NOTICE. In my First Edition of this Book I was under the belief that Editors of newspapers were likely to welcome all omission of useless letters. But this is true only within very narrow limits. I now learn that to drop final e where it is not only superfluous but also misleading, probably is the utmost that they can advance ahead of the public. To this therefor I confine myself at present, not without hope of elsewhere further pressing for cautious reform of our worst and indefensible irregularities. To the total revolution contemplated by the Pitman-school, I am on principle irreconcilable. CHRISTIANITY IN ITS CRADLE. CHAPTER I. GENERAL VIEW OF JUDAISM. HISTORY is a vast topic, of which few of us can know much; yet to know a little correctly is valuable. An obvious parallel is Geography. We must be contented with great ignorance, yet an outline map is superfluous to no one. To study the birth of a Religion is eminently instructiv, yet generally is very difficult from the absence of written documents contemporaneous and trustworthy. So much the more do we need to learn the people and the circumstances under which it rose; which in the case of Christianity are no wise obscure. These pages do not compete with complete Christian histories, nor attempt continuous narrativ, but only aim to summarize what will throw most light on the topic, and thereby aid to sound judgment. The peculiarity of the Jewish people has turned on two pivots, Monotheism and Ceremonialism; and in the secondary stage, which alone here concerns us, each principle has derived its energy from a belief in Sacred Books. In the earlier period, before and during the Hebrew Monarchy, an activ warfare was carried on against Polytheism, to which a majority of the people, surrounded by Polytheistic and Idolatrous nations, was inclined but the chief champions of the characteristic Hebrew faith were then, not established Priests, but Prophets rising untaught, or reared in voluntary seminaries; men who professed to utter the voice of God, A not to expound any sacred book, or rest upon any sacred law. The name of Moses is hard to find in these prophets, nor do they argue for the doctrin of One God by quoting the Pentateuch or the Decalogue. An eminent Christian divine of this century avowed that it was scarcely possible to worship a God who had neither place nor form nor geometrical size, so that an incarnate God is a necessary condescension to human infirmity. Nevertheless the Hebrews (indeed, it seems, the Persians before them) had quite dispensed with incarnation. It is hard to understand how any one can read the Hebrew psalms, and not see that an intense devotion of soul to an omnipresent God pervades them.* Even the Roman Tacitus, malignant as he is to the Jews and full of slander, yet seems in spite of himself to admire, when he approaches their absolute monotheism. "The Jews (says he) apprehend a single Deity, and that "by the mind alone; accounting those profane who out of "decaying substances fashion images of gods into the like“ness of men, while that which is Supreme and Eternal "can neither change nor perish." From our modern point of view, we must call the attachment of the Jews to the sole worship of Jehovah a fanaticism; because it enacted death by stoning for any one who enticed to the violation of this paramount doctrin. But in that day all nations which had an established creed accounted its deliberate violation a deadly guilt. The asperity of Persians against idolatry and the still greater severity of the Jews, denote, not that they were more cruel than Egyptians or Greeks, but that they were more definit and earnest in religious belief. * Ponder well that magnificent outburst of devout piety: "Whom hav I in heaven but Thee? there is none upon earth that I desire in comparison with Thee. My flesh and my heart faileth; but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever." Possibly the explanation of "for ever is found in another Psalm; "I will bless my God, as long as I hav any being." E |