[¹] Place of Ancient Greece in the Providential Order, 1865, in Gleanings of Past Years 1860–79. By the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P., vol. vii. ... London: ... 1879. pp. 79–80.
Here we have again the closest connection between Zionism and Biblical ideas.
At the Great Assembly Hall, Mile End, on the 29th May, 1891, on the occasion when the petition to be presented to the Sultan of Turkey, composed in Hebrew and English, was communicated to the public by Mr. S. Montagu, M.P. (afterwards Lord Swaythling), Mr. Elim H. d’Avigdor declared:—
“... His objection to colonising America was that the farther west they went, the greater the distance they placed between them and Zion. He wished rather that they should go to a country that was once Israel’s homestead, where brother might work with brother, where the Sabbath would be the Sabbath of all, and where Yom Kippur would be the day of abstention from food throughout the country. He was convinced that many wealthy co-religionists were willing to surrender cheerfully all their worldly possessions, and resign all their hopes of worldly aggrandisement, in order to return with their brethren to the land of their fathers. They express the hope every Passover, ‘Next year in Jerusalem.’ Was this utterance merely a lip service, or did it spring from their hearts?...”
Lieut.-Col. Goldsmid followed, and said:—
“... The seed of Israel was meant for something more than a commercial people. Let them not only strive to find a home for their outcast brethren, but let it be their aim and object to resuscitate the national idea in Israel.”[¹]
[¹] No. 4 ... Palestina, The Chovevi Zion Quarterly.... June, 1893 (History of the Chovevi Zion Rise of the Movement), pp. 10–13.
In an address delivered in Edinburgh he struck the same note:—
“... there was no nation on the earth nearer akin to the Jewish nation than the Scottish, both in their love of the Bible and in their sympathy with all that is best in Judaism. The Chovevi Zion, he said, was not a charitable institution, the main object was to foster the national idea in Israel. Had it not been for the national idea we would have been wiped off the face of the earth long before now.[¹] Colonel Goldsmid went on to show how we Jews, who are the descendants of the faithful minority in Babylon, continue to exist as heirs to the promises through all ages, while the descendants of the majority, who turned away from the national idea, no longer exist. Some people said that members of the Chovevi Zion could not be good citizens, but he maintained that the true lover of Zion, who could be faithful after two thousand years, would die in defence of the country he lived in.... When I visited Palestine in 1883, colonies were just beginning to be formed. People laughed at the idea of Jewish agriculturists. There were three small colonies, but for want of implements to work, things were at a standstill, some were actually tearing up the ground with their fingers. Through the kindness of Baron Edmond de Rothschild, matters are now very different. In future, colonisation, from the experience which has been gained, would start with enormous advantages....”[²]
[¹] Christian Englishmen have ever considered the Jews to be a historical unit, and appreciated their distinctiveness. Sir Isambard Owen, Vice-Chancellor of Bristol University, addressing a meeting of the Union of Jewish Literary Societies at Bristol in 1914, said that the work of the Union was of interest to him because it was a work which he himself had spent a good many years of his life in endeavouring to carry out amongst a nationality far smaller in numbers and far less known in history than the Jewish nationality—he meant the nationality of Wales.