ion." Obey Jehovah's laws, that thy days may be long in
the land he giveth thee; the wicked shall not live out half his
days: such is the burden of the Old Testament. It was reserved for
a later age to see life and immortality brought to light, and for
the disciples of a clearer faith to feel that death is gain.

There are many passages in the Hebrew Scriptures generally
supposed and really appearing, upon a slight examination, not
afterwards to teach doctrines different from those here stated. We
will give two examples in a condensed form. "Thou wilt not leave

6 Tractatus de Anima a R. Moscheh Korduero. In Kabbala Denudata.
tom. i. pars ii.

my soul in Sheol: . . . at thy right hand are pleasures for
evermore." This text, properly translated and explained, means,
Thou wilt not leave me to misfortune and untimely death: . . . in
thy royal favor is prosperity and length of days. "I know that my
Redeemer liveth:. . . in my flesh I shall see God." The genuine
meaning of this triumphant exclamation of faith is, I know that
God is the Vindicator of the upright, and that he will yet justify
me before I die. A particular examination of the remaining
passages of this character with which erroneous conceptions are
generally connected would show, first, that in nearly every case
these passages are not accurately translated; secondly, that they
may be satisfactorily interpreted as referring merely to this
life, and cannot by a sound exegesis be explained otherwise;
thirdly, that the meaning usually ascribed to them is inconsistent
with the whole general tenor, and with numberless positive and
explicit statements, of the books in which they are found;
fourthly, that if there are, as there dubiously seem to be in some
of the Psalms, texts implying the ascent of souls after death to a
heavenly life, for example, "Thou shalt guide me with thy
countenance, and afterward receive me to glory," they were the
product of a late period, and reflect a faith not native to the
Hebrews, but first known to them after their intercourse with the
Persians.

Christians reject the allegorizing of the Jews, and yet
traditionally accept, on their authority, doctrines which can be
deduced from their Scriptures in no other way than by the absurd
hypothesis of a double or mystic sense. For example, scores of
Christian authors have taught the dogma of a general resurrection
of the dead, deducing it from such passages as God's sentence upon
Adam: "