tenacious or circumstantial, is not necessarily genuine, and that too in spite of the chain of authorities by which its antiquity or genuineness appeared to be confirmed. Implicit reliance can no longer be necessarily placed upon the reputed authorship or editorship of a work; yet, although many of the views of medieval Jews in this respect prove to be erroneous (e.g. on the authorship of the Zōhar; see Kabbalah), they may sometimes preserve the recollection of a fact which only needs restatement (e.g. R. Joḥanan as the editor of the Pal. Talmud).
Finally, the Talmud comes at the end of a very lengthy development of Palestinian thought (see Palestine: History). Reformed Judaism. It is in the direct line of descent from the Old Testament—intervening literature having been lost—the essence of which it makes its own. Forced by the events of history, this legacy of the past was subjected to successive processes and adapted to the needs of successive generations and of widely different historical and social conditions. Legal compendiums and systems of philosophy served their age and gave place to later developments; and the elasticity of interpretation which characterizes it enabled it to outlive Karaites and Kabbalists. It also escaped the classicism of the Renaissance with its insistence upon the test—either fact or fiction. As an oriental work among an oriental people the moral and spiritual influence of the Talmud has rested upon its connexion with a history which appealed to the imagination and the feelings, upon its heterogeneity of contents suitable for all moods and minds, and upon the unifying and regulative effects of its legalism. The relationship of Talmudism to the Old Testament has been likened to that of Christian theology to the Gospels; the comparison, whether fitting or not, may at least enable one to understand the varying attitudes of Jewish thinkers to their ancient sources. With closer contact to the un-oriental West and with the inevitable tendencies of modern western scholarship the Talmud has entered upon a new period, one which, though it may be said to date from the time of Moses Mendelssohn (see Jews, § 48), has reached a more distinctive stage at the present day. In the weakening of that authority which had been ascribed almost unanimously to the Talmud, and invariably to the Old Testament, a new and greater strain has been laid upon Judaism to reinterpret its spirit once more to answer the diverse wants of its adherents. This is part of that larger and pressing psychological problem of adjusting the “authority” ascribed to past writings to that of the collective human experience; it does not confront Judaism alone, and it must suffice to refer to the writings of “Reformed Judaism”; see, e.g. C. G. Montefiore, Liberal Judaism (London, 1903); Truth in Religion (1906); I. Abrahams, Judaism (1907), and the essays of S. Schechter.
Bibliography.—E. Deutsch's article on the Talmud in the Quarterly Review, Oct. 1867 (reprinted in his Literary Remains), is noteworthy for the great interest it aroused. For ether introductions, see S. Schiller-Szinessy, articles “Midrash,” “Mishnah,” and “Talmud,” in Ency. Brit., 9th ed.; J. Z. Lauterbach, “Mishnah,” and W. Bacher, “Talmud” in the Jew. Ency.; S. Schechter, “Talmud,” in Hastings' Dict. Bib., vol. v.; and also S. Funk, Entstehung des Talmuds (Leipzig, 1910). More comprehensive are the handbooks of M. Mieiziner, Introd. to the Talmud (Cincinnati, 1894), M. L. Rodkinson, History of the Talmud (New York, 1903), and especially H. L. Strack, Einleitung in den Talmud (Leipzig, 1908, very concise, but replete with bibliographical and other information). The works already cited in this article or in the art. Midrash, cover the most important departments of the Rabbinical literature, and may be supplemented from the critical Jewish journals, e.g. the Jewish Quarterly Review, Revue des Études Juives (Paris), and especially the Monatsschrift f. Gesch. Wissenschaft des Judentums (Breslau).
The writer desires to express his indebtedness to Mr Israel Abrahams for bibliographical and other suggestions.
- (S. A. C.)
TALUKDAR (Hind. from talūk, district, and dār, holding), the name of (1) an official in the state of Hyderabad, India, equivalent to magistrate and collector, and (2) a landholder with peculiar tenures in various parts of India, particularly in Oude (see United Provinces).
TALUS (Lat. for the “ankle-bone”), in architecture, the slope of an embankment wall, which is thicker at the bottom than at the top, to resist the pressure of the earth behind it.
TAM, JACOB BEN MEÏR (1100-1171), a grandson of Rashi (q.v.), was the most famous French glossator (ṭosafist) on the text of the Talmud. In 1147 he was attacked and injured by a disorderly band who had attached themselves to the Crusaders. He escaped to the neighbouring Troyes, where about 1160 was held the first of the Jewish Synods, for which the Rhinelands became celebrated. At this meeting it was laid down that disputes between Jew and Jew were not to be carried to a Christian court, but were to be settled by fraternal arbitration. New conditions of life had arisen owing to the closer terms on which Jews and Christians lived, and Jacob Tam was foremost in settling the terms which were to govern the relations, from the Jewish side. Many others of his practical ordinances (Takkanoth), connected with marriage and divorce, trade and proselytism, as well as with synagogue ritual, had abiding influence, and bear invariably the stamp of enlightened independence within the limits of recognized authoritative tradition and law. Of his legal work the most important was collected in his Sefer ha-yashar. He was also a poet and grammarian.
See Gross, Gallia Judaica (index); M. Schloessinger in Jewish Encyclopedia, vii. 36-39.
- (I. A.)
TAMAQUA, a borough of Schuylkill county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., on the Tamaqua (Little Schuylkill) river, about 20 m. above its junction with the Schuylkill, about 17 m. E.N.E. of Pottsville, and about 98 m. N. of Philadelphia. Pop. (1890) 60545(1900) 7267, (625 foreign-born); (1910) 9462. Tamaqua is served by the Central railroad of New Jersey, by the Philadelphia and Reading railway and by an electric line connecting with Mauch Chunk, Pottsville, and other places. Tamaqua is in a rich anthracite coal district, and coal-mining is its chief industry. Among manufactures are foundry and machine-shop products, powder, stoves, furniture, hosiery, &c. The borough owns the water-works. The first settlement here was made in 1799 and anthracite coal was discovered in 1817. In 1829 Tamaqua was laid out and received its present name, an Indian word meaning “land of the beaver.” It was incorporated as a borough in 1833. Between 1869 and 1875 the Molly Maguires were active here.
TAMARIND. This name is popularly applied to the pods of a leguminous tree, which are hard externally, but within filled with an acid juicy pulp containing sugar and various acids, such as citric and tartaric, in combination with potash. The acid pulp is used as a laxative and a refrigerant, the pods being largely imported both from the East and the West Indies. The tree is now widely distributed in tropical countries, but it is generally considered that its native country is in eastern tropical Africa, from Abyssinia southward to the Zambezi. The name (meaning in Arabic “Indian date”) shows that it entered medieval commerce from India, where it is used, not only for its pulp, but for its seeds, which are astringent, its leaves, which furnish a yellow or a red dye, and its timber. The tree (Tamarindus indica) attains a height of 70 to 80 ft., and bears elegant pinnate foliage and purplish or orange veined flowers arranged in terminal racemes. The flower-tube bears at its summit four sepals, but only three petals and three perfect stamens, with indications of six others. The stamens, with the stalked ovary, are curved away from the petals at their base, but are directed towards them at their apices. The anthers and the stigmas are thus brought into such a position as to obstruct the passage of an insect attracted by the brilliantly-coloured petal, the inference of course being that insect visits are necessary for transference of pollen and the fertilization of the flower.
TAMARISK. The genus Tamarix gives its name to a small group of shrubs or low trees constituting the tamarisk family Tamaricaceae. The species of tamarisk and of the very closely allied genus Myricaria grow in salt-deserts, by the sea-shore, or in other more or less sterile localities in warm, temperate, subtropical, and tropical regions of the eastern hemisphere. Their long slender branches bear very numerous small appressed leaves, in which the evaporating surface is reduced to a minimum. The flowers are minute and numerous, in long clusters at the
