William Seward, Abraham Lincoln's Secretary of State, is the Next Witness to Jewish Life in the Holy Land in the 19th Century
Abraham Lincoln told his wife he "wanted to visit the Holy Land and see those places hallowed by the footprints of the Savior." Was his interest piqued by Seward's 1859 visit?
Abraham Lincoln said he “wanted to visit the Holy Land and see those places hallowed by the footprints of the Savior,” his wife related. “He was saying there was no city he so much desired to see as Jerusalem,” Mary Todd Lincoln told the Springfield, Ill., pastor who presided at Abraham Lincoln’s funeral.
Soon after the Lincolns’ conversation, the President was assassinated in Ford’s Theater.
Where did Lincoln get the idea to travel to Jerusalem? Probably from his Secretary of State, William Seward, who visited the Holy Land in 1859. In 1871, Seward returned to Palestine as part of an international tour, which he described in his 800-page travelogue, Travels Around the World.
Seward’s account of his visit to Jerusalem is illuminating in its description of living conditions and inter-religious relations in the 1850s and 1870s. His story about his unexpected attendance at a Friday night Jewish Sabbath service in Jerusalem’s Old City is fascinating. Seward’s description of the sanctuary leaves no doubt that he was a guest in the newly dedicated Hurva synagogue.
In his travelogue, Seward reported important demographic details relating to the population of Jerusalem in 1871:
Mohammedans [Muslims] are 4,000.
The Jews are 8,000.
The Armenians number 1,800.
The other Christians amount to 2,200.
William Seward’s text follows:
The population of Palestine is estimated at only 200,000.... Jerusalem is divided now according to its different classes of population. The Mohammedans are four thousand, and occupy the northeast quarter, including the whole area of the Mosque of Omar [the Dome of the Rock]. The Jews are eight thousand, and have the southeast quarter.... The Armenians number eighteen hundred, and have the southwest quarter, and the other Christians, amounting to twenty-two hundred, have the northwest quarter.
For centuries (we do not know how many), the Turkish rulers have allowed the oppressed and exiled Jews the privilege of gathering at the foot of this [wailing] wall one day in every week, and pouring out their lamentations over the fall of their beloved city, and praying for its restoration to the Lord...
The Jewish quarter adjoins, on the southeast, the high wall of the Haram [Temple Mount]. This wall is a close one, while the upper part, like all the Turkish walls of the city, is built of small stone. The base of this portion of the wall, enclosing the Mosque of Omar and the site of the ancient temple, consists of five tiers of massive, accurately beveled blocks. It is impossible to resist the impression at first view, notwithstanding the prophecy, that this is a portion of the wall of the Temple of Solomon, which was hewn in the quarries and set up in its place without the noise of the hammer and the axe. So, at least the Jews believe. For centuries, the Turkish rulers have allowed the oppressed and exiled Jews the privilege of gathering at the foot of this wall one day in every week, and pouring out their lamentations over the fall of their beloved city, and praying for its restoration to the Lord, who promised, in giving its name, that he would " be there."
The Jewish sabbath being on Saturday, and beginning at sunset on Friday, the weekly wail of the Jews under the wall takes place on Friday and is a preparation for the rest and worship of the day, which they are commanded to "keep holy." The small rectangular oblong area, without roof or canopy, serves for the gathering of the whole remnant of the Jewish nation in Jerusalem. Here, whether it rains or shines, they come together at an early hour, old and young, men, women, and little children — the poor and the rich, in their best costumes, discordant as the diverse nations from which they come. They are attended by their rabbis, each bringing the carefully preserved and elaborately bound text of the book of the Lamentations of Jeremiah, either in their respective languages or in the original Hebrew. For many hours, they pour forth their complaints, reading and reciting the poetic language of the prophet, beating their hands against the wall, and bathing the stones with their kisses and tears. It is no mere formal ceremony. During the several hours while we were spectators of it, there was not one act of irreverence or indifference.
Only those who have seen the solemn prayer-meeting of a religious revival, held by some evangelical denomination at home, can have a true idea of the solemnity and depth of the profound grief and pious feeling exhibited by this strange assembly on so strange an occasion, although no ritual in the Catholic, Greek, or Episcopal Church is conducted with more solemnity and propriety.
Though we supposed our party unobserved, we had scarcely left the place, when a meek, gentle Jew, in a long, plain brown dress, his light, glossy hair falling in ringlets on either side of his face, came to us, and, respectfully accosting Mr. Seward, expressed a desire that he would visit the new synagogue, where the sabbath service was about to open at sunset. Mr. Seward assented.
A crowd of "the peculiar people" attended and showed us the way to the new house of prayer, which we are informed was recently built by a rich countryman of our own whose name we did not learn. It is called the American Synagogue. It is a very lofty edifice, surmounted by a circular dome. Just underneath it, a circular gallery is devoted exclusively to the women. Aisles run between the rows of columns, which support the gallery and dome. On the plain stone pavement, rows of movable, wooden benches with backs are free to all who come. At the side of the synagogue, opposite the door, is an elevated desk on a platform accessible only by movable steps, and resembling more a pulpit than a chancel. It was adorned with red damask curtains, and behind them a Hebrew inscription. Directly in the center of the room, between the door and this platform, is a dais six feet high and ten feet square, surrounded by a brass railing, carpeted, and containing cushioned seats. We assume that this dais, high above the heads of the worshippers, and on the same elevation as the platform appropriated to prayer, is assigned to the rabbis. We took seats on one of the benches against the '.vail; presently an elderly person, speaking English imperfectly, invited Mr. Seward to change his seat; he hesitated, but, on being informed by Mr. Finkelstein that the person who gave the invitation was the president of the synagogue, Mr. Seward rose, and the whole party, accompanying him, were conducted up the steps and were comfortably seated on the dais, in the " chief seat in the synagogue." On this dais was a tall, branching, silver candlestick with seven arms.
The congregation now gathered in, the women filling the gallery, and the men, in varied costumes, and wearing hats of all shapes and colors, sitting or standing as they pleased. The lighting of many silver lamps, judiciously arranged, gave notice that the sixth day's sun had set, and that the holy day had begun. Instantly, the worshippers, all standing, and as many as could, turning to the wall, began the utterance of prayer, bending backward and forward, repeating the words in a chanting tone, which each read from a book, in a low voice like the reciting of prayers after the clergyman in the Episcopal service. It seemed to us a service without a prescribed form or order.
The Rabbi Entered, Led the Prayers, and Spoke
When it had continued some time, thinking that Mr. Seward might be impatient to leave, the chief men requested that he would remain a few moments, until a prayer should be offered for the President of the United States, and another for himself. Now, a remarkable rabbi, clad in a long, rich, flowing sacerdotal dress, walked up the aisle; a table was lifted from the floor to the platform, and, by a steep ladder which was held by two assistant priests, the rabbi ascended the platform. A large folio Hebrew manuscript was laid on the table before him, and he recited with marked intonation, in clear falsetto, a prayer, in which he was joined by the assistants reading from the same manuscript. We were at first uncertain whether this was a psalm or a prayer, but we remembered that all the Hebrew prayers are expressed in a tone which rises above the recitative and approaches melody, so that a candidate for the priesthood is always required to have a musical voice.
At the close of the reading, the rabbi came to Mr. Seward and informed him that it was a prayer for the President of the United States and a thanksgiving for the deliverance of the Union from its rebellious assailants. Then came a second; it was in Hebrew and intoned, but the rabbi informed us that it was a prayer of gratitude for Mr. Seward's visit to the Jews at Jerusalem, for his health, for his safe return to his native land, and for a long, happy life.
The rabbi now descended, and it was evident that the service was at an end. Coming down from the dais, we were met by a band of musicians playing on drums, fifes, and violins. We questioned whether this music was part of the service of the synagogue, but our doubt was removed when we found it accompanying us to the gate of our hotel. The Jews, in their dispersion, are understood to be forbidden the use of musical instruments in worship. Their chants of praise are the traditional songs of Israel, just as the Christians, who have succeeded them, prefer, to all other devotional hymns, the Psalms of David. A pleasant dinner ensued with the United States consul and his accomplished wife….
Seward revealed this heart-wrenching story of an American Jewish family he met on his ship on his way to Jaffa:
As we sat on the deck of our steamer, coming from Alexandria to Jaffa, we remarked a family whom we supposed to be Germans. It consisted of a plainly-dressed man, with a wife who was ill, and two children--one of them an infant in its cradle. The sufferings of the sick woman and her effort to maintain a cheerful hope interested us. The husband, seeing this, addressed us in English. Mr. Seward asked if he was an Englishman. He answered that he was an American Jew, that he had come from New Orleans, and was going to Jerusalem. We parted with them on the steamer. The day after we reached the Holy City, we learned that the poor woman had climbed the mountain with her husband and children, and arrived the day after us. She died immediately, and so achieved the design of her pilgrimage. She was buried in this cemetery. She was a Jewess, and, according to the Jewish interpretation of the prophecies, the Jew who dies in Jerusalem will certainly rise in paradise.
The Hurva Synagogue was destroyed by the Jordanian army in 1948. Israel liberated the Old City in June 1967. The Hurva was rebuilt and dedicated in 2010.
Portions of this essay appeared in the author’s book, American Interests in the Holy Land Revealed in Early Photographs, Urim Publications, 2017.