Translated from the German of Richard Huldschiner
TREMBLING in the mist of the desert, the moon stood red above the horizon. The camp-fires of the Jews were extinguished; for it was the Sabbath. In the deep caves of the mountain that harbored the refugees there was a stealthy, troubled, anxious life. Old men sat bowed upon the floor and prayed for their slain sons; the female mourners wailed and with desperate hands tore their withered breasts. A groaning came from the blood-soaked earth, rose higher, and spread itself out, hovered over the desert like a threatening storm-cloud, oppressed the erect and crushed the bowed. The desert remained silent and hearkened.
In the East, however, a red glare lay over the land. And there upon the altar the statue of the god Milkom the Destroyer, seven times the height of man, loomed up with eyes and nostrils of fire; for in his bowels blazed the sacrificial flame. Like a burning tower the figure rose above the plain, sent out rays of heat, and seemed desirous of taking possession of the land to the furthest distance, even to the waves of the sea.
The eyes of the fugitives wandered with dread over the distant fires, turned for help to heaven, where the stars were glimmering, and then sank, as it were, back into themselves, to their own misery, to the death of brothers and the wailing of mothers.
One old man, however, Eleasar, the son of Zaphan, son of Abdon, sat cowering upon the ground, clasping his knees with wasted arms, and propping his head upon his knees; and he called aloud unto the Lord:
"Lord, we have greatly sinned.Lord, thou didst punish us,Out of our reeling dream didst tear us.Hurled down our house.—Edom rises against us.
Stretches himself in scorn aloft And his brazen fist Rattles with ruin At the pillars of thy sanctuary. Woe Israel, I say unto you That the time has come when thy mothers weep, . And thy children perish, Israel! Torn out with its roots, The grape-vine perishes. Woe, Israel, drought is upon you; The gum thirsteth for the drink of deliverance; The hollows of the mountains resound with lamentations; And a trembling goes over the bristling clods. Oh Lord, we lie in the dust before thee. When will the green seed spring up anew? When wilt thou let new sprouts shoot up? With leaf and stem, with bud and blossom? With proud blossom that nods to the sun? Long thy servants have mourned, oh Lord--""
But his voice was choked in tears, and he did not see that the brothers that lay around him on the rocks, bowed in the dust, stretched out their arms, and called to one another:
"A prophet! A prophet!—Give blessingunto us, Eleasar!"
Yonder where the cliff descends into the plain, nearest to the enemy, sat Mattisjah, the son of Jochanan, son of Simeon, a priest, who belonged to the house of Jojarib in Modin; he sat there with his sons and spoke:
“Hearken to me, my sons! Are we born to see the fall of our people and to sit idle? Why are we still living?” And he rent his garment and mourned exceedingly.