“If a Gentile, and idolater, be seen perishing, or drowning in a river, he is not to be helped out. If he be seen near to death, he is not to be delivered. But to destroy him by active means, or to push him into a pit, or such-like things, is forbidden, as he is not at war with us.”[[10]] The Lord Jesus does not say that the man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho was an idolater. He only says, “a certain man.” But he evidently intimates that he was such, for if he had been a Jew, the priest and the Levite would not have passed him without rendering assistance. As he was only an idolater, according to the oral law, the priest and the Levite were not simply not to blame in leaving him to his fate, but were obeying a command. They saw him perishing—near to death. They did not use any violence to accelerate it. They only looked at him, and left him to perish. So far, then, the lawyer who asked the question thought that the priest and Levite were in the right. But then the Lord Jesus introduces a Samaritan, whom the oral law also looks upon as an idolater, and showing how he acted, he appeals to the plain common sense of the questioner, “Which of these three was neighbour to him that fell among thieves?” And the lawyer is compelled to acknowledge, “He that showed mercy.” We make a similar appeal to the advocates of the oral law. We ask, which is, the oral law or the New Testament, the most like the law of God? The oral law forbids you to help a poor dying fellow-creature in his hour of need, because he is an idolater. It commands you to stifle the natural instinct of the human heart, which is indeed the voice of the God of nature—to behold the agonizing struggles, and hear the heartrending cries of a drowning fellow-sinner, and yet when you have it in your power to snatch him from the jaws of death, and from that everlasting destruction which awaits him, to leave him to his fate, without help and without pity. The New Testament, on the contrary, tells you, that though, by his idolatry, he has incurred the wrath of God, yet he is your neighbour—that it is your duty to help him, and by that very help to endeavour to lead him to the truth. Which then agrees with the law of God? We are quite sure that the language of your heart is, the New Testament is right. The oral law is wrong. Your brethren in France and Bavaria have already proclaimed that opinion to the world. In the answer of the Jewish deputies to Napoleon and in the Bavarian Catechism, they have said, “that we are to love our fellow-creature as ourselves,” whatever be his religion. They have thus made an involuntary acknowledgment of the superiority of the New Testament, and of the benefit which it has been to the world. Just suppose, for a moment, that the scribes and Pharisees had succeeded in extirpating the doctrine of Jesus of Nazareth, what would have been the consequence to you and to the world? Had the doctrines of Jesus perished, the oral law would have had an undisturbed and universal domination, for the Karaites have always been few in number, and have never exerted any influence on mankind at large. The Jews in France, Bavaria, as well as in England and elsewhere, would all have known the law only according to the oral interpretation, and consequently would not have understood the command, “Thou shalt love they neighbour as thyself.” They would still have held the fearful doctrine, that a perishing idolater was not to be helped. They would, moreover, have had none but idolaters around them, for all the knowledge of God that prevails amongst us Gentiles comes from Jesus of Nazareth. Jew and Gentile, then, would have lived “hateful and hating each other.” You may think, perhaps, that some mighty spirit would have burst the chains of tradition, and reasserted, the simple truth of God. But such an event is altogether beyond the limits of probability. One of the mightiest intellects that ever dwelt in a tenement of clay was that of Moses, the son of Maimon; a man whose learning and industry were equal to his genius. If ever there was a Jew, who was likely to overcome the prejudices of tradition, it was he. And yet with all his genius and all his opportunities, he never was able to arrive at the true sense of the command which we have just considered. The atrocious passages, which we have above discussed, are all taken from his compendium of the oral law. You are indebted, then, to Jesus of Nazareth for your deliverance from this foul error. With respect to your duty to your neighbour, your own brethren in France and Bavaria confess, that you are right if you follow Jesus of Nazareth, and that you are wrong if you follow those who rejected him. Remember, then, that your duty to your neighbour is half of the whole law of God, and examine whether the Christians, who are confessedly right in the second table of the law do not, also, possess the truth respecting the first.

No. V.
TALMUDIC INTOLERANCE CONTRASTED WITH THE CHARITY OF THE BIBLE.

Any one who considers the circumstances of the Jewish people after the desolation of the first temple, will be inclined to make great allowances for the spirit of the Rabbinical laws against idolaters. Idolatry was not to them a mere system of religious error. It was the source of all their misfortunes; and idolaters were the destroyers of their country—the desolaters of their temple—and their own most cruel and tyrannical oppressors. Scarcely had they emerged from the horrors of the Babylonish captivity, when they were exposed to the insults and outrages as well as the persecutions of Antiochus; and hardly had they recovered from the havoc of his fury, before they were overrun by the fierce and haughty Romans, who were at last the executioners of the wrath of the Almighty. They not only saw the abominations of idolatry, but they felt the hard hand of the idolater; no wonder, then, if they hated the man as well as the system. In the Hilchoth Rotzeach there is a law which amply illustrates the misery of their situation, and the habitual treatment which they received from idolaters. According to this law, “It is forbidden to a Jew to be alone with Gentiles, for they are suspected of shedding blood; neither is a Jew to join company with them in the way; if he meet a Gentile, he is to cause him to pass on his right hand (that the Jew, as the commentary says, may be able to defend himself, in case the Gentile should make an attempt on his life); if they be ascending a height, or going down a descent, the Jew is not to be below and the Gentile above him; but the Jew above and the Gentile below, lest he should fall upon him to kill him; neither is he to stoop down before him, lest he should break his skull.” What an affecting picture does this present of the Jews under heathen domination; and who can wonder if such treatment called forth the natural feelings of the human heart, and dictated laws in the same fierce and merciless spirit? We, for our part, are quite ready to admit and to deplore the mighty provocations, which roused the spirit of retaliation in the Rabbies, and consequently, to make all due allowance for the men. But that is not the question before us. We are inquiring whether their religious system, the oral law, is or is not from God, and whether this religious system teaches Jews to love all their fellow-men as themselves? We have shown that the evidence adduced on this point by the French and Bavarian Jews, proves the contrary; and is therefore, nothing to the purpose. But we do not wish to rest the decision upon such limited proof, even though it be strong; we are willing to look at the whole system, and to compare it with the law and the prophets, which we all admit as divine authority. We say, then, that the Talmud not only does not teach us to love all our fellow-men, but that it puts idolaters altogether without the pale of humanity. We have seen already that it forbids its followers to save the life of a perishing idolater. But it goes farther still, and extends this precept even to an idolater’s infant, which knows not its right hand from its left:—

בת ישראל לא תיניק את בנה של נכרית מפני שמגדלת בן לעבודה אל כוכבים ומזלות ולא תילד את הנכרית עכו׳׳ם אבל מילדת היא בשכר משום איבה ׃

“A daughter of Israel shall not suckle the son of a heathen woman, because that would be to bring up a son for idolatry; neither shall she act as midwife to a heathen idolatress. But if she should, it must be for pay, on account of the enmity (that might otherwise be excited)”. (Hilchoth Accum, c. ix. 16.) What is meant by “pay, on account of the enmity,” is fully explained in the following passage, which forbids a Rabbinical physician to cure a sick idolater:—

מכאן אתה למד שאסור לרפאות עובדי כוכבים ומזלות אפילו בשכר ואם היה מתירא מהן או שהיה חושש משום איבה מרפא בשכר אבל בחנם אסור ׃

“Hence thou learnest, that it is forbidden to cure idolaters even for pay. But if (an Israelite) is afraid of them, or is anxious on account of enmity, he may cure them for pay; but to do it gratuitously is forbidden.” Hence the commonest offices of humanity are forbidden. But the Talmud goes further still, and prohibits even the giving of good advice to these outcasts.

ואסור להשיא עצה טובה לגוי או לעבד רשע ... ולא נתנסה דניאל אלא על שהשיא עצה טובה לנבוכדנצר ליתן צדקה , שנאמר להן מלכא מלכי ישפר עלך ׃

“It is forbidden to give good advice to a heathen or to a wicked slave.... Daniel was exposed to danger for no other reason than this, that he advised Nebuchadnezzar to give alms, as it is written, ‘Wherefore, O king, let my counsel be acceptable unto thee.’ (Dan. iv. 23, in English 27.)”[[11]] A more striking instance of the spirit of the Talmud can hardly be found. Nebuchadnezzar was the benefactor of Daniel, and had elevated him from the situation of a captive to the first dignity of the empire; and Daniel had not refused, but voluntarily taken upon himself the duties and responsibilities of the king’s chief adviser. Under such circumstances, an ordinary reader of the Bible would imagine that Daniel was bound by every tie of gratitude to his benefactor, of duty and fidelity to his sovereign, to give him the best advice in his power. No, says the Talmud. If the man be an idolater, gratitude, duty, and fidelity are out of the question; and because Daniel exercised those godlike graces, he was punished. It appears, at all events, on the Talmud’s own showing, that Daniel was not a Talmudist. These extracts seem sufficient to prove, that the Talmud altogether excludes idolaters from all benefit of the command, “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” The system which makes it unlawful to save his life, to cure his sickness, to suckle his child, to help his wife in the hour of nature’s trial, or even to give him good advice, can scarcely be said to teach us to love all our fellow-men, without any regard to religious differences. It may, however, be said, that the passages adduced lead to this conclusion only by inference, and that none of them expressly declares that an idolater is not our neighbour. We shall, therefore, add a few passages where this is plainly taught.