"Have Mercy on Zion, as You promised"
In today's hurting Israel, an ancient Hanukkah song is given a new, urgent, very sad addition.
The classical Maoz Tzur, in translation from Sefaria
Many of us are familiar with the classic Hanukkah song, Maoz Tzur. Most people who sing it on Hanukkah sing only the first verse, or the first (the introduction) and the fifth (which is about the Maccabees), but if you look at the song as a whole, you’ll see that it’s essentially a history of the Jewish people, through various attempts to destroy us. Apparently written in the 13th century after a Crusade, there is some disagreement as to whether the last stanza is original or added. (We won’t go into the various arguments here.)
Anyway, if you’re not familiar with the song, or if you didn’t know about all the verses and the history they tell, here’s a brief primer. A video of a simple performance, and the English words below as well:
O Fortress, Rock of my salvation, it is pleasant to praise you: let my house of prayer be restored, and I will there offer thanksgivings when you have prepared a slaughter of the barking foe, I will complete with song and psalm the dedication of the altar. My soul was filled with ills, my strength was spent with sorrow; they embittered my life by hardship during my subjection to the empire of the calf but God with his great power brought forth the treasured ones while the host of Pharaoh and all his seed sank like a stone into the deep. To his holy house he brought me, yet there also I found no peace, for the oppressor came and led me captive, because I had served strange gods: I had to quaff the wine of bewilderment; well nigh had I perished, when Babylon's end drew near; through Zerubbabel I was saved after seventy years. The Agagite the son of Hammedatha, sought to cut down the lofty fir tree but his design became a snare to himself, and his pride was brought to an end. You exalted the head of the Benjamite, but the enemy's name you blotted out: His many sons and belongings you hung on the gallows. The Greeks were gathered against me in the days of the Hasmoneans; they broke down the walls of my towers, and defiled all the oils; but from one of the last remaining flasks a miracle was wrought for the lilies and their men of understanding appointed these eight days for song and praises. Unsheath your holy arm, and bring near the end that is salvation. Claim the vengeance of your servants' blood from the evil nation. For the hour has lengthened on us, and there is no end to the days of evil. Push back the red one, in the shadow of the Tsalmon, and raise for us the shepherd of seven.
Naomi Shemer Re-writes Maoz Tzur:
For years now, on Israel from the Inside, we’ve been showing how Israeli songs have histories. Once a song becomes popular and well known (in this case, not an Israeli song, but an ancient liturgical song called a piyyut), it invariable gets changed as history changes.
In the late 1960’s, Naomi Shemer, probably Israel’s greatest ever classic song-writer, took the classic Maoz Tzur and rewrote it as a song about the War of Attrition, which was then raging, taking the lives of many Israeli soldiers along the Suez Canal after the 1967 War. In the original, the word “Maoz”, which means “refuge, is apparently a reference to God, to whom the writer turns. Here, though, the secular Shemer uses the word “maoz” to mean “stronghold” to refer to the Bar Lev Line, which Israel had constructed along the Suez Canal (and which would fall like a house of cards in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, leaving the Sinai unprotected). For Shemer, the source of strength and protection was the fortress, not God, a standard Israeli play on an ancient song.
Unlike in the original Maoz Tzur, which has a different first line for each stanza, Naomi Shemer uses the same first line over and over, to remind the listener that this is a play on an ancient text, a well-known song. But though the structure has changed, the point hasn’t. Once again, the Jewish people were being attacked. A new stanza, essentially, had been added to the ancient song, even if with a different melody.
Here’s a very old video of a performance of Shemer’s rendition, performed along the Suez Canal, which is the subject of the song, with the English words first (the video has English and Russian subtitles).
As you watch the video, take a look at those soldiers, now in their 70’s or 80’s if they’re still around (most of the soldiers stationed there on Yom Kippur in 1973 were slaughtered), pause for a moment to think about today, Hanukkah again, and Israeli at war, again.
Naomi Shemer and the War of Attrition — The Song “Shivchei Maoz,” Tribute to the Refuge
You can find the words to the Hebrew here. This is an English translation:
TRIBUTE TO THE REFUGE
O Refuge and Rock of my salvation
Whom we praise in pleasance.
Far, far away, beside my home,
orchards exude their fragrance.
I will pass through all the tunnels, caverns and fortresses,
Through grottoes rocky and trenches dusty..
Somewhere in the depths of night, someone intent lies,
Seeking my life, observing silently.
O Refuge and Rock of my salvation,
unwavering, unyielding stronghold and trove.
Almond trees beside my home
are covered white with blossom down the grove.
I will pass through all the tunnels, caverns and fortresses,
Through grottoes rocky and trenches dusty.
Somewhere in the depths of night,
someone intent lies,
Seeking my life, watching me silently.
O Refuge and Rock of my salvation
in endless battle victorious.
My sister Ayelet's smile
will be tinged with all her weariness.
I will pass through all the tunnels, caverns and fortresses,
Through grottoes rocky and trenches dusty.
Somewhere in the depths of night,
someone intent lies,
Seeking my life, in ambush silently.
Woe upon him I sting,
woe upon him from my honey's taste;
Woe upon him who seeks my life to take.
Given this history of changing, rewriting and revisiting ancient songs, it should not surprise us that the Simchat Torah War (as it’s beginning to be called, though we’ll see if that sticks) has also led to a new stanza. There are several that have been posted, but here’s a particularly beautiful one by Professor Vered Noam, an prodigious Israeli scholar who is also the first woman to win the Israel Prize in Talmud.
Here’s Vered Noam’s additional stanza, first in the Hebrew, then with my English translation and transliteration:
The men of Hamas attacked me On the Eighth Day, Atzeret [DG - the holiday of Shemini Atzeret] In their wickedness they blasted through my borders Slaughtered my children, kidnapped my flock My sons' bravery You reawakened [Hamas'] brazenness you cursed [DG - azat panim, brazenness, a play on "Aza/Gazah"] Destroy the kidnappers [chotef], rebuild those kibbutzim [otef] Have mercy on Zion, as You promised.
It’s too early, I imagine, for there to be a recorded performance of Noam Vered’s last stanza, but it fits the original melody perfectly.
Different Israelis have responded to this war and the horror of the hostages on Hanukkah in different ways. Some have left an unlit Menorah on the same table, a reminder of those who cannot light candles this year.
Others, like us, have begun to sing Noam Vered’s additional stanza after all the others—with the prayer that next year, perhaps, we’ll be able to change the plea that God show mercy on Zion into thanks for God having actually done that, having wrapped Zion in the Mercy we so desperately need.
Wishes for increasing light in these last days of Hanukkah.
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