immediately delegated the celebrated Rabbi David Kimchi to visit the synagogues of Catalonia and Arragon, and endeavour to prevail upon them to vindicate their illustrious countryman against the machinations of his furious enemies. Rabbi Kimchi undertook the mission, after having fruitlessly endeavoured to effect a reconciliation between the contending parties. Before he had proceeded far on his journey, he was seized with an illness, which prevented him from visiting the synagogues in person: but by his letters and influence he so far accomplished his object, that although some individuals of eminence and learning warmly espoused the cause of R. Solomon and his associates, all the principal synagogues of Spain united in the anathema, denounced against the Rabbins of France, who had combined their efforts to suppress and discredit the writings of Maimonides. R. Solomon, in the mean time, irritated by this vigorous opposition to his designs, ventured on the desperate measure of applying to the Christians to aid his determination of destroying or preventing the reading of any of the works he had condemned. For this purpose he appealed first to the common people, and then to the ecclesiastical dignitaries, assuring them that certain heretics had sprung up among the Jews, who entertained dangerous opinions, and expressing an earnest wish that they might be treated as the Christians treated such characters among themselves, by burning both them and their works. For some time the Jews were brought into great contempt and danger; but the decisive and united censure of the Spanish synagogues produced a revolution in the public mind in favour of Maimonides and his writings; for the Rabbins of France, astonished and alarmed by the proceedings of the Rabbins of Spain, withdrew their censure, revoked the decrees which had been passed at Montpelier, and consented to cancel the Epitaph on the tomb of Maimonides, who had been some time deceased, because it was there declared that he was excommunicated. The con test, however, did not entirely cease for several years, but was continued with more or less virulence till the year 1232, when it finally terminated. The More Nevochim was the last great literary work in which our author engaged, unless, indeed, we except an accurate transcription of the PENTATEUCH made with his own hand, and designed to serve as an exemplar for the scribes of the Law. Of this transcription, Maimonides himself has stated, if the account given in an ancient manuscript be correct, that having frequently remarked, with pain, the very inaccurate and faulty manner in which the manuscripts of the Law, in use in Egypt, had been copied, he transcribed the Books of Moses with his own hand, from a most valuable and accurate copy, written before the destruction of Jerusalem, that other copies might be made by his disciples, and dispersed among the Jews who were settled in Egypt, that they might by this means be furnished with true copies of the Divine Laws. After completing his transcription, he visited Chalons, in Burgundy, and there obtained sight of a transcript of the Law, written by the hand of EZRA, the priest and scribe. With this venerated copy of the Pentateuch, he collated that which he himself had written, and found it to agree with it in every particular; and so great was his joy on the occasion, that he vowed to celebrate the event by an annual feast. Some doubts, indeed, have been raised against the truth of this relation, from the fact not being stated in certain of his writings, in which it is supposed such an occurrence would have been noticed, if it had taken place; but if the transcripts were made, as is not improbable, towards the close of his life, it could not be noticed in works composed prior to the event. Our great author died in Egypt, at the age of seventy, and was buried in the Land of Israel. For three days successively there was a general mourning among the, Egyptians as well as the Jews; and the year in which he died, was called Lamentum Lamentabile. "From MoSES to MOSES," say the Rabbins proverbially, "there never arose one like unto MOSES."-" The memory of MAIMONIDES," says Dr. Clavering, Bishop of Peterborough, "has hitherto flourished, and will continue to flourish for ever. Bartalocci Bibliotheca Mag. Rabbinica, tom. iv. pp. 86-110, Romæ, 1676-93.-Buxtorf Maimonidis More Nevochim, in Præfat.-Buxtorfii Biblioth. Rabbin.-Clavering, Maimonidis Tractatus Duo, &c. Dissertatio de Maimonide.-Basnage's History of the Jews, B. vii. ch. 8.-Wolfii Biblioth. Heb. tom. i. p. 834. Hamburgh et Lips. 1715, 4to. DISSERTATION I. ON THE TALMUDICAL AND RABBINICAL WRITINGS. THE 1. THE TALMUDS. THERE are two Talmuds, designated from the respective places where they were compiled, the Talmud of Jerusalem and the Talmud of Babylon. The Jerusalem Talmud was compiled in the year of Christ, 230, (or, according to some, in the year 300,) for the use of the Jews living in Judea, by Rabbi Jochanan, who for many years presided over the Synagogues of "the land of Israel."-It comprises a much smaller number of doctrinal and legal questions and decisions than the later Talmud of Babylon; and, being written in the peculiar dialect of Judea, is difficult to be understood. On these accounts the voluminous Talmud of Babylon is preferred to the earlier Talmud of Jerusalem, by the Jews in general, among whom the Jerusalem Talmud is become so completely obsolete, that the use of the term "Talmud" is almost exclusively appropriated to the Talmud of Babylon. The Jerusalem Talmud was printed at Venice, in 1528, by D. Bomberg, in 1 vol. folio; and again, with marginal glosses, at Cracow, 1609, in 1 vol. folio. The Talmud of Babylon was compiled for the use of Jews dwelling in Babylon and other foreign countries, and completed about A. D. 500. It is an immense work, containing the Traditions of the Jews, their Canon Law, and the questions and decisions of the Hebrew Doctors relative to their doctrines and usages. This Talmud has been several times printed :-in 1520, in 12 vols. folio, including the Comments of Jarchi, Ben Asher, and Maimonides, by D. Bomberg, at Venice:-in 1581, by Frobenius, at Basil, in which those passages are expunged that were directed against Christianity:-at Cracow, in which the passages left out in the Basil edition were restored-at Amsterdam, in 1644, by Immanuel Benbenisti, in large quarto, on two kinds of paper: (Wagenseil says, there were two editions, one correct, the other incorrect:) but the best edition is said to be that printed at Berlin and Francfort, in 12 vols. folio, 1715. The Talmuds are composed of the Mishna, or Oral Law, which is the text, and the Gemaras, or decisions of the Jewish Doctors on the Mishna, prior to the compilation of the Talmuds. The Mishna, or Oral Law, consists of the traditionary explanations of the Law of Moses, said to have been given by God himself to Moses, on Mount Sinai, who transmitted them by Oral communications, through Aaron and his sons, to Joshua and the Prophets, and by them to the members of the great Sanhedrim, who committed them in a similar way to their successors, till the time of R. Judah Hakkadosh, or the holy, who flourished about A. D. 150: of whose compilation of the Mishna, David Levi, (“ Ceremonies of the Jews," p. 285,) gives the following account: "Rabbi Judah Hakkadosh was the compiler of the Mishna; for, having seriously considered the state of our |