Upon Leaving Lisbon

João Pinto Delgado

17th Century

Here is the infamous [city] gate,
the one of the olive branch and the sword,
for those who leave, it is so closed
and for those who enter, so open.
If in you peace is exiled
you cannot offer that branch,
because one promises peace
and the other wages war.
Gather, O ship, Sodom.
Only its accomplice take on board,
for since you are not the Ark
you need not await the dove.
Stain your fierce knife
and let it remain suspended here,
the mark of infamy will stay on you
like a true coat of arms.
And you, the most ferocious lion,
who kills those who do not injure you,
shall be repaid
by the hand of the One who understands you.
And although your rejoicing is born
of seeing so many perish,
if you made so many see their day come,
you, too, shall see yours.
If our sin obliges us
to suffer such harshness,
consider that the Lord,
though He conceals his actions, does punish.
If it seems that He has forgotten
to punish His enemy,
it is only because the punishment
shall go beyond life.
If your arrogance gloats
over the suffering of so many, be warned
that your suffering begins at your death,
while the other’s ends then.
The not-small noise
of sad lamentations,
like gentle songs,
delights you in your dreams.
You awaken to their chains,
you laugh if you see them cry,
your pleasure is their sorrow,
your comfort their suffering.
The hatred makes you so blind
that without seeing what is obvious,
you ask them not to give death
to the one for whom you fan the flames.
By doing this, your wickedness
hopes to hide its grievous violence;
but if those who understand nothing know about it,
what shall He who understands everything know?
You anoint the eyes with light
and all is darkness.
For whoever denies the truth
what can he give except dissatisfied longing.
So that Heaven shall be angrier still
you fabricated your palace
where you gave a brief space of time
so that the body should incline.
The damsel amid her torment
being uncertain of her life
half living and half dead
responds to your thought.
And between suffering and deceits
her fear did not forgive
the father who engendered her,
all the more so strangers.
If they deny the charge, you deny them life,
and if, seeing no other choice,
they forget themselves and confess,
then they yield their life to the flames.
It was not enough to see the
poor man in your midst sweating,
since what he earned you receive
and what he sowed you take.
Whoever as an idolater errs
enjoys the glories of the earth.
Whoever seeks refuge in heaven
you desire that he should die on earth.
How old-fashioned it is to worship
the gods you fabricated;
with that law that you invented,
you think to trick the world.
If the forest’s green plants
contain so much wood
and the earth produces so many stones,
it is not so that from them you might fashion gods.
You make twenty and you make ten
and none can say a word.
Whoever says that three are one
will say that twenty are three.
Your calculation is an impossibility
and on this your faith is founded,
saying: “What you do not see
this, it is possible by God.” [ . . . ]
Alas for you, fierce Esau
from whom virtue cannot escape!
How will you seize the cloak
of the one that you took it from?
Seeing that with just reason
from your father you did not inherit,
and for the pottage you exchanged
the heavenly benediction.
Straw you shall be on that day
when your brother’s house
sets fire, with their own hand,
to the one who burned his blood.
The exiles will come
to the new Temple to live,
and the one they made to serve,
Him your kings will serve.
Then your confusion
which now you scarce notice,
shall be your very death
and a death without redemption
You shall see how you always went
to the one whose idolatries
increase with the days,
and in those days you lost the sun.
You have eyes but do not see,
you have ears, without hearing.
You are a dormant idol
that has feet and does not walk.
Afflict the one that you have suffered
and burn the one that knows God.
By another hotter coal
shall your kingdom be injured.
This and that robbery begins
and there follows the greatest severity
because the shepherd does not sleep
although the wolf goes about killing.
He seems to you unconcerned
in tolerating such an offense.
Woe to thee, when His fury
reveals the might of His shepherd’s staff.
You shall plead in vain for help
to your gods. Oh, gentile!
If David slew ten thousand,
what shall the Lord’s mighty hand?
And you, O people, who have known
of God’s merciful rod—
return, return to Him that gives you shelter
since He heeds you and you did not call.
Do not change what your shield
and King feels for you.
Let your objective be His Law,
and your life His reason!
Follow His sacred precepts,
so that amidst the squadrons
and among raging lions
your goals you will attain.
Do not forget the place
where you offered up burnt offerings,
where you marked new moons and holy festivals
and made offerings on the sacred altar.
And although He moved away from us
through our error, do not be afraid
because the distances of man
for God are very close.
His right hand he forgets,
O Jerusalem, he who forgets you!
May his years be cut short,
whoever chooses you—O Babylon!
Taking up an instrument there,
the voice, amid such suffering,
may it stick in his throat
when he sings of you.1
And may the just Heaven protect him
if, driven by sorrow,
he harshly batters your children
to pieces on rocks.
Sacred Jerusalem:
sweet goodness, sweet memory.
Make alive in us, if not the glory,
then the memory of your goodness!
May my thought contemplate
forever you and your greatness,2
because human wealth
is a leaf that the wind carries away.
Never shall my deceptions go
after the day of pleasure,
because in the end, nightfall
closes the account of the years.
A thousand times happier is the one
who in the midst of his affliction,
makes an offering to the God of Zion,
who does not forsake Israel.
And in this sea of confusion
where so many vessels sink
to the happy port, he arrives
where salvation he shall find.
And the King of Kings
alone he fears and alone adores
who was, will be and is now,
One God, one People, one Law.
Oh happy he who trusts
and who firmly awaits
the True Word
that points to the day.
Who always made room
for the Law of God in his bosom.
For the Law that His finger had formed,
which hand can erase?
Come! O Lord, I beseech Thee,
and relieve this great suffering.
Let the world know, if it does not already
that Thy power is greater than its fire.
Let not Thy hand forsake
the one who invokes Thy Sacred Name.
Like a rock he will stand
against the waves of the tyrant.
And meanwhile, amid the shadows
may he see the sun of Thy Truth.
For wherever all is evil
What else can there be but fog?

Translated by
David
Herman
.

Notes

[Likely Jerusalem.—Trans.]

[Again referring to Jerusalem.—Trans.]

Credits

João Pinto Delgado, “A La Salida de Lisboa (Upon Leaving Lisbon),” in Antología Sefaradí, 1492–1700, ed. María del Carmen Artigas, Verbum Ensayo (Madrid: Editorial Verbum, 1997), 42–46.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 5.

Engage with this Source

You may also like

The Prayer of Queen Esther

Meanwhile the queen, wracked by internal anguish, invites the king and Haman to her banquet and in joyous hope awaits the sacred stream of divine mercy form the holy fount-head; her humble soul bowed…
View Source