Page:The old paths, or The Talmud tested by Scripture.djvu/167

and gone before the law was given, and consequently before the tremendous noise was made; so that it is certainly false that this was the cause of his coming. Secondly, that all the nations heard the voice of God is false, for it also contradicts the language of Moses, who makes it the peculiar privilege of Israel, that they alone heard the voice. "Did ever people hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, and live?" (Deut. iv. 33.) Lastly, this story is palpably absurd. The Talmud represents Balaam and his Gentile contemporaries quoting Scripture like two rabbies, and that, hundreds of years before the portions which they quote were written! They both quote the 29th Psalm, a Psalm of David, about 500 years before he was born, and the Gentiles quote the 66th of Isaiah above 700 years before it was written! And your rabbies have not been content to keep this absurd and foolish story in the Talmud, but have inserted it in the prayers for the solemn festival of Pentecost. According to these prayers, you are taught to believe that, at the giving of the law, God turned Mount Sinai over the people of Israel like a tub, and compelled them to receive the law against their will; and yet that, for their ready obedience, six hundred thousand angels were sent down to crown each man with two crowns. You are taught to believe that when the commandments were given, Israel walked backwards and forwards two hundred and forty miles. And that the voice of God was so loud that it was heard by all the nations of the world, who all went to Balaam, and all knew and quoted the Psalms and the prophets, centuries before they were written. This is what you have got by following the oral law. It is in vain for you to say that you do not believe these things—there they stand in your Prayer-book. If you do not believe them, why do you leave them there? But whatever individuals may say, it is evident that the compilers of the Jewish Liturgy heartily believed every word of them, and therefore introduced them into their prayers. And it is equally certain that, wherever the Talmud maintains its authority, these fables form part of the faith of Israel. But some will say, We do not believe them. Why not; Do you disbelieve them because they are true? No, but because they are false. Then you confess that the oral law contains downright palpable falsehoods, and that in many of its narrations it is not worthy of credence. Of what value, then, is the oral law, and what credit can we give to the authors of it, who did not scruple to invent these foolish stories?