marvellously affected the fortunes of the Chosen People, has written the following words: "The origin of the Talmud is coeval with the return from the Babylonish Captivity (some five centuries before Christ). One of the most mysterious and momentous periods in the history of humanity is that brief span of the Exile. What were the influences brought to bear upon the captives during that time we know not. But this we know, that from a reckless, lawless, godless populace they returned transformed into a band of Puritans. . . . The change is there, palpable, unmistakable—a change we may regard as almost miraculous. Scarcely aware before of the existence of their glorious national literature, the people now began to press round these brands plucked from the fire, the scanty records of their faith and history, with a fierce and passionate love, a love stronger than that of wife and child. These same documents, as they were gradually formed into a canon, became the immutable centre of their lives, their actions, their thoughts, their very dreams. From that time forth, with scarcely any intermission, the keenest as well as the most practical minds of the nation remained fixed upon them. Turn it, and turn it again, says the Talmud with regard to the Bible, for everything is in it."
After the fall of the City and the burning of the Temple in A.D. 70 the wonderful records of the Jew and his Book (the Talmud) are all clear and definite. How it was composed, who compiled it, and why it was put out, all this belongs to history, and forms a most important though little known chapter in the annals of the Chosen People; in some respects also it is a most weighty piece of evidential history—perhaps the most weighty—possessed by Christianity.
But some of the materials out of which the great Book (the Talmud), which has so enormously influenced the fortunes of the Chosen People for so many centuries, was composed, existed before the catastrophe of A.D. 70. We will briefly examine what we know of the ancient materials of the Talmud; the examination will be of the highest interest.
It is certain that very early—no doubt in the far-back days of Moses—there must have existed, as we have already suggested, a number of explanatory laws which set forth in detail many
