Principles of Judaism, Number III · Isaac Leeser Digital Repository · Legacy Projects from Judaica DH at Penn Libraries

Title

Principles of Judaism, Number III

Author

Isaac Mayer Wise

Contributor

Isaac Leeser

Location(s)

Philadelphia

Format

Letter. 4 page(s) on 1 sheet(s).

Legal

Type

Letter

Language(s)

English

Hebrew

Physical Characteristics

Lined Paper

Manuscript

Is Part Of

Arnold and Deanne Kaplan Isaac Leeser Collection

http://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q124370244

content

Principles of Judaism
No 111
To the Editor of the Occident
Reverend Sir!
Since you have been kind enough to insert my letters in your magazine I continue to write on my subject without any farther introduction preface or excuse apology; you may only please to recollect, that we I have stated in my last, that Judaism rests upon four strong and immovable pillars, 1. God is God, 2. man is His immage, 3. man is accountable here and here˶after to his Maker, and 4. Israel is His own people. All the duties of a man and an Israelite in all positions estimations of life are deducible from those four theses positions, & all the hopes in life and death, the confidence, the fortitude, the moral strength, the joy happiness of heart of an Israelite and his individuals are based upon those doctrines. It would surprise me if any one should detect a human duty be able to point out as high duty obligatory on man or any moral excellency, for which one can not be accounted for by upon one either or all of those theses principles. We have no difference of opinion dispute, I believe, about the first thesis axiom; but with the second and third are the differences commence; the our opponents tell us, that the body of man, in his body, will arise at some distant day, being then inhabited by the same soul; & that he will live nearly in the same manner as we do now; In connexion with this resurrection of the body is the last judgment and the everlasting demnation of those who deserve such a deplorable lot; and yet besides other things of the same kind. We suppose, that our opponents take for granted, that if the soul of man be perishable and die away, a resurrection of the body would be impossible, wherefore they must say give with us in maintaining that "The soul of man is immortal & can exist and exists without body; but that the body of man is

a subject to mortality & cannot exist in his its proper functions without the soul;" thus we are have satisfied about established the main point, the very basis of things our discussion. This dogma of ours is a biblical one derived from the Bible, where man is called an immage of God; but the dogma of an immortal body appears to us to be of no biblical origin as every impartial student of the Bible will admit, and you, reverend sir, have yet not yet come out with your biblical evidences. I shall first consider the matter in a natural point of view; for it appears to me, that the Rabbis expressed the most correct opinion on the matter, when they said Hebrew Hebrew "All The prophets prophesied only for the times of the Messiah, but the future world no eye has ever seen it but saw shine alone ˶O Lord?" (Berachoth 34) Hence Hebrew "It was taught (by the earlier Rabbis) that during the months (after death) the body remains uncorrup-ted; and his the soul ascends and descends (visiting the spot where his its former vehicle tenement is interred buried); but after two? months the body is dissolved and his the soul ascends to return never again." Sabbath 151) Hence we read in Moreh Nebuchim of maimonides Part I. ch. 40 Hebrew "The noun Rusach is also the name of that substance which is remains of man after death and which is not exposed liable to dissolution," and (ibid 41 chapter xli) we read the same definition of the term Hebrew. I shall say nothing about the Hebrew that the bodies of the dead must roll themselves through caves subterranean channels to Palestine where they will be revived, nor about the

opinion Hebrew that the pious who have arisen from death will be assembled in a tent made of the skin of the Leviathan, and that they will eat at a great feast the flesh of that very fabulous fish, which was killed and salted by God for this purpose soon after the creation; though these are substantial portions of the resurrection-creed of those, which you please to call orthodox, because they try to explain those singular assertions to be of a parabolic nature; but we have the same right to say all statements about the revival of the body are of the same nature. I shall confine myself exclusively to the question of the resurrection of the body. The surface of the earth contains one hundred and fifty six million, two hundred fifty thousand 156 250 000 square miles of land including the the vast regions of sandy deserts, stony mountains, marshes and swamps, large districts covered with perpetual snow and ice and other uninhabitable portions. The present population of our globe is estemated 1200000000 twelve hundred millions; if we suppose that one generation take to be 30 years, and that since the creation of man be 5611 years, there must have been then our earth 187 generations, which would gives the sum of individuals 1200,000,000x1872*=112200000000, which would give a population of 72 to a square mile, if the resurrection take place in our age; none of our friends has ever lost himself so far in mystical conjectures, as to think it natural, that such a popu-lation should exist on earth. Our old brethren have two different methods to help themselves out of this difficulty; they say first Hebrew
* There is ?ly an error in D W's formula here, we see no reason for dividing the product by two; our calculation would the population after these dates 1436 to a square mile.

"It be known that the world to come is made for none but the righteous and the Isralites" (Jebanoth 46.). But this is not in accordence with the passage in Daniel, which they suppose to be the expressive of the doctrine of the resurection of the body. "And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground he shall awake, some to an everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting reproach" (Daniel IIX 2) If our friends will insist admit, that Daniel speaks in this chapter only of Israel, then they cannot help saying but that only many of Israel will arise; some of these who arisen individuals will be a shame and an everlasting reproach, consequently they must ad-mit, that among those what will arise will be wicked people also; to say assert the wicked shall arise and die again is incompatible with the text, in which the Hebrew "everlasting" prohibits such a construction. And if this contradiction should is not to exist, our old friends cannot remove the difficulty by the above quoted conjecture; for it is sure enough unquestionable, that five children die to one grown person, and what wrong can a child have done? and among the rest of people mankind they must reckon Hebrew "one half innocent and one other half guilty", which is a strict talmudical principle; consequently the immense numbre of 720 to a square mile would be immaterially reduced. They cannot remove this difficulty by conjecturing, that them who has arisen people will be of such a spiritual nature, that they have no wants whatever; for this would be no resurrection of the same body, but a new creation;

Identifier

LSKAP20-807