Alas, evil has befallen Sefarad

ca. 1148

About This Entry

Abraham Ibn Ezra composed this Hebrew lament for the destruction that the Almohads wrought on the Jewish communities of al-Andalus (Muslim Spain) and North Africa in 1146. These events devastated local Jews, and many lost their lives. Others were forcibly converted to Islam or fled. Ibn Ezra wrote this poem while living in southern France, an important waystation on his lengthy and winding journey across Christian Europe. Strikingly, this poem refrains from even hinting at the persecutors until the end. Ibn Ezra also mentions many of the leading Jewish communities of al-Andalus and turns to God in penitence, in keeping with many medieval Jewish theological writings. This poem was not included in liturgical rites but rather in collections of “secular” poetry. It is written in syllabic and not quantitative meter, with both internal and final rhyme. The first two lines are the madrikh, the couplet at the beginning that creates the rhyme used at the end of each of the stanzas. Every stanza ends in a biblical quotation concluding with the word mayim, “water,” or, in the last stanza, shamayim, “heaven.”

Alas, evil has befallen Sefarad from heaven.

My eye, my eye pours down tears of water. (Lamentations 1:16)

My eye cries like an ostrich for the city of Lucena.

The Jewish diaspora lived there all on its own, with no sin,

with no overturning, until the year 1070.¹

But then her day came, and her people went wandering, and she became like a widow.

There is no Torah, no scripture, and the Mishnah has been hidden away,

and the Talmud is desolate, for all its splendor is gone.

Some kill, and some yearn to find a place here or there.

The place established for prayer [tefilah] and praise is now a place of vanity [tiflah].

For this I cry and slap my hands, and my mouth is constantly filled with lament,

and I never cease saying, “If only my head were a fountain of water!” (Jeremiah 8:23)

I tear out my hair and cry bitterly for the diaspora of Seville,

for the nobles, who are now corpses, and their sons who are in captivity,

and their dainty daughters who have been given over to a foreign religion.

And Córdoba, how has it been abandoned and become desolate like the sea?

The great sages there died in famine and thirst.

There is no Jew—not even one!—in Jaén or Almería,

and in Mallorca and Málaga there is no food left for life.

The remaining Jews have been beaten raw and wounded.

I wail over this and habituate myself to bitterness and moan, moan, moan,

with my cries in my anguish—for they are melting away like water (Psalms 58:8).

Alack, I call out like a woman in labor, for the communities of Sijilmása,

city of scholars and wise men, whose light has been covered by darkness.

The pillar of the Talmud has fallen down, the structure has collapsed,

and the Mishnah is taunted, trampled by feet.

And the enemy’s eye had no mercy for the dear people being stabbed.

Alas, the whole community of Fez was no more, given over to plunder.

Where is the strength of the community of Tlemcen? Its beauty has melted away.

I raise my voice bitterly for Ceuta and Meknès,

and tear my clothes for Der‘a, which was takenon the Sabbath day, when boys’ and girls’ blood was spilled like water (Psalms 79:3).

What can I say? This has occurred on account of my sin.

The evil has come to me from my God, my mighty Rock.

In whom can I put my hope? What can I say?

My hand is responsible for all!My heart heats up inside me, because my soul has acted perversely,

and therefore has gone from her land, her desired location, into exile in an impure land.

She is ashamed and has gone silent; she has become weary of recounting her travails.

But along with her pain, in her heart she hopes for kindness from her Rock,

that He will direct redemption from servitude, for she takes refuge in the shadow of His wings.

In her prison, at every moment, when she mentions His name she feels alive.

Her tears are upon her cheek, imposed by the maidservant [Hagar],² whose bow

shoots strongly—until the Lord looks down from heaven (Lamentations 3:50).

Translated by Gabriel Wasserman.

Notes

[1070 years after the destruction of the Temple (according to Jewish tradition: 68 CE) should be 1138 CE, but in fact Lucena was taken by the Almohads several years later. There is no satisfactory explanation for this discrepancy.—Trans.]

[Hagar was the mother of Ishmael, the archer (Genesis 21:20), traditionally understand to be the progenitor of the Arabs, and, by extension, of the Islamic world, and thus the Almohads.—Trans.]

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 3: Encountering Christianity and Islam.