Gemara

“ In another section of the Gemara it is related, that three hundred jars of wine and a like number of jars of oil were taken up into that attic in order to afford the sages no opportunity to leave their places until their deliberations concerning the regulations were finally concluded. ”

“ Our basis for this assertion is the ordinance to be found in Tract Yodaim, which proclaims that the scrolls or books containing the Holy Writ render hands unclean when coming in contact with them, and doubtless the hands of the priests, which were afterwards to handle Therumah, are meant. 383:1 There are differences of opinion in the Gemara as to the division of the regulations. Some hold that they should be grouped, while others would count them separately. ”

“ As the pages of the original are indicated in our new Hebrew edition, it is not deemed necessary to mark them in the English edition, this being only a translation from the latter.
5. Words or passages enclosed in round parentheses ( ) denote the explanation rendered by Rashi to the foregoing sentence or word. Square parentheses [ ] contain commentaries by authorities of the last period of construction of the Gemara. ”

“ However, it is now the Alcoran of the Jews, into which they have resolved all their faith, and all their religion, although framed almost with the same imposture as that of Mohammed, out of the doctrines falsely pretended to be brought from heaven. And in this book all that now pretend to any learning among them place their studies; and no one can be a master in their schools, or a teacher in their synagogues, who is not well instructed and versed herein; that is, not only in the text, which is the Mishnah, but also in the comment thereon, which is the Gemara ”

“ During the dancing... Rabbeinu z"l was once in Terhovitza for a wedding by one of his followers. During the dancing a woman approached Rabbeinu z"l with audacious words asking he give her money to dance. Rabbeinu z"l told her she's... And she was pregnant then, then she had a son and named him Pinchas (Pinch'sel) and he fulfilled the Gemara's statement (B"B 83b) , "Midechatzif kulei hai shema` mineih/ Since he's that insolent, conclude he's [wicked] ." For he was very brazen and raised great controversy on R' Yitzchak son in law of the Maggid of Terhovitza. ”

“ Standing behind the members of the class were some envying "boors," like our poor Asriel, to whom even the Mishnah was a luxury beyond their intellectual means.
One of the long tables in the adjoining room was covered with the open folios of the daily Gemarah class,—some fifteen men of all ages and economical conditions from the doddering apple-vender, to whom the holy books are the only source of pleasure in this life as well as in the other, to the well-fed, overdressed young furniture-dealer, with whom the Talmud is a second nature, contracted in the darker days of his existence in Russia. ”

“ When Nebuchadnezzar carried the people away captive from Jerusalem, he did not take Jeremiah with them, and the remnant of the people took him with them and departed to the land of Egypt. And by his prayer God destroyed the wild beasts, and the lions, which were in the valley of Egypt, and which used to harm the Egyptians. And having finished the days of his prophecy and pleased God, he died in peace in the city of Alexandria, and the Egyptians made a feast in his honor, even as at this day. Salutation to Jeremiah, one of the Great Prophets. Glory be to God Who is glorified in His Saints. ”

“ Yet Jeremiah could only give them the message which he believed to represent the will of God. He bade them return. He assured them that they need have no fear of the King of Babylon, and that God would bless them; whereas if they went to Egypt, they would die by the sword, the famine, and the pestilence. At the same time—doomed always to thwart the hopes of the multitude—he reproved the hypocrisy which had sent them to ask God's will when they never intended to do anything but follow their own. ”

“ Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, an eunuch, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the cistern. He went to the king, who was then sitting in the gate of Benjamin, where he would be accessible to any petitioner for favour or justice, and interceded for the prisoner:—
"My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the cistern; and he is like to die in the place where he is because of the famine, for there is no more bread in the city." ”

“ And Jeremiah said, "Wilt Thou indeed deliver Thy chosen city into the hand of the Chaldeans, that their king may boast himself against it and say, 'I have prevailed against the Holy City of God'? Not so, Lord; but if it be Thy will to destroy it, overthrow it rather with Thine own hand." And He said, "Neither the king nor his power shall prevail to destroy it, unless I first open the gates thereof to him. Come therefore at the sixth hour of the night to the city wall, thou and Baruch the scribe, and I will show you what I will do." ”

“ Libya takes in a portion of the African race. Gomer stands for the Germans in part, for those who descended from Gomer. From this word Gomer is Gomeron, Gemren, and the country Germia, hence, Germany and Germans. Togarmah includes the people of Independent Tartary. The Dragon includes China. The Beast, the Jesuits and their followers, which will take in France, Spain, Italy, and South America; and at first divide even England, especially Ireland, and the United States. Anti-Christ will be chiefly sustained by the Jews, who will have been settled in Palestine. ”

“ The first one of Jeremiah’s predictions to come true was when Daniel and the Israelites were taken captives to Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar. Again he warned them not to go into Egypt, but they not only went but compelled him to go with them.
The last we hear of Jeremiah is in Egypt, urging his people to give up their idols and worship God. He is indeed, as Mr. Sargent has represented him, “the prophet of sorrow”; and yet the figure is one of strength. ”

“ Every expectation of escape by flight, or by making an appeal for pardon, vanished as he beheld the indignant expression of the bailiff.
Mary at last recovered from the faint into which she had fallen. She looked around her in surprise, as if ignorant of what had happened; but when Geronimo's voice fell in joyous accents on her ear, a bright smile irradiated her countenance, and she exclaimed:
"It is not a dream! He lives! I see him once more! Geronimo! Geronimo!"
The young noble was too overpowered to do more than call the name of his beloved. ”

“ But Jeremiah laid a new plan for rehabilitating the land. Neither Jerusalem nor the Temple were to be rebuilt, for the present. All efforts were to be bent toward building up a new conscience in the simple farmers and vine dressers; to fit these for entering a new covenant with their God and to make them worthy, indeed, to be God's people.
In politics the land was to stand, above all, for faithfulness and loyalty to Babylonia. That was what Nebuchadrezzar expected from Gedaliah and that was what Gedaliah proposed to do. With the religion Nebuchadrezzar never did and never would interfere. ”

“ Mangus Coloradus spoke with the dignity of a chief and from the wisdom of years. "You, Geronimo, and you, Victorio, have ever been two of the most hot-headed warriors. Nothing I can say will make you believe that you cannot continue to battle the white man. Experience alone must teach you. ”

“ If I am killed no one need mourn for me. My people have all been killed in that country, and I, too, will die if need be."
I returned to my own settlement, reported this success to my chieftain, and immediately departed to the southward into the land of the Nedni Apaches. Their chief, Whoa, heard me without comment, but he immediately issued orders for a council, and when all were ready gave a sign that I [Pg 49] might speak. I addressed them as I had addressed the Chokonen tribe, and they also promised to help us. ”

“ Those of the people whom the soldiers had not killed were bound in iron chains, burdened with the spoils of the victors, and carried into captivity. Jeremiah the prophet returned to Jerusalem and accompanied his unfortunate brethren, who went out almost naked. When they reached a place called Bet Kuro, Jeremiah obtained better clothing for them. And he spoke to Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldeans, and said, "Think not that of your own strength you were able to overcome the people chosen of the Lord; 'tis their iniquities which have condemned them to this sorrow." ”

“ The gate was crowded with other Jews hurrying out of Jerusalem: citizens eager to breathe more freely after being cooped up in the overcrowded city; countrymen anxious to find out what their farms and homesteads had suffered at the hands of the invaders; not a few, perhaps, bound on the very errand of which Jeremiah was accused, friends of Babylon, convinced that Nebuchadnezzar would ultimately triumph, and hoping to find favour and security in his camp. ”

“ When Gherib entered the city, the brazen figure stationed at the gate blew such a terrible blast that the King was affrighted and going in to his idol, found fire and smoke issuing from its eyes and mouth and nostrils. Now a devil had entered the belly of the idol and speaking as with its tongue, said to the King of the city, ‘O King, there is come to thy city one Gherib, King of Irak, who uses to bid the folk quit their faith and worship his Lord; wherefore, when they bring him before thee, look thou spare him not.’ So the King went out and sat down on his throne ”

“ Thus the Papagoes would think that they had been raided by men from the White Mountain tribe and they would seek revenge on them, rather than on the Mimbreno Apaches.
"We have a wise chief," thought Geronimo, as Delgadito's plan became clear to him.
Just then Delgadito said, "Chie, continue northward with thirty of the more worthless horses. Leave a plain trail, as though we were stricken with panic. But drive the horses back and forth so it will appear as though there were many more than thirty. Run as soon as you see pursuers." ”

“ Then came Jemrcan and his tribe and kissed the earth before Gherib, who bestowed on him a splendid dress of honour and made him captain of his vanguard, saying, ‘O Jemrcan, mount with the chiefs of thy kinsmen and twenty thousand horse and fare on before us to the land of Julned ben Kerker.’ ‘I hear and obey,’ answered Jemrcan and set forward with his men, leaving the women and children of the tribe in Cufa. ”

“ The little Greeks won't dare to attack us! And if they really do come, the grandsons of Genseric will destroy the grandsons of Basiliscus just as Genseric destroyed him."
"But we are no longer Genseric's Vandals!" Gelimer lamented. "Genseric brought with him an army of heroes, brave, trained by twenty years of warfare with other Germans and with the Romans in the mountains of Spain, simple, plain in tastes, rigid in morals. He closed the houses of Roman pleasure in Carthage; he compelled all women of light fame to marry or enter convents." ”

“ So Gherib mounted with his troops and rode, till he came to the town of Babel, whose folk took fright at him. Now there was in this town a king called Jemek, under whose hand were twenty thousand horsemen, and there gathered themselves together to him from the villages [round about] other fifty thousand horse, who pitched their tents under the walls of the city. ”

“ And there were slaves in the triumph, among whom was Gelimer himself, wearing some sort of a purple garment upon his shoulders, and all his family, and as many of the Vandals as were very tall and fair of body. And when Gelimer reached the hippodrome and saw the emperor sitting upon a lofty seat and the people standing on either side and realized as he looked [11-16] about in what an evil plight he was, he neither wept nor cried out, but ceased not saying over in the words of the Hebrew scripture [29] : "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity." ”

“ It was as if he should have married Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, who probably was at that time a noted harlot. The land of Israel was like Gomer the daughter of Diblaim. Gomer signifies corruption; Diblaim signifies two cakes, or lumps of figs; this denotes that Israel was near to ruin, and that their luxury and sensuality were the cause of it. They were as the evil figs that could not be eaten, they were so evil. It intimates sin to be the daughter of plenty and destruction the daughter of the abuse of plenty. ”

“ Even that lesson was not enough. Within a few years the new king, Zedekiah, and his nobles again rebelled against Nebuchadrezzar. Jeremiah protested and was called a traitor. Many times his life was threatened; for a long period he was kept in a filthy dungeon, and almost perished from hunger. But friends saved him. Very soon, in B.C. 586, the city came to the horrible end which Jeremiah had so patiently tried to ward off. The city was captured by Babylonian soldiers and burned. Thousands were carried away as exiles. Thousands more fled to Egypt and to other foreign countries. ”

“ The enemy is victorious. The Egyptians have come to terms with the Chaldeans. Nebuchadnezzar is marching on Jerusalem.
The crowd utters cries of terror. In the king's name a herald issues the call to arms. Jeremiah, the seer whose visions have been too faithfully fulfilled, Jeremiah from whose neighbourhood the panic-stricken folk withdraw, vainly implores God to convict him of falsehood. ”