THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA.*
There is without doubt a certain magnificence in the coasep. tion of the Jewish Encyclopedia. To gather together into the compass of one work all that concerns the Hebrew people from the earliest dawn of history or legend down to the present day is a great undertaking, nor are the foundations laid down by the projectors of the scheme inadequate to the greatness of the contemplated structure. There are to be twelve volumes of the customary encyclopmdia size, which will contain an aggregate of between seven and eight thousand pages. To make the undertaking possible from the financial point of view there has been put together a list of subscribers of a magnitude quite unprecedented in literary history,—it contains more than six thousand names. This number can. not be supposed to exhaust the public to which the Encyclo. pedia appeals, as not more than six hundred belong to Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. (Great Britain and Ireland supply five hundred, the Continent of Europe forty, South Africa twenty, and the rest of the world fifteen.) We must not omit to say that the story of how the scheme was started exhibits a remarkable example of perseverance and courage.
We naturally turn to the article "Abraham," as likely to indicate the method in which the subject-matter of the Encyclopedia is to be treated. It has been divided between four contributors. One deals with "Biblical Data," epito. mising, without comment, the story of the Patriarch as it is told in the Book of Genesis; a second gives a summary of Abraham's personality as it appears in apocryphal and rabbinical literature; a third deals in the same way with Mahommedan legend ; and a fourth, Professor C. H. Toy, of Harvard, supplies the critical treatment. The third of these sections has more than usual interest just now. A few months ago a writer in the Nineteenth Century had the courage to deny that the Koran was indebted to Jewish or Christian sources (Orthodox Moslems are committed to this because it is de fide with them that the Koran has been in- scribed from all eternity on the Table in the divine presence). He relied largely on one of the -most eccentric books that the world has ever seen, the writer of which boldly maintained that there never was such a people as the Jews of the . Old and New Testaments, and that the city of Jerusalem has no right to appear in any historical map before the time of the First Crusade. Professor Gottheil (of iJolumbia University, New York) has a very com- plete account of the matter. Mahommed, he says, began by knowing very little about Abraham. Illiterate himself, he had to depend upon what he heard. As time went on, Ile found out more about the Patriarch, and made him a more important figure in his account of the revelations that had preceded his own. "Islam was merely a restatement of the old religion of Abraham." Finally, he connected Abraham with Mecca, restoring, at the same time, as we may put it, his birthright to Ishmael. It was thus he hoped to cut the ground from under the feet of the Jews, of whose conversion he had now begun to despair. The "critical view" is not unlike what Professor Cheyne sets forth 8.5. in the Encyclopmdia Balica• Professor Toy does not, indeed, draw the subtle distinctions
cannot be unreasonable to hold that there is a kernel of
E," and
between the narratives designated by the letters
"P" in which the English critic delights (in p “the friendly intimacy between Yahwe and Abraham has die' appeared; when Yabwe at length manifests himself, Abraham falls upon his face "), but he. regards the story as mini! mythical. Professor Cheyne goes as far as saying that "it
tradition in the narratives." Professor Toy thinks "that there can be little doubt tbat the name involves some historical
• The Jewish Encyclopedia. Edited by Isidore Singer, Vb...D. I* gel York : Funk and Wagnalls Company. V17 for 12 vole.] 'fact, and that this fact has to do with tribal migration." This is not much, but it is a little more than the very unsub- enntfal "kernel of tradition." Professor Ryle in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible goes farther, and sees in Abraham a t historical leader, while conceding that some of the details of his story are mythical. In the Jewish Enerloreclil "Abraham" is followed by articles on "Abraham's Bosom,' ',Abraham's Oak" (a tree at Mamre), with two illustrations, " Testament of Abraham" (an apocryphal work which Dr. Louis Ginsberg claims as wholly Jewish, in opposition to its English editor, Mr. M. R. James), and not less than a hundred /soaves of the name of Abraham. Here we have the Pe speciality a the work. Some of the number are, of course, of but little importance. Colonel Adolphe Abraham (b. 1819, though doubtless a good soldier, would hardly have found a place in a biographical dictionary but for the fact of his race, and Abraham of Augsburg was probably a madman; but Abraham of Toledo was a philosopher whose views on ethics and religion anticipated no little of what has been set forth by modern thinkers, Abraham of Posquieres was an eminent Talmudist, and Abraham of Barcelona (commonly called Au:1,7ns) was a versatile writer on science as well as theology. Passing on, we find two interest- ing articles on " Academies " (in Babylonia and Palestine), and a treatise on "Accents in Hebrew" (by Professor Max Margolis, of the University of California). Under the head of "Accident" a Jewish lawyer compares Hebrew, Roman, and English law. In "Africa" we have a general survey of the history of the Jewish people in that part of the world, its sub-divisions being reserved for subsequent treat- ment. Agricultural Colonies," set on foot in modern times, occupy some twenty pages, under the headings of Argentina the great experiment of Baron and Baroness Hirsch), Canada, Palestine, Russia, and the United States. The largest of the Argentine colonies is Clara (the name of the Baroness); the villages number nineteen, the inhabitants 4,885. There is an interesting illustration, "Children on Horseback Starting for School,"—in South America every one rides. The Pales- tinian colonies have about 45,000 acres under cultivation, with a population•of between 5,000 and 6,000; and there are ethers east of the Jordan. (We see that wine of Palestinian origin has been introduced—we do not know with what success—on the English market.) Some notice might have been taken of the remarkable movement in a similar direction which has lately taken place in Eastern London. Among other articles we see "Aldus Marratius," the first printer of a Hebrew grammar; Alexander the Great, whose visit to Jerusalem is considered doubtful; the Russian Czars 9f the name, the third having gained an unenviable notoriety by his persecution a his Jewish subjects; Alexandra, the mother of Mariamne ; and Alexandria, a very important place in Jewish history, and treated, accordingly, at some length. Under the heading of " America " we have an account of Jewish life, past and present, in the muitaus States of North and South America. " Amulet " is a learned article on charms, and handsomely illustrated. We have now said enough to give our readers an idea of the wide range of interest occupied by this work; it only remains to wish it a prosperous career and, a successful completion of the twelve volumes within which, the conductors hope, it will be contained.
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