[Flourished in Spain during the tenth century. Owing to some quarrels, he left his native country, and went to Damascus. He was an eminent talmudic scholar and liturgic poet, and is said to have translated the entire Talmud into Arabic. Only a small number of his poems have been preserved, but they tend to show that he was a skilful poet with intense religious fervor. Some of them are of ingenious and complicated structure.]
1. Hymn Based on Psalm 120[[78]]
O God, be gracious unto me on the day I hasten to praise Thee; forgive my sins, and judge me not according to my deeds; when with a Song of Ascents I cry to Thee, make clear to me: ‘In my distress I called unto the Lord, and He answered me.’
For Thee, O God, my soul has ever pined; through the abundance of my sins I have no respite; wipe off, I pray Thee, all my sins, the known and the unknown,—O Lord, deliver my soul from lying lips, from a deceitful tongue.
I said unto deceitful Uz[[79]]: ‘Shalt thou for ever walk upright in thy wantonness? Gehenna is prepared for thee as thy apportioned lot.—What shall be given unto thee, and what shall be done more unto thee, thou deceitful tongue?’
My presumptuous sins are marked before Thee; they are bound up in bundles, engraved, and sealed. Prepare a feast for them that are benign to the guileless people;—sharp arrows of the mighty, with coals of broom!
Majestic Lord, before Thee are my sorrows; among the multitude of thorns I am well-nigh destroyed. But a short while I lived in magnificent dwellings; woe is me, that I sojourn with Meshech, that I dwell beside the tents of Kedar.
All my oppressors smite me with horror; in the presence of my enemies I feel deeply ashamed; all the backsliders hate me with an everlasting hate; my soul hath full long had her dwelling with him that hateth peace.
O Most High, console Thy people that is disconsolate; to her that is unpitied turn Thou, and be merciful. My adversaries say: ‘No comfort shalt thou ever see.’—I am all peace; but when I speak, they are for war.
Whenever it is time for praise, I cry to Thee, my God; as I set forth my prayers, show Thy kindness unto me. To praise Thee, O Praised One, I kept awake at night—accept Thou then my prayer with the Song of Ascents.