble men and nations. Thus after a careful examination of the historical doc.u.ments of the Christian and Mohammedan religions, it is possible to state clearly their great historic mission and their achievements in the whole domain of civilization. The Jewish religion, as the mother who gave birth to both, must deliver the verdict, how far they still contribute to the upbuilding of G.o.d's kingdom on earth.

In fulfilling their appointed mission, each has given rise to valuable and peculiar inst.i.tutions, and each has fallen short of the Messianic ideal as visualized by our great prophets of old. Only an impartial judgment can say which one has reached the higher stage of civilization.

7. Christianity's origin from Judaism is proved by its religious doc.u.ments as well as by its very name, which is derived from the Greek for the t.i.tle Messiah (_Christos_), bestowed on the Nazarene by his followers. Still the name Christianity arose in Antioch among non-Jews who scarcely knew its meaning. All the sources of the New Testament, however much they conflict in details, agree that the movement of Christianity began with the appearance of John the Baptist, a popular Essene saint. He rallied the mult.i.tude at the sh.o.r.e of the Jordan, preparing them for the approaching end of the Roman world-kingdom with the proclamation, "Wash yourselves clean from your sins!" that is, "Take the baptismal bath of repentance, for the kingdom of heaven is nigh."(1396) He conferred the baptismal bath of repentance upon Jesus of Nazareth and the first apostles.(1397) Jesus took up this message when John was imprisoned and finally killed by Herod Antipas on account of his preachment against him.(1398) The life of Jesus is wrapt in legends which may be reduced to the following historical elements:(1399) The young Nazarene was of an altogether different temperament from that of John the Baptist, the stern, Elijah-like preacher in the wilderness;(1400) he manifested as preacher and as a healer of the sick a profound love for, and tender sympathy with suffering humanity, a trait especially fostered among the Essenes. This drew him toward that cla.s.s of people who were shunned as unclean by the uncompromising leaders of the Pharisees, and also by the rigid brotherhoods of the Essenes, whose chief object was to attain the highest degree of holiness by a life of asceticism. His simple countrymen, the fishers and shepherds of Galilee, on hearing his wise and humane teachings and seeing his miraculous cures, considered him a prophet and a conqueror of the hosts of demons, the workers of disease. In contrast to the learned Pharisees, he felt it to be his calling to bring the good tidings of salvation to the poor and outcast, to "seek the lost sheep of the house of Israel" and win them for G.o.d. He soon found himself surrounded by a mult.i.tude of followers, who, on a Pa.s.sover pilgrimage to Jerusalem, induced him to announce himself as the expected Messiah. He attracted the people in Jerusalem by his vehement attacks upon the Sadducean hierarchy, which he threatened with the wrath of heaven for its abuses, and also by his denunciations of the self-sufficient Pharisean doctors of the law. Soon the crisis came when he openly declared war against the avarice of the priests, who owned the markets where the sacrificial fowl for the Temple were sold, overthrowing the tables of the money-changers, and declaring the Temple to have become "a den of robbers."(1401) The hierarchical council delivered him to Pontius Pilatus, the Roman prefect, as an aspirant to the royal t.i.tle of Messiah, which in the eyes of the Romans meant a revolutionary leader. The Roman soldiers crucified him and mocked him, calling him, "Jesus, the king of the Jews."(1402)

The fate of crucifixion, however, did not end the career of Jesus, as it had that of many other claimants to the Messiahship in those turbulent times. His personality had impressed itself so deeply upon his followers that they could not admit that he had gone from them forever. They awaited his resurrection and return in all the heavenly glory of the "Son of Man,"

and saw him in their ecstatic visions, attending their love-feasts,(1403) or walking about on the lake of Nazareth while they were fishing from their boats, or hovering at the summit of the mountains.(1404) This was but the starting point of that remarkable religious movement which grew first among the lower cla.s.ses in northern Palestine and Syria,(1405) then gradually throughout the entire Roman Empire, shaking the whole of heathendom until all its deities gave way to the G.o.d of Israel, the divine Father of the crucified Messiah. The Jewish tidings of salvation for the poor and lowly offered by the Nazarene became the death-knell to the proud might of paganism.

8. But the ways of Providence are as inscrutable as they are wonderful.

The poor and lowly members of the early Christian Churches, with their leaders, called "apostles" or "messengers" of the community,-elected originally to carry out works of charity and love,(1406)-would never have been able to conquer the great world, if they had persisted in the Essene traditions. They owed their success to the large h.e.l.lenistic groups who joined them at an early period and introduced the Greek language as their medium of expression. Henceforth the propaganda activity of the Alexandrian Jews was adopted by the young Church, which likewise took up all the works of wisdom and ethics written in Greek for the instruction of the proselytes and the young, scarcely known to the Palestinian schools.

The Essene baptism for repentance was replaced by baptism for conversion or initiation into the new faith, while the neophyte to be prepared for this rite was for a long time instructed mainly in the doctrines of the Jewish faith.(1407) Subsequently collections of wise sayings and moral teachings ascribed to the Nazarene and handed down in the Aramaic vernacular, orally or in writing, were translated into Greek. These together with the manuals for proselytes were the original Church teachings. The Greek language paved the way for the Church to enter the great pagan world, exactly as the Greek translation of the Bible in Alexandria brought the teachings of Judaism to the knowledge of the outside world.

At first the same obstacle confronted the early Church which had prevented the Synagogue from becoming a world conqueror, namely, the rite of circ.u.mcision, which was required for full membership. Without this, baptized converts were only half-proselytes and could not be fully a.s.similated. This cla.s.sification was still upheld by the Apostolic Convention, which met under the presidency of James the Elder.(1408) The time was ripe for a bold and radical innovation, and at this psychological moment arose a man of great zeal and unbridled energy as well as of a creative genius and a mystical imagination,-Saul of Tarsus, known by his Roman name Paulus.(1409) He had been sent by the authorities at Jerusalem to pursue the adherents of the new sect, but when he had come as far as Damascus in Syria, he suddenly turned from a persecutor into the most ardent promoter of the nascent Church, impelled by a strange hallucination. Paul was a carpet weaver by trade, born and reared in Tarsus, a seaport of Asia Minor, where he seems to have had a Greek training and to have imbibed Gnostic or semi-pagan ideas beside his Biblical knowledge. In this ecstatic vision on his journey he beheld the figure of Jesus, "the crucified Christ," whose adherents he was pursuing, yet whom he had never seen in the flesh, appearing as a heavenly being whom Paul identified as the heavenly Adam, the archetypal "G.o.dlike" man.

Upon this strange vision he constructed a theological system far more pagan than Jewish in type, according to which man was corrupt through the sin of the first couple, and the death of Jesus on the cross was to be the atoning sacrifice offered by G.o.d himself, who gave His own son as a ransom for the sins of humanity. This doctrine he used as a lever with which, at one bold stroke, he was to unhinge the Mosaic law and make the infant Church a world-religion. Through baptism in the name of the Christ, the old sin-laden Adam was to be cast off and the new heavenly Adam, in the image of Christ, put on instead. The new covenant of G.o.d's atoning love was to replace the old covenant of Sinai, to abolish forever the old covenant based upon the Jewish law, and to set mankind free from all law, "which begets sin and works wrath." In Christ, "who is the end of the law," the sinfulness of the flesh should be overcome and the gates of salvation be opened to a world redeemed from both death and sin.(1410) The one essential for salvation was to accept the _mystery_ concerning the birth and death of Christ, after the manner of the heathen mystery-religions, and to employ as sacramental symbols of the mystery the rites of baptism and communion with Christ.

9. This system of Paul, however, demanded a high price of its votaries.

Acceptance of the belief meant the surrender of reason and free thinking.

This breach in pure monotheism opened the door for the whole heathen mythology and the worship of the heathen deities in a new form. But the saddest result was the dualism of the system; the kingdom of G.o.d predicted by the prophets and sages of Israel for all humanity was transferred to the hereafter, and this life with all its healthy aspirations was considered sinful and in the hands of Satan. The cross, originally a sign of life,(1411) became from this time and through the Middle Ages a sign of death, casting a shadow of sin upon the Christian world and a shadow of terror upon the Jew.

The greatest harm of all, however, was done to Judaism itself. Paul made a caricature of the Law, which he declared to be a rigid, external system, not elevating life, but only inciting to transgression and engendering curse. He even aroused a feeling of hatred toward the Law, which grew in intensity, until it became a source of untold cruelty for many centuries.

This spirit permeated the Gospels more and more in their successive appearance, even finding its way into the Sermon on the Mount. In the simple form given in the Gospel of Luke this was a teaching of love and tenderness; in Matthew, Jesus is represented as offering a new dispensation to replace the revelation of Sinai.(1412) Here the Mosaic law is presented as a system of commandments demanding austere adherence to the letter with no regard to the inner life, whereas, on the other hand, the actual teachings of the Nazarene were animated by love and sympathy, emanating from the ethical spirit of the Law. Yet the very words of Jesus in this same sermon disavow every hint of antinomianism: "Verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pa.s.s, one jot or one t.i.ttle shall in no wise pa.s.s from the Law till all be fulfilled."(1413) As a matter of fact, the very teachings of love and inwardness which are embodied in both the Sermon on the Mount and the epistles of Paul were largely adopted from the Pharisean schools and Hasidean works as well as from the Alexandrian Propaganda literature and the Proselyte Manuals preserved by the Church.

In fact, part of this criticism was voiced by the Pharisees, as they attacked the Sadducean insistence upon the letter of the Law. The Pharisean spirit of progress applied new methods of interpretation to the Mosaic Code and especially to the Decalogue, deriving from them a higher conception of G.o.d and G.o.dliness, breaking the fetters of the letter, and working mainly for the holiness of the inner life and the endeavor to spread happiness about.(1414) Taking no heed of the actual achievements of the Synagogue, the Paulinian Church rose triumphantly to power after the downfall of the Jewish State and impregnated the Christian world with hostility to Judaism and the Jew, which lasts to this very day, thus turning the gospel of love into a source of religious hatred.

10. Nevertheless it cannot be denied that Paulinian Christianity, while growing into a world-conquering Church, achieved the dissemination of the Sinaitic doctrines as neither Judaism nor the Judaeo-Christian sect could ever have done. The missionary zeal of the apostle to the heathen caused a fermentation and dissolution in the entire neo-Jewish world, which will not end until all pagan elements are eliminated. Eventually the whole of civilization will accept, through a purified Christianity, the Fatherhood of G.o.d, the only Ruler of the world, and the brotherhood of all men as His children. Then, in place of an unsound overemphasis on the principle of love, justice will be the foundation of society; in place of a pessimistic other-worldliness, the optimistic hope for a kingdom of G.o.d on earth will const.i.tute the spiritual and ethical ideal of humanity. We must not be blind to the fact that only her alliance with Rome, her holding in one hand the sword of Esau and in the other the Scriptures of the house of Jacob, made the Church able to train the crude heathen nations for a life of duty and love, for the willing subordination to a higher power, and caused them to banish vice and cruelty from their deep hold on social and domestic life. Only the powerful Church was able to develop the ancient Jewish inst.i.tutions of charity and redeeming love into magnificent systems of beneficence, which have led civilization forward toward ideals which it will take centuries to realize.