Delivered from the Cross
with all the authority
of the Saviour of the World
at the precise moment
of his people’s rejection of Him.
“Forgive them Lord
for they know not
what they do!”
And within forty years
it came to pass.
Their Temple destroyed.
Their Holy of Holies
trampled on by Titus.
Their sacred paraphernalia looted.
The consecrated foundations
of their city ploughed over.
A million killed during the siege
and 97,000 captured and enslaved.
A Roman coin was minted
showing a Jewish woman
in chains under a palm tree.
When the Romans
built a replacement city,
His people alone
were denied entrance.
Homeless,
they wandered the earth,
gaining hard won prosperity,
followed by expulsion
from every place
they settled in.
Finally,
after two millennia of statelessness,
and six million who died
in a Final Solution,
a plot of land was carved for them
among the cosmopolitan
humanity of Palestine.
And they were settled in the midst
of their most ancient enemies.
Proud, but unrepentant,
to fulfil their Saviour’s curse:
“Forgive them Lord
for they know not
what they do!”
And it could have been worse.
.