God Protects Our Fatherland
This chapter presents a sermon unusual for David Woolf Marks, as a response to a specific historical event. The background to this address was the outbreak of violence on the Indian subcontinent in May 1857, soon called the ‘Indian Mutiny’. The chapter compares the content of Marks' sermon to that of the Christian preachers of the day. Conversely, it shows how Marks emphasizes a theme that is understandably missing from the Christian preachers, who took it for granted: solidarity with Christian neighbours and the patriotism of the Jews of Britain. The other polemical thrust of the sermon is the reference to ‘whatever opinions we may entertain with respect to the causes which have produced this serious rebellion’. And throughout the text, there are passages that reveal the rhetorical power for which Marks was known.