The problem how to reconcile God’s Prescience and Omniscience with man’s Free-will has of course engaged the attention of all Jewish theologians and philosophers, and, though in different ways and words, they all assume that God’s knowledge of a thing is by no means the cause of its existence. (See Cuzari, V. xx.; “Guide,” III. xx.; Saadiah, Emunoth, II. chap, ix.) Perhaps a reconciliation is not necessary at all, there being no conflict. We should not call it a defect in God if His Omniscience were restricted to things knowable; a prescience of things to be determined by man’s free-will is contradictory in itself, and illogical, and to say that God would not be omniscient if He did not know them, is as absurd as to say that God would not be omnipotent if He could not make twice two to be three. On the Eleventh Principle, p. 150. The subject of this creed has been the main thought of the lesson preached by the prophets, of the hymns sung by the psalmists, and of the narratives written by the sacred chroniclers, as has been illustrated above (p. 155) by Biblical quotations. To these may be added (1.) the song haazinu, the professed object of which was to remind the Israelites of God’s Justice whenever evil should befall them. The words which form the basis of the song, viz., “The Rock, perfect is his work,” &c. (Deut. xxxii. 4), are also at present recited at funeral rites, as ‏צדוק הדין‎, an expression of our firm belief in God’s Justice. (2.) The prophet who laments over the fall of Jerusalem declares: “Out of the mouth of the Most High do not come forth the evil things and the good (i.e., man causes them by his evil or good deeds, which are the result of his own free will and not of the Will of God). Why should man complain (of what has befallen him), being master over his sins?” (Lam. iii. 38, 39). In the Talmud the doctrine of God’s Justice is expressed thus: “Thy employer is trustworthy, that he will pay thee the reward of thy deeds” (Aboth ii. 21). “The shop is open, and the merchant gives on credit, and all who like may come and borrow; but the collectors go constantly about, and exact payment whether the debtor is willing to pay or not, for they have something to rely upon, and the judgment is a just judgment; and everything is prepared for a banquet” (Aboth iii. 20). “God does not withhold ought of the desert of any creature” (Pesachim, 118a). It is, however, emphatically declared in the Talmud that the reward of good deeds is given to the righteous in the future life, ‏עולם הבא‎, “The reward for obedience to the Divine commandments is not to be expected in this world” (Kiddushin, 39b). “The Law says with reference to the Divine precepts, ‘Which I command thee this day to do them;’ hence we infer that their performance is to take place this day, i.e., in this life, but their reward will be received in the future life” (Abodah-zarah, 3a).