His attention in the years 1853 and 1854 was principally directed to communal matters in his own congregation, and to an extensive correspondence with Hebrew communities in foreign countries.
He received a communication from the Rev. S. M. Isaacs, a minister of one of the Hebrew communities in New York, referring to the "North American Relief Society," an institution founded by Mr Sampson Simon and himself (the Rev. S. M. Isaacs) for the purpose of creating a capital, the interest of which was to be annually appropriated to the support of the poor Israelites in the Holy Land.
He made the first remittance of the amount to Sir Moses, and requested that he would forward the same to Jerusalem. Sir Moses acceded to his wishes with pleasure, and continued to forward the remittances of that society, amounting to £145 every year, until his death.
The Rev. S. M. Isaacs also informed him of the death of a great philanthropist, Juda Touro of New Orleans, who had left the North American Relief Society $10,000, and a further sum of $50,000 for the benefit of the poor Israelities in Palestine; the latter sum subject to Sir Moses' control, conjointly with the executors.
Knowing the interest Sir Moses took in Jewish communal affairs, Mr Isaacs gave him all the particulars respecting his wealthy friend, who desired to benefit the poor, without distinction of creed or nationality. "Mr Touro," he wrote, "has left princely legacies of $20,000 for the hospital recently established at New York, $40,000 for educational purposes, and $80,000 to various synagogues. He has also left munificent gifts (more than $200,000) to Christian charities.
His remains are to be interred at Newport, Rhode Island, where his family are buried. He has left $10,000 for the endowment of the office of minister there, has given a synagogue worth $50,000 to the Hebrew community at New Orleans, and endowed it richly; he has also given a hospital, munificently endowed, to his co-religionists in New Orleans.
Sir Moses immediately expressed his willingness to forward the remittance of the North American Relief Society to the Holy Land, and to accept the trust of the Touro legacy, respecting the application of which I shall give the reader full particulars as I proceed further.
At the same time he received a communication from the Holy Land which gave him great pain. It conveyed the intelligence that there was great suffering in Palestine, and Sir Moses at once addressed the Chief Rabbi on the subject.
"For the sake of Zion," he writes to him, "I cannot remain silent, and for the sake of Jerusalem I cannot rest, until the whole house of Israel have been made acquainted with the lamentable condition of those of our brethren who devotedly cling to the soil sacred to the memory of our patriarchs, prophets, and kings.
"Thrice having visited the Holy Land, it was my earnest desire fully to inform myself as to the condition of our brethren there, for whom my deepest feelings of commiseration were excited, in regard to the amount of misery endured by them.
"Poverty in the East differs vastly from the like calamity experienced in Western Europe, inasmuch as the capability to relieve is in the East confined within the narrowest bounds, and restricted to a very limited number. Such being the general outline of the condition of our brethren in Judea, my feelings were most naturally aroused in their behalf.
"But, reverend sir, judge to what extent my sympathies are now awakened, when—as I informed you, from the harrowing intelligence it has been my painful lot to receive, both from direct and indirect sources—I learn that 'fathers in Israel'—men profoundly learned in the law, who, so that they may die near the graves of their forefathers, submit to live in the most abject poverty—are now impelled by the very love they bear towards their children to sell them to the stranger, 'so,' to use their own words, 'that their offspring may be spared death from starvation.'
"Reverend and respected sir, I am loudly called upon by our brethren in the Holy Land, as the annexed letters will show, and farther prompted by the voice within me, to urge their claims on the notice of the congregations of Israel, and to request their immediate and liberal assistance.
"Aware, however, reverend sir, of your great anxiety for the physical amelioration of our suffering brethren, and how watchfully you note their spiritual welfare, I am induced to put you in possession of the documents and appeals which I have received from the Holy Land, with the assurance that your powerful co-operation, in the shape of a pastoral letter addressed to the Jews of Great Britain and America, or the exercise of the same in any other mode your wisdom may dictate, will, with God's blessing, not only tend to remove the present appalling misery of our starving brethren in Zion, but spare us the humiliation of its recurrence."