[24] This is a very small fibre of a very pretty root.
CHAPTER III
THE JEW OF THE HOLY LAND AND HIS DESTINY
In dealing with the Jews of the Holy Land, it is well to remember that the two great branches of the Hebrew race are the Sephardím and the Ashkenazím. They are both equally orthodox, and may intermarry when they please. It is advisable to offer a few words concerning these great branches first.
“Sepharad,” pronounced throughout “the East” Safard, a word occurring only once in the Old Testament (“and the captivity of Jerusalem, which is in Sepharad,” Obad. ver. 20), has been subjected to various interpretations. Enough to say the majority of Jews following the Targum Jonathan and the Peshito, or Syriac version, identify it with Iberia, modern Spain and Portugal. The Sephardím claim descent from the royal tribe of Judah, which, like the children of Benjamin, was the last to disperse. It contains the usual three orders: (1) The Cohen (in Arabic Káhin), the priest or Levite of the house of Aaron—a numerous body, as the Cohens of England show. Though born an ecclesiastic, he may now, since the rite of ordination has become extinct, pursue a purely laical trade. Whenever a Jew slaughters an animal, the Cohen claims the tongue, one side of the face, and one shoulder.[25] So in the days of Josephus (Antiquities of the Jews, IV. iv. 4) the priest took the maw, the cheek (or breast), and the right shoulder of the sacrifice privately killed for a festival. (2) The Levite or descendant of Levi, but not through the house of Aaron; like the Cohen, to whom he should pay the tithe of his tithes, he must prove his genealogy, which is often doubtful, and he is known by taking the name of Levi after his own and before that of his birthplace—e.g. Simeon Levi Salonikli. (3) “The circumcision” or Ammon Israelite.
Since the final destruction of the Temple there are no Gentile Proselytes of the Covenant, that is, circumcised strangers admitted to all the privileges of the children of Abraham; nor are there Proselytes of the Gate, uncircumcised worshippers of Jehovah who keep the moral law. The Ger, or stranger, may be received into the Church under certain circumstances by purification and circumcision, which latter, unlike the law of Muhammad, is absolutely necessary. Judaism, however, like Hinduism and Guebrism, is essentially one of the old congenital creeds; it never has been, it is not, and it never will be a system of proselytizing. As regards the tribes, Judah and Levi are everywhere known. Benjamin, Ephraim, and Half Manasseh are spoken of, and tradition declares that Asher exists in Abyssinia with Karaïte peculiarities. Finally, many Jews do not believe that the Ten Tribes were ever lost. They say that, during the Great Captivity, when the faith became all but extinct, they were mixed to such an extent that it was afterwards impossible to separate them.
The Sephardím, or Southern Jews, are mostly the descendants of Spanish and Portuguese ancestry, and throughout the Levant and the North African coast they speak Spanish and read and write it in their own character. Those of the Moroccan interior use Arabic. The dress is Oriental, and in the Holy Land they still wear the black turban ordained by the sumptuary laws of El Hakim (circa a.d. 1000). In physical appearance they are somewhat more prepossessing than the Ashkenazím, who are outnumbering them in Syria and Palestine, and are gradually ousting them. Officially they retain their position; the Hakhám Bashí, or chief doctor, is the only Jewish official recognized by the Turkish Government and representing the community in the Majlis, or town council. In all matters which come before the tribunals the Ashkenazím must be supported by the Hakhám Bashí, while the doctors hear and decide all cases relating to the internal affairs of the community. Many of the Sephardím are shopkeepers, trading chiefly in stuffs and hardwares. There are many minor differences between them and the Ashkenazím, such as the contents and the arrangement of their ritual, the constitution of their meetings, the mode of reading the service, their music, and even their cursive form of the square Hebrew character. The Maghrabis, or Western Jews, chiefly living in North-western Africa, rank elsewhere as Sephardím; at Jerusalem, however, they are considered a separate sect, and have their own chief doctor.
Thus the Sephardím are the Southern, opposed to the Northern Jews, or Ashkenazím. These derive their name from Ashkenaz, son of Gomer, and grandson of Japhet (Gen. x. 3), who is supposed to have peopled, in ethnologic succession, Armenia (Jer. li. 27), Poland, Germany, and Scandinavia—the latter according to some derives from him its name. The Ashkenazím claim descent from Benjamin, and are generally supposed not to have been present at the second building of the Temple by Zorobabel (b.c. 520), as described in the Book of Ezra.
The Ashkenazím of the Holy Land are chiefly Germans, Poles, Muscovites, and other Northerners. On January 26, 1849, an order from the Russian Consulate-General of Beyrut obliged them either to return home biennially in order to renew their passports or to give up their nationality. They were then taken under the protecting wing of Great Britain by the immense exertions of their co-religionists in the “City of Refuge” (London) and of other Western powers. This step can hardly be looked upon with satisfaction. Relying upon their new nationality, they addict themselves openly to usury and to other transactions of a doubtful and often of a dishonourable character. A determination to protect the whole community from religious persecution, allowing the Sultan to treat their commercial and civic affairs on the same footing as all the rest of his subjects, would be much more just, and would probably remedy not a few evils. In the year 1840 the Northern Jews mustered few at Damascus, and even now they are not numerous; among them may be mentioned old Abú Brahím, a well-known cicerone at Demitri Cara’s Hotel, who usually passed for a Cohen.