then any child born before the death of the first wife is illegitimate, but not those born after her death." (See Babylonian Talmud, Treatise Yebamoth, tom v., p. 94, Amsterdam Ed.) In this treatise there occur even several passages where such marriages are encouraged, as, for example, chapter iv., § 13, p. 49. So also the celebrated and voluminous writer, Rabbi Maimonides, held the same views.
The Caraites, however, who reject altogether the Oral Law and the Talmudic traditions, and are therefore regarded as heretics by the other Jews, do not allow such marriages in their community. They argue that if the law forbids one degree of consanguinity, that which is equal or nearer ought to be forbidden also. There exists a great diversity of opinion as to the antiquity of this sect. According to their own writers they belong to the ten tribes that were led captives by Shalmaneser, but as neither Philo nor Josephus make mention of this sect, some writers infer from it that they could not then have existed in their times, and place their origin in the fourth or fifth century. Some of the Rabbies maintain that they sprung from the Sadducces. If this be true, they evidently must be a reformed sect, since the Caraites believe fully in the immortality of the soul. There are still some members of this sect existing in Poland, Russia, Constantinople, Cairo, and other places in the Levant.
But with the exception of this sect, the Jewish people as a whole held marriage with a deceased wife's sister not only permissible, but in some cases desirable. Upon this point all Jewish commentators and critics are perfectly agreed. Even the celebrated Maimonides and his followers, who denied the Divine origin of the Oral Law, and held other liberal views, and were therefore looked upon as schismatics, were, on this subject, in perfect harmony with their brethren.
In the early times of the Christian Church, however, it appears that marriages with a deceased wife's sister
