If you've been following my blog for a while, you know I seldom post about personal subjects, preferring to focus on medieval Jewish women and my writing about them. But this week I've been sick, more sick than I can remember in a long time. I don't know how I got it, since I haven't had much contact with people recently, but Tuesday I came down with gastroenteritis. I won't go into the nasty symptoms, other than to say that they were accompanied with a fever that reached 102 and some extremely painful cramps.
I've had my share of food poisoning, so I assumed I'd eaten something bad. I fully expected to be better in a day or so. But Wednesday was worse, so awful that there was no way I couldn't drive to my scheduled KPFK radio interview. Click here to listen to the podcast. Thankfully, the wonderful host Josy Catoggio not only agreed to let me to the show by phone, she called the next morning to see how I was doing. I was just as sick, and beginning to think of what I sent Meir went through in Book I, and of all the small children who have died, and continue to die, from dysentery.
I spent my hours shuttling between bed and bathroom, taking Imodium and Tylenol to lessen my symptoms, rereading my favorite children's books, and doing 4 more radio interviews. I followed the BBRATT died [banana, broth, applesauce, toast, tea] as best I could, but even though I could keep things down at that point, the very thought of eating was repulsive. I think over 5 days I consumed the grand total of 2 bananas, 2 cups of applesauce, 2 pieces of toast, and a quart of Trader Joes' free range chicken broth. Plus many, many cups of ginger tea.
Tonight I'm finally on the mend. My cramps are few and far between, and I actually finished a two-course dinner consisting of a cup of rice, mixed with chicken broth, along with a cup of applesauce. There is a silver lining to this however; I've lost 5 pounds.
I haven't looked forward to a book's release so much since the final installment of Harry Potter. Here is a new biography of Rashi [1040-1105], part of Nextbook's Jewish Encounter series, written by one of Judaism's most revered living authors, Noble laureate Elie Wiesel. Who better to write about Rashi, the French Talmud scholar, than Wiesel, who attended yeshiva as a youth, found asylum in France after surviving Auschwitz, and went on to study at the Sorbonne?
Wiesel's RASHI [Schocken Books, Aug 2009], originally written in French, is a love story between the author and Rashi, who lived and died in Troyes, capital of the province of Champagne. Rashi [acronym for Rabbi Shlomo ben Isaac], wrote commentaries on the entire Hebrew Bible and nearly the entire Talmud. The greatest of Jewish scholars, more Jews study his words every day than all the other scholars put together. In fact, many Christians study his words as well – Nicholas de Lyra used Rashi's explanations as source for his new Latin translation of Hebrew Scriptures, one that became the basis for both Luther's German text and our English King James Bible.
But Rashi isn't just words on a page; he was a writer whose personality and opinions permeate his works, a father with three learned daughters in a time when women were forbidden to study the holy texts, and a teacher who attracted a cadre of disciples who wrote devotedly of the teachings they'd "received from his mouth." In this slim volume Wiesel writes a 'stream-of-consciousness' remembrance beginning with what he learned from Rashi as a child, then expanded with legends, musings about Rashi's Torah commentary on Genesis, and finally, comparisons between the First Crusade, which took place towards the end of Rashi's life, and the Holocaust, which stole Wiesel's youth and became the force behind his own prodigious writings. Throughout the book, Wiesel asks questions about the medieval scholar who so influenced his childhood. Yet not all his questions get answered. Like Rashi, Wiesel admits that there are things he doesn't know.
There are only four chapters, less than 80 pages of text. The first chapter, titled "Impressions," recounts Rashi's life and places him in a community, country, and historical setting. Legends abound, and Wiesel is careful to label them as such. Considering his own history, Wiesel can be forgiven for focusing so heavily on the adversities that Jews of Rashi's time suffered, yet he admits that "in the eleventh century … Jews in Europe and in the Holy Land lived in relative safety." During Rashi's lifetime there are no ghettos, no Inquisition, no blood libels, and no restrictions on Jews' occupations – these come much later. In fact, Rashi lived at the beginning of what is known as the Twelfth-Century Renaissance.
Chapter Two, "Biblical Commentaries," opens with the first line of Genesis and Rashi's reply as to why the Bible begins with creation and not with the first commandment. Wiesel then continues with selected commentaries on the Garden of Eden, Noah, Abraham and the other Patriarchs, through the death of Jacob in Egypt. I admit I was pleased to see that Wiesel included some of Rashi's rather 'feminist' opinions, such as Adam bearing blame for eating the forbidden fruit because by blaming Eve, "Adam showed his lack of gratitude to God for giving him the woman." Rashi was not shy about discussing sexual matters in Genesis, and Wiesel is not shy in sharing these. For example: what aroused the serpent's interest in Eve? "He saw man and woman united sexually, and this excited him."
Chapter Three races through Rashi's commentary on the rest of the Bible [oh, if Wiesel had only included more of Rashi's Talmud commentaries] and concludes with some Responsa, legal queries sent to Rashi for judgment. The fourth chapter, "Sadness and Memory," returns to the massacres of the First Crusade, some in rather gruesome detail. Only at the final page do we hear about Rashi's death, as it is mentioned in two different Talmud commentaries, one by his son-in-law and the other by his grandson. Obviously such a small volume cannot possibly discuss every detail of Rashi's life and work; even ten such books could not. What is impressive is how beautifully Wiesel gives us a glimpse at what lies behind Rashi's greatness, a taste of Rashi's erudition and vast corpus of work.
Some say that Rashi allows us to swim in the sea of Talmud, but Wiesel eloquently writes, "Without him, I would have gone astray more than once in the gigantic labyrinth that is the Babylonian Talmud." However one describes it, Rashi's commentary is what keeps us from drowning or getting lost in this otherwise opaque text. And since Judaism as we know it is based on the Talmud –how we celebrate our holidays, observe our life-cycle events, prepare our food, run our businesses, how we relate to our Creator - if Rashi hasn't given us the ability to understand Talmud, Judaism today would either not exist or be a very different religion.
My blogs have been so serious lately that I wanted to share something fun. Today is Rosh Hodesh Elul; Elul being the month preceding the Days of Awe. To announce the upcoming holy days, we blow the shofar every day of Elul until Rosh Hashanah, starting today. In case you do not get to shul to hear the shofar sounded, here is the next best thing: my husband Dave and grandson Nathan perform a duet for shofar and baritone horn onYouTube. Since it's so short, you could watch it any day that you can't hear the shofar blown otherwise.
If you are a big fan of Chabad, read no further.
A while back I set up Google Alerts for "Rashi's Daughters" and "Maggie Anton," which sends me email whenever those two subjects show up on the internet. The idea, of course, is to find out who's posting about me or my books. But occasionally something else pops up, like the link below.
I could tell by the title, 'Why I Don't Put on Tefillin," that the article would probably upset me, but I read it anyway and indeed, felt quite sad when I finished. Here's this poor woman, who yearns to be closer to God, who wants to perform the mitzvot of tefillin and tzitzit, who hopes to honor her grandfather by praying in his - and she comes away condemned as egotistical, not on a high enough spiritual plane, even compared to Nadav and Abihu [sons of the high priest Aaron who were killed for offering 'strange fire' instead of the appropriate sacrifice].
It breaks my heart that this discouraged woman, who only wants to perform mitzvot from which she is exempt, for Heaven's sake, is rebuked as if she wanted to commit a sin. Nobody told her, yet I would think her rabbi knows about it, that Rabbenu Tam [Rashi's grandson] declared that any woman who, for her own nachat ruach [spiritual satisfaction], wishes to perform the men's mitzvot from which she is exempt, may certainly do them. Plus, she must also say the blessing when she does so [BT Rosh Hashanah 33a]. All Ashkenazim today follow the decisions of Rabbenu Tam, yet this woman's rabbi leaves her in ignorance and shame.
You would think that Chabad, whose purpose is supposedly to get more Jews to perform more mitzvot, would offer encouragement to women who want to take on tefillin and tzitzit. Well, I'm sorry, but nobody can convince me that God prefers for men to pray wearing these and women not. And because I've studied enough Talmud to know what Rabbenu Tam said [Talmud study is another mitzvot that Chabad women don't perform], I am well aware that women may indeed put on tefillin - provided they say the blessing.
Here is an interesting topic to consider as we enter the last Shabbat before Elul. According to Kabalistic sources, there are 22 saintly women mentioned in Torah, one for each letter of the aleph bet. They are: Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, Leah, Joheved, Miriam, the five daughters of Zelafchad, Deborah, Manoah's wife [Judges 13:2], Hannah, Abigail, the woman of Tekoa [II Samuel 14], the widow helped by Elijah [I Kings 17:9], the Shulamite woman [II Kings 4:8], Hulda, Naomi [but not Ruth], Jehosheva [II Kings 11:2] and Esther. Raise your hand whoever has heard of all 22?
Maybe it would make a nice Elul exercise to take the next month and read up about each of these saintly women [actually there are 26 women if you count the 5 daughters of Zelafchad separately]. Isn't it a shame that 3 of them are nameless?
Wow! I just got my first ever RASHI'S DAUGHTERS book review in mainstream media, [i.e. a non-Jewish newspaper], today in the Glendale News Press. I actually lived in Glendale for almost 40 years, moving just last year to West Los Angeles. So the News Press did good for a hometown girl with a real review, containing praise and criticism [thankfully more of the former]. You can tell that the reviewer actually read RACHEL, as opposed to merely reworking the back cover copy.
Here are some of the highlights:
"RASHI'S DAUGHTERS: BOOK III - RACHEL sets the scene with such vivid imagery and detail, and one cannot help but feel like they are a part of the culture. Anton craftily weaves a bantering subtext of the world outside Rashi's Jewish community that flows through the story, and the reader not only gets a sense of the complex nuances of societal hierarchy, but also senses the impending doom as the pilgrims for Christianity begin to extol their 'virtues' onto nonbelievers throughout Europe and the Byzantine Empire.
"The author's moving segment of familial sacrifice by [Rhineland Jews] as they face a barrage of homicidal pilgrims is one of the most emotional, heart-wrenching passages a reader will ever come across.
"The portrayal of characters stepping outside their more traditional roles are also a welcome aspect of this novel, such as Eliezer's study of astronomy and the proactive role of women within the family business and religious study. Additionally, the romantic relationship between Rachel and Eliezer is a timeless story of love and heartbreak, and the many facets of the strains of distance on a marriage. These aspects make for an entertaining and riveting read for any fan of the genre."
Click here to read the entire review, including the reviewer's complaints.
After 15 years of research, writing and editing, RASHI'S DAUGHTERS: BOOK III - RACHEL goes on sale today. The epic historical series of 3 sisters in eleventh-century France concludes with the dramatic tale of Rachel, the youngest child of the great Salomon ben Isaac (aka Rashi) and his favorite. A brilliant entrepreneur admired for her discernment as well as her beauty, she is working to build a successful textile business that will keep her husband Eliezer at home rather than traveling on increasingly lengthy trading mission. Before Rachel can achieve her dream, however, disaster strikes. The marauders of the First Crusade massacre nearly the entire Jewish population of Germany, and her beloved father suffers a stroke.
Eliezer wants their family to move to the safety of Spain, but Rachel is determined to stay in France and help her family save the Troyes yeshiva, the only remnant of the great centers of Jewish learning in Europe. As she did so effectively in JOHEVED and MIRIAM, Maggie Anton vividly brings to life the world of medieval France and a remarkable Jewish woman of dignity, passion, and strength, who thrived, against all odds, in this challenging time.
Follow the link to read an excerpt from Chapter One
I think the biggest misconception Jews have about the First Crusade is that it directly caused the destruction of medieval French and German Jewry. But it is only with 20-20 hindsight that we can see European Jews beginning to lose status and anti-Semitism rising after the First Crusade. Judging by the almost complete absence of mention in Jewish writings of the time, most Jews took little notice of events in the Rhineland in 1096, just as they had ignored the Berbers' destruction of Jewish life in Tunisia fifty years earlier. A large number of people were killed during the First Crusade, and the 10,000 German Jews who died, either by their own hand or at the hands of crusaders, was dwarfed by the over 100,000 peasants of the People's Crusade who died without reaching the Holy Land and tens of thousands of knights who died on the journey.
Yet I firmly believe that the First Crusade was instrumental in bringing about the Jews' decline - first for economic reasons. Until the crusaders came en masse to Byzantium and the Holy Land, Jews had a monopoly on long distance trade between Christian Europe and the Muslim Levant, buying surplus produce cheap in one locale and selling at a profit in the other. Franks and Germans paid high prices for silk and spice, just as Egyptians and Arabs paid high prices for woolens and wine, with neither group knowing how little these items cost in their native lands.
Once Christians reached the Levant, two things happened: 1] they resented and grew angry that the Jews had 'overcharged' them; 2] they realized how profitable the business was and [Italians in particular] became merchants themselves. In less than 100 years, the great Italian city-states had not only broken the Jewish trading monopoly, they had supplanted the Jews as the chief financial powers in Europe. Over the same time period, the rise of craftsman's guilds affiliated with specific churches [which obviously excluded Jews] led to further limiting of Jews' choice of occupations. Given a choice between doing business with Jews and Christians, most Europeans patronized their own compatriots, further eroding the Jews' income.
But the massacres of the First Crusade had another, more insidious, effect on relations between Christians and Jews. Christians were horrified to see Jews kill themselves to avoid baptism. They were especially outraged that Jews would kill their own children rather than let them be captured, and the only explanation Christians could imagine was that Jews were somehow lacking in human feelings. It was only a small step to believe that Jews must be something other than human, something less than human, demonic even. Judaism was no longer Christianity's 'little brother' who shared the same Bible, but an enemy of Christianity with its own heretical text, the Talmud.
Jews, knowing that German burghers opened their city gates to the crusading hordes and joined in their attacks, began to distrust Christians in general. Each side viewed the other with increasing enmity. When many German Jews forced to apostatize returned to Judaism [and were viewed as heretics by the Church], those who remained Christians were never quite accepted. The expansion of the Inquisition, originally developed to root out Cathars and Albigensians, focused the Church's attention not only on converted Jews suspected to be Christians in name only, but also on Jews who encouraged their former coreligionists to backslide. No one with Jewish 'blood' was safe from their scrutiny, and anyone with a grudge against either a Jew or former Jew only had to report them to the Church to get revenge. Thus anti-Semitism became a thriving enterprise.