--- title: Times and Seasons description: Issues of 1842 to 1843. authors: - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints editors: - Ebenezer Robinson - Don Carlos Smith - Smith, Joseph, Jr. - Taylor, John collections: - periodicals tags: - newspaper - times-and-seasons - nauvoo - nineteenth-century periodical: Times and Seasons volume: 4 number: 1 published: 1842-11-15 publisher: E. Robinson and D. C. Smith; later John Taylor publisher_place: Commerce and Nauvoo, Illinois language: en type: article reference: "“The Jews,” *Times and Seasons* 4, no. 1 (November 15, 1842): 6–8." printed_title: THE JEWS source: url: https://archive.org/details/per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1842-11-15_4_1 transcription: Text from the Centerplace.org transcription (https://www.centerplace.org/history/ts/v4n01.htm), with its page breaks; this Internet Archive scan is the reference copy (its OCR was used only as a witness for OCR repair) identifier: per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1842-11-15_4_1 start_page: 6 end_page: 8 curator_note: A Mormon newspaper published by the church in Nauvoo; included for historical study. Inclusion does not imply endorsement. rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1842 (Nauvoo, Illinois); published before 1931, so public domain in the United States source: https://archive.org/details/per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1842-11-15_4_1 publication_year: 1842 --- # The Jews continued. We suffered a good deal from heat, the thermometer sometimes 95 degrees, in our tent. . . No object attracts your eye, there is only one wide ocean of sand round and round. No sound breaks on the ear but the plaintive song of the Bedouin cheering on his slow paced camel; we entered the land of the Philistines on the first of June; it may be described in one word as an open pasture country, composed of vast undulating plains, or more graphically in the words of Zephaniah, "dwellings and cottages for shepherds and fold for flocks." I have counted 10 flocks of an enormous size from a single eminence. We did not enter Gaza, as the plague was raging there; but as we stood on Sampson's mount, and looked down upon the town, encircled with gardens of figs and olives, we could trace the fulfilment [fulfillment] of every word that God had spoken against it. The old city of Gaza seems to be buried beneath smooth round hills of sand; "baldness is come upon Gaza." The next day we found the reapers busy in the valley of Eschol, and met many a camel carrying to the threshing floor the ripe barley, its vines and pomegranates are gone; some fine spreading fig trees remain. Our first view of the hill country of Judea was truly heart stirring. Emerging from a mountain pass, the immense plain of Jeptha lay stretched like a map before us; the rays of the morning sun glanced on the brown walls of the many towns that lay beneath us; the hills of Judah rose in the back ground, tier above tier. We thought of the ark of God carried back by the oxen, (milch [milk] cows)-of Asa's battle with the Ethiopians-of Mary's visit to Elizabeth. That night we pitched our tent among the hills of Judah; the next morning we entered a mountain defile of the wildest description. I have seen many mountain passes, but never one of such romantic beauty. The flowers that appeared on the earth, the fig tree putting forth its green figs, and the voice of the turtle heard in the land, give it a holy loveliness. The thought that surely Solomon had often wandered here; and Isaiah too; for here was, "in the wilderness the shittah tree, the myrtle and the oil tree;-the fir-tree and the pine, and the box together." The terraced hills above all excited our admiration.-You have no idea to what an extent that wonderful method of cultivation must have been carried on by the Jews; nor of the perfect condition in which the remains are to this day.- We have scarcely seen a hill in the whole land however rocky, or barren, that does not bear the traces, more or less perfect, of having been terraced literally from the bottom. We often counted fifty, sixty and seventy terraces on one rocky hill. No spot was left uncultivated, so that when the vines were planted and trained, the words of the eighteenth Psalm were literally true. "The hills were covered with the shadow of it." The question was continually rising on our lips, where are all the vine that covered those hills with their fragrant clusters? We find the answer in Hos i:12. Joel i:11,12. Isa.. xxxv:7. The mountain shall yet drop sweet wine. Amos ix:14. But I must hasten to Jerusalem. The first sight of the city of the great King is truly a moving one. The question is Sam. i:15 was felt by each of us;. Is this the city that men call the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth? And word of the Savior we saw was true indeed; "Your house is left unto you desolate.". . . . . . Calvary is the only place about Jerusalem that yields nothing but disappointment. Buried under marble pavements, lighted up by lamps of tapers, and watched over by poor ignorant Monks! . . . . Descending the steep bank of Moriah, you cross the Kedron now quite dry, as David did when he fled from Absalom; as Jesus did in the night he was betrayed. The path before you leads directly up the steep of Mount Olivet; the path to the right gently ascending, leads you round the hill to Bethany. Between the two paths, enclosed by walls of rough stones, you see Gethsemane. Living very old olive trees mark the spot, each of them supposed to have lived a thousand years. . . . .About two miles from Jerusalem, descending the rugged pathway, you come unexpectedly upon a village mostly concealed by rocks, and figs, and pomegranates-this is Bethany! 'the house of figs.'-the village of Martha, and her sister Mary. Several houses are inhabited by Arab fellah's; built of good stone and flat roofed. Many are in ruins, and there are sepulchres [sepulchers] hewn in the rock-one of which was doubtless that of Lazarus. Mr. Bonar and I twice visited Bethany and read John xi, there with peculiar interest. Of all places in this land it is nearest the condition in which Jesus left it; the curse seems to have fallen more lightly on this spot which Jesus loved, and where so often he laid his head. The loveliest picture of Jerusalem that can be drawn is to be found in Micah iii:12. Zion is indeed plowed like a field. I pulled some ripe barley from a field on the very top, near David's sepulchre [sepulcher]. Jerusalem has become heaps; nearly one half the city appears to be heaps of ruins; in one place the rubbish is actually higher than the city wall. The mountain of the house, [Moriah] is like the high places of the forest, it bears two lofty Temples of false worship-The Mosque of Omar and the Mosque El-Uksar. These are surrounded by trees, under whose shade the Moslem ladies walk on their solemn days. God has fulfilled his word to the very letter. I should have mentioned that the plague was carrying on its awful work in Jerusalem during our stay-indeed it has been little out of it for two years past. The accounts we received at home as to the state of the Jews in this land is far from being accurate. The largest estimate reckons them to be about fifteen thousand; some reckon them a s low as ten thousand. In the towns along the coast there may be in Jaffa, 60-Kaiffa, 150 or 200-Acre, 200-Tyre, 150-Sidon, 300-Nablou in Sychar, 200-Samarian, 150-villages of Gallilee [Galilee], 500-total, 1660. The increase in the number of the Jews has been very decided since 1832, when the Pasha of Egypt took possession of Syria. For two years past the increase has not been so great, owing to the ravages of the plague, the increased price of provisions-the embarrassed finances of the Jewish community-and the oppression of their Rabbies [Rabbi's ?]. In my last I mentioned that collections were made at the door of each synagogue in Europe, for the support of the Jews in the Holy Land-these collections amount annually to 2800 pounds, on an average. Every Jew in the land, rich or poor, after he has been a year in the country has a share appointed to him if he chooses to take it. The chief cause of their returning to this land seems certainly to be an attachment to the inheritance of their fathers. They also believe that their Rabbies [ Rabbi's} here are actually inspired-that to die in this land is to a Jew certain salvation; and that if they die out if it they must make their way under ground, to rise in the valley of Jehosaphat. They are very different from the Jews we have seen in France and Italy, they are far from being Infidels; on the contrary they are superstitious Jews. They have a real expectation of the Messiah's coming, and this feeling is waxing stronger and stronger. . . . .They are counted as dogs by the Moslems. They maintain the beautiful dress of their fathers and are a noble looking race when compared with the wretched Arabs who are scattered over the land. Almost all the male Jews here spend their time in reading. There are six synagogues in Jerusalem, and thirty six reading places.-These latter are established by individuals that they may attain some merit to their souls! five or six readers are appointed to each, having a small salary-one or two of whom are expected to be always their reading the Talmud. At Sychar we visited both their synagogues, saw the Samaritan MSS. said to be three thousand six hundred years old. The most of the Jews in this country speak Hebrew-read and spoken in the Spanish way. Arabic is next in importance the language of the country-Chaldea and Syriac are useful. [Jewish Intelligencer. Mr. Bonar, of the Scotch Deputation, confirms Mr. Cheyne's account as to the number GOING TO JERUSALEM .-It is said that several thousands of Polish and Russian Jews, at Berlin and elsewhere, have entered into an engagement to proceed on the first favorable opportunity to Jerusalem, to await in prayer and fasting the coming of the Messiah. WESTERN INDIANS .-The St. Louis Republican announces that a treaty has been concluded between Gov. Chambers and the Sacs and Fox Indians. The Indians are to remain in possession of the western portion of the territory for three years. and are then to move to the west of the Missouri. They are to receive $1,000,000. In old times, when a man went to inquire of God, he said, come let us go to the Seer.-See 1 Samuel, ix:9. TIMES AND SEASONS. CITY OF NAUVOO, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1841.