Though an abundance of historical reminiscence and legend lay in the storehouse of Jewish literature, none of it was built into epic poem

Epic poetry

An epic is a lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation. Oral poetry may qualify as an epic, and Albert Lord and Milman Parry have argued that classical epics were fundamentally an oral poetic form...

s until relatively recently. Religious and secular poets, it is true, often treated of such subjects as Abraham

Abraham

Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...

 and Isaac

Isaac

Isaac as described in the Hebrew Bible, was the only son Abraham had with his wife Sarah, and was the father of Jacob and Esau. Isaac was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites...

 and the near sacrifice of Isaac

Binding of Isaac

The Binding of Isaac Akedah or Akeidat Yitzchak in Hebrew and Dhabih in Arabic, is a story from the Hebrew Bible in which God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, on Mount Moriah...

 on Mount Moriah, Jacob

Jacob

Jacob "heel" or "leg-puller"), also later known as Israel , as described in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the New Testament and the Qur'an was the third patriarch of the Hebrew people with whom God made a covenant, and ancestor of the tribes of Israel, which were named after his descendants.In the...

 and Joseph and the story of their lives, Moses

Moses

Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...

 and Aaron

Aaron

In the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, Aaron : Ααρών ), who is often called "'Aaron the Priest"' and once Aaron the Levite , was the older brother of Moses, and a prophet of God. He represented the priestly functions of his tribe, becoming the first High Priest of the Israelites...

 and the departure from Egypt

Egypt

Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...

, Joshua

Joshua

Joshua , is a minor figure in the Torah, being one of the spies for Israel and in few passages as Moses's assistant. He turns to be the central character in the Hebrew Bible's Book of Joshua...

 and the entrance into Canaan

Canaan

Canaan is a historical region roughly corresponding to modern-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, and the western parts of Jordan...

, Jeremiah and the fall of Jerusalem, Elijah the Prophet, etc. These, however, are often considered only poems with an epic coloring; a pure epic poem according to the rules of art was not produced during the Middle Ages.

The stern character of Jewish monotheism

Monotheism

Monotheism is the belief in the existence of one and only one god. Monotheism is characteristic of the Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Druzism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Samaritanism, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism.While they profess the existence of only one deity, monotheistic religions may still...

 prevented the rise of hero

Hero

A hero , in Greek mythology and folklore, was originally a demigod, their cult being one of the most distinctive features of ancient Greek religion...

-worship, without which real epic poetry is impossible. Spanish crypto-Jew, Antonio Enríquez Gómez

Antonio Enríquez Gómez

Antonio Enríquez Gómez , Spanish dramatist, poet and novelist of Portuguese-Jewish origin, was known in the early part of his career as Enríque Enríquez de Paz...

 is probably one of the first Jewish authors of whom an epic is known (Sansón Nazareno: Poema heróico, a Spanish-language heroic epic version of the Samson story), followed closely by Solomon de Oliveira's epic ("Elat Ahabim," Amsterdam, 1665). The first to produce an epic poem was N. H. Wessely with his Mosaide "Shire Tif'eret" (Berlin, 1789-1802), an epic on the Exodus

The Exodus

The Exodus is the story of the departure of the Israelites from ancient Egypt described in the Hebrew Bible.Narrowly defined, the term refers only to the departure from Egypt described in the Book of Exodus; more widely, it takes in the subsequent law-givings and wanderings in the wilderness...

 from Egypt. The influence of a similar work by the German poet Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock

Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock

Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock was a German poet.-Biography:Klopstock was born at Quedlinburg, the eldest son of a lawyer.Both in his birthplace and on the estate of Friedeburg on the Saale, which his father later rented, young Klopstock passed a happy childhood; and more attention having been given...

 is evident. Next to him stands Shalom Kohn with his "Ner David", an epic poem on King David

David

David was the second king of the united Kingdom of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible and, according to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, an ancestor of Jesus Christ through both Saint Joseph and Mary...

 (Vienna, 1834). The influence of these two epics on the readers and poets of that time was considerable.

In addition the following poets may be mentioned from that and the succeeding period: Issachar Bär Schlesinger ("Ha-Ḥashmona'im," Prague, 1817); Samuel Molder ("Beruriya," Amsterdam, 1825); Süsskind Raschkow

Süsskind Raschkow

Süsskind Raschkow was a German poet of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. He was the author of the following works: "Yosef v'Asenat," a drama ; "Hayye Shimshon," an epic poem ; and "Tal Yaldut," poems and proverbs ....

 ("Ḥayye Shimshon," Breslau, 1824); Gabriel Pollak ("Ha-Keritot," Amsterdam, 1834, and "Ḳiḳayon le-Yonah," ib. 1853); and Hirsch Wassertrilling ("Hadrat Elisha'," Breslau, 1857, and "Nezer Ḥamodot," ib. 1860). Works of this sort have been written by M. I. Lebensohn, Judah Leib Gordon

Judah Leib Gordon

Judah Leib Gordon, also known as Leon Gordon, was among the most important Hebrew poets of the Jewish Enlightenment....

 ("Ahavat David u-Mikal", Wilna, 1856, and vols. iii. and iv. of his collected works, St. Petersburg, 1883), Chaim N. Bialik

Bialik

Bialik was originally a Polish/Czech surname before it was adopted by the Jewish population. The name probably originated from the Polish word Biały...

, and S. Tschernichowski

Shaul Tchernichovsky

Shaul Tchernichovsky , was a Russian-born Hebrew poet. He is considered one of the great Hebrew poets, identified with nature poetry, and as a poet greatly influenced by the culture of ancient Greece.- Life :...

.