Excerpt from A History of the Religion of Judaism: 500 to 200 B. C I undertake this task, too large I fear for my power, for several reasons. First, after fifty years of strenuous toil in Montreal and in Bradford, in teaching to many what the Old Testament is, I feel that it would be wrong to throw away unused the mass of lectures I prepared for my classes by a great deal of busy search; so I publish some of my results now. Secondly, I am eager to see the Old Testament used. To say that actually it is almost unused is no exaggeration. I know this disuse is caused by mistaken theories and methods. Only the historical and critical method can bring men to use it; for it is a work of men, and only the Divinely human estimate of it and use of it will induce men to know it and to love it. Many ministers are afraid to use it afraid of its difficulties, afraid of funda mentalism. Let us play the man. Some unwise minister wished publicly a few days ago that this great Literature might be destroyed, buried in the ocean! That wish cannot be fulfilled, else jesus would be destroyed; for that Literature is part of Him. When the wonderful beauty and genuine humanity of its writers are seen, then its romance will win everybody. Since jesus was the Child of the Jewish People, therefore we cannot know Him really until we know the Old Testament. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.