Hebrew literature -- History and criticism; Jewish literature -- History and criticism; Jews in literature
Addison fairly gives his enthusiasm the rein when he discusses Jewish
education. “The care of the Jews is very laudable in this particular,
there being not many people in the world more watchful to have their
children early tinctured with religion than the present Hebrews.”
Though they usually speak “_Moresco_, the Language of their Nativity,
and a sort of Spanish which enables them for Traffick,” they learn
Hebrew. The children, he informs us, are usually taught the Hebrew for
the domestic utensils and “terms of Traffick Negotiation.” The method
was quite in accord with modern ideas of teaching a language. “By
this Order they furnish the Children with a _Nomenclature of Hebrew_
Words; and all this before they admit them to Syntax and Construction.”
Addison pictures the Jewish Sabbath with some charm; he even cites
passages from Luria, to whom the home and synagogue rites of the day
of rest owe so much. On no subject is our author more interesting than
with regard to the Jewish charities. The Jews live “in a more mutual
charity of alms than either the Moor or Christians”; and Addison
admits, “it cannot be denied that the Jews’ manner of relieving the
poor, is regular and commendable.” In his day it was, as it is in ours,
the Synagogue’s ideal to relieve its own poor. There were no beggars
in the Barbary Jewry. “For though among the Jews of Barbary there is
a great store of needy persons, yet they are supplied after a manner
which much conceals (as to men of other religions) their poverty.”
Obviously Addison would like these people to become Christians. Why
do they refuse? The “stiffness of their necks,” on the one hand, and
the “naughtiness of our lives,” on the other, cries the author. The
“naughtiness” will, let us hope, be more easily removed than the
“stiffness.” Lancelot Addison, says Macaulay, “made some figure in the
world.” He deserved to do so. His book on the Jews was a credit to his
power of observation and his goodness of heart.
THE BODENSCHATZ PICTURES
Johann Christoph Georg Bodenschatz, a priest of Uttenreuth, underwent
a triple training for his great work on Jewish Ceremonial. He
studied literature, observed facts, and used his hands. The _Jewish
Encyclopedia_ remarks that he “is said to have made elaborate models
of the Ark of Noah and of the Tabernacle in the Wilderness.” There is
no reason for the qualifying words “is said.” In a dedicatory epistle
to the Margrave Friederich of Brandenburg, Bodenschatz distinctly
informs us that in 1739 he constructed these models, “after the records
of Scripture and of Jewish Antiquities.” He adds that the models were
preserved in the royal _Kunst und Naturaliencabinet_. I cannot say
whether they still exist; but at the beginning of last century, the
Tabernacle was at Bayreuth and the Ark at Nuremberg.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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