Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-10-20

1 had been watching the Jews at
the Wailing Place in Jerusalem one
Friday afternoon. Some OF the deVo-
ton seemed mechanical, as when
some old Spanish Jews in gabardines
went up to the wall and read for a
space, then. after perfunctorily touch
ing the stones with their lips, stepped
off to one side and chatted and
laughed. / was informed that these
| men were hired to say prayers at the
Wailing Place for Jews in distant
lands.
Then, as 1 was about to leave. l
saw a woman of perhaps thirty years
draw near. She had been praying
at the other end of the wall. AS she
approached, l perceived that she bore
such n face as might have been Ra-
chers-strong, melancholy, spiritual,
queenly She was manifestly oblivi-
Gus to the motley company about her,
of Jews from many nations; her soul
was in her rapt face. turning toward
the great blocks of yellowish stone,
still standing from the foundation OF
Solomon's Temple. Her hands were
clasped to her bosom, and her lips
moved in prayer. She was seeing
with great lustrous eyes. not those
monolith covered with Hebrew names
and prayers, but the glory of the
House of Jehovah, and of the king
dom of her fathers. All that had
been and now is not and that de-
vout child of Abraham hopes that yet
may be. was symbolized for this wor-
shipper by these stones. She kissed
them again and again. as the woman
kisses the lover who she fears she
| may nevermore see; and as she moved
away, she looked back over her shoul-
der, with unutterable longing in her
eyes.
That incident gave me a new con-
! ception of the ardor and intensity
with which a Jew may love even the
very stones of the temple. There
saw embodied the passion of the re-
turning eXiles for the House of Je-
hovah. The spirit of her people, at
their highest and deepest moods. was
personified in that one deVotee. 1t
was a new light upon this entire
story of the rebuilding of the temple.
which the Sunday schools to-day
! study.
"Thc East Is the East"
Nobody will ever understand the
Jew until il is remembered that he
is an Oriental. The deep-flowlng, re-
ligious spirit of this people who were
chosen to be custodians of humanity s
loftiest religious truth is partially
explained by the Orientars supreme
is not so. To this day the people of
all the East, but especially of the
region called the Near East. whence
sprang the Jews, put religion first.
| All sorts of religions thrive there; an
irreligious man there is unthtnkable.
The villagers of the hills of Lebanon,
the shepherds in the fields of Pales-
tine, the Bedouins of the desert in
their tents, the diverse peoples in the
! Tigris- Euphrates Valley. talk over
historic and doctrinal religious ques-
tions, just as a group of Americans
discuss politics or baseball.
At the present time the region
where the Bible story was enacted is
PROSTATE beneath the cruel heel of n
war in which it was embroiled by the
unscrupulous appeal to the religious
motive OF a European monarch. A
million Christians have perished.
Jews by the thousands have died OF
| starvation. Armies are encamped in
| Jerusalem and Hebron and Damas-
Gus over the district of the exile,
old Babylonia, a series of dreadful
I battles have been waged and British
prisoners have been driven, in abject
misery, over the route of the return
ing Hebrew patriots.
The Chief Fact About Man
The Jewish eXiles who centered
their first thought upon the spiritual
side of the return from captivity were
! true to the fundamental aspiration of
humanity. As Carlyle says, I'm every
sense a mans religion is the chief
fact with regard to him. If you tell
me what this is, you tell me to very
great extent what the man is, what
kind of things he will do
The fiippant youth. or the immature
man. who has no time for religion"
and who is not interested in the
church, and feels too big for Bible
class, has all the history of the
human race, and the testimony of all
the great thinkers, arrayed squarely
against him. One hours honest re-
search upon the subject will start any
man toward a realization of the truth
that religion is the theme that has
most deeply engrossed the best
thought of mankind from the dawn
CT history to the present hour. The
shallow materialism of the West is
no Improvement upon the inbred re-
ligiousness of the East.
The Altar mt the Center
The huge task of the returned eX-
lies was 10 build a nation. Their
existence as a country had been prac-
tically ended they were only a
scattered host of captives, their land
was laid waste at it's capital. and
| elsewhere ptGupleu ny ny
The work ahead of them as they trav
ersed the dreary road from Babylon
hack home was even harder than the
first organization of a state. Rebuild
ing is in some ways more difficult
than building. The person who has
made a wreck of life finds it a greater
undertaking to remake than it was to
build in youth. China is in sorer
plight to-day than ever IN her past.
Vision was needed to see the new
, Jerusalem in these heaps of debris
these piled-up pillars, these obliter-
ated streets. 4 few years ago, when
/ walked over the smoking acres of
rubbish that had once been San Fran
cisco, / marveled at the courage and
. Imagination of the citizens who from
! the first saw new and fairer city
rising from these ruins. So 1t takes
the vision that has been spirit-anoint-
4 ed to see in every wreck of hu-
manity the man that may yet be; and
in the weaknesses and offenses of the
present social order new and per-
feet state of society The faith which
these old Jews possessed, to behold a
second and greater temple in the
stead of this desolation, is needed by
all spiritual builders to-day. out OF
: the desolation of the world war must
surely rise a better civilization and
a safer. sweeter life for all mankind
Despite their mixed emotions, theiI
, mingled tears and psalms, the return
ing exiles had the wisdom to per-