Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1907-03-11

|. e. to lead an upright life.
 | For how
 Can hearts not free be tried whether they serve
 Willing or no, who will but what they
 By destiny and can no other choose 9" tMilton: Paradise Lost" VI With out the belief ill human responsiiili;v life becomes silly game in which pasteboard figures are moved alour 1 by whimsical hand.
 Tn the fourth place, .Judasn, thinks that all men are brothets | equally dear to God the Father. Con s1defins the hostility that existed ba- tween one nation and another in an tlquity the few expressions of marrow intent found in Jewish literature form remarkable tribute to the broad mlndedness of the ancient Hebrews. And the few remarks breathing a spirit of hostility gainst non-Jeys lound III later literature were almost invariably wrung out of their authors by the sting of persecution (See Prof. M Lazarus: Ethik des Judenthums. D. 49) The dominant opinion in Jew lsh circles concerning those not )f their faith was the enlightened view which treated the stranger with the
 same consideration as the Israelite, eliminating in such superb sense of brotherhood as that felt by Isaiah Who puts in the mouth of God these
 words Of endearment for peoples who were then enemies of Israel: Bless ed be Egypt my people, and Assyria
 the work of my hands, and Israel mine inheritance' Acceptanco of Ju- dalsm was never required as a con dltlon for salvation by the enlight,n- ed thinkers. The pious of the Gcn- tlles have a share in the world t. come.' says the Talmud. If Israel
 was the chosen people, it was chosen, according to the explanation of the Second isaiah, for extra re- responsibilities and not for special priv lleges. At any rate, modern Judaism almost passionately proclaims the Brotherhood of man.
 This thought has a further impli- cation. No groups of men within a nation or sect hold monopoly upon the divine favor There are no such things as elect or damned; no chil- dren of light and God as opposed to children of darkness and the devil. The meanest sinner is left with the
 hope of final purification and re- demption. No other view is consist ent with a God of goodness and love. (Claude Montefiore: Liberal Juda- ism," pp 30-31)
 Finally, Judaism believes that man is morally and spiritually pro- sressng. He is not born sinful ana needs no redeemer. The Garden of Eden story has never figured for more than a story in the Jewish scheme of life. A few passages that betrav the psychological weakness of humanity in marking back to the past as the Golden Age notwithstanding. the Jew ish outlook has been fixed on the Mesianic era of happiness in the dis tant future. Neither the overhasti- ness of Utopians, who, as Maimonides describes them, would rush the Messlanlc era, nor the peevish, if me lodious, pessmism of a Schopenhau- CT, are characteristic of the attitude of Judaism. Slowly, laboriously, do men advance ill character and cul- ture, but with a sureness that ad- mits of no doubt. Not in the nea. future but 'in the last days shall the nations flock to hear the word of God But then, at that far-off time, they shall beat their swords into. plow- shares and their spears into pruning hooks.
 The significance of these thoughts of Judaism concerning man can scarcely fail to impress any of us. They must have a profound bearing On our individual careers. If man IS altogether child of dust and doom- ed to return to the dust; if he is "a mere automaton thrown about by a capricious master ;if he is unrelated to his fellows, if he is sinner with the best behind him, then life is scarcely worth the effort, But If he is in part at, least child of God and is endowed with a dea4hisxs ,sffei i''.if
 he is free to carve 5sout his own destiny, working among brothers ,in4. der the conviction that "the, best.is yet to be- then life is surely Wo.fh