DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5074#0276
•258
CHAP. XXII.
THE JEWS OF JERUSALEM.
" Glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good; to the
Jew first, and also to the Gentile."
" The cedars ware on Lebanon,
But Judah's statelier maids are gone!"
THE population of the Jews in Jerusalem is variously
estimated, and probably differs much from one season
to another: the numbers usually given are from six to ten
thousand, and these are divided into two classes — the
Sephardim, and the Ashkenazim; the first are descendants
of those Jews who were driven out of Spain by Ferdi-
nand and Isabella in 149*7; they amount to two-thirds of
the whole, and, although they have been in Jerusalem
ever since, but very few of them speak Arabic,—bad
Spanish is their language : the latter, or Ashkenazim,
are those who come from Germany and Poland. Some
few of the Sephardim are able to support themselves,
but many of them and all the Ashkenazim are supported
by alms; each family obtains but little, and the poverty
and suffering among them is very great, yet scarcely
any of them ever attempt to earn a piaster for them-
selves; they are paupers, with the slavish disposition
and bad habits of that class in every country, deepened
and degraded by the inactivity and indolence common
to the Oriental. Nevertheless, when incited to work
CHAP. XXII.
THE JEWS OF JERUSALEM.
" Glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good; to the
Jew first, and also to the Gentile."
" The cedars ware on Lebanon,
But Judah's statelier maids are gone!"
THE population of the Jews in Jerusalem is variously
estimated, and probably differs much from one season
to another: the numbers usually given are from six to ten
thousand, and these are divided into two classes — the
Sephardim, and the Ashkenazim; the first are descendants
of those Jews who were driven out of Spain by Ferdi-
nand and Isabella in 149*7; they amount to two-thirds of
the whole, and, although they have been in Jerusalem
ever since, but very few of them speak Arabic,—bad
Spanish is their language : the latter, or Ashkenazim,
are those who come from Germany and Poland. Some
few of the Sephardim are able to support themselves,
but many of them and all the Ashkenazim are supported
by alms; each family obtains but little, and the poverty
and suffering among them is very great, yet scarcely
any of them ever attempt to earn a piaster for them-
selves; they are paupers, with the slavish disposition
and bad habits of that class in every country, deepened
and degraded by the inactivity and indolence common
to the Oriental. Nevertheless, when incited to work