Recovered Roots: Collective Memory and the Making of Israeli National Tradition

by Yael Zerubavel

Because new nations need new pasts, they create new ways of commemorating and recasting select historic events. In Recovered Roots , Yael Zerubavel illuminates this dynamic process by examining the construction of Israeli national tradition.

In the years leading to the birth of Israel, Zerubavel shows, Zionist settlers in Palestine consciously sought to rewrite Jewish history by reshaping Jewish memory. Zerubavel focuses on the nationalist reinterpretation of the defense of Masada against the Romans in 73 C.E. and the Bar Kokhba revolt of 133-135; and on the transformation of the 1920 defense of a new Jewish settlement in Tel Hai into a national myth. Zerubavel demonstrates how, in each case, Israeli memory transforms events that ended in death and defeat into heroic myths and symbols of national revival.

Drawing on a broad range of official and popular sources and original interviews, Zerubavel shows that the construction of a new national tradition is not necessarily the product of government policy but a creative collaboration between politicans, writers, and educators. Her discussion of the politics of commemoration demonstrates how rival groups can turn the past into an arena of conflict as they posit competing interpretations of history and opposing moral claims on the use of the past. Zerubavel analyzes the emergence of counter-memories within the reality of Israel's frequent wars, the ensuing debates about the future of the occupied territories, and the embattled relations with Palestinians.

A fascinating examination of the interplay between history and memory, this book will appeal to historians, sociologists, anthropologists, political scientists, and folklorists, as well as to scholars of cultural studies, literature, and communication.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Middle East, Jewish, Academic, Religion

360 pages, Paperback

First published October 15, 1995

Reviews

[Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

A study of the structure of the Israeli national narrative, how it was constructed and why. Zerubavel mainly deals with three main events that form focal points of the national tradition and help give Israel its reason for being, and its connection to a tradition 3,000 years in the past. These events are, respectively: The fall of Masada, the Bar Kohkba revolt, and the retreat from Tel Hai. She explores why the Zionist movement chose these events and chose to relate these events to their children as the basis for the Jewish nation they were trying to build- one based on the "Hebrew culture" of distant Antiquity, not the "Jewish" culture of the "Exile" period. It is fascinating to watch the construction of the idea that everything that has happened since Jews left Palestine has been a reaction to that Exile, a result of being far from the land, and all ills will be cured by a return to the homeland. Influenced by the 19th century faith in nationalism, the Zerubavel shows the Zionists picking and choosing events that speak to the conditions of the state that they wanted to create, and the "New Hebrew Man," they wanted to raise. She shows how finding proof of these distant events in Antiquity helped people establish their connection to the land in Israel- how archeology was truly a state pastime, trying to prove over and over again the legitimacy of their connection to the place, and the construction of the narrative of how that place was taken from them. ("We deserve this, don't we? Look how we've fought for it. Those people were our people, look what was done to them over and over again...") She then explores the commemoration of the above events, and how remembering them has changed over the years, in reaction to changing political needs of the time. For example, the fall of Masada and the mass murder-suicide of the defenders- the emphasis of the story in modern times started off on the idea of "fighting to the last man," and defending the homeland, even when surrounded by a stronger power (as the Zionists would have the newly minted Israelis do), and how it changed to an emphasis on the suicide as an honorable alternative to capture, dehumanization and torture at enemy hands (this interpretation really came about after the Eichmann trial, the 67 war, and when the Holocaust became more acceptable to talk about). She details how this site of a mass tragedy became a rallying cry- the Israeli army takes their oath at this site, crying, "Never again shall Masada fall!", and how the conscious effort was made to make sure that these people thousands of years in the past seemed nearer kin to the new "Hebrews" than did the differentiated "Jews," in Europe.

All in all a well researched, in depth study on how a new nation creates a foundational narrative and a justification for its existence and "overthrow" of the old order (an interesting contrast to studies about the creation of narrative about "revolutionary" governments, especially the story of the Bolshevik revolution). It is a bit dry, especially as she gets into endless detail about the commemoration of the three major events she is covering, and covers in painstaking detail how each commemoration changed over time. She also tends to be more than a little bit repetitive (likes to restate what she's talking about every few pages, like you've forgotten, and say the same thing three different ways, I guess in case you're too stupid to understand it the first time), and you'll wish to never see the word "thus" again after you've finished with it. Also, if you don't have a special interest in Israeli history, I really think its difficult to stay interested after she gives you all the really important stuff in part one- the rest is just in depth gravy.

All in all, very interesting in concept, quite informative, but only really recommended for students of Israel and the Arab/Israeli conflict.

[Jherane Patmore · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well researched fantasy.

[Stella Rogers · Rating 2 out of 5]

wasn't actually that relevant to my diss urgh

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I am reluctant to criticize Zerubavel for her focus – after all, the point is to review the book she had written, rather than the book I wish she would have written – I am struck by a great void in her work, the missing Arabs. In her explanation of Tel Hai, she gives no sense of who the attackers were, whom they represented, what their goals were and why they were fighting. More distressingly, while she does mention that the Zionist master narrative ignores Palestinians and conceives of the land as empty and desolate before the pioneers, she reproduces this master narrative by not once mentioning Arab/Palestinian reaction to, participation in or subversion by the commemorations she describes. Do not, after all, the differing and unyielding interpretations of these groups’ pasts contribute to the continuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Further, within the descriptive monolith of “Israelis” exists Arab Jewish Israeli citizens and Arab non-Jewish Israeli citizens, as well as many other subgroups participating in state-sponsored traditions and commemorations.
These voices are silent in her work.

[Greg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dry but interesting theoretical look at the maintenence of identity through ritual in Israel.

[hay man · Rating 3 out of 5]

congrats to israel for inventing an identity

[Betsy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating, if not long, look at the creation of the Israeli narrative.

[Oren Yirmiya · Rating 1 out of 5]

Problematic book, that try to make up for what it lack in depth by using width. I've read some of the writer articles and papers, and they are way better composed. basiclly this is the coffee book version of itself.