Hasidic Faith in the Poetry of Zelda

Distant Signs and Ancient Wonders Hasidic Faith in the Poetry of Zelda Why is poetry so often the medium of prayer? Zvi Mark’s study of the masterful poet Zelda shows how the musical magic of language can draw us closer to the Divine he name Zelda – simply Zelda – is known to every lover of modern THebrew poetry. Israeli schoolchildren are taught her poems the way youngsters elsewhere are taught Tennyson or Robert Frost. American readers who recognize the name Zelda may have encountered her recently in the pages of Amos Oz’s wonderful autobiographical novel, A Tale of Love and Darkness, where the Jerusalem-born author describes his infatuation with his second-grade teacher in 1947, on the eve of the War of Independence: {By ZVI MARK 62 | Spring 2009 Distant Signs and Ancient Wonders: Hasidic Faith in the Poetry of Zelda /// Zvi Mark She was my first love. An unmarried woman The braiding of poetry and religious faith in her thirties, Teacher Zelda, Miss Schneer- is finely illustrated in Zelda’s poem Im Sabi sohn. I was not quite eight, and she swept (“With My Grandfather”): Distant Signs and me away; she set in motion some kind of inner metronome that had not stirred before Like our father Abraham and has not stopped since . I had not the who counted stars at night, slightest idea, and she never gave me the who called out to his Creator faintest hint, that besides being my teacher, from the furnace, my beloved, she was also Zelda the poet, who bound his son Ancient Wonders some of whose poems had been published in on the altar – literary supplements and in one or two ob- so was my grandfather. scure magazines. I did know that, like me, The same perfect faith she was an only child. Nor did I know that in the midst of the flames, the same she was related to a famous dynasty of Ha- dewy gaze sidic rabbis . and soft-curling beard. Outside, it snowed; Zelda Schneersohn (1914-1984) was outside, they roared: a direct descendant of the founder of “There is no justice, Chabad, Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Li- no judge.” ady, and of his illustrious grandson, the And in his cracked, shattered room, third Lubavitcher Rebbe, known as the cherubs sang Tzemach Tzedek. She was a first cousin of the Heavenly Jerusalem.* of Menahem Mendel Schneersohn, the last Lubavitcher Rebbe. Zelda was born in The spine of the poem is the analogy be- Russia and at age 12 came with her fam- tween the grandfather and the Patriarch ily to Jerusalem, where she attended reli- Abraham, who share “the same perfect faith gious schools. While studying at a teach- in the midst of the flames.” Abraham, ac- ers’ college she began to write poetry; she cording to the Midrash, was cast by Nimrod married (quite late by ultra-Orthodox into a fiery furnace; the faith of the grand- standards) in 1950, and published her father is tested by pogroms and crematoria. first book of poems in 1967. After the The repetition of the word “outside” stands death of her husband, Haim Mishkovsky, in contrast to the grandfather’s inner world. in 1971, she published five more books. To Outside, the heretical cries of “There is no this day, her readers continue to span the justice, no judge” ring out, while ““the same range of Israeli society, from secular Jews perfect faith” endures within; outside, “they to the most devout. roar,” inside, they sing. Outside, all is cold The link between faith and poetry is of and alienated – “it snowed” – while inside, fundamental importance in Zelda’s work. there is faith amid the flames. Indeed, her very definition of faith is bound But the heretical voices that threaten up in her conception of the art of poetry faith work their way in from outside. While and the role of the poet, as expressed in her the beginning of the poem portrays the in- poems themselves. Her vision of poetry is ner world as one of “perfect faith,” the end not didactic, but implicit. As we read Zelda, reveals cracks in this perfect world. First, we may well recall the summation offered by the American writer Archibald MacLeish * All translations of Zelda’s poetry in this article are from The Spectacular Di - ference: Selected Poems of Zelda, translated, with an introduction and notes, in his poem “Ars Poetica”: “A poem should by Marcia Falk. Copyright (c) 2004 Marcia Lee Falk. Used by permission of the not mean/But be.” translator. HAVRUTA | 63 the grandfather’s room is “cracked,” then ing of the Red Sea is chanted], the Rabbi of “shattered.” The grandfather is left defense- Sadagora said: “It is not written that they less, with no barrier against the roaring and sang the Song [of the Sea, shirat hayam] im- menacing outside world. The voices of heresy mediately after they crossed the sea. First penetrate the surrounding society, possibly they had to reach the rung of perfect faith, even his home and family, perhaps his very as it is written: ‘And they believed in the thoughts. Yet the grandfather is able to hear Lord, and in his servant Moses.’ Only after the singing of the angels, and withstands that come the words: ‘Then sang Moses and the test of his faith. Within the cracked and the children of Israel.’ Only he who believes shattered walls, he succeeds in maintaining can sing the song.” an independent inner space that enables him to hear the cherubs’ song. This linkage between faith and the ability Poetry, for Zelda, is inextricable from to “sing the song” or recite poetry is founded faith. The ability to listen to the poetic voices on the belief that human life and the exte- of the Heavenly Jerusalem within a world es- rior world contain, beyond their physical or tranged from faith, where the cries of “There psychological dimension, a spiritual reality is no justice, no judge” constantly burst forth, that poetry aspires to express. Listen to Rav is the modern test of faith. Hearing and read- Kook, himself an accomplished poet, writing ing poetry, and certainly poetry that comes in The Lights of Faith: from the heavenly realms, requires quiet, clarity of thought and deliberation. Only one Faith as a whole includes the poetry of life, whose inner world is unfaltering, with an am- the poetry of all existence. Poetry is the ple measure of inner harmony, can create an emotion that penetrates the deepest within, enclave of sanctity, an island of faith and po- into the depths of the essence of a concept, etry within the encircling tumult and chaos. into its inner content, which cannot be at- tained by prose. Consequently, the true mir- Poetry, for Zelda, is ror of life is to be found within the poetry of life, and not in the mundane life that is inextricable from faith. expressed by prose . There is no poetry in the world in which the sacred glimmerings “She would read to me,” recalled Amos Oz, of faith do not shine forth, and when sanc- “what she might have been intending to read tity is manifest in the poetical spirit in its anyway that morning: Hasidic tales, rabbinic purest and most whole form, then it is truly legends, obscure stories about holy Kabbal- holy poetry, that will be sung only by the ists who succeeded in combining the letters holy angels and the angels of God. of the alphabet and working wonders and miracles.” Indeed, Zelda’s conception of faith Poetry, for Rav Kook, is subsumed within as the ability to hear poetry reflects a com- faith; it is not merely a vehicle for expression, but plete worldview that stems largely from the a means of perceiving and sensing life’s essence. sources of her inspiration, which included, The strength of prose is its ability to describe along with Hasidism, the teachings of Rabbi the outer strata of existence, but a poem brings Avraham Yitzhak Hacohen Kook. In his Tales us face-to-face with life’s essential beauty, with of the Hasidim: The Later Masters, Martin Bu- the centrality of values in human life. Accord- ber retells the following story: ingly, loss of faith eliminates the possibility of poetry, for without faith poetry is merely empty On Shabbat Shira [the “Sabbath of Song,” verbiage that attempts to wrap the hollow real- when the Torah portion about the cross- ity within a stream of words and images. 64 | Spring 2009 Distant Signs and Ancient Wonders: Hasidic Faith in the Poetry of Zelda /// Zvi Mark The poet Zelda at home in Jerusalem, 1971. Photo: Israelsun HAVRUTA | 65 For Zelda, each poem emanates from the ship is illustrated by a story about Rebbe world of concealment. Poetry reveals the pu- Nachman: rity and holiness that are hidden beneath the pandemonium of the marketplace, the roar A person from Zlatopol [Ukraine] told me of the outside world. In Hasidism, and in that when our master, of blessed memory, the lyrical vocabulary of Zelda’s poetry, the was residing in Zlatopol . [O]ur master term “hidden” is laden with special meaning. told him: “Come with me for a walk.” He went The esoteric teachings of Judaism, known with him outside the city, and they walked as “torat ha’nistar” (literally, “the teaching of among the grasses. Our master told him: “If the concealed”), focus on the unseen strata only you would merit hearing the sound of that lie beyond the visible layer of the Torah, the songs and praises of the grasses, how and contain its deepest spiritual truths.

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