In my first lecture I tried to set out in brief some of the most striking features of the Babylonian Code of Laws due to the famous king Hammurabi, especially such as were likely to be useful for our comparison with the laws of Israel. We must, however, have a precise idea of the laws of Israel before we can institute a comparison. Now this is by no means so easy to obtain as one might expect. It is indeed true that the laws of the Hebrew peoples, as set out in the so-called Books of Moses, have been the subject of uninterrupted and intense study by the Jews themselves for many centuries, and that not only for their antiquarian interest but as of supreme importance for religion and morals in the life of to-day. Most of us have heard of the Rabbinic writings, of the Mishna and Gemara, of the Talmud, and may even know the names of some of the famous Rabbis, lawyers, and doctors who have commented upon them. But, I fear, few of us have any clear idea of the stupendous work which they represent. Perhaps the new Jewish Encyclopaedia may give us a better idea. Christian scholars, such as the famous Dr. John Lightfoot, made much use of the treasures of the Jewish writers, but modern scholars appear to have paid small attention to this type of learning. Nevertheless we are sometimes assured that the discussions of the Jewish Rabbis embody all the most assured results of modern criticism. Certainly they do contain an amount of material for the elucidation of the Mosaic laws which is almost bewildering in extent. When the traditional information and explanation which they furnish are freely taken into account we shall doubtless be in a far better position to understand much that is now very obscure. Certain it is that some scholars who have made a special study of this large traditional body of interpretation, such as D. H. MÜLLER, NATHAN, and PICK, have been willing to admit most striking likenesses between the Rabbinic rules and old Babylonian law. In fact, it seems to be the case that the later Jewish interpretation of the Mosaic law so closely follows Babylonian law that it may be regarded as no less a commentary on that legislation. Our task would soon be at an end if we could be sure that this traditional view was not strongly influenced by the Jewish exile, but really represented what the old Jewish law was intended to be. For it is practically indistinguishable from the Code of Hammurabi except for the peculiar usages based upon a separate religion and a progressive interpretation in favour of the criminal due to benevolence and humane sentiment.