| Rachel
(1889-1931)
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Rachel's grave, beneath a palm tree planted on the lake
shore, has become an important pilgrimage site for those
who recite or sing her poems.
Rachel Bluwstein
was born on September 20, 1890 in Saratov, on the Volga
River in Northern Russia. Her father, a former soldier in
the Czar's army, was a rich merchant known for his piety
and his generosity. Her mother, born into a long line of
rabbis, was an educated woman. Rachel spent her childhood
and youth in Poltava, in the Ukraine, where she learned
Hebrew with a tutor, wrote her first verses in Russian,
and became interested in painting.
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In 1909 she and one of her sisters visited Palestine
for what she thought would be a short visit before she returned
to her studies in Europe. In Jaffa, she met Hannah Maizel, one
of the first pioneers who had decided to created an institution
where young women could learn agricultural techniques. The two
sisters first moved to Rehovot, little more than a small village
or moshava at the time, determined to learn Hebrew and spending
only one hour a day speaking Russian for the ordinary tasks of
every day life, and to recite poetry.
A year later, Rachel decided to find Hannah Maizel
who was a salaried worker in an olive grove at the foot of Mount
Carmel. Under her leadership, Rachel began to work in agriculture,
seeking both self-realization and salvation in working the land,
'playing the shovel and painting on the earth.' In April 1911,
Hannah and her students moved to Kinneret; Rachel is generally
considered to be the first student in her agricultural school.
Rachel literally fell in love with the landscapes
and personalities around Kinneret, including Gordan who lived
in the country's first kibbutz, in Deganya, whom she called grandfather
and to whom she dedicated her first poems in Hebrew. Similarly,
she dedicated her love poems to Robashov, a young pioneer who
later became president of the State of Israel under the name Zalman
Chazar. She considered herself destined to collect the echoes
and memories preserved in the vestiges of abandoned sites around
the lake. In a note entitled, On the Shores of Kinneret, she wrote
the following:
The
Site of a Destiny
We
rise at dawn with the feeling that if we were to wake up just
one minute earlier we would surprise the night and penetrate
the mystery of its murmur. We first looked at the lake, still
plunged in sleep at that hour, entirely black and framed by
still slumbering blue mountains.
One of the shores belongs to us and we know every corner and
every bush. It rises to the right of the Jordan, along a sloping
hill. Poppies, anemones, and daisies celebrate the only springtime
they will ever know on these shores. Further down on the left
is a single palm tree in whose shadow I spend hours dreaming.
Dawn had not entirely broken before we began working. We were
fourteen in all, barefoot and with callused hands, completely
tanned, scratched everywhere and with hardened faces and ardent
hearts. The air was filled with our songs and debates and laughter.
The movement of shovels never stopped as we paused for only
brief moments to wipe the sweat pouring down our foreheads with
our kefia, the time to look quickly and lovingly at the lake.
How blue it was. Blue, blue, blue. Not a word. A message of
peace, a remedy for the soul. A veil floated over the water.
Soon the tiniest steam boat linking Tzema and Tiberias spat
out its smoke.
Once again in the fields, towards midday, we returned to the
lake like to a blue eye gazing upon us through the dining hall
window. The blue eye of this corner of our country. Our voices
were all the gayer for the modesty of the meal. Far from all
satiety, destined to be martyred, to the torments and the chains,
yet resolved nonetheless to sanctify the name of our country.
I remember having planted a eucalyptus, with the others, in
the middle of the swamps where the Jordan leaves the lake and
flows quickly towards the desert, spraying against the rocks,
overrunning its banks. On occasion, one of us shivered with
fever on her poor mattress but none of us ever lost, even momentarily,
this feeling of gratitude that we had for our destiny, for we
worked ardently and enthusiastically.
When we were thirsty, one of us would go get water in a utensil,
generally a can which had contained gasoline. What pleasure
to run along the rocky shore and drink deeply like wild beasts!
To plunge our burning faces into the water, raise them to the
wind and drink once again until we were exhausted. It is said
that these waters possess miraculous powers, that whoever drinks
of then, even once, is drawn back. Thus we might imagine that
it is because our ancestors satisfied their thirst at this lake
that Jews in the Diaspora feel so much nostalgia for its peaceful
beaches.
On Saturdays I usually took walks, resting gladly on the heights
surrounding us. There were hidden corners, shaded spots and
green valleys. Oh to spend your entire life here, walking along
the shore, until you reach the walls surrounded by round towers,
of Tiberias! This very ancient city seemed no more real to me
than a sketch in an old sketchpad. Its stones were as smooth
as the face of the preacher of Nazareth, they had heard the
lessons of the Talmudists and could recall Berenice's beauty.
Lake Kinneret is no ordinary landscape or even a corner of nature.
It is the site of a people's destiny. Here, our past winks its
thousand eyes and rocks us in its thousand lips.
Rachel,
On the Shores of Lake Kinneret
In 1913, under pressure from Hannah Mazel, Rachel
decided to leave Kinneret to study agronomy at the University
of Toulouse in southern France. In a letter to Schmuel Dayan,
who had criticized her for her departure, she explained her decision.
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Political
Commitment
Aren't the objectives
of my trip to study in order to improve the quality of our
work and to strengthen our links with work, with every fiber
of our hearts, and to understand the marvels of animals
and plants, and to understand the mysteries of creation?
Aren't I going to infuse life into these clumps of earth,
to beautify and glorify our country? It is true that I am
leaving, but in two years I will return like the dove in
springtime, propelled by the nostalgia and the need to go
further. I am committed to the lake, the mountains, and
to my Jordan River.
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The First World War caught Rachel by surprise at
the university in Toulouse where she was the only agronomy student.
Unable to return to Palestine, she resigned herself to return
to Odessa where she caught tuberculosis while caring for refugee
children. After the war, she took the first boat for Palestine
and lived first in kibbutz Deganya where, despite her illness,
she carried out the most difficult of tasks. Her health worsened,
however, and she was forced to leave the kibbutz. In addition,
she also had to stop working the land, to leave those whom she
loved and the enthralling landscapes of the lake, above all. She
first moved to Petah Tikvah where she taught agronomy in a school
for girls, and then to Jerusalem where, for four years, she contented
herself with the meager earnings from her private courses. After
a short stay in the Safed hospital, she moved to Tel Aviv where
she left her room only on rare occasions, attended to by her sisters
and writing her poems from her bed. In 1930 she entered a sanitarium
in Gedera. In a study on Rachel, Uri Milchstein describes her
final journey in these terms.
The
Final Detour
The
state of her health worsened during the morning of April 15.
Doctor Zvi Kitain, her doctor at Gedera, decided to bring her
to the nearest hospital, hours away, in a wagon drawn by two
horses. Rachel clearly felt that she was living her final hours
and decided to leave the village which had been her first stopping
point in Palestine, and the man who had been the first love
of her youth.
She said to the doctor, I would like to stop in Rehovot.
'We cannot lose any time, he answered, and must arrive at
the hospital as quickly as possible.
I would like to bid farewell to Rehovot and to take leave
of one of its inhabitants, she insisted.
Who?
Nakdimone
OK, let's go to Rehovot.
The wagon stopped on Ezra Street, in the courtyard of Nakdimone
Altschuler, whom Rachel had not seen for ten years. During
that time, she had become the poetess of the pioneers, had
fallen in love with other men and had also known infrequent
and ephemeral moments of happiness and much unhappiness. Nakdimone
was now a farmer and the father of a family. 'I went towards
her, he later said, and she was lying in the wagon. I had
a skeleton before me, her beautiful hair now appeared to be
like dried straw, her delicate features and gay face which
had laughed or smiled endlessly, with an ambiguity which confounded
many a man, was defeated and wrinkled and the skin was old.
I began to cry. Her blue eyes which had been the color of
the sky in springtime, watched me, steadily. A single tear
ran down her cheek and I understand that since she could no
longer cry, she was crying silently like a wounded animal
which knows that it is dying. She said, 'Farewell Nakdimone,'
and I answered, 'Farewell Rachel.' The doctor signaled to
the driver to take up the reins and the wagon took off and
began slowly to drive away. She tensed as if the pain of a
needle were going through her body and she suddenly began
to cough, a cough that resembled a moan. The wagon continued,
drawing further away on the road to Tel Aviv. I knew then
that I would never see her again. I remained in the courtyard
and cried.
O.
Milchstein, Rachel
Rachel died shortly thereafter in the hospital. Her
friends decided to bury her on the lake shore that she had loved
so much and where her poor health had made it impossible for her
to live. Perhaps in order to fulfill the wish in her verses.
If the verdict of destiny
Should lead me away from these shores,
I will return, Kinneret,
to rest in your cemetery.
Rachel's poems were for the most part written during her last
years and are typically very concise and clear.
They will be set to music and be included in the national repertory
of her people. A collection of her
poems is hidden near her grave and pilgrims usually read excerpts
from them.
Kinneret
There, the heights of the Golan, you would caress them
by stretching out a hand,
suggest a serene and silent pause,
there, the venerable Hermon,
in its radiant solitude,
the immaculate crown
sends me its wind.
There, on the lake shore, a small palm tree
with its tousled branches
like a mischievous child
running along the lake shore to dip his feet
into the waters of Kinneret.
Perhaps
Perhaps all this never was,
Perhaps I never rose at dawn to till
The garden by the sweat of my brow?
Nor even on long burning harvest days
Atop a sheaf-laden cart
Raised my voice in song?
Never purified myself in the quiet blue and innocence
Of my Kinneret,
Oh Kinneret,
did you truly exist?
Or were you only a dream?
To My Land
I have not sung your praises, my land, or celebrated your heroic
deeds,
One tree I planted on the way
Which to the Jordan leads
One narrow path to my feet yields
Which runs across the fields.
I know how humble are the gifts
The child offers her mother:
A cry of joy one glorious day,
When shines the sun in splendor,
And, shed for you, a secret tear,
To see the shabby clothes you wear.
Sad Song
Do you hear me, you who are
So far away from me, my dear?
Do you hear me crying aloud,
Wishing you were well, wishing you were near?
The world is vast, its ways diverse,
Brief meetings, partings long,
Men, with unsure feet, post on never to return, too weak
To find the treasure they have lost.
My last day drawing near
Of the tears of separation
I will await you until
my life leaves
as Rachel did her beloved
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