Review from Moment
Magazine:
TREE OF SOULS
The Mythology of Judaism
by Howard Schwartz
Oxford University Press,
618 pages
This is a very big book,
not just in size
but in ambition. It's an impressive impressive volume. It seems
hard to
believe that one author put it together on his own or in one
lifetime. But Howard Schwartz was well prepared to do the task. He has
been
collecting and re-telling Jewish imaginative literature for decades, in
well
known anthologies of Jewish folktales and Jewish mystical tales, such
as Elijah's
Violin, Miriam's Tambourine , Gabriel's Palace and Lilith's
Cave. In this way he's become the one man "Brothers Grimm"
of Jewish folklore for our time.
In his Reimagining
the Bible,
Professor Schwartz put all that gathering activity in a more scholarly
context.
He explains the development of what he calls "Jewish mythology" and
the features that set it apart from the mythology of other peoples.
Most of the
time, we associate mythology with oral literature that comes before the
establishment
of the written literature of a group or nation. For instance, we
conceive of an
entire oral tradition of stories and tales about the Greek gods as the
backdrop
for the epic poetry of Homer. Similarly in the Torah we can find
remnants
and traces of earlier Hebrew legends and myths, especially in the book
of
Genesis.
However, as Schwartz
points out, Jewish
oral literature is unique because oral literature brackets
the
written tradition. After the written Torah is established,
the
"oral Torah", arises in the rabbinic era. This rabbinic
story-telling is found in the "aggadot" or stories in the Talmud
proper, and extensively in the rabbinic midrash. The midrashic
style of
rabbinic story telling-- rooted in the Torah text, but ranging far and
wide
from it, becomes the model for the mystical speculation of the
Zohar and
other kabbalistic texts. Starting in the 13th century,
through
the kabbalah of Moses de Leon and later of Rabbi Isaac Luria of Safed,
an
entire mythology is inserted within the heart of the Jewish tradition.
The fertility of this mystical outlook continues in the tales and
legends
of the first great hasidic masters, and comes to a peak in the tales of
Rabbi
Nachman of Bratzlav. This second blooming of mythology in a
post-literate culture
is an entirely unique phenomenon and worthy of great reflection in
itself.
Since in colloquial terms
"myth" usually means "untruth" it's important to understand
exactly what Schwartz means. In his introduction, he writes,
"Myth
refers to a people's sacred stories about origins, deities, ancestors
and
heroes. Within a culture, myths serves as the divine charter, and myth
and
ritual are inextricably bound." For Schwartz the master
myth
of Judaism is the covenant between God and
From this "master
myth"
Schwartz identified ten sub-myths, namely "myths of God", "myths
of Creation", "myths of Heaven", "myths of Hell",
"myths of the Holy Word", "myths of the Holy Time",
"myths of the Holy People", "myths of the Holy Land",
"myths of exile" and "myths of the Messiah." The
volume is organized around these ten myths, each of which subdivides
further. The intellectual clarity of his organization bespeaks a
man who
has spent decades collecting, organizing and retelling Jewish tales--
by
arranging them he has created a very usable encyclopedia of Jewish
myth, and
helps the reader see the unified pattern behind the diversity of
thousands of
years of Jewish story telling. Schwartz brings into the mix,
ancient and
medieval documents, but also ventures towards the twenty first century
by
including among his myth-makers, Franz Kafka, the Piasetzner
Rebbe,
and Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, the zeide of the Jewish renewal
movement.
So far I have only given
the outline of
this tremendous project, the intellectual rind that gives it shape and
form.
But how to convey the taste of the fruit? Tree of Souls
can be
roamed through like an enchanted garden-- a book length
Reading this book puts
you in the mood of
a dream, and time quickly drops away. Who knows who might next
knock at
the door-- an angel, or Elijah? There are Jewish tales here of
demons and
giants, of the end of days and the beginning of time-- and all of them
stimulate reverie and reverence-- both states of mind we need to
cultivate in
our time, if we are to have any deeper sense of the sacred.
Fortunately
Howard Schwartz has done the digging for us, and opened up the way to
the Jewish
tree of souls; all we need do is bring our open hearts and minds.
--Rodger Kamenetz.
Kamenetz's most recent
book of poetry is The
Lowercase Jew (Northwestern University Press, 2003).
Rodger
Kamenetz
R@Kamenetz.com
http://www.kamenetz.com
