Tending our gardens
At Touro Synagogue
August 19, 2018
On Sunday after the reading of the Moses Seixas letter written on behalf of the Hebrew Congregation in Newport to President George Washington, Washington’s response was read. After several introductions, Col. Jonathan de Sola Mendes read the Seixas letter in a loud clear voice. Dr. Philip Mintz read Washington’s reply in a clear, loud voice. A keynote speech by the President of Salve Regina University followed.
Rhode Island Secretary of Commerce Stefan Pryor stole the show! His short speech was well written, and he delivered it with elan. Pryor addressed current affairs but avoided politics. He spoke about principles, not about personalities!
The Secretary focused on Washington’s use of the “vine and fig tree.” When I asked him why, he replied, “ …I have been intrigued by that phrase since I first viewed it in Washington’s letter. My interest was enhanced when I heard the phrase read aloud at Touro Synagogue during last year’s ceremony. Upon giving Washington’s letter a close read in preparation for this year’s event, I decided to go ahead and research the vine and fig tree language. If you’ll pardon the pun, it turned out to be a fruitful exercise.”
And it was a fruitful exercise!
Washington wrote, “May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants–while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.”
Pryor said Washington referred to the vine and fig tree almost 50 times. The phrase appears in the bible several times. Pryor said, “It appears that President Washington was referring to Micha 4:4.”
וְיָשְׁב֗וּ אִ֣ישׁ תַּ֧חַת גַּפְנ֛וֹ וְתַ֥חַת תְּאֵנָת֖וֹ וְאֵ֣ין מַחֲרִ֑יד
“But every man shall sit Under his grapevine or fig tree With no one to disturb him.”
Pryor noted that the next verse, Micah 4:5, says, ”Though all the peoples walk Each in the names of its gods…” Micah, and, in effect, the Almighty, were acknowledging the existence of other religions without criticizing them.
It was a popular phrase during the Revolutionary War, according to Charles Royster(1). “Sitting unafraid under the vine and fig tree captured the deep longing in the human soul for independence from the power of arbitrary government, from injustice, and oppression.”
Pryor may have drawn on a webpage about the vine and fig tree. http://teachingamericanhistory.org/religion-in-america/american-life/vine-and-fig-tree-motif/ Dr. David Tucker, senior fellow at the Ashbrook Center at Ashland University in Ashland, Ohio, put the page together.
Pryor concluded,
“I dwell upon Washington’s reference to the vine and fig tree because I think it’s a beautiful image. But I also think it should speak to us today. I fear that, if we focus exclusively on the phrase, ‘to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance’ – to be clear, a profoundly important phrase, one that deserves our intensive attention – but if we focus exclusively upon this phrase, restated so absolutely in Washington’s letter, as if immutable fact -- we run a significant risk…the risk of assuming that, because these words were affirmed by the first leader of our nation, they will always be true, that this view will ever be affirmed and reaffirmed.
“…the vine and fig tree portion of Washington’s letter reminds us that the shelter and safety provided by such vine and tree are being offered by living things–living things that themselves need to be nourished, cared for, and protected. We cannot take the vine and fig tree for granted–because there are multiple forms of ailment and types of pathogen that will infect them and cause them to wither if we do not care for them–that is, if we are not careful. Therefore, we must work diligently and vigilantly to ensure that the environment supports the vine and tree overhead. Together, we must actively prevent blight from taking hold and disease from taking root.”
Voltaire, one of the dominant thinkers of the 18th century, wrote in Candide, 1759, about tending a garden. In a New Yorker article, VOLTAIRE’S GARDEN, Adam Gopnik said, “As Tocqueville saw half a century later, home-making, which ought to make people more selfish, makes them less so; it gives them a stake in other people’s houses. It is not so much the establishment of a garden but the ownership of a gate that moves people from liking a society based on favors to one based on rights. Enclosing his garden broadened Voltaire’s circle of compassion. When people were dragged from their gardens to be tortured and killed in the name of faith, he began to take it, as they say, personally.”
Having a garden and a home leads to caring for society and one’s fellow man. If we don’t care for them, we can never sit under our vine and fig trees without being disturbed. During the American Revolution, Americans banded together in a body politic and and in an army to safeguard the right to live undisturbed.
1. Charles Royster, A Revolutionary People at War: The Continental Army and American Character, 1775–1783 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1979), 103
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