5. The Bible
The Tanach (Hebrew Bible) has played an integral part in
the development of modern Israeli society. Using popular
music as a measure of this phenomenon, large numbers of
songs were written in the early decades of the country
whose lyrics – sung by an eager public – were
taken from the Tanach. Shir HaShirim (The Song of Songs)
was a particular favorite. At first glance this may seem
surprising, given that the overwhelming tendency in Israeli
cultural creativity has been secular. Why would so secular
a generation turn so enthusiastically to the Tanach?
The answer seems to be that the most new Zionist Jews,
who identified themselves as secular, considered the Tanach
as a cultural, historical, poetic, even a geographical
text – anything, in fact, but a religious one. Thus,
while many disassociated themselves from the religious
context and philosophy of the text, they identified very
strongly with its other aspects. No less than religious
Jews, they felt that the text was theirs. They learned
it and – for the most part – celebrated it.
In a sense, their reaction to such texts was akin to the
reaction towards archaeology mentioned above. In fact,
text and archaeology were perceived as being aspects of
the same thing – the claim to Jewish identity in
this land. The walks and hikes through the land that became
second nature to the early pioneering generations were
seldom undertaken without a Bible stashed in the backpack.
Early Israeli literature carried on the tradition that
had been born in the Haskalah. It attempted to expand
the Biblical stories in prose and poetry by penetrating
to the emotional and psychological aspects of the narratives
that had been largely left out of the original. A good
example of this tendency is Moshe Shamir’s books
on King David and Bathsheva, and on the Maccabee kings.
Now living back on the soil of the Biblical homeland,
writers (including playwrights) were apparently able to
connect with these ancient figures and tell their stories
in a way which de-mythologized them, made them more real
– like the land itself.
Sculpture and art also contributed to the new trends of
realism. Freed from religious constraints regarding figurative
art, many artists began to depict Biblical figures, often
in strange and rather surrealistic surroundings. The work
of Ivan Schwebel, who showed King David cavorting down
the streets of modern Jerusalem, is a strong example of
this phenomenon.
The point being made here is simply that the Bible is a
living, approachable text for many Israelis who have broken
with the religious tradition and feel free to re-imagine
and re-examine its text from a fresh perspective. Living
on the land has somehow freed the imagination of many
of the country’s creative minds, allowing them to
mine the depths of the Biblical text for a new generation.
Many have discerned in it a potential for paradigms that
express the modern Jewish and Israeli reality. Perhaps
the most powerful example of this is the deep relevance
that many have found in the story of the binding of
Isaac (Akedah). There have been two important modern
interpretations of this story in modern Israel, both taking
the standpoint of Isaac, the innocent victim. The first
one interprets him as a victim of the Shoah (Holocaust);
the second shows him as a victim of Israel’s wars
– the fallen soldier. The element common to these
interpretations is identification with the figure of the
victim of ideologies be they racial or national. They
portray Isaac – the modern Jew or the modern Israeli
–as the one who pays the human price of others’
ideological fanaticism and blindness.
Some deeply powerful texts have emerged out of this reading
of the traditional story. Amihai, for instance, wrote
a stunning poem that goes beyond the idea of Isaac as
victim. He closes his poem by commenting that the reader
of the poem and the audience of the dramatic act tend
to go home together with Abraham and Isaac, sighing with
relief. He points out, however, that the real victim –
the ram, which does not survive the conclusion of the
story – is usually forgotten. For Amihai, the ram
represents the real hero of the Biblical story as the
ultimate victim.