He soon gave occasion for an increase of this suspicion. The Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, to avoid the dangers of premature interment, had in a mild, fatherly way (April, 1772) forbidden the Jews of his land to bury the dead at once, according to Jewish usage. Jewish piety towards the deceased, which forbids keeping the dead above the earth long enough for decomposition to set in--a feeling petrified in the ritual code--was affronted by this edict, as though the duke had commanded disregard of a religious practice. The representatives of the congregations of Schwerin supplicated Jacob Emden, of Altona, the aged champion of orthodoxy, to demonstrate from Talmudic and Rabbinic laws, that prolonged exposure of a corpse was an important infringement of Jewish law. Emden, who knew his inability to compose a memorial in German, referred the people of Schwerin to Mendelssohn, whose word had great influence with princes. They followed his advice. How astounded were they to learn, from a letter of Mendelssohn's (May, 1772), that he agreed with the ducal order, that the dead should not be buried before the third day; because, according to the experience of competent physicians, cases of apparent death were possible; and that it was right, in fact, compulsory, to rescue human life in spite of the most stringent ordinances of the religious code! Mendelssohn proved besides that in Talmudical times precautions were taken for the prevention of hasty burial in doubtful cases. His opinion was, with the exception of one blunder, faultlessly elaborated in the Rabbinical manner. Nevertheless, true to his peaceful, complaisant nature, he sent the formula of a petition to the duke to mitigate the decree. Emden, however, in his orthodox zeal, stamped this disputed question almost as an article of faith. A custom so universal among Jews, among Italians and Portuguese as well as Germans and Poles, could not be lightly set aside. Not much value was to be attached to the sayings of doctors. Mendelssohn's Talmudical proofs were not conclusive. In a letter Emden gave him clearly to understand that he was reproving him for his own benefit, to remove the suspicion of lukewarm belief, which he had aroused by his evil surroundings. Thus arose petty discord between Mendelssohn and the rigidly orthodox party, which afterwards increased. Meanwhile, his friend Lessing, just before his death, had unintentionally stirred up a storm in Germany which caused the Church to tremble, and, under the spell of discontent and an artistic impulse, he had glorified Mendelssohn, together with all Jews, in a perfect poetic creation. The first cause of this tempest, which shook Christianity to its core, was Mendelssohn's dispute with Lavater. Lessing was so indignant at the certainty of victory assumed by the representative of Church Christianity that he had strenuously encouraged his Jewish friend to engage in valorous conflict.