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The study of personal names in
all races is a very curious one.
Men get their names through some
personal accident or
peculiarity, often some
resemblance to bird, beast, fish
or flower. When the famous
Bishop Bull died the chaplain of
Bishop Sparrow preached his
funeral sermon and having an eye
to church preferment, concluded
his discourse with the
aspiration, "Lord, let me live
the life of a Sparrow and die
the death of a Bull !" In these
cemeteries the name of Salomon
is often found, it is, of
course, the same as Solomon, and
one might be named Solomon
Salomon or Salomon Solomon
indifferently. A final a added
to it, as to Isaac or Jacob,
makes more of a proper generic
name of it.
Here is the tomb of Jonas
Salomon, in the Thirty-fourth
street Synagogue burying ground;
he was a native of Helder, North
Holland, and near to him lies
another of his line, Israel
Salomon, as the Nineteenth
street Synagogue is called
Sherith Israel, so the
Thirty-fourth street Synagogue
is called Birenss Jeshurun, as
we were told, and below that
again is the ground of Temple
Emmanuel, New York. All these
are private cemeteries and
therefore no assistance can be
got from guide leaves and cards,
as at Greenwood. Moreover, an
army of mosquitoes, more
terrible than the plagues of
Egypt, assailed us the whole
morning with such fury that we
found little consolation at the
tombs of the prophets. Talking
of names, however, we found that
George Washington or Washington
is quite as popular among Hebrew
as among Christian families.
We have said that the religious
aspirations and texts are often
not less suitable for Christian
tombs. If Christianity has still
a good deal of Judaism in it,
the latter has the essence of
Christianity; for what is it
that the God whom both adore
requires of any of us but, as
the Hebrew word of inspiration
has it, "to do justly and to
love mercy and to walk humbly
with God?" Christians,
especially Catholics, write over
the grave of a beloved one,
"R.I.P.," "Requiescat in Pace,"
"May he (or she) rest in peace."
The epitaphs, "May his soul rest
in peace," "Peace to his soul"
and "May he rest in peace" are
quite frequent upon Jewish
tombstones. To the Jews even the
Catholic church is indebted for
its ideal of perfect womanhood
as embodied in the Virgin Mother
and the noble patterns of female
devotion and heroism that adorn
its calendar. Nowhere are the
endearing terms of mother,
father, son and daughter more
eloquent with the sincerity of
family affection than among the
Jews. One thinks of the
unacknowledged Saviour and
Martyr of pure Jewish religion
when from the cross He said,
"Son, behold thy mother,"
"Mother, behold thy Son," to His
mother Mary and His beloved
disciple John, as we read the
words of family relationship and
affection upon those Hebrew
sepulchers. Even the least
perfect verses are inspired when
they breathe these affections.
Thus, to Captain Jonas Phillips
Levy, born in Philadelphia,
January 14, 1807, died September
September 14, 1853, his children
raise a costly monument with the
inscription:
Speak gently, step softly, our
Father lies here;
Bow the head reverently, but
check the rising tear,
For he has gone to that bright
home above
Called by Him who doth all
things in mercy and love;
But fond memories of him will
remain with us here
Until we rejoin him in that
Heavenly sphere.
Next to this,
in the same lot, is the splendid
monument to his brother,
Commodore Uriah P. Levy, born
April 22, 1792; entered the
United States Navy, October 2,
1812; died in March, 1862. An
eagle with outspread wings
surmounts the column, and at the
base are a finely carved ship, a
man of war, cannon, an anchor,
flags, wreaths, etc. Close by
him lies his daughter, Frances
Lopez, wife of William Lopez, of
Spanish Town, Jamaica, her tomb
having been erected by him,
Commodore Levy, U.S. Navy.
Near by, in this cemetery of the
Thirty-fourth Synagogue, is
another instance of the repeated
name common among the Jews, on
the touching monument to a Union
soldier, w hose body is not
here: "In Memory of Jacob J.
Jacobus, First Lieutenant,
Washington Artillery, Augusta,
Ga., who fell at the battle of
Shiloh, Ten., April 6, 1862,
aged 32 years." A widowed mother
erected this fine monument
and placed on it the
inscription:
Cold in the earth my son lies,
Hidden ever from our mortal
eyes;
He sleeps not where his
ancestors sleep,
Where he died his grave is quite
as dark,
Nor his mortal slumbers less
profound,
Although no marble decks the
mound;
On the last day he shall rise
An angel in the darling skies.
The world is a large place and
yet a narrow one. Here is a
monument to one Jonah K. King,
born in Wurowana, Goslin, near
Posen, October 1, 1803; died in
Paris, March 6, 1866. Part of
the interval he passed no doubt
in Brooklyn and New York, or his
monument would not be here,
containing presumably his body
brought from France, as it is
not otherwise stated. The
epitaph is singular, "May his
Soul be Bound in Eternal Life."
In common parlance, one speaks
of bound "for" a destination,
and when "in" is used the
condition is usually a state of
misery rather than of happiness.
"Fast bound in misery and irons,
"says the Hebrew Psalmist. "Tied
and bound with the chain of our
sins, let the pitifulness of Thy
great mercy loose us," says the
Episcopal Prayer Book. The soul
that is "bound in eternal life,"
however, has still the cords of
a man around it yet endures no
bondage but the service of
perfect freedom. Its feet are
not tied nor its wings clipped.
"Jerusalem which is above is
free," flow appropriate tot he
pious Jew whose soul is "bound
in eternal life" would be the
Christian hymn.
There everlasting Spring abides
And never fading flowers;
Death, like a narrow sea,
divides
That heavenly land from ours.
Bright fields beyond the
swelling flood
Stand dressed in living green:
So to the Jews fair Canaan
stood,
While Jordan rolled between,
Oh could we make our doubts
remove,
Those gloomy doubts that rise,
And see the Canaan that we love
With faith's illumined eyes;
Could we but climb where Moses
stood,
And view the landscape o'er,
Not Jordan's stream nor death's
cold flood
Should fright us from the shore.
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