ABSTRACT
The Bible is the chief source of our knowledge of Judaism. Modern critics of the Old Testament are inclined to see in the word Torah, usually and inadequately translated law, a reference to the oral direction given by priest or prophet in the Divine name on moral and religious questions. Judaism, instead of sinking into a rigid, stereotyped system, became a progressive and a living religion, a religion making a continuous and adequate response to living needs. To assign limits to the development of Judaism, and to assert that the communication of Divine truth to Israel ceased with Moses or with Malachi or with the close of the Talmud, is to ignore the teachings not only of reason, but of history. The Mosaic Law, assuming that it existed in a written form in the early Prophetic age, could not have sufficed as a religious guide for the people.
