alien eyes. As a matter of fact, this book had been translated into German by H. G. F. Löwe as early as 1837.

The hunger for "revelations" is constantly sharpened by the anti-Semitic parties, and the enormous circulation of such books as Rohling's "Talmudic Jew", Briman's (Justus) "Jewish Mirror”, Dinter's "Rays from the Talmud" proves that the attraction of these stale, endlessly repeated forgeries and distortions is imperishable.

That is why I made the Opinion of Nöldeke and Wünsche the groundwork of this book. Nobody will be brazen enough to challenge the integrity, impartiality, and competence of these world-famous scholars.

As this work was not planned as a controversial weapon, but as a book of information and reference for all those who are in quest of enlightenment - jurists, theologians, publicists the provisions of Canonical Law, the enunciations of the Church Fathers, and the maxims of Moral Theology are often quoted for comparative purposes.

Now and again I thought it appropriate to draw the attention of my readers to the question of how the religious commandments among Jews and Christians respectively are reflected in the conduct of life. There is no need to justify this comparison, odious as it may appear to many, in face of the anti-Jewish propaganda.

Thus the suggestion which Adolf Jellinek threw out in 1893 is carried out at last late, but not too late in this Hand

book of Jewish Apologetics.

CHAPTER I.

ARE THERE ANY SECRET LAWS IN JUDAISM?

I. The Church Fathers and the Jews.

A catch-phrase to which German Jew-baiters first gave currency, and which the agitators never tire of repeating with great emphasis at all their meetings in order to fill the hearts of the naive and the credulous with terror, may properly be made the subject of the first short chapter.

This is the out and out invention of the absolutely false charge that there exist secret laws in Judaism.

Ernest Schneider, formerly a member of the Austrian Parliament, at the sessions of that body and of the Diet of Lower Austria as well as at numerous election meetings, frequently played upon the changes of this catch-phrase of secret Jewish laws.

In pamphlets which were circulated in Berlin in 1892 by the hundreds of thousands, one could read:

It is in the Talmud which, until now, has been anxiously and by all conceivable means kept hidden from the world, that the dreadful secret of Judaism lies concealed.

Th. Fritsch has the effrontery to say:

What guilty consciences the Jews must have that they conceal their religious laws so anxiously from the world!

The Jews are actually a secret society with clandestine principles and purposes!

Dr. Arthur Dinter also repeatedly conceives new variations of the theme of secret Jewish laws.

It is true that there did exist at one time Christian sects of whom it is said that they imposed upon their adherents the stern obligation of guarding as a profound secret the tenets of the sect.

1 Bloch, Israel and the Nations.

Thus J. M. Mandernach (History of Priscillianism. Trier 1851, p. 13) writes:

The Priscillianists pretend that a law of theirs, in case of need, lays them under the obligation even to perjure themselves in order to conceal their doctrine. St. Augustine heard it himself from the mouths of former disciples of this sect.

Likewise St. Augustine, Epist. 237 ad Ceret. (Compare Mandernach ibid. p. 13):

They are said to have in their heresies an instruction to perjure themselves, if need be, in order to conceal their doctrine. Those who came to know them closely and who formerly belonged to them, but by God's mercy were rescued from among them, even remember the exact words of this instruction: 'Swear, swear falsely, but do not betray the secret!' Timotheus (cap. 19 in Coteliers Eccles. Graec. Monument. vol. III, p. 400 ff.) and John of Damascus (Works, ed. Lequien, vol. I, p. 89; compare also Ch. W. F. Walch, Sketch of a Complete History of Heresies... Leipsic 1766, vol. III, p. 518) write of the Massalians:

When asked about their doctrines, they deny them, curse everybody who accepts any such, and take an oath that they abhor them, because such a curse and false oath is no sin in one who took orders.

In Judaism such ideas could never become current. Notwithstanding this, Theodor Fritsch asserts:

In Sanhedrin 59a and Chagiga 13a it is taught that a Gentile who studies the Talmud, or a Jew who teaches a Gentile the Talmud deserves death.

To this, the late Geheimer Konsistorialrat Dr. Hermann L. Strack, then professor of Protestant Theology in the university of Berlin, replied in his book Secret Laws in Judaism, p. 8:

In Chagiga 13 ff., there are cosmogonic and theosophical speculations that were connected with the story of creation Genesis 1, and with the divine chariot Ezekiel I: of the four learned men who entered "Paradise", that is, plunged into such speculations, only Rabbi Akiba came out unscathed in faith and perceptive faculties. In this connection Rabbi Asi said (end of third century A. D.): "The secrets of the doctrine are only transmitted to him who possesses the five qualities enumerated in Isa. 3, 3!" And then he proceeds: "The Torah must never be transmitted to a Gentile; for it is said in Psalm 147, 20: 'He hath not dealt so with any nation; and as for his judgments, they have not known them'." An individual interpretation, then, and not the laying down of a penalty. In Sanhedrin 59a Rabbi Iochanan (second

half of the third century A. D.) says: "A Gentile who takes up the Torah, deserves death; for it is written in Deut. 33, 4: 'Moses commanded us a law, even the inheritance of the congregation of Jacob.' In the face of this unauthoritative interpretation a saying of Rabbi Meir's, transmitted in Baba Kamma 38a and Aboda Zara 3a, is brought to mind at once: How do we know, that a Gentile who takes up the Torah is equal to a high-priest? In Lev. 18, 5, it is written: 'Ye shall therefore keep my statutes, and my judgments: which if a man do, he shall live in them.' It does not say: Priests and Levites, and Israelites, but: man, ha-adam.” This sentence, by the way, is a conclusive refutation of the widely circulated falsehood, that the Gentiles, particularly the Christians, are not considered human beings in the Talmud. In Yalkut on Psalm 29 § 710 the following fundamental axiom is found:

The saying of the prophet (Isa. 48, 16): “I have not spoken in secret from the beginning", is explained by R. Ami as follows: "God says: From the beginning I did not bestow it (the Torah) in a place of darkness, nor in a place of concealment, nor in a place of shadow, but the Torah was bestowed on Israel in the desert, in fullest publicity, in no man's land. For, if the Torah had been bestowed in the land of Israel, they would have said: The peoples of the world have no share in it. That is why it was bestowed in no man's land, in the desert, in the open air, in order to tell you: Whoever desires to possess it may come and take it."

Likewise Mechilta Jithro on Exod. 19, 2:

The revelation was openly bestowed in the desert (that is, no man's land); for, if it had been bestowed in the land of Israel, the Israelites would have said: The other peoples have no share in it. That is why it was bestowed in the desert, in no man's land, openly; it belongs to the whole world, everybody is at liberty to acquire it." Maimonides answered a question of one of his disciples as follows:

It is permitted to teach the Christians (Nazarenes) the doctrines of the Torah; for they believe that this our Torah was revealed by God through our teacher Moses; it is completely set down in writing, although sometimes they expound it falsely, but so large a number among them deal righteously. Resp. Peer ha-Dor number 58.

This should be well known to all who are conversant with the subject.

In harmony with this Professor Weber says:

The Torah being the complete salvation as revealed by God was originally meant for the whole of mankind. This we find expressed in

the Pesikta, fol. 107 where it says that the Torah was given in the third month (Siwan) whose constellation is Gemini the twins. This in order to suggest that the Torah was given to both, to Jacob as well as Esau (the Gentiles) provided he did penance. That is why its revelation came about in a way perceptible to the whole of mankind. Jewish Theology according to the Talmud, 1897, p. 19.

A pamphlet (number 5) originating in Mecklenburg states: "It is written in Libre David, Whenever a Gentile asks a Jew for information about a passage in the rabbinical writings it is the duty of the Jew to expound it falsely; for if the Gentiles knew what we are teaching against them would not they kill us all?"

Libre David, of course, makes no sense; such a Hebrew word does not exist. Evidently is meant Dibre David. There are, it is true, three Hebrew books of this title; one of them printed in the 18th century in Amsterdam, the other two (of the 19th century) published in Leghorn and in Frankfort respectively. Strack obtained all the three books and declares briefly and to the point: there is nothing of the kind to be found in any of them.

The catchphrase of Secret Laws in Judaism or of secret traditions is a pure fabrication. We repeat in agreement with Strack: Within the whole of Judaism there is neither a publication nor an oval tradition inaccessible to learned Christians. The Jews neither try to conceal anything from the Christians, nor are they able to do so.

Even in remote times it was impossible to keep the Talmudic laws secret, because the first Apostles of the Church had themselves been trained in Talmudic schools.

One of the most important authorities in Mishna and Talmud was Gamaliel the elder, president of the Sanhedrin in the reign of Agrippa I. He was the author of a great many Talmudic laws of great significance (Yebamoth 116b; Erubin 41b; Rosh Hashana 23b; Pesachim 32a; Gittin 34b; Sanhedrin 11a; and in other passages).

The New Testament also mentions him.