Page:The old paths, or The Talmud tested by Scripture.djvu/31

 places, and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi." Now one of the laws, still extant, forbids a man, when speaking of his Rabbi, to call him by name:—

"It is forbidden to a disciple to call his Rabbi by name, even when he is not in his presence." Another law, still extant, prescribes the formula of greeting or salutation:—

"Neither is he to salute his Rabbi, nor to return his salutation in the same manner that salutations are given or returned amongst friends. On the contrary, he is to bow down before the Rabbi, and to say to him, with reverence and honour, Peace be unto thee, Rabbi." The Rabbinical Jews, who see this, must not mistake us. We do not consider it in anywise sinful, but decorous, to treat a Rabbi with all due respect. We should feel no objection ourselves to make a bow to a Rabbi, and to salute him in the prescribed formula. But we cite these laws to show that the New Testament gives a fair representation of the Pharisees: for men, who could gravely sit down and enter into all these details of the mode in which they were to be honoured, and then give out these laws as divine, and, besides all this, call in the civil power to enforce them, must have had no mean idea of themselves and their own dignity. It must never be forgotten that these laws are not the mere regulations of a religious community. When the Rabbies had the power in their own hands, they enforced them by civil sanctions. They were not satisfied with excluding despisers of Rabbinical authority from eternal life, they prosecuted such before the tribunals, and sentenced them to a pecuniary fine and excommunication, as may be seen from the following law:—

"Whosoever despises the wise men has no share in the world to come. But notwithstanding this, if there come witnesses to prove that he has been guilty of contempt, even in words, his