dots-menu
×

Joseph Friedlander, comp. The Standard Book of Jewish Verse. 1917.

By Israel Zangwill

Yigdal

THE LIVING God, O magnify and bless,

Transcending Time and here eternally.

One Being, yet unique in unity;

A mystery of Oneness measureless.

Lo! form or body He has none, and man

No semblance of His holiness can frame.

Before Creation’s dawn He was the same;

The first to be, though never He began.

He is the world’s and every creature’s Lord;

His rule and majesty are manifest,

And through His chosen, glorious sons exprest

In prophecies that through their lips are poured.

Yet never like to Moses rose a seer,

Permitted glimpse behind the veil divine.

This faithful prince of God’s prophetic line

Received the Law of Truth for Israel’s ear.

The Law God gave He never will amend,

Nor ever by another Law replace.

Our secret things are spread before His face;

In all beginnings He beholds the end.

The saint’s reward He measures to his meed;

The sinner reaps the harvest of his ways.

Messiah He will send at end of days,

And all the faithful to salvation lead.

God will the dead again to life restore

In His abundance of almighty love.

Then blessed be His Name, all names above,

And let His praise resound for evermore.