Jewish Artisan Life in the Time of Our Lord. to Which Is Appended a Critical Comparison Between Jesus and Hillel, Tr. by Mrs. Philip Monkhouse - Softcover

This historic book may have numerous typos or missing text. Not indexed. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1877. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... OW did Hillel become a great teacher, and how did Jesus? This is the first question, to which their respective histories must supply the answer, and that, without our adding to, or diminishing aught from the record. About fifty years before the commencement of our era, the following occurrence took place in Jerusalem. Shemaiah and Abtalion, the most celebrated doctors of that day, had on one occasion, the eve of the Sabbath, conducted throughout the whole night," a numerous class of disciples, engaged in the study of the law. It was the month Tebeth, and just at the time of the winter solstice; therefore, about the end of December. When "the pillars of the dawn were set up" (it was thus that the Semitic races expressed themselves, since in that latitude the sun shoots like a ball of light above the horizon, after a much shorter twilight than with us), Shemaiah observed to Abtalion, "Good brother Abtalion, our schoolhouse is generally well lighted in the daytime, but this morning it is so dark, that it must be a cloudy day." On looking up, however, something resembling a human form was descried in the aperture of the window. Someone climbed on to the roof, and there a man was actually found buried in the snow which had fallen during the previous night. It was Hillel. They soon extricated him, bathed, and rubbed him with oil, and laid him before a fire, saying amongst themselves as they did so, "He is worthy that on his account the Sabbath should be broken." 1 l: Joma, 35 b. But how had Hillel placed himself in this situation? This Hillel, grandfather of Gamaliel, at whose feet sat St. Paul the Apostle, and ancestor of a family in which the office of president of the Sanhedrin was for centuries hereditary, belonged to a family of Jewish exiles at Babylon. Th...