The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-04-20

| evening at the Linden street temple by
Rabbi j. Feuerlicht. "Hope," said the
speaker, ''is the great comforter Of
men. 1t Is the twin sister Of courage,
and both united have sped mankind on
its triumphal march toward the ideal.
At the root Of every improvement in
mind and matter lies the restless long
Ing. the undying hope Of man; and the
achievement of the past gives us the
glad assurance that still greater glory
Is In store for those who will come after
| us.
From this gladstone nature Of man
has sprung the Messianic idea and ideal
In every age. The religious Messianic
idea Of mankind is Of Jewish birth. The
literal meaning Of the Hebrew word
Mashiach" (Messiah) and the Greek
''Christ" is "annointed." Every king
in Judea was called "Mashiach" be-
cause he had to be annointed with oil
before he ascended to the throne. Along
with the Bible-the great treasure Of
men--the Jew gave to the world its
hopes and Ideals Of future and better
existence. 1t is not a matter Of mere
accident that the two great religions,
Christianity and Mohammedanism
grew on Jewish soil, and that the seed
they planted. the ideas they spread,
were the product of Jewish culture and
civilization.
| Its Olden Political Meaning.
'The Messianic idea Of the cider type
is purely Of political nature. or
course, it is religious at the same time,
because originally the state and re-
ligion were one. The Jewish common
wealth was theocracy. 1t was only
at times Of danger and misfortune that
the prophets proclaimed their Mes
sianic hopes. Whenever the reins Of
government were held by the hands Of
a strong sovereign, who kept the enc
mics of Israel at bay, we hear nothing
of a Messiah to come.
amos, who lived during the reign
of the powerful Jeroboam the second.
knows nothing of personal Messiah.
Isaiah. who lived under the weak and
timid Ahaaz and Hezekiah, when the
kingdom Of Judah was tributary to
sennacherib, king Of Syria, proclaims
the advent Of a Messiah, who would
| again build up Judah. In the ancient
time he who would strengthen the king
dom and protect 1t against invasion
was looked upon as the Messiah-the
| annointed Of God. After the destruc-
tion of the first Jewish commonwealth
and during the seventy years that the
Jews were captives in Babylon, their
| most ardent desire and hope was the
coming of Messiah; and the Messiah
did come in the person of Cyrus,
heather king Of Persia, who was called
by the second Isaiah the Messiah Of
| God isaiah xiv, ~, because he not
| only permitted the Jews to return from
| captivity to Palestine, but he also as
sisted them in rebuilding the temple
and restoring their commonwealth.
Cyrus performed what the Messiah was
| expected to do-he gave back to the
Jews their national independence,
hence Isaiah did not scruple to call him
the Messiah of God, although he was a
heather. Strictly speaking, therefore,
the Christian idea Of a Messiah as one
| who was to die to save sinners has no
foundation in the Bible; and all those
passages in the Bible which, from a
chronological point Of view, have been
| made to that reference have simply
been misinterpreted and twisted from
| their context and natural meaning.
Tho Messiahship of jesus.
Nor do we believe that Jesus ever in
| tended to be more than a Messiah in
strictly Jewish sense Of the word and
for the Jews only. Nor was it ever His
intention to transcend the bounds of
nationality. When the Canaanitish
women came to Him, He said: "It is
| 70 fotr ha hn
children of the house and cast it to
dogs. I'm not sent but unto the lost
sheep of the house Of Israel" These
lost sheep of the house of Israel were
His own nearest countrymen, the
Galilleans. According to the only his
torical account, Jesus was born in
Nazareth of Galilee.
From the Talmud we know that the
Galileans were the most ignorant, IL
| literate and irreligious people of Pales-
tine. Being separated from Judea and
the temple by Samaria, through which
no Jew ever passed, they gradually
lapsed into neglect Of all the Jewish
precepts and ceremonies, and grew to
be looked upon as sinners and outcasts
by their strict conforming brethren Of
the Pharisaic sect, to which Jesus be-
| longed. Between the Pharisees (Cha-
berim) and their illiterate brethren a
Chinese wall had been cast up. 1t was
looked upon as q sin to associate with
them, to dwell under the same roof
| with them, or to cot with them. To
these poor and neglected children Of
the house Of Israel Jesus soul went out.
AS true, conscientious Jew, it grieved
Him at heart to have His countrymen,
His nearest kin, lost or thrust from the
house of Israel; and He therefore
turned all His energies to bring them
back again into the fold. What more
proof of this can we ask than His warn
ing to His followers: GO ye not in the
way of the heathens, nor into the cities
of the Samaritans.' His mission was to
the poor, down-trodden and outcast,
whom He called the lost sheep Of the
house Of Israel. He may have believed
that He was the messenger Of God and
that in Him the Messianic conditions
and hopes Of His times were fulfilled,
but all this makes Him no more and no
less than a Jew and a child Of His
times.
Jesus and the Taimud.
Whatever Is true in the teachings Of
Jesus is found and can be paralleled In
the Talmud and in other past Biblical
literature of the Jews. challenge any
one to show me a single word or maxim
in the sermon on the mount which Is
not already contained In the Talmud.
Now the sermon on the mount contains
the most significant doctrine that Jesus
ever taught, and still there Is not a
single word in 1t which is not strictly
Jewish, and cannot be fully subscribed
to even by the strictest orthodox Jew.
Had 1t not been for Paul, Jesus and
His followers would simply have been
known az tho adherents of Hillel and