[3373] Ber. 7 a.
[3374] Shem. R. 42, comp. Rosh haSh. 17 b.
[3375] Ber. 6 a.
[3376] Shem. R. 15, ed. warsh. p. 22 a, line 13 from top.
[3377] Is. lxvi. 15; comp. Numb. xxxi. 23.
[3378] Jer. Taan. 66 a, about the middle.
[3379] It was, however, admitted that the Halakhah sometimes went beyond the Pentateuch (Sot. 16 a).
[3380] St. Matt. xv. 3, 6; St. Mark vii. 9, 13.
[3381] See the remarks this point in vol. i. pp. 567, 576, 577.
[3382] Ab. iii. 18.
[3383] Ber. R. 81.
[3384] Nedar. 9 a; 22 a.
[3385] According to Nedar. 10 a, the Rabbis invented this word instead of Qorban to the Lord' (Lev. i. 2), in order that the Name of God might not be idly taken.
[3386] Nedar. i. 1-3.
[3387] Jer. Nedar. 36 d, line 20 from top.
[3388] u. s.
[3389] {hebrew} (Jer. Nedar. 36 d, line 22).
[3390] See Maimonides, Yad haChas., Hilkh. Nedar. i. 1, 2.
[3391] {hebrew}
[3392] {hebrew}
[3393] Jer. Ned. u. s.
[3394] Tos. Arach. iv.
[3395] {hebrew} they open a door.'
[3396] Nedar. ix. passim.
[3397] Maimonides u. s. Hilk. Shebh. v. 1.
[3398] Chag. i. 8.
[3399] This is altogether a very curious Mishnah. It adds to the remark quoted in the text this other significant admission, that the laws about the Sabbath, festive offerings, and the malversation of things devoted to God are like mountains hanging by one hair,' since Scripture is scant on these subjects, while the traditional Laws are many.
[3400] On the subject of Vows see also The Temple and its Services,' pp. 322-326. The student should consult Siphré, Par. Mattoth, pp. 55 b to 58 b.
[3401] Nedar. ii. 2.
[3402] I can only express surprise, that Wünsche should throw doubt upon it. It is fully admitted by Levy, Targ. Wörterb. sub {hebrew}.
[3403] {hebrew}
[3404] Ned. ix. 1.
[3405] Nedar. v.
[3406] In this case the son, desirous that his father should share in the festivities at his marriage, proposed to give to a friend the court in which the banquet was to be held and the banquet itself, but only for the purpose that his father might eat and drink with him. The proposal was refused as involving sin, and the point afterwards discussed and confirmed - implying, that in no circumstances could a parent partake of anything belonging to his son, if he had pronounced such a vow, the only relaxation being that in case of actual starvation (if he have not what to eat') the son might make a present to a third person, when the father might in turn receive of it.
[3407] Ex. xxi. 17.
[3408] Comp. Wünsche, ad loc.
[3409] Other translations have been proposed, but the above is taken from Nedar. viii. 7, with the change only of Qonam into Qorban.
[3410] The quotation is a Targum,' which in the last clause follows almost entirely the LXX.
[3411] Mark the definite article.
[3412] The words in St. Mark vii. 16 are of very doubtful authenticity.
[3413] St. Matt. xv. 10; St. Mark vii. 14.
[3414] Both these sayings seem to have been proverbial at the time, although I am not able to quote any passage in Jewish writings in which they occur in exactly the same form.
[3415] In St. Mark vii. 21 these outcomings of evil thoughts' are arranged in three groups of four, characterised as in the text; while in St. Matt. xv. 19 the order of the ten commandments seems followed. The account of St. Mark is the fuller. In both accounts the expression blasphemy' (blasphema) - rendered in tho Revised Version by railing' - seems to refer to calumnious and evil speaking about our fellow-men.
[3416] Midr. on Eccles. i. 16.
[3417] St. Mark vii. 19, last clause.
[3418] I have accepted this rending of the words, first propounded by St. Chrysostom, and now adopted in the Revised Version, although not without much misgiving. For there is strong objection to it from the Jewish usus and views. The statement in Ber. 61 a, last line, The oesophagus which causeth to enter and which casteth out all manner of meat' ({hebrew}) seems to imply that the words of Christ were a proverbial expression. The Taimudic idea is based on the curious physiological notion (Midr. on Eccles. vii. 19), that the food passed from the oesophagus first into the larger intestine (Hemses, {hebrew}, perhaps = omasum), where the food was supposed to be crushed as in a mill (Vayyik R. 4, 18; Midr. on Eccl. xii. 3), and thence only, through various organs, into the stomach proper. (As regards the process in animals, see Lewysohn, Zool. d. Talm. pp. 37-40). (The passage from Ber. 61 a has been so rendered by Wünsche, in his note on St. Matt. xv. 17, as to be in parts well nigh unintelligible.) It may interest students that the strange word phedrn rendered both in the A.V. and the R.V. by draught,' seems to correspond to the Rabbinic Aphidra ({hebrew}) which Levy renders by the floor of a stable formed by the excrements of the animals which are soaked and stamped into a hard mass.'