Note 454 — THE ANGEL OF DEATH WITH THE PROUD KING AND THE DEVOUT MAN.

The stricter kind of Eastern Jew prefers to die on the floor not in bed, as was the case with the late Mr. Emmanuel Deutsch, who in his well-known article on the Talmud had the courage to speak of “Our Saviour.” But as a rule the Israelite, though he mostly appears as a Deist, a Unitarian, has a fund of fanatical feelings which crop up in old age and near death. The “converts” in Syria and elsewhere, whose Judaism is intensified by “conversion,” when offers are made to them by the missionaries repair to the Khákhám (scribe) and, after abundant wrangling determine upon a modus vivendi. They are to pay a proportion of their wages, to keep careful watch in the cause of Israel and to die orthodox. In Istria there is a legend of a Jew Prior in a convent who was not discovered till he announced himself most unpleasantly on his death-bed. For a contrary reason to Jewish humility the Roman Emperors preferred to die standing.