Chagall windows for Psalm 68

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With thanks to Robert Geiss at daily athens photo for prodding us to take the PsalmChallenge every Sunday for the past 68 weeks.
We in his meme group will come back to our psalm illustrating again in September, God willing (and Robert willing).
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PSALM 68

To the leader. Of David. A Psalm. A Song.
¹ Let God rise up, let his enemies be scattered;
let those who hate him flee before him.
² As smoke is driven away, so drive them away;
as wax melts before the fire,
let the wicked perish before God.
³ But let the righteous be joyful;
let them exult before God;
let them be jubilant with joy.

⁴ Sing to God, sing praises to his name;
lift up a song to him who rides upon the clouds—
his name is the Lord—
be exultant before him.

⁵ Father of orphans and protector of widows
is God in his holy habitation.
⁶ God gives the desolate a home to live in;
he leads out the prisoners to prosperity,
but the rebellious live in a parched land.

⁷ O God, when you went out before your people,
when you marched through the wilderness,
Selah
⁸ the earth quaked, the heavens poured down rain
at the presence of God, the God of Sinai,
at the presence of God, the God of Israel.
⁹ Rain in abundance, O God, you showered abroad;
you restored your heritage when it languished;
¹⁰ your flock found a dwelling in it;
in your goodness, O God, you provided for the needy.

¹¹ The Lord gives the command;
great is the company of those who bore the tidings:
¹² ‘The kings of the armies, they flee, they flee!’
The women at home divide the spoil,
¹³ though they stay among the sheepfolds—
the wings of a dove covered with silver,
its pinions with green gold.
¹⁴ When the Almighty scattered kings there,
snow fell on Zalmon.

¹⁵ O mighty mountain, mountain of Bashan;
O many-peaked mountain, mountain of Bashan!
¹⁶ Why do you look with envy, O many-peaked mountain,
at the mount that God desired for his abode,
where the Lord will reside for ever?

¹⁷ With mighty chariotry, twice ten thousand,
thousands upon thousands,
the Lord came from Sinai into the holy place.
¹⁸ You ascended the high mount,
leading captives in your train
and receiving gifts from people,
even from those who rebel against the Lord God’s abiding there.
¹⁹ Blessed be the Lord,
who daily bears us up;
God is our salvation.
Selah
²⁰ Our God is a God of salvation,
and to God, the Lord, belongs escape from death.

²¹ But God will shatter the heads of his enemies,
the hairy crown of those who walk in their guilty ways.
²² The Lord said,
‘I will bring them back from Bashan,
I will bring them back from the depths of the sea,
²³ so that you may bathe your feet in blood,
so that the tongues of your dogs may have their share from the foe.’

²⁴ Your solemn processions are seen, O God,
the processions of my God, my King, into the sanctuary—
²⁵ the singers in front, the musicians last,
between them girls playing tambourines:
²⁶ ‘Bless God in the great congregation,
the Lord, O you who are of Israel’s fountain!’

²⁷ There is Benjamin, the least of them, in the lead,


the princes of Judah in a body,
the princes of Zebulun,

the princes of Naphtali.

²⁸ Summon your might, O God;
show your strength, O God, as you have done for us before.
²⁹ Because of your temple at Jerusalem
kings bear gifts to you.
³⁰ Rebuke the wild animals that live among the reeds,
the herd of bulls with the calves of the peoples.
Trample under foot those who lust after tribute;
scatter the peoples who delight in war.
³¹ Let bronze be brought from Egypt;
let Ethiopia hasten to stretch out its hands to God.

³² Sing to God, O kingdoms of the earth;
sing praises to the Lord,
Selah
³³ O rider in the heavens, the ancient heavens;
listen, he sends out his voice, his mighty voice.
³⁴ Ascribe power to God,
whose majesty is over Israel;
and whose power is in the skies.
³⁵ Awesome is God in his sanctuary,
the God of Israel;
he gives power and strength to his people.

Blessed be God!

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Photos:
Four of the 12 tribes of Israel as portrayed by Marc Chagall in four of his 12 stained glass windows at Hadassah Medical Center synagogue, Jerusalem.
You can click once on the photos and then click again to see the artwork up close.
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Translation used today: NRSV.
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Rabbi Segal notes that "Psalm 68 is widely acknowledged to be the most difficult psalm to translate and to interpret. It includes thirteen terms found only here in the Bible, historical “references” otherwise unknown, and phrases which read awkwardly at best."
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Chagall reflections

In this forbidden photo you can see 4 of Chagall's 12 stained glass windows in the synagogue of Hadassah medical center.
The Holy Ark and the reading table for the Torah scroll are covered by a two-piece soft sculpture created by Aviva Green.
The detail is better seen in the artist's slideshow, and here she explains about the creative process.
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The glass protecting the reading table gave nice reflections of the windows.
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I knew I just had to get them for James' Weekend Reflections so I shot fast, just before the shout of "No photographs!" rang out.
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Simchat Torah

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Today was the festive day called Hoshana Rabba. To see the throngs of worshippers at the Western Wall please see my post from last year.

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Tonight and tomorrow, immediately following the 7-day Sukkot festival, we have Simchat Torah (meaning "Rejoicing of the Torah"). In the synagogue the annual Torah reading cycle is completed and begun anew. The end of the fifth book of Moses is read, the scroll is rewound, and the first part of Genesis is chanted.

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As the Chabad website says, "The event is marked with great rejoicing, especially during the 'hakafot' procession, in which we march, sing and dance with the Torah scrolls around the reading table in the synagogue. 'On Simchat Torah,' goes the chassidic saying, 'we rejoice in the Torah, and the Torah rejoices in us; the Torah, too, wants to dance, so we become the Torah's dancing feet.'"

At Hadassah hospital's synagogue the Torah scrolls stand in this Holy Ark.

The ark doors are covered by a parochet.

This very special ark covering was designed and created by American-Israeli artist Aviva Green in 1981-82.

The stylized Hebrew calligraphy says "Da lifne mi ata omed," the exhortation "Know before whom you stand."

The Torah is opened and read on the reading table in the center of the synagogue. Here, too, the artist created a soft sculpture to cover the table, in wool, cotton, silk, hemp, and metallic thread. It can be seen better, without the glass, in a slideshow at the artist's website.

The artist explains in just a few wonderful paragraphs how she came to the ideas for her Two-Piece Soft Sculpture.

And above it all are the twelve glorious stained glass windows by Marc Chagall!

For more about the vitrage work please see my earlier post.
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Shabbat shalom and happy Simchat Torah!

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Benching in the synagogue

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Every Friday some of us meet at RuneE's Visual Norway to share our Bench of the Week. You are invited to do the same. Have a seat.

These simple benches are where I will most likely be sitting for parts of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, which begins this Sunday afternoon and ends on Monday night.
The women's section (on the upper floor) is not very big.
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Those semi-transparent curtains will be closed during the prayer service; but rest assured, the women in the front row will be peeking through this mechitsa to watch the men-folk and boys and Torah scrolls below.
What you can just see through the railing in this stealth photo is the top of the Torah ark.

Sometimes I think there is only one bench outside in front of our village synagogue in order not to tempt people to take a break from the hours and hours of Yom Kippur liturgy inside.
It is usually very hot on Yom Kippur, which makes the 26-hour fast (no water, no food) not so easy.
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Last year I walked uphill in the hot sun for 45 minutes (NO cars, buses, or even planes run on the most holy day of the year) to Hadassah medical center for an Ashkenazi rite Yom Kippur. (The moshav where I live has only the Sephardic synagogue, whose nusach I am less familiar with.) The Hadassah synagogue has the famous twelve stained glass windows by Marc Chagall (the post is here).
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Sadly, the rabbi of our village died several weeks ago. Rest in peace, Rav Avraham.
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The sun on Yom Kippur

This is my strange contribution to SkyWatch Friday.

Hundreds of other bloggers' skies can be viewed by clicking here.

The radiant circle at the top signifies the sunrise which in turn recalls the firstborn status of Reuben.

And this is the sunlight shining through Marc Chagall's stained glass windows as seen inside the synagogue at Hadassah Hospital.

The windows look so different--black--from the outside. Classical Hebrew of course had no word for this type of art, so we adopted the French word ויטראז vitrage.
  The square, simple synagogue is beneath the arched windows, behind the decorated lower walls.
Yesterday I walked up to Hadassah for the Yom Kippur prayer services. It was beautiful--the setting and the chanting and the sound of the shofar.
Late afternoon the sun sank low and suddenly the windows lost their color and light, making the intensity of the Neilah (literally, "locking") service even more powerful.
 The image is of the heavenly Gates of Repentance closing as the Day of Atonement ends.

Chagall  made one window for each of the twelve sons of the patriarch Jacob.
 The Twelve Tribes of Israel: Reuben, Asher, Benjamin, Dan, Gad, Judah, Joseph, Zebulon, Simeon, Levi, Naphtali, Issachar.

If you'd like to learn the Biblical source of Chagall's symbolism, Hadassah has a page on each of the windows starting here.

The late great Chagall made fascinating remarks about the sources of his inspiration at the dedication of the windows in 1962. This highly recommended reading is here.

Below is my favorite, Issachar, because of the donkey. Jacob's blessing in Genesis 49:
"Issachar is a strong-boned ass, crouching among the sheepfolds.
When he saw how good was safety, and how pleasant was the country,
he bent his shoulder to the burden and became a labourer."

This vitrage was damaged by shelling from Jordan's Arab Legion during the 1967 Six Day War. The white spot on the donkey is actually the repair of a shrapnel or bullet hole.
 I seem to remember from a guided tour that Mayor Teddy Kollek z"l was full of sorrow when this happened and telephoned the artist.
 Chagall said, "Don't worry. You just win the war and I will fix the glass."
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