Penitential Sabbath (Shabat shubah). Morais, Sabato. Philadelphia, PA. 1891 · Sabato Morais Digital Repository · Legacy Projects from Judaica DH at Penn Libraries

Title

Penitential Sabbath (Shabat shubah). Morais, Sabato. Philadelphia, PA. 1891

Author

Morais, Sabato

Date Created

1891

Location(s)

United States -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia

United States -- Pennsylvania

Format

10 pages on 5 sheets

Rights

http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?

Language(s)

English

Source

Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies

Sabato Morais Collection, Box 10, Folder 2

Has Format

https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/items/ark:/81431/p3f18t137/manifest.json

Link to Colenda

https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/catalog/81431-p3f18t137

Provenance

Transfer of Custody from the Hebrew Education Society, 10 March 1913.

Is Format Of

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/judaicadh/morais/main/TEI/SMBx10FF2_2.xml

content

S. MORAIS,
546 N. Fifth St.,
Philadelphia,

For the Penitential Sabbath
[Hebrew]

Brethren.
The book called in Hebrew Aboth, and styled in English with striking fitness "the ethics of the fathers," contains a sentence, which is our duty to keep in mind always, but most es--pecially at this solemn period of our year, devoted to a reflection of our past conduct, ans to wholesome prepa--rations for our future course, while destined to dwell upon earth. For to that end were the [Hebrew] the ten penitential days instituted. The sentence to which I have reference reads so in the original: [Hebrew] meaning, thou wilt be compelled to stand for judgment before the Supreme King of Kings, the Almighty,--a Rabbinical saying which agrees precisely with the closing verse of the book of Ecclesiastes [Hebrew] [Hebrew] that is; every deed God will bring before His tribunal with every thing hidden, whether good or evil bad. On Rosh Hashanah I cited the parting caution of the archprophet, with a view to prove that the government of the world is un--der the immediate supervision of a Sovereign Lord, both in its entirety, viz, according to nationalities, and in its component parts, or according to individuals.

I designed to show that the idea of a ubiquitous Providence is vitally essential for to the permanence of society, and that if the belief of our accounta--bility to an Omnipotent Ruler were banished, the widest entrance would be opened for all inequities to rush on. Lying and defrauding, unchastity and brutality would stalk abroad unchecked and unabashed. The doctrine of our personal responsibility is then not only a great truth founded upon the strongest basis--Holy Writ--but it is the mightiest safeguard against a universal corruption; it is the healthiest moral restraint upon all beings endowed with an immortal soul. And as the requital of our deeds--though surely given also here below also in a vast measure--is not so visibly perceptible by others strangers, and it is likely to escape the attention notice of our own selves who are its recipients, therefore the Sages directed our minds attention principally to the imperishableness of the faculties stirring within us; and to They emphasized the inevi--tableness of their our being called to answer for the use made thereof our powers in this world, which they style [Hebrew] [Hebrew]--our sphere of action, when summoned to a state, which they emphatically significantly term [Hebrew] the world of retribution.

Strange Curious as it may seem the train of my thoughts while mentally pensively following the serious subject of our glory or our shame hereafter--a subject which the penitential days intervening between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are calculated to suggest--brought back to my mind a Biblical narrative recorded in the second book of Samuel. You may remember it. King David, grateful for the protection asylum, which some of his relatives had obtained found in the country of the Ammoni--tes, when he himself was fleeing away, without a home, form the implacable anger enmity of Saul, sent ambassadors to condole with the reigning Sovereign for the demise of his royal parents. But the message of kindness was interpreted at the foreign court, as a pre--text to spy the land, and ascertain where it could best be attacked. Mischievously influenced by his ministers, the King of the Ammonites ordered that the Hebrew envoys should have their beards shaved on one side of their faces, their garments cut short in a most ludicrous manner, and be thus exposed to the Jeers and biting jests of all beholders.

That those men felt overwhelmed with confusion, we learn from the circumstance that they refused to go back to their own private firesides, and much less to appear at the King's palace [Hebrew] says the text: "the men were greatly ashamed" I fancy that they would almost have preferred death to their entering the capital in that wretched flight--they, who doubtless were notable persons. But what were the feelings which David's chosen ambassadors experienced at the thought of being made the butt of ridicule, in comparison with the confusion which will seize us--if while in a state of defilement pollution we were irresistibly forced to stand should be summoned before the Supreme King of Kings the Almighty Jug Judge; if irresistibly forced to answer in our actual condition to account for a mission received as creatures gifted with intellectual powers and as appointed witnesses of God's Unity? For, wrote the Mishnic Sage [Hebrew] In spite of our own will, we shall have to show how we employed did apply our faculties. We Our characters will be placed then in a right light, revealing our characters in disclosing their real aspect. The spots which we succeeded in conceal--ing before from human eyes, will be laid bare, and we shall stand convicted of evil foul deeds often committed.

Have I lived led a double life? The sins of my hypocrisy will pass in review before my spiritual vision [Hebrew] say the Talmudists: At the bar of the highest tri--bunal there will be a finger will unerringly pointing out our wrong doings and the very time that we be--came guilty thereof. "On such a day then, who wast considered gentle, gavest vent to thy passions, and those [?] those whom thou shouldst most care for suffered poignant grief. At the same such a season thou madest public pretense of piety, with a fixed determination nevertheless to fall back upon thy evil ways. At the same hour when thou hadst a wish to appear liberal, thou wouldst begrudge thy nearest ones the satisfaction of their very wants." And to all of that we shall inevitably compulsorily reply "Aye, it is so". "I am not the man that the world took me for. I did not gain my wealth by the strictest pro--bity. I have craved for indulgence in wanton plea--sures and unjewish practices. I am not innocent of having envied men in high places, even though to reach up to them I might have had to mount up on heaps of corruption."

And those humiliating acknowledgments we shall be con--strained to make within hearing of the good and those who preceded us in the world of spirits; men and women whose to enjoy whose favorable opinion you so we would have considered deemed a price to enjoy. Now, fellow-Israelites, you may recall the scene at the death bed of Rabbi Johanan Ben Zackaï. his disciples had come to ask for the great teacher's parting blessing. He said: [Hebrew]. "May your fear of God be like equal your fear of man." Amazed, the pupils inquired [Hebrew] "so far and no more?" But the illustrious Sage understood human nature. We are may be held back from the down--ward course of transgressions by the thought that human eyes are upon us, but not are we we are not so deterred by the belief that God is all seeing, and in proportion as the persons whose looks are rivetted on watch us excell in harming or virtue, so will be the restraint upon our actions lest we forfeit their esteem. Let us then imagine ourselves the observed of all observers in a circle of the noblest of beings who trod this earth; patriarchs, prophets and Sages. Their looks are rivetted upon us, and in their presence we are to confess ourselves guilty of vice and irreverence to irreligion.

No shame greater than that, yet we will be brought face to face--to use a human phrase--with those whose ethereal association we may long for in vain might have been our sweetest reward, but from which we our in wordly polluters cut us off. For so Not to be gathered to our fathers, or our people, as the Scriptures express it the joys of immortal life, is the knowing grief and im- -pure deep confusion. We will look with abhorrence upon the years, devoted to hoarding up what could not purchase us even an approving smile of the saints eternized by virtue rectitude [Hebrew], but the past is will be then irretrievable. It is when possessed of all the means to redeem our conduct, that we can should recover our innocence, washing in the laver of Jewish purification. The God of Israel has laid it now within our reach. He who holds the threads of our existence in His hand, may have beneficently resolved ordained to lengthen them, and we shall life to rejoice over recu our recovery over our recuperation from moral diseases, infirmities. Sound in spiritual health, we shall live to breathe into others the breath of the divinity that stirs within us; our example and our teachings will bring many to righteousness. We shall become god like.

Still, should another decree have gone forth, we will ascend move with a light gait to the spirit-land, for assured to meet the welcoming host of the noblest, glorified in the vision contemplation of God, for, where the sincere repentant will ascend, the perfect righteous themselves will can not enter. Oh may this [Hebrew] effect our elevation, and Thou O Lord, in whom we trust, take us not hence until we have conquered all our enemies--the passions that mislead us, and the fondness of worldly varieties which estrange us from Thee. May a wealth of virtues be amassed by each of Thy supplicants during the year which we have just entered, and the blessings of those toward whom we will exercised our manly qualities, afford us a foretaste of heaven upon earth. Grant O God that the year 5651, numerically representing the word [Hebrew] yo "you have seen", cause us to behold the salvation of Thy people, when the children of Belial Shah vex them no more, and may the banner of freedom wave over the oppressed of all nations from one end of Thy created world to the uttermost end speedily in our days: Amen.

Identifier

p3f18t137

identifier

SMBx10FF2_2