The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1921-06-30
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OF EVANSVILLE, MD.

who would naturally be among its
valiant defenders. Religion was the
very atmosphere of the place and the
best traditions of the Elders lived in
all its life. The boys name tells the
devotion to the ideals of Israels early
struggle for liberty and its meaning,
asked for, shows the shadow of long
prayer that covered babe and youth
with the touch of God. There was a
sister, probably the older, who may
have been a ''litte brother" to the boy
for there is no mention anywhere of
the mother who perhaps died before
the lad knew her. Possibly the father
was a bit stern and failed to share
the life of the youngster, but he COM
PEELED his pride, as the reference in
Philippians shows. There would have
been the early learning of the Law
and the feast would have been kept
scrupulously so that he grew in the
surroundings that made him incurably
religious. The picture of Timothy's
home was more than duplicated in his
own; the routine prescribed in Deuto-
ronomy would be the familiar round
in that Ghetto family. The Pharisee
might run to ritual, but he represen-
ted the highest religious type of the
time, and Jesus scored the class pride
and monopolistic religious sense that
had developed among its members who
had run to seed, not it's Simeons and
Zechariahs' Paul was reared in a
home that with the inevitable differ
ences of city and country compared
with John the Baptist's.
THE SCHOOL BOY
When he was six years or seven
years old he would be sent to the
synagogue school, the House of the
Book, because that was the text stud
led. 1t would be the Greek version
so that the boy would come to know
Aramaic from the home, Greek from
the school and Hebrew from Jerusalem
and be master of at least three Ian
guages. For three or four years he
would be taught the rudiments and at
ten he would begin the learning of the
Law. Since books were written and
costly, the children sat at the feet of
the teacher as they do today and lis
tened to the reading of sentence
which they chorused in response until
it was fixed in the memory. The
child's mind was saturated with pure
Bible unauthorized by newspapers,
movies or anything else, and while it
does not appeal to a modern teacher
as a practical method it did store a
great literature in the back of all the
thinking. There must have been much
inaccurate catching of the text which
would be REPEATED in the speech since
there would be little opportunity to
correct it by the Book. The wife of one
of our preachers long wondered about
my consecrated cross-eyed bear"
about which she liked to sing and SIM
liar happenings are common in any
method that gives first place to sound
instead of sense. That is one reason
the quotations in the New Testament
are not always word for word with the
line in the Old.
THE APPRENTICE BOY
Leaving the House of the Book at
thirteen this lad destined by that
Jewish home for the high place of
Rabbi, would be apprenticed to some
artisan that he might learn a trade.
For the work Of Rabbi was unpaid
except by the rich reward of ministry
and he was uncrowned except by his
disciples. SO he had to be able to