THE JEWISH PRAYER BOOKWHEN we come to view the half-dozen or so great Liturgies of the world purely as religious documents, and to weigh their value as devotional classics, the incomparable superiority of the Jewish convincingly appears. The Jewish Liturgy occupies its pages with the One Eternal Lord; holds ever true, confident, and direct speech with Him; exhausts the resources of language in songs of praise, in utterances of loving gratitude, in rejoicing at His nearness, in natural outpourings of grief for sin; never so much as a dream of intercessors or of hidings from His blessed punishments; and, withal, such a sweet sense of the divine accessibility every moment to each sinful, suffering child of earth. Where shall one find a hymn of universal faith like the Adon Olam,of mystical beauty like the Hymn ofGlory50;or services so solemn, touching, and tender as those appointed for Yom Kippur?Compare the misery, gloom, and introspection surrounding other requiem and funeral services, with the chastened, dignified sobriety of the Hebrew prayer for thedying,51and the healthy, cheerful manliness of the Mourner’s Kaddish.Again, there is most refreshing silence in regard to life-conditions after death. Neither is there any spiteful condemnation of the followers of other faiths; the Jew is singularly free from narrow intolerance.Certainly the Jew has cause to thank God, and the fathers before him, for the noblest Liturgy the annals of faith can show.G. E. BIDDLE, 1907.
WHEN we come to view the half-dozen or so great Liturgies of the world purely as religious documents, and to weigh their value as devotional classics, the incomparable superiority of the Jewish convincingly appears. The Jewish Liturgy occupies its pages with the One Eternal Lord; holds ever true, confident, and direct speech with Him; exhausts the resources of language in songs of praise, in utterances of loving gratitude, in rejoicing at His nearness, in natural outpourings of grief for sin; never so much as a dream of intercessors or of hidings from His blessed punishments; and, withal, such a sweet sense of the divine accessibility every moment to each sinful, suffering child of earth. Where shall one find a hymn of universal faith like the Adon Olam,of mystical beauty like the Hymn ofGlory50;or services so solemn, touching, and tender as those appointed for Yom Kippur?Compare the misery, gloom, and introspection surrounding other requiem and funeral services, with the chastened, dignified sobriety of the Hebrew prayer for thedying,51and the healthy, cheerful manliness of the Mourner’s Kaddish.
Again, there is most refreshing silence in regard to life-conditions after death. Neither is there any spiteful condemnation of the followers of other faiths; the Jew is singularly free from narrow intolerance.
Certainly the Jew has cause to thank God, and the fathers before him, for the noblest Liturgy the annals of faith can show.
G. E. BIDDLE, 1907.
IN ASYNAGOGUE52DERONDA gave himself up to that strongest effect of chanted liturgies which is independent of detailed verbal meaning. The most powerful movement of feeling with a liturgy is the prayer which seeks for nothing special, but is a yearning to escape from the limitations of our own weakness and an invocation of all Good to enter and abide with us; or else a self-oblivious lifting up of gladness, a ‘Gloria in excelsis’ that such Good exists; both the yearning and the exultation gathering their utmost force from the sense of communion in a form which has expressed them both for long generations of struggling fellow-men. The Hebrew liturgy, like others, has its transitions of litany, lyric proclamation, dry statement, and blessing; but this evening all were one for Deronda; the chant of the Chazan’s or Reader’s grand wide-ranging voice with its passage from monotony to sudden cries, the outburst of sweet boys’ voices from the little choir, the devotional swaying of men’s bodies backwards and forwards, the very commonness of the building and shabbiness of the scene where a national faith, which had penetrated the thinking of half the world, had moulded the splendid forms of that world’s religion, was finding a remote, obscure echo—all were blent for him as one expression of a binding history, tragic and yet glorious.GEORGEELIOT, 1876.
DERONDA gave himself up to that strongest effect of chanted liturgies which is independent of detailed verbal meaning. The most powerful movement of feeling with a liturgy is the prayer which seeks for nothing special, but is a yearning to escape from the limitations of our own weakness and an invocation of all Good to enter and abide with us; or else a self-oblivious lifting up of gladness, a ‘Gloria in excelsis’ that such Good exists; both the yearning and the exultation gathering their utmost force from the sense of communion in a form which has expressed them both for long generations of struggling fellow-men. The Hebrew liturgy, like others, has its transitions of litany, lyric proclamation, dry statement, and blessing; but this evening all were one for Deronda; the chant of the Chazan’s or Reader’s grand wide-ranging voice with its passage from monotony to sudden cries, the outburst of sweet boys’ voices from the little choir, the devotional swaying of men’s bodies backwards and forwards, the very commonness of the building and shabbiness of the scene where a national faith, which had penetrated the thinking of half the world, had moulded the splendid forms of that world’s religion, was finding a remote, obscure echo—all were blent for him as one expression of a binding history, tragic and yet glorious.
GEORGEELIOT, 1876.
THE TORCH OF JEWISHLEARNING53LEARNING was for two thousand years the sole claim to distinction recognized by Israel. ‘The scholar’, says the Talmud, ‘takes precedence over the king.’ Israel remained faithful to this precept throughout all her humiliations. Whenever, in Christian or Moslem lands, a hostile hand closed her schools, the rabbis crossed the seas to reopen their academies in a distant country. Like the legendary Wandering Jew, the flickering torch of Jewish scholarship thus passed from East to West, from North to South, changing every two or three hundred years from one country to another. Whenever a royal edict commanded them to leave, within three months, the country in which their fathers had been buried and their sons had been born, the treasure which the Jews were most anxious to carry away with them was their books. Among all theautos-da-féwhich the daughter of Zion has had to witness, none has cost her such bitter tears as those flames which, during the Middle Ages, greedily consumed the scrolls of the Talmud.A. LEROYBEAULIEU, 1893.
LEARNING was for two thousand years the sole claim to distinction recognized by Israel. ‘The scholar’, says the Talmud, ‘takes precedence over the king.’ Israel remained faithful to this precept throughout all her humiliations. Whenever, in Christian or Moslem lands, a hostile hand closed her schools, the rabbis crossed the seas to reopen their academies in a distant country. Like the legendary Wandering Jew, the flickering torch of Jewish scholarship thus passed from East to West, from North to South, changing every two or three hundred years from one country to another. Whenever a royal edict commanded them to leave, within three months, the country in which their fathers had been buried and their sons had been born, the treasure which the Jews were most anxious to carry away with them was their books. Among all theautos-da-féwhich the daughter of Zion has had to witness, none has cost her such bitter tears as those flames which, during the Middle Ages, greedily consumed the scrolls of the Talmud.
A. LEROYBEAULIEU, 1893.
DURING THECRUSADES54IN the little town Tiberias, on the shore of the Lake of Gennesaret, sat the old Jew Eleazar, with his family, prepared to celebrate the Passover. It was the fourteenth day of the month Nisan of the year 1089.After the head of the family had washed his hands, he blessed the gifts of God, drank some wine, took some of the bitter herbs, and ate and gave to the others. After that, the second cup of wine was served, and the youngest son of the house asked, according to the sacred custom, ‘What is the meaning of this feast?’The father answered: ‘The Lord brought us with a strong hand out of the Egyptian bondage’. Thereafter a blessing was pronounced on the unleavened bread, and they sat down to eat. The old Eleazar spoke of past times, and contrasted them with the present: ‘Man born of woman lives but a short time, and is full of trouble; he cometh up like a flower, and is cut down; he fleeth hence like a shadow, and continueth not. A stranger and a sojourner is he upon earth, and therefore he should be always ready for his journey as we are, this holy evening.’The eldest son, Jacob, who had come home in the evening after a journey, seemed to wish to say something, but did not venture to do so till the fourth and last cup was drunk.‘Now, Jacob’, said Eleazar, ‘you want to talk. You come from a journey, though somewhat late, and have something new to tell us. Hush! I hear steps in the garden!’All hurried to the window, for they lived in troublous times; but, as no one was to be seen outside, they sat down again at the table.‘Speak, Jacob’, Eleazar said again.‘I come from Antioch, where the Crusaders are besieged by Kerboga, the Emir Mosul. Famine has raged among them, and of three hundred thousand Goyim, only twenty thousand remain.’‘What had they to do here?’‘Now, on the roads, they are talking of a new battle which the Goyim have won, and they believe that the Crusaders will march straight on Jerusalem.’‘Well, they won’t come here.’‘They won’t find the way, unless there are traitors.’‘The Christians are misguided, and their doctrine is folly. They believe the Messiah has come, although the world is like a hell, and men resemble devils! And it ever gets worse....’Then the door was flung open, and on the threshold appeared a little man, emaciated as a skeleton, with burning eyes—Peter the Hermit. He was clothed in rags, carried a cross in his hands, and bore a red cross-shaped sign on his shoulder.‘Are you Christians?’ he asked.‘No’, answered Eleazar, ‘we are of Israel.’‘Out with you!—down to the lake and be baptized, or you will die the death!’Then Eleazar turned to the Hermit, and cried, ‘No! I and my house will serve the Lord, as we have done this holy evening according to the law of our fathers. We suffer for our sins, that is true, but you, godless, cursed man, pride not yourself on your power, for you have not yet escaped the judgement of Almighty God.’The Hermit had gone out to his followers. Those within the house closed the window-shutters and the door.There was a cry without: ‘Fire the house!’‘Let us bless God, and die!’ said Eleazar, and none of them hesitated. Eleazar spoke: ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He will stand at the latter day upon the earth. And when I am free from my flesh, I shall see God. Him shall I see and not another, and for that my soul and my heart cry out.’The mother had taken the youngest son in her arms, as though she wished to protect him against the fire which now seized on the wall.Then Eleazar began the Song of the ThreeChildren55in the fire, and when they came to the words,‘O thank the Lord, for He is good,And His mercy endureth for ever’,their voices were choked, and they ended their days like the Maccabees.AUGUSTSTRINDBERG, 1907.
IN the little town Tiberias, on the shore of the Lake of Gennesaret, sat the old Jew Eleazar, with his family, prepared to celebrate the Passover. It was the fourteenth day of the month Nisan of the year 1089.
After the head of the family had washed his hands, he blessed the gifts of God, drank some wine, took some of the bitter herbs, and ate and gave to the others. After that, the second cup of wine was served, and the youngest son of the house asked, according to the sacred custom, ‘What is the meaning of this feast?’
The father answered: ‘The Lord brought us with a strong hand out of the Egyptian bondage’. Thereafter a blessing was pronounced on the unleavened bread, and they sat down to eat. The old Eleazar spoke of past times, and contrasted them with the present: ‘Man born of woman lives but a short time, and is full of trouble; he cometh up like a flower, and is cut down; he fleeth hence like a shadow, and continueth not. A stranger and a sojourner is he upon earth, and therefore he should be always ready for his journey as we are, this holy evening.’
The eldest son, Jacob, who had come home in the evening after a journey, seemed to wish to say something, but did not venture to do so till the fourth and last cup was drunk.
‘Now, Jacob’, said Eleazar, ‘you want to talk. You come from a journey, though somewhat late, and have something new to tell us. Hush! I hear steps in the garden!’
All hurried to the window, for they lived in troublous times; but, as no one was to be seen outside, they sat down again at the table.
‘Speak, Jacob’, Eleazar said again.
‘I come from Antioch, where the Crusaders are besieged by Kerboga, the Emir Mosul. Famine has raged among them, and of three hundred thousand Goyim, only twenty thousand remain.’
‘What had they to do here?’
‘Now, on the roads, they are talking of a new battle which the Goyim have won, and they believe that the Crusaders will march straight on Jerusalem.’
‘Well, they won’t come here.’
‘They won’t find the way, unless there are traitors.’
‘The Christians are misguided, and their doctrine is folly. They believe the Messiah has come, although the world is like a hell, and men resemble devils! And it ever gets worse....’
Then the door was flung open, and on the threshold appeared a little man, emaciated as a skeleton, with burning eyes—Peter the Hermit. He was clothed in rags, carried a cross in his hands, and bore a red cross-shaped sign on his shoulder.
‘Are you Christians?’ he asked.
‘No’, answered Eleazar, ‘we are of Israel.’
‘Out with you!—down to the lake and be baptized, or you will die the death!’
Then Eleazar turned to the Hermit, and cried, ‘No! I and my house will serve the Lord, as we have done this holy evening according to the law of our fathers. We suffer for our sins, that is true, but you, godless, cursed man, pride not yourself on your power, for you have not yet escaped the judgement of Almighty God.’
The Hermit had gone out to his followers. Those within the house closed the window-shutters and the door.
There was a cry without: ‘Fire the house!’
‘Let us bless God, and die!’ said Eleazar, and none of them hesitated. Eleazar spoke: ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He will stand at the latter day upon the earth. And when I am free from my flesh, I shall see God. Him shall I see and not another, and for that my soul and my heart cry out.’
The mother had taken the youngest son in her arms, as though she wished to protect him against the fire which now seized on the wall.
Then Eleazar began the Song of the ThreeChildren55in the fire, and when they came to the words,
‘O thank the Lord, for He is good,And His mercy endureth for ever’,
‘O thank the Lord, for He is good,And His mercy endureth for ever’,
‘O thank the Lord, for He is good,
And His mercy endureth for ever’,
their voices were choked, and they ended their days like the Maccabees.
AUGUSTSTRINDBERG, 1907.
THE EXPULSION FROM SPAIN AND PORTUGAL,1492–149756THE persecution of the Jewish race dates from the very earliest period in which Christianity obtained the direction of the civil powers; and the hatred of the Jews was for many centuries a faithful index of the piety of the Christians.Insulted, plundered, hated, and despised by all Christian nations, banished from England byEdwardI,and from France byCharlesVI,they found in the Spanish Moors rulers who were probably not without a special sympathy for a race whose pure monotheism formed a marked contrast to the scarcely disguised polytheism of the Spanish Catholics; and Jewish learning and Jewish genius contributed very largely to that bright but transient civilization which radiated from Toledo and Cordova, and exercised so salutary an influence upon the belief of Europe. But when, in an ill-omened hour, the Cross supplanted the Crescent on the heights of the Alhambra, this solitary refuge was destroyed, the last gleam of tolerance vanished from Spain, and the expulsion of the Jews was determined.This edict was immediately due to the exertions ofTorquemada; but its ultimate cause is to be found in that steadily increasing popular fanaticism which made it impossible for the two races to exist together. In 1390, about a hundred years before the conquest of Granada, the Catholics of Seville being excited by the eloquence of a great preacher, named Hernando Martinez, had attacked the Jews’ quarter, and murdered 4,000 Jews, Martinez himself presiding over the massacre. About a year later, and partly through the influence of the same eminent divine, similar scenes took place at Valentia, Cordova, Burgos, Toledo, and Barcelona ... and more than once during the fifteenth century. At last the Moorish war, which had always been regarded as a crusade, was drawing to a close, the religious fervour of the Spanish rose to the highest point, and the Inquisition was established as its expression. Numbers of converted Jews were massacred; others, who had been baptized during past explosions of popular fury, fled to the Moors, in order to practise their rites, and at last, after a desperate resistance, were captured and burnt alive. The clergy exerted all their energies to produce the expulsion of the entire race, and to effect this object all the old calumnies were revived, and two or three miracles invented.It must be acknowledged that history relates very few measures that produced so vast an amount of calamity. In three short months, all unconvertedJews were obliged, under pain of death, to abandon the Spanish soil. Multitudes, falling into the hands of the pirates, who swarmed around the coast, were plundered of all they possessed and reduced to slavery; multitudes died of famine or of plague, or were murdered or tortured with horrible cruelty by the African savages. About 80,000 took refuge in Portugal, relying on the promise of the king. Spanish priests lashed the Portuguese into fury, and the king was persuaded to issue an edict which threw even that of Isabella into the shade. All the adult Jews were banished from Portugal; but first of all their children below the age of fourteen were taken from them to be educated as Christians. Then, indeed, the cup of bitterness was filled to the brim. The serene fortitude with which the exiled people had borne so many and such grievous calamities gave way, and was replaced by the wildest paroxysms of despair. When at last, childless and broken-hearted, they sought to leave the land, they found that the ships had been purposely detained, and the allotted time, having expired, they were reduced to slavery and baptized by force. A great peal of rejoicing filled the Peninsula, and proclaimed that the triumph of the Spanish priests was complete.Certainly the heroism of the defenders of every other creed fades into insignificance before this martyr people, who for thirteen centuries confrontedall the evils that the fiercest fanaticism could devise, enduring obloquy and spoliation and the violation of the dearest ties, and the infliction of the most hideous sufferings, rather than abandon their faith.Persecution came to the Jewish nation in its most horrible forms, yet surrounded by every circumstance of petty annoyance that could destroy its grandeur, and it continued for centuries their abiding portion. But above all this the genius of that wonderful people rose supreme. While those around them were grovelling in the darkness of besotted ignorance; while juggling miracles and lying relics were the themes on which almost all Europe was expatiating; while the intellect of Christendom, enthralled by countless superstitions, had sunk into a deadly torpor, in which all love of inquiry and all search for truth were abandoned, the Jews were still pursuing the path of knowledge, amassing learning, and stimulating progress with the same unflinching constancy that they manifested in their faith. They were the most skilful physicians, the ablest financiers, and among the most profound philosophers.W. E. H. LECKY, 1865.
THE persecution of the Jewish race dates from the very earliest period in which Christianity obtained the direction of the civil powers; and the hatred of the Jews was for many centuries a faithful index of the piety of the Christians.
Insulted, plundered, hated, and despised by all Christian nations, banished from England byEdwardI,and from France byCharlesVI,they found in the Spanish Moors rulers who were probably not without a special sympathy for a race whose pure monotheism formed a marked contrast to the scarcely disguised polytheism of the Spanish Catholics; and Jewish learning and Jewish genius contributed very largely to that bright but transient civilization which radiated from Toledo and Cordova, and exercised so salutary an influence upon the belief of Europe. But when, in an ill-omened hour, the Cross supplanted the Crescent on the heights of the Alhambra, this solitary refuge was destroyed, the last gleam of tolerance vanished from Spain, and the expulsion of the Jews was determined.
This edict was immediately due to the exertions ofTorquemada; but its ultimate cause is to be found in that steadily increasing popular fanaticism which made it impossible for the two races to exist together. In 1390, about a hundred years before the conquest of Granada, the Catholics of Seville being excited by the eloquence of a great preacher, named Hernando Martinez, had attacked the Jews’ quarter, and murdered 4,000 Jews, Martinez himself presiding over the massacre. About a year later, and partly through the influence of the same eminent divine, similar scenes took place at Valentia, Cordova, Burgos, Toledo, and Barcelona ... and more than once during the fifteenth century. At last the Moorish war, which had always been regarded as a crusade, was drawing to a close, the religious fervour of the Spanish rose to the highest point, and the Inquisition was established as its expression. Numbers of converted Jews were massacred; others, who had been baptized during past explosions of popular fury, fled to the Moors, in order to practise their rites, and at last, after a desperate resistance, were captured and burnt alive. The clergy exerted all their energies to produce the expulsion of the entire race, and to effect this object all the old calumnies were revived, and two or three miracles invented.
It must be acknowledged that history relates very few measures that produced so vast an amount of calamity. In three short months, all unconvertedJews were obliged, under pain of death, to abandon the Spanish soil. Multitudes, falling into the hands of the pirates, who swarmed around the coast, were plundered of all they possessed and reduced to slavery; multitudes died of famine or of plague, or were murdered or tortured with horrible cruelty by the African savages. About 80,000 took refuge in Portugal, relying on the promise of the king. Spanish priests lashed the Portuguese into fury, and the king was persuaded to issue an edict which threw even that of Isabella into the shade. All the adult Jews were banished from Portugal; but first of all their children below the age of fourteen were taken from them to be educated as Christians. Then, indeed, the cup of bitterness was filled to the brim. The serene fortitude with which the exiled people had borne so many and such grievous calamities gave way, and was replaced by the wildest paroxysms of despair. When at last, childless and broken-hearted, they sought to leave the land, they found that the ships had been purposely detained, and the allotted time, having expired, they were reduced to slavery and baptized by force. A great peal of rejoicing filled the Peninsula, and proclaimed that the triumph of the Spanish priests was complete.
Certainly the heroism of the defenders of every other creed fades into insignificance before this martyr people, who for thirteen centuries confrontedall the evils that the fiercest fanaticism could devise, enduring obloquy and spoliation and the violation of the dearest ties, and the infliction of the most hideous sufferings, rather than abandon their faith.
Persecution came to the Jewish nation in its most horrible forms, yet surrounded by every circumstance of petty annoyance that could destroy its grandeur, and it continued for centuries their abiding portion. But above all this the genius of that wonderful people rose supreme. While those around them were grovelling in the darkness of besotted ignorance; while juggling miracles and lying relics were the themes on which almost all Europe was expatiating; while the intellect of Christendom, enthralled by countless superstitions, had sunk into a deadly torpor, in which all love of inquiry and all search for truth were abandoned, the Jews were still pursuing the path of knowledge, amassing learning, and stimulating progress with the same unflinching constancy that they manifested in their faith. They were the most skilful physicians, the ablest financiers, and among the most profound philosophers.
W. E. H. LECKY, 1865.
A PROTEST AGAINST THEAUTO-DA-FÉOF SEPTEMBER 20, 1761, LISBONWHAT was their crime? Only that they were born. They were born Israelites, they celebrated Pesach; that is the only reason that the Portuguese burnt them. Would you believe that while the flames were consuming these innocent victims, the inquisitors and the other savages were chantingourprayers? These pitiless monsters were invoking the God of mercy and kindness, the God of pardon, while committing the most atrocious and barbarous crime, while acting in a way which demons in their rage would not use against their brother demons. Your madness goes so far as to say that we are scattered because our fathers condemned to death him whom you worship. O ye pious tigers, ye fanatical panthers, who despise your sect so much that you have no better way of supporting it than by executioners, cannot you see that it was only the Romans who condemned him? We had not, at that time, the right to inflict death; we were governed by Quirinus, Varus, Pilate. No crucifixion was practised among us. Not a trace of that form of punishment is to be found. Cease, therefore, to punish a whole nation for an event for which it cannot be responsible. Would it be just to go and burn the Pope and all the Monsignori at Rome to-day because the first Romans ravished the Sabines and pillaged the Samnites?O God, who hast created us all, who desirest not the misfortune of Thy creatures, God, Father of all, God of mercy, accomplish Thou that there be no longer on this globe, on this least of all the worlds, either fanatics or persecutors. Amen.F. M. A. VOLTAIRE,in ‘Sermon du Rabin Akib’.
WHAT was their crime? Only that they were born. They were born Israelites, they celebrated Pesach; that is the only reason that the Portuguese burnt them. Would you believe that while the flames were consuming these innocent victims, the inquisitors and the other savages were chantingourprayers? These pitiless monsters were invoking the God of mercy and kindness, the God of pardon, while committing the most atrocious and barbarous crime, while acting in a way which demons in their rage would not use against their brother demons. Your madness goes so far as to say that we are scattered because our fathers condemned to death him whom you worship. O ye pious tigers, ye fanatical panthers, who despise your sect so much that you have no better way of supporting it than by executioners, cannot you see that it was only the Romans who condemned him? We had not, at that time, the right to inflict death; we were governed by Quirinus, Varus, Pilate. No crucifixion was practised among us. Not a trace of that form of punishment is to be found. Cease, therefore, to punish a whole nation for an event for which it cannot be responsible. Would it be just to go and burn the Pope and all the Monsignori at Rome to-day because the first Romans ravished the Sabines and pillaged the Samnites?
O God, who hast created us all, who desirest not the misfortune of Thy creatures, God, Father of all, God of mercy, accomplish Thou that there be no longer on this globe, on this least of all the worlds, either fanatics or persecutors. Amen.
F. M. A. VOLTAIRE,in ‘Sermon du Rabin Akib’.
THE BIBLE IN ELIZABETHANENGLAND57NO greater moral change ever passed over a nation than passed over England during the years of the reign of Elizabeth. England became the people of a book, and that book was the Bible. It was read in churches, and it was read at home, and everywhere its words, as they fell on ears which custom had not deadened to their force and beauty, kindled a startling enthusiasm. As a mere literary monument, the English Version of the Bible remains the noblest example of the English tongue, while its perpetual use made it from the instant of its appearance the standard of our language. But far greater than its effect on literature was the effect of the Bible on the character of the people at large. Elizabeth might silence or tune the pulpits, but it was impossible for her to silence or tune the great preachers of justice, and mercy, and truth, who spoke from the Book which the Lord again opened to the people. The effect of the Bible in this way was simply amazing. The whole temper of the nation was changed. A new conception of life and of man superseded the old. A new moral and religious impulse spread through every class.J. R. GREEN, 1874.
NO greater moral change ever passed over a nation than passed over England during the years of the reign of Elizabeth. England became the people of a book, and that book was the Bible. It was read in churches, and it was read at home, and everywhere its words, as they fell on ears which custom had not deadened to their force and beauty, kindled a startling enthusiasm. As a mere literary monument, the English Version of the Bible remains the noblest example of the English tongue, while its perpetual use made it from the instant of its appearance the standard of our language. But far greater than its effect on literature was the effect of the Bible on the character of the people at large. Elizabeth might silence or tune the pulpits, but it was impossible for her to silence or tune the great preachers of justice, and mercy, and truth, who spoke from the Book which the Lord again opened to the people. The effect of the Bible in this way was simply amazing. The whole temper of the nation was changed. A new conception of life and of man superseded the old. A new moral and religious impulse spread through every class.
J. R. GREEN, 1874.
FOR THE EMANCIPATION OF THE JEWSIN the infancy of civilization, when our island was as savage as New Guinea, when letters and arts were still unknown to Athens, when scarcely a thatched hut stood on what was afterwards the site of Rome, this contemned people had their fenced cities and cedar palaces, their splendid Temple, their fleets of merchant ships, their schools of sacred learning, their great statesmen and soldiers, their natural philosophers, their historians, and their poets. What nation ever contended more manfully against overwhelming odds for its independence and religion? What nation ever, in its last agonies, gave such signal proofs of what may be accomplished by a brave despair? And if, in the course of many centuries, the oppressed descendants of warriors and sages have degenerated from the qualities of their fathers ... shall we consider this as a matter of reproach to them? Shall we not rather consider it as matter of shame and remorse to ourselves? Let us do justice to them. Let us open to them the door of the House of Commons. Let us open to them every career in which ability and energy can be displayed. Till we have done this, let us not presume to say that there is no genius among the countrymen of Isaiah, no heroism among the descendants of the Maccabees.LORDMACAULAY, 1833.
IN the infancy of civilization, when our island was as savage as New Guinea, when letters and arts were still unknown to Athens, when scarcely a thatched hut stood on what was afterwards the site of Rome, this contemned people had their fenced cities and cedar palaces, their splendid Temple, their fleets of merchant ships, their schools of sacred learning, their great statesmen and soldiers, their natural philosophers, their historians, and their poets. What nation ever contended more manfully against overwhelming odds for its independence and religion? What nation ever, in its last agonies, gave such signal proofs of what may be accomplished by a brave despair? And if, in the course of many centuries, the oppressed descendants of warriors and sages have degenerated from the qualities of their fathers ... shall we consider this as a matter of reproach to them? Shall we not rather consider it as matter of shame and remorse to ourselves? Let us do justice to them. Let us open to them the door of the House of Commons. Let us open to them every career in which ability and energy can be displayed. Till we have done this, let us not presume to say that there is no genius among the countrymen of Isaiah, no heroism among the descendants of the Maccabees.
LORDMACAULAY, 1833.
IGNORANCE OF JUDAISMHE had been roused to the consciousness of knowing hardly anything about modern Judaism or the inner Jewish history. The Chosen People have been commonly treated as a people chosen for the sake of somebody else, and their thinking as something (no matter exactly what) that ought to have been entirely otherwise; and Deronda, like his neighbours, had regarded Judaism as a sort of eccentric fossilized form which an accomplished man might dispense with studying, and leave to specialists. But there had flashed on him the hitherto neglected reality that Judaism was something still throbbing in human lives, still making for them the only conceivable vesture of the world.GEORGEELIOT, 1876,in ‘Daniel Deronda’.MOCK on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau!Mock on, mock on! ’tis all in vain:You throw the sand against the wind,And the wind blows it back again.And every sand becomes a gemReflected in the beams divine;Blown back, they blind the mocking eye,But still in Israel’s paths they shine.WILLIAMBLAKE.
HE had been roused to the consciousness of knowing hardly anything about modern Judaism or the inner Jewish history. The Chosen People have been commonly treated as a people chosen for the sake of somebody else, and their thinking as something (no matter exactly what) that ought to have been entirely otherwise; and Deronda, like his neighbours, had regarded Judaism as a sort of eccentric fossilized form which an accomplished man might dispense with studying, and leave to specialists. But there had flashed on him the hitherto neglected reality that Judaism was something still throbbing in human lives, still making for them the only conceivable vesture of the world.
GEORGEELIOT, 1876,in ‘Daniel Deronda’.
MOCK on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau!Mock on, mock on! ’tis all in vain:You throw the sand against the wind,And the wind blows it back again.And every sand becomes a gemReflected in the beams divine;Blown back, they blind the mocking eye,But still in Israel’s paths they shine.WILLIAMBLAKE.
MOCK on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau!Mock on, mock on! ’tis all in vain:You throw the sand against the wind,And the wind blows it back again.And every sand becomes a gemReflected in the beams divine;Blown back, they blind the mocking eye,But still in Israel’s paths they shine.WILLIAMBLAKE.
MOCK on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau!
Mock on, mock on! ’tis all in vain:
You throw the sand against the wind,
And the wind blows it back again.
And every sand becomes a gem
Reflected in the beams divine;
Blown back, they blind the mocking eye,
But still in Israel’s paths they shine.
WILLIAMBLAKE.
THEY ARE OUR ELDERSNEXT to the selection that has been in operation for centuries, it is, in my opinion, the antiquity and the continuity of their civilization that throws some light upon the Jews as well as upon the place they occupy in our midst. They were here before us; they are our elders. Their children were taught to read from the scrolls of the Torah before our Latin alphabet had reached its final form, long before Cyrillus and Methodius had given writing to the Slavs, and before the Runic characters were known to the Germans of the North. As compared with the Jews, we are young, we are new-comers; in the matter of civilization they are far ahead of us. It was in vain that we locked them up for several hundred years behind the walls of the Ghetto. No sooner were their prison gates unbarred than they easily caught up with us, even on those paths which we had opened up without their aid.A. LEROYBEAULIEU, 1893.
NEXT to the selection that has been in operation for centuries, it is, in my opinion, the antiquity and the continuity of their civilization that throws some light upon the Jews as well as upon the place they occupy in our midst. They were here before us; they are our elders. Their children were taught to read from the scrolls of the Torah before our Latin alphabet had reached its final form, long before Cyrillus and Methodius had given writing to the Slavs, and before the Runic characters were known to the Germans of the North. As compared with the Jews, we are young, we are new-comers; in the matter of civilization they are far ahead of us. It was in vain that we locked them up for several hundred years behind the walls of the Ghetto. No sooner were their prison gates unbarred than they easily caught up with us, even on those paths which we had opened up without their aid.
A. LEROYBEAULIEU, 1893.
THE JEWISH CEMETERY ATNEWPORT58HOW strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves,Close by the street of this fair seaport town,Silent beside the never-silent waves,At rest in all this moving up and down.How came they here? What burst of Christian hate,What persecution, merciless and blind,Drove o’er the sea—that desert desolate—These Ishmaels and Hagars of mankind?Pride and humiliation hand in handWalked with them through the world where’er they went;Trampled and beaten were they as the sand,And yet unshaken as the continent.For in the background figures vague and vastOf patriarchs and prophets rose sublime,And all the great traditions of the PastThey saw reflected in the coming time.And thus forever with reverted lookThe mystic volume of the world they read,Spelling it backward, like a Hebrew book,Till life became a Legend of the Dead.H. W. LONGFELLOW, 1858.
HOW strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves,Close by the street of this fair seaport town,Silent beside the never-silent waves,At rest in all this moving up and down.How came they here? What burst of Christian hate,What persecution, merciless and blind,Drove o’er the sea—that desert desolate—These Ishmaels and Hagars of mankind?Pride and humiliation hand in handWalked with them through the world where’er they went;Trampled and beaten were they as the sand,And yet unshaken as the continent.For in the background figures vague and vastOf patriarchs and prophets rose sublime,And all the great traditions of the PastThey saw reflected in the coming time.And thus forever with reverted lookThe mystic volume of the world they read,Spelling it backward, like a Hebrew book,Till life became a Legend of the Dead.H. W. LONGFELLOW, 1858.
HOW strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves,Close by the street of this fair seaport town,Silent beside the never-silent waves,At rest in all this moving up and down.How came they here? What burst of Christian hate,What persecution, merciless and blind,Drove o’er the sea—that desert desolate—These Ishmaels and Hagars of mankind?Pride and humiliation hand in handWalked with them through the world where’er they went;Trampled and beaten were they as the sand,And yet unshaken as the continent.For in the background figures vague and vastOf patriarchs and prophets rose sublime,And all the great traditions of the PastThey saw reflected in the coming time.And thus forever with reverted lookThe mystic volume of the world they read,Spelling it backward, like a Hebrew book,Till life became a Legend of the Dead.H. W. LONGFELLOW, 1858.
HOW strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves,
Close by the street of this fair seaport town,
Silent beside the never-silent waves,
At rest in all this moving up and down.
How came they here? What burst of Christian hate,
What persecution, merciless and blind,
Drove o’er the sea—that desert desolate—
These Ishmaels and Hagars of mankind?
Pride and humiliation hand in hand
Walked with them through the world where’er they went;
Trampled and beaten were they as the sand,
And yet unshaken as the continent.
For in the background figures vague and vast
Of patriarchs and prophets rose sublime,
And all the great traditions of the Past
They saw reflected in the coming time.
And thus forever with reverted look
The mystic volume of the world they read,
Spelling it backward, like a Hebrew book,
Till life became a Legend of the Dead.
H. W. LONGFELLOW, 1858.
THE JEW AS A CITIZENIAM glad to be able to say that while the Jews of the United States have remained loyal to their faith and their race traditions, they are engaged in generous rivalry with their fellow-citizens of other denominations in advancing the interests of our common country. This is true, not only of the descendants of the early settlers and those of American birth, but of a great and constantly increasing proportion of those who have come to our shores within the last twenty-five years as refugees reduced to the direst straits of penury and misery. In a few years, men and women hitherto utterly unaccustomed to any of the privileges of citizenship have moved mightily upward toward the standard of loyal, self-respecting American citizenship; of that citizenship which not merely insists upon its rights, but also eagerly recognizes its duty to do its full share in the material, social, and moral advancement of the nation.THEODOREROOSEVELT,on the 250th anniversary of the Settlement of the Jews in the United States, November, 1905.
IAM glad to be able to say that while the Jews of the United States have remained loyal to their faith and their race traditions, they are engaged in generous rivalry with their fellow-citizens of other denominations in advancing the interests of our common country. This is true, not only of the descendants of the early settlers and those of American birth, but of a great and constantly increasing proportion of those who have come to our shores within the last twenty-five years as refugees reduced to the direst straits of penury and misery. In a few years, men and women hitherto utterly unaccustomed to any of the privileges of citizenship have moved mightily upward toward the standard of loyal, self-respecting American citizenship; of that citizenship which not merely insists upon its rights, but also eagerly recognizes its duty to do its full share in the material, social, and moral advancement of the nation.
THEODOREROOSEVELT,on the 250th anniversary of the Settlement of the Jews in the United States, November, 1905.
IN THE EAST END OF LONDONSOME years ago, when I was living in Europe, I went for six months to reside in the very poorest part of the East End of London, when I made friends with a poor Jewish woman. She took me into the tiny one-roomed tenement where she and her husband and their children lived on the few shillings a week they earned by their joint labour. Though it had all the misery and confinement which extreme poverty means in a great city, I had yet often a curious feeling that it was ahome. With however much difficulty, a few pence would be saved to celebrate, if it were but in a pitiful little way, the festivals of their people; though it were by starving themselves, the parents would lay by something for the education of their children or to procure them some little extra comfort. And the conclusion was forced on me that, taking the very poorest class of Jew and comparing him with an exactly analogous class of non-Jews earning the same wages and living in the same locality, the life of the Jew was, on the whole, more mentally healthful, more human, and had in it an element of hope that was often wanting in that of others. I felt that these people needed but a little space, a little chance, to develop into some far higher form. The material was there.Therefore I would welcome the exiled Russian Jew to South Africa, not merely with pity, but with a feeling of pride that any member of that great, much-suffering people, to whom the world owes so great a debt, should find a refuge and a home among us.OLIVESCHREINER, 1906.
SOME years ago, when I was living in Europe, I went for six months to reside in the very poorest part of the East End of London, when I made friends with a poor Jewish woman. She took me into the tiny one-roomed tenement where she and her husband and their children lived on the few shillings a week they earned by their joint labour. Though it had all the misery and confinement which extreme poverty means in a great city, I had yet often a curious feeling that it was ahome. With however much difficulty, a few pence would be saved to celebrate, if it were but in a pitiful little way, the festivals of their people; though it were by starving themselves, the parents would lay by something for the education of their children or to procure them some little extra comfort. And the conclusion was forced on me that, taking the very poorest class of Jew and comparing him with an exactly analogous class of non-Jews earning the same wages and living in the same locality, the life of the Jew was, on the whole, more mentally healthful, more human, and had in it an element of hope that was often wanting in that of others. I felt that these people needed but a little space, a little chance, to develop into some far higher form. The material was there.
Therefore I would welcome the exiled Russian Jew to South Africa, not merely with pity, but with a feeling of pride that any member of that great, much-suffering people, to whom the world owes so great a debt, should find a refuge and a home among us.
OLIVESCHREINER, 1906.
THE RUSSIANAGONY59I.THEBEGINNINGSIN 1563 Ivan the Terrible conquered Polotzk, and for the first time the Russian Government was confronted by the fact of the existence of the Jewish nationality. The Czar’s advisers were somewhat perplexed, and asked him what to do with these newly acquired subjects. Ivan the Terrible answered unhesitatingly: ‘Baptize them or drown them in the river’. They were drowned.P. MILYUKOV, 1916.
IN 1563 Ivan the Terrible conquered Polotzk, and for the first time the Russian Government was confronted by the fact of the existence of the Jewish nationality. The Czar’s advisers were somewhat perplexed, and asked him what to do with these newly acquired subjects. Ivan the Terrible answered unhesitatingly: ‘Baptize them or drown them in the river’. They were drowned.
P. MILYUKOV, 1916.
II.IN THENINETEENTHCENTURY60FEW facts in the nineteenth century have been so well calculated to disenchant the believers in perpetual progress with their creed as the anti-Semite movement, which in a few years has swept like an angry wave over the greater part of Europe.The recent movement for proscribing, under pretence of preventing cruelty to animals, the mode of killing animals for food which is enjoined in the Jewish ritual, is certainly at least as much due to dislike to the Jews as to consideration for cattle. It appears to have arisen among the German anti-Semites, especially in Saxony....The Russian persecution stands in some degree apart from the other forms of the anti-Semite movement, both on account of its unparalleled magnitude and ferocity, and also because it is the direct act of a Government deliberately, systematically, remorselessly seeking to reduce to utter misery millions of its own subjects.An evil chance had placed upon the throne an absolute ruler who combined with much private virtue and very limited faculties all the genuine fanaticism of the great persecutors of the past, and who found a new Torquemada at his side. He reigned over an administration which is among the most despotic, and probably, without exception, the most corrupt and the most cruel in Europe.W. E. H. LECKY, 1896.
FEW facts in the nineteenth century have been so well calculated to disenchant the believers in perpetual progress with their creed as the anti-Semite movement, which in a few years has swept like an angry wave over the greater part of Europe.
The recent movement for proscribing, under pretence of preventing cruelty to animals, the mode of killing animals for food which is enjoined in the Jewish ritual, is certainly at least as much due to dislike to the Jews as to consideration for cattle. It appears to have arisen among the German anti-Semites, especially in Saxony....
The Russian persecution stands in some degree apart from the other forms of the anti-Semite movement, both on account of its unparalleled magnitude and ferocity, and also because it is the direct act of a Government deliberately, systematically, remorselessly seeking to reduce to utter misery millions of its own subjects.
An evil chance had placed upon the throne an absolute ruler who combined with much private virtue and very limited faculties all the genuine fanaticism of the great persecutors of the past, and who found a new Torquemada at his side. He reigned over an administration which is among the most despotic, and probably, without exception, the most corrupt and the most cruel in Europe.
W. E. H. LECKY, 1896.
III.IN THETWENTIETHCENTURYTO lock people like wild beasts in a cage, to surround them with disgraceful laws, as in an immense circus, for the sole revolting purpose to let loose the murderous mob upon them whenever practicable forSt.Petersburg—terrible, terrible!Anti-Semitism is a mad passion, akin to the lowest perversities of diseased human nature. It is the will to hate.The Emperor Hadrian was an honest anti-Semite.One day, the Talmud records, on his journey in the East, a Jew passed the Imperial train and saluted the Emperor. He was beside himself with rage. ‘You, a Jew, dare to greet the Emperor! You shall pay for this with your life.’ In the course of the same day another Jew passed him, and, warned by example, he did not greet Hadrian. ‘You, a Jew, dare to pass the Emperor without a greeting!’ he angrily exclaimed. ‘You have forfeited your life.’ To his astonished courtiers he replied: ‘I hate the Jews. Whatever they do, I find intolerable. I therefore make use of any pretext to destroy them.’So are all anti-Semites.LEOTOLSTOY, 1904.
TO lock people like wild beasts in a cage, to surround them with disgraceful laws, as in an immense circus, for the sole revolting purpose to let loose the murderous mob upon them whenever practicable forSt.Petersburg—terrible, terrible!
Anti-Semitism is a mad passion, akin to the lowest perversities of diseased human nature. It is the will to hate.
The Emperor Hadrian was an honest anti-Semite.One day, the Talmud records, on his journey in the East, a Jew passed the Imperial train and saluted the Emperor. He was beside himself with rage. ‘You, a Jew, dare to greet the Emperor! You shall pay for this with your life.’ In the course of the same day another Jew passed him, and, warned by example, he did not greet Hadrian. ‘You, a Jew, dare to pass the Emperor without a greeting!’ he angrily exclaimed. ‘You have forfeited your life.’ To his astonished courtiers he replied: ‘I hate the Jews. Whatever they do, I find intolerable. I therefore make use of any pretext to destroy them.’
So are all anti-Semites.
LEOTOLSTOY, 1904.
IV.THEMORALTHE study of the history of Europe during the past centuries teaches us one uniform lesson:That the nations which have received and in any way dealt fairly and mercifully with the Jew have prospered; and that the nations that have tortured and oppressed him have written out their own curse.OLIVESCHREINER, 1906.
THE study of the history of Europe during the past centuries teaches us one uniform lesson:That the nations which have received and in any way dealt fairly and mercifully with the Jew have prospered; and that the nations that have tortured and oppressed him have written out their own curse.
OLIVESCHREINER, 1906.
THE BLOOD LIBELBRITISHPROTEST, 1912WE desire to associate ourselves with the protests signed in Russia, France, and Germany by leading Christian Theologians, Men of Letters, Scientists, Politicians, and others against the attempt made in the City of Kieff to revive the hideous charge of Ritual Murder—known as the ‘Blood Accusation’—against Judaism and the Jewish People.The question is one of humanity, civilization, and truth. The ‘blood accusation’ is a relic of the days of witchcraft and ‘black magic’, a cruel and utterly baseless libel on Judaism, an insult to Western culture, and a dishonour to the Churches in whose name it has been falsely formulated by ignorant fanatics. Religious minorities other than the Jews, such as the early Christians, the Quakers, and Christian Missionaries in China, have been victimized by it. It has been denounced by the best men of all ages and creeds. The Popes, the founders of the Reformation, the Khalif of Islam, statesmen of every country, together with all the great seats of learning in Europe, have publicly repudiated it.Signed by:—TheARCHBISHOPSofCANTERBURY,YORK,ARMAGH;theCARDINALARCHBISHOPofWESTMINSTER,and theHEADSof all otherCHRISTIANDENOMINATIONS.TheBISHOPSofLONDON,OXFORD,WORCESTER,WINCHESTER,BIRMINGHAM,GLOUCESTER,LIVERPOOL,MANCHESTER,&c.;theDEANSofWESTMINSTER,CANTERBURY,NORWICH,RIPON,&c.TheDUKESofNORFOLKandNORTHUMBERLAND,and theEARLSofROSEBERY,SELBORNE,andCROMER;LORDSMILNERandRAYLEIGH;A. J. BALFOUR,SIREDWARDCARSON,GEN.N. G.LYTTELTON,&c.FREDERICHARRISON,A. V. DICEY,SIRWILLIAMOSLER,SIRFRANCISDARWIN,SIRWILLIAMRAMSAY;JAMESA. H. MURRAY,NORMANLOCKYER,J. G. FRAZER,&c.SIROLIVERLODGE,thePRINCIPALSof elevenOXFORDCOLLEGES;theMASTERSof sevenCAMBRIDGECOLLEGES,S. R. DRIVER,F. C. BURKITT,A. E. COWLEY,W. SANDAY,H. B. SWETE,ESTLINCARPENTER,A. E. GARVIE,A. C. HEADLAM,KIRSOPPLAKE,&c.JUSTICESEVE,WARRINGTON,andVAUGHANWILLIAMS.A. C. DOYLE,THOS.HARDY,ANTHONYHOPE,A. QUILLER-COUCH,G. B. SHAW,H. G. WELLS,&c.TheEDITORSof theEdinburgh,Quarterly,Fortnightly,Hibbert,Quest,Spectator,Nation,Daily Telegraph,Manchester Guardian,Daily Chronicle,Daily News,Pall Mall Gazette,&c.,&c.
WE desire to associate ourselves with the protests signed in Russia, France, and Germany by leading Christian Theologians, Men of Letters, Scientists, Politicians, and others against the attempt made in the City of Kieff to revive the hideous charge of Ritual Murder—known as the ‘Blood Accusation’—against Judaism and the Jewish People.
The question is one of humanity, civilization, and truth. The ‘blood accusation’ is a relic of the days of witchcraft and ‘black magic’, a cruel and utterly baseless libel on Judaism, an insult to Western culture, and a dishonour to the Churches in whose name it has been falsely formulated by ignorant fanatics. Religious minorities other than the Jews, such as the early Christians, the Quakers, and Christian Missionaries in China, have been victimized by it. It has been denounced by the best men of all ages and creeds. The Popes, the founders of the Reformation, the Khalif of Islam, statesmen of every country, together with all the great seats of learning in Europe, have publicly repudiated it.
Signed by:—
TheARCHBISHOPSofCANTERBURY,YORK,ARMAGH;theCARDINALARCHBISHOPofWESTMINSTER,and theHEADSof all otherCHRISTIANDENOMINATIONS.
TheBISHOPSofLONDON,OXFORD,WORCESTER,WINCHESTER,BIRMINGHAM,GLOUCESTER,LIVERPOOL,MANCHESTER,&c.;theDEANSofWESTMINSTER,CANTERBURY,NORWICH,RIPON,&c.
TheDUKESofNORFOLKandNORTHUMBERLAND,and theEARLSofROSEBERY,SELBORNE,andCROMER;LORDSMILNERandRAYLEIGH;A. J. BALFOUR,SIREDWARDCARSON,GEN.N. G.LYTTELTON,&c.
FREDERICHARRISON,A. V. DICEY,SIRWILLIAMOSLER,SIRFRANCISDARWIN,SIRWILLIAMRAMSAY;JAMESA. H. MURRAY,NORMANLOCKYER,J. G. FRAZER,&c.
SIROLIVERLODGE,thePRINCIPALSof elevenOXFORDCOLLEGES;theMASTERSof sevenCAMBRIDGECOLLEGES,S. R. DRIVER,F. C. BURKITT,A. E. COWLEY,W. SANDAY,H. B. SWETE,ESTLINCARPENTER,A. E. GARVIE,A. C. HEADLAM,KIRSOPPLAKE,&c.
JUSTICESEVE,WARRINGTON,andVAUGHANWILLIAMS.
A. C. DOYLE,THOS.HARDY,ANTHONYHOPE,A. QUILLER-COUCH,G. B. SHAW,H. G. WELLS,&c.
TheEDITORSof theEdinburgh,Quarterly,Fortnightly,Hibbert,Quest,Spectator,Nation,Daily Telegraph,Manchester Guardian,Daily Chronicle,Daily News,Pall Mall Gazette,&c.,&c.
JEWISH NATIONALISMWHEN it is rational to say, ‘I know not my father or my mother, let my children be aliens to me that no prayer of mine may touch them’, then it will be rational for the Jew to say, ‘I will not cherish the prophetic consciousness of our nationality—let the Hebrew cease to be, and let all his memorials be antiquarian trifles, dead as the wall paintings of a conjectured race’.The divine principle of our race is action, choice, resolved memory. Let us help to will our own better future and the better future of the world—not renounce our higher gift and say, ‘Let us be as if we were not among the populations’; but choose our full heritage, claim the brotherhood of our nation, and carry into it a new brotherhood with the nations of the Gentiles. The vision is there; it will be fulfilled.GEORGEELIOT, 1876,in ‘Daniel Deronda’.No British Jew would be less British because he looked upon the cradle of his race with pride, and at the religious centre of his faith with happiness and reverence.SIRMARKSYKES, 1918.
WHEN it is rational to say, ‘I know not my father or my mother, let my children be aliens to me that no prayer of mine may touch them’, then it will be rational for the Jew to say, ‘I will not cherish the prophetic consciousness of our nationality—let the Hebrew cease to be, and let all his memorials be antiquarian trifles, dead as the wall paintings of a conjectured race’.
The divine principle of our race is action, choice, resolved memory. Let us help to will our own better future and the better future of the world—not renounce our higher gift and say, ‘Let us be as if we were not among the populations’; but choose our full heritage, claim the brotherhood of our nation, and carry into it a new brotherhood with the nations of the Gentiles. The vision is there; it will be fulfilled.
GEORGEELIOT, 1876,in ‘Daniel Deronda’.
No British Jew would be less British because he looked upon the cradle of his race with pride, and at the religious centre of his faith with happiness and reverence.
SIRMARKSYKES, 1918.
A JEWISH NATIONALHOME61FOREIGN OFFICE,November 2, 1917.DEARLORDROTHSCHILD,I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet:—‘His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.’Yours sincerely,ARTHURJAMESBALFOUR.
FOREIGN OFFICE,November 2, 1917.
DEARLORDROTHSCHILD,
I have much pleasure in conveying to you, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet:—
‘His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.’
Yours sincerely,
ARTHURJAMESBALFOUR.
ISRAEL’S PRESERVATIONTHE destruction of the Holy City, the ruin of the House of God, the dispersion of the Chosen People into all the kingdoms of the earth, and their continued existence as a nation, notwithstanding every attempt to exterminate them or to compel them to forsake those ordinances which distinguish them to this very day from all other nations, is emphatically one of the strongest evidences we can have of the truth of the Bible. Jerusalem was indeed once a great city, and the Temple magnifical; but the Jews themselves were greater than either; hence, while the two former have been given over to spoliation, the latter have been wonderfully, miraculously preserved. The annals of the world do not contain anything so remarkable in human experience, so greatly surpassing human power and human prescience. Exiled and dispersed, reviled and persecuted, oppressed and suffering, often denied the commonest rights of humanity, and still more often made the victim of ruthless fanaticism and bigoted prejudice, the Jews are divinely preserved for a purpose worthy of a God!ST.JEROME,4th cent.
THE destruction of the Holy City, the ruin of the House of God, the dispersion of the Chosen People into all the kingdoms of the earth, and their continued existence as a nation, notwithstanding every attempt to exterminate them or to compel them to forsake those ordinances which distinguish them to this very day from all other nations, is emphatically one of the strongest evidences we can have of the truth of the Bible. Jerusalem was indeed once a great city, and the Temple magnifical; but the Jews themselves were greater than either; hence, while the two former have been given over to spoliation, the latter have been wonderfully, miraculously preserved. The annals of the world do not contain anything so remarkable in human experience, so greatly surpassing human power and human prescience. Exiled and dispersed, reviled and persecuted, oppressed and suffering, often denied the commonest rights of humanity, and still more often made the victim of ruthless fanaticism and bigoted prejudice, the Jews are divinely preserved for a purpose worthy of a God!
ST.JEROME,4th cent.
ISRAEL AND THENATIONS62THE Jew has made a marvellous fight in this world, in all the ages; and has done it with his hands tied behind him. The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendour, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away; the Greek and the Roman followed, and made a vast noise, and they are gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a time, but it burned out, and they sit in twilight now, or have vanished. The Jew saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was, exhibiting no decadence, no infirmities of age, no weakening of his parts, no slowing of his energies, no dulling of his alert and aggressive mind.MARKTWAIN, 1898.
THE Jew has made a marvellous fight in this world, in all the ages; and has done it with his hands tied behind him. The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendour, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away; the Greek and the Roman followed, and made a vast noise, and they are gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a time, but it burned out, and they sit in twilight now, or have vanished. The Jew saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was, exhibiting no decadence, no infirmities of age, no weakening of his parts, no slowing of his energies, no dulling of his alert and aggressive mind.
MARKTWAIN, 1898.