PaRDeS

Four entered  the  Orchard (Pardes): Ben Azzai,   Ben Zoma,  Akher and Rabbi Aqiva. One peeked and   died; one peeked and was smitten; one peeked and   cut down  the shoots;  one ascended  safely  and   descended safely.
Ben  Azzai   peeked  and  died.  Concerning  him   Scripture says:   "Precious  in the  eyes of  he   Lord is  the death  of His  loyal ones" (Ps. 16.   15).
Ben Zoma  peeked and was smitten. Concerning him   Scripture says:  "If you  have found  honey, eat   only your  fill lest   you become filled with it   and vomit" (Prov.  25:16).
Akher  peeked  and   cut  down   the  shoots.   Concerning him  Scripture says: "Do not let your   mouth bring  your flesh  to sin,  and do not say   before   the angel  that it  is  an  error;  why   should God  become angry at your voice, and ruin   your handiwork" (Eccl. 5:5).
Rabbi  Aqiva  ascended  safely  and  descended   safely.   Concerning him  Scripture says:  "Draw   me, let  us run  after you, the King has brought   me into His chambers" (Song I:4).

Baffling, right? During our first study session together one of the fellows described it as a sealed metaphor. This concept let me relax a little; the puzzle solver in me retreated and I learned to take solace in its impenetrability, its mystery, its magic.

But now, as this year’s LABA Fellows program has come to an end, I think I found a way in – to the story, that is, not the pardes. I realized that these four Rabbis were doing the same thing we did all year when they made their way to the orchard. They were also sitting around, reading old texts, discussing their meanings, trying to adapt them to contemporary logic and arguing over their importance or relevance. Their reverence to, or what today would surely be deemed obsession with, words, the word, was their ticket in; the entrance, located in their study hall. I don’t dare equate our group’s communal exegesis with that of the great Talmudic sages, but, still, I think I kind of get it now.

We also felt ourselves get lured by ancient stories, seduced by the words and images, drawn into another realm distinct from the world outside our place of study on 14th St. and 1st Ave. in the East Village. We drank the Kool-Aid and then stretched open our palms to create dance, photography, theater, art, and writing, certain that we were reaching in the right direction.

Below please find contributions from fellows in the US and Israel on the pardes.

Elissa Strauss
Editor

Picnic in the Pardes (Le déjeuner sur l'herbe)

I am preparing a picnic in the pardes
for the four wise rabbis and I
to sit there bare naked and converse about that which is sacred 
while licking raw honey, drinking wine. 
not to provoke their holiness I ask 
but to draw on that which is wholly mine.

With 32 wondrous paths of Wisdom engrave Yah, the Lord of Hosts, [God of Israel, the Living God, King of the Universe, Almighty God, merciful and gracious, High and Exalted, dwelling in eternity, whose name is Holy, and create His universe] with three books, with text (Sepher), with number (Sephar), and with story (Sippur).
Sefer Yetzirah, The Book of Creation, translated by Aryeh Kaplan

These 32 wondrous paths – 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet and 10 basic digits – are my basic tools of learning, life, and creation. The combination of text, numbers (as a category and artistic order), and story set for me the path into the pardes, the orchards of creative thinking. These are the yellow bricks that lead to wonderlands.

On Truth and Hope

There can be only one truth; therefore truth is an absolute thing. As such, it tends to be stiff, cold, and lonely. Furthermore, truth has the depressing habit of becoming the opinion of many. Pretty fast these opinions tend to become a reduced form of truth - a smoke of what once used to be a great fire. We usually name this reduced truth ideology. Due to my background, I dread all forms of ideology.

Art can't be absolute, and therefore has a very weak hold in the realm of truth. Art gains most of its power from our conversations, debates, and arguments, which hold many things but not even one absolute truth. It is for these reasons that Plato declared art as a poor, decaying copy of a perfect, rational, eternal, and changeless original. In short, Plato banded us (artists) from the truth. Artists sacrificed and are still sacrificing truth, probably for all the wrong reasons, but by doing so they allow humanity and human discourse to stand before the truth, and in this new "wrong" order lays, hidden as it should be, hope.

I want to believe that when Kafka said that there is hope* - but not for us; he actually dismisses hope from anyone who deals with absolute truth. That he declared philosophy as not relevant anymore. That he opened a way for us - the wicked others, obsessed and misguided, confused between pagan rituals and self-indulgent love. We, who are so deeply wrong and therefore so vulnerably human. Could we be the missing piece for the so needed human paradigm shift? May we make the shattered mirror of hope reflect again to all humanity? And just like innocent, loving, provincial, and careless Hobbits, could we be the only carriers and destroyers of evil rings? Could we bring back hope to the world? Are we ready for the task?

*"Oh [there is], plenty of hope, an infinite amount of hope - but not for us." - Franz Kafka

Working With the Land

The story of the pardes contains a portal to questions beyond our comprehension.

Questions or experiences of extreme importance appear to be addressed and responded to individually in the pardes. Each Rabbi seem to respond differently to the experience that took place in the pardes, yet we know very little of the events that actually occurred there. It appears as if the experience was so intense that it dramatically affected their lives and was probably too profound to describe in words. The pardes presents a place detached from our reality; a place of extreme unearthly experiences.

The more we read and studied the theme of the pardes, the more parallels I was drawing to the ultimate aspirations in the creation of live performance. The artists involved in the creation of a performance piece attempt to provide a kind of a pardes that will affect its visitors in a manner different from the everyday life experiences. Just like the pardes, the theater (or any designated location for live performance) comprises elements drawn from the reality of our everyday life yet when combined in a specific time, place and plot may carry significant meaning to the viewer. It is also inevitable that each spectator will have different reactions to the experience they would have in a live performance.

So how do we work the land to create some kind of a pardes? We do not know who or how the pardes was created or even if it was a physical space. On one hand it was identified as an orchard, and on the other its effect on its visitors was that of a divine intervention. What is certain is that it held transcending properties.

The creation of a performing art piece calls for many artists to collaborate in its creation. Alternatively it calls for a single artist to wear various hats. Whatever the case may be, the creative process is designed to combine all of the earthly materials and inspirations in order to create a unique individual experience larger than the sum of its stimulators. In a collaborative creative process, I find myself inspired to contribute different elements in an attempt to fertilize an artwork to bloom transcending fruits. The humbleness derived from a collaborative process frees me to believe that my input may become valuable in the creation of an event larger than I may contain as an individual.

Once, the Andalusian ‘Flamenco singer’ Pastora Pavon, La Niña de Los Peines, sombre Spanish genius, equal in power of fancy to Goya or Rafael el Gallo, was singing in a little tavern in Cadiz. She played with her voice of shadows, with her voice of beaten tin, with her mossy voice, she tangled it in her hair, or soaked it in manzanilla or abandoned it to dark distant briars. But, there was nothing there: it was useless. The audience remained silent.

In the room was Ignacio Espeleta, handsome as a Roman tortoise, who was once asked: ‘Why don’t you work?’ and who replied with a smile worthy of Argantonius: ‘How should I work, if I’m from Cadiz?’

In the room was Elvira, fiery aristocrat, whore from Seville, descended in line from Soledad Vargos, who in ’30 didn’t wish to marry with a Rothschild, because he wasn’t her equal in blood. In the room were the Floridas, whom people think are butchers, but who in reality are millennial priests who still sacrifice bulls to Geryon, and in the corner was that formidable breeder of bulls, Don Pablo Murube, with the look of a Cretan mask. Pastora Pavon finished her song in silence. Only, a little man, one of those dancing midgets who leap up suddenly from behind brandy bottles, sarcastically, in a very soft voice, said: ‘Viva, Paris!’ as if to say: ‘Here ability is not important, nor technique, nor skill. What matters here is something other.’

Then La Niña de Los Peines got up like a madwoman, trembling like a medieval mourner, and drank, in one gulp, a huge glass of fiery spirits, and began to sing with a scorched throat, without voice, breath, colour, but…with duende. She managed to tear down the scaffolding of the song, but allow through a furious, burning duende, friend to those winds heavy with sand, that make listeners tear at their clothes with the same rhythm as the Negroes of the Antilles in their rite, huddled before the statue of Santa Bárbara.

La Niña de Los Peines had to tear apart her voice, because she knew experts were listening, who demanded not form but the marrow of form, pure music with a body lean enough to float on air. She had to rob herself of skill and safety: that is to say, banish her Muse, and be helpless, so her duende might come, and deign to struggle with her at close quarters. And how she sang! Her voice no longer at play, her voice a jet of blood, worthy of her pain and her sincerity, opened like a ten-fingered hand as in the feet, nailed there but storm-filled, of a Christ by Juan de Juni.

From "The Duende: Theory and Divertissement" by the immortal Federico Garcia Lorca. The essay is based on a lecture composed and delivered by the poet during his stay in Havana en route from the United States; subsequently repeated in Buenos Aires for the Sociedad Amigos del Arte (1934).

The Hero or the Other

Every story is only as strong as its characters. The story of the pardes is no exception. Yes, in our early study sessions, I enjoyed the imagery of the orchard and paradise, but to me, it’s in the four sages of the story that the mystery truly lies. Why these four? Who is the hero, and who is the villain?

It seemed obvious to me that Akiva was our hero. He ascends into paradise, and then descends safely.  I relate to Akiva - he is the cautious one, the organizer, the rule maker. As the arts administrator of LABA, I too play that role. I ascend and descend into the theater every day, enforce a few rules, and exit - having no need to linger once I have taken my fill. 

But then, last week at LABA we studied Aher (other), also known as Elisha Ben Avuyah. Aher cuts down the shoots and becomes a heretic - he destroys, denounces paradise, and, according to some, Judaism itself. I disliked Aher from the start. Yet as we studied his story last week, I found myself completely captivated by his hopeless search for redemption. I went home and shared his story with my husband and, later that weekend, with friends at a birthday party. I read the text again and again, and I found myself relating to his story. Why the fascination? I suddenly remembered so many times in my life when I felt like “other.” Haven’t we all? Who hasn’t felt the urge to rebel, to question authority, to not accept what we see? 

This year at LABA, each study session grew more intense, and more emotional. I felt more and more affected each month. I am so glad we ended with Aher, when I was open enough to appreciate his story. Sure, there is a lot of Akiva in me. But I am going to remember to embrace my inner Aher, too.

This collaboration was created to serve the 14th  St Y community, particularly the children and families who use the center as a preschool, after-school, and for a variety of classes each day. We set out to create a performance that would highlight our artists' particular talents – theater, dance, puppetry, and interactive media- and take a modern look at the concept of paradise. Using the deceptively nuanced short story "A Fable" by Mark Twain as inspiration we spent many hours adapting this short piece of fiction to the stage while making sense of it’s moral:

You can find in a text whatever you bring,
if you will stand between it and the mirror of your imagination.
You may not see your ears,
but they will be there.

The storyline of the insight gained by four animals looking into a mirror for the first time has subtle similarities to the four rabbis’ visit to Pardes. We, the LABA artists creating this work, found those journeys to be allegories of a universal experience, one of delving into a text and circling back to find oneself.

I worked with the children to make these papier-mâché birds and was so moved by the environment they created, the feeling of being in nature even in this indoor urban venue, that I created an embroidery 'bluebird of happiness'.
For bird installation and embroidery click here.

Toward the Pardes

Stress literally smashed my head to the floor . . . twice! The second time my wife figured we should go to the hospital. Better take a cab to the one on the other side of the park. The one near us was on the news last year: They let a woman fall, have a seizure, and die in the waiting room.

Hours of waiting, then finally put me in a room. 81-year-old roommate groaning like you wouldn’t believe, screeching for help periodically.Nurses very nice, though. $5.50 extra for TV. I don’t do it. Read a bit. Waiting for the next test. I unplug IV tree (it has a battery) and roll it out into the hallway to explore, wearing jeans beneath my gown. Close by, a small room with two couches and an old woman in an easy chair. I ask, "Is this for everyone?" She nods.

Quick to engage, a thick Italian accent, joyous smiling eyes that intermittently show her terror about the bypass tomorrow. morning. We talk and talk and talk about her husband who passed away, her five children, two with great jobs but no husband . . . How they tried to wake her from mourning by traveling all through Italy in ’05, and the trip to Paris and London in ’90. And FOOD!! And how her husband was the kind of guy who would not let anyone pass by the front of their house without inviting them in for coffee.

Then two daughters show up, one having flown in from Tampa.Then another and her husband and their daughter . . . a son, a grandson.The room is full. Every time she speaks, my wife notices, all other conversation stops, not out of the respect gained through fear, but tasty and delicious Italian love. . . .

For me that room was an example of moving toward "the pardes."

Around Town: Welcome to Paradise

Life is all about the journey. After Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden of Eden, they began what could be considered humanity’s first journey, an endless trip to try to get back to pardes. 

A journey can be a physical foray to foreign lands or an inward search for peace and harmony. It can also be a stopover at the American Museum of Natural History, which currently has four special exhibitions that involve different types of journeys. (Even the trip to the museum has its own unique journey, the “For Want of a Nail” display in the 81st St. B/C subway station, depicting the evolution of extinct, existing, and endangered animals on the walls and floor.) 

In the latest space show in the Hayden Planetarium, Whoopi Goldberg narrates Journey to the Stars, a dazzling documentary that takes viewers to the sun and beyond. In “Traveling the Silk Road,” visitors follow the “Ancient Path to the Modern World,” making their way through X’ian, Turfan, Samarkand, and Baghdad.

It’s a much shorter journey through “The Butterfly Conservatory,” where elaborately colored butterflies interact with people, sometimes landing on their head or attaching themselves to clothing. But the life span of these beautiful insects is only two to three weeks, a very short journey indeed. 

Finally, “Lizards & Snakes: Alive!” contains more than five dozen living, squirming creatures, from a red spitting cobra to a Gabon viper, from a rhinoceros iguana to the eastern green mamba. The many snakes in the exhibition hearken back to the one that tricked Eve into partaking of the apple from the Tree of Knowledge, leading to her and Adam’s expulsion from the Garden of Eden – and the never-ending attempt of humankind to return to paradise. 

Mark Rifkin is the managing director of This Week in New York, an arts & entertainment blog that can be found at www.twi-ny.com. 

Photo Caption: A crafty snake -- not necessarily this eastern green mamba, now on view at the American Museum of Natural history -- sent humanity off on its first journey/ Mark Rifkin

When peeking into the PaRDeS intently for the first time in nearly fifteen years, the song Desperados Under the Eaves came to my ears. 

I was sitting in the Hollywood Hawaiian Hotel
I was staring in my empty coffee cup
I was thinking that the gypsy wasn't lyin'
All the salty margaritas in Los Angeles
I'm gonna drink 'em up

And if California slides into the ocean
Like the mystics and statistics say it will
I predict this motel will be standing until I pay my bill

Don't the sun look angry through the trees
Don't the trees look like crucified thieves
Don't you feel like desperados under the eaves
Heaven help the one who leaves

Still waking up in the mornings with shaking hands
And I'm trying to find a girl who understands me
But except in dreams you're never really free
Don't the sun look angry at me

I was sitting in the Hollywood Hawaiian Hotel
I was listening to the air conditioner hum
It went mmmmmm…
Look away down Gower Avenue,
Look away...

Over the last seven months I was puzzled by these words, this tune, and especially what this artist, Warren Zevon, means to the PaRDeS and me – until the story of Ben Zoma explained it:

Our Rabbis taught: Once R. Joshua b. Hanania was standing on a step on the Temple Mount, and Ben Zoma saw him and did not stand up before him. So [R. Joshua] said to him: ‘Whence and whither, Ben Zoma?’ He replied: ‘I was gazing between the upper and the lower waters, and there is only a bare three fingers’ [breadth] between them, for it is said: And the spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters – like a dove which hovers over her young without touching [them].’  Thereupon R. Joshua said to his disciples: ‘Ben Zoma is still outside.’

Read the rest here.

 Sivan is the third of the twelve months of the Jewish calendar. It is the month in which God descended on Mt. Sinai and gave the Torah to the Jewish people. As noted elsewhere, there are only three months that are referred to ordinally in the Torah in conjunction with the exodus from Egypt: Nisan, Iyar, and Sivan.

In the third month of the exodus from Egypt, they came to the Sinai desert.

A recurring theme is that the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai is intrinsically linked with the number 3. For instance, the sages state:

Blessed is the Merciful one who gave a threefold Torah to a threefold 
people, by the third, on the third day, in the third month.

In this quote, God is referred to as the “Merciful one.” God’s attribute of mercy is itself related to the number 3, for it is the third of the seven emotive attributes of the soul (corresponding in Kabbalah to Jacob, the third of the three patriarchs, “the pillar of the Torah”).

Read the rest at www.inner.org/times/sivan/sivan.htm