CHAPTER X_The Holy Land and Syria

JEWS OF JERUSALEM

The Jews are rapidly coming into their own. The Holy City now contains

some thirty thousand of them; they form about half of its whole

population. They have acquired the right to own land in Palestine, and

they can come and go as they please. This has not always been the case.

Jewish immigration used to be prohibited, and such Jews as bought real

estate had to purchase and hold it under other names.

Until the last decade of the nineteenth century the Turkish Government

had a rule that no Jew might come into Palestine and stay there longer

than three weeks. The restrictions were given up largely through the

activities of Mr. Gilman, a former American consul to Jerusalem. When

he came to the Holy City it was the policy of the representatives of

the other foreign governments there to aid the Turkish authorities in

expelling immigrant Jews. Shortly after his arrival he was advised by the

Sultan’s officials that some American Jews were overstaying their time

in the Holy Land and was requested to direct them to leave. He replied

that such action was entirely contrary to the spirit of our government

which is founded on religious toleration and freedom, and after some

negotiations the American Jews were allowed to remain. Soon after this

the British consul, acting under instructions from the British minister

at Constantinople, took the same stand, and the other leading governments

followed suit. Seventy-five years ago there were only thirty-two Jewish

families in all Jerusalem and only three thousand in all Palestine.

[Illustration: Christian sects may quarrel over their holy places,

Jews may clamour for their national home in Palestine, while the Arabs

proclaim that the land is theirs. Neither politics nor religion disturbs

this maid of modern Jerusalem]

[Illustration: Snow is almost unknown in these grass-grown vaulted

streets, beneath which lie buried the ruins of the Jerusalems of the

past. The streets Christ trod are twenty to eighty feet below the city of

to-day]

Now there are sixty-odd thousand in the Holy Land and, as I have said,

Jews make up half the population of the Holy City. The Jews here are now

engaging in trade, and already control a large part of the business of

Jerusalem.

Forty different languages are spoken among the Jews of Palestine, and

there are many who cannot understand one another. In the main there are

three separate classes: First is the Ashkenazim, made up of Jews from

Russia, Poland, Austria, and Germany. These people are much like the

lower-class Jews of America, and their common language is Yiddish. The

second class is the Sephardim. They are Spanish Jews, descendants of

those who came here centuries ago. These Jews speak a mixture of Spanish

and Hebrew. The third class is the Eastern Jews, made up of Israelites

from Syria, Persia, Arabia, and Central Asia. They speak Arabic and look

much like Moslems.

The American Jews are comparatively few, and it is seldom that you

meet one born in the United States. Those who claim to be American

citizens are chiefly natives who have gone to the United States to

get naturalization papers, and then returned here to live. Many of

them are frauds, and our consul believes that some of them bought

their naturalization papers without ever leaving Palestine. American

citizenship is an especially valuable badge of protection in this part

of the world. Said our consul to me:

“Our citizenship has been used to carry on frauds. When I first came

here I found it serving as a cloak for crime. One man who claimed to be

an American was acting as receiver of stolen cattle, and selling them

openly. He carried on a big business, and although the officials were

aware of his criminal practices they could not arrest him. This was so

because of a difference between our government and that of Turkey.

“The treaties provide that the offences of Americans against the Turks

may be punished only by the American consul, and we contended that

this gave us the right of trial in such cases. The Turkish Government

contended that all such offenders must be tried in the Turkish courts,

and as neither government would give in, it was impossible to convict and

punish without bringing about international complications. As soon as I

came I decided to stop it and told the man I would arrest and convict him

by means of American witnesses. The result was that he did not wait for

trial, but skipped out of the country.”

Most of the Jews here pride themselves on their piety. They think

themselves above the Jew who has suffered long contamination by mixing

with foreigners, and some of them especially despise the American.

Meeting one on the street they may slap him on the stomach and sneeringly

ask how much pork he ate when he was in the United States. In making

this statement I refer to the fanatics who are composed more especially

of the Spaniards and the members of the Ashkenazim. These people have

inner circles of religious aristocracy, some of whom are supposed to

have magic powers of healing. Among them are many men of education and

culture, men who know the Bible from beginning to end, and who speak

several languages. One can tell nothing of the culture of the Jerusalem

Jew by his dress, for a dirty, ragged old man is often a great scholar.

The dress here is about the same among all classes of the Israelites.

The boys and the men wear coats without belts which reach from the neck

to the feet. They are full, and are slightly open at the front, showing

gowns under them. Many of the Spanish Jews wear black turbans or velvet

caps with a wide fringe of fur outside. Some wear broad-brimmed felt hats

which come far down over the forehead, half hiding the ears. They do not

shave, for a long beard is a sign of wisdom, dignity, and piety. They

wear the hair long, with a curly lock on each side of the face, in front

of the ears. These locks often reach down to the breast, and are allowed

to grow, according to a saying in Scriptures, which reads, “Thou must not

mar the corners of thy beard.”

Many of the Jews never cut the hair in front of the ears for fear of

touching the beard, and I see boys with the rest of the head shaved and

these two earlocks left.

These Jerusalem Jews have fine faces. Many of them have high foreheads,

strong noses and mouths, and beautiful eyes. Some are fair and others

have olive complexions. Their hair is of all colours from jet black to

blond and fiery red, and there are many old men with beards of silver.

Indeed many of the Jews of the Holy City are old men and old women who

have come here to die. Jerusalem is to many of the Jews what Benares is

to the Hindu. They have a superstition that this city is on the direct

road to heaven and that they must come here in order to attain paradise.

I am told that many of the Jews of this city believe that if they should

die in other lands they will be dragged under the earth through the globe

to the Mount of Olives, where the Resurrection is to take place. The

Jewish cemetery on the side of the mountain contains thousands of tombs.

It is said that soil from that spot is sent all over the world to be

put in Jewish coffins. Not a few of the old men who live here have left

their business to come. Some have given their estates to their sons and

relatives, and receive allowances from them. Not long ago one such came

to the American consul, and said that he would like to leave some money

to found a synagogue in Jerusalem. He looked dirty and ragged, and the

consul asked what he had to leave. He replied that he owned under other

names six good houses in Jerusalem and that the money to buy them had

been saved out of an allowance of a thousand dollars a year which his

sons in New York had been sending him.

The Jews of Jerusalem are far more particular as to the observances

of their religion than the Jews of America. There are more than one

hundred synagogues in this city, in all of which worship is held on the

Sabbath. I have attended many of the services and have generally found

the synagogues full. The men read Hebrew aloud. They come in their best

clothing, and some of the old men are gorgeous in their rich gowns of

velvet and silk.

The Sabbath here begins Friday night and does not end until six o’clock

Saturday. It begins just as soon as the stars can be seen Friday, after

which no work of any kind must be done. Neither fire nor lamp may be

lighted, so most of the people light their lamps before the dark comes

and hire Gentiles to come in at bedtime to blow them out. The meals for

the Sabbath are all cooked beforehand, and if there are any hot dishes

they must be cooked by the Gentiles.

The orthodox Jew here will not carry a bucket, an umbrella, or even a

baby on the Sabbath day. I have just heard of a boy who was given a new

suit of clothes on Saturday, his Sabbath. The gift was made by one of the

American colony outside the walls, and the people there watched to see

how the boy could stick to his religion and still carry his new clothes

home. After pondering some time, he finally put the clothes on and wore

them, thus escaping the sin of carrying them on God’s holy day.

The Jews here have a slaughter house of their own. Indeed, they kill

all of the cattle of Jerusalem, serving the Gentiles free of charge, in

order that there may be no danger of sinning by eating animals improperly

killed. The city abattoirs are on the road to Jericho across the valley

of Jehoshaphat, on the southern slope of the Mount of Olives. The cattle

and sheep are brought there and passed upon by the Jewish rabbis. They

are then killed and skinned according to the Mosaic law, and the meat

is stamped by the rabbis before it is offered for sale in the cities. A

special stamp is placed on all that supplied to the Jews, and such meat,

strange to say, brings about twice as much per pound as that sold to the

Gentiles.

If the meat is good to eat it is known as _kosher_. If not killed

according to the regulations, it is called _tarif_, and no Jew will

touch it. The killing is done by the rabbinical butcher, who cuts the

animal’s throat with one stroke of the knife, going just deep enough

not to touch the bones. The law provides not only that the meat must

be healthy, but that no bone must be scratched, cut, or broken, and if

the butcher’s knife slips and cuts off a bit of bone, even though it be

no thicker than a sheet of paper, the whole carcass is regarded as bad

and fit only for the Gentiles. The Jews eat cattle and sheep, but they

will not touch the meat of pigs or game. Said one of the sportsmen of

Palestine to me:

“If the Jews ate game they would clean out our partridges and other birds

in a season. But as it is, there is always good shooting.”

Most of the Jews here will not eat the hind quarters of any animal, and

the hind legs and loins are sold to the Gentiles. The Spanish Jews say

that those who eat pork will be damned, but they get around eating rump

steak by pulling out the white sinews or scraping off the red particles

of the meat and making what we know as Salisbury steaks from them.

The Jewish quarter of Jerusalem is confined to the southeastern part

of the city. It is near the great platform on which Solomon’s Temple

stood and inside the Dung Gate. It is a dirty, squalid, poverty-stricken

section. Many of the Jews here are mendicants, who live on the alms

sent in by the Jews from the outside. At fixed hours of the day bread

is given away at certain places and the people come for it in crowds.

There are funds which are supplied at regular intervals to those who need

them, and much of the population is supported this way. They might be

called educated paupers. Many of these people are desperately poor. I

visited a number of the houses, finding family after family each living

in cave-like rooms no larger than a hall bedroom and lighted only by a

door at the front. In such dwellings the floors and walls are of stone,

and about the only furniture is the beds, which are for the grown-ups

only. The children sleep on the floor. The kitchen is often on a porch

outside the house, and the water comes from a court in which is a well or

cistern. This well may be used by a half-dozen different families, and

its surroundings are unsanitary to an extreme.

On the doorposts of each of these dwellings, whether it be of one room

or more, is tacked up a roll of white parchment six inches long. This

contains the name of Jehovah and the Ten Commandments. Every Jew here

wears the Commandments tied upon his arm under his coat, and some have

phylacteries, or strips of parchment with texts upon them, about their

foreheads.

One of the strangest sights of Jerusalem is the Jews’ wailing place,

where every Friday afternoon and Saturday morning certain sects meet on

the outside of the walls of the Mosque of Omar and with their heads bent

against the stones sorrow over the loss of Jerusalem and pray God to give

the land back to His chosen people. This custom has been observed since

the days of the Middle Ages and it is one of the saddest of sights. I

visited it last week. In a narrow alley surrounded by miserable houses—on

stone flags which have been worn with the bare feet of thousands of

Jews—against a wall of great blocks of marble which reached for fifty or

more feet about them, a line of men in long gowns and of women with head

shawls stood with their heads bowed, praying and weeping. Many of the

men had white beards and the long curly locks which fell down in front of

their ears were silver. Others were just in their prime. There were also

young men and young girls. Not a few of the male mourners wore European

clothes, and I saw one woman wailing in a hat and gown of Parisian

design. Most of the women, however, were dressed in Jewish costume with

shawls wrapped around their heads.

Each of the mourners had a book in his hand and read the Lamentations of

Jeremiah, swaying back and forth as he did so. Now and then the whole

party broke out into a chant, a gray-haired rabbi acting as leader and

the rest coming in on the refrain. The substance of one of the chants was

as follows:

O Lord, we pray thee have mercy on Zion,

Gather the children of Jerusalem together!

May the kingdom soon return to Zion!

Comfort those who mourn over Jerusalem,

And let the branch of Jesse spring up in Zion!

Still more affecting was this one:

_Leader_—For the palace that lies desolate.