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In recent decades, a group of second generation religious Zionist West Bank settlers have turned away from the collectivist political messianic ideology of the first generation of settlers and have begun to explore poetry as a mode of individual self expression. Based on interviews of eight key figures in this new trend and an analysis of fifty works by these poets, Beyond Political Messianism: The Poetry of the Second Generation of Religious Zionist Settlers tells the story of how they revolutionised the religious Zionist settler culture by moving poetry writing into the mainstream of that culture, and how they introduced into the world of secular Israeli literature images and language styles drawn from their lives as religiously observant Jews. Among the themes central to these poets' concerns are: the formation of a religious identity based on faith and ritual observance, the relationship of the contemporary Jew to the Bible and to traditional Jewish texts, appropriate ways to write about erotic experience, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

This book explores a central phenomenon in the development of modern Jewish literature: the retelling of tradtional Jewish narratives by twentieth-century writers. It shows how and toward what ends Biblical stories, legends, and Hasidic tales have been used in shaping modern Hebrew literature.

In her novellaThe Miracle Hater(Sone hanissim), Israeli writer Shulamith Hareven presents a reading of the biblical story of the Exodus that comes across as both history and midrash. Hareven's blending of historical and midrashic elements inThe Miracle Hatercorresponds to what she considered to be the only appropriate way to approach Israeli national myths. She believed that each myth must be submitted to an historical-critical approach that questions the factual nature of the myth and seeks to discern something of the historical reality behind the mythic narrative, but that such a myth must also be developed by means of a midrashic approach that transforms it into a contemporary myth that sheds light on the meaning and significance of contemporary Israeli existence.

This article explores various strategies for transferring artwork and their corresponding tax attributes and clarifies the procedure for establishing the art's value. It begins by introducing the guidelines for obtaining an income tax deduction for charitable gifts. This discussion includes a description of the \"related purpose\" rule as well as recent legislation affecting fractional interest gifts. The article then describes the attributes of private operating foundations and techniques for combining both charitable and noncharitable goals, such as bargain sales and charitable remainder trusts. It then discusses the procedure to determine the value of a collection for tax purposes and the importance of obtaining a qualified appraisal. The final section covers techniques for making noncharitable gifts and the importance of anticipating the liquidity needs of an estate. The common thread throughout all of the planning techniques is the importance of early planning. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]

This article focuses on stories written by the Israeli women writers Savyon Liebrecht, Emuna Elon, and Michal Peleg during the last two decades of the twentieth century, in which an Israeli Jew and a Palestinian Arab from the occupied territories draw close to some form of intimacy. The article explores how each author assesses the possibility of closer relations between Israelis and Palestinians in the real world and the barriers to such intimacy. These stories share similar features: (1) It is work which brings the Israeli and the Palestinian characters together. (2) Israeli male characters cling more to prejudiced views pf Palestinians than do Israeli female characters. (3) When Palestinian characters assert themselves, they destabilize the usual patterns of Israeli-Palestinian relations and open up the possibility of some intimacy. (4) The intimacy develops gradually on the levels of inner thought and actions. (5) The intimacy is not sustained, largely because the Palestinian character feels slighted by the Israeli character.

This book explores a central phenomenon in the development of modern Jewish literature: the retelling of tradtional Jewish narratives by twentieth-century writers. It shows how and toward what ends Biblical stories, legends, and Hasidic tales have been used in shaping modern Hebrew literature. The author's impressive knowledge and careful analysis of both early and modern Hebrew texts reveal the main literary features of the genre, while making an important contribution to current discussions of the relationship between midrash and literature, the relationship between myth (and other traditional narratives) and modern literature, and the concept of intertextuality. The book also provides many fresh insights on the various issues of modern Jewish existence addressed in these works. Among these are: the revival of the Jewish tradition by reinterpreting it in light of new values, the preservation of Jewish identity entering into Western culture, the changing roles of men and women in Jewish culture, challenges to traditional Jewish views of sexuality, attempts to physically destroy the Jewish people, moral and political issues raised by the establishment of the State of Israel, and the conflict between Jews and Arabs.

According to Sheleg, \"the most dramatic and marked change\" in the relationship of religious Zionists to art has been their entrance into an area from which they had previously been largely distant: the world of modern media production.10 The founding of Ma'ale has been the most important factor in facilitating this new direction for religious Zionists. In a similar fashion, Ma'ale was founded both to facilitate the influence of religious Zionism on Israeli culture as a whole and to enrich the cultural dimensions of religious Zionism. [...]just as the nationalist yeshivot challenged the accomodationist approach of Bar-Ilan University and the redefined NRP and Gush Emunim challenged the tendency of religious Zionism to play a relatively passive role in Israeli politics, so Ma'ale challenged the tendency of religious Zionism to distance itself from active artistic creativity in general and the world of modern media production in particular. In the context of Jewish ritual, Hallel is a specific selection of celebratory psalms said on religious holidays. [...]the Zach poem constitutes Yael's personal expression of praise in response to the birth of her child, which comes not from the biblical psalms included in the traditional prayer book, but rather from the words of a poet, who, although he is secular, knows how to pray. Ma'ale graduate films are shown in religious Zionist educational settings, they have been broadcast on occasion on Israeli television, and they have become a regular element in the programming of the religiously-oriented television station, Tekhelet, which began broadcasting in April, 2003. [...]Ma'ale has succeeded in legitimizing media production in the eyes of at least some religious Zionists, as well as facilitating the entrance of many religiously observant Israeli Jews into the world of the communications media.

In this passage from an autobiographical statement by Shaul Tchernichowsky the poet declares his commitment to re-evaluate the traditional version of Jewish history and to discover instead an alternative version more suited to contemporary values. His reference to “holy and good” characters whose evil deeds were played down by the Jewish tradition undoubtedly includes King David. It disturbed Tchernichowsky that despite such morally questionable acts as his adulterous relations with Bathsheba and his arrangement of her husband’s death, David was still hailed by Jewish tradition as a great hero. On the other hand, Tchernichowsky believed, Saul, the first king of

In a public talk to the teachers of Tel Aviv in 1933, a little more than a year before his death, Chaim Nachman Bialik reflected on the meaning of one of his most enigmatic works, the prose-poem “Megillat haʾesh: meʾaggadot haḥrban” (“The Scroll of Fire: From the Legends of the Destruction”).¹ In that work, published nearly three decades earlier in 1905, Bialik had retold legends of the destructions of the First and Second Temples and the dedication of the Second Temple in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah and had woven those retold legends into a narrative whole. One of