📖 Hymns Written for the Service of the Hebrew Congregation Beth Elohim, Charleston, South Carolina (Penina Moïse et al., 1842)

Source Link: https://opensiddur.org/?p=39305

Date: 2021-10-04

Last Updated: 2024-12-17

Categories: Hymn-Books & Religious poetry

Tags: 19th century C.E., 57th century A.M., American Reform Movement, Classical Reform, Reform Jewry

Excerpt: The first prayerbook largely composed by a Jewish woman and the first prayerbook compiled by a Jewish woman in the United States. . . .

Content:

The first prayerbook compiled by an American Jewish woman, and quite possibly by the first Jewish woman ever, is the hymn-book of Penina Moïse (1797-1880), prepared for her congregation Beth Elohim in Charleston, South Carolina in 1842. This is the first edition (1842) containing 74 hymns (61 of which are by Penina Moïse).

While the majority of the hymns published are attributed to Penina Moïse (as P.M.), a handful of other authors are also occasionally indicated, all by their initials. We can identify four of these with certainty: Cordelia Moïse Cohen (1809-1869), Caroline de Litchfield Harby (1800-1876), Columbus Moïse (1811-1872), and Gershon Lazarus (1804-1868).^[1] Gershon Lazarus is identified as Gershom Lazarus in the 1914 CCAR Union Hymnal. There was a Gershom Lazarus in Charleston at the time, working as a steamboat inspector in the Custom House from 1847-1858. Unfortunately, we know very little else about him. Some correspondence of his is recorded in the Bulletin of the Lower Cape Fear Historical Society, October 1983.  The identity of the remaining author, J.C.L.,^[2] J.C.L. may indicate Jacob Lazarus (a signatories to both the Beth Elohim constitution of 1825 constitution of the Reformed Society of Israelites). Alternately, it may reference Jacob C. Levy of the Hebrew Orphan Society in Charleston (d. 1875).  remains a mystery.

The very first edition of Moïse’s hymn-book was published as Hymns Written for the Service of the Hebrew Congregation Beth Elohim, Charleston, S.C. (1842), over a decade before Fanny Neuda’s Stunden der Andacht (Hours of Devotion) in 1855, or Hester Rothschild’s English translation of the French anthology of tehinot and paraliturgical prayer, Imrei Lev (Prayers and Meditations, also in 1855). A second edition of Beth Elohim’s hymn-book, Hymns Written for the Use of Hebrew Congregations was published with revisions (mostly small but sometimes large) as well as 137 new hymns in 1856.

This work is in the Public Domain due to its having been published more than 95 years ago.

INDEX (1842 edition)

Penina Moïse
When Faith too young, (Hymn 1)
The Lord of heaven, (Hymn 5)
In God the holy, (Hymn 6)
Almighty God! whose will alone, (Hymn 7)
How cold that man, (Hymn 8)
Fear not, (Hymn 10)
Unless the land, (Hymn 11)
When light broke forth, (Hymn 14)
O king of glory! (Hymn 15)
Let choral songs, (Hymn 16)
Lord! when I hear, (Hymn 17)
Remember man, (Hymn 18)
Lord! what is man, (Hymn 19)
Lift, lift the voice, (Hymn 20)
Descend into thyself, (Hymn 22)
While man explores, (Hymn 23)
O! turn, (Hymn 24)
How long will man, (Hymn 25)
Man of the world, (Hymn 26)
Though sorrows, (Hymn 27)
O! how shall man, (Hymn 28)
Rebuke me not, (Hymn 29)
Early and late, (Hymn 31)
God Supreme, (Hymn 32)
O! that on morning’s (Hymn 33)
Draw nigh, O Lord! (Hymn 34)
I wept, (Hymn 35)
O! thou in whom, (Hymn 36)
O! thou whose shrine, (Hymn 37)
Return O Lord! (Hymn 38)
I saw a palace, (Hymn 39)
When I remember, (Hymn 40)
How beautiful, (Hymn 41)
Blessed is the bond, (Hymn 42)
Praise ye the Lord, (Hymn 43)
Eternal, Almighty, (Hymn 44)
We bless thee, (Hymn 45)
Let the Lord, (Hymn 47)
The Lord a watchful guardian, (Hymn 49)
Holy and everlasting one, (Hymn 50)
O! sad is nature’s, (Hymn 51)
O! thou possessed, (Hymn 52)
It is the solemn (Hymn 55)
Source of mercy, (Hymn 57)
Into the tomb, (Hymn 59)
Morn breaks upon, (Hymn 60)
My heart is bared, (Hymn 61)
Lord of the world, (Hymn 63)
How desolate, (Hymn 64)
Rude are, (Hymn 65)
Great Arbiter, (Hymn 66)
Almighty God! thy special grace, (Hymn 67)
God of the earth, (Hymn 68)
Glory to God, (Hymn 69)
Let us to prayer, (Hymn 70)
We bring not, (Hymn 71)
Why mourneth, (Hymn 72)
Wo unto Zion, (Hymn 73)
Mournfully chant, (Hymn 74)

Cordelia Moïse Cohen
The sun shines, (Hymn 9)
I will extol thee, (Hymn 12)
O’er all this wide, (Hymn 13)
Here at this, (Hymn 21)
I lift mine eyes, (Hymn 30)
Refreshed by sleep, (Hymn 48)
When morning paints, (Hymn 54)
He spoke, (Hymn 56)

Caroline de Litchfield Harby
O! uncreated Holy One, (Hymn 46)
God of my fathers! (Hymn 53)
Eternal love is thine, (Hymn 62)

David Nunes Carvalho
Before the glorious orbs, (Hymn 4)

J.C.L.
By Babel’s streams, (“נחמו | Comfort ye,” Hymn 2)

Gershon Lazarus
With rapture I behold, (Hymn 58)

Columbus Moïse
Israel to holy numbers, (Hymn 3)

 

Notes

Notes

1	Gershon Lazarus is identified as Gershom Lazarus in the 1914 CCAR Union Hymnal. There was a Gershom Lazarus in Charleston at the time, working as a steamboat inspector in the Custom House from 1847-1858. Unfortunately, we know very little else about him. Some correspondence of his is recorded in the Bulletin of the Lower Cape Fear Historical Society, October 1983.
2	J.C.L. may indicate Jacob Lazarus (a signatories to both the Beth Elohim constitution of 1825 constitution of the Reformed Society of Israelites). Alternately, it may reference Jacob C. Levy of the Hebrew Orphan Society in Charleston (d. 1875).

Contributor: Penina Moïse

Co-authors:

• 
  Name: Penina Moïse
  Bio: Penina Moïse (1797-1880) was born to a large and wealthy family in Charleston, South Carolina, the progeny of her merchant father, Abraham Moïse (1736-1809), originally from Strasbourg in Alsace, France, and her mother Sarah from the Jewish community on the Caribbean island of Sint Eustatius in the Netherlands Antilles. Her brother, also named Abraham, was a leader in the Reformed Society of Israelites, and so we imagine she was closely associated with the reformist wing of the congregation it wished to and ultimately succeeded in reforming, Ḳ.Ḳ. Beth Elohim. Moïse wrote at least 187 prayers for Beth Elohim's hymn books published in 1842 and in 1856. Moïse was also a gifted teacher and, in 1845, became head of Beth Elohim’s religious school. Moïse was a prolific writer, earning praise for her 1833 collection of poems, Fancy’s Sketch Book, as well as her articles for various newspapers across the country. After the Civil War, she returned to Charleston and ran an academy with her sister and niece. Though her eyesight eventually deteriorated into blindness, she continued to work and write until the end of her life. (This short biographical sketch includes material adapted from her entry in the Jewish Women's Archive by Jay M. Eidelman.)
  Website: https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/moise-penina
  Profile Link: https://opensiddur.org/profile/penina-moise
• 
  Name: Ḳahal Ḳadosh Beth Elohim (Charleston, South Carolina)
  Bio: Ḳahal Ḳadosh Beth Elohim (Hebrew: קהל קדוש בית אלהים‎, also known as Ḳ.Ḳ. Beth Elohim, or more simply Congregation Beth Elohim), founded in 1749 in Charleston, South Carolina, is one of the oldest Jewish congregations in the United States. The founding members of the synagogue were Jews of Spanish and Portuguese descent (Sepharadim), who arrived into Charleston via London, England. Before 1830 Ḳahal Ḳadosh Beth Elohim was a place of worship for Spanish and Portuguese Jews using Portuguese rituals as done in Portugal before the Spanish and Portuguese inquisitions. A splinter group animated by the European Reform movement, the Reformed Society of Israelites, formed in 1824. While at first this group did not succeed in reforming Beth Elohim, by the mid 1830s Beth Elohim had reabsorbed its members and its ḥazzan, Gustavus Poznanski (1804–1879), joined the Reform camp in 1840. After the first synagogue building was destroyed by fire in 1838, it was rebuilt two years afterward (in a Greek Revival style designed by Cyrus L. Warner) with an organ to the chagrin of the traditionalists. Ḳahal Ḳadosh Beth Elohim is recognized as the oldest Reform Jewish congregation in the Americas.
  Website: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kahal_Kadosh_Beth_Elohim
  Profile Link: https://opensiddur.org/profile/kahal-kadosh-beth-elohim

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Title: Hymns written for the Service of the Hebrew Congregation Beth Elohim, South Carolina (1842)
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