Kyrie eleison / Ḳ’răv-na elenu

Before presenting the Hebrew version of Bach’s Kyrie, I want to apologize for my friend Robert. The reader of my previous posts has probably been wondering, “Why did Robert keep his discovery a secret for so many years? And why has he now asked someone else to present it to the world, while keeping his face hidden?” It seems that Robert is unwilling to show his manuscript to experts, for fear that this would create a distance between him and his discovery. And he is shy about expressing himself in public. (There are times when I feel that I am playing Aaron to his Moses.) In the end he decided that I should reveal the score he had so carefully and lovingly edited, so that one day his B minor Mass in Hebrew could be performed.

Sara Levy, on the other hand, was not shy about presenting her Judaized version of the Mass to Carl Philipp Emanuel. And we see in the very first movement that she was not satisfied with a simple translation of the Latin Mass. Here is the Kyrie of the Mass, in the original Greek, and in English:

Kyrie eleison. Christe eleison. Kyrie eleison. (Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.)

And here is the Hebrew version:

Ḳ’răv-na elenu. Ḳ’răv-na mălkenu. Ḳ’răv-na elenu. (Draw near to us, we pray. Draw near, our King, we pray. Draw near to us, we pray.)

What was Sara thinking when she decided to begin by imploring God to “draw near”? In characterizing the nature of Bach’s music, I rely on the excellent book by George Stauffer, Bach, The Mass in B minor: The Great Catholic Mass (Yale University Press, 2003). Bach’s first Kyrie is “deeply serious,” dramatic, and grave; the soprano voice in the opening measures represents the Christian soul that “cries out in anguish over the other voices.” In the Christian version it is a cry for mercy, and there is no reason why the Jewish version could not have begun with something equivalent. Either Răḥem-na ‘alenu (Have mercy on us, we pray) or Ădonai, răḥem-na (Lord, have mercy, we pray) would have fit the music well enough. Perhaps Sara felt that part of the drama of the opening of the Kyrie was the explosiveness of the initial k sound, and this may have led her to search for a Hebrew verb beginning with ḳof. But having hit on the verb ḳarăv, of which ḳ’răv is the imperative form, she was able to begin the piece with a concept that is characteristically Jewish, having to do with the nearness or remoteness of God. In this way the music announces at once that its purpose is not to convey the usual Christian message of the Mass, but rather to articulate a theology that is specifically Jewish.

For Christians, God’s closeness is never questioned, because He is present in the flesh. The rite of the Eucharist, which is the culmination of the Mass, actualizes the presence of Christ and his Kingdom. It also memorializes Jesus’ act of communion at the Last Supper, anticipates the messianic banquet at the end of time, and repeats Jesus’ voluntary sacrifice. Paul of Tarsus makes explicit the mystical identification of the Christian community with the person of Christ: “So we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another” (Romans 12:5). Mircea Eliade (A History of Religious Ideas, §220) emphasizes, in addition, the archaic and universal idea of life arising through a sacrificial death, which is implied in the Christian rite; while Freud, in Moses and Monotheism, regards the Christian rite of Communion as a return of the repressed memory of the killing the primal father, as well as an assumption of patricidal guilt.

Many of the symbolic elements of the Eucharist are also found in Judaism: the sacred nature of the communal meal, the messianic idea, even the expectation of a messianic banquet at the end of time. (As my grandfather used to sing, in Yiddish, Ven moshiakh vet kimen, veln mir makhn a sidnyu — When the Messiah comes, we will make a wonderful banquet!) Guilt is present in Judaism in abundance, but not as the conscious reenactment of a murder. The concrete presence of God, in the form of mystical union, only appears in Judaism after the twelfth century, when the esoteric doctrines of Jewish mysticism come out into the open, forming the basis for kabbalistic doctrines and ecstatic practices; but these have never become part of mainstream Jewish theology or worship.

There is one symbolic element of the Eucharist which is present in Judaism from the very beginning of its development: the idea of sacrifice. The generic Hebrew word for sacrifice is ḳŏrbăn, from the verb ḳarăv. In its simple construction, ḳarăv means to approach, to come near. In its causative construction, hiḳriv, it means to sacrifice. So there is reason to suppose that one function of ritual sacrifice in ancient Judaism was to bring man and God closer together, whether by way of appeasing or finding favor with God, or by some more mysterious means. After the destruction of the Temple in 70 of our era, prayer took the place of sacrifice; the daily, Sabbath and festival prayers ordained by the rabbis corresponded to the regular Temple sacrifices that had formerly been brought at fixed times. So having a Jewish prayer service begin with a plea to God to come near to his people, is entirely in keeping with the Jewish idea of prayer.

But there is another reason why it is fitting for Jews to cry out to God in anguish, imploring him to come near. It is the ancient Jewish doctrine of the hiding of God’s face, hăstarăt panim, first enunciated in the book of Deuteronomy (31:16-18): “And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Behold, you are about to sleep with your fathers; then this people will rise and play the harlot after the strange gods of the land, where they go to be among them, and they will forsake me and break my covenant which I have made with them. Then my anger will be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them and hide my face from them, and they will be devoured; and many evils and troubles will come upon them, so that they will say in that day, “Have not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?” And I will surely hide my face (hăster ăstir panăi) in that day on account of all the evil which they have done, because they have turned to other gods….'” This motif recurs numerous times in the Prophets and Psalms. In its plain meaning, the hiding of God’s face is the withdrawal of His favor. But in the Jewish consciousness it came to represent the withdrawal of God from the world, so that His presence was no longer clearly visible. Beginning with the book of Esther (whose name, according to a rabbinic play on words, is derived from histir, to hide), miracles are performed in a hidden way, behind the scenes. After the destruction of the Temple, God’s presence, the Shekhinah, is withdrawn from the world, and prophecy ceases.

Hence, in imploring God to come near, Sara Levy begins her Jewish version of the Mass with a gesture that has a double meaning. On the one hand, it refers to the function of prayer, which, like sacrifice, brings God closer to man. On the other hand, it alludes to the historical position of Israel in relation to a God who hides His face and withdraws His visible presence from the world. It is a bold formula indeed, and one which, to my knowledge, does not appear in the traditional Jewish liturgy.

Now let us return to the music. The Hebrew words, Ḳ’răv-na elenu, fit the music well, although there is a difficulty about the singing of the schwa after the initial ḳof in Ḳ’răv. I am not a singer, and I am not sure if the schwa can, or should, be made to sound as flat as it would be in ordinary speech. I assume that, when sung, the schwa would be sharpened slightly in the direction of a short ĕ, so that it would be closer to the y in Kyrie. And this is what Robert recommends.

If you click on Ḳrăv-na elenu (I) you will see Robert’s electronic score of the first movement. If you like, you can listen to a recording of the beginning of the Mass and follow the Hebrew in Robert’s score. To hear John Eliot Gardiner’s performance of the movement, click on the link Kyrie eleison (I).

In my next post I hope to discuss the Jewish version of the Christe eleison.