Each time we read the Book of Exodus in anticipation of the vivid and timeless struggle between dualities that comprise and compromise humanity, we rediscover a story that never disappoints. Pharaoh, the story’s antagonist is portrayed as the embodiment of evil, on a mission to maintain his royal status quo while Moses presents as the good man leading his people forth on a mission from God.

Though each player in this game of morality and theology offers clever, strong arguments for their positions, the ultimate moderator is unseen, yet fearsomely present. Because the familiar tale of Israel’s long-suffering sojourn in Egypt has been interpreted and retold in myriad editions of the Passover Haggadah, I won’t be doing so now. Instead, along with the title of this post, I’ve decided to offer these images of Pharaoh, Moses and his brother Aaron as a visual prequel to the Haggadah’s traditional four questions.

Perhaps they will provoke your own questions, challenge old concepts and reveal new facets of a story whose characters and threads continue to  shape our ever-unfolding history. As ever, your thoughts are welcome here.

Further fuel for questions may be found in the AfterImages portion of my book, Between Heaven & Earth: An Illuminated Torah Commentary (Pomegranate, 2009) For previews and purchase information visit: http://bit.ly/g2D9Lm

The reading of Parashah VaYechi, the final chapter in the book of Genesis/Bereshit on this past Sabbath provides some interesting insights on the origin and often subversive nature of the corporate entity in human history. In the previous chapter, after a long Egyptian sojourn, Joseph as second-in-command to Pharaoh, receives news of his father’s failing health and rushes back to Goshen with his two young sons.

His brothers, the sons of the 147 year old patriarch Jacob/Israel with his wives and their handmaids are also summoned to their father’s deathbed to receive his final blessing. The old man however, is still playing favorites and grants a private audience to Joseph and his sons Ephraim and Manasseh. I can imagine the stressful vibe in that room, given their notable history of nasty behavior towards Joseph, their only sister Dinah and the people of the city of Shechem.

Nevertheless, their father elegantly couches his final blessings in a series of twelve verses which are uncannily prophetic analyses of his sons’ physical attributes and characters as well as the individual destinies of this band of brothers who will lead the twelve tribes of Israel to become the future Jewish people. In effect, the patriarch has laid the ground rules for history’s first corporation and suggested imagery for the logos that would represent each of the tribes. These visually rich verses, interpreted by many artists and architects who have incorporated them into architectural treatments of synagogues have also been a dominant inspiration for much of my work over the past twenty years. Beginning in 1986, I created three drawings called the Tabernacle Trilogy which included an interpretation of the verses. They can be seen at: www.magiceyegallery.com within the Judaica gallery. In 1987, a fellow artist, Helen Bittmann Sysko and I were commissioned by the Jewish Community Center of Pittsburgh to design a set of banners on the Twelve Tribes theme to complement the newly built natatorium (swimming pool). These remained in place until 2007 when they needed to be replaced due to the harsh chlorine and humid environment. At that time, Ms. Sysko had changed careers and no longer practiced her art, so I was asked to design and install a new, updated set of banners. The first set had been constructed of appliquéd parachute cloth while for the second set, I had my designs digitally printed on canvas. Examples of both are below:

1987                                                                                       2007

In the illustration above, from my book Between Heaven & Earth: An Illuminated Torah Commentary (Pomegranate, 2009), the logos of the tribes are shown in their birth order: (left) Reuven, Shimeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, (right) Naphtali, Dan, Gad, Asher, Joseph (Ephraim & Manasseh) and Benjamin. The colors of their Hebrew names correspond to the colors of the gems assigned to each on the choshen (breastplate) of the High Priest that will be seen in the next book, Exodus. These are listed and detailed in the AfterImages section of the book on pages 143-144.

Though Parashah VaYechi is replete with ideological corruption, dirty money and nepotism, it sounds disturbing familiar (no pun intended) as we are bombarded daily with the frightening lies and tragicomic discourse of the current Republican Primary that is a precursor to the coming 2012 election. Which of these logos would fit each of the current contenders; or pretenders?

“ Thp-thp-thp…”

The tiny red-faced infant sucked his fingers contentedly as his proud parents congratulated themselves on their good fortune. They were getting older and this child would their last… in this century anyway.

Father and Mrs. Time had given birth to countless adorable little minutes since the very Beginning, but these inevitably became obnoxious adolescent hours and the old couple was becoming ever so tired.

“Well, my dear, “ sighed Father Time, “after all we’ve been through, I think we owe ourselves a little treat. Let’s have a party!” Mrs. Time stared open-mouthed at her husband. “ Oy, are you nuts?” she shouted. “In case you forgot already, mister, we do have a new little minute!”

“Exactly!” Father Time grinned. “And he will be our guest of honor!”

“But I’m in no shape for anything!” his wife moaned.

“Oh, don’t you worry, sweetheart,” he soothed, kissing her wrinkled cheek. “I’ll take care of everything! Now let’s go have a nice cup of tea.” “Oh, o-k,” Mrs. Time rolled her eyes and followed her husband down to the kitchen.

Later that afternoon, while his wife and newborn were napping, Father Time planned his party. “Let’s see, he thought. “New Year’s Eve is in three days. That’s perfect. I’ll spare no effort or expense to make this the best celebration ever! Now the expense part’s easy,” he mused, “ I’m a watch and clock salesman; everyone knows that time is money! But finding the very best refreshments…hmmm; that’s going to require real effort!”

Taking care not bump his scythe into the intricate gears turning thanklessly through eternity, Father Time quietly shut the glass door to his grandfather’s house and stepped out into the road towards the marketplace.

As a gentle breeze ruffled his long white beard, the old man signed with pleasure, waving to his friends and acquaintances along the way. After stopping to accept their congratulations and free advice, he graciously invited them all to his celebration.

At the marketplace, Father Time carefully inspected each stall, listening to merchants’ sales pitches and sampling their wares. Eventually, he was convinced that he’d found the best refreshments time and money could buy. He slung his selections over his scythe and headed home.

Mrs. Time, refreshed from her nap, greeted her husband cheerfully at their door. “It looks like we’re going to have a lovely party, dear. What did you bring?” She smiled at his bulging shopping bags.

The old man’s pale blue eyes twinkled mischievously. “Now, my sweet; I promised that I would take care of everything and I want you to be surprised. Our party is going to be just perfect!”

Mrs. Time frowned suspiciously at the bag’s mysterious bulges. Although they sported logos from several gourmet shops, she couldn’t even smell anything mouth-watering. What could her old man be up to?

On the day of the party, Father Time was up bright and early, bustling about the kitchen and dining room. Mrs. Time confined gently but firmly to the nursery with her son, squirmed with curiosity. At last, the doorbells chimed and she heard her husband pound up the stairs.

“All right, my dear,” he panted, “everything’s ready. Wrap Little Minute in his best blanket and let’s welcome our guests!”

A crowd of friends and acquaintances poured into the narrow foyer laden with gifts and good wishes for the Times’ new arrival. “Oh, isn’t he cute!” My, what an angel!” came the squeals of adoration. After a few seconds, everyone wanted to know what there was to eat. Mrs. Time raised her eyebrows at her husband. “Well?” she challenged silently.

With a flourish, Father Time bade his guests enter the dining room. The table was elegantly set with the finest china and silver. A beautiful crystal goblet sat in the center of each plate and two neat rows of shining golden pitchers flanked a colorful floral centerpiece. When all were seated, Father Time proceeded to fill their goblets with water from the golden pitchers. “I’d like to propose a toast to my new little minute,” he announced. “May he grow into a happy, healthy hour and be a blessing to all our days!” The guests, who had expected something bubbly to drink, looked uncertainly at each other and lifted their goblets. Amidst the clinking crystal and murmured agreement, Father Time prepared to serve the first course. Soup plates were brought out and filled from the golden pitchers. The guests began to make faces and whisper among themselves.

Suddenly, Herr Tickermann, one of Father Time’s important Swiss customers, spoke up. “ So what’s with the water, already? Was it on sale this week?” Several people started to sputter. “Yeah,” someone else snickered, “Perrier is giving the stuff away since they finally admitted to filling those little green bottles at a car wash in New Jersey!”

Mrs. Time, who was nearly as red-faced as her squalling infant, gave her spouse a vicious poke. “What have you done, you old fool? You’ve invited all these good people to celebrate the birth of our new minute and all you serve them is water? I knew I shouldn’t have left it all to you!” Father Time just stood there whistling to himself and staring at the ceiling with infuriating patience. When the laughter had run out of steam, Father Time put his arm around his spouse and held up his scythe for attention.

“Friends,” he smiled. “We want to thank you for joining us on this special occasion. Now I will explain ‘what’s with the water’.”

Father Time cleared his throat and took a sip of water from his own crystal goblet. “Three days ago,” he began, “when we decided to have a party, I took it upon myself to make it the best ever. So I went to the marketplace in search of the finest refreshments available. My first stop was the fishwife’s stall. I’d heard that she carried the best, most expensive lox on the planet. But Goldie, who is an honest soul, told me that her herring, though less expensive, was a sweet as sugar. So this gave me an idea. If herring is as sweet as sugar, then sugar must be better than herring! So I went over to the confectioner’s stall and asked for a large bag of sugar. Well, the confectioner, who was pleased at the sale, proudly told me that his sugar was as sweet as honey. Then I thought that honey was better than sugar so I asked him to sell me honey instead.

“Certainly, Father Time,” he said. “My honey is as clear and fragrant as olive oil.” Of course, I figured that olive oil had to surpass honey in quality, so I changed my order again. But I really became confused when the poor fellow began to fill a jug with olive oil because I heard him mumble, “this oil is so pure, it pours like water!” Well, at that point, I decided that water surely had to be the finest refreshment of all!”

“So,” the old man paused significantly, “you can now understand why I couldn’t serve anything less than this water, which is the very best refreshment I could find!”

When Father Time sat down at last, his wife leaned over and kissed his damp wrinkled forehead. Little Minute, squeezed in the crook of his mother’s elbow, drooled into his father’s goblet as the room filled with the crystal sounds of a joyful toast.

“Happy Birthday, Little Minute! And A Happy New Year!

Story & Illustration©1994 Ilene Winn-Lederer

Father Time’s Perfect Party is from a series of stories published in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review under the title ‘Visual Fiction’ during the years 1993-97. Some of the others may be seen at this link:http://bit.ly/vZP5Dh

Having learned that his father is dying, Joseph orders his chariot prepared and leaves immediately for what will be a final visit. Below him is a map of Goshen, the land that Joseph has promised for Israelite resettlement in the wake of the famine. The map is in the shape of a hand symbolizing Joseph reaching out to his people. It is also a nod to the illustrated allegorical maps of the Holy Land found in Heinrick Bunting’s Itinerarium Sacra Scripturae, or Travels According to the Scriptures, first published in 1581. Below, Joseph and Jacob are seen in an emotional embrace, the former having cast aside his formal court wig and scepter as evidence of his true identity as a son of Israel. You might notice that Jacob’s foot is twisted as a reminder of his angelic confrontation and dramatic transition from a man named Jacob to that of Israel, the progenitor of the twelves tribes of Israel. The young girl in the foreground is Serakh Bat Asher, the legendary daughter of Jacob’s son Asher. She earned immortality for her kindness to old Jacob who had given up hope of ever seeing his son Joseph after his tragic disappearance long ago. So as not to shock him in his fragile state, she is said to have played her harp embedding the news that Joseph was alive in a song. When we need a complex story like this one to yield an understanding of a basic human value, in this case, of chesed (the fourth of the ten sefirot) or kindness, it may be that we must earn that understanding intellectually before we can manifest it unconditionally and unmotivated in ourselves and towards those we love and cherish.

These images are from my book, Between Heaven & Earth: An Illuminated Torah Commentary (Pomegranate, 2009) which can be purchased directly from the publisher at this link: http://www.pomegranate.com/a166.html or from Amazon:  amzn.to/gZSp5j where you will also find several reviews.

*see post of December 13

Other images from the Notes From The London Underground series may be seen and purchased as gicleé prints at www.magiceyegallery.com.

I was recently honored by an invitation from Pomegranate Communications, the publisher of my book Between Heaven & Earth: An Illuminated Torah Commentary(2009) to contribute a post on the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah which begins tomorrow evening , December 20/24 Kislev, 5772 at sundown. I’ve re-posted it here:

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Friday, December 16, 2011

We are pleased to welcome guest blogger Ilene Winn-Lederer, artist, illustrator, and author of Between Heaven and Earth: An Illuminated Torah Commentary. In today’s post she provides a brief history of Hanukkah and explains the symbolism of the menorah. Hanukkah begins this year at sunset on December 20.

The holiday of Hanukkah, or the Festival of Lights, commemorates the historical events that showed the Jewish people’s resilience during the enforced prohibition of their faith and religious culture.

In the writings of the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, the story begins in 175 BC, when Judea, then part of the Syrian Seleucid Empire under the benevolent rule of King Antiochus III, was invaded by the armies of his son, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, goaded by special interests dedicated to imposing Greek culture on the Jews.

After the invasion that resulted in the looting and desecration of the Second Temple at Jerusalem, all practices associated with Judaism were outlawed.

One legend relates how children of that era, forbidden to study Torah, would go out to the gardens or fields with their study materials and toy dreidels, or wooden spinning tops. If they were confronted by soldiers who accused them of religious study, they innocently spun their dreidels as a decoy. Below is an illustration of this legend:

In 167 BC, when Antiochus IV installed an altar to the Greek god Zeus in the Temple, he provoked the bloody Maccabean revolt for Jewish independence. The leaders of this rebellion were Mattityahu, a Jewish priest, and his five sons Jochanan, Simeon, Eleazar, Jonathan, and Judah, who later became known as Judah the Hammer (Judah Maccabee). After the death of his father in 166 BC, Judah inherited the mantle of leadership and under his watch, in 165 BC, the Jewish revolt against the Seleucid monarchy was completed.

The Temple was then rededicated with a new altar, a restored menorah (candelabrum), and new holy vessels required for proper religious observance. According to Jewish law, the lights of the menorah must be tended for continuous illumination. The Talmud (a core text of Judaism) explains that after the Temple was desecrated, only enough pure (undesecrated) olive oil remained to keep the menorah’s eternal flame burning for one day.

Miraculously, however, the oil continued to burn for eight days, allowing sufficient time for a new supply to be obtained. The holiday is observed by lighting an additional candle on each of eight nights, recalling the time the oil remained alight in the Temple. Outside of Israel, this miracle is recalled by four Hebrew letters traditionally written or carved on the dreidels we use today. The letters nes, gadol, hayah, and sham stand for “A great miracle was there.” Inside Israel, the dreidels carry the letter po instead of sham, meaning, “A great miracle was here.”

The Talmud also states (in Menachot 28b) that the Jerusalem menorah, which has seven branches, may not be used outside the Temple.

So the menorahs used for Hanukkah observance are called hanukiya. They have eight branches plus a ninth (called the shamash or servant), set off from the others, that is used for lighting them.

In Between Heaven and Earth, Ilene Winn-Lederer illustrates the Torah reading preceding Hanukkah, Parashah VaYeishev from the Book of Genesis. Her commentary in the AfterImages portion of the book about this illustration provides further insight into the structure of the menorah and its symbolism.

The steadfast spirit of Hanukkah is also reflected in the preceding weekly Torah portion, Parashah VaYeishev, found in the Book of Genesis. It recounts the story of Joseph and his brothers, sons of the patriarch Jacob, his two wives Leah and Rachel and their handmaids Bilhah and Zilpah. Joseph, Jacob’s youngest son, was the offspring of Rachel, Jacob’s favorite wife. He flaunted his intelligence and prophetic abilities, and his father prized him above all of his other children. Great dislike and jealousy festered among Joseph’s brothers, who plotted to kidnap Joseph and murder him. Whether or not they wished to claim his portion of their father’s inheritance is not clear. Though he was cast into a pit full of snakes and scorpions, the young man survived, setting into motion the story of his journey to Egypt. Initially sold into slavery by unscrupulous captors passing the pit, Joseph was able to use his skill at dream interpretation to rise from servant of the palace guard captain Potiphar to become Pharaoh’s grand vizier, credited with saving Egypt from dire famine. The story continues on the Sabbath of Hanukkah when parashat Miketz is read.

Joseph’s subsequent reunion with his father and brothers, detailed next week in parashat VaYiggash dramatically illustrates the workings of divine providence. I will post an illustration next Monday for that reading.

Finally, if we posit a common thread tying the stories of Hanukkah and these parashiyot together, it might be the dual natures of blessings and adversity, where each occurrence is seeded with the other so that the outcome often manifests as a miracle, teaching us to appreciate the importance of both.

When I first entered Turbine Hall at London’s Tate Modern museum, I was blown away by the sheer size and industrial grandeur that nearly dwarfed the large scale Anish Kapoor and Rachel Whiteread installations it hosted. Such that I wasn’t even tempted to look at the art or determine its significance objectively. But sliding up the elevator with a bird’s eye view of it below, I schooled myself to do so while wandering the collections in the upper galleries. Still, amidst the ubiquitous modern classics by Rothko, Beuys, Warhol, deKooning and Richter, one of Cy Twombley’s Bacchus series was a painful visual assault, not just for its prominent size, but for its disappointing absence of story. Unless you tell yourself that Mr. Twombley simply needed exercise that day and found himself with an excess of plywood and red paint that demanded a wall in his studio and by extension in many major modern art museums.

I could not help but recall this quotation seen in an art magazine long ago. It was attributed to a Tim TwoGuns, someone I’d never heard of, perhaps an artist?
“When artists create works of art, we become part of these works. After physical death, our spirits remain and our works of art become windows back to the living world. We cannot travel back through the window, but in spiritual form can observe the painting’s owners on the other side. If we become bored with the lives of one family, or if they are not at home that day, we can move to another of our works of art on another wall somewhere else…”   I also remember thinking that if this were true, then the owners of our artwork would see part of us, the artists, in the image too. Which is why, as an illustrator, such art dismays and saddens me. Was Mr. Twombley merely being cynical, riding on his reputation as a marketable artist? Knowing that truly great art must serve as testament to its era for future generations, then all our descendants will glean from our era is that much of the 20th and early  21st century was chaotic and self-indulgent, trumpeting size and cost over substance. Like the gentleman/connoisseur above, do we really want to get sucked into this stuff and sacrifice our history for the sake of exhorting ‘freedom of expression’ at all esthetic cost? How do we move forward if we forget how to look back?

These were my thoughts as, wandering through the halls of London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, I came upon a wooden near life-size sculpture of a tiger atop what appeared to be a fallen European soldier. Turns out this creepy objet d’ art was an automaton, a mechanical organ commissioned around 1793 by Tippoo Saib, Sultan of Mysore, India. The tiger, his personal emblem, was employed to express his smouldering hatred of the British economic and military domination of his country by simulating the mauling of a British East India Company officer. Though some of today’s political cartoonists brave the wrath of extreme world leaders, it is often gentle mockery when compared with the outrage that informs Tippoo’s Tiger. Given our perceived helplessness in the face of global entropy, I suppose our true reactions are as always, best expressed in art, bequeathing the task of interpretation to future generations.

Moving on, I realized that it was nearly time for lunch. But in my current state of mind, eating meat was not an esthetic option, so when I rounded the corner of Cromwell Road onto Exhibition Road, the Kensington Crêperie with its art nouveau ambience and hints of London Underground tile decor caught my eye. The aroma of sweet and savoury crêpes was irresistible. When, with tiger-like grace, she had seated me at a small round table on a Thonet style chair, this green-eyed mahogany-haired waitperson brought a steaming cinnamon-sprinkled cappuccino to accompany my choice of the smoked salmon crêpe with crisp red onions and piquant capers. Heavenly decadent enough to temporarily banish thoughts of Tippoo and 18th century British foreign policy…

Other images from the Notes From The London Underground series may be seen and purchased as gicleé prints at www.magiceyegallery.com.

It is difficult for me to read this section of Parashah Va-Yishlach without a recurring sense of outrage and injustice. Though the parashah relates the story of Dinah, Jacob and Leah’s only daughter among twelve sons and her ill-fated liaison with the Prince of Shechem, it gives short shrift to this epic tragedy. In barely more than a footnote, we learn of the dishonoring of a daughter of Israel and the subsequent pathologically violent response led by Simon and Levi, two of her brothers.

Despite the horrific mass circumcision and murder of the men of Shechem, the only remorse is expressed by Jacob, their father who seems more concerned about his political relations with that city than with the welfare of his daughter. Curiously, no mention of Leah, her mother is made either, adding insult to injury in my mind. While the text presumes Dinah was raped when it tells us that ‘he took her by force’, it then adds that Shechem claimed to be in love with her as he requests her hand in marriage afterwards. Nowhere do we hear Dinah’s side of the story, a fact that invites much speculation. In her bestselling novel, The Red Tent, writer Anita Diamant suggests that Dinah may have felt reciprocal love for Shechem; a view which I found quite intriguing. Accordingly, I’ve shown Dinah’s two brothers, Simeon and Levi plotting against the Prince of Shechem in revenge for ‘defiling’ their sister. She appears at their mercy while her bound wrists indicate her status as the possession of her father, rendering her wishes insignificant. In my portrayal of Dinah, I wondered; how I might have reacted to the unjust pillaging of an entire city allegedly on my behalf and to the horrifying post-circumcision slaughter of my lover and his male subjects? It took quite a while to channel these thoughts into a cohesive illustration. Yet, I wasn’t sure I’d interpreted the story correctly until I read a story last week in the New York Times (nyti.ms/vYddMp) about Gulnaz, an Afghan woman and her extreme punishment for being the victim of rape. For me, these events opened an old wound in the history of women that in some quarters has never been allowed to completely heal. Despite my dramatic treatment of Dinah’s story, it seems that neither words nor pictures are enough…