e last of whom was an antagonist to the Germanizing tendency of Moses
Mendelssohn.

Joseph Karo himself was a man of many parts. He was born in Spain in
1488, and died in Safed, the nest of mysticism, in 1575. Master of the
Talmudic writings of his predecessors from his youth, Karo devoted
thirty-two years to the preparation of an exhaustive commentary on the
"Four Rows" of Jacob Asheri. This occupied him from 1522 to 1554. Karo
was an enthusiast as well as a student, and the emotional side of the
Kabbala had much fascination for him. He believed that he had a
familiar, or _Maggid_, the personification of the Mishnah, who appeared
to him in dreams, and held communion with him. He found a congenial home
in Safed, where the mystics had their head-quarters in the sixteenth
century. Karo's companion on his journey to Safed was Solomon Alkabets,
author of the famous Sabbath hymn "Come, my Friend" (_Lecha Dodi_), with
the refrain:

Come forth, my friend, the Bride to meet,
Come, O my friend, the Sabbath greet!

The Shulchan Aruch is arranged in four parts, called fancifully, "Path
of Life" (_Orach Chayim_), "Teacher of Knowledge" (_Yoreh Deah_),
"Breastplate of Judgment" (_Choshen ha-Mishpat_), and "Stone of Help"
(_Eben ha-Ezer_). The first part is mainly occupied with the subject of
prayer, benedictions, the Sabbath, the festivals, and the observances
proper to each. The second part deals with food and its preparation,
_Shechitah_, or slaughtering of animals for food, the relations between
Jews and non-Jews, vows, respect to parents, charity, and religious
observances connected with agriculture, such as the payment of tithes,
and, finally, the rites of mourning. This section of the Shulchan Aruch
is the most miscellaneous of the four; in the other three the
association of subjects is more logical. The Eben ha-Ezer treats of the
laws of marriage and divorce from their civil and religious aspects. The
Choshen ha-Mishpat deals with legal procedure, the laws regulating
business transactions and the relations between man and man in the
conduct of worldly affairs. A great number of commentaries on Karo's
Code were written by and for the _Acharonim_ (=later scholars). It fully
deserved this attention, for on its own lines the Shulchan Aruch was a
masterly production. It brought system into the discordant opinions of
the Rabbinical authorities of the Middle Ages, and its publication in
the sixteenth century was itself a