Jewish Literature and Other Essays

by Gustav Karpeles

"I will not have you think me less
Than others of my faith,
Who live on a generous king's largess,
Forsworn at every breath.
And if you deem my teachings true,
Reject them not with hate,
Because a minstrel sings to you
Who's not of knight's estate.
The fragrant, waving reed grows tall
From feeble root and thin,
And uncouth worms that lowly crawl
Most lustrous silk do spin.
Because beside a thorn it grows
The rose is not less fair;
Though wine from gnarlèd branches flows,
'Tis sweet beyond compare.
The goshawk, know, can soar on high,
Yet low he nests his brood.
A Jew true precepts doth apply,
Are they therefore less good?
Some Jews there are with slavish mind
Who fear, are mute, and meek.
My soul to truth is so inclined
That all I feel I speak.
There often comes a meaning home
Through simple verse and plain,
While in the heavy, bulky tome
We find of truth no grain.
Full oft a man with furrowed front,
Whom grief hath rendered grave,
Whose views of life are honest, blunt,
Both fool is called and knave."

It is surely not unwarranted to assume that from these confessions the data of Santob's biography may be gathered.

Now as to Santob's relation to Judaism. Doubtless he was a faithful Jew, for the views of life and the world laid down in his poems rest on the Bible, the Talmud, and the Midrash. With the fearlessness of conviction he meets the king and the people, denouncing the follies of both. Some of his romances sound precisely like stories from the Haggada, so skilfully does he clothe his counsel in the gnomic style of the Bible and the Talmud. This characteristic is particularly well shown in his verses on friendship, into which he has woven the phraseology of the Proverbs:

"What treasure greater than a friend
Who close to us hath grown?
Blind fate no bitt'rer lot can send
Than bid us walk alone.
For solitude doth cause a dearth
Of fruitful, blessed thought.
The wise would pray to leave this earth,
If none their friendship sought.
Yet sad though loneliness may be,
That friendship surely shun
That feigns to love, and inwardly
Betrays affections won."

The poem closes with a prayer for the king, who certainly could not have taken offense at Santob's frankness:

"May God preserve our lord and king
With grace omnipotent,
Remove from us each evil thing,
And blessed peace augment.
The nations loyally allied
Our empire to exalt,
May God, in whom we all confide,
From plague keep and assault.
If God will answer my request,
Then will be paid his due—
Your noble father's last behest—
To Santob, Carrion's Jew."

Our troubadour's poetry shows that he was devotedly attached to his prince, enthusiastically loved his country, and was unfalteringly loyal to his faith; that he told the king honest, wholesome truths disguised in verse; that he took no pains to conceal his scorn of those who, with base servility, bowed to the ruling faith, and permitted its yoke to be put upon their necks; that he felt himself the peer of the high in rank, and the wealthy in the goods of this world; that he censured, with incisive criticism, the vices of his Spanish and his Jewish contemporaries—all of which is calculated to inspire us with admiration for the Jewish troubadour, whose manliness enabled him to meet his detractors boldly, as in the verses quoted above:

"Because beside a thorn it grows,
The rose is not less fair;
Though wine from gnarlèd branches flows,
'Tis sweet beyond compare.
A Jew true precepts doth apply,
Are they therefore less good?"

History does not tell us whether Pedro rewarded the Jewish troubadour as the latter, if we may judge by the end of his poem, had expected. Our accounts of his life are meagre; even his fellow-believers do not make mention of him. We do know, however, that the poor poet's prayers for his sovereign, his petitions for the weal and the glory of his country were not granted. Pedro lost his life by violence, quarrels about the succession and civil wars convulsed the land, and weakened the royal power. Its decline marked the end of the peace and happiness of the Jew on Castilian soil.

As times grew worse, and persecutions of the Jews in Christian Spain became frequent, many forsook the faith of their fathers, to bask in the sunshine of the Church, who treated proselytes with distinguished favor. The example of the first Jewish troubadour did not find imitators. Among the converts were many poets, notably Juan Alfonso de Bæna, who, in the fifteenth century, collected the oldest troubadour poetry, including his own poems and satires, and the writings of the Jewish physician Don Moses Zarzal, into a cancionera general. Like many apostates, he sought to prove his devotion to the new faith by mocking at and reviling his former brethren. The attacked were not slow to answer in kind, and the Christian world of poets and bards joined the latter in deriding the neophytes. Spanish literature was not the loser by these combats, whose description belongs to general literary criticism. Lyric poetry, until then dry, serious, and solemn, was infused by the satirist with flashing wit and whimsical spirit, and throwing off its connection with the drama, developed into an independent species of poetry.