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A
Sermon for Shabuoth, 5611, Delivered at the
Synagogue Beth Israel, Philadelphia, on the Second
Day of Pentecost, by Request of the Congregation
By
Isaac Leeser
Father of Israel, we call on Thee for thy blessing
and thy aid, to be with us when we rise up to pursue
our daily toil, and also then when we are engaged in
thy service and in the study of thy law. For if we
labour without thy blessing, we sow for naught; and
if Thou sendest not the rain, the seed we plant will
not shoot up from the ground; and if thy sun does
not send down the light and heat with which he is
endowed by Thee, the fruit will not ripen, and the
corn will rot in the field. But also in spiritual
things we are nothing without thy help. Vain and
proud of our intellect, confiding in our experience,
we would stumble in the plain path of duty, were we
not enlightened by Thee—had we not thy wisdom to
guide us safely. It was therefore thy will, O most
holy God! to descend before the visible eye of thy
children, to let them see thy glory, and to let them
hear thy potent voice; and from the fire Thou
spokest to their outward senses, that they might
know thy law, to fear Thee and to lore Thee, that
they may live for ever. And therefore, we entreat
Thee, be not wanting to us at this day, and be
graciously pleased to open our minds to receive the
full impression of thy greatness and holiness, that
we <<170>> may be enabled to appreciate the
commandments which we have received, that we may
follow thy guidance, rejecting the inspirations of
pride and self-conceit, which would counsel us to
prefer worldly glory to thy favour, carnal pleasures
to thy service, and self-aggrandisement to the love
of our neighbour, as we are commanded in thy law.
Yea, remove from our path the stumbling stone of sin
and temptation, and give us full understanding of
our subjection to thy gracious Providence, in order
that we may live as Israelites, as men in covenant
with Thee, who, in obeying Thee, have obtained thy
good will, which is life everlasting, and the
unending pleasures of spiritual delights, which are
at thy right hand, stored up for the righteous, in
whom Thou findest pleasure, Which no eye has seen
save thine alone, O God! our Redeemer and King,
Amen.
Brethren:—One of our ancient prophets, one of those
chosen by God to diffuse a knowledge of his being
and will among men, thus spoke in the holy
enthusiasm with which he was filled at the
contemplation of sin around him:
הוי אמר לעץ הקיצה עורי
לאבן דומם הוא יורה הנה הוא תפוש זהב וכסף וכל רוח אין
בקרבו׃ וה׳ בהיכל קדשו הס מפניו כל הארץ׃ חבק׳ ב׳ י״ט
כ׳׃
This is the festival of the promulgation of the law
on Mount Sinai, when the Lord appeared in a manner
never before or since witnessed, to instruct mankind
in his will. This was an event which is most fitting
to be celebrated whilst the earth stands—whilst the
seasons follow each other in their ceaseless
succession—whilst the sun shines as a light by day,
and the moon and the stars rule the night; for by it
we were lifted up from the ignorance of the nations,
and were brought into connexion with the Creator, to
serve Him alone, and to know no other god and
saviour. Let us therefore dwell on the words of the
prophet which have been quoted to you, in order to
draw from them such lessons as are fitting to the
occasion, since the festivals of
<<171>>the Lord are
not seasons for mere rejoicing, but are all a
memorial of our going out of Egypt, which means
incentives to recall to our minds, the benefits we
have received, and the duty which rests on us to be
grateful to our eternal Benefactor.
Habakuk, in common with most of the prophets whose
works have come down to us preserved in the canon of
the Bible, lived at a time when fearful sin had
usurped the place of the worship of the Lord, which
the law was given to institute. Israel had indeed
departed from the way of righteousness, and their
land was full of idols, and the number of Judah’s
gods was equal to that of its cities. The
instruction of the sages learned in the history and
legislation of their people was not sought; but the
sinful multitude resorted to priests of falsehood
and deceptive oracles to tell them what the future
would bring forth. The temple at Jerusalem was not
visited; but, instead of thin, men rushed to the
altars at Dan and Beth-El, wherefore the last was
called by the prophets Beth-Aven, meaning no longer
the house of God, as it was named by Jacob, when he
dreamt of the angels who watched over his flinty
pillow, but the house of iniquity, as it had become
through the enormous transgressions of the chosen
people. Therefore did God send fearless men, who
only saw in their fellow-beings perishable
creatures, whose anger they could well despise, and
whose vengeance they could well defy, in the holy
work for which they were designed, to lead back the
erring children to the embrace of the Father who
wished for their reconciliation. Hence we have the
long list of prophets and teachers, who faltered not
before the frown of despots, and halted not in the
presence of a riotous multitude, though carnal
weapons were lifted up against them, and they knew
that by their perseverance their hours would be few
on earth. They, however, taught boldly against the
prevalent follies of their age. It mattered nothing
in their estimation that it was the king who said to
the wood “Thou art my father,” or that the high
priest spoke to the stone “Thou hast born me;” for
their mission was from on High, and they regarded
not the earth nor its allurements, in view of the
great destiny which was theirs.
<<172>>
Therefore says Habakuk, “Woe to him who saith to the
wood, Awake.” Yes, so senseless had the people
become in that generation, that they felled a tree
in the forest, cut it into pieces, and fashioned a
portion into the shape of a man, to stay with them
in the house, whilst the other was perhaps used to bake the very bread they ate; and then they fell
down on their knees before it, and addressed it in
the words of prayer, in order to invoke the
assistance of the idol, the fancied god, which had
been made from a block of wood by the skill of the
sculptor, and the decorations of gold and silver
which it exhibited being merely the tinsel trappings
of a cunning artisan, who had perhaps exhausted his
skill in thus adorning the work of his hands, to
render it a fit object of worship to himself and
others.
Now, behold, the idol is done; it is introduced into
a gorgeous temple, with magnificent portico and
elaborate ceiling; the light of day is mellowed
into a dreamy twilight by a skilful arrangement of
the windows; a refreshing coolness is spread around,
even in the midst of noonday heat, by means of
sparkling fountains gushing forth from a variety of
fanciful forms, discharging the watery element into
snow-white marble basins; heavenly music re-echoes
along the dome from many high-sounding instruments
and mellifluous organs; a cloud of sweet incense
obscures the view, as it rolls along, opens and
closes, wafted by the slightest puff of air which
circulates through the vast space within the fans;
numerous priests, with snowy robes, rude
habiliments, or magnificent attire, are there, to
participate is the ceremonies of the day; and there
stands the idol, dressed out with all the
meretricious art which a diseased imagination can
conceive, either in the shape of a beautiful youth,
a grim warrior, a sage counsellor, a sweet maiden, a
ripe virgin, a shameless woman, a monster with many
heads and arms, with bead or feet of beasts—nay,
even the figure of a brute or reptile; and all
shout, “Rise and help for thou art our god.”
Or
suppose that a long time they have been calling on
their object of worship to come to their aid, and no
heed is taken of their cries, no answer is given to
their entreaties, in vain has flowed the blood of a
hundred victims; to no purpose have been the gifts
that were <<173>> poured into the coffers of the
deceivers: and a servant of the true God mocks them,
and says, “Call with a louder voice, for he is a
god; perhaps he is engaged in conversation; perhaps
in a battle; perhaps he is on a journey;
peradventure he sleepeth, and may wake up.”
What reply can they make, who so surrender their
sound judgment to the inspirations of folly and
self-deception? What matters it that the statue of
their god is formed in the highest style of
art?—that the temple itself is fashioned so as to
challenge admiration from all beholders, and is
destined to endure for ages? Does all this invest
the wood with knowledge and life, and impart
intellect and power to the inert stone?
You will think it strange that intelligent men ever
could be thus misled to fall down in worship before
deities thus fashioned; that enlightened states
could legislate to institute different orders of
priesthood, to attend to the large variety of idols
which were set up all over the land; nay, that even
mariners did not venture to sea without devoting a
part of their vessel to the tutelary gods, as they
conceived them, to which they paid adoration.
You cannot understand how the mind could so far go
astray, and lose itself in the labyrinth of folly;
but so it is recorded in history that these things
were, and so it is witnessed in distant lands that
idols yet claim the homage of mankind, and that
enormities are practised, at which humanity
shudders, and which degrade man in ferocity and
recklessness below the level of the brute. Most of
you have no doubt heard of the practice of women
burning themselves alive on the funeral piles of
their husbands, as husbands, as though they thereby
performed a religious duty; of crowds falling down
to let the idol wagon with its enormous weight, pass
over to crush them into shapeless masses, a willing
and senseless sacrifice to brutal superstition; of
men who devote themselves to murdering on the
highway any unfortunate travellers who may fall into
their hands, imagining that in this manner they
bring an acceptable sacrifice to their abominable
goddess, in whose mission they travel far and wide,
to extinguish, by cunning, craft, or open violence,
the sacred life of their fellow-beings.
But it is not necessary to enumerate
<<174>> all the
horrors of idolatry, as it is at the present time,
to exhibit the degrading effect it has on the soul;
much less will it be requisite to go back to
antiquity for illustrations which are met with on
almost every page of history. All this only shows
how weak man is without God—how utterly helpless he
is, if the Almighty’s wisdom and strength do not
support him. Boast not, therefore, that you, my
hearers, would not be so silly—that you could not
have sunk so low, if, instead of being educated as
Israelites, you had been instructed by Brahmins.
Believe not in your own superior endowments; for,
however our faith is congenial to our minds, however
true it is that the doctrine of the unity of God has
found its strongest supporters and defenders among
the descendants of Jacob, do not imagine that we are
not liable to fall away from the truth, if ever we
are neglected in our early training, or that unhappy
period should arise, as it almost was in the time of Menasseh and Amon, kings of Judah, that the law be
nearly forgotten among us.
For it was in those disastrous times, and previously
thereto, during the reign of other wicked kings of
Judah and Israel, that the prophets of God and the
chosen teachers of Jeshurun were not permitted to
speak in the name of the Lord; yes, we doomed to
capital punishment those who were bold enough to
reprove the backsliding of their sinning brothers;
and a Zechariah and Isaiah thus perished, besides
many others, but more especially in the reign of
Ahab, in the fulfilment of their mission. How
ignobly did we then sink—how deeply were we
fallen—when, like the uninstructed heathen, we
resorted to our idols of wood and stone, which, when
called upon, could not be awakened—which, when
entreated, could not be roused up, to ask of them
for advice and counsel, and when we came to the
priests of deception to unravel for us the dark and
known volume of the future.
But do not for a moment imagine that there are not
powerful means resorted to, to deceive the people,
so that even the intelligent might occasionally be
startled by the uncommon and strange coincidence
which the event accomplished had to the cunningly
devised prediction; for there have been at all times
persons who flourished upon the degradation of their
fellows, and who made <<175>> the follies and vices
of others subservient to their own advantage, or
who, without any profit to themselves, rejoiced in
becoming the corrupters of their race. Hence the
means of deceiving were reduced to a perfect system,
and you could scarcely frame a question to which the
priests of darkness were not able to contrive some
cunning, double-meaning reply.
Now, observe, the morals of the age had become
corrupt; the voice of instruction had been
effectually silenced so far as the masses were
concerned; a more showy worship was introduced, and
this everywhere, than that exclusive, simple,
awfully silent one at Jerusalem; every one that
chose could be a priest, and the sons of Aaron were
not the only ones who could claim the right to
officiate, for here was a system in which all who
chose might participate; add to which that answers
about the future could be obtained, such as they
were, at all times, by every one who had the means
of satisfying the avarice or ambition of those who
duped the simple, whether they were high or low: and
you have some solution to the curious phenomenon
that Israelites ever could have been idolaters.
Perhaps some of you have even doubted the evidence
of Scriptures about the universality of the
defection. Some may have even gone so far as to
suppose that the prohibition against image worship
could not have existed among us till after the
rebuilding of the temple, at the return of our
remnant from Babylon, since when idolatry has never
been practised nationally among us. But such an
assumption would be against the evidence of
history; and, however mortifying the confession
must be, we cannot deny that Israelites have often
lapsed into error regarding the nature of God and
the worship of other divinities; and though these
apostates from the truth cannot claim the benefit of
conviction in favour of their adopted creeds,
whether these be Nazarene, or Mahomedan, or absolute
heathenism, they certainly have outwardly assumed
the religion and manners of our opponents, and their
children will assuredly be hostile to Israelites,
and aliens to our faith; and if you examine into the
families of every European and Asiatic nation, you
will find among them the descendants of Jews, and
these are not less devout and zealous
<<176>> in the
service of the popular religions than those
descended from their original professors, if any
such can really be found, except among the people of Hindostan and the countries farther to the east
thereof.
And, though European nations have not that gross
idolatry which prevailed in ancient Greece and the
modern East, their belief is not less injurious to
our peace and permanence than the worst system that
ever was invented. Tell me not that to pray through
a mediator is but a small offence; say not that to
believe in the abrogation of the ceremonial law is a
harmless error; imagine not that to permit us to
mingle silently with the other families of man is
not destruction to Israel. No, Israelites, no! He is
a traitor to your God who would permit himself to
address any being save Him alone who is the Creator
of all; who would believe in the asserted plurality
of the Blessed One, like whose oneness—simple,
uniform, uncompounded— nothing else exists. He is a
renegade to truth who asserts that any change has
taken place in the Almighty’s holy law—that one jot
or tittle has passed away from all that the Lord our
God has taught us. And he is an enemy to Israel who
would in the least weaken your attachment to your
own nation, one and entire—a family of priests, as
you are all, amongst whom no unaccepted stranger
dare to mingle.
Still, brethren, we have known that such apostates
have been; that some have left us who could not
claim ignorance as their excuse; who could not even
plead in their defence a pressure from without, and
the weight of intolerable tyranny. Hence, if even
our sufferings did not attest the fact, we should
have ample reason not to doubt of the authenticity
of Israel’s shame; that almost universally they
called on the wood to “Awake,” and spoke to the
stone “Rise up,” at the period when the prophets
were sent early and late to indite them, to return
from their evil path; but they would not, until the
wrath was poured out, and they who would not receive
correction when they possessed all that could
embellish life, had to go forth, naked and
famishing, into captivity, driven out of their
lovely inheritance by the fire and sword of their
enemies. Yet this signal chastisement was needed, to
root out the evil from our hearts, and to implant
<<177>> therein an abiding love for our faith. Hard
was the lesson, and dreadful the teachers which
enforced it. Kindness and affectionate appeals would
not move us. It therefore required the unbending
will of arbitrary men, who could hear, without
flinching, the groans of the dying on the field of
battle, and who spurned the uplifted hands of the
petitioning widow, who interceded on her knees for
the life of her sole surviving offspring. And thus
we wandered abroad, chased by day by the savage
hosts of our invaders, and by night by the fear of
our own hearts, which would not let us rest.
Well, therefore, commences the prophet with the
awful “Woe,” “Woe to him who saith to the wood,
Awake.” Yes, woe in this life, woe in the next, to
him who, living in the world which the Undying One
has formed, still doubts of his providence and
power, and addresses his prayer to the carved block,
or calls for aid on the sculptured stone, or
inquires of the things set in gold and silver for
counsel and advice, or who entreats a god who cannot
save, “who has no spirit whatever in him.” And now
that we are here, no longer in dread of our life
because of the adversary, let no one be deceived,
that he may swerve from the truth, either by
permitting his children to go astray, either through uncircumcision, or by intermarriage with gentiles,
or by an habitual disregard of the ceremonial laws,
by all which a gradual amalgamation is necessarily
brought about, or by direct apostacy, by which the
union with Israel is at once severed, without danger
of retribution; for the same God who denounced his
anger against those who lived at ease and in plenty
in their own land, defying the commandments which
they had received, still lets us hear his “Woe”
against any who, either themselves, or through those
they might have restrained, but did not, call on
any one in whom there is no spirit whatever, who is
not the Creator, and has therefore no share or
portion in the salvation of mankind.
It
was not, understand, brethren, to teach a merely
relative truth to mankind—by which I mean something
which is pernicious than another system, which is
only in a less degree false and evil, but an
absolute truth, or an idea which, if compared with
what you will, is true, and only so as it
<<178>> is
in every view you take of it—it was only to teach
the absolute truth, that God revealed himself to
our forefathers in all his inconceivable glory, on
the first Pentecost after their redemption from
slavery. He taught us then what we yet repeat to our
children, to our brothers, to ourselves, that there
is but one God, and there is no one else; in the
words of the Decalogue,
אנכי ה׳ אלהיך “I am the Lord thy God,” not
“we are,” which might perchance imply a multitude of
divine beings, though our reason would reject this
doctrine upon the basis of our history, inasmuch as
the same uniform Power has always been with us; but
“I am,” one, and only one, without a second to rule
and save, just as there was but one to redeem us
from thraldom, and just as there was but one at the
creation of all things.
Whatever else is offered to us, as an object of
worship, is a being in which there is no spirit
whatever, be this the idol carved out by the hands
of the cunning workman, or an ideality, the
invention of yet more cunning deceivers;—they are
all to be rejected, because their worship would
militate against the reverence and homage due to the
Lord of all, whom we have been taught to acknowledge
as all-pervading—who is the living God, the Lord of
the dead and of the quick, the Master of earth and
of heaven, the Creator of the first and the
Preserver of the last. As such He appeared before
us, and as such his majesty illuminated the summits
of Sinai, and spoke to our senses audibly and
distinctly, so that there was not a servant in the
camp of Israel who did not feel convinced that there
is not a god in heaven and on earth who can do like
the works and mighty deeds of our Father.
We
were chosen as the messengers of this absolute
truth, and for generations many millions have ever
proclaimed it aloud before friend and foe, amidst
prosperity and the deepest affliction. The unity of
God has been our battle cry; and, perishing under
the torture of the Roman tyrant, or at the stake of
a Spanish Inquisition, we exclaimed, “The Lord is
one,” and closed our eyes to the earth, its joys and
its sufferings; and from the howling desert and the
raging sea there ever ascends the same exclamation
and, go where you will, the heart of the
<<179>>
Hebrew re-echoes the familiar sound, “There is none
else.”
And is this nothing to accomplish? Was it not a
result every way worthy of the Almighty’s power, to
establish for himself thus a nation of witnesses—an
unbroken chain of teachers, which stretches onward,
onward, till the mind aches to fix the end? Yea, it
was a glorious spectacle, that assemblage at Horeb;
it was beautiful to see more than twenty times
hundred thousand of men, women and children,
listening eagerly to the same beatifying
announcement of an imperishable faith; but more
glorious still is the continuance of the same race
of witnesses, of the same people of listeners, who
even now rise up when the Decalogue is proclaimed
among them, to receive again and again the joyful
message which is announced to them in the name of
the Universal Father. And earth and heaven speak of
his might, and millions of suns recount his
goodness, and an endless number of planets attest
his mercy, and all space is filled with his being,
and all revolve, exist, and live in Him; and still
He watches over all with parental care; the highest
angel veils his face before his throne; none may
abide the effulgence of his light; and still He
hears the orphan’s prayer, and marks the cry of the
needy one; and He feeds the hungry, and provides
raiment for the naked, and saves the oppressed from
a hand too mighty for them.
This is our God, one, great, eternal, omnipotent,
and all-pervading; yet He delights in the worship of
his creatures, and He who gives us all is willing to
accept our gifts; He who is everywhere is willing
to dwell in a house which we have built of
perishable materials; and He who knows all our
thoughts is willing to listen to our entreaty, when
we humble ourselves before Him in our distress, or
thank Him in our prosperity. Human reason would not,
could not have invented such a religion; but it is
to Him alone we look as the Author of our faith, as
He is the Author of our life. Therefore says the
prophet properly, after exhibiting the folly of
idol-worship, “But the Lord is in his holy temple;
be silent before him, all the earth.” Go where you
will, over land or sea, in sunshine or darkness,
there is God; no space is free from Him, and no
imaginable state of existence can
<<180>> be without
his supervision. Let, therefore, wickedness tremble;
the Lord is in his temple; the whole world is his
house; the highest is not too high, the lowest depth
is not too deep for his power, or removed from his
government. Let discontent be hushed; for all is
from Him, and He elevates the one and humbles the
other, and who knows what is best for us, who can
tell but that joy might have caused us to forget our
Maker, and that it is affliction alone which brings
us back to his embrace. Let pride and arrogance
lower their look at viewing the universal power of
the Lord, who is so great, yet so humble; who dwells
amidst the host of adoring angels, and yet disdains
not to regard the contrite and lowly.
Let the virtuous hope on amidst difficulties; for
they are watched over unceasingly with more than a
mother’s love, with a tenderness which knows no
abatement; and let all and each reflect that
whatever takes place on earth is treasured up in the
book of memorial, and that at the appointed time all
will be brought to light, and the good and the evil
will receive the recompense due to their deeds.—Yea,
the Lord is in his holy temple; universal nature is
his dwelling; not a spot but is full of his might;
and, though He accepts our service, it is that we
may be blessed through our own merit, not that He
may be more exalted. Be silent, therefore, before
Him, all the earth, and let the afflicted hope on in
the salvation of their God, and always know that
their Redeemer lives, to whom be praises for ever.
Amen.
Sivan (June) 5, 5611. |
