Julius H. - Greenstone | Akateeminen Kirjakauppa

Hbessfafo IToea in Jewish JULIUS H. GREENSTONE, PH. D. PHILADELPHIA THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA 1906 COPYRIGHT, 1906, BT THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SoaErr OF AMERICA. TO THE MEMORY OP MY MOTHER PREFACE That Judaism has dogmas, has been estab lished convincingly by Dr. S. Schechter in his admirable essay on this subject. The prevailing tendency of modern Jews to re peat, from pulpit and from platform, the assertion made by Mendelssohn, that Juda ism has no dogmas, is rightly condemned in this essay, in which the author proves from the vast stores of Jewish lore, that dogma played as important a part in the develop ment of Jewish institutions as did the Law, that Judaism regulates not only our ac tions, but also our thoughts. And yet the position of dogma in the Jewish religion is not the same as that which it occupies in other creeds. The Jewish dogmas are not only devoid of any saving power, not only has their exact number and relative importance never been definitely set tled, but even the constructions placed upon 8 PREFACE them have varied from time to time, and they have frequently contradicted each other. Fortunately for the development of Judaism, though not for the historian of Jewish the ology, the Jewish principles of belief have never been definitely settled, nor have their limits been definitely described. No Jewish synods, except those of very recent date, ever attempted to set limits to the dogmas of our faith, and even the thirteen articles of the creed of Maimonides, which have been ac cepted by the majority of Jews and incor porated in the Prayer-Book, were left in their bare outlines, allowing much latitude for various schools of interpreters. The belief inthe coming of the Messiah, the treasured hope of the Jew throughout all the centuries of misery and persecution, is regarded by most Jewish thinkers as a dog ma of Judaism. Some of them, indeed, would not make this belief essential to Juda ism. They consider it merely as a branch or corollary to others more important, but PREFACE 9 almost all agree that the belief in the coming of a Messiah is an important feature of Judaism. The nature and limitations of this dogma, however, remained unsettled, the Jewish authorities differing widely in their conception of it, according to the intellectual and material position of the people at their respective times. It is the object of the present volume to trace the development of this ideal from its early origins to the present day, to elucidate the influences it exerted upon the lives and habits of the Jews, and to explain the causes by which it, in turn, was influenced, giving in outline the historical conditions of every period. It does not pretend to be an ex haustive study of the subject, but a mere out line of the marvellous development of this hope in the Jewish heart. Less space has been devoted to the pre-Christian period than its importance demands, since that period has been sufficiently explored by many Chris tian scholars, to whom I hereby acknowledge 10 PREFACE my indebtedness for many valuable sugges tions. I have paid special attention to the Talmudic and Midrashic sources, to the works of the Jewish philosophers of the middle ages, and to the Kabbalistic writings, and have endeavored, whenever possible, to consult the original sources and translate them faithfully. The material was prepared by me during the winter of 1903-4, andthen incorporated in a course of lectures which were delivered before the Young Mens Hebrew Associa tion of Philadelphia. Since then I have made numerous changes in the work, the result of further study and investigation on the subject. I aim to give due credit to the authorities I have consulted, in notes at the end of the book, which may prove useful to he student for further investigation. In conclusion, I wish to express my grati tude to Mrs. D. W. Amram, who greatly as sisted me in the revision of the style and the arrangement of the material...