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THE YIDDISHISTS

OUR SERIES DELVES INTO THE TREASURES OF THE WORLD’S BIGGEST ARCHIVE AT YIVO INSTITUTE FOR JEWISH RESEARCH

Left: Performance photo from the Habima production Sephardi of The , 1925; Below: Drawing of the golem and the Maharal from the 1925 Habima production of H Leivick’s play RENAISSANCE wipes away the holy name of God from the golem’s forehead. In doing so, the golem falls on top of Elijah Ba’al Shem, leaving him cut and battered. In the early 20th century, the golem of took on an added dimension that was entirely absent from earlier tellings. Thanks mainly to a fabricated story produced by a chasidic from Warsaw which he passed off as being written by the Maharal’s son-in-law, the golem now protected the Jewish community from a brought about by a accusation. This version coincided with 58 PHOTOGRAPHY Return to Lebanon an increase in anti-Jewish violence across 60 SEPHARDI VOICES Cultures connect over a Beirut bridge table Europe stemming from charges of blood libel and ritual murder. In 1920 H Leivick, an anti-Czarist SPONSORED BY DANGOOR EDUCATION activist who had fled Belarus in 1913, wrote the modernist play Der goylem: a THE LEGEND OF THE GOLEM dramatishe poeme in akht bilder (The Golem: a dramatic poem in eight acts), THE YIDDISHISTS The 19th-century story of the Prague golem is well known but tales which was popular in the repertoire worldwide. In the UK it was about the mythical clay creature reach back almost a thousand performed by Maurice Schwartz’s Yiddish years, says Stefanie Halpern Art Theatre, and Moscow’s Habima theatre showed it in a Hebrew translation. he legend of the golem, a creature in the late 12th century, provide detailed Unlike the golems of legend who are formed from clay and formidable instructions for golem creation. His robotic beings acting without agency on T in its physicality but without agency commentary explains that after combining behalf of their creators, the breath of life of its own, has captivated the collective and kneading virgin soil collected from a brings humanity to Leivick’s golem. He imagination for centuries. Perhaps the mountain with pure water, one must recite learns to fear, love, feel pity, succumb to best-known iteration of this tale comes an intricate pattern of letters and sounds temptation and live a life of loneliness. from a 19th-century German literary as each limb of the golem is shaped. Each A gentle figure whose task is to protect invention set in 16th-century Prague. The letter of the Tetragrammaton, or the through force an innocent community story involves the creation of a golem by four-letter name of God, is then combined seeking redemption from suffering, Rabbi Judah Loew, known as the Maharal, and spoken aloud with each letter of the persecution, and violence, the golem must in order to protect the Jewish community alphabet, and this series of permutations live in opposition to his nature. When he from antisemitic violence. serves as the activation word, bringing the succeeds in descending into a dark and Writings about golem creation have golem to life. abandoned cave to find the vials of blood their roots in early kabbalistic texts. The Stories such as that of the golem of a priest has planted in order to frame the (Book of Creation), one of the Chelm were also popular in 17th- and 18th- Jewish community for ritual murder, the earliest books of (thought century . In this tale, Elijah golem is plagued by evil spirits, descends to have been written in the third or fourth Ba’al Shem, a 16th-century into madness, and ends up murdering two century), is said to contain the secrets of talmudic scholar, kabbalist, innocent Jews. the way God created the universe and rabbi of Chelm and the Now afraid of the weapon created provides the basic outline for first person said to possess to protect them, the Jewish community creating a golem. Succeeding secret knowledge of the demands that the golem’s life be taken from in giving life to a golem was holy names of God, creates him. As the Maharal issues his life-ending believed to demonstrate a golem to perform hard order to the golem, the golem cries out in that one had studied labour for him. When Elijah an ultimate display of humanity, “What will and gained mastery Ba’al Shem realises that the you do with me? What will you do?” n of the Sefer Yetzirah. golem is growing larger by the Commentaries on this day, he becomes fearful See: yivo.org. Read more about the Prague golem text, such as that written that it will consume the in our Prague special beginning on p22. Stefanie Rebecca Hakim-Dowek holding a portrait of her family in Tiberias

by Rabbi universe and therefore Halpern is the director of the YIVO Archives. JEWISH RESEARCH FOR INSTITUTE FROM THE ARCHIVES OF YIVO LESLIE HAKIM-DOWEK © 56 JEWISHRENAISSANCE.ORG.UK JANUARY 2021 JANUARY 2021 JEWISHRENAISSANCE.ORG.UK 57