wives at once or by succession lib. de Monogam But others granting the lawfulness of successive Marriages have yet wholly exploded the licence of many wives at one time unless where Divine Revelation gave toleration Mr. Grotius saith there was no restraint herein until the Coming of Christ l. 2. c. 5. § 8 9. de jure Belli Pacis But as to what herein relates to the Jews Polygamy has ever been so far from an ill name among them that it has been reckon'd for one of the chief Priviledges confer'd upon them by Divine Prescription So that if we be herefrom abstemious it is not out of Conscience but worldly Interest The Gemara Babylonia as Mr. Selden writes makes it lawful for any Jew to take as many wives as he can maintain that is according to the Barbary-Jews Any one may take as many wives as he can find with meat and cloth and the right of the Bed For to all these he obligeth himself in his Marriage-Letters And what the Jews herein pretend unto by Divine Law other Nations practice through evil Custom For Tacitus de moribus German saith That they used Polygamy as a mark of Nobless and Gallantry But the Jews of whom I now write though they greatly magnifie and extol the concession of Polygamy yet they are not very fond of its practice For they are generally abstinent herein not out of Religion but policy as finding one wife at a time enough for their maintenance and government Besides if they find any grievance in being always confined to one Female they have a present remedie in Divorce or Concubinage Of which we must now speak a little Now as touching Divorce there are several things thereunto required which being all contain'd in the Sepher Kerithuth need not any particular enumeration And in this Sepher Kerithuth or Book of Cutting off so called because the wife thereby was cut off from her husbands Family I have met with three several Copies hereof one taken out of Moses Kotsensis where saith the citation there is another A second Copy hereof is collected out of Maimonides and extant in the end of Burtorf's Caldee and Syrian Grammar and a third used in Barbary among which there is little difference but in circumstances A Copy of the Bill of Divorce UPon the _____ day of the Week and _____ of the Month _____ and Year of the Creation of the World according to the account which we Hebrews use at Tituan in the Kingdom of Fez governed by the puissant Muley I Joseph Ben Rabbi have desired of mine own accord without any Compulsion to cut off divorce dismiss and cast thee out thee I say thee my Wife Fatima the Daughter of Rabbi Ben which has been my Wife heretofore But now I cut thee off divorce dismiss and cast thee out And be thou cut off divorc'd dismiss'd and cast out from me And be at liberty free and Mistriss of thine own self to go to Marry whom thou hast a mind to and let none be refused for my name from this day forward for ever And this shall be to thee from me a Bill of Divorce and the Epistle of putting away according to the Law of the twelve Tribes This is done before two or more Witnesses who attest it by subscribing thereunto their Names CHAP. IX Of the Jews Concubinage of their Marrying the Brothers Wife THose secondary Wives which were of old among the Jews our English Translation renders Concubines Gen. 25.6 And Tertullian speaking hereof in the first Chapter of his Book De unis Nuptiis ad Vxorem affirms that not the Patriarchs alone but also our Ancestors had a right not only to Marry but also to use Matrimony variously and that there were Concubines before the Law we read of the Concubines of Abaham Nahor Jacob c. And out of Philo we are told by Mr. Selden that the primary wives were called the just and the secondary Concubines A Learned man of our own Nation in his Annotations upon the New Testament seems to incline to another Opinion for he saith that the Matrimonial Laws of the Jews forbad a servant or Gentile woman to become wife to a Jew but that she was called a Concubine Whether or no this might be so by some new Institute of the Masters I have no just occasion here to enquire But I am sure the Egyptian Agar who was Abraham's Concubine is called his wife Gen. 16.3 And that both she and Kethurah were called both his Wives and Concubines but Sarah bore only the name of his wife August Civitat Dei lib. 17. cap. 34. But grant that the Concubine by some late Rabbinick Matrimonial Laws of the Jews was not called a wife yet she was far from the ill character of an Harlot nor was conjugal association with her any more unlawful than Polygamy which was practised among the Patriarchs and is still allowed of by the Modern Jews And yet if we grant Concubines the Title of Wives and Concubinate to be Marriage yet betwixt them and the primary wives there was and is still no small difference and disparity For the first sort of wives were taken by Matrimonial Patent or Dotal Covenant with solemn Espousals and had a power to receive all such presents as might testifie both the husbands Affection and the Contract but Concubines were taken without any of these Ceremonies or Assurances Next the primary wives were the Governesses of their husbands Families but the Concubines live therein as Servants and equal to the former in nothing but in the right of the Bed In the third place the children of the first wives had a right to succeed to the hereditary Estates and Titles of their Fathers but those of the Concubines were secluded all succession therein and instead thereof receive portions Gen. 25.6 And some think that it was upon this account that Jephte being the Son of a Concubine was denyed to co-inherit with his brethren Agreeable unto this Custom is the Matrimonium Morgengabicum in some Countries where the second wife and her children are not taken in to a right of the husbands Estate whereby the woman can have no part thereof for a Joynture nor the children for their inheritance but only certain portions are assigned them by Compact which are called Morgengab or Marriage-Gifts But not to pursue the Laws of the old Jewish Concubinage whereof enough is to be met with in Mr. Selden Our present task is to state the present use thereof among the Jews in Barbary Who are generally herein very abstemious but when they make use of it 't is with such Rites as have been already mention'd And we may easily imagine the unsettledness of their Condition to be the main reason why they are so reserved in the use of this priviledge People of an Ambulatory state being usually very careful not to multiply their lumber The next thing to be accounted for is the Marrying or refusing of the Brothers wife who is dead without Issue A
imitation and remembrance of David 2 Sam. 6.16 During the time that the Law is out of the Ark they place burning Torches therein in token that the Law performs all the duties of a light to those that obey it On this day also the Elder Jews make themselves merry in seeing the Youth scramble for the fruits they cast among them On this day also are sold the Offices of the Synagogue to them that will give most And all being orderly consummate every one leaves the Synagogue with this Prayer The Lord preserve my going out and my coming in from henceforth and for ever The next thing that we are to account for in this Chapter is the Manner of their keeping the Sabbath and the Offices thereon celebrated A Theme large enough for a whole Volume if we were to give an exact description of all Rites and Cases thereunto belonging But I shall confine the discourse at present to the Customs of the Jews in Barbary among whom and the rest of the Jewish Nation there is but small disagreement in the Sabbatarian Ritual Though it must be confessed that the Barbary-Jews are neither so strict nor Ceremonious in this matter as the Jews of other Countries if we may believe the account which good Authours have given of the later The whole Nation of the Jews sufficiently accord in the notice of the word Sabbath and grant that it barely signifies no more than Rest and that sometimes too it is used both for working-dayes and Festivals and that it puts on a more peculiar and restrained sense when it is concisely taken for that seventh day which God set apart for his Worship And in the Observation of this Sabbath or Rest the Jews practice numerous Ceremonies some antecedent and relating to their preparation and others concomitant or waiting upon the day Their antecedent Ceremonies are seen in dressing and preparing on the Eve of the Sabbath the Victuals that are thereon to be eaten According to the Commandment Exod. 16.23 To Morrow is the rest of the Holy Sabbath unto the Lord bake that which ye will bake to day and seeth that ye will seeth c. From which they conclude That all things necessary to the Sabbath and for the Honor thereof ought to be provided over night that there may be nothing to interrupt this Rest If it falls out that the Servants are not able to make all things ready the Masters assist them to the end that the Sabbath by no bodily labour may be transgressed And they are able to cite many great Rabbins who have help'd their Servants in preparing for this Rest But this strict Custom of dressing no Victuals upon the Sabbath is not universal with the Jews we now speak off With whom I have been entertain'd with good cheer on the Sabbath that was thereon prepared And asking them how they durst or would act so contrary to their own pretences the Reply was That they thought the Crime of a low nature if it was done without giving scandal to others that is secretly Which was then the Case Every Sabbath is observed with three Feasts and four Offices The first Feast is upon the Friday-night or rather at the very entrance and begining of the Sabbath The second is their Sabbath-dinner and the third Feast concludes the Sabbath Now the Custom of this triple Feast they deduce from the triple repetition which Moses used of the word To day when he gave out Orders concerning gathering of the Manna Exod. 16.25 Some of the more hospitable and wealthier Jews keep their Tables spread during the whole time of the Sabbath And in this as other things they generally tread in their Fore-fathers steps who were excellent at turning the power and intention of the Law into Carnal Form and Superstition But besides their greater apparatus in Diet for the Sabbath they use other preparative Rites in order to the Solemnity of This Great Day All which are bodily and external and not worth our recital if it were not to let us see into what follies a people may fall in Religion when they have once renounced the Truth All the Friday-afternoon is usually taken up in Sabbatical preparations as washing of the head and hands the trimming of their beards whose corners the Graver sort suffer not to be cut according to Law and in a peculiar Superstition of paring their nails on which parings they are forbid to tread in prevention whereof they usually burn or bury them In like manner they spend no small time in whetting the Knives and preparing other Utensils of the Table The women on the Friday comb and dress their heads and make ready all accoutrements of the body For they esteem a neglect in any of these particulars a down-right violation of the Rest And because their Masters use a word for Sabbath signifying Queen they think it reasonable that they as duly prepare themselves thereunto as they would for the reception of so great a Personage And he saith the Jewish Canon is greatly to be praised who honoureth the Sabbath with his Body Clothes and Dyet with his body by duely dressing it with his clothes by having a Sabbath-days Suit and with his dyet which on the Sabbath should be both more and better than on other dayes In Barbary they have their Sabbath-Lamps which are lighted by the women to which being lighted they hold up their hands and say this Benediction Blessed be thou O Lord our God King of the World who hast sanctified us with thy Precepts and commanded us to light the Sabbatine-Lamps If any mans curiosity lead him to enquire into the reason why the Office of lighting these Lamps belongs to the women I shall only tell him that among many other reasons pretended to be given hereof the chief is the keeping the women in minde of the transgression of Eve who seducing Adam to disobedience thereby put out say they and extinguished his Light and Glory But the women do it upon the account of a received Opinion among them that thereby they facilitate their Child-birth There being these three Precepts recommended to them for that end viz. To keep the Sabbath-bread light the Lamps and carefully to attend their Months The Sabbath-lights we now speak of are so contrived that they may last the whole Sabbath on which they are not allowed so much as to snuff them for fear of transgressing the fourth Precept But notwithstanding that the Jews in this part of the World are sufficiently rigorous in the observation of the Sabbath yet I neither could finde nor hear of any of them who would if surprised with the Sabbath expose themselves to the danger of abiding in Woods and Desarts rather than on the Sabbath to travel a few furlongs to gain a safer residence For they are willing to let things necessary to save mans life thereon to be provided for And some will not doubt to say that if ever they be Masters again of Hierusalem they will not loose it for
Alms. The object of the later are Orphans Widows Synagogues and the Holy house for so they call the Temple which they expect shall be rebuilt at the coming of their Messiah And therefore toward the structure thereof every dying Jew that is able contributes something For they have erected a Treasury to this purpose which is managed by the Masters and carefully improved by them The rest of the Estate is divided among the Wives and Children The Wives first taking out their Dowries doubled If the Children of the dying person be very young the Master is to be their Guardian who with a signal care labours to improve their Fortunes The Alms likewise are deposite in the Rabbies hands who out of them disposeth of some Females every year in Marriage When the sick man has set his house in order and is under evident indications of Death He makes confession of his Faith and in a short Oraison is recommended to Mercie And the breath is no sooner out of his Nostrils but they prepare for his Funeral which is always within the natural day of his Departure And first the Corps is washed in clean water or if he be rich in water of Roses Orange-flowers or any thing that is Aromatick While the Corps is thus making clean they pray that God would cleanse the Soul from all the defilements that it had contracted in the body This ceremony of washing being finished they put the Corps in a clean Shirt and Drawers and then a Strip of linnen resembling the Zizith and after all they sow him in a very white Sheet and put him into a Coffin The relations of the Deceased for seven daies after the Interment stir not abroad or if by some extraordinary occasion they are forced to go out of doors it is without Shoos which is a token with them that they have lost a dear Friend For the seven daies that they stay within the Neighbours come to the house to pray with them and their Mourning habit is either a black Ganiphe or the same clothes they wore when the party died The Corps is born by four to the place of Burial in this procession In the first rank march the Chachams or Priests next to them the kindred of the Deceased after whom come those that are Invited to the Funeral and all singing in a sort of plain-song the 49th Psalm And if it last not till they come to the Grave they begin it again At the Grave ten Rabbies or so many old Jews in their room say over some certain Psalms composed by the Rabbins for that purpose And when they are ended the Corps is laid in the Grave and covered with Earth and the Rabbies compassing the Grave seven times say From the Earth thou camest and to the Earth thou art returned After this is done they return from the Grave to the house of the Deceased where one who as chief Mourner receives them with his Jaws tied up with a linnen Cloth after the same manner that they binde up the Dead And by this the Mourner is said to testifie that he was ready to die with his Friend And thus muffled the Mourner goes for seven daies during which time the rest of his Friends come twice every twenty four hours to pray with him At the end of these seven daies the Friends of the Deceased repair to his Grave which they cover with a black Cloth and say this Prayer Vide Syracides 22.23 Judge of the Truth who Judgest truly be Judge of the Truth for all thy Judgements are Justice and Truth And then the Kindred of the Dead wish one another good health and Comfort And the same Ceremonie is repeated precisely that day twelvemonth till which time the Obsequies are incompleat If the Friends of the Deceased be devout they often every Week repair to his Grave where they make great Lamentation and bitter Weeping over him they pray at the same time That God would pardon his Sins and receive him into the Garden Meaning the Garden out of which Adam was cast when he became disobedient In the Funeral-Rites of the Jews the same order is observed for both Sexes only with this Decorum that the Women meddle not with the Men nor the Men with the Women but each Wash and Shrowd those of their own Sex They never bury their Dead promiscuously with those of another Faith but have purchased distinct Burying-places where they reside which they very much respect and to which they often resort both in contemplation of their own Mortality and to lament and pray for those who are dead already It may not be unfit to observe that though the Modern Ceremonies of Burial are neither so numerous nor costly as those of old among the Jews yet they do not much varie from them For the washing of the Body was in use at the time of Tabitha's death and the Chief Mourner spoken of before as also the Weekly Lamenting of the Dead refers to the Women hired to lament at Burials And which the Scripture calls Mourning-Women Jerem. 9.17 the same with the Praeficae among the Romans They likewise agree in the places of Burial which are now as formerly without the Towns or Cities where they live except that in Fez they have a Burying-place within the City adjoyning to the Juderia or the part where they live as was said in the entrance of this Discourse Enquiring after Inscriptions or Epitaphs and though often in the Burying-place for that end I could see none nor any other State about the Graves than Green Turf and Boughs But this remark respects the Jews in Barbary whom I conceive to come far short of those of other Countries in this sort of Funeral Pomp. But we are told that they were not without Inscriptions upon their Sepulchers as Hic jacet N. Memoria ejus sit in Benedictione Though this I confess be now used rather as an honourable Commemoration when any Author of worth being dead is cited by the Masters than as a common Epitaph But when they use Sepulchral Inscriptions they are usually a Prayer for the Dead such as Let his Soul be received into the Garden of Eden Or Let his Soul be bound in the bundle of Life with the rest of the Just The Confession of Sins made by the Sick upon his Death-bed I Acknowledge and confess before thee O Lord my God and the God of my Fathers the Mighty God of the Spirits of all flesh that both my Health and Death are in thy hands Restore me I beseech thee to my former health be mindful of me and hear my Prayers as in the time of King Ezechias when he also was grievously sick But if the time of my Visitation be come that I must die let my death be an Expiation for all my sins iniquities and transgressions whether I have committed them ignorantly or knowingly from the day that I first drew in the light Grant I beseech thee that I may have my Portion in Paradise
and the future World appointed for the Just. Make known unto me the ways of Eternal Life satisfie me with the joy of thy glorious Countenance at thy right hand for ever Blessed art thou O Lord God who hearest Prayers This Confession is usually made by the sick person in the presence of ten more invited thither for that purpose After this Confession follows the Absolution which is pronounced by some chief Rabbi wherein the sick person is absolved from all the Execrations and Curses which are fallen or may fall upon the sick and his Family Here are also read the 20 38 and 91 Psalms then follows this Prayer utter'd by the Rabbi Let God be merciful unto N. and restore him to life and former health and let his name be hereafter called B. Let him rejoyce in this name and let it be confirmed in him Let it be thy good pleasure O God that the change of his name may help to abolish all hard and evil decrees and to tear in pieces the Sentence that is brought against him If death be decreed upon the former name N. it is not decreed upon the later name B. If evil be designed against N. it is not so against the name B. Behold at this hour he is as it were another man as a new Creature as a new-born Babe bring him to a good life and length of daies c. In dangerous Diseases they change the Name of the sick and impose a new one as the Prayer shows on purpose thereby to move God to have compassion upon the sick on the account that he desires to become a New man Another Prayer used at the Grave BLessed be God who hath formed created fed brought up preserved and doth kill us all in Justice and Judgement who knows the number of you all and will restore you all to life in his good time Blessed be God who kills and makes alive Amen In some places the Jews are said upon the Departure of a Friend first of all to cast all the Water out of the house and then presently to cover his Face without permitting any one to look upon him They likewise bow down the dead man's Thumb into the hollow of the Hand and by that incurvation they fancie to express the Holy Name of God which is an Amulet against Satan But all the rest of the Fingers of the Dead are stretched out at length to shew that they have utterly forsaken the things of the World and hold nothing of its Goods Returning from the Grave they pluck up Grass and cast it behinde their backs to signifie their hope of the Resurrection of the Dead Who shall flourish again as the Grass according to Es 66.14 The Mourners use to eat Eggs out of no less Emblem than that Death is voluble like an Egg and to day takes one and another to morrow and so will come round upon all The Children yearly Fast upon the day their Parents died and for the eleven Mouths say the Prayer for deliverance out of Purgatory Where the Children out of a Reverend esteem of their Father's Piety suppose that he stays but eleven months though all the other Jews tarry twelve there As we have said in our Chapter of Purgatory They are very wary that none of the Earth taken out of the Grave remain uncast upon the Corps for they imagine this were to upbraid the Dead as if the Earth should disdain to cover him There are many other minute Ceremonies relating to the Jewish Interment omitted chiefly upon the account of their small importance THE CONCLUSION Wherein is considered The present OBSTRUCTIONS OF THE JEWS CONVERSION HAving through the Divine assistance finished this Succinct Account of the present State of the Jews I deem'd it would not be unwelcome to the Reader by way of Epilogue to recollect some of the visible Impediments of their Conversion Of which some respect the Jewish Nation in general and others relate to the Jews of a particular Residence Among the fatal Impediments respecting the Jews Conversion in general their own ingrafted Perversness and obstinate adherence to the Doctrines of their Fore-Fathers may be reckoned for the chief and indeed the root of all the rest As to the former the Jews are Notorious therein above all other people though the latter be a thing common to the Hebrew with other Nations For not onely Cotta in Cicero but most men of any parts or Education have thought themselves under no small obligation to keep close to the Traditions of their Fathers although no rational Evidence could be produced for the matter of the Tradition Vnum mihi satis est Majores nostros ita Tradidisse which was Cotta's is the ultimate Resolution of the Jews Religion And not to speak of the obstinacie of Education in this particular we finde even the renowned Propagators of Christianity complaining of a Prioribus Credere as the most knotty and stubborn objection they met with And when the Jews such I mean as are considerate and ingenious do freely acknowledge the Religion of Christians to be very conformable to the Law of Nature which they account the Principal yet lest they should seem to think themselves Wiser than their Ancestors and so incur the imputation of being Proud or upon the change of their Faith to be branded for Inconstancy they resolutely retain the Religion in which their Forefathers lived and died and thought themselves happy and secure And this is spoken not upon Trust but Experience For upon a fair occasion pressing a Spanish Jew with the evident danger he was in if after means of Conviction he should obstinately die in his Judaism he made no other Reply but that he desired to be in no better State nor to be accounted wiser than the Sabies or Wise men of his Nation And that if he was Damn'd so would Rabbi Ben Maimon Rabbi Salomon Jarchi and so run over a large Catalogue of their Rabbins placing great consolation to have such good company in Perdition But beside all this they esteem it so scandalous a thing for any man to forsake his Native Religion that even those who turn Jews are still under a very jealous aspect according to their own old Proverb Beware of Proselytes to the tenth Generation Which is also the Genius of the Moors for albeit that with a seeming Triumph they receive a Renegado for a Musulman yet they never repose in him any considerable Trust nor look upon him as a person of any worth or Gallantry As to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which some reckon among the Internal Obstacles of the Jews Conversion if thereby be meant their ignorance either in their own Rites or in evading the Arguments brought against them those that shall practise them herein will finde they have arrived to no contemptible knowledge in both there being no Rite of their Religion whereof they have not been taught according to their Principles a probable Rationale nor any objection brought by Christians against