The Jew, The Gypsy and El Islam. Sir Richard Francis Burton

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СКАЧАТЬ sacred and profane, between light and darkness, between Israel and other nations.” On the New Year’s Day (Rosh ha-Shanah) the housemaster says at supper: “Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who didst select us from all other people, and exalt us above all other nations, and sanctify us with Thy commandments, … for Thou didst select us, and sanctify us from all other people. … Blessed art Thou, O Lord, the Sanctifier of Israel,” etc. At the Passover they repeat the same, adding, “Blessed art Thou, O Lord, the Sanctifier of Israel and the times.” During the Feast of Pentecost they pray, “Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who hast selected us above all other people, and exalted us above all other nations, and sanctified us with Thy commandments. … Our Lord is exalted—He is the first and the last, He desired and chose us, and delivered to us the Law.”

      Such are a few of the passages which are still approved of by learned and reverend Jews, “the stars of the evening twilight of their race.” These pretensions are evidently misplaced at the end of the nineteenth century. Their effects are remarkable upon the feeble brains of certain Christians, who, in conversation and missionary matters, have been thrown much in Jewish society, and who end by thoroughly believing all these absurd claims. A Gentile writes about them: “In addressing the posterity of the Patriarchs on such a theme [incredulity], well may I avail myself of the words held sacred by their fellow-citizens, not of their race, while I repeat the assertion that a Hebrew infidel—an infidel amongst the ‘Israelites, to whom appertained the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants,’ and to whom were committed the oracles of God’—the only open eye of the world when all the rest of mankind had darkness for their portion, or the light of dreams—is indeed a frightful, a portentous phenomenon!” Yet such as they are they number hundreds of thousands, and the spread of absolute infidelity is enormously on the increase.

[18] The journey of this eminent philanthropist to Alexandria in 1840 was a very remarkable one, all things considered. In 1855 he again visited “the East,” with the especial object of ameliorating the condition of his co-religionists in the Holy Land; and it is a favourite subject to conjecture how much, or how little, of the true state of things he was allowed to know. He certainly learned nothing from his Damascus host, the late Ishak Haim Farkhi, a Jew under French protection. Nor is it believed that he gained much knowledge of the true state of affairs at Jerusalem. For instance, the almshouses built outside the city under his trusteeship are occupied by the friends of the Scribes and those who pay court to them, not by the destitute for whom they were intended. When the venerable philanthropist paid his last visit, a collection of the poorest and the most miserable of the community was hurriedly installed there, and after his departure was as summarily ejected. The public has not forgotten his trip to Morocco, which, however, if matters progress as they do now, may eventually be regretted by his protégés.

[19] [I have retained 729, the date given by Burton, although Muhammad died in 732 from the effects of the experiment.]

[20] Upon the sanguineo-oleaginous expression of the Jews and the consequent pendency of the epiglottis, see “A Cause of Diminished Longevity among the Jews,” by Sir Duncan Gibb, Bart, M.A., M.D., LL.D., Article 10, Journal of Anthropology, No. 1, July, 1870, pp. 94–97. It exactly describes many of the Jews of Syria and Palestine.

[21] This is a complete misnomer applied to Christianity, which it confuses with the Rabbinical Schools of Tiberias and Safed.

[22] [The year would be 1873.]

[23] The Jewish family is still in England what it is all over the East, the chief defence of the individual against society. Hence the strong affections between relations. And for the same reason Jews are excellent parents—it can hardly be otherwise when the son is expected to liberate his father and mother from Sheol.

[24] This is a very small fibre of a very pretty root.

CHAPTER III

       THE JEW OF THE HOLY LAND AND HIS DESTINY

       Table of Contents

      In dealing with the Jews of the Holy Land, it is well to remember that the two great branches of the Hebrew race are the Sephardím and the Ashkenazím. They are both equally orthodox, and may intermarry when they please. It is advisable to offer a few words concerning these great branches first.

“Sepharad,” pronounced throughout “the East” Safard, a word occurring only once in the Old Testament (“and the captivity of Jerusalem, which is in Sepharad,” Obad. ver. 20), has been subjected to various interpretations. Enough to say the majority of Jews following the Targum Jonathan and the Peshito, or Syriac version, identify it with Iberia, modern Spain and Portugal. The Sephardím claim descent from the royal tribe of Judah, which, like the children of Benjamin, was the last to disperse. It contains the usual three orders: (1) The Cohen (in Arabic Káhin), the priest or Levite of the house of Aaron—a numerous body, as the Cohens of England show. Though born an ecclesiastic, he may now, since the rite of ordination has become extinct, pursue a purely laical trade. Whenever a Jew slaughters an animal, the Cohen claims the tongue, one side of the face, and one shoulder.[25] So in the days of Josephus (Antiquities of the Jews, IV. iv. 4) the priest took the maw, the cheek (or breast), and the right shoulder of the sacrifice privately killed for a festival. (2) The Levite or descendant of Levi, but not through the house of Aaron; like the Cohen, to whom he should pay the tithe of his tithes, he must prove his genealogy, which is often doubtful, and he is known by taking the name of Levi after his own and before that of his birthplace—e.g. Simeon Levi Salonikli. (3) “The circumcision” or Ammon Israelite.

      Since the final destruction of the Temple there are no Gentile Proselytes of the Covenant, that is, circumcised strangers admitted to all the privileges of the children of Abraham; nor are there Proselytes of the Gate, uncircumcised worshippers of Jehovah who keep the moral law. The Ger, or stranger, may be received into the Church under certain circumstances by purification and circumcision, which latter, unlike the law of Muhammad, is absolutely necessary. Judaism, however, like Hinduism and Guebrism, is essentially one of the old congenital creeds; it never has been, it is not, and it never will be a system of proselytizing. As regards the tribes, Judah and Levi are everywhere known. Benjamin, Ephraim, and Half Manasseh are spoken of, and tradition declares that Asher exists in Abyssinia with Karaïte peculiarities. Finally, many Jews do not believe that the Ten Tribes were ever lost. They say that, during the Great Captivity, when the faith became all but extinct, they were mixed to such an extent that it was afterwards impossible to separate them.

      The Sephardím, or Southern Jews, are mostly the descendants of Spanish and Portuguese ancestry, and throughout the Levant and the North African coast they speak Spanish and read and write it in their own character. Those of the Moroccan interior use Arabic. The dress is Oriental, and in the Holy Land they still wear the black turban ordained by the sumptuary laws of El Hakim (circa a.d. 1000). In physical appearance they are somewhat more prepossessing than the Ashkenazím, who are outnumbering them in Syria and Palestine, and are gradually ousting them. Officially they retain their position; the Hakhám Bashí, or chief doctor, is the only Jewish official recognized by the Turkish Government and representing the community in the Majlis, or town council. In all matters which come before the tribunals the Ashkenazím must be supported by the Hakhám Bashí, while the doctors hear and decide all cases relating to the internal affairs of СКАЧАТЬ