Tlie followers of Ahmed and Ismael are called Thari- cali MohaMmedii/dt, and bear some resemblance in their doctrines to the Sunnites (q. v.). Ismael composed for the benefit of the sect, and at the instigation of Ahmed, the Tukfia ul-Imun, or '• Basis of the Faith," in the Urdu, or vernacular language of Upper India, and it was printed at Calcutta. " It is divided into two portions, of i which the first only is understood to be the work ot Is- mael, the second part (the Sirat Almostukim, puljlishod in Persian at Cakutta, and translated in the Jmirmtl of the Asiatic Societi/ of Bengal) being inferior, and the production of another person. In the preface Ismael deprecates the opinion ' that the wise and learned alone can comprehend God's Word. God himself had said a
prophet had been raised up among the fude and igno- rant for their instruction, and that he, the Lord, had rendered obedience easy. There were two things essen- tial : a belief in the unity of God, which was to know no other, and a knowledge of the Prophet, which was obedience to the law. Many held the sayings of the saints to be their guide, but the Word of God was alone to be attended to, although the wTitings of the pious which agreed with the Scriptures might be read for ed- ification.' The first chapter treats of the unity of God, and in it the writer deprecates the supplication of saints, angels, etc., as impious. He declares the reasons given for such worship to be futile, and to show an utter igno- rance of God's Word. ' The ancient idolaters had like- wise said that they merely venerated powers and divin- ities, and did not regard them as the equal of the Al- mighty ; but God himself had answered these heathens. Likewise the Christians had been admonished for giv- ing to dead monks and friars the honor due to the Lord, God is alone, and companion he has none; prostration and adoration are due to him, and to no other.' Ismael proceeds in a similar strain, but assumes some doubtful positions, as that Mohammed says God is one, and man learns from his parents that he was born ; he believes his mother, and yet he distrusts the apostle ; or that an evil-doer who has faith is a better man than the most pious idolater" (Cunningham, Ilistoi'ij of the Sikhs, p. 190, foot-note f). The work was translated m the Jour- nulofthe Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain (1852), xiii, 317-367. See Garcin de Tassy, Hist, de la Litt. hin- doustane, i, 251 ; Hoefer, Nouv. Bioyr. Genirale, xxvi, 81. (J. H. W.)
Ismael ben-Elisa, Ha-Cohex, one of the most celebrated Je\visli Itabliis and theologians, was born about A.D. 00 in Upper Galilee, and when yet a child was carried as a captive to Rome on the destruction of Jerusalem. While he was confined in prison in the Eternal City, the Rabbis Joshua, Azzariah, and Gamaliel II had come to Rome to implore mercy and pardon for the captive Jev,-s of the then reigning emperor Diocle- tian (about A.D. 83), and by accident passing the pris- on door of this j'oung boy. Rabbi Joshua exclaimed at his door, " Who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers?" (Isa. xlii, 24) to which Ismael ben-Elisa gave this manly reply : " The Lord, against whom we have sinned, and would not walk in his ways, nor be obedient unto his law" (ibid.). This remarkable reply from the mouth of Ismael so interested the celebrated Rabbis in his behalf that they vowed to secure his liberation before they should quit the city. Ismael ben-Elisa, when liberated, placed himself under the instruction of Rabbi Joshua, and also studied imder the celebrated Simon ben-Jochai. At a later period we find Ismael ben-Elisa in Southern Judtea, not far from the Idumajan boundaries, at Kephar-Aziz (Ti'X'ISS), occupied in the cultivation and sale of the grape. But while thus employed he was also engaged in the noble effort of maintaining young Jewish maidens, who, by the desola- tions of the war, had been impoverished, and were suf- fering terribly from destitution. Ismael ben-Elisa is supposed to have suffered martyrdom during the perse- cutions so frequent at that period (about A.D. 121). His especial service to Judaism was the system of inter- pretation which, he inaugurated in opposition to the system of Rabbi Akiba. The latter held that " every repetition, figure, parallelism, synonyme, word, letter, particle, pleonasm, nay, the very shape, and everj' or- nament of a letter or title, had a recondite meaning in the Scripture, 'just as every fibre of a fly's wing or an ant's foot has its peculiar significance.' Hence he main- tained that the particles TN, na, "^X, and p"i, as well as the construction of the finite verb with the infinitive, e. g. '15::i3iTl :jnrn, airn Srn, have a dogmatic significance, and he therefore deduced points of law from them. Philo was of the same opinion (comp. ca- <pCJ(; iiciog, on wepirruv uvo/xu ovc'tv ri^ijaiv, hivb ri^iQ
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rov ■K^ayfiaToXoytlv cifiv^i'iTov (popag, Deprofugis, cd. Mangey, p. 458), and he even deduced from them eth- ical and philosophical maxims; and this was also the opinion of the Greek translator of Ecclesiastes in the Septiiagint, as maj^ be seen from his anxiety to indicate the Hebrew particle PS by the Greek avv, which has greatly perplexed the commentators who, being unac- quainted with this fact, have been unable to account for this barbarism and violation of grammatical propriety" (comp. Ginsburg, Comment, on Ecclesiastes, p. 496). On the other hand. Rabbi Ismael ben-Ellsa held that the Scriptures (of course only the O. T.), being a composi- tion intended for human ej'es and comprehension, " used expressions in their common acceptation, and that many of the repetitions and parallelisms are simply designed to render the style more rhetorical and powerful, and cannot, therefore, without violation of the laws of lan- guage, be adduced in support of legal deductions." In accordance with this theory, he established thirteen ex- egetical rules, which are called T^'^12 n"ni33 Tl^b^U Vxy:2"n"i 'in-il. The thhiecii Rules of R. Ismael, by which alone, as he maintained, the Scriptures are to be interpreted (Ora niljnna rTlimir). Comp. the very valuable work of Dr. E. M. Pinner, Talmud Bahli (trac- fat Berachoth) mil deutscher Uehersetzung, etc. (Berlin, 1842, fol.), i, 17-20, where Ismael's rules are given with lengthy annotations. See also the article Miurasii. Rabbi Ismael is also the reputed author of a number of other works. The most important of these are, an allegorical commentary on Exod. xii-xxiii, 20, called Krbw'O, treating of the ceremonies prescribed by the Torah. Numerous editions of it have been printed; the first at Constantinople, 1515, folio; the last, to our knowledge, at Wilna, 1844, folio. It has been augment- ed by notes from several other Jewish writers, and was translated into Latin by Ugolino {Thesaurus Antiquifa- ium, vol. xiv) :— ri^Din "^p^^ (or T|i:n D), a work on mystic theolog}', of which extracts have been pub- lished' in "iDnb ins (Venice, lG01,4to; Cracow, 1C48, 4to), and in other works. It was printed separately un- der the title n-.b^in iJ^'lS ^n-I (Venice, 1677, 8vo; Zolkiew, 1833, 8vo). It was also inserted in parts in the edition of the Zohar. Ismael also wrote a cabalistic, allegorical treatise on the nature and attributes of God, luider the title n^ip ^^"O; also called rrai'pn 'o. A part of it was published in the ?X^'"i D of Eleazar ben-Jehudah of Worms (Amsterd. 1701, 4to, and often). Another small cabalistic treatise on the shape and mys- tic value of letters, under the title of tli^lTSriil O, was published with a long commentary (Konz, 1774, 4to), etc. See Flirst, Bill. Judaica, ii, 75 sq. ; Rossi, Dizion. storico der/li Autoi'i Ebrei; Zunz, Die Gottesdiensilichen Vortrage der Juden (Berlin, 1832), p. 47 sq.; Griitz, Ge- schichte der Juden, iv, G8 sq. ; Steinschneider, Catalor/us Libr. Ilehr. in Biblioth. Bodleiana, col. 1160, etc.; Ben- Chananja (Szegedin, 1858), i, 122 sq. (.J. H.W.)