The Spanish period · Sabato Morais Digital Repository · Legacy Projects from Judaica DH at Penn Libraries

Title

The Spanish period

Author

Morais, Sabato

Location(s)

United States -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia

United States -- Pennsylvania

Format

29 pages on 30 sheets

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Language(s)

English

Source

Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies

Sabato Morais Collection, Box 13, Folder 2

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Provenance

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

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content

S. MORAIS,
546 N. FIFTH STREET,
PHILADELPHIA, PA.

The Spanish period
delivered before the Y. M. H. A.

This lecture was delivered again
with many alterations, additions
&c before the M. I. Association
in 189?

Ladies and Gentlemen
To inquire when Israelites first settled in Spain, would be to ask that the dead should rise to give us oral instruction, for what the pen has written on that topic, fails to impart any positive knowledge. Authors who identify Tarshish of the Bible with Tartessus--an ancient city in the Iberian peninsula-- believe that the Phenicians--the earliest navigators known in history--having established colonies in Spain, for instance, in Cadiz, in Seville in Toledo--cities whose names show recalling a derivation common to the Phenician and Hebrew language--carried conveyed in ships many of King Solomon's subjects to those distant colonies. Our clever predecessors, having learned from their seafaring neighbors the art of commerce, exchanged Palestenian goods for precious metlas, with the aborigines in the peninsula for precious metals, and thus enriched their distant own fatherland. Some scholars have also theorized on a passage of the Mishnah, where the word Aspania occurs, and have ventured to advance the untenable idea that, during the second Temple, long before the vulgar era, men of the Jewish faith brought offerings from Hispania, which they confound with Hispania Aspania to the officiating priest at the altar and he accepted them as if having come from consecrated ground.

More reliable however, are the proofs which we possess, that the Talmudists, living in Persia during the fourth century, had a knowledge of Jewish communities exist--ing in the south-western country of Europe. How were they those Jews religiously governed at the time? What was the status extent of their secular culture? The solution of these questions which ought, by right, to serve as an introduction to my lecture, I am unable to give. Nor do I regret it much, for, I surmise that in obedience to truth, I would be compelled to shame the religion, which claims the fatherhood of civilization. The laws of the reigning Visgoths, breathe a spirit of inveterate hatred, so contradictory of to the staple Church preach--ing "peace on earth and good will toward men," that to read them is to force Christianity before the bar of public opinion, and stigmatize it as the arch enemy of human progress. What freedom could Jews in Spain have enjoyed at that period in the exercise of their religious practices, when no worship was tolerated, and only allowed other than the most unyeilding Roman catholic--ism? was allowed? What opportunities could they be afforded to acquire a fund of useful information, when no--thing else than absurd stories and legends of monks, formed the current literature?

It was reserved for a purely Monotheistic race, bearing a great likeness resemblance to the descendants of the patriarchs in language and sentiments, to usher in an era surpassingly brilliant for the people of Abraham. It was reserved for a purely Monotheistic race of versatile genius; a race essentially poetical, to carry with themselves into lead on to the heights road way of learning, their an equally apt Semitic brethren race.
The eighth century, from since the birth of the Nazarene creed, had just begun dawned. Europe, forgetful of the lessons which ancient Greece and Rome had imparted, grew fana--tically stupid. To remove the crust of ignorance thickening around it, the cimitar of the Arabs proved a useful instrument. The disciples of the pro--phet of Mecca, spreading as far as Sicily in lower Italy, conquered also with ease soon mastered the arts and sciences which had once flourished in the countries now subjugated by them. Spanish Jews, loving personal liberty, and the unrestrained pursuits of the intellect, hailed the Crescent as the ensign of deliverance.
I cannot believe that our coreligionists, disloyally, showed the invaders points from which an attack could be successfully made.

I cannot believe it, because history, both Biblical and post-Biblical, testifies to the abhorrence on which Israelites have ever held treachery. But I can credit readily believe that hearty hallelu--jahs echoed forth resounded in the Synagogues, when a Caliph sat himself upon the throne of a Visigothic King.
The first two centuries of Asiatic rule in Southern Europe, prepared the vast field destined to produce a harvest of knowledge, which the whole world of letters was finally to enjoy. At their expiration, a struggle for supre--macy between the rival tribes of the Abassides and the Omejades, left the latter masters of the situation in Spain. To its daring Chief, Abdal Rackman is due the imperishable glory due of having called back renewed the palmiest days of classic Greece Attica. Cordova became as new Athens; Andalusia the a realm of science. A Jew stood at the right-hand of the Moor, and with a sagacity, exceeded only by his medical skill, advised how the govern--ment might be strengthened by the pen arts of peace, not less than by the sword warlike exploits.

Hadaï ABen Sharout, who, if not really the a prime minister, still, weilded unparalelled influence at the royal court, is the first commanding figure in that grand tableau of Hebrew celebrities, on which we yet still gaze with unabated unqualified admiration. Of what he wrote, there remains only a letter--a noble monument to his religious sentiments zeal--, a letter of anxious inquiry to a population the inhabitants of Daghestan in Asiatic Russia, called Kahsars, who, a century before and in their King Bulan, had embraced Judaism. But of what he Aben Shaprut did, numberless evidences have been given by his contemporaries and successors. Scholars who basked in the sunshine of his unbound--ed favors, recognized in that Hebrew, the leading spirit of the house of Judah, the Maecenas of learning, the Prince King of charity beneficence. A Spanish author of later times, describing the rising revival of sacred literature, thus glowingly speaks of Hasdaï. "In his days an ocean of learning surged up on; its waters shot forth cast up pearls and diamonds..... A voice had set was heard proclaiming "whosoever is on the Lords' side, let him come to me. He shall lack noting." Then hastened renowned literati from the lands of Christianity and of Islam.

From the East and from the West they arrived. That Prince spread before all a table laden with tokens of unstinted generosity. The pillar of his protection hovered around led only by day; that of his unquenchable light led guided onward by night. His beneficence became filled with a spirit of God, with wisdom and superior understanding in all arts. He initiated the era of science in Spain from which soil it passed [?] to the rest was further propagated, and reached the of the globe it reached thousands of civilizations whence modern civilization may reckon date its beginning nativity." So far the tribute of the enthusiastic Harizi to our Aben Shaprut Linguistic knowledge had gained for Hasdaï the lofty station which he occupied until death, to the glory of his people, and the interest of his King. For, when none but he could be met in Cordova to tran--slate into Arabic certain terms occurring in a Greek work of great medical usefulness by Dioscorides, the abilities to define which ren--dered him equal to that task, them proved a most successful recommendation to Abdal Rachman, the ruling Caliph. And the by means of the same thorough familiarity with languages was enriched our history enriched with a name scarcely less illustrious than that of Aben Shaprout.
Samuel Levy Aben Gektela (or Naydela, or Nagrela) sat in his apothecary's shop, adjoining to the residence of the Secretary of State at Malaga.

During the sojourn of that high official in Granada, his maid-servant would often ask the Jew to write in the name of for the family to their absent member. The reading, the communications latter, on reading those epistles, and marvelled at the purity of the Arabic style, and more so at the keen discernment they which the communications disclosed therein. Returning home, he demanded determined to know the real author of the letters which he had received, while abroad. The sharp-minded Hebrew, was being then sent for by that officer of the government, and the Secretary of State, was requested to act as his confidential adviser. Some years elapsed, and when the Secretary of State became extremely incurably ill. The Caliph Habos or Habus who,--engaged in constant wars with hostile Moorish tribes, and with the Nazarenes Christians still ruling Northern Spain, needed greatly a minister on whose ripe judgment he could implicitly rely, lamented the that an irreparable loss, he which was about to be sustained. The dying man reassured his lord, by speaking of commanding to his favor, Samuel Levy, the Jew, as the fittest person to be his successor in so responsible a position.
The twenty eight years that our Spanish coreligionist trod a royal palace was an honored servant of Royalty formed an epoch in our annals. Aben Gektela Nagdela, (or Nagrela) known thenceforth best among Jewish scholars as "Samuel the Prince," bestowed treasures, with a lavish hand, treasures on rarest works.

He procured them wherever they could be found bought, in Alexandrian libraries and in Italy, in Persia and in Palestine. The affairs of state, claiming his deepest attention and the main portion of his time, did not, nevertheless, engross all his entire thoughts. A valuable production--the first critical analysis extant of Talmudical diction, technical terms--if I may say so use the term expression--abounding in the Talmud, and an abridgment of which becomingly suitably prefaces the most accredited writings editions of the Babylonian Gemará, bears testimony to our only in part but to only a part of our Samuel's literary activity within the sphere circle of his own fellow-believers. Ail Alike large-hearted and and broad-minded, students obtained from his generosity supplied students with the means to gratify their aspirations; colleges felt the promptings of his munificence; synagogues secured constant aid from his purse, and sacred hymns from his pen. Surely If a good name be a crown which when splendor will pa not pale before the brightest diadems, that wherewith which adorned the spiritual brow of Samuel Levy Aben Gekela, was adorned, Nagrela (or Nagela) must for ever always sparkle with undiminished lustre. But let us leave the political heights of Andalusia of which we have taken a birds eye but a very hasty slight view, and rest our look for a brief a while of others upon eminences of another character.

Poetry, as the image of a soul enamored with what is lovely and great, sits not on mount Parnassus. To Zion-hills it wends its steps. to It quaffs at the limpid fountain which set there by a divine spirit has opened. The Scripture, Holy Writ is the hand spirit main spring of that true poetry, which flows unrestrained spontaneously in ceaseless streams. Rhyme and metre, sought painfully after, rule chained as it were, by conventional rules to gratify the ear, do not check its a majestic course. However Renowned authors, in their anxiety fond Desire to show that the writings of the our Psalmists and the prophets are not inferior to the effusions of the ancient Greeks have tried,--but in vain--to show point out in the Bible Hebrew scriptures instances of rhythm and studied versification. the attempt proved very unsatisfactory The beauty of the inspired word is not artificial. Ardent thoughts, the offspring of profound convictions; incisive ideas penetrating the mind of him that reads, distinguish the outpourings of David, and the oratory of Isaiah, not the tetrameter or the hexameter, smooth and stout sounding. though mellifluous and eup smooth [?] euphemisms. From the Arabs, the close imitators of the Greeks, our people first learned to to voluntarily to fetter their poetical conceptions, chain-ing the inner thought to the outward form.

Already the Gaons of Persia or Presidents of Rabbinical Academies at in countries between the Euphrates and the Tigris, after the spread of Islamism, began to compose prayers and moral exhortations, in in metrically form form. But Moorish Spain, from the ninth century to the end of the thirteenth, saw the Jews rival their rulers in the art of softly producing verse marked by rhyme. and rhyming euphoring. Towards the end of the illustrious career of Samuel the Prince there was born unto Israel a poet; eminently in very deed, a poet. He knew how to shape his language in the Arabic mould, and yet preserve unbroken the sinewy vigor clothed with by which pro--phetism has clothed that language. Sombre was his muse. Nature, or untoward circumstances, had let fall into fitted his cup of his cup an undue proportion of life's bitter drops life with bitterness. When still very young, he thus plaintively sung. "Severed from the world, without a brother, my thoughts alone are my companions. Tears, is are the blood, that courses in through my veins; tears and my drink com mingle together. fast. I thirst for friends; but I shall be no more, ere that thirst be quenched." Solomon Aben Gabirol is the reads as first King of Hebrew poetry, and the "Royal Crown" that he still wears, is the poem which he so entitled [Hebrew] Sovereign Genius! Would, it thou hadst been less melancholy. and not so tinctured Would that thy [?] soaring mind had not imbibed with a philosophy, which dared discuss the incomprehensible.

Still, that sadness of our poet uplifts the soul to God, as the highest source of comfort; that his philosophy elevates uplifts elevates the thought to the Omnipotence of the Creator, to and makes us feel the more intensely keenly the audaciousness of man's impious rebellion. I must regard as faulty the judgment of some among the moderns, who censure Gabirol for having been a devotee of to Aristotelian teachings, and an a believer in Astro--logy. What mind can, by a single leap, rise above all-prevailing notions? In reading the productions of that immortal son of our race, we should look (and who can fail to admire it?), we should look to the religious fervor dictating each prompting every word. Our poet so addresses the Deity in the course of his work "the royal Crown", written in rhythmical prose. "Thou art wise: wisdom floweth from Thee perenially, and man standeth aghast when seeking to define its origin. Thou art wise; the most ancient of all conceivable antiquity, but even then did Wisdom attained by experience; it is interlev a part of Thee. Thou art wise, and like a skilful artificer didst prepare, in Thy wisdom, a Devine Will, by which at a predetermined time,

existence might be brought forth from nothing, as light which issues form the eye, without the aid of human agencies." Here we perceive an attempt to dive into the unfathomable, and a leaning, unwittingly perhaps, to the Grecian theory of aeons or emanations, in the developpingment of nature;--a theory which afterwards later on played so conspicuous a part in Cabbalism; yet, the utterances burn with the zeal of piety. Again, in another part of the same composition "By the fiat of Him whose plastic hands fashioned the planets, each of them has been assigned a special charge, influencing the mortals. Faithful to the task; heedful of the ordinance, every one each carries answer to effects the call design of the Creator." We Some may discover detect in the doctrine advanced, what clashes with a cardinal point of Judaism,--freedom of will--and hence the doctrine of belief in reward and punishment. Still, the idea is not to subserve, for, the stars are declared subservient to the control of the Almighty Being, who holds them under con--trol. But graphic as touching in its sad tones is the language of our poet, when he calls upon petitions God to be mindful of man's vicissitudes, and because of them to pronounce for their sake a mild verdict. "Man! Lo! he is born; he spends a babe--the night in crying he is spent in cries the day in wailing whining sobs. Man! Lo! This morning he rises high; on the morrow vermins may worms have arisen on his body.

Man! Lo! He is swifter than eagles to go in quest of run in his race for riches, heeding but is deaf not to the sound of death close at his heels. He Home he has left home, to gather wealth. He rises travels On ships he travels; he traverses deserts, jeopardizes his life among ferocious animals; abiding midst howling beasts. Ah! He has at length grown opulent. He can enjoy affluence and be at peace. Of a sudden the destroyer comes. See! look around! He Man is no more. O Eternal! Thou Knowest Thou not these trials? Give not measure for measure, though man's mis--deeds may exceed all measure" It must not be supposed, however, that Gabirol's genius never struck by but plaintive chords. It touched soft strings, sacred to virtue. That genius weaved wove garlands for creatures deserving of all honor. For, the sensitive soul, wont to weep, appreciated what--ever is truly great in human characters. Let it this be said in homage to the memory of one of Israel's glorious sons. The sombre muse of our poet did not beget misanthropy. The erroneous notions with which he was imbued, did not no de-generate into a cold calculating heart-withering Pantheism; as that a pantheism of Benedict Spinoza, the modern idol of all who fain would dethrone the sovereign Creator and enthrone man's bewildering philosophy. Gabirol's abstractions did not degenerate into the negative of a personal God, from whom Nature received sp shape, incentive, and imprescriptible laws; a God of Justice, but of love.

Besides the stirring hymns and odes and [?] invocations and admonitions wherewith Aben Gabirol enriched the ritual of the Jews of Spain, the writings which he left in Arabic set that high-gifted fellow believer of ours, foremost among authors, who committed their profound thoughts their profound thoughts to the vernacular tongue. their profound thoughts. The world of letters had not learned how irreparable had been the loss which it sus--tained, when the renowned Israelite of the eleventh century died ere he had reached his fiftieth--and (according to some only his thirtieth)--year, until an Israelite of the nineteenth century told it. The distinguished historian and Orientalist, Solomon Munk of Paris, to whom we are notably indebted for a splendid French translation of Maimonides monu--mental work "the guide to the perplexed," the erudite Munk sought and found that the philosopher Abicebron, celebrated for his originality and depth, was none other than our Aben Gabirol; that he wrote "Fous Vitae," extolled in successive ages as the creation of a master mind. What might not have brought forth that so marvellous an intellect have brought forth, if its possessor had attained the three score years and ten, our allotted term! Legendary has, of course, like ivy climbing up to high walls, has grown thickly around the life of our poet. but it cannot beautify Beauty itself. I shall not direct to it your attention to it.

Suffer me rather to conduct you to another spot, perhaps not quite so lofty, but still more romantic. Moses Aben Ezra is rul rules holds dominion there. enthroned Nature had smiled complacently at his birth. Buoyancy of spirits, and an wide reaching exalted mind were the gifts of which he could exhibit boast. Unlike Gabirol's first notes, those which he early gave forth the poet of Granada sang in his youth, were like unto the songs of the sky-lark, sweet and joyous. Fair ladies, and their resistless charms, sparkling wines and convivial banquets, rural pleasures and light diversions, drew evoked complete and sonnets and madrigals, from the sprightly youth. He Listen to the minster's carols "A handsome face, and a brimful goblet, feathered warblers, and purling brooks; they are restoratives to lovers' hearts, gladness to the low-spirited, riches and songs are liveliness mirth they to the necessitous; the best of physics for all the sick." But thwarted love changed this lively mood vivacious sprightly wit to hypocondria. The graces of a neice were cupid's arrows, left thrust into his heart to canker it make it bleed. Why the damsel was denied him, none can explain at this distance of time, but the refusal the lover could not calmly bear; and when the woman

he adored, after having been wedded to another, was soon brought to the grave; when the oldest brother of the poet and the dearest, was also quickly called away from earth; when men that Moses trusted played the false and broke their faith, then wrapped2 in gloom, the1 once genial creature being, left Granada for unknown parts; but not without leaving believed infuriating leaving to in the city of his birth the traces of his profound his intense sorrow. So Thus he lamented: "My thoughts incited me to pass led me near the lasting home of parents and of friends. I spoke, but none would listen hearken nor give to me an answer. Have father and mother too plotted with traitors? They uttered not a word, but beckoned me still nearer. At their side they showed to me an empty seat." Finally, the influence of religious education grappled with those morbid feelings, and won a complete victory. The poems which emanated from the prolific pen of our writer, yeilded, though revealing a subdued nature, evince nevertheless a serenity which intensified deepened by piety. has overspread has over over Hence, the more adapted were they considered as penitential prayers, because of the longing which they express for Divine compassion, and for the inheritance of a celestial bliss.

Doubtless, during the life of their author, and in the his native city of his brith natural place, they were accepted and embodied largely introduced in the ritual, to be delivered chaunted on solemn occasions. Some are still remain left incorporated embodied in the Sephardic liturgy, and, none who use thus used uttered to the latter, can forget the ode, whose melody is so reviving, and which prefaces the closing service for the day of Atonement. But not the entire num--ber of those effusions found its way there, nor were incorporated in the ritual. is what yet remains, recited without any exception.
Like Aben Gabirol, Moses Aben Ezra, employed the vernacular extensively as a vehicle ot his philoso--phical ideas,--the sacred tongue in its naïve simplicity not lending itself to the intricacies of intellectual speculations, I hold the views of Ernest Renan on the science of lan--guages in great estimation, but I must nevertheless be--lieve that the Arabic does offer a scope to writers on abstruse subjects. Certainly it does more than the Hebrew: Witness the far-fetched expressions, and the newly coined words of the famous translators, the Aben Tibons, which obscure rather than elucidate the Arabic text. The Hebrew is essentially the language of sentiment, and not of metaphysics.

Regarding the tendency of the philosophical writings of the great by the famous Jew of Granada, I will state that Germans who, at the present age have a right to pronounce an authoritative opinion judgment, detected therein what will not always accord with sound theological doctrines. But we must bear in mind that the Stagirite was then the oracle which made itself heard, by all through the pen of medium of all ripe scholars. Who would have dared to to pronounce an opinion that clashed with the theses dictum of Aristotle?
Yes: one man did exist, who refused [?] to bow to bend low before the world-renowned Macedonian. I will let That man must be brought to your acquaintance. But not by myself me, lest what I say be regarded extra--vagantly eulogistic. I will vacate my place, and call on Heine-- suffer allow ask the anti-Rabbinist, the anti-Judaist, the skeptic, the satiric Heïne to make the introduction. He speaks. introduce that poet man of men. "A great poet was this, and in a wicked age, sanctity marked the steps he took. Like a polar star he shone before his hapless people. A pillar in a blaze became his poetry to the caravans of burdened Hebrews. Through the howling deserts of exile, he led the way, mindless of all dangers."...........

Fair, pure, sound, spotless, as the soul that breathed poured breathed it forth out forth, was the song. When that soul, so gentle, issued forth from above, God saw it. That soul pleased the Creator much, and His lips impressed on it a kiss divine. God kissed that lovely soul, and the sound of the celestial kiss sweetly echoes in each song, which Grace has hallowed."
The introduction is deserving of the illustrious Castilian. of the middle ages. Could I now make him speak with the his words he spoke, and lay set before your visions the thoughts that stirred that noble mind, you would indeed rise and bless the Eternal who imparted bestowed so large a portion of His spirit upon Judah Hallevi.
When I first began to learn, that during three or four centuries of the medieval ages a the remnant of the tribes in Spain could reckon poetical writers by the scores, I felt surprised that the Jew of Toledo should have been given a preference; so as to that he let him should occupy the principal space in the formulary of prayers, which his Sephardic fellow-believers, most--ly adopted for the solemn days of their annual autumn--al holidays season. Now, I am astonished that more room

was not made for the immortal lays of our bard, to the exclusion of ritual portions compositions of doubtful merit. For, if in the constellation of poetical cele--brities, Gabirol is distinguished as the a star of first of starry of magnitude, and Moses Aben Ezra follows with a brightness resplendent the light of Judah Hallevi appears increases in to increase in size and lustre the longer human a splendor, which is never continues un dimmed. and It sheds a radiance unequalled upon every human eye eyes rest thereupon which beholds it. The qualities which that other poets separately possessed, centred in him as in a focus. Fervid imagination, terseness of diction, grandeur, symmetry, the facility to use, to perfection scriptural phrases that they may fit his ideas are gifts which he holds absolutely but sincerity is his but the highest qualification, is sincerity mirrored in every utterance. I could not then continue to wonder any more any longer at the retention of many of his outpourings, in the services tendered to the God of Truth. Nay Even more: I am amazed, when on the ninth of Ab, I search and cannot find in my book that elegy which has touched the deepest chord of pathos, and see I discover it in the Ashkenazi liturgy. The omission is unpardonable, because all whose breasts swell with

sorrowful motions at the memory of Zion's no woes, ought to read what no uninspired author has ever equalled. In that inimitable elegy the character and aspirations of Judah Hallevi are summarized. He In Moorish Spain to which he may the Castilian Hebrew may have early [?] emigrated he enjoyed ease and the affection of wife and daughter. The tending of his gander, as the culturing training of youths, gave him delight. The store of know--ledge which he had acquired in sacred and secular literature, and joined his to medical practice [?] skill, had gained for him competence Hallevi an high enviable and renown. But in the mind of that great believer, Judaism was a living being, endowed with the noblest features. To unfold these before the world, philosophy became the ally of poetry. In his Cuzari the author reasons profoundly, but not once will he concede the possibility of anything superior to the Sinaic revelation and the traditions of the Sages. He does not No attempt is then made to reconcile Moses with Aristotle. He does not borrow fresh colors and The author never attempts ventures to draw on the imagination to in order to represents differently from the original [?] what is supernatural in the legation of the son of Amram. Building Basing his arguments on the Omnipotence of the Creator, and recognizing in Israel the heart of mankind humanity and in the holy land, the heart of the world, he justifies both selection God's selection of both.

He beholds in the sufferings of his people the throes of a new birth--a universal faith; in the agonies of the Palestine Jerusalem, the hardships attending the erection of a universal altar to the Shekinah. The philosopher poetizes; but earnest are the sentiments. Call him not a visionary who bids all which is dear upon earth in his fiftieth year, relinquishes what the sweets of a home, farewell and despite the entreaties and affectionate re--monstrances of all, determines resolves, to fulfil his a religious pious longing. Aye: when the inhuman Crusaders, reddened the rivers of Palestine he determines with blood, to he to undertakes a voyage pilgrimage to that country, whose former glories he has sung, and in the predictions of whose prophets he has the deepest faith; there to mingle his dust with that of the four fathers of God's chosen race.
We owe the late Critic and philologist, and poet Samuel David Luzzatto, everlasting gratitude for having procured, after much difficulty a manuscript con--taining the poems of the great Judah Hallevi, respect--ing his journey of religious love. I shall not dare to pre--sent even one of those gems, lest the touch tarnish its lustre lustre.

Germans have made given us metrical versions of the collection entitled "A Divans," and the reputation of the translators, bespeaks demands the approval of even my humble uninitiated self, ignorant of the language, employed. In Italian, Salvatore De Benedetti, prosser late professor of Hebrew and Aramaic in the University of Pisa, has given presented a rendition in flowing unsurpassed prose of a able or most a large number of those splendid magnificent productions. And Miss Emma Lazarus has won the affectionate respect of all her English speaking people, who value sublime atonements sublimely exhibited. But I cannot part with the Levite, in whose mental fellowship I enjoyed exceedingly, is to me joy, with--out having quoted a line from of his multifarious writings. I will cite a light joyful mirthful topic, a few stanzas of from a poem, which I do not think I think, has never been translated. It was doubtless intended as an epithalamium. I choose that not by reason of extraordinary merits, but to name the remarkable indi--vidual, whose nuptials elicited the composition. Joseph Aben Megas, the reputed preceptor of the universally known Maimonides, was the groom whom our Judah thus con- com-gratulated -plimented "A sun has arisen, whose rays orb never sets; by day and by night its sky is unclouded.....Time says to it: Enwrapped in thy mantle, I can outshine both Diana and Thoebus.......I am the sun arrayed in scarlet and gold (quoth the Bride) and I diffuse moreover sweet aroma and perfume around.

Come my beloved; a garden of pleasures I made have ready for thee...Fear not that a snake lies hidden mid flowers. The tresses thou seest sport on my cheeks, are the bonds whereby thou alone shalt be shackled. Wait not dear one, for whose ransom I would die, to hold out thy right hand, and declare me thine."
Aben Megas should have secured more than a mere passing men-tion. He who was privileged to be styled by Moses the son of Maimon "my learned teacher" ought to have formed the subject of lengthy remarks, and of merited eleg eulo--gies. And what can exhaustless biography; what a wealth of encomiums ought not the name of his pupil to have elicited? his pupil, who revolutionized completely the system of Hebraic studies; his pupil whose works on ritualism, on rhetorical, doctrines, philosophical logic and medicine works have given him a fame which will endure till a new heaven and a new earth be created? And that son of the Aben Ezra family; the explorer of countries, and the keen observer of men, the acute reasoner on Biblical exegesis, the Grammarian1 and the poet2, whose writings the Sage of Cordova chiefly mainly recommended to his child Abraham, ought he not to have been set before you upon a high pedestal?

And Aben Pakoda the deep thinker and devoted Rab--binist, who taught us "The duty of human hearts" in a book teeming with lessons of piety, and Moses Gherondi or Nachmanides, the critic and defender of Maimonides; he who stood before kings to uphold the true faith, and the German celebrity, that Asher who took sought shelter took up his home in in Spain Toledo, and spread lore far and wide, and that the numberless chieftains of the sacred host, who led Israel on the path of exaltation even to the last hour when the tocsin was totted, and the most Catholic Ferdinand and Isabella determined to glut with our blood the monster born in the Vatican, reared in Italy France, and grown gigantic in Spain, ought they not all to have received tokens of homage, while I surveyed the literary domains of medieval our forefathers in Iberia in during the middle ages?
Ladies and Gentlemen. I do not mean to disparage the good sense of your talented president, nor that of any of his coadjutors who may have made the sug--gestion; but to have imposed upon me the task of discussing in a single lecture a theme so varied and vast, was to place me in the unpleasant dilemma,

I greatly fear that the announcement was misleading beyond measure. To discuss in a single lecture, a theme so varied and vast as that of the Spanish period of in Jewish literature in the middle ages, could have meant either (p 26)

either to weary you with a list of names and dates, or to disappoint in their expectations of those who anticipated seeing perhaps fifty and not five form among their our celebrated ancestors, arrayed before their mental vision. Regretting the disappointment, I still nevertheless resolved to risk displeasure, rather than commit a grievous wrong. Having devoted some moments to the philosopher-poet, the object of my special affection, whom I dared not dismiss with a few hasty sentences, I considered it indecent if, by reason of the lack of time, I simply made simply a passing bare mention of Sages who excelled in various departments of literature. If I said, for instance, Isaac Israeli wrote on Astronomy Isaac Arama on metaphysics, Isaac Abarbanel, a great man copious prolific author, was born in Portugal, emigrated to Spain and died in Italy. I would have felt as if particularly that the spirit of the one of the that one most prolific and versatile writer author; of that eminent and high-minded and eminent statesman, who was ready to sacrifice position, riches and life, if he could have extinguished the flames of the horrid inquisition and prevented the cruel expulsion, would have risen and with a frown re--buked a brevity akin to insolence. Who would not have pre--ferred absolute silence to the perpetration of so a gross an offence?

And yet, I hope that I have not been altogether unsuccessful in carrying out the intention of the Directors of the Young Men's Hebrew Association of Philadelphia. The little I have said about the Spanish period, whose productions I was asked to exhibit, should have proved the effects of unrestricted freedom in the prosecution of learning. Have I not demonstrated how nobly some of our ancestors employed that privilege the during the medieval ages? The deeds of Hasdaï and of Samuel the Prince suffice to place them as exemplars to Jews, who are afforded unequalled facilities to rise by the exercise of their intellectual powers.
American Jews can renew the days in which the adorers of the Unity shed lustre on the land of their sojourn by striking surpassing attainments in arts and sciences. They should renew those days, to honor their faith--the pioneer of light and progress--; to honor their land, dearer than Spain under the most liberal of the Moorish Caliphs, for it is their land. When the Jews of this generous Republic, shall resolve so to act, they will deserve a name everlasting, even like that of glorious sons of our race, whose characters and writings I have endeavoured accurately, though very faintly, to set before my hearers this evening.

Identifier

p3zc7sd9c

identifier

SMBx13FF2