Many Jews, religiously observant or not, who have spent a Friday night at synagogue for a Shabbat evening service have observed the congregation, at the last verse of the “L’cha Dodi” liturgical song, turn around and ceremoniously bow to greet the Shabbat. Do they ask who composed that hymn, and what is the source of the bowing procedure?
If they did inquire, they would have learned that “L’cha Dodi” was written by Shlomo Halevi Alkabetz, who was born in the Ottoman city of Thessaloniki in the early 16th century. At the age of 30, he moved to Israel and resided in Safed, where he immersed himself in the group of Kabbalists in the town.
His inspiration came from the Talmud’s Tractate Shabbat (119a). It is related that Rabbi Hanina and Rabbi Yannai, who lived in the third century C.E., would dress themselves in clean robes. Facing the setting sun in the West, Hanina would say, “Come, let us go and greet the Sabbath Queen.” Rabbi Yanai would announce, “Enter, O bride! Enter, O bride!”
Following the service, those Jews most probably would have gone home or to a host’s house. At the Shabbat meal, they very well may have sung the “Yah Ribbon Olam” hymn. Its verses were composed by Yisrael Najara. A scion of a Spanish Jewish family, he was born in Damascus in 1550 and, after 1580, moved to Gaza and served as the community’s rabbi, as did his son, Moshe.
The 16th century is but one century of the 18 centuries during which, despite a loss of political and military sovereignty after two revolts against the Roman occupation, Jews sought to return to the Land of Israel from all over areas of dispersion and exile. They came to the Land of Israel, resided there, and created Jewish artifacts and commodities, influenced by the land and its history.
Jews immigrating to Israel is a principled characteristic of the national identity of the Jewish nation. Jews living there are engaged in religious and cultural Jewish and Hebraic activities, in addition to the normal economic, commercial and artistic undertakings that are the most elementary examples of a people.
The Jews desired to go to fulfill the commandments contained in the Torah and explained by the Talmud, and did so throughout the period of exile. As much as permitted by the foreign occupiers, they built houses, purchased land, planted crops, formed a business enterprise, copied religious scrolls, sat and learned the holy writs, and communicated with their fellow Jews in Europe, Asia, Africa and other far-flung locations.
Their identity as Jews centered on the accomplishments of their peoplehood generated by their beliefs, language, literature and acknowledgement that their homeland is Eretz Yisrael. Their rabbinic literature never ignored the commandments connected to the land, as well as the obligation to ascend to it and live in it. The land was at the Jews’ core, and Jews knew that they would return. It was all a question of how—by Messiah or by human effort, by a Shabtai Zvi in Turkey in 1648 or a Menachem Mendel in Vitebsk in 1777.
With the development of the idea of secularism among Jews, the Return to Zion became an undesired goal. The Enlightenment further eroded the national underpinnings of the Jews’ identity. The appearance of Reform Judaism further denied Judaism’s national element as in 1869, when Chicago Rabbi Bernhard Felsenthal protested schemes to resettle the Land of Israel and supported the resolution of the Philadelphia Conference of Reform Rabbis, which declared: “The Messianic goal of Israel is not the restoration of the old Jewish state under a descendant of David, involving a second separation from the nations of the earth, but the union of all men as the children of God.”
Not unremarkably (as we are dealing with Jews), in 1907, that same Rabbi Felsenthal expressed his conviction that “Zionism alone will be the savior of our nation and its religion, and save it from death and disappearance.” At that same time, prominent Chassidic rebbes and other traditionalists saw in the recently established Zionist organization a threat to the spiritual and religious aspects of Judaism, leading to what could be referred to as the Satmar/Neturei Karta version of anti-Zionism. Even the American Council for Judaism is making a comeback, as is the Bundist version.
Despite the prominence they receive—whether on the opinion pages of The New York Times, electronic and digital-media platforms, or the assistance they receive from Hollywood stars and academic self-professed experts—they are a minority among the Jewish people. Unfortunately, their behavior is tyrannical. But like others before them, their influence will wane, and they will fade away.