The historical consciousness of Israel was vitalised by a unique
adaptability to present conditions. This is shown in the fidelity
with which a number of ancient festivals have been maintained through
the ages. Some of these were taken over from pre-Israelite cults. They
were nature feasts, and these are among the oldest rites of men. But,
as Maimonides wisely said eight centuries ago, religious rites depend
not so much on their origins as on the use men make of them. People who
wish to return to the primitive usages of this or that church have no
grasp of the value and significance of ceremonial. Here, at all events,
we are not concerned with origins. The real y interesting thing is that
feasts, which originated in the fields and under the free heaven, were
observed and enjoyed in the confined streets of the Ghetto. The influence
of ceremonial is undying when it is bound up with a community's life. 'It
is impossible to create festivals to order. One must use those which
exist, and where necessary charge them with new meanings.' So writes
Mr. Montefiore in his _Liberal Judaism_ (p. 155).
This is precisely what has happened with the Passover, Pentecost, and
the Feast of Tabernacles. These three festivals were original y, as has
been said, nature feasts. But they became also pilgrim feasts. After the
fal of the Temple the pilgrimages to Jerusalem, of course, ceased, and
there was an end to the sacrificial rites connected with them al . The
only sense in which they can stil be called pilgrim feasts is that,
despite the general laxity of Sabbath observance and Synagogue attendance,
these three celebrations are nowadays occasions on which, in spring,
summer, and autumn, a large section of the Jewish community contrives
to wend its way to places of public worship.
In the Jewish Liturgy the three feasts have special designations. They
are cal ed respectively 'The Season of our Freedom,' 'the Season of the
Giving of our Law,' and 'the Season of our Joy.' These descriptions are
not biblical, nor are they found in this precise form until the fixation
of the Synagogue liturgy in the early part of the Middle Ages. But they
have had a powerful influence in perpetuating the hold that the three
pilgrim feasts have on the heart and consciousness of Israel. Liberty,
Revelation, Joy--these are a sequence of wondrous appeal. Now it is
easily seen that these ideas have no indissoluble connection with specific
historical traditions. True, 'Freedom' implies the Exodus; 'Revelation,'
the Sinaitic theophany; 'Joy,' the harvest merry-makings, and perhaps
some connection with the biblical narrative of Israel's wanderings in the
wilderness. But the connection, though essential for the construction of
the association, is not essential for its retention. 'The Passover,' says
Mr. Montefiore (_Liberal Judaism_, p. 155), 'practically celebrates
the formation of the Jewish people. It is also the festival of liberty. In
view of these two central features, it does not matter that we no longer
believe in the miraculous incidents of the Exodus story. They are mere
trappings which can easily be dispensed with. A festival of liberty,
the formation of a people for a religious task, a people destined to
become a purely religious community whose continued existence has no
meaning or value except on the ground of religion,--here we have ideas,
which can fitly form the subject of a yearly celebration.' Again, as
to Pentecost and the Ten Commandments, Mr. Montefiore writes: 'We do
not believe that any divine or miraculous voice, still less that God
Himself, audibly pronounced the Ten Words. But their importance lies in
themselves, not in their surroundings and origin. Liberals as wel as
orthodox may therefore join in the festival of the Ten Commandments.
Pentecost celebrates the definite union of religion with morality,
the inseparable conjunction of the "service" of God with the "service"
of man. Can any religious festival have a nobler subject?' Finally, as
to tabernacles, Mr. Montefiore thus expresses himself: 'For us, to-day,
the connection with the wanderings from Egypt, which the latest [biblical]
legislators attempted, has again disappeared. Tabernacles is a harvest
festival; it is a nature festival. Should not a religion have a festival
or holy day of this kind? Is not the conception of God as the ruler and
sustainer of nature, the immanent and all-pervading spirit, one aspect of
the Divine, which can fitly be thought of and celebrated year by year?
Thus each of the three great Pentateuchal festivals may reasonably and
joyful y be observed by liberals and orthodox alike. We have no need or
wish to make a change.' And of the actual ceremonial rites connected
with the Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles, it is apparently only
the avoidance of leaven on the first of the three that is regarded as
unimportant. But even there Mr. Montefiore's own feeling is in favour
of the rite. 'It is,' he says, 'a matter of comparative unimportance
whether the practice of eating unleavened bread in the house for the
seven days of the Passover be maintained or not. Those who appreciate
the value of a pretty and ancient symbol, both for children and adults,
wil not easily abandon the custom.'
This is surely a remarkable development. In the Christian Church it seems
that certain festivals are retaining their general hold because they
are becoming public, national holidays. But in Judaism the hold is to be
maintained precisely on the ground that there is to be nothing national
about them, they are to be reinterpreted ideal y and symbolically. It
remains to be seen whether this is possible, and it is too early to
predict the verdict of experience. The process is in active incubation
in America as wel as in Europe, but it cannot be claimed that the eggs
are hatched yet. On the other hand, Zionism has so far had no effect in
the opposite direction. There has been no nationalisation of Judaism as
a result of the new striving after political nationality. Many who had
previously been detached from the Jewish community have been brought back
by Zionism, but they have not been re-attached to the religion. There
has been no perceptible increase, for instance, in the number of those
who fast on the Ninth of Ab, the anniversary of the destruction of the
Temple. Hence, from these and other considerations, of which limited
space prevents the specification, it seems on the whole likely that,
as in the past so in the future, the Festivals of the Synagogue wil
survive by changes in religious significance rather than by any deepening
of national association.
Except that the Synagogues are decked with flowers, while the Decalogue
is solemnly intoned from the Scrol of the Pentateuch, the Feast of
Pentecost has no ceremonial trappings even with the orthodox. Passover and
Tabernacles stand on a different footing. The abstention from leavened
bread on the former feast has led to a closely organised system of
cleansing the houses, an interminable array of rules as to food; while
the prescriptions of the Law as to the bearing of palm-branches and other
emblems, and the ordinance as to dwel ing in booths, have surrounded
the Feast of Tabernacles with a considerable, if less extensive,
ceremonial. But there is this difference. The Passover is primarily a
festival of the Home, Tabernacles of the Synagogue. In Europe the habit
of actual y dwel ing in booths has been long unusual, owing to climatic
considerations. But of late years it has become customary for every
Synagogue to raise its communal booth, to which many Jews pay visits of
ceremony. On the other hand, the Passover is _par excel ence_ a home
rite. On the first two evenings (or at al events on the first evening)
there takes place the _Seder_, (literally 'service'), a service of
prayer, which is at the same time a family meal. Gathered round the table,
on which are spread unleavened cakes, bitter herbs, and other emblems of
joy and sorrow, the family recounts in prose and song the narrative of
the Exodus. The service is in two parts, between which comes the evening
meal. The hallowing of the home here attains its highest point.
Unless, indeed, this distinction be al otted to the Sabbath. The
rigidity of the laws regarding Sabbath observance is undeniable. Movement
was restricted, many acts were forbidden which were not in themselves
laborious. The Sabbath was hedged in by a formidable array of enactments.
To an outside critic it is not wonderful that the Jewish Sabbath has
a repellent look. But to the insider things wear another aspect.
The Sabbath was and is a day of delight. On it the Jew had a foretaste
of the happiness of the world to come. The reader who wishes to have a
spirited, and absolutely true, picture of the Jewish Sabbath cannot do
better than turn to Dr. Schechter's excellent _Studies in Judaism_
(pp. 296 _seq._). As Dr. Schechter pithily puts it: 'Somebody,
either the learned professors, or the mil ions of the Jewish people,
must be under a delusion.' Right through the Middle Ages the Sabbath grew
deeper into the affections of the Jews. It was not til after the French
Revolution and the era of emancipation, that a change occurred. Mixing
with the world, and sharing the world's pursuits, the Jews began to
find it hard to observe the Saturday Sabbath as of old. In stil more
recent times the difficulty has increased. Added to this, the growing
laxity in observances has affected the Sabbath. This is one of the most
pressing problems that face the Jewish community to-day. Here and there
an attempt has been made by smal sections of Jews to substitute a Sunday
Sabbath for the Saturday Sabbath. But the plan has not prospered.
One of the most notable rites of the Service of the Passover eve is the
sanctification with wine, a ceremony common to the ordinary Sabbath eve.
This rite has perhaps had much to do with the characteristic sobriety
of Israel. Wine forms part of almost every Jewish rite, including the
marriage ceremony. Wine thus becomes associated with religion, and
undue indulgence is a sin as well as a vice. 'No joy without wine,'
runs an old Rabbinic prescription. Joy is the hal mark of Judaism;
'Joyous Service' its summary of man's relation to the Law. So far is
Judaism from being a gloomy religion, that it is almost too light-hearted,
just as was the religion of ancient Greece. But the Talmud tells us of a
class who in the early part of the first century were known as 'lovers
of sorrow.' These men were in love with misfortune; for to every trial
of Israel corresponded an intervention of the divine salvation. This is
the secret of the Jewish gaiety. The resilience under tribulation was
the result of a firm confidence in the saving fidelity of God. And the
gaiety was tempered by solemnity, as the observances, to which we now
turn, wil amply show.
Far more remarkable than anything yet discussed is the change effected in
two other holy days since Bible times. The genius of Judaism is nowhere
more conspicuous than in the ful er meanings which have been infused
into the New Year's Day and the Day of Atonement. The New Year is the
first day of the seventh month (Tishri), when the ecclesiastical year
began. In the Bible the festival is only known as a 'day of blowing the
shofar' (ram's horn). In the Synagogue this rite was retained after
the destruction of the Temple, and it stil is universal y observed.
But the day was transformed into a Day of Judgment, the opening of a
ten days' period of Penitence which closed with the Day of Atonement.
Here, too, the change effected in a biblical rite transformed
its character. 'It needed a long upward development before a day,
originally instituted on priestly ideas of national sin and col ective
atonement, could be transformed into the purely spiritual festival which
we celebrate to-day' (Montefiore, _op. cit._, p. 160). But the day
is none the less associated with a strict rite, the fast. It is one of
the few ascetic ceremonies in the Jewish Calendar as known to most Jews.
There is a strain of asceticism in some forms of Judaism, and on this
a few words will be said later. But, on the whole, there is in modern
Judaism a tendency to underrate somewhat the value of asceticism in
religion. Hence the fast has a distinct importance in and for itself,
and it is regrettable that the laudable desire to spiritualise the day
is leading to a depreciation of the fast as such. But the real change
is due to the cessation of sacrifices. In the Levitical Code, sacrifice
had a primary importance in the scheme of atonement. But with the loss
of the Temple, the idea of sacrifice entirely vanished, and atonement
became a matter for the personal conscience. It was henceforth an inward
sense of sin translating itself into the better life. 'To purify desire,
to ennoble the wil --this is the essential condition of atonement. Nay,
it is atonement' (Joseph, _Judaism as Creed and Life_, p. 267;
cf. _supra_, p. 45). This, in the opinion of Christian theologians,
is a shallow view of atonement. But it is at al events an attempt to
apply theology to life. And its justification lies in its success.
Of the other festivals a word is due concerning two of them, which
differ much in significance and in development. Purim and Chanuka are
their names. Purim was probably the ancient Babylonian Saturnalia, and
it is stil observed as a kind of Carnival by many Jews, though their
number is decreasing. For Purim is emphatical y a Ghetto feast. And this
description applies in more ways than one. In the first place, the Book
of Esther, with which the Jewish Purim is associated, is not a book that
commends itself to the modern Jewish consciousness. The historicity of
the story is doubted, and its narrow outlook is not that of prophetic
Judaism. Observed as mediaeval Jews observed it, Purim was a thoroughly
innocent festivity. The unpleasant taste left by the closing scenes of the
book was washed off by the geniality of temper which saw the humours of
Haman's fall and never for a moment rested in a feeling of vindictiveness.
But the whole book breathes so nationalistic a spirit, so uncompromising
a belief that the enemy of Israel must be the enemy of God, that it has
become difficult for modern Judaism to retain any affection for it. It
makes its appeal to the persecuted, no doubt: it conveys a stirring lesson
in the providential care with which God watches over His people: it bids
the sufferer hope. Esther's splendid surrender of self, her immortal
declaration, 'If I perish, I perish,' still may legitimately thril all
hearts. But the Carnival has no place in the life of a Western city,
still less the sectional Carnival. The hobby-horse had its opportunity
and the maskers their rights in the Ghetto, but only there. Purim thus
is now chiefly retained as a children's feast, and stil better as a
feast of charity, of the interchange of gifts between friends, and the
bestowal of alms on the needy. This is a worthy survival.
Chanuka, on the other hand, grows every year into greater popularity. This
festival of light, when lamps are kindled in honour of the Maccabean
heroes, has of late been rediscovered by the liberals. For the first four
centuries of the Christian Era, the festival of Chanuka ('Dedication')
was observed by the Church as wel as by the Synagogue. But for some
centuries afterwards the significance of the anniversary was obscured. It
is now realised as a momentous event in the world's history. It was not
merely a local triumph of Hebraism over Hel enism, but it represents
the re-entry of the East into the civilisation of the West. Alexander
the Great had occidentalised the Orient. But with the success of the
Judaeans against the Seleucids and of the Parthians against the Romans,
the East reasserted itself. And the newly recovered influence has never
again been surrendered. Hence this feast is a feast of ideals. Year by
year this is becoming more clearly seen. And the symbol of the feast,
light, is itself an inspiration.
The Jew is really a very sentimental being. He loves symbols. A
good deal of his fondness for ritual is due to this fact. The outward
marks of an inner state have always appealed to him. Ancient taboos
became not only consecrated but symbolical. Whether it be the rite of
circumcision, or the use of phylacteries and fringed praying garments,
or the adfixture of little scrol s in metal cases on the door-posts, or
the glad submission to the dietary laws, in all these matters sentiment
played a considerable part. And the word sentiment is used in its
best sense. Abstract morality is wel enough for the philosopher,
but men of flesh and blood want their morality expressed in terms of
feeling. Love of God is a fine thing, but the Jew wished to do loving
acts of service. Obedience to the Wil of God, the suppression of the
human desires before that Will, is a great ideal. But the Jew wished to
realise that he was obeying, that he was making the self-suppression. He
was not satisfied with a general law of holiness: he felt impel ed to
holiness in detail, to a life in which the laws of bodily hygiene were
obeyed as part of the same law of holiness that imposed ritual and moral
purity. Much of the intricate system, of observance briefly summarised in
this paragraph, a system which filled the Jew's life, is passing away.
This is largely because Jews are surrendering their own original theory
of life and religion. Modern Judaism seems to have no use for the ritual
system. The older Judaism might retort that, if that be so, it has no
use for the modern Judaism. It is, however, clear that modern Judaism
now realises the mistake made by the Reformers of the mid-nineteenth
century. Hence we are hearing, and shal no doubt hear more and more, of
the modification of observances in Judaism rather than of their abolition.