Legends of the Patriarchs and Prophets

Solomon asked them to what race they belonged.

The envoys replied, “We are of human origin, and of the race of Israel, and we are descended from those who, in spite of all warnings, have violated the Sabbath, and who have therefore, in punishment, been transformed by God into monkeys.”

Solomon had compassion on the apes, and he gave them a letter on parchment, assuring to them undisturbed possession of their valley against all assault by men.

And in after days, in the time of the Calif Omar, some of his troops invaded this valley, and, with great amazement, beheld the apes stone a female which had been taken in adultery. And when they would conquer the valley, an aged ape came before them bearing a parchment letter. This they were unable to read; so they sent it to the Calif Omar, who was also unable to decipher the writing; but a Jew at his court read it, and it was an assurance given to the apes against invasion by King Solomon.

Therefore Omar sent orders that they were to be left unmolested, and returned to them their parchment.673

7. SOLOMON MARRIES THE DAUGHTER OF PHARAOH

The throne of Solomon had four feet. It was of red ruby, and of the ruby were made four lions. None but Solomon could sit upon the throne. When Nebuchadnezzar came to Jerusalem and sought to ascend the throne, the lions rose and struck at him, and broke his legs. He was given remedies, and his legs were reset. No one after that ventured to sit on the throne.674

Djarada was the daughter of King Nubara, of an island in the Indian Sea, according to the Arabs; of King Pharaoh of Egypt, say the Jews.

Solomon marched against the king, on his carpet, with as many soldiers as it would accommodate; defeated him, and slew him with his own hand. In the palace of King Nubara Solomon found the Princess Djarada, who was more beautiful than all the ladies in Solomon’s harem, surpassing even the beautiful Balkis.

Solomon made her mount the carpet, and he forced her, by threats of death, to share his faith and his couch. But Djarada saw in Solomon only the murderer of her father, and she recoiled from his embrace with loathing, and spent her nights and days in tears and sighs. Solomon hoped that time would heal these wounds and reconcile her to her fate; but as, after the expiration of a year, her sorrow showed no signs of abating, he asked her what he could do which might give her comfort. She replied that at home was a statue of her father, and that she desired greatly to have it in her chamber as a reminder of him whom she had lost. Solomon, moved with compassion, sent a Jinn for the statue, and it was set up in the apartment of Djarada. Djarada immediately prostrated herself before it, and offered incense and worship to the image; and this continued for forty days.

Then Asaph heard of it, and he ascended the pulpit in the temple and preached before the king and all the people. He declared how holy and pure had been the ancient prophets from Adam to David, how they had been preserved clean from all idolatry. Then he turned to Solomon, and praised his wisdom and piety during the first years of his reign; but he regretted that his latter conduct had not been as full of integrity as at first.

When Solomon heard this, he called Asaph to him, and asked him thus before all the people. Asaph answered, “Thou hast suffered thy passions to blind thee, so that idolatry is practised in thy palace.”

Solomon hastened to the room of Djarada, and found her in prayer before the image of her departed father. Then he cried out, “We are the servants of God, and to Him shall we return.” Then he broke the image and punished Djarada.

After that he put on him garments which had been woven and sewn by virgins, strewed ashes on his head, and went into the wilderness to bewail his sin. God forgave him, after that he had fasted and wept for forty days.675

Another sin that Solomon committed was this. He was very fond of horses. One day, when the hour of prayer approached, the horses of Saul were brought before him; and when nine hundred had passed, Solomon looked up and saw that the hour of prayer was passed and he had forgotten to give glory to God. Then said Solomon, “I have cared for the things of this world, instead of thinking of my Lord;” and he said, “Bring back the horses;” and when they were brought back, he cut their throats.676

Some commentators on the Koran object that this was an act of injustice, for Solomon had sinned, not the horses; and they explain away the passage by saying that he dedicated the horses to God, and that he did not kill them.677

8. HOW SOLOMON LOST AND RECOVERED HIS RING

One day that Solomon retired to perform the necessary functions of nature, he placed his ring in the hand of Djarada; for on such occasions he was wont to remove the ring from his finger. For the first time he forgot the advice of the queen of the ants, and gave no praise to God as he committed the signet to other hands.

Sachr, the mighty Jinn,678 took advantage of this act of forgetfulness, and, assuming the form of Solomon, came to the Egyptian princess and asked her for the ring. She, nothing doubting, restored it to him; and Sachr went to the hall of audience, and ascended the throne.

When Solomon returned, he asked Djarada for the signet.

“I have already given it thee,” said she; and then, contemplating him with attention, she exclaimed, “This is not the king! Solomon is in the judgment-hall; thou art an impostor, an evil spirit who has assumed his shape for evil purposes.”

Then Solomon was driven, at her cry, from the palace, and every one treated him as a fool or rogue. He begged from door to door, saying, “I, Solomon, was king in Jerusalem!” but the people mocked him. For three years he was an outcast, because he had transgressed three precepts of the Law – “The king set over thee … shall not multiply horses to himself … neither shall he multiply wives to himself; neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.”679 And this is what befell him in that time. He went into the land of the Ammonites, and there he fell into great want; but the master cook of the king’s house took him to serve as scullion in the kitchen. After he had served for some time, he one day cooked some meats for the king; and when the king tasted the meats Solomon had baked, he was well pleased, and sent for Solomon and asked him if he would be his head cook.

Then Solomon consented, and the king of the Ammonites dismissed the master cook, and placed Solomon in his room, and Solomon excelled greatly in cooking, and pleased the king more and more with the variety and excellence of his dishes every day.

Now it fell out that Naama, daughter of the king, saw Solomon from day to day, and she conceived an ardent passion for him, and she went to her mother and said, “I shall die of love, unless I am given the head cook to husband.”

The queen was astonished and ashamed, and said, “There are kings and princes and nobles in Ammon; take to you which you will.” But Naama answered, “I will have none save the head cook.”

Then the queen went and told the king, and he was exceeding wroth, and would have slain both Solomon and Naama; but when the first fury of his anger was cooled down, he bade one of his servants take them, both Solomon and Naama, and conduct them into the desert, and there leave them to perish.680 The command of the king was executed, and Solomon and Naama were left in the wilderness without food. Then they wandered on till they came to the borders of the sea, and Solomon found some fishers, and he labored for them, and every day they gave him, in payment for his services, two fish.

Thus passed the time, till one day Solomon’s wife, Naama, on cleaning one of the fishes, found in its belly a ring, and she brought it to her husband; and behold! it was his signet which he had put in the hands of Djarada, and which had been taken from her by subtlety by the evil spirit. And this was how he recovered it: on the ring was engraved the Incommunicable Name, and this the Jinn could not endure; therefore he could not wear the signet, and he cast it into the sea, where the fish had swallowed it.

Now when Solomon recovered his ring, he was filled with joy, and the light returned to his eyes; he went back to Jerusalem with great haste, and all the people recognized him, and bowed before him: and when the Evil Spirit saw Solomon, and that he had the signet upon his hand, he uttered a loud cry and fled. Solomon refused to see again Djarada, the author of his misfortune; but he visited Queen Balkis every month, till the day of her death.681

When Balkis died, he had her body conveyed to Tadmor in the desert, the city she had built; but her grave was known to none till the reign of the Calif Walid, when in consequence of a heavy rain, the walls of Tadmor fell. Then was found an iron sarcophagus which was sixty ells long and forty ells wide, which bore this inscription: – “Here lies the pious Balkis, queen of Sheba, wife of the prophet Solomon, son of David. She was converted to the true faith in the thirteenth year of the reign of Solomon; she married him in the fourteenth, and died in the three-and-twentieth year of his reign.”

The son of the Calif raised the lid of the coffin, and beheld a woman, as fresh as if she had only been lately buried.

He announced the fact to his father, and asked what should be done with the sarcophagus. Walid ordered him to leave it where it had been found, and to pile blocks of marble over it, so that it might not again be disturbed by the hand of man.682

Solomon, when he was again on the throne, placed a crown on the head of Naama, and seated her beside him, and sent for the king of Ammon. And when the king came, he was filled with astonishment, and wondered how his daughter had escaped from the desert and had found favor with the greatest of monarchs. Then said Solomon, “See! I was thy head-cook, and this is thy daughter; bid her come to thee and kiss thee.” Then the king of Ammon kissed his daughter and returned, glad of heart, to his own land.683

9. THE DEATH OF SOLOMON

When Solomon had recovered his throne, he reigned twenty years. His whole reign was forty years, and he lived in all fifty-five years.684 He spent these years in prosecuting the building of the temple. Towards the end of his life he often visited the temple, and remained there one or two months plunged in prayer, without leaving it. He took his nourishment in the temple. He even remained a year thus; and when he was standing, with bowed head, in an humble attitude before God, no one ventured to approach him, man or Jinn; if a Jinn drew near, fire fell from heaven and consumed him.

In the garden of Solomon grew every day an unknown tree. Solomon asked it, “What is thy name, and what are thy virtues?” And the tree answered him, “I am called such and such, and I serve such a purpose, either by my fruits, or by my shadow, or by my fragrance.”

Then Solomon transplanted it elsewhere; and if it were a tree with medicinal properties, he wrote in books the kinds of remedies for which it served. One day Solomon saw in his garden a new tree, and he asked it, “What is thy name, and what purpose dost thou serve?”

The tree replied, “I serve for the destruction of the temple. Make of me a staff, whereon to lean.”

Solomon said, “None can destroy the temple as long as I am alive.” Then he understood that the tree warned him that he must shortly die. He pulled up the tree, and of it he made a staff, and, when he prayed, he leaned on this staff to keep himself upright.

Solomon knew that the temple was not completed, and that if he died, and the Jinns knew of it, they would leave off building; therefore he prayed, “O Lord! grant that the event of my death may be hidden from the Jinns, that they may finish this temple.”

God heard his prayer, that the temple might be completed, and that the Jinns might be humbled. Solomon died in the temple, standing, leaning on his staff, with his head bowed in adoration. And his soul was taken so gently from him by the Angel of Death, that the body remained standing; and so it remained for a whole year, and those who saw him thought he was absorbed in prayer, and they ventured not to approach.

The Jinns worked night and day till the temple was finished. Now, God had ordered, the same day that the soul left Solomon, a little white ant, which devours wood, to come up out of the earth under the staff, and to gnaw the inside of the staff. She ate a little every day; and as the staff was very strong and stout, she had not finished it till the end of the year. Then, when the temple was finished, at the same time the staff was eaten up, and it crumbled under the weight of Solomon, and the body fell. Thus the Jinns knew that Solomon was dead. Now, wherever the white ant eats wood, the void is filled up with clay and water by the Jinns; and this they will continue to do till the day of the Resurrection, in gratitude to the little ant which announced to them the death of him who held them in bondage. If the clay and the water are not inserted by the Jinns, whence can they come?

The sages assembled and enclosed an ant in a box, with a piece of wood, for a night and a day; then they compared the amount devoured in that time with the length of the staff, and thus they ascertained how long a time Solomon had been dead.685

XXXIX

ELIJAH

When the prophet Elijah appeared, idolatry was general. God sent him to Balbek (Heliopolis), to persuade the inhabitants to renounce the worship of Baal, from whom the city took its name. Some say that Baal was the name of a woman, beautiful of countenance. The Israelites also adored Baal; Elijah preached against idolatry; and Ahab at first believed in him, and rejected Baal, but after a while relapsed. Then Elijah prayed, and God sent a famine on the land for three years, and many men died. None had bread save Elijah, and when any smelt the odor of bread, they said “Elijah hath passed this way!”

One day Elijah came to the house of an old woman who had a son named Elisha. Both complained of hunger. Elijah gave them bread. It is said, likewise, that Elisha was paralytic, and that at the prayer of Elijah he was healed.

When the famine had lasted three years, Elijah went, accompanied by Elisha, before King Ahab, and he said: – “For three years you have been without bread; let your god Baal, if he can, satisfy your hunger. If he cannot, I will pray to Jehovah, and He will deliver you out of your distress, if you will consent to worship Him.”

Ahab consented. Then Elijah ordered the idol of Baal to be taken out of the city, and the worshippers of Baal invoked the god, but their prayers remained unanswered. Then Elijah prayed, and immediately rain fell, and the earth brought forth green herb and corn.

Nevertheless, shortly after, the people returned to idolatry, and Elijah was weary of his life; he consecrated Elisha to succeed him, and he prayed to God, “O Lord! save me from this untoward generation.” And God heard his cry, and He carried him away and gave him life till the day when Israfiel shall sound the trump of judgment.686

Both Jews and Mussulmans believe that Elijah is not dead, but that he lives, and appears at intervals. The Mussulmans have confused him with El Khoudr, and relate many wonderful stories of him. He is unquestionably the origin of the Wandering Jew. His reappearances are mentioned in the Talmud, and in later Jewish legends, as, for instance, in a story told by Abraham Tendlau.687 A poor Jew and his wife were reduced to great necessity; the man had not clothes in which to go forth and ask for work. Then his wife borrowed for him clothes, and he entered the street seeking work. He met a venerable man, who bade him use him as a slave. The Jew engaged to build a palace for a prince with the assistance of his slave, for ten thousand thalers. The mysterious stranger labored hard and angels assisted him, so that the mansion was completed with astonishing rapidity. When the Jew had received the money, the old man announced that he was Elijah, who had come to assist him, and vanished.

After the Arabs had captured the city of Elvan, Fadhilah, at the head of three hundred horsemen, pitched his tents, late in the evening, between two mountains. Fadhilah having begun his evening prayer with a loud voice, heard the words “Allah akbar!” (God is great!) repeated distinctly, and each word of his prayer was followed in a similar manner. Fadhilah, not believing this to be an echo, was much astonished, and cried out, “O thou! whether thou art of the angel ranks, or whether thou art of some other order of spirits, it is well, the power of God be with thee; but if thou art a man, then let mine eyes light upon thee, that I may rejoice in thy presence and society.”

Scarcely had he spoken these words, before an aged man with bald head stood before him, holding a staff in his hand, and much resembling a dervish in appearance. After having courteously saluted him, Fadhilah asked the old man who he was. Thereupon the stranger answered, “Bassi Hadut Issa, I am here by command of the Lord Jesus, who has left me in this world, that I may live therein until He comes a second time to earth. I wait for the Lord, who is the Fountain of Happiness, and in obedience to his command I dwell beyond the mountain.”

When Fadhilah heard these words, he asked when the Lord Jesus would appear; and the old man replied that his appearing would be at the end of the world.

But this only increased Fadhilah’s curiosity, so that he inquired the signs of the approach of the end of all things; whereupon Zerib bar Elia gave him an account of the general social and moral dissolution which would be the climax of this world’s history.688

“In the second year of Hezekiah,” says the Rabbinic Sether Olam Rabba (c. 17), “Elijah disappeared, and he will not appear again till the Messiah come; then he will show himself once more; and he will again disappear till Gog and Magog show themselves. And all this time he writes the events and transactions that happen in each century… Letters from Elijah were brought to King Joram seven years after Elijah had disappeared.”

A prophecy ascribed to Elijah is preserved in the Gemara:689 “The world will last six thousand years; it will lie desert for two thousand years; the Messiah will reign two thousand years; but, because of our iniquities which have superabounded, the years of the Messiah have passed away.”

XL

ISAIAH

The Book of the Ascension of Isaiah has reached us only in an Ethiopic version, which was published along with a translation by Archbishop Laurence, Oxford, 1819. Gieseler translated the book, and gave learned prolegomena, and notes, Göttingen, 1837; and Gfrorer has included it in his “Prophetæ Pseudepigraphi,” Stuttgardt, 1840, pp. 1-55, with the Latin translation. It must have existed in Greek and Latin, for fragments of the Latin apocryphal book remain, and have been published by Cardinal Mai, in “Scriptorum Veterum Nova Collectio;” Romæ, 1824, t. III. ii. 238 et seq.: and it is very evident from these that they are versions of a Greek original, and not of the Ethiopic.

Whilst Isaiah was speaking to the king Hezekiah, he suddenly stopped, and his soul was borne away by an angel. He traversed the firmament, where he saw the strife of the angels and demons, waged between the earth and the moon. He entered the six heavens and admired their glory; then he penetrated into the seventh heaven, where he saw the Holy Trinity, and there the events of futurity were revealed to him. When he returned to himself, Isaiah related to Hezekiah all that he had seen and heard, except what concerned his son Manasseh.

This is the prophecy of Isaiah concerning Antichrist: “And when that time had passed, Berial, the great angel, the prince of this world, Berial will descend from his place in the form of a man; an impious king, the murderer of his mother, a king of this world.

“And he will pluck up from amongst the twelve apostles the plant that they had planted, and it will fall into his hands.

“And all the powers of the world will do the will of the angel Berial, the impious king.

“At his word, the sun will shine in the darkness of the night, and the moon will appear at the eleventh hour.

“He will do all his pleasures; he will ill-treat the Well-Beloved, and will say to him, Lo! I am God, and before me there is none other.

“And all the world will believe in him.

“And sacrifice will be offered to him, and a worship of adoration, saying, He alone is God, and there is none other.

“Then the greater number of those gathered together to receive the Well-Beloved will turn aside to Berial;

“Who by his power will work miracles in the cities and in the country;

“And everywhere shall a table be spread for him.

“His domination shall be for three years seven months and twenty-seven days.”690

Only when Hezekiah was at the point of death, did Isaiah reveal to him what and how great would be the iniquities of his son. Then the king would have slain Manasseh: “I had rather,” said he, “die without posterity, than leave behind me a son who should persecute the saints.”

When the prophet saw that Hezekiah loved God more than his own son, he was glad, and he restrained the king, and said, “It is the will of God that he should live.”

Manasseh reigned in the room of his father, and was a cruel tyrant. He worshipped idols, and sought to make Isaiah partake in his idolatry. And when he could not succeed, he sawed him asunder with a saw of wood.

“And whilst Isaiah was being cut asunder, Melekira stood up and accused him, and all the lying prophets were present, and they showed great joy, and they mocked him.

“And Belial said to Isaiah; ‘Confess that all thou hast said is false, and that the ways of Manasseh are good and just.

“‘Confess that the ways of Melekira, and of those that are with him, are good.’

“He spake thus to him, as the saw entered into his flesh.

“But Isaiah was in an ecstasy, and his eyes were open, and he looked upon the spectators of his passion.

“Then said Melekira to Isaiah: ‘Confess what I shall say, and I will change the heart of those who persecute thee, and I will make Manasseh, and the heads of Judah, and his people, and all Jerusalem worship thee.’

“Then Isaiah answered and said: ‘Cursed art thou in all that thou sayest, and in all thy power, and in all thy disciples!

“‘Thou canst do nothing against me; all thou canst do is to take from me this miserable life.’

“Then they seized the prophet, and they sawed him with a saw of wood, Isaiah, son of Amos.

“And Manasseh and Melekira, and the lying prophets, and the princes of Israel, and all the people, beheld his execution.

“Now before that the execution was accomplished, he said to the prophets who had followed him: ‘Fly to Tyre and Sidon, for the Lord hath given the cup to me alone.’

“And whilst the saw cut into his flesh, Isaiah uttered no complaint and shed no tears; but he ceased not to commune with the Holy Spirit till the saw had cloven him to the middle of his body.”691

In the Mishna692 it is related that the Rabbi Simeon Ben Azai found in Jerusalem (2d cent.) a genealogy, wherein it was written that Manasseh killed Isaiah. Manasseh said to Isaiah, “Moses, thy master, said, There shall no man see God and live.693 But thou hast said, I saw the Lord seated upon His throne.694 Moses said, What other nation is there so great, that hath God so nigh unto them?695 But thou hast said, Seek ye the Lord while He may be found.”696

Isaiah thought, “If I excuse myself, I shall only increase his guilt and not save myself;” so he answered not a word, but pronounced the Incommunicable Name, and a cedar-tree opened, and he disappeared within it. Then Manasseh ordered, and they took the cedar, and sawed it into lengthways; and when the saw reached his mouth, he died.

XLI

JEREMIAH

The work entitled De Vitis Prophetarum, falsely attributed to S. Epiphanius, contains some apocryphal details concerning Jeremiah. It is said that he was stoned at Taphens in Egypt, in a place where Pharaoh formerly lived. He was held in great honor by the Egyptians, because of the service he had rendered them in taming the serpents and crocodiles.

The faithful who take a little dust from the spot where he died, are able to employ it as a remedy against the bites of serpents, and to drive away crocodiles.