After the Vision
Judah Zarco
1560
How can I hew out a song when the hammer of my senses is coated with rust? How can I play the lute when my hand is ensnared in fetters of fear? For my heart has entered the gazelle’s paved [palace]; its fountain-stones are as sardin and chrysolite. Angels and seraphs hover within it, bending low, kneeling before her. Having seen the image of God’s…
Creator Bio
Judah Zarco
Judah Zarco was born and raised in Rhodes, and it seems that he wrote most of his poems there. He later lived in Salonika, where he was welcomed with great acclaim. At the time, circles of Hebrew poets existed in a number of major Ottoman cities. During their meetings, the members of such groups read out their poetry and discussed it, sometimes also holding competitions. Zarco became a member of the Salonika circle, known as ḥakhme ha-shir. In addition to his poems, some of Zarco’s letters have been published in collections. His work Leḥem Yehudah (The Bread of Judah; Istanbul, 1560) is an intricately structured fictional tale, written in rhymed prose interspersed with poems, that tells the story of a king’s daughter and her suitors.
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As Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews migrated eastward, Yiddish and Ladino emerged as distinct languages. Both languages developed literary traditions, as print became more widespread.
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Jewish literary creativity flourished in the early modern period, dominated by Hebrew poetry that blended religious themes with Renaissance forms.