Selected quad for the lemma: love_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
love_n	heart_n	let_v	life_n	6,149	5	4.4186	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B04456	Vindiciæ Judæorum, or A letter in answer to certain questions propounded by a noble and learned gentleman, touching the reproaches cast on the nation of the Jevves; wherein all objections are candidly, and yet fully cleared. By Rabbi Menasseh Ben Israel a divine and a physician.	Manasseh ben Israel, 1604-1657.	1656 (1656)	Wing M381; Thomason E.880[1]; Interim Tract Supplement Guide 482.b.3[7]	31,719	45

sacrifices for nations confedederate with us and how all Emperours desired this Yea and we offered sacrifices not onely for particular princes but for all mankind in generall How since sacrifices ceased with the temple we at this day do the same in our prayers and how we beseech God for their salvation without giving any scandall or offence in respect of religion and how we think our selves obliged to perform all this by the sacred Scripture By all which layed together I hope I have sufficiently evidenced the truth of that I have asserted THE FOURTH SECTION BY consequence the accusation of Buxtorphius in his Bibliotheca Rabbinorum can have no appearance of truth concerning that which he puts upon us viz. that we are blasphemers I will set down the Prayer it self We are bound to praise the Lord of all things to magnifie him who made the world for that he hath not made us as the Nations of the earth nor hath he placed us as the families of the earth nor hath he made our condition like unto theirs nor our lot according to all their multitude For they humble themselves to things of no worth and vanity and make their prayers to gods that cannot save them but we worship before the King of kings that is holy and blessed that stretched forth the Heavens and framed the Earth the seat of his glory is in heaven above and his divine strength in the highest of the Heavens He is our God and there is no other He is truly our King and besides him there is no other as it is writen in the Law And know this day and return into thine own heart because the Lord is God in Heaven above and upon the Earth beneath there is no other Truly in my opinion it is a very short and most excellent prayer and worthy of commendation The Sultan Selim that famous conquerour and Emperour of the Mahumetans made so much account of it that he commanded his Doctor Moses Amon who translated the Pentateuch into the Arabian and Persian languages that he should translate our prayers And when he had delivered them to him in the Turkish Tongue he said to him what need is there of so long prayers truly this one might suffice he did so highly esteem and value it This is like an other prayer which was made at that time viz. Blessed be our God who created us for his honour and separated us from those that are in errours and gave unto us a Law of truth and planted amongst us eternall life Let him open our hearts in his law and put his love in our hearts and his fear to do his will and to serve him with a perfect heart that we may not labour in vain nor beget children of perdition Let it be thy will O Lord our God and God of our Fathers that we may keep thy statutes and thy laws in this world and may deserve and live and inherit well and that we may attain the blessing of the world to come that so we may sing to thy honour without ceasing O Lord my God I will praise thee for ever But neither the one nor the other is a blasphemy or malediction against any other Gods for these reasons following 1. It is not the manner of the Iewes by their law to curse other gods by name though they be of the Gentiles So in Exod. cap. 22.27 Thou shalt not revile the Gods Heb. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Gods or God as Philo Iudaeus in libro de Monarchiâ doth interpret and not Judges as Onkelus and Ionathan translate in their Chald. Paraphr Where Philo addes this reason which is lest they hearing their own Gods blasphemed should in a revengefull way of retaliation blaspheme the true God of Israel And we have examples enough how the idolatrous heathen used to revile and defame each others Gods both in Cicero and Iuvenal And in that sense Flavius Josephus in his book written against Apion saith these words As it is our practise to observe our own and not to accuse or revile others so neither may we deride or blaspeeme those which others account to be Gods Our Law-giver plainly forbad us that by reason of that compellation Gods According to this by our own religion we dare not do that which Buxtorfius chargeth us with And upon this account the Talmudists tell us that we ought to honour and reverence not onely the Kings of Israel but all kings princes and governours in generall forasmuch as the holy Scripture gives them the stile of gods in respect of the dignity of their office 2. The time wherein these as also the other prayers were composed and ordered was in the dayes of Ezras who with 120 men amongst whom were three Prophets Haggai Zechary Malachy composed them as we have it in the Talmud Wherefore he cannot say that there is any thing intended against honour or reverence of Christ who was not born till many yeares after Moreover the Iewes since that calumny was first raised thouh that was spoken of the Gentiles and their vain gods humbling themselves to things of no worth and vanity because they desire to decline and avoid the least occasion of scandall and offence have left off to print that line and do not in some books print any part thereof As John Hoornbeek also witnesses in his fore-mentioned Prolegomena and William Dorstius in his observations upon R. David Gawz p. 269. and Buxtorf in his book of Abbreviatures And perhaps it will be worthy our observation that all these three witnesses say that it was first made known to them by one Antonius Margarita who was a Iew converted to the Christian saith That this part of the prayer was intended Contra idola Papatus against the Popish idols which they therefore as by a necessary consequence interpret as against Christ but how justly let the unprejudiced and unbiased reader judge 3. If this be so how can it be thought that in their Synagogues they name him with scornfull spitting farre be it from us The Nation of the Iewes is wise and ingenius So said the Lord Deut. cap. 4.6 The Nations shall say surely this is a wise and an understanding people Therefore how can it be supposed that they should be so bruitish in a strange land when their Religion dependeth not upon it Certainly it is much contrary to the precept we spake of to shew any resemblance of scorn There was never any such thing done as it is well known in Italy and Holland where ordinarily the Synagogues are full of Christians which with great attention stand considering and weighing all their actions and motions And truly they should have found great occasion to find fault withall if that were so But never was any man heard thus to calumniate us where ever we dwell and inhabite which is a reason sufficiently valid to clear us Wherefore I suppose that I have sufficiently informed you concerning our prayers in which we purpose

●INDICIAE JUDAEORUM OR A LETTER In Answer to certain Questions propounded by a Noble and Learned Gentleman touching the reproaches cast on the Nation of the JEVVES wherein all objections are candidly and yet fully cleared By Rabbi Menasseh Ben Israel a Divine and a Physicyan Printed by R. D. in the year 1656. Most Noble and Learned Sir I Have received a letter from your worship which was welcome to me and I read it because yours with great delight if you will please to allow for the unpleasantnesse of the subject For I do assure your worship I never met with any thing in my life which I did more deeply resent for that it reflecteth upon the credit of a nation which amongst so many calumnies so manifest and therefore shamefull I dare to pronounce innocent Yet I am afraid that whilst I answer to them I shall offend some whose zeal will not permit them to consider that self vindication as defensive armes is naturall to all but to be wholly silent were to acknowledge what is so falsly objected Wherefore that I may justifie my self to my own conscience I have obeyed your worships commands for your request must not be accounted lesse at least by me I presume your worship cannot expect either prolix or polite discourses upon so sad a subject for who can be ambitious in his own calamity I have therefore dispatcht onely some concise and brief relations barely exceeding the bounds of a letter yet such as may suffice you to inform the Rulers of the English nation of a truth most reall and sincere which I hope they will accept in good part according to their noble and singular prudence and piety For innocencie being alwayes most free from suspecting evil I cannot be perswaded that any one hath either spoken or written against us out of any particular hatred that they bare us but that they rather supposed our coming might prove prejudiciall to their estates and interests charity alwayes beginning at home Yet notwithstanding I propounded this matter under an argument of profit for this hath made us welcome in other countries and therefore I hope I may prove what I undertake However 〈…〉 but small encouragement to expect the happy attainment of any other design but onely that truth may be justified of her children I shall answer in order to what your worship hath proposed THE FIRST SECTION ANd in the first place I cannot but weep bitterly and with much anguish of soul lament that strange and horrid accusation of some Christians against the dispersed and afflicted Iewes that dwell among them when they say what I tremble to write that the Iewes are wont to celebrate the feast of unleavened bread fermenting it with the bloud of some Christians whom they have for this purpose killed when the calumniators themselves have most barbarously and cruelly butchered some of them Or to speak more mildly have found one dead and cast the corps as if it had been murdered by the Iewes into their houses or yards as lamentable experience hath proved in sundry places and then with unbridled rage and tumult they accuse the innocent Iews as the committers of this most execrable fact Which detestable wickednesse hath been sometimes perpetrated that they might thereby take advantage to exercise their cruelty upon them and sometimes to justifie and patronize their massacres already executed But how farre this accusation is from any semblable appearance of truth your worship may judge by these following arguments 1. It is utterly forbid the Iewes to eat any manner of bloud whatsoever Levit. Chapter 7.26 and Deuter. 12. where it is expresly said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And ye shall eat no manner of bloud and in obedience to this command the Iewes eat not the bloud of any animal And more then this if they find one drop of bloud in an egge they cast it away as prohibited And if in eating a piece of bread it happens to touch any bloud drawn from the teeth or gummes it must be pared and cleansed from the said bloud as it evidenely appeares in Sulhan Haruch and our rituall book Since then it is thus how can it enter into any mans heart to believe that they should eat humane bloud which is yet more detestable there being scarce any nation now remaining upon earth to barbarous as to commit such wickednesse 2. The precept in the Decalogue Thou shalt not kill is of generall extent it is a morall command So that the Iewes are bound not onely not to kill one of those nations where they live but they are also oblig'd by the law of gratitude to love them They are the very words of R. Moses of Egypt in Iad a Razaka in his treatise of Kings the tenth Chapter in the end Concerning the nations the ancients have commanded us to visit their sick and to bury their dead as the dead of Israel and to relieve and maintain their poor as we do the poor of Israel because of the wayes of peace as it is written God is good to all and his tender mercies are over all his works Psal 145.9 And in conformity hereto I witnesse before God blessed for ever that I have continually seen in Amsterdam where I reside abundance of good correspondency many interchanges of brotherly affection and sundry things of reciprocall love I have thrice seen when some Flemine Christians have fallen into the river in our ward called Flemburgh our nation cast themselves into the river to them to help them out and to deliver their lives from death And certainly he that will thus hazard himself to save another cannot harbour so much cruell malice as to kill the innocent whom he ought out of the duty of humanity to defend and protect 3. It is forbidden Exodus 21.20 to kill a stranger If a man smite his servant or his maid with a rod and he die under his hand he shall surely be punished notwithstanding if he continue a day or two he shall not be punished for he is his money The text speaks of a servant that is one of the Gentile nations because that he onely is said to be the money of the Iew who is his master as Aben Ezra well notes upon the place And the Lord commands that if he die under the hand of his master his master shall be put to death for that as it seems he struck him with a murderous intent But it is otherwise if the servant dies afterwards for then it appeares that he did not strike him with a purpose to kill him for if so he would have killed him out of hand wherefore he shall be free and it may suffice for punishment that he hath lost his money If therefore a Iew cannot kill his servant or slave that is one of the nations according to the law how much lesse shall he be impowred to murder him that is not his enemy and with whom he leads a quiet and a peaceable life and therefore how can