The Book of Delight and Other Papers Part 13

The Hebrew word for letter, Iggereth, is of unknown origin, though it is now commonly taken to be an a.s.syrian loan-word. It used to be derived from a root signifying to "hire," in reference to the "hired courier," by whom it was despatched. Other terms for letter, such as "book," "roll," explain themselves. Black ink was early used, though it is certain that it was either kept in a solid state, like India ink, or that it was of the consistency of glue, and needed the application of water before it could be used. For pens, the iron stylus, the reed, needle, and quill (though the last was not admitted without a struggle) were the common subst.i.tutes at various dates.

We must now return to the subject with which we set out, and make a few supplementary remarks with regard to the actual conveyance of letters. In the Talmud (_Baba Mezia,_ 83b) a proverb is quoted to this effect, "He who can read and understand the contents of a letter, may be the deliverer thereof." As a rule, one would prefer that the postman did not read the correspondence he carries, and this difficulty seems to have stood in the way of trusting letters to unknown bearers. To remove this obstacle to free intercourse, Rabbenu Gershom issued his well-known decree, under penalty of excommunication, against anyone who, entrusted with a letter to another, made himself master of its contents. To the present day, in some places, the Jewish writer writes on the outside of his letter, the abbreviation [Hebrew: beth-cheth-daleth-resh-''-gimel], which alludes to this injunction of Rabbenu Gershom. Again, the Sabbath was and still is a difficulty with observant Jews. Rabbi Jose ha-Cohen is mentioned in the Talmud (_Sabbath_, 19a) as deserving of the following compliment. He never allowed a letter of his to get into the hands of a non-Jew, for fear he might carry it on the Sabbath, and strict laws are laid down on the subject. That Christians in modern times entrusted their letters to Jews goes without saying, and even in places where this is not commonly allowed, the non-Jew is employed when the letter contains bad news. Perhaps for this reason Rabbenu Jacob Tarn permitted divorces to be sent by post, though the controversy on the legality of such delivery is, I believe, still undecided.

Besides packmen, who would often be the medium by which letters were transmitted, there was in some Jewish communities a special cla.s.s that devoted themselves to a particular branch of the profession. They made it their business to seek out lost sons and deliver messages to them from their anxious parents. Some later Jewish authorities, in view of the distress that the silence of absent loved ones causes to those at home, lay down the rule that the duty of honoring parents, the fifth commandment, includes the task of corresponding when absent from them. These peripatetic letter-carriers also conveyed the doc.u.ments of divorce to women that would otherwise be in the unpleasant condition of being neither married nor single. Among the most regular and punctual of Jewish postmen may be mentioned the bearers of begging letters and begging books. There is no fear that _these_ will not be duly delivered.

Our reference to letters of recommendation reminds us of an act, on the part of a modern Rabbi, of supererogation in the path of honesty. The post is in the hands of the Government, and, accordingly, the late Rabbi Bamberger of Wurzburg, whenever he gave a Haskamah, or recommendation, which would be delivered by hand, was wont to destroy a postage stamp, so as not to defraud the Government, even in appearance. With this remarkable instance of conscientious uprightness, we may fitly conclude this notice, suggested as it has been by the modern improvements in the postal system, which depend for their success so largely on the honesty of the public.

VIII

THE SHAPE OF MATZOTH

Dr. Johnson said, "It is easier to know that a cake is bad than to make a good one." I had a tiny quant.i.ty of material which, by dint of much rolling, I might have expanded into a broad, flat, unsubstantial whole; I preferred, however, to make of my little piece of dough a little cake, small and therefore less pretentious. I am afraid that even in this concentrated form it will prove flavorless and indigestible, but the cook must be blamed, not the material.

I have no intention to consider the various operations connected with the preparation of unleavened Pa.s.sover cakes: the kneading, the ingredients, the curious regulations regarding the water used, such precautions as carefully watching the ovens. Those who are inclined to connect some of these customs with the practices of non-Jewish peoples will find some interesting facts on all theses topics; but what I wish to speak of now is the shape and form of Pa.s.sover cakes.

The Christian emblems that figure in the celebration of the Eucharist, or Lord's Supper, were probably derived from the ceremonies of the Pa.s.sover eve. The bread employed in the Eucharist is with some Christian sects unleavened, and, indeed, leavened cakes seem to have been introduced solely as a protest against certain so-called Judaizing tendencies. The Latin Church still contends for the propriety of employing unleavened bread, and from the seventh century unleavened bread was used at Rome and leavened bread at Constantinople. From the earliest times, however, the Eucharistic loaves were invariably round in shape, there being, indeed, a supposed edict by Pope Zephyrinus (197-217) to that effect. It is pa.s.sing strange that Bona, an ecclesiastical writer, derived this roundness from the shape of the coins Judas received for betraying his master. But though there is no distinct enactment either in the Talmud or in any of the later codes as to what the form of the Matzoth must be, these have been from time immemorial round also. Some Minhagim are more firmly rooted than actual laws, and this custom is one of them. In one of his cartoons, Picard has an ill.u.s.tration which is apparently that of a squarish Matzah; this may, however, be only a case of defective drawing. It is true that in Roumania square Matzoth are used, but in the controversy raised by the introduction of Matzah-making machines, the opponents of the change argued as though no other than a round shape were conceivable. Kluger, for instance, never seems to have realized that his weightiest objection to the use of the machine would be obviated by making the Matzoth square or rectangular. When it was first proposed to introduce Matzah machines in London, the resistance came chiefly from the manufacturers, and not from the ecclesiastical authorities. The bakers refused categorically to make square Matzoth, declaring that if they did so, their stock would be unsalable.

Even to the present day no square Matzoth are baked in London; those occasionally seen there are imported from the Continent. The ancient Egyptians made their cakes round, and the Matzoth are regarded Midrashically as a memorial of the food which the Egyptian masters forced on their Israelite slaves. A round shape is apparently the simplest symmetrical form, but beyond this I fancy that the round form of the Pa.s.sover bread is partly due to the double meaning of Uggoth Matzoth. The word Uggoth signifies cakes baked in the sand or hot embers; but Uggah also means a "circle." To return, however, to the Eucharistic wafers.

A further point of ident.i.ty, though only a minute detail, can be traced in the regulation that the Eucharistic oblate from which the priest communicated was, in the ninth century, larger than the loaves used by the people. So the Pa.s.sover cakes (Shimmurim) used by the master of the house, and particularly the middle cake, pieces of which were distributed, were made larger than the ordinary Matzoth. Picard (1723) curiously enough reverses this relation, and draws the ordinary Matzoth much larger and thicker than the Shimmurim. The ordinary Matzoth he represents as thick oval cakes, with a single coil of large holes, which start outwards from the centre. Picard speaks of Matzoth made in different shapes, but he gives no details.

In the Middle Ages, and, indeed, as early as Chrysostom (fourth century), the Church cakes were marked with a cross, and bore various inscriptions.

In the Coptic Church, for example, the legend was "Holy! holy! holy is the Lord of hosts." Now, in a Latin work, _Roma subterranea_, about 1650, a statement is made which seems to imply that the Pa.s.sover cakes of the Jews were also marked with crosses. What can have led to this notion? The origin is simple enough. The ancient Romans, as Aringhus himself writes, and as Virgil, Horace, and Martial frequently mention, made their loaves with cross indentations, in order to facilitate dividing them into four parts: much as nowadays Scotch scones are baked four together, and the central dividing lines give the fourfold scone the appearance of bearing a cross mark. It may be that the Jews made their Pa.s.sover cakes, which were thicker than ours and harder to break, in the same way. But, besides, the small holes and indentations that cover the surface of the modern Matzah might, if the Matzah be held in certain positions, possibly be mistaken for a cross. These indentations are, I should add, very ancient, being referred to in the Talmud, and, if I may venture a suggestion, also in the Bible, I Kings xiv. 3, and elsewhere, Nekudim being cakes punctuated with small interstices.

We can carry the explanation a little further. The three Matzoth Shimmurim used in the Haggadah Service were made with especial care, and in medieval times were denominated Priest, Levite, Israelite, in order to discriminate among them. Picard, by an amusing blunder, speaks of a _gateau des levites;_ he, of course, means the middle cake. From several authorities it is clear that the three Matzoth were inscribed in some cases with these three words, in others with the letters _Alef, Beth, Gimmel_, in order to distinguish them. A rough _Alef_ would not look unlike a cross. Later on, the three Matzoth were distinguished by one, two, three indentations respectively, as in the Roman numerals; and even at the present day care is sometimes taken, though in other ways, to prevent the Priest, Levite, and Israelite from falling into confusion. I do not know whether the stringent prohibition, by the _Shulchan Aruch_, of "shaped or marked cakes" for use on Pa.s.sover, may not be due to the fact that the Eucharistic cakes used by Christians were marked with letters and symbols. Certain it is that the prohibition of these "shaped" cakes is rather less emphatic in the Talmud than in the later authorities, who up to a certain date are never weary of condemning or at least discouraging the practice. The custom of using these cakes is proved to be widespread by the very frequency of the prohibitions, and they were certainly common in the beginning of the sixteenth century, from which period seems to date the custom of making the Matzoth very thin, though the thicker species has not been entirely superseded even up to the present day. In the East the Matzoth are still made very thick and unpalatable. They cannot be eaten as they are; they are either softened, by being dipped in some liquid, or they are ground down to meal, and then remade into smaller and more edible cakes.

The Talmud mentions a "stamp" in connection with "shaped cakes," which Buxtorf takes for _Lebkuchen_, and Levy for scalloped and fancifully-edged cakes. The Geonim, however, explain that they were made in the forms of birds, beasts, and fishes. I have seen Matzoth made in this way in London, and have myself eaten many a Matzah sheep and monkey, but, unfortunately, I cannot recollect whether it was during Pa.s.sover. In Holland, these shaped cakes are still used, but in "strict" families only before the Pa.s.sover.

Limits of s.p.a.ce will not allow me to quote some interesting notes with reference to Hebrew inscriptions on cakes generally, which would furnish parallels to the Holy! holy! of the Coptic wafers. Children received such cakes as a "specific for becoming wise." Some directions may be found in _Sefer Raziel_ for making charm-cakes, which must have been the reverse of charming from the unutterable names of angels written on them. One such charm, however, published by Horwitz, I cannot refrain from mentioning, as it is very curious and practical. It const.i.tutes a never-failing antidote to forgetfulness, and, for aught I know, may be quite as efficacious as some of the quack mnemonic systems extensively advertised nowadays.

"The following hath been tried and found reliable, and Rabbi Saadia ben Joseph made use of it. He discovered it in the cave of Rabbi Eleazar Kalir, and all the wise men of Israel together with their pupils applied the remedy with excellent effect:--At the beginning of the month of Sivan take some wheatmeal and knead it, and be sure to remain _standing._ Make cakes and bake them, write thereon the verse, 'Memory hath He made among His wondrous acts: gracious and merciful is the Lord.' Take an egg and boil it hard, peel it, and write on it the names of five angels; eat such a cake every day, for thirty days, with an egg, and thou wilt learn all thou seest, and wilt never forget."

The ma.n.u.script illuminated Haggadahs are replete with interest and information. But I must avoid further observations on these ma.n.u.scripts except in so far as they ill.u.s.trate my present subject. In the Haggadah the question is asked, "Why do we eat this Matzah?" and at the words "this Matzah" the illuminated ma.n.u.scripts contain, in the great majority of cases, representations of Matzoth. These in some instances present rather interesting features, which may throw historical light on the archeology of the subject. Some of these figured Matzoth are oval, one I have seen star-shaped, but almost all are circular in form. Many, however, unlike the modern Matzah and owing to the shape of the mould, have a broad border distinct from the rest of the cake. The Crawford Haggadah, now in the Ryland library, Manchester, pictures a round Matzah through which a pretty flowered design runs. Others, again, and this I think a very ancient, as it certainly is a very common, design, are covered with transverse lines, which result in producing diamond-shaped s.p.a.ces with a very pleasing effect, resembling somewhat the appearance of the lattice work cakes used in Italy and Persia, I think. The lines, unless they be mere pictorial embellishments, are, possibly, as in the Leeds cakes, rows of indentations resulting from the punctuation of the Matzah. In one British Museum ma.n.u.script (Roman rite, 1482), the star and diamond shapes are combined, the border being surrounded with small triangles, and the centre of the cake being divided into diamond-like sections. In yet another ma.n.u.script the Matzah has a border, divided by small lines into almost rectangular sections, while the body of the cake is ornamented with a design in which variously shaped figures, quadrilaterals and triangles, are irregularly interspersed. One fanciful picture deserves special mention, as it is the only one of the kind in all the ill.u.s.trated ma.n.u.scripts and printed Haggadahs in the Oxford and British Museum libraries. This Matzah occurs in an Italian ma.n.u.script of the fourteenth century. It is adorned with a flowered border, and in the centre appears a human-faced quadruped of apparently Egyptian character.

Poetry and imagination are displayed in some of these devices, but in only one or two cases did the artists attain high levels of picturesque ill.u.s.tration. How suggestive, for instance, is the chain pattern, adopted in a ma.n.u.script of the Michaelis Collection at Oxford. It must not be thought that _this_ idea at least was never literally realized, for only last year I was shown a Matzah made after a very similar design, possibly not for use on the first two nights of Pa.s.sover. The bread of affliction recalls the Egyptian bonds, and it is an ingenious idea to bid us ourselves turn the ancient chains to profitable use--by eating them. This expressive design is surpa.s.sed by another, found in a beautifully-illuminated ma.n.u.script of the fourteenth century. This Matzah bears a curious device in the centre: it is a prison door modelled with considerable skill, but I do not suppose that Matzoth were ever made in this fashion.

NOTES

"THE BOOK OF DELIGHT"

The connection between Zabara's work and the Solomon and Marcolf legend was first pointed out in my "Short History of Jewish Literature" (1906), p. 95.

I had long before detected the resemblance, though I was not aware of it when I wrote an essay on Zabara in the _Jewish Quarterly Review._ To the latter (vi, pp. 502 _et seq._) the reader is referred for bibliographical notes, and also for details on the textual relations of the two editions of Zabara's poem.

A number of parallels with other folk-literatures are there indicated; others have been added by Dr. Israel Davidson, in his edition of the "Three Satires" (New York, 1904), which accompany the "Book of Delight" in the Constantinople edition, and are also possibly by Zabara.

The late Professor David Kaufmann informed me some years ago that he had a ma.n.u.script of the poem in his possession. But, after his death, the ma.n.u.script could not be found in his library. Should it eventually be rediscovered, it would be desirable to have a new, carefully printed edition of the Hebrew text of the "Book of Delight." I would gladly place at the disposal of the editor my copy of the Constantinople edition, made from the Oxford specimen. The Bodleian copy does not seem to be unique, as had been supposed.

The literature on the Solomon and Marcolf legend is extensive. The following references may suffice. J.M. Kemble published (London, 1848) "The Dialogue of Solomon and Saturnus," for the Aelfric Society. "Of all the forms of the story yet preserved," says Mr. Kemble, "the Anglo-Saxon are undoubtedly the oldest." He talks vaguely of the intermixture of Oriental elements, but a.s.signs a northern origin to one portion of the story. Crimm had argued for a Hebrew souice, thinking Marcolf a name of scorn in Hebrew. But the Hebrew Marcolis (or however one may spell it) is simply Mercury. In the Latin version, however, Marcolf is distinctly represented as coming from the East. William of Tyre (12th cent.) suggests the ident.i.ty of Marcolf with Abdemon, whom Josephus ("Antiquities," VIII, v, 3) names as Hiram's Riddle-Guesser. A useful English edition is E.

Gordon Duff's "Dialogue or Communing between the Wise King Salomon and Marcolphus" (London, 1892). Here, too, as in the Latin version, Marcolf is a man from the Orient. Besides these books, two German works deserve special mention. F. Vogt, in his essay ent.i.tled _Die deutschen Dichtungen won Salomon und Markolf,_ which appeared in Halle, in 1880, also thinks Marcolf an Eastern. Finally, as the second part of his "_Untersuchungen zur mittelhochdeutschen Spielmannspoesie_" (Schwerin, 1894), H. Tardel published _Zum Salman-Morolf._ Tardel is skeptical as to the Eastern provenance of the legend.

It has been thought that a form of this legend is referred to in the fifth century. The _Contradictio Solomonis_, which Pope Gelasius excluded from the sacred canon, has been identified with some version of the Marcolf story.

A VISIT TO HEBRON

The account of Hebron, given in this volume, must be read for what it was designed to be, an impressionist sketch. The history of the site, in so far as it has been written, must be sought in more technical books. As will be seen from several details, my visit was paid in the month of April, just before Pa.s.sover. Things have altered in some particulars since I was there, but there has been no essential change in the past decade.

The Hebron Haram, or shrine over the Cave of Machpelah, is fully described in the "Cruise of H.M.S. Bacchante, 1879-1882," ii, pp. 595-619. (Compare "Survey of Western Palestine," iii, pp. 333-346; and the _Quarterly Statement_ of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1882, pp. 197-214.) Colonel Conder's account narrates the experiences of the present King of England at the Haram in April, 1882. Dean Stanley had previously entered the Haram with King Edward VII, in January, 1862 (see Stanley's "Sermons in the East," 1863, pp. 141-169). A good note on the relation between these modern narratives and David Reubeni's (dating from the early part of the sixteenth century) was contributed by Canon Dalton to the _Quarterly Statement_, 1897, p. 53. A capital plan of the Haram is there printed.

Mr. Adler's account of his visit to Hebron will be found in his "Jews in Many Lands," pp. 104-111; he tells of his entry into the Haram on pp.

137-138.

M. Lucien Gautier's work referred to is his _Souvenirs du Terre-Sainte_ (Lausanne, 1898). The description of gla.s.s-making appears on p. 53 of that work.

The somewhat startling identification of the Ramet el-Khalil, near Hebron, with the site of the altar built by Samuel in Ramah (I Sam. vii. 17) is justified at length in Mr. Shaw Caldecott's book "The Tabernacle, its History and Structure" (London, 1904).

THE SOLACE OF BOOKS (pp. 93-121)

The opening quotation is from the Ethical Will of Judah ibn Tibbon, the "father" of Jewish translators. The original is fully a.n.a.lyzed in an essay by the present writer, in the _Jewish Quarterly Review_, iii, 453. See also _ibidem_, p. 483. The Hebrew text was printed by Edelmann, and also by Steinschneider; by the latter at Berlin, 1852.

A writer much cited in this same essay, Richard of Bury, derived his name from his birthplace, Bury St. Edmunds. "He tells us himself in his 'Philobiblon' that he used his high offices of state as a means of collecting books. He let it be known that books were the most acceptable presents that could be made to him" ("Dictionary of National Biography,"

viii, 26). He was also a student of Hebrew, and collected grammars of that language. Altogether his "Philobiblon" is an "admirable exhibition of the temper of a book-lover." Written in the early part of the fourteenth century, the "Philobiblon" was first published, at Cologne, in 1473. The English edition cited in this essay is that published in the King's Cla.s.sics (De la More Library, ed. I. Gollancz).

The citation from Montaigne is from his essay on the "Three Commerces" (bk.

in, ch. iii). The same pa.s.sages, in Florio's rendering, will be found in Mr. A.R. Waller's edition (Dent's Everyman's Library), in, pp. 48-50. Of the three "Commerces" (_i.e._ societies)--Men, Women, and Books--Montaigne proclaims that the commerce of books "is much more solid-sure and much more ours." I have claimed Montaigne as the great-grandson of a Spanish Jew on the authority of Mr. Waller (Introduction, p. vii).

The paragraphs on books from the "Book of the Pious," ---- 873-932, have been collected (and translated into English) by the Rev. Michael Adler, in an essay called "A Medieval Bookworm" (see _The Bookworm_, ii, 251).

The full t.i.tle of Mr. Alexander Ireland's book--so much drawn upon in this essay--is "The Book-Lover's Enchiridion, a Treasury of Thoughts on the Solace and Companionship of Books, Gathered from the Writings of the Greatest Thinkers, from Cicero, Petrarch, and Montaigne, to Carlyle, Emerson, and Ruskin" (London and New York, 1894).

Mr. F.M. Nichols' edition of the "Letters of Erasmus" (1901) is the source of the quotation of one of that worthy's letters.

The final quotation comes from the Wisdom of Solomon, ch. vi. v. 12; ch.

viii. vv. 2, 16; and ch. ix. v. 4. The "radiance" of Wisdom is, in ch. vii, 26, explained in the famous words, "For she is an effulgence from everlasting light, an unspotted mirror of the working of G.o.d, and an image of His goodness."

MEDIEVAL WAYFARING

The evidence for many of the statements in this paper will be found in various contexts in "Jewish Life in the Middle Ages," in the Hebrew travel literature, and in such easily accessible works as Graetz's "History of the Jews."

Achimaaz has been much used by me. His "Book of Genealogies" (_Sefer Yochasin_) was written in 1055. The Hebrew text was included by Dr. A.

Neubauer in his "Mediaeval Jewish Chronicles," ii, pp. 114 _et seq_. I might have cited Achimaaz's account of an amusing incident in the synagogue at Venosa. There had been an uproar in the Jewish quarter, and a wag added some lines on the subject to the ma.n.u.script of the Midrash which the travelling preacher was to read on the following Sabbath. The effect of the reading may be imagined.

Another source for many of my statements is a work by Julius Aronius, _Regesten zur Geschichte der Juden in Deutschland,_ Berlin, 1893. It presents many new facts on the medieval Jewries of Germany.