B. Spiers.--_School System of the Talmud_ (London, 1898) (with appendix on Baba Kama); the _Threefold Cord_ (1893) on _Sanhedrin, Baba Metsia_, and _Baba Bathra_. M. Jastrow.--_History and Future of the Text of the Talmud (Publications of the Gratz College_, Philadelphia, 1897, Vol. I). P.B. Benny.--_Criminal Code of the Jews according to the Talmud_ (London, 1880). S. Mendelsohn.--_The Criminal Jurisprudence of the Ancient Hebrews_ (Baltimore, 1891). D. Castelli.--_Future Life in Rabbinical Literature_, _J.Q.R._, I, p. 314. M. Güdemann.--_Spirit and Letter in Judaism and Christianity_, _ibid._, IV, p. 345. I. Harris.--_Rise and Development of the Massorah_, _ibid._, I, pp. 128, etc. H. Polano.--_The Talmud_ (Philadelphia, 1876). I. Myers.--_Gems from the Talmud_ (London, 1894). D.W. Amram.--_The Jewish Law of Divorce according to Bible and Talmud_ (Philadelphia, 1896). CHAPTER IV THE MIDRASH AND ITS POETRY Mechilta, Sifra, Sifre, Pesikta, Tanchuma, Midrash Rabbah, Yalkut.--Proverbs.--Parables.--Fables. In its earliest forms identical with the Halachah, or the practical and legal aspects of the Mishnah and the Talmud, the Midrash, in its fuller development, became an independent branch of Rabbinical literature. Like the Talmud, the Midrash is of a composite nature, and under the one name the accumulations of ages are included. Some of its contents are earlier than the completion of the Bible, others were collected and even created as recently as the tenth or the eleventh century of the current era. Midrash ("Study," "Inquiry") was in the first instance an _Explanation of the Scriptures_. This explanation is often the clear, natural exposition of the text, and it enforces rules of conduct both ethical and ritual. The historical and moral traditions which clustered round the incidents and characters of the Bible soon received a more vivid setting. The poetical sense of the Rabbis expressed itself in a vast and beautiful array of legendary additions to the Bible, but the additions are always devised with a moral purpose, to give point to a preacher's homily or to inspire the imagination of the audience with nobler fancies. Besides being expository, the Midrash is, therefore, didactic and poetical, the moral being conveyed in the guise of a _narrative_, amplifying and developing the contents of Scripture. The Midrash gives the results of that deep searching of the Scriptures which became second nature with the Jews, and it also represents the changes and expansions of ethical and theological ideals as applied to a changing and growing life.