even, as the substance of their dictation, from the hands of their immediate disciples, in the state in which they now appear; but the general opinion is, that, though they may have undergone some alterations or interpolations, there is no reason to doubt their being for the most part the same; that there is sufficient ground for believing them to have been written before the Talmud; and that they contain the notions which were commonly adopted by speculative Jews in the age to which they are thus attributed. The same notions have been followed by the more modern Cabbalists, who have lived chiefly since the tenth century, and have employed themselves in amplifying and commenting upon the dogmas of their predecessors.*

The Cabbala is of two kinds, theoretical and practical. The theoretical is so denominated from the things about which it is conversant, being objects to be apprehended by speculation and meditation. The practical is nothing more than a system of magic, consisting in a superstitious use of the Scriptures, and especially of the divine names, with the hope, or pretence, of effecting things beyond the capacity and course of nature.Abraham, Moses, Solomon, and others in ancient times, are said to have been distinguished for a profound knowledge and skilful application of these mysteries; some experience in which was deemed an essential requisite in every candidate for a seat in the Sanhedrim. This study was much cultivated

* Bartoloc. Bib. Rab. tom. iv. p. 272–274. 412-417. Wolf. Bib. Heb. vol. i. p. 23. 955. 1134. Wagens. Sota, 982. Brucker. Hist. Philos. tom. ii. p. 834-841. 845, &c.

by the Jews in the middle ages; when by diagrams delineated in certain forms, and inscribed with mystical terms produced by transpositions of the letters of sacred names, or combinations of the initials of particular words, they pretended to heal or secure from wounds, extinguish fires, and achieve other wonderful exploits. The following was one of the figures most celebrated for these potent qualities. It was called The Shield of David: the inscription Agla is composed of the initials of four Hebrew words.*

Sovereign virtues were believed to be annexed to the seventy-two names of the Deity, which the Cabbalists formed by decomposing the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first verses of the fourteenth chapter of Exodus, which contain seventy-two letters each, and distributing them into seventy-two

which may be rendered, Thou art אתה גבר לשלם אדני •

strong for ever, O Lord! or, Thou art strong in the eternal God.

words of three letters each.-Whether it was from a want of efficacy in these divine names, or because all the multiplications of rabbinical ingenuity had failed of supplying a number adequate to the demand, that recourse has been had to the name of an infernal spirit, furnished by the same fruitful source of invention, we are not informed. Such, however, has been the strange fact.-The Talmud, after cautioning its votaries against drinking water by night, lest it should cause dizziness and blindness, instructs them, if they do drink at that time, how to guard against these maladies it is by repeating Shiavriri, Vriri, Riri, Iri, Ri, I., The rabbies say Shriavriri is the demon who presides over these plagues, and that any person afflicted with them may obtain a certain cure by writing the name of this personage in the following form; in which as the name gradually diminishes to one small letter, so the disorder will daily abate till it be wholly removed.

(שברירי) that

This will remind the reader of the Abracadabra, which used to be deemed a remedy for agues.— Medallions were also made, according to Cabbalistic art, and prized as amulets of astonishing power. Some of them contained, in a circular field, an emblematical figure of the Moon; and on the

reverse a square Table, divided into eighty-one compartments, with one or two Hebrew letters in each and these letters were so disposed that if cast up as numerals, perpendicularly, horizontally, and diagonally, in twenty different lines, they exhibited the same total, 369. There were similar medallions of the primary planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; and also of the Sun, which were the most esteemed of them all. The wearer of one of the solar medallions was assured, that he should be fortunate in all things, should be feared by all men, should obtain from kings and princes whatever he should desire either by personal application or by messages, should recover what he might happen to lose, and that himself and all his affairs should be under the special blessing of God.*-A famous rabbi, who lived in the thirteenth century, relates two marvellous adventures:-one of a Jew, who, being sentenced to be burnt alive for adultery, contrived by his Cabbalistic skill that the executioners of justice mistook a horse for him, and burnt the horse in his stead; so that he escaped :—the other of himself,—that at Barcelona, in the presence of the king, he, by a cabbalistical use of the name Jehovah, actually launched a ship, after the shipwrights had done their utmost to launch it, and abandoned the attempt as impracticable.+-The name of this rabbi was Moses Ben Nachman, frequently called

* Wolf. Bib. Heb. vol. ii. p. 1210. 1213-1216. Brucker. Hist. Philos. tom. ii. 970. 875, 676. Bartoloc. Bib. Rab. tom. i. p. 251. tom. iv. p. 232, 233. 250—255.

+ Stehelin's Traditions, vol. i. p. 146.

72

Nachmanides; to whose wonderful tales the reader will give as much credit as he may deem them to deserve.

The Theoretical Cabbala is subdivided into two species; artificial or literal, and symbolical or dogmatical. The latter leaves nothing to art or ingenuity, but propounds doctrines received from the teachers of this science. The former opens a large field for the exercise of ingenuity or industry: it presents several mystical modes of expounding the scriptures, and eliciting the recondite senses which they are supposed to contain.

Menasseh Ben Israel, who flourished about the middle of the seventeenth century, and whom the present chief Rabbi of the Portuguese Jews in London* extols as a Divine Philosopher, en'dowed with profound learning and extreme piety,' compares the Law to the body, the Mishna to the soul, and the Cabbala to the soul of the soul. The ignorant vulgar, he says, may be satisfied with the first: wise servants of the Most High attend to the second; but the wisest direct their contemplations to the third. Those who confine their attention to the ritual and civil regulations of the Mishna and Gemara, he compares to compounders of medicines, who, without knowing the virtues of the various ingredients, merely follow the prescriptions confided to their care: but persons that study the mysteries of the Cabbala, he compares to physicians, who understand the nature

Form of Service in commemoration of the Dedication of the Portuguese Jew Synagogue. By Dr. R. Meldola. For Friday Evening, Tisri 17, A. M. 5575. i. e. September 29, A. D. 1814.