of amulets or charms, and that even on the Sabbath-day. That
such charms are near akin to magic or witchcraft is plain from
the nature and purpose of the manufacture, and from the
undisguised use of the word (
Hebrew characters) "charms;" but there is
a passage in Rashi's commentary on another Talmudic treatise,
which puts this beyond all doubt; we therefore give both the
text and the commentary—
(Hebrew characters)
"Our rabbies have handed down the tradition that Hillel
the elder had eighty disciples, of whom thirty were as worthy
as Moses our master to have the Shechinah resting upon them.
Thirty others were as worthy as Joshua the son of Nun that
for them the sun should stand still. Twenty were in the
middle rank, of whom the greatest was Jonathan the son of
Uziel; and the least of all was Rabbi Johanan ben Zachai.
Of this last-named rabbi it is said, that he did not leave
unstudied the Bible or the Mishna, Gemara, the constitutions,
the Agadoth, the niceties of the law and the Scribes, the
argument, a fortiori, and from similar premises, the theory of
the change of the moon, Gematria, the parables taken from
grapes and from foxes, the language of demons, the language
of palm-trees, and the language of the ministering angels," &c.
(Bava Bathra, fol. 134, col. 1.) This was pretty well, considering
that he was the least of the eighty; what then must have
been the knowledge of the others? This tradition alone, from
its gross exaggeration, would be sufficient to mark the character
of the rabbies as false witnesses. It is plainly a fable, such as
one might expect in the "Arabian Nights' Entertainments,"
but not in a law that professes to have come from God. It is
another proof that the account of the oral law is a mere fiction.
But our object in quoting the passage here, is to point out its
connexion with charms and amulets. It tells us, that this
rabbi understood the language of the ministering angels?
Now what use was this? Rashi tells us in his commentary,
(Hebrew characters) to conjure or to adjure them: that is, to compel
them to serve him, when he adjured them; that is, by their
means to act the part of a conjuror. It may perhaps be said,
