let us reason together faith the Lord though your sins were as crimson yet shall they be as white as snow though they were red like scarlet they shall be as wooll Now if the Cock be white he is not polluted with sin and so is able to bear the sins of others which being red he could not possibly do being stufft with his own sins already Antonius Margarita in his book of the faith of the Jews registers it as the affirmation of some of the Hebrew Doctors that an Ape is a more fitting beast for this dayes sacrifice then the Cock because in his face he more represents a Man Yet they chuse a Cock rather then any other creature because a Man in Hebrew is called Gebher Now if Gebher offend Gebber must also in justice suffer for his offence And therefore the Jews considering the burden of death too grievous to be born and the punishment too heavie spare themselves and kill the Cock which the Babylonian Talmudists call Gebher to satisfie the judge of all flesh and by this shift Gebher offends and Gebher suffers for it Blinde and beastly Jews how do they trisle and think to puzzle God in that manner that he cannot know a Cock from a Man Wo wo unto them for this their horrible blindnesse above example without pattern Such another exposition relishing of the same pate we finde in the book called Schebet Jehudah written first in Hebrew then translated into the Teutonick tongue by the Jews and printed at Cracovia in Poland some twenty two years ago It is a certain disputation between a Jew and a Christian before Alphonsus King of Portugal wherein when the Christian urged divers places of Scripture proving Christ to be the true Messias and amongst others that of the Psalmist My God my God why hast thou forsaken me The Jew made answer that it was a certain property belonging to the holy Scripture to be capable of divers interpretations amongst which that is the best which may be confirmed and declared by other places of holy writ But as for the forecited place there were many other Scriptures which did evidently prove that it cannot be understood of Christ And first of all saith the Jew I will rell thee what answer a learned Rabbine did upon a certain time make unto the King of Spain Yesterday said he unto the King I being very wroth with my houshold Cock because he had troubled me in my studies with his crowing musick I smote him with my staff put him into a dark room where he ceased his crowing yet withal this my anger being never a jot abated I did beat him till I had rent his skin and disjoynted his bones then I put him into a Pot and covered it according as I thought meet and convenient which served him for a Coffin for there he died After his death there happened out a miracle for his life returned unto him again and he began to sing and crow as at former times and this is the true meaning and exposition of these words urged by the Christian out of the 22 Psalm Which appears so to be if we parallel the place with that of Jeremiah in the third of his Lamentations and the first verse I am the man that have seen affliction in the rod of his indignation He hath led me brought me into darknesse but not light Surely he is turned against me be turneth his hand against me all the day My flesh and my skin hath he caused to wax old and he hath broken my bones He bath builded against me and compassed me with gali and labour He hath heaged about me that I cannot get out he bath made my chains heavy And when I cry and shout he shutteth out my prayers I am the man Am Gebher that is to say I am the Cock for the word among the Talmudists â—ignifieth so much Who bath see naffliction In the rod of his indignation There is the rod with which the Cock was beaten He bath led me there is his flight into darkness and not into light there is the place of obscurity into which he was put He turns his hand against me there is the second beating after that he was put up in his close prison or the motion whereby he thought himself to move in the pot My flesh and my skin hath he caused to wax old that is to say he hath torn and rent it He hath broken my bones or cut me in pieces He hath builded against me He hath shut me up in the pot He hath set me in dark places that is he hath put me in the pot and covered it And when I cry and shout which words signifie unto us that the Cock sung and crowed after he was dead So much foppery out of the book called Schebet Jehudah out of which we may plainly see after what a ridiculous manner the Jews interpret and make a mock of the holy Scripture and prove themselves to be really possessed with that phrensie blindness and hardness of heart wherewith Moses threatned them We may see also with what art these jugling mountebanks and quacksalvering impostros can metamorphose a man into a Cock and again turn a Cock into a man Truly I am forced to believe that if the Prophet Esay had used the word Gebher in his fifty third chapter the man that is there made mention of should of necessity the Jews being translators have been a very Cock Seeing the Prophet calls him Isch machobheth a man full of sorrows despised and not esteemed One that hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows even Christ who was beaten for our sins and wounded for our transgressions The chastisement of our peace was upon him by whose stripes we are healed Yet the Jews will not acknowledge receive and confess such a man but chuse one whom they can kill put upon the broach rost at the fire and fill their filthy paunches withall But woe and alass they may long look for health from the wounds of an household Cock The Greek Calends will first have place in the annual computation before they receive from hence any setled peace of conscience which evidently appears to be true at the houre of their death when destitute of all comfort ready to despair they câ—y out my death is my reconciliation and satisfaction for my sins A miserable poor and cold comfort indeed when not only death temporal but eternal both of soule and body must be the wages for their sin This the Jews cannot comprehend seeing God in his just judgment hath shut their eyes that they cannot see nor understand Pitifull and lamentable is their case in which with an unwilling heart I leave them and descend to a further declaration of their preparation to this festival After that they have made an attonement for their sins by the sacrificing of the Cock they repair to the place where the dead are buried where they say many prayers as they did
and religious who have done as much good as evil Those who are perfectly just have their names presently registred in the book of life but they who are extremely wicked have their names written in the book of death Those of the middle sort are deferred and put off untill the day of reconciliation which is the tenth day after the celebration of the feast of the new year If they truly and sincerely repent them of their sins in the mean time so that their good deeds exceed their bad ones then it goes well with them but if on the contrary their evil deeds be more in number then they are presently put in the catalogue of the reprobate and damned As it is written Let them be blotted out of the book of the living and not be written among the just By the blotting out of the book understanding the book of the wicked and by the word life or living the book of the just and by the words Let them not be written among the just the book of those who are indifferently honest Hence is also that of Ralig bbi Nalig chman the son of Isaac upon these words of Moses Now if thou wilt palig rdon their sin thy mercy shall appear But if thou wilt not blot me out of the book which thou hast written In which words Blot out fingers out the book of the wicked Out of thy book the book of the just Which thou hast written the book of them which are indifferently just and godly So far the Talmud 1. Now that God should at this time sit in judgment rather then at any other the reason is grounded upon a certain tradition of the Antients that God created the whole world Adam and placed him in Paradise in the moneth of September therefore it was thought very meet and just that God at the years end should require of man an account of his life and see how he hath carried himself for the space of the year past and so reward every one according to his works Which he paies unto every one in the year following in this manner Sins are of divers sorts some God punishes in this world some also in the life to come so also good works some whereof are recompenced here some hereafter Now if a man for the most part doe nothing els but sin all the year long polluting his soul with the horrid filth of wickedness yet doing some few good deeds the sum of all is presented before Gods tribunal upon new-years day 1. Then God takes the scales and puts his good deeds in one end and his bad deeds in another If it seem good then to the Judge of all men to reward the foresaid man for the good he hath found in him in this present world it cometh to pass that he is called a just man and hath this happy sentence pronounced upon him in this vale of misery that he shall have a name in the book of life live for the next year become rich and shall be advanced to great honours 1. In like manner if an honest and just man who every day makes a conscience of his wayes and lives according to the law all the year through offend and commit some gross enormities for which God is pleased to punish him in this world then God calls him a wicked and unjust liver and pronounceth sentence against him for evil and not for good puts his name into the book of the dead thereby giving him notice that he shall either die or become poor or be troubled with some dangerous disease the year following and therefore although a man may enjoy the happiness of Saints in the world to come yet may he be called with injustice in this seeing he is here punished for his offences even as the reprobate And on the contrary one here accounted just and holy may be ordained to damnation because God gives him the reward of his workes in this present world And therefore no man ought to wonder or account it a strange thing that the godly suffer affliction and all manner of distress in this present life when on the contrary the wicked lives as he list gives rest unto his soule enjoyes pleasure and is without the gunshot of sorrow and vexation yet at the day of death the case is altered for he that was here so gay and gallant must goe into everlasting fire and the other so miserable into enternal bliss God then paying unto them the due reward of their labours And this is the very reason why the Germara affirms that the three foresaid books are opened upon new-years day Furthermore it often falls out that one good work blots out a number of transgressions and one sin abolisheth many good works both which are in the power of God If the sinner whose name is put into the book of death repent him of his wayes from the bottom of his heart and continue in this course unto the day of reconciliation being the tenth of the new-year he may happily moue God to reverse the sentence pronounced against him and to transferr him into the book of life Even as the godly in the same space angering his Maker by the commission of some hainous offence may move him to blot his name out of the book of life and to write it among the dead Thus the blindfolded Jews write speak and are conceited of the Almighties rule and government making him a Judge of that stampe and quality which they desire him to be of far contrary to the description of the Prophet David who in heavie cheer praying unto God for the forgiveness of his sins cries out Enter not into judgment with thy servant O Lord for no man living shall be justified in thy sight And again If thou O Lord marke whalig t is done amiss who is able to abide it Seeing therefore God sits in judgment upon every new-years-day and so severely punisheth the transgressors of his commandements the Rabbines have made it an Ordinance and Statute in Israel that every one should for a moneth before repent of his sins and the evil he hath committed turn from his wicked wayes and begin to lead a new life This therefore the Jews put in execution and upon the first day of Elul or August they fall to a serious account calling all their sins to remembrance and weighing them according to every several circumstance in which they have wickedly transgressed through the whole circuit of the year Whosoever then every day before he eat or drink questions his soule what it hath done and with a diligent scrutinie searches every corner of his heart for some formerly practised wickedness grieving very much and being very heartily sorry for the same he shall upon New-years-day when others are to give an account for their offences receive a plenary absolution And hence it is that the Jews dwelling among the Walloones at this day have a custome to rise every morning of this moneth
fills their hearts with sorrow being a very probable token of an unfruitful and dangerous season When the trumpeter hath done his office the whole Synagogue trumptes out those words of David Blessed is the people O Lord that can rejoyce in thee they shall walk in the light of thy countenance Morning prayer ended they return again to their houses where they eat and drink and sound upon their Rams-horns For it is a position of the Rabbines that at this time every one ought to be merry and jocund being assured that God hath been gracious unto him in pardoning his sins and offences and not because he hath fill'd his panch and liquored his throat for this would God rather impute unto them as a sin then recompense as a good work After this their repast every one man woman and child hasten to the water or to some Bridge thereupon to make Taschlich that is to say to cast their sins into the water and the ground of the practise is that of the Prophet He will turn again and have mercy upon us be will subdue our iniquities and cast all our sins into the bottom of the sea The Jews thus gathered together upon the Bridge so soon as they behold the fishes accounting the sight as a prosperous signe and token they caper alost and shake their garments over the â—ishes dreaming and vainly conceiting that by this their foolery they have shaked off all their sinnes upon the fishes backs which swim away with them even as the scape-Goat which carried away the sinnes of their ancestors into the wilderness Others write that they do it in remembrance of Abraham who travelling to sacrifice his son Isaac upon Mount Meriah which was upon the first day of September Satan met him and turned himself into a great River which at the first took him only to the knees but by and by it reacht his neck Abraham perceiving himself to be in such a distresse and that he was in danger of drowning cried mightily unto God who heard his prayer and turned the water into dry ground as it is recorded in the tract Medrasch rotosoha Evening being come they fall again to eat and drink and make merry as they were wont and in this manner they celebrate the feast of the New-year in great security with much mirth and jollity for the space of two dayes together I conclude with that of the Prophet If a man walk in the spirit and would lie falsly saying I will prophesie unto thee of wine and of strong drink he shall even be the prophet of this people To which alludes that of Sophonie Her Prophets are light and wicked persons her Priests have polluted the Sanctuary they have polluted the Law CHAP. XX. How they prepare themselves to the Feast of Reconciliation and the celebration thereof THe time between New-years-day and the tenth of the same moneth upon which they keep the feast of Reconciliation is called by Jews the ten penitential dayes for which space they fast and pray very much and are wonderful desirous to become holy and religious that if God should have written any of their names in the book of death and determined to afflict their souls with an unfortunate year he might at the contemplation and sight of their penitent life and practise of good works repent him of the evil and have mercy upon them transcribing their names in the book of life and sealing the judgement Every morning so long as these dayes endure while it is as yet very early they confesse their sins three several times do not proceed to the excommunication of any one neither do they call any man into judgement or force any one to take an Oath Upon the ninth day they forsake their beds betimes in the morning frequent the Synagogue sing and pray So soon as they return home every male old and young takes a Cock and every woman a Hen into their hands the master of the family doing likewise and saying these words Foolish men are plagued for their offence and because of theâ—r wickednesse Their soul abhorred all manner of meat and they were even at deaths door So when they cried unto the Lord in their trouble he delivered them out of their distresse He sent forth his word and healed them and they were saved from their destruction O that men would therefore praise the Lord for his goodnesse and declare the wonders that he doth for the children of men that they would offer unto him the sacrifice of thanksgiving and tell out his works with gladnesse And again If there be a messenger with him or an interpreter one of a thousand to declare unto man his righteousnesse then will he have mercy upon him and will say Deliver him that he go not down into the pit for I have received a reconciliation that is a Cock which shall be a reconciliation unto me When he hath ended this his repetition he finisheth the reconciliation waving the Cock three times about his head and saying at every time This Cock shall serve instead of me he shall succeed in my stead who deserve death he shall be my reconciliation he shall die for me but I shall enter into life and blisse with them that are righteous in Israel Amen This he doth three times as was said before once for himself once for his children and once for strangers which sojourn with him according to the custome of the high Priest in ancient dayes as it is recorded in the third book of Moses In the next place he takes the Cock and kills him and drawing and gathering the skin together about his neck first meditates with himself that he is worthy to have his own throat cut for his sinnes and offences and then cutting the Cocks throat thinks himself worthy to be punished with the sword After this he takes the cock and with all his might throws him upon the ground thereby signifying that he deserves to be stoned to death for his sins and wickedness lastly he puts him upon the spit and roasts him thereby giving others to understand that to be burnt in a fiery furnace doth not equalize his desert These four kindes of death the poor Cock undergoes for his Master The intrals out of commiseration they commonly cast upon the house top that it may also be partaker of such a sacrifice Others say that they do it because sin is rather an internal then an external thing and that it cleaves fast to the bowels of the Cock some Crows coming by may claw them up and flee away with them into the wildernesse even as the scape-Goat in the Old Testament ran away with the sins of the people into the Desert They take all possible pains and care to procure a white Cock for the sacrifice They will by no means admit of a red one because such an one is full of sins seeing sin it self is red also as it is written Come now
out a place for his ingresse with an Hatchet he is forced to stand up to the chin in the water so long as an Egge may be made hard rosted In Summer time he is compelled to sit naked in an heap of Pismires where although he be so naked that he hath not the least rag upon him yet are his ears and nostrils stopped his penance ended he washeth himself with cold water If the season be neither hot nor cold in which he is to suffer punishment then they appoint him a certain time of fasting for the space whereof he must not eat unlesse it be very late at night at what time they give him some small portion of bread and water and this they practise until the time come when he may either stand in cold water or sit amongst an heap of Pismires It is written in Medrasch that the first man Adam stood in the water up to the nostrils an hundred and thirty years before he begot Seth for eating of the forbidden fruit If the punishment seem to be lesse then the offence requires then they compel him in the Summer time to run through the middle of a thick swarm of Bees which may lance and sting his body until the bulk thereof by reason of the anguish swell again And so soon as he is cured of the said malady he must again run through the foresaid swarm of Bees and that more then once according to his desert If he have often committed fornication and adultery then for many years he must continually suffer the said punishment Such a Fast is sometimes enjoyned such an offender that for the space of three years he must fast night and day not eating any thing unless it be at supper when his daintiest fare must be bread and water onely this qualification is annexed that he may chuse whether he will perform the forementioned injunction or otherwise fast three whole dayes in every one of the three years not tasting the least morsel of bread or drop of water As Queen Esther did in her great and extream necessity and commanded the Jews to practise the same If any go in unto a woman at unfitting time he is enjoyned to fast forty dayes and every day to have his back twice or thrice soundly lashed with a lethern whip and thirty nine stripes to be given him He must not eat any flesh or hot meats drink no wine unlesse it be upon the Sabbath day If any kiss or embrace a woman being in her monethly flowers he must undergo the same punishment A Robber is adjudged to a three years exile as also that wandering through every City where any Jews do sojourn he should with a loud voice proclaim Rotzeach Ani I am a Robber and expose himself to the lash He must not eat flesh nor drink wine He must not cut his hair or beard nor put on any clean lineâ— or change of garments It is not lawful for him to wash his hands every moneth once he is bound to cover his head and to binde the arm wherewith he acted the murther thereunto with an Iron Chain and so to deplore the offence committed in the sight of the Iews Some have this punishment inflicted upon them that if they sleep one night they should watch the next and so become vagabonds upon the face of the earth as Cain was Others are compelled to wear plaits of Iron upon their naked skin Others forced to prostrate themselves before the door of the Synagogue that every incommer may tread upon If any Jew accuse another and bring him before a Christian Magistrate or divulge his wickednesse and evil actions then is he called a traytor Others inflict some grievous punishment upon him and from thenceforth esteem him as a man of no account and reckoning CHAP. XXXV Touching the burial of the Jews and how they are bewailed and lamented of their living Friends and Kinsfolks WHen any Jew is visited with sickness then the learned Rabbines come diligently to visit and comfort him which they esteem as a good and precious work If any be sick unto death he sends for his nearest Kinsfolks and other of the learned crew If the sick person be rich then in the first place they barter with him about his temporal estate if poor they spare their labour They seriously exhort him to a constant perseverance in their faith First of all catechising him whether he believes the Messias is yet for to come He is also bound to make a confession of his sins upon his death-bed the form whereof is this I confesse before thee my Lord and God the God of my fathers the Lord of all creatures that health and sicknesse are in thy hand I pray and beseech thee to restore me to my former health and being mindful of me to hear my prayer as thou heardest the prayer of King Hezekiah when he was sick But if my appointed time be come then let this my death be the remission of all my sins which I have committed either out of ignorance or wantonness since the day that I was born Grant that I may have a part in paradise and in that world to come that is reserved for the just Grant that I may know the way of life everlasting Satisfie me with the joy of the excelling countenance by thy right hand for ever more Blessed be thou O God who hearest my prayer Their final comfort is that temporal death a debt to corrupt nature may be a reconciliation for all their sins and that God is bound to remit their sins because they undergoe this death Alass who can but perceive what peace such poor comfort can afford to a loaden conscience When he is giving up the Ghost then all the by-standers whether kinsfolke or strangers rent their garments yet this they doe in the skirts thereof where the rent being but a hands breadth can doe no great hurt they deplore and lament the man departed seven dayes after the example of Joseph who mourned for his father for the same space and for the renting of their garments they produce that Scripture Jacob rent his garmants and put sackcloth upon his loines and lamented his son many dayes As soon as he is dead they cast forth all the water in the house into the streets cover his face that from thenceforth none may behold it Then they take his thumbe and by wresting of it into the palme of his hand make it to represent the name Schaddai which is so great a terrour to the devil that he dare not approach the dead corps They binde his thumb with the threads and stringes of his own coat which otherwise would not remain crooked For it is ordinary for a dead man alwayes to stretch out his hands and fingers thereby signifying that he hath left the world and that there is nothing in it which he can now lay challenge unto as on the contrary the little infants at their birth have their hands
to return to the place where he gave up the ghost and dolefully to lament over his dear consort the body So soon as the man is dead they cast all the water in the house out of doors that they who pass by may be warned of the decease of some person there Others have recorded that they do this thing in memory of the Prophetess Miriam of whom it is written All the Congregation of Israel came into the wilderness of Sin in the first moneth and the people remainâ—d in Cades where Miriam died and was buried there And when there was no water for the Congregation they gathered themselves together against Moses and Aaron The Talmudists say that the occasion hereof is this the Angel of death who hath deprived the man of life washing his knife or sword in the water poisons it for they write that Satan or the messenger of death standing at the beds-head with a drawen sword in his hand upon which sword hang three drops of gall which as soon as the sick man beholds being terrified at the sight he opens his mouth whereupon these three drops fall into it By reason of the first he gives up the ghost the second makes him become yellow and pale the last causeth him to putrifie So soon as the sick man dieth the Angel runs to the waters washeth his sword in them by which means they being infected with poison are to be powred out Again this is one of the best grounds of the Jewish faith Antonius Margarita in his tract of Tabernacles or Booths writes that the Jews in ancient times were accustomed to pray unto God that he would not suffer the Angel of death any longer to appear in such a fearful shape at their bedsheads and that also they had their request granted and that they their ancestors put out his left eye conjuring and binding him by the holy names of God It is also recorded in the Talmud that great honour ought to be given unto them who have departed this life because they in the other world have perfect knowledge of all occurrences in this They write also that the soule doth not presently upon the dissolution return into heaven from whence it came but that for twelve moneths space it becomes a vagabond through the earth returns into the Sepulchre suffers many torments in purgatory and then twelve moneths fully expired it ascends up into heaven there taking its rest The question being proposed in the book called Schebhet Jehudah in a certain disputation betwixt a Jew and a Christian How it came to pass that the dead should know all things that are done here upon earth It is answered that the soule doth not gain an entrance into heaven untill the body that was buried be turned into dust and therefore it remaining so long a time upon the earth may without contradiction know the things which are done here below That the soule doth not presently goe into heaven is manifest out of the words of Solomon The dust shall return unto the earth from whence it was and the spirit to God that gave it In this place they say that by the dust is meant our bodie which of necessity returns unto the earth out of which it was taken and by the Spirit our soule which returns to God that gave it now then to conclude the body must first be made dust and ashes and then the Spirit shall return unto the Creator which if it were otherwise certainly Solomon had inverted his words and propounded them thus The Spirit shall return unto God that gave it and the body to the earth Elias the famous Grammarian in his dictionary called Tisbi expounding the word Chabat hath left it in record that it was the opinion of their Rabbines that so soon as any of the Jews do take their farewell of this tâ—r restrial paradise and the chamberlain death hath furnished him with a lodging in the lower parts of the earth that the Angel of death comes and sits upon his sepulchre and that at the same time the soule returns into the body reanimates and erects it Whereupon the Angel takes an iron chain the one part of which is hot the other cold with which he smites the dead corpes two times or more At the first stroke all the members of the body are torn one from another At the second all the bones are dispersed abroad at the third flesh and bones yea the whole carcass is turned into dust and ashes Then come the good Angels and gather the bones together honouring them with a second burial This punishment the Rabbines call Chibbut hakkeber which they do not only write of but also most absurdly believe in their common prayer petitioning that God would preserve them against this punishment and divert it from them as we may see in that petition which they call Benschen being in the number of those which they use upon the day of reconciliation It is written in the book Chasidim that who is much given to almsdeeds is a lover of reproof and honesty who entertains strangers willingly and from his very heart who prayes with an attent minde although he die without the land of Canaan he shall neither tast nor trie the violence of the grave but shall be certainly preserved against the Chibbut hackkeber Hence it is most evident that they who die in the land of Canaan are free from this torture but they who die in a strange land are subject thereunto Hither it is also to be referred that they who die in other lands are wont to wander through secret caves and holes of the earth untill they come to the land of promise otherwise they are not made partakers of the general resurrection which thing we have formerly made mention of in the first Chapter and other places of this book CHAP. XXXVI Touching the Jews Messias who is yet for to come THat a Messias was promised unto the Jews they all with one mouth acknowledge hereupon petitioning in their daily prayers that he would come quickly before the houreglass of their life be run out The only scruple is of the time when and the state in which he shall appear They generally beleeve that this their future Messias shall be a simple man yet nevertheless far exceeding the whole generation of mortals in all kinde of vertues who shall marry a wife and beget children to sit upon the throne of his kingdom after him When therefore the Scripture mentioneth a twofold Messias the one plain poor and meek subject to the stroke of death the other illustrious powerful highly advanced and exalted the Jews forge unto themselves two of the same sort one which they call by the name of Messias the son of Joseph that poor and simple one yet an experienced and valiant leader for the warrs Another whom they entitle Messias the son of David that true Messias who is to be king of Israel and to rule over them in