Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, WILLIAM RUFUS AND THE JEW, by RALPH WALDO EMERSON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

WILLIAM RUFUS AND THE JEW, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: May it please my lord the king, -- there's a jew at the door
Last Line: "quoth he, ""I think I'll keep the thirty for the payment of my pains."
Subject(s): Jews; William Ii, King Of England (1056-1100); Judaism


"May it please my lord the king, -- there's a Jew at the door."
-- "Let him in," said the king, "what's he waiting there for?"
-- "I wot, Sir, you come from Abraham's loins,
Love not Christ, eat no pork, do no good with your coins."
"My lord the king! I do as Moses bids;
Eschewing all evil, I shut my coffer lids;
From the law of my fathers, God forbid I should swerve;
The uncircumcised Nazarite, my race must not serve;
But Isaac my son to the Gentiles hath gone over,
And no means can I find my first-born to recover.
I would give fifty marks, and my gabardine to boot,
To the Rabbi that would bring him from the Christian faith about;
But phylacteried Rabbins live far over sea,
I cannot go to them, and they will not come to me.
Will it please my lord the king, from the house of Magog,
To bring my son back to his own synagogue."
-- "Why I'll be the Rabbi, -- where's fitter Pharisee?
Count me out the fifty marks, and go send your son to me."
The king filled his mouth with arguments and jibes,
To win the boy back to the faith of the tribes,
But Isaac the Jew was so hard and stiff-necked,
That by no means could the king come to any effect;
So he paid the Jew back twenty marks of his gains;
Quoth he, "I think I'll keep the thirty for the payment of my pains."





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