Sidonia, the Sorceress Volume Ii Part 13

_K_.--"Wherefore, wherefore?"

_C_.--"Because Raf Aschi hath said, he who goes from the Halacha (the Talmudical teaching) to the Scripture will have no more luck; [Footnote: Talmud, tract. Chagiga, fol. X. col. I. Raf Aschi, the author the Gemara, a portion of the Talmud.] and good luck we all prize dearly above all things--eh, my master?"

_K._--"Right, right. Who is he like who reads only in the Scripture, and not in the Talmud? What say our fathers of blessed memory?"

_C_.--"They say that he is like one who has no G.o.d."

[Footnote: Talmud, tract. Eruvin.]

_K._--"Can the holy and ever-blessed One sin? What is the greatest sin He has committed?"

_C._--"First; He made the moon smaller than the sun."

_K._--"Our rabbis of blessed memory are doubtful upon this point, as Jonathan, the son of Usiel, says, in the Targum of Moses. [Footnote: The ancient Chaldee paraphrase of the Old Testament is called Targum by the Jews. It is split into the Jerusalemitan, and the Babylonian Targum.] But which is the greatest sin of all that the holy and ever-blessed One committed?"

_C._--"I think it was when He forswore himself. [Footnote: Talmud, tract. Sanhedrin.] For He first swore, saith Rabbi Eliaser, that the children of Israel, who were wandering in the desert, should have no part in eternal life; and then His oath lay heavy on Him, so that He got the angel Mi to absolve Him therefrom."

_K._--"It was, in truth, a great sin, but a greater, methinks, was, that He created the accursed Nazarene--the Jesu--the idol of the children of Edom. I mean the Christ."

_C._--"Rabbi, that is not in the Talmud."

_K._--"Fool! it is the same. _I_ have said it, therefore it is true. Knowest thou not, when a rabbi says, 'This thy right hand is thy left, and this thy left hand is thy right,' thou must believe it, or thou wilt be dammed?" [Footnote: Targum upon Deut.

xvii. 11.]

Here all the elders cried out--

"Yea, yea; the word of a rabbi is more to be esteemed than the words of the law, and their words are more beautiful than the words of the prophets, for they are words of the living G.o.d."

[Footnote: Talmud, tract. Sanhedrin.]

_K._--"Now answer--what says the Talmud of that Adam Belial, that Jesu, that crucified, of whom the Christians say that he was G.o.d?"

_C._--"That he was the son of an evil woman, who learned sorcery in Egypt, and he hid the sorcery in his flesh, in a wound which he made therein, and with the magic he deceived the people, and turned them from G.o.d. He practised idolatry with a baked stone, and prostrated himself before his own idol; and finally, as a fit punishment, he was first stoned to death, upon the eve of the pa.s.sover, and then hung up upon a cross made of a cabbage-stalk, after which, Onkelos, the fallen t.i.tus' sister's son, conjured him up out of h.e.l.l." [Footnote: Although the Jews deny that Christ is named in the Talmud, saying that another Jesus is meant, yet Eisenmenger has fully proved the contrary, on the most convincing grounds.]

_K_.--"Is it possible to find more detestable Gojim than these impure and dumb children of Talvus--these Christian swine?"

[Footnote: Children of Edom, children of harlots, swine, dogs, abominations, worshippers of the crucified, idolaters, are t.i.tles of honour freely given to Christians by the rabbis.--See Eisenmenger.]

_C_.--"No; that were impossible."

_K_.--"It permitted us to deceive them and spoil them of their goods."

_C_.--"Eh? Wherefore are we the selected people, if we could not spoil the children of Edom? They are our slaves, for we have gold and they have none."

_K_.--"Good, good; but where is it written that we may spoil the swine and take their goods?"

_C_.--"The Talmud says, it is permitted to deceive a Goi, and take his goods." [Footnote: Tract. Bava Mezia.]

_K_.--"Forget not the princ.i.p.al pa.s.sage, Tract. Megilla, fol.

13--'What, is it then permitted to the just to deal deceitfully?

And he answered, Yea, for it is written, With the pure thou shalt be pure, and with the froward thou shalt learn frowardness.'

[Footnote: 2 Sam. xxii. 27; a specimen of how the Talmudists interpret the Bible.] _Item_, it is written expressly in the _Parascha Bereschith_, 'It is permitted to the just to deal deceitfully, even as Jacob dealt;' and if our fathers of blessed memory acted thus, we were fools indeed not to skin the Christian dogs and flog them to the death. (Spitting out.) Curse on the unclean swine!"

_C._--"I will be no such fool, rabbi, and if they compel me to take an oath, I will do as Rabbi Akkiva of blessed memory."

_K._--"Right, my son; pity thou canst not speak Hebrew; methinks then thou wouldst have been a light in Israel. Speak--how hath the Rabbi Akkiva sworn?"

_C._--"The Talmud says, 'Hereupon the Rabbi Akkiva took the oath with his lips, but in his heart he abjured it." [Footnote: Talmud, tract. Calla.]

_K._--"The Rabbi Akkiva, of blessed memory, was but a sorry liver. Canst thou, too, defend the violation of the marriage vow?"

_C._--"With the wives of the unclean Christian dogs, wherefore not? For Moses saith (Lev. xx. 10), 'He who committeth adultery with his _neighbour's_ wife shall be put to death;'

so saith the Talmud, the wives of _others_ are excepted; and Rabbi Solomon expressly says on this pa.s.sage, that under the word 'others' the wives of Gojim, or the Christian dogs, are meant."

[Footnote: Eisenmenger quotes a prayer-book of the Jews on this subject, called _The Great Tephilla_.]

_K._--"Yea, cursed be they and their whole race. Dost thou curse them daily, as is thy duty?"

_C._--"My duty is to curse them once; I curse them thrice."

[Footnote: Talmud, tract. Sanhedrin.]

_K._--"Then wilt thou be recompensed threefold when Messias comes, and the fine dishes and the fine clothes will grow out of the blessed earth of themselves, that it will be a pleasure to see them. [Footnote: Talmud, tract. Kethuvoth.] Speak--what saith the Talmud? How large will the grapes then be?"

_C._--"So large that a man will put a single grape in the corner of his house, and tap it as if it were a beer-barrel. Is not that almost too large, master!"

_K_.--"Look at my pert wisehead! Knowest thou not, that he who mocks the words of the wise goes straight to h.e.l.l, as happened to that disciple who laughed at the Rabbi Jochanan when he said that precious stones should be set in the gates of Jerusalem, three ells long and three ells broad? [Footnote: Talmud, tract Bava Bathra.] _Item_, hast thou not read how Rabbi Jacob Ben Dosethai went one morning from Lud to Ono for three miles in pure honey, or how Rabbi Ben Levi saw grapes in the land of Canaan so large that he mistook them for fatted calves. What, then, will it not be when Messias comes? [Footnote: In tractat Kethuvoth] But who will _not_ partake these blessings?"

_C._--"The accursed swine, the Christians." [Footnote: Eisenmenger ii. 777, &c. On this point he brings forward numerous quotations from the later rabbinical writings; for it is certain that on _this_ subject the Talmud judges more mildly.]

_K_.--"Wherefore not?"

_C._--"Because they cat swine's flesh, and believe on the Talvus, who deceived the people through his sorceries."

_K_.--"All true; but when the Talmud says that the impure Nazarene brought all his sorceries out of Egypt, what say our rabbis of blessed memory against that?"

_C._--"That he secretly stole the Schem Hamphorasch out of the Temple, and st.i.tched it into his flesh." [Footnote: An extract from the horrible book of curses against the Saviour, the _Toledotk Jeschu_, is given in Eisenmenger; the entire is printed in Dr. Wagenseil's _Tela Ignea Satanae_]

_K_.--"What is the Schem Hamphorasch?"

_C._--"G.o.d's wonder, His greatest! the seventy names of the holy and ever-blessed G.o.d; and to him who knows them will the angel Metatron appear, as he appeared to our forefathers, and all stones can he turn to diamonds, and all loam to gold."

_K_.--"Dost thou know, my son, that I myself possess this Schem Hamphorasch?"

_C_ (clasping his hands).--"Wonder of G.o.d! can it be? And have you all these riches?"

_K_.--"One of the accursed Christian dogs deceived me, and kept back two of the leaves (may G.o.d plague him in eternity for it), but still it effects much. I sell the holy Schem in little pieces, as a cure for all diseases; yea, even bits no larger than a grain will bring three ducats; _item_, I sell bits of it to the dying to lay upon their stomachs, that so they may gain eternal blessedness. Wilt thou buy a little grain too--eh? Ask the elders here if ever better physic were found than the least grain of dust from the holy Schem Hamphorasch?"

So the elders swore as my knave bid them, and said that no better physic could be, and told of the various diseases which it had cured in their own persons; _item_, that no Jew in the whole town was without a morsel, be it large or small, to lay on his stomach when dying; "but the greater the piece," said the rabbi, "the greater the blessedness."

Now as the red-haired disciple seemed much inclined to purchase a bit, the rabbi went over to the drawer, withdrew the tapestry, and lifting up the golden jad, [Footnote: The jad--a gold or silver hand with which a priest pointed out each line to the reader of the Tora.] pointed smilingly to the palm-leaves therein with it.

"This," he said to the disciple, "was the ever-blessed Schem Hamphorasch itself, if he had not already believed his words."

Meanwhile the aforesaid Meir, the rabbi's servant, crept forth from under the women's gallery, and spake--"Now may ye stick two Christian dogs dead, who are hiding here to steal the blessed golden treasure from my master the rabbi: the clock has struck eleven, and the Christian swine are snoring in all quarters of the city. Up to the women's gallery! up to the women's gallery! There they sit! Their six ducats I have safe: kill the dumb uncirc.u.mcised dogs! strike them dead! For a ducat I will fling them into the Oder. Come, come! here are knives! here are knives."