Rivka Elitsur is known for her beautiful children’s stories steeped in Jewish traditions and moral values. Without being overtly didactic, she manages to adapt traditional Rabbinic tales for children, or weave traditional motives into some of her modern works. Using these traditional tales and motives in her writings, she grants them additional meanings to those familiar and traditionally accepted.   יונתן וסבאקטן   , Yonatan and Littlegrandpa ( to read English translation click  Yonatan and Littlegrandpa - Translation ) is one such story.

Yonatan is a small child. He lives in his ancient family home. While spending time alone, high on a tree in his garden, he looks down and sees his grandfather sleeping on the bench below.  With no one else to play with, Yonatan wishes that his old and tired grandfather were a little boy, who could join him in his play. Magically, his wish is granted; Yonatan removes an invisible pile of rocks from the old man’s back, and there appears Littlegrandpa, a boy of his age. Littlegrandpa wakes up and spends time playing with Yonatan. Gradually though, he becomes  bewildered. The garden is the one he knows, but he notices changes that puzzle him. The sapling, that he remembers just planting, has disappeared. In its place stands a large tree. Littlegrandpa cannot find his tools, the tool shed, the goats’ shed or the kids that his father gave him the day they were born. When he enters his childhood home, he recognizes the place, but is surprised to see different curtains, tablecloth and rug. What is familiar though, and comforting, is the smell of the Shabbat cake coming out of the kitchen. While entering the kitchen, expecting his mother and a piece of cake, he is startled to find a strange woman (Yonatan’s mother). Overwhelmed and at a loss in this known/unknown world, he rushes around the house and outside in a frantic, futile search for his parents. The loss of his childhood world, not recovered with his childhood self, sinks in. He is heartbroken. Realizing that the experiment “didn’t work”, Yonatan’s transfers the rocks onto Littlegrandpa’s back, and Grandpa returns to his current elderly self. Now, Yonatan is relieved and accepts his old Grandpa lovingly as he is.

The analysis of the story offered here, is based in part on work done several years ago with a group of  Grade Six and Seven students in a Hebrew day school in western Canada. This group can be described mostly as Heritage language students (children of Hebrew speakers). Elitsur’s story has been used a few times with adult learners of Hebrew as well, but not yet in a Bet level Mini Ulpan. The issues dealt with in this complex story, the way it draws from the Talmudic text and uses its motives creatively can provide the adult learners of Hebrew with fulfilling artistic and thematic stimulation as well as a glimpse into of the riches of classical Jewish texts. Through this story, students can get an idea of the extent to  which Modern Hebrew literature draws inspiration from its classical heritage, a phenomenon not limited to children’s literature, but apparent in the adult Hebrew culture in general.    

The inspiration for the story  is, no doubt the famous Talmudic tale about Rabbi Honni, the Circle Maker (Bialik & Ravnitsky, 1936. p. 6. , to read English translation click  Honni the Circle Maker - translation). Honni comes across a man planting a carob tree. The man tells him that the carob bears fruit only after seventy years. Since the man will surely not live to enjoy its fruits, Honni wonders why he is still planting it. The man answers that his forefathers planted for him, therefore, he is planting now for his children. Honni falls asleep, and a rock rises miraculously and encloses `im. He qleeps for seventy years. When he wakes up, he finds the mAn's grandson gathering the carob fruits. Honni goes back home and asks for his son. His son, he is told, died, but his grandson is alive. Honni goes on to Beit Hamidrash, the academy/house of learning, and introduces himself to the Rabbis. The Rabbis, who know of him and who respect and study his transmitted wisdom, do not believe him. He is unsettled and hurt. He grieves in a world that does lot recognize him any more, anddoes not gire him his due respect. He prays for mercy (death) and dies. The tale concludes with the Aramaic saying: ‘Either cmmpanionship or death’.

      &jbsp;     The pr!ctice of intertextuality is an integral part of  the tradition of transmitting and imparting Jewish teachings. Borrowing from texts of previous generations and creatively applying what is borrowed to new situations and ideas is common. Rivka Elitsur is doing the same in her story. . The story can be defined as ambivalent children’s literature (see above, p. 7)[RH1] . She uses motives taken from Hojni’s talE, but manipulates them cleverly beyond their original meanings in order to treat issu%s of old age, image, transmission of traditions and values, on different levels. Her framework is indeed a children story, but the treatmenT of these problems is complex and sophisticated enough to ap0eal to the adults. She also follows another age-old tradition of telling, what on the surface may seem a simple tale, but in fact conveys deep meaning and wisdom. The young child cannot, of course, detect the borrowed themes and motives and the transformation of their meanings. Reading closely, the adult reader of such a well textured children’s story, who is versed in classical Jewish texts, can detect its motives and realise its complex, layered make up. Similarly, young adults and adult learners of Hebrew, who are presented with the two stories, the old and the new, can greatly benefit from them on various levels. In the Bet level, students are certainly able find the parallels and the differences between the two stories and discuss them. 

            The story deals deeply with difficult human problems and dilemmas. Before delving into them, it would be worthwhile finding the m/tives appearing in the Talmudic tale and their reappearance, now transFormed, in Elitsur’s story: