This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1919 Excerpt: ... a handful of it on the altar. Finally, he caused the woman to drink the holy water, which, impregnated with the dust of the sanctuary and the ink of the curse, had become a powerful instrument to execute the curse upon the guilty by causing the belly of the adulteress to swell and her thigh to fall away. The passage ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1919 Excerpt: ... a handful of it on the altar. Finally, he caused the woman to drink the holy water, which, impregnated with the dust of the sanctuary and the ink of the curse, had become a powerful instrument to execute the curse upon the guilty by causing the belly of the adulteress to swell and her thigh to fall away. The passage is interesting as the only record of a trial by ordeal prescribed by Jewish law; and though the Priestly Code, in which it occurs, belongs to the period after the Exile,2 we cannot doubt that the practice which it enjoins was no novelty, but that on the contrary it had been in vogue among the Israelites from time immemorial. For trial by ordeal, wherever it flourishes, is a mode of ascertaining guilt as barbarous as it is ineffectual; and though, by reason of the conservative nature of law and custom, it may long linger even among peoples who have attained to a considerable degree of civilization, it can only take its rise in ages of gross ignorance and credulity. The different forms of ordeal by which men have sought to elicit the truth are many and well fitted to illustrate the extent and variety of human folly.3 To describe, or simply to enumerate them all, even if it were possible, would here be out of place; I shall confine myself to exemplifying a form of ordeal which bears some analogy to the Hebrew ordeal of the bitter water. Hebrew ordeal of the bitter water is probably very ancient and has its analogies elsewhere. 1 The Hebrew word sepher (ted), here translated "book " in our English Bible, denotes anything which can receive writing, for example a slip of parchment. 2 See above, pp. 109 sq. For examples see (Sir) Edward B. Tylor in Encyelopedia Britannica, Ninth Edition, xvii. (Edinburgh, 1884) s.v. "Ordeal," pp. 8...
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Add this copy of Folk-Lore in the Old Testament, Volume 3 to cart. $61.45, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 2011 by Nabu Press.
