Page:Chapters on Jewish literature (IA chaptersonjewish00abra).pdf/49

Rh mainly confined. The Talmud is not a book, it is a literature. It contains a legal code, a system of ethics. a body of ritual customs, poetical passages, prayers, histories, facts of science and medicine, and fancies of folk-lore.

The Amoraim were what their name implies, “Expounders,” or “Discoursers”; but their expositions were often original contributions to literature. Their work extends over the long interval between 200 and 500 C. E. The Amoraim naturally were men of various character and condition. Some were possessed of much material wealth, others were excessively poor. But few of them were professional men of letters. Like the Tannaim, the Amoraim were often artisans, field-laborers, or physicians, whose heart was certainly in literature, but whose hand was turned to the practical affairs of life. The men who stood highest socially, the Princes of the Captivity in Babylonia and the Patriarchs