cutting of roots" by the sons of God who came to earth and associated with them. The Greeks and Romans always held Jewish sorcery in the highest esteem, and the Arabs accepted their teaching with implicit confidence. The Talmud is full of magical formulas, and the Kaballah, a mystic theosophy which combined Israelitish traditions with Alexandrian philosophy, and began to be known about the tenth century, was unquestionably the foundation of the sophistry of Paracelsus and his followers.
In the Middle Ages, and in some communities until quite recent times, belief in the occult powers of Jews, which they had themselves inculcated, was firm and universal, and became the reason, or at least the excuse, for much of the persecution they had to suffer. For the punishment of sorcery and witchcraft was not based on a belief that fraud had been practised, but resulted from a conviction of the terrible truth of the claims which had been put forward.
The Jews of Western Europe have lost or abandoned many of the traditional practices which have been associated with their popular medicines from time immemorial. But in the East, especially in Turkey and Syria, quaint prayers and antiquated materia medica are still associated as they were in the days of the Babylonian captivity. Dogs' livers, earthworms, hares' feet, live ants, human bones, doves' dung, wolves' entrails, and powdered mummy still rank high as remedies, while for patients who can afford it such precious products as dew from Mount Carmel are prescribed. Invocations, prayers, and superstitious practices form the stock in trade of the "Gabbetes," generally elderly persons who attend on the sick. They have a multitude of infallible cures in their repertoires.
