This might seem to be merely a renewal of the covenant which binds the members of the family to one another and to God; yet it evidently partakes of the nature of a sacrifice, and it is so understood by the more orthodox Jews. The primitive idea of an altar was a table of intercommunion with God, or with the gods. It was thus with the Babylonians, the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Hindoos, the Persians, the Arabs, the early inhabitants of North and South America, and with primitive peoples generally.[136] Thus also the Bible would seem to count an altar and a table as synonymous. The prophet Malachi reproaches, in God's name, the Jews for irreverence and sacrilege. "And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name? Ye offer polluted bread upon mine _altar_. And ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The _table_ of the Lord is contemptible."[137] [136] _Blood Covenant_, pp. 167-190. [137] Mal. 1 : 6, 7. See also Isa. 65 : 11 and Ezek. 41 : 22. The Talmud emphasizes the home table of the Jew as the altar before the Lord, to be approached in sacrifice with the essential offering of salt. "As long as the Temple existed, the altar effected atonement, and now it is for the table of each man to effect atonement for him. It is for this reason that the description of the altar (in Ezekiel 41 : 22) closes by saying, 'And he said unto me, This is the table that is before the Lord.'"[138] [138] Tract B'rakhoth 55 _a._, cited by the Rev. Dr. M. Jastrow. It would seem, therefore, that bread and salt are as the body and the blood, the flesh and the life, offered in sacrifice at the home table of the Jew, as formerly at the altar of intercommunion with God.[139] [139] _Blood Covenant_, pp. 350-355. This view of the household table as an altar has been recognized by many Jews. Picart[140] says: [140] _Ceremonies and Religious Customs of the Various Nations of the Known World_, I., 245. London, 1733.