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SPIRIT 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Biblical Legislation, 
 
 IN PARALLEL WITH 
 
 TALMUD, MORALISTS, CASUISTS, NEW TESTAMENT, 
 
 ANCIENT AND MODERN LAW; ESPECIALLY 
 
 THE SOCIAL AND POLITICAL 
 
 INSTITUTIONS. 
 
 ■' / 
 
 REV. MAURICE FLUEGEL, 
 
 LECTURER IN BALTIMORE, HD. 
 
 Author oe "Religious Rites and Views;" "Diet and Hygiene;" 
 "Reply to Professor Fr. Delitzsch ;" "Germany," etc. 
 
 BALTIMORE: 
 
 Press of The Sun Book and Job Printing Office. 
 
 1893. 
 
Copyright Secured by the Author. 
 1893. 
 
CONTKNTS 
 
 Part I. 
 
 Spirit of Biblical Legislation — Sco2)e of the hooh 1 
 
 The Biblical Legislation — Sinai 6 
 
 Cardinal Principles — Liberty, Equality, Wealth, Solidarity. 7 
 
 Herbert Spencer on that 10 
 
 Man's Freedom — A Biblical Doctrine 11 
 
 Status of Woman in the Bible 13 
 
 Eve and Pandora — Christianity and Woman 14 
 
 Civil Freedom-Laws in Pentateuch 16 
 
 State and Citizenship — State elsewhere 18 
 
 Biblical Democracy 20 
 
 Prophets and Tribunes — Leaders and Orators 21 
 
 Biblical and Non-Biblical State — The Citizen 24 
 
 Biblical Patriotism — Strength of the Law 26 
 
 Part IL 
 
 Social Equality 28 
 
 Man-Servant — Woman- Servant 29 
 
 Crime, Murder — Asylum 31 
 
 Penal Laws — Exemption — Capital Punishment 32 
 
 Filial Disrespect — Man Stealing — Maltreatment 34 
 
 Eye for Eye and Democracy — Compensation 37 
 
 Old and New Testament on that 39 
 
 Eabbinical Penal Code 40 
 
 Simon b. Shetah on that 42 
 
 The New Testament on that 46 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGB. 
 
 Native and Alien 47 
 
 Civil Jurisprudence, Theft, Fraud, Burglary 48 
 
 Status of Stranger — One God, one Law 51 
 
 Stranger, Widow and Orphan — Plimsol in Parliament 53 
 
 Creed and Deed — Hospitality — Protection and Bread 54 
 
 Legislator's Heart — Cardinal Manning 67 
 
 Usury, Interest and Profit in Pentateuch 58 
 
 Stranger in Greece — Bible — Homer 59 
 
 Jahveh and Zeus 62 
 
 Benjaminite War 64 
 
 Expressions for Foreigner in Pentateuch 65 
 
 Talmud on Strangers and Gentiles — Casuists 66 
 
 Keview, Bible Tolerance — Bismarck's Biases 72 
 
 Part III. 
 
 Eqiial Distribution of Wealth 80 
 
 Salisbury, Chamberlain, Huxley on it 81 
 
 Jubilee and Septennate 83 
 
 Septennate and Indebtedness 87 
 
 State Polity and Bible Economics 89 
 
 Debtors in Rome and Judrea, Cicero on it 89 
 
 Present and Ancient Economics 91 
 
 Number Seven. Sacred in antiquity 92 
 
 Was Septennate a Fact ? Evidence 93 
 
 Abolishment of Septennate — Never really tried 96 
 
 Septennate and Modern Charity ; 98 
 
 Exemption Laws — Code Napoleon on it 99 
 
 Restime of Jubilee and Septennate. Bible, Talmud, History. ... 1 01 
 
 Bible and Comrminism. — Matthew Arnold 104 
 
 Bible and Socialism 107 
 
 Program of Socialism 108 
 
CONTENTS. V 
 
 Karl Marx's Doctrines on Lalor, Land, Property 109 
 
 Criticism of Marx's System 112 
 
 Herbert Spencer on Property 113 
 
 Competition, honest and not — Laissez aller 114 
 
 Karl Marx, continued — Bakunin 130 
 
 Marx's Optimism. — The Socialistic Ideal 131 
 
 His Denunciations — Democracy, Inventions 133 
 
 Parallels and Contrasts , Bille and Socialism 135 
 
 Marx, Son of the Prophets 131 
 
 Socialism and Bible Economics 133 
 
 Septennate, Strong and "Weak Sides.— Never tried 135 
 
 SabbatJi and the Social Question 137 
 
 The Bible on the Sabbath 138 
 
 Talmud and Philosophers on it 140 
 
 Numbers one, three and seven, in Greece and Judaea 143 
 
 Sahhath in History. — Manna. — In Hoary Times 144 
 
 Sabbath the Grand Social Institution 147 
 
 Sabbath's Bearings— Physical, Social, Intellectual 150 
 
 Democracy, Aristocracy, Ochlocracy. — Natural, Artificial 153 
 
 Sabbath Influence.— Emancipation Day.— Foot Man's Day 158 
 
 Sabbath Politically. — Kelease and Jubilee 163 
 
 Sabbath and the Social Problem. American Democracy 165 
 
 Part IV. 
 
 State and Solidarity. Solidarity or Prejudice 169 
 
 Bible poor-laws. — Poor and Pauper.. 173 
 
 Negative poor-laws. — Usury and Monopoly 175 
 
 Marriage, Divorce and Solidarity.- Moses, Mohammed 177 
 
 Levirates' Marriage and Solidarity 179 
 
 Naomi and Kuth— Racial Intermarriage 180 
 
 Piety for the Dead.— Greece ; Rome and Solidarity 182 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 PAOE. 
 
 The Sublime with Classics and Moderns 184 
 
 Piety in Homer. — In Bible 186 
 
 Bible Eeverence and Solidarity 191 
 
 Jules Simon on Reverence 193 
 
 Cave of Machpelah and Family Sympathy 194 
 
 Moses' Two Arks — Serah b. Ashir 196 
 
 Positive Benevolence a7id Poor Laws — Tithes 199 
 
 Bible Charity, Unsectarian 202 
 
 Rabbinical Charity — New Testament 203 
 
 Talmudical Charity Methods 207 
 
 Herbert Spencer, etc. , on Public A Imsgiving 209 
 
 Mosaic Solidarity 212 
 
 Retrospect — State Charity — Divine Legislation 214 
 
 Church and State in the Bible 217 
 
 Sacrifices and Ceremonies — Homer's Gods 218 
 
 Theological Crimes — Rabbi's Exuberance 222 
 
 Kabbalah to Moses Mendelssohn on it 226 
 
 Resume of the foregoing 227 
 
 Retrospect, Cardinal and General Principles — Talmud 229 
 
 Aims of the Bible Scheme 236 
 
 Conclusion : the Bible and present Society 240 
 
 Comments on Author's Works 245 
 
Spirit of the Biblical Legislation. 
 
 PART I. 
 -SCOPE OF THE BOOK. 
 
 In delivering over this volume to a kind public, tlie 
 author does not presume to convey the idea of offering 
 hereby a full tableau and a complete discussion of all the 
 Biblical institutions, statutes and laws. Such is not his 
 scope; he aims rather at elucidating the spirit of the law; 
 to examine not the matter and the details, but the prin- 
 ciples animating and pervading it ; to search for, and, if 
 possible, to point out the objects of the legislator in framing 
 the code. This conscientious examination the reader will 
 find here, and by way of illustration, a large part of the 
 leading groups of the law, too, carefully analyzed and set 
 forth. 
 
 For nearly a quarter of a century, having had it as 
 my calling to publicly interpret the Bible and its commen- 
 taries; fully well aware, with the best expounders, that 
 part of its prescriptions belong to ages and circumstances 
 in which they were originated ; whilst part of them were 
 framed for later centuries, some even for times yet to 
 come, — I tried to elucidate here, not so much the matter 
 thereof, as rather their final, social, political and ethical 
 objects in view. 
 
 Part of the results of these modest endeavors are laid 
 down in the following pages, An purpose and intentionally 
 denominated : "Spirit of the Biblical Legislation." 
 
2 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 Tlie reader will, therefore, be so kind as not to look liere 
 for a work as that of Michaeli's '■'■Laws of Moses, ''^ or Salva- 
 dor's '^Institutions de Mo'isej'^ or the Hebrew i^'Taamai 
 Ha-Mizvot?i^^) ^'Reasons for the Bible Commandments^'' 
 but rather as Montesquieu's "Esprit des LoisP As that 
 French writer took, especially, tlie Roman Law for his 
 starting point and, at the hand thereof, discussed many of 
 the modern legal codes, in nearly the same manner did I 
 treat here of the Biblical Legislation in constant parallel 
 with modern laws and institutions. 
 
 Particularly do these pages endeavor to find out the 
 original Mosaic aims, ideas and ideals concerning the polit- 
 ical and social status of the people to be constituted; the 
 State, the Church, the Society, and the Economic condi- 
 tions that legislation was intended for. 
 
 Whilst thus expressly stating that this volume is not a 
 rendition of the entire and full Biblical code, the reader 
 will find that, by way of illustration and as examples of the 
 theories brought forward, I have especially treated in these 
 pages a salient portion of the Biblical code, viz : those most 
 important enactments bearing on State, society, civil, crimi- 
 nal and economic laws, family and church, contained in the 
 chapters 21 to 24 of Exodus, conjointly with their wide 
 ramifications, numerous expoundings and qualifications, 
 scattered throughout the entire Pentateuch aud the Bible. 
 
 These chapters are denominated " Laios and Ordinances'^ 
 ^' Judgments ^^^ " MisJipatim,'" par excellence, in sacred writ. 
 As these appear to have been the nucleus around which the 
 Biblical legislation clustered and from which it slowly 
 developed, they form the centre of this volume. 
 
 Around this centre of laws and conjointly with them, 
 find here full room and consideration their later elaborations 
 in the Talmud, Halacliah and Agadah, the New Testa- 
 ment, ofen, too, their parallels in Roman law, Zend 
 Avesta and Koran, and especially their paramount influ- 
 ence upon the State, the society and the laws of to-day. 
 
SCOPE OF THE BOOK. 3 
 
 The result of these investigations seems to me to be that 
 most of the political aspirations of our own contemporaries, 
 of our truest statesmen and noblest philanthropists, that 
 most, if not all, of the objects of our present democracy, 
 have had their forerunner, their initiator, their first warm 
 advocate in the Legislator of Sinai; that our American 
 democracy found its first enthusiastic expression in the 
 Pentateuch, repeated and inculcated over and over by the 
 Biblical prophets; that modern democracy is simply the 
 evolution of the Biblical Democracy. 
 
 As a practical law, the great hook undoubtedly made its 
 concessions to the rude conditions it originated in and 
 emerged from. But, as is the case with all extraordinary pro- 
 ductions of divine mind, the Biblical legislation was essen- 
 tially non-sectarian; that it finally aimed at universal jus- 
 tice, tempered with charity, for universal mankind, chil- 
 dren of the one universal Parent ; that though admitting 
 special forms for a special people and country, it taught but 
 universal doctrines ; that Israel was but a nucleus of the 
 one human race, and Canaan or Judaea but an epitomized 
 United States of the World. 
 
 Every one knows the prejudices the Bible has been, 
 and is as yet, the object of. To some it is the incarnate, 
 all-absorbing, crystallized, last and final word of God, 
 authoritative for all times and all circumstances. To others 
 it is an archaeological mosaic, a compound of divers elements 
 and heterogeneous suggestions, by different schools and 
 centuries, for various objects in view. The following pages, 
 examining into its leading principles and institutions, not 
 prejudiced by any bias of sect, doctrine or theology, rever- 
 ently abstaining from, all inquiry into the supernatural and 
 miraculous, taking the Bible as a positive legislation and 
 as extant before our eyes, studying it in the light of reason 
 and fairness, in connection with the contemporaneous and 
 subsequent history of ethical and political human develop- 
 
4 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 ment, for these last three thousand years, they result in the 
 following conclusion ! The Bible represents a well digested 
 and admirable whole, an elaborate system for an ever- 
 developing, homogeneous human kind, progressing under 
 struggle, vice and error, towards the ideal of "<x Mngdom of 
 priests and a holy nation" a humanity, united by justice^ 
 reason and sympathy, with the same rights and duties and 
 aspirations; "no longer learning war;" "breaking their 
 swords into implements of husbandry ; " following up the 
 divine law of justice and eternal fitness, and establishing 
 slowly "a kingdom of Heaven on earth," the dominion of 
 truth, peace and love among harmonized and reconciled 
 mankind. 
 
 This highest ideal concerning State and Society, aspired 
 to by present democracy, by modern humane economists 
 and philanthropists, is identically the same as the one held 
 up in the Pentateuch ; of course with the necessary develop- 
 ments and complements answering our contemporaneous 
 conditions. That type and ideal first dawned and loomed 
 up in the Pentateuchal Institutions. It developed with the 
 Judgean seers and the non-Judsean sages. It is taking definite 
 shape and form with Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill, 
 with Karl Marx and Herbert Spencer. It is being slowly 
 realized in our present State and Society. It is all along 
 but one chain of evolving, philanthropic thought about 
 human amelioration, from Sinai to Washington, from Abra- 
 ham to Lincoln and Cleveland. That book is therefore one 
 of the grandest monuments extant for the contemplation 
 and the study of man. It is not simply a book ; it is the 
 book; it is the Bible. It is underlying human civilization. 
 It is not the property of this nation and that country, but 
 of mankind, of the world, the study and the profit of ages 
 yet to come. 
 
 In 1888, at the publication of my ^^ Thoughts on Religious 
 Rites and Views, ^^ that small volume was the object of many 
 
SCOPE OF THE BOOK. 
 
 kind cominents and appreciations by some of tlie best and 
 most learned men of both bemisplieres ; as by the hoary, 
 English leader, the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone; the re- 
 nowned Professors, Franz Delitzsch and W. Wundt, of Leip- 
 sic; N. Bruell, of Frankfurt; H. Gratz, of Breslau; A. Neubauer, 
 of Oxford ; Presidents Day, of Yale, and Green, of Prince- 
 ton Universities ; Fredrich v Bodenstedt, the poet, etc., etc. 
 In different words they kindly declared " the little book to 
 contain much food for reflection, and a real contribution to 
 science." (Delitzsch). Such kind encouragement made me 
 continue my modest efforts, and these leaves are part of the 
 result thereof. 
 
 Go ye forth then, as a respectful greeting to these eminent 
 men, my noble seniors and kind teachers, objects of my 
 veneration and my emulation, bearers of solace and cheer 
 to me in the sharp and intense "struggle for existence^" 
 you great and good men, some of you resting already, your 
 work nobly finished, and some yet leading on the " Wars of 
 JaJiveJi/' in the service of humanity ! May these leaves be 
 grateful to you, and may they prove as interesting and use- 
 ful to the kind public at large. 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
 Baltimore, August, 1893. 
 
THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 The Biblical statutes on State and Society, on civil, crim- 
 inal and economic legislation have, no doubt, their root 
 and raison d' etre in the hoary Ten Commandments. That 
 truly Sinaitic Magna Charta dates back to the great law- 
 giver. It bears on its face all the marks of original legisla- 
 tion. All hypercritical cavelling is impotent to impugn 
 that fact. It is the organic law of the Biblical Common- 
 wealth. The Decalogue establishes the State and its people 
 on the immovable basis of God, as omnipotent Ruler and 
 all-wise Providence; on a sanctified humanity, — the Sab- 
 bath or day of culture; on the family, with filial piety J 
 on the sacredness of life, property and chastity; on the 
 inviolability of our word and the purity of our feelings. 
 On such a basis the Biblical Society could rise to the ideal 
 of a "kingdom of priests and holy nation" — a "kingdom of 
 Heaven upon earth " — a society of educated, free and duty- 
 bound men and women. 
 
 Sinai. 
 
 From that Sinaic root slowly grew up the tree and devel- 
 oped the branches and the fruit of the Mosaic Legislation, 
 as extant in "Laws and Ordinances," ''Mishpatim^''^ in II. 
 M. 21, etc. ; successively supplemented and enlarged in 
 Pentateuch and Bible, elaborated in Talmud, slowly rising 
 to a fairly complete legislation, civil and criminal, agrarian 
 and religious; political, social and ecclesiastical. With 
 rare exceptions, they are nearly all worked out in the same 
 spirit, all bear the stamp of the same divine genius, as the 
 splendid rays, the bright emanations from the same flaming 
 
SINAI. / 
 
 Horeb, tlie wisdom and the benevolence of the " great 
 Moses, standing upon Sinai as his footstool." C) 
 
 The Cardinal Principles. 
 
 Four cardinal principles appear to underlie that entire 
 code. These four principles are but in our present century 
 fully being appreciated and slowly realized. They have 
 first clearly loomed up before the Biblical Lawgiver, more 
 than 3,000 years ago ! These are : Individual liberty. 
 Social equality, Equal distribution of the national wealth, 
 and Community of interests, or Solidarity. Let us illustrate 
 these four principles : 
 
 I. Individual Liberty. — In ancient, and even in modern, 
 times the State consisted of dominant races and of subju- 
 gated ones. The latter were not free, and the first neither. 
 Only the State was free, its leaders, tlie prince, the Senate, 
 the nobles, the high ecclesiastics, etc. Whilst the bulk of 
 the people, the rank and file of even the dominant race, 
 had no personal freedom. The individual, Ms life, his 
 family, his property, his work, all belonged to the State. 
 His rights were measured by the good pleasure of the 
 rulers. 
 
 The Bible first put forth the axiom: Every Ebrew 
 inhabitant of the country is personally free; the man, 
 woman and child; the poor, the weak, the criminal, cannot 
 lose their original character of free agents. All yield to 
 the State just what is necessary for their own protection. 
 None are born to rule, none to serve. God and law are 
 alone natural rulers. Even laws had to be accepted by the 
 people, in covenant with God. 
 
 The later kings were elected and had a Constitution. 
 Thus the claim that personal liberty came into the world 
 with free Greece, or Patrician Rome, or the Anglo-Saxons? 
 or with the English Charta Magna, or with Calvin of 
 
 (1) Heine. 
 
8 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION, 
 
 Geneva, or with Holland and Switzerland, or witli Rousseau 
 and Voltaire, or the American and French revolutions, — 
 that claim is unfounded. Personal freedom dawned upon 
 history with the Code as extant in II. Moses, 21, called 
 '^Mishpatim," over 3,000 years ago. That blessed seed of 
 the principle of human freedom may be as old as the 
 Adamite or Biblical era of civilization. It was propagated 
 by Abraham with the doctrine of Monotheism as the creed 
 of the people: Whereas the Egyptian jMysteries may have 
 taught both as the privilege of the few. The idea of 
 human freedom thus entered with the patriarchs Jacob and 
 Joseph into the splendid and powerful, yet despotically- 
 governed Egypt; and crushed by the Pharaohs, the Raamses 
 and Menephtas of the eighteenth dynasty, freedom went 
 forth triumphant, with ]\Ioses, to assert itself in eternal 
 legislation slowly embracing mankind. 
 
 II. Social Equality. — The aijcient society was a hierarchy 
 of different gradations and strata ; a monarch, descendant 
 from and representative of the gods ; a nobility by the same 
 claim, his companions and satellites; a military clan, his 
 supporters and tools; an ecclesiastical aristocracy, his coad- 
 jutors ; the trades and crafts, and lastly the serfs, remnants 
 of all the vanquished tribes. Hence, were the inhabitants 
 divided up into privileged classes and disfranchised ones — 
 in born ruling, and in born serving social strata. The Bible 
 conceived another polity ; a commonwealth without a hier- 
 archy, a State without king, nobility or military class, with 
 absolutely equal civic rights and duties, burdens and emolu- 
 ments for all. This social equality was the necessary result 
 of the personal liberty underlying the Biblical republic in 
 federation. Later, monarchy and aristocracy crept in, yet 
 democracy remained paramount. Its sense of equality has 
 remained to this day as a salient feature of the Hebrew 
 people. 
 
THE CARDINAL PRINCIPLES. 9 
 
 III. Equal distribution of the national loealth among 
 the menibers of the Ebrew nationality. This is the 
 next concomitant of the axiom of individual liberty. 
 The inequality of wealth is the supreme cause of the 
 deterioration of civil freedom and equality. The ex- 
 orbitantly and hereditarily wealthy will soon buy off 
 those rights from the chronically poor and weak ones. 
 You remember the constant commotions among these 
 classes in Athens and Rome. You remember how Draco 
 and Lycurgus tried to avoid these difficulties by even 
 more dangerous social monstrosities. The Mosaic lawgiver 
 succeeded better in that attempt at economical average 
 equality, by infinitely more moral and more humane means. 
 He divided his country's soil, per capita, in equal portions, 
 into family lots, and declared them inalienable, just as the cit- 
 izen's personal liberty. Commerce and enriching wars were 
 discountenanced. A new economic feature of the grandest 
 dimensions, periodically renovating the social physiognomy 
 and restoring the equality of property, was introduced into 
 the State, forever prohibiting plutocracy, proletariat and 
 pauperism ; same justice to all ; privilege and drawback to 
 none; hence all had the same chances in the arena of 
 existence. 
 
 IV. Solidarity or Community of Interests. — The Biblical 
 legislator endeavors by positive laws, religious doctrines 
 and moral persuasions, to impress his fellow-citizens with a 
 sense of mutual interest in each other, the deep conscious- 
 ness of altruism, side by side with the other necessary 
 instinct of egoism. " Live and let live." " Love thy neigh- 
 bor as thyself." Thine interest is not antagonistic to his. 
 It is rather intimately bound up with his and that of the 
 entire community. 
 
10 spirit of the biblical legislation. 
 
 Herbert Spencer's Criticism. 
 
 When Herbert Spencer points out^^^ tlie flaerrant contra- 
 diction of the two dominant religions, viz : Selfishness and 
 Self-sacrifice, the first in practice, the latter in theory, the 
 one in the State, the other in the Church, this may be true 
 with the State and the Church, now, as extant. The present 
 society practices egoism; the Church teaches "Love thy 
 neighbor — yea, love thy enemy — as thyself." We must not 
 forget that the present State and the present Church derive 
 from divers sources: the State from Diocletian and Con- 
 stantine the Great, the Church from Jesus and Paul — vastly 
 different characters ! The first two acting from selfishness, 
 the others from self-sacrifice, and hence the flagrant dis- 
 crepancy, so pointedly and vividly remarked by Herbert 
 Spencer, J. J. Rousseau and others. Not so in the Biblical 
 polity. There stand State and Church upon the harmonious 
 co-workings of egoism and altruism combined. Self-preser- 
 vation requires the preservation of our fellows. Our 
 interests go hand in hand with those of our neighbors. 
 The aim is : ^'- LooTc that there should be no chronic pauper 
 class among you." (V. M. 15, 4.) There will always be, 
 sporadically, poor ones. Let them not become permanent, 
 hereditary, socially doomed proletarians. 
 
 Hence is charity with the Pentateuch, not an ideal, a 
 sermon, but a commandment, a positive duty. Help the 
 poor so as never more to need thy help. Lend him even on 
 a slender security. So in Pentateuch, Talmud and Casuists 
 (Joreh Deah, 246, 9.) Take no interest nor increase of him. 
 He must pay his debts, even by six years labor, but the 
 seventh year cancels them. He cannot be sold nor im- 
 prisoned for such. In Athens and Rome he could, — even be 
 mutilated, too. There his family also could be taken from 
 him. The Pentateuch levies a host of imposts upon the 
 farmer in favor of the poor, the stranger, the widow and the 
 
 (I) Data of Ethics. 
 
FREEDOM A BIBLICAL DOCTRINE. 11 
 
 orphan, the State and the temple ; not as alms, but as a 
 stern duty of solidarity. 
 
 Man's Personal Freedom. 
 
 Having glanced at the four cardinal principles of the 
 Biblical legislation, let us analyze some passages of that 
 code, following the chapters and verses designated as Laws 
 and Ordinances in II. M. 21, etc., called ^^ Mishpatim" in 
 the text. 
 
 The universal feature of the ancient State and Society 
 being serfdom, the woman, the child, the poor, the conquered, 
 the foreigner, as also the mass of the people being unfree, 
 the lawgiver begins with the declaration of the personal 
 freedom of each and every citizen (II. M. 21,2.) 
 
 " When thou wilt buy an Ebrew servant (slave or working 
 man) for six years he shall serve, and in the seventh he 
 shall go free without redemption money." That verse 
 means plainly that an Ebrew can never be a slave. He can 
 be hired out for some years, but his liberty is inalienable. 
 
 Indeed, from II. M. 22,2, the Talmud gathers that the 
 above took place forcibly, that the Ebrew was sold by the 
 courts for theft, and nevertheless the quality of a freeman 
 could not be wrested from him, as a criminal either. Hence 
 is personal liberty inherent. To be an Ebrew is to be free. 
 The principle was, "To me are the children of Israel servants 
 (III. M., 25,55)* God's servants ; man's never." 
 
 freedom a biblical doctrine. 
 
 Remembering this to have been enacted over three thou- 
 sand years ago, — those chapters in form and substance point- 
 ing to a primitive condition of ancient Israel, — that is truly 
 grand ! It points to the fact that the personal freedom idea 
 did not come with the Saxons or the Huguenots, or classical 
 Greece, or the American and French Revolutions, but that 
 mankind owes it to the Bible. 
 
12 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 (II. M. 21,3.) " If the Ehrew servant he a husland, Ms 
 wife leaves with him.^^ During his servitude the master 
 was bound to support her, justly remarked the Rabbis. — 
 (Ibid., verse 4.) " But if the master gave him a (slave) wife, 
 she and her children remain with the master." Here we 
 find the clashing, hard concessions to the social conditions, 
 stronger than the laws of nature and State. — (Ibid., verses 
 5 and 6.) " But if the servant declare to prefer Ms affec- 
 tion for Ms Tnaster and family to his freedom, then let 
 the rogue be branded as a slave." ^^ His master shall 
 bring Mm to the Courts and nail his ear to the public gate, 
 and then he shall serve for ever." " Why bore the ear?" 
 says a witty expounder. The ear that heard, but did not 
 listen to, at Sinai, " thou shall not steal,''^ not be lazy, not be 
 wasteful, etc., shall be bored for having neglected the 
 lesson. Historically, the boring of the ear was the mark of 
 slavery among ancient nations. Our ladies' ear-rings are 
 yet a sparkling reminiscence thereof. The clause, ^^ He 
 shall serve for ever,^^ received later by the Rabbis the 
 interpretation of : He shall serve till the coming jubilee , 
 or until his master's death ; thus forcing the letter of Holy 
 Writ in favor of the spirit thereof; the biblical law is 
 thus consecrating the inviolability principle, good for every 
 Ebrew inhabitant, that personal liberty is inalienable, even 
 with the criminal and the coward, not admitting even the 
 possibility of absolute loss of freedom. Let us not overlook 
 the moral and psychological features of that passage : A 
 vicious freemen is given to theft ; he lapses unto serfdom ; 
 he marries a slave; he begets slave children; he has to 
 choose between these and his free citizenship ; and yielding 
 to his natural yearnings, he must bear the mark of infamy. 
 " One sin brings another one" and " Misfortune never comes 
 alone." 
 
status of womax ix the bible. 13 
 
 Status of Woman in the Bible. 
 
 With even greater care does tlie lawgiver screen the 
 freedom, the dignity, the delicacy of woman. Woman, the 
 '■^mother of all living" is the rudiment of society. Not an 
 horn" could she alienate her freedom. A free person, wife 
 and mother, her children, too, were free. Hence was so the 
 entire people. You remember the myth of Pandora, the 
 toy, drudge, and the Circe of the Greek world. The Ehrew 
 Bve represents woman as the very opposite thereof. She is 
 the wife, help-meet and blessing of man. Hence the noble 
 legislation concerning her station in II. M. 21, 7 to 12. She 
 could not be enslaved for one single moment. From her 
 father or brother she had to pass to none else but her 
 husband. It was, therefore, a natural presumption that her 
 master would make her his wife. If he did not, she was 
 considered as ill-used ; something not far from the modern 
 breach of promise. Her lord was morally bound to marry 
 her, he or his son in his stead. If not, he has lost his 
 money, and she shall leave him. A Ebrew woman shall 
 be a wife and a mother, never a slave ! Israel shall be a 
 nation of free men and free women. Thus the law states, 
 " Wheii she displeased her master to lohom she was 
 destined, he shall free her." Or give her to his son, and 
 then she must be treated as an honorable girl. The natural 
 presumption being that her master was acquiring her to 
 make her his legitimate wife, he was fairly expected to 
 fulfill her expectations. Yet he could not be compelled to 
 do so. The legislator supposed that she had displeased 
 him. Some other reasons, less charitable, he would not 
 accept. If this poor girl did not appear to the master to be 
 good enough for his wife, he could not alienate, speculate 
 nor trifle with her, the modern part of Gretchen or Clarcheii 
 being unknown to Mosaism. 
 
14 SPIRIT (JF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATIOX. 
 
 What, then, was the reparation, the honorable amends 
 due to her? His son was to marry her, or he had to free 
 and endow her; assist her to a new establishment. The 
 master not consenting to be her spouse, could not be her lord 
 either ; and she could not stay under his roof with her 
 modesty unprotected. What noble championship of woman's 
 rights! As in those barbarous times, one loop-hole was 
 open yet to avarice and lust, as the master might contrive 
 to pass her away to somebody else, in order to get rid of 
 her shrieks and her claims, the legislator stopped up that 
 loop-hole. In just indignation he exclaims : " He is not 
 allowed to sell her to a stranger. He having been faithless 
 to her, she shall leave him ; she is free ! " 
 
 By one of the Hermeneutic rules that Hillel I, and 
 especially later, R. Ismael and R. Jose, the Galilean, had 
 contrived in order to enact new laws opportune for the 
 times, tradition curtailed that parental right to sell one's 
 own daughter, viz., limiting it to her puberty. If at that 
 time, about twelve and a-half years old, she had not been 
 betrothed to her master, she could leave him and dispose 
 of herself at full liberty. So, too, was she free, even within 
 the six years' servitude, if her master died. In Hindostan, 
 and even elsewhere, she had to ascend with him to the 
 funeral pile and serve him— in Hades. 
 
 Eve and Pandora. 
 
 Yet you will hear time and again the claim that the Bible 
 has created the prejudice of the inferiority of woman, and 
 this in the known legend of the temptation of the first couple 
 by the serpent (I. M. 3). The vulgar is misrepresenting the 
 sense of that Oriental allegory and overlooking the real views 
 of the sacred writer, plainly expressed in the history of the 
 creation of woman. There she is declared and emphasized 
 upon, as the noble companion of man — in contradistinction 
 with the Greek Pandora, created for the destruction of 
 
CHRISTIANITY AXD AVOMAN. 15 
 
 man. Indeed, womankind always was aware of the liio:li 
 plane the Bible placed them upon ; they willingly exchanged 
 the position of Pandora for that of E'Kie ; that of a drudge, 
 or a paramour, or a toy, for that of a free and equal help- 
 meet of man. The sex always felt a strong leaning towards 
 the Ebrew Bible, as the earliest advocate of their human 
 rights. The Greek poets imagined woman a bewitching 
 she-devil ; even Klytemnestra, Penelopeia and Phaedra are 
 not shown to much advantage. The Komans relegated her 
 into the Atrium, as the drudge or the nurse of the children. 
 The Spartans imagined her the fit prize for the strongest 
 warrior. The Teuton gambled her away, in lieu of some- 
 thing else. The Slav made her the beast of burden of the 
 household. 
 
 The Biblical Moralist alone thought her the free, equal 
 and dutiful companion of man ; and before him the legis- 
 lator had declared that no circumstances, however humble, 
 can rob her of the position of an honorable citizen, at the 
 level of king and high priest. 
 
 Christianity and Woman. 
 
 Hence Josephus narrates, that 1800 years ago the best 
 women of the proudest capitals of his time felt much 
 inclined to Judaism ; because they justly appreciated the 
 position which the Bible had given them, and this was the 
 good chance of Christianity. Christianity was the necessary 
 outcome of the moral and religious conditions of the, then, 
 Gentile world. The faith in the gods and their government 
 was broken down, and the world turned to Judaism, its 
 God — idea, morals, family, justice and purity. But the 
 Gentiles were not ready for the Judaic ceremonies and 
 observances. The then Talmudical Jews could not and 
 dared not separate the two to accommodate the world. 
 They had not the courage to give the Gentiles the first 
 alone and drop the latter, and what they did not dare, Paul 
 
16 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 did. And thus came out Christianity; it sprung from seeds 
 left unharvested. Christianity gathered in what the Bible 
 and the times had matured. It arose from the leading ele- 
 ments of the Biblical structure, with a strong Grseco-Egyp- 
 tian drapery. It is simply an abridged form of Judaism, 
 adapted to the state of mind of the then Gentile world. 
 Now the position of woman, not as a toy or a drudge, but 
 as the companion of man in his struggle for existence, shar- 
 ing in his burdens and his triumphs, — that position the Bible 
 gave to woman. Woman seized upon the opportunity, 
 gaining through that book the throne in the household, 
 and in her turn helped the book to conquer the world. 
 Rome feeling her sword failing, enlisted both book and 
 woman, and saved her dominion for a new lease of centuries. 
 Slowly mankind enlisted Bible, woman and Rome, and 
 gained by that its own emancipation, for right engenders 
 right, and freedom, freedom. Wrong has no future. 
 
 Civil Freedom Laws. 
 
 Let us now recapitulate the leading traits of the Mosaic 
 civil freedom laws, sketched more than 3,000 years ago. 
 They solemnly guarantee the liberty of each and every 
 inhabitant of the land. The citizen's liberty is an inherent 
 right, and hence inalienable. The criminal or the insolvent 
 man may, in punishment, be sold, for six years' labor, but 
 not beyond that term, guaranteeing him all the rights of a 
 free man, especially protection against over-hard work or 
 harsh treatment, or abuse of his helpless family. That law 
 declares woman to belong to her family ; never to a master. 
 It tolerates no illegitimate sexual connections. That is the 
 sense of the Talmudical axiom — a striking instance of a 
 noble and rigid moral sense. (^) "Any sexual union is natur- 
 ally presumed to be on legitimate grounds.'* It screens the 
 woman from the ill-usage of the libertine, the wealthy or 
 
 •nxT n^j^ya in^^yD ,n^')v onx px np\n (i) 
 
CIVIL FREEDOM LAWS. 17 
 
 tJie rough. Whoever thinks her too bad for his wife, is too 
 mean to be her lord. The Bible declared woman the equal 
 companion of man. (Genesis, 1:26). It yielded to the 
 times in making her subordinate to him, but on express 
 condition that their relations are those of love, not of lord- 
 ship ; those of husband and wife, not master and slave. 
 That law, too, protects her children against the avarice of 
 an unnatural or even an unjust father. Ever presuming and 
 treating mother and children as legitimate, both to enjoy 
 their full rights as wife and heirs ; not to be alienated, or 
 sold, or sent to a foundling house. Compare those laws 
 with other legislations, yea, even with some of modern 
 times, where to marry an ignoble person was considered a 
 crime, whilst at the same time public justice was indiffer- 
 ent to all irregular, domestic intercourse, deaf and blind to 
 the shrieks and tears of helpless women and children — 
 make this comparison, and you will find out, why many old 
 statute-books are buried in the dust of oblivion; why 
 others again have been wiped out in a pool of blood and 
 fire. Read of the long and bloody wars of Rome and Byzan- 
 tium grappling with the Teutonic invaders, under the 
 most violent commotions of social conflagrations, whilst the 
 Mosaic law of 3500 years ago is yet alive, is continually 
 spreading to all races and climes, is preserved and revered 
 as the embodiment of divine wisdom. Because it is not the 
 law for the strong, the crafty, the highborn, the rich, the 
 learned; it is not the law of the classes, but of the masses ; 
 not the privilege of this or that race or people or clime, but 
 the natural equity, the rule of conduct for all races, nations 
 and times. It is the nearest expression of the inherent fit- 
 ness of things, and hence bearing on its face the divine seal 
 of eternal truth. This is scientific revelation. 
 
18 spirit of the biblical legislation. 
 
 The Biblical State and Citizenship. 
 
 The personal liberty Mosaism guarantees to its citizens, 
 the human dignity it vindicates to each and every inhabit- 
 ant, modified entirely and radically its conception of the 
 State in relation to the individual. Through all antiquity 
 and until recent times, the State was all, the individual but 
 the cipher; the first the unit, the latter the zero; the first 
 counted for a thousand, a million, etc., according to the 
 number of its inhabitants, the latter reckoned for little or 
 nothing. The State was the aim, the inhabitants the means ; 
 the first was the real sovereign, the other the subject; the 
 commonwealth owned the soil, the laborer had the drudg- 
 ery; the government or prince was lawmaker, and yet 
 above the law; the subject had blindly to obey; his life, 
 his work, his opinion, his property, his family belonged to 
 his country and its chiefs. The legislator aimed at the 
 security, the greatness, the welfare thereof; whilst the 
 inhabitants were rarely taken into consideration. 
 
 The American and the French Revolutions, only one cen- 
 tury ago, had yet to struggle against such an all-absorbing 
 State and Prince. The American Colonies were simply 
 sacrificed to the interests of Old England. They existed 
 in order to buy English manufactures, and to produce for 
 the English markets. They existed as the flock — for the 
 good of the shepherds. When the French Premier, Xecker, 
 in 1789, convoked the Nobles, the Clergy and the Tiers-Etats 
 (the people) to remedy France's impending bankruptcy, 
 the liberal leaders felt that they had to contend against 
 that State — Moloch. A pamphlet appeared then which 
 gave the clue to the awful situation, in its very first lines. 
 ^^ QiC esi-ce qu' estle Tiers-Etats?^' (What is- the people). 
 ''Rien!" (Nothing). '' Que-veut-il ctre? Tout!'' (What 
 will it be ? All). This was Caesar's march over tlie Eubicon. 
 It plainly stated the bitter conflict between the old and 
 
THE STATE ELSEWHERE. 19 
 
 the new society. When, a little earlier, in 1661, Louis XIV 
 of France entered parliament, whip in hand, and ordered 
 the venerable assembly to register his edicts, he frowned 
 down their hesitations by his superb '■'■UEtat c'est moi'^ 
 "The State am I!" The people individually are nothing, 
 the State is all, and is incarnated in the prince. Such it 
 was everywhere and through all times, until the dawn of 
 this very century, except in the Biblical Society. 
 
 The State Elsewhere. 
 
 The boastful, free Greek Repiiblics of old were not a 
 whit above that crude relation between State and citizen. 
 Remember the ruinous intrigues between Athens, Sparta 
 and Thebes. Think of those of Rome and its provinces; 
 how and by what means she subjugated Italy and the 
 world. Ponder over the policy of the Roman and the Byzan- 
 tine emperors. Ever and ever there is the question of the 
 welfare and the glory of the State, that means the vanity 
 of the rulers. Never is there the question of the masses. 
 From ' Charlemagne to Louis XIV, from the Napoleons to 
 the present ruling dynasties, the same reckless policy pre- 
 vailed. When Madame de Stael asked Napoleon I, " Which 
 is the greatest woman?" — " She who rears the most soldiers 
 for the army," was his ominous reply. " What are the 
 people for?" the same was asked, and he replied as cate- 
 gorically, "To pay taxes and be food for the cannon." 
 Machiavelli, in his famous book "The Prince," put it into 
 doctrine : " Everything is good that increases the power of 
 the Prince ; the Prince is the State." 
 
 So it was from the dawn of history until our own 
 times, except in Mosaism, except in the Biblical Society. 
 Three thousand years ago, in Jud£ea, the inhabitant was 
 declared a citizen, not a subject; endowed with freedom 
 and rights, which no misfortune could wrest from him, not 
 even crime ; there he was the aim of all legislation ; he was 
 
20 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 there the sovereign and absolute owner, obeying but God 
 and law, whom every one was bound to obey, the State and 
 the governors, too ; none were born to rule, none to obey ; 
 his human dignity, his liberty were inalienable. The State 
 and the princes had what he, what the democratic law, chose 
 to yield to them ; they were for his welfare, not he for 
 theirs. The tithes were moral, free gifts, not taxation in 
 our sense. His conscience, his work, property, family, life 
 were his ; no privileges and no drawbacks ; no aristocracy 
 and no pariahs ; the rulers were elected, and obeyed as long 
 as they fulfilled their duty. The right of demonstration 
 and rebellion against tyranny was reserved and often exer- 
 cised. Thus, the modern democratic free State, as aspired 
 at and slowly unfolding in America and Western Europe, 
 was first attempted in the Biblical Society of yore. 
 
 The Biblical Democracy. 
 
 There were there later a king, an aristocracy, a priesthood, 
 with the same pretensions as their later confreres elsewhere, 
 but their roots were slender ; democracy could not be over- 
 turned by them. The priests had the privilege of serving 
 in the national sanctuary, but their emoluments were small ; 
 they had but the voluntary sacrifices of the people, {" God 
 is their inheritance," id est., the sanctuary and its offerings. 
 T. M., 10, 8.) As the poets in Schiller's "Division of the 
 Earth," they had but the spiritual domain and could never 
 become dangerous; whilst the ancient Ilagi were really 
 the political masters ; the Druidic priests possessed most of 
 the soil; the Catholic and Greek clergy owned one-third 
 part of their respective countries until of late. The Popes 
 claimed the sovereignty of the globe ; the Hebrew priest- 
 hood remained poor ; they and the Rabbis later constituted 
 but a spiritual aristocracy. The nobility of mind will 
 never be abolished, because it is the reward of personal 
 merit, and for the good of the people, and can never become 
 dangerous. 
 
DEMOCRACY, PROPHETS AND TRIBUNES. 21 
 
 There was, too, in Judaea a king with a retinue of satellites 
 and nobles, "but their tenure of office was precarious ; they 
 rooted in an essentially democratic soil ; they were appar- 
 ently a later concession to the new political constellations 
 and emergencies. Compare I. Samuel, Chapter 8; analyze 
 the circumstances, the popular murmurings, the hesitations, 
 the picture of priestly corruption and of bold royalty there. 
 Compare that with V. M., 17, 15, etc., and you will see how 
 democracy fastened its constitutional fetters around the 
 new monarch. He shall not be a foreign dynast, no blue 
 blood, no descendant from the gods, but an humble mortal, 
 a 'brother among his brethren; no assumed superiority, no 
 exorbitant wealth is allowed ; no harem and no standing 
 army. He shall study the Law all his lifetime and not 
 depart from it, but fear God and rule according to that law. 
 Then he will keep his office. If not, the natural right of 
 rebellion was reserved, and later but too often exercised. 
 This is quite another prince than that of Egypt, Assyria or 
 Babylonia, themselves gods and descendants of gods. In 
 Judaea God alone continued king. A mortal king was and 
 remained half a rebel. When the Ebrew people asked 
 a king of Samuel, God appeased him with the words : " It is 
 not thee, but Me, they have rejected from ruling over them." 
 (I. Samuel, 8, 7.) Saul was deposed by the prophet ; so was 
 Rehoboam by popular secession ; so were many other 
 princes, in the kingdom of Israel especially. You see in 
 spite of royalty and priesthood, the Mosaic democracy 
 remained unbroken. 
 
 Democracy, Prophets and Tribunes. 
 
 Nowhere is the spirit of democracy so conspicuous as in 
 the extraordinary part of the Biblical Prophets. Here we 
 see men without any public office or any artificial authority, 
 assume such a formidable sway and wield it with such 
 eclat, such indomitable perseverance, for such a length of 
 
22 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 time, and with such stupendous results. The prophetic role 
 is quite unique in the history of mankind; the only key 
 to it is : first, that original democratic spirit, and next, the 
 exalted purity and disinterestedness which characterized 
 those truly holy personages, by far superior to the tribunes 
 of Rome. Men sprung from the lowly ranks of the people, 
 with the thunder of Jahveh vibrating upon their lips, 
 boldly tearing off the mask from king, grandee and priest, 
 in the name of God, honesty and truth, whose lightnings 
 burn in their bosoms. Did you ever realize the magnan- 
 imity of Nathan addressing the conqueror David, on a 
 most delicate occasion, with "'Thou art the man?" Or 
 Elijah's defiance of the Kings and Queens of Israel ? Or 
 Jeremiah's denunciation of the iniquities of Jerusalem ? We 
 admire the courage of a Demosthenes or Cicero, of a 
 Schiller, Lessing or Victor Hugo, boldly affronting the 
 wrath of mob and prince. They cannot compare with the 
 self-sacrifice of the Hebrew prophets. Now the source of 
 their sublimity and virtue is to be found in the Mosaic 
 democracy. Democracy alone inspires the citizen with such 
 unselfishness, such heroism. Democracy alone breathes into 
 us true and pure love for our fellows. There alone we 
 feel patriotism and self-interest fused into one ; for there 
 alone our fellows are our family. ^Ye toil and sacrifice for 
 them, as our brothers and kinsmen. We feel, work and 
 lioard for our dearest ; not for a cold-hearted tyrant. Mon- 
 archies produce brilliant courtiers; Democracies create 
 great patriots and prophets. 
 
 Leaders and Orators Elsewhere. 
 
 The great orators and tribunes of Greece and Rome have 
 often been compared to the Ebrew prophets. But, super- 
 naturalism not considered now, looked upon from the 
 purely human standpoint, we must give the palm of victory 
 to the biblical prophets, not to the tribunes of Rome or 
 
LEADERS AND ORATORS ELSEWHERE. 23 
 
 Athens. Ten to one, these latter ones were demagogues, 
 brilliant rhetoricians and ambitious politicians, who 
 harangued for office, money and self-aggrandizement. For 
 one Aristides, Demosthenes and Epaminondas you will find 
 a hundred venal orators. For one or two Gracchi you will 
 find scores of Catalines and Antonios. Even with the best 
 of them was not absolute right and purity the aim, but 
 the interest of their State, viz., their caste. The overlauded 
 Cato hired out his fair slaves to the highest bidder. He 
 was ever ready with his Carthago delenda est, without 
 reflecting whether she had not as much right to exist as 
 Rome herself; and/when his caste was beaten, he suicided. 
 I can see there no special sublimity in the sitblimized Cato. 
 Nor can the Homeric nor the Virgilian soothsayers and 
 Sibyllas hold out any comparison. I could never get serious 
 at the frantic outpourings of the heathen mantis and vates. 
 They strongly savor of nonsense and deceit. They were the 
 tools of kingcraft and priestcraft. So was the Greek Calchas, 
 so Valeda the German. Otherwise are the biblical prophets, 
 tribunes of the people indeed. Whether you believe or 
 not, you cannot help being thrilled with deep emotion and 
 sympathy at the burden of their message. You feel they 
 are inspired by the true interests of the people ; by justice 
 and right universal; by truth, purity and goodness. Do 
 they speak for themselves, or even for their caste and class ? 
 No; they often harangue against their personal interests; 
 against the masters, and against the majority. They live on 
 roots ; sleep on stones ; hide in the wilderness ; at the mercy 
 of wind and wave, with hunger and death staring into their 
 faces ; but they yield not, hide not, hush not up. They 
 bring the message of truth, or of warning, or of consolation, 
 to those needing it. Read the harangues of Moses^ 
 Isaiah, Micha, Jeremiah. " Listen, O ye heavens, hear, O 
 earth, for God speaks ! Children, I have reared and exalted 
 — but they rebelled. Listen, O ye princes of Sodom. What 
 
 ^lcf~c^ 4£> Cci^ ^ Ji' £rtt »x^ e^ 
 
24 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 for to me your many sacrifices ? I have enough of your burnt 
 offerings. Bring no more of your falsehood — gifts and 
 hypocrisy — incense. ... Do away with your wicked 
 deeds; learn to do good; search for truth and justice; 
 encourage the oppressed, plead for the orphan and the 
 widow. If willing and obeying, you shall enjoy the fat of 
 the land ; if not, the sword is ready for you . . . Thus 
 speaks Jahveh." (Isaiah I.) The Bible contains a thou- 
 sand such addresses. They ring from the deep recesses of 
 a heart, brimful with truth, purity and sympathy. Now, 
 such men, such words, such holiness, could grow only in the 
 soil of genuine democracy. 
 
 The Biblical and the Non-Biblical State. 
 
 This striking contrast between the biblical State and the 
 non-biblical one is easily explained by looking at the ethical 
 basis of each. The first was built upon Monotheism ; the 
 last upon Polytheism. The one has as its foundation an all- 
 just and benign God, hence is right and benevolence the 
 rale of the State and the ideal of the citizen ; the other 
 has force and interest for its pedestal, hence the individual, 
 the woman, child, foreigner, weak, conquered, etc., are 
 without rights. The State alone is strong, and to him 
 belongs all. The prince there is free, is infallible. What 
 serves his advantage is right ; he can never be wrong — as 
 long as he is strong. So taught Machiavelli : " Everything 
 is permissible to the prince, if advantageous." So is arson, 
 poison, treachery, perjury, unjust wars, breach of word, 
 incest, assassination — all. Upon that basis acted the Tiberias, 
 the Neros, the Borgias of old and modern times. As to the 
 subject of the ancient State, he had but one virtue, one merit 
 and one distinction, viz., patriotism. His conscience, feel- 
 ings and thoughts were absorbed by patriotism ; to contribute 
 to the greatness of the State, or prince, was his only merit ; 
 that was superseding all other virtue and morality. The 
 
THE ROMAN AND THE JUD^AN CITIZEN. 25 
 
 Bible, on the contrary, basing upon right, exacted justice 
 from people, State, prince and noble, and, if neglected, let 
 loose upon them the flaming tongue of its prophets, its 
 orators, its leading priests. 
 
 The Roman and the Jud^ean Citizen. 
 
 A few well-known facts from history will illustrate this 
 difference of the Mosaic State from the Pagan one. A Spar- 
 tan mother loses her three sons on the battlefield, and 
 repudiates the fourth, because he had lost his buckler, with 
 his three brothers. — Brutus the elder delivers over his sons 
 to death, because of their suspected intrigues with the ban- 
 ished king — i. e. the State deadens a parent's heart, the 
 citizen stifles a parent's feelings. — The three pairs of the 
 Horaces and Curiaces fight the mortal battle of their respec- 
 tive countries. The last Horacius, victorious, murders his 
 sister for bewailing her betrothed Curiace — and receives 
 the laurel wreath, notwithstanding. — Mucius Scaevola burns 
 his hand off on a slow coal-fire, in order to deceive the 
 enemy into a precipitate retreat, for nature must be silent 
 in presence of the State. Thus the Moloch, called the State, 
 obtained the mastery over and the total sacrifice of all sym- 
 pathetic feelings ; over all morality and nature itself. 
 
 Another was the ideal of the Biblical Society. The object 
 there was not a great State, but a great nation teeming with 
 noble individuals. Not force, but goodness, was aimed at. 
 The highest ideal was, therefore, duty, justice, conscience — 
 the " voice of GodP For these the citizen must be ready to 
 die. State interest could not stifle them. What an immense 
 advance in the Mosaic Society over the most boasted ones 
 of Persia, Greece and Rome ! Compare the crooked ways and 
 petty jealousies of the several leading cities and leading men 
 of Greece in their fratricidal struggles for selfish liegemony. 
 Compare the crooked jiolicy of the leading patricians of 
 Rome in their conquest of the world. Compare the aims 
 
26 
 
 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 and means of its later leaders and imperatores. For one 
 lionest Galba, Trajan or Julian, liow many Neros and Cal- 
 igulas and Ottos? Nay, Judsea was infinitely beyond 
 Athens and Rome in true moral j^randeur. So, our Frank- 
 lins and Washingtons, Lafayettes and Neckers, Steins and 
 Carnots, took their models in Jerusalem, not in Rome, nor 
 Athens, nor in the Persian serag-lio. 
 
 Biblical Patriotism. 
 
 Let us return to the biblical patriotism. The Judsean 
 citizen cherished the State that protected himself, the ashes 
 of his fathers and the cradle of his children. He would 
 willingly die for it. Hundreds of thousands did die in the 
 defense of the first Jewish empire ; millions in that of the 
 second one. They died fighting in Judaea, Parthia, Baby- 
 lonia, Egypt, Africa, etc. They died since then on a 
 thousand battlefields. The Judsean knew how to die, heroic- 
 ally, for the State that has well deserved of him. Yet 
 patriotism is but one virtue out of a hundred equally 
 sacred. The State does not absorb our bei?ng nor our moral 
 sense. There is but one thing absolutely sacred : that is 
 duty. You remember the family picture — Abraham, ready 
 for the sacrifice of his son Isaac, hears the divine behest 
 calling: "Do not touch thy son, for I do know that thou 
 wilt obey My voice:' The Ebrew gracefully yielded life 
 when duty dictated. So teaches the Talmud : " For three 
 things a man shall die and not trespass : Idolatry, murder 
 and unchastity." 
 
 The nation and the citizen, not the State, being the aim 
 of the biblical patriot, he would sometimes drop the latter 
 to save the former. So did Jeremiah advise the Babylonian 
 exiles to identify themselves with their new homes. (Jere- 
 miah 29, 6). So did he repeatedly advise the Judaeans to 
 surrender to King Nebuchadnezzar, spare themselves and 
 hope and wait for better times. So did, seven centuries 
 
STRENGTH OF THE BIBLICAL LAW. 27 
 
 later, Rabbi Johanan ben Sakkai steal away in a coifin from 
 the tottering walls of Jerusalem, besieged by Titus, and save 
 the nation by erecting his school at Jamnia. Whilst that 
 grand, pathetic legend of the mother stoically witnessing 
 the tortures of, and encouraging her seven sons in adhering 
 to their inherited faith, shows us in strikingly lurid colors 
 the Ebrew ideal of self-sacrifice for duty. Thus we recog- 
 nize that the Bible has given to the world not alone 
 Monotheism, but a phalanx of other ideas not less fruitful 
 of human happiness. Among these are the principles of 
 a free State and free citizenship, of human dignity, of indi- 
 vidual freedom, of social equality, of man's equal rights 
 and. duties, of freedom of the woman, of charity as a duty 
 to the poor, the weak, the stranger, the orphan and the 
 widow — basing society upon right and sympathy, not 
 force and egoism. 
 
 Strength of the Biblical Law. 
 
 Compare these laws with other legislations of even the 
 proudest nations, and you will easily find out the cause why 
 these latter have disappeared under the dust of ages, or have 
 been wiped out in the collapse of decaying races ; whilst the 
 Bible is alive, silently gaining over and permeating man- 
 kind, revered as the word of God. For what is good now 
 and thousands of years ago, good for all ages, countries and 
 conditions — that is divine, that is dictated by the spirit of 
 God, the universal mind. 
 
 We may further learn from the above that only what is 
 God's word, what is just and holy, and good for all, not for 
 the few, is lasting and enduring. Hence, that not chance, 
 blind force or cunning prevail, but an all-wise law, a provi- 
 dential plan, as suggested by the Bible perhaps identical 
 with evolution, governs and permeates human history. That 
 is one of the grand traits of that great book, running through 
 all of its parts and chapters and verses; through laws, 
 moralists or historians, that not chance or force or cunning 
 
28 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 govern the world and man, but an all-wise Supreme Being, 
 providing for the eternal fitness of things. In the long run 
 only the just and the wise will be triumphant. The heathen 
 view was the very opposite. The gods are not just and wise. 
 Fate is stronger than even Zeus, and fate is blind accident, 
 or at best brute force, a crushing necessity. Pre-ordained ? 
 Arranged? That is, distinctly, never stated. Eternal fitness 
 of things is not fate. For neither human reason nor divine 
 wisdom ever attempted to raise the veil of fate. Yet it is 
 the supreme power, unscrutable and blind, in whose pres- 
 ence Zeus himself trembles. Now, that is a most desolate 
 doctrine, not true, baffling all human effort and all wisdom. 
 It is most dangerous to a virtuous, serene life. It is a theory 
 for daring Prometheus, Alexander or Napoleon I. The Bible 
 doctrine of a just, all-wise Providence is more favorable to 
 both, to human virtue and human happiness. Hence more 
 appropriate to underlie the foundations of a State. 
 
 PART II. 
 SOCIAL EQUALITY. 
 
 Have the ancient times not been cognizant of the principle 
 of individual liberty and human dignity, much less did they 
 know the other principle, the necessary complement there- 
 of, viz., social equality. The equality as to rights and 
 duties of the different members composing the community 
 was entirely foreign to the ancient world. 
 
 Society was one great hierarchy, one great chain of subor- 
 dination, where every link had its superior and its inferior 
 link: the king, the high-priest, the general, the princes, 
 the nobles, the soldiers, the officials, the proprietors, the 
 mechanics, the peasants, the slaves. T7iis is the " militant 
 social type.''^^^^ 
 
 In earlier times this hierarchy was not only personal ; 
 no, it descended from father to son and grandson. The 
 
 (1) Herbert Spencer. 
 
MAX-SERVANT. 29 
 
 entire number of inhabitants were divided into castes or 
 sharply differentiated classes of people, and it was not per- 
 mitted to pass from one class into another. If your father 
 was a soldier, you would be but a soldier; if a tailor, your 
 children had to be tailors, and nothing else. Nor was inter- 
 marriage allowed between different castes. Mosaism alone 
 of all antiquity knows not of this hierarchy. Every one 
 was as good as his neighbor. Every one could choose his 
 own calling. Everyone could cumulate or change his occu- 
 pations, if he thought he could do so profitably. There 
 was indeed an official priesthood belonging to a particular 
 family, but they never ruled, as elsewhere. The judges, 
 the soldiers, the generals, and later the kings, the teachers, 
 the prophets, did not belong to any caste; they came from 
 every class and every rank of the people, as part and parcel 
 of tlie people. In the kingdom of Judaea the more conserva- 
 tive part of Israel, there did spring up a dynasty and an 
 aristocracy, but it never degenerated into a caste. The 
 different estates of nobles, priests, Levites and Israelites 
 did always intermarry and occupy alike any position. The 
 principle of social equality, of the same laws, same rights 
 and same duties for all, was first recognized by Moses three 
 thousand years ago. Thus individual liberty and social 
 equality both mankind owes to the Bible. 
 
 Man-Servant. 
 
 Which are the passages applying to social equality? Let 
 us first review the verses mentioned above, but now con- 
 sidered from the social standpoint. (Exodus 21, 2). '^ When 
 thou wilt buy an Ebrew servant, he shall serve for six years; 
 in the seventh he shall go out free, without compensation." 
 Why so ? Because all Ebrews are and remain equal before 
 the laws. Because manhood-rights and equality are origi- 
 nal and fundamental principles. 
 
 We read in Levit. 25, 39 : " AVhen thy brother has impover- 
 ished and becomes thy servant, let him not do any slave 
 
30 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 work, treat him as a hired servant. With the Jubilee he 
 shall go free and return to his family acre — "for my ser- 
 vants are the Israelites." To which Rashi adds : " Israel 
 is God's servant, not the slave of slaves." How magnani- 
 mous ! What a generous pride ! The ancient state was one 
 long chain of social inequality. First came the Pontifex 
 Maximus, then the Emperor, the provincial ruler, the duke, 
 the baron, the monk, the soldier, the burgher, at last the 
 Jew, upon whom all trampled. " I defy all your hierarchy," 
 shouted, proudly, Rashi, the great commentator, "I serve 
 not burgher, soldier, monk, baron, king or pope ; I obey 
 none but God. You rob me of my rights, my honors, my 
 share of the land, yea, of the warm sunlight and the fresh 
 air, yet you can't make me a slave. The Ebrew is but 
 God's servant." Thus spoke a Jewish writer in the eleventh 
 century. This is the fruit of Mosaic social equality, viz., 
 human dignity, elasticity of mind, energy under adverse 
 circumstances. The mob was happy in feeling the Jew 
 lower than themselves. The Jew proved free in his very 
 chains. " I am the servant of God, freer than all your 
 hierarchy, and am not the slave of slaves." 
 
 Woman-Servant. 
 
 (Exod. 21, 7.) — "When a man will sell his daughter — as a 
 help— she shall not be treated as male servants, but the 
 acquisition of her services imply the expectation of ulti- 
 mate wedlock. If not, she leaves without compensating 
 the master." Why so ? Because the law guarantees the 
 equality of man and woman ; and more so because, as in 
 our United States, Judaea allowed to woman even privileges. 
 She being the weaker party, the law was especially solicit- 
 ous for her. The ancient world allowed the father to sell 
 his child-daughter. Yes, says the Mosaic law, he can sell, 
 i. e., deliver her to her husband, not to a master. The 
 
RIGHT OF ASYLUM. 31 
 
 Eabbis, in the same sense, add : " Woman rises with her 
 husband, but never descends with him." (^) 
 
 Grime and Murder. 
 
 (Exod. 21, 12)—" Who smites a man, that dies by it, shall 
 himself be put to death." No difference of rank, class or 
 nativity, nor is a money compensation admitted. All other 
 ancient legislators discriminated, whether patrician or 
 plebeian, yjatron or client, native or alien, free-born or slave. 
 They allowed compensation, which alone is a token of 
 social inequality. (Exod. 21, 13) — "When the killing was 
 not Intentional, but accidental, then the innocent man- 
 slayer shall have the chance and right of asylum. He 
 shall not be the victim of blood-revenge at the hands of the 
 relatives of the killed person." The blood-revenge, i. e., to 
 avenge a relative killed, was universally acknowledged as 
 the first duty of kinship. Social opinion was inexorable 
 thereupon. Mosaism mitigated it. The intentional killing 
 is murder, and can be expiated only by the death of the 
 murderer. The accidental slaying was sufl3.ciently atoned 
 by exile; hence the right of asylum. Thus it states (Exod. 
 21, 14) : " When a man will intentionally waylay his 
 neighbor and kill him, then take him from my altar to 
 die." The ancients abused the right of asylum, granting it 
 indiscriminately even to the worst criminals, especially to 
 powerful ones. The Mosaic law allowed the use and dis- 
 carded the abuse, sheltering the innocent, never the guilty, — 
 because of social equality. 
 
 Right of Asylum. 
 
 So the ancient world guaranteed immunity to criminals 
 w^ho succeeded in escaping to some famous temple. That 
 of Diana, Apollo, Jupiter Ammon, etc., were such. There 
 were in Christendom hundreds of places of refuge during 
 
 ■ rhv^ Dy mnv n^i n^iy hb'n (i) 
 
32 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the Middle Ages tliat screened the thief, the murderer, the 
 political intriguer, from just punishment. Ecclesiastical 
 Eome abounded in such holy asylums. Many churches 
 and abbeys became thus the dens of all the outlaws and 
 desperadoes, whilst criminal priests were never delivered 
 to the arm of public justice. The Bible of three thousand 
 years ago, on the contrary, ignored such privileges of places 
 or persons. With awful rigor, it states : " From my altar 
 take the criminal to his deserved punishment." Crime shall 
 not be sheltered by the sanctity of place. Crime at the altar 
 is doubly hateful. It defiles the altar, and cannot be purified 
 by it. The Bible thus allows no compensation and no 
 immunity to places or persons ; no chicanery, no tricks, no 
 asking. Who was the killer and who the killed one? 
 whether the murderer belonged to a powerful or rich 
 family ? no quibbling about murder in " first or second 
 degree" — the loopholes of trickery. Our criminal cases 
 offer what dilemmas, monstrosities, surprises, as if justice 
 were blind and deaf. If the jury had before their eyes 
 these plain, lucid, unsophisticated verses, there would be 
 no room for chicanery, bribery and venal oratory. They 
 would see their way clear, wrong would be punished and 
 innocence avenged, and the jury institution, one of the most 
 glorious bulwarks of liberty, would not be so often discred- 
 ited as it is. The lawyer triumphs when succeeding to 
 whitewash a murderer, not caring for innocence unavenged, 
 justice ashamed and lynch law calling for self-help. 
 
 Penal Laws. 
 
 " Who smites a man that dies, shall be killed." (^) (Exod. 
 21, 12 and 23). " Who kills shall be killed. Life for life." 
 Even so the Talmud declares the death penalty for murder, 
 as also for other capital crimes against the State and society, 
 as will be ascertained in other places. Modern over-senti- 
 
 • c'Dj nnn ^^'dj ,nov mo n»i ^'n n^o (i) 
 
CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 
 
 33 
 
 mentality is against capital pnnisliment. How to screen 
 society against tigers in Imman shape? Wliy be sentimen- 
 tal to the criminal and callous to the innocent victim? 
 How to deter from crime? That is not satisfactorily 
 answered. Imprisonment for life, hard labor, deportation 
 to Siberia or Cayenne is costly, probably more cruel and. 
 unsafe and not striking enough. 
 
 Capital Punishment and Striking Examples. 
 
 The Bible is practical. It aims at satisfying both, the 
 wronged party as much as the public. The feeling of 
 revenge, if moderated, is natural and wise. Its substratum 
 is the instinct of self-defense. Every one feels the law of 
 equity in his bosom, the wrong-doer and the wrong sufferer. 
 The first feels deterred, the other encouraged by it. Hence 
 is sentimentality for the murderer both wrong and foolish. 
 Next is the punishment of crime the safeguard for society 
 at large. Capital punishment reassures best outraged 
 society, for it does it strikingly. Imprisonment, deportation 
 does it not. An embezzler in a Canada hotel encourages 
 thieves ; in jail and in the criminal's jacket he deters. J. J. 
 Rousseau narrates that in order to show his pupil ^'■Emile" 
 the consequences of lewdness, he called with him at a 
 hospital of veneric diseases. — Will you make a young girl 
 conscious of the dangers of gallantry, take her to a repre- 
 sentation of Victor Hugo's " Rigoletto." There is nothing 
 so effective as objective lessons, and quick punishment is the 
 best object lesson. It is a powerful motive with the Bible 
 in punishing, that " They shall hear and fear." (^) The 
 defaulting bank cashier running away with his prey, is poor 
 consolation to the depositors. To deter the evil propensities 
 from crime, the punishment must be quick, striking, public, 
 and serve as an example of rash acts followed by stern 
 consequences. The fashion of newspapers lionizing a bold 
 
 ."iKT'i lyoK'^ |yD^ (1) 
 
34 SPIRIT OF THK BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 criminal, reporting' daily about him, as a hero, or a victim, 
 is most mischievous. Guiteau, the murderer of Garfield, 
 was quite as much talked about as that noble patriot him- 
 self. He was presented to the vulgar as a sensation, and all 
 the roughs and the idiots mistook it for glory. The only 
 tenderness the Talmud has for such a man is a quick death. 
 They say: "Love thy neighbor as thyself," means here: 
 '''choose for him a proper death." (^). 
 
 In our times of huge standing armies, incessant dynastic 
 wars and crushing competition, where wealth goes to the 
 wealthy, and starvation to the poor, where plutocracy on 
 one hand, and pauperism on the other, have created the 
 most tremendous Social question, absorbing all other polit- 
 ical dilemmas, in such an age, the biblical common sense 
 axiom of " Who kills shall be killed " is good enough. As 
 to the future, let it take care of Itself. The future may 
 better provide against crime and too cruel punishment. 
 
 Filial Disrespect. 
 
 Exod. 21:15 and 17: "Whosoever smites his father and 
 mother, or even curses them, shall die." That law appears 
 to be of a draconic rigor. Yet in primitive, rude socieiies 
 it was just and salutary. Later traditions added their 
 accompanying qualifications. The Talmud requires (San- 
 hedrin SS*") in such cases, the majority of the culprit, a 
 solemn warning, in presence of witnesses, and a visible 
 wound inflicted, in presence of witnesses, and that in spite of 
 the express warning and the announcement of the resultant 
 punishment, as also many other restrictions fully answering 
 to the purpose. Now, when a grown person, in full reason, 
 in quiet temper, well forewarned, is so abundant and so 
 conscience-seared, so obdurnte, and beastly, when no longer 
 needing the sustenance and help of a parent, to forget all the 
 tender and most sacred ties of blood, gratitude, reverence, 
 
 ■ns' nn'o "b 113 ,"Ti»3 iy~i^ nanxi (i) 
 
MAN-STEALING. 35 
 
 and to curse and smite a parent — that shows of the utmost 
 depravity; and society has no interest in sparing such a 
 monster. Modern times have been busily at work in 
 undermining filial piety. I am afraid modern times have 
 gone too far. Beware! American society especially, beware ! 
 The French philosopher Jules Simon, of late gave a sad 
 picture of the reverence and filial piety in — America especi- 
 ally. 
 
 Man-Stealing. 
 
 Exod. 21, 16.) — " Who kidnaps a person and sells him, or 
 detains him in his power, shall die." Now, remember this 
 law was enacted over three thousand years ago, at a time 
 when slavery was universal, conquest legitimate, the right 
 of the stronger fully acknowledged, equality unknown. At 
 such a time the Mosaic legislator declared man stealing a 
 capital crime. Ii may be caviled, he meant but stealing a 
 fellow Ebrew, a free, civilized being, a grown person, a 
 man — Yir-Ish in Ebrew — not a child or woman, but that is 
 caviling and belittling. The plain face of the verse is : 
 " Whosoever kidnaps a person shall die." Should even the 
 interpretation, by the standard of antiquity, restrict the 
 range of the word Ish-Yir, nevertheless the absolute sense 
 thereof is universal, sweeping, covering all cases, per- 
 sons, sexes and races, and thus be a solemn declaration 
 against all kinds of man-stealing and enslaving. Let me 
 here invoke on behalf of liberalism the current theory of 
 Inspiration. I admit that ancient and more modern times 
 did restrain the sense of that verse to prohibiting only the 
 kidnapping of a fellow-citizen; but why should not the 
 modern interpreter take the verse in a universal and 
 absolute sense, befitting all times and cases and truly worthy 
 of the Deity?— 
 
36 spirit of the biblical legislation. 
 
 Maltreating a Slave. 
 (Exod. 21, 20.) — "When a man will smite his male or 
 female slave with a rod — not with a dangerous weapon — 
 and they die under his hand, they shall be avenared." The 
 Eabbinical tradition is : ''The murderer shall suffer capital 
 punishment by the sword." That slave is, of course, a non- 
 Ebrew bondsman. For, as to the Ebrew servant, acquired 
 but for six years' work, that needed no special law, his life 
 wasguaranteedbythe previous general axiom. — (Exod. 21, 12): 
 " Who kills shall be killed."—" But, if the slave, beaten by 
 his master, remain alive and erect for a day or two, then — 
 capital punishment, according to tradition — such a^enge- 
 ment shall not take place, since the slave was his property 
 and bought by him" (Exod. 21, 21), he losing his money 
 anyhow. Here is a concession to social conditions. The 
 master could buy bondsmen and hold them, hence he must 
 be permitted to chastise them, when necessary, with a rod, 
 not with a dangerous weapon. If, long afterwards, death 
 ensues, he loses his property anyhow. Follows there no 
 other punishment? W^ait and read further : (Exod. 21, 26, 27,) 
 " When a man knocks out the eye, or even the tooth of his 
 slave, he shall let him go free in compensation for liis eye 
 or his tooth." Here is social equality. The Bible originally 
 declared all men free and equal, all entitled to liberty and 
 happiness, all made in the image of God, all offspring of 
 the same parental couple ^Gen. 1, 9), yet it tolerated the 
 social institution of slavery, but tried by all means to safe- 
 guard the slave as much as it could. Of course, in those 
 remote times naaster and slave were of the same physio- 
 logical race. Spartan and Helot, Ebrew and Gibeonite 
 belonged to the same stock and clime. That fierce antago- 
 nism, as between Caucasian or not, civilized and not civil- 
 ized, etc., was not yet developed, and cannot be taken here 
 into consideration. The non-Caucasian races were simply 
 never contemplated in the Pentateuch. 
 
eye for eye and democracy. 37 
 
 Eye for Eye and Democracy. 
 
 Tlie democratic spirit of, and the higli sens8 for rigid and 
 equal justice of Mosaism, is particularly illustrated by the 
 legal axiom expressed in Exod. 21, 24: "Eye for eye, tooth 
 for tooth, (') hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, blow 
 for blow, wound for wound." Here is the consecrated prin- 
 ciple of retaliation, the legal formula of natural justice and 
 equity, of original equality, as practiced by small societies 
 living yet in a state of nature, following yet the unsophis- 
 ticated dictates of unbiased conscience, prompted by the 
 inborn instincts of talion, as deposited in our breast by the 
 Author of all, before conquests and castes had robbed 
 man of his pristine sense of self-preservation. That formula 
 has been decried as barbarous and harsh. Yet it is but the 
 strict logical, mathematical, legal expression of full and 
 untempered equality and justice before the law, when dis- 
 passionately looked at. Consider : If one man is as good 
 and valued as much as another man, then necessarily, one 
 man's eye is as valuable as another one's eye. If one is 
 equal to one, then one-tenth part, etc., is equal to another 
 one-tenth part, etc. Whilst, if, instead of that Mosaic 
 axiom, we shall put fines instead, or compensation, as a 
 principle of law, then the natural equality of man is 
 destroyed. For the rich can pay $100 easier tlian the poor 
 can pay ^10. Hence, punishment would be unequal. The 
 rich would pay and laugh at it; the poor be ruined or 
 oftener submit to loss of life or limb. In both ways is 
 equality destroyed. To declare the value of each and every 
 eye to be $100, would not be equal punishment, for the 
 value of $100 is vastly different to the rich man and to the 
 poor one. Compensation means, therefore, aristocracy. 
 " Eye for eye " is democracy. Thus, " eye for eye and tooth 
 for tooth," or Jus talionis, is the legal measure of the 
 
 •pj? nnn py (i) 
 
38 SPIRIT OF THE BIB'LICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 biblical civil and criminal law. No doubt sympathy will 
 have opportunities to demur. In practice we may have 
 occasion to deviate from it, but as a legal, universal axiom, 
 it can not be impugned. Justice alone is equitable to both 
 parties ; sympathy favors one party and wrongs the other. 
 It is claimed that in 1888, the noble -hearted, late Cardinal 
 Manning demurred against that axiom on the following 
 occasion : Daring a time of popular distress, he said that 
 the law of '■'■Thou slialt not steal^^ ''does not apply to a 
 hungry man stealing a loaf of bread." I admit that Cardinal 
 Manning could not be condemned for heresy on that score. 
 I acknowledge that decision does honor to his heart. 
 Nevertheless, could we accept that sentiment as a principle 
 of law ? Where should we draw the boundary line ? A 
 poor man stealing a loaf is pardonable, and a poor man 
 stealing a dime ? stealing a dollar ? stealing a winter 
 coat ? stealing $50 to pay his rent ? $200 to start in busi- 
 ness his daughter? steal an office to support his family? 
 Some years ago Maxwell killed his friend, needing his 
 diamonds. Guiteau murdered Garfield for having refused 
 him a consulship, much needed. Please extend the line 
 till you arrive at Cromwell and Napoleon taking a crown — 
 much needed by them, too ! . . . No doubt, in practice 
 there is a vast difference between stealing a loaf and steal- 
 ing a crown. In theory, " eye for eye and tooth for tooth " 
 is alone a safe principle, and society must insist upon it. 
 
 Compensation. 
 
 But it will be asked, "How can 'eye for eye' practically 
 be carried out?" May not the offender die under his 
 punishment ? In a state of nature that would be no serious 
 objection. 
 
 A scandalous author being asked by a witty judge, ''why 
 he writes such objectionable stuff," answered, "I must live, 
 sir." And the judge replied : " I do not see the necessity 
 
THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENT. 39 
 
 thereof." Should the semi-murderer fully die, he could 
 not much complain. Let the rogue bear the consequences 
 of his viciousness. But it is true, its application is revolting 
 to civilized society. Well, then, in civilized society the 
 formula of iallon remained but a formula, a theorem. 
 
 In practice the principle of compensation was ruling. The 
 Rabbinical tradition was that, in practice, "eye for eye" 
 meant the value of an eye, but with the important differ- 
 ence that equality, the democratic principle, nevertheless 
 remained safe-guarded. For the fine was graded — not equal 
 for poor and rich. The rich and the poor paid in propor- 
 tion to their wealth and to the value of the eye to the 
 offended party. Thus the legislator stated the rigid prin- 
 ciple of retaliation, leaving to the judge the application of 
 the law. The judge determined the amount of compensa- 
 tion, varying proportionately, always keeping in view the 
 fact that $100 to the rich is no heavier than |10 to the 
 poor, etc. 
 
 The Old and New Testament. 
 
 A great deal of sentimentalism has been wasted on that 
 subject. " Behold the harshness of the Old Testament in 
 comparison with the New one." The one says : "Love thy 
 neighbor as thyself ; " the other, " Love thine enemy too." 
 The one, "Take the criminal from mine altar to die;" the 
 other, or rather, the Church, allowed him to escape into a 
 sacred asylum or by vicarious atonement, in this world and 
 hereafter. The one says, " Tooth for tooth ; " the other, " If 
 the wicked smites thee on the right cheek, offer him the left 
 one too." The one, " The thief shall pay five oxen for the 
 one stolen ; " the other, " If he steals thy coat, give him thy 
 mantle, too," etc. The answer is : The Old Dispensation is 
 a code of laws, for men as they are, for a political State, a 
 real, live society, with the actual, human passions and self- 
 ishness, and a very small stock of charity. Hence are rigid 
 
40 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 right and equity rule of conduct. The New Dispensation 
 is ideal, for man as he might be ; its principle is self-sacri- 
 fice, altruism, the very protest against man as he is. The 
 Old Testament is practical law, enacted for the State as it 
 is, and there rigid right with a small admixture of love and 
 charity, can reasonably be asked. Or else every one will 
 rely upon the charity of others, and act from sheer selfish- 
 ness for himself. If the rich should work and give all to 
 the poor, every one would prefer being poor, and receive 
 all from the rich. Now, if all would stop work, whence 
 should come the rich ? And if all are poor and lazy, society 
 will soon starve. 
 
 Other aims are pursued by the New Testament. It was 
 intended for the kingdom of Heaven upon earth, with self- 
 sacrifice as its leading principle, for beatitude in the here- 
 after as the final aim. This world is a vale of tears, tainted 
 with original sin, the purgatory of the future Paradise. It 
 aimed at a community of monastics (the Essenes), living 
 in stoic simplicity and poverty (Ebionites), with community 
 of property, and preferring celibacy to marriage. This 
 world is doomed to destruction, and the kingdom of Heaven 
 about to dawn. — Hence the discrepancies between the Old 
 and the New Testament. Now look to the world in 1893. 
 The interminable wars and huge standing armies — exorbit- 
 ant taxations, with plutocracy, soldateska, pauperisn, dyna- 
 mite and constant social upheavals, eighteen centuries 
 after the New Testament Era ! Thus Herbert Spencer 
 pointedly remarks that as yet, there exists no really Chris- 
 tian State in the world. 
 
 Rabbinical Penal Code. 
 
 We have spoken of the leading principles underlying the 
 Mosaic criminal jurisprudence. We have seen that spirit 
 to be eminently practical; the emanation of a great law- 
 giver, truly inspired by the desire to found a strong society, 
 
RABBIXrCAL PENAL CODE. 41 
 
 capable of coping with the " evil inclinations," the bestiality 
 and selfishness of man. He felt that law is for the protec- 
 tion of the innocent victim, not of the criminal transgressor. 
 He gave the accused all chances of proving his innocence, 
 if so ; but none, or few, to profit by the intricate meshes of 
 paragraphs, chicanery and subterfuge. We read (V. M. 1 9, 16): 
 **Bytwo or three witnesses charges shall be established." 
 "Thou Shalt examine and inquire diligently." "False 
 testimony shall be rigorously punished." "But he insisted 
 that wrong shall be removed." "Eye for eye, and tooth 
 for tooth — whosoever shall spill blood, his blood shall be 
 spilled." "Innocent blood cries to God, and that blood 
 pollutes the land." "The unintentional manslayer was to 
 flee to and hide in an asylum." The intentional murderer 
 shall be seized and examined, condemned and executed by 
 a regularly instituted court, not by lynch-law. Thus the 
 leading traits of the Mosaic penal laws were dictated by 
 the divine spirit of common sense, and with the pure aim 
 of firmly establishing a civilized State and society, screening 
 innocence, deterring crime, and giving the citizen as much 
 security and happiness as the circumstances allow. This 
 general outline of civil and criminal law is sound. Its 
 principle lies deep in liuman nature, and hence it underlies 
 the best of all penal codes extant. All build upon the 
 principle of : (^) " Whosoever spares the guilty, punishes the 
 innocent." 
 
 Unfortunately, lay, and even professional, men are often 
 liable to false sympathy. Seeing before them, not the 
 murdered victim, but the person tried for his life, they think 
 only of the possible wrong to him, and never of the certain 
 wrong done by him. They pity him, forgetting that pity for 
 him is cruelty to the victim and to society at large. Now, 
 this charge of over-sentimentalism, which cannot be laid 
 at the door of the Mosaic legislation, appears to me, to be 
 
 (1) (Jui parcit nocontihus, iiiiiocfiitibiis piiiiit. 
 
42 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the burden of the Rabbinical penal code. The tendency 
 of the New Testament to put love in place of right, seems 
 to prevail in the Talmud, too. It appears, the rigid discip- 
 line of the Ten Words, the noble family influence, the refined 
 Monotheism and the deeply inculcated prophetic morality 
 had long ago educated the Teachers in Israel to such a high 
 idealism, that they knew crime but by hearsay, and legislated 
 upon it only theoretically, not to meet stern facts and pro- 
 tect society. Several large treatises discuss the Talmudical 
 penal laws. But they all bear the stamp of idealism, as if 
 they could never make up their minds that 'crime is actual 
 and must be restrained. They asked such proofs of guilt 
 that, a hundred to one, crime remained unpunished. It 
 would seem as if they were rather afraid of doing than of 
 restraining wrong. They started from the Mosaic law, but 
 interposed so many points and clauses and paragraphs as ever 
 to leave the case doubtful and give the criminal the benefit 
 of the doubt. They were implicitly trusting in miraculous, 
 providential interference that the guilty would be punished, 
 for heaven's sake. 
 
 Illustrations — Simon ben Shetaii. 
 
 Here is an illustration : In Babil. Sanhedrin 37a, the 
 leading treatise of the Rabbinical penal code, we read : 
 "How shall we overawe the witnesses?" They are to be 
 told: Perhaps do you speak only by guess, or by hearsay, 
 or by witness, even of an honest man ? Remember, we, the 
 judges, shall closely examine yon, for human life is therein 
 involved, . . . and future generations, . . . and 
 whosoever destroys a person is just as wicked as if he had 
 destroyed the world, . . . following up with a long 
 homily. Upon this Mishna comes the Rabbinical discus- 
 sion: The witnesses are asked : Did you see the accused 
 running after a man, into a ruin, and you were after him, 
 whereupon you saw the accused with bloody sword in hand 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS — SIMON BEN SHETAH. 4J 
 
 and the murdered man weltering in Ms blood? If that is 
 what you saw, you have seen nothiui^! . . . We have 
 learned R. Simon ben Shetah (prince of the Sanhedrin) 
 said : So may I see consolation that once upon a time I saw 
 one running after a man, into a ruin, and I run after him, and 
 I saw a sword in his hand with blood trickling down from it 
 and the other man weltering on the ground. Whereupon I 
 exclaimed : ''Bad man, who has killed this person? Either 
 I or you! But how can I help it; I cannot punish you, 
 because the Thorah — Law — has declared : ' By the mouth of 
 two witnesses he shall die.' (V. M. 19). ' He who examines 
 the thoughts shall punish thee for this murder ! ' " Indeed) 
 it was rumored that the murderer did not stir from the 
 place, " but expired from the bite of a serpent." — So for 
 Sanhedrin 37, a and h. 
 
 Now of that same Simon ben Shetah, it is told in another 
 place of the identical treatise, that he was a very energetic 
 man, fiercely striving to extirjiate fraud and crime, to such 
 an extent that he had hanged eighty witches in one day, and 
 that once upon a time some aggrieved parties conspired 
 against him and accused his own son of some imaginary 
 crime, which son was actually condemned and executed, 
 though his accusers acknowledged, before the execution? 
 that they had slandered him; the Rabbinical law not 
 allowing witnesses to recant what they had testified to. 
 (Sanhedrin, 44 &, Rashi and elsewhere.) 
 
 The story is piquant enough and runs thus : '' A ghost had 
 denounced in a dream the Synhedrial President, Simon ben 
 Shetah, for his tolerating Jewish witches in Askalon, a 
 neighboring Philistine city. Thereupon he surprised eighty 
 such witches ; he, followed by as manj'- stout, young students, 
 who, on entering their conventicle by stratagem, raised them 
 from the ground to render their witchcraft impotent (^j — the 
 known popular superstition. — They took them forcibly out 
 
 nitt^ijr msKorD pN dvj'i ,)'-iN'n p jno nnN* c^'-x n-ar iDjant* nyc-o (i) 
 
44 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 and at once hanged them. Thereupon their relatives 
 avenged them ^y accusing of a deadly crime the president's 
 own son, who was really executed, though the witnesses, in 
 time, confessed their slander." The legendary character of 
 the tale is palpable. A judge who abstained from punishing 
 a murderer upon the best circumstantial evidence, hanged 
 eighty women, in a foreign country, in one day, summarily, 
 upon the strength of their own confession, contrary to 
 Eabbinical law, for witchcraft, and had his son executed, 
 thougli his accusers confessed their mendacity ! All of 
 these stories aim only at showing the eccentricities of 
 Simon ben Shetah, and say nothing more. 
 
 Of course, both these stories are legendary, yet they show 
 the spirit and drift of the Rabbinical statute. Let us give 
 here a cursory outline of its principles : Two witnesses, at 
 least, had to testify to the facts of the crime. Self-incrimi- 
 nation and confession was not tolerated (^) ; no torture was 
 ever used. No circumstantial evidence, even of a most certain 
 nature, was admitted; only eye-witnesses, solidly testifying 
 to each and every item of the case, had a hearing. The 
 least contradiction was invalidating the testimony; any 
 doubt was for the benefit of the defendant. The witnesses 
 were overawed and severely cross-examined, almost intimi- 
 dated. (') They were questioned about the major and the 
 minor circumstances, the surroundings, the hour, day, 
 month, year. Release year and .Jubilee, the place, tlie cloth- 
 ing, the colors, etc., of the case. If several persons committed 
 one murder, he alone who gave the death blow was guilty of 
 murder; hence again entangling questions. Above all, the 
 witness must have giten forewarning to the would-be 
 aggressor, and this just before the act, with mentioning of 
 punishment, etc, which delinquent must have expressly 
 acknowledged. Each of the witnesses must be an eye- 
 
 .yjn vovy D'L"ro mN px np;n (i) 
 
 .prD'"SQ 1 2) 
 
II-LUSTEATIOKS — SIMON BEN SIIETAH. 45 
 
 witness of the entire crime ; one part thereof supplemented 
 by another \Yitness was not sufficient. The accused must be 
 of a^e, which majority vnvie^from puherty to full Tnanhood. 
 
 Carefully surveying the Eabbinical penal code, it would 
 seem as if it had never been practically carried out ; and that 
 even from beginnint^, it was but a speculative study. The 
 Mislina may yet represent practical law. The Gemara is 
 but theory and speculation. The early Mishna-doctors, 
 mostly, were yet judges ; but after Hillel, and especially 
 with the second century after C, they were but students of 
 the law. For then Home held the government with the 
 administration of criminal justice. The Sanhedrin was 
 no longer occupied with either; it was but the high 
 religious court, j)i*esiding over the congregation and the civil 
 justice, as in the diaspora. It is very possible that under 
 the Persians, the Seleucidse and the Ptolemeans, the Judseans 
 had not, either, their own, full, criminal jurisdiction, and 
 hence had but very little opportunity to work out a prac- 
 tical penal code. They were pre-occupied with two grand 
 ideas — the preservation of the national religion and with 
 watching the opportunities of restoration. Everything 
 else they wisely left to the political masters. 
 
 In the meantime, to occupy usefully their minds, they 
 expounded Bible and Mishna, preparing everything for the 
 coming restoration. As to the penal laAvs of the Penta- 
 teuch, they seemed to have thought them too severe, and 
 fell into the other extreme of being too lenient. They 
 appear to have aimed at the abolition of capital punish- 
 ment, probably also of all corporeal punishment, reserving 
 it only for such extreme cases where the lawgiver had 
 pronounced the curse of eircmo7z {^), or "elimination from 
 among the people." There is much talk about the thirty- 
 nine stripes, yet they may never have been administered. A 
 very ideal way of thinking was that ; unfortunately not 
 
 •niD (1) 
 
46 .SPirUT OF THK lUP.r.ICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 strong enougli for this real world, as it is. In peaceful 
 times the moral sense of the nation may have been suffi- 
 cient; not so during civil commotions. Hence, the Roman's 
 complaint about the " slcariansy 
 
 The New Tp:stament. 
 
 It is interesting to remark that the New Testament 
 moved in parallel lines. It abolished corporeal and cayjital 
 punishments. You remember Jesus dismissing the adul- 
 teress witli, " Go and sin no more," and " Whosoever is better 
 may throw the first stone," etc. It made even a trial at 
 abolishing all kinds of punishment, pecuniary, too, suggest- 
 ing: "Who steals thy coat, give him thy mantle, too," 
 abiding by love, reason and persuasion for human improve- 
 ment. There was a rich flood of ideality streaming in 
 Judsea, coming from the heights of Sinai, which inspired 
 her leading minds witli so much hopefulness for human 
 amelioration. Fifteen centuries have since passed over New 
 Testament and Talmud, and those hopes have not yet been 
 fulfilled. The Mosaic penal code, mainly, is yet the crim- 
 inal law of nations; the ideals of apostles and rabbis are 
 yet ideals. We are now in 1893, the epoch of Bismarck^ 
 the age of the " blood and iron" policy, of dynamite, and of 
 anti-Semitism. How slow the masses move! 
 Beware, ye generous enthusiasts! — And yet these very 
 dreamers and idealogists of to-day, are the models and 
 ideals of the far-off future. In the age of the hlood and 
 iron policy we warm our hearts and cheer our souls with 
 the hope that once man will make these ideals real, and we 
 dream of the time when capital punishment and all i)unish- 
 ment, will be abolished; when reason and sympathy alone 
 will render man amenable to justice and kindness. And 
 such dreams are worth more than many a reality. They 
 are tlie leaven of progress, the quickening dew of liuman 
 advance. 
 
native and alien. 47 
 
 Native and Alien. 
 
 The equality before the biblical law has no restriction as to 
 race, or creed or original country. The Guer, alien in blood, 
 creed and origin, if he but renounced the grossest forms of 
 heathenism, the cruel and licentious worship of Baal, 
 Astaroth, etc., if he had but adopted the seven Noachidic 
 commandments, which we would term the universal moral 
 law, wsuch an alien immigrant, called Guer toshahh, was 
 entitled to the same civil rights and privileges as the 
 indigenous Judsean of the creed and seed of Abraham. 
 So we read in Exod. 12, 49, and Numb. 15, 17 and 29 : 
 " There is but one law, and one right for native and for 
 immigrant." Realistic and sober as the Mosaic legislation 
 is, in comparison with the idealism of the later New 
 Testamentary development, it is most magnanimous com- 
 pared with all other contemporaneous codices. Over three 
 thousand years ago it did not discriminate against aliens, 
 whilst our to-day's legislations are brimful of such discrim- 
 inations. Europe has invented its Pan-Latinism — Slavism — 
 Germanism, anti-Polism and anti-Semitiiam. No one can com- 
 pete but the native, if of the dominant Church. There are 
 in our America cropping up biases of the same nature and in 
 the same direction, lurking among the vulgar, those having 
 no other virtue to boast of, putting an embargo upon mind, 
 protecting one's own indolence behind the Chinese wall of a 
 protective tariff, prohibiting foreign-born talent and science 
 from competing, in order the easier to barter off one's own 
 incapacity, thus expecting civilization to come from Africa or 
 Arizona. I hope every clear-sighted American, every thought- 
 ful citizen of this broad land, will remember that we or our 
 parents, have come hither in search of freedom, home and 
 bread, coupled with the best part of European civilization. 
 We did not come here to live in laziness and sink down into 
 Indian barbarism. And that will be the result should we 
 
48 SPIRIT OP THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 exclude European mind, science and art from competing 
 and stimulating our rising generations. I hope this pitiful 
 addition to European craze, viz., " Pan-Americanism/' that 
 new edition of old knownuthifigism, under the hypocritical 
 mask of assumed patriotism, in reality a screen for ignor- 
 ance, will never become the polity of this great country, 
 the hope of liberated mankind. — Now the biblical law 
 alone among ancient States, declared for the equality of the 
 immigrant. For not only among barbarians, but even in 
 refined Greece and Rome, there was a' vast distinction made 
 between native and stranger, free-born and slave, patron 
 and client. Here is a trait of truly divine impartiality. 
 The modern equality of man was consecrated, at least in. 
 principle, over three thousand years ago. 
 
 Civil Jurlspeudence. 
 
 The biblical civil jurisprudence, too, is built upon the 
 principle of rigid equality. In pecuniary matters, too, is 
 '^ eye for eye'' the measure. But whilst that principle 
 made criminal punishment severer there than, in our modern 
 sentimental times, it treated offenses against property much 
 milder than we do. We, in modern times, term fraud, theft 
 and robbery a penal, criminal offense, and punish them with 
 stripes, imprisonment, and even death. The Mosaic law 
 does not. Even in our America, the judge does condemn to 
 prison and stripes for theft. In Europe, now, it is mostly 
 punished with imprisonment and fines besides. In Eastern 
 Europe theft used to be punished by lopping off hands. 
 In Hungary formerly, they used to hang to the first tree 
 every unfortunate wretch robbing twenty-five kreutzer (eight 
 cents) on the public road. Undoubtedly such harsh treatment 
 is against equality. How can we punish bodily an offense 
 against property? The principle of " eye for eye " screens 
 the Biblical law from such barbarities. Any attack upon 
 property is there punished with loss of property and no 
 
THEFT, FRAUD, ETC. 49 
 
 more ; this is democracy ; the other is plutocracy. Thus in the 
 later nou-biblical legislations, the noble and the rich were 
 fined with money for offenses against limb and life of the 
 poor ; the poor with life and limb for offenses against the rich 
 man's property. The Bible says : " Limb for limb, life for 
 life, and dollar for dollar." This is democracy, this is divine 
 equality. The limit of civil jurisprudence in Mosaism i& 
 somewhat more largely drawn than in modern law. All mat- 
 ters not involving life or limb are civil. JS'on-payment of 
 debts, fraud, theft, robbery, embezzlement, etc., fall under this 
 heading. The offender must pay, even with an additional 
 fine. If he has not, the court can hire him out for six years 
 labor, but never inflict imprisonment or stripes or death. 
 Generally no two punishments for a crime are inflicted at the 
 same time. 
 
 Theft, Fraud, etc. 
 
 So we read (Exod. 21, 36) : " When a man will steal an ox 
 or a sheep, and kill or sell them, he shall restitute five oxen 
 or four sheep instead." The ox, the chief wealth of the 
 Judsean farmer, the bread-giver, in primitive times, an object 
 of worship (the Egyptian Apis, the ^^ golden calf" of Israel), 
 must be protected by all means — hence, it must be resti- 
 tuted five-fold instead. The sheep, comparatively less 
 important, yielding milk to the family, was restituted four- 
 fold. When yet found alive with the thief, and hence 
 suggesting a possible restitution, the indemnification was 
 but double. (Baba Kama. VII), (Mainonides Jad., see Trea- 
 tise on Theft, I, 4). On returning the stolen object before sued 
 for it, no fine was imposed. Any other movable property 
 stolen, incurred double restitution. Defrauding the sanctuary 
 entailed one-fifth part in addition, as punishment. (Levit. 
 5, 16). — The same one -fifth was for civil fraud and over- 
 reaching (Idem 5, 24) ; he must pay or be sold unto six years' 
 servitude. According to Rabhinical tradition, the selling 
 
50 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 of a man for six years was only for the original value of 
 the robbery. If he could not pay the fine, he was not sold, 
 but remained indebted for it until he could. 
 
 The Eabbis found in the Pentateuch 365 prohibitory laws 
 and 248 affirmative ones. The transgression of the former 
 entailed, besides the money involved, if so, flagellation, too, 
 or thirty-nine stripes ; but this was hedged in with such legal 
 requirements, as forewarning by two exact witnesses immedi- 
 ately before the commission of the act, with their naming of 
 the crime and its punishment, ttc, the acknowledgment, yea, 
 acquiescence in, or affronting the law by the offender; then 
 again, rigid examination of the witnesses, etc.; that the claim, 
 in theory, of flagellation, besides the money punishment, is 
 pretty nearly illusory, and next to impossible. Hence, it 
 appears that the general rule of the Rabbinical court was 
 to punish for each offense, but with one kind of chastise- 
 ment, viz: the severer of the two; though the Pentateuch 
 mentions occasionally a money fine and stripes in the case 
 of a man slandering his own bride. 
 
 Burglary. 
 
 We have seen that thieving never incurred imprisonment 
 nor death. Yet the text says (Exod. 22. 1): "When the 
 thief is surprised in house-breaking, in the dark of niglit, 
 and — fighting ensuing — he is killed, that killing is not con- 
 sidered a criminal act. But if the stealing takes place in 
 broad daylight, killing the thief is manslaughter." This is 
 the plain sense of the verse. Breaking in during the night 
 constitutes danger of life for the people of the house, and 
 killing the thief is but self-defense; whilst in broad day- 
 light the thief shall be held to pay, but not killed. So 
 expounded Bhen, Ezra and Raslibam. Whilst tradition 
 expounds : "Any house-breaking renders the killing of the 
 thief legitimate defense, except when it is clear as day- 
 light that he never intended murder (?). (Sanhedrin, 72, a,) 
 and (Mainonides on Theft, IX, 7.) 
 
status of the stranger. 51 
 
 New Testament on Theft. 
 
 No doubt the New Testament teaching : " Whosoever steals 
 thy coat, give him thy mantle, too," is more ideal, and if 
 followed up, would create a righteous society, needing no 
 laws, judges, police, prisons and armies. Unfortunately, the 
 kingdom of heaven is not yet come, and the State needs yet 
 repressive laws to maintain society ; lience^ right and force. 
 
 It is, as said above, both odious and sheer folly to make 
 any such comparisons. Moses claims to be a lawgiver. 
 Jesus assumed the role of a divine Messiah. One legislates 
 for this earth ; the other for heaven. One for the State ; the 
 other for the Church. The one for the immediate present ; 
 the other for an ideal future. Their aims differ; hence so 
 their views. 
 
 Status of the Stranger. 
 
 A solid test of the calibre of a statute-book, to know 
 whether a lawgiver is animated by narrow zeal for his own 
 clan and class, or by large-hearted humanity, aiming at the 
 ultimate benefit of all classes and all fractions of the 
 people, such a test is : what he legislates concerning the 
 poor, the orphan, the widow, and more than that, concern- 
 ing the stranger — he the most unbefriended, unprotected, 
 helpless alien, for whom nobody cares, nobody has a feel- 
 ing, a word — nobody, except the great heart of a true 
 legislator, a philanthropic sage. Indeed, the test of a 
 sound statute-book is not sympathy with the strong, the 
 crafty, the bold, the criminal, but rather with the victims 
 thereof. This test applied to Mosaism, that proves to be 
 supremely humane and sympathetic. So it is with the 
 weaker portion of humankind in general, and especially 
 with the alien. Wherever we look among ancient legisla- 
 tions, we find but harshness for him. He was pretty much 
 out of the pale of justice — a piece of public property. A 
 stranger was synonymous with an enemy. In Roman times 
 
52 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 lie had to accept some citizen as his patron. During the 
 Middle Ages his property was confiscated on any pre- 
 tense, especially when he died. When shipwrecked, he 
 was pillaged and enslaved. Crimes against him were con- 
 nived at. Crimes by him were punished with exceptional 
 cruelty. So it was everywhere. In Germany, during the 
 Middle Ages, the Jews were so treated. So they were in 
 England, France and Spain until their expulsion. In Russia 
 and Roumania this is as yet the case — in 1893. In holy 
 Russia the Poles, the Germans, the Tartars, etc., though 
 inhabitants of the country long before the JNIoscovite 
 dominion, are treated as such aliens and cruelly discrimi- 
 nated against. Just now liberal. Western Europe is pretty 
 exclusive concerning new immigrants. When poor, they 
 are simply not allowed to stay. Even when talented or 
 wealthy and allowed to naturalize, they are never perfectly 
 put on equality with the natives. A piece of the alien's 
 chain, as the string at the foot of the bird breaking from 
 its cage, is ever dragging after him. He is a native in 
 regard to duties ; he is a stranger as to rights. 
 
 One God, One Law. 
 
 Mosaism, with its one God-idea as the corner-stone of the 
 State, is inexorable concerning idolatrous worship, with its 
 obscene, cruel and revolting rites. Save that exclusion, it 
 is impartially just and merciful to the stranger. Nay, some- 
 times it seems as if the lawgiver is especially solicitous 
 concerning him. We find in Sacred Scripture hundreds of 
 passages to that point. Nay, one of the attributes of the 
 Deity is : " He loves the stranger, the widow and the 
 orphan ; " which occurs time and again on the pages of the 
 entire Bible. It very seldom occurred to Homer or Hesiodor 
 Virgil, that that might be a befitting attribute of the Deity. 
 W^e do find it as a compliment to the gods of certain descrip- 
 tions. The gods there in reality and fact side with the 
 
PLIMSOL, E. P. 
 
 53 
 
 stronger and the victors. Success was there the only criterion 
 of merit and virtue. So much so, that even the etymologi- 
 cal origin and meaning of virtue, denotes force, bravery, 
 success, not moral goodness, righteousness or wisdom ; virtue 
 actually meaning manly strength. 
 
 Protectiox to Strangers, Widows and Orphans. 
 
 Let us look at a few Biblical passages concerning the 
 stranger and its status. (Exod. 22, 20) : " The stranger thou 
 shalt not overreach nor oppress, for strangers ye were in 
 Egypt. Nor shall ye wrong the widow, nor the orphan, for 
 if ye do wrong him, and he cries unto me, I shall indeed 
 listen to the cry. And my ire will enkindle and I shall kill 
 ye by the sword (of war), and your wives shall be widows, 
 and your children orphans !" Reader, please search through- 
 out the entire GrsBCO-Roman fine literature, with all its 
 piety, prayers and sacrifices, litanies and eulogies, and see 
 whether you find a passage of such a ring, so thrilling, so 
 worthy the Deity, so effective to enforce right living and 
 justice. 
 
 Plimsol, M. p. 
 
 Some years ago the following interesting piece of news 
 run through the papers : In the British Parliament a hot 
 discussion arose concerning the discovery that certain 
 English merchant princes had sent out to sea unsafe 
 vessels with huge stocks of merchandise, well insured, 
 viz : the vessels and the goods were insured, the sailors not. 
 Of course the vessels were wrecked, the princely merchants 
 got their insurance and chuckled; the sailors, drowned, 
 became the prey of the fishes, and their poor widows and 
 orphans cried in vain and were thrown ui3on the poor-rates 
 and the work-houses. One, very plain speaking Mr. Plimsol, 
 M. P., an honest old-fashioned Puritan, quoted, in the face 
 of the murderers : "Ye shall not wrong the widows and the 
 
54 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 orphans, for tliey will cry unto me, and I shall kill you by 
 the sword, and your wives shall be widows, and your chil- 
 dren orphans ! " That was very unparliamentary, but it was 
 telling ; the merchant princes found it shocking. — (Exod. 
 23,9): "The stranger thou shalt not press, for ye know 
 how he feels at heart. Ye were strangers in Egypt. — The 
 crops of six years are thine, but that of the seventh, leave 
 to the poor. For six days thou shalt work, but on the seventh, 
 rest ; that on it may rest, too, thy beast, thy slave and the 
 stranger." (Levit. 19, 33) — "The stranger in thy land thou 
 shalt not over-reach ; treat him as a native, love him as thy- 
 self, for strangers ye were in Egypt." 
 
 (Levit. 24, 20-22): "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. The 
 murderer shall die. One right for stranger and native." 
 
 (Deut. 1, 16-17): "Render fair justice between a man, 
 his neighbor and his stranger. Do not discriminate between 
 humble and big people." — (Deut. 10, 17-19): "For Jahveh, 
 your God, is above all the gods, omnipotent and awe-inspir- 
 ing, accepting no bribes, nor favoring any person; who 
 renders justice to the orphan, the widow, and loves the 
 stranger to give him bread and raiment. Love the 
 stranger, for strangers ye were in Egypt." 
 
 Creed and Deed. 
 
 Mark here how the broad theology of Moses yields a 
 broad morality; how religion is humanitarian; a universal 
 God, a universal mankind, a universal right ; the father- 
 hood of God, the brotherhood of man ; including all races, 
 sects, countries, tongues, sexes, stations, classes and masses. 
 Look here how right creed yields right deed, as root and 
 fruit, as principle and life. 
 
 Homer and Hesiod, Virgil and Ovid, teach scores and 
 hundreds of gods, that means as many colliding forces, 
 interests, creations, human races and dynasties of divine 
 origin, feuds and wars fomented by the gods and their 
 
HOSPITALITY AND rROTECTION. 55 
 
 descendants, the earthly rulers. Polytheism in heaven 
 means war on earth. 
 
 Remember those grand tragic poems, Homer's "Iliad" 
 and "Odyssey," the siege and destruction of Troy by 
 combined Greece, originated in the jealousy and the quar- 
 rels of the gods and goddesses. So is Virgil's "iEneid." 
 See how a contemptible theology produces an execrable 
 morality and becomes the source of a wretched society- 
 The Monotheism of the Bible community is, therefore, 
 justly accounted as its corner-stone. It is so of its entire 
 legislation. It is the base of the doctrine, " One duty and 
 one right for all ; " and hence the status about the stranger, 
 who is fully protected by the law, because he is included 
 in large-hearted humanity — offspring of the one Deity. 
 
 Hospitality and Protection. 
 
 Let us contemplate a few more verses of that nature. 
 They are fully worthy of our consideration. Verses over 
 three thousand years old, standing upon the large base of 
 broad, universal right and justice, without asking the 
 ^^ shibholetJi^^ of race, sect or origin, treating native and 
 alien alike. Such verses, indeed, are refreshing in our age, 
 our Bismarckian age of blood and iron, in 1893, in our 
 boastful Western civilization, brimful with pan-Germanism, 
 Latinism and Slavism, and permeated with so many bitter 
 antagonisms under the pretext of race and church. Let us 
 look to a few verses more, breathing the divine spirit of 
 one large-hearted humankind. 
 
 (V. M., 23, 16): "Thou slialt not deliver a slave running 
 away from his master; let him dwell with thee wherever 
 he pleases ; do not bring him to grief." What a noble 
 " verse ! How far-reaching ! A stranger, a slave, a f ugitive? 
 the most forlorn subject under the sun; yet is he a human 
 being, yet born in the image of God, yet a fellow being. 
 Over three thousand years ago Mosaism granted him the right 
 
56 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATIOX. 
 
 of hospitality. In ancient times every citizen was at the 
 despot's mercy. The proudest dignitary of to-day could 
 to-morrow become a fugitive. The Bible granted him hos- 
 pitality. Russia wants the United States to deny an asylum 
 to her victims ! Three thousand years ago the State rested 
 upon the principle of force. The poor, runaway slave was 
 the weakest of the weak, hence no one took his part ; his fate 
 was as in the story of Androclus, the fugitive slave of a Roman 
 proconsul in Africa, to be thrown in the amphitheatre to 
 the wild beasts. Androclus' lion was yet more merciful 
 than his master. The Old Testament alone advocated his 
 cause and took him under its divine aegis : " Do not deliver 
 poor Androclus to his master, nor to the beasts in the arena." 
 And the New Testament, too, came to its rescue, and lovingly 
 admitted him to the " kingdom of heaven." 
 
 Protection and Bread, too. 
 
 But whereupon shall poor Androclus live? Listen! 
 (Deut. 24, 10, etc.): *' When thy neighbor owes thee a debt, 
 do not penetrate into his house to pawn him ; remain out- 
 side and he will hand thee the pawn ; yet towards sunset 
 return it to him, for he sleeps on it, and God will bless thee 
 for thy charity." " Thou shalt not withhold the wages from 
 the poor laborer, be he a brother Israelite or a stranger Gentile. 
 On the very same day pay him his wages before sunset, for 
 he is poor and is waiting for the hire ; he might cry to God 
 and that will render thee sinful." — " Do not turn the scales of 
 justice against the stranger, the orphan," etc. "Remember 
 thou wast a stranger in Egypt and God has redeemed thee." 
 " When thou reapest thy grain harvest, thy oil, thy wine, 
 leave a small portion to the stranger, the oriphan, the widow, 
 for a stranger and poor thou wast in Egypt, therefore do I 
 recommend thee to act in that way." 
 
 Here we see the lawgiver does not only allow the poor 
 stranger an asylum, not simply air, light and water. No ; 
 
THE lawgiver's HEART. 57 
 
 he provides for liim an humble source of subsistence; he 
 puts him on the same footing with the native poor. More, he 
 allows him to work, to earn wages, and be punctually paid, 
 not over-reached, nor harshly treated if resorting to the 
 pawnbroker ; he allows him the right to glean and partici- 
 pate in the blessings of the wealthy citizen; he is no pauper, 
 no drone, no outlaw ; he gets the chance to work up, thrive 
 and become an independent citizen. 
 
 The Lawgiver's Heart. 
 
 Read and ponder over those passages. Don't you dis- 
 tinctly hear the heart of the lawgiver beating with sym- 
 pathy ; don't you see his frame quivering with compassion, 
 writing down : "Allow a poor fellow-man to live with thee ; 
 a crust of bread, a kind word will make him happy, and 
 earn for thee the blessing of thy soul, if thou hast one." 
 
 Eead these verses over. They will bring you tears of 
 fellow-feeling into your eyes, and thrill you through and 
 through. Those verses toach deeper a feeling heart than 
 all the laments of Here and Aphrodite, of Paris and Helena, 
 of Achilles and Patroklus, with all the heroes of Homer 
 and Virgil inclusive ; because they are honest and sincere. 
 They are taken from the eternal quarry of stern reality. 
 They are pages from the tragedy of human, daily, woeful 
 history, rehearsed since the days of Abraham and Nimrod (0 
 until our own. They are of hoary age and still fresh and 
 acute as of yesterday. Look to suffering humanity and you 
 find it mirrored in those verses. 
 
 The ^Mosaic lawgiver is no communist. He well distin- 
 guishes between mine and thine. Yet he commands part 
 of the crops to go to the poor and the strangers. 
 
 So Cardinal Manning, mentioned above, correctly stated ; 
 " ' Thou shalt commit no theft,' never applies to him who 
 steals a loaf of bread for his children." Practically, he well 
 
 (1) Midrash legend. 
 
58 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 understood the great heart of the Mosaic legislator. A 
 hungry man is no tliief for a loaf of bread. A poor man is 
 entitled to his "gleanings," be he native or stranger, granted 
 him three thousand years ago by the Ebrew law. Of course, 
 in theory the Cardinal may not be infallible. In theory is 
 stealing always wrong, but the sympathetic, noble prelate, 
 on making that statement, was biased by his humane 
 heart. So was the Arabo-Ebraic lawgiver, in pleading 
 the cause of the run-away slave, in securing for him the 
 right of asylum, and saving out a pittance for his subsist- 
 ence. Not because Moses was a communist, but because 
 he could not help siding with Androclus against the cruel 
 proconsul, his master; he felt with the eternal victims of 
 social wrong. Truly, great men have great hearts. 
 
 Usury, Interest and Profit. 
 
 We read in Deut. 23, 20 : " Thou shalt take no interest 
 of thy brother on money or eatables or anything else. Of 
 the foreigner thou canst take interest; of thy brother, not. 
 That God may bless thee in all thy doings." This was 
 claimed to be a strong instance of foreigner-hatred and 
 national exclusiveness. But that charge is erroneous. It 
 originated in misunderstanding, in plain ignorance. The 
 word Nocltri was mistaken as identical with Ouer, alien, 
 which is not the case. No doubt both mean the non- 
 Ebrew, but with the vast difference that Nochri means a 
 stranger residing in his own, non-Judasan country; Guer 
 means a foreigner emigrated into, domiciled and natural- 
 ized in Judsea. A Gentile immigrant making Judsea his 
 home, submitting to its public laws and assuming all its 
 civic duties, was entitled to all its civic rights. Him the 
 law recommended to the especial protection of the State ; 
 whilst a stranger hailing from a foreign land and traveling 
 temporarily in Judaea on some business, was entitled to 
 international rights, but not to the privileges of a citizen. 
 
THE STRANGER IN GREECE. 59* 
 
 And sncli was the extra privilefj^e of getting money and 
 goods without interest and profit. A Gentile naturalized 
 among the Ebrews was entitled to that privilege. So we 
 read (Levit. 25, 35): "If thy brother should impoverish 
 and decay, give him encouragement. Immigrant {Ouer) or 
 inhabitant, let him live with thee. Take no interest on 
 money, or profit or eatables, of him. Be afraid of God ; 
 let thy brother, native or alien, live with thee. I am thy 
 God who brought thee out of Egypt," etc. Here we see the 
 non-Jew domiciliated in Judsea, who, hence, is a Guer, but 
 not a Nochri; he is fully entitled to the privilege of a 
 loan without interest. We shall have in the sequel of 
 these pages more occasion for seeing why the lawgiver 
 allowed profit and interest when trading with foreign coun- 
 tries and deprecated it at home. This was not from racial 
 or sectarian prejudices, but from economical reasons. He 
 would not have any commerce and speculation at home ; he 
 discouraged home traffic, but allowed international com- 
 merce. Hence, all business profit at home was interdicted, 
 and any loan was to be given purely as a neighborly 
 assistance. We shall later dilate on that Mosaic State 
 policy. 
 
 The Stranger in Greece. 
 
 For any person or anything not Greek or not Roman, both 
 these nations had a classic expression—" harbaros ! " Bar- 
 barians they called the Persians, the Ebrews, the Egyptians, 
 the Gauls, the Germans, the Skythians ; indeed, the entire 
 world, except themselves. Their slaves were, of course, 
 " barbaros.''' Any other country than theirs was " barbaros 
 gy." War with them was natural and always in order — 
 '■'■ polemos barbarosP Intermarriage with them was a 
 stain and a reproach — '^lechos barbaros.'^ The foreigner 
 was deemed half a savage, rude and uncultured. They 
 owed him no consideration; he was out of the pale of 
 
60 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 justice. To make war upon liiin, subjugate and enslave 
 hini, rob and destroy him, if too numerous and dangerous, 
 was natural right, not in the least immoral, and perfectly 
 compatible with the highest virtue, even in our sense of 
 the term. Cato had it for his current expression — Carthago 
 delenda est (Carthage must be destroyed), because she was 
 barbarian and in the way of Rome. The Scipios, carrying 
 out Cato's word, are famed as the most ideal heroes and 
 demi-gods. Nothing harmed Antonius so much, as the fact 
 that he was the husband of a barbarian — Cleopatra, the 
 Queen of Egypt, a Ptolemean princess, but a barbarian 
 anyhow. jNIay be that great Csesar, too, suffered at the 
 hands of Brutus and Cassius for the same crime. To be a 
 foreigner was unpardonable in Greece and Rome, the pat- 
 terns of ancient civilization. (See Arist. Polit. I, 8; and 
 Plato Republ. 373 and 469.) 
 
 The Stranger in the Bible. 
 
 Nothing of the kind was in the Bible (V. M., 10, 17): 
 "Jahveh, your God, is the master of all masters, the Supreme 
 Power who favors no persons (classes and castes) and takes 
 no bribes (sacrifices), who pleads the cause of the widow and 
 the orphan, who loves the foreigner and gives him bread 
 and raiment. Love ye the stranger, for such ye were in 
 Egypt." 
 
 Here is quite another ideal of Deity, and hence another idea 
 of right and justice; here is the foreigner not an outcast and 
 a fit victim, but a brother, as the native, hence under the 
 same law and protection as he. 
 
 Curious it is that sometimes we find among the Greeks, 
 too, the idea of pity and benevolence as due to the stranger 
 the poor and the unhappy one. The ancient poets had some 
 such ideal of the gods, at least of Zeus, the supreme Dios. 
 
the stranger in homer. 61 
 
 The Stranger in Homer. 
 
 But it was rare and sporadic and it never became a prac- 
 tical rule of conduct for man. So we read in Homer's 
 Odyssey, VI, 207, (^) where the poet pleads for his hero, 
 Odysseus, to be taken care of, " because all foreigners and 
 beggars are under the protection of Zeus;" and further, 
 there, VII, 165 : ('-') '' Let us spend to Zeus, who accompanies 
 (and safeguards) the respectable strangers, invoking his 
 assistance." But that is a mere poetical phrase. This 
 exalted view is empty poetry. The Greek gods were usually 
 modeled after the Greek princes and heroes. Justice and 
 benevolence were not their leading traits. Agamemnon 
 and Achilles, etc., undertook to punisli Troy in order to 
 avenge a kidnapped woman, the Spartan Helena, or, at 
 least, her husband, Menelaus; but they for long years 
 quarrel and neglect the war; they quarrel over what? Over 
 their own captive women, whom they distribute as concu- 
 bines. These captive women are treated with inhumanity 
 snd shamelessness. At the end of the ]ong wa.r Androm- 
 ache and Cassandra fall into their hands — about the only 
 two persons having the reader's full sympathy — and they are 
 treated with the utmost indignity by the Greeks, their 
 cruel captors; far worse than ever was Helena by Paris. 
 All the gods and Zeus himself take a hand in the war with- 
 out compunction. To neither h.ero or god does it occur to 
 " plead the cause of widow, orphan or stranger." We need 
 not search long for proofs that th.e Greeks did not practically 
 think strangers under the especial or any protection of the 
 gods. The most bitter hatred and contempt for them was 
 the rule, and but as an exception they made show of gen- 
 erosity. In the very next chapter after the above passages, 
 (Odyssey, VII, 30,) Athene accompanies the hero to the 
 Faieken and recommends him " to follow her quickly and 
 
 (1). ~^v v'fv Xpi/ Koiitttv ~pu(; ')u() A/iif t'latv airavTH^ ielvoi re -ruj^ni re. 
 
 (2). ,, . . . Ira Kdl All T£p~iKfpahr(.i (j~Fico/ni\ oa^' iKtrijaiv ci^u' aU^oioiaiv 67r;/de<.." 
 
62 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAl, LEGISLATION. 
 
 silently, and not to look at, nor speak to any passer-by, 
 taking even the precaution of enveloping Mm in a thick 
 cloud, so as to make liim invisible to the natives, adding, 
 * for the people here do not much tolerate strangers, nor do 
 they offer them hospitality.' " (^) 
 
 And yet that people are described as rather good natured 
 and humane ! The fact is, that throughout entire antiquity 
 the stranger was an alien, not a guest; the alien was an 
 enemy, and the enemy a brute, having no rights whatever. 
 The Bible alone declared liim a human being — a brother. 
 Of course Odysseus followed up the advice of Athene, and 
 makes his way without any accident, f) Nevertheless, it 
 strikingly shows the prevailing sentiment of the times. It 
 needed an extra effort on the part of the great deity to 
 screen the favorite hero from violence. Without a miracle, 
 strangers among the Greeks, etc., were treated as enemies. 
 And as to the claim of Zeus to be the protector of the alien, 
 that was mere poetry. The Bible posits the doctrine, and 
 many passages there prove that the doctrine condensed into 
 fact but slowly. 
 
 Jahveh and Zeus. 
 
 Nor were the conceptions of the classic peoples about 
 Jupiter himself very subliine. All the gods, without excep- 
 tion, were thought to be hungry and thirsty, and dependent 
 upon the gifts of mortals. Hence, the above-mentioned 
 biblical statement that "Jahveh does not favor persons, nor 
 does he take bribes," viz., by accepting gifts or sacrifices for 
 favors to bestow. For as to the heathen gods, they did 
 discriminate against some, and show favors to others, and 
 all for bribes and sacrifices, for "hecatorribsJ^ Jupiter, 
 
 (1). fiTjM Tiif av^pojTTUv —poTioaaso jirjd' kpieive. oh yap ^t:ivovr oldi; ju'i'k' av& ponrox)^ 
 avkxovrai, ohd' ayaTvai^ofievoi ouMova' Oi' k' d?i?iod- ev fA-Q)]. 
 
 (2). Tov 6' apa ^air/ue^ vavciKAvTol ovk kvdrjaav hpxifisvov Kara aarv dia ai.)ia(;- ov yap 
 ' Adr/vT] ela ehirXoKa/io^, Seivt/ i^eof, y pa oi ax^vv ■&EaKealriv Karex^ve (jiXa upoveova' 
 hi ■&v/iGK—{Odjss. VII, 39.) 
 
JAHVEH AND ZEUS. 63 
 
 indeed, was specially called Dios, God, and surrounded by 
 much pomp and circumstance. At his nodding the Olym- 
 pos and the Heavens, the earth and the ocean shook. But 
 withal he was depicted, but as a Roi-faineant, with not 
 too much will-power, nor too much brain. He was con- 
 stantly led and misled by Juno or Venus or Athene, etc. 
 What a doubtful role he played at the siege of Troy, or later, 
 in Odysseus' wanderings! He was for the Greeks and 
 against them, for and against the latter, ever trimming, 
 according to the stratagems of Athene, Here, Aphrodite, or 
 Porseidon; not seldom quarreling with his illustrious 
 sister and wife, Saturnia, after having dethroned and 
 exiled his father; offering occasionally his dear spouse 
 something like blows, and throwing his son, Hefaistos- 
 Vulcan, headlong to the earth, for having taken sides with 
 his mother, and laming him for ever, etc., etc. Now it is 
 true that Socrates, Plato and Aristotle had a nobler concep- 
 tion of the Deity. But their idea was not the people's idea. 
 They were more or less considered as atheists. Nor was it 
 they who framed the State laws; it was the vulgar and 
 their leaders who did, as at all times. Fifteen centuries 
 later Virgil did not describe Jupiter under more sublime 
 colors. iEneas steering for Italy, is the play-ball of blind 
 fate and of jealousy. The gods and goddesses are divided 
 about his success, and Jupiter himself is not knowing his 
 own mind, either, whether to favor the Trojans or the 
 Latins. Behold how weak migJiiy Jupiter appears, (iEneis 
 IX, 801) : " Sed manus e castris propere coit omnis in unum ; 
 Nee contra vires audet Saturnia Juno sufficere : aeriam coelo 
 nam Jupiter Irim demisit, germanae hand mollia jussa 
 ferentem." Thus Jupiter is not very complimentary to 
 his spouse. 
 
 There is no denying, the divine ideals of Greeks and 
 Romans, poets and people, were not over refined, and their 
 notions about human rights and duties, the rights of the 
 
64 SPIRIT OF THf] BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 strangers, the weak, the conquered, etc., were just as crude. 
 The Bible is therefore outstanding, sublime and alone, in 
 those remote ages, teaching : " For thy God is great and 
 powerful, and above all the gods, who favors no person and 
 accepts no bribes. He loves the stranger and gives him 
 bread and raiment. He pleads for the widow and the orphan. 
 Love the stranger, for strangers ye were in Egypt." {Y, 
 M. 10, 17). The Bible alone starts from the firm rock of an 
 omnipotent and all-just God, who favors none and discrimi- 
 nates against none, and hence it arrives at the conclusion of 
 justice and kindness to the stranger and the helpless, to the 
 child and the woman. 
 
 The Benjaminite War. 
 
 There, too, we find an analogy to the story of Helena and 
 Paris. It is in Judges, 19. Read and see what a difference 
 between the Biblical and the Homeric spirit. 
 
 In the Bible we find no exaggerations, no heaven-tower- 
 ing poetries, no embellishments; nothing but plain matters 
 of fact. Man and woman, honesty and dishonesty, act and 
 speak without paint and hyperbole. It is a picture of 
 nature ; no poetic lies. Read and compare : A humble 
 Levite is returning home with his mistress after a pleasant 
 visit to her parents. They arrive at a wicked place among 
 the tribe of Benjamin, and find some isolated, kind hospi- 
 tality, but are roughly treated by the youth. The poor 
 mistress is abused, and dies of that maltreatment. The 
 entire nation is aroused over the indignity ofi'ered to a 
 forlorn woman. A national war ensues, and that wicked 
 place and its surroundings, with the entire tribe, are nearly 
 extirpated, after a short but most bloody war. The entire 
 nation, with their ecclesiastical and lay leaders, as one 
 man, fight that battle for purity and right owing to strangers 
 and to womanhood. There is no wavering and hesitating, 
 no petty jealousies and backthoughts, as we find in the 
 
BIBLICAL EXPRESSIONS FOR FOREIGNER. 65 
 
 Iliad, among the very leaders of the expedition. With 
 different feelings do we rise from the reading of the Iliad 
 and from that of Judges, chapter 19. The former leaves 
 back a feeling of deep sadness ; the other offers the conso- 
 lation that wrong is righted, though at an immense cost. 
 Why this difference? The cause is that the Ebrew leaders 
 did not claim to be descendants from the gods, nor did they 
 fable stupidities about them on a par with themselves. 
 They had nobler conceptions of the Deity, and having a 
 higher and purer idea of that, they had a nobler conception 
 of the rights of man ; of those of the poor and stranger, and 
 of helpless womanhood. The mistress of the Levite was not 
 the daughter of the gods, nor the wife of a king, nor a 
 divine miracle of beauty, as Helena. She was a pilegesh, 
 the semi-wife of a nameless Ebrew, journeying as a stranger. 
 But he and she were fellow-citizens ; he was a lowly man, she 
 was a helpless woman, and the entire nation felt the insult 
 and injustice done to these poor strangers, and the entire 
 nation arose to punish and avenge that crime. There is no 
 doubt, a nobler conception of God yields a better man, a 
 nobler people, and, fairer justice to native and alien; and 
 these ideas mankind owes to the Bible. 
 
 Biblical Expressions for Foreigner. 
 
 The biblical expressions for foreigner are manifold, viz : 
 Zor, meaning one not belonging to the same tribe or caste. 
 So the Israelite was a Zor opposite to the priest in the 
 temple ; to perform sacrificial service was in him usurpa- 
 tion and sacrilege. In the same sense was the Gentile a Zor 
 opposite to the Israelite concerning privileged rites and 
 observances. But Zor has not even the odor of tarharos, 
 in regard to positive human rights and duties or benevolent 
 feelings. 
 
 Next comes the expression ^^Nochri" pretty nearly 
 coming up to the modern word outlandish or foreigner. It 
 
 5 
 
Q6 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 means a non-Ebrew living in a non-Judsean country of Lis 
 own speecli and creed. He was entitled to human rights, 
 not to civic rights and privileges in Judaea. The Ebrew 
 could do with him any kind of business, of money or 
 goods, for mutual interest or profit. That was forbidden 
 among his fellows, where such was done only for kindness 
 sake and as a mutual assistance. 
 
 Next follows "Guer/' the immigrant, a Gentile passing 
 over into the biblical State; and when permanently domi- 
 ciliated there, he was termed Gue?' Toslidb or Shaar. He 
 could be naturalized when not practicing, publicly, idolatry 
 and living up to the universal moral law, without having 
 adopted the Mosaic creed proper. He then enjoyed all 
 civic rights and privileges ; he was termed brother,' he could 
 live there, work, earn wages, get rich, acquire property and 
 occupy office, except kingship and priesthood. When a 
 slave, he was not delivered up to his former master ; when 
 poor, he was provided side by side with the Ebrew poor, 
 widows and orphans. Everywhere he is recommended 
 equally with them to the justice and tenderness of the 
 State. (Maleachi 3, 5 ; Zach. 7, 10.) In that solemn covenant 
 on Mounts Garisim and Ebal (V. M. 27, 19), the lawgiver 
 pronounces the curse of God '' against whosoever will bend 
 the judgment of the stranger." When he adopted the 
 Mosaic creed he was termed Guer Zedek, or proselyte, and 
 was assimilated to Israel in a religious respect, too. 
 
 The Talmud on Strangers. 
 
 In Mishna and Talmud we find, indeed, expressions which 
 occasionally seem to smell of the Greek word harharos, 
 though never going so far as to declare him out of the pale 
 of human justice or even dignity. Such terms are Akkum, 
 the notaricon of a compound expression meaning " worship- 
 ers of the stars," or, in general, idolaters. The worst the Tal- 
 mudists have ever enacted against Gentiles was aimed against 
 
THE RABBIS COXCERNING GENTILES. 67 
 
 these Akkum, or idolaters, first by following the Mosaic 
 severe injunctions against Canaanites. More probably it 
 was directed against those Romans and Greeks who had 
 made upon them and their people such a war of extirpation 
 during the first three centuries of the current era, had 
 robbed them of their country, killed them by the millions 
 in war, slaughtered them in the hippodrome and sold them 
 into slavery after the war was over. 
 
 A somewhat milder expression than Akkum is Ammim 
 and hen Noack, meaning simply a non-Israelite, of the 
 Gentile nation, or a son of Noach, the Patriarch. The word 
 Goy finally means simply gens — nation, tribe or each indi- 
 vidual of them. Israel, too, is called Goy, sometimes, but 
 rarely, with the addition of " holy." Goy, thus, is not the 
 equivalent of harharos, as often believed by the ignorant. 
 (See I. M., 19, 6 ; Y. M., 4, 8 ; and Isaiah, 26, 2.) 
 
 The Habbis Concerning Gentiles. 
 
 As a striking proof that the Rabbis had least of racial 
 prejudice, closely following Mosaism, and that they 
 abhorred idolatry for the sake of its cruelties, absurdities, 
 licentiousness, its stupefying effects upon the masses, but 
 hated not the Gentiles simply as non-Jews, may serve the 
 following quotations. Indeed, how could they ? Believers 
 in the doctrine of one creative Omnipotence and one parental 
 couple, they had to accept, as result, one right for native and 
 for stranger; hence there was very little room left for racial 
 bigotry — except when hidden under the cloak of idolatry- 
 Otherwise it was with Hindoos and Egyptians, Greeks and 
 Romans, etc., who believed in castes or dijfferent origins of 
 races and ge'iis, descendants from different gods and divers 
 parents. These progenitors were often at war with each 
 other. Such polytheistic notions, applied to the different 
 sections of mankind, could not but make war the leading 
 idea of the State, and hence racial hate and contempt were 
 
68 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 dominant features in ancient societies. There the stranger 
 was a foreigner, the foreigner was an enemy; the enemy 
 was not above the wild beast ; war upon him, booty, enslave- 
 ment, murder were deemed just and glorious. This was the 
 necessary sequel of idolatry. 
 
 No doubt, as said above, there are in the Talmud many 
 harsh expressions against the, then. Gentiles. These date 
 from the times of the wars of extermination against the 
 Ebrews, during the first three centuries of the present era, 
 waged by Romans and Greeks. And who will think too hard 
 of harsh words uttered in exchange of bloody deeds ? . . . 
 Nor must we misunderstand why the Rabbinical Law so 
 intensely hated idolatry, no less than the Biblical one. 
 We need only read of the superstition, the cruelty, the 
 unnatural vices, the subversion of all morality, chastity^ 
 right and reason, connected with idolatry, to fully under- 
 stand that antipathy. The following pages will afford us 
 ample opportunity for illustrating the immense moral and 
 intellectual superiority of Judaea over the religions of 
 ancient paganism, the ethereal and sublime heights of Sinai 
 and Carmel over Mounts Olympos and Ida, and hence the 
 horror thereof in Judsea. 
 
 But as soon as both these elements, the horror of idolatry 
 and the bitter sense of persecution, were out of sight, the 
 Rabbinical law, as the biblical one, is remarkably tolerant. 
 Thus we read (in Megillah 13): "Who denies idolatry is 
 called a Jew." (^) The following passages go to the same 
 point. (Sanhedrin 96, h.) : 
 
 " The righteous of all nations participate in eternal life.'^ 
 Sefra (to Sanhedrin, 59) says: ''A great many biblical 
 verses mention that the righteous are most pleasing to God y 
 the ^righteous,'' simply, not the priests, the Levites or 
 Israelites, for even the Gentiles are included therein." 
 That means : " God cares for moral goodness, not for race, 
 
 •ni.T N-lpJ T"j;3 -I£13n ^3 (1) 
 
THE RABBIS CONCERNING GENTILES. 69 
 
 caste or condition." — This was Paul's reasoning to the 
 Gentiles; this his lever to move the world. He admitted 
 them into the pale of Monotheism on the sole ground of 
 the moral law, without insisting upon the ceremonial one, 
 as binding alone upon the Jew. (Baba. Bathra 10, b.) reads: 
 ^* Since the destruction of the Temple the sacrificial service 
 has been supplanted by benevolence, indiscriminately, for 
 Jew and Gentile." 
 
 In Sanhedrin 58, &., we read : "A heathen occupying with 
 the Thorah (Bible) is as good as the high priest." — (Cholin 
 13) : The heathens nowadays are no longer idolaters ; they 
 but follow thoughtlessly the customs of their fathers.(^) — 
 (Sanhedrin 38) : The Bible teaches but one God and one 
 parental couple. Why ? In order to obviate to any pride 
 of origin (as castes in Hindostan and Egypt), and that 
 nobody should think theft and murder of other races 
 allowable. — Rabbi Gamaliel II and Rabbi Akiba (of second 
 century, Palestine) subscribe to that equality in all legal 
 matters. (See Baba Kama, 35 and 113).— Tosephta Baba. 
 Kama, 10, adds: "To rob a Gentile is worse than to rob a 
 fellow Jew, for there is additional desecration of God's 
 name,"('') — (Cholin, 94.) Rabbi Samuel declares : '/' It is for- 
 bidden to steal people's good opinion; so it is, even of an 
 idolater."(^) Everywhere in Mishna, Talmud and Casu- 
 ists there is no trace of unfair discrimination between Jew 
 and Gentile in all legal matters, closely following up the 
 Mosaic law in this regard; they stigmatize usury and 
 forbid it toward a Gentile as toward a Jew. It is, unfor- 
 tunately, the Middle Age Church — interpreting wrongly 
 a Bible verse — that thought the Jew can take interest of a 
 Gentile, even when a countryman, and force him into the 
 pawnbroker's shop, thereby drawing upon him fresh ill-wil 
 
 .Dnn'3 nn-nUN' jnjo (i) 
 
 .DtM ^'i^-'n 'JLD .^NiK'^ ^TJO 'ij ^n "ii»n (2) 
 
 .n"iDy hv i^^DN ,nyn iy\i (3) 
 
70 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 from liis neighbors, cursing that privilege. Rabbi Simlai, 
 (third century) says, quoting the Psalm: " Who shall ascend 
 the mount of the Lord? Who shall enter his sanctuary? 
 He who walketh in righteousness . . . and gives not his 
 money on usury." " Not either to a heathen,''^ (Makkoth, 24,) 
 adds the teacher. — R. Hunnah (fourth century) quotes the 
 known verse : " Who increases his wealth by usury hoards 
 it for the benefit of the friends of the poor;" that means 
 those who take usury of the Gentiles (Baba Mezia, 70.) — 
 Usurers are stigmatized as apostates and atheists and are 
 not admitted to the Rabbinical witness box (Sanhedrin, 3). — 
 " Usurers are like murderers, they can never atone for their 
 crimes," (Baba Bathra, 90.) — That will sufiice to show that 
 the Rabbis had no small horror of the pawnbroker's shop, 
 and warned their flock often enough against it. Unfor- 
 tunately, the Middle Age Church and State shut against 
 them all avenues of an honest livelihood, leaving open but 
 that one for them. — Jalkut, 250 h., remarks' that at the 
 Jerusalem Temple, on the feast of Tabernacles, seventy 
 bullocks were offered for the seventy nations (mankind) to 
 pray for their welfare. The same, page 267, says : " Who 
 robs a heathen will not spare a Jew either. There is but 
 one law for Jew and Gentile." — (Gittin, 61.) It is our duty 
 to feed the heathen poor, nurse their sick, bury their dead, 
 save their property when in danger and keep up peace and 
 good-will. — In Mainonides Talm. Thora, we read: ''It is 
 our duty to rise before an old Gentile as before a Jew 
 (Gittin, 60), and to greet him, as a mark of respect (Aboda 
 Sara, 6); to send presents to Gentiles on their festive 
 days," etc. 
 
 Later Casuists and Moralists on Gentiles. 
 
 Tana de be Elia (tenth century) chapter 9, begins : " I call 
 heaven and earth to witness that all mankind, without any 
 difference of creed or condition, free or slave, are to be 
 
LATER CASUISTS AND MORALISTS ON GENTILES. 71 
 
 judged only by their deeds, not creeds. " Whosoever holds 
 converse with us is owe brother, and it is unlawful to over- 
 reach him, . . . and whosoever is guilty of fraud against 
 him J desecrates the name of God." 
 
 In the twelfth century flourished R. Jehuda the pious. 
 In h;s " Book of the Pious "he repeatedly enjoins : " Over- 
 reach nobody, be peaceful, be honest in thy dealings and 
 never take advantage of anybody, without any discrimina- 
 tion, whether Jew or Gentile, or you desecrate the name of 
 Israel and his law." 
 
 Mainonides, (Egypt, twelfth century), Jad. on Kings, 10, 12, 
 says : "Any Gentile observing the moral law is entitled to 
 our respect, to our benevolence, charities and all amenities, 
 just as Israelites are." — R. Moses de Coucy (thirteenth cen- 
 tury) in his work 8emag, 143, enjoins : " Never overreach 
 any one, Jew or Gentile, but be just and fair to everybody." 
 
 R. Isaac ben Shesheth, of North Africa (fifteenth cen- 
 tury) declares in his " Responses, 119" : '' Christians are to 
 be considered as (Guer Toshab) semi-proselytes to Judaism, 
 hence are they entitled to all practical rights and privileges 
 of Jews. The same is the opinion of R. Joseph Caro (in 
 Baith Joseph, 266) (fifteenth century, Palestine.) The same 
 says Moses ben Nachman (seventeenth century) in his book 
 of the Laios : " We are bound to save the lives of Christians 
 in any danger of fire, water, etc." 
 
 So Beer Hagola (seventeenth century to Choshen Mishpat, 
 chapter 425) : " All the harsh enactments of the Talmud 
 concerning the Gentiles have reference only to ancient 
 times of idolatry. TLe Gentiles of to-day keep the leading 
 principles of religion, and hence do we owe them all good 
 will and benevolence." 
 
 R. Isekiel Landau, of Prague (eighteenth centurj^), in his 
 "Responses," says: "I state expressly that in all legal 
 affairs, concerning theft, fraud, robbery, murder, etc., there 
 is nu difference whatever between Jew and Gentile, and that 
 
72 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the Talmudical expression of Goim or ATckum (idolaters) 
 has no reference whatever to the present nations among 
 whom we dwell." 
 
 Dr. I. Hamburger, of Stettin, delivered an excellent 
 lecture on the above subject in 1880, to which we refer our 
 readers for any further information. 
 
 I close with the eighteenth century, the era of Moses 
 Mendelssohn, the era of pure and exalted humanitarianism, 
 represented by Mendelssohn and Lessing, the noble pair 
 that closed the sectarian dark ages and inaugurated the era 
 of fraternization of creeds and races — " the true Renais- 
 sance " of man. 
 
 Review of Biblical Toleratiox. 
 
 What have we seen concerning the status of the stranger 
 in the biblical and post-biblical writings ? The following : 
 The stranger in Judsea adopting the universal moral law, 
 though not yet the Mosaic creed, was entitled to all the 
 rights and privileges of the Judsean, and was termed a 
 brother. If a fugitive slave, he was to be protected and 
 not to be delivered over to his master. He was allowed to 
 compete, to work and earn wages and thrive. He could 
 acquire lands; nay, he could acquire as servants full- 
 blooded Israelites, for the legal term of six years, or until 
 the Jubilee. Read how justice was stronger than national 
 prejudice (Levit. 25, 47) : "When the Gentile stranger will 
 thrive, and thy countryman, impoverished, be sold to that 
 stranger domiciled with thee, the sold Ebrew shall have 
 the privilege of redemption by one of his relatives ; a fair 
 compensation shall take place according to the years of 
 service until the Jubilee. Should he not be redeemed, then 
 he shall go free on the Jubilee, he and his children." You 
 see, the lawgiver's heart, of course, yearns at the thought 
 of an indigenous Ebrew sold to a foreign Gentile, thriving 
 there where the native impoverishes. Does he cry at over- 
 
REVIEW OF BIBLICAL TOLERATION. 73 
 
 reacliing, usury, blood-sucking? No; riglit is right, and 
 property is property. He can't go against facts. The native 
 got poor and was sold to the wealthy foreigner, and he 
 must stick to the bargain. The lawgiver calls upon the 
 relatives to come and redeem their kinsman. But if they 
 do not, then the Ebrew bondsman stays. Only at the 
 Jubilee he goes free. " For mine are the children of Israel, 
 my servants they are, redeemed from Egypt." (Levit. 
 25, 55.) 
 
 What a noble national pride, tempered by meek submis- 
 sion to the laws of equity and justice towards a Gentile and 
 stranger ! Reader, ponder over that. 
 
 The domiciled Gentile immigrant could intermarry when 
 he fully adopted the Mosaic creed and nationality. If he 
 would not, he was not debarred from any civic rights in 
 the State. He was not dragooned into the Ebrew Church, 
 nor wliipped into the Ebrew marriage, nor excluded from 
 privileged trades or employments or streets, nor put into a 
 ghetto, nor had he to wear a yellow patch for discrimina- 
 tion. King David was the offspring of a poor Moabite 
 woman. King Solomon wedded an Egyptian princess. 
 Hundreds of thousands of Gentiles lived peaceably among 
 the Jews as fellow-citizens under the Davidians, the Has- 
 moneans and the Herodians. Thus, Jhree thousand years 
 ago the Bible proclaimed the law of human fellowship — 
 " Love thy stranger. Oppress not the stranger. Love him 
 as thyself." The founders of Christianity, Jews, too, abro- 
 gated the race question, and declared all Gentiles embracing 
 Monotheism as children of God, participating in divine 
 grace, conform to Bible and Talmud. 
 
 Thus Mosaism does not simply teach religion in the 
 abstract. No, it is practical and realistic ; so that to worship 
 God means justice and love to men, indiscriminately. One 
 God means harmonious creation ; means good-will and 
 peace to all, one right and one duty for all. Right creed 
 
74 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 means right deed. Theology is not a dead letter. No, it is 
 a principle of life, permeating, vivifying, quickening body 
 and soul, the individual, the family hearth, the relation of 
 classes and of masses, natives and aliens. State and society, 
 all, effacing the word stranger, making all men one family, 
 worshiping one Maker. 
 
 As to the later Rabbinical law, though sometimes giving 
 back hard words for bloody blows, though erecting Chinese 
 walls to screen its followers from assimilation, it neverthe- 
 less never lost sight of the fact of one right for Jew and 
 Gentile, and never discriminated in matters of fact, in 
 right, benevolence, charity, amenity, and politeness, ask- 
 ing the same respect for the rights and virtues of all,. 
 Christian, Parsee or Mohammedan, with whom it came in 
 contact. 
 
 BiSM A rck'« B [ASES . 
 
 Whilst writing these lines, I felt startled in just now 
 reading, in the daily papers, the following cable news of 
 to-day, April 29th, 1893. It reads as if it were dated from 
 1693. At an interview. Prince Bismarck said : 
 
 "I was never a friend to the Jews, owing to my education. 
 I was in 1847 the adversary of Jewish emancipation, which 
 I subsequently favored in 1869, because the late Baron 
 Bleschroeder appreciated my national projects. The reap- 
 pearance of anti-Semitism after an epoch of speculation is 
 natural, because the deceived people confound capitalism 
 with Judaism. . . , 
 
 " In 1880 the anti-capitalist movement could have been 
 moderated only by the safety-valve of anti-Jewism. The 
 Ahlwardt era will result in politics with no important or 
 lasting consequences. 
 
 " Prince Bismarck added that the adoption of legal means 
 against the Jews would be useless, and expressed the opinion 
 that the cross-breeding of the Ebrew and Gentile races 
 
Bismarck's biases. 75 
 
 would gradually bring about a settlement of the vexatious 
 question." 
 
 Thus in 1893, in cultured Germany, in the country of 
 Mendelssohn, Boerne, Heine, Baron Hirsch, etc.! Prince 
 Bismarck, the assumed architect of Germanic unity, was 
 just interviewed on anti-SeTnitism, or the feasibility 
 whether a class of people living in Germany just as long as 
 the Teutonic nations do, shall be worsted, because they 
 worship God after the fashion of their fathers; because 
 they claim to live according to that very same Mosaic law 
 we just now speak of; that law that over three thousand 
 years ago proclaimed to the world the brotherhood of 
 the entire humankind ; that taught : " Thou shalt love thy 
 neighbor as thyself," "Love the stranger as thyself." Yea, 
 some of its votaries even taught " Love thine enemy as 
 thyself." Anti-Semitism is agitating against half a million 
 of that biblical people. And what is Bismarck saying in 
 the interview? Ho is very philosophical, very composed, 
 whilst some of his neighbors are about firing the roofs of 
 other neighbors. Drinking his bock-beer and smoking his 
 long pipe, he delivers himself with the ambiguity of an 
 ancient oracle. Not for a moment does he allude to justice 
 and fairness and decency deeply involved therein. Not 
 even to State — wisdom and utility. He begins : " I was 
 never a friend of the Jews, owing to my education." That 
 is frank, indeed ! But why, Prince, don't you correct your 
 educational prejudices at your age of seventy-eight? It is 
 never too late. — " In 1847 I was an adversary of Jewish eman- 
 cipation." — Why were you so, Sir? Again prejudice, in a 
 statesman! — "Which Jewish emancipation I subsequently 
 favored, because of Baron Bleschroeder." Ah, so ! Baron 
 Bleschroeder's money did it ! Why not rather on account of 
 the gold mines in the Bible ? — the justice and the wisdom as 
 in the Old and the New Testament, both teaching: "Love 
 thy neighbor as thyself," as a leading doctrine? Why not 
 
76 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 rather in imitation of America or of civilized Europe? 
 Prince, you claim to be a religionist, a Christian! — "The 
 people confound capitalism with Judseaism." Are you not, 
 perhaps, Prince Bismarck, the cause of that confusion? 
 You sided with freeing the Jews for Bleschroedei-'s sake. 
 Did you not thereby set the fatal example of confounding 
 religion with capitalism? Why not rather, for the sake of 
 Moses, Isaiah, Hillel, Jesus, Paul, Washington or Monte- 
 fiore? "In 1880 the anti-capital movement could be mod- 
 erated only by the safety-valve of anti-Jewism." That 
 frankness is astonishing! After freeing the Jews in 1869 
 on account of Bleschroeder's capital, they had to be sacri- 
 ficed in 1880 to save the capitalists! You offered them up 
 as a scape-goat to Mammon. Remember the adage. Prince : 
 " One mistake brings another. '' Are nations to be handled 
 as figures on the chess-board? Prince, you sacrificed the 
 "knight" to save the "queen." Had Bismarck helped 
 emancipating the Jews because it is just and wise, there 
 would never have come the occasion for arousing anti- 
 Semitism as a safety-valve for the capitalists. "One mis- 
 take brings another." Here are the fruits of a Machiavelian 
 policy. "Honesty alone is a safe policy," in the long-run of 
 history. — " The Ahlwardt era will have no important 
 result." I hope not. But in the meantime it disgraces the 
 century; it dishonors civilization; it renders unhappy its 
 victims; it fills with dismay all honest men of enlightened 
 Germany; entire civilized society feels unsafe at such an 
 equivocal policy used in such high quarters. 
 
 " Love thy neighbor as thyself," is the only safe social 
 basis. As to Ahlwardt, Bismarck must not forget, either, that 
 "Ahlwardt's era" is but a phase in Bismarck's era. History 
 will hold the latter responsible for the former. Prince 
 Bismarck alone is dangerous. Here I remember the prayer : 
 "God save me from my friends; as to my enenies, I'll take 
 care of myself." — " The adoption of legal means against the 
 
Bismarck's biases. 77 
 
 Jews would be useless." No, Prince, it would be dangerous, 
 hurtful and shameful! Consider: to-day, Jews; to-morrow, 
 Catholics ; Socialists, Liberals, Democrats, etc., next. Where 
 will you stop ? " War of all against all ? " — " The cross- 
 breeding of Hebrew and Gentile would gradually settle that 
 vexatious question." Prince Bismarck is amiable when he 
 wants to be. But we must not forget the words of Lessing's 
 (Nathan the Wise's) Judge, in the known allegory of "The 
 Three Rings," answering that question, viz: "By kindness, 
 justice and urbanity let each party prove the virtue of the 
 true Ming, the virtue of rendering lovable and estimable." 
 To whip a man into the nuptial room is neither good policy 
 nor good match-making. Don't you remember what Shake- 
 speare has the Jew say on such an interesting occasion : "Sir 
 Antonio, you called me dog, cut-throat, and spat upon my 
 gabardine. Shall I give you now my moneys ? " You send 
 the Jew to the social Ghetto, abet on him anti-Semitism, kick 
 him, oust him, and withal, he shall marry you ? Begin with 
 being just and amiable, and then sympathy will follow. 
 "The vexatious question" between Jew and Gentile, Prince, 
 will be settled without any dragooning to the dominant 
 creed nor whipping into the nuptial room. It will be set- 
 tled amicably when politics will not be governed by Mach- 
 iavelism, but by " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 
 AVhen people will worship God in sincerity, then they will 
 love man without discrimination. When the Jew will be 
 a sincere Jew and the Christian a sincere Christian, then a 
 cordial understanding will be reached. For the time being, 
 the doctrines of "Love thy neighbor," "Love the stranger; 
 do not overreach nor oppress him," taught three thousand 
 years ago, is yet an ideal. For the present, Prince Bismarck 
 has invented Pan-Germanism with two millions of soldiers. 
 He is an admirer of the Czar, with Pan-Slavism and three 
 millions of soldiers. He was a friend of Napoleon III, the 
 pretended inventor of Pan-Latinism, with so and so many 
 
78 SPIRIT OF THK BIBIJCAL LEGISLATIOX. 
 
 millions of soldiers. For the time being, the Russians 
 make war upon tlie Germans, the English, Turks, Poles, etc., 
 and these reciprocate duly; whilst Prussia is distrusted by- 
 Germany and hated by France, Austria, Denmark, Hanover, 
 etc. 
 
 In Russia we see ostracised millions of Baltic Germans. 
 Thousands of disinherited, starVing families are ejected in 
 Ireland. There are Christians worsted, and there Jews, and 
 there Mohammedans. The Jews, counting many millions 
 in Russia, once citizens in Poland, formerly masters of the 
 great Chazar Kingdom on the Volga, later swallowed up by 
 Moscow, are treated like wild beasts, as out of the pale of 
 humanity. They are dragged away in the night, in mid- 
 winter, pillaged, ravished, famished, and forced into the 
 Polish pale to starve, or driven into exile to far-off conti- 
 nents as pariahs and vagabonds. Contemplate the fate of 
 the Poles, the greatest nation of the North yet one century 
 ago, now broken, gagged and distributed as the price for 
 perfidy Jiiid remorseless dynastic ambition— a national 
 assassination in the face of this nineteenth century ! Behold 
 gallant, unhappy Ireland ! What a heroic fight for now 
 three hundred years! A small minority, disinherited, 
 impoverished, ruined by selfish, one-sided legislation and 
 by industrial jealousy. She loses not courage; she goes on 
 fighting for her inalienable rights. Judaea and Poland 
 submit in despair. Ireland fights on, and will surely con- 
 quer. More lucky or more plucky ! Yet Russians, Ger- 
 mans, French, English, Turks, etc., etc., worship the Bible? 
 which is repeating a thousand times, " Thou shall love the 
 stranger as thyself P After three thousand years the world 
 has yet to learn that doctrine. They swear by the Bible, 
 they are idolatrous of it, but they do not practice it. 
 Ancient and modern society stand yet upon egoism. True 
 love and justice without bias, without any back-thought of 
 self, family, race and sect, have yet to be learned. All the 
 
Bismarck's biases. 79 
 
 above-mentioned "pans " and " vexatious questions " are 
 but ill-disguised screens for brute egoism. The Bible alone, 
 with one God and one mankind, rises to the high plane of 
 universal right, corresponding to universal duty. This, 
 mankind has yet to learn. Will they ever? 
 
 The march of history seems to move exceedingly slow. 
 Started three thousand and two thousand years ago, mankind 
 has just invented the needle-gun, dynamite and pan-Latin — 
 Slav — and Germanism . Some of our Americans would like to 
 follow suit with " Fan-Americanism." The contemplative 
 beholder is nigh despairing of human progress. But let us 
 not despair. Let us rather hopefully labor and toil for 
 human advance. History's march is slow, yet mankind 
 moves onwards. Plato and Aristotle yet jeered at the 
 ^^hariarians'^ as just fit for spoil and the yoke. We, two 
 thousand years later, have at least the courage to remember : 
 " Love the stranger as thyself ;" and let us hope the thought- 
 ful reader sympathizes with us. 
 
PAET III. 
 EQUAL DISTRIBUTION OF NATIONAL WEALTH. 
 
 In the foregoing pages we have made some researches 
 concerning the Mosaic Civil Code as set forth in Laws and 
 Judgments (II. M. 2L) AVe have seen that code embodies 
 four cardinal principles in reference to the relation of the 
 inhabitants to the State. The absolute liberty of the 
 citizen is the first feature thereof. The absolute equality 
 before the law is the next one. The economical ratio, the 
 equal distribution of wealth, is the third. Solidarity, or 
 community of interest, is the last. 
 
 We have already treated of the liberty and the equality 
 of the Judaean State. Now we shall discuss the third 
 feature, intimately connected with the first two. 
 
 Let us take, for an example, England, the classical coun- 
 try of individual liberty and political equality. Is there 
 equality a real fact? Are not there equal duties, rights 
 and chances a mockery? a cruel wrong? a dead letter? 
 Compare the rights and duties, claims and enjoyments, of 
 the eldest son of a lord and those of a son of the working- 
 man. Of what avail is even voting to the poor son of 
 Albion, except to sell his vote ? Now, this is the result of 
 the inequality of wealth. Lord A and Marquis de B have 
 respectively the yearly rent of <£100,000 and of £60,000. 
 Baroness C enjoys one of half a million pounds. There are 
 a few hundreds of such great fortunes in England. On the 
 other hand, there are in London alone a hundred thousand 
 paupers, living on alms, and several hundred thousands 
 
SALISBURY, CHAMBERLAIN, HUXLEY. 81 
 
 of proletarians, living- from hand to mouth, neither of 
 them knowing what the morrow would bring them ; whilst 
 forty thousand lewd women infest the streets in dead 
 night, and thousands of men are addicted to crime, from 
 lack of any other means of sustaining life. 
 
 Now, behold the arduous struggle for existence ! " Where 
 you see a palace, look and you will find a hundred wretched 
 huts," says J. J. Rousseau. "Ze droit du peuple &est le 
 pain," St. Just pointedly said. If liberty and equality were 
 realities and not mere words, then every young man and 
 woman starting into life ought to have the same chances to 
 succeed. Have we all the same chances ? By no means. 
 Your father is rich, and he gave you an education ; mine 
 was poor, and my education is neglected. You have been 
 raised in comfort, and hence your bodily health ; another 
 one in misery and sickness. You have powerful and 
 wealthy relatives, who back you in your competition ; his 
 relatives are poor and helpless themselves, and cannot 
 afford him any patronage. Is liberty and equality here of 
 much avail ? Think of a battle — one soldier is armed, the 
 other is not. Two persons have to swim across a dangerous 
 stream — one is prepared from childhood for the occasion, 
 the other is stiff and heavy. Are the chances equal? Two 
 persons run a match of five miles. The one has wings at 
 his feet, the other chains dangling down his. Who will 
 win? What value has liberty and equality in such an arena 
 of existence ? Hence, liberty and equality will never be 
 complete without their necessary complement — equal dis- 
 tribution of wealth among the members of the community. 
 
 Salisbury, Chamberlain, Huxley. 
 
 Some years ago Lord Salisbury, the English Conservative 
 leader, made a sensational motion, a la Beaconsfield, in an 
 effort to take out the wind from the sails of the liberals. 
 He proposed that the State should build cheap dwellings for 
 
82 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the poor. Professor Huxley, equal to the emergency, demon- 
 strated the futility of the idea. He said, "not poor-rates 
 and poor-houses and poor-rents, but manhood — suffrage and 
 education, would remedy the evil of pauperism." Mr. Cham- 
 berlain, on another similar occasion, remarked : " that the 
 rich must pay a ransom to the poor." The fact is, we have to 
 frame such laws, as to give each person the same chances 
 in the arena of existence. This done, and in the course of 
 time, we shall bring about — not by communism and spolia- 
 tion, but by the natural logic of things — we shall slowly 
 succeed in bringing about a desirable sameness of wealth. 
 Now this great problem, termed the Social Question, and 
 recognized as of first political importance, the Mosaic law- 
 giver has well known, and tried to solve over three thousand 
 years ago, by several great and far-reaching economic insti- 
 tutions, standing forth in bold relief tlirough his entire 
 system, as bold as those of Lycurgus, but which, for reasons 
 easy to explain, have been mostly overlooked by commen- 
 tators. These institutions were well calculated to settle 
 the social question of Ms time and circumstances, and may 
 contain some solution for our times too. They went straight 
 towards bringing about equality of fortunes among the 
 citizens. This solution of the social problem the lawgiver 
 endeavored to reach, first, by starting with a just distribu- 
 tion of the national wealth ; next, by securing one day out 
 of seven as a respite for the hard working masses of which 
 we shall speak later ; then by a set of laws providing for 
 the maintenance of that average economic equality, by 
 providing against land grabbing and accaparation, by equal 
 chances of acquiring, accumulating and keeping wealth. 
 All that he did without resorting to the unnatural methods 
 of old legislators, or to the dangerous methods of modern 
 crude communism ; upholding property as a fundamental 
 and sacred, social principle. 
 
JUBILEE AND SEPTENNATE. 83 
 
 Jubilee and Septennate. 
 
 We Lave said that in order to make liberty and equality 
 a reality, it is urgently necessary to insure a proximately 
 equal distribution of the nation's wealth. For in spite of 
 individual, personal equality and liberty, a too great differ- 
 ence of wealth will soon destroy the former and bring about 
 a discrepancy in the rights and duties of citizens. Sooner 
 or later the rich will buy out or squeeze off the vote of the 
 poor. Legislative science has not yet found any efficient 
 remedy against this greatest of social evils. This evil is 
 nearly as great in America as in England, or Russia, 
 Turkey and China. 
 
 Socialism and communism try their hands on that 
 problem, recognized in our times as the Great Social Ques- 
 tion, more important than all others, political, religious and 
 national combined. The movement began with St. Simon, 
 Owen and Fourier, etc, Karl Marx, Engels and Lasalle are 
 the socialistic apostles. These latter ones deprecate appar- 
 ently any violent expropriation, yet desire for the Social 
 Democracy the direction of all, capital and labor, parcelling 
 out to each citizen his work and his emoluments. As yet 
 the system is not settled, and offers no definite base for 
 action. 
 
 That panacea against tbe great human misery, that safety- 
 valve against exorbitant wealth on one hand and abject 
 pauperism and proletariat on the other, with their long train 
 of misfortune, discontent and crime, — that panacea was sug- 
 gested by the hoary genius of Mosaism, and enacted by its 
 legislation over three thousand years ago. It is the Insti- 
 tution of the Jubilee with its subdivision, the Year of 
 Release, both basing on the Sahbath. In II. M. 23, 10, the 
 lawgiver alludes to that great Sabbatic Institution. Whilst 
 in III. M. 25, the entire chapter is consecrated to it, with a 
 gl-and emphasis of speech and space, fully conscious of its 
 paramount importance. 
 
84 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATIOX. 
 
 It reads : " Wlien you will arrive into the land I, God, 
 am giving to you, then tlie soil shall have a rest (Sabbath) 
 to God. Thereupon during six years thou shalt sow and 
 reap and gather in thy field harvests and vineyard crops. 
 And in the seventh year the soil shall have a Sabbath — 
 rest. There shall be no sowing and no reaping ; whilst the 
 spontaneous growth shall belong to thy slaves, thy hire- 
 lings, strangers, and cattle for their food. Thereupon thou 
 shalt count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, 
 making forty-nine years. Then shalt thou have the solemn 
 trumpet sound through the entire land on the tenth day of 
 the seventh month, on the day of Atonement. And ye 
 shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim freedom to 
 all her inhabitants. It shall be unto you a Jiibilee. And 
 ye shall return every one to one's own inherited lot, and to 
 one's own family. A Jubilee-festival shall be the fiftieth 
 year unto you. No sowing nor reaping shall take place on' 
 it. It shall be a consecrated Jubilee-YQ2LV. All selling and 
 buying of the soil shall be in accordance with the computa- 
 tion of that JuMlee-cycle. Do not overreach one another. 
 And ye shall perforin these ordinances, and you will dwell 
 safely in the land. ... So that the land shall not be 
 sold for ever. For Mine is the land ; you are but My immi- 
 grants and tenants. Therefore shall you grant the boon of 
 redemption to the soil. Should anyone sell his allot- 
 ment, his kinsman shall redeem it. And if he can not 
 redeem it, the sale remains good till the Jubilee, when the 
 acre must return to its original owner." 
 
 Many more details follow thereupon. This is the grand 
 Mosaic institution of the Jubilee, one of the boldest eco- 
 nomical suggestions ever uttered by a lawgiver. It ordained 
 that : Every fiftieth year everything shall be restored to its 
 originaT condition. The entire status of all property and all 
 social relations underwent a renovation. Man and land and 
 houses, dislocated and rent asunder heretofore, reassumed 
 
JUBILEE AND SEPTENNATE. 85 
 
 tlieir pristine status to eacli other. When Joshua had con- 
 quered Canaan, he divided it out into tribal districts, and 
 these again into family lots. The entire Israelitisli people 
 were divided into twelve tribes, and the Levites formed extra 
 a thirteenth one. The tribes of Reiiben, Menasse and half 
 of Oad were assigned to the territory beyond the Jordan, to 
 conquered Gilead. Nine and one-half tribes were placed 
 this side of the Jordan, in Canaan proper, each group having 
 a territory or canton, which was again sub-divided into 
 districts, boroughs and lots, and wherein were placed the 
 tribes, gens, families and all male individuals, nuclei of 
 future families. The Levites had their hamlets scattered 
 among all the tribes, forming the connecting link of all and 
 uniting them into one integral nation. Thus every and 
 each adult Ebrew had a lot of ground assigned to himself 
 and his future posterity for ever and ever. That ground he 
 superintended, tilled, husbanded and enjoyed its produce, 
 but not beyond that. It was disgraceful to alienate it. It 
 was considered a sacred heirloom, rather to improve than to 
 disintegrate. Remember the touching and tragic story of 
 King Acliab usurping Naboth's family vineyard (II. Kings, 
 21). Only in desperate cases was it sold until the Juhilee. 
 This simply means that the owner gave away its crops, till 
 the Jubilee, for a consideration. 
 
 Thus, the best part of the modern socialistic idea was at 
 the bottom of the Mosaic State. The State owned the land. 
 Jahveli, the kintf, or his representative, the State, was the 
 only and absolute proprietor. He was the real master of the 
 soil, then, the only national wealth, and he remained so for- 
 ever. The citizens were simply the tenants thereof; they 
 had to work it and lived upon its produce ; tliey could not 
 alienate it. Thus the family-lot remained intact for pos- 
 terity. No one of the Biblical Society was born poor, nor 
 was any one born over-rich ; no one could acquire his neigh- 
 bor's property by any amount of power, wealth or stratagem. 
 
86 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 Queen Jesabel had to hire assassins to grab a vineyard. The 
 agglomeration of the soil, the modern large property- 
 holdings were impossible there. Originally and since the 
 very occupation of Canaan, the approximate equality in 
 property among the Israelites having been thus established, 
 the care of the lawgiver was now to keep np that economic 
 equality, which was the necessary base of civil liberty and 
 political equality. This, Mosaism was endeavoring to 
 realize by the Jubilee and Release- Year institutions. Every 
 fiftieth year all sold property returned to its original owner. 
 Hence, the two extremes, proletariat and grand property- 
 holdings, could not grow up. The Jiihllee formed every 
 fifty years a new equalizing readjustment of wealth, on the 
 original basis of apportionment pro capita. The Year of 
 Release was a powerful auxiliary in that direction. The 
 Ebrew slave was held but for six years. In the seventh he 
 went out free. Hence, slavery and pauperism were, too, 
 rendered impossible. Again, with the arrival of that 
 seventh year, all debts were cancelled (V. M., 15, 1,) (Mai- 
 monides, Yad. Release and Jubilee, I and IX.) (See, too, Philo 
 Septenar, 1173.) The debtor thus got rid of all his indebt- 
 edness and began work clear of all former obligations. 
 These seventh-year and fiftieth-year institutions amounted 
 to a total renovation of the social status, a real " restitutio 
 in iiitegruin.^'' They were mighty bulwarks against Ebrew 
 pauperism, slavery and proletariat on one hand, and on the 
 other against the tyranny of great landlordism, of accap- 
 parating all the soil into a few hands and all the poor as 
 their clients or serfs. Rome and Constantinople were 
 ruined by that mode. An equal distribution of wealth was 
 kept up, especially as the lawgiver did not encourage either 
 conquests or extensive industries, the two other means of 
 enrichment and deterioration. The only inheritance was 
 the family lot. Thus, a fair average equality of wealth 
 was rendered possible and actually maintained according to 
 
SEPTENNATE AND INDEBTEDNESS. 87 
 
 the Mosaic sclieine, without resorting to violent means, as 
 the Gracchi, etc., attempted in Rome. 
 
 Septennate and Indebtedness. 
 
 Did the Year of Release actually release the debtor 
 definitely and fully? Or, rather, was the Seventh Year but 
 a suspense of debts, a year of grace, a patient waiting, the 
 debtor having to pay thereafter ? Commentators and econo- 
 mists are divided thereupon. Some take the Release Year, 
 ^^ Shemitta,'' and its root, " Shamot," to express but a stay of 
 debts, meaning- that during that year no debtor could be 
 prosecuted, analogous to the modern Sunday privilege, 
 leaving on Monday the debt perfectly valid. They find the 
 idea absurd that a practical lawgiver ever could have 
 imagined the extinction of all debts at each seventh year. 
 That would destroy all business and all confidence and all 
 industry (See Michaelis). ^^^ Carefully surveying all the pas- 
 sages bearing on that, pondering over them in connection 
 with the contemporaneous circumstances of ancient Canaan, 
 keeping in mind the leading aims of the Mosaic law, I 
 think that the traditional conception of the Release- Year 
 to really mean a total and absolute extinction of all pecu- 
 niary debts, is the correct one. 
 
 We must, namely, judge an ancient author by his stand- 
 ard, not by ours. We, now, give to industry and initiative, 
 to the desire of enrichment and enterprise all possible 
 impetus, freedom and encouragement. This is our, modern, 
 way of understanding freedom and happiness. If well 
 applied or not, that is another question. The Mosaic law- 
 giver had another ideal before his eyes. His ideal was not 
 a rich, luxurious, competitive, conquering, encroaching 
 nation, filling the world with its arms, its glory, its luxury, 
 its edifices and its monuments, as the Assyrians or the Athe- 
 nians tried or realized. No, his model was rather nearer 
 
 (1) Cesetzg-ebung Mosis ad locum. 
 
88 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 that of Lycurgus, than that of Raamses, Herod, or Louis 
 XIV, each surnamed The Great-, with that difference, that 
 he aimed not simply at strength and endurance as the 
 Spartan lawgiver, but at moral greatness, at perfection and 
 holiness (11. M. 19, 6.) Therefore, he discouraged conquests 
 and war, great and luxurious industries and enriching com- 
 merce. He aimed really at a " kingdom of priests and holy 
 nation,'^ humble and meek and paciiic ; fulfilling the law, 
 kind to each other, keeping their own and not encroaching 
 upon other nations, remaining obscure, modest, poor ; but 
 sound, hale, pure, and thus, really happy. This political 
 and ethical ideal is at the base of the Pentateuch. The 
 later prophets constantly point to it and lead the nation 
 back to it ; with all the fire of their enthusiasm, and with the 
 warm heart of patriots they oppose the vain and glittering 
 schemes of Jerohoaia and Ahdb. With the rising of the 
 great empires, Assyria, Media, Babylonia, Persia, etc., that 
 ideal appears to have been totally lost sight of. The 
 Great kings of those countries aimed at universal empires, 
 and conquests, huge armies, centralization, splendid monu- 
 mental structures, immortalizing their fame, and eternizing 
 their dynasties and their names. The ^ilosaic ideal of a 
 people's happiness and endurance, can therefore not be 
 much younger than three thousand years. Later, that ideal 
 was supplanted by sterner, coarser realities. Later con- 
 querors and politicians realized that ^'hammer or anvil^^ 
 is the lot of nations, and that in order not to be subjugated, 
 a people must subjugate others. This is no doubt a sad sort 
 of political wisdom, but it is one in a certain state of society, 
 especially a young, inexperienced one, as were those of the 
 biblical times, comparatively. This is one of the many 
 reasons, why the bulk of the Pentateuch must belong to a 
 higher antiquity than often accepted by certain critics. 
 The practical, good sense of the ]\fosaic legislator can not 
 be questioned. Yet by the time of Isaiah and Jeremiah, 
 
DEBTORS IN ROME AND JUD.EA. 8^ 
 
 600 and 800 B. Ch., that ideal was already superseded. 
 Hence must that Mosaic state-polity, of modest law-abiding 
 peace and justice-loving national life, without war, com- 
 merce, great industries, wealth and luxuries, — that must be 
 of a more hoary antiquity. 
 
 State Polity and Economy of the Bible. 
 
 Thus the biblical laws enjoined: Do not sell your 
 inherited family-acre. Do not enslave your persons. In 
 distress, liire out for six years' labor. Do not lend money 
 or goods on interest or profit. A loan was to be half and 
 half a charity. You need no marble houses nor coach and 
 livery. Therefore, give of your superfluity to your poorer 
 neighbor lacking bread, and God will bless you for it; 
 Every seventh day take a rest for thee, thy servant, 
 stranger and cattle. Every seventh year keep an agrarian 
 Sabbath for man, beast and the soil, too, all needing it. 
 Every seventh year the Ebrew slave goes out free, or the 
 rogue shall be bored in the ear. Every septennate the bond- 
 age of debts shall be cancelled, debts being the worst 
 slavery. Half the poor in ancient States fell into slavery 
 from non-payment of their debts, as chattels of creditors. 
 Ancient, powerful Rome, mistress of the world, was many 
 times on the brink of revolution and collapse, yea, of total 
 ruination, from that cause. 
 
 Debtors in Rome and Jud.ea. 
 
 The gi-eat civil commotions in the times of the Gracchi, 
 Sylla and Ma.rius, Caesar and Pompeius, etc., were largely 
 brought about by the mutiny of the debtors against their 
 cruel creditors. In his second oration against Catiline, 
 Cicero alludes to that important fact again and again, as one 
 of the principal sources of Rome's social embarrassments. 
 '' Do you expect war ? Will your possessions be spared in the 
 general devastation? Or do you wish the abolition of 
 
^0 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 debts? — an tabulas novas? Errant qui istas a Catilina 
 expectant. They who expect it from Catiline are in errror."— 
 Catiline, and later, C?esar, were popular, holding out the hope 
 of debt-abolition. " The very first class (of Catiline's sup- 
 porters) are great nobles deeply in debt, and not wishing to 
 pay them," says Cicero. " Unus genus est eorum qui magno 
 in aere alieno, . . . quarum dissolm nullo modo pos- 
 sunt" (Oratio 11. in Catilinam, 100.)— Moses discouraged 
 the accumulation of debts by interest or speculation, check- 
 ing that tremendous avidity for accap^ara^mp' and grasping, 
 the leading features and the curse of old and of modern 
 nations. In a society constituted after the pattern of the 
 Bible, one would entertain no fear of communism, anarchy 
 and dynamite. Indeed, the Mosaic polity contains probably 
 everything rational and safe in socialism, expunging all its 
 crudities. Look close to these verses (V. M. 15, 1): "At the 
 end of six years let there be a release iShemitta), namely: 
 Every creditor shall release his debtor from his indebted- 
 ness, and not press his neighbor and brother, for it is a release 
 to the Eternal. The foreigner (in his own country) thou 
 mayest press for payment, but he living with thee, thy 
 brother, take off thy hand from him, that there shall be no 
 pauper among you, and God will bless thee. He who gave 
 thee an inheritance in possession. When, nevertheless, 
 there will be a poor one in thy city, do not harden thy 
 heart, nor close thy hand against thy brother, the poor one. 
 Should thy wicked heart think, the release-year is near, 
 and thou wouldst give him nothing; that would be mean. 
 Indeed, open thy hand to thy poor brother, and God 
 will bless thee in all thy doings." That sounds by all 
 means, if not as a peremptory command, at least as a strong 
 recommendation to abandon and annul all debts in the 
 seventh year. The passage following is to the same point 
 (V. M. 15, 12): ''An Ebrew, being sold to thee, .^hall work 
 six years; in the seventh he shall be free. And when leav- 
 
PRESENT AND ANCIENT ECONOMICS. 91 
 
 ing thee, let him have a portion, according to the wealth God 
 blessed thee with. For a slave thou hast been in Egypt, and 
 God has redeemed thee." I think, therefore, to be nearer the 
 truth in siding with the Rabbinical interpretation, that the 
 year of release meant a complete cancellation and abandon- 
 ment of all pecuniary debts. It was, namely, a sub-division 
 and auxiliary of the Jubilee. Every seventh year debts were 
 extinguished and slaves set free. Every fifty years there 
 was a total renovation and restoration of the entire Judaean 
 society and a return to its pristine condition. Let us not 
 forget the difference of times and circumstances. 
 
 Present and Ancient Economics. 
 
 In our present era of fierce competition, selfish individual 
 efforts and unbridled acquisition, such a law would be tan- 
 tamount to communism and confiscation of property. All 
 commerce and trade would come to a stand-still, and society 
 would celebrate an involuntary and uninterrupted holiday; 
 work would be stopped and starvation might follow. Not 
 so in ancient Ebrew Canaan, the scene of that legislation. 
 Imagine Sparta, clinging yet to the letter and spirit of 
 the Lycurgian laws, and before its days of corruption by 
 conquest, would enact such statutes of Release and Jubilee, 
 there would not result the least social disturbance. Just so 
 it was in Judsea, with a tolerable equality of property and 
 political status, with little wealth, industry and commerce, 
 a modest nation given to agriculture and a simple mode of 
 life; that could have no other effect than to uphold the 
 original scheme of the legislator. This aim was the found- 
 ing of a State and of a people for absolute freedom and full 
 equality, frugal and sober, strong enough to repel invasion, 
 too weak to encroach upon the neighbors, having little inter- 
 course with other nations, the lawgiver deprecating amal- 
 gamation, having placed his God-idea and purity of morals 
 as frhe corner-stone of his State, so much in contrast with 
 
92 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the neigliboring tribes, worsliiping Baal, Moloch and 
 Astaroth. The metliod of Moses is more congenial to our 
 modern taste than that of Lycurgus. The latter sacrificed 
 everything, even property, morals, nature and family, to 
 secure the existence of the State. Moses secured the State, 
 while yet upholding all these ; remaining true to nature ; 
 the family was dear and sacred to him ; so was property, so 
 filial piety, chastity, ethics and all the instincts of nature. 
 Nevertheless did he keep in bounds fierce avarice, competi- 
 tion, plutocracy and pauperism, building up human holiness 
 upon the ''7ioly God"" principle. 
 
 The Number Seven. 
 
 Why did the legislator take the number seven as his 
 norm ? To the supernatural import thereof I have nothing 
 to add; that is well known. It is the seven-days creation 
 doctrine. Critically considered, it appears to recall the 
 ancient view of the solar system of the universe, with its 
 seven heavenly bodies; hence, the sacredness of the 
 number seven. Seven in Ebrew " 8heh7ia,^^ is the root 
 of 87iel)iah, meaning swearing, taking an oath ; as in 
 English, seven and swear, or affirming by the seven 
 heavenly bodies. Thus, there are six days of creation, and 
 the seventli is a "Sabbath," consecrated. The seventh month 
 is the holiday month. By seven were computed the cycles 
 of time. Release Year and Jubilee. At the completion of 
 that cycle, the return of slaves and of their property to 
 their original status was proclaimed. The ten days before 
 the atonement day were given free to the slaves, who then 
 appeared in wreaths, as the equals of their masters, recall- 
 ing the natural state of man. (^) Later, by the Rabbis, 
 these ten days were turned to moral account — liberation 
 from sin — called " Ten Days of Repentance." Seven days 
 yearly are biblical holidays. The seventh year again is the 
 
 (1) Maimonides, I'tuL Releases and Jubilee. \ 
 
IS SEPTENNATE A FACT. 93 
 
 holy rest, without any agrarian work, as tilling, sowing and 
 reaping, for the soil, too, needs a rest. Its spontaneous 
 produce belongs to every one, tlius again remembering the 
 original state of natural society, when the soil belonged 
 to every one. After seven times seven years, the fiftieth 
 year is the grand Jubilee, where everything and every man 
 returned tO their original condition, without any artificial 
 dislocation of man and matter. 
 
 Is Septennate a Fact? 
 
 Were those institutions, the Sabbatical year and the 
 Jubilee, really facts, laws realized in practical life, or simple 
 theories, ideas, desirable suggestions? Here we must dis- 
 criminate. During the whole course of the first period of 
 Ebrew hi story, from Moses to Ezra and Nehemiah, it appears 
 they were much neglected, if not totally ignored ; as, indeed, 
 most of the Mosaic legislation was; as even the leading 
 doctrine of Monotheism was, the prophetic school alone 
 entertaining the tiacred hearth of nationality and pure wor- 
 ship. The mass of the people, with the princes at their 
 head, were given to the surrounding idolatries. During that 
 long period, the Jubilee and Release year were at the utmost, 
 Ideals a.nd pious wishes, not general facts. So we find 
 Jeremiah remonstrating with the nobles against their 
 detaining Ebrew slaves. His denunciations (34, 8) of king 
 and princes are bold, vehement and sweeping. So do we 
 read of the poor woman, complaining to the i^rophet about 
 her creditors, having taken away her children in payment 
 of debts, — utterly contrary to the biblical law. Isaiah 
 (61, 1) and Ezekiel (46, 17, etc.), to all appearances, allude to 
 it as a philanthropic ideal. Another solid hint that that 
 vast and far-reaching institution was but a pious wish, do 
 we already find in III. M. 26; in that severe and gloomy 
 chapter, delineating the infidelity of Israel and its grave 
 national consequences. 
 
94 spirit of the biblical legislatiox. 
 
 Evidence Thereof. 
 
 There tlie sacred orator denounces in a severe, scathing^ 
 long passage the grievous sin of having neglected the insti- 
 tution in question (ibid 26, 33) : " I shall scatter you among 
 the barbarians, unsheathing my sword after you and destroy- 
 ing your cities. Then will the land make good its Sabbaths 
 (time of rest or Release-years). As long as you stay among 
 your enemies, the land will make good its Sabbath-rest— a 
 bitter irony! — since it did not rest during your dwelling 
 thereon." — According to Isaiah V, 8, and Michah II, 2, the 
 poor man's family-lot often was remorselessly appropriated 
 by the strong.— II. Chronicles 36, 21, alludes to III. M. 26, 34, 
 apparently. Wonderful, he ascribes it to Jeremiah and in 
 nearly the identical words. May be that Jeremiah, too, 
 contained that allusion to our passage, which in our version, 
 now, is omitted. It reads verbatim : " The remnants of the 
 sword he exiled into JBabylon to fulfill the word of God 
 to Jeremiah : Until the land will make good its Sabbaths 
 during all the days of its being deserted, it will rest to 
 complete seventy years." Of course the bold critic would 
 conclude from that utterance of Chronicles that III. M. 26, 
 31 to 36, has been written by Jeremiah. I believe that 
 assumption not to be necessary. 
 
 With Ezra and Nehemiah, the restorers of the Mosaic 
 polity, the Jubilee and Sabbath year were, it appears, 
 reinstated. In a solemn convention of the Ebrew Estates^ 
 (Nehemiah 10, 1, etc.), they wrote and signed a solemn 
 compact to abide by the Law of God, they and their fami- 
 lies, and affirmed upon oath to walk after that doctrine as 
 taught by Moses, etc., not to inter-marry with the Heathen 
 Gentiles nor to buy anything on the Sabbath and holy 
 days, and to forego [work) on the seventh year and remit 
 all indebtedness, etc., etc. Thus we see here that in the 
 sacred pact of the national convention under Nehemiah, 
 
EVIDENCE THEREOF. 95 
 
 the law concerning the' Release-year, in its two leading 
 features, viz.: no tilling of soil and cancelling of debts was sol- 
 emnly instituted and declared valid. In I. Maccabeans, VI. 
 49, we read expressly: "And they, (the Judaeans), left the 
 city, (Baith Zur), for they had no provisions to stand any 
 longer the siege. Because there was the year of rest in. 
 the land." And Ibidem, verse 53 : " They, (the Jews), had 
 no provisions in their vessels, since it was the senetdh year, 
 and those who had fled to Judaea from the Heathens, had 
 consumed all their provisions." 
 
 This can mean nothing else but the Mosaic Year of 
 Release. Further, do we read in Josephus (Antiquib. XIII, 
 8, 1): "As the siege was drawn out into length by this 
 means, that year on which the Jews use to rest, came on, 
 for the Jews observe this rest every seventh year, as they 
 do every seventh day;" and Ibidem XIV, 10, 6, we read: 
 " Caius Caesar, imperator, for the second time, hath ordained 
 that all the country of the Jews, excepting Joppa, do pay a 
 tribute yearly for the city of Jerusalem, excepting the 
 seventh year, whicli they call the Sabbatic Year, because 
 thereon they neither gather the fruits of their trees nor do 
 they sow their lands." — The same Josephus mentions it in 
 many other places — ibid. 16, 12, 15, and Jewish Wars, 1, 2, 4. — 
 So Tacitus' History, 5, 4 : " The seventh day they give to 
 rest, the seventh year to laziness." (^) That this Sabbatic 
 institution was a practical one, is proven too by the fact that 
 the Rabbis elaborated that system with all their wonted 
 minuteness and exactness in Mishna, Talmud and Casuists. 
 (See Talmud, Bably., Schebiith and Maimonides, " Release 
 and Jubilee," chapter X, 3.) 
 
 According to tradition, there were seventeen plus eight 
 Jubilee cycles celebrated, since the Ebrew occupation of 
 
 (1) Septimo die otium placuisse ferunt; quia is finem laborum tulerit; dein blan- 
 diente inertia septimum quoQue annum ignavi.e datum. 
 
 Tacitus knew little of the facts and less of the spirit of Mosaism, destined to reiga 
 even in Rome hoi'self . 
 
96 
 
 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 Palestine until Ezra and the diaspora. I, therefore, do 
 not in tlie least doubt tliat tliese institutions were 
 intended as actual facts and positive laws, commanded, 
 and, at least during the II temple, really practiced. But 
 I think they never were realized in their full sense and 
 entire essence. I think rather, as with many other Mosaic 
 ordinances, they were buried under the mass of Kabbini- 
 cal traditions, the law was kept in letter, but changed 
 materially in spirit, whenever the original spirit no 
 longer was believed to be the "spirit of the times;" a 
 method followed by Mishna and Talmud, as also in later 
 times. A proof thereof is the Rabbinical arrangement of 
 Pros-houly or Reservation. (^) (Maim. Yad. on Release and 
 Jubilee IX, 16.) Namely, as the Mosaic code required the 
 relinquishment of all debts every seventh year, and as 
 towards the latter part of the II Ebrew Commonwealth the 
 Judseans, especially those living in foreign countries, had 
 adopted largely mercantile pursuits, the release of indebt- 
 edness proved to be simply ruinous. Now there is a maxim 
 in Jewish jurisprudence, that a law is intended to be useful 
 and beneficial, ('-) not detrimental, as long as it is to remain 
 in force; and that when it becomes obnoxious to the 
 majority f ) it must be abolished. 
 
 Abolition of Septennate. 
 
 Even so did Hillel and the leading authorities act in that 
 instance. They abrogated it, because "Judsea was no longer 
 independent." They formulated a legal deed by which the 
 debt and the right of collecting it at any time, except the 
 Release-year, was reserved to the creditor, and then the 
 Septennate was reduced simply to a postponement of pay- 
 ment, as it is even now interpreted by many jurists, as 
 Michaelis and others. 
 
 •^ums (1) 
 
 • Dna nio'^E^' n^i ."Dnn ^m,, (2) 
 
 •n niDv!? p^i3' jrx iiTvn nn (3) 
 
SEPTENNATE NEVER TRIED. 97 
 
 The interesting passage thereon is in Talmud Bably. 
 Shehiith, 10: "The Pros-hoiily act saves the debt from 
 cancellation. This is one of the arrangements of Hillel the 
 Elder, seeing the people's hesitation in lending money.'' 
 (^) By a similar legal fiction the later Rabbis allowed to 
 take interest on money, contrary to the express Mosaic law, 
 by a deed declaring the creditor a partner of the debtor, 
 with a ri^ht to share in the profits of the business for 
 which he is lending the money, at the same time intimat- 
 ing that he is relinquishing that profit for a percentage on 
 the capital. Even so, no doubt, did the Rabbinical sages 
 deal with all the features of that far-reaching institution, 
 originally intended for a small agricultural, isolated people 
 in hoary times and primitive surroundings, but altogether 
 out of harmony with the Ebrew development fifteen cen- 
 turies afterwards. 
 
 Septeis'nate Never Tried. 
 
 We can, therefore, not say that this institution ever had 
 a fair trial, nor do I believe that we can actually have an 
 estimate of its bearings in real life. I presume that this 
 far-reaching institution, of the utmost import to the econom- 
 ical, political and social development of a people, though 
 formally kept up in puny Judaea during its second histori- 
 cal period, is yet, in truth and reality, a terra incognita. 
 We cannot judge of its grand results, what it might be . 
 when fully in practice, for a long period of time, on a large 
 scale, realized in. essence and in spirit, and supervised by 
 statesmen and wise economists. I think it worth while for 
 philosophers and philanthropists to take it into the most 
 earnest consideration. It strikes my mind that it can not 
 be accidental that so many of the leading scientists and 
 systematizers of modern social democracy are of Ebrew 
 
 ■ nr nx m nii^nisD nyn pyjojcj* 
 
 7 
 
98 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 origin. I mean, in the first place, Karl Marx. So, too, are 
 next Lasalle, Singer, Bamberger, Dr. Max Hirsh, etc. Even 
 others, as St. Simon and Prudhon, the French social initi- 
 ators, have drawn their sympathies and ideas from that 
 same fountain, the Mosaic aspirations, to base the State, 
 not simply upon personal liberty and political equality, but 
 going deeper, upon a comparative sameness of property, an 
 equal distribution of wealth, a system compounded of 
 property and community, of individualism and socialism, 
 of supremacy of the citizen and that of the State, a com- 
 munism combined with full individual initiative, so unlike 
 modern communism, and as unlike that of Lycurgus and 
 Sparta. As so many other great thoughts, so social demo- 
 cracy, too, may be but a recent revival of a biblical idea. I 
 think economists have only to dig in that antique gold mine, 
 and they will find there more genuine treasures than in 
 all the finds of Babylon and Greece. 
 
 Septennatp: and Modern Charity. 
 
 Mutilated and curtailed as the Jubilee and Release-year 
 have been realized, their influence upon the character of 
 modern nations is, nevertheless, potent and vast. Their 
 political and social benefactions have been greatly frus- 
 trated by legal fictions, downright misunderstanding and 
 misapplication. An equality of wealth they have not 
 brought about, because they were never fairly tried. Never- 
 theless, they have realized practical, grand results of a 
 moral nature. That sensibility, sympathy and fellow-feeling 
 in the modern man's temperament are undoubtedly their 
 effects. Those biblical charity-laws of which I shall treat 
 soon, are their logical outcome. That Israelites are pro- 
 verbially charitable, (^) that organized sympathy exists 
 among modern nations in Europe and America, that charity 
 is a leading feature in the New Testament and in the 
 
EXEMPTION LAWS AND FRAUD. 99 
 
 Koran, all this re-echoes the great heart of the author 
 of the Septennate system. The modern all-pervading 
 idea that active goodness and philanthropy are the very 
 marrow and essence of religion, standing out in relief 
 before and above dogma and race and class-interest, filling 
 the heart of enlightened Christian, Jew and Heathen, that 
 idea is hewn fro'm the great quarry of the Mosaic, humani- 
 tarian legislation. The New Testament is brimful of it ; 
 it starts with a communistic society ; it declares the King- 
 dom of Heaven especially belonging to the poor; it asks 
 of the rich " to give away all, if he desires to enter that 
 kingdom." The Koran did not remain far behind in that 
 respect, holding to the identical sujjreme idea of love to 
 man. As the Sabbath, the means of educating, elevating 
 and sanctifying man, originated in the Bible, expanded 
 in the vast Christian world and then in the vaster Mahom- 
 medan one, encompassing now the civilized portion of man- 
 kind; even so may its perfect development, the Insti- 
 tution of the seven-years'-cycle, become the panacea against 
 our great social evils, the solution of the "social ques- 
 tion," the remedy against proletarianism, pauperism and 
 plutocracy. 
 
 Exemption Laws and Fraud. 
 
 That Institution has, besides the above-mentioned politico- 
 social purposes, also a legislative one. It is the bankruptcy 
 and exemption law of ancient times. Nearly every modern 
 statute book has enacted some provisions against totally 
 depriving a man of all means of subsistence in case of mis- 
 fortune. Some leave a certain allowance in goods for him- 
 self and his family; some, his homestead; some, his furni- 
 ture and clothing; some, his life-insurance; some, the 
 dower brought in by his wife, etc., etc. Now behold the 
 abuse of such exemption laws. Here is a merchant, living 
 extravagantly, out-doing and out-shining all his neighbors. 
 
100 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 To cover up such display, lie must over-speculate and under- 
 sell. To hide that, he falsifies his books. — Even his clerks 
 are kept in the dark. — Even his books are made, to hide the 
 truth. He never was a friend of honest double-entry book- 
 keeping. He had his own crooked ways of keeping accounts. 
 As the Holy of Holies of old, his personal stock-account 
 was shrouded in darkness, his bookkeeper n^ever approached 
 it without trembling. A crisis comes on, failure sets in, 
 and there is a woeful deficit. — But his lady is so charming ; 
 he was so hospitable; she gave such fine dinner-parties and 
 musical soirees. "'Society ^^ the courts, the creditors them- 
 selves, sympathize with him and her. They can't endure 
 the thought that such people should leave the brown stone 
 house and the diamonds. The exemption laws are twisted 
 and tortured in their favor, and a compromise of twenty- 
 five cents on the dollar is effected. 
 
 Here, again, is a modest man, living humbly, keeping a 
 small store, with a large family behind him. He is crushed 
 by competition ; he has but few customers ; his goods are 
 depreciated by going out of fashion, and he suspends pay- 
 ment. — Little sympathy is there for him. The sheriff sells 
 his humble stock under the hammer, at thirty cents on the 
 dollar. His creditors lose and are furious; nobody has a 
 good word for the fellow; and he and his family are forever 
 ruined and forever bankrupt. Now, where is here justice ? 
 Is not justice here a mockery! The extravagant and fash- 
 ionable are exempted. The modest, the honest, the thrifty, 
 ruined by reckless, soulless competition — they are sent to 
 the poor-house. 
 
 Code Napoleon. 
 
 When the famous Code Napoleon was prepared, at the 
 dawn of this century, by the French Council of State, such 
 exemption laws were proposed in favor of the wife of the 
 bankrupt. With his usual good common sense. Napoleon I. 
 
RESUME OF JUBILEE AND SEPTENNATE. 101 
 
 argued the case as just set forth, viz: "That display and 
 diamonds are mostly at the bottom of failures, and that 
 the sin must be laid at the door of the sinner proper, with- 
 out distinction of sex." — The Bible is eminently just in its 
 exemption laws. — No man shall be born to absolute pov- 
 erty. Everyone is possessed of his family lot. In marry- 
 ing he has some speck of ground to rely upon as a last 
 resort. He enjoys its fruit. He cannot alienate it. It is 
 the leaning staff of his widow and his children. It cannot 
 be wrested from liim by debt. It is inalienable. In our 
 times people marry on air, pay the last hundred dollars for 
 a bridal present, begin business on air and moonshine, and 
 rely on exemption laws and " stolen sympathies." Could 
 we not learn here, too, from the wisdom of the ancient 
 lawgiver? — A hundred times he warns against wronging 
 widows and orphans. He forbids to take a pawn of a 
 widow, — to take away the " simla" or shawl used in time of 
 night. God is the special protector of the widows and 
 orphans. A portion of the crop is theirs. But she is not 
 exempt from the law of responsibility. Again, we must not 
 forget that tlie status of woman now, and once, is immensely 
 different. Anciently, she was sold into marriage ; she had 
 little or no cboice of her lord. He was entitled to have 
 several marital establishments. Hence, often could he 
 ruin the family without her concurrence, even against her 
 will. Now it is the wife who is mostly the mistress of the 
 house, who arranges her household and its expenses, who 
 has her full share of its enjoyments. She can coerce, 
 restrain or destroy. Hence, she must be responsible. 
 "' Nobility obliges." 
 
 Resume on Jubilee and Septennate. 
 
 The biblical passages on the above institutions are: 
 II. M. 23, 10— III. M. 25— V. M. 15, and many, many more. 
 The import of the institution is a restoration of man and 
 
102 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 soil to their natural and original conditions. Originally, 
 botli were free. Social and economic alterations changed 
 that status, and both were enslaved. The lawgiver estab- 
 lished the seventh year cycle for the freedom of persons 
 and of soil, and the Jubilee as a total restoration of society to 
 the original state, a restitutio in integrum. It is realizing 
 thus the ideas of ''Mine are Israel, devoted to Jahveh's 
 service, by Him redeemed from Egypt," and " Mine is the 
 land; ye shall not sell it for ever. — Ye are but my tenants." 
 — Now these are, closely seen, the views of modern democ- 
 racy, those, especially, pervading modern socialism. Man 
 and soil are absolutely free, the property of the entire 
 society, not of king or class. Mosaism thus has happily 
 compromised between property and community, individ- 
 ualism and communism, consecrating the first, yet con- 
 stantly remembering the latter: "Ye were slaves in 
 Egypt." That means, poor ye were and oppressed. Hence, 
 learn to live and let live; be no oppressors in your turn, no 
 plutocracy, no landlordism and no proletarianism. 
 
 The remission of debts in the seventh year is absolute, a 
 relinquishing and total cancellation thereof. It is not 
 simply a suspension during the Sabbatic year, as believed 
 by Keil and Michaelis. Such is the sense of the Septua- 
 ginta (Deut. 15, 1.) (') The same is the opinion of Philo 
 (M. II., 277.) The same, originally in the Talmud (Shebiith 
 10, 1), declaring without any discussion or doubt that f) 
 " the seventh year cancels and releases from all indebted- 
 ness, with or without a legal deed." The Rabbis go to the 
 very extreme, declaring that " even the hireling's wages are 
 forfeited when left as a loan to the employer." Later, 
 exceptions began to crop up. No doubt this took place 
 
 (1). Ai krcra iruv Trou'/aei^ CKptatVj kcu ovtcj tu TrpocTay/ui rf/r a(j>tagij)Q. aor/ceic ttHv 
 Xpio(;'i6ioVj b dfei?.ei aoi 6 rr?.7/c/ov^ aal top cuhAipov aov o'vk cnrairijatig. hTiiKtKATjrai jap 
 acpeoLq /ityjiw rcJ ^eiJ aov. 
 
 ."ictja vh^"\ nt2L"3 ,m^on riN nD»L"D n^r^c* (2) 
 
RESUME OF JUBILEE AND SEPTENNATE. 103 
 
 when the Ebrew nation left its primitive agricultural state 
 and became more largely industrial and commercial. So, 
 debts on pawn were not forfeited; and above all by the 
 legal exemption of the " Priisbul.'' (^) 
 
 Thus we read in " Shebiith " Mishna (10, 2 to 8,) the 
 following : There is non-cancellation of debts secured by 
 pawn, and for him who registers his asset-notes at the courts. 
 Nor does the Prusbul admit of cancellation. This is one of 
 the enactments of Hillel the Elder (first cent. B. C.) See- 
 ing that the people abstained from lending each other (on 
 account of the Release-year), he contrived the above Prus- 
 bul (or act of postponement of payment). The act read 
 thus : " I herewith declare to you, Judges N. N., that on all 
 my active debts and assets, I reserve the right of collecting 
 and receiving payment for, whenever I please " — " which 
 act judges or witnesses signed." — The Mishna continues — 
 ibidem : — "When the debtor offers, during the Release-year, 
 to pay his debt, then the creditor should offer to relinquish 
 it, and when the debtor insists to pay, the creditor can 
 accept. Which act is meritorious.^^ ('^) Allusions to the 
 Jubilee and Release Institutions we find enough: In 
 Isaiah 37, 30, and Jeremiah 7, 12; Ezekiel 46, 17, calls it 
 the year of liberty ! ('j a new term, then. The word Jubilee 
 is derived from the Ebrew ^n% meaning to stream or to 
 violently flow; from the strong sounding of the cornet, pro- 
 claiming on the tenth day of the seventh month the entrance 
 of the Liberty-year. According to various allusions in the 
 Bible, the family-lot was fairly kept up and retained in the 
 respective families and tribes. According to Sibra (Behar. 
 2, 3,) the first interruption in that institution occurred when 
 the two and a-half tribes residing beyond the Jordan were 
 driven into exile. Later, again, after the ten tribes of the 
 
 (1) Pros-bouly, ^ntnD 
 
 •irDn nmj Dvran nn (2) 
 •ii-nn nrc i.3) 
 
104 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 kingdom of Israel were conquered and exiled by King Sal- 
 uianassar, of Assyria. It was reintroduced by King Josia, 
 of Judsea; again suspended after the destruction of that 
 kingdom, and again introduced by Nehemiah (10, 32). During 
 the II Temple and empire, that institution is frequently 
 mentioned by Jewish and Gentile writers, in Josephus, 
 Tacitus, etc., as a live institution and described as above. 
 
 After the destruction of the second Jewish empire, it 
 was again revived and kept up, but hardly understood. 
 Thus, it became a greac drawback. Rabbi Jehudah, (II 
 century P. C), the prince had the idea of abolishing it 
 entirely as no longer opportune, but he was foiled in this, 
 his intention, by his other more conservative colleagues. 
 (Jerushalmi Taanith, 66 a.) Slowly it decayed, and when, 
 later, the Romans insisted upon their tribute even during 
 tliat year, it was suffered to fall into desuetude. (See Ham- 
 burger's Real Encyclop. on this subject.) 
 
 Where we find in our forest ramblings a mighty tree with 
 a sound, round, vast stem and lofty, thick, powerful branches, 
 stretching into all directions around and above, towering to 
 the ethereal sky, yielding exquisite shade to brute and man, 
 and a refreshing pool or well murmuring at its feet, we are 
 vividly reminded of the mighty roots entwined deeply in 
 the earth, giving support and strength and sap to that tree. 
 Even so when we contemplate that far-reaching Jubilee and 
 Release-Year Institution, we ask, where is the deej) root of 
 that vast tree? How powerful must it not be to give sup- 
 port to such a growth? This root is the Sabbath, of which 
 we shall speak later in the following pages, having first to 
 survey a great question intimately connected with tlie above 
 theme. 
 
 Bible and Communism. 
 
 A rough, crude attempt at settling the all-absorbing social 
 question, is communism. It is a remedy suggested by 
 hunger, folly and despair, developed into some sort of sys- 
 
BIBLE AND COMMUNISM. 105 
 
 tern by inebriated science, takiny: brute force as a measure 
 of ri^lit, a remedy a^'ainst the two extremes, grasping accu- 
 mulation on one hand and excessive poverty on the other 
 hand. That crude, first outline of communism attempts at 
 making the State the only one proprietor of all and every- 
 thing, and all the citizens one great herd of passive subjects 
 and obedient workers, unfree tools in the hands of the 
 leaders. It is a trial to make man a machine, to rob him 
 of all his rights to individuality and to property. He shall 
 not own his own will, his i)erson, taste and inclination, 
 aspiration and effort. He shall not own his own house, his 
 wife, his child; he shall labor as an ox, a machine, for the 
 State. The State shall be the sole employer, the only 
 boarding house, furnishing him with meagre, Spartan meals, 
 scanty raiment and lodging, without any regard for his 
 taste, his merit, his work. That system deprives man of 
 all inclination, of every incentive to effort, labor and dis- 
 tinction; it robs him of all personality, all moral freedom, 
 all noble emulation; it opens the crib for all, happiness to 
 none ; it satisfies the beast, not the man. To all appearances, 
 that kind of communism is the first rude trial of socialism, 
 its later, higher evolution. That communism cures the 
 patient by decapitation. The veteran Frenchman, St. Juste, 
 sardonically said : " The right of the people is bread." The 
 communistic politicians took him at his literal word. They 
 offer the people bread — at the expense of all human happi- 
 ness; they save the animal by sacrificing man. But man 
 wants something more than bread ; he wants education, cul- 
 ture, sympathy — a happy, developed self. Communism 
 forgot that. 
 
 Not so IVIosaism. It suggests to solve the question as old 
 as man is, in a more rational way — by the .lubilee Cycle. It 
 secures the bread of the poor, but also his freedom, his 
 Individuality, his culture — Sabbath — his family, his happi- 
 ness. Mosaism allows us to acquire as much as our skill 
 
108 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 and industry permit. " Conquer matter," utilize forces 
 and chances (Genes. I. 281, have the advantages of your 
 talents and your thrift. But be moderate, reasonable, mer- 
 ciful. Crush not your neii^hbor ; take not advantage of his 
 weakness or simplicity. Remember, live and let live ; his 
 person is sacred ; his field, his home, his wife and children, 
 are sacred. His patrimony must never be estranged from 
 him and his family. When poor, you are bound to help 
 him to a competency, not by alms, not by making him a 
 pauper, but by encouraging him, backing him, helping him. 
 to an independence, for he is your brother. What a vast 
 difference between that genuine benevolence and the one 
 usually in practice ; the hypocritical, painted benevolence, 
 the real bitter competition, the venomous jealousy or 
 revenge, offering a neighbor some showy assistance, in order 
 to gain the appearance of charitableness, and at the very 
 same moment making all efforts to crush him and his 
 manly independence, to loAver his public standing and 
 stamping him a pauper. . . . The biblical way alone 
 solves the social question. 
 
 Whilst our present economical system is crushing compe- 
 tition and "ring" policy; whilst communism is robbing us 
 of all our individuality, making us machines, the Penta- 
 teuch takes a middle course, yet teaches, "Live and let 
 live. Work and acquire, and let room for others, too- 
 Enjoy and let enjoy; emulation, yet sympathy, too; egoism 
 tempered with altruism. Love thy neighbor, love the 
 stranger as thyself." Hence, let not be all accumulation 
 on one side and all destitution on the other. Human effort 
 has free scope ; yet remorseless, soulless competition is 
 stigmatized and checked. In that manner is individual 
 liberty and social equality built up there, upon the solid 
 rock of economical equality ; upon fair and impartial distri- 
 bution of the national wealth among all the members of 
 the commonwealth. The Release-year is partial restora- 
 
BIBLE AND SOCIALISM. 107 
 
 tion, the Jubilee is total restoration of the freedom of man 
 and soil, yet fully in accord with the principle of property. 
 That Septennate is a social, peaceful revolution, a fair read- 
 justment, a restaur atio in integrum, without violent com- 
 motion or bloodshed. It is the gravitation force of the social 
 pendulum ever vibrating off, to the right and the left, 
 towards plutocracy or proletariat. 
 
 INIatthew Arnold. 
 
 According to that late English critic, we have not in our 
 United States any ideal civilization, not much of distinc- 
 tion, nor much of the beautiful. But we have a good deal 
 of political and social advancement. American legislators, 
 he says, '' see straight and go straight on all political and 
 social questions." This is something to atone for and to 
 render us hopeful concerning the ideal sides of our civiliza- 
 tion. Let our American lawgivers and economists ponder 
 over the institutions just discussed. Having realized so 
 much in the domain of liberty and equality, something 
 should be done now for their necessary complement — a 
 fairer distribution of the national wealth ; or competition 
 will run mad and may ruin democracy. Think of it! Messrs, 
 Gould are complaining of over-taxation! 
 
 Bible and Socialism. 
 
 We have seen that the iBrst rough outline of communism 
 does not contain much for the edification of the liumanist 
 or the economist. That is a trial to help up the brute, to fill 
 his crib, not to rescue man and woman with all their nobler 
 aspirations. Otherwise, it stands with the later and more 
 recent development of communism. Otherwise, it is with 
 its present evolution, socialism as formulated by Rodber- 
 tus, Engels, and especially by the scientific expounder of 
 that doctrine, I mean Karl Marx ; as introduced into practi- 
 cal politics by the German Social Democracy, headed by 
 
108 8PIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 Lasalle and by the English International, inaugurated, too, 
 by Karl Marx. Rejecting the coinmunism as attempted in 
 olden and in modern times by men of the calibre of Catiline, 
 or by adventurers of the temper of John of Leyden, and 
 in our own times by such as Babeuf or Spies, etc. — rejecting 
 such attempts at violence and incendiarism, as contrary to 
 comm')n sensf^ and contrary to the Bible, we cannot refuse 
 our respect and full consideration to its latest evolution, 
 denominated Socialism, or Social Democracy; without 
 being hasty, even there, in giving our indiscriminate assent 
 to all its propositions. 
 
 Wonderful! There we shall find out its many points of con- 
 tact and many other points of striking contrast with the 
 Mosaic scheme. Nay, we shall recognize even a strongaffinity 
 between the two systems, a kind of derivation, as between 
 parent and offspring, as one developed from the other, no 
 doubt with great variations in essentials and accidentals. 
 Let us begin with the practical part of that system, as 
 embodied in the program of the followers of Karl Marx and 
 of Lasalle — fused in Gotlia, Germany; the program promul- 
 gated in May, 1875. We shall have later enough of oppor- 
 tunity to dilate on the theory and abstruse principles of the 
 State according to Marx and of society according to Moses. 
 But for the moment let us begin to look at the practical 
 features of the socialistic system in parallel with the Pen- 
 tateucal one. The above-named Gotha program proclaims 
 the following : 
 
 Program of Socialism. 
 
 "I. Labor is the source of all wealth and of all culture. 
 To society and all its members, belongs the entire product 
 of labor ; by equal right ; to each according to his reasonable 
 wants; all being bound to work. In the existing society 
 the tools of labor belong to the capitalists; hence, 
 the subjugation of the working classes; this is the source 
 
KARL MARX's DOCTRINE. 109 
 
 of their wretclieduess and servitude. Their emancipation 
 therefore demands the transfer of such instruments of labor 
 into the common property of society. Further, it demands 
 society's control of all labor, the product of that labor to 
 be for the common good and use, for just distribution 
 among- all. 
 
 " II. The socialistic workingman's party aims at a free 
 State and a free society ; at destroying the iron law of 
 wages and removing exploitation and inequality. That 
 party acknowledges the international character of the labor 
 movement and desires the realization of the universal 
 brotherhood of men. ... In order to solve the social 
 question, the party demands the establishment of socialistic 
 productive associations, with State help, under democratic 
 control by the laboring people, for industry and agriculture, 
 slowly developing all labor. . . . They demand univer- 
 sal suffrage, universal military duty, no standing armies, 
 direct legislation by the people, no exceptional laws, one 
 single progressive income tax, etc., etc." 
 
 Now, we must not forget that this programme of the 
 German Socialistic party of 1875 is a practical exposition of 
 its aspirations, a good deal tempered with prudence, aiming 
 at the now feasible and possible, under the regime of 
 Bismarck and successors, etc., and the Kaiser, by no means 
 merciful towards socialism. That programme is the lion's 
 paw in a fur glove of prudence and caution. In order to 
 know the real tenor of the doctrine, not even according to 
 the versions of Bakunin and Baheuf, the revolutionary 
 anarchists, but after the scientific, humane and prudent 
 Karl Marx, Engels, etc., let us study the latter system in its 
 general outline at least. 
 
 Karl Marx's Doctrine. 
 
 Karl Marx, in his great work, "The Capital," a wonderful 
 scientific work, the fruit of forty years' experience and of a 
 
110 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 lifetime devoted to ardent study, philanthropic aspirations 
 and practical initiative in the workshop and in behalf of 
 the proletarians, — this work, "Capital," the Bible of social- 
 ism, teaches essentially the following doctrine : 
 
 Labor is the source of all value. All objects of human 
 usefulness derive their mercantile value from the labor 
 bestowed on them. Air and sunliglit, for instance, are most 
 useful, but since they require no human work, since 
 nature yields them spontaneously in great abundance, they 
 have no marketable value. But in order to create a pair of 
 shoes, do we not need also materials and tools? No doubt, 
 but they, too, are the result of labor. Hence is labor the 
 creator of the article in its present form, as shoes, and in 
 its former form, as leather, skin or animal ; — the first ele- 
 ments come from the soil, and the soil is nature's, and 
 belongs to all alike. The present use-value of the shoes, 
 is therefore the labor bestowed on them. '■'■Labor, as the 
 source of all xialue,^^i& a kind of acknowledged head-princi- 
 ple of the leading political economists before Marx. He 
 only developed it to a grand system of economics, the doc- 
 trine of socialism. 
 
 Now, that all-absorbing and all-creating labor is performed 
 by the workingman ; hence all the value extant, all useful 
 things, all real wealth, is the product of his toil, and by right 
 is his — the just reward of his work! Now, what do we see 
 in actual society, as it is, before our eyes ? The laborer, 
 the producer of all value, gets but a pittance thereof, hardly 
 enough to sustain himself and his family, viz., the present 
 and the future workers and drudges, whilst the surplus 
 of value goes to the — Capitalist, under the pretense of 
 rent for his lands, his machines, his tools and his outlays. — 
 But lands are nature's; the capitalist did not create lands; 
 and the machines, tools and outlays have been, too, created 
 by the workingman's labor, and are, therefore, his, and their 
 produce ought to be his; all real value and wealth being 
 
KARL MARX's DOCTRINE. Ill 
 
 the fruit of work, they must go to the worker, not to the 
 capitalist, the drone. But what happens actually? After 
 the pittance-wage for the work has been paid, the '^surplus 
 7)alue^^ goes to the capitalist, and accumulates his capital. 
 Capital is thus the accumulation of unpaid labor. The 
 laborer got only a fraction for his sweat, his waste of life 
 and his enslavement. The surplus goes to the capitalist, 
 who has been living in idleness and luxuriance. Thus is 
 established the startling doctrine that capital is robbery. 
 But has not the capitalist powerfully contributed to the 
 creation of the goods by his lands, his machines, his tools, 
 his superintendence, his outlays? No! These claims are 
 fictitious. The land is owned by nature.—" He that first 
 enclosed a field and declared ' this is mine/ was the first 
 robber" (J. J. Rousseau). Machines and tools are the product 
 of work. The capitalist never did any work ; his claims 
 are thus contrived ; he cheaply came to lands, tools, 
 machines, etc., by conquest and robbery, or inheritance, a 
 doubtful title, too, or by accumulating the surplus of 
 unpaid labor — that is, by over-reaching the laborer, who 
 had to give his work for a song. There was no free con- 
 tract. He was compelled by the fierce competition of his 
 fellow-proletarians to undersell his labor; he was hand- 
 cuffed by the '' iron law of wages.'' Indeed, when there is 
 but one morsel of bread and five hungry mouths, there is no 
 free competition, but actual slavery. Says Odysseus tersely, 
 Odyss., VII, 216 : " There is not such another formidable 
 thing and more doggish than a hungry stomach, forcibly 
 compelling us to think of him."(^) Our workingman, the real 
 and only creator of wealth, being poor, was not free to 
 wait and abide his time ; hunger compelling him, he was no 
 free party in his contract with the cunning and wealthy 
 capitalist. The so-called free laborer is actually a slave, and 
 
 (1). oh yap ri aTvyepiJ ekX yaaTtpt Kiivrepov aTJiO 
 £7r/l£ro,f/r' EKk'ksvaEV eo fivijaac&ai avdyKij. 
 
112 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 tlie employer is his tyrant, who puts him to such a stress as 
 to work for half value and leave the other half to the 
 master himself. The doctrine, universally accepted, that 
 all wealth derives from work, flagrantly contradicts the . 
 principle of the " iron law of loages,^^ this being but the 
 tyranny of soulless competition, the workingman being 
 really compelled to his bargain. — Hence, is there flagrant 
 over-reaching; the capitalist is accumulating the surplus 
 value of unpaid labor, and he is simply a robber, a 
 usurer, a " Harpagon." 
 
 Criticism of Marx's System. 
 
 So far Karl Marx's reasonings. But they are not wholly 
 correct. Admitted that some capitalists may have come to 
 part of their capital by foul means, or at least doubtful 
 means, as conquest, fraud, violence, etc., that does not 
 imply that all capitalists have acquired all capital by foul 
 means. Admitted that conquests, over-reaching, pandering 
 to princes, etc., are impure sources of acquisition, reason 
 and fairness can but respect capital when it is the outcome 
 of one's own honest savings and industry, or that of our 
 father's life-long accumulations; and the rent of that econ- 
 omized capital is as justly ours as the capital itself. And 
 if with that we buy lands or machines or tools, which are 
 indispensably necessary for work, we are too, no doubt, 
 entitled to their rent. 
 
 Thus all the great learning and ingenuity of Marx to 
 prove the doubtful sources of some ownership, cannot shake 
 the firm base of property in* general ; cannot prove that all 
 ownership is robbery, that all is the result of taking advan- 
 tage of the distressed laborer, crushed by the iron law of 
 offer and demand. Still, there is some truth in all his reason- 
 ings. They prove that great landlordism, etc., may be tainted 
 with a foul origin ; that often profits go the wrong Avay ; that 
 employers, being stout-hearted, few and rich, whilst the 
 
HERBERT SPENCER OX PROPERTY. 113 
 
 workers are many and poor, these labor under great disad- 
 vantages ; that there is no freedom of contract between 
 such unequal parties ; that competition may be carried to a 
 dangerous excess, or rather, that there is, on such terms, no 
 real, free competition, but a taking advantage and over- 
 reaching, coarse and mean, and that the law ought to look 
 to it. . . . 
 
 Let us take as an instance the landownership in our own, 
 young American society. No doubt, the first title to the 
 lands by the first conquerors is a precarious one. The Amer- 
 ican land belonged either to the Indians or to any human 
 being settling en and fertilizing it. Originally, the Bible 
 states correctly : " Mine is the land ; ye a,re but My tenants." 
 Each shall have his lot and keep it. But does that prove 
 that the owner of the house I live in is a robber? That he 
 is not entitled to his rent? By no means. The land, origi- 
 nally seized upon, robbed or surreptitiously got for a toy, a 
 string of beads or for a barrel of whiskv, a pistol or a pouch 
 of powder, has since passed through a hundred hands ; the 
 last hand has paid the full price thereof, and asks now his 
 rent. Is he not entitled to it? Of course he is. The same, 
 when Charles V or Philip II of Spain got their galleons 
 of gold from Mexico and Peru by putting its owners, the 
 " savages,^^ on burning coals, or by "teaching them true 
 religion." That gold dollar had a sad origin. But for that 
 same dollar you, honest reader, have been working a day or 
 an hour. Is that dollar not honestly yours? Can I say 
 that property is robbery ? That would be absurd. 
 
 Herbert Spencer on Property. 
 
 In his " Sociology," Vol. I, p. 292, and more especially in 
 " Sociology," Vol. II, pp. 536 to 541, Herbert Spencer makes 
 a profound study of the property question. With his usual 
 mastery of facts and sagacity of reasoning, he shows that 
 " the desire to appropriate and keep that which has once 
 
114 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATIOX. 
 
 been appropriated lies deeply not in human nature only, but 
 in animal nature, too, being indeed a condition to survival. 
 The consciousness thereof tends to establish the custom 
 of leaving- each in possession of what he has obtained by 
 labor, and this claim is soon admitted by primitive men. 
 . . . We see the claim to exclusive property understood 
 by a dog fighting in defence of his master's clothing, left in 
 charge of him. ... So savages are boldly insisting 
 upon their own weapons, canoes, huts, women, children, 
 etc." 
 
 Herbert Spencer admits that the property title to the 
 soil is not so clear as that to movables created by private 
 labor. He says, then, §539 : " At first land appears to be 
 common property; how did possession of it become indi- 
 vidualized? Force in one form or another is the sole ade- 
 quate cause to make the members of a society yield up 
 their just claims to the area they inhabit ... to an 
 external or internal aggressor, (conquest or usurpation)." 
 He ominously concludes : " While private possession of 
 things produced by labor will grow even more sacred than 
 now, the inhabited area which cannot be produced by labor 
 wixl not be privately possessed. . . As personal slavery 
 was slowly abolished, so may be that of the land, and 
 again become the property of all." Let us return to the 
 original question, having given Spencer's opinion in paren- 
 thesis and having seen that the theory that " Property is 
 Robbery " is untenable. 
 
 Dishonest and Honest Competition. 
 
 But now comes another side of the question, entirely 
 overlooked, it seems, by. socialists, viz : the important 
 intellectual part of business, lodged in the chief. Now 
 comes mental work, risks, force of initiative, commercial 
 enterprise, capacity, solidarity, breadth of combination, etc. 
 All these belong not to the workingmen in the factory, but 
 
LAISSEZ ALLER. 115 
 
 to the careworn, thoughtful proprietor, partner or business 
 manager in the rear office box, in the stately front cabinet 
 or parlor, the sanctum of the head of the vast combination. 
 Can any reasonable man say that the clerks and porters and 
 office boys run the establishment, and that the leader, 
 standing on the watchtower with frowning mien and anx- 
 ious look, scaiming the newspapers and telegrams and 
 telephones, calculating the chances of the crops in America, 
 the wars in Europe and the uprisings in Asia, weighing 
 mentally, and balancing whether it is opportune to sell or 
 buy, to wait or act, to take hold or let go, — can any one say 
 that that brain, which gave the impulse to every motion, 
 upon which everything is staked — that that busy Tnental 
 worker is a drone, an idler, living upon the "surplus value 
 of unpaid labor" of the workingmen? By no means. Hence, 
 the first axiom of the system, viz : that labor is the source 
 of all value; that value is produced by the labor of the 
 mechanical worker alone, and without the chief and pro- 
 prietor's initiative ; that, therefore, rent for land, tools and 
 machines, and the interest of the capital and the risks 
 underlying the business and the profit of the leaders, are 
 contrived and fictitious, and hence a robbery — that doctrine 
 needs a strong qualification. It is practically untenable. 
 As matters have come down from hoary times, have crys- 
 tallized and become organized thought of civilized men, 
 the idea of property is firmly rooted in the human mind, — it 
 is an instinct, — and the claim that it is but robbery is simply 
 a paradox. 
 
 Laissez Aller. 
 
 What, then, has manTcind gained hy the studies of the 
 modern economists, especially by those of Marx, Engels 
 and Rodbertus? A good deal! The conviction that 
 the old policy of '^laissez faire'' and '^laissez aller" — 
 ^' Let go" — is incorrect; that unequal as the struggle for 
 
116 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 existence is between classes and masses, free competition 
 does not take place between privileged and ostracised, rich 
 and poor, educated and uneducated, etc. ; that free compe- 
 tition is a misnomer, and that the State must step in, into 
 the unequal contest, and equalize chances. Now the extrem- 
 ists want us to throw out competition and give everyone 
 his share according to his needs, not his deeds; that, too, is 
 Utopian, and will make society starve. The moderate view 
 is, let competition stand, but make it equal, free and with 
 the same chances for all. Then nobody will crush out his 
 neighbor, nobody being so much superior to his competitor. 
 Each will have work and bread, whilst the industrious, the 
 gifted, the thrifty, will and shall have more than bread, for 
 to that they are entitled. And society, too, will gain by 
 superior work. In such a way we shall have noble emula- 
 tion, not beastly competition, and that alone will prove 
 suflScient, I think, to settle the social question. 
 
 I thus believe Marx's scientific analysis has shown, not 
 that "property is robbery," nor that competition is unjust, — 
 that is not warranted; that is jumping at conclusions. 
 What he has shown is : that some property is doubtful, that 
 the relation between employer and employe is not a free 
 one ; hence, the contract between them is not free either ; 
 that wage-labor is but a masked slavery, that there is no 
 free competition in reality; there is but a taking advan- 
 tage of destitution ; that society ought to step between and 
 protect the weaker party. Further, that we ought by educa- 
 tion, State help, unions, etc., help the masses to restore 
 FREE COMPETITION, wlieu the social question will be solved ; 
 at least until something better has been evolved. What 
 really Karl Marx has shown is: that the great property 
 holdings are not all allright ; that much accumulation was 
 going on by unfree competition, by real over-reaching; 
 that the humbler party of the labor contractors are hand- 
 cuffed and compelled to liLdersell their work. Human 
 
LAISSEZ ALLER. 117 
 
 society, therefore, is in duty bound to interfere in order to 
 avoid moral and economic bankruptcy and social collapse. 
 It must restore tlie equal chances in the battle for existence. 
 It must make competition free and open. These are the 
 legitimate results of Marx's labors, and they are vast and 
 serious enout^h to help solve the social question. 
 
 This solution might be tried in the following several 
 ways : To declare at once all property the property of all — • 
 that would not do ! It would not be just nor prudent. The 
 present property-holders will fight, and will probably come 
 out victorious. — To proscribe all competition will be nearly 
 as difficult; for by what measure else shall we decide upon 
 merit and the value of things ? The rational socialists 
 do not propose revolution, confiscation, immediate assump- 
 tion by the State of all capital and all production. They 
 believe socialism to be the slow growth of the time, the 
 necessary and gradual outcome of our public difficulties. 
 They claim the present private competitive system is 
 anarchic and nigh bankruptcy, and socialism bound to be 
 the savior of society. Hence, let us go slowly and by 
 degrees. What, then, would be the middle course and the 
 connecting link between now and the future? Might we 
 not try first by having this social drawback remedied, 
 viz., competition being now handcuffed and lamed by privi- 
 lege, let it (competition) he free, fair and honest ; remove 
 all obstacles; set free the combatants in the arena, and let 
 us see whether that alone would not do. Indeed, as far as 
 I see, there is rather no competition, and that is our real 
 drawback; there is but sham competition allowe(3. The 
 commoner cannot compete against the noble, the civilian 
 cannot against the military, the foreign -born not against 
 the native. The clericals have intrenched their rights 
 against free competition. The learned profession have 
 reserved their privileges against free competition. Such is 
 the effort by every trade and profession to erect artificial 
 
118 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 intrencliinents and privileges against free choice. — Wherever 
 a vacancy occurs and candidates compete, look behind and 
 you will find the backdoor open for some privileged 
 aspirant. Not merit, but patronage, family, race, denomi- 
 nation, etc.; prevail. Publicly is free competition adver- 
 tised, privately is prlmlege practiced. Ten to one is that 
 the case. The people elect the best flatterer to office. The 
 board of trustees, of directors, of managers, etc., appoint, 
 not the superior candidate, but the best-sustained one — him 
 with the largest backing. Why, then, overlook that? 
 There is really, in most cases, no competition. The social 
 contest goes on really by mere force, not merit ; that is most 
 glaringly, unjust and palpably wrong, and easily to be 
 remedied. Let us begin there our reformation. Society is 
 going by force; let us begin going by merit, real and 
 honest. Let us begin with the introduction of real and 
 honest competition. Any chance in life shall be given to 
 the most competent one — to him who can offer the best 
 work in return. Let us sincerely abolish brute force, 
 covered by rotten privilege and patronage. Among the 
 different candidates, let he or she be selected who can do 
 the best work; let him or her profit by their own industry, 
 or skill, or talent, and society will be the winner. Then 
 let us see whether that alone will not do to solve the 
 social problem. As far as I see, social wrong is going on, 
 not for crusljing competition, but for competition crushed 
 out and privilege and favoritism put in instead. Let us^ 
 therefore, give a fair trial to fair competition. Next may 
 come another social phase. We have been going by force 
 and privilege. Let us now try right, viz., competition, fair 
 and just. Later we may come to tov)e in place of right. 
 This proposition of real competition has at least the merit 
 of a wise and honest experiment. Society has been really 
 going on by the principle of favoritism, patronage and 
 privilege, under the false pretenses of free competition. 
 
LAISSEZ ALLEK. 119 
 
 The masses, crushed by feudal privilege, mistook it for com- 
 petition ; thus duped, they think that to be at the bottom of 
 our social Pandora-box: "Down with competition; it is 
 cruel and crushing!" shout the woe-stricken in their dilem- 
 ma: "It is giving all advantage to the stronger." No doubt, 
 free competition is not ideal. It does give the premium 
 to the stronger, the wiser, the more persevering. — But at 
 least it is just, if not ideal. — Let us give it a fair trial. — Let us 
 begin going by free competition. Let us give to the greater 
 merit, the greater premium. — Anj how, society will gain 
 by it, it will realize better work; whilst by patronage 
 society is undoubtedly the loser — and none the gainer, but 
 inferiority. — Should time show that free competition will 
 not remedy the social question, we can then resort to the 
 No-competition-policy, and give each according to needs, not 
 merits. In one word: The hue and cry that free competi- 
 tion is at the bottom of our social evils, is anyhow prema- 
 ture, unproven and perhaps contrived, for it is a fact? 
 palpable to every close observer, that society goes as yet 
 by privilege and stratagem, not by honest and free compe- 
 tition, hence the present social evils cannot be put at its 
 door. — Now consider : privilege and patronage are decidedly 
 wrong and foolish. Competition, indeed, is hard and sharp, 
 but it is just. Socialism aims at the ideal of non-compe- 
 tition, at giving according to needs — not merits. Would it 
 not be wiser not to jump to the ideal, but begin with the 
 just and the real, before we take refuge in the ideal? 
 
 Now this tempered competition, to give everyone his 
 reward according to his real merit — not favoritism or privi- 
 lege — is represented in the Biblical State. "One law for 
 native and stranger." " Discriminate not in justice," — 
 "favor not the poor, nor the rich." "Have not two stones 
 and two measures." "Justice is God's; tamper not with 
 it," etc. Could not statesmen learn therefrom? 
 
120 spirit of the biblical legislation. 
 
 Karl Marx — Continued. 
 
 Karl Marx believes to have proven, after reviewing, the 
 history of wealth and property, that lands, instruments 
 and capital belong to all and have been usurped by a few. 
 Therefore are these few not entitled to them, nor to their 
 rent. He shows that political history began in hoary times 
 with slavery; that thereupon, after the migration of the 
 Teutonic nations and the collapse of the Roman Empire, 
 came serfdom and feudalism ; that with the reformation, the 
 confiscation of church-property, the discovery of America, 
 of gunpowder and the printing press, the collapse of feudal- 
 ism, the utilization of steam, the inventions of machines, 
 etc., and after the American and French Revolutions — serf- 
 dom gave way and made room for wage-labor. He shows 
 that this is but a masked slavery, that the proletarians are 
 severed from the means of human comforts and human 
 culture, that society is on the way to anarchy and bank- 
 ruptcy, and that a new social phase is ready to dawn, which 
 is to right this long wronged fourth estate, the masses ; in 
 place of the present, private, competitive capital and wage- 
 labor is coming the era of collective capital and associated 
 labor, for the good of all. The profit is to belong to all 
 society, to all its members and workers, which profit shall 
 be divided out according to some "equitable principle." 
 
 What is that equitable principle ? Shall there be some 
 discrimination made among the different crafts? Between 
 the degrees of capacity? Between excellent, good and 
 indifferent woik? Wlio shall be the arbiter? Who shall 
 formulate that equitable principle? Who shall administer 
 the distribution ot profits? Shall there be rulers in the 
 future society or not? These different questions are 
 diversely answered by the several doctrinaires of the sys- 
 tem. Indeed, these questions are hard to answer; yea, they 
 are absolutely impossible to answer, for they are relative. 
 
KARL mark's optimism. 121 
 
 They depend upon factors we know not, and which alone 
 will determine the mode of solution. 
 
 Bakunin's Fallacies. 
 
 Bakunin, the Russian Anarchist, wants no rulers what- 
 ever, for rulers will soon be tyrants. They will rule to keep 
 forever the people as slaves for exploitation, for the advan- 
 tage of the leaders. He wants only such laws and restraints 
 as are self-evident and dictated by nature, and will be 
 obeyed without coercion. 
 
 A great idealist is he, that terrible Anarchist Bakunin! 
 His ideals will need a long while before they be real. It 
 may need ceons of years before man will obey the laws of 
 nature without coercion. All good laws now extant, from the 
 decalogue downwards, are mostly, if not all, rational, natural 
 and self-evident to the impartial and honest reasoner. Yet 
 they need coercion to make them be obeyed. '' Pray for the 
 government," says an oriental proverb; "If not for that, 
 men would swallow each other alive." C) 
 
 Again, if we shall have laws, king. Senate or Parliament 
 must make them, and that means again monarchy or aris- 
 tocracy or oligarchy ; that means rulers, and we have thus 
 come back to the position where we started from. Again, 
 Saint Simon and Owen had an idea of utilizing the exist- 
 ing governments, the patriarchal, the sacerdotal or the 
 monarchical, for the realization of their designs. Bakunin's 
 ideas appear thus utopian. AFen need government. 
 
 Karl Makx's Optimism. 
 
 Karl Marx, the most scientific and sober-minded of the 
 socialistic galaxy, is at the same time the most noble 
 idealist, and, I am afraid, the greatest dreamer, too. He 
 expects a real millenium from social democracy. Having 
 himself spent a noble life in toil and sacrifice, in abnegation 
 
122 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 and poverty for the good of the masses, he believes in a 
 whole crop of such unselfishness and altruism. His nobility 
 of idealism strikingly proves him to be a son of the 
 prophets — a self-sacrificing Messiah of our own times. How 
 does he solve the problem ? The social democracy will 
 need laws and lawgivers and leaders, and these will be the 
 best, the noblest, the most refined, just as the Mosaic "elders'' 
 and the Platonic ''sat^'es." They will be picked out by the 
 people, not for flattery, but for real merit; and this office, 
 this opportunity of doing good, will he their reward. The 
 best of the people will feel rewarded by working for the 
 good of the people. — That the people will, perchance, chose 
 the worst demagogues, those flattering and corrupting them, 
 Marx has never realized! Tlie best men and women, he 
 thinks, will be rewarded by being called to govern. That 
 was Plato's dream, too, and Moses' belief, too ; yet Socrates 
 had to drink the hemlock and Korah had almost supplanted 
 Moses. We moderns have made experience enough, care- 
 fully studying history, that the people will select those 
 that corrupt and exploit them, if left to their own feelings; 
 and if influenced, their choice will not be quite, so bad, but 
 surely not the best. How, then, get out of that dilemma? 
 Perhaps by indirect selection; choice by deputy. — Anyhow,, 
 it is not so easy to tell. 
 
 The Socialistic Ideal. 
 
 Karl Marx believes that the leaders of the democracy 
 will soon be their political rulers — the noblest and most 
 unselfish of mankind. They will make the laws and admin- 
 ister them to the satisfaction of all parties concerned. — 
 Yes, the leaders of the present democracy may be so. But 
 let that system triumph, and you will have a crowd of 
 demagogues and camp-followers yelling with the crowd 
 and getting their own nominations and sinecures. 
 
MARX's DENUNCIATIONS. 123 
 
 Curious to remark, that, witli so much enthusiasm, so 
 much faith in the good instincts of the masses and the 
 nobility of their leaders, Marx is a materialist of tLe most 
 despairing kind — no God, and yet an ideal man ! You see, he 
 has a Hegelian head and a prophet's heart; there is no God, 
 but there is the Messiah ! " The kingdom of heaven will 
 dawn upon earth," though there is no heaven. . . . 
 
 He believes that democracy is now coming to the front. 
 Democracy, he claims, has now the helm of government. It 
 is changing monarchical, aristocratic and plutocratic rule into 
 the rule of the masses. These democratic rulers, indeed, are 
 now but proletarians, carpet-baggers ; but once they are well 
 established in power and have changed politics, they will 
 soon change economics, too. By what means? Violence 
 and confiscation, as advised by Bakunin and tried by 
 Babeuf? Marx answers : "By the slow process of evolu- 
 tion," viz : Society will find out that it must change its 
 system from slave and wage-labor to collective socialistic 
 labor and equal distribution of profits; that it must do 
 justice to the laboring masses, now pariahs and dynamiters, 
 or perish. That he proves in this manner : The present 
 system of wage-labor is but one century old, and already it 
 has drawn the State into the straits of plutocracy and 
 pauperism. Infinite vice, idleness and luxuriousness on 
 one side, and on the other, wretched poverty, lack of educa- 
 tion, coarse crime and vice, and dangerous dissatisfaction. 
 
 Marx's Denunciations. 
 
 Again that system ruins not only rich and poor, but even 
 work itself. For competition is commanding cheap labor 
 and cheap goods, at the price of beauty, taste and strength. 
 Next it ruins the moral sense of all, each thinking only of 
 himself, all society being rivals and enemies. Already it 
 shows signs of threatening danger; the Damocles sword is 
 hanging over the heads of society, with its wars of nations,^ 
 
124 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 classes and masses, races and countries, its anarchy, confu- 
 sion and insecurity for all, even the strongest and wealthiest. 
 Again he shows that the small agriculturist, tradesman and 
 laborer, once fairly happy with their lot, have been crushed 
 out by the capitalist. Soon, the capitalist has been so by 
 the great capitalist, and this one in his turn is so by the 
 great companies, which will be absorbed by the State, at 
 last. Again, our gigantic, modern improvements in agri- 
 culture and industry, with huge factories, machines, steam, 
 etc., require things to be done all on a grand scale. The 
 former individual worker can now no longer successfully 
 ■compete. Small producers and individual workers, as of 
 old, become less and less possible. All is now centralized, 
 all done on a grand scale, or crushed out by the huge com- 
 binations. Even these huge companies are often crippled 
 by rivalry. They over-produce and over-stock the market 
 and starve each other by over-production, and by undersell- 
 ing. As a man dies by over-feeding, so they by creating 
 too much wealth, hj plethora. To save themselves, they, at 
 last, are compelled to agree upon some equitable plan, good 
 for all, by union. Just that is what Socialism drives at. 
 Slowly it will supplant individual labor and individual 
 capital, with their soulless envy and competition, with 
 fraud and anxiety, etc., by collective labor and collective 
 capital. Slowly it will include the entire State, with all its 
 individuals, thus avoiding both bad work and competition, 
 making each do the best for all, and yielding him or her a 
 fair share in the profits. This is the noble ideal of 
 Socialism. 
 
 Democracy, Inventions and Socialism. 
 
 Mankind thus expects its regeneration, its emancipation, 
 the solution of the great social question by a combination 
 of the great social factors, viz : Democracy, Inventions and 
 Socialism. By Voltaire's and Rousseau's doctrines of f rater- 
 
PARALLELS AND CONTRASTS. 125 
 
 nity and equality for all on one hand, and on the other by 
 England's industrial inventions, combined with lands, tools 
 and capital belonging to the State, the State controlling all 
 labor, and dividing its profits equitably among all, with no 
 difference of creed, race, sex or country ; all nations to be 
 sister-nations; all men brothers — what a noble idealism? 
 What a breadth of thought, embracing the globe and man- 
 kind in one mighty bond of justice and love to all ! Marx 
 is a son of the prophets. His ideal heart and his vast brain 
 show it. 
 
 Parallels and Contrasts in Bible and Socialism. 
 
 We started with the proposition that the Bible has noth- 
 ing to do with communism, or that cruder form of socialism, 
 as tried by anarchists in bygone times, from Catiline to 
 Babeuf and the Chicago Haymarket tragedy. But the 
 Bible has a great deal to do with its higher and nobler 
 evolution, now termed Social Democracy. Nay, I may say 
 that many of the noblest aspirations of the latter, grew 
 out, perhaps unconsciously, of the prophetic ideal about 
 State and Society. 
 
 Social democracy, in its above-mentioned Gotha manifesto 
 of 1875, aspires to a commonwealth "where everything 
 belongs to the community and all its members ; land, tools, 
 capital and labor, by equal right, all bound to work, and all 
 to share, according to their reasonable wants." This pro- 
 gramme is entirely biblical. Mosaism declares: '-Mine 
 are the children of Israel; they cannot be enslaved." "Thy 
 brother, hired out for six years, thou shalt not crush under 
 hard labor." (^) — "Mine is the soil; ye are but its tenants. 
 Ye shall not sell it for ever." — On the Jubilee the family-lot 
 and the family-house shall be restored to the original 
 owner. — " Thou shalt take no interest on money nor profit 
 upon any goods of thy brother." — " Ye shall not press nor 
 
126 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 over-reacli each other." — But the Mosaic system has the 
 advantage over socialism in giving to each definitely his 
 portion, for himself and his posterity. Thus, it makes him 
 interested in the improvement of his acre, he providing 
 by it for himself and his descendants. It is not Utopian in 
 its propositions. It proceeds slowly from experience to 
 experience. It proceeds with less startling innovations? 
 and, hence, it is much surer of practical success. The 
 entangling socialistic scheme of having everything turned 
 over to the State, and then the State to become the treas- 
 urer of all the wealth, the superintendent of all the work, 
 the sole enterpreneur and employer, the sole distributor of 
 labor and emolument to the communal members, renders 
 the system hazardous and hard of execution, problematic 
 and Utopian, perhaps never to be realized. 
 
 Social democracy demands the surrender of all lands and 
 of most of movable property to the State. It asks the 
 surrender, too, of the citizen's individual work, talent, 
 inclination, taste, etc., to the good judgment of the State. 
 How sliall that be realized? since every one, possessing 
 anything, inherited or acquired, naturally clings to it. By 
 confiscation ? That is doubtful justice or wisdom, and will 
 bring on discontent and social war. How else, then ? By 
 slow compromise? But the urgent necessity of satisfying 
 the starving, threatening masses! That is a long road 
 to travel by and very precarious. To begin with tearing 
 down the well-tried house and build up, perhaps, a castle 
 in the air ! What do we know how that exceedingly com- 
 plicated system would work? Compromise will need five 
 centuries ; but the masses won't wait. — The Bible contrived 
 something plainer, quicker, safer, less drawing upon the 
 imagination, viz : The equal distribution of the chief capi- 
 tal of those times, land ; leaving ail other things, as efltort, 
 taste, inclination, acquisition, competition, etc., a private 
 matter, all tempered with sympathy. It enjoined the 
 
PARALLELS AND CONTRASTS. 127 
 
 descent of land, peremptorily, to posterity, prohibiting 
 rigorously all land speculation and grabbing, thus erecting 
 a dam and bulwark against plutocracy and pauperism, land- 
 lordism and serfdom. Of the two schemes, I think the 
 biblical one the less hazardous and more realistic, pretty 
 well calculated for primitive conditions and mode^st claims, 
 where every one was content to live " under his vine and 
 his fig tree." 
 
 Socialistic democracy desires a State without a despot, 
 ruling classes and serving masses, no proletarians, no pau- 
 pers, no inequality, no exploitation and no exceptional laws- 
 It acknowledges a brotherhood of peoples and of men, the 
 equality of the sexes and races. All that is biblical; it is 
 Mosaic and New Testamentary. The Bible began with 
 nothing. Later, even when it admitted a ruler, he was to 
 be a ''Ir other,'' not a despot, without seraglio, exorbitant 
 wealth and a standing army. 
 
 Social democracy labors with might and main to elimi- 
 nate the " iron law of wages.'' Such a "law " was not in the 
 biblical state, nor was there any remedy necessary against 
 it, for every one had his own house and acre. There were 
 few, if any, baronial planters, grand industrials, etc., and no 
 opportunity to leave one's own workshop and crowd into 
 factories, with bad air, immorality and slavery; each 
 worked on his own farm, adding occasionally one or two 
 "hand laborers." Very few had work and wages where- 
 with to buy off their neighbor's liberty or morality. Boaz, 
 cultivating a large farm, and Nabal, master of many flocks, 
 were the rare exceptions, and their "hands" were slaves, 
 no doubt. 
 
 Socialistic democracy demands State help for grand 
 socialistic industries, slowly to form one unique State- 
 industry, with all the citizens crowding into its workshops. 
 This is depriving each citizen of his individual inclination^ 
 judgment, initiative and stimulant for effort. This policy 
 
128 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 is very problematic. We may form in that way good tools^. 
 but the tools may prove poor individuals. We may estab- 
 lish in that manner good workshops, but create a poor 
 community. 
 
 That may cost mankind half of its men of genius and 
 talent. The great aim of society is to build up solid and 
 noble citizens. — Industry must be subordinate to it. The 
 Bible needed no such contrivance. It left every man to 
 his native initiative, yet preventing competition from 
 becoming mischievous. It rather allowed emulation, not 
 competition. 
 
 Social Democracy demands universal suffrage, direct leg- 
 islation, no exceptional laws, no privileges, and no discrimi- 
 nation of race, creed, sex or class. It insists on one simple, 
 progressive income tax; no standing armies, but military 
 duty for all. All that is literally Mosaic. According to 
 the Bible, the people consented to each and all the laws. 
 That is expressly propounded by Moses and emphasized by 
 Joshua ; there was one law for classes and masses, one for 
 native and stranger; no legal discrimination against whom- 
 soever. The categories, "priests," {''Colianim,") "Levites'' 
 and "Israelites" had an ecclesiastical bearing, not a civil 
 or lay one. They intermarried, interchanged professions 
 and trades; had no castes, no privileges and no restric- 
 tions. Many a public teacher, many a Synhedrist or Sena- 
 tor, was by trade a shoemaker or carpenter, a smith, a 
 weaver, a physician. There wa& impartial and free justice 
 in Judsea; no standing armies and no pretorian guards; no 
 dynasties by "divine descent," no noble "blue blood," and 
 no extravagant display of loyalty to, nor adoration of, king 
 or high priest. There was but one tax from the produce of 
 the soil and the flocks ; a direct income tax, levied without 
 harshness, rather voluntarily prompted by mere conscience. 
 
 Socialistic Democracy declares for international solidarity 
 of the peoples and for the brotherhood of mankind. Hence 
 
PARALLELS AND CONTRASTS. 129 
 
 comes their personal freedom and social equality. Hence 
 their right to share in all the boons and the wealth of 
 nature. This principle, the grandest and noblest idea of 
 Socialism, hails directly from the Bible. Hindooism, 
 Egypt, Greece and Rome knew it not; the Bible did. 
 It lacks, unfortunately, in Socialism a firm basis and 
 all substantiation, though the entire system hinges upon 
 it ; for the Socialistic leaders are materialists, and mate- 
 rialism yields no standing room for solidarity and brother- 
 hood; Monotheism does. That all men are free and equal 
 and entitled to happiness, culture and bread — how will you 
 prove it from the standpoint of materialism ? Is there free- 
 dom in nature ? Are children born equal ? Does not the 
 stronger and the more cunning rule in nature? You build 
 upon the ideal goodness of man, his sympathy, his altruism, 
 — are these to be found in brute nature ? 
 
 The materialists repudiate the God-ideal and deny the 
 divine Providence which made right slowly supersede 
 might, commanded virtue supernaturally, or ordained it 
 primordially, in the deep essence of things, having fitted 
 our instincts and our interests for virtue and goodness. 
 These ideas they rule out, and yet they hope for them and 
 postulate them as their corner-stone! No, these ideas and 
 aspirations are pieces of mosaic, taken over from Mosaism, 
 blocks of stone, hewn from the biblical quarries, the Old 
 and the New Testament, the two breasts whereat you 
 Socialists first sucked in your humanity ; they remained, 
 unconsciously, at the bottom of your hearts, to serve now as 
 the needed foundation of your system, otherwise, hanging 
 in the air. You see, materialism is no base for the old nor 
 the new system. You can build up no humanity without 
 idealism, and idealism is the offspring of the God-belief. 
 
 A profane wit once remarked : "The Mosaic religion is a 
 religious mosaic." That is good enough for a witticism, not 
 for truth. The unprejudiced student can not but admire 
 9 
 
130 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the adamantine solidity of that legislation. Created by a 
 man or a school, during a lifetime or centuries, we cannot 
 help admitting that there is one set of principles running 
 through its many,.varied books, from Pentateuch to Chroni- 
 cles, from beginning to end, making it one grand, harmo- 
 nious whole, all answering the legislator's purpose, viz : the 
 establishing of " a Tcingdom of priests and a holy nation^ 
 The entire work is growing out of one piece as an antique 
 monolith, or as the "golden chandelier in the Temple." 
 Look how the Bible is solidly consistent, without being 
 less rational for that. It starts the world and the State 
 with its God-idea : " In the beginning God created Heaven 
 and earth." (Genesis 1, 1.) — "I am the Eternal who liberated 
 thee from Egypt." (Exodus 20, 1.) — Thus is He the very 
 corner-stone of the entire social structure. He delivered his 
 people from oppression, gave it freedom, a country, lands 
 and laws, freely accepted by it. He is a " Holy One." — 
 " He is not to be bribed or intimidated " by " king or priest." 
 — "He is the holy Being," hence shall his people be holy 
 (III. M. 19, 1.) — This very same chapter gives the definition 
 of its grand opening verse, viz : " To he holy,'^ means to be 
 moral, just and educated, chaste, forgiving, sober, merciful 
 and charitable. — All the biblical peoples, with all mankind, 
 spring from one parent couple ; hence are they brothers ! 
 All equal and all free ; hence shall the weak, the women, 
 the children, the poor stranger, etc., be treated with mercy 
 and forbearance. — Property is sacred, chastity is holy, hence 
 the sacredness of marriage and parenthood ; hence " Honor 
 thy father and thy mother." — " Love thy neighbor as thy- 
 self." — "Love the stranger as thyself." — Hence the New 
 Testament. " Love thy enemy as thyself ; if he insults 
 thee, pardon him ; if he strikes thee, disarm him by meek- 
 ness; if he robs thee, rather give him more." — A trifle, 
 perhaps, too lofty for man as he is. Yet it is a noble ideal 
 of goodness and meekness, yea, even of prudence. It is 
 
MARX, SON OF THE PROPHETS. 181 
 
 good and worthy of a man who dies for what he thinks to 
 be right. 
 
 Now whilst social democracy is aspiring to an ideality 
 even greater than that of the Old and the New Testament, 
 postulating unselfishness and self-sacrifice, not as an excep- 
 tion, but as the rule, as the daily habit and nature of each 
 and every man, it, nevertheless, rules out God and worship, 
 providence, marriage and family! Yet these latter ones 
 are perfectly compatible with reason, and at the same time 
 give the human state a firmer base than socialism has ever 
 contrived. Materialism is a poor background for a State 
 based on morality and ideality. I am afraid materialism 
 rather suits despotism and coercive duty, controlled by a 
 tyrant. 
 
 Marx, Son of the Prophets. 
 
 As in Spinoza's system we recognize its best elements to 
 have come from early educational impressions, from 
 Bible, prophets, mystics and philosophers, whilst its sad 
 aspects were derived from strange sources : even so in the 
 system of Karl Marx we perceive how his best political 
 material, his broad humanity, his noble social solidarity, 
 his deep, thrilling sympathy with human woes, his great 
 anxiety and bold initiative to remedy them, were imbibed 
 with his mother's milk, drawn at the breast of Moses and 
 the prophets; whilst the weaker points of his system, the 
 denying of any and every religious ideal, of any Providence 
 working deep in the bowels of nature, his abandoning all 
 divine piety and family piety, all worship and all churches 
 as exploded theories and effete institutions, yet asking, at 
 the same time, all the noble virtues cultivated through 
 them,— disclose spiritualism and materialism, inconsistently 
 yoked together. — Having learned from Hegel self-deifica- 
 tion, he needs no higher ideal. His brain is his Sinai. 
 Yet, Prometheus-like, he feels the vulture of doubt gnaw- 
 
132 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 ing at his vitals. He feels tlie urgent need of a base for 
 his system, and accepts man's goodness from sheer despair. 
 ', That reminds us of Heine's satirical remark : " Kant had 
 first destroyed the God-ideal with his demonstrations in the 
 'Theoretical Reason.' But he thought ^Lampe must have 
 an ideal/ and he restored it in his 'Practical Reason.'" 
 Even so Karl Marx: ''My followers must have faith in 
 human goodness, and I postulate it without any further 
 proof." He claims to believe in evolution, and this is utterly 
 incompatible with materialism. Evolution really means: 
 Things are so primordially arranged that the wise and the 
 just will and must slowly succeed. Whether he believes it, 
 or only claims to do so, is hard to tell. The Bible believes in 
 Providence, and bases consistently its society upon it. It 
 can claim virtue and self-sacrifice of man, — because there is 
 a "holy God." — And why not? When there is evolution^ 
 must there not he Providence f When there is primordially 
 ordained an eternal fitness of things, must there not be a 
 Providence having shaped things that way? . . . 
 
 Socialism and Bible. 
 
 We have seen that a higher evolution of Communism is 
 Socialism; here the points of contact with the biblical 
 system are numerous, and the contrasts are striking. 
 
 The Marx-Lasalle Socialism begins with declaring for 
 the necessity of society acquiring all lands, instruments 
 and capital. But how will they realize that, since these 
 lands, instruments and capital are at present private prop- 
 erty ? By open confiscation ? That is Communism ! Marx 
 and Lasalle as yet deprecate that ; Bakunin's anarchy and 
 downright spoliation having been repudiated by them. If 
 so, how, then, make private lands and capital public ? — The 
 next difficulty is, perhaps, even greater; supposing all 
 belong to the Socialistic Democracy, the future evolution 
 of society; supposing that miracle is performed, what next? 
 
SOCIALISM AND BIBLE. 133 
 
 The social leaders will inaugurate associated and collective 
 industries for the general benefit, giving to each a share of 
 the profits, according to his or her capacity and their 
 reasonable wants. — But who shall be the judge thereof? 
 Again, who shall determine the nature and the amount 
 of the vv-ork, and the share of profits or the "reason- 
 ableness of every one's wants ? " Who will be judge 
 and ruler, and who will meekly accept the role of the 
 drudge, with the poor wage of such? Arbiters? Will 
 there not be heard the old hue and cry at partiality ? Will 
 the drudges abide by it? Do we expect the arbiters to be 
 angels and never be partial? But supposing even they 
 would be angelt^, and treat every worker " according to his 
 true deserts," his talents, diligence and self-sacrifice ; "Who 
 will then escape a whipping? " — to speak with Shakespeare 
 — "If the greater merit will have a larger share, and the 
 humbler talents a smaller one, what have we gained by 
 Socialism?" We shall again have the old competition, 
 crusliing competition, which was expected to be elimi- 
 nated in the future Socialistic Democracy ! Or should 
 we follow out the hints of some other socialistic ideal- 
 ists and assume the utopia that all workers should, 
 be treated alike, all fed, housed, dressed, etc., alike, as in 
 old Sparta — and that we should reward merit only by a civic 
 wreath, only by an honorable recognition of public services, 
 by enrollment into a democratic "legion of honor?" — How 
 many such self-sacrificing men and women, for the sake of 
 philanthropy, can we reasonably expect? Will not the 
 vast majority of usual commonplace people prefer doing as 
 little as possible, and declare to be " ladies and gentlemen," 
 having many wants, but little inclination for hard work? 
 No doubt there are a few select persons who are happy in 
 doing good deeds for society's sake, with few needs to 
 sustain life; but the vast majority of mortals are just the 
 contrary. If not stimulated by hunger and want, if not fired 
 
134 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 on by personal advantages and substantial emoluments, 
 they will do as little as possible, and society will soon 
 starve. The socialistic scheme is expecting-, therefore, a 
 second miracle, viz., that all people should become ideals, 
 and do the most and best work for philanthropy's sake. — 
 May it not be utopian ? 
 
 And the biblical scheme! Three tliousand years ago, in 
 the hoary past, that Mosaic scheme seems to have been 
 more practical. The first miracle, it needed not. The 
 lawgiver had a tabula-rasa society to deal witli, whose 
 members were nearly equally circumstanced. Their instru- 
 ments of labor were as yet in his own hands, God being 
 King. He divided the lands fairly among the citizens, and 
 provided for the perpetual maintenance of the family-lot. 
 He thus could hope to have put a barrier against accappa- 
 rating the soil by a few. Each cultivating and enjoying his 
 crops, the difficulty of distribution was avoided. Nor was 
 there allowed internal profitable commerce, or external 
 enriching wars, to disturb that balance of wealth among 
 the social members. Moses kept, therefore, the original 
 economic relations of the wealth of his community pretty 
 well stationary. Add to that his demanding personal liberty 
 and social equality ; add his grand, ennobling, weekly 
 Sabbath institution ; his frequent Release-years, with their 
 extinction of debts ; his other numerous benevolent statutes, 
 tending to keep up the feeling of solidarity and brother- 
 hood among the nation; add his entire system, identifying 
 State, religion and people, permeating and fusing each with 
 the other, without any fear of abuse; adding all that, we 
 might be warranted to come to the conclusion that his 
 political economy system had many chances of success, at 
 least during the first period of Ebrew history, if ever fairly 
 put on trial. For the circumstances then extant (three 
 thousand years ago) it was vastly superior to our socialistic 
 scheme. All capital and instruments of labor, land inclu- 
 
THE 8EPTENNATE. 135 
 
 sive, were in his grasp. Hence, this difficulty did not exist 
 for him. But the second one — how to fairly distribute the 
 profits of labor among the workers — he likewise avoided by 
 giving eacli a lot to cultivate and enjoy its fruit. Everyone 
 had, therefore, his share in his own hands, needing thus no 
 arbitrators and avoiding jealousy and discontent. The 
 family-lot was inalienable ; it remained for eve"r and ever 
 to the descendants of the original owner, or rather tenant. 
 Hence, it operated against proletarianism. No one ever 
 was born absolutely poor. It evaded landlordism by giving 
 no food for land-grabbing, absolute acquisition of new acres 
 being simply impossible. The no commerce and no-war 
 policy, stopping all avenues of suddenly acquiring or losing 
 wealth, insured the average economic equality, and, hence, 
 the liberty and equality of all was never undermined. 
 
 The Septennate. 
 
 The biblical system no doubt has many advantages. It 
 combines the old and the new State-ideas. The individual 
 has all free play, yet grasping and soulless competition is 
 checked. Work and emulation are stimulated by self- 
 interest and emolument; yet there is room left for every 
 one's efforts, even for the humbler talents. There is free- 
 dom of thrift and acquisition, yet these are kept in bounds 
 by the fact of the soil being stationary and inalienable, and 
 no internal commerce or depredatory wars being allowed. 
 The unity of the family, of the nation and of worship is 
 kept up. — Society rested upon idealism ; superior to mate- 
 rialism, to a shifting family, a vague internationalism, 
 without any base and raison d'etre, those three pillars 
 of the Socialistic Society. Imagine! No religion, no fixed 
 family, no national feeling, and yet the claim of the fraternity 
 of mankind. Yet to ask of one to work and toil without 
 any personal reward — for goodness sake, for philanthropy, 
 for the love of humanity ! Materialism and self-sacrifice 
 
136 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 to humanity ? We should therefore incline to think Karl 
 Marx's system more Utopian than the Mosaic one. 
 
 Septennate Never Tried Yet. 
 
 Yet many drawbacks are in the way of suggesting the 
 Mosaic social democracy for our times and our circum- 
 stances. For would present mankind ever consent to the 
 Judsean simplicity, poverty, uniformity? Could we ever 
 think of breaking our soil into as many lots as male citi- 
 zens? Could we then utilize our present machines and 
 instruments of labor, railways and steam engines, by making 
 each laborer work for his own account ? Or shall we give 
 up our fine industries, our noble arts, our grand commerce, 
 and come back to the simplicity of Judaea ? Evidently that 
 would be retrogression. Besides, the simple fact that the 
 biblical, political economy never was tried, may be a fair 
 presumption that even in antiquity it was not feasible. 
 There were among the Talmudists solid thinkers, men not 
 inferior to our modern economists and socialistic leaders, 
 full of philanthropy and sympathy for the proletariat. 
 When, two thousand years ago, the Herodian policy, or the 
 school of Hillel, abolished, stone after stone, all of the bib- 
 lical economic structure, that may suggest the fair pre- 
 sumption that the system seemed not realizable, and that 
 conditions had altered greatly, at least under the rule of 
 the Herodians, the slaves of the Caesars. Nevertheless, 
 present i)o]itical economists may ponder over the biblical 
 way of solving the social problem, for, anyhow, there may 
 be yet many elements left, if not the entire structure, fit 
 for adaptation to our evolving society of the present time. 
 Great lawgivers have suggestions in store even for late 
 posterity. 
 
SABBATH AND THE SOCIAL QUESTIOX. 137 
 
 SABBATH AND THE SOCIAL QUESTION. 
 
 We have largely spoken of tlie Jubilee and the Release- 
 year-laws, and we have hinted at their root being the Bibli- 
 cal Sabbath. We now come to that weighty theme, one of 
 the most important traits of Mosaism, slowly developing 
 through the Gospels and Islam into an institution of the 
 grandest dimensions. Well, that Sabbath forms the basis of 
 the Jubilee and the Release-year. 
 
 What is the Sabbath f A symbol, a sacrament, a cere- 
 mony, religious rite, and no more? Let us take time 
 and elucidate the question; it may prove of great interest 
 to the thoughtful. 
 
 For thousands of years the Ebrew people are celebrating 
 that day; for nearly fifteen centuries the vast. Christian 
 world does the same ; and for six hundred years the 
 Mohammedan world has adopted it, too. Nay, even 
 Rationalists and non-Sectarians recognize its necessity. 
 The German Social democrats at Gotha, in 1875, mentioned, 
 too, in their program that Rest-day as necessary for the 
 welfare of the workingman. The Sabbath is one of the 
 great traits and characteristics of the Sinai-law ; both the 
 Decalogues enjoin it with great solemnity. It is repeated 
 a hundred times in Pentateuch, Prophets, etc. It is termed (^) 
 the "sign of the Covenant," the ''eternal Covenant," be- 
 tween God and his people; the distinguishing trait of 
 Monotheism and Mosaism, tlie flag and badge of that ancient 
 legislation (II. M. 31, 13-15.) (■) Humanely considered, what 
 is the object of that institution? At what does it aim? We 
 said it is the symbol of Mosaism. Well, there was another 
 symbol for Abraham, i^) and still another for Noah. (*) Is, 
 then, the weekly rest-day of no greater practical import- 
 ance than these two last mentioned ? Is it nothing more 
 
 .nL"p (4) .rh^n (3) -D^iy nnn i2) .nn2 mx d) 
 
138 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 than a sign and a means to bring home to the votary of 
 Jahveh some certain idea of consequence ? What is that 
 idea? The Sabbath-commandment is most frequently 
 repeated in the Pentateucli. After the doctrine of the 
 unity and immateriality of God, the strict observance of 
 the Rest-day is most frequently and forcibly enjoined in 
 Sacred Writ, especially in both the Decalogues. And all 
 that pomp and display means but a mere sign^ a symbol, a 
 sacrament? Is that probable? And if not, what else is the 
 real object of that weekly institution? 
 
 The l^iRLE ox the Sabbath. 
 
 In order to be enabled to fairly answer this important 
 question, let us read the more conspicuous biblical passages 
 concerning it. (Gen. II., 1-3). " Thus tlie heavens, the earth 
 and all their hosts were finished, etc ; and on the seventh 
 day God had accomplished the work to be done ; and He 
 rested on the seventh day and sanctified it." 
 
 Shall we now understand that the Sabbath institution is 
 contemporaneous with the creation? Is it, so to say, the 
 day of divine rest and the inauguration of the world? 
 Modern science cannot be satisfied herewith. Even the 
 Ebrew Agada does not take it literally. See Jalkut thereto. — 
 Next let us read {Exodus 20, "8-11): "Remember the 
 Sabbath day to sanctify it. Six days shalt thou labor, and 
 the seventh day is a rest to thy God . . . for in six 
 days He had made heaven and earth and rested on the 
 seventh. Therefore he blessed the Sabbath day and sanc- 
 tified it." 
 
 Here in the grandest passage of S. Script., the Decalogue,. 
 the covenant between God and His people, the constitution 
 of mankind, the corner-stone of human civilization ; here, 
 immediately after the sublime declaration of the divine 
 unity, we read the commandment concerning the Rest-day, 
 in the most solemn and most emphatic manner. And this 
 
THE BIBLE ON THK SABBATH. 139^ 
 
 apparently refers to the above tradition of the cosmogony : 
 " For in six days God created heaven and earth and rested 
 on the seventh ; therefore, He blessed and sanctified it." 
 (Hen. II., 2). — Which the Agada correctly takes as a pream- 
 ble to the Sabbath. 
 
 Let us read a third passage on the subject (Deut. V. 12-16) : 
 "Observe the Sabbatli day and sanctify it, as God has 
 bidden thee, etc., etc., that thy male and female-servants 
 may rest like thyself. And remember that thou hast been 
 a slave in Egypt, etc., therefore, God bade thee to have gu 
 Rest-day." — Here, in the second Decalogue, we find in the 
 same place, with the same solemnity and with even more 
 circumstantiality, the commandments bearing on our sub- 
 ject forcibly repeated. Yet remark: as the aim and reason 
 therefor, we find no longer the cosmogonical divine rest 
 after the six days creation, but the practical, human object: 
 '' that thy male and female servants may rest like thyself," 
 especially remembering the Egyptian slavery. Here we 
 see that the aim is not mystic and supernatural, but entirely 
 practical, palpable, humanitarian, moral, yea, social and 
 political.— Plainer yet it reads in 11. M. 23, 12 : " That thy 
 beast, thy slave and thy stranger may rest and recreate 
 themselves." 
 
 These passages bearing upon our question, will be our 
 guides in trying to ascertain the scope of the legislation in 
 this weekly institution. The first quotation (Gen. II, 2,) 
 bases the Sabbatli rest-day upon the divine rest after the 
 six creation days. Exactly the same version is given in the 
 secouji quotation (Kxod. 20, ll.)^The third (Deut. V, 15,) 
 brings in two new factors of an entirely natural and human 
 character, viz: the rest, the re-creation of the dependent 
 enslaved masses, and the commemoration of the exodus 
 from Egypt. Finally, the fourth passage (in Exod. 23, 12,) 
 is the plainest, setting forth the aim and sense of the law- 
 giver in the simplest terms,without a shadow of supernatural- 
 
140 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 ism, viz: The re-creation of tlie hard-working people, and 
 the sympathy even with the toiling beast. The super- 
 natural and the liistorical motives are passed by ; the physio- 
 logical, the political, or the philanthroi)ical one is set forth 
 with all desirable plainness and simplicity. It is this 
 aspect of the Sabbath institution which interests us here, 
 in our study of the sociological bearings of the Bible and 
 its legislation. Let us closely examine these texts and 
 endeavor to get at the political idea of the legislator. 
 Beginning with the first : " God had finished his work and 
 he rested on the seventh day, and he blessed that day and 
 sanctified it." (I. M. 2, 2.) — Speaking here of tbe Bible from 
 the legislative standpoint, we are not called upon to treat 
 of these words in their literal sense and as matters of fact. 
 That is the domain of theology. The historian has another 
 range of thought, having seen that even the Agada takes 
 them as but a poetical substantiation of the Sabbath, insti- 
 tuted at a later time. 
 
 The second Decalogue gives, moreover, as the aim of the 
 Sabbath-day, the remembrance of the event of the exodus 
 from Egyi)t. Is this to be taken literally? Is the Rest- 
 day a commemoration of Ebrew national independence, 
 .a kind of weekly Passover? Who can be in earnest with 
 this acceptation? Who ever brought the Sabbath in histor- 
 ical connection with Egypt? Do we not, so to say, 
 intuitively feel that our verses in Genesis, Exodus and 
 Deuteronomy must be understood in their deeper sense? 
 
 Talmud and Philosophers on the Sabbath. 
 
 Rabbinical, as well as modern, thinkers contrived many 
 other explanations, perfectly well worth looking at. Some 
 said : The Sabbath is an institution in memory of the 
 world's creation; that the world was created and had a 
 beginning; by God, alone uncreated, alone without begin- 
 ning, free-willed and self-conscious. 
 
TALMUD AND PHILOSOPHERS ON THE SABBATH. 141 
 
 Thus, these Rabbinical philosophers think Sabbath to be 
 a kind of demonstration in favor of the transcendental, 
 spiritual, Mosaic God, in contra-distinction from the Pan- 
 theistic conception of Deity, identical with or inherent in 
 the world. We feel how little interest such abstract ques- 
 tions, such abstruse speculations, offer to the mass of the 
 people. Is it possible, then, that the great lawgiver should 
 create an institution of such magnitude, for all eternity, 
 and such practical bearings, with an abstract, philosophical 
 object in view? With no other aim, indeed, than to favor 
 one philosophical system and protest against another one? 
 Where do we find Moses so anxious about abstract ideas and 
 opinions which never had any practical influence upon the 
 people? There is another theory in store on our subject, 
 viz: Some modern philanthropists believe Sabbath to be a 
 kind of sanctification of labor^ a protest against the con- 
 tempt of work, so prevalent in antiquity. But how should 
 an injunction for rest, absolute abstention from work, have 
 for its aim the rehabilitation of labor? To honor labor by 
 commanding rest? I have to call attention to one circum- 
 stance more. I mentioned before how often, how circum- 
 stantially and emphatically the Rest-day is repeated. The 
 lawgiver spares no means of impressing it upon the physi- 
 ognomy of his system. He designates it as his special sign. 
 He punishes its transgression with death. He places it in 
 the Decalogue, the great essence of the Pentateuch. Now, 
 look at the commandments contained in that Decalogue. 
 Each and all of them are plain, practical, real, urgently 
 necessary for the salvation of every civilized people and 
 every rational being. There is in it nothing mystical, 
 nothing supernatural, hardly even dogmatical. For the 
 declaration of the divine unity itself is so rational, so self- 
 evident, that it is rather a principle of reason and senti- 
 ment than of creed. Why, then, should the Sabbath alone 
 make an exception — Sabbath alone, out of all the Ten Words, 
 
142 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 be of a mystical or symbolical nature? Whilst the entire 
 Decalogue is its own object and aim, the Rest-day alone 
 should be but the means for some end, should be but a sign 
 ■or sacrament. Is that probable ? 
 
 Let us mention yet the following commentators and 
 thinkers on the subject: Philo (Decalog., 758) finds in the 
 Sabbath the teachings : " Ever to imitate the divine Creator. 
 As He worked for six days and rested on the seventh, so, too, 
 must we do." That doctrine of work and rest is perfectly 
 congenial to human nature, not to the divine one. — Even Ezra 
 finds in it a hint that : " Six days we shall devote to the needs 
 of the body, and work, and the seventh to spiritual culture."— 
 Maimon. ( More, Neb. III., 343 ) is even more positive and 
 plain-spoken : " It is a day set apart for the rest, recreation 
 and happiness of men." — Albo (in Ikk. III., 26) takes it as 
 *'a symbol of the creation by God, of the exodus, or freedom 
 of Israel and of Revelation." — With the ideas of a sanctified 
 Sabbath and of freedom, modern commentators and thinkers 
 penetrate deeper into the profound meaning of the institu- 
 tion, viz : It is a day set apart by divine Providence for 
 the bodily, mental, moral and spiritual welfare of man ; a 
 day devoted to bodily rest and cheer, to moral improve- 
 ment, mental culture and spiritual elevation ; it is a soaring 
 up to a higher existence, a liberation from the earthly 
 drudgery and cares to spiritual freedom. Dr. Hamburger 
 summarizes thus: " It is the symbol of man's likeness to 
 the Deity in freedom and holiness. As God is the ever- 
 a«'tive Creator, yet ever-free Master of the universe, never 
 absorbed by his work, — even so should man neither be the 
 slave of nature nor its contemner, but work in full freedom 
 for his own development, and neither flee the world, as does 
 the Hindoo, nor be absorbed by it, as the ancient Greek." — 
 This interpretation is interesting for a metaphysician — not for 
 Moses, it is ingenious and pretty, but it is too metaphysical 
 for a practical institution. — Others take Sabbath for an 
 
NUMBER SEVEX. 143 
 
 expiatory sacrifice, ( Ewald ) — or to stem human greed, 
 (Knobel) — or as a corrective against moral defects deriving 
 from worldly activity, (Keil) — or as bearing most usefully 
 upon health, morality, family, etc., (Proudhon)— Midrash 
 Tanchuma (Kithisa) declares : " The Sabbath alone is of as 
 much weight as the entire Thora." — Michilta to III. M. 20, 
 takes it as the symbol of the divine creation, — Talmud, 
 Cholin 2, states : " Who desecrates the Sabbath is just as 
 bad as he who denies the entire law." — Treatise (Talmud) 
 Sabbath is entirely consecrated to that subject. The work 
 prohibited on it is divided by the Rabbis into thirty-nine 
 chief kinds, and many more subordinate ones, denominated 
 " Aboth and Toldoth." — Art is mostly allowed, yet later 
 again it was prohibited. In the ancient Temple-service the 
 necessary work was allowed on that day. So was lighting 
 fires there. — To avoid danger, work is allowed. So it was 
 during the Maccabean wars. " The Sabbath is given unto 
 you, not you to the Sabbath," is a Rabbinical saying, later 
 quoted in the New Testament. — In the Jewish wars against 
 Rome, there was discriminated between offensive and de- 
 fensive warfare, the latter alone being allowed. The " Chas- 
 sidim" sect rather died than worked thereon. — In Joshua, 
 Judges and Samuel, there is no nientioning of the Sabbath. 
 In Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, there is. From the second 
 Jewish Empire to the present days, it was a leading feature 
 in the Synagogue and Ebrew home life. — According to 
 elosephus (Contra Apion II., 39), many Greeks, Romans and 
 Barbarians imitated the Sabbath-rest. Seneca complains 
 that this was the case (Seneca III., 427). 
 
 Number Seven. 
 
 The sacred number of the Bible is seven ; be it because 
 the ancient computation was the four phases of the lunar 
 montli, or the seven days of creation, including the divine 
 rest; or on account of the sun, moon and five visible 
 
144 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 stars. Whatever the reason may be, seven underlies all 
 sacred enumeration. The seventh day is the rest-day, con- 
 secrated to God. The seventh month, Tishre, is the sacred 
 holiday-epoch. There are seven holidays in the year. 
 Passover and Tabernacles have seven days each. In seven 
 weeks is harvest time and Pentecost. The seventh year is 
 Release-year, and seven such ^eptennates make a Jubilee. 
 The festive sacrifices were seven. Seven branches were in 
 the chandelier; such were the sprinklings and the purifica- 
 tion days in the Temple ; such are yet the wedding week and 
 the mourning week, each of seven days, etc., eitc. Seven 
 became slowly a solemn afiarmation ; to take an oath is in 
 Ebrew expressed by a word meaning : " make seven." As 
 the Greeks swore by three : Orcus, Styx and Hades ; or by 
 Zeus, Apollo and Athene, so the old Semites by seven ; the 
 Christians by Trinity or cross, and the later Judseans by one 
 (God). The claim that the biblical Sabbath is but a rem- 
 nant from the hoary Saturn or luna-cult, is futile. In 
 neither was it a day for sanctification, rest, freedom or ele- 
 vation. In the Saturn worship it was accounted an unlucky 
 day. It was the first of the week, not the last. It may be 
 older than the Sinai-epoch, but it is the Bible that made it 
 what it is : a day of liberation for man «and beast, of leisure, 
 recreation and elevation for all, as we shall see hereafter. 
 
 Survey of Sabbath m History. 
 
 In order to find the key to that labyrinth of opinions, 
 sayings and theories, old or new, let us refer to positive 
 history ; let us look soberly, impartially, and closely to the 
 institution itself. When we examine the numerous Sab- 
 bath-verses, especially the Manna passage, Exodus 16, 26, 
 we find there, plainly stated, that the Sabbath was known 
 to the Ebrews before the Sinai proclamation ; known, if not 
 fully observed. Now, more than three thousand years after 
 Sinai, the Sabbath, instead of being disused and forgotten. 
 
SURVEY OF SABBATH IN HISTORY. 145 
 
 like so many other obsolete customs and rites, or instead 
 of being limited to the practice of the people of Israel 
 alone, that institution has become a universal feature of 
 the civilized world. Three hundred millions of Christians 
 celebrate that day, in their way, and in connection with 
 their creed. Four hundred millions of Mohammedans do 
 the same in connection with -theirs. The first do it, indeed, 
 on Sunday ; the latter on Friday. Yet the time does not 
 change the intrinsic nature of the fact. The two daughters 
 of Judaism did not think it necessary to everywhere bear 
 the features of their mother. As everywhere else, so here, 
 things went on by compromise ; the Gentile world accepted 
 the kernel and changed the garb. To spare old time preju- 
 dices, forms were changed to disguise features, and hide 
 the origin; whilst the essence of tlie Sabbatic Institution 
 was retained. Christianity is Biblical spirit in a Hindoo- 
 Germanic body with an Egypto-Greek drapery. Mahomme- 
 danism is biblical, spirit and body, shrouded in oriental 
 colors and brandishing an Arabian scimetar. With the 
 spirit, the principal institutions of our Christian brothers 
 and our Mahommedan cousins are of biblical origin. And 
 thus the Sunday of the first and the Friday of the latter, 
 each is simply the Mosaic Sabbath. Again, when the French 
 Revolution of 1793, in its paroxysm, abolished Catholicism 
 and Christianity, with all positive religion, and introduced 
 that of ''Reason'' under the attractive form of a noted 
 Parisian beauty, even those deicides and regicides could not 
 kill the Sabbath; they kept up a decadical one, as the 
 ancient Egyptians, each tenth day was devoted to rest. 
 Even the Social Democrats in 1875, at Gotha, declared for 
 the Sabbath-rest, though they are religiously indifferent. 
 So, too, all our most modern iconoclasts, thundering against 
 any and all Sunday restrictions, are but aiming at the 
 abolition of Clmrch privileges and ecclesiastical interference; 
 but they, too, acknowledge the absolute necessity of a spe- 
 
 10 
 
146 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 cial day for rest and culture ; tlie Mosaic Sabbath is not ques- 
 tioned by tliem, since it is a human need : " For six days 
 shalt tLou labor and do all thy work, and the seventh day 
 consecrate to rest, freedom, thinking and moral elevation," — 
 religious, scientific and humanitarian; a day consecrated to 
 everything divine in human nature ; until slowly man's 
 entire life will be one great divine service ; until duty, 
 virtue and happiness will become synonymous. 
 
 Now let us look to that manna passage (Exod. 16, 26); it 
 is fully worth our while. That chapter states that at the 
 Wilderness of Sin, one station before Mount Sinai, on the 
 fifteenth day of the second month after the Exodus, the 
 people were murmuring, dissatisfied with their food. Then 
 the manna was given them, to collect daily, fresh, except 
 on the seventh day. It continues : " To-day is Sabbath to 
 Jahveh; ye shall not be out; six days shall ye collect the 
 manna and the seventh day is Sabbath. Behold, God gave 
 you the Sabbath ; do not stir from your places." This took 
 place before the Sinai legislation. The logical congrulty is 
 easy to guess. The Egyptian Ebrews did know the Sabbath, 
 but did not much observe it. Moses, after the Exodus, 
 and especially at Sinai, gave it aim and purpose and all the 
 solemnity of revelation, raising it to an "0th hrith" a sign 
 of the covenant. From the new Assyrian discoveries we 
 learn that the moon's monthly four phases gave rise to the 
 four monthly weeks, one day of which was some sort of a 
 holiday, known to the Babylonians and Assyrians; not, 
 indeed, as the Mosaic Sabbath, an epoch of rest and sancti- 
 fication, of freedom and culture. That higher evolution 
 the Bible, later civilization, later experiences and needs gave 
 it. Originally it may have been merely a day of pleasure, a 
 free, popular, weekly festival, consecrated to the moon or 
 some other deity. It may well have been such a daj^ with 
 some or with all the Semitic races since hoary antiquity, 
 connected with the star worship of ancient Chaldea — older 
 
SABBATH, THE GRAND SOCIAL INSTITUTION. 147 
 
 tlian Abraham and Sinai. Yet special and particular promi- 
 nence it received in history, as a solemn rest consecrated to 
 God, for body and for mind, for rich and poor, freeman and 
 slave, as the symbol of a great doctrine and people, only 
 and singly at the epoch of Sinai and the advent of the 
 Ebrew liberator. It may have footprints older than Semi- 
 ramis and Nineveh, but history only dates it from the 
 Decalogue and the Sinai epoch. I am strongly inclined to 
 that view, not only by the simple statement of Exodus 16, 
 verse 26, expressly declaring Sabbath as pre-Siiiaic, but 
 also from analogy. From comparative religion we justly 
 assume that festivals do not suddenly spring up, but they 
 slowly develop from natural data, and then are authori- 
 tatively consecrated as men's ethical needs. The spring 
 and fair seasons, the different harvests, life's events, etc., 
 offer opportunities for such festive days. The ''human 
 heart craves to connect them with the Deity; men ever 
 yearning for God" — as said by Homer (^) and by the Psalm- 
 ist.f ) Now, when after long centuries of experience, we 
 have found out the practicability and refining influence of 
 such days, the Deity speaks and consecrates them, and the 
 truly popular and sympathetic lawgiver embodies them in 
 his code and makes them the pivot for new combinations, 
 the vehicle of new boons for his fellow men. Thus it is 
 with all festivals ; thus with the Sabbath, too, having a retro- 
 spect even anterior to Sinai and a prospect of near three 
 thousand five hundred years, with all the chances of a 
 boundless future, as we shall see in the following pages. 
 
 Sabbath, the Grand Social Institution. 
 In fact, we may say that now, more than three thousand 
 years after it had been confirmed and proclaimed from Mt. 
 Horeb, that institution has become universal; it is to be 
 
 (1). Havrsg rJe Qewv jdreot'CT' av&puTToi. — Odyssey, III, 48. 
 
 Ps. 118, 5— .H' am»2 'jjy ,n' nxip ivdh p (2) 
 
148 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 found wlierever man lias emerged from his native savage- 
 ness. Wlierever we find civilization, there we also meet 
 with a Rest-day. "Adam, the first civilized man of the 
 Bible, appeared on Friday, and at once the Sabbath became 
 a necessity." Are we not by all these circumstances and 
 concurring facts logically compelled to infer that our Sab- 
 bath is not simply a symbol, a sacrament, a sign, for some 
 idea or commemoration, but itself some moral or social 
 Institution of the highest moment? That it carries with 
 itself some of the greatest interests of the State or of entire 
 mankind at large? The more we ponder, the more we are 
 positively compelled to come to the conclusion that our 
 weekly institution must be one of the great instruments for 
 bringing about, in the slow process of time, some great 
 moral or material boon of human happiness, though we can 
 not as yet exactly tell the nature of that boon. 
 
 After having recognized the great part of the Sabbath in 
 history, let us now try to find out the nature thereof, the 
 real, though secret cause of its importance, that we may 
 learn why it has become a universal feature of civilized 
 life. In order to be enabled to do that, let us suppose a 
 people perfectly unacquainted with that institution; a 
 people without any official rest-days, commanded by divine 
 authority or law of State. In the present times, and much 
 more so in antiquity, the great majority of men, called the 
 people, are and were hard-working, bodily — laboring. In 
 antiquity they were slaves; later, serfs. They were not 
 blacks, nor barbarians, nor vicious ; no, they were for the most 
 part prisoners of war. The conquered lost their liberty. 
 And to the conquered were reckoned all who were bodily 
 weaker and had the misfortune to displease the stronger. 
 Plato, the famous Athenian philosopher, a descendant from 
 Theseus and Solon, was sold into slavery by Dionysius, the 
 tyrant of Syracuse, for a few free words uttered in the hear- 
 ing of the latter. The slave's labor was hard and incessant, 
 
SABBATH, THE GRAND SOCIAL INSTITUTION. 149 
 
 done under the stern eye of the master. And there is no 
 harder master now than want, than a hungry family, for 
 the mass of the present people. Now, according to our 
 supposition, this large class would work all the seven week- 
 days and all the thirty days of the month and all the three 
 hundred and sixty-five days of the year. One year after 
 another will pass in that unceasing toil without a rest or 
 holiday. — How long, may we imagine, could such a hard- 
 working man or class of men bear up under such a regime f 
 Ten years ? Twenty years ? Anyhow, hardly long enough 
 for bringing up a new generation, for substituting the 
 unhappy child to the unhappy, fainting parent. What 
 signifies that? The great majority of the people, the labor- 
 ing class, would soon die out and become extinct. In order, 
 therefore, to insure the perpetuity, the material life, the 
 propagation of the race, God gave to man the boon of the 
 Sabbath, "that he may (as says Maimonides) pass at least 
 the seventh part of his life in peace." On that day, at 
 least, he can take some recreation, restore his powers, so as 
 to be enabled to repair again to his work of the ensuing 
 six days. 
 
 Thus, we find, as soon as men begin to congregate in 
 larger bodies, in gens and tribes and compound societies, 
 they must work; spontaneous nature being no longer suflS.- 
 cient. The barbarian has few needs and little exertion, but 
 civilized man needs more, hence, overwork ; and overwork 
 will soon destroy him. Here steps in the law and regulates 
 work : " six days shall thou labor and one day rest'' Our 
 institution begins to reveal its import. It is the great reg- 
 ulator of work ; just as our generation agitates for an eight 
 hours' day work. We likewise begin to understand the 
 lofty conception thereof as contemporaneous with the crea- 
 tion of Adam (Genesis II, 2). Adam, the noblest, the highest 
 development of creation, the dawn of civilized human 
 society, — Adam needed a rest-day after the weekly toil, and 
 
ISO SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the seventh day was consecrated to that purpose for his 
 benefit. Hence the quaint Talmudical saying : " The Sab- 
 bath is given to you, not you to the Sabbath," 
 
 The Sabbath is, therefore, as says its etymology, the 
 grand day of rest, of abstaining from all menial labor. It 
 is the recreation day for the masses, the hard-laboring 
 human strata. 
 
 We begin now to grasp the meaning of our other texts : 
 " That thy male and female servants may rest " — " that thy 
 stranger may recuperate." It is the safeguard of the 
 dependent masses of old and of modern times. It regu- 
 lates work; it hand-cuffs the hard master from abusing his 
 power. It restrains our inner, individual masters, greed 
 and gain. As the parent restrains the child from harming 
 itself, even so the lawgiver interferes in our own behalf, 
 often against our own short-sighted volition. 
 
 The Sabbath's Manifold Social Bearings. 
 
 Let us continue our hypothesis, viz : a people without 
 public Rest-days. The majority of that people is contin- 
 ually and exclusively occupied with material labor. The 
 poor, laboring man will be strictly kept under the yoke. 
 Bodily work, and nothing but bodily work, will be his lot. 
 The poor, the dependent, has no time for the mind. All 
 spiritual occupation, all culture of the mental faculties, will 
 be jealously withheld from him. For when educated, he 
 may aspire to liberty! You remember the aristocracies, 
 old or modern, were and are declaring that the poor shall 
 have no education ; it hurts them ! Bismarck complained 
 that it is the poor man's over-education that makes him a 
 socialist. Now let us remember that the real distinction 
 between man and brute is surely not in his food or clothing 
 nor in generation or extinction. Our food is often less 
 rational in its artificiality and complications than that of 
 the common animal. Our clothing belongs to the Spanish 
 
THE sabbath's MANIFOLD SOCIAL BEARINGS. 151 
 
 sheep, the Chinese silJc worm, the Indian cotton tree. We 
 are "parading with other people's feathers." 
 
 We respire and sleep, digest, generate and die, just like 
 the vulgarest of animals. Our true and real superiority- 
 over the brute consists, principally, in our spiritual facul- 
 ties, greater brain and nerve power, greater intelligence; 
 we are moral and conscientious beings; we try, at least, to 
 practice right and justice whenever we can. We are rational 
 beings ; we aspire to truth, knowledge and reason ; we 
 investigate the laws of nature ; we measure the heavenly 
 orbits in their eternal march through unbounded space. We 
 weigh the earth, search the ocean's abyss ; chain the light- 
 ning and bid the elements : " Thus far and no further." 
 We are affectionate beings, we love our families, our friends, 
 our fellow-men, as far as it goes. Finally, we are religious 
 beings. In the depth of feeling, in the height of thought, 
 dawn the ideals of God, Providence and universal harmony, 
 of soul, freedom, virtue, beauty, harmony, perfection, holi- 
 ness, self-sacrifice, humanity, duty, immortality, etc. The 
 domain of these spiritual faculties makes the essence of 
 manhood and womanhood. Now suppose a people without 
 Sabbaths and holidays — when will the great majority of 
 that people, the laboring class, the ninty-nine out of each 
 one hundred, arrive at that manhood? When will they 
 become beings endowed with mental or spiritual culture ? 
 When will they aspire to truth and science, reflect on virtue 
 and vice, right and wrong, the beautiful, the sublime and 
 the mean? When sympathize with their friends; when 
 give themselves up to the endearments of a child, a consort, 
 a parent, a friend, a fellow-citizen ? When reflect on the 
 awful enigma of body and soul, world and God ? Never I 
 Never will they! Never can they have the leisure for it! 
 Imperious wants absorb all their time with bodily work* 
 The bread, the fuel, the house-rent, absorb all reflections. 
 St. Juste pointedly said : '* the people's rights, that is — 
 
152 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 bread ! " What, then, will be the necessary consequences of 
 such a state of things? The great laboring masses will 
 never arrive at manhood, at full maturity. Being used and 
 abused as cattle, they will soon descend to the level of 
 cattle. Providence, all-wise and all-benign, foreseeing this 
 greatest of possible misfortunes, gave mankind the great 
 remedy : On " the sixth day, evening, he created Adam and 
 Eve/' (^) and gave them the seventh day as the noblest of 
 presents. There shall be no labor on the Sabbath. The 
 workingman shall rest bodily, and spontaneously he will 
 cultivate his mind. On the Sabbath at least the laborer 
 shall be a man, intellectually, morally, aifectionately and 
 religiously. 
 
 And thus we perfectly understand the verses in Genesis 
 II, 1. When heaven and earth and all their hosts of crea- 
 tures were in their final developments and so far advanced 
 as to bring forth Adam, viz : civilized man ; when the cosmic 
 conditions were so far matured as to admit of moral and 
 rational beings, then God sanctified one day out of seven 
 for the benefit of man, that man should rest from his toils, 
 refresh his body and cultivate his mind, civilize and 
 sanctify himself. Thus, the first Decalogue bases the Sab- 
 batli on that noble metaphor — that the seventh day rest is 
 contemporaneous with creation, viz : with the advent, the 
 creation of civilized man. Immediately man began to be 
 rational, not a mere instinctive brute, the rest-day was 
 instituted in his behalf. 
 
 Democracy and Aristocracy. 
 
 Thus, our institution is of the highest importance for the 
 material and for the mental welfare of man and woman. 
 But it is much more than that. Let us continue our 
 hypothesis. In the beginning of the formation of 
 societies and states, it is a necessary evil that citizens 
 
 (1) Medrashic. 
 
DEMOCRACY AND ARISTOCRACY. 153 
 
 should divide into an aristocratic minority and a plebeian 
 majority. Tlie few, the naturally stronger, wiser, better 
 gifted or situated, think, govern and enjoy. The many, the 
 less favored, obey, learn and labor. Now, by sheer perverse- 
 ness, or rather, shortsightedness, the governing minorities 
 have often taken a narrow egoism for their rule of conduct 
 or policy. They try to govern and educate the masses in 
 such a way as to keep them the longest in a state of subjec- 
 tion ; inventing some foolish theory of assumed superiority 
 for their downright usurpation. You remember the divine 
 claims of the Chinese and Japanese emperors. Alexander 
 was the son of Jupiter Amon; Caesar the descendant of 
 ^neas, grandson of Zeus. — Vespasian, dying, said satiri- 
 cally, " I feel I am becoming a god." — The Incas of Peru 
 claimed to be descendant from the sun. — It is the story of 
 the " children of the gods marrying the daughters of men," 
 ironically mentioned by the biblical narrator (Genesis VI, 4.) 
 These usurpers tell us that God is the father of the 
 strong, the rich, the crafty, and that the poor and unedu- 
 cated are just made for the yoke. You know the vain 
 arguments of political and social oppressors, the Nimrods 
 of old and of present times; banditti, in reality, claimed as 
 demi-gods. To counterbalance and neutralize these danger- 
 ous tendencies, the legislator, the friend of the poor, the 
 stranger, the widow and orphan, gave to mankind the Sab- 
 bath. It is a divine veto against the aristocratic usurpa- 
 tions of all ages. The almighty law declared : On this 
 day I recognize neither master nor slave, neither rich nor 
 poor. All of mortal Adam's children shall be equal before 
 mine eyes. The body shall rest ; the spirit shall cultivate 
 and develop itself. And when the plebeian, the pariah, has 
 but one day in seven for recruiting his strength and culti- 
 vating his mind, he will slowly acquire his entire liberty 
 and rise in the social scale, rise to full equality. The 
 aristocratic minority will give way, and slowly there will 
 
154 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 be developed a great democracy of free, equal, tliinking and 
 enjoying citizens. Thus, Sabbath is of paramount import- 
 ance in a physiological, a psychological and a politico-social 
 point of view. Let us continue. It is yet more. 
 
 Asa stone, dropping into water, forms a circle, this forms 
 another, and this agaiu another one, until the entire surface 
 is covered with such rings, even so are in history the effects 
 of the Sabbath institution. As the rising sun is first visible 
 only on the mountain tops, slowly descending upon the 
 plateaus, and finally shedding his light upon high and low 
 places, upon mount and dale, even so the Sabbath. — We 
 have seen its first three rings. Let us observe its 
 unfoldings. 
 
 As in every nation of antiquity we find a small reigning 
 minority and a large, laboring, plebeian majority, even so 
 were all the different branches of the human family 
 divided up into reigning and serving races or tribes. Scat- 
 tered over the entire globe, so manifold in soil, configuration 
 and clime, which so differently influence the development 
 of beings, the different races and aptitudes of mankind were 
 the necessary outcome, dividing them up into superior and 
 inferior ones, stronger and weaker, more and less gifted 
 ones. Thus, the Gibeonites were subject to the Ebrews; 
 the Helots to the Spartans ; the Pariahs to the Hindoos ; 
 the Provincials to the Romans. Nearly the same in modern 
 times in Europe, Asia and Africa. A few races born and 
 educated under more happy circumstances, favored by 
 climate, food, natural strongholds, great men, etc., took the 
 lead of our species, representing the progressive, the civil- 
 izing element thereof, and soon became dominant races ; 
 whilst the younger tribes took their stand around the 
 former, serving and obeying and looking up to them as to 
 their superiors and teachers. And that was quite natural. 
 The aristocracy of the mind will never be abolished. 
 The intelligent, the moral, the industrious will always 
 
DEMOCRACY AND OCHLOCRACY. 155 
 
 rule the stupid, the vicious and the lazy ones. So with 
 individuals and so with races and peoples. This was not 
 only rational and just, but even advantageous, even to the 
 serving party itself. In order to rule, we must begin 
 to serve an apprenticeship. 
 
 Democracy and Ochlocracy. 
 
 All wars and revolutions and conventions and new con- 
 stitutions are of no avail as long as there is no premium for 
 being educated, honest and thrifty. The rulers must he 
 the natural aristocrats, the wiser and the more moral ones. 
 Full and unmitigated democracy is ochlocracy. As long as 
 the ignorant and the vicious rule, as long as such vote, elect 
 and are elected to office, as long as we have no just criterion 
 at the ballot-box, the source of modern government, so 
 long our fate will not be bettered one whit. 
 
 We can change persons and parties, but we may always 
 have a mob at the helm of government. Our rulers, 
 appointed by the majority, will be no more intellectual or 
 just than the majority. Wise and good are the minorities. 
 Our rulers will always lack in honesty and capacity. The 
 majorities, with the best will, will be blindfolded by the 
 gift of the gab and flattery. They can not find out the 
 worthy candidates, and will appoint — duped by vulgar 
 time-servers and sophists — no superior legislators. Remem- 
 ber our " fiat money " and " free silverists." There is but 
 one salvation for real political improvement, viz : a fusion of 
 Democracy and aristocracy, each to be modified by the 
 other — government must be for the people, but by the best 
 and noblest of the people. Only the wise shall rule, the 
 wise, not the stump-speakers. Our modern democracies 
 are somewhat averse to that wholesome truth, but they 
 will slowly learn that lesson. Athens and Sparta, Holland 
 and Switzerland did, and so will America, too. The mode 
 of our elections, the criteria of electors and elected must 
 
156 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 be modified in such a manner, that only the educated, the 
 enlightened, the honest, the experienced, if possible men 
 of genius, not the artificial arisrocrats, but nature's true 
 noblemen, those really more wise and virtuous, should be 
 appointed by the people to the helm of government ; 
 appointed by the people to govern for the people, through 
 the best of the people; not the stump-speakers. — Hence, a 
 blending of democracy and aristocracy in the interest of 
 all parties concerned. Remember, it is a fiction to say that 
 men are born with equal endowments. Every pedagogue 
 will tell us that one child is strong, intelligent and mode- 
 rate ; the other weak, stupid and ungovernable. Through 
 education we should try to remedy natural defects and 
 discrepancies. Nature begins with inequality ; circum- 
 stances continue that. Education ought to try to reach 
 equality. All that enlightened democracy can do is through 
 education and equal chances to remedy the inequalities 
 of nature. — Here it is where historical, artificial aris- 
 tocracy is wrong. It denies education, and inequality 
 remains. Democracy justly offers the same chances to 
 every citizen to become all that nature and education can 
 make of him, by removing all contrived notions of heredi- 
 tary inferiority and all artificial barriers, allowing him to 
 develop himself to his utmost capacity and will-power, 
 and as much as possible to remedy natural defects. This 
 is the good part in democracy and in aristocracy, viz : To 
 let every one have his chances. — Artificial aristocracy is a 
 lie ; the natural one is true. Equality taken literally, posi- 
 tively, viz: to give no premium to honesty and capacity, 
 what they call '■'■rotation in ojffice^^ is a fallacy, a stupidity 
 and a misfortune. — It is not true in nature nor in right. — 
 The gifted lose by it, and the incapable lose even more, 
 viz: ''the necessary stimulus to vanquish their laziness and 
 improve." Capable, incapable, all society slowly Inpses by 
 that into barbarism. As long as this pseudo equality is 
 
NATUKAL AND ARTIFICIAL AEISTOCBATS. 157 
 
 acted upon, so long is democracy a failure, and European 
 artificial aristocracies and dynasties have yet a chance to 
 supplant it. Let us hope the American democracy, by fully 
 recognizing the true nobility of mind, — not of race, and not 
 of birth, — will not give them that chance. 
 
 Natural and Artificial Aristocrats. 
 
 Now the natural aristocracy, however legitimate and 
 advantageous, when well understood, ought never to become 
 a caste ; genius not being hereditary. The natural aristo- 
 cracy should never become a historical one, but ought to 
 aspire towards democracy; the elevation of all should be 
 the highest aspiration of the true nobleman of nature. — 
 Nature's nobleman is not jealous. — "Would all the people 
 were prophets," prays Moses, whilst his servant is envious 
 of some claimants to prophecy.(^) — ^The older superior races 
 ought to educate the younger ones in such a way as to bring 
 them up to full manhood. The superiority of the wiser 
 and better developed classes ought to be used to the advan- 
 tage of the less favored ones, and not for selfish purposes. 
 The wise men rule only then legitimately, when they render 
 the foolish wiser. Unfortunately, the natural, legitimate 
 aristocracies tend to change into historical, artificial ones, 
 and hence the antipathetic significance of the word aristo- 
 crat, no longer meaning the best, but the privileged one. 
 They try to perpetuate their dominion by privilege. They 
 continue to rule, not by being themselves superior, but by 
 making others inferior, by retarding the education of the 
 less favored races, by keeping back human progress in 
 general, by retaining the Helot and the Pariah in perpetual 
 childhood; they willfully impede and retard all progress, 
 that of their own race inclusive, and thus harm their own 
 race in harming others. This is the history of castes in 
 India, China, Egypt, etc., and of classes in Europe. Now 
 
 (1) IV. M., 11,39. 
 
158 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 if matters had gone on that way, without any check, the 
 old. state of things, the original inequality, would have 
 continued, yea, increased, in all eternity. A few classes and 
 tribes only would have acquired some civilization, freedom 
 and happiness, while the great majority of the different 
 races would continue unto this day in dependence and bar- 
 barism as Pariahs, Helots and Gibeonites. 
 
 Would, then, the object of humanity be attained? Would 
 it not be rather frustrated ? Is the Almighty the father 
 only of the aristocrat, of the Brahmin? Is he not the 
 author of all mankind, of all creatures, of all existence ? 
 Shall the State prefer one child to another? be the parent 
 of one and the tyrant of the other ? Society may give to 
 the wise authority over the simple, in order to make the 
 simple wiser, but not for nurturing the evil spirit of arro- 
 gance and dominion, of race and caste. 
 
 Sabbath's Vast Political Influence. 
 
 The biblical legislator, therefore, in his love and impar- 
 tiality for all the community, put in his veto against the 
 oppression of all times and of all forms. Full of the divine 
 spirit, he bestowed upon mankind the gift of the Sabhath. 
 "Observe the Rest-day T On that day there shall be no 
 distinction between races, origins and castes; on that day 
 the slave races shall be free; they shall rest bodily and 
 recuperate ; they shall cultivate themselves mentally, 
 spiritually and develop their moral instincts; they shall 
 acquire the notions of the noble and the good ; of truth, jus- 
 tice and liberty. Thus acquiring through education power 
 and volition, virtue and wisdom, they will soon find the 
 means for their entire liberation. 
 
 The dominant races will gradually reconcile themselves 
 to the idea of equality. They will slowly submit to a new 
 order of things : the abolition of privilege, and there will 
 gradually be established a universal republic of equal, 
 
sabbath's vast political influence. 159 
 
 civilized, happy, brother-peoples and sister-countries. Man- 
 kind will again be one family of brothers, with one father 
 above, sprung from one parent-couple on earth. Education 
 will make that Shem, Ham and Japheth will be again the 
 equal and blessed children of the one patriarch, Noah, 
 before the Babel's Tower of Egoism had divided them into 
 different castes, races and classes. 
 
 Thus our Sabbath is powerfully promoting the great 
 interests of our species in d.todily, intellectual, social and 
 hvmanitarian point of view. Nay ! Our institution extends 
 its great boons even to the animal kingdom. For the brute, 
 though not endowed with reason, is not without feeling; 
 it is therefore entitled to its comforts. Its existence and 
 well-being are necessary for the civilization of man. Hence 
 the law must protect it. Even in order to insure its propa- 
 gation the law must give it some rest. And this rest is 
 extended to it, too, by the great Lawgiver through the same 
 day. 
 
 Thus our institution is the noble benefactor of the depend- 
 ent, the uneducated, the socially unfree, the conquered 
 . races and the brute. It extends its benign influence to the 
 utmost boundaries of living creation, in a physical, educa- 
 tional, spiritual, social, humanitarian and universal sense. 
 Now all these ideas are implied in the above-quoted 
 texts. But they are explicitly set forth in the II Decalogue, 
 in Deuter. 5, 14. " Observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy, 
 as God has commanded thee. Six days shalt thou labor 
 and do all thy work. But the seventh is a rest to the 
 Eternal, thy God. On it thou shalt do no manner of work ; 
 thou, nor thy son and thy daughter, nor thy male servant 
 and female servant, nor thy ox or ass, nor any of thy cattle, 
 nor the stranger in thy g^ie^—that thy man- and maid- 
 servants shoidd rest like thyself. For remember that a slave 
 thou hast been in Egypt, but God brought thee out from 
 there with a mighty arm, therefore He commanded thee to 
 
160 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 keep the Sabbath day." — Before analyzing these verses, let. 
 us glance at our other texts. The first declares (Genesis II., 
 1): " God sanctified the seventh day, after the last creation," 
 viz: Adam. — With the advent of civilized man, Adam, the 
 Sabbath became necessary. The first Decalogue conveys 
 the same idea. After the declaration of God's existence 
 and spirituality looms up the Sabbath institution (II. M. 20.) 
 as necessary for a civilized community, as the means of 
 human spiritualization. The fourth text (II. M. 23, 12) 
 corroborates plainly the sense of the aforegiven second 
 Decalogue. It reads: "Six days shalt thou work, but the 
 seventh day thou shalt rest, in order that thy ox and thy 
 ass shall rest, and that there shall recreate themselves 
 thy slave and thy stranger." Let us now analyze Deut. 5, 12 : 
 "Observe the Sabbath day to sanctify it." — That means, 
 that day is set apart for the higher purposes of human life. 
 He continues: "During six days shalt thou work." — The 
 different needs of civilized life require toil. "But the 
 seventh day is a rest to God " — hence total cessation from 
 menial labor and the day to be consecrated to the divine, 
 i. e., to the highest objects of human aspirations, the mental, 
 moral and religious in our nature. — " Thou, thy son and 
 thy daughter," ye all shall rise on it to higher planes of 
 intellectuality, capacity and goodness. "A?id thy male and 
 female servants, ^^ for their bodily, spiritual and social 
 amelioration, too, for their gradual emancipation. — "And 
 thy leasts of burden" — for their rest, comfort and 
 preservation. — "And the stranger within thy gates," — for 
 the subjected races and pariahs in thy reach. — " That thy 
 servants and dependents may rest and recuperate as thy- 
 self " — emphasizes the aim of the day. 
 
 Sabbath the Universal Emancipation Day. 
 
 Observe how the lawgiver is anxious that we should grasp 
 the import of the Sabbath, as the opportunity for the 
 
SABBATH THE POOR MAN's DAY. 161 
 
 emancipation of the toiling masses. He knew liuman 
 nature ! Lest tlie upper classes might cunningly mistake ; 
 lest there should remain some doubt concerning the great 
 aim of our weekly institution; lest the employer, the 
 plutocrat and the historical aristocrat, should claim for 
 themselves, and alone, the divine privilege of that day; 
 lest they should pretend that they alone are the " cliildren 
 of the gods,'^ that they and their race sprang from the head 
 of Brahma, whilst the Pariah, the Helot, the peasant, the 
 wage-laborer came from his feet ; lest the Baron should 
 exclude the poor son of toil even from the protection of 
 this grandest institution of freedom, the Mosaic lawgiver, 
 as a true son of toil and freedom himself, repeats with so 
 much emphasis, and lays so much stress on the subject by 
 summing up: ^'•Tliat thy man-servant and thy maid-ser- 
 vajit may rest as thyself." This is his principal scope, the 
 chief aim of the Sabbath day : the bodily recreation, the 
 spiritual culture, the gradual emancipation of the dependent 
 masses. The powerful ones, the free-born, the rich, can 
 have a nd do have leisure, ease and liberty enough ! But 
 the great laboring class, the ninety-nine out of every one 
 hundred, they need all the solicitude, all the tender cares, 
 all the warm and strong protection of the sympathetic law- 
 giver. After God, he is their only friend! The rich can 
 have seven free days in the week ; the poor shall have one 
 at least ! Therefore, for them especially, is intended the 
 Sabbatic institution; they particularly were the objects 
 of the Biblical Rest-day. 
 
 Sabbath the Poor Man's Day. 
 
 And lest the haughty nobleman, the employer, in his 
 blind pride should forget the divine declaration of human 
 equality, of men being all " shaped in heaven's image," 
 with feeling hearts, consciences and noble instincts, the 
 lawgiver recalls sternly to his mind (Deut. 5, 15) : Well 
 11 
 
162 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 mayst tliou remember thy original slavery, that God 
 brought thee out from Egypt with a mighty arm — therefore 
 let the Sabbath boon be the boon of the poor, too. There- 
 fore be not selfish, allow him his chance to recuperate and 
 use his opportunity. Kemember, thou art not born a 
 master, not born in the purple, not born in a gold mine ; 
 no, a "slave wast thou in Egypt," and the author of all 
 freedom and justice broke thy yoke and made thee free, — 
 hale, free and happy. Remember, therefore, that justice 
 has been done thee, O thou proud and wealthy one, do justice 
 to those poor and humble and dependent upon thee ! For 
 the mighty arm of supreme justice is outstretched over him 
 and thee. 
 
 You remember, American reader, your ancestors' or your 
 own modern Egypt across the ocean. You are mindful of 
 your European Egypt of yesterday, or a century ago, of the 
 cruel intolerance and ostracism, the many great and small 
 tyrannies, the poverty, the disabilities yonder in Ireland, 
 England, Germany, or Russia, at the hands of hierarchs 
 or patricians. Here on the holy ground of Columbus's fair 
 land we all are celebrating our Sabbath, political and social, 
 under the segis of the Constitution, declaring that every 
 human being is entitled to aspire to life, liberty and happi- 
 ness. Here let us be mindful of the redeeming clause: 
 " Observe the Sabbath day that thy dependent may rest as 
 thyself." Let us not begrudge the poor of that day. Let 
 the clerk, the hand-laborer, the shopgirl, the apprentice, the 
 housemaid not be robbed of it. Let us remember that its 
 special and express object is : the recreation of the depend- 
 ent, laboring man and woman, his and her rest and spiritual 
 culture, his and her social elevation, his and her moral, 
 mental and economic redemption. When the bright sun of 
 the glorious Sabbath-day dawns upon the awakening eyes 
 of him and her, dependent upon you, American employers, 
 the fiLTst thought of each shall be : " To-day I also am a 
 
SABBATH FROM THE POLITICAL STANDPfJlNT SOLELY. 163 
 
 free being, a rational, happy being! I can recreate my 
 body, cultivate my mind, rejoice at my liome, convene 
 with my I'ellow-citizens, commune with my God ! I feel I 
 am worthy of freedom and happiness ! " Such let, employers, 
 your dependents feel on the Sabbath. 
 
 The diverse, far-reaching objects and aims of that day 
 are slowly but surely being attained. The goal is slowly 
 approaching. Observe the march of history for these three 
 thousand years from Sinai to Washington, from Moses to 
 Cleveland. Compare the gradual development of society. 
 Behold chains are bursting and tyrannies tumbling ; slavery 
 is disappearing, mounts and oceans becoming highways of 
 brother peoples. Do you hear the revolutionary tocsin 
 roaring ? These are the workings of our grand institution. — 
 They are announcing the emancipation-day of the masses, 
 the great Sabbath of mankind, the jubilee of right and 
 freedom, education and happiness for all. 
 
 Sabbath from the Political Standpoint Solely. 
 
 We have tried to unfold the meaning of that institution, 
 without any theological postulate or any supernatural 
 assumption. We did not insist upon basing it on the 
 divine rest after the creation ; nor did we decide whether 
 the creation was done in six days or in ceons of years, or 
 is as yet going on. We did not make any sectarian assump- 
 tions whatever ; being here concerned with sociology and 
 States' policy solely; with law and matters of fact, not 
 with theology and creed. We made tabula rasa with 
 all educated and acquired ideas on the subject. Thus 
 untrammeled, we began with the clear ground of a people 
 having no ordained official rest- and holidays. We exam- 
 ined how that would work upon the development of men, 
 and we saw that there would be no development whatever, 
 that mankind would dwarf and decay and slowly disap- 
 pear ; that the first condition towards a gradual healthy 
 
164 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 evolution and amelioration is just such a public rest-day 
 for all, and especially for the mass of the people ; that the 
 physical preservation of the body and the development of 
 mentality, ethics, freedom and equality could never be 
 brought about, except with such a periodical rest-day as 
 the primordial condition. 
 
 Sabbath, Release and Jubilee. 
 
 We have seen that the Sabbath is not simply a ceremony, 
 a sectarian symbol or a religious sacrament. No, it is an 
 institution of the grandest dimensions, of the most far- 
 reaching results, the condition of all human improvements- 
 No w this institution has slowly developed and unfolded and 
 grew into the mighty tree: the Year of Release and the Jubilee. 
 Utilizing some good material of older religious phases, the 
 legislator declared the seventh day of each week an epoch 
 for the higher purposes of human life, vindicating thus for 
 the masses, time and leisure for recreation and culture. 
 Proceeding by that sacred number, the seventh day of the 
 week became the Sabbath rest. Seven festive days were 
 consecrated during the year as seasons of holy memories 
 and rest. The seventh week after Passover closed with the 
 Pentecost and the commemoration of the law of Sinai, the 
 charter of popular rights and duties; the seventh month, 
 Tishre, became the sacred season of the great festivals, viz : 
 the day of Memorial, or of counting the civil year, — the 
 sublime day of Atonement, and the feast of Tabernacles, — 
 the modern Thanksgiving-day. Again, every seventh year 
 became the Release-year, for liberating every Ebrew slave 
 and remitting all indebtedness, the greatest curse in antique 
 times. Finally, the seventh Release-year culminated in the 
 Jubilee, the great national cycle, restoring persons, soil and 
 houses to their original condition; remedying all inequali- 
 ties, all wrongs and all misfortunes; radically renovating 
 the entire State and Society, and replacing them as origi- 
 
SABBATH AND THE SOCIAL PROBLEM. 165 
 
 nally intended by the lawgiver, viz: every one being free, 
 every one holding his family-lot, his house and his acre, 
 free in the midst of his family; no one a dependent pauper; 
 no one lording over his equals; a competence to each, 
 plutocracy for none. Thus, better than Lycurgus, remedy- 
 ing social inequalities, allowing individualism, family, prop- 
 erty and accumulation, yet tempering egoism by altruism, 
 placing insuperable barriers against greed, avarice and soul- 
 less competition ; compelling the cunning and the monopo- 
 list to leave some room for the less favored brother, keeping 
 up a certain sameness of fortune and of power in the social 
 ranks, and, by that means substantiating and perpetuating 
 the original equality and liberty among the citizens. 
 
 The grandeur of that scheme explains the noble biblical 
 verse (Genesis II, 2) : " When creation had been accom- 
 plished, then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified 
 it." Indeed, out of the root of the seventh week-day, con- 
 secrated as the rest and recreation for the laboring masses, 
 and even the beast, slowly developed the festive calendar, 
 the national union and its sacred memories, the Septennate 
 and the Jubilee. Thus, Sabbath, Release and Jubilee con- 
 stitute the three Hercules columns of the Mosaic State, in 
 an economical, social, moral and political sense. The law- 
 giver built up the freedom, the equality and the economical 
 happiness of his people upon these three grand pillars. 
 
 The Sabbath has since been adopted by the entire civil- 
 ized world. May not the other two await a similar acceptance 
 by advancing mankind ? Would not an inalienable acre for 
 every born human being be a feasible thing ? Would not a 
 periodical release from the bondage of debt be possible? 
 Could not mad competition, with plutocracy and prole- 
 tarianism, be put to the chain? Reader, think! 
 
 Sabbath and the Social Problem. 
 
 In that manner tries the Bible to remedy the social 
 question. This question is old as mankind. Formerly it 
 
166 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 was kept down by slavery and serfdom. The masses, now 
 emancipated, clamor for their share, and hence looms up 
 the social question. It is in the front rank in America, 
 just as in Europe ; it is growing more menacing day by day, — 
 being now nearly all-absorbing; more important than even 
 peace and war, freedom, law and government; the formi- 
 dable question how to screen the weak from hunger and 
 cold ; how to house and shelter the masses from the heart- 
 less competition of the rich and the strong; how to incul- 
 cate the duty of "live and Jet live." It threatens existent 
 nations with social war and dynamite — war bitterer than 
 ambition or fanaticism ever were. " The right of the people 
 is bread." C) 
 
 The biblical Sabbath-day has had its fair trial, and 
 though spoiled in many ways by petty meddling in old and 
 modern, yea, in present times, by Sabbath — and Sunday — 
 laws, meddlings showing how little great ideas are grasped 
 by the average expounders, lay and clerical, how often they 
 are exploited by petty, cunning officials or ecclesiastics — 
 though spoiled by abuse, yet the Sabbath could not be 
 made inoperative. It yet succeeded, and did wonderful 
 services in the development of mankind. 
 
 The seven yearly festive days have been, too, accepted by 
 large portions thereof, and do effectively assist in bringing 
 cheer, joy and noble reminiscences to human hearts and 
 brains. The Atonement-day has not been yet sufficiently 
 appreciated. The idea of assembling the people once yearly 
 for reflection and improvement, for giving and for receiving 
 pardon, is a grand one, as a simply ethical and humani- 
 tarian measure of advancement. 
 
 The church and the mosque have some sort of substitutes 
 thereof, but rather in the shape of sacraments and fasts, not 
 in its essence, viz., meditation and self-confession, improve- 
 ment and reconciliation, with conscience and with fellow- 
 
 (1) St. Juste. 
 
SABBATH AND THE SOCIAL PROBLEM. 167 
 
 men. The racial jealousy is here the chief cause. From 
 mere sectarian pride the world has neglected many grand 
 biblical institutions; or, changing their robes, they altered 
 their essence. The Atonement-day is a great idea, and 
 lawgivers ought to bestow more thought upon it as a useful 
 institution. 
 
 But above all have the last rings of that seven-fold cycle 
 been neglected, viz: the Year of Release and the Jubilee? 
 The fact is, these conceptions have never yet been fairly 
 tried. They were ignored during the first period of Ebrew 
 histo^J^ But even during the second one, only the letter 
 of the institution was retained, not the spirit. The people 
 got the straw, whilst the grain had been thrashed out, by 
 the casuistry of the expounders or the despotism of the 
 rulers. Indeed, Ezra and Nehemiah and Judas Maccabeus 
 had heart and nerve enough for such a trial. But the later 
 Hasmonean princes, and especially the latest Herodians, were 
 not of that calibre. They had not the heart nor the head even 
 to pay any attention to such far-reaching institutions ; the 
 less to realize them. Apparently they mistook them for 
 usual ceremonies and observances. Later, Rome crushed 
 out every attempt at individuality. Tacitus ridiculed them 
 as a piece of national laziness (History V., 4.) For centu- 
 ries, Rome herself stood upon the volcano of plutocracy and 
 pauperism, and many a time she was shaken to her pro- 
 foundest base. Mad ambition for the patricians: "Bread 
 and play " for the proletarians — that was her State policy. 
 To remedy the evil, herself, or to allow others to remedy 
 theirs, that was out of the question. When the Roman 
 world broke down, came the great invasions with the new 
 political and social order, the Germanic peoples and feudal- 
 ism, or landlordism, with vassalage, in place of former 
 slavery, — a mitigation in degree, not in kind. Entire Society 
 was enchained with one huge hierarchical bond ; the very 
 opposite of the Mosaic ideal. The Bible wants a State with 
 
168 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 equal and free citizens, with equal means and with solidarity. 
 Feudalism developed a Society personified in and absorbed 
 by the king and the baron, who absorbed all ; the people thus 
 becoming their tools and instruments for personal ambition 
 and perpetual wars. In Switzerland, and later in Holland, 
 the biblical idea gained some hold upon the State. But it 
 was the American and French revolutions that made the world 
 turn its eyes again towards the Mosaic society. Modern^ 
 American Democracy stands on Sinaic grounds. May be, 
 philanthropists, economists and philosophers will yet find 
 out that the biblical legislation contains some remedy for 
 our all-absorbing social question. May be that the teachers 
 of Social Democracy may yet willingly sit down at the feet 
 of the Legislator from Sinai and his successors. 
 
 It would be worth while to closely examine that grand. 
 Mosaic trial at compromising between property and com- 
 munism, between egoism and altruism : by the above-men- 
 tioned, vast, moral and economic enactments; the full and 
 entire Septennate system, the Sabbath-day, Sabbath-year and 
 Sabbath-cycle of fifty years in their grand ensemble. But 
 let it be done without prejudice. Formerly the Sinai 
 laws were accepted as binding, upon all times and all cir- 
 cumstances, in all its details. Now the opposite direction 
 prevails. Let all prejudice be dropped and an impartial 
 examination be held : what elements thereof are available 
 for our times; and I think, the present State, with its 
 all-absorbing social question, would profit by such an 
 unbiased investigation. 
 
PART IV. 
 
 THE BIBLICAL STATE AND SOLIDARITY. 
 
 Having spoken of tlie individual liberty, the personal 
 equality and the equal distribution of wealth in the biblical 
 State, we now arrive at the fourth cardinal principle of 
 that legislation, — the solidarity of the members of the 
 commonwealth. The rock underlying the entire social 
 structure is mutual sympathy, the solid feeling of the 
 community of interests among its social units. This feel- 
 ing, natural between the rational parts of any composite 
 body, as between husband and wife, between members of 
 a family, slowly extending to the gens, the patriarchal group, 
 the tribe and the people, the legislator strove to fan and 
 kindle into full consciousness among the horde brought 
 out from Egypt and established in Canaan. This is the 
 feeling of solidarity , the conviction that the welfare of 
 each is bound up with that of his fellow-citizens. Egoism 
 is whispering that our interest is contrary to that of our 
 neighbor's, that our advantage and his advantage are like 
 the two buckets at the well : whenever the one is up the 
 other is down. But altruism is the other instinct lying 
 deeper even in our soul, with a " still, thin, yet divine 
 voice," whispering: " No, mine and the neighbor's interests 
 really and truly go together. I can not be happy without 
 his being so too." Remark : Mosaism has here another 
 tendency than the New Testament has. Mosaism endeavors 
 to mitigate, curb and moderate selfishness by love to fellow- 
 ship. But it makes no attempt at eliminating selfishness. 
 For, indeed, human society could not subsist without love 
 of self, either. Without the powerful stimulus of self, wife 
 
170 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 and child, late offspring, future name, reward, glory, etc., etc. 
 we could never overcome tlie formidable obstacles in the 
 way of human advance, of work, toil, discovery and inven- 
 tion. That prodigious amount of self-sacrifice and abnega- 
 tion required by an Aristides, an Elijah, a Paul, a 
 Mendelssohn, to fulfill what they did, and under their 
 circumstances, must have had some backbone of self -grati- 
 fication too, besides ideality and self-sacrifice. Moses, 
 therefore, endeavored to temper and fuse both self and 
 others, egoism and altruism, into one harmonious whole. 
 Upon both he created his social fabric. Hence he said : 
 "Love thy neighbor and love the stranger as thyself." 
 " Tolerate thy enemy." — " Expostulate with him, but bear 
 him no grudge." Never did he ask for : " Love thy 
 enemy," because a human State could not subsist wholly 
 upon self sacrifice, could not stand without a strong alloy 
 of selfishness. 
 
 The New Testament starting from a monastic society, with 
 common property, a mystic "pMlanstere''' of saints and 
 saintesses, all striving to realize the "kingdom of heaven 
 upon earth," — such a community with such ideal aspirations 
 could make the trial at eliminating self and found its 
 system upon pure altruism. Mosaism, less ideal, aiming at 
 establishing a human State with average human beings as 
 its units, with work and family as its corner-stone, had, 
 therefore, to keep alive the feeling of solidarity in order to 
 counterbalance egoism, by teaching not simply rigid justice 
 and equality, "eye for eye,^' but another deeper principle — 
 that of benevolence and kindliness, of reciprocity and sym- 
 pathy to our species. That remark disposes of the stale 
 criticism that Mosaism is but cold justice, the scales of 
 mine and thine, and that love and charity were waiting for 
 Voltaire to be revealed. On examination we shall find 
 sympathy at the very bottom of the Mosaic system. 
 
legal prejudice or solidarity. 171 
 
 Legal Prejudice or Solidarity. 
 
 This principle of benevolence and solidarity to our species 
 is surely one of the most prominent and most deeply rooted 
 in the human breast. Let us hope for the honor of our 
 species that it has never been entirely stifled. But how 
 often has it been obscured, falsified or silenced by the 
 prejudices of the blind masses, or even the passions of the 
 leaders! The history of legislation, ancient and modern, 
 sacred and profane, tells us how often prejudice of nation- 
 ality, of tongue, country, caste, sect and condition, — vulgar, 
 foolish and cruel prejudices, have been converted into laws 
 and sanctioned by the authority of the State, nay, of 
 religion. What a sacrilege! What a blasphemy against 
 God, reason and justice to embody hatred and folly into a 
 code of laws destined for the education and government of 
 mankind! Mosaism is fairly free of such dark, bloody 
 stains. Save its severities against the Canaanites and the 
 Amalekites, severities, no doubt, urgently dictated by the 
 given circumstances and conditions, except that Mosaism 
 is free of those bigoted, narrow-minded, Draconic laws 
 which fill half of the world's codes. Let us survey the 
 verses of our section in question, and we shall soon feel 
 convinced of the broad, humanitarian character of " Mish- 
 patim,^^ our chapters on " Laws and Ordinances " (II. M. 22, 
 20, etc.) There we read: "An immigrant thou shalt not 
 overreach nor oppress, for immigrants ye were in Egypt." — 
 '•The widow and the orphan ye shall not wrong, for they 
 will but cry unto Me, and I will listen unto them and shall 
 retaliate upon you," etc. — "If thou lendest money, be not 
 hard upon the debtor, nor take any interest of him." — "If 
 thou takest as a pawn the dress of thy fellow, return it to 
 him at sunset." — " Do not carry around false reports." — " Do 
 not incline to the majority for evil, nor shalt thou favor the 
 poor one in his contest." — " When thou meetest thy enemy's 
 
172 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 OX astray, return it to him." — " When thy enemy's beast 
 succumbs under its burden, thou shalt relieve it." — 
 " Nor shalt thou bend justice against the poor." — ''Take no 
 bribe, for bribery blinds the eyes of the* wise." — "The 
 growth of the seventh year leave to the poor." — "The 
 seventh day keep as a rest for the poor, the animal," etc., 
 etc. — What grand traits of broad sympathy, of fellow- 
 feeling with fellow-creatures, man or beast! 
 
 The Bible Poor-Laws. 
 
 Let us see now the Mosaic poor-laws, arising from solidar- 
 ity and reciprocity of interests. In the preceding pages 
 we have taken England as an example for illustrating how 
 little theoretical liberty and legal equality influence 
 real, social equality. Let us now do the same regarding 
 her pauper laws, for these are, most probably, the oldest 
 extant, as is English liberty and equality. Already under 
 the reign of Elizabeth, the British statutes provided in 
 some measure for the destitute. Besides private, corporate 
 and communal charities, the poor-rates of England in 1831 
 amounted to forty millions of dollars. England has, 
 besides, many poor-establishments, as: work-houses and 
 poor colonies, soup establishments, endowments of fuel, 
 clothing, homes, poor-hospitals, etc., etc. Yet with all 
 this fair expense of treasure and sympathy, Albion has 
 probably the largest and most abject pauper class in 
 the world; a million of English subjects are belonging 
 to that class! There the indigent very rarely succeed in 
 raising themselves from that abyss of economical and 
 moral ruin. The English pauper has but one means of 
 salvation, that is emigration. As long as he stays at home 
 and gets his poor-rates and his poor-boons, he remains an 
 outcast, a social leper ; deprived of his civic rights, almost 
 of his human rights. Why? Because of the terrible 
 social inequality ! Whilst society keeps him from starva- 
 
THE BIBLE POOR LAWS. 173 
 
 tion, it likewise hinders liim in Ms efforts, it keeps liim 
 down in tlie bonds of pauperism. Sucli is England, the 
 most enlightened and humane country of Europe. 
 
 Mosaism starts from another standpoint. All citizens are 
 free, all equally noble born. " Ye shall be a kingdom of priests 
 and a holy nation." — " Mine is Israel." " Mine is the land." 
 All obey the same laws, all have equal rights and duties. 
 Hence, equal interests and solidarity ; no proletarians, no 
 paupers ! But shall the thrifty, the intelligent, the indus- 
 trious, have no premium ? Yes, he shall surely have one ; 
 the fruits of his virtues are his. No communism ! Shall 
 the vicious, the lazy and stupid one not feel his punish- 
 ment ? Undoubtedly ! All the pangs of poverty, of 
 dependence, of a biting conscience, shall stimulate him 
 to improve. Pauperism is no privilege and no virtue, 
 as in Brahmanism. The law declares : "Jf^avor not the 
 poor in his contest.'^ — Shall he be crushed under his 
 poverty ; he and his innocent family ? No ! The Release- 
 year rescues his personal liberty; it cancels his debts. 
 Jubilee redeems his family-lot; Sabbath gives him a 
 breathing spell. Shall he, in the meantime, starve or live 
 on alms? No! There steps in solidarity: the thrifty, the 
 intelligent, etc., profiting by the lazy and stupid, must leave 
 them at least a pittance to keep them from starvation. 
 
 Thus the Bible levies upon the wealthy contributions for 
 the poor; as Mr. Chamberlain said: "The rich must pay a 
 ransom to the poor ; " not because it is a sin to be rich, or a 
 virtue to be poor. No, but because the rich, the cunning, the 
 efficient, the thrifty profit by the ill luck of the poor and 
 lazy. The first have not only their own, legitimate share ; 
 they have also the share of the luckless. Hence it is just, 
 they should help those latter ones to a pittance ; hence the 
 tithes for the poor, the Levites, the unhappy, the impover- 
 ished and the vicious. This is a duty, not a charity. The 
 grand principle is solidarity, aiming at Q) " Let there be no 
 
 .p'3N ^2 n^n" N*^ ^3 DSN (1) 
 
174 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 pauper class among you." Give each a chance to rise again 
 and become independent. 
 
 Poor and Pauper. 
 
 We have seen that by the Sabbatic Year and the Jubilee 
 Mosaism tries to remedy the greatest social evils, pauper- 
 ism and plutocracy. — The English social conditions, viz : 
 Lords of one-half million pounds yearly income, on one 
 hand, and one hundred thousand paupers, with thirty 
 thousand lewd women in London alone, on the other, are 
 obviated in the biblical State. But as industry, capacity, 
 frugality and good luck, etc., will always be great factors 
 in the economy of a nation, just so will the above Sabbatic 
 Institutions alone not suISce to equalize fortunes. A great 
 discrepancy will always remain. At the utmost may we 
 succeed in eradicating an hereditary pauper class, not in 
 totally discarding proletarianism and poverty. Hence is the 
 Mosaic double axiom perfectly conceivable, of V. M. 15, 4 : 
 " In order that there should be no pauper among you; " and 
 further again, in Y. M. 15, 11, affii'ming: "There will never 
 fail some poor one in the land ; therefore open thy hand to 
 him." In both verses the original has the word ''Bhiyon.^' 
 But in the first one it means a pauper, in the last a poor 
 one; as in all old languages, the same word means both. 
 Indeed, the idea and the word pauper are of modern origin, 
 our own social circumstances having created an hereditary 
 pauper class ; in antiquity it was unknown ; rich and poor 
 were always liable to change rolls and hands. But the 
 Pentateuch, deprecating chronic pauperism, admits that there 
 will ever be poor ones. Modern communism alone is claim- 
 ing the Utopia of an absolute equality of fortunes. In 
 reality, luck, capacity, thrift, prudence, the number of chil- 
 dren in the family, widows, orphans, exiles, idealists, weak- 
 lings, invalids, vicious, etc., will ever influence economic 
 conditions. The Bible, wishing to extend the principle of 
 
USURY, MONOPOLIES AND RINGS. 175 
 
 solidarity throughout all the ranks of society, and endeavor- 
 ing not simply to eradicate pauperism, but even to mitigate 
 poverty and give the needy all possible chances of recuper- 
 ating, except communism, has therefore instituted a long 
 string of laws, to give the poor a competency. These laws 
 are of a double nature, negative and positive. One set of 
 laws forbids putting any hindrance in the way of the poor. 
 The other set of laws commands active assistance for him. 
 We shall begin with the first named, the negative ones. 
 
 Negative Poor-Laws. 
 
 " An Ebrew servant goes out free in the seventh year." 
 (II. M. 21, 2). The Roman slave, client, conquered, etc., 
 never had any such boon. The Judsean's alienated family- 
 lot was to be redeemed by his near kinsman. Latest the 
 Jubilee set it free (III. M. 25, 25-28.) Thus he and his 
 posterity always had something to fall back upon. Never 
 was there a pauper born in the Biblical Society. The 
 Judsean could never be crushed and buried under indebted- 
 ness, as in all ancient States it was the case; half of 
 enslavements there had that for their origin. The Ebrew 
 laws prescribed the cancellation of all debts in the seventh 
 year— (Y. M. 15, 2 and 9). 
 
 Usury, Monopolies and Rings. 
 
 In ancient and in modern times the poor suffer especially 
 under the burden of usury or interest, the original capital 
 accumulating by it a hundredfold. The Ebrew law for- 
 bade all interest on money, and all profit on goods and 
 eatables. (III. M. 25, 35.) Again, no monopoly was allowed. — 
 In ancient and modern times the poor suffer terribly by the 
 pushing up of prices of bread, meat, coal, etc., by the rings 
 cornering the market, availing themselves of " unions " and 
 combinations, profiting by monopolies and huge capitalism 
 to enhance the prices of victuals, clothing and fuel, with- 
 
176 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 out any reasonable cause, just by cornering the poor buyer's 
 market. The Bible proscribes not only money interest, 
 but all kinds of usury or increase upon eatables and making 
 profit on any kind of goods. (III. M. 25-36, and elsewhere.) 
 Any kind of buying and selling with a view to profit is 
 prohibited. All trade is thus forbidden, not only pawn- 
 broking, as usury. Only with foreign countries such was 
 allowed. The Gentile living in Judaea participated in that 
 privilege. No interest or profit, on. money or goods, was 
 allowed to be taken of him. '' Be he Gentile-stranger or 
 domiciled, take no interest or increase of him ; fear God. — 
 Let thy brother live with thee." ([II. M. 25, 35.)— The 
 Ebrew, during his six years hiring out, could not be 
 harshly treated. No hard slave-work, or any maltreatment 
 was permitted. (III. M. 25, 39-44). — When killed he was 
 duly avenged by the law. When his tooth was knocked 
 out he went out free. (II. M. 21, 27). — His free wife and 
 children were not at the mercy of a harsh or a lascivious 
 master. (II. M. 21, 3, and III. M. 25, 41).— His daughter, 
 when sold, was to be married to the master, or to his son, 
 or go free (II. M. 21, 7, etc.), and her treatment was in all 
 things humane. (II. M. 21, 9 and 10).— When the freed 
 slave left he was to get a portion from the master's flock 
 and corn a.nd wine, according to means (V. M. 15, 14,) 
 reminding the latter of his having been once poor him- 
 self. It was forbidden to enter the house of the poor 
 debtor for pawning him, leaving the latter the choice of 
 the pawn to be given, which pawn had to be returned to 
 the owner every night. (V. M. 24, 10-14). — What exquisite 
 delicacy! This was a kind of exemption law in favor of 
 the poor; the lawgiver reckoning that the creditor will 
 get tired of taking and returning the pawn, and give it up. 
 A widow's garment was never allowed to be pawned, nor 
 could the grinding-mill be taken away (V. M. 24, 6 and 17). 
 The requisites of life were thus exempted from the grip of 
 
MOSES AXD MOHAMMED ON THE SAME TOPIC. 177 
 
 the creditor. The immigrant, the widow and orphan were 
 to be protected at court. (Ibidem). — " Do not withhold the 
 wages from the hireling, be he Ebrew or Gentile-stranger. 
 Pay him on the same day, for he is waiting for it, and he 
 may cry unto God and you will be held accountable." 
 (V. M. 24, 14 and 15.) — What abroad sympathy, so humane, 
 yet divine ! Divine, because so broadly humane, including 
 all races and classes and creeds. 
 
 Makkiage and Divorce. 
 
 Look close to (V. M. 24, 1, etc.) What a nobility of senti- 
 ment! The lawgiver protects not only the rights of the 
 weak, but their feelings and social standing, too. Read : 
 "iWhen a man has married, and having found some blemish 
 in his wife, he divorced her, whereupon she married 
 another man and was divorced, or widowed of that other 
 one, too, then her first husband shall not remarry her, since 
 she has been the wife of another." There is here a fine 
 feeling of the proper and the becoming. May be that it is 
 a silent protest against the barbarous custom prevalent 
 in Arabia (see Michaeli's Laws of Moses, Vol. II, page 138, 
 London, 1814), according to which remarriage of a divorced 
 wife could take place only after her marriage to and divorce 
 from a second husband! The Mosaic lawgiver sacrifices 
 here the chance of a home for the divorced woman to the 
 gain of her self-respect. Let her not be treated as a 
 milking cow, bought, sold and bought again. 
 
 Moses and Mohammed on the Same Topic. 
 
 Let us dwell a while on this trait. It is interesting to 
 follow up the thoughts of great legislators. In Arabia and 
 in Judsea, as all over the ancient world, women were mostly 
 bought by their husbands. The husbands, therefore, had 
 the privilege of sending them off at a moment's notice ; 
 then they went free, losing their husbands and gaining 
 
 12 
 
178 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 their freedom, and thereby they lost nothing, having been 
 originally unfree. Now both the Ebrew and the Arabian 
 legislators were anxious to make woman gain and not lose 
 in the transaction. They could not curtail the husband's 
 rights to divorce her, since he had bought her. All they could 
 do was to impede the divorcement and warn him not to be 
 hasty in the usage of his barbarous privilege. In this 
 sympathetic desire both the lawgivers participated. But 
 they took different roads in attaining their object. 
 Mohammed, by his adopting the mentioned current custom, 
 meant to convey the following advice : " Fellow- Arabian, 
 you are about sending away, in hot haste, your life-com- 
 panion. Now, take counsel and ponder over it, for to-morrow 
 you may repent it and wish to remarry her. But Alahah 
 will punish you. You will not be allowed to remarry her, 
 except after she has been the wife of another and then 
 divorced from him." — Thus he was trying to sober the 
 husband by arousing in him the feelings of jealousy ; and 
 that may often have deterred him from rash divorcement. 
 But that was exceedingly indelicate, though perhaps often 
 effective. Good enough for rough times! That was the 
 custom long before the Koran in the Arabian world. Now, 
 the biblical lawgiver could follow that usage, but he thought 
 the remedy worse than the evil. It was repugnant to the 
 ideal of " Ye shall be unto me a holy nation." There the 
 priest could not marry a divorced woman; Mohammed did. 
 The Mosaic community revolted against that proposition, 
 and believed to reach the same object by the cleaner road, 
 declaring : '' Be not hasty in divorcing your wife, for if she 
 marries another you can never marry her again, and thus you 
 wrong yourself forever." — I believe there is here bo,th more 
 delicacy and more prudence than in the Arabian mode. 
 Here is another law of great delicacy, viz : 
 
the levirate marriage. 179 
 
 The Levirate Marriage. 
 
 Among the Hindoos and Persians, anciently, and yet now 
 among Mongols, Afghans, etc., there is a custom requiring 
 that a man marries the wife of his deceased brother, in 
 order to raise him a son and perpetuate his name. That 
 custom prevailed, too, in the ancient Ebrew Commonwealth. 
 Moreover, as there the lawgiver desired to retain each acre 
 and cottage in the original family-group this constituted 
 a second interest for retaining the widow in the family by 
 having her marry a kinsman of the deceased. Hence the 
 law (V. M. 25, 5) : "When brothers dwell together, and one 
 of them dies childless, but leaves a wife, then shall she not 
 marry out of the family ; but her husband's brother shall 
 marry her, and the first-born son by that marriage shall 
 bear the name of her first husband (and get his family-lot), 
 that the latter one's name shall not be blotted out from 
 among Israel." (^) But if her brother-in-law refuses to 
 marry her, a ceremony shall take place before the courts to 
 that effect, whereupon she is free to dispose of herself. Of 
 course, the Rabbinical law amplifies and changes greatly 
 these provisions. (Eben Ha-Eser, 156, and Ibamoth ad 
 locum). 
 
 Here we find a custom of older date than Mosaism is, 
 grown out of the agrarian and the marriage customs of 
 hoary times, when the entire family had one lot and one 
 wife, perhaps, which usage of Levirate-marriage the Bible 
 allowed to stand, but modified, restrained, changed and 
 slowly turned to such account as to bring out its good feat- 
 ures, effacing its harsh ones, and, moreover, making it 
 optional. Later, the Rabbis finally abolished it. 
 
 The whole is brought out in the Bible in such a way that 
 we almost hear the heart of the feeling lawgiver throbbing 
 at the thought of a man dying childless, and his poor widow 
 wrangling with the selfish relatives, and about to be turned 
 
 .^Nic^'D IDC' nno' N^ (1) 
 
180 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 into the cold street, or to ascend the burning funeral pile, 
 as in Hindostan. The law interfered, therefore, declaring: 
 " The widow shall stay in the family, and an heir be raised 
 to her deceased husband." — The conditions are foreign, old 
 and rude, but the feeling and the sympathy is eternally 
 fresh and humane. 
 
 Naomi and Euth. 
 
 To sympathize with that custom in our far-away times 
 and social conditions, we need but to read over the beautiful 
 idyl of Kuth and Naomi — one of the noblest gems of Sacred 
 Writ. A poor Ebrew family, during a famine, leave their 
 country and their acre and move into a neighboring heathen 
 land. The two sons marry there from among the Gentiles. 
 Soon father and sons die and leave each a widow. — The old 
 widow determines to return to her own country and farm. 
 Tenderly she persuades one of her widowed daughters-in- 
 law to stay in her own country, and this after many hot 
 tears and kind words. But the other one, Ruth, persistingly 
 declares never to leave her old mother-in-law, whom she 
 would follow wherever she goes, whose country she will 
 make hers, and whose God will be hers; she will follow 
 her and work and toil for her, and glean in the fields and 
 devote herself to her late husband's mother, the only relic 
 and consolation of her past conjugal happiness. The two 
 widows return to the Judsean village and acre. Many of 
 the old neighbors remember Naomi. "Alas ! I am no longer 
 Naomi, the sweet one. — Call me 'Bitter,' for my lot is 
 bitter, indeed, now ! " — Ruth keeps her promise. She works 
 and toils and gleans in the fields, and sacrifices her young 
 beauty and her fine face for the nobility of a dutiful life, 
 consecrated to tender reminiscences and to charity at home, 
 entirely devoted to filial piety. Soon she is rewarded 
 grandly and nobly, in the most touching and the most 
 natural way. The richest man in the place, Boaz, perchance 
 a distant relation of the family, having been witness of 
 
RACIAL INTERMARRIAGE. 181 
 
 Ruth's purity, lier self-sacrifice and devotion, takes lier as 
 liis spouse, by virtue of tlie above-mentioned custom of 
 Levirate marriage, and one of the late descendants of the 
 poor Gentile immigrant Ruth is King David, the "anointed 
 of the Lord." You see here, as in many other passages, the 
 Bible bears no prejudice to Gentiles, when good, pure and 
 noble-hearted. It prohibited intermarriage with the Canaan- 
 ites because of their barbarous and mean idolatry, of 
 unchaste and cruel customs, doctrines and life — not on 
 account of race or blood. Prince Bismarck recently acknowl- 
 edged to have connived at anti-Semitism as a " safety-valve 
 to save capitalism." That "anti-Semitic fury," a shame to 
 an enlightened country and century, renders unhappy half 
 a million of Germans, victims of that scourge, and totally 
 ruins several millions of other human beings in the neigh- 
 boring Russian countries — poor souls who never harmed 
 Bismarck, nor even know the meaning of anti-Semitism, 
 Whereupon he smiles, and declares : Jew and Gentile shall 
 intermarry and reconcile — on the graves of the victims and 
 the ruins of their homes. Ruth and Boaz, however, are a 
 match consecrated by the Bible, cemented by devotion 
 and sacrifice, not by " blood and iron." 
 
 Racial Intermarriage. 
 
 Here is another law of great moral beauty, of universal 
 sympathy with the helpless and the weak. In V. Moses 21, 10, 
 we read : " When thou goest to war and takest many prison- 
 ers, among whom thou seest a beautiful woman, thou canst 
 take her — as thy wife." Whereat the law prescribes that 
 from that moment she is no longer a prisoner, but " She is 
 to be brought to his house; a month's time shall be given 
 her for preparation ; she shall wear no longer the prisoner's 
 dress ; she shall be allowed to mourn over her parents ; 
 then, after a month is lapsed, she becomes his wife." Now, 
 " Should he, thereafter, not like her, then he must let her 
 go wherever she pleases. Sell her as a slave he cannot, 
 
182 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 since he had been her husband." — Compare this with the 
 treatment of captive women elsewhere, even in our own 
 times In Kussia, Turkey or Asia, and you will agree that 
 the biblical author had a great heart, including in his 
 sympathy all conditions, races and countries. You will see 
 that from there to the later recommendation in the New 
 Testament, " Love thy enemy," the transition is not too far. 
 Moses could not avoid war, from his purely human stand- 
 point, but he mitigated its horrors. Of course, the Rabbis 
 turned that law rather in a sense to impede intermarriage, 
 pointing to the fact that disharmony, etc., will follow. 
 Of course, with their bitter experiences in view, they could 
 not think otherwise. Just as the Jew now thinks of Bis- 
 marck's proposition of intermarriage coming close after 
 inciting to anti-Semitism and ostracism. 
 
 Piety for the Dead among Greeks and Romans. 
 
 That sympathetic anxiety for perpetuating the name of 
 the dead, as seen above in the Pentateuch and the story of 
 Ruth and Boaz, is akin to the solicitude of the ancients '' to 
 burn or bury the bodies of those slain in battle, to throw 
 up fresh turf upon their ashes, erect a hillock, even offer 
 sacrifices over their graves," — so tenderly mentioned by all 
 the poets of Greece and Rome. A reminiscence thereof — 
 to-day yet, is the reading of solemn Mass in the Catholic 
 Church, the recitation of the Kaddish prayer in the syna- 
 gogue, and the belief in Paradise, by both. 
 
 The idyl of Ruth is a -beautiful instance of ancient pious 
 regard for the dead. Let us now look for some examples 
 from Greek and Roman poets. 
 
 Virgil, in the JEneid, tenth book, narrates as a noble 
 trait of Turnus, the Latin adversary of his Trojan hero, 
 that when he had vanquished and killed young Pallas, son 
 of King Evander, the friend of ^neas, he exclaims : " Arca- 
 dians, listen to and remember my words and bring them to 
 Evander. I send him back Pallas, such as he has deserved it, 
 
PIETY FOR THE DEAD. 183 
 
 that' he may bestow on him the honors of the grave and all 
 those funeral duties, which may console him, — indeed, he 
 has dearly paid for the hospitality granted to the Trojans.'X^) 
 ^neas, thereupon arriving in the camp, is inconsolable 
 over the death of young Pallas, the son of his friend, old 
 King Evander. With his terrible sword he makes a fearful 
 carnage among the enemy and takes eight warriors alive, to 
 offer them in expiation to the manes of Pallas, who with 
 his father are ever present to the mind of JEneas(^). With 
 especial callousness he massacres a vanquished enemy who 
 is begging for his life, — shouting : " Here you have what 
 the manes of Anchises, what lulus ask, Pallas being dead."(^) 
 
 In the same book, X., Virgil narrates the death of fero- 
 cious King Mezentius and his son. The first, nigh succumb- 
 ing under ^neas, is saved by his young son, who heroically 
 dies in his stead. The ferocious sire is disconsolate and 
 pathetic at that misfortune. He offers himself to the 
 strokes of his antagonist with these tender words : " Bitter 
 enemy, here, now, take my life, without committing a 
 crime, for I wish not to be spared. Yet, if the van- 
 quished may hope for some grace, I beg thee to allow some 
 earth to cover my body, and, moreover, suffer that I rest in 
 the same tomb with my son."(*) 
 
 The psychology of these verses is particularly fine, and 
 among the moderns it recalls passages of Oorneille and 
 Victor Hugo. In the first three quotations, uEneas, the soft, 
 
 (1) "Arcades, hii^c, inquit, memores mea dicta referte Evandro: qualem meruit, 
 Pallanta remitto. Quisquis hoiios tumuli, quidquid solamen humandi est, Largior: 
 haud illi stabunt yEiieia parvo Hospitia."— Virg. X, 491. 
 
 (3) " Proxima quitque metit jjladio, latumque per agmen Ardens limitem agit 
 ferro; tc, Turne, superbum Cticde nova quivrens. Pallas, Evander, in ipsis Omnia 
 sunt oculis, mens.L' quas advena ptimas Tunc adiit, dextneque dat<i?. Sulmone 
 creates Quatuor hie juvenes, totidcm quos educat Ufens, Viventes rapit, inl'erias 
 quos immolet umbris, Captivoque rogi perfundat sanguine llammas. " — Virg. X, 513. 
 
 (3) "Belli commercia Turnus Sustulit ista prior jam turn, Pallante pererato. 
 Hoc patris Anchisic Manes, hoc sentit lulus. Sic fatus galeam loeva tenet, atque 
 reflexa Ccrvicc orantis capulo tenus applicat cnsem."— Virg. X, 534. 
 
 (4) " Hostis amare, (luid inerepitas, mortemque minaris? Nullum in cajde 
 nefas; nee sic ad pni'lia vcni. Nee tecum meus hivc pepigit mihi fwdera Lausus. 
 Unum hoc, per, si qua est victis venla hostibus, oro. Corpus humo patiare tegi, . . . 
 Et me consortem nati concede sepulcro. ' '—Virg. X, 900. 
 
184 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the pious and tlie humane, is so cruel and ferocious, so 
 strikingly contrary to his nature, because of the death of 
 Pallas, who, he thinks, deserves all the victims now falling 
 by his own sword. Even "prisoners' blood shall flow over 
 the flames of his funeral pile." (^Eneas, X., 520). Whilst 
 the last passage of Mezentius is striking by the contrary 
 trait ; he is hated by his own kin ; chased away by his sub- 
 jects, followed only by his son, who sacrifices himself to 
 save the hard-hearted father. He, usually so selfish, savage 
 and brutal, is here, in this instance, all tenderness, love and 
 pathos. Though out of the reach of the enemy, he yet 
 returns to the battle-field, not to conquer, but to die, asking 
 of his victor as a last and only favor, to be honorably 
 buried, and at the side of his devoted son. That is of 
 grand pathos, and true to nature. The ferocious Mezentius, 
 in presence of his dead son, dead in his defence, dead for 
 him whom everyone else hated and who hated everyone 
 else, is suddenly turned into a humane, loving being; he is 
 overcome for the first time in his life, by a tender feeling, 
 piety for his dead child. For once he feels what it is to 
 love, to admire and to have been loved — and this supreme 
 moment is — his last one ! — In Corneille and in Victor Hugo 
 we find often happy imitations of the great Virgil. 
 
 The Sublime Among the Classics and the Moderns. 
 In " Polyeuote "(^) and in " Horace "{^) Corneille attains 
 
 (1) Polyeucte V, 3. 
 
 Je vous I'ai deja dit, et vous le dis encore, 
 Vivez avec Severe, ou moui'ez avec moi. 
 Je ne meprise point vos pleurs, ni votre foi; 
 Mais, de quoi que pour vous notre amour m'entretienue, 
 Je ne vous connais plus, si vous n'etes chretleune. 
 (3) Horace III, 6. 
 
 Horace: Nous venez-vous, Julie, apprendre la victoire ? 
 
 Julie : Mais plutot du combat les funestes effets. 
 
 Horace : Rome n'est point sujette, ou mon fils est sans vie: 
 
 Je conuais mieux mon sang, il salt mieux son devoir. 
 Julie : Que vouliez-vous qu'il fit contre trois "? 
 Hoi-ace: Qu'il mourut, . . . 
 
 N'eut-il que d'un moment recule sa defaite, . . . 
 II eut avec honneur laisse mes cheveux gris, 
 Et c'etait de sa vie un assez digne prix. 
 
THE SUBLIME AMONG THE CLASSICS AND MODERNS. 185 
 
 at such sublime effects. In " Le roi s' amuse," " Lucretia 
 Borgia," and in "Notre Dame," Victor Hugo reaches that 
 climax. That sublimest of effects, that deepest thrill of 
 our noblest passions the poet appears to reach in uniting 
 into one and the same instance the terrible and the tender. 
 Such is ^neas dealing his fearful death-blows around, yet 
 aiming but at appeasing the shadow of young Pallas, 
 inanimate, and of soothing his father, disconsolate; or 
 Mezentius receiving his last stroke, asking of his victor the 
 favor of a burial at the side of his only beloved son. — 
 Here are the terrible and the tender united ; at once 
 excruciating pain and sweet gratification, horror and delight. 
 Here is the sublime. That brings our noblest soul-strings 
 into vibration. This is the highest of the poetic art. This 
 but the greatest masters, Virgil, Shakspeare, Schiller, 
 Corneille, Victor Hugo, etc., know how to reach. It is the 
 sanctum sanctorum of poetry. 
 
 Another reminiscence strikes me, just parallel to this, 
 coming from the far-off past : When a young man, I 
 recollect to have found in a Roumanian poet, of blessed 
 memory, my friend, Dimitriu Bolintineanu, such, heautiful 
 passages, uniting the tender and the terrible to a high pitch. 
 I have not the book at hand to quote ; be his name here 
 remembered with gratitude. 
 
 Victor Hugo reached that pitch in depicting a grand, 
 profligate duchess; having poisoned at a banquet her 
 enemies, and fiendishly rejoicing over it, she discovers that 
 her only, long lost and sincerely beloved son is among her 
 poisoned enemies. — Her despair and remorse are exceedingly 
 pathetic. — In another drama the same poet hits a great 
 moment in the scene, when a father opening the sack 
 presumingly containing the murdered ravisher of his dear 
 child, full of hellish, yet natural glee, finds there instead — 
 his poor dead child herself, dead to save the life of her 
 ravisher ! — The most pathetic, I think, is in a historic novel 
 
186 SPIEIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 by the same poet. There we meet a beggarwoman, long 
 mourning over her child — stolen in infancy "by gypsies — 
 who gets hold of, and delivers in revenge, to the execu- 
 tioner, an innocent gypsy girl, which girl, whilst dying, is 
 found to be her own long-lost child. — Shakespeare has 
 often reached that climax of the sublime; the tender, 
 there, being often subordinate to the terrible. That is 
 well known. But let us return to our subject proper. 
 
 Funeral Piety in Homer. 
 
 Homer reports many cases of pious regard for the dead, 
 their own, or their relations' keen desire for their obtain- 
 ing a becoming burial; with accompanying funeral-rites, 
 offerings, sacrifices, libations, incense, precious oil, flowers, 
 tears and lamentations, with their habitual arms, favorite 
 horses, oftentimes even with some favorite attendants. It 
 was such passages in ancient authors which suggested to 
 Herbert Spencer his hypothesis about the sacrificial service, 
 etc., which, according to him, originated in by-gone pre- 
 historic times in the naive and pious offerings of food to 
 dead ancestors. Later they were raised to the gods, divine 
 worship was paid them by posterity, and such offerings 
 were continued to divinized heroes and remote tribal patri- 
 archs. Such rites and such feelings we find often reported 
 in Homer. Odysseus, for instance, is ordered to make a 
 journey to the realms of Hades, the kingdom of the nether 
 deities and the ghosts, to offer them sacrifices and con- 
 sult them about the ways how to appease the superior 
 gods, and reach home after his long wanderings since 
 the siege of Troy. He says : '' There Perimedes and Eury- 
 lochos held the victims, whilst I drew the sword from my 
 side and dug a pit of the largeness of an ell, and filled it 
 with a libation to all the dead ; first with a honey-mixture, 
 then with sweet wine, at last with water, and thereat I threw 
 in some white barleymeal. Then I prayed and vowed 
 
BIBLICAL AND CLASSICAL FUNERAL EITES. 187 
 
 to all the unsteady-heads of the dead, that when I had 
 returned to Ithaca, a young cow, the best one, should be 
 sacrificed to them in the palace, and to fill the fire-altar 
 with costly gifts, and for Teiresias alone I shall offer a 
 black sheep. Having prayed to them, I took the sheep and 
 cut their throats over the pit, and the black blood flowed 
 therein. Thereupon came crowding all the souls of the 
 departed, coming from Erebus : virgins, youths, much-tried 
 old men, tender, mourning girls, war-slaughtered men with 
 stained armor. These came around the pit, in large numbers, 
 from all directions, and with great noise. Pale fear took 
 hold of me." {^) 
 
 Biblical and Classical Funeeal Rites. 
 
 Here I wish to call attention to the fact that, whilst the 
 Bible remembers the dead with a feeling of resignation and 
 quiet tenderness, and whilst, with the Romans, we find on such 
 
 (1). 'EvT?' iepffia fiev Jlepi/ir/deg EvpiiXoxo^ ~£ 
 ecxov- kyu f5' hop o^v ipvaadftevog wapd fj.rjpov 
 l36d-pov 6pv^' haaov re Tvvyovacov ivd^a Kal kvd^a, 
 dfi^' avT(f 6e x^W X^^F^ Trdacv veTiveaaiv, 
 TvpuTa fieTiLKpTjTif), fXETewsiTa 6e ^dei olvu, 
 TO Tp'iTov av'^' iidarc ■ etvl 6' a.?ixj)iTa ?i,evKd TraKwov. 
 * TToXAd de yoxjvou^irjv vekvoiv a^evrjva Kdprjva, 
 kTi-Buv elg 'I-&dKT/v ardpav (3ovv, yrig dpioTij, 
 pi^Eiv £v fieydpaim -Kvprpj r' runrlrjcefiev ectiJauv, 
 Teipealy 6' aTvdvEV&ev b'iv lepEvaE/xEV olu 
 TvafifiE/iav' , Of fii/AoiCi. jiETairpETiEc y/iETipoiaiv. 
 Tovg tT eiret Evx^^yci Turrjal te, sd^vsa vsKpuv, ' 
 
 EXTiiadfiTjv^ Ta 6k fifjTia ?m(3uv dTrsSEipoTo/iT/ca 
 kg fio^pov, pEE (T aifxa KE?iaiv£<j>kg • di 6' aykpovTO 
 ■^x<u vKE^ 'Epk^Evg VEKVuv Ka-aTE'&vrjOiTuv. 
 \y'vn^aL t' 7]i-&Eoi te Tvo'kvT'kTiToi Tt yepovTEg 
 nap-&EviKai r' aTa}.ai vsowEV&ka ■dvjibv Exovaai 
 noTCkol (V ovrdfiEvoi ;\;a/lK%>e^<v kyx^iycfiv, 
 dv6pEg dptji(paT0i fiE^poTu^kva te'vxe kxovTEg ■ 
 01 TToXkol TTEpl [id'&pov k(j)oiTuv aA,'Ao-&EV dTiAog 
 ■dsaKEaii) laxir kfik 6£ x^-(^pi>v 6kog »Jp«.] — Odyss. XI, 23-43. 
 
188 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 occasions the terrible and the tender mingled together, we 
 see in Homer to these two elements a third one added, viz.? 
 that of the funny. Or do we find it funny because we do 
 not believe in it? Reading that poet, we imagine to see 
 him chuckle between the lines. A kind of tragic-comical 
 narrative seems to be Odysseus' descent into Hades and his 
 talk, etc., with the ghosts. But is it so ? Is it not possible 
 that in those remote times that was all real earnest? 
 Indeed, could the ancient bard have intended to make his 
 leading hero ridiculous? That is hardly probable. More 
 plausible is that it was meant in earnest, and that the old 
 Greeks did believe in it. And that would constitute a dark 
 spot in Greek civilization, indeed. The deep hatred the 
 Bible entertains for these rites and practices, the sarcasm 
 the prophets constantly launched against them, seem to 
 show that the heathen world was very puerile in many 
 respects. Indeed, what a hocus-pocus! These funeral sacri- 
 fices may be, as alluded to before, the rudimentary origin 
 of the later pagan, widespread sacrificial services so much 
 insisted upon by priests and so little thought of by the 
 biblical prophetic school ; so much so that Samuel already 
 thundered down poor, anxious King Saul with : " Behold-' 
 to obey is preferable to slaughter offerings (I. Samuel 
 15, 22) ; to hearken, better than fat rams."(^) The Homeric 
 prophet, Teiresias, is not so outspoken as Samuel. At the 
 invocation of Odysseus he makes, duly, his appearance. 
 Stalking with a golden sceptre in his hand, he eagerly asks 
 for the proffered blood, saying : " Step back from the pit 
 and take off thy sharp sword that I may drink of the blood 
 and tell thee the truth."f) Of course, he tells him the 
 
 • D'^'K 2^n» y^\>Th mt2 nnrc yoK' r\:r[ (i) 
 
 (3). "Rl^E 6' tiri ijwx>) Q>/(3aiov TLEipeaiao, 
 
 Xpiiaeov anfjTVTpov £;^wv, efie 6' eyvu Koi Trpoahcirev .... 
 
 ak?i' a~oxa.^£0 /3(^i?pov, awiaxE ^£ (haayavov 6.f i', 
 
 nijuarog o(j)pa tt/w kcu toi v?/fispTta eIku. — Odyss. XI, 90. 
 
BIBLICAL AND CLASSICAL FUNERAL RITES. 189 
 
 truth. Just such a "hocus-pocus^^ as the entire rite is; a 
 pompous specimen of the stupidities and abominable 
 cruelties of those heathen forms of worship so justly 
 denounced in the Ebrew sacred books. 
 
 Among the numerous visitors in Hades had come also the 
 mother of Odysseus. She, too, was very hungry, and 
 eagerly had asked for the blood-offering; but her son 
 warded her off with the sharp sword until first the sooth- 
 sayer, Teiresias, had taken his share. Then only came 
 her turn. She did not stand upon ceremonies. She came 
 again, after the prophet, drank of the blood and at once 
 recognized her son.(^) Before partaking of the food she did 
 not ; she then gave him her motherly advice. 
 
 Herbert Spencer's hypothesis appears to be strongly 
 confirmed by such passages, viz : the dead were simply 
 persons sleeping in their tombs, shadowy and weak, 
 trembling and shaking their heads for want of food. — 
 As soon as they drank of the blood of the victims they 
 felt refreshed, remembered their friends and gave them 
 good advice. Most pathetically Odysseus' mother closes 
 her long discourse with the thrilling words : " I did not 
 die of sickness, but from longing for thee, musing about 
 thee, Odysseus. My tender love for thee has deprived 
 me of sweet life."(~} Here again is an honest word of nature, 
 which finds a thrilling response in our souls. It is not 
 artificial, no mythology. One passage more and our Greek 
 parallels will be at an end. Among the many pale visitors 
 came also Elpenor, one of Odysseus' companions. He had 
 been, as all of them, entertained at the house of Kirke, the 
 
 (1). "iif (pa/jevr/ if'vxv fJfv CfS// dofwv Wi(5iic dau 
 
 Teipecrtao- .... t:Tri fiyrr/p 
 
 yXv&g nal TTiEv aifia KeAaive^tq- avTina 6' kyvu, 
 
 Kai. // t'TTta irpoajMvSa- — Odyss., XI, 150. 
 (2). ovTE Tit; oi'v fiot vovaoq enriTivdev, i/Te /ja/jaTa .... 
 
 d/l/l« fie a6g te 7r(5i?of ad te fiydea^ .... 
 
 ci] f ayavotppoai'vri jieT^uiSla f}v/uuv arif/rpa.'^ — Odys. XI, 200. 
 
190 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 famous witcli, drank too much, fell down from the roof, 
 died, was left there unburied, and hence, according to the 
 ideas of those times, could not be admitted into Hades till 
 his body was inhumed. He pleads for such a burial, and 
 finds us sympathetic. " I pray thee, now, on my knees, by 
 those thou didst leave behind, by thy wife, by thy father, 
 who reared thee, by Telemachus, whom thou didst leave as 
 thy only son in the palace, ... I pray that thou 
 rememberest me. Going away hence, don't let me remain 
 there unwept and unburied; that the gods should not be 
 wroth at you on account of me; but bury me with my arms 
 and make me a hillock at the shore of the gray sea ; for 
 me, the unhappy man, that future generations should 
 remember me."( ) 
 
 Thus the unfortunate Elpenor prays for burial and a monu- 
 ment " that he may be remembered by future generations." 
 Just as in the Bible: "The first son of the Levirate mar- 
 riage shall represent the deceased kinsman (the widow's first 
 husband), that his name shall not die out." (^) Is that not 
 wonderful ! Seemingly there is such a vast distance between 
 Greece and Judaea; so much prejudice, so much misunder- 
 standing. — Yet after all, the genuine tones of nature, at the 
 very spring of the soul, before they are overlaid with the 
 varnish of superstition and hypocrisy, — such tones are identi- 
 cal ! In Homer and in the Bible we find the same cravings, 
 same hopes and aspirations, viz : The dead wish to be 
 
 (1). vvv de ce ruv omd'ev yovva^o/xai, ov irapeovruv, 
 
 7ip6g t' a7i6xov kuI Tvarpbg, o & STpe<pe rvT'&bv kovra, 
 
 T/jle/idxov ■&', bv fiovvov kvl fieydpoiaiv IT^enveg- .... 
 
 kv^a a' ETTELTa, ava^, KsXafiai fivt^aaad^ai ejieIo- 
 
 fii] fi' CLKkavTov^ ad-aiTTOv, libv brnd-ev /cara/le/'Trew, 
 
 voa(pia^£ig, fi^ roi re -dewv fiyvi/xa ysvufiai, 
 
 a/l/ld /IE KanKTJai cbv TEvx£<yifi, aaaa fioi kariv^ 
 
 cf]\ia T£ fioL xevai 7vo?u7'/g k-nrl ^tvl -^aT^aaaTig, 
 
 avdpbg 6v(yT?/voio, Kal eaoofievoiat. Trv^eo&ar — Otlyss., XI, 65-76. 
 
 V. M. 25, 6.— .^Nic'^D itDK' nno- N'!?i ,nDn DB' hv Dip"' (3) 
 
BIBLICAL REVERENCE. 191 
 
 remembered to posterity. The living feel piety and tender- 
 ness for the dead. Homer bespeaks for them a grave and 
 funeral rites and a monument. The Bible legates to them, 
 children to bear their name, cultivate their acre, and occupy 
 their cottage. Here we find the source of the immortality- 
 idea with Heathen, Jew, Christian and Mohammedan. The 
 Hindoo sage aspires to Nirvana, or absorption in God. The 
 biblical nations crave for posterity, and shudder at annihila- 
 tion. Curious! Semite, Turanian and Arian now coincide 
 in the West in this instance. 
 
 Biblical Reverence. 
 
 This, apparently, wonderful coincidence between Arians, 
 Turanians and Semites, between Christian, Mohammedan 
 and Ebrew peoples of to-day, having the same hopes and 
 aspirations to commemorate the past generations, and be 
 remembered by the future ones, this fidelity to the dead 
 and to the living, equally entertained by present nations 
 of divers creeds and origins, is most naturally and easily 
 explained . We have but to remember that all those three sets 
 of races have been nursed at the breast of the same Book, 
 and that piety to the departed, and those unborn, is one of 
 the leading traits of that book. The Bible does not expressly 
 teach the doctrine of human immortality. But it does 
 more ; it conceives mankind as one huge tree, the different 
 races as its branches, and the different generations as the 
 blossoms, leaves and fruits of the divers seasons and crops 
 of the one and the same arbor. Therefore is each and every 
 individual person part and parcel thereof, and each is in 
 duty and reality bound to consider himself as such, and con- 
 stantly act as such, viz : to have regard for the past and 
 the future, and be faithful to those gone by and those to 
 come, — that is the law of the biblical solidarity ; solidarity 
 not only within the limits of the same State and genera- 
 tion, but solidarity and responsibility between the mem- 
 
192 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 bers of the generations present, and those of the past and 
 the future centuries. 
 
 This feeling of unison of all mankind and all centuries, 
 vaguely pervading the civilized and refined of all times, 
 found its most solemn expression in the Decalogue (II. M. 
 20, 12), where it stands forth in grand relief. After the 
 solemn declaration of the unity and spirituality of the 
 Deity, connected with and revealed to man through the 
 Sabbath, the day of rest and sanctification, the lawgiver 
 solemnly enjoins parental reference. "Honor thy father 
 and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land 
 God is giving thee." — Now, parental reverence is filial piety, 
 is piety for the dead and fidelity to the unborn. To respect 
 the ancestors is taking into consideration the unborn genera- 
 tions. Again, reverencing our fathers is the pledge of being 
 considered by posterity. Parental piety affirms the family, 
 secures the nation, establishes the country, and thus secures 
 the offspring. Hence, reverence for those preceding us safe- 
 guards the coming generations ; it is the connecting bridge 
 between past, present and future. 
 
 This fifth commandment, passing over from the natural 
 religion of antiquity to the positive religion of Sinai, sunk 
 deeply into the human heart. From the Ebrew it passed to 
 the Christian and the Mohammedan, to the civilized in 
 general. For long cejituries it was specially established 
 among the biblical people. When that people lived yet in 
 the European and Asiatic Ghetto, in the gloom of poverty 
 and wretchedness, during long ages gone by, this precious 
 family solidarity, this noble fidelity to the dead and the 
 living, this reverence for parents and love of kindred, was 
 the only sunshine of that ghetto, the only redeeming 
 feature of that social Tartarus, invented by popular stupid- 
 ity and priestcraft. Parental reverence was the mystic gem 
 illumining and cheering that night of the Ebrew middle- 
 ages. It was that love, devotion and adherence to prede- 
 
JULES SIMON. 193 
 
 • 
 
 cessors, kindred and posterity, the reverence of the chil- 
 dren to parents, the love of parents to descendants. At a 
 time when everything Ebraic was decriecl, hooted and 
 derided, parental reverence and fidelity to the dead and the 
 living was its redeeming feature, was respected and admired 
 by the entire world, and slowly it was learned by the world; 
 it was acquired by Arian and Turanian. Slowly the Teu- 
 tonic nations, the Latin, Slav and Mongol races, made it 
 their own. And that plant, nurtured with tears and kisses 
 at the Ebraic ghetto, became the brightest flower of civil- 
 ized mankind, an organized feature in man's physiognomy, 
 adorning the halls and the drawing-rooms of the Latin and 
 German count, the English earl and the Slav hoyar, as well 
 as the peasant's hut. 
 
 Jules Simon. 
 
 May this ever be its crowning glory, and may this gem 
 never be plucked from civilized man's diadem ; but I fear 
 recent nihilism has partly, already, tarnished it. Sometimes 
 it appears as if the fragrance of that costly flower be 
 already evaporated and its colors faded. There is some- 
 thing in our modern way of understanding liberty and 
 equality which tends to fade and rot that flower, to uproot 
 all reverence and love for, all veneration and devotion to past 
 or future, to parent or descendant ; to scoff at the wrinkles 
 of the mother and the tears of the babe, which creates 
 impatience and insubordination, coldness and indifference, 
 selfishness and self-sufficiency, — the doctrine of : ^^ After me 
 the deluge^'' concentrating all upon the Ego and the present, 
 and caring for nothing but the dear self and the gratifica- 
 tion of the hour. That is the nihilism of the family. 
 
 Mr. Jules Simon, the well-known French Minister of edu- 
 cation, a great statesman, philosopher and writer, is of 
 the opinion that the sense of reverence for the noble and 
 the good, that parental respect, filial piety or fidelity to the 
 
 13 
 
194 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 dead and tlie living, with the solidarity of the family are 
 strongly on the wane. And, mark it well, reader, he claims 
 that this process of family-deterioration is having its focus 
 in our beloved United States of America, and that from 
 here it is invading Europe. 
 
 The Baltimore Sun, of the 14th April, 1892, brought out 
 the weighty utterances of Mr. Jules Simon in this regard. I 
 quote here the following verbatim. After having unfolded 
 the sweet picture of the adherence, cohesion and mutual 
 respect of the family members of by-gone times, Mr. Jules 
 Simon says : " Again I fancy to myself a family of persons, 
 pressed and busy, who disdain everything that is not new, 
 and trample upon everything which might interfere with 
 their 'progress.' The father and mother have merely con- 
 sented to marry one another as a business of convenience ; 
 finding marriage too heavy ; . . . they go to the magis- 
 trate .... declaring that they love in other places. 
 The children do not bear the yoke of obedience, as in that 
 age when it was absolutely necessary that they be guided 
 and protected. Being yet supported — by the parents — this 
 is the only band binding them to the parents. The strong 
 and holy bond of former years has given place to the mar- 
 riage of adventure, facilitated by the divorce . . guard- 
 ianship . . . boarding-house and emancipation from 
 family control. . . . The family is further deserted for 
 the club, the games of chance, the out-door meals, . . • 
 the Exchange, the fine hotels, the dinners. . . . Eman- 
 cipation is good, but too much is not good." ... So far 
 Jules Simon on Nihilism in the family. 
 
 The Cave of Machpelah. 
 
 From this picture of " trilUant wretchedness " and the 
 neglect of family-piety, let us pass to its reverse, the 
 solemn, yet inspiring scene, in Genesis, 23, of a model 
 family ; still suggesting all the purity, nobility, affection and 
 
THE CAVE OF MACHPELAH. 195 
 
 mutual self-sacrifice of tlie conjugal ideal, as expressed in 
 the legend of Eve cut out from the side of Adam, with 
 the pointed moral of : " Therefore shall man leave his 
 father and mother and cling to his wife and become one 
 person." (Gen. II. 24). 
 
 There — I. M. 23 — we read : " And the life of Sarah was a 
 hundred and twenty and seven years; and Sarah died at 
 Hebron, in Canaan ; and Abraham came to mourn and shed 
 tears over Sarah ; then he arose and bought an hereditary 
 burial-place, the Gave of Machpelah, paying its full price, 
 acquiring it for ever, as a burial-place for the family." 
 Look how weighty and solemn, yet quiet, serene and manly 
 are these words and verses, as if to impress us with the import 
 of this model pair and model family picture, this paragon of 
 suave and manly piety for the dead. One hundred and 
 twenty-seven years she had lived at his side — first as a 
 child and kindred, then as his consort; had clung to the 
 chequered fortunes of an innovator, an initiator ; had shared 
 in his battles and struggles, obloquies, failures and poverty; 
 shared in his exile, wanderings and vicissitudes of fortune ; 
 slowly rose with him to afiluence, wealth, renown and great- 
 ness, thus fighting his battles, ever cheering, smiling, 
 hoping, inspiring, persevering. — She now breathed her last 
 in his arms. . . . Well deserving his tears, his respect, 
 a place for her dust to mingle with his, the worthy consort 
 of a providential man. 
 
 The ancient Syrians, Canaanites and Egyptians knew 
 no more sacred duty of the living than to provide for 
 the dead ; and their precautions were indeed extraordinary. 
 They built their graves as if for eternity. Kings and 
 princes built during lifetime their residences of here- 
 after. Towers and gigantic structures they erected over 
 their last abode. The Pyramids, the most astonishing works 
 of ancient times, seem to have had for their chief aim the 
 security of the rest of the dead. The greatest misfortune 
 
196 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 that could befall an individual or a nation was to have the 
 rest of their dear ones rudely interrupted. The mass of the 
 people had their burial-place in subterranean caves. These 
 were either naturally or purposely hewn in the rock, in 
 order to defy destruction. These catacombs generally 
 consisted of one spacious chamber or hall, lit up only by 
 an aperture at the top, giving to the whole a mysterious 
 half -darkness, fit for the sacred repose of the dead. Along- 
 side the walls there were niches, each containing one sar- 
 cophagus. Sometimes the hall led into another chamber 
 or a long corridor, the walls of which were lined with 
 coffins, each standing upon pedestals. Sometimes the cave 
 had again another cave beneath, accessible by a staircase, 
 having thus one burial-ground upon another. Perhaps the 
 " Cave of Machpelah " was such a double cave, kafol 
 meaning double. The door used to be closed by a huge 
 stone, requiring several persons to remove it. The original 
 meaning of such massive tombs may have been to preserve 
 the body for resurrection. — The Bible never taught it, 
 though allusions may be claimed for it. 
 
 Moses and the Two Auks. 
 
 But the most beautiful instance of fidelity to the living 
 and the dead we find in Exodus 13, 19 : "And Moses took 
 the bones of Joseph with himself (to bring them into the 
 Promised Land), for Joseph had earnestly enjoined upon 
 the Israelites, 'When God will remember you, then take 
 my bones with you hence.' " — Thus, when Moses had 
 matured his scheme of redemption, when he had vanquished 
 the numerous obstacles on his way, those of the despotic 
 Pharaohs and of the inert Ebrew masses, then, in the 
 moment of departure and of liberation, what occupied his 
 attention in that crisis? The care for the ashes of the 
 patriarch! — What a noble piety for the dead! Again, 
 Joseph, the juvenile shepherd, sold into slavery, a captive in 
 
MOSES AND THE TWO ARKS. 197 
 
 Egypt, and there becoming tlie viceroy, wlien dying, at the 
 foot of the throne, prayed his brethren— those who had 
 wronged him so much— "God will remember you; you will 
 return home, then take my bones with you, that my ashes 
 may mingle with yours."— What a noble piety for the 
 living ! 
 
 Think! Joseph, the Egyptian prince, prefers a humble 
 mound near his kinsmen to the proud mausoleum of the 
 Egyptian Pharaohs. Centuries later, Moses, starting a new 
 nation, a new era, fulfills that wish. The sarcophagus of 
 the dead patriarch had been buried under a stream, turned 
 away for that purpose. Legend claims that, at the voice of 
 Moses, the sarcophagus arose and came swimming across the 
 waves to share in the redemption and return from exile to 
 the ancestral home. Legend and history both, what fine 
 ideals of fidelity to the living and the dead! 
 
 In classic times it was customary (says Dr. Yellinek), 
 when a general returned victorious from his campaign, to 
 receive the honors of a triumph. Gorgeously clothed with 
 the imperial purple, a rich, golden wreath around his brow? 
 he made his entrance in a magnificent chariot, bands of 
 music and numerous decorated guards, the war -prisoners, 
 the captive, chained princes, the booty, following; the 
 people hilarious and shouting, the banners gaily waving, 
 the names of battles gained, of cities taken, exhibited to 
 the admiration of the vociferous multitude. Such was the 
 triumphal march of a Roman imperator. Moses, having 
 conquered the successors of Raamses, liberated his clansmen, 
 and leading them forth to independence— what was his 
 trophy? what his triumphal pomp? The sarcophagus of 
 the dead chieftain, Joseph, who wished his ashes to mingle 
 with those of his posterity ! 
 
 What a noble example of fidelity to the living and the 
 dead. 
 
198 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 A legend claims that Moses was preceded on Ms marcli by 
 two arks, one containing Joseph's remains, the other destined 
 as the future ark of the covenant. And the nations wondering 
 at that, were answered : " Why, one ark is containing the ashes 
 of the dead and the other the spirit of the Ever-Living ; " 
 the one representing the past, the other the ever future ; 
 those ashes had been inspired by that spirit — that spirit is 
 but the unfolding of history past and future. 
 
 Seeah b. Ashir. 
 
 Who discovered the place where Joseph's sarcophagus had 
 been buried under the stream ? A legend tells that it was 
 Serah b. AsTiir, a woman. She had lived and waited, since 
 Joseph's demise till the liberation by Moses. She pointed 
 out to the latter the watery grave of the viceroy. Thus 
 a woman was made the symbol of hopefulness to bridge 
 over and connect the past bondage with the future redemp- 
 tion! The Greek myth claims that Pandora frivolously 
 opened the fatal box with the fatal locked-in ills ; the ills 
 got out to the ruin of man ; hope alone, at the bottom of the 
 box, remained, thus precluded from solacing man. Thus the 
 Greek myth insinuates woman as disappointing man's 
 hopes. The Ebrew legend makes woman the bearer of 
 solace and hope to man. Here is another contra=?t between 
 woman in Greek myth and Ebrew legend. (^) 
 
 Reader, am I wrong in saying that Homer and Hesiod, 
 Virgil, Edda and Mebelungen, are eclipsed by such simple 
 narratives, and such sweet legends as just mentioned 
 from Pentateuch and Agada ? And wherein lies their charm, 
 their thrill, their superiority ? Simply in their truthfulness ; 
 fact and fiction tave their gold grain of truth; they mirror 
 nature in their crystal waves. Both their conceptions and 
 their feelings are honest and genuine ; they touch us, 
 because they touch a corresponding chord in our bosoms, 
 ever ready to respond to what is really great and noble. 
 
 (1) Jalkutbe-Shalah. 
 
POSITIVE BENEVOLENCE AND POOR LAWS. 199 
 
 POSITIVE BENEVOLENCE AND POOR-LAWS. 
 
 We have discussed, above, many institutions and enact- 
 ments of the Pentateuch, which we may denominate 
 as negative benevolence, laws that remove obstacles 
 in the way of the needy to recuperate and rise in the 
 economic scale. Let us now have a survey of the positive 
 ones. Those by which they shall actively be helped to 
 stand again upon their feet. (V. M. 24, 19-22): "When thou 
 reapest thy harvest and hast forgotten a sheaf, do not go 
 back to fetch it, but leave it to the stranger, the fatherless 
 and the widow." — " When thou beatest down thy olive tree 
 do not go over the boughs again, but leave something for 
 the stranger, fatherless and widow." — " When thou gatherest 
 in thy grapes, do not glean over again, but leave some, etc., 
 etc., that God may bless thee. . . . Remember, a slave 
 and poor thou hast been in Egypt." . . . 
 
 These divers gifts are by the Talmud denominated pick- 
 ings — leavings — margins and gleanings.(^) 
 
 (See Maimonides — Ta^Z—" Gifts to the poor," I. 1, and 
 Pcah. I. 2) : " Remember, thou hast been a bondsman in 
 Egypt; therefore do I command thee." This is the law's 
 constant keynote. Thus the most helpless of mankind are 
 placed under the special protection of the Deity, the king 
 of the biblical State. According to III. M. 19, 9, the 
 products of the margins of the farm belong to the poor, too. 
 In the Release- Year the spontaneous field-growth belonged 
 to the same. (III. M. 25, 6). — Three yearly festivals are 
 instituted, during which the whole nation should, possibly, 
 be at the capital to worship and unite in the same national 
 bond and feel happy.—" But," adds the law, (V. M. 16, 11) 
 " thou shalt rejoice with thy children, thy slave, the Levite, 
 the stranger, the widow and the orphan." Thus the holi- 
 days, too, were benefits for the poor. So was especially 
 
 ■n'hb'W ,nND ,nn3tr ,^rh (i) 
 
200 SPIRIT OP THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the weekly Sabbath. Even in the Ghetto, the darkest days 
 of the Mosaic people, this hospitality to the poor was a 
 standing virtue with them. It was a privilege to take 
 home a poor traveling guest for the Sabbath. — In V. M. 14, 
 28, we read: "At the end of every third year thou shalt 
 collect the tenth of thy field-produce and leave it in thy 
 storehouses, that the poor, the Levite, the Gentile-immi- 
 grant, the orphan and the widow shall eat and get enough — 
 that God may bless thee in all thy handiwork." — In V. M. 
 26, 12, this law is repeated, preceded by another of a 
 similar nature, according to which the firstlings of the 
 produce of the land were consecrated to the national 
 gatherings in the capital, the above-named poor to partici- 
 pate in. According to tradition (Bikkurim III.) the people 
 met in the leading places of the districts, and, accompanied 
 by music and a wreathed ox for sacrifice, they pilgrimed 
 to Jerusalem and the temple mount, each with his pro- 
 visions and his friends. After a solemn temple service and 
 a most touching special prayer, remembering the common 
 lot of troubled mankind, the feeling of national unison 
 and solidarity, they enjoyed the humble feast in the 
 presence of the Deity, extending the conviviality to poor 
 and stranger, etc. The wreathed ox in the procession is 
 remembered in the " Mardi Gras." These festivals are 
 frequently alluded to in S. Scrpt., a beautiful trait inter- 
 twining and fusing religion, nation and mankind, body and 
 soul and their solidarity, as they really are in nature. 
 
 It is not easy to decide whether the lawgiver instituted 
 for such purposes one-tenth of the crop or several tithes, 
 since they are mentioned several times. 
 
 Of course, critics have claimed to find here different 
 hands and divers epochs. The Rabbis try to settle matters 
 in the following way: From all field-produce the Ebrew 
 farmer had to bring two from one hundred to the priests ; 
 next the jirst tenth to the Levites ; next a second tenth to 
 
BIBLICAL TITHES. 201 
 
 be consumed in Jerusalem during tlie holidays (V. M. 14, 23). 
 Of tliis second tithe enery third and sixth year the produce 
 was set apart for the poor, etc. (Maimonides, Tad, Poor- 
 gifts and second Tithes— Talmud Peah. 8, 5) (M.— Nor must 
 we forget that the Sabbath is especially instituted for the 
 poor serving classes, as expressed with special emphasis in 
 the second Decalogue, V. M. 5, 14.— These popular gather- 
 ings in the capital during the holidays Maimonides justly 
 thinks ''to intend keeping alive the feeling of sociability 
 and fraternity." (More Neb. Ill, 39). Moreover, L. Philipson 
 adds : " They were to conform to the mode of the ancients, 
 to unite religion and joy; whilst in modern times, people 
 are given to either the stern earnestness of religion or to 
 unbridled sensuality." — I think, they were intended as an 
 especial bond of nationality and consanguinity, coupled 
 with the desire to interconnect life and religion, as is the 
 case throughout Mosaism. 
 
 Biblical Tithes. 
 
 These tithes were levied upon the produce of the soil, 
 and the flocks of clean and unclean animals. The first-born 
 son, too, had to be redeemed. The firstlings of animals 
 belonged, too, to the Temple. The question now arises: 
 "Were not all these taxes exorbitant, and were they 
 really paid? " Some claim, they were not paid; some, that 
 there was but one and the same tithe, differently applied 
 in divers epochs and circumstances. Yet, according to 
 Tobias I, 7, and to Josephus, (Antiquit. 4, 8 and 8-22), such 
 tithes were actually paid ! Let us not forget that the tribe 
 of Levy had no lands, and hence needed some safe income 
 for subsistence. Again we must remember that these tithes 
 covered the expenses of State, church and school, of temple, 
 priests, Levites, police, etc., representing all of our modern 
 government, divine worship, public instruction and justice ; — 
 
 .-JK' "iK'yo ,jit:'xi "i:ry» ,nDnn (i) 
 
202 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 then it would not seem to be exorbitant. Nor must we 
 forget that these were not taxes, in our sense of the term- 
 They were rather moral duties, ordained by law, the pay- 
 ment of which was left to individual good-will and con- 
 science. The Levites were always classed with the poor, 
 the widow, the stranger and the orphan ; that proves suffici- 
 ently that the Levites and many of the priests were not 
 overpaid for their spiritual services. Judging from differ- 
 ent hints in MisJina and Gemara, we feel justified in think- 
 ing that the farmers were believed not to be overscrupulous 
 in the payment of tithes. They were often termed " ignor- 
 amus," '^ idiot,'" and naturally presumed as ^^ unclean 
 hoors." (^) 
 
 Biblical Charity — Unsectarian. 
 
 In the above-mentioned verses we find the classic sources 
 of the so-called "Jewish charities," the "Christian chari- 
 ties," the "Moslem charities," etc.; all these are but the 
 developments of the Mosaic teachings on benevolence and 
 universal solidarity. The Eabbinical law, the New Testa- 
 ment, the Koran, are but expounding and applying those 
 principles to actual circumstances. When, in later times, 
 the Jews had become less an agricultural and more an 
 industrial and commercial people, especially those out of 
 Judffia, money was raised for charitable purposes called 
 Quppa, charity-box, wherewith it was prescribed to assist 
 Ebrew and Gentile poor indiscriminately; in conformity 
 with the biblical prescriptions, where the Gentile stranger 
 or immigrant was recommended, side by side with the 
 native poor, the Levite, the orphan, the widow, etc. 
 
 Thus does the Bible provide for the less-favored of for- 
 tune, not by begging and modern pauper-rates, but by right 
 of sympathy, human solidarity or national community of 
 interests; to such an extent that it became an Ebrew saying : 
 
 • SOD /NDi ,t2V"in ,pxn nv (i) 
 
RABBINICAL CHAEITY AND NEAV TESTAMENT. 203 
 
 (Prov. 14, 31) : " Who wrongs the poor, blasphemes his 
 Maker ; and who befriends him, worships God ; " identical 
 with our English expression : " Worship to God is love to 
 man." 
 
 Rabbinical Charity and New Testament. 
 
 In Talmud Shekallm, V. 6, we read that the ancient tem- 
 ple had a room called " room of the silent " (^), where those 
 needy persons were remembered that refused public chari- 
 ties. Here we have the parallel of the New Testament say- 
 ing : " In giving alms, let your left hand not know what the 
 right one is doing." — Our modern charities must be stimu- 
 lated, if not provoked, by the public press. Closely seen, 
 certain people become philanthropists solely as a paying 
 means of advertisement. Many things are undertaken osten- 
 sibly for the public interest, really for self-glorification. 
 Let it pass, if the public at least profits by it. The New 
 Testament is especially severe on ostentatious alms-giving, 
 denying it any merit whatever. It closely follows its prede- 
 cessors. The prototype of such views on the delicacy of 
 charity is found exactly so in Talmud Chagiga, 5a:" Better 
 no charity than for ostentation's sake. " 
 
 In Mishna Tanith 4, 5, we read of peculiar and unique 
 festive days (the 15th Ab and 10th Tishri), instituted for 
 matchmaking, called the " pretty ones," when the maidens 
 took the initiative in courting the youths. " All of them 
 alike were dressed in white, plainly and humbly, in order 
 not to shame the poor girls, and let each of them have their 
 good chances." (^) Here is the origin of our leap-year free 
 courtship and sociable, at least as to the privilege of feminine 
 initiative. As to the magnanimity of dressing plainly in 
 order not to shame the humbler rivals, I know of no 
 instance in modern times. Competition now-a-days seems 
 to be of a hardier stuff, even among the gentler sex. 
 
 .D'N::'n n2::6 (i) 
 
 .y'r]''^^ 3X3 V'tD3 ^X-1L"'!5 D''31t3 D"©' Vn N^ (3) 
 
204 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 Here is another sweet emanatioii from tLe biblical soli- 
 darity and charity laws :— (Peali, I., 1). The following 
 have no limits (^) : " The gifts to the poor of the corner 
 growth of the field; of the firstlings of the fruit; of festiv- 
 ities during the national gatherings in Jerusalem ; free 
 benevolence and study or learning." — To the question 
 whether wordly or Greek learning, too, is included, the 
 answers and opinions are varied, according to the school 
 and the epochs of the expounders. 
 
 Thus we read in Talmud, Menachoth, 99 & : " Ben 
 Doma, nephew of R. Ismael, inquired of the latter: 'I, 
 who have learned the entire law, can I study the Greek 
 science ? ' The uncle quoted thereat the verse : ' This 
 law-book shall not be removed from thy mouth, and thou 
 Shalt ponder thereover day and night.' Now go and look 
 out for an hour that is neither day or night, and learn the 
 Greek science." Again in other places it is mentioned 
 eulogistically of Rabbis, strong in Greek and in science. So 
 it is claimed that every member of the great Sanhedrin 
 had to know many languages, as the examination of crimi- 
 nals had to be held without an interpreter. Liberality 
 produced liberality, and intolerance intolerance, with Jew 
 and Gentile. 
 
 The same Mishna continues : " These (^) are the things 
 whose fruit a man enjoys in this world, whilst the principal 
 remains for the hereafter, viz: Filial respect to parents; 
 benefactions to the needy ; peacemaking ; whilst learning 
 outweighs them all." — It is interesting to remark the high 
 esteem in which the Rabbis held learning. Their education 
 began with morality and closed with mentality. They based 
 the latter upon the former. Mentality without morality 
 they likened to "a large tree with huge, wide-spreading 
 
 • min mo^ni onon n^'OJi irt^nm nma^m r]iiE:ir[ (i) 
 
RABBINICAL CHARITY AND NEW TESTAMENT. 205 
 
 branches rising to the sky, — but with slender roots ; such a 
 tree tumbles down at the least storm." — The Rabbinical 
 moralists enjoin on all public occasions benefactions to the 
 poor, as in dangers and sickness, at funerals, births, wed- 
 dings, etc. 
 
 And whilst they so much and so often enjoin to give, 
 they at the same time enjoin the needy to refuse public 
 assistance as long as possible. Only actual starvation 
 allows that; only in extreme cases alms were acceptable. 
 Here are some Talmudical proverbs to that effect : " Skin 
 a carcass in the street, but ask for no alms.^f ) — " Who- 
 soever neglects teaching his son a trade is as much 
 guilty as if he had raised him for robbery."f) R. Simon 
 says : " It is written, ' Choose life.' " (Deuteronomy, 30). — 
 That means a trade. — '* Work honors the workman." (^j — 
 " Cherish work and hate assumed gentility." (*) " Make 
 thy Sabbath a week-day and apply to nobody for help." — 
 " Upon three things stands the world : upon instruction, 
 work — others, prayer — and benevolence." — (Aboth, I). — 
 Another version thereof is : " Upon truth, justice and peace 
 stands the world." Many other passages there enumerate 
 the leading human virtues : For the mass of the people they 
 extol practical work as the highest of virtues. For the 
 professional scholar learning is the highest. Many Rabbis 
 combined learning with a humble trade.(^j '* A scholarly 
 bastard is above an ignorant high priest," is a significant 
 Rabbinical proverb. — All these teachings are staunch sup- 
 poirters of work, menial and mental. " For six days shalt thou 
 work," was just as sacred a commandment as the Sabbath- 
 rest. They stand up for property, for mine and thine. 
 They were no communists. They recognized the knight- 
 hood of both labor and knowledge. They aspired to both 
 whenever possible. Says a teacher in the same Ahoth : 
 
 (1) Pesachim, nSti. (li) Kidushin, 39 a. (3) Nedarim, 49 b. (4) Aboth I, 9. 
 (5) Aboth II, 2. 
 
206 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 " That is tlie way of study." — " Eat bread with salt; drink 
 water in moderate quantities ; sleep on the bare floor and 
 go on studying." — " Well goes learning with work. The 
 first alone will not thrive." — " No meal, no learning.''^ — 
 " There are in the world three crowns : that of learning, of 
 priesthood and of royalty ; yet a good name is the highest." 
 Others say : " Learning is the best." — " Seek for no other 
 honors than learning.": — " Seek not for prince's favors, since 
 thy table is more honorable than theirs and thy crown is 
 above theirs," etc. 
 
 The Rabbis understood well the delicacy of charity. So 
 Toreh Deah (Charity, 249,) says : "■ We must give charity 
 with a friendly, smiling face, sympathetically conversing 
 with the poor one and encouraging him. If you have not to 
 give him, do not speak harshly, but rather by kind words, 
 show him, anyhow, your good-will. — There are several 
 grades of charity, each one higher than the other : 
 First encourage a man who is impoverished, by a loan, a 
 partnership, etc.; i. e., offer no degrading alms. Next give 
 charity without letting the poor one know who gave it to 
 him. Next give without waiting for being asked. Above 
 all, do not speak and boast of the charity bestowed." — 
 IMdem, the poor scholar is especially recommended. 
 His work, his goods, etc., shall first be considered by buyer 
 or employer. 
 
 We read in Hagigah (5 a) a Rabbinical discussion con- 
 cerning sins deriving from simple, indelicate, indiscreet 
 dealings. As such are quoted, persons that " give alms -in 
 public," for '' better is not to give, than give and shame 
 the poor ;" or to "give alms to a poor woman secretly, on 
 account of the evil tongues." In Kethuboth, 67 a and 5, we 
 read : "A male and female orphan in need, the female 
 comes first to be assisted. When such are to be married 
 she is first in order; he shall wait." — We are bid to assist the 
 poor, not to enrich them. Yet it is told of Hillel I. that 
 
TALMUDICAL CHARITY METHODS. 207 
 
 he gave to sucL an effeminate one even a horse and a slave. 
 When the poor refuses alms, a loan shall be given him. — 
 A Rabbi used to give, incognito^ a small alms daily ; once 
 upon a time the poor detected him ; the Rabbi ran away, 
 hurting himself on the occasion — "/"or 'better is to run into 
 a fiery furnace than shame a fellow-manr 
 
 Talmudical Charity Methods. 
 
 There is no denying that the Talmud once started in 
 assuming that the biblical word ^^Guer" in connection with 
 gifts to the poor, originally denoting immigrant, foreigner, 
 meant only the "Guer Zedek,''^ a proselyte, a Gentile having 
 adopted the full Judsean faith, trying to deduce this from a 
 verbal analogy. Yet their solid sense for truth, propriety and 
 morality made the Rabbis soon abandon that position, and 
 declare that " the heathen poor are not to be deprived of 
 those gifts, for the sake of humanity " (darkai Shalom.) 
 There is not, etymologically, a shadow of doubt that the 
 biblical, original sense of Guer is a non-Israelite, an immi- 
 grant stranger, the distinction between " Guer Zedek " and 
 " Guer ShaarP or '■'■Thoshal) " being of later date (Maimon- 
 ides Yad — Poor-gifts I, 9.) 
 
 Beautiful, indeed, are these teachings. (Ibid. VII) : "It 
 is a positive commandment to be charitable to the poor as 
 much as we can. Whosoever closes his eyes to the destitute, 
 transgresses the law. — We must give according to their 
 needs and habits — clothing, dwelling — a wife, too." — Mal- 
 thus' misgivings concerning '^ o'ver-population^^ never dis- 
 turbed the minds of those teachers, whose maxim was, 
 " W7to gives life, will give hread.^' 
 
 " If the poor was bred up with the habits of a riding- 
 horse and a servant attending on him, he must be provided 
 with them." — A Rabbinical hyperbolical anecdote narrates 
 that Hillel I. having provided such a fastidious poor with 
 a horse, and not being able to give him a servant, put 
 
208 SPIEIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 himself at Ms disposal as such. — '' A fifth part of one's 
 income should be spent in charities. Heathen poor shall 
 be fed and clothed together with Jewish poor, for the sake of 
 humanity. Sensitive poor refusing charity, shall be assisted 
 in some other honorable manner. The city authorities are 
 entitled to compel every one to contribute to the public char- 
 ities. The redemption of captives is a special and privileged 
 duty. Woman has the privilege over man concerning food, 
 clothing, marriage and ransom from captivity. The scholar 
 has the privilege before all. A learned bastard comes 
 before an ignorant high priest." — Ibid. VIII. 
 
 Maimonides, following the Rabbis, continues : " Every 
 Jewish community is bound to appoint a charity-board, who 
 shall make collections of money, eatables^ etc., and distribute 
 them among the poor, the money-distribution was called 
 ^Quppa,'' and that of eatables : 'Tlmchui.^ " Never have we 
 seen or heard of a Ebrew community not having such an 
 arrangement. Especially on fast-days such distributions 
 should be made ; a fast-day without charity is hypocrisy, 
 is almost homicide. The collections and distributions are 
 carefully to be done, to prevent fraud by the busy-bodies, 
 etc. (Ibid. X) : " More than any other commandment must 
 we practice active charity, charity being the criterion of 
 the seed of Abraham. The import of Israel and his faith 
 aro established solely by acts of benevolence. Always is 
 benevolence bringing blessings, for wJiosoever Loves, is loved, 
 whilst who is hard-hearted, is of doubtful blood and origin. 
 God is love. The sages gave without being known; they 
 first gave and then prayed. Whosoever spends to the poor 
 with an unfriendly mien, even a thousand gold-pieces, has 
 forfeited all his merit. We must give with a kindly, smil- 
 ing, beaming countenance, showing compassion and true 
 sympathy by word and deed, with the object of our charity; 
 if you have nothing to give, give kind words, anyhow ; be 
 not harsh to him who is heart-broken. Woe to him who 
 
HERBERT SPENCER ON PUBLIC ALMSGIVING. 209 
 
 shames the poor! — There are different grades of charity. 
 The usual, dry, cold almsgiving is the very lowest. The 
 highest is to procure employment, give encouragment, 
 utilize the sinking man's capacities in a inarmer as to render 
 him above anybody's charities." — ^Here is an outline of the 
 Talmudical charity teachings, emanations from the biblical 
 ones, models for all civilized nations, finding their echo in 
 New Testament and Koran. The New Testament reader, 
 especially will now see whence derive those fine pithy, 
 pointed, sharp sayings of Jesus about true and false charity, 
 about hypocrisy and genuine goodness; they come from 
 a disciple of Hillel's school. That treatise concludes 
 (Ibid. X, 18) "Ever shall a man toil and bear everything, 
 and not throw himself upon people's charities." — '• Make thy 
 Sabbath a week-day, and apply to nobody for assistance." 
 "If even a distinguished man, nevertheless, rather skin a 
 carcass in the street, and say not : I am a nobleman and 
 can't work. Some of the great sages actually did cliop 
 wood, draw water, work as smiths, etc., and never asked 
 for charity." 
 
 Herbert Spencer on Public Almsgiving. 
 
 In modern times economists and scientists have decid- 
 edly pronounced themselves against indiscriminate public 
 charity. From Adam Smith to Herbert Spencer and Jolin 
 Stuart Mill, they have declared poor-laws and poor-rates, 
 etc., as inadequate, futile and even hurtful. Herbert Spen- 
 cer especially, (^) is pretty near condemning it as misguided 
 and cheap philanthropy. With pointed arguments he ques- 
 tions the feasibility and the right of the government to 
 interfere in such a way on behalf of the poor. The gov- 
 ernment's oflS^ce is, he says, " To protect the citizen in the 
 exercise of his rights, to shield him against wrong, not to 
 confer boons upon him at the cost of a fellow-citizen." 
 
 (1). Social statics on "poor-laws" and elsewhere. 
 14 
 
210 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 He shows that, looking at the bottom of things, the poor 
 ha^ been wronged somewhere in his struggle for existence ; 
 that society has somehow ostracised him and robbed him 
 of his chances ; that the government ought there to step in 
 and protect him and open him the avenues of subsistence, 
 not to make him a pauper, not to give him poor-rates and 
 petty endowments, which may, at best, save him from 
 starvation, but chain him down to the galley-bench of the 
 .proletariat. He shows, for instance, that the appropriation 
 of the soil by a minority to the exclusion of all rests upon 
 a very doubtful title. With Karl Marx and others, he 
 points to the fact " that property in lands originally rests 
 upon violence, cunning, fraud, force and prerogative; that 
 its title-deeds are written by the sword, with blood, and 
 paid with blows." 
 
 He claims *' that such title-deeds can never confer legiti- 
 mate ownership, however many hands have changed and 
 however much time has elapsed since." . . . "There is 
 the source of wrong, and many more social wrongs may 
 have been committed against the poor in the struggle for 
 existence. Here is the place for the government to inter- 
 fere, and to see that one person should not accapparate all, 
 and ten to live on sufferance." So poor-laws and rates are 
 now almost universally condemned as a burden to the tax- 
 payers, and useless, yea, ' dangerous, to the beneficiaries. 
 That criticism refers especially to alms-giving and indiscrim- 
 inate charities, as practiced whilom at the doors of abbeys 
 and mosques and old-time synagogues. Again, such indis- 
 criminate alms-giving, considered from another standpoint, 
 is the outcome of heedless philanthropists, and doubtful 
 pietists; for such poor-laws rather breed than diminish pau- 
 perism. They are a heavy burden upon, and an unjust taxation 
 of, the honest worker, a premium for laziness, vice and 
 improvidence. They take away the well-earned comforts 
 of the first and bestow them upon the latter, as if to foster 
 
liERBERT SPENCER OX PUBLIC ALMSGIVIXG. 211 
 
 and indulge them. They often rob the producing honest to 
 feed the dishonest drones ; being thus an actual premium 
 for laziness and vice, they propagate and breed vicious 
 drones and criminals, and stint the growth of honest, labor- 
 ing families. . . . How, then, treat that class of people ? 
 The answer to that is : " Well, do not actually drown them, 
 but do for them as little as possible; do not let them 
 starve, but, anyhow, keep them from breeding. For pauper- 
 ism is hereditary, just as any other vice is." — This is Herbert 
 Spencer's idea concerning governmental and public charity; 
 and that of most of modern, economic thinkers. Indeed, who 
 is not aware of the many abuses and drawbacks of many 
 charity institutions ! How often are not the most heartless 
 and worthless hypocrites at their head, as if to cover their 
 own ill-gotten wealth by the veil of public sympathy ! I 
 know many men and women, thrilling with true philan- 
 thropy, occupied with public benevolence. But I know, 
 too, others, wolves in sheep-skins, using it as hypocrisy's 
 cloak. 
 
 But we must not "turn out the baby with the bath." We 
 must not confound and condemn the two sorts of persons, 
 nor the two kinds of charities, nor -pyit pretense alongside 
 of genuine goodness. Hypocrisy is a parasite, fastening 
 itself just upon the noblest and holiest. Indeed, what 
 sacred things have not been desecrated and profaned by 
 such Tartiiffes\ Even so the English poor-laws may be 
 laws poor indeed, and Herbert Spencer may be right in liis 
 strictures upon them. No doubt indiscriminate alms-giving, 
 as practiced in the Middle Ages at the abbeys and churches, 
 or in the Orient in mosque and synagogue, or even to-day 
 in certain quarters, may be an abuse — may rather foster 
 pauperism and vice than diminish it, an opportunity for 
 pretense, rather than philanthropy. 
 
 But there is, too, another kind of benevolence, a benevo- 
 lence which is but justice masked. Let us look to that 
 other kind and its criteria. 
 
212 spirit of the biblical legislation. 
 
 Mosaic Solidarity. 
 
 The benevolent and solidary laws of Mosaism are of that 
 kind. They are not degrading ; they are not begging oppor- 
 tunities ; not easy alms-giving and alms-taking, requiring 
 no effort from the rich, and from the poor none except 
 cringing or showing a contrived, " crooked arm," or a stolen 
 " shivering baby." Those laws were simply reservations of 
 the State, held in store for the less endowed. As we have 
 in modern times ^'commons," or large lawns, grounds, tracts 
 of land and parks, belonging to all the citizens, as common 
 property, which the State reserves for and utilizes on extra 
 occasions, even so did the Pentateuch make its reservations. 
 The Sabbath-rest, the seven yearly festivals, the Year of 
 Release and Jubilee-restitution, the corners of the field, the 
 forgotten sheaf, the gleanings, the firstlings, the tithes, the 
 holiday-gifts, etc., were such reservations for the poor, the 
 scholar, the stranger, the widow, the orphan, etc. They 
 were reserved in right, not as an alms, not degrading the 
 needy, but uplifting them, giving them a backing in extreme 
 cases, placing them under the especial protection of God, 
 the king and proprietor of the State, not depriving them 
 of any of the rights of men or of citizens, leaving them all 
 the chances and room to recuperate and reconquer an 
 economical independence. Whilst the English poor-laws, 
 poor-rates, poor-rents, poor-workhouses, poor-gifts, etc., used 
 to give the destitute but a poor resource — a dog-kennel, with 
 a bone and a rag, bedding them upon vice and filth and con- 
 tempt, beyond the means of resurrection, considering them 
 as pariahs, lepers and outcasts, the Bible treats them as 
 "brothers " in momentary difficulties and reserves for them 
 rights and sympathies, not alms and contempt. Why this? 
 Because the political and social fabric of the Bible is based, 
 not upon property, or conquest, or birth, but upon solidarity; 
 upon liberty, equality, equal economic chances and com- 
 
MOSAIC SOLIDARITY. 
 
 213 
 
 munity of interests; because of the principle of one 
 humanity, " children of one God." Q) 
 
 Indeed, never was a lawgiver so free in his legal promul- 
 gations as the Mosaic one. He led his people out of Egypt 
 under the guidance of God, all alike, unf ree and poor ; he 
 gave them a country, conquered by God, the sole king of . 
 the State. 
 
 He portioned out among them that territory, dividing it 
 into equal shares, and declared them all free and equal; he 
 did that upon his own terms, emanating from a superior 
 source. " Mine are the Israelites, my servants, redeemed 
 from Egypt." " Mine is the land, ye shall not sell it for- 
 ever." Person and soil were thus declared inalienably free. 
 This being the case, he could prescribe the one God-worship, 
 the Sabbath-rest, the Septennate and Jubilee, the Release 
 from debts, the leaving of parts of the crops, of the flocks, 
 the tithes, etc., to the Levites, the poor, the stranger, the 
 widow and orphan. Never was a lawgiver so untrammeled 
 and original ; not Mann, Lycurgus or Solon, Buddha, Zoro- 
 aster or Rome's Decemviri and their Twelve Tables; nor any 
 of the modern leaders.— Hence the originality, the impar- 
 tiality, the universal justice of the Bible legislation. Nor 
 was there any injustice resulting therefrom, not even in the 
 course of long centuries of Judaean occupation; no injustice 
 to the occupants, nor degradation to the beneficiaries, for 
 these benefactions were from the start granted as rights, 
 not as gifts and alms. For the thrifty, the intelligent 
 and lucky always profit by the stupid, the lazy and the 
 wasteful ones; they get their own share and moreover, 
 that of the luckless ones. Hence it is but fair to let them 
 give a pittance of their own superfluity, arising out of the 
 missed share of the luckless. It is a kind of "ransom to 
 the poor," as Mr. Cliamberlain says. Or better as the Bible 
 puts it, ''that thy hrotJier shall live with thee;'" an admir- 
 
 .Q3'n^X ni.T^ DHN D'J3 (1) 
 
214 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 able phrase, seldom met with in modern poor-laws. Thus, 
 the Bible considers them, and the New Testament, with 
 a special, thrilling sympathy and warmth, as brothers and 
 fellow-citizens, and does all it can to rescue them from 
 pauperism, and help them to a competency. All in all, the 
 Mosaic poor benefactions, State-school — and temple — con- 
 tributions may have amounted to some twenty per cent, of 
 the national produce; a pretty fair share it was. But the 
 ancients wasted less in silks and in cards, and in wines and 
 cigars ; hence they bore it patiently. 
 
 Eetrospect on State Charity. 
 
 We started from the proposition that the Biblical State 
 and Society are built upon four cardinal principles : Personal 
 liberty, social equality, equal distribution of the national 
 wealth, and, lastly, solidarity or community of interests; 
 hence mutual assistance as a right, not an ideal. As a 
 branch of this last-named, we considered the Mosaic laws 
 on benevolence. We have compared them with the English 
 poor-laws, the most elaborate of Europe, beginning with 
 Elizabeth, in 1563, and developing steadily and continually 
 to this very present. We have seen the scathing criticism 
 of Herbert Spencer, Huxley, etc., upon these latter, claiming 
 that they are rather means for propagating pauperism than 
 alleviating it ; that England has probably the largest and 
 most helpless pauper-class in the world — nearly a million 
 of English-born subjects — and that emigration is their only 
 means of escape ; that in spite of poor-rights and poor-rates, 
 and colonies and work-houses and endowments, etc., they 
 are kept down and riveted to pauperism, as with an iron 
 grip, by social ostracism, disfranchisement and contempt — 
 kept from starvation for eternal degradation. Quite other- 
 wise the Bible. It begins with the ideal of " Ye shall be 
 unto Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation," i. e., all 
 alike and of the same caste — all educated; no mob. "To 
 
RETROSPECT ON STATE CHARITY. 215 
 
 Me is Israel subject." — "To Me is the soil subject." God 
 alone is King; all persons are free, equal, obeying the 
 same laws and enjoying the same rights. The soil is equally 
 divided out, and inalienable. There is but little of high 
 industry, little of high internal commerce ; all subsist upon 
 the produce of the original family-lot. Hence, equal distri- 
 bution of the national wealth. No proletarians, no paupers 
 and no nobles. The poor are protected, encouraged, helped 
 up to rise again. Can we detect in that system any kind 
 of communism? No. It consecrates property, work and 
 profit, individuality, emulation and effort. It rewards the 
 virtues and talents, and punishes vice, laziness and improvi- 
 dence. Thus, the Bible contains the best of scientific 
 socialism. The State superintends, directs and prescribes 
 all — "God is King;" laws govern; the State originally 
 owned all ; to that reverts all. The citizen is but the free- 
 holder — the tenant of the soil. Every seventh year, and 
 especially the fiftieth, there is a readjustment of persons 
 and property ; a return to the original conditions ; universal 
 equality in rights, duties and wealth. The law intentionally 
 discourages internal high commerce and external, unjust 
 wars. It is moderating and curbing cruel competition ; it 
 tries to keep every citizen on a par with his neighbor. 
 Thus it establishes the solidarity principle, or community 
 of interests. For him crushed in the battle of existence, 
 it provides, first, by negative protection. He cannot be 
 enslaved; his acre can't be alienated; he can't be crushed 
 by debts ; nor by usury ; nor his bread endeared by rings 
 or monopoly; nor can he be ground down by overwork; 
 nor mutilated ; nor harshly treated. He is in every respect 
 a citizen, with special care protected by the State; he is 
 " a brother.'' " Let thy brother live with thee," is a leading 
 maxim. — Next comes a group of laws of positive benevo- 
 lence, of active assistance in his behalf, as loans, portions 
 from harvest and flocks, exemption laws, punctual payment 
 
'-^16 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 of wai§fes, Sabbath and holiday boons, tithes and g-if ts on all 
 'solejnn occasions. — Withal, he has not lost caste, he is not 
 disfranchised, not dishonored; all avenues are open to him> 
 to rise again and become an independent member of society. 
 Thus whilst the ancient State generally consisted of 
 rulers, ruled and slaves ; the Mediaeval State of rulers, ruled 
 and serfs or conquered; the modern one of wealthy, well- 
 to-do, proletarians and paupers; the Biblical Society was 
 unique in having but one class, but one mass of citizens, all 
 alike by law and fact, legally, socially and economically 
 equal ; no aristocrats, no plebeians, no proletarians and no 
 paupers. As to the accidentally impoverished individuals, 
 the law looked intently to it that they should not become a 
 pauper class ; by provisions, nei^ative and positive, which 
 gave them all the necessary means and deprived them of 
 no means to rise again and become self-sustaining, inde- 
 pendent individuals, just as the rest of their fellow- 
 citizens. Thus the Biblical State put forward a scheme, 
 which granted to each and all of its members all their 
 natural chances in the struggle for existence; granting no 
 privileges to some and allowing no drawbacks to others. 
 This the Biblical State did, without recurring to any of the 
 far-fetched, unnatural, yea, impossible means of ancient 
 Sparta or of modern communism. It consecrated family, 
 inheritance, property, individual effort and emolument; 
 generous emulation, thrift, economy, etc. Yet it chained 
 down fierce and soulless competition, and left full scope for 
 altruism by constantly appealing to man's moral sense. 
 " That thy 'brother may live with tliee'^ including all races, 
 creeds and tongues in the term " thy brother. ^^ 
 
 Divine Legislation. 
 
 These are the Mosaic solidarity laws, so vastly different 
 from modern poor-laws; they are elevating and human- 
 izing ; not pauperizing and degrading ; calculated for the 
 
CHURCH AND STATE. 217 
 
 class.es and masses, impartial to strong or weak — to all. 
 And this universally is the grand criterion, the touch-stone 
 of a truly divine legislation ; a legislation made to create a 
 great nation, and through that nation to spiritualize and 
 ennoble mankind. This democracy and this sanctification of 
 the law is the real and secret principle which makes out 
 the strength of the Bible and renders it invulnerable to the 
 tooth of time, the havoc of conquerors and the prejudice of 
 the vulgar. The Bible system is a theocracy, but in the 
 noblest sense of the term. It never became a hierarchy. 
 Priestcraft was always put down. State and Church there 
 are one. So they are in nature; so they are in body 
 and soul ; for good use, not abuse. Egypt and India, too, 
 were theocracies, but hierarchies, and full of abuse. The 
 Mosaic form, surely, is calculated for a certain epoch and 
 people, in a special land under given cin'umstances. But 
 the spirit of Mosaism is universal and boundless ; no clouds 
 of sect, race or countrj^ obscure its vision. It is for all 
 times and circumstances, and hence divine. It is calculated 
 to slowly gain over mankind and make all man one large 
 'brotherhood. Israel is intended there as mankind in minia- 
 ture, and mankind considered as Israel in extenso. 
 
 Church and State. 
 
 Chur<5h and State are simply identical in the Bible. So 
 they are in nature. In our text-books and in their practical 
 administration they are divided, but in fact, they are one ; 
 one thing looked upon from different standpoints, as the 
 one ray of the sunlight, broken by the prisma inti^ many 
 colors. Both aim at right living. What we believe, we 
 must realize, or our faith is hypocrisy. The creed is the 
 theory, life is the practice, the necessary outcome of the 
 first, just as the fruit is of the root. If not, there is pre- 
 tense and sham. Hence, the indissoluble interfusion of 
 Church and State in that system. In our times, where 
 
218 
 
 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 often Cliurcli means dogma and ceremony, mostly artifi- 
 cially taken up from tradition, whilst there are many such 
 Churches and various dogmas, ceremonies and traditions, 
 which but little influence actual life, we feel their burden 
 and try to lighten it by clamoring for separation of Church 
 and State, to avoid spiritual or political despotism. Not so 
 at the formation of religions; life and principle there are 
 intertwined ; they belong to each other, and as little 
 separable as body from soul. They are simply the two 
 poles of the same being. This is the Mosaic theocracy. 
 God rules, and His just laws are the rules of the State 
 government. The human rulers were but the spokesmen. 
 The Mosaic, or Abrahamic, religion was originally most 
 simple and rational. God, the creator of all, was sole and 
 absolute authority. To Him alone belonged worship. Wor- 
 ship was : actual, virtuous, humane life ; the realization of 
 the commandments of justice tempered by charity. 
 
 Sacrificial Seevcce and Ceremonies. 
 
 Slowly the temple-worship was elaborated, supplemented 
 and adjusted from materials extant and believed in by the 
 generality of mankind. But they were closely examined, 
 sifted, selected and adapted from what would the least con- 
 flict with the original Jaliveh worship. The masses could 
 not and cannot grasp abstract ideas and principles. The 
 Jahveh religion was too sublime for them. Hence, were 
 added thereto necessary and adequate forms and observ- 
 ances. Slowly many more forms accrued, mostly from the 
 general stock extant at those times, and consecrated by 
 venerable ages past ; forms to keep alive the sense of his- 
 tory and nationality; as the holidays, the gatherings in 
 the capital, etc., or to nurture the sense of nationality and 
 country, as the one capital and the unique temple ; or the 
 sense of solidarity and community of interests ; as the 
 tithes, poor-gifts and national banquets, etc.; or to give an 
 
homer's gods. 219 
 
 external expression to the recognition of our sinfulness, of 
 duty, of obedience to God and his laws; as sacrifices, the 
 universal mode of worship in ancient times ; that mode — 
 sacrifices — came down, no doubt, from pre-historic, barbar- 
 ous times, when God was but the ancestral ghost or an 
 idealized fetich. But that crude notion had been obliterated 
 and more refined ideas evolved, not only with the Jews, but 
 even with the Egyptian and the Asiatic priesthoods, at 
 least in their select mysteries, where the Deity was nearly 
 as nobly thought of and taught as in the Bible. 
 
 Homer's Gods. 
 
 The sacrificial service, the least congenial, of all modes 
 of worship, to the modern mind, was then not so repugnant. 
 In the Bible it was so refined and purified as to represent the 
 idea of expiation, or the eradication of sin, discarding the 
 notion that the Deity were dependent on man for food, 
 drink, smell, etc. Compare, for instance, the Homeric and 
 the biblic systems concerning the sacrificial service, both 
 composed at about the same time, — and you will find an 
 immense advance in the latter. In Hesiod and Homer the 
 gods are really in need of food, drink and luxuries ; likewise 
 they need habitation, sleep, sport and eulogies. Man offers 
 them their wants, under the express condition that they 
 should grant him favors, protection, victory; not even 
 shrinking from asking miracles of them. The gods, besides, 
 are above all the rules of either reason or morality. Even 
 the great Zeus himself, sometimes described nearly as 
 sublimely as Jahveh, often acts as a paltry tyrant, being 
 moved in different directions, as a puppet by strings, or by 
 small motives and personalities, like a petty potentate is 
 by his favorites. Here are a few examples about the needs 
 and greeds of the gods. 
 
 We read in Homer's Odyssey, I, 59 and 66, about 
 Athene praying to Zeus in favor of Odysseus being 
 
220 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 allowed to reach his home, concluding with : (^) " DoevS not 
 thy heart thrill with sympathy, Olympian? Did not 
 Odysseus serve thee well and bring thee sacrifices in the 
 Greek ships, in the vast land of the Trojans? Why, then, 
 art thou so wroth with him, Zeus?" To which Zeus repliesj 
 affirming that he would never forget Odysseus. . . . 
 "Who did bring most of offerings to the gods?"('^) So 
 again (IV. 351): "The goda desire 'hecatombs.''' Ibidem, 
 IV. 473, the same is claimed for services rendered. (^) So, 
 again we read (Odyssey, VII. 201) : (") — " On many occasions 
 the gods appear to us bodily as soon as we offer fine 
 hecatombs ; they dine with us, sitting down where we, too, 
 are sitting. When one of us, travelling alone, meets with 
 them on his journey, they do not hide themselves, since we 
 are their kindred, just as the cyclops and the wild gener- 
 ations of the giants." In Odyssey, VIII, 266, we are treated 
 to a scandalous story among the gods, as never reporter of a 
 sensational daily could offer better to his scandal-thirsty 
 readers, viz : " The love of Ares and the beautiful 
 Aphrodite, when they first met secretly in the house of 
 Hephaistos. . . . Many presents he had given her, etc., 
 
 (1). .... (yi)Se vv ao! nep 
 
 ivTpi-erai (ptXov rjrop, 'OAvfj.TriE. ov vv r' '0<hi<raevg 
 
 'Apyeluv Trapa vijval j^api^ero iepa pei^cjv 
 
 T/OOtf/ £V eupeiy ; ri vv ol t6cov co6vaao, Zev ;" — Odyss. I, 59. 
 (3). TTw^- av ekeit' 'Odwcr^of iyo) ■&ei.om 'Aa-&oifi7jv, 
 
 Of ... . TTept 6' ipd ■&eolaii' 
 
 a\'iav(iT(naiv eJw/ce," . . . . — Odyss. I, 66. 
 (3). aXka fiaTC u^eXkeq ^ii r' aXT^Miniv re -^Eolaiv 
 
 pi'^ag tEpa Ka?' .... d(ppa -ax'tara 
 
 a^ kg narpid' iKoin . . . ." — Odyss. IV, 478. 
 (4.) a'tEi yap to izdpog ye t!^£0< (paivovrai. evapyeig 
 
 I'lfilv, siir' Ep6u[iEv ayaKkeLTag EKaTdfi^ag, 
 
 (Wivm>rai te irap' afi/xi Ka'&fjfievoi i/x^a tvep >)iielc. 
 
 £1 rf' apa Tig /cat irovvog litv ^hjx^TiJjTaL odiTi/g, 
 
 ohrc KaTaKpuTTTovaiv, ekec aij)Laiv kyyh'&Ev Eifiev, 
 
 iooKEp 'K.'vuXonkg te kuI aypia <pv?a Tiyavrui'.*^ — Odyss. VII, 301. 
 
homer's (40DS. 221 
 
 etc. How, then, her jiery, lame husband caught them 
 together, in a trap, having given out that he was leaving 
 on a journey. . . . His own wrath and the immense 
 laughter of the gods finding the lovers entrapped. That is 
 most comical — but speaks very badly of the ideas of the 
 Hellens about their Deity and of their own loose morals and 
 models. (^) Of similar sensualities of the gods is narrated 
 there, XL 240.— Whilst in Odyssey XII, 383, Apollo brings 
 complaint to Zeus about Odysseus' friends having killed his 
 oxen, threatening that: "If they would not give him an 
 equitable indemnity ]ie might go down to Hades and spend 
 his light to the dead.'' (^) — An exceedingly puerile threat 
 from a first-class god. 
 
 Again, there we find the loud disputes of Zeus, Here> 
 Aphrodite, Athene, etc., concerning Troy. Everywhere it 
 appears that the vagaries of the Greeks about mundane 
 government were brought home to the gods. — Nowhere 
 do we find there that sublime conception of the Bible 
 regarding the Deity, the holy God, who "takes no 
 bribes and favors no persons, needs no sacrifices, dwells 
 in the sublime heights and looks down into the hearts 
 of the meek and the contrite, pleading for the widow 
 and orphans, giving bread and raiment to the stranger," 
 etc. The utterances of Homer and Hesiod respecting 
 the gods show that Max Muller's views about mythology 
 
 (1). Ai'Tap 6 fopfti^uv ave^dTJ^ETO kuTmv aeUhiv 
 
 afj.il)' 'Apeog (pMrr/Tog kvaret^avov r' 'A(j)po^lTT/g, 
 
 <jf TO. TTpora filyf/aav kv 'll<l)ai(TToio dSfioiaiv 
 
 TiO'&py • TTO/l/ld 6' iduKe, 71x"'^ ^' V'^X'''^'^ '>'"' t:vvyv 
 
 'Yi^aidToto avuKTog ■ . . . . 
 
 "nXiog, a^' i;v6r/a£ fityaC,ofikvovg ^/,/ldrtr/ 
 
 o( (V ayepovTQ i?eo( ttoti ;^fa>lKo/?arec rfw . . . . 
 
 ■difki'Tspai 6e -deal fzivov alihl oIkoi EKdari/ 
 
 aaf^earog (V dp evupro yeXug fiampecai -diolaiv 
 
 Tfxvo.g eiaopduai 7roXv(ppovog "HipacoToio. — Odyss. VIII, 266 and 320. 
 (2). ft rff fiot ov rhovai /?owv knieiKt' ifioijSyv, 
 
 i^'oofiai. slg 'Atdao Kal iv vsKheaai (fiaecvu. — Odyss. XII, 382. 
 
222 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 must give way to those of Herbert Spencer. Those gods 
 are not idealized bodies, stars or personified forces of nature. 
 No, they are mostly idealized and apotheosized real persons? 
 patriarchs, heroes, sages, conquerors, male and female, who 
 were transplanted to heaven and Olympos in pre-historic 
 times. There they were believed to talk, eat and live as 
 before, on earth. This theory alone explains the fables 
 about them. — They were sublimized men and women — an 
 apotheosis later yet in use among the Roman emperors. The 
 biblical Deity, especially with the epoch of Moses, is almost 
 invariably delineated with all the sublimity and purity 
 asked even now by a fastidious metaphysician. Once or 
 twice only a phrase still reminds us yet of the ancient 
 cruder conceptions of the divine essence. (See the verses in 
 Exodus XXIV, 10-11.) C) Generally the sublimity and 
 spirituality of the Deity is maintained in S. Writ. 
 
 The Pentateuch and Theological Crimes. 
 
 Remark, again, with all the rigor of the Bible against 
 idolatry, the theological crimes and transgressions there are 
 very limited. At certain observances of great historic and 
 national bearing, the law pronounces a curse upon the 
 transgressor thereof — "His soul shall be cut away from 
 among his people." — But the Rabbinical tradition is perfectly 
 right in not understanding there a judicial condemnation to 
 be put to death. Michaelis (see his Mosaische Gesetzge- 
 bung), not always well acquainted with the inner spirit of 
 Mosaism, claims that it means a judicial death-warrant. 
 He is mistaken. I decidedly believe that tradition here 
 has more correctly grasped the lawgiver's sense. Such 
 extermination is pronounced, for instance, for eating leav- 
 ened bread on Passover, the law prescribing unleavened 
 bread as a reminiscence of the Exodus. Michaelis construes 
 this into a death-penalty. The Rabbis think it implies a 
 
 ■v^n nnni bi^iu" 'nba ns isi^i (i) 
 
RABBINICAL EXUBERANCE. 223 
 
 strong vituperation, and they are right. Hence, about the 
 only theological crime entailing death is idolatry — active 
 public worship of Baal, Astarte, etc. And whosoever knows 
 well that worship, how even among the refined Greeks and 
 late Romans, it was full of licentiousness, cruelty, murder 
 and superstition, will acknowledge that the Mosaic rigors 
 were here in order, and that these rigors do not constitute a 
 proof of sectarian bigotry. Monotheism was not theology ; 
 no, it was morals, it was the ethical and social basis ; hence 
 the political foundation of Judaea. . . . We can, there- 
 fore, abide by our theory that the Bible, originally, is 
 broadly tolerant, humane and unsectarian. A salient proof 
 of the correctness of this view is the fact that it allows the 
 Gentile immigrant (Guer Toshab) all the privileges of civil 
 citizenship when he does not practice idolatry and has 
 but adopted the general moral law of mankind. (^) 
 
 Rabbinical Exuberance. 
 
 1 can not claim the same for the Rabbinical laws. There 
 we do find a huge multiplication of forms and observances, 
 as also, ostensibly stringent punishments for transgressing 
 them (;). Intolerance and sectarianism can not be denied 
 there. But upon the correct cognition of facts and motives 
 thereof, we can hardly condemn them. During the long 
 period of Talmudical jurisprudence, the Ebrews had no 
 country of their own. They lived scattered in all parts of 
 the globe, from Mesopotamia and the Tigris regions to Asia 
 and Africa, Spain and all the European countries. Immense, 
 cruel, vulgar superstitions hovered over those regions ; whilst 
 the dominant religions were in some sense a form of Juda- 
 ism, close issues and varied patterns thereof, yet not identi- 
 cal therewith. Christianity claimed to be a rejuvenated 
 Judaism, having adopted the one God-belief, the Decalogue, 
 
 ^"1 nivD y3B' (1) 
 ■rwrsn ni3D ,nip^r3 (3) 
 
224 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 the prophetic morality, etc. But in fact, as the Gentile 
 races had but lately emerged from crude polytheism, they 
 had brought over into new Christianity a great deal of 
 practices, phrases and even dogmatic symbols that nearly 
 obscured the noble Monotheism of the Bible, with its 
 rationality and luminous morality ; even the status of man 
 was obscured by words brought over from foreign systems 
 and theories. — Whilst in the Islam religion, the Biblical 
 God-idea was fairly well kept up ; unfortunately the pro- 
 phetic morality and humanity, etc., were not; the universal 
 indiscriminate justice of the Decalogue, its moral purity, 
 the sacredness of property, of life and chastity, of word 
 and desires were strangely contrasted by the Arab polygamy ^ 
 roving propensities, conquests, enslavements and conver- 
 sions by the scimetar. The intelligent observer will there- 
 fore understand, that the Rabbis were excusable in not 
 recognizing either of those daughter-religions as perfectly 
 identical with the Synagogue, and that they deemed it their 
 duty not to give in and fuse, but to continue the unequal 
 contest, at any cost and any price. But now arose the ques- 
 tion, the Jews not having an inch of land as their own, how 
 could they keep up their identity in an age where religious 
 toleration was simply unknown? This they answered by 
 counter-sectarianism and counter-intolerance. The few 
 rational, luminous, religious ideas were hedged in by a pro- 
 fuse forest of forms, ceremonies and observances. The Bibli- 
 cal Monotheism and prophetism, so simple as hardly to 
 require any creed or text-book, were elaborated and built 
 out and up into a vast, complicated and impenetrable 
 religious system, with forms and observances that first 
 counted by the hundreds, but soon by the myriads. They 
 are encompassing the orthodox Israelite from morning to 
 eve, from the cradle to the grave, and beyond it, begin- 
 ning with the hoary past and reaching to the farthest 
 future. These myriads of forms and observances were 
 
RABBINICAL EXUBERANCE. 225 
 
 to be the bulwarks, fences and citadels of the faithful 
 and the safeguard of Monotheism. They were of such a 
 construction as to form around each individual a Chinese 
 wall; to isolate him in the very midst of the Gentile 
 world, each and everyone to form a centre, a nucleus, an 
 independent being, a people and country in miniature. 
 In the market, the Exchange, the palace, he was a unit 
 of the Gentile community he lived with. At home, with 
 his family, his books, his festivals, his ceremonies, his 
 worship, he was again a Judsean, an Ebrew, an Oriental, 
 living and dreaming in his old by-gone surroundings. 
 Rabbinism is perhaps the unique historic example of a 
 small, broken, infinitesimal minority, treated for centu- 
 ries as outlaws and pariahs that knew to keep up the old 
 identity, patiently waiting for recognition. Rabbinism 
 kept up these claimed-to-be pariahs as a nobility, as 
 an aristocracy of mind and morals, "as a light to the 
 nations." It was the first bold trial to upset the usual laws 
 of majorities and those of the crude times, and to show for 
 once, that the minority, too, has a right to be, and that the 
 genius of history, of God, often moves in the minority, 
 working out by it the salvation and the advance of the 
 majority. When the Greeks of the time of Antioclms 
 Epiphanes challenged the -ludseans to adopt Greek life, and 
 these refused, that was, no doubt, then thought foolish and 
 foolhardy. And, nevertheless, the philosopher now admits 
 that it was magnanimous. Why, then, should not the 
 philosopher now, perhaps, admit the same line of reason- 
 ing? — So, some years ago, St. Hilaire, the great Frenchman 
 and writer of the Thiers government, declared that, "Should 
 present Israel yield to the onslaught of anti-Semitism and 
 give up its biblical Monotheism, that would be one of the 
 greatest misfortunes to mankind at large." 
 
 15 
 
226 spirit of the biblical legislation. 
 
 Kabbalah. 
 
 For long centuries the Rabbis went on increasing the 
 ceremonial and ritualistic bulwarks and fences, wliich 
 served the Jew as his armor and coat of mail, to isolate and 
 strengthen him, even in the midst of danger and tempta- 
 tion. At last these observances began to weigh heavily 
 upon the votaries. The masses not knowing them as simple 
 armor, but as a part of divine teachings, began to doubt 
 them as snch, and to murmur against them, as heavy shackles 
 in the battle of li±e. But the Rabbinical leaders, aware that 
 that armor was not yet superfluous, contrived a new mode of 
 spiritualizing and re-enlivening those forms. It was the 
 system of the Kdbhalali that did revive these myriads of 
 observances. With the advent of the " Soliar" this spirit 
 awoke and infused new life among the mystic Jews. It was 
 now admitted that these forms would be useless and even 
 burdensome, if not for their symbolical value and their con- 
 nection with the supernatural world ! All the stars and angelic 
 hosts were believed to be set in motion by these apparent 
 forms ! They ceased to be forms, or historical, or symboli- 
 cal remembrances, and began to be charms, mysterious 
 powers, to dictate to the laws of nature, yes, even to the 
 Lord of nature Himself. The ^'^Zaddiq,^' the mystic saint, 
 took up the Messiah-role of ancient times and became 
 omnipotent. But that exalted spiritualism broke its spell by 
 its own exaggeration. When the followers of Sahhatai Zem, 
 the Palestinian Messiah of the seventeenth century, boldly 
 passed into the Moslem religion, and the Polish Frank, 
 with his followers, into some sort of Trinitarianism, claim- 
 ing thus to reunite the three religions into one Kabbalistic 
 Judseaism, the Rabbis shrank back from that dangerous 
 and extravagant mode of spiritualizing the forms, and fell 
 back into the enigmatic, old and cold Talmudic formal- 
 ism, hardly knowing where to stop ; until with Moses Men- 
 
RESUME OF THE FOREGOING. 227 
 
 delssohn, the new school arose, coming back to the study of 
 the Bible and the origins of tradition, and began to find their 
 way in that labyrinth of thirty centuries, slowly discover- 
 ing the luminous traces of original Sinai, as the religion for 
 Jew and Gentile, for all mankind and all times. The 
 Renaissance of the ghetto-Judaeaism began. With that 
 Mendelssonian epoch opened a new chapter in the history 
 and the activity of Israel. The career of mysticism was 
 closed; so was that of formalism. And the master minds 
 undertook that other task of critically studying the Bible at 
 the torchlight of conscience and science, and to square it 
 with the just needs of the times. 
 
 Resume of the Foregoing. 
 
 One glance more at the chapters on "Laws and Ordi- 
 nances " (Mishpatim II, 21, etc.), and we shall recognize the 
 universality, the divinity thereof. " The male citizen can 
 hire out for six years; on the seventh year he must go 
 free." — " The female citizen sold becomes the master's wife, 
 or goes free." — " The heathen male slave must not be 
 maltreated, or he goes free." — " The heathen, conquered 
 female slave, when cohabited with, becomes the master's 
 wife, or goes out free. Ipso facto, since she was his wife, 
 hence, she can no longer be his slave." — " The punishment 
 for murder is death, no difference whether native or 
 foreigner, rich or poor, free-born or slave." — " There is no 
 pecuniary compensation, no privileged ranks nor refuge 
 places for murder." — " From the altar take him to die. " — 
 '* One law is there for native and stranger, Ebrew and non- 
 Ebrew." — " Eye for eye and tooth for tooth." — Even so, 
 " Money for money and value for value." — " The thief, 
 fraud and robber are punished in purse, not in body." — 
 " The stranger, guer, non-Israelite, in Judaea enjoys all the 
 protection of the law. If permanently located, tosJiab, he 
 has all the civic rights." — "The poor stranger, just as the 
 
228 SPIEIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 orphaiijWidow and poor Israelite, are under the special protec- 
 tion of thelaw." — "A portion of the crops, the flocks, etc., is 
 reserved for them by right, not as a degrading charity." — 
 ''Benevolence is not an ideal merit, but a duty prescribed. 
 Those benefited by it are not degraded and disfranchised ; 
 they continue as citizens and brothers." — " The poor are not 
 crushed by debts, for these lapse every seventh year; nor by 
 interest and usury, which are never allowed ; nor by rings 
 and monopolies enhancing the price of his bread, butter, 
 meat, etc., for all commerce for profit's sake is prohibited." 
 — ''The family-lot goes down to posterity; it is not alien- 
 able; it is free as the citizen." — "The freed Ebrew servant 
 gets a portion ; the freed Ebrew girl an establishment or 
 dower." The entire fabric of the Biblical State is built 
 upon the solid rock of personal liberty and social equality, 
 and these are real and tangible, not simply de jure and 
 ideal. They are built upon the original equality of wealth, 
 kept up by equal chances to improve, by the safety-valve of 
 Sabbath, Jubilee and the Release-Year, the three great 
 Septennate institutions. 
 
 The Jubilee is tantamount to a radical social renovation ; 
 the Septennate to a partial one. Internal commerce and 
 foreign wars are discouraged. Thus all possibilities and 
 opportunities for sudden unequal acquisition or loss of 
 wealth and property are reduced to a minimum. Hence 
 plutocracy, proletariat and pauperism are nearly impos- 
 sible. — Now, these three pillars of the Bible State are 
 sustained by the necessary fourth one, solidarity, the con- 
 sciousness of the people that they are but one large family, 
 that the welfare of each depends upon the welfare of all, 
 that their interests are common, that altruism, not selfish- 
 ness, is the sound social base, and that, " love thy neighbor 
 as thyself" is there a fact, not an ideal. 
 
 The Pentateuchal legislation being universal, humanita- 
 rian, aiming at the elevation and the happiness of all, the 
 
RETROSPECT CARDINAL PRINCIPLES. 229 
 
 divine character thereof, as emanating from the eternal 
 wisdom, the source of truth and reality, is established. For 
 what is good for all classes and for all times and all cir- 
 cumstances can emanate but from supreme wisdom and 
 truth ; from Him who created all with eternal fitness and 
 inherent harmony. — Wliatever is purely human, is partial, 
 temporary, exceptional ; all things eternally good and just 
 are divine. And this is the secret strength of the biblical 
 legislation ; the Samson's hair of that grand historic monu- 
 ment, old as the pyramids, young as the United States ; a 
 legislation long since without a special country, nation, 
 armies or defenders. — Yet it conquers. It conquers by its 
 inherent force, by the spirit of truth and goodness pervading 
 it, by the genius of mankind moving in it. Like the famous 
 Parthian hosts that conquered whilst apparently fleeing, so 
 is the biblical legislation; it conquers whilst migrating 
 from country to country, from continent to continent, every- 
 where scattering the seed of its divine truth, everywhere 
 proclaiming : " Peace, peace to those near by and those far 
 away." 
 
 Retrospect — Cardinal Principles. • 
 
 We have started with the proposition, in the second 
 chapter of this work, that the biblical State and community 
 rested upon four cardinal principles, viz: 
 
 I. Personal Freedom. — Every Israelitish inhabitant of 
 Judaea, male, female, and child, poor or rich, lay or priest, 
 were born and remained absolutely free, and could, under 
 no condition, be robbed of their inherent liberty. We have 
 seen that personal freedom is, thus, not of modern origin, 
 deriving from the speculations of J. J. Rousseau and A. de 
 Voltaire or Kant and Descartes, nor from modern Holland 
 and Switzerland, nor from old Rome and Greece. No ; that 
 principle has been first clearly stated in the Biblical Legis- 
 lation. 
 
230 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 II. Social Equality. — Whilst not only India and Egypt, 
 but even Greece and Rome, had their classes and masses, 
 patricians and plebeians; even whilst Germany, Holland 
 and Switzerland had their different strata of society, 
 separated by difference of rights and duties, an abyss not to 
 be filled up, except by civil war and blood — Judaea had no 
 such castes; its citizens were absolutely equal, partici- 
 pating in all the emoluments, honors and burdens of the 
 State, capable of all employments, dignities and charges. 
 
 III. Equal Distribution of Wealth Among the Members of 
 the Community. — Originally the conquered Canaan belonged 
 to the entire people. That land was parceled out into equal 
 shares and then divided among the grown male miembers, 
 the heads of families ; and that farm or lot remained in the 
 family from generation to generation. It could never be 
 sold nor wrested from it. Thus, every child born in Judaea 
 was a free-holder. No land-grabbing, no great landlordism 
 was allowed, and no proletariat possible. 
 
 IV. Solidarity, or Community of Interests — Th e altruistic 
 feeling as link of the one body politic. — That bitter rivalry, 
 that fierce competition, that venomous, economical envy, 
 the curse of modern society, was not known nor possible in 
 the Biblical State. The citizens felt that, as members of 
 the same body, their interests were common ; that happi- 
 ness and calamity is in store for them equally and con- 
 jointly ; that the fate of one is the fate of all. Hence was, 
 in all critical cases, mutual assistance, benevolence and 
 active charity not simply an ideal, a moral recommendation. 
 No, it was a duty peremptorily ordained by the law, just as 
 paying one's debts; because all were mutually inter- 
 dependent ; all interested in the welfare of each. Hence 
 was there the modern, chronic, inherited pauperism impos- 
 sible. 
 
 Contrasting the Biblical State with the modern ones 
 concerning government and rulers, peace and war, conquests, 
 
RETROSPECT — CARDINAL PRINCIPLES. 231 
 
 dominant and serving races, militia, taxation and exploita- 
 tion, etc., we have seen that the principles of personal 
 liberty and social equality settled those questions at once 
 and for ever. Once these two principles admitted as funda- 
 mental, the long and bitter civil strifes and quarrels, internal 
 and international wars on account of freedom and equality, 
 as in modern and in ancient times, could not take place in 
 the Mosaic community. Had there existed several such 
 communities, peoples really governed by the same law, but 
 in different States, they could not have gone to international 
 war. The wars between Judsea and Samaria were constantly 
 denounced by the prophets as fratricidal, and had at last to 
 be stopped. Nor could a biblical monarch or an oligarchy 
 ever practice usurpation and tyranny, the people having 
 the right of rebellion as a protection. Hence, our last 
 century's revolutions could not have taken place under a 
 biblical regime ; nor could the present European struggle 
 occur. 
 
 Applying further the principles of equal distribution of 
 wealth and solidarity of interests, the present all absorbing, 
 social problem is likewise solved by the Bible legislation. 
 Equal distribution of wealth disposes of plutocracy and of 
 proletariat. Community of interests, not soulless competi- 
 tion, not force and taking advantage; generous emulation, 
 harmoniously combined with humane, mutual assistance; 
 sympathy and charity as a right and duty, not an alms, a 
 degradation, a dog-kennel for the poor; benevolence to 
 eradicate poverty, not the poor, to uplift and make him 
 independent; community of interests at the base of the 
 social structure that disposes of pauperism and of prole - 
 tarianism. Thus equal distribution of national wealth and 
 the feeling of national unity or solidarity of interests settles 
 our social problem. 
 
 Now the Mosaic State, as the Platonic Republic, has never 
 existed ; both have remained ideals. — But should it ever be 
 
232 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 a possibility of founding a State and a society on the grounds 
 of the Bible, there would be no civil strifes and revolutions, 
 no international wars, no plutocracy^ no proletariat, no 
 pauperism, no aristocrats, no mob, no masters and no slaves, 
 serf or wage-labor or its ^^ iron law J' The social question 
 would be settled in a natural, rational way. 
 
 It would be settled without the utopia of communism 
 or of exaggerated socialism. Property, individuality and 
 family would continue to be sacred. Personal effort, talent, 
 genius, thrift and wisdom would be fostered and rewarded, 
 whilst vice, laziness, wastefulness, and imprudence would 
 have their due and necessary rebuke. A rebuke, necessary 
 not only as a healthy encouragement to virtue and wisdom 
 in general, but as a stimulant and corrective for the vicious 
 themselves ; the only remedy left them for improvement ; 
 punishment being the last salvation of the vicious. 
 
 General Principles Reviewed. 
 
 The principles of the hihlical legislation are first to be 
 looked for in the hoary Sinaic Ten Commandments. The 
 base of that entire legislation is the God belief. God is the 
 Creator of the universe, the Redeemer and Liberator of His 
 people. He is the conqueror of Canaan, the liege-lord and 
 king of the redeemed, and He is the authority of that legis- 
 lation. That theme runs through Pentateuch, Bible, Tal- 
 mud, New Testament and Koran. 
 
 As such, God consecrated the Sabbath as the symbol of the 
 new nation. It is the emancipation day of all the enslaved. 
 It is remembering the Ebrew redemption from Egypt. He 
 further consecrated filial piety, human life, chastity, prop- 
 erty, the sacredness of our word and our feelings. This 
 decalogue is the organic law of the biblical State and society. 
 That community is a theocratic democracy. God is king. His 
 law rules. The magistrates are but the servants ; the people 
 are the aim. It is a theocracy ; it is not a hierarchy. Not 
 
GENERAL PRINCIPLES REVIEWED. 
 
 233 
 
 the priests reiKn— they but apply and execute the supreme 
 law.— They hold their authority from the people in whom 
 resides all authority. That authority is the reflex of the 
 law, of eternal reason. The people are the judges whether 
 the priests apply the genuine law of Qod or their own 
 caprice, and whether it is correctly a.ppUed. — Later crept in 
 royalty ; but that was half a rebellion, God alone being the 
 rightful sovereign. The king was at best but the execu- 
 tive officer, judge and general. He was but a "brother;" 
 he could have no guards, no seraglio, no exorbitant wealth. 
 The Supreme law was ever binding upon him (Deuteron- 
 omy 17, 15). What a vast difference between him and an 
 Asiatic or Egyptian monarch, himself a god or descendant 
 of the gods, himself law -maker and yet above the law ! 
 
 The community was a democracy. No born aristocratic 
 classes and no oligarchies ; rigidly all equal in social rank 
 and economic wealth; all alike educated, all free, equal, with 
 same laws, duties, rights, chances, burdens, charges, imposts, 
 honors and emoluments. The model was: "Ye shall be 
 unto me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation."—" Mine 
 are the children of Israel, I have redeemed them from 
 Egypt." 
 
 Status of land: "Mine is the land, ye shall not sell it 
 forever." — Every citizen had a farm, detailed to him from 
 God's own property. That. acre descended to his posterity, 
 could never be alienated nor wrested from the family. 
 This was the economic base of liberty and equality. 
 
 All taxation and imposts were made by law. About one- 
 fifth, it appears, of the produce of the soil and of the flocks, 
 the sole -Judaean wealth, went to defray the expenses of 
 government, divine worship, public justice, schools and 
 sustenance of ihe poor. 
 
 In the preceding chapter we have sufficiently reviewed 
 the laws about freedom and slavery. We have seen that 
 the Ebrew could be hired out, but never enslaved. So was 
 
234 SPIRIT OP THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 freedom inherent in every and each man and woman of 
 Judaea. 
 
 Every seventh year all debts were cancelled. Every 
 fiftieth year man, soil and houses returned to their original 
 families. Thus .was all social and economic inequality 
 remedied. 
 
 Justice was freely and gratuitously administered. Special 
 protection was given to strangers, widows, orphans and the 
 poor. — The children suffered not for the parents' sins, nor 
 parents for the children's. — Justice became less cruel. 
 Excepting the Canaanites, is toleration and forbearance 
 enjoined towards all, even the Egyptian and the EdomiteSj 
 hereditary foes of the Judaean people.— The dead, too, have 
 their rights of an honorable burial and a family remem- 
 brance ; even the criminal was protected from undue cruelty. 
 
 Woman was the equal of man, his helpmeet, born in the 
 image of God, "the mother of life," to work and toil, to 
 rule and enjoy, as the companion of man and at his side, 
 as part and parcel of man. She was not a mischievous 
 toy, a Circe, a Pandora, to beguile and ruin, but to bless 
 and assist him. 
 
 War was discouraged and sufficiently humanized. — No 
 wanton destruction of useful things. The yielding enemy 
 had his life spared. The captive enslaved was protected in 
 life and limb. — The captive woman could be married, not 
 abused, and her issue was legitimate. So were children 
 anxiously sheltered and under the aegis of the law. 
 
 The ideal of social harmony is, " Thou shalt love thy 
 neighbor as thyself." — It is founded upon that other idea 
 of one parental stock and one origin of man. Thus God, 
 sole king, the people a unit, one country, same patriarchs, 
 same interests, rights, duties, chances and equal wealth, all 
 deeply moored in the emancipating Sabbath, the inalienable 
 family-lot, the ever nivellating and renovating economics : 
 the Year of Release and the Jubilee — these are the leading 
 ideas of the biblical legislation. 
 
REFLECTED IN THE TALMUD. 
 
 Reflected in the Talmud. 
 
 235 
 
 These principles liave been fairly kept alive by succeed- 
 ing ag-es, leaders and teachers, on the whole. The Talmud- 
 ists, the Casuists and the Moralists have fairly elaborated 
 that biblical ideal of State and people, not in its minute 
 practical details, but in its ethical features. In spite of their 
 vicissitudes of fortune, the amount of hate and suffering, 
 unparalleled in history, they have never deserted their task 
 nor their people. That noble example of adherence, of 
 unflinching perseverance, through a long line of centuries 
 and generations of martyrs, is as unparalleled as that of their 
 sufferings. It will remain a tli eme of admiration to posterity. 
 This seems to have been the secret of their strength. Why 
 their followers remained true to them? It was their 
 unflinching trust in the cause; and next, their self-sacrifice, 
 which won the respect and adherence of the masses. In 
 our times both, cause and effect, have disappeared; will 
 they ever reappear ? — 
 
 By that phalanx of martyrs the leading ideas and ideals 
 of Mosaism have been fairly kept up, often times, pure and 
 unalloyed — a marvelous phenomenon in the history of two 
 thousand years' legislation. Pure Monotheism has been 
 retained to this day at such an enormous sacrifice and 
 under such tremendous temptations. — So has been the 
 belief in the unity of the human race, its doctrine and its 
 final goal, in spite of mountains of prejudice. "Thou shalt 
 love thy neighbor as thyself," prominently culminating as 
 the climax of the noble 19th chapter of Leviticus, was duly 
 emphasized and conscientiously declared by them as the 
 central doctrine and "essence of the law." — So it was by 
 Hillel, adding : " What thou wilt not be done unto thee, do 
 not unto thy neighbor." (Sabbath, 31 a.) — It was repeated 
 by Akiba (Sifra Kedoshim IV, 12.) It is declared such in 
 the New Testament by Jesus. It i s so by all later moralists. — 
 
236 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 "All men are in the image of God; lience their lives, 
 dij^nity, rights, duties, are holy, all men being but one race, 
 all brothers," (Ibid.) is deduced by an old teacher from the 
 verse : " This is the book of the generations of men." (^) 
 This he declares " the first cardinal principle." — "All the 
 righteous among the Gentile nations will share in eternal 
 bliss," is a well-known Talmudical doctrine. — All practical 
 duties, as respect, love, benevolence, justice, truth, etc., the 
 Talmudists, in Halachali and Agadah, without exception, 
 enjoin upon their adherents to practice toward Gentiles, 
 without asking for their creed or race or country. — From 
 Jeremiah(2), who enjoined it upon the Babylonian exiles, to 
 this day, patriotism to country, just as love, forbearance, 
 justice, etc., toward our fellow-citizens, are emphasized and 
 taught by Jewish moralists and Talmudists. The proofs 
 are given above in all detail. 
 
 Thus has been upheld the great prophetic Messiah-ideal 
 concerning the eternal progress of the human race, that 
 once the nations will stop their wars and jealousies, that 
 through knowledge and wisdom united they will form but 
 one people, prnctice one right and worship one God. This 
 is the combined sense of the identical ideal in Isaiah II and 
 XI and Michah IV. 
 
 Aims of the Biblical Scheme. 
 
 The biblical scheme is vast and profound; it is both 
 practical and theoretical, realistic and ideal. We have but 
 to take as an instance the great Decalogue and the nine- 
 teenth chapter of Leviticus, and we shall soon be aware of 
 this. First, it lays down the rule that the laws are simply 
 for practical good. (Ill M. 18, 5): "Ye shall observe my 
 statutes and judgments which a man shall perforin, and 
 live hy theTn." — It has little or no dogma, no special creed, 
 
 (1) Genesis V, 1. 
 (3) Jeremiah 39,7. 
 
AIMS OF THE BIBLICAL SCHEME. 237 
 
 no mystic teachings — though a great deal of practical sym- 
 bolism, as in the Orient. It lays all stress upon active 
 morality, upon purity and sincerity, justice and right-living. 
 But it aims jnst as much at the practical well-being, at 
 individual, bodily happiness. It promises earthly, divine 
 blessings for right-living. Right conduct vrill insure a joy- 
 ous, long and happy existence. The rights of the mind and 
 of the flesh are equally noticed. It goes so far as to make 
 even external, physical nature depend upon the morality of 
 its votaries. It promises (V M. 2. ) — " Rain and sunshine, 
 peace and plenty, as the revt^ard for obeying Jahveh." Thus, 
 the aim of the Bible religion is in first instance, morality 
 and happiness. They appear to Mosaism but one thing, one 
 and inter-dependent ; neither can exist alone. — A life pleas- 
 ing to Jahveh will be moral at one pole and happy at the 
 other. The Roman stoics cared alone for correct conduct ; 
 virtue was their ^'summuTn honum.'''' The neo-Platonic phil- 
 osophers aimed at ecstacy, or absorption in God. The 
 Greek popular ideal was military glory; the Greek philoso- 
 phers' ideal was knowledge and truth. The Roman ideal 
 was patriotism. The Mosaic scheme labored for morality 
 and happiness ; for health, peace, plenty, progeny, etc.; these 
 were the necessary results of a noble and pure life ; wor- 
 ship of God was chiefly love to man. So psalmists and 
 prophets seem often to imply religion as wholly absorbed 
 by justice and charity, by purity and modesty ; and these go 
 with happiness. 
 
 Yet it is not wholly so, when deeply looked into the 
 system. The Bible religion is more than morality. It has 
 its own and proper sphere. Not practical equity and 
 happiness is its final goal ; no, it aims higher, at ^'■Holy 
 shall ye ie, for lioly am I, your GodP — Here is the 
 noble idealism, the hoary, oriental mysticism, ever rooting 
 at the bottom of human hearts. Religion is the striving 
 for God ; to imitate, to reach, to identify ourselves with the 
 
238 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 Divine, to achieve perfection. Behold ! Frail, shortcoming, 
 one-day creatures that we are, we yet dream of and labor 
 to know all, embrace all, reach all: happiness, glory, beauty, 
 wisdom, holiness, perfection. " To be as God." (I. M. 22). — 
 This ideal is the grandest, the noblest, the divine in the 
 human, the image of the Deity in our soul, the reflex of the 
 Creator in the individual creature, the universe mirrored in 
 man, its thinking miniature. This is the higher ideal, the 
 mysticism of religion, self-perfection in the highest degree ; 
 this is : " Holy shall ye he, for holy am /, your God J' 
 
 This is elucidated in chapter XIX of Leviticus, first as 
 practical right-conduct, next as ideal goodness, culminating 
 in God-likeness, in striving to reach divine perfection, 
 divine holiness. This ideal is further elaborated by psalm- 
 ists, prophets and later teachers. Read each of these liter- 
 atures carefully, and you will find this manifold character 
 reflected; very realistic and yet sublimely ideal. From 
 Deuteronomy it runs through prophets, Halachah and 
 Agadah undismayed at the havoc of times. Will that 
 idealism outlive the present " blood and iron policy f " 
 
 Some such ideal apparently is depicted in the mystic 
 personality of the Messiah, or Adam Kadmon, born before 
 creation, the Demiourg of Talmud and Midrashim and 
 Kabbalah; next in the hoary patriarch, Abraham, his 
 efforts, his results, his doctrine, his worldly success and his 
 family happiness ; that is expressed in: 'Mahveh blessed 
 Abraham with all " (^) on which the Midrash expatiates in 
 that sense ; such an ideal, God-like man is to the Jew Moses 
 who died with all his faculties unimpaired; who passed 
 over to immortality with his glance intent upon the prom- 
 ised land, from the sublime Pisgah-height (-j ; or Elijah, after 
 a formidable straggle against idolatry and sensuality, dis- 
 appearing in the clouds, snatched away to ethereal life. 
 
 (1) Genesis XXIV, 1. 
 (3) Deut. 34, 1 to 8. 
 
AIMS OF THE BIBLICAL SCHEME. 239 
 
 Socrates was thought such in Greece, cheerfully drinkinjjr 
 the cup of hemlock, unjustly forced upon him by the State ; 
 such wai? the Sage of Plato's republic, alone entitled to rule 
 in the name of the gods; such does the pious Christian 
 imagine Jesus, his sublime and ideal God-man, dying with 
 the prayer upon his lips: "Pardon! O father, thy children, 
 they know not what they are doing." Such do thinkers 
 imagine Spinoza, living and bearing without a murmur, and 
 dying without regret; ever even-tempered and cheerful. 
 " For all must be ; ' all that is, is good.' " "All comes from 
 God ; ami God is the Ever-goodJ^ 
 
 The neo-Platonic ecstacy and the Hindoo Nirvana, we 
 commonly conceive as identical with self-annihilation. The 
 biblical ^^ Holy shall ye he^^ seems to be more self-conscious. 
 And even so is the Rabbinic ideal of the highest beatitude, or 
 paradise. They say : " The righteous are sitting there, 
 radiating with glory and beholding the splendors of the 
 Shechinah;^^ to which Maimonides adds: "They recognize 
 truth in all its reality." — Thus, highest mentality, embrac- 
 ing all, based upon morality and happiness, seems to be the 
 ideal and aim of all Biblic and Talmudic religion. That 
 is "termed: holiness and perfection. The Sohar, the lead- 
 ing book of the Kabbalah, often spreads out its bright- 
 colored wings towards that ideal. But it is such already in 
 the Psalmist, 15 : " Who is to ascend the mount of the 
 liord?" answering: "The pure, the good, the truthful, the 
 unflinching, etc., etc." 
 . There are some claims and discussions about differences 
 in the systems of Abraham, of Moses, of Prophetism, 
 Talmud, etc. Such claims have a scant foundation. All the 
 above-mentioned ideas and ideals are but one continuous 
 development, without any real break or discrepancy, less 
 yet a contradiction, or even antagonism. They are develop- 
 ments from Abrahamism to Mosaism, to Prophetism and to 
 the best of Rabbinism. Any discrepancy there is not the 
 
240 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION, 
 
 conscious result of the teacher's change of front, but rather 
 a sad echo of the times and conditions. Barbarous times 
 and treatment had their counteraction among the Ebrews, 
 and such times emphasized more creed and ceremonies 
 within and prejudice without. The Ebrew nationality 
 harshly treated, most naturally thought harshly of its 
 persecutors ; and the more it was attacked, the more it had 
 to intrench itself behind forms and observances. Liberal 
 times laid most stress upon deeds and principles. Thus, 
 there is no real break in those systems. They are but the 
 natural evolutions of one from the other. 
 
 The Bible and the Present. — Conclusion. 
 
 Having carefully studied the legislation of the great 
 Book, let us now examine what does the present State and 
 Society owe to that system and what to other sources ; what 
 elements of the present civilization derive from Judaea and 
 what from Greece and Rome and their predecessors, Assyria, 
 Persia, Phoenicia or Egypt; what modern manners, feelings 
 and views come from classical and what from biblical 
 impressions. 
 
 No doubt our present society rests upon a solid biblicSal 
 foundation. The ideas of God, duty and righteousness 
 underlie our community, at least as an ideal. That God- 
 ideal is Monotheism ; and righteousness, not force, is the 
 sequel ; both are biblic. Our modern religions are monothe- 
 istic. Polytheism, apparently, is dead among educated 
 people. 
 
 The next principle is morality, or the doctrine of the 
 golden rule, " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." — In 
 theory that is the base of our society, and it is biblical, 
 Old- and New-Testamentary. — But in reality, in grand 
 outlines, in politics, statecraft stands upon egoism, force 
 and taking advantage. — The present condition of Europe, 
 its huge standing armies, its late and its latent wars, its 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE PRESENT. 241 
 
 " Pan-Latinism, Slavism and Germanism," as well as our own 
 would-be '' Pan- Americanism " and our "silver" dilemma, 
 prove it sufficiently ; and that hails from heathen Rome 
 and Greece. 
 
 The best part of our present religions derives from the 
 Sacred Writ. — Regular worship, or popular yearning for the 
 good and the holy, with the Sabbath and holidays, epochs 
 of great moral, political and historical import, utilized for 
 ideal and refining purposes, come from that same source. 
 The pattern thereof we find only in Judaea. Elsewhere 
 public worship was a State contrivance. 
 
 Next our idea of pan-humanity can originate only in that 
 of pan-deity and unity of creation, with their sequels of 
 justice, philanthropy, fraternity, freedom, equality, human 
 dignity, one race, one interest, same rights and duties ; no 
 poligamy, no slavery ; woman the equal and companion of 
 man; no ruling and no serving-races, — all these are the 
 logical outcome of Monotheism, never of Greek, Roman or 
 Oriental Polytheism. 
 
 From the Bible is next hailing our " sweet home," family, 
 marriage, conjugal and filial piety; because there woman 
 is an ^?)(?, not a Pandora. There she is the "helpmeet,'' 
 the mother of life, to bless man, not to ruin. The pattern 
 of womanhood was low, even in Greece and Rome, not only 
 in Babel and Assyria. Force was there, yet the measure of 
 worth and virtue was a manly epithet. Woman and family 
 rose alone with the Bible. 
 
 The full idea of property I must likewise vindicate to 
 the great Book. There alone is work consecrated and ren- 
 dered noble. In Greece, Rome and the East, with Arabs, 
 Teutons and Mongols, was conquest the supreme source of 
 acquisition, and conquest is shifting; it is a poor founda- 
 tion for property. Work alone is its solid base. With 
 property and work, iMosaism consecrated thrift, effort and 
 individuality. 
 
242 SPIRIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 So it is with truthfulness, sincerity, honesty, veracity, 
 pity. — The Greek gods and heroes were not distinguished 
 for any of these qualities. 
 
 So are our noblest social features biblical ; democracy, or 
 popular government, the citizen as the aim and object, not 
 the pedestal of the State ; the magistrate as the brother and 
 oflB^cer, not the despot, of the people ; enjoyment, happiness 
 and education at the reach of all, is biblical. 
 
 So is the best and soundest part of socialism. Land is 
 the property of all; each is entitled to his share — his family- 
 lot. No one is born for pauperism, nor for proletarianism ; 
 equal chances for all, and for none privileges; no over- 
 reaching, nor taking advantage of the distressed ; no land- 
 grabbing and no plutocracy; no born nobles and no mob; 
 solidarity and community of interests among all the mem- 
 bers of the community ; altruism and not crushing competi- 
 tion — all that is biblical doctrine. Whilst it is united there 
 with religion, family, property and individuality, which 
 some socialists unreasonably repudiate. 
 
 From the ancient Greek philosophers and sages present 
 society derives the noble tastes and cravings for exact 
 knowledge, careful study, close observation, discrimination 
 and criticism ; to learn by experiment and trial, to follow 
 the steps of nature, to search for each effect its adequate 
 cause, not to rely upon authority and blind imitation, not 
 to account by an a priori hypothesis or " deus-ex-macMna " 
 assumption, but rather by inductive methods, by watching 
 the workings of nature and generalizing its laws. Hence all 
 exact sciences, all fine arts, all practical trades and crafts, 
 nearly all about mechanics, solidity and beauty in forms and 
 esthetics, all accurate mathematical knowledge, the method 
 of beginning with doubt, advancing by observation and 
 arriving at knowledge by verification, that adhering to 
 scientific truth, above all authority and preconceived theo- 
 ries, all that is of Phoenician and Egyptian, especially of 
 
THE BIBLE AND THE PRESENT. 243 
 
 Greek orijs^in ; the modern elements thereof may be retraced 
 by derivation to Hellenic methods ; Aristotle coming before 
 Bacon and Darwin. 
 
 The useful elements of present society coming from Rome 
 and her predecessors are government and legislation. To 
 assimilate and form divers units and petty tribes into one 
 compound, political society, to turn clans and masses into 
 organized civilized bodies, by persuasion or by compulsion, 
 by cunning or by wisdom, by law or by force, by good means 
 or by foul means, to show the useful (?) part which " Mood 
 and iron " play in human affairs ; the art of government. 
 State-craft, war and legislation, we moderns have learned 
 from Rome and Nineveh, Babel and Persia. 
 
 From Greek and Roman and Asian paganism, we have 
 yet our lingering remnants of Polytheism, our very numer- 
 ous, popular superstitions and our dogmatic crudities; 
 further, the present unprincipled politics; cynicism, private 
 and public; hypocrisy in State and in Church, bloody 
 dynastic ambitions, heartless competition, tyranny of race 
 and creed ; selfishness, violence and over-reaching ; reckless 
 sensuality ; demagogism, small and great, careless of conse- 
 quences ; civil, social and international wars ; altruism in 
 church and egoism in the world ; " Love thy neighbor " in 
 theory, and " Ruin thy neighbor," in practice, they hail 
 from that quarter, decaying Greece and Rome. 
 
 It is not easy to classify all the present social features. 
 It is harder yet to weigh their import. But it seems that 
 most of our communities' best moral and social elements 
 derive from the Bible, and most of its worst traits hail from 
 declining Hellas and Italy and their Asiatic predecessors. 
 
 It appears that duty, righteousness and morals, men 
 learned from Judsea; exact knowledge was imparted by 
 Greece. The first ever points to supernatural guidance. 
 The latter teaches self-reliance. Noble inspirations, and 
 great moral thoughts mankind derived from Jerusalem; 
 
244 SPIKIT OF THE BIBLICAL LEGISLATION. 
 
 exact scientific truth and methods from Athens ; bold initia- 
 tive from classic Rome. Our head turns towards refined 
 Hellas ; our hold hand towards Patrician Rome, and our 
 heart and feelings towards Judsea. As our feelings have 
 the strongest hold, as the heart is most concerned in our 
 deeds, even such is the hold of the Sacred Book upon 
 present society. Believers or not, it influences them. It 
 is the ethical pulse thereof, though not by far yet the norm 
 of deeds. There is no doubt that the leading moral aspira- 
 tions and noblest instincts of our modern civilization, in 
 Church, State and home, mankind has derived from the 
 Bible; and there is merit enough. 
 
 True, we Americans, have yet our " silver question," and 
 Europe its "Pan-Latin-Slav — and Germanism." True the 
 forum and the curia, the market and politics are yet 
 heathen, selfishness being there dominant. Yet we may 
 fairly hope that common sense and exact science, that 
 nature's promptings, ripe reflection and the advancing influ- 
 ence of mankind's great Book, will succeed in making the 
 doctrine of *'Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," a 
 full and substantial reality. 
 
 The End. 
 
COMMENTS ON THE AUTHOR'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 "Spirit of the Biblical Legislation.'^ 
 
 The Baltimore Sun in last June, brought out the prospectus of 
 this work. So did other papers in the East and West. Among the 
 first encouraging letters with subscriptions were those from his 
 Eminence, Cardinal Gibbons, Honorables Attorney-G-eneral J. P. 
 Poe, Charles J, Bonaparte, L. N. Hopkins, Baltimore; Attorney- 
 General S. N. Eosedale, Jacob H. Shiff, New York; leading min- 
 isters and laymen, booksellers, congregations followed. 
 
 Advanced sheets have been submitted to leading scholars, and 
 their opinions were unanimous that: "The book is highly interest- 
 ing and important, fully deserving public attention.'' Such are the 
 replies, among many others, by the Eev. Drs. Edavard A. Law- 
 rence, Eutaw Congregational Church; J. T. Wightman", McOul- 
 loh Methodist Episcopal Church; H. M. Wharton, Brantly Baptist 
 Church; C. A. Fulton, North Avenue Immanuel Baptist Church; 
 P. H. Pullman, Guilford Avenue Universalist Church; Dr. Clam- 
 pett, Druid Hill Avenue Episcopal Church, an^ Dr. A. Frieden- 
 WALD, Physician, North Eutaw street. 
 
 The Cincinnati American Is. published in 1888, two lectures 
 by the author on that theme, delivered at the H. Union College, 
 with Resolutions of thanJcs voted him. The Book will prove inter- 
 esting and useful to the general reader, as well as to professionals. 
 The author and proprietor's address is : 
 
 Rev. MAURICE ELUEGEL, 
 
 2041 Division Street, 
 
 Baltimore, Md. 
 
246 
 
 COMMENTS. 
 
 The Author's "Thoughts on Religious Rites and Views" received 
 the cordial acknowledgmeut of many scientists, writers, divines 
 and leading Universities in America and Europe. So writes: 
 
 President W. H. Green, of Princeton. ''The book seems to 
 embody, in an interesting way, the results of extensive reading, 
 study and careful reflection." 
 
 President Andrew D. White, of Cornell: "It interests me very 
 much in my hurried examination of it." 
 
 President Day, of Yale, had a continued correspondence on it, 
 desiring the author to write on kindred themes. 
 
 Friedrich von Bodenstedt, German poet: ''I have read your 
 thoughtful tract with lively interest, and marked many passages 
 to talk over with you. I find in it so much instruction and sug- 
 gestion."' 
 
 Professor Franz Delitzsch, of the Leipsic University: ''It is 
 likely to prove a real enrichment of science:" and later: "It is a 
 little book, rich in contents, and offering much material for 
 reflection." 
 
 Professor W. Wundt, of the same University: "Taking great 
 interest in the history of manners and customs, your historical 
 researches are calculated to vividly interest me." Again: "I shall 
 utilize your remarks in my studies on Spinoza, with reference to 
 Maimonides." 
 
 Professor A. Neubauer, of Oxford University, England: 
 "Hearty thanks for your interesting work, which I have just fin- 
 ished reading. I shall lend it to Dr. Mills, of New York, who 
 is writing on the Avesta and the Vedas, etc." 
 
 The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, London: "It appears to be 
 of great interest. Examining into the character of the Mosaic 
 system, compared with others, all that throws light on this 
 subject is very loelcome to me." 
 
COMMENTS. 247 
 
 Cardinal Gibbons, Baltimore, sent his good wishes for its 
 success. 
 
 The Chief Eabbi, Dr. Zadoc Kahn, of France: "I have read 
 your charming little book with as much pleasure as with profit.'^ 
 
 Dr. (Schwartz, Land-Rabbi of Baden: "With great pleasure 
 have 1 read already many fine things therein.^' 
 
 The Author's "Mosaic Diet and Hygiene:" "Attracted con- 
 siderable notice, in Germany especially.^^ 
 
 Professor Dr. Gratz, of Breslau, writes: "It pleases me very 
 much . . , and I request you to let me keep the copy."' 
 
 Dr. H. Abler, Chief Rabbi of England; Dr. Isadore Loeb, 
 of Paris; Dr. G. Gottheil, New York, and others cordially 
 approved of it. 
 
 Many European and American periodicals reproduced or epito- 
 mized the above. 
 
 Smaller publications, as " Belus' Tower," and the " Two 
 Philosophies," were cordially endorsed by Professors D. Fricke 
 and Franz Delitzsch, of the Leipsic University. 
 
 Professor Gratz writes: "Your polemics: 'Shylock' and 
 'Prejudice,' are beautiful. In our country one can not speak so 
 plainly." 
 
 In 1877 Hon. W. E. Gladstone wrote: "Rev. FluegeFs arti- 
 cles, ' The Ottoman Empire,' gave me unqualified pleasure. 
 I am desirous of expressing my gratification to him." 
 
 Two letters by Lord Beaconsfield (1878), acknowledge the 
 receipt of his articles on that topic. 
 
 President Garfield and Secretary Evarts sent thanks for 
 interesting articles on the same. 
 
 Ad. Cremieux, the French statesman (1877): "Your articles 
 on the Oriental Question have been much remarked by our 
 committee." 
 
248 COMMENTS. 
 
 Rev. Henky W. Beecher (1869): "I congratulate you upon 
 your having acquired such a command of the English language. 
 Your work might make many a native proud. ^^ 
 
 Rev. Dr. S. Abler, New York (1887): "I gladly acknowledge 
 your earnest sense of research." 
 
 Rev. Dr. Hubsch, New York (1875): "Your Hyhsos article 
 proves your profound studies. I am ever ready to listen to your 
 excellent remarks." 
 
 Dr. L. Philippson commented, flatteringly, in the Allgemeine 
 Zeitung, on "The United States' Credo.'' 
 
 Hon. Carl Schurz, recently: "Your sketches of 'G-ermany' 
 are most instructive and interesting." 
 
 So was the "Reply to Prof. Fr. Delitzsch," cordially received by 
 scientific and laymen. 
 
 Spirit of the Biblical Legislation, single copy $2.00 
 
 Thoughts on Religious Rites, " " .75 
 
 Mosaic Diet and Hygiene, " " .50 
 
 Address : 
 
 Rev. M. FLUEGEL, 
 
 Baltimore, Md. 
 
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