Jewish Ethical Idealism (Classic Reprint)

Bücher

Angebote / Angebote:

Excerpt from Jewish Ethical IdealismPortions to form the stream of religious life which marked this period. As a background to any deeper and richer elements were to be found the common rites and traditions belonging to the great Semitic stock from which the Hebrews had come. As a distinctive possession, however, the Hebrews inherited the traditions and religious customs and ideals connected with the worship of Yahweh, the God of Moses. But permeating this whole fabric were the in¿uences, both ideals and institutions, borrowed from their Canaanite neighbors. We find, then, the basal concepts of sacrifice, with its altars and its priests, with its feasts and its ceremonials, all shot through by the lofty concept of a covenant God, bound to his people by ethical bonds. But human nature has its un1versal elements, and Semitic culture has its racial tendencies, and Yahweh worship was set in con¿ict with human weakness clothed in ancient Semitic traditions and new Canaanite environments. Many altars threatened the unity of God, ashera and pillars materialized the con cept of deity, and joyous festivals of seed-time and harvest, of Springing life and ripening fruits, all threw wide open doors of sensuality and cor ruption. Thus even Yahweh worship could not maintain 1ts integrity when expressed 1n countless sanctuaries and under the shadow of the sacred post and the stone pillar, with even the great 'sanctuary at Jerusalem not free from ministers of zmpurity and emblems of pagan origin. It is not strange, but natural, that Israel fell a victim to the lower elements of Canaanite religious cus tom.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.