a 90 minute collage of text, music and images, based on the lives of rabbi nachman of breslav and salon hostess rahel varnhagen. the lives of these two historical persons overlapped during the first decade of the 19th century. rabbi nachman of breslav founded the breslav hassidic sect in the ukraine, and rahel varnhagen was a salon hostess of the jewish enlightenment movement, known as the "haskalah", in berlin. i combined their biographies and imagined what might have happened in reality and in fantasy if nachman showed up at rahel's salon and attempted to bring the assimilating jews there back to the fold of orthodox judaism. the 90 minute show begins in the style of naturalism and evolves into an expressionistic fantasy being woven by the two main characters, in which nachman projects onto rahel the role of "the shekhinah" ( female aspect of god and also the jewish people in relation to god), while rahel projects onto nachman the role of messiah. so we end up at the end of the show with a fantasy marriage of the jewish people and the jewish messiah at the end of days, without forgetting for a moment that in real life these two never met and as a matter of fact rahel converted to christianity and married the german protestant nobleman august varnhagen. IN THE ESSAYS THAT FOLLOW THE SHOW HAS ITS ORIGINAL NAME, "RAHEL! RAHEL!". I CHANGED THE NAME AFTER I DISCOVERED ON THE NET THAT PAUL NEWMAN MADE A MOVIE WITH THAT NAME BACK IN THE 1960'S. TO VIEW OR DOWNLOAD ALL OF MY VIDEOS, PLUS 1500 PAGES OF MY EXPLANATORY ESSAYS (ALL AT NO CHARGE) PLEASE VISIT MY WEBSITE: franklynwepner.com. ALSO PLEASE NOTE MY NEW EMAIL ADDRESS, IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE WITH ME ANY COMMENTS ABOUT MY WORK: franklynwepner@gmail.com. IN THE LISTING OF VIDEOS THE LETTERS (HQ) REFER TO A HIGHER QUALITY VERSION OF THE VIDEO, WHICH IS AVAILABLE TO YOU IF YOUR COMPUTER CAN HANDLE IT. APPRECIATING MY MUSICAL SHOW "RAHEL! RAHEL!" 1. GENERAL THEORY Of course, the best way to begin to appreciate most works of art is just to experience them a few times and form your own conclusions. The opinions of the creator of an artwork are merely incidental at that stage of the process. And certainly once an artwork is created it takes on a life of its own, just like a child more and more slips out of the control of its parents. Nevertheless, I think we will agree that this particular artwork is unique in its form, what it seeks to accomplish, and the demands it makes on its audience. "Rahel! Rahel!" is an ambitious project which reaches out beyond the realm of art and grapples with major issues of religion and philosophy. Whether I as the author have succeeded in my project is for you the audience to decide, but since my artwork is intended to operate on several different levels I feel it appropriate for me to lay out for you the plan of what might be there for you if I have succeeded in carrying out my original goals. Just as I did not compromise in creating the piece, I will not compromise here in discussing the piece. If you don't "get it", maybe I failed and there ain't nothing there to "get" in the first place. Or if you don't "get it", maybe you need to do some homework on your own, or just give up on it and go do something else more appropriate for your talents. Nachman of Breslav wrote "my Torah is entirely 'b'hinot' ". "B'hinot", in Hebrew, means "aspects of", "associations", "points of view". For example, if I think of vanilla ice cream then I can associate to that idea chocolate ice cream, or cows, or a forest of vanilla beans somewhere in Madagascar. In other words, there is no limit to the range of possible associations I might get. Nachman might have said instead, "my Torah is entirely induction", and then we would contrast inductive logic to deductive logic. Deductive logic begins with a single idea and like an upside down tree follows the ramifications of that idea out into the myriad subdivisions and corollaries of that idea. Scientific textbooks usually are written deductively. Inductive logic begins with the vast realm of concrete living awareness experiences and step by step moves up the upside down tree back to a single encompassing idea that strives to somehow include all of the original experiences in its breadth. Francis Bacon in the 14th century championed inductive logic. Theologically speaking, Breslav kabbalah is inductive thinking, while Chabad kabbalah is deductive thinking. Nachman begins with a wide range of Torah texts and trusts in associative links to get to his main points, while Shneur Zalman, author of the Chabad "Tanya", writes an orderly textbook in which he systematically lays out his major and minor premisses. But both authors are using the same tree style thinking. Nachman moves up the upside down tree, while Shneur Zalman moves down the upside down tree, the kabbalistic tree of life on which the "sefirot" (points of view) are hanging like Christmas tree ornaments. For philosophy in general, this tree is th

• published: 04 Aug 2010
• views: 25193

a 90 minute collage of text, music and images, based on the lives of rabbi nachman of breslav and salon hostess rahel varnhagen. the title, "the king's son & the emperor's daughter", is from one of the three nachman stories which are included in the show. the other two are "the lost princess" and "the heart of the world and the spring". TO VIEW OR DOWNLOAD ALL OF MY VIDEOS, PLUS 1500 PAGES OF MY EXPLANATORY ESSAYS (ALL AT NO CHARGE) PLEASE VISIT MY WEBSITE: franklynwepner.com. ALSO PLEASE NOTE MY NEW EMAIL ADDRESS, IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE WITH ME ANY COMMENTS ABOUT MY WORK: franklynwepner@gmail.com. IN THE LISTING OF VIDEOS THE LETTERS (HQ) REFER TO A HIGHER QUALITY VERSION OF THE VIDEO, WHICH IS AVAILABLE TO YOU IF YOUR COMPUTER CAN HANDLE IT. PART 3 "rahel betrayed" SCENE 9: Rahel relates a dream. She is standing in the stone ruins of a castle, high on a cliff. An angry mob demands that Finkenstein (their king and the person by whose side Rahel now is standing) allow them to throw her over the cliff. Terrified, Rahel in her dream screams to Finkenstein for his protection, but he hands her over to the mob. As she falls over the cliff she awakens, only to find Finkenstein standing by her side and giving her a "dear John" rejection message. Rahel is furious and humiliated. She blames all her misfortunes, once again, on the fact of her "infamous" (Jewish) birth. SCENE 10: Menachem expresses his sympathy for the sufferings of Rahel, which he regards as the sufferings of the Shekhinah. The time has come, he concludes, for his own major project to begin. He shares with the audience his belief that he himself is the Messiah. Not just the Messiah of the seed of David is he, but also the Messiah of the seed of Joseph - the warrior Messiah whose sword prepares the way for the final Day of Judgment. Menachem now asks his disciples (the audience) to choose, each one for himself, whether or not he wishes to accompany him on this dangerous mission to the Holy Land. With those few that decide to remain with him, he shares his Messianic teachings. This small band is to be the vanguard which prepares the way for an exodus of the Jews from Europe and Czar Alexander's Russia to the Holy Land. To those that falter in their resolve for the task, Menachem gives advice. "Then you must sing and dance and clap your hands many times! Above all, do not despair!" One's joyous side must dance to force his own melancholy side to join in the struggle, just like dancers in a group grab a hesitant onlooker and encourage him to join their dance. These are basic principles of the Breslaver sect of Hassidim which Nachman of Breslav (i.e., Menachem in this play) is founding. Then Menachem does a full-scale dance of theurgy to mobilize the divine powers (and the audience) for the coming journey. SCENE 11: Rebbe Mordecai Daniel sends the sheriff (who happens to have a Texas accent, 10-gallon hat, six-gun and star) to bring Menachem before the "beyt din" (religious court). Mid much Kafka-esque ritualistic chanting and tribal drumming, witnesses confirm every charge the Rebbe makes and then the sheriff hauls Menachem off to the hoosgow. The sheriff warns the audience (Menachem's disciples): "Ah siggest yiz make easel's scare 'roun these parts a while". As the sheriff demands, an intermission follows. PHILOSOPHICAL OVERVIEW The author is of the opinion that the true "history" that Rahel "would not now have missed at any price" is: (1) what Hegel calls "the phenomenology of the spirit", or an "objective history" rather an everyday ego dominated, illusionary "subjective history", (2) which is what therapists call working through the blocks to our awareness and the "games we play" to get to authentic action in our lives, (3) which is what literary critics call a complete dramatic action, in this case spread out over the events enacted by both Rahel and Menachem rather than combined in the life of just one character, (4) which is what neo-Platonic thinkers such as Philo call the path of the logos embodying pure Platonic ideas, (5) which is what Christians call the "stations of the cross" as embodied ideally in the life of Jesus, (6) which is what Maimonides in his "Guide For The Perplexed", and in the tradition of Aristotle, calls the system of concentric spheres or heavens leading down from and back up to God (God being conceived as the Unmoved Mover or Active Intellect), (7) and which is what Jewish kabbalists call emanation of the "Word of God" or "hish'tal'sh'lut", from the Hebrew: "to make a chain". The chaining is a chain of "sefirot", from the Hebrew "to count" pure numbers (like Pythagoras) or to enumerate a sequence of pure ideas or different points of view (like the Greek "logos" or account). The "hish'tal'sh'lut" is a descent down the chain and an ascent back up the chain - from the highest sefirah ("Keter") down to the lowest sefirah ("Malchut") and then back up again. The ascent or "t'shuvah"

• published: 11 Aug 2010
• views: 3895

a 90 minute collage of text, music and images, based on the lives of rabbi nachman of breslav and salon hostess rahel varnhagen. the title, "the king's son & the emperor's daughter", is from one of the three nachman stories which are included in the show. the other two are "the lost princess" and "the heart of the world and the spring". TO VIEW OR DOWNLOAD ALL OF MY VIDEOS, PLUS 1500 PAGES OF MY EXPLANATORY ESSAYS (ALL AT NO CHARGE) PLEASE VISIT MY WEBSITE: franklynwepner.com. ALSO PLEASE NOTE MY NEW EMAIL ADDRESS, IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE WITH ME ANY COMMENTS ABOUT MY WORK: franklynwepner@gmail.com. IN THE LISTING OF VIDEOS THE LETTERS (HQ) REFER TO A HIGHER QUALITY VERSION OF THE VIDEO, WHICH IS AVAILABLE TO YOU IF YOUR COMPUTER CAN HANDLE IT. PART 2 "nachman at rahel's salon" SCENE 4: Menachem (Nachman) is present at the salon of Rahel, i.e., at what he sees as the palace of the devil, in an effort to bring the Jews that are there back to traditional Judaism before they intermarry with the gentile aristocrats and artists who also attend the salon. Rahel and the Protestant Count Karl Gustav von Finkenstein sing a passionate Mozart style love duet, amid antisemitic gossip directed against Rahel. SCENE 5: Count Genz taunts Menachem, who is playing chess, with the fact that he saw Rahel in the park on the Sabbath riding in a carriage. In a song, Rahel strongly defends her right "to say no to remembering my Jewish race". SCENE 6: Rahel invokes the writings of Fichte, who advocates freeing children from the heavy hand of tradition and developing in them instead the free use of their natural reason. In this way they will grow up to be "cultivated personalities", such as the glorious free spirits present in this salon now SCENE 7: This scene is a Brechtian formalist style theatrical caricature of those "cultivated personalities" imagined by Fichte and worshipped by Rahel. SCENE 8: Menachem is talking to God, pouring out his heart about his triumphs and failures. He sings "Comfort Ye". The text of the song states that the Jewish people (the "Shekhinah" or "Divine Presence" here on earth which is represented by Rahel) have already received from God a double portion of punishment, and they therefore should return to God their father, who now will be compassionate. Menachem gives us an example of how he uses a Talmudic text as a basis for spiritually inspired free interpretation. His meditations lead him to a deeper sense of his own mission as "tzaddik ha-dor", the "righteous man of his generation". He sees himself as the contemporary embodiment of the Messianic soul, which reappears in each generation. First this soul was that of Moses, now it is his, and soon it will be that of the Messiah. PHILOSOPHICAL OVERVIEW The author is of the opinion that the true "history" that Rahel "would not now have missed at any price" is: (1) what Hegel calls "the phenomenology of the spirit", or an "objective history" rather an everyday ego dominated, illusionary "subjective history", (2) which is what therapists call working through the blocks to our awareness and the "games we play" to get to authentic action in our lives, (3) which is what literary critics call a complete dramatic action, in this case spread out over the events enacted by both Rahel and Menachem rather than combined in the life of just one character, (4) which is what neo-Platonic thinkers such as Philo call the path of the logos embodying pure Platonic ideas, (5) which is what Christians call the "stations of the cross" as embodied ideally in the life of Jesus, (6) which is what Maimonides in his "Guide For The Perplexed", and in the tradition of Aristotle, calls the system of concentric spheres or heavens leading down from and back up to God (God being conceived as the Unmoved Mover or Active Intellect), (7) and which is what Jewish kabbalists call emanation of the "Word of God" or "hish'tal'sh'lut", from the Hebrew: "to make a chain". The chaining is a chain of "sefirot", from the Hebrew "to count" pure numbers (like Pythagoras) or to enumerate a sequence of pure ideas or different points of view (like the Greek "logos" or account). The "hish'tal'sh'lut" is a descent down the chain and an ascent back up the chain - from the highest sefirah ("Keter") down to the lowest sefirah ("Malchut") and then back up again. The ascent or "t'shuvah" (Hebrew: "returning") is the pathway back to our lost unity with God. The different one sided points of view which Rahel and Menachem embody along this pathway are incomplete versions of the Name of God, while the play as a whole seeks to approach - but only asymptotically - the Great Name (or Naming) of God. As the Jewish prayer service tells us, "On that day will God and His Name be One". (8) Menachem embodies the soul of the Messiah, the possibility of God in human experience as symbolized by the notion of the complete Name. Rahel, on the other hand, embodies the Shekhinah, a

• published: 12 Aug 2010
• views: 2683

a 90 minute collage of text, music and images, based on the lives of rabbi nachman of breslav and salon hostess rahel varnhagen. the title, "the king's son & the emperor's daughter", is from one of the three nachman stories which are included in the show. the other two are "the lost princess" and "the heart of the world and the spring". TO VIEW OR DOWNLOAD ALL OF MY VIDEOS, PLUS 1500 PAGES OF MY EXPLANATORY ESSAYS (ALL AT NO CHARGE) PLEASE VISIT MY WEBSITE: franklynwepner.com. ALSO PLEASE NOTE MY NEW EMAIL ADDRESS, IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SHARE WITH ME ANY COMMENTS ABOUT MY WORK: franklynwepner@gmail.com. IN THE LISTING OF VIDEOS THE LETTERS (HQ) REFER TO A HIGHER QUALITY VERSION OF THE VIDEO, WHICH IS AVAILABLE TO YOU IF YOUR COMPUTER CAN HANDLE IT. APPRECIATING MY MUSICAL SHOW "RAHEL! RAHEL!" 1. GENERAL THEORY Of course, the best way to begin to appreciate most works of art is just to experience them a few times and form your own conclusions. The opinions of the creator of an artwork are merely incidental at that stage of the process. And certainly once an artwork is created it takes on a life of its own, just like a child more and more slips out of the control of its parents. Nevertheless, I think we will agree that this particular artwork is unique in its form, what it seeks to accomplish, and the demands it makes on its audience. "Rahel! Rahel!" is an ambitious project which reaches out beyond the realm of art and grapples with major issues of religion and philosophy. Whether I as the author have succeeded in my project is for you the audience to decide, but since my artwork is intended to operate on several different levels I feel it appropriate for me to lay out for you the plan of what might be there for you if I have succeeded in carrying out my original goals. Just as I did not compromise in creating the piece, I will not compromise here in discussing the piece. If you don't "get it", maybe I failed and there ain't nothing there to "get" in the first place. Or if you don't "get it", maybe you need to do some homework on your own, or just give up on it and go do something else more appropriate for your talents. Nachman of Breslav wrote "my Torah is entirely 'b'hinot' ". "B'hinot", in Hebrew, means "aspects of", "associations", "points of view". For example, if I think of vanilla ice cream then I can associate to that idea chocolate ice cream, or cows, or a forest of vanilla beans somewhere in Madagascar. In other words, there is no limit to the range of possible associations I might get. Nachman might have said instead, "my Torah is entirely induction", and then we would contrast inductive logic to deductive logic. Deductive logic begins with a single idea and like an upside down tree follows the ramifications of that idea out into the myriad subdivisions and corollaries of that idea. Scientific textbooks usually are written deductively. Inductive logic begins with the vast realm of concrete living awareness experiences and step by step moves up the upside down tree back to a single encompassing idea that strives to somehow include all of the original experiences in its breadth. Francis Bacon in the 14th century championed inductive logic. Theologically speaking, Breslav kabbalah is inductive thinking, while Chabad kabbalah is deductive thinking. Nachman begins with a wide range of Torah texts and trusts in associative links to get to his main points, while Shneur Zalman, author of the Chabad "Tanya", writes an orderly textbook in which he systematically lays out his major and minor premisses. But both authors are using the same tree style thinking. Nachman moves up the upside down tree, while Shneur Zalman moves down the upside down tree, the kabbalistic tree of life on which the "sefirot" (points of view) are hanging like Christmas tree ornaments. For philosophy in general, this tree is the tree of dialectical thinking, whether we are forking from one branch to two or from two branches to one. Both types of forking involve moving logically from thesis to antithesis to synthesis in one way or another. Dialectical thinking underlies much of world culture, whether in religion, philosophy, healing or the arts. Turning now to "Rahel! Rahel!", this work is offered as an example of dialectical thinking, especially in the inductive tradition which we find in the work in Nachman of Breslav. It is therefore one more chapter to be added to Nachman's own "Likutei Moharan" ("Collected Essays"). I do in this piece what he does in Likutei Moharan, with the addition that I insert the man Nachman himself into the same dialectical process he uses. I begin with Nachman's biography and writings. Then I work by associations and trust that somehow you as audience will have the intelligence, motivation and patience to "get it" when it all comes together at the end. Or if you don't get it on your own, perhaps you will get it once I show you what I am driving at. You might not agree with my interpretation, but at lea

• published: 12 Aug 2010
• views: 2763