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Itzik Manger's Exegesis
When Itzik Manger (1906-1969) compiled his first set of
biblically themed poems in 1935, he encapsulated a Jewish tradition as old as Yiddish itself. As he remarked in his introduction, "The alert reader will recognize that the landscape in which these biblical figures move is not Canaanitish but Slavic. I was thinking of eastern Galicia." For Manger, characters from the Bible live next door, not on the ancient page. (Manger was born and raised in the Galician market town of Kolomey, now Kolomyya, Ukraine.)
Manger's Humesh lider / Bible Poems begin not with God's creation of the universe but with something a little more down home, the first couple Adam and Eve. Excerpted below are the last four stanzas of the poem, foreshadowing the struggles of men, women, and humanity in general as they walk off the pages of the Bible and into the house next door.
Originally published in 1935, the Humesh lider / Bible Poems were later collected in an anthology of Manger's biblical themed works called Medresh Itsik / Itzik's Exegesis, first published in Paris in 1951. With woodcuts by Paris based artist Artur Kolnik, this book is a beautiful ode to some of the most brilliant and entertaining poems in the Yiddish language.
“What did you do in the apple allée,
My dear, where have you been?”
“I was chatting with the serpent
About a blessed-sin.”
The apple trembles in her hand,
Gleaming scarlet red,
Foreshadowing, as she holds it,
Twilight and passion and death.
The first man, Adam, is puzzled by
The sweetness in her voice.
And he simply cannot understand
Her strange new loveliness.
Trembling he puts his hand out –
“Stop, Adam. You’re making me blush.”
The night extinguishes their shapes –
H,U,S,H spells “Hush.”
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"װאָס האָסטו געטון אין דער עפּל־אַלײ,
עװאַ מײַן גאָלדענעם קינד?"
"איך האָב געפּלױדערט מיט דער שלאַנג
מכּוח דער מיצווה זינד."
און ס'ציטערט דער עפּל אין איר האַנט
און פֿינקלט װי שאַרלאַך רױט
און ס'שאָטנט אױס די דערמערונג
די תאווה און דער טױט.
אָדם הראשון פֿיבערט און קאָן
באין אופֿן נישט פֿאַרשטײן,
פֿאַר װאָס איר קול איז צוקער־זיס
און זי איז מלא-חן.
ער שטרעקט מיט אַ ציטער אױס די הענט.
— װאָס טוסטו, אָדם, האַ?
די נאַכט לעשע בײדע געשטאַלטן אױס
און פּתח שין מאַכט – שאַ.
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-English translation by Leonard Wolf
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The Five Books of Moses: A Translation with Commentary, by Robert Alter.
The brilliant biblical scholar offers a masterly new translation of the Hebrew Bible that gives readers the definitive editions of the Pentateuch.
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The World According to Itzik: Selected Poetry and Prose by Itzik Manger, translated by Leonard Wolf, with an introduction by David G. Roskies.
In the years between 1929 and 1939, when Itzik Manger wrote most of the poetry and fiction that made him famous, his name among Yiddish readers was a household word. This book -- the first full-length anthology of Manger's work -- displays the full range of his genius in poetry, fiction, and criticism.
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The Bible: Genesis, Exodus, the Song of Solomon by Marc Chagall.
The celebrated artist Marc Chagall began illustrating the Bible in 1931, and it became his lifelong passion. This extraordinary volume includes more than 130 pages of his finest works, paired with three books from the Old Testament. |
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