in what is predicted in Is. iv. 5; 'rest yourselves under the tree,' in what is said in Is. iv. 4;
and 'I will fetch a morsel of bread,' in the promise of Ps. lxxii. 16.46
42. Babha B 75 a.
43. Yalkut ii. p. 57 b, par. 363, line 3.
44. Babh B. 75 b.
45. Gen. xviii. 4, 5.
46. Ber. R. 48.
But by the side of this we find much coarse realism. The land would spontaneously
produce the best dresses and the finest cakes;47 the wheat would grow as high as palm-
trees, nay, as the mountains, while the wind would miraculously convert the grain into
flour, and cast it into the valleys. Every tree would become fruit-bearing;48 nay, they
were to break forth, and to bear fruit every day;49 daily was every woman to bear child,
so that ultimately every Israelitish family would number as many as all Israel at the time
of the Exodus.50 All sickness and disease, and all that could hurt, would pass away. As
regarded death, the promise of its final abolition51 was, with characteristic ingenuity,
applied to Israel, while the statement that the child should die an hundred years old 52
was understood as referring to the Gentiles, and as teaching that, although they would
die, yet their age would be greatly prolonged, so that a centenarian would be regarded
as only a child. Lastly, such physical and outward loss as Rabbinism regarded as the
consequence of the Fall,53 would be again restored to man.54 55
47. Shabb. 30 b.
48. Kethub. 111 b.
49. Shabb. 30 a, b.
50. Midr. on Ps. xiv.
51. Is. xxv. 8.
52. Is. lxv. 20.
53. Ber. R. 12.
54. Bemidb. R. 13.
55. They are the following six: His splendour, the continuance of life, his original more
than gigantic stature, the fruits of the ground, and of trees, and the brightness of the
heave nly lights.
It would be easy to multiply quotations even more realistic than these, if such could
serve any good purpose. The same literalism prevails in regard to the reign of King
Messiah over the nations of the world. Not only is the figurative language of the
prophets applied in the most external manner, but illustrative details of the same
character are added. Jerusalem would, as the residence of the Messiah, become the
capital of the world, and Israel take the place of the (fourth) world -monarchy, the Roman
Empire. After the Roman Empire none other was to rise, for it was to be immediately
followed by the reign of Messiah.56 But that day, or rather that of the fall of the (ten)
Gentile nations, which would inaugurate the Empire of Messiah, was among t he seven
things unknown to man.57 Nay, God had conjured Israel not to communicate to the
Gentiles the mystery of the calculation of the times.58 But the very origin of the wicked
world -Empire had been caused by Israel's sin. It had been (ideally) founded59 when
Solomon contracted alliance with the daughter of Pharaoh, while Romulus and Remus
rose when Jeroboam set up the worship of the two calves. Thus, what would have
become the universal Davidic Rule had, through Israel's sin, been changed into
subjection to the Gentiles. Whether or not these Gentiles would in the Messianic future
become proselytes, seems a moot question. Sometimes it is affirmed;60 at others it is
stated that no proselytes would then be received,61 and for this good reason, that in the