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THE AGED RABBI.
A JEWISH TALE.
From the Danish of B. S. Ingemann.
BY MRS. Bushby.
I.
"Is the day of persecution to return, lost, unhappy Israel?" exclaimed the old rabbi, Philip Moses, sadly shaking his venerable grey head, as one evening in the autumn of 1819 stones were thrown in through the windows of the house in which he resided, whilst the rabble of Hamburg shouted in the street in derision the first words of the Jew's lament for Jerusalem.
"Yes! ye are right," he continued, mournfully, "Jerusalem is demolished and laid waste. Te could not stone us against Jehovah's will! But His wrath is sore kindled against us. His patience was great, but His people have forgotten Him in the midst of their banishment; they have forgotten the Law and the Prophets amidst the dwellings of strangers; they have mingled their blood with the blood of the unbeliever; and lo! therefore God's people are thrust forth from the earth, and blotted out from among the living."
"Oh, grandfather, grandfather!" cried his weeping grandchildren, clinging to him in their terror, "protect us from the fearful Christians!"
"If ye be still the children of Israel," answered the old man, calmly, "fold your hands, and bow your knees, turn your faces towards the east—towards the ruins of God's holy city—and pray to Jehovah, the God of your fathers! While thus engaged in Prayer, what if these stones crush your heads, and dash out your brains? Praise Jacob's God with me, and die in the name of the Lord God of Sabaoth! Then shall his cherubim bear ye in peace to our Father Abraham's bosom!"
"Is that the only comfort you can bestow, simple old man?" said his son Samuel, the father of the children. He was the richest jeweller in Hamburg, and now saw his valuable shop exposed to be ransacked and plundered by the furious mob. "Can you give us no better advice than to pray? I know something better. We will all let ourselves be baptised to-morrow."
"Would you renounce the faith of your fathers on account of your anxiety about your jewellery, my son?" said the old man, casting a contemptuous glance upon the wealthy, trembling Israelite, whom overcome with fear, was rushing from keeping-place to keeping-place, gathering together and packing up his most valuable articles.
"Truly it is indifferent to me weather they call me Jew or Christian," replied Samuel, "so I can save my goods and my life. When the question is, whether I shall be a rich man to-moarow or a beggar—whether I shall walk the streets, and go to the Exchange in peace, or if I am to be pelted in open day by the very children, and risk my health, my limbs, my life itself—when my jewels, my furniture, my wife, my children, and my windows are in question—I should be a great ass if I hesitated to let a handful of cold water be thrown upon me. It is only a stupid ceremony; but I dare say it is just as good as our own crotchets.
