Читать книгу History of the Jews in Russia and Poland (Vol. 1-3) - Dubnow Simon - Страница 26

Behold—he says in Biblical phraseology109—darkness covereth the earth, and the ignorant are numerous. For the breadth of thy land is full of yeshibahs and houses of Talmud study. … [The Jews of Poland] are opposed to the sciences, … saying, The Lord hath no delight in the sharpened arrows of the grammarians, poets, and logicians, nor in the measurements of the mathematicians and the calculations of the astronomers.

The Cabala, which might be designated as an Orthodox counter-philosophy, made constant progress in Poland. The founder of the Polish Cabala was Mattathiah Delacruta, a native of Italy, who lived in Cracow. In 1594 he published in that city the system of Theoretic Cabala, entitled "Gates of Light" (Sha`are Ora), by a Sephardic writer of the fourteenth century, Joseph Gicatilla, accompanying it by an elaborate commentary of his own. Delacruta was, as far as the subject of the "hidden science" was concerned, the teacher of the versatile Rabbi Mordecai Jaffe, who, in turn, wrote a supercommentary to the mystical Bible commentary by the Italian Menahem Recanati.

Beginning with the seventeenth century, the old Theoretic Cabala is gradually superseded in Poland by the Practical Cabala,110 taught by the new school of ARI111 and Vital.112 The Cabalist Isaiah Horowitz, author of the famous work on ascetic morals called SHeLoH,113 had been trained in the yeshibahs of Cracow and Lemberg, and for several years (1600–1606) occupied the post of rabbi in Volhynia. His son, Sheftel Horowitz, who was rabbi in Posen (1641–1658), published the mystical work of his father, adding from his own pen a moralist treatise under the title Vave ha-`Amudim.114 Nathan Spira, preacher and rector of the Talmudic academy in Cracow (1585–1633), made a specialty of the Practical Cabala. His more ingenious than thoughtful book, "Discovering Deep Things"115 (Megalle `Amukoth, Cracow, 1637), contains an exposition in two hundred and fifty-two different ways of Moses' plea before God for permission to enter the Promised Land (Deuteronomy iii. 23). It consists of an endless chain of Cabalistic word-combinations and obscure symbolic allusions, yielding some inconceivable deductions, such as that Moses prayed to God concerning the appearance of the two Messiahs of the house of Joseph and David, or that Moses endeavored to eliminate the power of evil and to expiate in advance all the sins that would ever be committed by the Jewish people. Nathan Spira applied to the Cabala the method of the Rabbinical pilpul, and created a new variety of dialectic mysticism, which was just as far removed from sound theology as the scholastic speculations of the pilpulists were from scientific thinking.

135

136More wholesome and more closely related to life was the trend of the Jewish apologetic literature which sprang up in Poland in the last quarter of the sixteenth century. The religious unrest which had been engendered by the Reformation gave rise to several rationalistic sects with radical, anti-ecclesiastic tendencies. Nearest of all to the tenets of Judaism was the sect of the Anti-Trinitarians (called Unitarians, Arians, or Socinians116), who denied the dogma of the Trinity and the divine nature of Jesus, but recognized the religious and moral teachings of the Gospels. Among the Anti-Trinitarian leaders were the theologian Simon Budny, of Vilna, and Martin Chekhovich, of Lublin. Stung by the fact that the Catholic clergy applied to them the contemptuous appellation of "Judaizers," or semi-Jews, the sectarians were anxious to demonstrate to the world that their doctrine had nothing in common with Judaism. For this purpose they carried on oral disputes with the rabbis, and tried to expose the "Jewish falsehoods" in their works.

Martin Chekhovich was particularly zealous in holding theological disputations, both in Lublin and in other cities, "with genuine as well as pseudo-Jews." The results of these disputations are embodied in several chapters of his books entitled "Christian Dialogues" (1575) and "Catechism" (1580). One of his Jewish opponents, Jacob (Nahman) of Belzhytz,117 found it necessary to answer him in public in a little book written in the Polish language (Odpis na dyalogi Czechowicza, "Retort to the Dialogues of Chekhovich," 1581). Jacob of Belzhytz defends the simple dogmas of Judaism, and accuses his antagonists of desiring to arouse hostility to the Jewish people. The following observation of Jacob is interesting as showing the methods of disputation then in vogue:

It often happens that a Christian puts a question to me from Holy Writ, to which I reply also from Holy Writ, and I try to argue it properly. But suddenly he will pick out another passage [from the Bible], saying: "How do you understand this?" and thus he does not finish the first question, on which it would be necessary to dwell longer. This is exactly what happens when the hunter's dogs are hounding the rabbit which flees from the road into a by-path, and, while the dogs are trying to catch it, slips away into the bushes. For this reason the Jew too has to interrupt the Christian in the midst of his speech, lest the latter escape like the rabbit as soon as he has finished speaking.

Chekhovich replied to Jacob's pamphlet in print in the same year. While defending his "Dialogues," he criticized the errors of the Talmud, and made sport of several Jewish customs, such as the use of tefillin, mezuza, and tzitzith.

A serious retort to the Christian theologians came from Isaac Troki, a cultured Karaite,118 who died in 1594. He argued with Catholics, Lutherans, and Arians in Poland, not as a dilettante, but as a profound student of the Gospels and of Christian theology. About 1593 he wrote his remarkable apologetic treatise under the title Hizzuk Emuna ("Fortification of the Faith"). In the first part of his book, the author defends Judaism against the attacks of the Christian theologians, while in the second he takes the offensive and criticizes the teachings of the Church. He detects a whole series of contradictions in the texts of the Synoptic Gospels, pointing out the radical deviations of the New Testament from the Old and the departure of the later dogmatism of the Church from the New Testament itself. With calmness and assurance he proves the logical and historical impossibility of the interpretations of the well-known Biblical prophecies which serve as the substructure of the Christian dogma.

For a long time no one was bold enough to print this "dreadful treatise," and it was circulated in manuscript both in the Hebrew original and in a Spanish and German version. The Hebrew original, accompanied by a Latin translation, was printed for the first time from a defective copy by the German scholar Wagenseil, Professor of Law in Bavaria. Wagenseil published the treatise Hizzuk Emuna in his collection of anti-Christian writings, to which he gave the awe-inspiring title "The Fiery Arrows of Satan" (Tela Ignea Satanae, 1681), and which were published for missionary purposes, "in order that the Christians may refute this book, which may otherwise fortify the Jews in their errors." The pious German professor could not foresee that his edition would he subsequently employed by men of the type of Voltaire and the French encyclopedists of the eighteenth century as a weapon to attack the doctrine of the Church. Voltaire commented on the book of Isaac Troki in these words: "Not even the most decided opponents of religion have brought forward any arguments which could not be found in the 'Fortification of the Faith' by Rabbi Isaac." In modern times the Hizzuk Emuna has been reprinted from more accurate copies, and has been translated into several European languages.119

FOOTNOTES:

65 See pp. 72 and 73.

66 [Unanimi voto et consensu are the exact words of the document. See Bersohn, Dyplomatariusz (Collection of ancient Polish enactments relating to Jews), p. 51.]

67 [Literally, By-Kahals.]

68 [a = short German a. In Hebrew ועד.]

69 [Great Poland, Little Poland, Red Russia, and Volhynia. Volhynia at first formed part of the Lithuanian Duchy, but was ceded to the Crown, in 1569, by the Union of Lublin.]

70 In the middle of the seventeenth century their number was six.

71 Nathan Hannover, in his Yeven Metzula [see p. 157, n. 1], ed. Venice, 1653, p. 12.

72 [A Hebrew term designating public-spirited Jews who defend the interests of their coreligionists before the Government. In Polish official documents they are referred to as "General Syndics." In Poland the shtadlans were regular officials maintained by the Jewish community. Comp. the article by L. Lewin, Der Schtadlan im Posener Ghetto, in Festschrift published in honor of Dr. Wolf Feilchenfeld (1907), pp. 31 et seq.]

73 Towards the end of the sixteenth century Warsaw, instead of Cracow, became the residence of the Polish kings. The Jews had no right of domicile in Warsaw, and were permitted only to visit it temporarily. [See p. 85.]

74 [See p. 93, n. 1.]

75 [See p. 76, n. 1.]

76 [The so-called Jüdisch-Deutsch, which was by the Jews brought from Germany to Poland and Lithuania. It was only in the latter part of the seventeenth century that the dialect of Polish-Lithuanian Jewry began to depart from the Jüdisch-Deutsch as spoken by the German Jews, thus laying the foundation for modern Yiddish. See Dubnow's article "On the Spoken Dialect and the Popular Literature of the Polish and Lithuanian Jews in the Sixteenth and the First Half of the Seventeenth Century," in the periodical Yevreyskaya Starina, i. (1909), pp. 1 et seq.]

77 [I.e. Red Russia, or Galicia.]

78 Yeven Metzula [see p. 157, n. 1], towards the end.

79 [Literally, "our teacher," a title bestowed since the Middle Ages on every ordained rabbi.]

80 [Literally, "companion," "colleague," a title conferred upon men who, without being ordained, have attained a high degree of scholarship.]

81 [Abbreviation for Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac (d. 1105), a famous French rabbi, whose commentaries on the Bible and the Talmud are marked by wonderful lucidity.]

82 [A school of Talmudic authorities, mostly of French origin, who, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, wrote Tosafoth (literally, "Additions"), critical and exegetical annotations, distinguished for their ingenuity.]

83 [Hebrew for "Rows," with reference to the four rows of precious stones in the garment of the high priest (Ex. xxviii., 17)—title of a code of laws composed by Rabbi Jacob ben Asher (died at Toledo ab. 1340). It is divided into four parts, dealing respectively with ritual, dietary, domestic, and civil laws. The Turim was the forerunner of the Shulhan Arukh, for which it served as a model.]

84 [Isaac ben Jacob al-Fasi (i.e. from Fez in North Africa) (died 1103), author of a famous Talmudic compendium.]

85 עמודי שש, ed. Lemberg, 1865, pp. 18b, 61b.

86 It has been conjectured that the same scholar occupied, some time between 1503 and 1520, the post of rector in Poland itself, being at the head of the yeshibah in Cracow.

87 [Two of his Responsa were published in Cracow, ab. 1540. See Zedner, Catalogue British Museum, p. 695. A new edition appeared in Husiatyn, in 1904, together with Hiddushe Aaron Halevi.]

88 רמ״א [initials of Rabbi Moses I(א=o)sserles].

89 [See p. 118, n. 1.]

90 Popularly, however, Isserles' supplements are called Haggahoth ("Annotations").

91 רש״ל [initials of Rabbi SHelomo Luria].

92 [See p. 117, n. 4.]

93 [Allusion to I Kings vii. 23–26.]

94 [Allusion to Lev. vi. 2.]

95 [See p. 118, n. 1.]

96 [The titles of the various parts of his work are all composed of the word Lebush ("Raiment") and some additional epithet, borrowed, with reference to the author's name, from the description of Mordecai's garments, in Esther viii. 15.]

97 [The Shulhan Arukh, following the arrangement of the Turim (see above, p. 118, n. 1), is divided into four parts, the fourth of which, dealing with civil law, is called Hoshen Mishpat, "Breastplate of Judgment," with reference to Ex. xxviii. 15.]

98 [Allusion to Ps. xix. 9.]

99 See pp. 111 and 112.

100 מהר״ם [initials of Morenu (see p. 117, n. 1) Ha-rab (the rabbi) Rabbi Meïr.]

101 מהרש״א [initials of Morenu Ha-rab Rabbi SHemuel E(א=o)dels. Comp. the preceding note].

102 [Literally, "Teaching Knowledge" (from Isaiah xxviii. 9), the title of the second part of the Shulhan Arukh. See above, p. 128, n. 1.]

103 ["Rows of Gold," allusion to the Turim (see above, p. 118, n. 1), with a clever play on the similarly sounding words in Cant. i. 11.—Subsequently David Halevi extended his commentary to the other parts of the Shulhan Arukh.]

104 [Allusion to Mal. ii. 7.—Later Sabbatai extended his commentary to the civil section of the Shulhan Arukh, called Hoshen Mishpat (see p. 128, n. 1).]

105 [See p. 75, n. 2.]

106 [Allusion to Gen. xxv. 27.]

107 [Allusion to Ps. i. 3.]

108 ישר מקנדיא [initials of Yosef SHelomo Rofe (physician)].

109 [In his book Ma`yan Gannim ("Fountain of Gardens," allusion to Cant. iv. 15), Introduction.]

110 [Kabbalah ma`asith, a phase of the Cabala which endeavors to influence the course of nature by Cabalistic practices, in other words, by performing miracles.]

111 [Initials of Ashkenazi Rabbi Isaac [Luria]; he died at Safed in Palestine in 1572.]

112 [Hayyim Vital, also of Safed, died 1620.]

113 [Abbreviation of SHne Luhoth Ha-brith, "The Two Tables of the Covenant" (Deut. ix. 15).]

114 ["Hooks of the Pillars," allusion to Ex. xxvii. 11.]

115 [Allusion to Job xii. 22.]

116 [See above, p. 91, n. 1. There were, however, considerable differences of opinion among the various factions.]

117 [A town in the province of Lublin. Jacob became subsequently court physician of Sigismund III.; see Kraushar, Historyja Zydów w Polsce, ii. 268, n. 1. On his name, see Geiger's Nachgelassene Schriften, iii. 213.]

118 Some deny that he was a Karaite.

119 [An English translation by Moses Mocatta appeared in London in 1851 under the title "Faith Strengthened."]