This is a love triangle involving a British MP who loved Israel, a poet who loved to drink and wrote "Hatikvah," and a beautiful aristocrat.
Love, a Cult and a Mission
Alice Le Strange was a British aristocrat whose beauty, charm, and noble bearing captivated everyone she desired - and she desired many...
The first to catch her eye was Lawrence Oliphant, whom she met in Paris. Together they joined the Brotherhood of the New Life, a cult led by Thomas Lake Harris, an eccentric preacher who called himself the "Messiah."
Lawrence Oliphant was born in South Africa and grew up in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). An adventurer, he traveled to Nepal, befriended the king, and on his return wrote a bestseller about his life there. From Nepal he went to England. He settled in London, ran for office, and became a British MP. Oliphant lived alone and often spent time in brothels, where he contracted syphilis.
After meeting Alice, who was eighteen years younger than he was, he proposed to her. She accepted, despite his telling her about his illness and despite her family's opposition to the marriage.
Harris, the cult's leader, bewitched Alice and Lawrence. At his request, they handed over all their money to him and joined his cult in America. After some time, Harris sent the Oliphants on a lecture tour of Europe to increase the number of his followers. During the tour, the couple visited Vienna, where, at a lecture Lawrence gave, they first met the young, unknown poet Naftali Herz Imber, who was living in the city at the time. Naftali fell in love with Alice at first sight and joined the cult solely to be near her.
Naftali Herz Imber was born in Galicia and had been writing poetry since childhood. As a young man, he received a cash prize and a certificate of recognition from Emperor Franz Joseph at a grand ceremony in the imperial palace in Vienna.
But Lawrence and Naftali were not the only ones to fall in love with Alice - Harris fell in love with her too.
Every few days, Harris would bring his followers' wives to his bed; they did not dare oppose him. They believed the Messiah was allowed to do anything. Harris courted Alice ardently and, using his authority, declared her marriage to Lawrence annulled and kept her away from her husband. "This is where I draw the line," Oliphant said. "I'm willing to give you the money, but not Alice." The Oliphants left the cult and returned to London. There, Oliphant searched for a new faith. He found it in the teachings of a Protestant preacher named John Thomas (1871-1805).
According to Thomas's teachings, the world's redemption would begin in the Land of Israel, provided that all the Jews returned there from exile. Lawrence was swept up by this belief and decided to take on a mission: he would be the man to bring the Jews to the land. And so he set out on a visit to the Land of Israel, after which he published the book "The Land of Gilead."
Around 1880, Lawrence and Alice arrived in Istanbul to meet the Turkish sultan and persuade him to hand over land in the Land of Israel for Jewish settlement. While they were guests there, they met Naftali Herz Imber again. Lawrence offered Naftali a job teaching him Hebrew and serving as his secretary. Overwhelmed by the good fortune that had befallen him - "to be close to Alice, to see her every day, all day" - Imber immediately accepted the offer.
On the way to the Land of Israel, Naftali's relationship with Alice grew closer - through hurried meetings in train carriages at night and intimate conversations, right under her husband's nose, while he suspected nothing.
In November 1882, the Oliphants arrived in Haifa with Imber, and Lawrence rented a house in Haifa's German Colony (the house still stands at 16 Ben-Gurion Boulevard).
The Oliphant home soon became a lively social hub. It hosted all the elite of the Land of Israel at the time: consuls, archaeologists, religious leaders, Turkish officials, and others. Lawrence helped the residents of Zamarin (Zikhron Ya'akov) buy their land, gave them money to purchase agricultural equipment, and built houses for the residents of Rosh Pina.
When Lawrence traveled to Europe to raise more money, intending to drive Rothschild out of the Land of Israel, Alice and Naftali were left alone, and their love blossomed. They differed in nationality, religion, social class, and education. Alice was ten years older than Naftali.
Naftali Herz wrote most of his love poems at that time:
The Song of Songs
THE SONG OF SONGS
But you will walk upright,
your stature like a palm,
your head held high,
your height like a tower.
...
You will burst into my heart,
you will open its gates,
with a wink from one of your eyes
you will send it into its chambers.
...
Like a stream of honey - your kiss:
my feelings stirred,
I tasted a little of your lips
and my eyes lit up...
Lawrence Oliphant often toured the land, especially Gilead and the Golan, places he envisioned as part of a Jewish state. He had good relations with the Druze, as did Alice. Some gossiped that she had found an unconventional way to convert the Druze from their faith to Christianity - a way that led through her bed... The Druze invited the Oliphants and their secretary Imber to live in the village of Daliyat al-Karmel. The couple even bought a plot of land there and built a house. The house, also known as "Beit Oliphant," still stands in the village and has served for many years as the Druze community's memorial hall for its fallen.
Naftali Herz Imber realized that Alice probably preferred the Druze to him, and with a broken heart and no hope, he left the couple and set off to wander the land. In every settlement he wrote a poem, and he also added verses to the song "Tikvatenu," which eventually became the national anthem. Naftali Herz Imber died at the age of 53 from kidney disease caused by excessive drinking, in poverty and destitution.
The beautiful Alice died in Daliyat al-Karmel in 1886 and was buried in Haifa's Templer cemetery. Her funeral took place on a rainy day, yet the Druze vied with one another for the honor of carrying her coffin to the cemetery.
After Alice's death, Lawrence returned to England. In 1888 he married Rosamond Dale Owen, and they had a son. He died in England shortly after the wedding. Rosamond inherited the house in Daliyat al-Karmel and moved into it.
The story of this trio was the basis for Ram Oren's novel "Nefesh Homiyah."
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