White Fire

[magid]

There's an exhibit of paintings by R. Ariel Burger at Harvard Hillel through the middle of December, and tonight was the opening, which was celebrated with a beit midrash about integrating creativity and tradition.

We started by looking at a story, told by a grandmother to her granddaughter, and collected by Ansky (an ethnographer who collected stories and songs of Eastern European Jews before WWI) that touched him when he read it.

Once upon a time there was a father and mother who went off to the market, leaving their daughter Soreh-Channeh alone in the house.

Soreh-Channeh swept the floor. Then a raven flew down and caught her up in his bill and carried her to the tip of the church tower.

When her father came home and saw her at the tip of the church tower, he said, "Soreh, dear. Soreh, dear. Come down from the tower."

But she replied,
"No father, no.
You don't know what I want.
The maidens are all married
And I'm still all alone."

Then her mother called up to her, "Soreh, dear. Soreh, dear. Come down from the tower."

But she replied,
"No mother, no.
The maidens are all married
And I'm still all alone."

When night fell, she climbed down from the tip of the church tower and went slowly to her house.

She stood outside her father's window and said, "Father, open up."

"No," he said. "You wouldn't come down from the tower when I asked you."

So she went to her mother's window, but she also said no.

Then to her brother's - again, no.

So she went to her sister's window, and her sister opened the door and let her in and sat her down on the oven and fed her boiled groats with milk, and Soreh-Channeh ate it all and went to sleep at once.

We talked about the central idea of the story, and R. Burger said that for him, the first central idea for him was hospitality.

Which is why we next looked at some traditional texts about hospitality, starting with the linguistically intriguing story in Gen. 18: 1-5 of Avraham's (angelic?) three visitors, which is used as the epitome of hospitality. There was Rashi's comment on 18:1, about looking for guests, then two quotes from Talmud Bavli. The first (Shabbat 127a) discusses how welcoming guests is greater than greeting the Divine, while the second (Pesachim 87b) gave the reason for the exile from Israel as so converts could join them (which (a) seemed not to be so much about hospitality per se, plus (b) weird in that converts are not sought out, plus (c) that whole 'exiled for our own sins' thing).

We used these texts to examine the nature of hospitality, that it is not only going out to welcome guests and providing what they need physically, but giving what they need more deeply (the bread Avraham offers is 'to sustain your hearts'), while also opening onself to new ideas, new thoughts, the possibility of change. Not to mention the whole traditional guest-host obligation.

Next we looked at a parable from Likutei MoHaRaN Tinaya 23, about joy, getting a person who is depressed, outside the joyous dance, into the dance, which will allow him to replace the sadness with joy. It goes on to say that at another level, one can strengthen oneself to pursue the sadness, to bring it in and transform it into joy. We talked about this in relationship to hospitality, and as a psychological paradigm, bringing in and integrating the different parts of one's self. (There was much discussion I'm gliding over, for I did not take notes.)

All this was the preparation for the final set of sources, which were about creativity. The first was also of Rebbe Nachman (Likutei MoHaRaN Tinaya 105), one of his disciples saying that he'd often heard his teacher say that we are called to be creative in Torah, that it is a great tikun (fixing) for the past, and that even one word of innovation is very good.

The second was a prayer (Likutei Tfilos 28) for new true Torah insights, which included language about how it is "forbidden to be a dry branch." The third there wasn't time to go over, but I like it very much (Likutei MoHaRaN 61:5), about how necessary creative insights are, and that the Divine takes delight in their new ideas; not believing in ones ideas leads to strife, which then leads to them returning and valuing those thoughts.

And the last source was from Rav Kook (Orot HaKodesh I: 166ff 172), a mystical paragraph about the soul constantly singing, and how everyone must be ready to hear their soul's words. It goes on to describe how when this deep faith in our own powers works, the world fills with light. Which is to say that the creative is not only necessary to the individual, but is part of making the world a better place.

Then we looked again at the story, reexamining it in light of the sources we'd looked at. And the story seemed transformed, rather. Is this an actual family, or the private and public faces of one? Why do the parents not address their child's concerns? Is the sister the only compassionate one because she is the closest in experience? Is the 'raven' a priest, and her failing to return earlier a choice to remain other? And so on.

And he finished with a blessing for our own creativity (worded much more nicely than that).

I admit, the images he made did not speak to me, but I am glad I got to learn from R. Burger.

After note, which really should be a before note: before the beit midrash started, there was some lovely violin music, which sounded to me like wistful klezmer music. It turned out that the violinist had been improvising based on what the art inspired in her, which is very cool.

Comments

[neorock.livejournal.com]

Hello

I thought of you when I read two things...

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locavore
2. http://marriedwithdinner.com/

(the two are related, as these people are self proclaimed locavores.)

and

3. Shabbat Shalom :-)

[magid.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the links!

And I hope you have a lovely Shabbat too :-)