inclination may not stir up and sully man s heart so as to impede this submission. The correlative idea, the acceptance of the divine will as man s highest good, is expressed in a noble prayer by Rabbi Eliezer (Berachoth 29 b) : " Do thy will, O God, in heaven above and bestow tranquillity of spirit on those who fear thee below, and what is good in thine own sight do ! Blessed art thou, O Lord, thou who hearest prayer."
nnnp T^l n-n nm r
Scorn (P* 1 !?), i.e. irreverence and a propensity to de graded ideals ; perhaps also the worshipper prays to be delivered from the low esteem of others (cf. Esther i. 18).
May it be thy will... to deliver me.. .from arrogant men and from arrogance (pTJ "H!), i.e. from arrogance in others and from the same fault in oneself. The Hebrew for arrogance is literally "boldness of face" (E^S rMlJ). A bad companion .. .a bad neighbour the one is a false friend ("QH), the other an ill-conducted person who dwells (P.IP) near by. Cf. the saying in the Mishnah Aboth, ii, 4 (P.B. p. 189). The adversary (!&&>) that destroy eth, i.e. the intrusion of evil suggestions and corrupting desires. For the significance of the term Satan used here see note on Angelology. A hard judgment, perhaps a case hard to decide when acting as judge ; or it may mean harshness to wards others, just as a hard opponent implies implacability towards oneself. The whole passage is from the Talmud (Berachoth 16b), where we are told that Rabbi Judah the Prince (who compiled the Mishnah circa 200), when he had finished his prayers, habitually added this paragraph, although, the Talmud adds, Rabbi Judah was accompanied by Roman guards who would have protected him personally from the insults of arrogant men. Curiously enough, in the Talmud the form is plural, "to deliver us" while in the P.B. before us it is singular. But in another Talmudic passage (Sabbath 30 b), where the opening words of the same prayer are cited, the singular is used.
