Though, as already stated, the contents of the Beiträge are of a varied description, they deal chiefly with that section of Jewish literature that owes its existence to the Jewish writers of the Middle Ages. Mention is made of a good many mediaeval Jewish commentators on the Bible and the Talmud, as well as of grammarians and moralists. Instructive remarks are made on some of them, most of whose names and writings had scarcely been known before. Here our admiration for Zunz's rare talents must be enhanced when it is observed how out of stray paragraphs and notes found in old and neglected MSS., in rare prints, or on almost illegible tombstones, he has actually created a standard book of reference, which has now become indispensable to every student of Jewish literature.
In the course of his investigations in the Beiträge Zunz touches on a subject which ought not to be passed over unnoticed. He refers to the crass ignorance sometimes manifested by Christian scholars in regard to Judaism and its literature. He quotes, for example, the names of a few French writers, who had published books dealing with Jewish subjects, of which they knew as little as the aforementioned Chiarini. One of them, Cupefigne by name, actually won the prize offered by the French Academy for the best essay on the subject, L'État littéraire des Juifs dans le moyen âge. But as a specimen of what he actually knew of the Talmud Zunz quotes the following note he found in the essay. It runs thus: Le Gemare titre Sanhed. Sectio 14; le Talmud même titre. With this kind of Talmudical knowledge says Zunz, with just indignation, a French professor has ventured to write a long dissertation on Rabbinical literature, for which he was rewarded by the most learned literary society in France with a valuable prize[[147-1]].
Another masterpiece of Zunz, ranking almost as high as his Homilies of the Jews, is Die synagogale Poesie, which deals specially with the Piyutim and Selichoth, and which was published in 1855. It is virtually only the first volume of a work, which would certainly have remained incomplete without the two additional volumes, issued in 1859 and 1865 under the respective titles Die Ritus des synagogalen Gottesdienstes and Nachtrag zur Literaturgeschichte der synagogalen Poesie. Each of these volumes treats of a variety of subjects, though they all belong to one and the same department.
Though the literary matter contained and discussed in Die synagogale Poesie is extremely copious and interesting, it is impossible to do more, within the limits of a short essay, than to refer to it briefly. Beginning with the Psalms the author describes the process of the gradual development of psalmody into the so-called Agadah, and that of the latter into the various kinds of prayers usually read in the synagogue, including the “Penitential Poems,” called Selichoth. These, containing, as they do, some of the most heartrending incidents in the mediaeval history of the Jews, Zunz discusses with special warmth and feeling. One particular passage excited the admiration of George Eliot, who printed a translation of it in Daniel Deronda. It runs as follows:—
“If there are ranks in suffering, Israel takes precedence of all the Nations;—if the duration of sorrows, and the patience with which they are borne, ennoble, the Jews are among the aristocracy of every land;—if a literature is called rich in the possession of a few classical tragedies, what shall we say to a national Tragedy lasting for fifteen hundred years, in which the poets and actors were also the heroes.”
When some later writers, including Professor Paul Legarde, criticized the Synagogale Poesie adversely, asserting that Zunz had wasted his time and energy in the preparation of an elaborate work on the Piyutim, most of which are admittedly valueless, the late Professor David Kaufmann defended his friend, the author, in a remarkable pamphlet. He says, inter alia, that in writing about the Piyutim Zunz was chiefly actuated by the desire to display before the eyes of the world the unexampled miseries and sufferings, which the Jewish people endured during a period extending over more than a thousand years. Thus it was obvious that, whether the Piyutim have by their existence enriched Hebrew literature or not, Zunz has, at all events, by his long dissertation on them, brought to light a piece of history of his people which, for various reasons, was worthy of a permanent record.
Another noteworthy point connected with the Synagogale Poesie is, that it contains a considerable number of versified German translations of pieces of liturgical Hebrew poetry, which renders them more intelligible to the ordinary reader than would otherwise have been the case. The following example may serve here as an illustration. One of the dullest liturgical pieces composed by the Hebrew writer Kaliri (about 700 A. D.) is no doubt the Hebrew hymn beginning with the words, Adam-u-behemah (אדם ובהמה), which is read in most of the synagogues on Hoshanah Rabbah. Yet Zunz translated it into excellent German. A free English translation is appended:—
On all that lives and moves
Look down, O Lord, with grace;
Preserve in health and strength