TACK MHEX 5 072 SO J A DISCOURSE DELIVERED AT THE MICKVEH ISRAEL SYNAGOGUE Sabbath Emor; lyar 20th, 5653 May 6th, 1893. BY s. gioti al \PUBL1SHED BY SPECIAL REQUEST. Priests and Prophets. A DISCOURSE BY DR. MORAIS. Ill the course of my life, it lias doubtless happened more than once that I have been shown writings which grieved me by reason of open or covert attacks upon the religion of Israel. But I cannot remember just now an occasion on which I was so mortified as when I read the installation sermon of the newly-chosen associate rabbi in Philadelphia. Pained because of his assault upon ancestral Judaism, I did not know whether to weep over the degeneracy of the American rabbinate, or over the defection of men and women who claim to congregate as Israelites, but who listen approvingly to the aspersions cast upon tenets and ordinances which Israelites revere. A prophet would not scruple to call such " an unwise and unthinking people, who have eyes but see not, have ears but hear not." (Jer. v. 21.) A host of inconsistencies is set in array in their presence with an undisguised resolve to strike the ancient faith to death, and those reared in that faith applaud. The clergyman who succeeded so well in gaining the approval of his hearers stands, per- haps, unparalleled in the history of even "Radicalism." Attend : Aaron, always looked upon as subordinate to the directions of his younger brother, whom the civilized world all over has been taught to believe God-inspired, is represented in the pulpit effusion to which I have refer- ence, as the prototype of an oppressive autocracy the caste of priests bent upon enriching itself with tithes imposed on the credulous; on growing fat with the choice flesh of rams and he-goats. For, according to this novel school of the Philadelphia rabbinate, Aaron personifies 209:5851 2 the creation of a soul-debasing ceremonialism. on the contrary, typifies a religion free from the preten- sions of ecclesiasticisni, a religion soul-elevating in its spirituality. What Scriptures the Jewish rubbi has studied, I am at loss to discover. But why try? He has said it. He leaves behind Robertson Smith and Briggs and Well- hausen and Kuenen. He has distanced all the disciples of the school of " higher criticism." For Nature is the only Bible to which the recently appointed shepherd in Israel bows. He does concede that the Decalogue is a document, upon the whole, morally good, but he decries the Sabbath, though in the Decalogue, as the invention of priest-craft. Perchance the Mosaist deems the fourth command- ment an interpolation ; a sacerdotal fraud. For, in his judgment, all rules characteristically Jewish, were con- cocted by the cunning successors of Aaron, who had learnt to profit by the ignorance of the masses. But Isaiah, whom the neologistic preacher points out as a mas- ter mind in prophetism, because of his denunciation of hypocritical services Isaiah did not inveigh against the Sabbath, as the offspring of a superstition. Every He- brew child, rightly trained, knows the declaration of the son of Amoz: "If thou restrain thy foot for the sake- of the Sabbath, not doing thy business 011 My holy day, . . . then thou shalt find delight in the Lord." (Is. Iviii. 13,34.) I might invoke the authority of Jeremiah, who also regarded the observance of the Sabbath very favorably. Witness his words: "Carry not a burden out of your houses on the Sabbath day, neither do any work, but hallow the Sabbath, as I commanded your fathers." (Jer. xvii. 22.) But I refrain from citing Jeremiah still further, because lie too belonged to the priesthood. Were it not so, I might hazard to show that the priest, sorely tried in the discharge of his mission ; " the man who saw affliction," responded, amidst the sufferings of imprison- ment, to the spirit that spoke irre||lbly within him, and foretold the indestructibility of the same progeny . t of Aaron. (Jer. xxxiii. 18, 21, 22.) But peradventure Uie sacerdotal seer of Anathoth studied to grow rich by his ministry. Jeremiah, buffeted, thrown into a pit, carried violently into exile, because he loved truth most dearly, ma} 7 have wished to grow fat on choice oxen ! Pity that Ezekiel reckoned his pedigree from among the crafty family at the head of which stood Aaron ! For the son of Buzi, accentuates the necessity of keeping the Sabbath. He emphasizes it not once but repeatedly. " My Sabbaths I gave unto them." (Ez. xx. 12.) " Sanc- tify my Sabbaths." (ibid 20.) "They shall sanctify My Sabbaths." (ibid xliv. 24.) And the prophet on the river Chebar goes so far as to contradict the Philadelphia associate rabbi by giving some officiating priests actually a good character. His testimonial is recorded in the Haphtarah of this morning: "The Priests, the Levites, the sons of Zadok, that kept the charge of My sanctuary when the children of Israel went astray from Me, they shall come near Me to minister unto Me." (Ez. xliv. 15.) Anxious to be right, I search again through my Bible, and perceive that Moses, before he died, referred to the progeny of Aaron as the counsellors of the Divine Law (Dent. xvii. 9, 12), as the custodians of the Divine Law (ibid xxxi. 9), as the teachers of the Divine Law (ibid xxxiii. 10. > In my reading I meet likewise with a number of priests whom even the insuperably progressive rabbinate of Philadelphia would hesitate to brand as unrighteous. The jealous Jehoiada rises, and I pay obeis- ance to the CoJien who prevented the nation from lapsing into brutal idolatry, which the murderous queen Athaliah fostered and protected. (II. Kings xi. and II. Cbron. xxiii.) Uriah the Cohen also appears before me as lie whom Isaiah, the prince of prophetism, selected as the reliable witness cf a prediction which was to be chronicled in advance. (Is.'viii. 2.) But surely none is so prominent as Ezra, whose steadfast will and unabated fervor, the Rad- ical of Radicals among Philadelphia rabbis wishes to copy and be upheld in, while discharging the holy functions of the pastorate assumed. But who is the son of oi^ race that Malachi declares to have been the originally chosen preceptor of the nation ? Read it in the very rebuke of the last of He- brew prophets to the faithless ministers of his time. The dependant of Aaron, like the founder of his tribe, was bound to God with a lasting covenant, as a conservator of the Torali; keeping it jealously to impart it truthfully ; walking in loyalty and integrity, turning many away from the way of sin. (Malachi ii. 5, 6, 7.) Yes, numerous were the wicked priests, and not a few the false prophets. But Jeremiah of the seed of Aaron witheriugly strikes the ones, just as he lashes the others unsparingly. "Both prophet and priest are hypo- crites." (Jer. xxiii. 11.) Ezekiel of the seed of Aaron pours out the full vial of his wrath on double-faced im- posters. " Woe unto the scandalous prophets." (Ez. xiii. 3), and with all the vigor of his aggrieved soul he charges the impious wearers of sacerdotal garments with perversity. "The priests of the Torah have profaned it." (ibid xxii. 26.) In dead earnestness was that language spoken ; but many who, like myself, have read the late installation sermon, were unprepared to receive the information that Hebrew prophets indulged in bantering, that they clear!}' "ridiculed religion in its ceremonial aspect." \\Y11, I either must have wasted scores of years in turning over with a dull comprehension the pages of my Bible, or prejudice so beclouded my mental vision that I missed the drift of the sacred writings. Indeed, I have failed to detect any "ridicule of religion in its ceremonial aspect" in prophetism. I noticed a rod laid upon the back of fools or rogues, who imagined that they could deceive God as they misled men with their sanctimoniousness. I listemfft to Asaph, when with crushing directness he cries out: "Gather my saints together unto Me; those who make a covenant with p|e by a sacrifice" (Psalms 1. 5.) godless Jews who fancy that they can enter into a bargain with the Almighty ; that they can gain His good will, despite their wrong doings, if they only bring a present to His temple. Of such the Bible has supreme contempt; but not once have I met that the Sabbath, or the holiday's, or the dietar} 7 laws, or any of the ordinances of the Pentateuch, are a subject of " ridicule " at the hands of the inspired preachers of old. In one of his most sublime effusions, Isaiah with burning eloquence fain would consume his people's phan- tom self-deception and cast it to the four winds. The devoted servant of his Master does not ask for the aboli- tion of the National Fast not he but, yearning after righteousness, insists upon the celebration of a Fast that cleanses away sin regretted for. He tells us in forceful accents that humanity, loving-kindness will always win God's favor, not the noisy praying on a day of abstinence with hands outspread, but polluted with iniquities, with a head bowed low like a bulrush, but with a heart swelling up with wicked thoughts. (Is. Iviii.) No. I proclaim it in the deep consciousness of standing upon unassailable ground. Good priests and good prophets were a unit in preaching the sanctity of both the moral and the ceremo- nial injunctions of the five books. The act of offering an oblation to God in all humility was no more depre- 6 cated than the offering of a prayer to the throne of Grace; but gifts to the Temple with a spirit of haughtiness, invo- cations with sullied lips, were denounced with unmitigated wrath. " The sacrifice of the wicked is loathsome to the Lord, but the prayer of the upright meets with His pleasure." (Prov. xv. 8.) And again, " He who turns away his ear not to listen to the Torah, even his prayer is an abomination." (ibid xxviii. 9.) But the champion of the abrogation of all statutes which are specifically Jewish attempted more. In like manner as in the Bible he drew an imaginary line between priests and prophets, so in Talmudism he di- vided the rabbis into two castes