Medieval Jewish Visitors

Medieval Jewish Visitors.

About the year 1140, Judah ha-Levi visited Jerusalem and was inspired, as legend says, to compose his "Zionide" before its walls. In 1173 Benjamin of Tudela visited Jerusalem. He describes it as a small city full of Jacobites, Armenians, Greeks, and Georgians. Two hundred Jews dwelt in a corner of the city under the Tower of David. He mentions especially the two buildings of the Hospitalers and of the Templars; the four gates of Abraham (Khalil), David, Zion, and "Gushpat" (Jehoshaphat); the Gate of Mercy; the house and stable of Solomon; the Pillar of Absalom; and the grave of Uzziah. In front of Jerusalem is Mt. Zion, upon which there is only a Christian church, and where are the graves of the princes of the house of David ("P. E. F. S." 1894, p. 294). It is curious that Pethahiah of Regensburg (p. 11) mentions only one Jew in Jerusalem, a certain R. Abraham the dyer, who had to pay a heavy tax for permission to remain (ed. Benisch, p. 60). Pethahiah recalls (p. 64) the tradition connected with the Gate of Mercy; namely, that it could not be opened until the Shekinah returned to the gate by means of which it had left the city. Though often spoken of as one, this was really two gates in the eastern wall of the Temple enclosure (now called the "Golden Gate")—the Gate of Repentance and the Gate of Mercy, the first of which was for happy people, the second for the unhappy (see "Ozar tob," p. 35; Carmoly, l.c. pp. 237, 239, 458; Gurland, "Ginze Yisrael," pp. 13, 39, 49; "ShibHe Yerush." p. 19b; Luncz, l.c. v. 242; "LuaH Erez Yisrael," vii. 95, 106; ix. 8). The later Arabs had the same designations for these gates ("Z. D. P. V." vii. 163; Guy le Strange, l.c. pp. 161, 177, 184), and many tales are told in Jewish writings of the futile attempts of the Arabs to open them (see, e.g., Gurland, l.c. p. 39; "Sammelband," Mekize Nirdamim, 1888, pp. 27, 47; Obadiah of Bertinoro, ed. Neubauer, p. 65; and Jehudah, in Luncz, l.c. v. 240 et seq.). Reference to a gate separating the blessed from the damned is made in the Koran, sura lvii. 13.

In 1210 a certain Samuel b. Simon made a pilgrimage to Palestine as the forerunner (Berliner's "Magazin," iii. 158) of the 300 and more rabbis from the south of England and from France who went to the Holy Land in 1211 ("Shebet Yehudah," p. 113). His account has been published in "Ozar tob," p. 35;transl. in Carmoly, l.c. p. 127. He mentions the custom of praying on Sabbaths on the Mount of Olives. In 1218 Al-Harizi visited Jerusalem and saw the English and French rabbis mentioned above. Among them were Samuel b. Simon, Joseph b. Baruch, his brother R. Meïr, and Samson b. Abraham. According to Grätz ("Gesch." vi. 404), this migration was the consequence of the Albigensian persecutions. Al-Harizi speaks of the Jews coming to Jerusalem in large numbers; but he bewails the spirit of discord he found there (see "TaHkemoni," ch. xxvii., xxviii., xlvi., and xlvii.; and M. Schwab in "Archives de l'Orient Latin," 1881, pp. 231 et seq.). In 1219 the walls of the city were taken down by order of the Sultan of Damascus; in 1229 by treaty with Egypt Jerusalem came into the hands of Frederick II. of Germany. In 1239 he began to rebuild the walls; but they were again demolished by Da'ud, the emir of Kerak.

In 1243 Jerusalem came again into the power of the Christians, and the walls were repaired. The Kharezmian Tatars took the city in 1244; and they in turn were driven out by the Egyptians in 1247. In 1260 the Tatars under Hulaku Khan overran the whole land, and the Jews that were in Jerusalem had to flee to the neighboring villages.

Jerusalem