Jewish Theology Part 14

8. In this manner the ancient sacrificial cult, thus long monopolized by the priesthood, was gradually superseded by congregational prayer which was no longer confined to a certain time or cla.s.s, and justly called by the rabbis "a service of the heart."(845) Moreover, the Temple itself lost much of its hold upon the hearts of the people, owing to the more spiritual character of the Synagogue. Thus the torch of the Roman soldiery which turned the Temple into a heap of ashes broke only the national bond, but left the religious bond of the Synagogue unbroken. True, the hope for the restoration of the Temple with the priestly sacrifices was not relinquished, and officially the daily prayers were considered only a "temporary subst.i.tute" for the divinely ordained sacrificial cult.(846)

Nevertheless, the deeper religious consciousness of the people felt that the celestial gate of divine mercy opens only to prayer, which emanates from the innermost depths of the soul. Accordingly, some of the Haggadists try to prove from Scripture that prayer ranks above sacrifice,(847) while others even identify wors.h.i.+p with prayer.(848) They represent G.o.d as appearing to Moses in the guise of one who leads the congregation in prayer, His face covered by the prayer-shawl (_tallith_), in order to teach man for all time the mode and power of prayer.(849) Still these remain isolated expressions of an underlying sentiment; on the whole, the rabbis regarded the Mosaic legislation, with its emphasis on sacrifice, far too highly to accord prayer any but a secondary place, either accompanying sacrifice or as its subst.i.tute.(850)

9. Through many centuries, then, the belief in the divine origin of the sacrificial cult remained, even though it could no longer be carried out.

The liturgy contained prayers for the speedy restoration of the Temple and the sacrifices, which were preserved by tradition, and nowhere was even an echo heard of the bold words of Jeremiah denying the divine character of the sacrifices,(851) even though the idea of the restoration of the old cult must have been repugnant to thinkers. The sages of former ages could only resort to a compromise or an allegorical interpretation. It is noteworthy that the Haggadist Rabbi Levi considered the sacrifices a concession of G.o.d to the people, who were disposed to idolatry, in order to win them gradually for the pure monotheistic ideal.(852) This view was adopted by the Church Fathers, and later by Maimonides and other medieval thinkers. On the other hand, an allegorical meaning was a.s.signed to the sacrifices by Philo and Jehuda ha Levi, as well as by Samson Raphael Hirsch in modern times.(853)

Reform Judaism, recognizing the results of Biblical research and the law of religious progress, adopted the prophetic view of the sacrifices.

Accordingly, the sacrificial cult of the Mosaic code has no validity for the liberal movement, and all reference to it has been eliminated from the reform liturgy. In this, however, the connection with the past was by no means severed. The main part of the service remains the same, although much of the character and many of the details have been changed.(854) Only the allusions to the Temple wors.h.i.+p and the sacrifices were eliminated, and the entire form of the service was made more solemn and inspiring "by combining ancient time-honored formulas with modern prayers and meditations in the vernacular and in the spirit of the age." The morning and evening services retained their places, while the additional festal service (_mussaf_) was abrogated, because it stood for the additional festal sacrifice. As to the voluntary element in the old sacrificial system, the peace, sin, and thank-offerings, this is replaced in the reform ritual, as in the traditional practice, by private devotions for special occasions, to be selected by the individual.

The traditional Jewish prayer has certainly a wondrous force. It remains a source of inspiration from which the religious consciousness will ever draw new strength and vitality. It echoes the voice of Israel singing the song of redemption by the Red Sea: "This is My G.o.d, and I will glorify Him; My father's G.o.d, and I will exalt Him."(855) Consequently our liturgy must ever respond to a double demand; it must throb with the spirit of continuity with our great past, to make us feel one with our fathers of yore; and it must express clearly and fully our own views and needs, our convictions and our hopes.

Chapter XLII. The Nature and Purpose of Prayer

1. Prayer is the expression of man's longing and yearning for G.o.d in times of dire need and of overflowing joy, an outflow of the emotions of the soul in its dependence on G.o.d, the ever-present Helper, the eternal Source of its existence. Springing from the deepest necessity of human weakness, the expression of a momentary wish, prayer is felt to be the proud prerogative of man as the child of G.o.d, and at last it becomes adoration of the Most High, whose wisdom and whose paternal love and goodness inspire man with confidence and love.

2. Every prayer is offered on the presumption that it will be heard by G.o.d on high. "O Thou that hearest prayer, unto Thee doth all flesh come,"

sings the Psalmist.(856) No doubt of the efficacy of prayer can arise in the devout spirit. There can be only the question whether, and how far, the Deity can allow its decrees to be influenced by human wishes.

Childlike faith antic.i.p.ates divine interference in the natural order at any time, because it has not yet attained the conception of a moral order in the universe and, therefore, expects from prayer also miraculous effects on life. As the Deity can suddenly send or withhold rain or drought, barrenness or birth, life or death, so the inference is that the man of G.o.d can do the same with his prayer. This is the point of view of the Biblical and Talmudic periods, as well as of the entire ancient world.

It seems almost childish to our religious consciousness when, according to Talmudic tradition, the high priest pet.i.tioned G.o.d in the Sanctuary on the Day of Atonement for a year rich in rain and blessed with suns.h.i.+ne and with dew, and at the same time expressed the entreaty that the prayers of travelers for dry or cool weather should find no hearing.(857) That the prayers of the pious may alter G.o.d's decree is not doubted for a moment by the rabbis; only they insist that G.o.d has taken into account beforehand the efficacy of this prayer in deciding the fate of the pious, in order that they may pet.i.tion for that which He actually plans to do. "G.o.d longs for the prayer of the pious"; for that reason, they say, the Mothers of Israel were afflicted with barrenness, until the prayers of the Patriarchs had accomplished the transformation in their const.i.tutions.(858) On the other hand, the rabbis warn against excessive pondering over prayer and its efficacy, as through it that childlike faith would be weakened, which is the basis of all prayer.(859)

3. According to the rabbinic viewpoint, prayer has the power to reverse every heavenly decree, inasmuch as it appeals from the punitive justice of G.o.d, which has decided thus, to His attributes of grace and mercy, which can at any time effect a change. When the prophet Isaiah came to King Hezekiah with the message: "Set thine house in order, for thou shalt die,"

he replied, "Finish thy message and go; I have received the tradition from my royal ancestor David that, even when the sword already touches the neck, man shall not desist from an appeal to the divine mercy."(860) Nay more, the rabbis believed that G.o.d Himself prays, saying, "Oh, that My mercy shall prevail over My justice!"(861) Only after the divine judgment has been executed prayer becomes vain. In general, the entire Talmudic period ascribed miraculous power to prayer, especially the prayers of the pious, like the popular saint Onias or Hanina ben Dosa.(862) In many such cases the invocation of G.o.d was combined with the use of the sacred name, the tetragrammaton, to which magical powers were ascribed.(863)

4. The two attributes of G.o.d, Justice and Mercy, correspond to the double nature of mankind, as the sinful man, who deserves punishment, is called to account by the former, while the righteous man may appeal to the latter. Accordingly, the efficacy of prayer could be so explained that, before it can influence the decision of G.o.d, it demands the reformation of man. While the unregenerate man meets an evil destiny, the reformed man has become a different being, and hence instead of justice mercy will control his fate. Albo pleads for this view of prayer, when he cites the Talmudic incident about R. Meir. It is said that R. Meir interceded for the people of Mimla, who all seemed to have been doomed to die on attaining manhood because they inherited the curse of the priestly family of Eli.(864) But he also recommended to them that they should devote their lives to worthy deeds, as it is said in the Proverbs:(865) "The h.o.a.ry head is a crown of glory, it is found in the way of righteousness."(866)

Other thinkers ascribe to prayer the power to change the fate determined by the stars, because it exalts man into a higher sphere of G.o.dliness, exactly like the spirit of prophecy. Of course, this conception is connected with the belief in astrology, which swayed even clear thinkers like Ibn Ezra.(867)

5. According to our modern thinking there can be no question of any influence upon a Deity exalted above time and s.p.a.ce, omniscient, unchangeable in will and action, by the prayer of mortals. Prayer can exert power only over the relation of man to G.o.d, not over G.o.d Himself.

This indicates the nature and purpose of prayer. Man often feels lonely and forlorn in a world which overpowers him, to which he feels superior, and yet which he cannot master. Therefore he longs for that unseen Spirit of the universe, with whom alone he feels himself akin, and in whom alone he finds peace and bliss amid life's struggle and unrest. This longing is both expressed and satisfied in prayer. Following the natural impulse of his soul, man must pour out before his G.o.d all his desires and sighs, all the emotions of grief and delight which sway his heart, in order that he may find rest, like a child at its mother's bosom. Therefore the childlike mind believes that G.o.d can be induced to come down from His heavenly heights to offer help, and that He can be moved and influenced in human fas.h.i.+on. The truth is that every genuine prayer lifts man up toward G.o.d, satisfies the desire for His hallowing presence, unlocks the heavenly gate of mercy and bliss, and bestows upon man the beatific and liberating sense of being a child of G.o.d. The intellect may question the effect of prayer upon the physical, mental, or social const.i.tution of man, or may declare prayer to be pious self-deception. The religious spirit experiences in prayer the soaring up of the soul toward union with G.o.d in consecrated moments of our mortal pilgrimage. This is no deception. The man who prays receives from the G.o.dhead, toward whom he fervently lifts himself, the power to defy fate, to conquer sin, misery, and death. "The Lord is nigh to all them that call upon Him, to all that call upon Him in truth."(868)

6. To pray, then, is to look up to G.o.d and to pour out before Him one's wishes, thoughts, sorrows, and joys. Certainly the All-knowing does not require to be told by us what we desire or what we need. "For there is not a word in my tongue, but lo, O Lord, Thou knowest it altogether."(869) But we mortals merely aspire toward Him who bears the world on His eternal arms, to express in His presence our agony and our jubilation, because we are certain of His paternal sympathy. When we praise and extol Him for the happiness and the many pleasures which He has granted us, He becomes the Partaker and Protector of our fortune, just as He is our sympathetic Helper when we cry out to Him under the burden of sin or grief, in the anxiety of danger or of guilt. Every genuine prayer realizes deeply the truth of the words, "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He will sustain thee."(870)

7. Self-expression before G.o.d in prayer has thus a double effect; it strengthens faith in G.o.d's love and kindness, as well as in His all-wise and all-bountiful prescience. But it also chastens the desires and feelings of man, teaching him to banish from his heart all thoughts of self-seeking and sin, and to raise himself toward the purity and the freedom of the divine will and demand. The essence of every prayer of supplication is that one should be in unison with the divine will, to sum up all the wishes of the heart in the one phrase, "Do that which is good in Thine own eyes, O Lord."(871) On the other hand, only the prayer which avoids impure thoughts and motives can venture to approach a holy G.o.d, as the sages infer from the words of Job, "There is no violence in my hands, and my prayer is pure."(872)

8. Every prayer, teach the sages, should begin with the praise of G.o.d's greatness, wisdom, and goodness, in order that man should learn submission and implicit confidence before he proffers his requests.(873) While looking up to the divine Ideal of holiness and perfection, he will strive to emulate Him, and seek to grow ever nearer to the holy and the perfect.

But only when he prays with and for others, that is, in public wors.h.i.+p, will he realize that he is a member of a greater whole, for then he prays only for that which advances the welfare of all. "He who prays with the community," say the rabbis, "will have his prayer granted."(874)

Another saying of theirs is that he who prays should have his face directed to the sanctuary, and when he stands on its sacred precincts, he should turn his face toward the Holy of Holies.(875) By this they meant that the att.i.tude of the suppliant should ever be toward the highest, making the soul soar up to the Highest and Holiest in reverent awe and adoration, transforming the wors.h.i.+per into a new character, pure from all dross.

9. Therefore prayer offered with the community upon the sanctified ground of the house of G.o.d exerts a specially powerful influence upon the individual. In the silent chamber the oppressed spirit may find calm and composure in prayer; but the pure atmosphere of heavenly freedom and bliss is attained with overwhelming might only by the united wors.h.i.+p of hundreds of devout adorers, which rings out like the roaring of majestic billows: "The Lord is in His holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before Him."(876) The familiar strains from days of yore touch the deep, long-silent chords of the heart, and awaken dormant sentiments and repressed thoughts, endowing the soul with new wings, to lift itself up toward G.o.d, the Father, from whom it had felt itself alienated. In the ardor of communal wors.h.i.+p the traditional words of the prayer-book obtain invigorating power; the heart is newly strengthened; the covenant with heaven sealed anew. To such communal prayer, which springs from the heart, the rabbis refer the Biblical words, "to serve Him with the whole heart."(877) The synagogal wors.h.i.+p exerts an enn.o.bling influence upon the spirit of the individual as well as that of the community. For after all the main object is that the soul which aspires toward G.o.d may learn to find G.o.d. "Seek ye the Lord while He may be found; call ye upon Him while He is near."(878) No man is so poor as he who calls in agony: "O G.o.d!" and to whom neither the heaven above nor the heart within answers, "Behold, G.o.d is here." Nor is any man so rich with all his possessions as he who realizes, like the Psalmist, that "the nearness of G.o.d is the true good,"

and imbued with this thought exclaims, "Whom have I in heaven but Thee?

And beside Thee I desire none upon earth."(879)

Chapter XLIII. Death and the Future Life

1. The vision of man is directed upwards and forwards; he will not resign himself to decay in the dust like the beast. As he bears in his breast the consciousness of a higher divine world, he is equally confident of his own continuity after death. He cannot and will not believe that with the giving up of his last living breath his being would become dust like that of the animal; or that his soul, which has. .h.i.therto accomplished and planned so much, should now suddenly cease altogether to exist. The longing for a future life, however expressed, has filled him and buoyed him up since the very beginning of history. Even the most primitive tribe does not allow its dead to lie and rot like the carca.s.ses of the beast, but lays them to rest in the grave with all their possessions, in the expectation that somewhere and somehow, under, over or beyond the earth, they will continue their lives, even in a better form than before.

This longing for immortality implanted in the human soul is so represented in the legend of Paradise that the tree whose fruit bestowed upon the celestial beings the gift of eternal life-like the Greek ambrosia, "the food of the G.o.ds"-was originally intended for mankind also in the divine "Garden of Bliss." But after man fell through sin, all access to it was denied him, in order that he might not stretch out his hand for it and thereby attain that immortality which was vouchsafed only to divine beings.(880) According to his original destiny, therefore, man should live forever; and, just as legend allows those divinely elected, like Enoch and Elijah,(881) to ascend to heaven alive, so at a later period prophecy predicts a time when G.o.d will annihilate death forever.(882) Accordingly, through the power of his divine soul man possesses a claim to immortality, to eternal life with G.o.d, the "Fountain of life."

2. It was just this keen longing for an energetic life on earth, this mighty yearning to "walk before G.o.d in the land of the living,"(883) which made it more difficult for Judaism to brighten the "valley of the shadow of death" and to elevate the vague notion of a shadowy existence in the hereafter into a special religious teaching. Until long after the Exile the Jewish people shared the view of the entire ancient world,-both the Semitic nations, such as the Babylonians and Phnicians, and the Aryans, such as the Greeks and Romans,-that the dead continue to exist in the shadowy realm of the nether world (_Sheol_), the land of no return (_Beliyaal_),(884) of eternal silence (_Dumah_), and oblivion (_Nes.h.i.+yah_),(885) a dull, ghostly existence without clear consciousness and without any awakening to a better life. We must, however, not overlook the fact that even in these most primitive conceptions a certain imperishability is ascribed to man as marking his superiority over the animal world, which is altogether abandoned to decay. Hence the belief in the existence of the shades, the _Refaim_ in Sheol.(886) But throughout the Biblical period no ethical idea yet permeated this conception, and no attempt was made to transform the nether world into a place of divine judgment, of recompense for the good and evil deeds accomplished on earth,(887) as did the Babylonians and Egyptians. Both the prophets and the Mosaic code persist in applying their promises and threats, in fact, their entire view of retribution, to this world, nor do they indicate by a single word the belief in a judgment or a weighing of actions in the world to come.

3. Whether the Mosaic-prophetic writings be regarded from the standpoint of traditional faith or of historical criticism, the limitation of their teaching and exhortation to the present life can be considered narrowness only by biased expounders of the "Old Testament." The Israelitish lawgiver could not have been altogether ignorant of the Egyptian or the Babylonian conceptions of the future world. Obviously Israel's prophets and lawgivers deliberately avoided giving any definite expression to the common belief in a future life after death, especially as the Canaanitish magicians and necromancers used this popular belief to carry on their superst.i.tious practices, so dangerous to all moral progress.(888) The great task which prophetic Judaism set itself was to place the entire life of men and nations in the service of the G.o.d of justice and holiness; there was thus no motive to extend the dominion of JHVH, the G.o.d of life, to the underworld, the playground of the forces of fear and superst.i.tion. As late as the author of the book of Job and of the earlier Psalms, Sheol was known as the despot of the nether world with its demoniacal forms, as the "king of terrors" who extends his scepter over the dead.(889) Only gradually does the thought find expression in the Psalms that the Omnipotent Ruler of heaven could also rescue the soul out of the power of Sheol,(890) and that His omnipresence included likewise the nether world.(891) In this trustful spirit the Hasidic Psalmist expressed the hope: "Thou wilt not abandon my soul to Sheol, neither wilt Thou suffer Thy G.o.dly one to see the pit. Thou makest me to know the path of life; in Thy presence is fulness of joy; in Thy right hand bliss forevermore."(892)

4. Biblical Judaism evinced such a powerful impetus toward a complete and blissful life with G.o.d, that the center and purpose of existence could not be transferred to the hereafter, as in other systems of belief, but was found in the desire to work out the life here on earth to its fullest possible development. Virtue and wisdom, righteousness and piety, signify and secure true life; vice and folly, iniquity and sin, lead to death and annihilation. This is the ever recurring burden of the popular as well as of the prophetic and priestly wisdom of Israel.(893) In the song of thanks of King Hezekiah after his recovery, the Jewish soul expresses itself, when he says:(894) "I said, I shall not see the Lord, even the Lord in the land of the living.... But Thou hast delivered my soul from the pit of corruption. For the nether world cannot praise Thee; death cannot celebrate Thee. The living, the living, he shall praise Thee, as I do this day. The father to the children shall make known Thy truth." Therefore the author of the seventy-third Psalm, enn.o.bled by trials, finds sufficient comfort and happiness in the presence of G.o.d that he can spurn all earthly treasures.(895) Job, too, in his affliction longed for death as release from all earthly pain and sorrow, but not to bring him a state of rest and peace like the Nirvana of the Indian beggar-monk, or an outlook into a better world to come. Such an awakening to a new life seems to him unthinkable,-although many commentators have often endeavored to read such a hope into certain of his expressions.(896) Instead, his belief in G.o.d as the Ruler of the infinite world, with His lofty moral purpose far outreaching all human wisdom, lent him courage and power for further effort and persistent striving on earth. Since to this suffering hero, impelled to deeds by his own energy, life is a continuous battle, a hereafter as a "world of reward and punishment" can hardly solve the great enigma of human existence in a satisfactory manner for him. The wise ones-says a Talmudic maxim-find rest neither in this world nor in the world to come, but "they shall ascend from strength to strength, until they appear before G.o.d on Zion."(897)

5. In the course of time, however, the question of existence after death demanded more and more a satisfactory answer. Under the severe political and social oppression that came upon the Jewish people, the pious ones failed to see a just equation of man's doings and his destiny in this life. The bitter disappointment which they experienced made them look to the G.o.d of justice for a future, when virtue would receive its due reward and vice its befitting punishment. The community of the pious especially awaited in vain the realization of the great messianic hope with which the prophetic words of comfort had filled their hearts. They had willingly offered up their lives for the truth of Judaism, and the G.o.d of faithfulness could not deceive them. Surely the shadowy realm of the nether world could not be the end of all. So the voice of promise came to them from the book of Isaiah, where these encouraging and comforting words were inserted by a later hand: "Thy dead shall live; thy (My) dead bodies shall arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in the dust, for Thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast forth the shades."(898) Even before this time the G.o.d of Israel had been praised as "He who killeth and maketh alive, who bringeth down to Sheol, and bringeth up."(899) So was also the miraculous power of restoring the dead to life ascribed to the prophets.(900) Furthermore, the vision of the prophet Ezekiel concerning the dry bones which arose to new life, in which he beheld the divine revelation of the approaching event of the restoration of the Jewish nation,(901) shows how familiar the idea of resurrection must have been to the people. Hence the minds of the Jewish people were sufficiently prepared to adopt the Persian belief in the resurrection of the dead.

6. This, however, led to a tremendous process of transformation in Judaism with a wide chasm between Mosaism and Rabbinism, or, more accurately, between the Sadducees, who adhered to the letter of the law, and the Pharisees, who embodied the progressive spirit of the people. On the one hand, Jesus ben Sira, who at the close of his book speaks with great admiration of the high-priest Simon the Just as his contemporary, knew as yet nothing of a future life, and like Koheleth saw the end of all human existence in the dismal realm of the nether world. Yet at the same time, the Hasidim or pious ones and their successors, the Pharisees, were developing after the Persian pattern the thought of a divine judgment day after death, when the just were to awaken to eternal life, and the evil-doers to shame and everlasting contempt.(902) This advanced moral view, frequently overlooked, transformed the ancient Semitic Sheol from the realm of shades to a place of punishment for sinners, and thus invested it with an ethical purpose.(903) After this the various Biblical names for the nether world became the various divisions of h.e.l.l.(904) Indeed, the Psalmists and the Proverbs had announced to the wicked their destruction in Sheol, and on the other hand held out for the G.o.dly the hope of deliverance from Sheol and a beatific sight of G.o.d in the land of the living. Thus the transition was prepared for the new world-conception.

All the promises and threats of the law and the prophets, when they did not receive fulfillment in this world, appeared now to point forward to the world to come. Moreover, the Pharisees in their disputes with the Sadducees made use of every reference, however slight, to the future life,-even of such pa.s.sages as those which speak of the Patriarchs as receiving the promise of possessing the Holy Land, as if they were still alive,-as proofs of the continued life of the dead, or of their resurrection.(905) Thus it came about that the leading authorities of rabbinic Judaism were in the position to declare in the Mishnah: "He who says that the belief in the resurrection of the dead is not founded on the Torah (and therefore does not accept it) shall have no share in the world to come."(906)

7. The founders of the liturgy of the Synagogue, in opposition to the Sadducees, formulated therefore the belief in resurrection in the second of the "Eighteen (or Seven) Benedictions" of the daily prayer in the following words: "Thou, O Lord, art mighty forever. Thou revivest the dead. Thou art mighty to save. Thou sustainest the living with loving-kindness, revivest the dead with great mercy, supportest the falling, healest the sick, loosest the bound, and keepest Thy faith to them that sleep in the dust. (This refers to the Patriarchs, to whom G.o.d has promised the land of the future.) Who is like unto Thee, O Lord of mighty acts, and who resembleth Thee, O King, who killest and bringest to life, and causest salvation to spring forth? Yea, faithful art Thou to revive the dead. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who revivest the dead." In this prayer dating from the age of the Maccabees(907) the Jewish consciousness of two thousand years found a twofold hope,-the national and the universally human. The national hope, which combined the belief in the restoration of the kingdom of David and of the sacrificial cult with the resurrection of the dead in the Holy Land, can be understood only in connection with a historic view of Israel's place in the world, and is treated in the third part of this book. The purely human hope for the continuity or the renewal of life rests on two fundamental problems which must be examined more closely in the next two chapters. The one belongs to the province of psychology and considers the question: What is the eternal divine element in man? The other goes more deeply into the religious and moral nature of man and considers the question: Where and how does divine retribution-reward or punishment-take place in human life? To both of these questions our modern view, with its special aim toward a unified grasp of the totality of life, requires a special answer. This can be neither that of rabbinic Judaism, which rests upon Persian dualism, nor that of medieval philosophy, which was under the Platonic-Aristotelian influence.

Chapter XLIV. The Immortal Soul of Man

1. The idea of immortality has been found in Scripture in a rather obscure and probably corrupt pa.s.sage,(908) "In the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death." In the same spirit Aquila, the Bible translator, who belonged to the school of R. Eliezer and R.

Joshua, renders the equally obscure pa.s.sage from the Psalms,(909) "He will lead us to immortality," reading _al maveth_, the Al with _Alef_, for _al muth_, the Al with _Ayin_. There is more solid foundation for the view that the verse, "G.o.d created man in His own image" implies that there is an imperishable divine essence in man. In fact, that which distinguishes man from the animal as well as from the rest of creation, both the starry worlds above and the manifold forms of life on earth about him, is his self-conscious personality, his ego, through which he feels himself akin with G.o.d, the great world-ruling _I Am_. This self-conscious part of man, which lends to his every manifestation its value and purpose, can no more disappear into nothingness than can G.o.d, who called into existence this world with all its phenomena, who set it in motion and directs it.

Whatever thought the crudest of men may have of his ego, his self,(910) or however the most learned scholar may explain the marvelous action and interaction of physical and psychical or spiritual forces which culminates in his own self-conscious personality, it appears certain that this ego cannot cease to be with the cessation of the bodily functions. There is in us something divine, immortal, and the only question is wherein it may be found.

2. The creation of man which is described in the Bible in the words, "G.o.d formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul"(911) corresponds to the child-like conceptions of a primitive people. On the other hand, Scripture speaks of death in parallel terms, "The dust returneth to the earth as it was, and the spirit (Ruah, the life-giving breath) returneth unto G.o.d who gave it."(912)

The conception that the soul enters into man as the breath of life and leaves him at his death, flying toward heaven like a bird,(913) is quite as ancient and as universal as the other, that the soul descends into the nether world as a shadowy image of the body, there to continue a dull existence. The two are related to one another, and in the Bible, as well as in the literature of other peoples, they have given rise to diverse definitions of the soul. This was the point of departure for the development of the conception of immortality in one or the other direction, according to whether the body was considered a part of the personality which somehow survives after death, or only the spiritual substance of the soul was thought to live on in celestial regions as something divine. The former led to the theory of the resurrection of the body and its reunion with the soul; the latter to the belief in a future life for the soul, after it had been separated or released from the body.

3. When once the soul was felt to be a "lamp of the Lord," filling the body with light when man is awake,(914) it was easy to imagine that the soul had escaped and temporarily returned to G.o.d in sleep. This induced the teachers of the Synagogue to prescribe a morning prayer of thanks which reads, "Blessed art Thou, O G.o.d, who restorest the souls unto dead bodies."(915) The conception underlying this prayer throws light upon the entire belief in resurrection. Death to the pious is only a prolonged sleep. On that account the prophet in the pa.s.sage from Isaiah already referred to, as well as the Hasidic author of the Book of Daniel,(916) could express the hope that "those who sleep in the dust shall awake." As at every awakening from sleep in the morning, so at the great awakening in the future, the souls which have departed in death shall return again to their bodies. These bodies could then hardly be conceived of as subject to decomposition, and the picture in Ezekiel's vision of resurrection(917) had to be accepted as fact. Still R. Simeon b. Yohai in the especially instructive thirty-fourth chapter of Pirke de R. Eliezer a.s.sumes the complete disintegration of the body, in order to render the miracle of resurrection so much the greater. Later still arose the legend of an indestructible bone of the spinal column, called _Luz_, which was to form the nucleus for the revival of the whole body.(918) The name Luz, which denotes an almond tree and is the name given in the Bible to a city also,(919) seemed to point to a connection with two legends, a fabulous city into which death could not enter,(920) and the tree of resurrection in the Osiris cycle.(921)

4. Still, no clear, consistent view of the soul prevailed as yet in the rabbinic age. The popular belief, influenced by Persian notions, was that the soul lingers near the body for a certain time after it has relinquished it, either from three to seven days or for an entire year.(922) Furthermore it was said that after death the souls hovered between heaven and earth in the form of ghosts, able to overhear the secrets of the future decreed above and to betray them to human beings below. In fact, the rabbis of the Talmud, especially the Hasidim, never hesitated to accept these ghost stories.(923) Some sages of the Talmudic period taught that the souls of the righteous ascend to heaven, there to dwell under the throne of the divine majesty, awaiting the time of the renewal of the world, while the souls of the G.o.dless hovered over the horizon of the earth as restless demoniacal spirits, finally to succ.u.mb to the fate of annihilation, after they had been cast down into the fiery pit of Gehenna or Sheol.(924) Of course, this view, which prevails in both the Talmud and the New Testament, according to which the souls of the wicked are to be consumed in the fire of Gehenna, is inconsistent with the conception of the purely spiritual nature of the soul.

Nevertheless at this same epoch we find the higher idea expressed that the soul is an invisible, G.o.d-like essence, pervading the body as a spiritual force and differing from it in nature in much the same way as G.o.d is differentiated from the world.(925) "Thou wishest to know where G.o.d dwells, who is as high as are the heavens above the earth; tell me then where dwells thy soul, which is so near," replied R. Gamaliel to a heathen.(926) The prevailing view of the schools is that G.o.d implants the soul in the embryo while in the mother's womb, together with all the spiritual potentialities which make it human. In fact, R. Simlai, the third-century Haggadist, advances the Platonic conception of the preexistence of the soul, as a being of the highest intelligence, which sees before birth all things throughout the world, but forgets all at birth, so that all subsequent learning is only a recollection.(927) In h.e.l.lenistic Judaism especially the doctrine seems to have been general of the preexistence of the soul, or of the creation of all human souls simultaneously with the creation of the world.(928) Of course, the soul which emanates from a higher world must be eternal.

5. The first clear idea of the nature of the soul came with the philosophically trained thinkers, who were dependent either on Plato, main founder of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, or on Aristotle, who ascribes immortality only to the creative spirit of G.o.d, the supreme Intelligence as a cosmic power. The nearest approach to Plato was Philo,(929) who saw in the three Biblical names for the soul, _nefesh_, _ruah_, and _neshama_, the three souls of the Platonic system,-the sensuous soul, which has its seat in the abdomen; the courageous or emotional soul, situated in the breast; and the intellectual soul, which dwells in the brain and contains the imperishable divine nature. This last is kept in its physical environment as in a prison or a grave, and ever yearns for liberation and reunion with G.o.d. The soul of the righteous enters the world of angels after death; that of the wicked the world of demons.

Saadia, who was under the influence of Aristotle interpreted from the neo-Platonic viewpoint, did not share the Platonic dualism of matter and spirit, nor did he divide the soul into three parts, seated in various parts of the human body. He finds the soul to be a spiritual substance created simultaneously with the body, and uniting the three forces of the soul distinguished in Scripture into one inseparable whole, the seat of which is in the heart,-wherefore soul and heart are often synonymous in the Bible. This indivisible substance possesses a luminous nature like that of the spheres, but is simpler, finer, and purer than they, and endowed with the power of thought. It was created by G.o.d out of the primal ether from which He made the angels, simultaneously with the body and within it. By this union it was qualified to display that moral activity prescribed for it in the divine teaching, the neglect of which would defile and tarnish it. According to Saadia some kind of material substance adheres to the soul as well as to the angels, and on that account he does not hesitate to accept the Talmudic expressions about the abode of the soul after death, or the last judgment which is to take place as soon as the appointed number of souls shall have made their entrance into their earthly bodies, when the souls of the righteous will have their angelic nature recognized, and those of the wicked will have their lower character revealed. However, Saadia combats with so much greater fervor the Hindu teaching of metempsychosis, which had been adopted by Plato and Pythagoras.(930)

Bahya connects his theory with the three souls of Plato, and likewise ascribes to the soul an ethereal essence.(931) He holds that its destiny is to raise itself to the order of the angels through self-purification, and finally to return to G.o.d as the divine Source of light. To this end the intellectual soul, which has its being from the primal light, must overcome the lower sensuous soul which leads to sin.

6. The conception that the soul is a substance derived from the luminous primal matter, like the heavenly spheres and the angels, was now persistently retained by the Jewish thinkers, who explained thereby its immortality. In adopting the Aristotelian theory that the soul is the form-principle of the body, the Platonic doctrine of its preexistence was gradually relinquished, and its existence ascribed to a creative act of G.o.d at the birth of the child or at its conception. But Jehuda ha-Levi, the most pious of all the philosophers, emphasized vigorously the indivisibility of the soul, its incorporeality and its reality apart from the condition of the body, and-in opposition to the Aristotelian free-thinkers, who expected the human soul to be absorbed into the divine soul, the active intellect,-he declared the immortality of the individual a fundamental article of faith.(932)