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Updated: June 27, 2025
In the nave of the small church sat in comfortable arm-chairs two monks, one black, one white, leaning their ears to gilded grates and receiving the confessions of the sisterhood. The paschal candlestick stood in front of the high altar, Ascension-Day not being past; but here, as in other Sicilian churches, it assumes the form of a seven-branched tree, generally of bronze bedecked with gold.
Among these utensils was the seven-branched candlestick of pure gold, every branch set with twenty-six pearls, and beside the pearls two hundred stones of inestimable worth. Furthermore, the tower at Bagdad was the hiding-place for seventy-seven golden tables, and for the gold with which the walls of the Temple had been clothed within and without.
But, at the same time, we must not forget that, from the very beginning of the Jewish Revelation, from the time when the seven-branched candlestick was appointed for the Tabernacle, right down to the day when the Apocalyptic Seer saw in Patmos the Son of Man walking in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, the metaphor has had one meaning.
When it is found again, and seven lights are kindled and burning in it, the whole world will gain the illumination which it needs. Would not this be an admirable idea for a mystic story or parable, or seven-branched allegory, full of poetry, art, philosophy, and religion?
On the same side of the way, farther on, is the Jewish Catacomb, the tombs of which bear Jewish symbols, especially the seven-branched golden candlestick, and are inscribed, not with the secular names and occupations of the occupants, but with their sacred names, as office-bearers of the synagogue, rulers, scribes, etc. The inscriptions are not in Hebrew, but in Greek letters.
Above the entrance was seen a representation of the seven-branched candlestick, which the Jew had had carved as a sign of hope, in expectation of the promised days when the Temple should rise again from its ashes. The Merchant now entered a hall lighted by a copper lamp with twelve wicks that were burning smokily. Eliezer the Jew was there, seated before his scales.
The city was utterly overthrown and sown with salt, and such treasures as could be saved from the fire were carried in the triumph of Titus namely, the shew-bread table, the seven-branched candlestick, and the silver trumpets and laid up as usual among the spoils dedicated to Jupiter.
Turning again to the Old Testament, I need only remind you of the great seven-branched lamp which stood in the Tabernacle, and afterwards in the Temple. It was the symbol of the collective Israel, as recipient of divine influences, and thereby made the light of a dark world.
The wealthy devotee brings his huge luminary of wax, the eager zealot, his seven-branched candlestick; and even the mendicant pilgrim is by no means satisfied that sufficient light is thrown upon the deceased unless he hangs up his little lamp of smoking oil.
Wert Thou an Egyptian, he would take thee to his palace; but a Jewess." "He will cast aside?" said Sarah, sighing. "Why torment one's self with days to come, which are in the hand of God? I am here to pass the Sabbath with thee." "I have splendid fish, meat, cakes, and wine of the Jews," put in Tafet, quickly. "I have bought also, in Memphis, a seven-branched candlestick and wax tapers.
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