Since the final destruction of the Temple there are no Gentile Proselytes of the Covenant, that is, circumcised strangers admitted to all the privileges of the children of Abraham; nor are there Proselytes of the Gate, uncircumcised worshippers of Jehovah who keep the moral law. The Ger, or stranger, may be received into the Church under certain circumstances by purification and circumcision, which latter, unlike the law of Muhammad, is absolutely necessary. Judaism, however, like Hinduism and Guebrism, is essentially one of the old congenital creeds; it never has been, it is not, and it never will be a system of proselytizing. As regards the tribes, Judah and Levi are everywhere known. Benjamin, Ephraim, and Half Manasseh are spoken of, and tradition declares that Asher exists in Abyssinia with Karaïte peculiarities. Finally, many Jews do not believe that the Ten Tribes were ever lost. They say that, during the Great Captivity, when the faith became all but extinct, they were mixed to such an extent that it was afterwards impossible to separate them. The Sephardím, or Southern Jews, are mostly the descendants of Spanish and Portuguese ancestry, and throughout the Levant and the North African coast they speak Spanish and read and write it in their own character. Those of the Moroccan interior use Arabic. The dress is Oriental, and in the Holy Land they still wear the black turban ordained by the sumptuary laws of El Hakim (_circa_ A.D. 1000). In physical appearance they are somewhat more prepossessing than the Ashkenazím, who are outnumbering them in Syria and Palestine, and are gradually ousting them. Officially they retain their position; the Hakhám Bashí, or chief doctor, is the only Jewish official recognized by the Turkish Government and representing the community in the Majlis, or town council. In all matters which come before the tribunals the Ashkenazím must be supported by the Hakhám Bashí, while the doctors hear and decide all cases relating to the internal affairs of the community. Many of the Sephardím are shopkeepers, trading chiefly in stuffs and hardwares. There are many minor differences between them and the Ashkenazím, such as the contents and the arrangement of their ritual, the constitution of their meetings, the mode of reading the service, their music, and even their cursive form of the square Hebrew character. The Maghrabis, or Western Jews, chiefly living in North-western Africa, rank elsewhere as Sephardím; at Jerusalem, however, they are considered a separate sect, and have their own chief doctor.