1930 Jewish HAND SIGNED Bezalel ABEL PANN Bible LITHOGRAPH Judaica ISRAEL Hebrew 1 of 3Only 1 left1930 Jewish HAND SIGNED Bezalel ABEL PANN Bible LITHOGRAPH Judaica ISRAEL Hebrew 2 2 of 31930 Jewish HAND SIGNED Bezalel ABEL PANN Bible LITHOGRAPH Judaica ISRAEL Hebrew 3 3 of 3 See More
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1930 Jewish HAND SIGNED Bezalel ABEL PANN Bible LITHOGRAPH Judaica ISRAEL Hebrew

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Seller: judaica-bookstore ✉️ (2,810) 100%, Location: TEL AVIV, IL, Ships to: WORLDWIDE, Item: 285680284466 1930 Jewish HAND SIGNED Bezalel ABEL PANN Bible LITHOGRAPH Judaica ISRAEL Hebrew.   DESCRIPTION :  Here for sale is a an ORIGINAL HAND SIGNED ( With pencil ) LITHOGRAPH of exquisite BEAUTY and ARTISTIC IMPORTANCE . The ORIGINAL LITHOGRAPH was created and HAND SIGNED by the BEZALEL ARTIST , The legendary painter , Bible interpreter ABEL PANN. The ORIGINAL LITHOGRAPH is SIGNED TWICE - It is HAND SIGNED with PENCIL "ABEL PANN" and also SIGNED IN THE PLATE by Pann. Kindly note that most PANN lithographs in the market are signed only in the plate - This LITHOGRAPH is personaly HAND SIGNED by PANN with PENCIL. The LITHOGRAPH was published around 80 years ago ( Ca 1930's ) in Eretz Israel ( Then also refered to as Palestine ) as a part of a cycle of BIBLICAL SCENES and HEROES . It depicts the Biblical image of BILHAH and ZILPAH from the Biblical book of GENESIS . The LITHOGRAPH is of EXQUISITE BEAUTY .  Biblical quotations/Captures in Hebrew and English , Being quotes from the Biblical book of GENESIS .  Sheet size around 16" x 11.5". Very good condition  . Very slight foxing of lower margins. ( Pls look at scan for accurate AS IS images ) . Will be sent inside a protective rigid packaging .   AUTHENTICITY : This is a ca 1930's ORIGINAL HAND SIGNED LITHOGRAPH  , Not a recent reproduction , It holds a life long GUARANTEE for its AUTHENTICITY and ORIGINALITY.   PAYMENTS : Payment method accepted : Paypal & All credit cards . SHIPPMENT : SHIPP worldwide via registered airmail is $  29.  Will be sent inside a protective rigid packaging .  Handling around 5-10 days after payment.  Abel Pann (1883–1963), born Abba Pfeffermann in Latvia[1] or in Kreslawka, Vitebsk, Belarus,[2] sources vary, was a European Jewish artist who spent most of his adult life in Jerusalem.Early career and war paintingsPann studied the fundamentals of drawing for three months with the painter Yehuda Pen of Vitebsk, who also taught Marc Chagall.[1] In his youth, he traveled in Russia and Poland, earning a living mainly as an apprentice in sign workshops.[1] In 1898 he went south to Odessa where he was accepted into the Academy of Fine Arts.[1] In 1903, he was in Kishinev where he documented the Kishinev pogrom with drawings; an effort that is thought to have contributed to his self-definition as an artist who chronicles Jewish history.[1] Still in 1903, he moved to Paris, where he rented rooms in La Ruche, a Parisian building (which still exists) where Modigliani, Chagall, Chaim Soutine and other Jewish artists also lived.[1] Pann studied at the French Academy under William-Adolphe Bouguereau.[3] He earned his living primarily by drawing pictures for the popular illustrated newspapers of the era.[1] In 1912, Boris Schatz, founder and director of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design visited Pann in Paris and invited him to come work in Jerusalem.[1][2]In 1913, after traveling in Southern Europe and Egypt, Pann arrived in Jerusalem where he had decided to settle for life.[1][3] Pann went to see Schatz and it was decided that he would head the painting department at the Bezalel Academy for several months while Schatz embarked on an extensive overseas fund-raising trip.[1] According to Haaretz art critic Smadar Sheffi, a work form this period with the simple title "Jerusalem" shows a cluster of buildings at sunset "with a sky in blazing orange." The painting is "more expressive and abstract that is typical of his work," and Sheffi speculates that "the encounter with the city" of Jerusalem was a "strong emotional experience" for the artist.[1]Pann returned to Europe to arrange his affairs before moving permanently to the British Mandate of Palestine, but was caught on the continent by World War I.[1] Pann's wartime paintings would prove to be among "the most important" of his career.[1] He made many posters to support the French war effort.[1] He also made a series of fifty drawings showing the extreme suffering of Jewish communities caught in the fighting between Germany, Poland and Russia.[1] Art critic Smadar Sheffi regards them as "the most important part of his oeuvre."[1] These "shocking" drawings put modern viewers in mind of depictions of the Holocaust.[1] Pann's drawings were intended as journalistic documentation of the fighting and were successfully exhibited in the United States during the War.[1] According to Pann's autobiography, the Russians, who were allied with the French, refused to allow a wartime exhibition of the drawings in France.[1] According to the New York Times, the drawings were published in Paris during the war, but the government intervened ot block their distribution on the grounds that they "reflected damagingly upon an ally" (Russia).[4]Mid-career and Bible paintingsUpon his post-war return to Jerusalem in 1920, Pann took up a teaching position at the Bezalel Academy and wrote that he was about to embark on his life-work, the painting and drawing of scenes from the Hebrew Bible.[2] He returned briefly to Vienna where he met and married Esther Nussbaum and purchased a lithographic press, which the couple brought home to Jerusalem.[2] Pann began work on a series of lithographs intended to be published in an enormous illustrated Bible, and although that series was never completed, he is widely admired for the series of pastels inspired by Bible stories that he began in the 1940s.[2] The iconography of these works is linked to the 19th century orientalism.[1] He was part of a movement of contemporary Jewish artists interested in Biblical scenes, including Ephraim Moses Lilien, and Ze'ev Raban.[1] All three were influenced by Art Nouveau and by the Symbolist movement.[1] This influence can be seen in "You shall not surely die," a colored lithograph in which the serpent is represented as a bare-chested woman.[1] The lithograph is reminiscent of the style of Aubrey Beardsley.[1]In 1924, Pann resigned from his teaching position to devote himself full-time to lithography.[2] The lithographs met with considerable success on international tours.[4] Pann told the New York Times that he found most illustrated Bibles boring, accusing the many artists who had illustrated Bibles before him of tending "to produce an impression that the Bible itself is a tiresome volume."[5] He said that he wished to present the Bible's characters as "possessing the passions of human beings... with their virtues and vices, loves and hatreds."[5]Especially in his pastels, Pann envisioned Rachel, Rebekah, and other Biblical women as child-brides and imagined the teen-aged Jewish girls from Yemen whom he used as models along with young Bedouin girls, regarding both Yemenites and Bedouins as authentic oriental types.[2] He posed them in elaborate traditional wedding and festival clothing and jewelry.[2] In the twenties, the period when Pann was painting them, Yemenite and Bedouin girls did marry at the age of puberty.[2] He often captured not only their youth and beauty, but the anxiety of a young girl about to marry a man she might hardly know.[2] Other pastels capture the elderly matriarch Sarah looking "absolutely alive" and the care-worn facts of Jerusalem's Yemenite Jewish laborers, posed as Biblical patriarchs.[2]Pann's work reveals an intimate familiarity with the work of Rembrandt, James Tissot, and other European painters of biblical scenes.[2][4] Among his most original approaches was a pastel of Potiphar's wife. This familiar theme had for hundreds of years and in the hands of innumerable artists conventionally depicted a mature beauty seducing an innocent youth, Joseph. According to art critic Meir Ronnen, Pann's interpretation, a late period pastel dating from the 1950s, depicts Potiphar's wife as a spoilt child, an extremely young and very bored girl who is "possibly just one of the lesser playthings of a gubernatorial harem." She turns her bored gaze on the young Israelite. Ronen considers her to be "the most brilliant of all Pann's creations."[2]Pann's youngest son was killed in the Israeli War of Independence. After that loss, he turned to painting scenes of the Holocaust.[2] He died in Jerusalem in 1963.[2]For many years, Pann was considered an important artist in Israel, and had even greater success among Jewish art consumers abroad, but he "outlived his artistic times," fading in importance beside the new, modernist painters.[1][2] Although many of his paintings are in museum collections, private collectors can sometimes find them at galleries such as the Mayanot Gallery.[3] In 1990 art curator and Israeli art historian, Shlomit Steinberg submitted an MA thesis at the History of Art department of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, titled: "The Image of the Biblical Woman as Femme Fatale in Abel Pann's Works".ExhibitionsAbel Pann Paints the Bible, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem. Curator: Yigal Zalmona. (2003)[1]"Abel Pann - The painter of The Bible, Catalogue by Shlomit Steinberg and Felix Salten, The Jewish Museum, Vienn (2001).[6]Abel Pann, Mayanot Gallery, Jerusalem. (1987)[6]Paintings, Drawings, and Lithograph by Abel Pann," Art Institute of Chicago, (1920) [7]Books and articlesShlomit Steinberg (1991) 'The Image of the Biblical Woman as Femme Fatale in Abel Pann Works' (Jerusalem): MA Thesis, The Hebrew University Yigal Zalmona (2003), The art of Abel Pann: from Montparnasse to the Bible, Jerusalem: The Israeli Museum. Abel Pann (1883-1963), born in Latvia, was one of the pioneers of Israeli art. As a young child, he studied painting and later, traveled around Russia. At the age of 20 he moved to Paris, where he studied art. During this period, his humorous caricatures were published in many French newspapers. In 1921 Pann arrived to Israel and joined the teaching staff at the Bezalel academy of arts, after being invited by its founder, Boris Schatz. Pann is best known for his biblical paintings which depict the characters of the bible as exotic figures with authentic oriental appearance. Pann believed that in order to achieve a genuine impact, the Bible series should only be painted in Israel. Abel Pann's work influenced many Israeli artists in the 1920's and 1930's, who perceived the oriental style as having a social and political mission. Abel Pann: A prominent and influential member of the first generation of Israeli artists, Abel Pann first studied art techniques in Vitebsk, under Yehuda Pen. He then travelled within Russia and Poland, earning a living mostly as a sign painter. In 1898 Abel Pann enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts, Odessa. Five years later he visited Kishinev and chronicled the impoverished living conditions of the pogrom residents there. This would form the genesis of the drawings and lithographs he made during World War One concerning the extreme sufferings of those living in the Russian pogroms. Pann was in Paris during the war and intended to publish his lithographs of the Russian pogroms under the title, Road of Tears; however, the Russian Minister in Paris convinced French officials to forbid its publication. Abel Pann first moved to Paris in 1903, renting rooms in a building which was called, 'La Ruche' ('The Hive'). Other occupants there included Marc Chagall, Chaim Soutine and Amedeo Modigliani. Pann enrolled at the Academie des Beaux-Arts to study painting under Bourguereau. At the same time he began illustrating for journals and newspapers. By 1912 Abel Pann had established enough recognition for his art that Boris Schatz, the founder and first director of the Bezalel Academy of Arts, invited him to work in Jerusalem. Pann visited the city in the following year and decided to make it his permanent home. He returned to Paris to settle his affairs but was forced to stay there due to the outbreak of the First World War (1914-1918). At this time he created posters and prints for the Allied Cause, as well as the suppressed Road of Tears portfolio of lithographs. Pann permanently settled in Jerusalem in 1920. In this year his paintings, drawings and lithographs were the subject of a large exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago. Consequently in the following years there were many American collectors of his art. Abel Pann took a teaching post at the Bezalel Academy and imported a lithographic press from Vienna, which was the first in Jerusalem. He began working almost immediately on the lithographs for The Bible (1924) and The Five Books of Moses (1930), and dedicated most of his efforts to these lithographic portfolios during the decade. In fact he resigned from his teaching post at the Academy in 1924 to devote all his energies to the Biblical lithographs. Abel Pann's later years saw their share of misfortunes. As the decade of the Depression took its toll, customers, both at home and abroad, for his lithographs and paintings diminished. As well, the twentieth century taste for abstraction and other avante guarde movements slotted his representational style as archaic. Pann lost a son in the Israeli War of Independence and dedicated his final years mostly to paintings images relating to the Holocaust. Today the fine art of Abel Pann is included in the permanent collections of the Hecht Museum, University of Haifa, Haifa Museum of Art, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Jewish Museum, Prague, Duke University Library, and the Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, Texas. ABEL PANN Abel Pann was born in Lithouania. He began his artistic studies in Odessa and continued them in Paris. A number of his pictures have been acquired by the French Government, by the Municipality of Paris, by the Museum of Luzembourg and by the Art Institute of Chicago and a series of 45 pictures has been purchased in America for the National Museum of Jerusalem. The Palestine Art Publishing Co. Ltd Jerusalem Abel Pann wrote: The task I have set myself involves a serious responsibility. The enthusiasm which my work arouses in me is often clouded by painful doubts and questionings. For that same Book which has inspired many a genius to produce his masterpiece has proved to be beyond the reach of a far greater number of artists. A son of the race which produced this marvelous Book. I feel that I, better than some others, may be able to seize its true spirit, and to communicate it to my fellow-men. But the absolute truth is with G-d alone. Mankind is ever the subject to error. And so I entreat the indulgence of my judges. The term Bezalel school describes a group of artists who worked in Israel in the late Ottoman and British Mandate periods. It is named after the institution where they were employed, the Bezalel Academy, predecessor of today’s Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, and has been described as "a fusion of ‘oriental' art and Jugendstil." The Academy was led by Boris Schatz, who left his position as head of the Royal Academy of Arts in Sofia, Bulgaria, to make aliyah 1906 and set up an academy for Jewish arts. All of the members of the school were Zionist immigrants from Europe and the Middle East, with all the psychological and social upheaval that this implies. The school developed a distinctive style, in which artists portrayed both Biblical and Zionist subjects in a style influenced by the European jugendstil ( or art nouveau) movement, by symbolism, and by traditional Persian and Syrian artistry. Like the British Arts and Crafts Movement, Wiener Werkstätte in Vienna, William Morris firm in England, and Tiffany Studios in New York, the Bezalel School produced decorative art objects in a wide range of media: silver, leather, wood, brass and fabric. While the artists and designers were European-trained, the craftsmen who executed the works were often members of the Yemenite community, which has a long tradition of craftsanship in precious metals, and began to make aliyah about 1880. Yemenite immigrants with their colorful traditional costumes were also frequent subjects of Bezalel School artists.Leading members of the school were Boris Schatz, E.M. Lilien,Ya'akov Stark, Meir Gur Arie, Ze'ev Raban, Jacob Eisenberg, Jacob Steinhardt, and Hermann Struck.The artists produced not only paintings and etchings, but objects that might be sold as Judiaca or souvenirs. In 1915, the New York Times praised the “Exquisite examples of filigree work, copper inlay, carving in and in wood,” in a touring exhibit. In the metalwork Moorish patterns predominated, and the damascene work, in particular, showed both artistic feeling and skill in execution . Bezalel Academy of Art and Design is Israel's national school of art. It is named after the Biblical figure Bezalel, son of Uri (Hebrew: ), who was appointed by Moses to oversee the design and construction of the Tabernacle (Exodus 35:30).It is located on Mount Scopus in Jerusalem and has 1,500 students registered in programs such as: Fine Arts, Architecture, Ceramic Design, Industrial Design, Jewelry, Photography, Visual Communication, Animation, Film, and Art History & Theory. Bezalel offers Bachelor of Fine Arts (B.F.A.), Bachelor of Architecture (B.Arch.), Bachelor of Design (B.Des.) degrees, a Master of Fine Arts in conjunction with Hebrew University, and two different Master of design (M.des) degree. The academy was founded in 1903 by Boris Schatz, and opened in 1906, but was cut off from its supporters in Europe by World War I, and closed due to financial difficulties in 1929. The academy was named "Bezalel" (Hebrew: "in God's shadow") as an illustration of God's creativity being channeled to a man of flesh and blood, providing the source of inspiration to Bezalel ben Uri in the construction of the holy ark.Many early Zionists, including Theodor Herzl, felt that Israel needed to have a national style of art combining Jewish, Middle Eastern, and European traditions. The teachers at the academy developed a distinctive school (or style) of art, known as the Bezalel school, in which artists portrayed both Biblical and Zionist subjects in a style influenced by the European jugendstil (art nouveau) and by traditional Persian and Syrian styles.Like the Wiener Werkstätte in Vienna, William Morris firm in England, and Tiffany Studios in New York, the Bezalel School produced decorative art objects in a wide range of media: silver, leather, wood, brass and fabric. While the artists and designers were European-trained, the craftsmen who executed the works were often members of the Yemenite community, which has a long tradition of craftsanship in precious metals, and whose members had been making aliyah in small groups at least form the beginning of the nineteenth century, forming a distinctive Yeminite community in Jerusalem. Silver and goldsmithing, occupations forbidden to pious Muslims, had been traditional Jewish occupations in Yemen. Yemenite immigrants with their colorful traditional costumes were also frequent subjects of Bezalel school artists.Leading artists of the school include Meir Gur Aryeh, Ze'ev Raban, Boris Schatz, Jacob Eisenberg, Jacob Steinhardt, and Hermann Struck. The School folded because of economic difficulties. It was reopened as the New Bezalel School for Arts and Crafts in 1935, attracting many of its teachers and students from Germany many of them from the Bauhaus school which had been shut down by the Nazis. In 1969 it was converted into a state-supported institution and took its current name. It completed its relocation to the current campus in 1990. In the Book of Genesis, Zilpah (Hebrew: זִלְפָּה‎ Zīlpā, meaning uncertain)[1] was Leah's handmaid, presumed slave,[2] whom Leah gave to Jacob like a wife to bear him children (Genesis 30:9). Zilpah gave birth to two sons, whom Leah claimed as her own and named Gad and Asher (Genesis 30:10–13). Zilpah is given to Leah as a handmaid by Leah's father, Laban, upon Leah's marriage to Jacob (see Genesis 29:24, 46:18). According to the early rabbinical commentary Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer, Zilpah and Bilhah, the handmaids of Leah and Rachel, respectively, were actually younger daughters of Laban.[3] Zilpah also figures in the competition between Jacob's wives to bear him sons. Leah stops conceiving after the birth of her fourth son, at which point [4] Rachel, who had not yet borne children, offers her handmaid, Bilhah, to Jacob like a wife in order to have children through her. When Bilhah conceives two sons, Leah takes up the same idea and presents Zilpah to Jacob so she can have children through her. Leah names the two sons of Zilpah and is directly involved in their upbringing. According to Rashi, an 11th-century commentator, Zilpah was younger than Bilhah, and Laban's decision to give her to Leah was part of the deception he used to trick Jacob into marrying Leah, who was older than Rachel. The morning after the wedding, Laban explained to Jacob, "This is not done in our place, to give the younger before the older" (Genesis 29:26). But at night, to mask the deception, Laban gave the veiled bride the younger of the handmaids, so Jacob would think that he was really marrying Rachel, the younger of the sisters.[5] In Jewish tradition, Zilpah is believed to be buried in the Tomb of the Matriarchs in Tiberias.   ****** Bilhah (בִּלְהָה‎ "unworried", Standard Hebrew: Bīlha, Tiberian Hebrew: Bīlhā) is a woman mentioned in the Book of Genesis.[1] Genesis 29:29 describes her as Laban's handmaid, who was given to Rachel to be her handmaid on Rachel's marriage to Jacob. When Rachel failed to have children, Rachel gave Bilhah to Jacob like a wife to bear him children.[2] Bilhah gave birth to two sons, whom Rachel claimed as her own and named Dan and Naphtali.[3] Genesis 35:22 expressly calls Bilhah Jacob's concubine, a pilegesh. When Leah saw that she had stopped having children, she took her servant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob like a wife to bear him children as well. The apocryphal Testament of Naftali says that Bilhah and Zilpah's father was named Rotheus.[4] He was taken into captivity but redeemed by Laban, Rachel and Leah's father. Laban gave Rotheus a wife named Euna, who was the girl's mother.[5] On the other hand, the early rabbinical commentary Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer and other Rabbinic sources (Midrash Rabbah, and elsewhere) state that Bilhah and Zilpah were also Laban's daughters, through his concubines, which would make them half-sisters to Rachel and Leah.[6][7][8] Bilhah is said to be buried in the Tomb of the Matriarchs in Tiberias. In the Book of Chronicles, Shimei's brothers were said to have lived in a town called Bilhah and surrounding territories prior to the reign of David.[9] Reuben's adultery with Bilhah[edit] Reuben was Jacob's (Israel) eldest son with Leah. Genesis 35:22 says, "And it came to pass, while Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father's concubine; and Israel heard of it."[10] As a result of this adultery, he lost the respect of his father, who said: "Unstable as water, have not thou the excellency; because thou wentest up to thy father's bed; then defiledst thou it—he went up to my couch."[11] Some rabbinical commentators interpreted the story differently, saying that Reuben's disruption of Bilhah's and Jacob's beds was not through sex with Bilhah. As long as Rachel was alive, say these commentators, Jacob kept his bed in her tent and visited the other wives in theirs. When Rachel died, Jacob moved his bed into the tent of Bilhah, who had been mentored by Rachel, to retain a closeness to his favourite wife. However, Reuben, Leah's eldest, felt that this move slighted his mother, who was also a primary wife, and so he moved Jacob's bed into his mother's tent and removed or overturned Bilhah's. This invasion of Jacob's privacy was viewed so gravely that the Bible equates it with adultery, and lost Reuben his first-born right to a double inheritance.[12][13] In popular culture[edit] In the novels The Red Tent by Anita Diamant and Rachel and Leah by Orson Scott Card, Bilhah and Zilpah are half-sisters of Leah and Rachel by different mothers, following the Talmudic tradition. In Margaret Atwood's speculative fiction novel The Handmaid's Tale, the theocratic society depicted cites the relationship between Bilhah, Rachel and Jacob as the basis for role of handmaids as surrogates to high-ranking men and their infertile wives.[14] *****  Claiming Bilhah and Zilpah October 27, 2017   Josephine Rosman JEWISH WOMEN, AMPLIFIED  Blog Home  Rising Voices  Book Club  From the Archive  Recipes  About LISTEN TO OUR PODCAST Can We Talk? 2021-22 Season Wrap YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE Food for Thought What I Would Have Said When Brontë Gave Me Wings JEWISH WOMEN, AMPLIFIED Blog Home Rising Voices Book Club From the Archive Recipes About Biblical family tree showing Jacob's line One afternoon when I was in the 7th grade, my Hebrew tutor, Sarah, was wearing a shirt that read: “Sarah & Rebecca & Rachel & Leah & Bilhah & Zilpah.” The first four names, the names of the matriarchs, were familiar to me. I had heard these names for as long as I could remember at temple, but I had never heard the last two names before. When I asked Sarah who they were, I didn’t know that her answer would be my introduction to the intersection between Judaism and feminism, and would influence how I thought about my role in relation to both.  Sarah explained to me that Bilhah and Zilpah were handmaidens of Rachel and Leah who were given to the sisters by their father. Bilhah and Zilpah gave birth to four sons—Naphtali, Dan, Asher, and Gad—fathered by Jacob, who became the heads of four of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. Bilhah and Zilpah were slaves, not wives of a patriarch, but their descendants eventually became the Jewish people. For this reason, some modern Jewish feminists have reclaimed Bilhah and Zilpah as matriarchs. Subscribe to Jewish Women, Amplified and get blog updates in your inbox.   For me, this was a revelation. I have long identified as a feminist and have always been interested in Judaism, but before this, I had never really considered how the two could overlap. At first, it almost seemed wrong for feminists to make their own assertions about thousand-year-old practices, but then I thought more about the fact that the Torah was written by men, which meant our most important text was biased from inception. I thought about how there are two versions of the Amidah in some prayer books, one including the first four matriarchs’ names, and one without them. Obviously, at some point, some Jews decided that the matriarchs needed to be acknowledged in prayer. We could continue this tradition by claiming Bilhah and Zilpah as matriarchs. We could defy the patriarchal constraints of the Torah, and highlight significant women regardless of their status. Coming to this realization was inspiring, but it also reminded me of the upsetting reality of the patriarchal nature of Judaism. I had always thought of Jewish spaces as empowering ones; most of the people who bolstered my Jewish education were women, including my rabbi. For me, synagogue was always the place where everyone was truly equal, because my community made such an effort to be inclusive and accepting. Gender was never an issue. Reflecting on this, I now recognize that it was Jewish feminists who have made Judaism more equal for me. It’s my job, as a woman and as a feminist, to continue to integrate feminism into Judaism. As time has passed, I’ve learned about other people who’ve successfully integrated feminism into their Judaism, the way I want to. I learned that Miriam hadn’t always been recognized at our Passover seders. I learned that there weren’t always the more progressive Jewish sects that allow women to wear tallises or kippas or to become rabbis. I came to realize that being a Jewish feminist means elevating women, those from our sacred texts who have been forgotten like Bilhah and Zilpah, and Jewish women today. Now, I try to keep Bilhah and Zilpah in mind in my daily life. To me, they are emblematic of all the women who have been left out of and left behind by history. This pushes me to actively seek out women who have been overlooked by our tradition, whether from the Torah or from more recent history. And my goal, at least for now, is to continue the act of reclaiming these women, and making them known.   **** Traditional Understanding of the Story The twelve tribes of Israel were conceived by four women. Two of them, Rachel and Leah, are lionized in history as the matriarchs of our people. Lesser known are the other two, Bilhah and Zilpah, mothers to Dan, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher. Bilhah and Zilpah were originally Rachel and Leah’s handmaids, but when Rachel and Leah struggled to conceive, they proposed that Jacob marry and have children with their handmaids. Who Were They? In Biblical times, men often had many wives. Sometimes, the wives were of different social castes and would retain that social status after marriage. The woman of the higher caste was considered the man’s primary wife and her children received preferential treatment. When a man married into the slave’s caste, on the other hand, the children of their union usually remained slaves. Social anthropologists have coined a rarely used term to describe the practice of a man marrying women from both higher and inferior castes: polycoity. Our tradition tells us that Laban also had at least two wives. Most traditions assert that Laban’s second, inferior wife was a concubine, while others posit that she was actually his maidservant. Leah and Rachel were sisters born of Laban’s primary wife, and Bilhah and Zilpah were daughters of his second wife, making Bilhah and Zilpah the half-sisters of Rachel and Leah. Before they married, ****  Who Were Bilhah and Zilpah? By Leibel Gniwisch The twelve tribes of Israel were conceived by four women. Two of them, Rachel and Leah, are lionized in history as the matriarchs of our people. They are so well known that in the list of the most popular American girls’ names, Rachel and Leah rank 235 and 61 respectively.1 Lesser known are the other two, Bilhah and Zilpah, mothers to Dan, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher.2 Bilhah and Zilpah were originally Rachel and Leah’s handmaids, but when Rachel and Leah struggled to conceive, they proposed that Jacob marry and have children with their handmaids. Why Aren't Bilhah and Zilpah Jewish Matriarchs? In this article: Who Were They, Anyway? Jacob Marries the Maidservants Reuben and Bilhah How Could Jacob Marry Two Sisters? Who Were They, Anyway? In Biblical times, men often had many wives. Sometimes, the wives were of different social castes and would retain that social status after marriage. The woman of the higher caste was considered the man’s primary wife and her children received preferential treatment. When a man married into the slave’s caste, on the other hand, the children of their union usually remained slaves. Social anthropologists have coined a rarely used term to describe the practice of a man marrying women from both higher and inferior castes: polycoity. Our tradition tells us that Laban also had (at least3) two wives.4 Most traditions5 assert that Laban’s second, inferior wife was a concubine, while others6 posit that she was actually his maidservant. Leah and Rachel were sisters born of Laban’s primary wife, and Bilhah and Zilpah were daughters of his second wife, making Bilhah and Zilpah the half-sisters of Rachel and Leah. Before they married, Laban gifted Bilhah and Zilpah to Leah and Rachel as handmaidens (in Hebrew amah or shifchah).7 Bilhah means “to become alarmed” (lehibahel). Bilhah was named so because of her stunning beauty.8 Zilpah means “to flow” (lezalef). This name proved to be prophetic, as when Zilpah was told—as a young girl—that she was destined to join Leah in her marriage to the evil Esau,9 tears would flow down her face.10 Vayeitzei in a Nutshell Jacob Marries the Maidservants One could assume that a young bride would be opposed to having her husband marry her maid. What events led Jacob’s wives to offer their handmaids to him in marriage? At the beginning of her marriage, Rachel could not conceive despite her desire to have Jacob’s children and be part of the future he was trying to build.11 The pain of her childlessness was exacerbated when she watched her sister, Leah, birth not one but four children one after the other. Rachel became jealous of her sister. Besides envying the children she had begotten,12 Rachel attributed Leah’s fertility to her righteousness, and envied the good deeds Leah must have done to merit offspring.13 “Give me children, Jacob!” she cried to her husband. “If not, I am as good as dead!”14 Rachel was so stricken that she thought she would die from grief.15 Mirroring her grandmother Sarah who gave Abraham her maidservant Hagar, Rachel hoped that she would merit to have children if she did the same.16 At the very least, Rachel hoped to help raise Bilhah’s children as her own, mitigating some of the pain she was experiencing.17 Thus, Rachel set Bilhah free and Jacob married her.18 In time, Bilhah bore two children and Rachel named them Dan (“judgment,”) and Naphtali (“contest” or “prayer”19).20 After Leah saw Rachel’s partial success, Nachmanides relates, she too desired more children. Rachel and Leah were prophetesses and knew that Jacob was only destined to have twelve sons. To ensure that the majority of those boys would be borne by her or her handmaid, even though she already had four children at the time (Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah), Leah offered Zilpah to Jacob in marriage. It appears that she made the offer half-heartedly, almost hoping he would refuse.21 Zilpah gave birth to two children, and Leah named them Gad (“good luck”) and Asher (“fortune”).22 Rachel eventually gave birth to two sons, Joseph and Benjamin. After her premature passing, Bilhah raised Rachel’s children as her own.23 Why Does Torah Law Allow Polygamy? Reuben and Bilhah In Talmudic times, the Torah was read in Hebrew and then in the colloquial Aramaic so that the congregation could understand what was being said. The reader chanted a verse in Hebrew and the meturgeman (translator) would repeat it in Aramaic.24 The Mishnah25 lists four Biblical stories that should not be translated lest they be misinterpreted by the unlearned.26 One of them is the story of Reuben and Bilhah. The verse27 simply states, “And it came to pass when Israel sojourned in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah, his father's concubine, and Israel heard [of it], and so, the sons of Jacob were twelve.” While one Talmudic tradition interprets the verse literally, the majority do not, prompting the Talmudic dictum, “Anyone who says that Reuben sinned [with Bilhah] is nothing other than mistaken, as it is stated: ‘Now the sons of Jacob were twelve.’ This teaches that all of the brothers were equal [in righteousness].”28 So what does the verse mean? The Talmud (quoted in Rashi29) explains that Reuben moved Jacob’s bed from Bilhah’s tent to the tent of his mother, Leah. Reuben knew that Jacob loved Rachel more than his mother,30 and that it was she who Jacob desired to marry at the outset. Indeed, Jacob kept his marriage bed in Rachel’s tent for the duration of her life. After Rachel’s passing, Reuben assumed that Jacob would move into Leah’s tent. In his mind, Bilhah and Zilpah were inferior to Rachel and Leah, their former masters. When Jacob chose to move into Bilhah’s tent instead, he felt righteous indignation. “If my mother’s sister was my mother’s rival, should my mother’s sister’s handmaid be her rival as well?” He took Jacob’s bed and moved it to Leah’s tent.31 Years later, when Jacob blessed his children before his passing, he chastised Reuben for this act. “[You have] the restlessness of water; [therefore,] you shall not have superiority, for you ascended upon your father's couch; then you profaned [Him Who] ascended upon my bed.”32 Jacob punished Reuben for his disrespectful act by declining to give him the usual firstborn rights.33 The Book of Chronicles records, “For he [Reuben] was the firstborn, but when he defiled his father's bed, his birthright was given to the sons of Joseph the son of Israel.”34 Joseph’s two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, became two separate tribes, mirroring the double inheritance given to firstborn children. How Could Jacob Marry Two Sisters? The Talmud tells us that Abraham fulfilled the entire Torah before it was given.35 Presumably, Abraham taught his descendants to observe the commandments as well.36 Indeed, the Midrash records that Jacob kept Shabbat,37 and Rashi quotes Jacob in conversation with Esau, “I have lived (גרתי) with Laban and kept all of the 613 (תריג) commandments.”38 Knowing this, commentators throughout the ages have grappled with instances where it seems that the patriarchs neglected to observe a particular commandment, including Jacob’s marriage to two sisters despite the Biblical prohibition:39 “And you shall not take a woman with her sister [in marriage] as rivals.” Many explanations have been given to solve this contradiction. Here are a few: Nachmanides answers that the patriarchs only kept the law when they resided in Israel. Outside the Holy Land, they kept only the moral laws incumbent on all of humanity, and that code permits marrying sisters.40 Rabbi Samuel Eliezer Eidels, the Maharsha,41 explains, based on the dictum, “a convert is considered like a newborn,” that Rachel, Leah, Bilhah and Zilpah converted to Judaism before they married Jacob and were no longer legal siblings.42 Rabbi Judah Lowy, the Maharal of Prague,43 understands that the patriarch’s fulfillment of the commandments was based on ruach hakodesh (Divine inspiration). In the instances where they veered from that practice, it was once again ruach hakodesh that instructed them to do so. In this instance, G‑d saw that these four women were especially suited to be the progenitors of the Jewish people, so He suspended His prohibition for Jacob. The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Schneerson, of righteous memory, wonders why Rashi—who is supposed to address all questions a simple reader of the Torah might have—doesn’t address this one. In two talks,44 the Rebbe answers the question in regards to both sets of sisters. The Rebbe explains that the patriarchs agreed to observe the Torah not as an obligation (like it became after the Torah was given) but as a self-imposed stringency. The Seven Noahide Laws and other accepted moral practices, however, were absolutely binding. As such, when faced with competing values, an accepted moral precept would trump their non-binding acceptance of the Torah’s prohibitions. In our case, Jacob promised Rachel he would marry her.45 Keeping one’s promise was an accepted moral law at the time,46 so even after he married Leah he would have to fulfill his promise to Rachel despite the Torah’s prohibition against doing so.47 This explanation does not justify his marriage to Bilhah and Zilpah, however, to whom no promises were made. In a long and complex legal treatise, the Rebbe argues, a) that Bilhah’s and Zilpah’s mother was a maidservant according to Rashi,48 and b) that the children of a maidservant do not have the legal status of siblings.49 Therefore, Jacob did not violate a Torah prohibition by marrying them. On a final note, while little has been recorded about these two great women, Bilhah and Zilpah, that which we do have paints a portrait of devotion, piety and goodness, traits they undoubtedly passed on to their children. [19])     ebay3860c folder 120
  • Condition: Used
  • Condition: Very good used condition . Slight wear and foxing of margins. ( Pls look at scan for accurate AS IS images )
  • Country of Manufacture: ERETZ ISRAEL Bezalel PALESTINE
  • Handmade: Yes
  • Country/Region of Manufacture: Israel
  • Religion: Judaism

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