poetry – Page 3 – "A Song Every Day"

Rivers of His Hands

“The rivers of his hands [נהרות ידיו] poured into his good deeds,” reads the Yehuda Amichai poem “My Father.” The Hebrew Poetry group at Temple Micah discussed this poem on Shabbat, and I later recalled some background which seems related.

Rabbi Meir says in Pirkei Avot:

Anyone who involves himself in Torah for its own sake merits many things…and the secrets of the Torah are revealed to him, and he becomes like an ever-strengthening spring, and like a river that does not stop [וּכְנָהָר שֶׁאֵינוֹ פוֹסֵק]…
— Pirkei Avot 6:1, from Sefaria

In addition, the biblical concept of “נָהָר — nahar” provides further relevant background.

A River Goes Out

River images are pretty common in biblical text. The word “נָהָר — nahar” is used 120 times in the Hebrew bible, with 98 uses translated as “river,” according to this concordance . (The word is also rendered “flood” or “floods” or “streams.” Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance is widely available on the web and very handy; here’s more about this Christian resource.) But the first “nahar” in particular seems related to both the verse from Avot and Amichai’s poem.

“A river comes forth from Eden to water the garden.”
V’nahar yotzei me’eden lehashkot et hagan
וְנָהָר יֹצֵא מֵעֵדֶן
— Genesis 2:10

Noting that the river “yotzei [goes out, comes forth]” from Eden, a contemporary teacher writes:

How ironic. Wouldn’t the river be more likely to water the Garden if it flowed INTO the Garden? The deepest answer is that Torah is compared to lifegiving waters. The more one gives Torah over to others the more watering comes back in return. The more one teaches, the more one learns. The more we give of ourselves to others, the more we get back in return.
— blog of Rabbi Baruch Binyamin Hakohen Melman

Amichai’s poem, “My Father,” says nothing about Torah. But the images he shares seem consistent with — and I’d argue, built on — biblical and rabbinic ideas of rivers sustained by their “going out.”

Prayer in the Midst of Bullets and Bombs

Decades ago, Yehuda Amichai wrote about the diameter of a bomb — thirty centimeters, with circles of pain outward from its center. (English here).

Similarly, every bullet leaves pain in circles rippling outward.

We also know that kindness has a ripple effect,
and many people think prayer works this way, too.

The 20th Century rabbi Max Kadushin asks us to notice that the Amidah (“Standing prayer,” the central prayer of a Jewish service) begins with one opening blessing formula and then proceeds with a series of prayers that use only a closing formula.

…Jewish blessings are frequently structured with an opening and closing formula book-ending the content. The unusual structure of the Amidah, he says, creates a “cascade of blessing,” growing from the first blessing outward….

If everyone on the outer edges of pain ripples
sends blessings inward,
a lot of healing energy
will wend its way toward those most in need…
with most of us in a position
to both send and receive.

Max Kadushin. Worship and Ethics: A Study in Rabbinic Judaism. (NY: Bloch, 1963)

Treona Kelty is founder of Beautiful U Yes U, see also Facebook.
This photo is from their office this summer.

The Picture, Part 2

In Bialik’s poem, the Matmid, there is both a collective of students and a “lonely voice,” chanting solo at night:

His comrades three await him in his place,
They, who have been his friends since first he came:
The burning light, the desk, his Talmud text.
— HaMatmid [The Talmud Student], Helena Frank, trans.

1947 illustration for the poem, "The Talmud Student," by Lionel S. Reiss (1894-1988) — 1947 illustration for the poem, “The Talmud Student,” by Lionel S. Reiss (1894-1988)

See also, Reiss’ illustration of this passage at right.

According to one biography, and several articles on Lithuanian yeshivot [academies] of the late 19th Century, this is a direct reflection of author’s experience. Chaim Nachman Bialik (1873–1934; also: Haim or Hayim) studied in Volozhin in the late 1880s, where several, somewhat competing, educational forces were at work:

comraderie among students and a sense of collective learning;
the anti-ascetic leaning of one master, Rabbi Naftali Tsevi Yehudah Berlin (“the Natsiv”); and
the 24/7 learning philosophy of Rabbi Chayyim Soloveitchik.

One Biographer’s View

1) “Bialik was no longer alone with his sacred books in the vacant synagogue of his hometown,” writes biographer Sara Feinstein of Bialik’s arrival in Volozhin. “Now he felt part of a mighty force of hundreds of talmudic scholars whose voices rang with fervor and exhilaration.” (Sunshine, Blossoms, and Blood, p.43; more below)

2) Of the Natsiv, she writes:

It was said that he once admonished a Matmid who went to extremes by denying himself food and sleep:

In your obsessive studying you do not have time to become a scholar. When you cease to exaggerate your being a Matmid, going without food or sleep, you will begin to know Torah.

— Feinstein, p.42;
inner citation: Meir Bar-Ilan. Mi-Vilozhin ‘ad Yerushalayim (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University, 1971) vol 1, p.114

3) The yeshiva’s founder, Rabbi Chayyim (the elder) Soloveitchik, ancestor of the master of Bialik’s day, “had decreed at the time of the Yeshivah’s founding that learning must go on twenty-four hours a day: ‘The sound of leaning must not cease to be heard within its walls.’ All students were required to take shifts in learning during the night, over and beyond the regular schedule of lectures and recitations…” (Feinstein, p.38)

Feinstein goes on to quote a description of a yeshiva day around the time Bialik was there:

Every student, no matter what age, is expected to attend the Shaharit (morning service) at 8:00 a.m. At the conclusion of the service some may return to their lodgings fo breaksfast, others remain in the study hall…Following Ma’ariv (evening service) students return to their lodgings for their evening meal. Some return to the Yeshivah to study past midnight, others sleep until 3:00 a.m. when they return to study until morning.
— Feinstein, again, p.38
citing Berdyczewski, “Toldot Yeshivat ‘Ets-Hayyim,” ha-Asif (1887): 237

Why is Bialik’s Matmid Alone? (Reprise)

Knowing the strong tradition of Jewish learning in groups, particularly pairs, I wondered in this blog, a few days back, why Bialik’s student is alone: is this a literary device? a reflection of personal isolation? a homelitical warning?

Apparently there is something of a controversy today about educational practice in the 19th Century, with some debate about when and where paired study called “hevruta” was used. See “Three Partners in Study” and “Learning in Pairs.”

— and, in support of paired study, I note that it was my study partner who read through the latter citation finding material pertinent to the question I was asking…points I had missed, even while citing the article! —

Even if hevruta study was regularly employed at Volozhin, however (which appears debatable), it seems that Bialik’s poem reflects the odd, late-night vigils required of students there.

So that answers the basic “why is he alone?” question, and it provides additional background for understanding the poem, HaMatmid. Deeper layers of the question remain. And “What’s wrong with this picture?” has a different resonance.

With gratitude to my many partners in study, past and present, long-time and newer.
And with special thanks to my chevruta, Amy Brookman.

HaMatmid and Bialik Resources

Feinstein, Sara. Sunshine, Blossoms, and Blood: H.N. Bialik in his Time, A Literary Biography. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2005.

Hebrew. The full Hebrew text is available at Project Ben-Yehuda, which “aims to make accessible the classics of Hebrew literature (poetry and prose, but also essays, letters, memoirs, and reference works) to the reader of Hebrew.”

English. An English translation, posted for educational purposes and covering much of the poem, is available at Poetry Nook.

What’s Wrong with this Picture?

The Hebrew Poetry group at Temple Micah (DC) is exploring some works of Chaim Nachman Bialik (1873–1934; also: Haim or Hayim). So I have recently discovered “The Talmud Student,” one of his most famous poems. I find it fascinating and powerful. But it leaves me with one large question I’m hoping someone(s) can help me answer.

Some read this poem as pure ode to Talmud study:

The ideal Torah student is constantly studying. His is the image portrayed by the great poet Chaim Nachman Bialik in his masterpiece, HaMatmid [The Talmud Student]. There he describes the night and day devotion of the young man to his studying task in moving and inspiring terms. For Bialik, himself once a yeshiva student, the “Matmid” is the true hero of Jewish history.
— Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb, VP emeritus of the Orthodox Union

It is also, perhaps more commonly, read as a statement of “great ambivalence” toward the way life in the Lithuanian yeshiva of the late 19th Century CE. (See, e.g., this Jewish Virtual Library note.)

The poem is frequently understood as referencing concerns about insularity in the yeshiva world, as in this contemporary opinion piece by Shmuel Winiarz.
Continue reading What’s Wrong with this Picture?

Unlikely Answers: At the Burning Bush with Durante, Mamie Smith, and Sherman Alexie

“Without impossible questions and unlikely answers, faith is only dust,” Sherman Alexie writes in a poem that finds Moses at the Burning Bush. Alexie reaches this mountaintop via a circuitous path that touches on roller coasters, obsessive worry about failing to turn off the stove, Jimmy Durante, Dante Alighieri, and another poet‘s obsession with the fact that “Dante” is, in reality, short for “Durante.” (More on Dante/Durante)

Do you think, after Moses talked to the Burning Bush, that he couldn’t stop himself from thinking that the bush was still burning, and presented a clear and present danger? Do you think Moses hiked back up the mountain to make sure? If I claim that, in Hebrew, Moses is spelled Mos Eisley, will you look it up? Of course, you must. Without impossible questions and unlikely answers, faith is only dust.
— “Hell,” IN What I’ve Stolen, What I’ve Earned
(Brooklyn, NY: Hanging Loose Press, 2014), p.51

Of course, I looked it up.

'Star Wars' image (property of LucasFilms) — “Star Wars” image: Mos Eisley Cantina musicians (property of LucasFilms)

Wookieepedia explains that Mos Eisley (pronounced “Moss Ize-lee”) is an important location in the Star Wars universe: a “wretched hive of scum and villainy” where wise visitors are cautious, it’s the site of the cantina (right) where Luke Skywalker first meets Han Solo and Chewbacca….Not, as this ignorant Star Trek fan guessed, some odd conflation of Mos Def and the Isley Brothers.

Perhaps Alexie is hinting at some kind of parallel between Luke Skywalker and Moses (spelled “מֹשֶׁה” [Moe-SHEH] in Hebrew, BTW, and thought to come from a verb meaning “to draw out”). If so, I know too little about Star Wars to catch it. Instead, my minimal wiki-knowledge sets me on a different path.

Jimmy Durante's Jazz Band (image: RedHotJazz.com) — Jimmy Durante’s Jazz Band (RedHotJazz.com)

I imagine Durante, in his jazz years and his later comic persona, with gigs at that alien cantina. Could Alexie have had this in mind, I wonder, when he came up with the inventive spelling for Moses?
Continue reading Unlikely Answers: At the Burning Bush with Durante, Mamie Smith, and Sherman Alexie

Beyond Bleary-Eyed Page Shuffling

Some Early Morning Blessing Resources

offered with thoughts of Temple Micah’s upcoming siddur study group
Why open a prayer book?
The Art of Blessing the Day
God’s Faith
Morning Poetry
More Links

Why open a prayer book:

“Sometimes you’re just too strung out to come up with your own personal prayers. Having the text in front of you kind of takes you by the hand and walks you over to something that matters more than whatever is getting you down.
— Jay Michaelson in Making Prayer Real by R. Mike Comins, Jewish Lights 2010 (see also Making Prayer Real website
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“The Art of Blessing the Day”

An excerpt from the eponymous 1999 book by Marge Piercy:

…
The blessing for the return of a favorite cat,
the blessing for love returned, for friends’
return, for money received unexpected,
the blessing for the rising of the bread,
the sun, the oppressed. I am not sentimental
about old men mumbling the Hebrew by rote
with no more feeling than one says gesundheit.

But the discipline of blessings is to taste
each moment, the bitter, the sour, the sweet
and the salty, and be glad for what does not
hurt. The art is in compressing attention
to each little and big blossom of the tree

of life, to let the tongue sing each fruit,
its savor, its aroma and its use.
— Marge Piercy. Entire poem on publisher’s page
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God’s Faith?

Rabbi Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer teaches, regarding the early morning prayer, “Modah/eh ani…rabah emunatekha [Thank You, God for returning my soul to me…great is Your faith]”: What is this about God having “great faith”? Upon awakening, we note that God has just entrusted us with a new day…a whole day to help heal the world, wreak havoc in it, whatever we might choose to do with these precious hours. God is trusting us.
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Continue reading Beyond Bleary-Eyed Page Shuffling

“A Whisper Will Be Heard”: Babel, the Wake and Echoes of Sukkkot

What went wrong at Babel, and how might the situation be redeemed? One answer, I think, is to be found in a whisper still reverberating from our shaky sukkot and the rustling of the lulav.
Continue reading “A Whisper Will Be Heard”: Babel, the Wake and Echoes of Sukkkot

Kedoshim: Great Source(s)

“Be holy, etc.!” Vayikra Rabbah 24,9, considering the words: [ki kadosh ani], “For I am holy,” asks whether it is possible that the Torah demands that we, the Jewish people, are to be as holy as He is? the Midrash’s answer is that, on the contrary the words [ki kadosh ani], indicate that true sanctity is something reserved for the Creator alone….

Recognition of the greatness of G’d inevitably leads to an awareness of the puniness of man when compared to Him. It is the awareness of our own limitations that gradually brings us closer to understanding and emulating the virtue of the [ein sof], ultimate form of humility. The school of Hillel, disciples of Hillel who was world renowned for his personal modesty and humility, followed their mentor when they formulated the concept that a spark of holiness feeds upon itself and makes ripples like a pebble thrown on the surface of the water.

This idea is also reflected in the opening words of our portion [kedoshim tihyu ], “commence the process to become holy, as it is continuous and feeds on itself.” An additional factor helping you to progress along this route is [ki kadosh ani], “for I am holy,” i.e., when you contemplate My holiness this will inspire you to emulate My holiness to the extent that it is humanly possible. In fact, G’d says that His own holiness will increase proportionate to the amount of holiness to be found amongst His people on earth.
–R. Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev Kedushat Levi,* pp.578-579

Ripple in still water
when there is no pebble tossed
nor wind to blow

Reach out your hand
if your cup be empty
If your cup is full
may it be again
Let it be known
there is a fountain
that was not made
by the hands of men
–from “Ripple,” by Robert Hunter
(music by Jerry Garcia)

* Please see Source Materials for full citation and additional information.

————————————————————–
The “Opening the Book” series was originally presented in cooperation with the independent, cross-community Jewish Study Center and with Kol Isha, an open group that for many years pursued spirituality from a woman’s perspective at Temple Micah (Reform). “A Song Every Day” is an independent blog, however, and all views, mistakes, etc. are the author’s.

Acharei Mot: A Path to Follow

How is writing “with four pens between five fingers” related to the Day of Atonement?

There are many paths to follow from Chapter 16, which describes the ancient Yom Kippur service and has become the Torah reading for Yom Kippur morning and the basis for the Avodah Service. To start, it can be very interesting to explore a High Holiday Machzor outside the Days of Awe (and on a non-fast day, to boot). And this exploration can add meaning to this week’s Torah reading. For anyone who chooses to follow, though, the tangential “four pen” path might be interesting.

One of only three entries for Leviticus in the collection Chapters into Verse** is a poem by Charles Reznikoff (1894-1976) called “The Day of Atonement.” That poem is one segment of a four-part work, “Meditations on the Fall and Winter Holidays.” Selections are included below; here’s the whole four-part poem.

I. New Year’s
…This is the autumn and our harvest–
such as it is, such as it is–
the beginnings of the end, bare trees and barren ground;
but for us only the beginning:
let the wild goat’s horn and the silver trumpet sound!

…The work of our hearts is dust
to be blown about in the winds
by the God of our dead in the dust
but our Lord delighting in life…

II. Day of Atonement
…If only I could write with four pens between five fingers*
and with each pen a different sentence at the same time —
but the rabbis say it is a lost art, a lost art.
I well believe it. And at that of the first twenty sins that we confess,
five are by speech alone;
little wonder that I must ask the Lord to bless
the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart….

III. Feast of Booths
…I remember how frail my present dwelling is
even if of stones and steel

I know this is the season of our joy:
we have completed the readings of the Law
and we begin again;
but I remember how slowly I have learnt, how little,
how fast the year went by, the years–how few.

IV. Hanukkah
…That was a comforting word the prophet spoke:
Not by might nor by power but by My spirit, said the Lord;
comforting, indeed, for those who have neither might nor power–
for a blade of grass, for a reed.

…The miracle, of course, was not that the oil for the sacred light–
in a little cruse–lasted as long as they say;
but that the courage of the Maccabees lasted to this day:
let that nourish my flickering spirit.

Go swiftly in your chariot, my fellow Jew,
you who are blessed with horses;
and I will follow as best I can afoot,
bringing with me perhaps a word or two.
Speak your learned and witty discourses
and I will utter my word or two–
not by might not by power
but by Your Spirit, Lord.
— from The Poems of Charles Reznikoff: 1918-1975 (Black Sparrow Books)

*Four Pens/Five Fingers

In Yoma 38b, Ben Kamzar is among several rabbis criticized for not teaching a special art to others:

It was said about him that he would take four pens between his fingers and if there was a word of four letters [Rashi says this is YHVH] he would write it at once. They said to him: ‘What reason have you for refusing to teach it?’ All found an answer for their matter. Ben Kamzar could not find one. Concerning [all] former ones it is said: ‘The memory of the righteous shall be for a blessing’, with regard to Ben Kamzar and his like it is said: ‘But the name of the wicked shall rot.’

Later commentators add that simultaneously writing all four letters of the Tetragrammaton is not forbidden, although writing them in the wrong order is. However, writing the letters in the proper order, one by one, involves writing yud-heh (Yah), and then adding a vav. This means taking a version of God’s name and turning it, however briefly, into an ordinary word. Ben Kamzar’s technique would have obviated this concern. (Some say he had invented a kind of printing press.)

So, what is this reference doing in Reznikoff’s poem?

Admittedly the story of Ben Kamzar comes within a longer section of the Talmud dealing with the Day of Atonement. But, is that sort of obscure reference — without another point — Reznikoff’s style? Seems unlikely for a man credited with helping to establish the “Objectivist” school of poetry.

Is he talking about the Book of Life, into which we hope to be inscribed on Rosh Hashanah? If so, why the reference to “sentences” rather than names?

I had hoped the longer fall/winter meditation would elucidate what “Day of Atonement” alone did not. But it does not do so in anyway I could see.

Is he concerned about time running out, which does seem to be a theme of the larger poem?

Given the reference to the speech-related confessions, does Reznikoff believe that he needs four pens to keep from short-changing the truth?

If anyone has an idea, please share.

** Please see Source Materials for full citations and additional information.

The “Opening the Book” series was originally presented in cooperation with the independent, cross-community Jewish Study Center and with Kol Isha, an open group that for many years pursued spirituality from a woman’s perspective at Temple Micah (Reform). “A Song Every Day” is an independent blog, however, and all views, mistakes, etc. are the author’s.

Tzav: A Path to Follow

When is “taking out the ash” as simple as clearing up the remains of a fire? As often, perhaps, as a cigar is just a cigar. And when — in musing on “musings,” or sins of the heart — does “Mah nishtanah?” simply mean “What’s changed?”

Musings: or Sins of the Heart

This is the ritual of the burnt offering: The burnt offering itself shall remain where it is burned upon the altar all night until morning, while the fire on the altar is kept going on it. The priest shall dress in linen raiment, with linen breaches next to his body; and he shall take up the ashes to which the fire has reduced the burnt offering on the altar and place them beside the altar. — Leviticus/Vayikra 6:2-4

Scholars have long drawn lessons of derekh eretz [manners/ethics] from this passage: Dress appropriately to an occasion, including Shabbat, as a sign of respect, e.g.; change dirty clothes before serving food, (see Something to Notice). Those preparing for Passover often seize on the topic of “housekeeping” as a sacred task, linking it with the seasonal search for chametz. But less straightforward lessons have also been linked with taking out the ash.

The olah — burnt offering, totally consumed by fire — is not obviously linked with any sin. However, R. Simeon bar Yochai associated the olah with sinful thoughts (Vayikra Rabbah 7:3). Nachmanides (Ramban) saw inner or secret thoughts — hirhurim ha-lev [literally: speculations of the heart] — as a kind of first step toward active sinning. See A Torah Commentary for Our Times* for a discussion of this.

The passage above’s focus on a sacrifice which burned all night caused some teachers to link it particularly with inappropriate sexual passions, which might also “burn all night.” (Can’t find an English citation, but some cite the Hebrew Torah Shelemah Menahem Kasher.)

Avivah Zornberg, in her book The Murmuring Deep,* links the Akedah — which was to be a burnt sacrifice — with Abraham’s hirhurim, his “qualms.” (See also “Look Behind You.”)

Considering the link between the olah and hirhurim is one path to follow. Here’s another…
Continue reading Tzav: A Path to Follow