Yadgar Ismail

JEWISH LITERATURE 2022

POWER OF REMEMBRANCE
* How many countries can you name where jews lived or live?
* Jewish is broader or Israeli Literature?
* Jewish literature is intertextual? How?
* Jewish literature is part of world literature? Yes, but how?
* What do world literature and intertextuality have in common?
WHO ARE THE JEWS?
* Jew, Hebrew Yĕhūdhī or Yehudi, any person whose religion is Judaism. In the
broader sense of the term, a Jew is any person belonging to the worldwide group that 
constitutes, through descent or conversion, a continuation of the ancient Jewish
people, who were themselves descendants of the Hebrews of the Bible (Old Testament
).
* In ancient times, a Yĕhūdhī was originally a member of Judah—i.e., either of the 
tribe of Judah (one of the 12 tribes that took possession of the Promised Land) or of the
subsequent Kingdom of Judah (in contrast to the rival Kingdom of Israel to the north).
* The term Jew is thus derived through the Latin Judaeus and the
Greek Ioudaios from the Hebrew Yĕhūdhī. The latter term is an adjective occurring
only in the later parts of the Hebrew Bible and signifying a descendant of Yehudhah
(Judah), the fourth son of Jacob, whose tribe, together with that of his half brother 
Benjamin, constituted the Kingdom of Judah
WHO ARE THE JEWS?
* The Jewish people as a whole, initially called Hebrews (ʿIvrim), were known
as Israelites (Yisreʾelim) from the time of their entrance into the Holy Land
to the end of the Babylonian Exile (538 BCE).
* Thereafter, the term Yĕhūdhī (Latin: Judaeus; French: Juif; German: Jude;
and English: Jew) was used to signify all adherents of Judaism, because the
survivors of the Exile (former inhabitants of the Kingdom of Judah) were the
only Israelites who had retained their distinctive identity.
* (The 10 tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel had been dispersed after
the Assyrian conquest of 721 BCE and were gradually assimilated by other
peoples and into other people, like the Medes and other Middle Eastern
people.)
JEWISH LITERATURE
* Literature on Jewish themes and in languages regarded as Jewish has
been written continuously for the past 3,000 years.
* What the term Jewish literature encompasses, however, demands
definition, since Jews have lived in so many countries and have written in
so many different languages and on such diverse themes.
* Thus, Jewish literature includes works written by Jews on Jewish
themes, literary works written in Jewish languages on various themes,
and literary works in any language written by Jewish writers. Ancient
Jewish literature includes Biblical literature and rabbinic literature.
WHAT CAN BE CONSIDERED
JEWISH LITERATURE?
* A paradigmatic statement is made in the narrative that begins with Genesis and
ends with Joshua.
* In the early chapters of Genesis, the divine is described as the creator of humankind
and the entire natural order.
* In the stories of Eden, the Flood, and the Tower of Babel, humans are recognized as
rebellious and disobedient.
* In the patriarchal stories (about Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph), a particular
family is called upon to restore the relationship between God and humankind. 
* The production of Jewish literature has flowered with the modern emergence of 
secular Jewish culture. Modern Jewish literature has included Yiddish literature, 
Judeo-Tat literature, Ladino literature, Hebrew literature (especially Israeli literature),
and Jewish American literature.
WHAT CAN BE CONSIDERED
JEWISH LITERATURE?
* The subsequent history of the community thus formed is recounted so that God’s
desired restoration may be recognized and the nature of the obedient community
may be observed by his people: the Egyptian servitude, the Exodus from Egypt,
the revelation of the “teaching,” the wandering years, and finally fulfillment through
the entrance into the “land” (Canaan).
* The prophetic books (in the Hebrew Bible these include the historical narratives up
to the Babylonian Exile—i.e., Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings) also address the
tension between rebellion and obedience, interpreting it within the changing
historical context and adding new levels of meaning to the motif of fulfillment
and redemption.
SOURCES AND SCOPE OF
THE TORAH
* The concept “Giver of Torah” played a central role in the understanding of
God, for it is Torah, or “Teaching,” that confirms the events recognized by the
community as the acts of God.
* In its written form, Torah was considered to be especially present in the
first five books of the Bible (the Pentateuch), which themselves came to be
called Torah.
* In addition to this written Torah, or “Law,” there were also unwritten laws
or customs and interpretations of them, carried down in an oral tradition
over many generations, which acquired the status of oral Torah.
THE ORAL TRADITION
* The oral tradition interpreted the written Torah, adapted its precepts to ever-
changing political and social circumstances, and supplemented it with new legislation.
* The oral tradition added a dynamic dimension to the written code, making it a
perpetual process rather than a closed system. The vitality of this tradition is fully
demonstrated in the way the ancient laws were adapted after the destruction of the
Temple in 70 AD and by the role played by the Talmud in the survival of the Jewish
people in exile.
* By the 11th century, Diaspora Jews lived in a Talmudic culture that united them and
that superseded geographical boundaries and language differences.
Jewish communities governed themselves according to Talmudic law, and individuals
regulated the smallest details of their lives by it.
CATEGORIES
1. works written by Jews on Jewish themes in any language
2. works of a literary character written by Jews in Hebrew or Yiddish or
other recognized languages, whatever the theme.
3. literary works were written by writers who were essentially Jewish
writers, whatever the theme and whatever the language. This entry
covers the subject up to the threshold of the modern period.
FICTION; MEDIEVAL
Prominent examples of medieval Jewish fiction included:
Sefer ha-Ma'asiyyot, by Nissim b. Jacob b. Nissim ibn Shahin of Kairouan, written
in Arabic, a book of fables based on aggadic legends.
Sefer Sha'ashu'im, by Joseph Ibn Zabara (12th century), a story combining folktales,
epigrams, and passages of philosophy and science.
Ben ha-Melekh ve-ha-Nazir, by Abraham b. Samuel ha-Levi Ibn Ḥasdai, based on an Indian
tale based on the life of Buddha.
Meshal ha-Kadmoni, by Isaac ibn Sahula (13th century), combining aggadah with original
stories
Mishlei Shu'alim ("Fox Fables"), by Berechiah ben Natronai ha-Nakdan, Hebrew fables
which resemble Aesop's fables.
MODERN JEWISH LITERATURE
* Modern Jewish literature emerged with the Hebrew literature of the Haskalah.
* It overlapped traditions of religion and its restriction in literature; distinct from
Rabbinic Literature, which was religious.
* It contributed to the national literature of many of the countries in which Jews
lived.
EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY
HEBREW LITERATURE
* Moses Hayyim Luzzatto (1707–1746) took poetry into a different level
leading to its free development. His allegorical drama "La-Yesharim Tehillah"
(1743), is arguably the first product of modern Hebrew literature.
* In Germany, the leader of the Haskalah movement Naphtali Hartwig
Wessely (1725–1805) has been regarded as the "poet laureate" of his era.
* Luzzatto and Wessely also wrote works of ethical musar literature, and
Luzzatto's Mesillat Yesharim gained particular prominence.
NINETEENTH-CENTURY HEBREW
LITERATURE; HEBREW LANGUAGE
REVIVAL CENTURY
* In Amsterdam, poet Samuel Molder (1789–1862) led the front. In Prague, the
haskalah leader Jehudah Loeb Jeiteles (1773–1838) the author of witty epigrams
("Bene ha-Ne'urim") mainly wrote against superstition.
* Italian Jewish writers included: I. S. Reggio (1784–1854) and Rachel Morpurgo
(1790–1860), the latter’s poems evince religious piety and a mystic faith in Israel's
future. Samuel David Luzzatto (1800–65) has been described as the first modern
writer to introduce religious romanticism into Hebrew.
* The poet Judah Leib (Leon) Gordon was a satirist who has been characterized as
"an implacable enemy of the Rabbis."
HEBREW NOVEL
* The creator of the Hebrew novel was Abraham Mapu (1808–67)
* His historical romance "Ahabat Tziyyon" exercised an important influence on the
development of Hebrew.
EARLY 20TH CENTURY
HEBREW LITERATURE
* Hayim Nahman Bialik (1873–1934) was one of the pioneers of modern Hebrew
poetry and came to be recognized as Israel's national poet.
* Bialik contributed significantly to the revival of the Hebrew language.
* His influence is felt deeply in all subsequent Hebrew literature.
* Another prominent Hebrew poet of Bialik's era was Shaul Tchernichovsky (1875–
1943), who is especially well known for his nature poetry and for his interest in
the culture of ancient Greece.
ISRAELI LITERATURE
* Among Israeli writers, Shmuel Yosef Agnon won the Nobel Prize for
Literature for novels and short stories that employ a unique blend of biblical,
Talmudic and modern Hebrew.
* Other Israeli authors whose works have been translated into other languages
and who have attained international recognition include Ephraim Kishon,
Yaakov Shabtai, A. B. Yehoshua, Amos Oz, Irit Linur, Etgar Keret and
Yehoshua Sobol.
YIDDISH LITERATURE
* Modern Yiddish literature is generally dated to the publication in 1864 of Sholem
Yankev Abramovitsh’s novel Dos kleyne mentshele (“The Little Person”).
* The most important of the early writers to follow Abramovitsh were Sholem
Rabinovitsh, popularly known by his alter-ego, Sholem Aleichem, and I. L. Peretz.
Later Yiddish writers of note include Abraham Sutzkever, Isaac Bashevis Singer,
who won the Nobel Prize in 1978, and Chaim Grade.
AMERICAN JEWISH
LITERATURE
* American Jewish literature written in English includes the works of Gertrude
Stein, Henry Roth, Saul Bellow, Norman Mailer, Bernard Malamud, Alicia Ostriker,
Chaim Potok, and Philip Roth.
* The poetry of Allen Ginsberg often touches on Jewish themes (notably the early
autobiographical works such as Howl and Kaddish).
* Recent Jewish-American literature includes the writings of Paul Auster, Michael
Chabon, Joshua Cohen, Jonathan Safran Foer and Art Spiegelman.
ALLEN GINSBERG
* Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American Jewsih poet and writer.
Born: June 3, 1926, Newark, New Jersey, United States
Died: April 5, 1997, New York, New York, United States
* As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with
William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Generation.
* Allen Ginsberg, the visionary poet and founding father of the Beat generation
inspired the American counterculture of the second half of the 20th century with
groundbreaking poems such as "Howl" and "Kaddish.
INFLUENCE
Movies: Howl, Jack Kerouac: What Happened to Kerouac?
HOWL
SOURCES
* Waxman, Literature: see bibliographies at end of each volume; Winter and
Wuensche, Die juedische Literatur (1906); see also bibliographies for each relevant
entry in the encyclopaedia. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: YIDDISH LITERATURE: J.C.
Frakes (ed.), Early Yiddish Texts, 1100–1750 (2004); J. Baumgarten, Introduction to
Old Yiddish Literature (2005).
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