How strange it seems!
These Hebrews in their graves, Close by the street of this fair seaport town, Silent beside the never-silent waves, At rest in all this moving up and down! The trees are white with dust, that o'er their sleep Wave their broad curtains in the south-wind's breath, While underneath these leafy tents they keep The long, mysterious Exodus of Death. And these sepulchral stones, so old and brown, That pave with level flags their burial-place, Seem like the tablets of the Law, thrown down And broken by Moses at the mountain's base. The very names recorded here are strange, Of foreign accent, and of different climes; Alvares and Rivera interchange With Abraham and Jacob of old times. "Blessed be God! for he created Death!" The mourners said, "and Death is rest and peace;" Then added, in the certainty of faith, "And giveth Life that nevermore shall cease." Closed are the portals of their Synagogue, No Psalms of David now the silence break,
How strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves, Close by the street of this fair seaport town,
Silent beside the never-silent waves, At rest in all this moving up and down!
The trees are white with dust, that o'er their sleep Wave their broad curtains in the south-wind's breath,
While underneath such leafy tents they keep The long, mysterious Exodus of Death.
And these sepulchral stones, so old and brown, That pave with level flags their burial-place,
Seem like the tablets of the Law, thrown down And broken by Moses at the mountain's base.
The very names recorded here are strange, Of foreign accent, and of different climes;
Alvares and Rivera interchange With Abraham and Jacob of old times. "Blessed be God! for he created Death!" The mourners said, "and Death is rest and peace";
Then added, in the certainty of faith, "And giveth Life that never more shall cease." Closed are the portals of their Synagogue, No Psalms of David now the silence break,
No Rabbi reads the ancient Decalogue In the grand dialect the Prophets spake.
Gone are the living, but the dead remain, And not neglected; for a hand unseen,
Scattering its bounty, like a summer rain, Still keeps their graves and their remembrance green.
How came they here? What burst of Christian hate, What persecution, merciless and blind,
Drove o'er the sea--that desert desolate-- These Ishmaels and Hagars of mankind?
They lived in narrow streets and lanes obscure, Ghetto and Judenstrass, in mirk and mire;
Taught in the school of patience to endure The life of anguish and the death of fire.
All their lives long, with the unleavened bread And bitter herbs of exile and its fears,
The wasting famine of the heart they fed, And slaked its thirst with marah of their tears.
Anathema maranatha! was the cry That rang from town to town, from street to street;
At every gate the accursed Mordecai Was mocked and jeered, and spurned by Christian feet.
Pride and humiliation hand in hand Walked with them through the world where'er they went;
Trampled and beaten were they as the sand, And yet unshaken as the continent.
For in the background figures vague and vast Of patriarchs and of prophets rose sublime,
And all the great traditions of the Past They saw reflected in the coming time.
And thus forever with reverted look The mystic volume of the world they read,
Spelling it backward, like a Hebrew book, Till life became a Legend of the Dead.
But ah! what once has been shall be no more! The groaning earth in travail and in
Brings forth its races, but does not restore, And the dead nations never rise again.1. "July 9, 1852. [Newport,
R.
I.] Went this morning into the Jewish burying-ground, with a polite old gentleman who keeps the key.
There are few graves; nearly all are low tombstones of marble, with Hebrew inscriptions, and a few words added in English or Portuguese.
At the foot of each, the letters S.
A.
G.
D.
G. [Su Alma Goce Divina Gloria.
May his soul enjoy divine glory.] It is a shady nook, at the corner of two dusty, frequented streets, with an iron fence and a granite gateway, erected at the expense of Mr.
Touro, of New Orleans." [Editor, pp. 33-34.] 8.
Exodus:
Biblical book describing the departure of the Israelites out of Egypt into the desert in search of the promised land.12.
Cf.
Exodus 32.19.15.
Portuguese and Spanish names, indicating the origin of many American jews.16.
Abraham and Jacob: the father of the Hebrew people, and his grandson (son of Isaac) and heir of Abraham's promised blessing.21.
Synagogue:
The Touro Synagogue (83 Truro St.), the oldest one in the United States, began in 176323.
Decalogue: the ten commandments.32.
Ishmaels and Hagars:
Hagar, a concubine of Abraham, was exiled with their son Ishmael into the desert on account of Sarah's jealousy at the birth of her son Isaac by Abraham.34.
Ghetto and Judenstrass: city quarter in which Jews were forced to live; "street of the Jews."37. unleavened bread: bread baked without leavening (e.g., yeast) that raises or lightens the dough (cf. the Jews' practice in their exile from Egypt in Exodus 12.39). 40. marah:
Hebrew word meaning "bitter(ness)," an allusion to the undrinkable water found by the Israelites in the desert (Exodus 15.23-26).41.
Anathema maranatha! the highest form of excommunication among the Jews (1 Cor. 16.22), the two words meaning "given over to destruction" and "at the Lord's coming."43. the accursed Mordecai: persecuted by Haman with therest of the Jewish people (see Esther 2 ff.).
