Contemporary Accounts of Early Modern Jewish History

1. Part three of Samuel Usque, Consolation for the Tribulations of Israel (Ferrara 1553), is a lengthy account of the many sufferings of the Jewish people in the diaspora. Beginning with the forced conversion of the Jews of Spain in 617, the author lists 37 separate instances of Jewish suffering down to a massive fire in Salonika in 1545, an outbreak of the plague in Ferrara in 1551 that led to the expulsion of the Jews, and the vandalizing of the synagogue in Pesaro two years later.

After bewailing the unending and undeserved sorrow afflicting the Jews, Usque ends with hopes for the future. He reminds the Jews that their sufferings are a just punishment for their sins as well as God's way of purifying them so as to make them worthy of an ultimate--and greater--happiness that will be theirs in the world to come. Finally, Usque lists eight patterns or factors that explain why Jews have not been totally destroyed by their suffering and turn his tale of woe into a message of consolation.

Firstly, He meted out your punishment gradually, so that your full punishment might not consume you and destroy you. . . .

Secondly, He punished you immediately after each sin, so that your unrequited iniquities should not accumulate , and so that you should take measures to remedy your works after every lash. . . .

Thirdly, by scattering you among all peoples, He made it impossible for the world to destroy you, for if one kingdom rises against you in Europe to inflict death upon you, another in Asia allows you to live. And if the Spaniards burn you in Spain and banish you, the Lord wills for you to find someone in Italy who welcomes you and lets you live in freedom. And if the Lord had not dispersed you but instead, as your iniquities merit, had isolated you in one corner of the earth, like your brethren, the Ten Tribes, your life would be in jeopardy and the die for your destruction cast. You would long ago have perished from the wrath of only one of the peoples who had subjected you. . . .

The fourth way for you to receive consolation also derives from this mercy. The Lord not only prepared these grades for the great mountain of punishment which you were required to climb, but in order for you to scale it with less hardship. He from time to time consoles you by redemptive acts and taking vengeance on your oppressors for the malice with which they have inflicted the penalty for your iniquities. Jeremiah's words testify to this: "I will visit upon you nations the wickedness of your thoughts." (Jer. 23.2). You have already witnessed this in the fates of the early nations -- the Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Greeks and Romans, and in the more modern nations of whom you recently complain . . .

So as not to weary you with more such details, let me tell you generally that among all your abusers, though they were brethren of one and the same religion and faith, such an accursed strife has arisen and continued to this day that great torrents of Latin blood have run throughout their lands and abroad. We can thus say of Spain that Italy is its grave; of France, that Spain is the means of its consumption; of Germany, that all of its neighbors, including the Turks, are its executioners, who make it the wall where their artillery strikes; and of England, that continual pestilence and hostile Scotland are its scourge. . .

Thus, Jeremiah's words have been fulfilled: "They that eat you shall be devoured, and they that carry you off shall be carried off and they that spoil you shall I make a spoil." (Jer. 30.16). Therefore, unburden yourself, and lighten your load of your suffering. Your hungry spirit will rest as soon as it imagines its vengeance.

The fifth road to consolation is the great benefit which has come of your misfortunes in Spain and Portugal, of which you so bitterly complain; for when a person's limbs are being devoured by herpes, it is best to cut them off with the knife or the fire, so as to prevent the spread of the disease and save the rest of the body. At such a time the cruel surgeon is the instrument of recovery. Therefore, since you had forgotten your ancient Law, and feigned Christianity with all your might solely to save your life and property, without realizing that you were jeopardizing your soul, it was proper that in such a perilous and mortal illness the Lord should not be apprehensive about applying the cautery to cure you. Truly, if you consider matters carefully, His mercy was great in being cruel to you, for the noxious wound penetrated your body so rapidly that in a few years it would have killed the memory of Judaism in your children. . . . Let the great benefit you are receiving soften the unyielding pain of your rigorous cure. And throw these waters of consolation upon the flames of the Inquisition, that the heat you suffer may be lessened.

The sixth way to consolation is the help you received in the hardships which you say you had to suffer in order to save your life after leaving Portugal:

Has God's mercy ever appeared to anyone in human garb? It has appeared to you, to help you with your troubles. Has anyone ever seen a woman risk her life to save her brethren . . . or govern her peole . . . or aid the persecuted . . . or free the besieged from anguish . . . ? The Lord has sent you such a woman in our own days from the supreme choir of His hosts. He has treasured all these virtues in a single soul. To you happy fortune, He chose to infuse them in the delicate and chaste person of the blessed Jewess [Gracia] Nasi.

Her inspiration greatly encouraged your needy children in Portugal, who were too poor and weak to leave the fire, and to undertake a lengthy journey. She generously provided money and other needs and comforts to the refugees who arrived destitute, sea-sick, and stuporous in Flanders and elsewhere. She helped them overcome the rigors of the craggy Alps in Germany and other lands, and she hastened to alleviate the miseries caused by the hardships and hazards of their long journey. She offered you her compassion and divine largesse in the sudden dire distresses you faced when you were exiled from Ferrara. . . . To more aptly describe the great blessing she represents, she has always been a beautiful summer, a refuge during all the misfortunes of our Portuguese people, and a pillar of strength on which its affluent could depend to preserve them and their fortunes. A large number of your children, who have fled from the brutality of the Portuguese, have reached safety on this eagle's outstretched wings. . . .

The seventh road which leads you to great consolation is the safe and placid port which God's boundless mercy has prepared for you, so that your wearied limbs, your exiled children, might find shelter from the storms of sea and land. It lies in the blessed spirit of a noble prince of Italian blood, sublime and generous, whose abode is nestled on the beautiful river Po. . . . Indeed in no other human being has heaven infused a more blessed spirit or a nobler soul than in this prince, who is not human, but divine. To this day he has stood with his wings outstretched, waiting to gather you lovingly beneath them. . . .Therefore, if you suffered such bitter tribulations up until this time, the remedies now beginning are so sweet that they should arouse your expectation for greater blessings yet to come. . . .

The eighth and most signal way by which you will rise to a higher degree of consolation is in the great nation of Turkey. This country is like a broad and expansive sea which our Lord has opened with the rod of His mercy, as Moses did for you in the Exodus from Egypt, so that the swells of your present misfortunes, which relentlessly pursue you in all kingdoms of Europe like the infinite multitude of Egyptians, might cease and be consumed by it. Here the gates of liberty are always wide open for you that you may fully practice your Judaism; they are never closed. Here you may restore your true character, transform your nature, change your ways, and banish false and erring opinions. Here you have begun to embrace your true ancient faith and to abandon the practices opposed to God's will, which you have adopted under the pressures of the nations in which you have wandered. . . .

Taken from the complete translation
by Martin A. Cohen (Philadelphia:
Jewish Publication Society, 1965), pp. 227-231.

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2. In the aftermath of the massacres of Jews in Poland at the hands of the Ukrainian and Tatar forces in 1648/49, Rabbi Nathan Hannover composed his "Deep Mire" (Venice, 1653) tried to give meaning to the events of his time.

[Jewish History as Prophecy Fulfilled]

"I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of His wrath" (Lam. 3:1). For the Lord smote His people Israel, His firstborn. From heaven to earth He cast down His glorious and lovely land of Poland, "fair in situation, the joy of the whole earth" (Ps. 48:3) and His ornament. "The Lord hath swallowed up unsparingly the habitations of Jacob" (Lam 2:2), destroyed His inheritance, "and hath not remembered His footstool on the day of His wrath" (ibid., 2:1) and His anger.

All of this did King David (may he rest in peace) foresee in his prophecy: that Tatars and Greeks [Ukrainians of the Orthodox Church] would join together to destroy Israel, His chosen, in the year zot of His creation. [Note: The letters of the Hebrew word zot have the numerical value of (5)408, the year of the persecution according to the era of Creation.] The Greeks said, as is their custom: "Whoever wants to stay alive must change his faith and make a public statement renouncing Israel and its God." But the Jews paid no heed to their words; they stretched out their necks for the slaughter, sanctifying the name of God. These were the land's great scholars and the other men, women, and children: all of His community. "The Lord is a God of vengeance" (Ps. 94:1). May he wreak His vengeance and return us to His land.

King David (may he rest in peace) forewarns of this [zot] persecution in Psalm 32 (vs. 6): "For this [zot] let everyone that is godly pray unto Thee in a time when Thou mayest be found [le'et metzo] . . ." so that the calamity will not come about. The letters of the words le'et metzo have the same numerical value as yavan vekedar yahdav hubaru [Greece and Tatary joined together]. Dog and cat joined to uproot the people of Israel, which is compared to a straying lamb. It happened in the year five thousand and zot [408] of the Creation.

Psalm 69 (vss. 2-3) also refers to this persecution: "Save me, O God . . . I am sunk in deep mire . . . and the flood overwhelmeth me" etc. Tavati biven metzula [I am sunk in deep mire] possesses the numerical value of hemil vekedar beyavan yahdav huburau [Chmiel and Tatary joined together with Greece], scorpion and wasp. Shibolet [the flood] is numerically equivalent to hemiletzki, hayavan, vekedar [Chmielecki, Greece, and Tatary]; thus wrath and anger overwhelmed me. (In the Polish language his name was changed to Chmielecki to indicate his nobility, but in Russian he was called Chmiel.) The great scholar, our teacher R. Jehiel Michel, judge and head of the academy in the holy and precious community of Nemirov [A city in the Ukraine whose Jewish inhabitants were slaughtered when it fell to the Cossacks.], whose soul departed in purity for the sanctification of God's name, said that hemil was an acronym for havle mashiah yavi le'olam [he will bring about the birth pangs of the Messiah]; and after him will come the feet of Elijah. [Elijah the Prophet is regarded by Jewish tradition as the harbinger of the Messiah.]

Therefore, I have called my book dealing with this incident Yeven Metzula ["Deep Mire"] for the Psalmist alludes to the catastrophe and speaks of the enemy nation, Tatars and Greeks, and of the enemy Chmiel (may his name be blotted out; may the Lord send a curse upon him). This book shall preserve the tale for future generations. I have dwelt at length upon the causes which initiated this brutish design: that the Greeks revolted against the kingdom of Poland like a rebellious cow, that Greeks and Tatars joined together although they had always hated each other. I have related all the battles and persecutions, large and small. Likewise, the dates on which the major persecutions occurred have been recorded so that everyone might be able to note the day on which his father or mother died and to observe the memorial properly. The book will also describe all of the good and just practices of the glorious Jewish community of Poland -- all in the pure fear of the Lord. I based these practices upon the six pillars which support the mighty word. [The pillars are mentioned in Mishnah Avot, ch. 1.]

I have written it all in lucid, clear language and printed it upon fine, clean paper. Therefore, buy this book without delay. Do not withhold your money. Thus, I will be able also to publish the book Plant of Delights, containing homilies I have composed on all of the Torah. For this merit, God, fearful and awesome, will preserve you from every anguish and distress. And may He speedily send us the Messiah. Amen; thus, may God do, who dwelleth in splendor. These are the words of the author, Nathan Nata, son of our teacher, R. Moses Hannover Ashkenazi (may the memory of the righteous be for a blessing; may the Lord avenge his blood) who lived in the holy community of Zaslav, which is near the large holy community of Ostrog in the province of Volhynia in the great land of Russia [note: not politically a part of Russia, but inhabited by a non-Polish Ukrainian population].

from Ideas of Jewish History, edited by Michael A. Meyer
(New York: Behrman House, 1974), pp. 135-137.