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PREFACE.

This volume completes the work begun several years ago. Though bearing the title "The Ethics of the Hebrew Scriptures," it is the third and concluding part in the series of Biblical readers published by us heretofore, viz: Part I. The Pentateuch: Part II. The Historical Books of the Bible, Milwaukee, 1883-1884. Why the new title was chosen, requires no long justification or even explanation. What dowers the prophetical and the poetical books of the Biblical canon with inestimable worth, is certainly the ethical element so richly presented by them. To this even those must assent who, perhaps, are not as ready as others to concede that this ethical element constitutes the very essence of the prophetic message, and is, in very truth, the contribution made by Israel to the wealth of the spiritual possessions of mankind; yea, that in these ethics is bodied the distinctive character of Judaism in which it is differentiated from all other religious conceptions of the universe and man's station in it. With the general outlines of Pentateuchal history most of our religious schools succeed in acquainting their pupils. But beyond this the fewest. attempt to go; and when they do, they find their best efforts hampered by the absence of a handy guide to lead the scholars to the limpid original source of the Biblical word. In consequence of this, the stirring oratory of the Prophets, the melody of the Psalms,, and the wisdom of the Proverbs, the uplifting spiritual flight of Job and the reasoning of Ecclesiastes remain for most of the rising generation an untrodden territory, and the neglect to visit this beautiful garden of spiritual thought cannot but react upon the whole character of the religious training provided; that it does so detrimentally, of this the proofs abound. Should not those born in the household of Israel receive in their youth, as full a knowledge of the Biblical texts as do most of their comrades of non-Jewish parentage? And what is still of greater importance, should they not be made to know that the ethics of the Biblical prophets and poets and thinkers are

II

not obsolete, but that modern life might much to its benefit apply the principles enunciated by the seers of Palestine?

Not merely for the sake of making, as it were, a holiday ex cursion into the contiguous territory of post-Biblical writings, have we extended our selections beyond the limits of the Biblical canon. The firm conviction that prophetic inspiration did not cease when Malachi's ministry had ended, but that as in the Bible, so in the writings of the later periods the voice of God spoke to the chosen few to whom comes the divine call:—this conviction that the great teachers of the second Temple and the dispersion are full of the same spirit as quickened the tongue of the masters of the first Temple and the captivity and the restauration, induced us to make the additions. What better means is there to show that whatever its outward fate and form the soul of Israel's religion is ethics; that there is its quickening force and the vital spark from God's altar touching to eloquence its lips, than the presentation of the post-Biblical writers and writings?

We are confident that the book in this form will not be merely a useful guide to instruction in the class-room, but will be a welcome aid at home in the hands of a good and devoted mother who is desirous of acquainting her children with the treasurers of our rich ethical literature. And the wants of the thousands who are scattered throughout this land, isolated as Jews among communities where the cultivation of Jewish thought and association is absolutely impossible, may be, we hope, met to a certain extent by this collection. A text book in the ordinary sense it is not; it stands to reason that the selections are not intended to be used in the order they are here arranged. We are hopeful that in whatever sequence they may be studied or even merely read, they will be apt to plant a deeper love and reverence for Israel's literature and a more profound knowledge of our mission.

CHICAGO, ILL., November 12, 1889.

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