37. Ab. Z. 10 a; Gitt. 80 a.
38. Ps. lxxv i. 9.
39. Shabb. 88 a.
40. Ab. Z. 22 b. But as in what follows the quotations would be too numerous, they will be omitted.
Each statement, however, advanced in the text or notes is derived from part of the Talmudic tractate
Abodah Zarah.
To begin with, every Gentile child, so soon as born, was to be regarded as unclean. Those who
actually worshipped mountains, hills, bushes, &c. - in short, gross idolaters - should be cut
down with the sword. But as it was impossible to exterminate heathenism, Rabbinic legislation
kept certain definite objects in view, which may be thus summarised: To prevent Jews from
being inadvertently led into idolatry; to avoid all participation in idolatry; not to do anything
which might aid the heathen in their worship; and, beyond all this, not to give pleasure, nor even
help, to heathens. The latter involved a most dangerous principle, capable of almost indefinite
application by fanaticism. Even the Mishnah goes so far41 as to forbid aid to a mother in the
hour of her need, or nourishment to her babe, in order not to bring up a child for idolatry!42 But
this is not all. Heathens were, indeed, not to be precipitated into danger, but yet not to be
delivered from it. Indeed, an isolated teacher ventures even upon this statement: `The best
among the Gentiles, kill; the best among serpents, crush its head.'43 Still more terrible was the
fanaticism which directed, that heretics, traitors, and those who had left the Jewish faith should
be thrown into actual danger, and, if they were in it, all means for their escape removed. No
intercourse of any kind was to be had with such - not even to invoke their medical aid in case of
danger to life,44 since it was deemed, that he who had to do with heretics was imminent peril of
becoming one himself,45 and that, if a heretic returned to the true faith, he should die at once -
partly, probably, to expiate his guilt, and partly from fear of relapse. Terrible as all this sounds, it
was probably not worse than the fanaticism displayed in what are called more enlightened times.
Impartial history must chronicle it, however painful, to show the circumstances in which teaching
so far different was propounded by Christ.46
41. Ab. Z. ii. 1.
42. The Talmud declares it only lawful if done to avoid exciting hatred against the Jews.
43. Mechilta, ed. Weiss, p. 33 b, line 8 from top.
44. There is a well-known story told of a Rabbi who was bitten by a serpent, and about to be cured by
the invocation of the name of Jesus by a Jewish Christian, which was, however, interdicted.
45. Yet, such is the moral obliquity, that even idolatry is allowed to save life, provided it be done in
secret!
46. Against this, although somewhat doubtfully, such concessions may be put as that, outside
Palestine, Gentiles were not to be considered as idolators, but as observing the customs of their fathers
(Chull. 13 b), and that the poor of the Gentiles were to be equally supported with those of Israel, their
sick visited, and their dead buried; it being, however, significantly added, `on account of the
arrangements of the world' (Gitt. 61 a). The quotation so often made (Ab. Z. 3 a), that a Gentile who