The Caucasian. (Shreveport, La.) 1900-192?, 1907-03-12

| etymology. Of the word? Pharisee
originally comes from the, Hebrew
| word pellshim or separatist3 A Phar
isee i'll broad Technology means -
separator" \ separator from what:
Their Origin.
Away back in the time of Jehoiakim,
600 years before Christ Nebuchalnaz-
Ear, king of the ChsldeanS, with his
mighty army swept sOuthwestward
| and laid siege to and captured JeruS;l-
| lem. As was the custom of that day
large number of the Hebrews were
carried away from the land of their
nativity. There. within the strong walls
of old Babylon. they had to dwell.
No temple had they. No priesthood
had they. Surrounded by the sins of
heather nation and under the shad-
ow of the shrineS of the idols. they
| had to do something to prevent their
children becoming immoral idolaters
| So what did they do? They withdrew
| themselves just rs far as possible from
associating with these sinful Babylo-
mans. They did what the puritans
did when they were exiles in Holland
| They did what the foreign missiona-
rfes are accustomed to do amid the
| awful customs of the heather lands.
They keep their children within their
own homes as far as possible. And
when their boys and girls grow too big
to be longer kept clean from the CON
Eliminating immoral influences of the
east they send them back home to be
educated in the American homes and
American institutions. oh" said an
American missionary some years ago
to me in India, the hardest burden
which missionary has to bear is this
separation from his children. But
what can a missionary do? l cannot
allow my children to grow up amid
the licentious influences of this land. |
must separate them from these evil
surroundings. and therefore | send
them back home to be educated and to
be kept morally and spiritually pure"
When the Puritans arrived in the
city of Leyden, which was to be their
home for some years to come" wrote
the author of The Pilgrim Fathers OF
New England" 1.-THE eXiles from Scroo-
by lived very much together, com
munity within a community. dwelling
among Il strange people" Thus wa
it with the Hebrews in the Babylonis:l
exile. They kept as completely sepa-
rate as possible. In order to keep Their
Hebrew religion pure and indebted
they becam@ in time a people narrow
and bigOts and clannish. SO the be
ginning olsshe sect was altogether com
mendable The Jew was a despised
captive. He could not reform the con
ditions around him, but he could reg
lister his protest against them by with
drawing himself from them. Not all
the Jews of that time were willing to
thus withdraw at the cost of obloQuy
and perhaps financial loss. Those who
did withdraw We're called separatists
or Pharisees. Though the Pharisees
as class We're narrow and bigoted
they had their origin in the noblest and
purest of ideals. They We're first or
ganized as a sect in order to protect
their own morals and the morals of
their children.
l cannot illustrate my thought better
than by taking you for little while in
old Jerusalem to the "wailing place. Of
the Jews. It is one of the great sights
for the Palestine tourist to see. Though
Jerusalem has been under foreign con
troll for centuries upon centuries, yet
the intense patriotic Hebrews have not
forgotten their race or their religion.
They are not allowed to enter the Mo
hammedan mosque, which is built up
on the site of the old temple so they
gather day after day at the foot of the
walls where there are stones that once
formed part of the temple. There they
repeat over and over again the lamen-
tation of the Seventy ninth Psalm: 80
God, the heather are come into thine
Inheritance Thy holy temple have
they defiled They have laid .Ierusa
lem on heaps We are become a re
proach to our neighbors, a scorn and Il
derison TO them that are roundabout
us How long, Lord? Wilt thou be
angry forever:" Thus they stand day
month after month and year after year
and century after century the weeping |
and wailing and praying and pleading
go Oh Thus did the eXiled Hebrews
become the Pharisees or the separators
Of Babylon. Day after day, year after
year. they pleaded with God to bring
them back to the Davidic capital.
How long. o Lord" they cried. how
long must we live amid these licentious
and disappearing Babylonians? How
long? How long? How long? Thus
they prayed Thus they pleaded. And
thus they refused to mingle with the
Chaldean sinners. Thus we find that |
the genesis of the Pharisees was in
spired by love for God, by love for
purity and by love for the Mosaic laws.
Their Deeeneracy.
Having explained the genesis Of the
Pharisees, it is sad to have to trace
their spiritual degeneracy. When God
took pity on the race and permitted