The Banner of the Jew

Emma Lazarus

1882

Wake, Israel, wake! Recall to-day
   The glorious Maccabean rage,
The sire heroic, hoary-gray,
   His five-fold lion-lineage:
The Wise, the Elect, the Help-of-God,
   The Burst-of-Spring, the Avenging Rod.1
From Mizpeh’s mountain-ridge they saw
   Jerusalem’s empty streets, her shrine
Laid waste where Greeks profaned the Law,
   With idol and with pagan sign.
Mourners in tattered black were there,
   With ashes sprinkled on their hair.
Then from the stony peak there rang
   A blast to OPE the graves: down poured
The Maccabean clan, who sang
   Their battle-anthem to the Lord.
Five heroes lead, and following, see,
   Ten thousand rush to victory!
Oh for Jerusalem’s trumpet now,
   To blow a blast of shattering power,
To wake the sleepers high and low,
   And rouse them to the urgent hour!
No hand for vengeance—but to save,
   A million naked swords should wave.
Oh deem not dead that martial fire,
   Say not the mystic flame is spent!
With Moses’ law and David’s lyre,
   Your ancient strength remains unbent.
Let but an Ezra rise anew,
   To lift the Banner of the Jew!
A rag, a mock at first—erelong,
   When men have bled and women wept,
To guard its precious folds from wrong,
   Even they who shrunk, even they who slept,
Shall leap to bless it. and to save.
   Strike! for the brave revere the brave!

Notes

The sons of Mattathias—Jonathan, John, Eleazar, Simon Thassi, and Judas Maccabeus.

Credits

Emma Lazarus, “The Banner of the Jew,” Songs of a Semite: The Dance to Death and Other Poems (New York: The American Hebrew, 1882), p. 56.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 7.

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Creator Bio

Emma Lazarus

1849–1887

The socially conscious writer Emma Lazarus grew up in an established Sephardic family in New York. Lazarus’s eloquent essays, emotive poetry, and insightful translations—particularly of the works of Heinrich Heine—garnered her early respect and acclaim. She was a fervent activist against antisemitism and a champion for Jewish immigrants, volunteering and supporting social services. Her efforts reflected her proto-Zionist views advocating Jewish cultural rebirth and settlement in Palestine. The words she is perhaps most remembered by, which encapsulate her views on the importance of immigrant rights and freedom from persecution, were added to the base of the Statue of Liberty in 1903, sixteen years after her death at the age of thirty-eight.

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