Jews and Moors in Spain

by Joseph Krauskopf

RODERICK'S LAMENT.

A SPANISH NATIONAL BALLAD.
Translated by J. G. Lockhart.

The host of Don Rodrigo were scattered in dismay,

When lost was the eighth battle, nor heart nor hope had they;

He, when he saw the field was lost, and all his hope was flown,

He turned him from his flying host and took his way alone,

His horse was bleeding, blind, and lame, he could no farther go,

Dismounted, without path or aim, the king stepped to and fro.

It was a sight of pity to look on Roderick,

For sore athirst and hungry he staggered faint and sick.

All stained and strewed with dust and blood, like to some smouldering brand

Pluck'd from the flame, Rodrigo shew'd. His sword was in his hand;

But it was hacked into a saw of dark and purple tint;

His jewell'd mail had many a flaw, his helmet many a dint.

He climbed unto a hill-top, the highest he could see,

Thence all about of that wild route his last long look took he.

He saw his royal banners where they lay drenched and torn,

He heard the cry of victory, the Arabs' shout of scorn.

He look'd for the brave captains that had led the hosts of Spain,

But all were fled except the dead, and who could count the slain?

Where'er his eyes could wander, all bloody was the plain;

And while thus he said the tears he shed ran down his cheeks like rain:

"Last night I was the King of Spain, to-day no king am I;

Last night fair castles held my train, to-night where shall I lie;

Last night a hundred pages did serve me on the knee,

To-night not one I call my own, not one pertains to me.

"O luckless, luckless was the hour, and cursed was the day

When I was born to have the power of this great seigniory;

Unhappy me that I should live to see the sun go down this night,

O Death, why now so slow art thou, why fearest thou to smite?"

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CHAPTER VI.
A SABBATH EVE IN CORDOVA.

THE SYNAGOGUE OF CORDOVA.—THE DAUGHTERS OF ISRAEL PREPARING FOR THE SABBATH.—THE THRONE OF THE "NASI."—RABBI MOSES BEN CHANOCH.—THE ELOQUENCE OF SILENCE.—A TEARFUL SCENE.—THREE RABBIS TAKEN CAPTIVE BY PIRATES.—EVIL DESIGNS AGAINST CHANOCH'S YOUNG AND BEAUTIFUL WIFE.—SOLD AS SLAVE TO CORDOVA.—HIS MIRACULOUS RISE.

A paved walk, guarded on each side by majestic cypress trees, winding its course along terraced gardens and near refreshing fountains, leads up to the lofty eminence on which stands the only synagogue of Cordova. Almost breathless we reach the height. We express our surprise that the Synagogue, visited twice daily, and thrice on the Sabbath day, should have been located so inconveniently, to which our distinguished friend Dunash ben Labrat replies: "Such is the custom in Israel, both Solomon[7] and Ezra[8] have established the custom of building the Synagogue on a lofty eminence, and the Talmud teaches: "The city whose houses are higher than its houses of worship will be destroyed."[9]

Before entering, we pause awhile to cast our eyes about us. Were we standing on Mount Moriah, of deathless memory, with the gorgeous temple of Solomon before us, and with the sacred scenery of Jerusalem and her environments about us, even such scenes could not have awed us more than those which fascinate our heart and mind on the temple-mount of Cordova, the brightest gem in the proud diadem of fair Andalusia.

At the foot of the mount glides the silvery Guadalquivir. The blushing sun is sinking behind the azure hills, and houses and synagogues and foliage and fountain and river, all are crimson tinted, while the fleecy cloudlets, that float in his radiant tracks, are resplendent with colors of purple and violet and gold and red. The evening star sparkles in the rosy sky so benignly, as if it were the eye of God, pleased at seeing His "chosen people" hasten to prostrate themselves before His footstool. The golden glimmering vapors, that rise from beneath the illumined horizon into infinite space, seem to vault over the Synagogue, as if bestowing celestial Sabbath blessing over its worshipers. All nature around us inspires to worship. The nightingales have begun their evening hymns, and the air is loud with the soft melting notes of the skylarks, who sing their sweet "Good Night" to the sunken sun. Our soul, too, is filled with a yearning to commune with God, and so we turn toward the synagogue.

Like the mezquita (mosque) its exterior facade is plain and unnoteworthy. We enter the high and spacious vestibule, and our eye is dazzled with all the magnificence, with the harmonious blending of colors, with the costly, but chaste ornamentations. The cupola above admits a free circulation of air, bringing the sweet fragrance of the surrounding gardens. On the one side is heard the refreshing sound of the flowing waters within the reservoirs for ablution, and on the other side the soft splash from the fountain jets in the garden.

Within the synagogue proper, clusters of delicate columns of various marbles and of costly woods, support double galleries, one above the other, with lattice work in front, that the black-eyed and raven-locked and comely-featured Hebrew women may not draw the mind of the worshipers beneath from their devotions. The galleries are empty now. The Hebrew women do not attend the service of the Sabbath Eve. They are at home awaiting the return of their husbands, fathers, brothers. All day long have they been busy in the preparation for the Sabbath. The house has been put in order. The choicest that means would allow and the market afford has been secured and prepared for the festive Sabbath meal. Upon the table, decked with snow white linens, and with the tempting dishes, burn the lights in the heavy silver candlesticks, and the traditional seven-armed Sabbath lamp, suspended from the center of the ceiling, having been lighted with Sabbath benedictions by the queen of the house, sheds a hallowed light over mother, wife and daughter, who are attired in their neatest, and whose countenances are flushed from the day's busy task, and whose eyes beam, and whose hearts beat with joyous expectations.

But we have strayed from the description of the galleries of the synagogue to the women in their homes. What wonder the Spanish Jews had need of their latticed railings!

The interspaces between the graceful horseshoe arches and the ovals in the ceiling are delicately pencilled with brilliant colors, and the walls are filled with arabesques interwreathing appropriate Hebrew texts.

The wall to the east, the direction towards Jerusalem, holds the Haichal, the shrine, in which is kept the Thora, the parchment scrolls of the Pentateuch.

The shrine is canopied by a wondrously designed shell-shaped covering, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, ivory and silver. A curtain of silk and woven gold, and decorated with gems of chrysolite and emeralds and sapphires, serves as a screen to this "Holy of Holies." Over this shell-shaped canopy is an illuminated window of artistic workmanship, inscribed in brilliant colors with the words, "Yehi Or," "Let there be light." The moon, queen of the night, rides in the cloudless sky, and she sends her peerless light through this double-triangled window, and the effect is most sublime.

Suspended from the ceiling, and directly in front of the curtain is the Ne'er Tamid the "Perpetual Lamp," famous for its wondrous beauty and for its priceless value, the gift of the mother of Chasdai ben Isaac, and its mellow light sends a hallowing influence over the congregants. Beneath it are the pyramidal steps, from which the descendants of the High-Priest Aaron bestow, on the great holidays, the priestly blessings upon the congregation. To the right and left of these stand the M'noroth, the high seven-armed candelabra, a faithful copy of the Biblical design[10].

In front of the steps stands the throne-like chair, in which is seated Chasdai ben Isaac, the Nasi, secular head of all European Jews, the Resh Kallah, President of the Academy for the Talmudical Sciences at Pumbadita in Babylonia, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and of Commerce, and of Finance to the Caliph Abderrahman III.

To the right of the shrine, on a raised platform, are seated Rabbi Moses ben Chanoch, the Dayan, the chief judge and chief rabbi of all European Jews; at his right the Sh'liach Hazibur, the Reader, is seated; at his left his Chief Assistant Dayan; at his feet sit the most advanced disciples of his far-famed academy.

To the left of the "Shrine" is seated the Rosh Hak'neseth, the President of the congregation; behind his chair stands the Chazan Hak'neseth, the beadle, to his right and left the officers of the congregation are seated, at their feet sit the elders.

These three groups sit with their faces towards the congregation, while the congregation faces the shrine. In the center of this capacious interior is the "Almemor," or the "Bimah," a spacious elevated platform of magnificent design. A balustrade encircles this platform, whose balusters, as well as those of the graceful stairways that lead up to the platform on both sides, are of delicate alabaster columns. On this "Bimah" is the Reader's desk, and the Rabbi's pulpit, placed there, that the vast audience may have the opportunity of advantageous hearing.

From the ceiling great chandeliers are suspended, which shed a shower of light upon the host of worshipers, and streaming through the inexpressibly beautiful stained-glass windows, the synagogue, that towers high above the city of Cordova, sheds its benign rays of holiness and peace and good will over the city and all its people.

The floor of the vestibule is composed of marble, mosaics and glazed tiles, so joined as to form various complicated patterns of surpassing beauty. The floor of the synagogue is covered with embroidered Persian carpets.

Though the seats are filled, and the officers are in their respective places—

"No sound is uttered—but a deep

And solemn harmony pervades."

Verily, the Hebrews understand the essence of worship well. There is in every prayerful soul that indefinable yearning and longing after the infinite, after the highest and the sublimest that can give eloquent utterance in deep silence only. The soul may stammer forth its wants and its thanks, but its deepest, innermost feelings never. Therefore have the Jews established the custom that the service of expression shall ever be preceded by the still more sacred service of silent meditation.

The strange surroundings, and the wondrous sights, have so completely taken hold of our mind that it cannot find that calm repose so necessary for silent devotion, and so, while the others are lost in meditations our mind, continues its observations.

Two men rivet our attention. The one is Chasdai ben Isaac, one of those awe-and-respect-commanding and love-and-confidence-inspiring appearances we meet with but rarely in life. His features present an embodiment of three distinct races. His high and square forehead, his deep-set eye, his aquiline nose, his prominent chin, indicative of profound wisdom, of capacities to command and of great will power; these bespeak the Palestinian Hebrew. The grace and comeliness of the figure bespeak the Moor. His tall, majestic form, full of life and vigor, bespeak the European Visigoth.

No less attractive is the person of Rabbi Moses Ben Chanoch. There is something strange and fascinating in his intelligent countenance. Some strange, sweet melancholy seems to hover about his eyes. The lines of his face fall into an expression of mild suffering, of endurance sweetened and sustained by holiness and resignation to God's will. He seems to be more deeply lost in meditation than any of the rest. Now and then his forehead wrinkles, and his lips quiver, as if in pain, and his teeth close, as if suppressing a cry of anguish.

Is the great and learned and pious Rabbi, revered wherever a Jewish heart beats, whether in Asia or in Africa or in Europe, through whom the light of Eastern learning, which, by the dispersion of the illustrious teachers, and by the final closing of the great schools, seemed to have been extinguished forever, suddenly rose again in the West in renewed and undiminished splendor, is he really lost in pious meditations? We have our suspicions, and may God pardon us if we suspect him wrongfully.

"There are moments when silence, prolonged and unbroken,

More expressive may be than all words ever spoken,

It is when the heart has an instinct of what

In the heart of another is passing."[11]

It may be, he recalls the day of his departure from Sura, in company with his young and beautiful wife, and his little son, and three other young and eminent rabbis, Rabbi Sahamaria ben Elchanan, Rabbi Chuschiel and Rabbi Nathan ben Isaac Kohen, for the purpose of raising funds for the academy at Sura, which was then in its last throes. He is recalling, perhaps, the harrowing scene when they were taken captive along the Italian coast by the Spanish-Moorish pirate, Admiral Ibn Rumachis. His quivering lips and wrinkled brow and his suppressed cry of anguish betray his thinking of the evil designs which the pirate admiral carried in his foul heart against his young and beautiful wife; how she, the pious and innocent, preferring death to infamy, had asked him, concealing the motive: whether there is resurrection for those who perish in the sea; and how he, unsuspecting, answered in the affirmative, basing it upon Psalm lxviii: 23. "The Lord said, I will bring again from Bashon, I will bring again from the depths of the sea," how she, no sooner had the answer been given, plunged into the sea, and the raging billows swallowed his young and beautiful wife, the mother of his young and only child.

Hence, his wrinkled brow and quivering lip and melancholy expression on the blessed Sabbath eve. No illuminated home awaits him. No wife that has cheerfully labored all day long to prepare for the festive reception of the Sabbath. No wife to greet him with her cheery smile, and with her wise and pure and holy converse to dispel the cares and worries of the week. No mother to press his child against her love-beating bosom and call him, too, "My own sweet child."

His thoughts continue in their wandering. He recalls the day when he was sold as slave to Cordova; how he was ransomed by the Jewish community, though his quality and learning were unknown; how he entered, one day, the school for Talmud studies, over which Rabbi Nathan, "Dayan" of the Jews of Cordova, presided; how he, ashamed of his costume of sackcloth, seated himself in a corner, at a respectful distance from the disciples; how he, aroused, at last, by the false decisions of the ignorant Rabbi Nathan, forgetting in his excitement his humble state, and his costume of sackcloth, ventured to correct, with becoming modesty, the decisions rendered; how all eyes had turned towards the poor slave; how, to draw forth his learning, Rabbi Nathan entered into a debate with him, in which he evinced such profound scholarship that Rabbi Nathan exclaimed with enthusiastic admiration.

"I am no longer Head of this School—Yon slave in sackcloth is my master, and I his disciple."

His mind continues in its reveries. He recalls how he had been installed by acclamation as Head of the Jewish community; how he had gained the favor of Chasdai and of the Caliph; how his great school was founded and is flourishing now, and is the most famous in the Jewish literary world.

His face becomes more and more placid. He recognizes the finger of God in his fate. His capture, and that of his three colleagues, he sees now, has been providential. They had been destined to carry the knowledge from the schools of Babylon to Africa and Europe. His colleagues had fared equally as well. Rabbi Sahamaria ben Elchanan had been sold as a slave to Alexandria, where he, too, was ransomed by the Jewish community, and later he also established a flourishing school at "Misr" (Kahira). Rabbi Chuschiel met with the same fate. He was sold to Kairuan, on the coast of Africa, and there he, too, opened a school. Rabbi Nathan ben Isaac Kohen was sold to Narbonne, France, and, as if fate had so ordered it, he too opened a flourishing school at that place. He would have continued his reveries had not the "Sh'liach Hazibur" aroused him, who leaves his side, and mounting the "Almemor," takes his place at his desk. The services are to begin, and so we, too, must cease our observations, and unite with our co-religionists in their joyous and reverential greeting of the weekly Sabbath, the blessed Day of Rest.

---

CHAPTER VII.
A SABBATH EVE IN CORDOVA
(CONTINUED.)

THE EVENING SERVICE.—A BEAUTIFUL CUSTOM IN ISRAEL.—HONORED WITH AN INVITATION TO CHASDAI'S HOUSE.—ILLUMINATED STREETS.—THE TWO ANGELS.—AN IDEAL SABBATH IN AN IDEAL HOME.—THE PRAISE OF THE VIRTUOUS WOMAN.—A FATHER'S BLESSING.—PRESENTED TO THE LADIES.—THE EVENING MEAL.—THE JEWISH KINGDOM OF THE KHOZARS.

The "Sh'liach Hazibur," (Reader) has taken his position before the lecturn upon the "Bimah." From a voluminous parchment folio he chants the beautiful and joyous Psalms xcv, xcix, cii, in that fascinating musical recitative, peculiar to Hebrew liturgy, so joyous and yet so holy, so gay and yet so reverential, so intensely sacred, so religiously elevating as to lift the worshiper on its mighty pinions, gently, from week-day life into the higher and purer Sabbath realm.

The "Reader" and the congregation sing alternate verses. What a grand chorus of human voices! What majestic strains wing their heaven-ward flight! How sublime a music to hear these hundreds of men entune their sacred anthems to God. Sweet is the sound of the melting harp and of the warbling lute, but sweeter than both is the music that rises from the warm human breast. Touching are the strains of the nightingale and the lark, but sublimest and most touching of all is the sacred music that rises from the innermost depths of the strong and masculine heart. Such

"Music religious heat inspires,

It wakes the soul and lifts it high

And wings it with sublime desires,

And fits it to bespeak the Deity."

To hear a man weep, to see his strong bosom melt in tears and his great grief express itself in eloquent sobs, breaks another's heart, to hear him sing with fervor and devotion the praises of God, gives the strongest stay to the human soul. When men sincerely sing religious songs their hearts speak. When we hear the Elders in front, yon saintly patriarchs, laureled with the silver crown of three and four and five score years, mingle their voices with those of the young in the religious songs, we know such songs raise their weary souls above mortal weakness, soften their pain to ease, stay the ruthless hand of fell disease, and force death itself to sheathe, yet awhile, his unsparing scythe, and our lips involuntarily breathe forth the benediction: Praised be Thou, O God, who hast blessed us with the gift of song.

The congregation rises and the "Reader" chants aloud the Borchu, the appeal to the congregation "to worship God, the Worship deserving," to which they answer: "Yea, we will worship God, for deserving of praise is He, now and evermore."

They resume their seats and continue their prayers. They render thanks for the genial hour of twilight, which bids the weary laborer cease, and takes him to his peaceful home, and rewards him there with shelter and with rest. They render thanks for the revealed truths and doctrines conducive to moral good and human excellence, and sincerely they pray, that, as long as in their thoughts and deeds God's word is their law, and that law their light, they may never be without his fatherly care. Again they rise; amidst awe-inspiring solemnity, the "Reader" chants Israel's great creed: "Hear, O Israel, the Eternal, our God is One," to which the worshipers respond in one grand chorus: "Praised be the name of His glorious kingdom forever and aye."

Silent, but fervent, devotion ensues. They express their deathless faith in the God of their fathers, in Him who sustains life, supports the falling, heals the sick, takes to himself the souls of the departed, crowns the week with the blessed Sabbath day, and they conclude praying that God may keep their tongues from evil, their lips from uttering deceit, and arm them with meekness against ill will, that he may impart humility in their soul and faith in their heart; that He may be their support when grief silences their voice and comfort them when woe bends their spirit, that truth may illuminate their path and wisdom be their guide; that He may frustrate every evil device and turn to goodness the hearts of those who devise them.

The "Reader" breaks the silence by taking a goblet of wine, and with it, as the symbol of joy, he entunes the Kiddush, the consecration of the Sabbath as a day of rest and joy and spiritual elevation.

The mourners and those who commemorate the anniversary of the death of some dear departed, rise now and recite the Kaddish, the "Mourner's Prayer," by which they utter even in their painful trials, their pious submission to God's will and to His superior wisdom.

How sublime this mourner's service! How consoling to those who mourn and weep, to those who have mourned and wept, and how instructive to those who are destined to mourn and weep! It is as fraught with goodly lessons for those whom the hand of death has spared as for those who have been afflicted. It is more potent to move the heart than are the most fervent prayers, more eloquent than the most stirring discourses. Would you have your family life the sweetest, the purest, the most blessed, while it lasts, then go to the synagogue, hear the Mourner's Kaddish, and think how that heart must feel that has seen one of its links, neglected while living, go down into the lonely grave, there, where all the acts of charity and kindness, where the choicest of flowers and most expensive of monuments can cheer the silent sleeper no more. Would you have help to overcome jealousy and hatred, contempt and evil thoughts and evil deeds, go to the synagogue, hear the solemn "Kaddish," learn from it that there is a time when regret and repentance come too late to be heard, a time when sobbing and wailing can not pierce the clods. Would you moderate your ambitions and check your appetites, would you see the frailty of the mortal, would you keep your heartstrings vibrating in sympathy with suffering humanity, would you have a clear conception of the ends and aims of life, would you keep your conscience pure, then go to the synagogue, see the mourners rise, and from their sighs and tears learn the lesson that for the proud and the humble, the high and the low, the learned and the ignorant, the rich and the poor, the tyrant and the slave, the king and the servant there is but one common goal, death equalizes them all, his scythe knows no caste, no creed, no name, no fame, no title and no rank.

But we have strayed from the living to the dead, from the joyous to the sorrowful. Let us return to the service.

Again the congregation rises and solemnly they read the "Olenu," the concluding prayer, in which they express their fervent hope to behold soon the splendor of God's majesty, such as will call unbelief to vanish from the earth, will banish wickedness forever, will lead all mortals to recognize and worship the One and Only God, and bring on that glorious day when all men will live together in unity and brotherly peace, and the spirit of enlightenment will reign supreme over all.

Another joyous Sabbath hymn and the services are concluded.

In the vestibule, in the meantime, a number of strangers, showing by their appearance and costume to belong to different countries and to different stations of life, had gathered. They awaited there the conclusion of the services to be invited home for the Sabbath meal, for it is considered a sin in Israel if a brother in faith, be he rich or poor, friend or stranger, passes, or is permitted to pass, the joyous Sabbath Eve by himself, alone and forsaken, and it is regarded an act of piety to grace the festive board of the Sabbath meal with the presence of strangers. And so the company of these strangers is pressingly solicited, and the invitation is cheerfully accepted. Moses ben Chanoch, the Rabbi, and Jacob ben Eleasar, the special messenger, who had on that day returned from the Jewish kingdom of the Khozars, and we, who were cordially greeted after we were presented by our friend Dunash ben Labrat, are the guests of the distinguished "Nasi."

Through whatever streets we pass, the houses inhabited by Jews vie in their brightness with the brilliant illumination of the streets. A bright and cheery home on the Sabbath Eve is a law unto the Jew. "From the house that is cheerfully illuminated on the Sabbath great minds will issue"[12] spoke the Talmud, and it said still more: "When the Israelite leaves the synagogue for his home, on the Sabbath Eve, an Angel of Good and an Angel of Evil accompany him. If, upon entering his home, he finds the table spread, the Sabbath lamp lighted, and his wife and children attired in festive garments, ready to receive him, and in unison with him to bless the Holy Day of Rest, the Good Angel sweetly speaks: "Thy next Sabbath, and all the Sabbaths shall be as bright and as happy as this. Peace unto this dwelling forever," to which the Angel of Evil says a reluctant "Amen." But if no preparations have been made to greet the Sabbath, if light, and song, and thanksgiving do not cheer the inmates of the house, then the Angel of Evil exultingly speaks: "May thy next Sabbath and all thy Sabbaths be as this. Gloom, misery, dissension, unhappiness unto this dwelling forever," to which the Angel of Good, bathed in tears, stammers forth a reluctant "Amen."[13]

Upon entering the palatial residence, the very atmosphere breathes holiness and peace. Scarcely has Chasdai ben Isaac crossed his threshhold, when, in accordance with the established custom in Israel, in a joyous but sacred melody, in which his mother, and wife, and children join, they sing the salute to the Sabbath angels at the domestic hearth, repeating each verse three times. Thus it runs:

"Peace unto you, ye angels of God, ye high messenger from the King of Kings, praised be He."

"May your coming be in peace, ye angels of God, ye high messengers from the King of Kings, praised be He."

"Bless us with peace, ye angels of God, ye high messengers from the King of Kings, praised be He."

"Let your parting be in peace, ye angels of God, ye high messengers from the King of Kings, praised be He."

Then fondly taking his mother by his right hand and his wife by his left, and leading them both lovingly to the center of the room beneath the radiant glow of the hallowed Sabbath lamp, he sings the last twenty-one verses of the last chapter of the Book of Proverbs, that noblest of all noble tributes to the virtuous woman, which reads as follows: "The heart of the husband of the virtuous woman doth safely trust in her, so that he shall not want for gain. She will do him good and not harm, all the days of her life. She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh with diligent hands. She is like the merchant ships; she bringeth her food from afar. She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and the day's work to her maidens. She considereth a field and buyeth it. With her fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard. She girdeth her loins with strength and maketh strong her arms. She sees that her trading yields good profit; her lamp is kept burning by night. She layeth her hands on the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff. She stretcheth out her hands to the poor, yea, she reacheth out her hands to the needy. She is not afraid of the snow for her household, for all her children are clothed with scarlet wool. She maketh herself robes, her clothing is silk and purple. Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land. She maketh fine linen and selleth it, and delivers girdles unto the merchants. Strength and honor are her clothing, and she smiles at days to come. She openeth her mouth with wisdom, and in her tongue is the law of kindness. She looketh well to the ordering of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness. Her sons rise up and praise her, her husband also, and he extols her. Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excelleth them all. Gracefulness is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised. Give her the honor that the fruits of her hands deserve; her works are the praise of all in the gates."

The scene of that happy group, Chasdai, the learned and sagacious minister of the Moorish realm, facing his wife and mother, and encircled by his children, singing this glorious tribute to the virtuous women—a weekly tribute that has done much toward establishing the beauty and grandeur of the Jewish family life—the wife, whose beautiful form and features and grace express nobility of character and godliness within, as she lowers her black and musing eyes, as her bosom heaves with tender emotion, and her countenance is mantled with the scarlet hue of innocence at her husband's enumeration of her praises; the queenly mother, majestic and tall as her son, and in her beauty a rival to his beautiful wife, as she holds her eye with speaking pride upon her distinguished son; that scene is for the artist's brush and for the sculptor's chisel. It is too beautiful, too pathetic, too sublime for the feeble tongue or pen.

The children crowd to their father, and kissing them fondly, he lays his hands in blessing upon them. Verily, blessed is the head upon which parents' hands lie in blessing, and blessed are the parents' hands that lie in blessing upon a child's head. We know now whence to trace the cause of Chasdai's greatness and nobility of mind and excellence of character. That happy home life reveals to us the secret of his success. Here is the perennial fountain whence he quaffs daily the sweet draughts of moral goodness and human excellence. Here is that earthly paradise where kindness and good will, and peace, love, joy, reverence, mingle and produce continuous ecstatic bliss.

We are presented to the ladies and a hearty welcome is written on their countenance. We are no stranger to them, for Dunash ben Labrat has kindly announced us in advance, and they are pleased with our presence, for they, too, are longing to hear of the entrance of the Jews into Europe, especially of the entrance into Spain. We are shown our places at the festive board. A servant pours water on our hands from a basin and ewer. Chasdai rises, and filling a goblet with wine, he repeats, in melodious strains, the "Kiddush," the ceremony we had already seen in the synagogue, the consecration of the Sabbath as a day of rest and joy and spiritual elevation within the sacred precints of the home. From beneath a beautifully embroidered cloth he takes the Sabbath loaf, recites the benediction, and breaking it, gives a piece thereof to every diner. And now the meal begins, spiced with excellent conversation, in which the women enter as lively as the men, and more than once their profound knowledge and brilliancy of mind and subtle wit exact from us expressions of admiration. The chief topic of the conversation is concerning the Jewish kingdom of the Khozars, from whom Jacob ben Eleazar had brought the anxiously-awaited news that morning. What we gather from this conversation is this:

West of the Caspian Sea is a powerful kingdom, named "Khozar," before the strength of which the Persian monarchy trembles, and whose favor and alliance is courted by the Greek Empire. Its original inhabitants were a Turcoman tribe, who had gradually abandoned their nomadic habits and maintained considerable commerce. Their capitol, Bilangiar, is situated at the mouth of the Volga, and a line of cities stretches across from thence to the Don. Merchants of all religions, Christians, Mohammedans and Jews, were freely admitted, and their superior intelligence over his more barbarous subjects had induced one of their kings, Bulan (740 A. C.), to embrace the religion of the Jews. His choice between the conflicting claims of Christianity, Mohammedanism and Judaism was decided in this manner: He examined the different teachers apart. He asked the Christians if Judaism was not better than Mohammedanism. To which the Christians replied affirmatively. He asked the Mohammedan teachers if Judaism was not better than Christianity. To which they, too, replied in the affirmative. Both deciding in favor of Judaism, the king embraced the faith of Moses, and induced learned Jewish teachers to settle in his domains. A belief in Judaism is the necessary condition on the accession to the throne. The most liberal toleration of all other forms of faith prevails. But of this Jewish kingdom nothing was known in Spain till Chasdai learned of its existence through the ambassadors of the Byzantian emperor. Chasdai, to assure himself fully of the sovereignty possessed by his brethren, had sent Jacob ben Eleazar as a messenger to them, with a letter to their king, which concluded thus: "Were I sure of the existence of this kingdom I would throw aside all my present honors and positions, and, hastening to it, would throw myself at the feet of a Jewish king and feast my heart and eyes at the sight of his might and splendor." That very day had brought the eagerly looked-for letter from the present King of the Khozars. Chagan Joseph, giving the above information, and concluding thus: "I, too, am desirous of knowing thee and of profiting by thy wisdom. Could my desire be gratified, and could I speak to thee face to face, thou wouldst be to me as a father, and I thy son, and into thy hand would I intrust the government of my kingdom."

The meal was finished and grace was said. Dunash ben Labrat, mindful of the promise he had made to Abdallah ben Xamri to bring him whenever Chasdai would relate to us the history of the entrance of the Jews into Spain, had come with his Moorish colleague, and they are announced. Chasdai leads the way to the library, and we follow.

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CHAPTER VIII.
THE ENTRANCE OF THE JEWS INTO EUROPE.

CHASDAI'S LIBRARY.—HIS ACCOUNT OF THE ENTRANCE OF THE JEWS INTO EUROPE.—THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM.—A TERRIBLE CARNAGE.—ISRAEL CEASES AS A NATION.—THE DIASPORE.—THE DAUGHTER-RELIGIONS THRIVE UPON THE SUFFERINGS THEY INFLICT UPON THE MOTHER-RELIGION.—THE INDESTRUCTIBILITY OF ISRAEL.—HUMILIATED BUT NOT FORSAKEN.

When we were comfortably seated in the magnificent library of Chasdai ben Isaac, which was furnished luxuriantly, and with an eye to ease and comfort, and stocked with thousands of parchment folios, which stood row upon row, from floor to ceiling, in beautifully arched and decorated alcoves, along the walls of the spacious library hall, our host, Chasdai ben Isaac, began:

"My friends, you asked for an account of 'The Entrance of the Jews into Europe.' The task you honor me with is not an easy one. Upon these shelves stand side by side the best that has been written upon History, Theology and Science, the classics, old and new, in their various tongues, both in prose and poetry, all that has been written for and against the religions of Mohammedanism and Christianity and Judaism, and yet among these thousands of volumes you will search in vain for historic traces of the movements of the Hebrew people since their exile from their native soil. Nay, more, you may even look through the vast library of the Caliph, than which exists at present (950 A. C.) none greater upon the face of the earth, and still you will find naught upon this subject. You may consult the most renowned scholars of our age and meet with no better result.

You marvel why so little is known of the History of the Jews during the period that extends from the Diaspore (70 A. C.) to the time of the conquests of the Arab-Moors of Spain, yet you will cease to marvel when you reflect upon the degradations, persecutions, cruelties, sufferings heaped upon them, when you remember that histories are never written of those who are considered outcasts, pariahs, moral lepers, the accursed by God and man, and the so degraded and execrated, the so persecuted and so barbarously treated are not over-zealous to rejoice their scourgers by flaunting the history of their suffering in their face. What I know of that period is little, and that little have I secured only after much labor and diligent research.

Insatiable Rome, she who had made the world her slave, in whose realm the sun ne'er set, and who, to vaunt of so vast a power, had killed in cold blood, and for no offense at all, fully as many as she ever claimed among the living had stretched at last her cruel hand against Palestine, and the "separate" and "peculiar" and sacred land became a heathen heritage. Jerusalem, the Holy City, lay in ruins. Smoking embers marked the site where stood the Temple of Temples, and the glory of Israel fell, and fell forever, and Israel ceased, and ceased forever, as a nation among the nations of the earth.

Rome enacted a carnage within the holy city, the like of which her inhuman legions, with all their multitudinous and murderous experience, had never seen before. What the famine had left the sword consumed, and what escaped the sword fell a prey to the flames, and what remained, after streams of human blood had quenched the flames, dropped dead beneath the pestilence, and they, that had defied all these grim allies of cruel death, were driven into an open space, the tallest and most handsome were reserved to grace the triumphal march of Titus, to be dragged along the streets of Rome with a halter around their neck, and to be executed after the eyes and ears of the Romans had had their fill of the conquered's sufferings; of the rest, all above seventeen years of age were sold to distant countries, to the most cruel servitude, or they were distributed among the provinces to give sport to the people by their gladiatorial combats, fighting for their lives against hungry and ferocious beasts.

One million one hundred and ten thousand Jews perished during this siege; ninety-seven thousand were driven in chains as slaves to distant lands. The old and feeble, and the young and helpless who were spared, not from mercy, but because the Romans for once, weary of their slaughter, and sickened from the loathsome sight and insufferable stench that arose from the heaps of unburied, putrid bodies, were forced to retreat. This pitiable remnant was compelled to take the staff of exile.

Forth they went from their native soil to roam the wide world over. Everywhere homeless, friendless, despised, trodden down, hunted down by man and beast, tortured, an object of derision, a shadow of their former greatness.

And when occasionally a ray of tolerance found its way to these outcast people, and under the spell of its genial warmth the degraded dog was metamorphosed again into a human being, and the Jewish mind awoke again into life, and the Jew, strengthened and rejuvenated and encouraged, dared to enter again into the arena of useful activity, that single ray was at once recalled by priests, who were more cunning and contriving than humane and godly, for only upon the suffering of the mother-religion could the daughter-religion expect to exist. It was feared that the prosperity of Judaism would prove the absurdity of Christianity's and Islam's claims and prophecies. If the Jews are permitted to prosper and flourish and follow their religion, and that religion is shown to be full of life and vigor, what reason for existence have the daughter-religions? Success and prosperity must accompany only that religion which the masses are to accept and follow, and for which superiority is claimed over the others. Such was their sophistical and self-interested reasoning, and so they afflicted and tortured the Jews, denied them every human right, and then kindly and magnanimously credited God with their own wickedness, claiming that God visited these punishments upon the Jews for their rejection of Christ or Mohammed. Hence, the uninterrupted persecutions and sufferings of the Jews.

But God had not withdrawn his guiding hand from His Chosen People. He had cast them down, but he forsook them not. Never before had they been so nigh unto extinction, and still they despaired not. With David they said: 'Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff shall comfort me.'[14] They lost not their faith in God and in their divine mission. They doubted not that there was a meaning to their sudden change of fortune. They believed that as each seed when sown must endure darkness and suffer decay before it can multiply its kind a hundredfold, so had God scattered the children of Israel as seeds among the nations of the earth, and subjected them to threats and sufferings that the number of true believers might increase a thousandfold. They regarded it a special distinction to be chosen by God to spread monotheism and civilization among the children of men.[15]

"This strong faith in the superior wisdom of God's doing was the elixir that preserved them during their indescribable sufferings. This it was that established unconsciously a bond of union among them, scattered though they were, and whithersoever they went, however near to or however far from the land where once stood the cradle of their nation, their temple and palaces, where ruled and sang and spoke their princes and bards and inspired orators of deathless fame, however removed from this dearly beloved center, one past and one future, one hope and one aim, characterized them all and planted within them the seeds of indestructibility.

What wonder then that soon after this terrible national calamity, a disaster from which no other people on the face of the earth could have possibly survived, we hear of large Jewish communities in Asia, Africa and Europe? Some of these were established even before the dissolution of the Jewish kingdom. At the time of Titus numerous Jewish communities existed in the countries bordering on the Euphrates and the Tigris, in Asia Minor on the north coast of Africa, in Greece and in Italy. The Jewish community in Rome was large and influential long before the reign of Titus, having been brought thither as slaves by Pompey, after his conquest of Jerusalem. After the terrible siege of Jerusalem, crowds of exiles wandered to them and swelled their number, and these destitute exiles must have diminished the community's opulence and respectability and popularity, for before the Diaspore Latin authors speak of them as a wealthy and respected community; after this period, the notices of them by Juvenal and Martial are contemptuous, and imply that many of them were in the lowest state of penury, the outcasts of society.

Whatever city in Asia Minor and Greece the Apostle Paul enters he seems to find a synagogue. In some of these cities the Jews seem to have flourished; in most of them, however, they were proscribed as an odious people, and were objects of hatred and abhorrence. The rule seemed to be, in localities where Christianity predominated the Jews suffered; where the Heathens were in power the Jewish communities flourished.

In Italy they were permitted, with few exceptions, to live in peace. Even though Theoderic wrote: "Why should we give them peace in this life, when God will not give them peace in the life to come?" and even though Cassiodorus piously bestowed upon them the flattering appellations of "scorpions, wild asses, dogs," etc., it never came to very serious persecutions, and the valiant defense of Naples by the Jews against the great Belisarius, for which History gives them their deserved credit, clearly shows how the Jew can be patriotic for his adopted fatherland.

Concerning the Jews in Western Europe, we have no knowledge before the second century. When the Franks and Burgundians conquered the Roman colonies in Gaul, the Jews, who had been brought thither as slaves, were classed by the victors, as Romans, and shared equal fate with them. They were permitted to follow agricultural pursuits and trades. Their own ships furrowed the ocean. Jewish physicians were sought by the princes of the Church and of the Realm. As soldiers they distinguished themselves in the warfare between Clovis and Theoderic. Their religious practices were not interfered with, the Jew was everywhere respected by the heathen.

But the sun of their prosperity was extinguished when the heathen kings adopted Christianity. With the change of their religion came a change of heart; the heart that was formerly full of love toward the Jew, turned into stone. The clergy dictated, and the kings and the people obeyed with the sword, and the Jews bled and suffered and perished by the thousands, or were dragged under tortures to baptism into the alone-saving and all-loving church.

So much for the early history of the Jews in France. We now come to the history of the Jews in Spain. That theme is vast. It demands a chapter for itself.

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CHAPTER IX.
THE ENTRANCE OF THE JEWS INTO SPAIN.

JEWS SETTLE IN SPAIN DURING THE REIGN OF KING SOLOMON.—JEWISH AGRICULTURAL SKILL MAKES ANDALUSIA THE GARDEN SPOT OF EUROPE.—PROSPERITY THE GREAT CRIME OF THE JEWS.—THE BEGINNING OF JEWISH PERSECUTIONS IN EUROPE.—CRUEL LAWS.—VENGEANCE.—JEWS CONSPIRE WITH COUNT JULIAN AND MOORS AGAINST SPAIN.—VICTORY.—MOORISH APPRECIATION OF THE SERVICES OF THE JEWS.

The week had passed. It was Sabbath Eve once more. Again we assembled in the library hall of Chasdai ben Isaac to listen to the narrative of "The Entrance of the Jews into Spain." When all were gathered Chasdai began and spoke as follows: History is more communicative about the entrance of the Jews into Spain than she is about their entrance into any of the other West European countries. The Bible gives us sufficient basis to build upon the fairly reliable theory that as early as the time of King Solomon (1,000 B. C.) the Iberian peninsula was known to the Israelites, that considerable traffic was carried on between them and the autochtones of the Southwestern corner of Europe, and that a settlement of a Jewish colony within the sunny lands of Andalusia may have taken place then. We have a tradition which tells us, that when in the early days of the Christian era the Jews of Spain were attacked for having crucified Jesus, they claimed that neither they nor their fathers had any share in the crucifixion, that they were the descendants of Jews who lived in Spain long before the time of Christ, and produced a gravestone upon which was inscribed: "This is the grave of Adonirams, the servant of Solomon the king, who came hither to collect the tribute for the king."

We know that when the Romans became complete masters of Spain in the second century B. C. they found a considerable number of Israelites domiciled there. About 60 A. C. the Jewish community of Spain must have been strong and influential enough to make the coming of the Apostle Paul among them necessary.[16]

Crowds of exiles wandered westward and swelled their number after the terrible siege of Jerusalem by Titus, and in addition 80,000 slaves are said to have been transferred thither and sold as slaves and speedily ransomed by their more fortunate brethren. Historic sources are agreed that these Jewish inhabitants of Spain by their passionate fondness for agricultural pursuits, a passion which they had brought along from the Holy Land, soon made Andalusia the garden spot of Europe, and by their industry, frugality, skill in traffic and intellectual powers, they became the pillars of the country's prosperity and acquired great wealth and distinction.

It could not have been otherwise. In habits, aims and ambitions there was an organic difference between the Jews and their warlike fellow citizens. The Romans, as well as the Visigoths, were wedded to military life. Every other calling or pursuit was degrading in their eyes. Trading or tilling the soil was in their eyes only befitting the slave. The uncertainty of their future, their roaming life, their habit of living from plunder, developed in them traits that were just the opposite to those of the Jews. The Jew hated war. His love for home was intense. His industry and frugality, his religious life and his love of study, were proverbial, and so in proportion as the others increased in brutality and ignorance, in poverty and moral corruption, the Jews reached the heights of prosperity, morality and intellect.

That prosperity, however, proved to be their curse. It is a mistake to believe that the greatest crime of the Jews was their faith; it was their prosperity. Idlers and spendthrifts have never yet been thrilled with ecstatic delight at another's prosperity, and never is their venom more poisonous and their wrath more bitter than when the Jew is unfortunate enough to be fortunate. In Spain, as elsewhere, a mighty power of soldiers, and monks, and priests, and dependants, all unproductive laborers, stood arrayed against the handful of Jews, the only productive laborers of the realm, and the battle cry was not the Jews' money, but the Jews' "soul." There was great diplomacy in this battle cry. They knew of the intensity of the Jew's faith in his religion. They knew how he was wedded to the traditions and hopes of his race. They knew that he would cheerfully part with all his treasures rather than sacrifice an iota of his belief. They knew that the industrial, and economical, and intellectual, and peace and home-loving traits of the Jew were so deeply rooted, that he would at once begin anew to acquire again, perhaps for the same end, all that had been cruelly torn from him, just as the bees, nothing daunted by the theft of their painfully hoarded wealth, will start anew to fill the hive. And so, whenever they had need of the money of the Jews, and that need was, alas, a frequent one, they became all at once painfully concerned about the Jewish soul, and its final fate, and they never failed to relieve the Jews of their treasures, even if they failed in the saving of their souls.

Spain took the lead in Jewish persecutions and maintained its odious distinction for centuries. Henceforth there is no lack of historic material concerning the Jews in Spain. But, alas! until the time of the conquest of Spain by the Moors, it is not a history of achievement, it is a history of suffering—a martyrology. That martyrology began with the Third Council of Toledo (589 A. C.) at which Recaredo presented his abjuration of Arianism and was anointed as the first Catholic monarch of Spain. At that council laws were passed, of which the spirit may be comprehended from the following preamble and titles:

"Laws concerning the promulgation and ratification of statutes against Jewish wickedness, and for the general extirpation of Jewish errors. That the Jews may not celebrate the Passover according to their usage; that the Jews may not contract marriage according to their own customs; that the Jews may not practice the Abrahamitic rite; that the Jews bring no actions against Christians; that the Jews be not permitted to bear witness against Christians."

The Jews knew what was wanted; they paid a large sum of money, and the laws remained inoperative till Recaredo's successor, Sisebuto, ascended the throne. This king entered into a league with Emperor Heraclius, with the pious determination of "extirpating the dangerous race throughout the world," and so he issued a law which gave the Jews a year's time to decide whether they would confess Christ and be baptized, or be shaved and scourged, their property confiscated, and themselves forced to leave the country.[17]

Ninety thousand are said to have submitted to baptism, but with them the enforced Christian rite was but a mask for their secret Jewish belief and practices. And they had ample cause for regretting their religious weakness, for baptism did not secure them from new indignities and humiliation. They were despised for their apostacy, and their property was taken from them as if they had not complied with the king's edict. Thousands upon thousands fled to the northern coasts of Africa, and with them fled the prosperity from the Gothic kingdom.

Having once discovered so excellent a source for satisfying their greed for money, they had no intention of letting such golden opportunities escape them. A few years had passed, and the baptized Jews, true to their industrial and economical habits, had hoarded up some wealth with which they might buy life from the infuriated mob, and so the Fourth Council met at Toledo, in the year 633, and enacted the cruel requirement that the children of those, who had accepted Christianity, should be torn, forever, from their parent's heart, to be educated by Christians in the Christian faith. The Sixth Council enacted a law, that every king on his accession shall take an oath, that he will execute all the laws against the Jews, and will issue others equally as severe. Another law enacted the punishment of death upon Christians, who should embrace Judaism, or commit "the monstrous and unutterable crime of pursuing an execrable commerce with the ungodly." The Ninth Council decreed, that all baptized Jews were bound to appear in the church, not only on Christian, but also on Jewish holidays, lest, while they outwardly profess Christianity, they should practice secretly Judaism.

The Twelfth Council, of Toledo, 681, far surpassed its predecessors in the cruelties of its enactments. The preamble complained that "the crafty Jews had eluded all former laws," and then decreed that hereafter 100 lashes would be inflicted upon the naked body, and after that, the offender would be put in chains, banished, and his property confiscated for any of the following offences: For rejecting the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, for not bringing children or servants or dependants to baptism, for observing the Passover, the New Moon, the Feast of Tabernacles, for violating the Christian Sabbath, or the great festivals of the church. The circumcision of a child brought additional tortures, upon the father mutilation, upon the mother the loss of her nose. No marriage was hereafter to be contracted, without solemn obligation that both would become Christians. All subjects of the kingdom who harbored, assisted or concealed the flight of a Jew, were to be scourged, and have their property confiscated. The Jew who read or allowed his children to read books written against Christianity was to suffer 100 lashes; on the second offense the lashes were to be repeated, with banishment and confiscation. No Jew was to hold any office by which he might have authority over Christians.

I shall spare you a recital of the numerous other cruel laws enacted, and the account of the terrible sufferings endured. The land re-echoed the piteous groans and lamentations of the lashed and scourged. Their wealth purchased but temporary immunity and exemption.

"Certainly the heroism of the defenders of every other creed fades into insignificance before this martyr people, who confronted all 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. For these were no ascetic monks, dead to all the hopes and passions of life, but were men who appreciated intensely the worldly advantages they relinquished, and whose affections had become all the more lively on account of the narrow circle in which they were confined. Enthusiasm and the strange phenomena of ecstasy, which have exercised so large an influence in the history of persecution, which have nerved so many martyrs with superhuman courage, and have deadened or destroyed the anguish of so many fearful tortures, were here almost unknown. 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 enquiry 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."[18]

The enemy succeeded in impoverishing the Jew, and in stifling his energies and efforts for the good of the country, but failed ignominiously in their effort to inspire him with a love for Christianity, which perhaps was never sincerely wanted, and, if wanted, the means chosen to secure the end were not such that are crowned with success. The degraded and tortured Jew was filled with a bitter hatred against Christianity, and with a burning longing for revenge.

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And vengeance came. God had heard the wailings and seen the sufferings of the people that never was born to die. The Gothic kingdom of Spain was to suffer bitterly for its terrible crimes and the Jew was to be rewarded a thousandfold for the sufferings he had endured for his religion's sake. Weaker and weaker became that kingdom which the Jews had made in former years the pride of Europe. It was beset by foes within and by foes without. The tyranny of the church and of the throne had instigated dissatisfaction among the grandees of the state, and the insult of Roderick, the king, to Florinda, the young and beautiful daughter of Count Ilyan aroused this bravest of Spanish warriors and numerous powerful friends of his into open rebellion.

Nearer and nearer drew the Arab-Moors. They reached the Northwestern point of Africa, where the Jews, who had fled and who had been banished thither, and who had risen there to power and influence, greeted them with a hearty welcome. The martial sound of the Moslem hosts made as pleasant music to their ears as to the insulted father and his wrath-inspired followers. Both parties conspired with the Moorish chief, Amir Musa Ibn Nosseyr, for the invasion of Spain. Musa grasped eagerly at this ardently wished-for opportunity. He dispatched his valiant warrior Tarik, with 12,000 men across the narrow strait that separated Africa from Europe, and Islam from Christianity. Roderik met him at the banks of the Guadalete with an army eight times as large, and that day was the last Spain beheld him and his army. On that day Christianity ceased to rule within the land of Spain, and as its power sank, there dawned once more the sun of prosperity unto Israel.

The Moors did not forget the valuable services of the Jews. The early hatred against them in Arabia, for refusing to accept the creed of Mohammed, had long since been converted into tolerance and good will. Unlike the religion of Christianity, which started as the religion of love and soon became the religion of the sword, Islamism began as the religion of the sword but soon become the religion of love. Political and religious freedom and social recognition was granted to the Jew throughout the caliphate, and from that day unto this the two Oriental people have lived in peace side by side upon the Occidental soil, viewing with each other in their noble efforts to restore unto Spain her original beauty and prosperity, and to make her in culture and art and intelligence the mistress of Europe. We, sons of Israel, have labored hard and zealously in this noble contest, but with all our efforts our rival has passed beyond us, and humbly we cede the palm of victory to the Arab-Moors."

Here Chasdai ben Isaac ceased. He had spoken of the sufferings of the Jews with such perceptible anguish, he had related the part which the Jews took in the conquest of Spain with such vivid animation, and referred to the prosperity of the Jews under Moorish sway, and to Moorish tolerance and intellectual greatness, with such touching pathos that when he paused, a deep impressive silence ensued. At length Abdallah ben Xamri, the Moorish poet laureate to Caliph Abder Rahman III., arose, advanced towards Chasdai, and bowing low, thus he spoke:

"Your modesty must not bridle my tongue. I would appear an ingrate to my people should it become known that I listened in silence to your last remarks. The Arab-Moors forgot not their benefactors, nor are they so boastful as to arrogate to themselves, or allow others to bestow upon them a superiority which is unmerited.

Within our heart of hearts we treasure the services which your people have rendered. We owe the Hebrew people much more than your modesty, noble Chasdai, has suffered you to claim. You opened the portals of Spain unto us, and to you alone belongs the credit of turning Spain once again into a paradise, for a hundred years of uninterrupted warfare under the banner of Islam, had unfitted us for agricultural and mechanical and intellectual and artistic pursuits. You sowed the seeds of our prosperity. We sat at the feet of your masters, and if we have proven ourselves apt scholars, we bear testimony to the excellency of your teachers. Far be it from us to claim superiority over our honored rival. In the arts and sciences and philosophies your people hold distinguished places. Your theologians have given us many a problem which the wisest among us have failed to solve. In the purity of your home and social life, and in your industries you serve the world as models. In poetry I should never venture to compete for supremacy with friend Dunash ben Labrat and Menachem ben Saruk. In diplomacy, where lives the man who can equal you in intellect and sagacity, to whom else do we owe our political greatness than to you, Chasdai ben Isaac, the Jewish minister of our beloved Caliph Abder Rahman III."

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CHAPTER X.
THEIR POSITION IN MEDICAL SCIENCE.

THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.—A CHANGE IN THE FORTUNES OF THE JEWS AND MOORS.—AN EXAMINATION INTO THEIR GREAT ACHIEVEMENTS.—THEIR SKILL IN MEDICAL SCIENCE.—MIRACLE CURE BY CHRISTIAN CLERGY.—JEWISH BODY PHYSICIANS HIGHLY PRIZED AND MUCH SOUGHT.—PROMINENT MEDICAL SCHOOLS AND EMINENT PHYSICIANS.—RASHI.—IBN EZRA.—IBN TIBBON.—MAIMONIDES.—AVENZOAR AVACENNA.

We have witnessed the rise of Islam. We accompanied the Arab on his march of conquest. Breathlessly we stood upon the banks of the Guadalete and awaited the issue of a battle upon which the destiny of nations depended. We followed the triumphal processions of the Arab-Moors into Spain, and our eyes and hearts never ceased rejoicing over the manifold beauties and wonders which Moorish skill spread o'er fair Andalusia, and our tongues ne'er tired speaking of the manifold blessings which Moorish social and domestic and political life and religious tolerance showered lavishly not only upon their own generation, but upon all the generations that have been ever since.

And there was another picture, not so beautiful, but far more instructive; not so cheering, but fuller of pathos. Tearfully we witnessed the siege of Jerusalem and its unparalleled massacre. Heartbroken we followed the despised and spurned and abused, the friendless and homeless Jew, in his vain efforts to find a spot where he might rest his weary head in peace. Our hearts leaped for joy when we beheld the followers of Mohammed—not the followers of the founder of the religion of love—not only restore to the Jew human rights unjustly torn from him, but also offer him the hand of brotherhood. When we parted last we left the Jew and Moor busily engaged in making fair Andalusia, in culture and art and intelligence, the mistress of the world. Then all was peace and joy and sunshine.

We have returned. Five centuries have passed since our last visit. We are now at the end of the fifteenth century. A mighty change has taken place. Peace has turned to war, joy to sorrow, sunshine to darkness. Culture wears the crown of thorns. Art is dragged through the mire. Science is fettered hand and foot. Religious liberty sends forth piteous shrieks from the flames and smoke of the auto-da-fe. Enlightened Europe weeps and trembles. We ask Mercy: "Why weepest thou?" And she sobs forth the name: "Cardinal Ximenes." We ask Art the same question, and she stammers forth: "The Church." Science answers: "The Inquisition." Religious Liberty utters between its death throes the name: "Torquemada." Enlightened Europe weeps and trembles, because the vast storehouses of learning, which Moorish and Jewish intelligence had built up, are about to be consigned to the flames, and the builders themselves are to be extirpated from the soil, upon which they have lived nigh unto eight centuries, and which their own diligent toil has made the wonder of Europe.

"Haste ye," the Spirit of knowledge calleth unto us, "the furnaces are heated, the death-pyres are awaiting impatiently their martyrs, the ships are ready in the harbor to carry off, and give abundance of water to all such who refused the few drops of the water of salvation, the massive gates of the Inquisition dungeons are open, and the instruments of torture are eager for their cruel and inhuman work of death. Haste ye, the moments are precious, gather the knowledge for which you have come, as speedily as you can; tarry, and not a trace nor a record will remain of this most wondrous and fruitful era of Europe's intellectual advance."

Let us heed the warning, and hasten to our task. We had come prepared for a detailed account, but now we must content ourselves with a mere synoptical sketch of the progress made by the Arabs and Jews in literature, art, philosophy and in the mathematical and physical and applied sciences, during the same era when the rest of Europe was yet lying in comparative darkness and barbarism.

A feeling of awe comes over us as we approach our task. We cannot but feel that in dealing with the Arab and Jew in Europe, the period that extends from the beginning of the eighth to the end of the fifteenth century, we are dealing with a divine agency, sent into Europe to rekindle and keep alive the sacred fire of intelligence, which, prior to their coming, had been extinguished by the church and by barbarian conquerors. At this era they are the sole depositories of learning. The second and third chapters of this narrative have acquainted us with the terrible stifling mist of ignorance and its concomitants, fanaticism and cruelty and corruption and intense suffering, which hovered over Europe at the time when the people of the Orient had entered it, and began their intellectual unfolding.

In the East those centers of learning that had not yet passed away were rapidly declining. Antioch, Alexandria, Bagdad, Damascus, Jerusalem, these cities which in their day had made the light of the East more luminous with their light, had drawn in their rays and sent them forth no more. But the Jew and Arab had wandered into Europe before this intellectual decline, and there they fanned the spark of knowledge they had brought with them into such a brilliant and active life, that its light still illumines our mind, and its genial warmth still cheers our heart. The Jew and the Moor have made Europe their everlasting debtor for their services in bridging the yawning chasm which separates ancient from modern culture. With them, most of that ancient knowledge, for which mankind had toiled diligently and untiringly for thousands of years, would have been lost, and lost forever, and modern knowledge, would have been compelled to begin again at the very alphabet, and we to-day might have been some 2,000 or 3,000 years behind. Without their untiring efforts to disperse the poisonous mists, and force their light upon the people, even at the expense of much suffering, the darkest, and most slothful period of European annals which was co-eval with the highest Jewish and Moorish intelligence before that intelligence made itself felt in Europe, might have still surrounded us to-day.

But this is not the time for reflection nor laudation. Hark! Already the doleful knell is tolling, and the people are thronging the public square, and the clergy are chanting hymns of victory and imprecatory formula, and the autos-da-fe are piled up high and dry, and the condemned are impatient, for they long for death, they pray to be released, at last, from the insufferable tortures of the Inquisition, and so we must hasten to our task of recording upon History's pages the wonderful strides the Jews and Moors did make in science and literature and philosophy, before flame and sword and rack and expulsion, silence their voice and obliterate their works forever.

We shall consider their intellectual labors in the order of their importance and service to human-kind, and for that reason we shall begin with a hasty review of their progress in medical science. In this branch the Jew was without peer. He excelled the Moor, because the restrictions which Islamism imposed upon the follower of the Koran, such as prohibitions against dissecting man or animal, did not trammel him. And he eclipsed the Christian, for the Church held medical science accursed, branded and condemned the physician as an atheist, and zealously propagated the doctrines that cures must be wrought by relics of martyrs and bones of saints; by prayer and intercession; that each region of the body was under special spiritual charge, the first joint of the right thumb being in care of God the father, the second under that of the blessed Virgin, and so on to the other parts. For each disease there was a saint. A man with sore eyes must invoke St. Clara. St. Anthony is a sure cure for other inflammations, St. Pernel delivers from ague. In all cases, cured or not, the clergy constituted themselves as the self-appointed agents for collecting the fees for the saints, and as long as this spiritual method of curing disease formed one of their most productive sources of gain, they took great care that no other mode of treatment should excel theirs. Hence their attitude against physicians, and their frequent council decrees, making it a crime punishable with death for a Jewish physician to attend a Christian patient, and for a Christian patient to seek recourse to a Jewish physician, instead of to the shrines and altars of the saints.[19] But for all that, Jewish physicians, and Jewish medical schools flourished, and found their prohibited profession very profitable among the Christians, especially among kings, and popes, and princes, and bishops, among the very men, who passed the sentence of death for crimes which they were the first to perpetrate.

In the tenth and eleventh and twelfth centuries, nearly all the physicians in Europe were Jews. Later, the Moors joined them, but only for a short time, and then the Jews again became the sole champions of medical science. There was not a man of power or prominence who had not his own Jewish body physician, and these body physicians constituted a power, for besides holding the lives of potentates in their hand, they combined with their professional skill, all the learning of the age, a profound knowledge of theology, mathematics, astronomy, philosophy, music, law, statesmanship, poetry, lexicography, criticism, and of other branches.

In naming them and their schools and their works we must give honorable mention to the Jewish physicians of France. Out of the Spanish peninsula there had came across the Pyrenees an intellectual influence which found a warm reception by the Jews of France. To verify this, of schools, we need but name the famous medical school at Narbonne under the presidency of Rabbi Abbu, and the flourishing school at Arles, and the most famous of them all, the college of Montpellier, with the great Profatius as regent of the faculty, as distinguished in medicine as he was eminent in astronomy; and of the distinguished Jewish physician of France, we need but name Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac, (1040-1105) better known under the abbreviation: "Rashi," the greatest French physician of the eleventh century, unrivaled in his age for his instructions in great surgical operations, as the Cæsarean section; nor must we forget the learned Ibn Tibbon, (1160-1230) who emphasized the necessity of a close study of botany for medical purposes, and of carefully cultivating the art of preparing drugs.

The scope of this discourse will not permit us to name all of the distinguished Jewish physicians of Spain, nor to enumerate their works nor to dwell upon their merits. From the many we shall select the name of Ibn Ezra, (1093-1107) the polyhistor of his age. His chief work is a treatise on practical and theoretical medicine, entitled, "Book of Proofs."

But greater than Ibn Ezra, both as a physician and a philosopher, is Moses Maimonides, (1135-1204), honored by his countrymen with the titles: "The Doctor," "The Great Sage," "The Glory of the West," "The Light of the East, Second Only to Moses." He was the most famous of all living physicians of his time. He was coveted as body physician by the greatest potentates, and the justly celebrated Sultan Saladin considered himself honored and fortunate to secure him as his body physician. When Richard Cœur de Lion, King of England, fell sick, Moses Maimonides was summoned for consultation. His contributions to medical works are many. He wrote medical aphorisms derived from former Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Arabic sources; an abridgment of Galen, a treatise on "Hemorrhoids," on "Poisons and Antidotes," on "Asthma," on "The Preservation of Health," on "The Bites of Venomous Animals," and other valuable works.[20]

We return to the Moors, and here, too, we are confronted by an abundance of medical literature. Over 300 distinguished medical writers are mentioned, and their works are voluminous. Chief among them stands Avenzoar, Ibn Zohr, (beginning of the Twelfth century) physician, to the court of Seville. His famous work "Canon of Medicine," an encyclopedia of medical knowledge, established for him a world wide reputation and became the medical authority for European universities for many centuries. Upwards of 100 other medical treaties are ascribed to him, some are tracts of a few pages, others are works extending through several volumes. Avicenna (Ibn Sina, 980-1037) occupies an honored place next to him. Chief among his works is his "Method of Preparing Medicine and Diet," "Treatment of Leprosy," and two works on "Fever," in which he continues the work begun a century before by the Jewish physician, Isaac ben Suleiman Israeli. The Moors themselves acknowledge that the Jews far surpass them in their knowledge of anatomy, physiology and hygiene, that from want of knowledge of the construction of the human body, their surgery is necessarily crude. Their great fame, however, rests, and will rest, upon their introduction of pharmacy, their therapeutical use of drugs, their making chemistry, the handmaid of medical treatment. Pharmacopoeia dates from this period. The Moors of Spain, opened the first apothecary shops, and many of the names and many of the medicines still used, have come down to us from their period.[21] We must content ourselves with this brief review (more the scope of this work will not permit,) of "The Position of the Jew and the Moor in Medical Science."

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CHAPTER XI.
IN THE SCIENCES.

MARVELOUS INTELLECTUAL SUPERIORITY OF MOORS AND JEWS.—MOORS EXCEL THE JEWS IN THE SCIENCES.—THEY INTRODUCE THE MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES.—THEIR PROGRESS IN ASTRONOMY.—ABSURD REFUTATIONS BY THE CHRISTIAN CLERGY.—THEIR RESEARCHES INTO CHEMISTRY, ZOOLOGY AND GEOLOGY.—THEY ANTICIPATE MODERN DISCOVERIES.—EUROPE'S INGRATITUDE.

We turn next in our review of the intellectual labors of the Moors and Jews in Spain, during the period that extends from the beginning of the eighth to the end of the fifteenth century, to an examination of their position in the sciences. The deplorably benighted state of contemporaneous Europe prepares us to expect little or nothing in this noblest department of human knowledge, and our surprise is therefore so much the greater as we gaze upon, and ponder over, the mighty strides made by the Moors and by the Jews on the highways of science. The impetus in this special branch seemed to have come from the Arabs. The few words of Ali, the fourth Arabian caliph: "Eminence in science is the highest honor; he dies not who gives life to learning," seems to have taken as deep roots within the minds of the Arabians, and to have yielded far more precious fruits, than did the Koran the vast volume of his distinguished father-in-law; Mohammed.

For centuries the Arab-Moors led the world in this department. Here the Jews cannot lay claim to rivalry; they were collaborators, but nothing more. In justice to the Jews, however, we shall add, that there are some who differ from us in our conclusion. Some give to the Jews an equal rank with the Moors, others claim that the point under discussion is still debatable. And we must not treat their objection lightly. We must not forget that in treating of these scientists of Spain, we are dealing with men known under Arabic names; beyond a knowledge of their scientific works we know little or nothing about them. Concerning their religion, history maintains a commendable silence; the Mohammedans preferring, at this period, the ink of science to the blood of martyrs. Knowing of the scientific scholars nothing more than that their works are written in Arabic, and that their names are Arabic, the canons of criticism will not permit us to conclude that a scientist who writes in Arabic, and whose name is Arabic, is necessarily also a Mohammedan by faith. The records give incontestable proof that many and many of the distinguished Jewish scholars of that period wrote in Arabic, and went under an Arabic name, who, but for a chance article of work from their pen upon a Hebrew subject, might have been classed to-day as Arab-Moors by race and Mohammedan by creed. Be this as it may. That point will never be definitely settled, and as long as a doubt remains, the Arab-Moors may justly claim the benefit of the doubt, and the Jews shall be the last to contest their claims of superiority in the sciences during the Middle Ages over every other race or creed.

Entering upon our subject, and beginning at the root of the tree of science, we make the pleasing discovery that to the Arab-Moors of Spain belongs the honor of having been the first to generally introduce in Europe, for scientific and industrial and commercial purposes, the science of arithmetic. Had they achieved nothing else, the introduction of this most needful of all the branches of mathematics alone, would have entitled them to a distinguished place among the world's benefactors. That introduction was the starting point of a new progress. Its use and development made possible the higher mathematics and analytical mechanics and astronomy, and every other science discovered since, and hailed with delight. Little do we think to-day when we pride ourselves on the startling achievements of our astronomers and meteorologists and other scientists, when we speak of the miracles they work in space and time, of the ascensions they make to the remotest of the nebulæ, and of their holding communion there with stars and worlds and solar systems whose light has not yet reached the earth, little do we think when we speak of electricity obeying our every wish, and of steam yoked in our service, and of the countless other wonders of modern science, little do we think that for all these blessings we are lastingly indebted to the Arab-Moors, and to their assistants, the Jews, for their faithful labors in mathematics. Little do we think that we are pronouncing Arabic words when we speak of the "zero" or the "cipher", the "naught,"—that most important of all figures, upon which the most needful of all arithmetical contrivances is based—the decimal system. And when we remember that the prosperity and progress of every country in Europe dates from the introduction of the Arabian figures[22] and when we realize the clumsiness and uselessness of the Hebrew and Greek and Latin alphabet figures, in vogue in Europe before the entrance of the Arab-Moors into Spain, and when we try to work out a problem of multiplication, say ninety-nine multiplied by ninety-nine, in accordance with the notation of the Arabic nine digits and cipher, and then, in accordance with the Roman alphabet figures, XCIX times XCIX, then, perhaps, will we most readily give thankful praise to those to whom Europe owes so magnificent a boon—to those who, with so simple an invention, opened the avenues of prosperity and loosened the fetters that had shackled the advance of science.

Encouraged by their success in arithmetic, they turned towards a higher branch of mathematics and gave to Europe the science of numbers and quantity, and named it algebra ("al'jabara," to bind parts together). Whether, as some claim, the Arab-Moors obtained their knowledge of algebra from their schools in Bagdad or Damascus, who, in their turn, had derived it from the Hindoos, or whether, as others claim, the Jews, in their diligent translations from the early Greek geometricians into Arabic, must have come across, and followed up the algebraic trace, which is supposed to exist in the treatise of Diaphantus (350 A. C.), or whether the Moorish claim be the true one, that the honor of having invented algebra belongs to one of their own mathematicians, who flourished about the middle of the ninth century, to Mohammed ben Musa, or Moses,[23] whoever the inventors be of this valuable branch of mathematics, unanimity of opinion prevails concerning one point, and that is, the Arab-Moors and Jews first introduced algebra into Europe. Still more Ibn Musa (or Ben Moses) developed it to the solution of quadratic equations, and Ibn Ibrahim (Ben Abraham) to the solution of cubic equations, Ibn Korrah (or Ben Korah) to the application of algebra to geometry, laying thus the foundation of analytical geometry. Geometry led them to trigonometry, which they elevated to a practical science by substituting sines for chords and by establishing formulas and tables of tangents and cotangents and secants and cosecants. From trigonometry Al Baghadadi advanced to land surveying, and wrote on it a treatise so excellent, that by some it has been declared to be a copy of Euclid's lost work on that subject.

The unbiased student, who searches diligently among the achievements of the Moors and Jews, will soon detect, not only a systematic contrivance on the part of the literature of Europe to put out of sight our obligations to them in science, but a bold effort, wherever a chance presents itself, to wrest their hard toil from them, and bestow it upon some one, who is not so unfortunate as to be Saracen or Jew. But "injustice founded on religious rancor and national conceit cannot be perpetuated forever." The real truth can not be much longer hidden, and if the chapters of this volume have no other effect than simply to do justice to the memory of those who have toiled and who have suffered, that we may enjoy, to-day, the blessings of our civilization, we shall regard our labors amply rewarded.

We have digressed. Let us return to our theme. They toiled for science sake, not for fame. They looked for none. When Spain itself, indebted to them for all her blessings, repays so miserably their faithful services, why should they look to Europe for recognition? "High minds," it has been truly said, "are as little affected by such unworthy returns for services, as the sun is by those fogs which the earth throws up between herself and his light."[24]

And so, expecting no thanks, and working for none, they advanced, with their present achievements as stepping stones, to the study of astronomy. And marvelous, almost incredible, is their success in this department. They determine the altitude of celestial bodies by means of the astrolabe. They register all the stars in their heaven, giving to those of the first magnitudes the names they still bear on our celestial maps and globes, writing thus indelibly their impress upon the celestial heaven, though it be denied them in the literature of Europe. They give us the words "azimuth," "zenith," "nadir," "almanac," and others. They compute time by the oscillations of the pendulum, and determine the true length of the year. They discover the theory of the refraction of light and ascertain the curvilinear path of a ray of light through the air. They explain the horizontal sun and moon, and why we see those bodies before they have risen and after they have set. They measure the height of the atmosphere and determine it to be nearly fifty-eight and one half miles. They give the true theory of the twilight, and of the twinkling of the stars. They not only know the spheroidal form of the earth, but approximately its diameter and circumference. Averroes discovers the spots upon the sun. Kepler alludes honorably to the observations of Levi ben Gerson, and Copernicus to those of Profiat Duran, and Laplace accepts Ibn Musa's proof of the diminution of the eccentricity of the earth's orbit, and Ibn Junis' proof of the obliquity of the ecliptic. They invent the first pendulum clock. They build the first observatory in Europe, the Giralda, (1196 A. C.) turned into a belfry after the expulsion of the Moors and Jews. They almost discover the laws of gravity, considering it terrestrial, reserving it for Newton to teach that it is universal. Rabbi Isaac ben Sid prepares for Alphonso X., king of Castile, new astronomical tables, for which Alphonso takes the credit, names them the Alphonsine tables, and is modest enough to remark: "That if God had called him (the king) into His councils when He created the universe, things would have been in a better and simpler order."

The Church, in the meanwhile, does her best to refute the "ungodly scientific teachings" of the Moors and Jews. The argument of the "Sohar" that the earth revolves upon its own axis and around the sun (a Jewish teaching in the twelfth century, anticipating that of Copernicus), the shining lights of the church nail to the ground with clinchers from the Bible such as these: "The sun runneth about from one end of the heaven to the other," and "the foundations of the earth are so firmly fixed that they cannot be moved." The absurdity of the existence of the antipodes they prove to their full satisfaction in this manner: "It is impossible that any inhabitants exist on the opposite side of the earth, since no such race is recorded by Scriptures among the descendants of Adam." Again, "we are told by St. Paul that all men are made to live 'upon the face of the earth,' from which it clearly follows that they can not live upon more faces than one or upon the back." Again, "how could men exist on the other side of the earth, since on the day of judgment, being on the other side, they could not see the Lord ascending through the air?" Ergo, the teachings of the Church alone are the true theories of this universe, "concerning which it is not lawful for a Christian to doubt."

But the Moors and Jews treated with contempt this puerile opposition, little thinking that the Church of "Love unto all men" has stronger and more convincing weapons than tongue and pen to prove her points. They persevered in their path so well begun. They turned to the physical sciences. They originated chemistry. They discovered some of the most important reagents, such as the nitric, sulphuric and hydrochloric acids, and alcohol, which still bears its Arabic name. They knew the chemical affinities of gold, silver, copper, iron, tin, lead and quicksilver. They invented various apparatus for distillation, sublimation, fusion, filtration, etc. They constructed tables of specific gravities. In geology, Abu Othman wrote a valuable work. In zoology, the following extract from a chapter of Avicenna (Ibn Sinai or Ben Sinai) on the origin of the mountains, which reads as if it were written by one of the most advanced geologists of our day, will best indicate the heights to which they attained in this science. "Mountains" said Ibn Sinai (980-1037), "may be due to two different causes. Either they are upheavals of the crust of the earth, such as might occur during a violent earthquake, or they are the effects of water, which, cutting for itself a new route, has denuded the valleys, the strata being of different kinds—some soft, some hard. The winds and waters disintegrate the one, but leave the other intact. That water has been the main cause of these facts is proved by the existence of fossil remains of aquatic and other animals on many mountains."[25]

But little has been cited here concerning the position of the Moors and Jews in the sciences. The field is too vast and the scope of this volume will not permit us to enter into greater details. He that would have fuller knowledge upon this theme let him peruse the following works, to which I am largely indebted for the facts stated above. "Geschichte der Arabischen Aerzte and Naturforscher," Wuestenfeld; "Conquest of Spain," "Book V.," by Coppe; "Eastern Caliphate," Stanislaus Guyard; "History of Algebra," Phillip Kelland; "History of Arithmetic," George McArthur; "Astronomy," R. A. Proctor; "The Intellectual Development of Europe," Draper; "Conflict Between Religion and Science," Draper; "Rationalism in Europe," Lecky.

Yet, even though our synoptical review has been brief we have seen and heard enough to understand fully why in the year 1492, and within the realm of Spain, Wisdom mourns and Knowledge wails, and Science is broken-hearted and Europe trembles. Anguish seizes upon our soul at the thought, yet a little while, and all this wondrous intellectual advance, so active and so promising will be torn off the soil of Europe, root and all, and darkness, cruel darkness, ignorance, cruel ignorance, will ascend the throne once more and usher into the scenes of life stagnation, corruption, suffering, despair.

For science and for humanity's sake we venture to approach the princes of the realm and prelates of the church and plead for mercy. "No!" is the stern reply of Ferdinand and Isabella, "Spain is polluted by the presence of the accursed Moors and Jews." "Avaunt!" shouts Cardinal Ximenes, "Catholicism is in danger where Moorish and Jewish brain is at work." "Mercy ye ask for," fairly shrieks the Grand Inquisitor Torquemada, "the Church knows no mercy for the Moorish and Jewish infidel dogs. Begone, or their fate is yours."

We are not yet prepared for death. Our task is not yet done. Many a Moorish and Jewish achievement remains still to be spoken of, and so we shall hasten our review, while yet we may speak of their position in literature.

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CHAPTER XII.
IN LITERATURE.

SPAIN'S PROSPERITY STIMULATES LITERATURE.—LAVISH PROVISIONS FOR EDUCATION.—CALIPHS PATRONS OF LEARNING.—VAST LIBRARIES EMBODYING THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE DAY.—POETRY ESPECIALLY FOSTERED.—STORY-TELLING.—JEWISH AND MOORISH POETRY CONTRASTED.—JEHUDA HA LEVY.—CHARISI.—GABIROL.—MOSES BEN EZRA.

When we turn to an examination of the position of the Jews and Moors of Spain in Literature, and behold their progress in this department of knowledge, we are not so much surprised as we were when we surveyed the wondrous advance both did make in the department of science, at a time when the rest of Europe was still under the spell of a mental torpor. The great epochs of the world's literature have ever had their origin during times of peace and prosperity. They may continue into turbulent times, and even outlive them, but never can they take root in them. Such an age Spain and its people were enjoying for many years under Moorish sway. The Moors had ended their conquests, and for a while the Jews enjoyed freedom from persecution. Peace prevailed, and prosperity gladdened the heart of man. Hills and dales yielded bountiful harvests. The rich mines of Spain brought to light the treasures of the earth. The long line of coast was crowded with vessels, which restlessly furrowed the oceans, exchanging the products of Europe for the wealth of the Orient. The commerce of the world centered in Spain; there, too, could be found its wealth. The age was ripe for literary activity.

The Jews were the first to open this epoch-making era of European literature. The past had shown that the Jewish mind needs no other impetus for earnest intellectual toil than an age of peace and prosperity, and the present marked no departure from the general rule. The Arab-Moors, sharing the general characteristics of the Jews, did not tarry long behind; as the Jews were mindful of the teachings of their sages, that the crown of learning is the greatest of honors, so did the Moors remember the words of the great Caliph Al Mamum: "They are the elect of God, they are His best and most useful servants, whose lives are devoted to the improvement of their rational faculties." And so great was the literary zeal of both these races that within comparatively few years there arose a literature upon grammar, lexicography, rhetoric, history, politics, biography, translation, statistics, music, fiction, poetry, law, ethics, theology, philosophy, much of which, despite our boasting of to-day, not only need not fear modern criticism, but is still authority. And it endured for nearly eight centuries, exceeding in duration that of any other literature, ancient or modern, and even after it was crushed, it continued to emit a steady luster through the clouds and darkness of succeeding centuries. Like a flood it overflowed the mountain barriers and went on, widely irrigating the arid fields of Europe.

The provisions for education were abundant. To every mosque and synagogue a free school was attached. Endowed colleges dotted the Saracen Empire, in which free tuition was given to all who were eager for knowledge, and stipends were cheerfully furnished the indigent students. In addition to this, many of the caliphs distinguished themselves not only for their scholarly attainments, but also for their munificent patronage of learning. They assembled the eminent scholars of their times, both natives and foreigners, at their court making it the familiar resort of men of letters, establishing a precedent which the Medicis later turned to excellent use. Above all, they were intent upon the acquisition of extensive libraries. They invited illustrious foreigners to send them their works, and munificently recompensed them. No donation was so grateful to them as a book. They employed agents in Egypt, Syria, Irak and Persia, for collecting and transcribing the rarest manuscripts; and their vessels returned freighted with cargoes more precious than the spices of the East. In this way they amassed magnificent collections—that of Alhakem Second amounted to 600,000 volumes.[26] Our own Harvard cannot reach half that number, even in the nineteenth century, and with the advantage of steam and printing press. Besides these royal libraries, seventy public libraries are named in Andalusia. The collections in the possession of individuals were sometimes very extensive. A private doctor refused the invitation of a sultan of Bokhara because the transportation of his books would have required 400 camels.

The subjects upon which these thousands upon thousands of volumes treat are so manifold, and the authors so numerous—the department of history, for instance, according to an Arabian author cited by D'Herbelot, could boast of 1,300 writers—that even a synoptical review of them would need more space and time than the scope of these discourses will allow, and so we dismiss them with the simple remark that such is their excellence, such the influence they exercised upon the literature of Europe that a careful perusal of the works still extant in the original or in translation will well repay the special student of any of the special branches of literature of which they treat.

The poetry of that period, however, refuses to be dismissed. She bids us halt. She, the queen of literature, is not accustomed to such slight. She was born to rule, she brooks no opposition, and so we pause. And after we have held sweet converse with her minstrel bards, and after we have perused a number of the almost countless volumes devoted to winged words of music and to poetic fancy, we regret not, that she made us pause. No longer do we think her boast an idle one that Spain, during the period that extends from the eighth to the fifteenth century, can show a greater number of poets than all the other nations combined. We need not ask the reason why. Any one acquainted with the extraordinary richness of both the Hebrew and its kindred—the Arabic language—their natural cadence, which lends itself to verse, the ease which both languages afford in passing from prose to poetry, and with the bent of mind of both races, poetical, delighting in figurative speech, in metaphor and allegory and fable, in luxuriant imagery and fanciful romance, any one acquainted with their Oriental predilection for the fairer sex, which could only express itself in languishing idyls or passionate lyric sonnets, any one knowing all this, will not wonder at the vastness of the Jewish and Moorish poetic literature.

The Moors excelled in what was then known as the art of "story telling." They had brought it with them from the East and the enchanting moonlight evenings of Andalusia, and the sequestered, fairy-like gardens, with their shady cypress trees, and their cascades, and their flowering shrubs, and their bowers of roses, and their crypt-like grottoes, all these tended to keep the love for their art alive. With them "this story telling," both in prose and poetry, took the place of theatrical representation. Those of you familiar with one of the many extant prose collections of stories such as "The Arabian Nights," can readily form an opinion of the great charm that branch of literature must have had in the original language for the Moorish people.

Physicians often ordered "story telling" as a prescription for their patients, to mitigate their sufferings, to calm their agitation and to give sleep after protracted insomnia, or to beguile the ennui of the grandees, or to recreate them after their fatigues. The "munshids" or "story tellers" found their vocation a very honored and a very profitable one, and they took great pains to foster that art.

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These stories and their lyric poetry exercised a potent influence over the literature of Southern and Western Europe. It can be traced in the reproduction of many stories as well as in the structure of the French "fabliaux" and "chansons de geste" of the "jongleuers", "trouveres" of the North; and is more particularly to be observed in "le gai saber" of Provencal troubadours. It extended into Italy, and is found in the charming stanzas of Ariosto, and in the "twice told tales" of Boccaccio's "Decameron."

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In a word, the entire fiction and poetry of Southern Europe, up to the Renaissance, owes as much to the Spanish-Arabians for matter and form, as it does to the Latin language.[27] Still more, when we remember that our English Chaucer borrowed the scheme of his "Canterbury Tales" from several of the stories of Boccaccio, and other Italian writers, and that other English writers imitated Chaucer in borrowing plots and subjects from Italy and France and Spain, we may well claim that the Arabian idea has penetrated into the North, and left its profound impression upon English literature.[28]

But in the purer poetry, in touching tenderness of pathos, in sublimity of thought and majesty of diction, in those lofty flights where hope blends with sorrow, and with a religious fervor that is tempered by celestial sweetness and warmth of heart, here, the Jewish poets of Spain not only excel their Moorish rivals, but every poet before or since. Once more Israel's sons and daughters took their harps of Judea from off the mourning willows, and the Songs of Zion, the Glory of Israel, and the Praises of the Universal Father resounded again as sweet in the fairy land of Andalusia, as formerly upon the banks of the Jordan. They consecrated their Muse to the purest and holiest purposes. The epigram of Aben Esra, one of the immortal poets of this age, tells briefest and best the uses to which poetry lent itself among the various nations. He wrote:

"Among the Arabs in their fiery way,

The song doth breathe alone of loves sweet sway.

The Roman sings exultant of war's spoils.

Of battles, sieges and warriors' toils.

In wit and spirit doth the Greek excel,

And India's bards of curious riddles tell,

But songs devoted to the Maker's praise,

The Jews alone among the nations raise."

We do not mean to convey by this, that the Jewish poets of Spain devoted themselves only and exclusively to the sacred song. Jehuda Ha-Levi thus sings of love and wine as fiery as e'er did Moorish bard.[29]