Rabbi I. Lichtenstein Of Budapest (1824-1909). (Translated from the German by Mrs. Baron.) Click here to download a copy in pdf format.

MY APPEAL

I ENTREAT you to read this little paper calmly from beginning to end. To read it thoughtfully, without prejudice, and undisturbed by the outcry made by people who are either deceivers themselves or deceived. I beg you to read it attentively and honestly, and to judge if its contents are logical, based on sound judgment, and deeply rooted in that Rock on which Moses stood when he beheld the glory of God.

The times are past when public thought was led in bondage by certain newswriters, and when men of narrow and indolent mind expected an unenlightened laity to cry Amen to anything they gave out to be dogma and beyond dispute. Reason has at last entered upon her right. "Wisdom cries aloud, she calls at the top of the market; at the town gates; through the whole town her cry resounds" (Prov. 8: 1-3).

Mankind is now mature and of age to understand and appreciate truth, which is eternal and absolute, though formerly misjudged. Everybody is now zealous for his own sound judgment and independent convictions.

Well, let us understand one another in brotherly love and goodwill. Let us go hand in hand without reserve, but taking with us the plummet of reason and of a spiritual religious consciousness; let us consider whether that which I have already written, and now write, is worthy to be cherished as in accord with the signs of the times, the hopes and expectations of Israel, with our past, present and future; whether it harmonizes or not with that which is genuine and unadulterated of our Jewish sentiment and maxims. With the Psalmist I fervently pray, "Remove from me the way of lying, and grant me Thy law graciously. I have chosen the way of Faith; Thy judgments have I laid before me. I hold fast Thy testimonies; O Lord, put me not to shame. I walk in the way of Thy commandments, for this enlarges my heart."

It is true, I have penetrated far into the Holy of Holies; I have boldly, my enemies say madly, crossed the Rubicon - and trodden an unfrequented path, hitherto shunned like the pest by every Jew, and especially by their Rabbis. I have paid homage to the founder of Christianity, and rendered Him praise as the Redeemer of the World, the Savior, the long-expected Messiah of the Jews. But, humanly speaking, do not our eventful, truly epochal times, require extraordinary means, bold thoughts, and thorough reforms? Are not new men now more than ever needed, who, conscious of the purpose of their being, shall be as new channels of good to all peoples of every family and race? And is not this also the need of Israel? Scattered in all the world, fallen out in himself and with himself, dismembered, disunited Israel, who has yearned so longingly, and yet in vain, for the coming of the Angel of the Covenant ! What (or who) can effect the regeneration and resurrection of Israel ? Who shall bring to pass the prophesied miracle of Ezekiel? (Chapter 37)

"Behold, I send My Angel, He shall prepare the way before Me, He shall suddenly come to His Temple. The Lord whom ye look for, the Angel of the Covenant shall appear, saith the Lord of Hosts" (Mal. 3: 1).

At the very outset I make my honest and public confession, the result of earnest thought and inward struggle, that it is my steadfast, unalterable conviction, that Christ, and no other, is intended in this passage of the Prophet, and that it was fulfilled in His appearance. Yes, as a Rabbi grown grey in office, as an old Jew faithful to the Law, I confess candidly, Jesus is the predicted Messiah of Israel; Christ, and no other, is the Angel of the Covenant, for whom we long, and whose Advent our people have ever expected. He is come! This is now my shout of rejoicing, which my lips and pen, and, if God will, my prolonged life shall serve to make known. He is the most worthy successor of Abraham, Moses, and the Prophets, for He beheld in cloudless light that which they saw dimly as through mist, and longed for with holy presentiment and awe. At the time of the sacrificial death of Christ, the veil of the Temple was rent in two, from top to bottom, and the glory of the Lord and His secret were revealed in brightest light to all the world.

"This is the message which we have heard of Him and declare unto you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin." (1 John 1. 5-7). "This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God " (John 3: 19-21).

"Arise, shine, for thy Light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For behold, darkness covers the earth, and gross darkness the people; but the Lord and His glory are risen over thee. And the Gentiles shall walk in the Light, and the kings in the brightness of thy rising " (Isa. 60: 1-3).

"O House of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord" (Isa. 2: 5). Or shall Israel alone be untrue to his longing, his hope, his ideal? Shall Israel - God's possession above all people, the priestly kingdom, the holy people, elected and called of God to render priestly service to the world, to stand at the head of the nations as the most excellent witness of God's truth, light, and salvation, as represented by Moses and the Prophets, proclaimed by Christ, and written in the New Testament - shall Israel willfully, defiantly, and obstinately renounce such high privilege? Truly deplorable and hopeless is the case of the man who has lost all confidence in God as well as in himself, and folds his idle hands in his bosom, saying, despairingly, "There is no more hope or possibility of improvement for me." That nation is despicable which obstinately surrenders itself, and, so doing, crushes the hope of all its sons; it is like that unnatural mother who wickedly exclaimed, "Neither I nor thou shalt have it; cut it asunder." But, on the other hand, that people is worthy of honor, and immortal, who, in spite of temporary weakness and long subjection, powerless and helpless, neither despair or give up hope, but continue to cherish faith in their hidden energy, in their future, and in a revival of national life.

What power is that which but lately raised to prosperity the degraded and neglected States of Greece, Romania, Serbia, and Bulgaria, notwithstanding their political dissolution, the destruction of all scientific life, and servile degradation; in spite of the stupidity, ignorance, the enervation, in which the inhabitants have been held for centuries by the terrible and despotic Turkish government? Was it not inextinguishable hope? - the longing for better times, thought on what their past had been, sad memory of departed glory, united with the impulse to awake out of the national sleep of centuries ? The noblest among them felt ever more and more impelled towards freedom by the history of their land and people, their proverbs and national songs. You may well reply: The mighty hand of Russia, as of other powers, was to be seen here, compelling and giving freedom. But look at Hungary! Forsaken and abandoned of all the world. What power was that which restored life to its withered, dried-up bones, which renewed its suspended constitution, and gave it power to re-assert its nationality, and to blossom anew in unexpected prosperity? Was it not perhaps its songs, breathing hope and promise of freedom, its patriotic poets, the songs of the grandchildren singing their ancestors' courage and strength, of the never to be forgotten spirit of self-sacrifice of their heroes ; the inspiriting inexhaustible love of Fatherland ; the irresistible impulse towards freedom and independence ? But listen to me as I say: We groan and cry and sigh for our Messiah, and out of very longing for Redemption, we have often been misled by false Messiahs; and yet how inconceivable! What perversity! What unnatural confusion of thought! Let us suppose a poor man in great need, who expectantly waits to obtain a number in the lottery, being told, "Your lot has won the highest sum; you can draw your money when you will": would he not hasten home and make diligent search to satisfy himself if it were true?

Now, through all these centuries, thousands upon thousands of the most excellent of all nations have cried triumphantly to us : " Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Zion, behold thy Redeemer, He is come, He spreads out His hands to you, He will gather you as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings : He comes on the mountains and leaps on the hills ; behold, he stands at thy door and knocks." Open to me, my beloved, my sister, my dove! Thy fathers have often followed false Messiahs, idolatrously rendering them divine homage; shut thine ears no longer, open thine eyes, search thy Bible, inquire of thy Prophets, read the New Testament attentively, and thou shall find Moses here, the Prophets there, Christ as Redeemer, Messiah, in the midst,- God over all. "Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon" (Isa. 55: 6, 7). "Harden not your hearts, as at Meribah, as in the day of Massah, in the wilderness, when your fathers tempted Me, proved Me, although they saw My works" (Psalm 95: 8). "Taste and see how kind the Lord is; blessed is the man who trusteth in Him. Fear the Lord, ye His saints, for there is no lack to them that fear Him. The lions lack and suffer hunger, but they that fear the Lord want no good thing. Come, ye children, listen to me, I will teach you the fear of the Lord" (Psalm 34: 8-12).

"For whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. How shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed, and how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that publish the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things ! " (Rom. 10: 13-15).

"But to whom shall I speak, and whom shall I warn that they may hear ? Their ear is closed, they cannot understand, the word of the Lord is to them a reproach, they hear it with reluctance" (Jer. 6: 10). All else the Jew will receive with respect, however opposed it may be to God and His word. Everyone, however forgetful of God, and worldly-minded, the greatest sinners and most hypocritical braggarts, he will treat with the greatest esteem. He accepts the latest phases of modern thought, aad smiles benevolently at the strangest principles advanced; only one thing - oh horror! oh grief! - will he not endure, that Christ should be preached to him, and whosoever dares to name that sacred name with reverence, him he will curse and execrate bitterly.^#1

Dear brethren, "I am the man that hath seen affliction."

A Jew still works as a teacher in my late community of Tapio Szele, who, conversing with a sorely afflicted man, whose sickness is incurable, and to whom no consolation remains but faith and trust in God, tells him, with the hardihood of folly : "There is no God." This infidel avoids, calumniates, and insults me, because I preach the gospel.

There is yet another, a wolf in sheep's clothing, who does not understand the difference between thine and mine, who observes the law of Moses only in so far as it does not touch his gain, who keeps his business open on Sabbaths and festivals, and sells Chametz at Passover ; this man rages against me with fanatic, unappeasable fury. Yes, men who continually make light of the mightiest precepts of Jewish law persecute me; liberal-minded Rabbis, who practice the greatest leniency to themselves and others in religious matters, have declared me outlaw and excommunicate, and branded me as unfit for my office, on account of my testimony for Jesus Christ.

Why, I ask, this unconquerable apathy, this blind inextinguishable hate, this fanatic rage against one of the greatest, most exalted, most excellent of the founders of religion, who, it is impossible to deny, has brought to a whole world, civilization, salvation, redemption, and blessed faith? It is incomprehensible! In our days, when the thoughts and judgments of the past are being recast, and even a monster of Nero's type finds champions and eulogists, when a conservative Rabbi publishes a critique in favor of Spinoza, who combated every positive religion, - in these days, I say, an old man, who for forty years has held his office in honor, is robbed of his modest livelihood and persecuted to the uttermost, because he has dared to raise the cry to his people, "Search and seek, plunge into the pure, untroubled stream of divine teaching ; take note of the general moral ruin and degradation, and consider the good of your children. Let go prejudice, be reasonable, be upright and impartial; and, when you have thus made way for your stifled and buried religious convictions, the Old and New Testament will witness to you, beyond all dispute, that Christ is our only hope, our Savior and Messiah; that He, only He, and no other, will bring us to Zion, to the House of our God."

But, be it as it may, I will not conceal my deep-rooted convictions, or be dismayed either by the mean, malicious tricks of secret foes, or by the rough blows of open enemies. "For Zion's sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake will I not keep silent, until her righteousness arise and her salvation as a lamp that burneth. That the Gentiles may see thy righteousness, and all kings thy glory, and thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord shall name" (Isa. 62: 1,2). "I say, then, hath God cast away His people? God forbid! For I am also an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God hath not cast away His people which He foreknew. Or know ye not what the Scripture says of Elias, how he made intercession to God, against Israel, saying, Lord, they have killed Thy prophets, and digged down Thine altars, and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God to him ? I have reserved to Myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to Baal. Even so there is at this present time also a remnant according to the election of grace" (Rom. 11: 1-5).

I sow the seed undismayed and undiscouraged, though it may be with tears. The time will assuredly come when it will ripen and bear fruit, when he will return with joy who bears his sheaves with him. "Here I stand on my watch and set me upon the tower, and look and see what will be said to me, and what I shall answer him that reproveth me. The Lord, however, answers me and says, Write the visions, paint it clearly on a tablet that he who runs may read. The vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak and not lie. Though it tarry, wait for it, for it will surely come, and will not tarry. Behold, he who is stiffnecked, he will have no rest in his heart. But the just shall live, by his faith" (Hab. 2: 1-4).

"For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto every one that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For therein is revealed the righteousness of God from faith to faith, as it is written. The just shall live by faith" ( Rom. 1: 16, 17).

If I speak here of faith and confess Jesus as our Messiah, if I speak with enthusiasm of His worldwide mission, of that Light-tower - the Tower of David - which is built to illumine the dark horizon with its heavenly radiance, so that we may not go astray in the wilderness of this life, but keep the narrow road of salvation in sight; if I bring forward the simple, sublime, unsurpassed, divine teaching of the New Testament, and recommend every one who strives after righteousness and the fear of the Lord to seek therein for themselves; if I encourage my Jewish brethren to draw from the crystal spring and youth-renewing well of the apostle, that they may recover in body and soul, and, newborn, may rejoice and be glad in the living God; - if I do this, it is not to force into undue prominence any dogma, any sign or wonder, but simply to draw attention to the God-ordained way of Salvation, as contained in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. There Christ stands as the central point- the miracle of history, the goal of Israel's history of miracle, in whom all its power and perfection is found. Israel, shy of miracle! because without faith. Israel, born of miracle, who has the God of miracle as his father and author; Israel, whose history is encircled and filled in with miracles of God, stumbles at the miracles of the New Testament! Israel, whose prophets were continually obliged to confirm their words by miracles and signs - who have known an Elijah and an Elisha, who, on necessity, multiplied meal and oil and bread, cleansed lepers, and raised the dead (1 Kings 17: 14, 21; 2 Kings 4: 5-44; 5: 1-27) - Israel, I say, stumbles at the miracles of Jesus Christ, in whom Israel's line of prophets culminated and ended.

Leave, for the present, these signs and miracles of Christ, and concern yourselves with those words in His gospel which go home so powerfully to heart and conscience. So doing, you will make progress in the way, the Being of Christ will be revealed to you, and truly it will be as (Isa. 9: 6), miracle in Person, the miracle of all history. Then you will cease to wonder that the marvelous Savior-life of this divine Master is full of miracle.

They are all miracles of healing and love, in which His calling as Savior is apparent, and His love to the miserable is evidenced by deed. Miracles to satisfy the curious, to serve His own glory, or for the relief of His own personal necessity, you will seek for in vain in His holy life. Miracle served His word, to strengthen faith where it found entrance. For such as opposed Him and yet sought for signs. He had only the drastic reply, "This evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of the prophet Jonah " (Matt. 12: 39).

He required faith, as God requires faith of those who come to Him seeking help; faith, that is, openness to His Word, devotion to His person, reliance on His help. "Jesus turned Him about, and when He saw her He said, Daughter, be of good comfort, thy faith hath made thee whole"^#2 (Matt. 9: 22). "And there shall come forth a shoot out of the stem of Jesse, and a tender shoot from his roots. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord; and shall make Him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord ; and He shall not judge after the sight of His eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of His ears. But with righteousness shall He judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth ; and He shall smite the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips shall He slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of His loins, and faithfulness the girdle of His reins" (Isa. 11: 1-5.)

Thus does Isaiah describe the coming Son of David, such divine attributes do the Prophets ascribe to Him. Truly He is a miraculous Person, both divine and human, but still I will not enlarge here upon His wondrous birth and wondrous return to the Father - a stone of stumbling to the unbelieving, notwithstanding that an Elijah also ascended to heaven in a fiery chariot and in storm. (2 Kings 2: 11.)

Again, I will not speak of the Holy Spirit or the Christian doctrine of the Godhead- Father, Son, and Spirit - although our Chassidim, who claim to be successors of the heroes of the Talmud, and with whom the orthodox in Judaism now go hand in hand, believe in a tenfold godhead, in ten emanations, who with En-Sof (the Eternal) form one absolute, inseparable unity, with ten sides and ten faces. These say, "As the fire with its flames and its sparks is but one, so the Eternal with the Sefirot radiating from Him is one in being." Many also of our most advanced Rabbis cannot think of God without the Shechina^#3 (glory) and the Holy Spirit. Neither will I here represent Christ as the Lamb of sacrifice whose death was an atonement, although our Talmudists often repeat:

But I will here only emphasize the fact that that Jew is an enemy to his own flesh, a traitor to himself, and morally a suicide, who does not finally recognise Christ as his Messiah, and render Him the homage due to Him - who does not unite with the pioneers and heralds of Christ and exclaim in accord with them, "Sing to the Lord a new song, for He has done wondrously. His right hand and His holy arm have gotten Him the victory. The Lord has proclaimed His salvation before all peoples, He has revealed His righteousness, He remembered His grace and His truth to the house of Israel."

"Here is the patience of the saints, here are they who keep the commandments of God and faith in Jesus, who is not come to destroy but to fulfill the law and the prophets."

Brethren, away to Jesus, who by the wings of His Spirit has borne countless thousands into a purer region, into the kingdom of heaven; who alone has made fruitful the spirit of the nations, who has averted the death-blow from the human victim of degraded heathen sacrifice, who has given a new direction to thought and manner of life, and a new existence to nations and states. Who like He has awakened dead consciences out of their senselessness, taught true dignity and nobility, broken down the separating walls of classes and races, and established brotherliness and equality of mankind before God ? Certainly He has effected that which was prophesied of the Seed of David, His work has been that of the predicted Messiah and the true Seed of Abraham, through Him all nations of the earth are being and will yet be blessed. It is possible to shut our eyes to these patent facts, but we are not the less blind for doing so.

It is true you can point me to curse and not to blessing, and bring to my remembrance the iniquity and abominable treatment which has encountered us in the name of Christianity through all the centuries; the torture, the oppression, the martyr-piles, and the blood, which stain so many pages of the Church's history. You may well make me note the hateful doings of the Anti-Semites, and their attempts to poison the minds of the peoples against us, but, I ask, is Israel in its past and present itself free from such reproach? Have we nothing to mourn and repent? Have our ancestors ever spoken in the same spirit as our father Abraham, "Let there be no strife between me and thee, between my herdsmen and thy herdsmen, for we are brethren?" Has not bitter unappeasable strife raged between tribe and tribe, brother and brother, among those nearest related?

Have there not been in the past, and are there not yet, Jews enough who, full of envy and mistrust, endeavor to spoil their brother of honor, and would even snatch the scant food from his mouth? "These are wicked people, Jews only by name," so you answer me; but I tell you on the authority of the plain teaching of the New Testament, that Christians who do not love every one, whose hearts do not beat in love and brotherliness to their neighbor, regardless of class or race, who are revengeful or do evil of any kind, that such are Christians in name only, like those Jews who are only Jews according to the flesh, - Christians who are alien to the spirit and word of Christ, unregenerate, sin-stricken souls, whom every true Christian, every real follower of Christ, must denounce as unclean, and avoid, - Shadows of the night which disappear before the light of day. Look, then, not into the darkness, but into the light. "Light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun." God has His people among the peoples, and Christ His spiritual disciples in the churches. Step out of your narrow circle and rub your sleepy eyes; look about you, and see what is being done on every hand by the true disciples of Christ; see the sacrifice of their faith, the work of their love, the life and endeavor of their spirits. Admire those noble Christian women who, instead of frequenting places of entertainment, balls, concerts, and the like, for the love of Christ, visit hospitals, tend the sick and bind up wounds, who venture on gloomy nights into dens of vice, to raise the fallen, to save the tempted from destruction, and to lead the erring to virtue and to God.

Admire the power of Christ in the numerous youth in all Christian lands, chiefly in Germany and England, who, instead of reading pernicious literature, read the Bible, instead of frivolous songs sing psalms, and instead of loose company, frequent devotional meetings.

Lastly, be just to the Christian messengers, the missionaries, ^#4 who for Christ's sake go out into the world, the Bible only in their hand, without weapon or defense, and who, renouncing comfort, and defying privation and weariness, offer the gospel to the heathen, and in such self-denying work are neither dismayed by the savage cannibal or the fatal climate. Learn to honor and appreciate those friends of Israel among the nations, those Philo Semites among Christians-of whom Professor Franz Delitzsch, of Leipzig, was one- who "behold the God of Israel, and under His feet, as it were, a beautiful sapphire like the colors of heaven when it is bright,'" and who hold in truth the pure, spiritual, original Mosaic faith:

"Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy might; and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" (Mark 12: 29-31).

These follow Jesus, and in the power of His Spirit seek to give expression to that which was the heart and soul of the revelation of God by Moses and the Prophets; in them it is truly come to pass : "My name is had in praise among the nations, from the sunrise to its going down" (Mal. 1: 11).

These friends of Israel have no desire to turn us away from the one God our Father, but to bring us to Christ, as to Him in whom Jehovah dwells, and who has appeared to redeem His people; as to Him also in whom Faith, Hope, and Love, those three heavenly powers, which are the arteries of true Judaism, course together in their original source and heat. If we call on Him He will reveal Himself as the Good Shepherd, "through the tender mercy of our God, whereby the dayspring from on High hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace" (Luke 1: 78, 79).

Dearest Brethren, we are in the midst of the Christian world, we are scattered among the nations who worship the God of Israel in Christ; whether we recognize it or not, we are walking in the light which Christ has shed over the world, and we enjoy the fruits of His having come as Savior. How long shall we continue cold and lifeless? How long shall we repel and hold aloof from Him whose is the Crown of Israel, in whom the Law and the Prophets have their fulfillment and completion? No more do we dwell pent up in the Ghetto, the time of our inequality as citizens and deprivation of political rights is at an end, we share in all the intellectual privileges of our Christian fellow-citizens. Why then should we longer remain cooped up in the narrow spiritual Ghetto, in which for centuries long we have dwelt, whose walls have long since been broken down and overcome by a new spirit of life?

Rabbinic-Talmudic Judaism, that wonderful old fortress of the tenacious Jewish mind, built up in opposition to Christianity, is full of breaches - a heap of ruins.

Gone is the old Jewish piety, gone the old Jewish virtues, kindled by faith in Scripture and tradition, the whole armory against oppression and persecution is decayed. The barest unbelief, the boldest immorality and worldliness, meets us in the Jewish youth of our day; not the Talmud only, but with countless Jews, Moses and the Prophets are also become a scoff. From whence shall help come? Who can heal this wound of Joseph? The true balm of Gilead for Israel lies in the hand of Jesus. New enemies of our people have arisen, the Anti-Semites have sown a dragon's seed which ripens to a horrid harvest. This new Goliath will receive his death-blow from the Semites, Jesus and His Apostles, by the grace and truth of His words. Range yourselves under the banner of Jesus, and then we can overcome our enemies with their own weapons, and destroy their molehill. Is God with us, then who can be against us? But God is not with us if we are not with His Servant and Child Jesus.

And will Israel cease to be a nation when at last he recognizes in Christ his Redeemer and Messiah-King? Shall we then be absorbed in Christendom, and will there be an end to our God-consecrated people? By no means; Israel will then, at last, attain the position to which he is called of God. At the head of the nations, as the first-born, the people of Salvation, from whom the Savior of all peoples has arisen ; as that nation in which the Kingdom of God was first founded, and reached its perfection in Jesus, the true King of Israel. Then will be fulfilled to Israel those prophetic promises as yet unfulfilled ; then the words of Zechariah shall become true : " Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, at that time ten men out of all the languages of the nations shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying. We will go with you, for we have heard that God is with you " (Zech. 8: 23) ; as also the word of Isaiah: "At the last times shall the mountain of the Lord's house be exalted, and be high above all the mountains, and all nations shall flow unto it. And one shall encourage another, saying, Come ye, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the House of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us His ways, and we will walk in His paths. For from Zion will go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. O House of Jacob, come ye and let us walk in the light of the Lord!" (Isa. 2: 2-5).

Jesus says: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one cometh unto the Father but by me" (John 14: 6). "Then spake Jesus again to them and said : I am the Light of the World, he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the Light of Life " (John 8: 12).

Israel ! Arise, shine ! Thy Light is come.

#1 An accomplished lady, who was conversing with me, exclaimed, when her arguments had all been met, "He is everything great, every thing noble, if only He were not called Jesus Christ." We Jews call Him "Yeshua", was my laconic answer.

#2 A little book has appeared quite recently which is worthy of serious consideration. It is written by Prof. J. M. Charcot, and is entitled "Saving Faith," founded on knowledge and experience (Der Heilende Glaube). Yes, Christ will come again in unimagined glory and splendor. Then, for the first time, we shall perfectly understand Him, and perfectly adore. Now we see through a mirror, a word which is dark to us, but then face to face. "Now I know in part, but then shall I know even as I am known" (i Cor. xiii. 12.)

#3 Protocol of the first Assembly of Rabbis at Braunschweig, June 1844. Third edition, page 105.

#4 Ah ! I have again committed an unheard of offence, and given my enemies a new point of attack. Impossible! Who dares to speak in praise of the missionaries, the most hated of all men after Christ Himself? And above all, who speaks in praise of the Jewish missionaries? But truth and experience have set me free. It may be among missionaries as also in other human societies, that there are some self-serving, sordid natures, yet the greater number are earnest, truly pious and tried disciples of Christ, who glow with fervent zeal for the salvation of mankind and also of the Jews. "The Lord reward them according to their work," and their recompense be perfect with the Lord, the God of Israel.