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Mordecai M. Noah: American Zionist

Discourse on the Restoration of the Jews, Delivered at the Tabernacle, N. Y., Oct. 28, and Dec. 2, 1844, by M. M. Noah. New York, 1845, 8vo. pp. 55.

Mr. Noah’s object seems to be to excite the American Christians, and especially the ladies and gentlemen belonging to the various conversion societies to unite in a plan, to urge upon the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire to allow the Jews to hold land in Syria, and then to aid all those who may be willing to emigrate thither with the requisite means to establish themselves there as an independent and republican people. We are not bold enough to hazard the assertion that such a plan is absolutely impracticable, or that it is altogether opposed to Scripture to encompass in the manner indicated, the primary restoration of the Jews. Besides it would appear from the letter from Jurburg, published in The Orient which we gave in the last number of our magazine, that many of our people living under the iron sway of Russia, ardently desire the consummation of some project of the kind. But we apprehend, that the difficulty will not be found with the Turkish government, which has latterly, since the accession of Abdul Medjid to the throne, and since the persecution at Damascus, granted the Jews an equality of rights, (at least it was so stated in the papers of the day,) with other Rajahs or non-Mussulman inhabitants, which equality we presume, includes the right of holding real estate.
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April 27, 1865 by Emma Lazarus

The flight, pursuit, and remorse of Lincoln's assassin are vividly portrayed by a teenage Emma Lazarus in this poem. She chose for her title the date of John Wilkes Booth's capture and death, in error giving it a day later than it actually occurred. This poem first appeared in 1867, in "Poems and Translations by Emma Lazarus, Written Between the Ages of Fourteen and Seventeen." Because of the ambiguous title, this piece has gone unnoticed by most Lincoln scholars. continue

Dias' Letters: A Jewish Look at the New Testament

How unfortunate is it, that there should not be any authentic ancient writing of the transactions which are related in the New Testament, on the veracity of which we might depend. The disadvantage of being reduced to the necessity of taking every particular from such as were deeply engaged, and whose interest must naturally have led them to relate things which, perhaps, never happened, and many others in which they might be deceived, great as it is, is nothing (were there any certainty that the evidence of such authors is genuine,) in comparison with what they have received; and that to such a degree, that I dare say no learned man of the present day will be willing to assert of any one single text that it may not have undergone some change or alteration. continue

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