Jewish Folklore and One of Its Lessons

Disclaimer: the opinion expressed in this article are those of its writer ONLY. It is written from the Jewish point of view and its belief system. One of the courses I attend at Bar-Ilan University is Yiddish language and Literature.  A few lessons ago, we read a story by Y.L. Peretz. It is entitled “Three presents.” The story tells the adventures of a departed soul that goes up in front of the Heavenly Court. Since according to Jewish belief, it is only one’s behaviour on earth which determines whether their soul will enter Paradise or Ghenna, its good deeds are weighed against the bad ones.

Unfortunately for the soul in question, its transgressions slightly outweighed its acts of kindness. One of the angels had mercy on it and decided to give the soul another opportunity. It was sent back to earth and told to return with three presents which would please the Court.

The soul roamed the earth for many generations. One night, it noticed, through an open window, a Jewish man being robbed. The man pleaded with the burglars to take all his silver, gold and precious stones while clinging to a little box, refusing to part with it. The robbers were intrigued. Thinking that the box contained some treasure, they killed the man. As he fell down weltering in his blood, the content of the box spilled out. It was holy dirt from Eretz Yisrael. The soul took a morsel of the soil soaked with the Jew’s blood and brought it up.

The first present was accepted. On its second trip to earth, the soul found itself at the center of an ancient European town. There, a beautiful Jewish woman who was accused of tainting and desecrating Easter holy day by her mere presence on the street at that time, was put on trial. Next to her, a wild horse was being held by ten men. Her sentence was to be tied by her hair to the horse’s tail and dragged through the streets of the town. She had one request only. Much to the surprise and amazement of all present, she asked for a few pins. Her wish was granted. As the horse galloped through the streets, the soul noticed how the young woman was struggling to fasten the rim of her dress to her flesh in order to keep her modesty and prevent her nakedness from being exposed. Surreptitiously, the soul went down and detached a red bloody pin from her dying body. The second present was graciously accepted. “One more present,” thought the soul, as it made its way down to earth for the third time. “If all souls were to be weighed as I was,” she thought in anguish, “the world would be full of lost souls trying to make amends to their wickedness. And what would G-d do then?” she wondered. “Will He bring the world back to chaos?”

Steeped in her thoughts, she suddenly noticed a fortified prison in an isolated area. It was surrounded by black walls. Next to it, she noticed two rows of soldiers, each holding a whip.

Between them was doomed to walk the convicted, a pious Jewish man, wearing a shabby shirt and on his half shaved head, an old yarmulke.

And his crime?

No one was certain. Was it murder, theft or perhaps a blood libel?

As he was pushed between the two rows of soldiers, they were each lashing him incessantly, smiling and wondering how long the victim would hold on. Yet, he remained defiant. The whips whistled in the air wrapping the Jew’s torn body like snakes as the blood gushed out. But he kept on walking.

One of the whips, suddenly, hit the yarmulke which dropped to the ground.

When the victim noticed that, he stood still contemplating his next move. “I cannot walk bare headed, no matter what” he decided. He turned back, picked the yarmulke, put it on his head and resumed his harsh sentence until he fell and expired.

The soul approached the fallen man and took a blood soaked thread from the yarmulke. The third present was welcome…… the soul was redeemed. We can each draw our own lesson from this sad and heart wrenching tale. My lesson is that in our Jewish tradition, as our folklore well reflects it, redemption and the world to come are not handed nor guaranteed. They must be earned. It is only up to us, how we carry ourselves and what we do in this world. We, and no one else, are the only ones who are held responsible for the outcome of our deeds. Not only does our mature and enlightening Jewish tradition command us to choose life, we have to do justice, perform acts of kindness and hope that they would please G-d, and grant us a place among the righteous of the world.

Lost, misused and abused in translation

Translations have many positive facets. They bridge between cultures, peoples and societies. They can help enlighten us, educate us and enrich us.

Unfortunately, translations, when done by the wrong entities, some of whom may carry their own selfish agenda, can lead just to the opposite. The consequences can be detrimental, cause much strife and shed rivers of blood.

One such translation is what is known as the Septuagint (תרגום השבעים), an affair that went down in Jewish history as a sad and disastrous milestone. In fact, it was considered such a calamity that Jewish rabbis designated a special mourning day to commemorate it.

It all started in the third century B.C.E. with the Greek ruler, Ptolemy II Philadelphus, the king of Ptolemic Egypt. An educated man, Ptolemy wished to augment his library in Alexandria and commissioned seventy-two (six from each of the twelve tribes) scholars to translate the Torah and later the rest of the Tanach into Greek. This translation came to be known as “The Septuagint” (Seventy in Latin). The main reason for producing the translation was for the benefit of the many Jews who were scattered throughout the Greek Empire and who were beginning to lose their Hebrew language. The translation also gave many non - Jews an opportunity to have a glimpse at the Hebrew Scriptures. Apparently, a noble cause but, as you will soon learn, dear readers, a great reason for alarm.

The main concern of Jewish authorities regarding this translation or for that matter, any translation, was that it might pose danger to the Biblical message and word, the danger of being misunderstood or badly interpreted. Unfortunately for us, Jews, this has ended up being the case which in turn gave rise to much of the suffering that many of our people have endured throughout history and continue to endure until this very day.

To those of you wondering why I chose to write about this subject, let me just add that I have personal reasons for alerting my fellow Jews to the dangers that such mistranslations hold. As a teacher who lost at least one student to the unrelenting efforts of missionaries to convert Jews, I learned that the lurking spiritual thieves use such mistranslations to lure Jews into their midst. Uneducated Jews will fall an easy prey to them. Knowledge is power and a tool to ward off such efforts. The more our Jewish brethren know about their own history and the better they understand it, the less likely are they to become victims of treacherous efforts by the missionaries!

Let us move on to some examples of how our Tanach was mistranslated and the ensuing price, we Jews and Am Yisrael sustained as a result.

One example that comes to mind is the mistranslation of Leviticus 34, verse 29: "כי קרן עור פני משה" (Moshe’s skin was radiant). The Hebrew word for “radiate”קרן  , is the same as that for  “horn.” This mistaken translation is well illustrated in the famous sculpture of Moshe by Michelangelo which is displayed in Rome. One can hardly ignore the horns that were added to the gracious figure of Moshe holding the two tablets. That mistranslation not only affected Michelangelo’s creation, it was also a tool used by many anti-Semites through history to describe Jews and attributing to them monstrous traits. And who loves monsters?

Another example causing much controversy and a rift between Judaism and Christianity can be found in the Book of Isaiah Chapter 7 verse 14. There it says: “לכן יתן אדני הוא לכם אות הנה העלמה הרה וילדת בן וקראת שמו עמנו אל” The same verse is conveniently translated as: “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.”

Luckily, the Tanach was written in Hebrew and yours truly is proficient in that language. Isaiah does NOT use the word “virgin” in that verse in Hebrew. He uses the word  (almah) עלמה “maiden,” “an unmarried woman.” The Hebrew word for virgin is בתולה (betulah). If Isaiah had indeed intended to impress upon us that he was prophesying the immaculate conception would he not have used “betulah” instead of “almah?”

“But hey,” argue my devout Christian friends, “were not all maidens during Biblical era expected to be virgins?” A valid argument indeed, one would suggest. But do not rush to any conclusions, dear friends, not yet anyway. And this, by the way, is where many innocent ignorant Jews fall in the trap set by messianics and missionaries. Unfortunately for the missionaries who enter a debate with me on this verse in Isaiah, I always have the answer.

It is then that I enlist the help of a publication called  a “ Bible Concordance,” a verbal index to the Bible. In it, one can find references to every word that appears in the Tanach. Since my contenders suggest that “a Biblical maiden has got to be a virgin,” I looked up the references to maiden. It appears in the Tanach seven times. The first one is in Genesis 24, verse 43  where Eliezer, the servant of Avraham describes Rivkah, the future wife of Yitzchak “מג הִנֵּה אָנֹכִי נִצָּב, עַל-עֵין הַמָּיִם; וְהָיָה הָעַלְמָה, הַיֹּצֵאת לִשְׁאֹב, וְאָמַרְתִּי אֵלֶיהָ, הַשְׁקִינִי-נָא מְעַט-מַיִם מִכַּדֵּךְ.  ("See, I am standing beside this spring. If a maiden comes out to draw water and I say to her, "Please let me drink a little water from your jar") .In that same chapter verse 17, Rivkah is described as a Virgin, betulah that no man knew (and we all know what “to know” in the Biblical sense means). “טז ""וְהַנַּעֲרָ, טֹבַת מַרְאֶה מְאֹד--בְּתוּלָה, וְאִישׁ לֹא יְדָעָהּ  (The woman was very beautiful, a virgin; no man had ever slept with her). So here is my question to you, dear missionaries, if indeed it was so obvious that almah, a young maiden is akin to betulah in Biblical times, why was there a need to reiterate it in the case of Rivkah? Evidently, it was not as obvious as you would like your poor uneducated Jewish victims to believe!

So how did the Hebrew word almah become virgin? Remember the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Tanach? That is where the answer lies. In Greek, the same word Parthenos means BOTH “maiden” and “virgin.” Isn’t it natural, therefore, that to make their case for the immaculate conception, early Christianity conveniently chose the word virgin instead of the original Hebrew word for maiden?

Finally, and I have used that example of mistranslation a few times, I have an issue with those who refer to my homeland as Israel (where the S is pronounced as a Z instead of Yisrael where the S is pronounced as it should be an S.

Israel (where S sounds like Z) when written in Hebrew עיברית (Ivrit) the language of Am Yisrael, the language of our heritage, is spelled as יזרעאל  which is how we spell the valley of Jezereel in the Northern part of Eretz Yisrael. That valley is ONLY one part of our Jewish Homeland. Additionally, it also means something totally different than what our forefathers intended for our state. It means in Hebrew, “G-d will sow”. The name Yisrael which is the correct English spelling of our Home has a totally different meaning.

The name “Yisrael, first appears in the Torah, in the Book of Bresheet (AKA Genesis in its Hellenistic translation) Chapter 32 verse 29 “לֹא יַעֲקֹב יֵאָמֵר עוֹד שִׁמְךָ כִּי אִם-יִשְׂרָאֵל כִּי-שָׂרִיתָ עִם-אֱ-לֹהִים וְעִם-אֲנָשִׁים וַתּוּכָל "  (No longer shall your name be Yaakov, but Yisrael because you fought with G-d and people).

Dear Jewish readers, Am Yisrael and those who claim to love us, do you realize the significant message that the name יִשְׂרָאֵל  (Yisrael, where the S is pronounced like an S as it should be!) bears? Do you grasp the message of Hope, Strength and Promise that it holds? No longer shall your name be Yaakov, which in Hebrew means to follow, to walk in the footsteps of others. We shall no longer be followers, but rather leaders. We will lead our people and those who wish to follow our holy message that we carry for humanity. We shall do it against all odds. We shall face our challengers, our haters and adversaries and we shall win! We are the People of Eternity!

Am Yisrael Chai <3

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Please do not expect me.....

                                                                           

My eyes are blurry as the waves of tears are flooding them. My heart is bleeding and my soul is crying. The deafening shrieks of my Jewish essence refuse to fade.

I watch the falling victims of evil all around me. They are white, black, yellow. They are Christians, Muslims, Hindus. They are gay, they are straight. They are religious and they are atheists. They are young and they are old. Evil sees no color, no creed and no age. It smites anything and anyone who stands in its way towards its own redemption towards the fulfillments of its revolting prophecies.

The four chambers of my Jewish heart, however, have room to mourn and hurt the pain, the loss of only my people. Why? Because, as I repeated time and again, if I don’t, very few others, if any, will.

I am not going to beg you, plead with you, dear world, to join me on the journey of my bereavement. You never did, you never will. If anything, you only helped and continue to help pave the way and remove the roadblocks that hamper the path for those who target us, those who wish to turn us into an extinct specimen in the history of mankind.

Please do not expect me to join you when you mourn and count your dead strewn on the very same trail that you have toiled so hard to devise for us. I cannot, I simply cannot. I am still mourning millions of my people who died in the fires of the altars of history, alters that you and your ancestors sweated so hard to erect in their efforts to purge this world of a plague called “Jews.”

The tears I shed help extinguish those fires. Unfortunately, you never tire to ensure there are more fires than the gashes which my drying eyes could ever yield.

So please, do not expect me to join you in your pain. The scars of my ache reject, much with your unrelenting support, the healing process of my own agony. I have no time, no ability to share yours. You have numbed my sensitivity to your suffering. The bitter taste of the medicine you have been feeding my people has intoxicated us. It has failed you.  We have become indifferent to it. Unfortunately, it has made us like you, oblivious.

Your antics have forced many of us to produce our own medicine. We even have a name for it, “Our Jewish people come first!” We care for Jews first. If our common enemy, the monster you have given birth to, fed and nurtured, leaves our Jewish victims next to yours, we will mourn ours first. We will remember and commemorate ours before we do yours.

Please do not expect us to do otherwise. 

Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln revisited

                                                                        

Spring is upon us again. For us, Jews and Am Yisrael, this season connotes a spell of rejuvenation, a season of joy, celebration of freedom and our renewed covenant with G-d and His eternal blessing. Unfortunately, this time of year brings to mind other, not so pleasant undertones, historical and current. It is also the time of year when ancient baseless accusations against our people rear their ugly heads again. Yes, I am talking about the rebirth of the old  Blood Libel. It was only a few days ago that I read, in this paper, a chilling interview with the Egyptian politician, Khaled Zaafrani, on al-Hafez TV, a salafist Egyptian station. The interview took place in 2013. There, Zaafrani said that "it is well known that during Passover they make matzos called the "Blood of Zion." They take a Christian child, slit his throat, and slaughter him....they never forgo this rite." More recently, according to the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), an Egyptian journalist, Firnas Hafzi wrote the following in the Egyptian monthly 'Al Kibar,' "The Jews combined the preparations of Mazos and the offering up of sacrifices with their enmity towards non-Jews, especially Christians, and mixed the blood of one of their victims into the matzos dough."

Evidently, "matzah blood libel" is alive and well not only in Egypt but throughout the Arab and muslim world where such narratives find fertile ground. Moreover, such accusations do nothing but serve to further fan the already wild fires of hatred in cultures that are steeped in darkness and obscurantism.

Blood libels are not a modern concept. Jews and Christians were accused of the practice of drinking human blood by pagans who misunderstood the meaning of the doctrine of drinking the blood of Christ and eating the Eucharist. Prior to that, King Antiochus the IV (215-164 BCE), in his anti-Jewish propaganda, claimed that Greek prisoners were held in the Temple in Jerusalem for the purpose of drinking their blood

Scholars believe that modern day blood libel originated in in 1144 in Norwich, England where a twelve-year-old boy, William, disappeared. Jews were accused with kidnapping child and draining his blood. Though it was never proved that the allegations were true, it did not stop the incident from gaining impetus and prevent it from growing.

 According to Rabbi Ken Spiro of Aish Hatorah, “the most famous of all blood libel legends is that of the ritual murder of the child Hugh of Lincoln, England in 1255.” The story was eternalized in a ballad entitled, ”Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln.” Rabbi Spiro adds that this ballad is “so well-known in England and Scotland that it is number 155 in the standard cannon of English and Scottish ballads compiled by Francis James Child in the 19th century.” 

For an unfounded claim that was revived and repeated during the dismal, bleak period called the dark ages and with the help of the Church trickled into every aspect of the daily lives, one would hope that, by now, the world has learned some lessons from history and do all it can to disassociate itself from it. Unfortunately, it does not seem to be the case.

In 1987, I taught Hebrew to mostly Jewish students in one of the top public schools in Texas. One day one of student shared with me that one of the other teachers had jokingly suggested that his Jewish students were preparing for the Christmas holiday by murdering a Christian child in order to use its blood for their Jewish rituals. My student responded to such a suggestion was: ““Actually, we do it only at Passover and we use the blood to bake the matzah, our traditional unleavened bread.”

Naturally, I did not find that a laughing matter. I doubted many of my students even grasped the severity of the comment. It raised the strong urge in me to educate them about the sick rumor called “blood Libel” which had caused the untimely death of many of our fellow Jews throughout history. I insisted that they all read Malamud’s novel “The Fixer,” a novel based on the Beilis case which took place in Russia in the early twentieth century. Additionally, I approached the teacher, discussed the issue with him and and got him to apologize to my students.

An apology is also the least I would expect from anyone, a person, an institution or a public figure who in our time and age dares to slander us, Am Yisrael and the Jewish people with such unfounded allegations This is what I believe Yisrael should insist upon unless, of course,  an apology is reserved only to us, for our refusal to disappear and for our strong wish to continue to survive and live in a world that cannot see right from wrong.