numerous synods in the Middle Ages, but they invariably dealt with
practical morals or with the problems which arose from time to time in
regard to the relations between Jews and their Christian neighbours. It is
true that we occasionally read of excommunications for heresy. But in
the case, for instance, of Spinoza, the Amsterdam Synagogue was much
more anxious to dissociate itself from the heresies of Spinoza than to
compel Spinoza to conform to the beliefs of the Synagogue. And though
this power of excommunication might have been employed by the mediaeval
Rabbis to enforce the acceptance of a creed, in point of fact no such
step was ever taken.

Since the time of Moses Mendelssohn (1728-1786), the chief Jewish
dogma has been that Judaism has no dogmas. In the sense assigned above
this is clearly true. Dogmas imposed by an authority able and willing
to enforce conformity and punish dissent are non-existent in Judaism.
In olden times membership of the religion of Judaism was almost entirely
a question of birth and race, not of confession. Proselytes were admitted
by circumcision and baptism, and nothing beyond an acceptance of the
Unity of God and the abjuration of idolatry is even now required by way
of profession from a proselyte. At the same time the earliest passage
put into the public liturgy was the Shema' (Deuteronomy vi. 4-9), in
which the unity of God and the duty to love God are expressed. The Ten
Commandments were also recited daily in the Temple. It is instructive to
note the reason given for the subsequent removal of the Decalogue from the
daily liturgy. It was feared that some might assume that the Decalogue
comprised the whole of the binding law. Hence the prominent position
given to them in the Temple service was no longer assigned to the Ten
Commandments in the ritual of the Synagogue. In modern times, however,
there is a growing practice of reading the Decalogue every Sabbath day.