JEWISH NOVELISTS AND THEIR JUDAISM

There are three varieties of Jewish authors. One kind writes neither out of his Jewish experience nor out of his Judaism. This type of writer rejects what he is an sometimes will write anti-Semitically and with distinct Christian symbolism in order to flaunt his “liberation” from geneological ties. An example of this variety would be Nathanael West.¹

A second variety of Jewish author writes out of his Jewish experience but not out of Judaism. This is the dominant category in America. An example of this kind would be Philip Roth.² Members of this class are often characterized as “Eastern, liberal, academic—in short, ‘Jewish.’”³ This brand of writer often writes about Judaism. He often expresses a self-confident ignorance sometimes joined by an arrogance bred of self-hatred.⁴ His standards for defining what is authentic to the Jewish people and to the Jewish religion are often sociological generalizations and personal interpretations of questionable ethnic peculiarities. Jewish historical experience and classical Jewish literature are rarely considered. When this type of Jewish author attempts to write out of his understanding of Judaism, theological absurdities and historical blunders often ensue.

The final type of Jewish author writes both out of his Jewish experience and out of Judaism. He writes about the Jewish people and about the Jewish religion from within. His own experience is interpreted from the perspective of Jewish historical experience and with an awareness of the literature of classical Judaism. Members of this class, therefore, can claim a more intense authenticity than those of the other varieties of Jewish authors. Few can qualify for membership. Elie Wiesel is one who can.

An author is not only a spectator. He may also be a witness. Elie Wiesel has served as a witness to the three central events in contemporary Jewish experience: the Holocaust, Israel, and Soviet Jewry.

The Greek word for “witness” is “martyr.” Once the martyr is dead another witness is needed. Wiesel fills this role for the martyrs of Auschwitz. He is the “messenger of the dead among the living,”⁵ the “spiritual archivist of the Holocaust.”⁶

Elie Wiesel was in Israel during both Israel's War for Independence and the Six Day War. His novelette Dawn treats the former; his novel A Beggar in Jerusalem describes the latter. His writings on Russian Jewry are based upon his visits to the Soviet Union.⁷ He speaks for those who cannot speak and to those who, he claims, will not listen.⁸

Wiesel directly confronts the vital experiences of contemporary Jewry armed with a profound and erudite knowledge of classical Judaism. His grasp of the primary sources of classical Jewish literature, which most of his American Jewish colleagues do not share, enables him to offer literary contributions of impeccable Jewish historical and theological authenticity. The present essay will attempt to serve as a source-critical analysis of Wiesel's utilization of the sources and themes which constitute classical Jewish Messianism.

REDEMPTION: HUMAN AND DIVINE

According to Jewish mystical thought, man need not be a passive spectator to the cosmic drama of redemption; he can be a participant, a liberator, a protagonist.⁹ Man's task is to work in partnership with the Divine to effect redemption.

For the Jewish mystics, redemption comes for man, for the world and for God's Indwelling in the world—the Shekinah. Redemption is marked by bringing the scattered forces into unity and harmony. The Messianic Age may thus be understood as one in which “exile” or alienation ceases. It is a time of liberation for man, for the world and for the Divine presence in the world.

Until the final redemption, insists the Jewish mystical tradition, everything in the natural and the supernatural spheres remains alienated from its true essence. God Himself is no exception. His presence in the world, like that of His people, is in exile, alienated from its true essence. The exile of Israel is understood to reflect the exile of the Divine. “Wherever Israel was exiled, there was God exiled.”¹⁰ The redemption of Israel, therefore, implies the redemption of the Divine.

That the redemption of the Divine is interlaced with the redemption of man is an important theme in Rabbinic literature.¹¹ “When Israel is redeemed, God too is redeemed,” says a midrash. Rabbi Meir is quoted by another midrash as saying, “‘Redemption,’ says God, ‘will be mine and yours,’ as if to say: ‘I will be redeemed with you.’”¹²

On the verse in Psalms, “My heart shall rejoice in Thy salvation,” (13:6), Rabbi Abahu taught: “This is one of those difficult verses which declare that the salvation of the Holy One, blessed be He, depends upon the salvation of the people of Israel. Note that it is not written ‘My heart shall rejoice in my salvation,’ but ‘in Thy salvation’ by which David means: Thy salvation depends upon our salvation.”¹³

Still another source suggests that in the Messianic era God will be compared to a bridegroom.¹⁴ Marriage, in Jewish thought, is an end to alienation, a symbol of fulfillment. A parable:

Once a prince was betrothed to a princess. A certain day had been appointed for the festivities before the wedding. The prince was looking forward to his wedding joy … So does the Holy One, blessed be He, look forward to redemption for Israel, and Israel awaits redemption for the Holy One, blessed be He.¹⁵

This Rabbinic notion of the exile and redemption of God and man was further developed in the sixteenth century by R. Isaac Luria. According to Lurianic mysticism, the harmony which characterized existence on all levels—human, cosmic, Divine—was disrupted by the “breaking of the vessels” which contained the Divine Light. As a result of this event, the Shekinah was cast into exile and part of the Divine light flowed downward into the cosmos. Thus sparks from the Divine light are to be found throughout creation. But these sparks, which belong reunited with their Source, are now mixed with the evil elements which surround and imprison them with “shells.” The purpose of human existence is to restore the primordial harmony and unity. Redemption is acquired through man's attempts to liberate the sparks through the performance of good deeds, and rejoin them to their Source.¹⁶

Luria formulates a similar theory concerning the soul of Adam, the first man. According to this view, after Adam's fall, which intervened when he should have completed the restoration of harmony by lifting up all the Divine sparks from the broken vessels, the great and all-embracing soul that was his was shattered, too. The souls of all men, symbolized as sparks, originally comprising the soul of the first man, were scattered throughout the world. The human sparks, like the Shekinah and its sparks, are in exile, dispersed. The reunification of the sparks of the First Man brings about the advent of the Last Man, the Messiah.¹⁷ In this view, the Messiah is not one who brings redemption but one who comes as a sign that redemption has arrived.¹⁸ The Lurianic notion that each of our souls contains a spark of the soul of the primordial Adam, which is identical to the soul of the Messiah, means that each individual shares in the drama of bringing the Messiah because he shares in being the Messiah. Luria's system often fails to distinguish between these two kinds of sparks: human and divine.

The already described perspective of Luria appears in Wiesel with this characteristic absence of a clear differentiation between the human and divine sparks.¹⁹ Wiesel writes:

An aspect of God was concealed even in evil, and the theory of the Nitzotzot said so poetically: every man possesses a divine spark. The Shekinah is the sum of the sparks. Let the Shekinah—the divine emanation—be reunited with God, and the world will have achieved its final liberation.²⁰

Wiesel restates the rabbinic notion that man has the power to redeem God's presence in the world and the Kabbalistic notion that attainment of the internal unity of the Godhead is to be equated with redemption. The collection of the sparks, restoring the primordial unity of the divine forces in the cosmos, stressed in Lurianic thinking, is reiterated by Wiesel:

Once I asked my teacher, Kalman the cabalist, the following question: For what purpose did God create man? I understand that man needs God. But what need of man has God? … ‘The Holy Books teach us,’ he said, ‘that if man were conscious of his power, he would lose his faith or his reason. For man carries within him a role which transcends him. God needs him to be ONE … man—who is nothing but a handful of earth—is capable of reuniting time and its source, and of giving back to God his own image.’²¹

THE MESSIAH

Some critics claim that Wiesel “asserts that it is too late for the Messiah,” that he rejects the Messianic advent.²² What is claimed here is that Wiesel does not reject the Messianic idea. He simply stresses the Lurianic notion of a collective Messiah over the role of an individual Messiah. The same text which has been used to illustrate Wiesel's rejection of the Messiah can be used to validate his opting for the collective Messiah. Wiesel writes: “‘The Messiah is not coming. He's not coming because he has already come. This is unknown, but he is neither at the gates of Rome nor in heaven. Everybody is wrong. The Messiah is everywhere.’; ‘The Messiah,’ he used to say, ‘is that which makes man more human, which takes the element of pride out of generosity, which stretches his soul toward others.’”²³ “‘We shall be honest and humble and strong, and then he will come, he will come every day, thousands of times every day. He will have no face, because he will have a thousand faces. The Messiah isn't one man, Clara, he's all men. As long as there are men there will be a Messiah.’”²⁴

Though Wiesel stresses the Lurianic notion of the collective Messiah, he continues to allude to the individual Messiah. He writes:

‘The Talmud tells us,’ said Gavriel, ‘that the Messiah sits, waiting to be called, at the gates of Rome, amid beggars and cripples and other outcasts. The Kaballah, on the other hand, says that he conceals himself far from men and near to God, in the most holy and inaccessible of sanctuaries, and from there he sees time unfold—time filled with pity and distress—and beyond time, eternity.’²⁵

In this text Wiesel reflects a polarity inherent in Jewish messianism.²⁶ From one perspective the Messiah is apprehended as a heavenly being: another view has him a citizen of earth.

The apprehension of the Messiah as one who lives amongst men is common in Wiesel's writings.²⁷ The Talmudic passage to which Wiesel refers in the above citation is the following:

Rabbi Joshua ben Levi met the prophet Elijah standing near the tomb of Rabbi Simeon bar Yohai.

Rabbi: When will the Messiah come?

Prophet: Ask him yourself.

Rabbi: Where shall I find him?

Prophet: At the gates of Rome.

Rabbi: How will I recognize him?

Prophet: He sits among the poor lepers bandaging their sores.

The rabbi then travelled to Rome and found the Messiah as the prophet had said.

Rabbi: Peace upon you, Master and Teacher.

Messiah: Peace upon you, son of Levi.

Rabbi: Master, when may we expect you to come?

Messiah: Today.

After some time, when the Messiah had not yet come, the Rabbi asked Elijah for an explanation.

Rabbi: He spoke falsely to me, stating he would come today, but he has not come.

Elijah: He was quoting the first word of a verse in Psalms: Today, IF you will hearken to His voice

(Psalm 95:7)²⁸

As Wiesel notes, the Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical tradition, to some extent, stresses the farness, the hiddenness, the inaccessibility of the Messiah in his heavenly abode, close to God. This motif already appears in apocalyptic literature where the Messiah is perceived as “chosen and hidden before Him” and “dwelling under the wings of the Lord of spirits.”²⁹ Rabbinic literature preserves a similar notion. God “puts His Messiah away, under His throne, until the time of the generation in which he will appear.”³⁰ A representative citation of what Wiesel describes as the Kabbalistic perspective is the following text from the central book of Jewish mystical literature, the Zohar:

In the lower Paradise there is a secret and unknown spot, embroidered with many colors, in which a thousand palaces of longing are concealed. No one may enter it, except the Messiah whose abode is in Paradise. … There is another place, entirely hidden and undiscoverable. It is called “Eden,” and no one may enter to behold it. Now the Messiah is hidden in its outskirts. … The Messiah enters that abode, lifts up his eyes and beholds the Patriarchs visiting the ruins of God's sanctuary. He perceives Mother Rachel, with tears upon her face; the Holy One, blessed be He, tries to comfort her, but she refuses to be comforted. (Jeremiah 31:14) Then the Messiah lifts up his voice and weeps, and the whole Garden of Eden quakes, and all the righteous and saints who are there break out in crying and lamentation with him. When the crying and weeping resound for the second time, the whole firmament above the Garden begins to shake, and the cry echoes from five hundred myriads of supernatural hosts, until it reaches the highest throne. … The Holy One swears to destroy the wicked kingdom by the hand of the Messiah, to avenge Israel, and to give her all the good things which he promised. Then the Messiah is hidden again in the same place as before.³¹

JOSEPH DI-LA-REINA

As was mentioned above, Jewish messianism provides man with a dynamic, participatory role in securing redemption. Man must not passively wait for the Messiah but should precipitate his advent. This motif is reiterated many times by Wiesel: “I wanted to discover the sanctuary of the Messiah, to grip him by the shoulders and bring him forcibly to earth.”³² It is therefore understandable why Wiesel should choose to recount the legend of Joseph di-la-Reina.

There are many versions of this powerful example from Jewish lore of a man who tried, single-handed, to bring about the promised redemption. Wiesel relates it as follows:

A famous medieval cabalist, Joseph di-la-Reina, made up his mind to put an end to the comedy which man is condemned to play against himself and to bring about the advent of the Messiah. At the cost of considerable sacrifice the great sage overcame Satan and threw him into chains. Everywhere—in heaven and upon earth, in paradise and in Hell—there was a great commotion: the end was at hand. But the sage made one mistake: he took pity on his captive and succumbed to his tears. Pity is a double-edged weapon, and Satan knows how to use it. He broke his chains, and the Messiah, already on the threshold, was forced to return to his prison, somewhere infinitely far away, in the chaos of time and man's hope. Everything had to start all over, because the poor miracle-maker had a heart which wasn't hard enough.³³

The sacrifices to which Wiesel alludes include extreme ascetic exercises: e.g., fasting, lack of sleep, many immersions, and the dangerous, sometimes fatal practice of magic associated with “practical mysticism” (Kabalah ma'aseeth). Only after first training his mystical and magical abilities to withstand a bout with Satan does Joseph engage his opponents.³⁴

Many versions of this episode, unlike that of Wiesel, have the protagonist either converting or committing suicide when hope of redemption is lost.³⁵ But this ending seems to be a gloss, superimposed upon the original tale.³⁶ Wiesel, therefore, recounts what is probably the authentic version of the tale.

SUFFERING AND REDEMPTION

Engrained within Jewish optimism is the awareness of the redemptive potentiality of suffering and affliction. Rabbi Israel Baal Shem said that from “suffering”—tsa'ar—can come 'tzo'har—light, the symbol of redemption. Redemption may elicit from affliction.

The paradigm redemptive act in Jewish history, the Exodus, was the climax of the afflictions suffered in Egypt.³⁷ From the bitterness of affliction many blessings can accrue.³⁸ It should, therefore, not be surprising that the time of redemption is envisioned as being preceded by the “birth-pangs of redemption.”³⁹ It is only to be expected that the Redeemer must suffer to secure redemption.

According to a tradition repeated in several midrashim, the Messiah assumes one-third of all suffering.⁴⁰ According to other sources, he suffers for the sake of each generation, the degree of his suffering being determined by the gravity of the sins.⁴¹ For this reason Hermann Cohen called the Messiah “the moral Atlas of the world.” According to a medieval midrash, when he learns that his suffering is the necessary prerequisite for the resurrection of the dead, “the Messiah immediately accepts all these afflictions in love.”⁴²

The Midrash Pesikta Rabbathi records the Messiah's willingness to suffer, but only if redemption is the outcome of his affliction. The Midrash has the Messiah demand of God:

Master of the Universe, with joy in my soul and gladness in my heart I take this suffering upon myself, provided that not one person in Israel perish; that not only those who are alive today be saved in my days, but that also those who are dead, who died from the days of Adam up to the time of redemption; and that not only these be saved in my days, but also those who died as abortions; and that not only these be saved in my days, but all those whom Thou desirest to create but were not created. Such are the things I desire, and for these I am ready to take upon myself whatever Thou decreest.⁴³

The Zohar also reiterates the theme of the suffering Messiah. When the Messiah hears of the suffering of the righteous, he weeps, imploring God to allow him to assume the burden of the suffering of his people. He then assumes that burden. If not for this, insists the Zohar, no one could endure the sufferings which one's sins would normally justify.⁴⁴

The Messiah suffers not for himself but for others, not for his own redemption but for the redemption of others, because he knows that sometimes affliction must be penultimate to redemption. Wiesel echoes this motif. He insists that when suffering is to secure only one's own redemption, it is brutish, selfish and immoral. It can make one proud rather than humble.⁴⁵ When suffering is self-reflective it is counter-redemptive; only when suffering is for another can it be redemptive.⁴⁶

Suffering gains meaning when it is for a “thou,” whether the thou be human or divine. The “other” attains his existence and his redemption through our suffering for him. To the human thou Wiesel suggests: “Suffering must open us to others.”⁴⁷ “To say ‘I suffer, therefore I am’ is to become the enemy of man. What you must say is ‘I suffer, therefore you are.’”⁴⁸

Wiesel suggests the Lurianic claim that everyman carries a spark of the Messiah's soul and that all men, consequently, can share in bringing the redemption. Each man can bring “a drop of Messianic fulfillment.” Everyone, therefore, has a duty to suffer, when necessary, to bring about redemption. The “suffering servant” is not one man but every man; each man is a miniature Messiah.

WAITING

The Hebrew root of the verb “to wait” (K V H) can also mean “to hope” and “to pray.” Much of Jewish history has been waiting, hoping, praying. After each of the many great catastrophes which befell the Jewish people, it was expected that the Messianic Age would soon dawn. Persecution and calamity were often interpreted as the birthpangs of what was expected to be a new era of peace and prosperity. Hope was perceived even in apparently hopeless situations.

The destruction of the First Temple and the exile of the Jews was a time of tragedy, sorrow and despair. The razing of the Second Temple and the end of the Second Jewish Commonwealth led many to despondency. But no matter how harsh the tragedy, the rabbis still found hope, even with the temple destroyed, even with thousands massacred or exiled. This ability to find hope within despair is expressed by the Rabbinic view that the Messiah was born on the day on which the Temple was destroyed.⁴⁹ In other words, redemption is always potentially present, even within tragedy.

Many writers on the Holocaust express an expectation for the Messianic advent during the Holocaust. Certainly if the Messiah was expected when one Temple was destroyed, so could he be expected when six million temples were destroyed.

The birth-pangs of the Messianic age felt during the Holocaust produced a still-born. The Divine promise, recorded in the Midrash, was not fulfilled:

Israel: ‘When will you redeem us?’

God: ‘When you have gone down to the bottom of the pit, then shall I redeem You.’⁵⁰

Yet even at the pit, hope persisted. Wiesel writes:

It was night. I found myself transported into a strange and distant kingdom. In the shadow of the flames, the exiled were gathered. They came from everywhere, they spoke every language and all told the same story. Seeing them together under the fiery sky, the child in me had thought: This is it; this is the end of time, the end of everything. Any moment the Messiah will appear out of the night. …⁵¹

The question which haunts Wiesel is whether the waiting has been in vain, whether the prayers have gone unheard, whether one can hope for a future, much less for a Messiah in the future after Auschwitz.⁵²

Wiesel's response to this question becomes evident in the progression from deep pessimism toward a somber but firm optimism discernible in the chronological development of his writings.⁵³ His earliest work, Night, presents a world without mercy, without humanity, without God. It is a world of night and abandonment of responsibility.⁵⁴

Wiesel's second work—Dawn—begins at the end of night. A glimmer of hope is perceived. The meaning of the establishment of the State of Israel begins the end of absolute pessimism for the survivor of tragedy. Le Jour is mistakenly translated as The Accident; it should be called “Day.”⁵⁵ With the assertion that life has meaning, Wiesel states the assumption to be expounded in his following work, The Town beyond the Wall. In this work, meaning in life is understood as found in one's caring for another, in suffering for another, and in preventing another from suffering: “I suffer—therefore you are.”⁵⁶ These ideas are explored more completely in The Gates of the Forest. Here Wiesel is optimistic. As long as there is man, there is hope. “What is man? Dust turned to hope.”⁵⁷ The theme of care and suffering is expanded. Suffering endows man with the fortitude to work, even in spite of God, for redemption.⁵⁸ Remembrance of former suffering and·new faith are needed to prevent a recurrence of old suffering. The goal of suffering is to ennoble.

In The Jews of Silence Wiesel derives hope from Russian Jewry, a community which thrives on hope.⁵⁹ In A Beggar in Jerusalem, a psalm about, the Six Day War, the reader is witness to a transformation from doubt to affirmation, from fear to joy. The Jews of Silence indicts World Jewry for being apathetic to the plight of Russian Jewry, of not having learned the brutal lessons of Auschwitz. In A Beggar in Jerusalem, Wiesel congratulates World Jewry for preventing a second Holocaust, for not affirming his fears. During the Six Day War, claims Wiesel, the prayers of Israel were answered,⁶⁰ their hopes fulfilled, and a Messianic presence was evident.⁶¹ In One Generation After, the optimism of A Beggar in Jerusalem is tempered. Wiesel now expresses optimism and pessimism. The future becomes a question mark. After all that has happened, one can only hope and pray and wait.

Having concluded that human suffering was beyond endurance, a certain Rebbe went up to heaven and knocked at the Messiah's gate.

“Why are you taking so long?” he asked him. “Don't you know mankind is expecting you?”

“It is not me they are expecting,” answered the Messiah. “Some are waiting for good health and riches. Others for serenity and knowledge. Or peace in the home and happiness. No, it's not me they are awaiting.”

At this point, the Rebbe lost patience and cried: “So be it! If you have but one face, may it remain in shadow! If you cannot help men, all men, resolve their problems, all their problems, even the most insignificant, then stay where you are, as you are. If you still have not guessed that you are bread for the hungry, a voice for the old man without airs, sleep for those who dread night, if you have not understood all this and more: that every wait is a wait for you, then you are telling the truth: indeed, it is not you that mankind is waiting for.”

The Rebbe came back to earth, gathered his disciples and forbade them to despair:

“And now the true waiting begins.”⁶²

Notes

1. Stanley Edgar Hyman. “Afterword,” in Nathanael West. Miss Lonely-hearts (New York: Avon, 1955), pp. 119ff.

2. See for example: Theodore Solataroff. “Philip Roth and the Jewish Moralists,” Marvin Murdick, “Who killed Herzog? or Three American Novelists,” and the little known review of Portnoy's Complaint by Gershom Scholem, the leading authority on Jewish mysticism, in the Journal of the Central Conference of American Rabbis 17 (1970), pp. 56-58.

3. Glen Meeter. Philip Roth and Bernard Malamud: A Critical Essay, (Ann Arbor, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1968), p. 10.

4. Eugen Borowitz. “Believing Jews and Jewish Writers,” Judaism 14:2 (Spring 1965), p. 181.

5. Elie Wiesel. The Accident. (New York: Hill and Wang, 1962), p. 45.

6. Curt Leviant. “Elie Wiesel: Soul on Fire,” Saturday Review of Literature, LI (January 31, 1970), 25.

7. Elie Wiesel. The Jews of Silence. (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966) (hardcover); (New York: Signet, 1967) (softcover); Legends of Our Time (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968) (hardcover), (New York: Avon, 1970) (softcover), “Moscow Revisited.”

8. The Jews of silence refers to silent American Jewry and not to the silenced Russian Jews; Jews of Silence, ibid., hardcover: p. 103; softcover: p. 127.

9. Zeev Eshkoli. Tenuath Ha Meshihiyuth B'Yisrael (Hebrew) (Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik, 1952), p. 280; Abraham Heschel. Israel: Echo of Eternity (New York: Farrar, Straus, 1969), p. 159.

10. Megillah 29a: See Abraham Heschel. Theology of Ancient Judaism (Hebrew) (London: Soncino, 1962), I, 68-70.

11. Midrash Tanhuma, end “Aharey.”

12. Exodus Rabbah 15:12 on Exodus 12:1.

13. Midrash on Psalms 13:4.

14. Yalkut Shimoni “Song of Songs” #988.

15. Midrash on Psalms 14:6.

16. See, for example, Shaar Maamarey Rashbi “Pekuday” 34:71; Shaar Ha Pesukim “Genesis” 3:4.

17. See Meir ibn Gabbai. Avodath Ha Kodesh, “Helek Ha Avodah” Chapter thirty-eight; see Numbers Rabbah 13:12.

18. Gershom Scholem. The Messianic Idea in Judaism (New York: Schocken, 1971), p. 47; Shabbtai Zevi (Hebrew) (Jerusalem Am Oved), I, 37: Isaiah Tishbi. Torath Ha Ra v'ha Klipoth b'Kabalath Ha Ari (Hebrew) (Jerusalem, 1963), pp. 134ff.

19. Gershom Scholem. The Messianic Idea, op. cit., pp. 186f; Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (New York: Schocken, 1941), chap. 6. Wiesel's lack of a careful distinction between the divine and the human sparks is also expressed in the fact that the Hebrew word for God—El—forms part of the names of each of his major figures—Eliezer, Elisha, Gavriel, Katriel, Michael. Man's redemptive capabilities draw from the Divine element within him. The Kabbalists, beginning with the sixteenth century, stressed the Divine element in man. No longer intimidated by Christian polemics, they asserted the possibility of a divine “part” within man. The great Jewish mystic of sixteenth century Prague, Judah Loew (Maharal), even asserted the possibility of the incarnation of God and man in the personage of Moses, the redeemer of Israel from Egypt. Loew calls Moses the man-God; see his Tiferet Yisrael, chap. 21. Hence, Wiesel's messianism is not humanistic but Kabbalistic. Furthermore, one should read Wiesel's work, specifically Beggar in Kabbalistic terms. In Kabbalistic parlance, certain personalities symbolize various sefirot or divine emanations. References to these personalities are to be read on two levels, literal and symbolic. In Beggar, Katriel represents the upper emanation Kether, David the emanation Tiferet, and Malkah the lowest emanation, the female aspect of God—Malkut or the Shekinah. Thus, Katriel and David's relationship with Malkah has not only a human but also a divine referent. When union occurs between the human couple, it effects a union in the divine realm of the sefirot. Redemptive acts below—on the human sphere—reflect above into the divine realm. Beggar is therefore not only a novel, but a modern attempt at Kabbalistic discourse.

20. Elie Wiesel. The Town beyond the Wall (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964), p. 41 (h) 46 (p) (h signifies hard cover edition, p signifies paperback edition.) See Souls On Fire (New York: Random House, 1972), pp. 33, 189. Louis Jacobs, “The Doctrine of the ‘Divine Spark in Man’ in Jewish Sources” in ed. R. Loewe. Studies in Rationalism, Judaism and Universalism (London: Routledge and Paul, 1966), pp. 98ff.

21. ———The Accident (New York: Hill and Wang, 1962), p. 42; Town, op. cit., p. 79.

22. Emil Fackenheim. God's Presence in History (New York: New York University Press, 1970), pp. 88, 78.

23. Elie Wiesel. The Gates of the Forest (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966), pp. 32f (h), 42f (p); see also p. 33 (h), 43 (p).

24. Ibid., p. 225 (h), 223 (p); Souls on Fire, op. cit., p. 189. Phophetic literature contains both notions, an individual as well as a collective Messiah. Rabbinic literature strongly opts for an individual Messiah; see sources noted in Joseph Klausner. (transl. W. F. Stinespring.) The Messianic Idea in Israel (New York: MacMillan, 1955), p. 214, 217; Solomon Schechter. Some Aspects of Rabbinic Theology (New York: Schocken, 1961), p. 101, note 2; Steven Schwarzschild. Judaism, “The Personal Messiah,” 5:2 pp. 123-135.

25. Wiesel. Gates, op. cit., pp. 30f: A Beggar in Jerusalem (New York: Random House, 1970), p. 54.

26. Heschel. Israel, op. cit., p. 159; Scholem. Shabbtai Zevi, op. cit., I, 7.

27. Wiesel. Gates, op. cit., pp. 32f (h) 42f (p); 22 (h), 43 (p); Legends of Our Time (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968), pp. 59, 85.

28. Sanhedrin 98b.

29. See Ethiopic Enoch 48:6; 39:4, 6a, 7a, 4 Ezra 12:32, 13:26-55; 14:4 and the many sources collected by Judah Even Shmuel Kaufmann. Midreshei Geulah (Hebrew) (Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik, 1955).

30. Pesikta Rabbathi; 36:1; Yalkut Shimoni “Isaiah” #499.

31. Zohar II, 8a.

32. Wiesel. Gates, op. cit., p. 31 (h), 40 (p); see Dawn (New York: Hill and Wang, 1961), p. 95; Accident, op. cit., p. 41; Town, op. cit., p. 32 (h), 37 (p); Legends, op. cit., p. 151; compare H. Leivick. “I am ready every second to go to the Messiah in the desert and free him from the chain.” Contrast Elie Wiesel, The Oath (New York: Random House, 1973), pp. 226-7.

33. Gates, op. cit., p. 18.

34. See the reconstructed tale from its many versions in Abraham Kahana. Maase Norah Al Yoseph de la Reina v'Hamishath Talmeedav (Hebrew) (Tel Aviv).

35. Ibid.

36. Gershom Scholem's analysis of the historicity of the tale in Zion (Hebrew) (old series) V, 124-130; David Kahana, A History of Sabbateans and Hasidim (Hebrew) (Odessa: 1913) I, 49f; see also Abba Hillel Silver. A History of Messianic Speculation in Israel (New York: MacMillan, 1927), p. 148.

37. Jerusalem Talmud, Taanith 1:1.

38. Pesikta Rabbati 44:9, Midrash on Psalms 106:9 and see, for example, Midrash on Psalms 94 and Abraham Heschel. Theology of Ancient Judaism, op. cit., I, 104-6.

39. Hosea 13:13; Sanhedrin 98b.

40. Midrash on Psalms 16:4; Midrash Samuel, chap. 19.

41. Pesikta Rabbati 37; Yalkut Shimoni “Isaiah” #469.

42. Quoted in Saul Lieberman. Shkin (Hebrew) (Jerusalem: Wahrmann, 1970), pp. 58f.

43. Pesikta Rabbati, chap. 36.

44. Zohar II, 212a.

45. Gates, op. cit., p. 144 (h), 197 (p); Accident, p. 49; see Gates, p. 179 (h), 180 (p).

46. Town, op. cit., p. 118 (h), 127 (p).

47. Gates, op. cit., p. 179 (h), 180 (p).

48. Town, op. cit., p. 118 (h), 127 (p).

49. Lamentations Rabbah I, 16, 51; Jerusalem Talmud, Berachoth, chap. 2, 5a; Agadath Bereshith, chap. 67.

50. Midrash on Psalms, 45:3.

51. Souls on Fire, op. cit., p. 166; also Accident, op. cit., p. 42; see Seymour Siegel. “Theological Reflections on the Destruction of European Jewry,” Conservative Judaism, 18:4 (Summer, 1964), p. 9.

52. Waiting is a major theme in Wiesel. For example, in The Gates of the Forest, Gregor waits for Gavriel. In A Beggar in Jerusalem, David waits for Katriel. Both Gavriel and Katriel have the Hebrew word—el—God—in their names. Man waits for God and for the Messiah. Compare Wiesel, The Oath, op. cit., p. 192.

53. Jack Riemer. “Eli Wiesel: Messenger of the Dead,” Torch, Fall, 1967.

54. Night, op. cit., p. 81.

55. Abraham Heschel. The Insecurity of Freedom (New York: Farrar, Strauss, 1966), p. 147, note 5.

56. “In this world, war, suffering, the evil inclination, Satan and the angel of death hold sway.” “Midrash Voyosha,” Beth Midrash ed. Jellinek, part 3, p. 55; “This world is compared to night.” Baba Metzia 83 b, Pesachim 2 b.

57. Gates, op. cit., p. 87.

58. Elie Wiesel, “Jewish Values in a Post-Holocaust Future” Judaism, Summer 1967, p. 299.

59. Elie Wiesel, Jews of Silence (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966), p. 94.

60. Beggar, op. cit., pp. 116ff.

61. Ibid., pp. 53f, see 62f, 111.

62. Elie Wiesel. One Generation After (New York: Avon, 1972), pp. 92-93.