Jewish Poland—Legends of Origin by Haya Bar-Itzhak

Author:Haya Bar-Itzhak [Bar-Itzhak, Haya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Jewish, Literary Criticism, Fairy Tales; Folk Tales; Legends & Mythology, Social Science, Jewish Studies
ISBN: 9780814343920
Google: gZdwDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Wayne State University Press
Published: 2018-02-05T03:16:54+00:00

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The Legend of Esther the Jewess and King Casimir the Great of Poland

The story of Esther and Casimir (Kazimierz) is a legend of origin from the folk tradition. It deals with the relationship between a Jewish girl, Esther or Estherke, and the king of Poland, Casimir the Great—that is, a relationship that violated a Jewish religious taboo. In normal circumstances, such relations would be condemned, but the absence of such condemnation, and even possible legitimation, is seen from the story of the biblical Esther on, when such relations are interpreted as being decisive for the survival of the entire community. The positive attitude toward the heroine is justified by an exegesis that interprets the heroine’s act as self-sacrifice on behalf of her people. Thus the legends about Esther and Casimir are used in the folk tradition to explain the grant of settlement rights and the expansion of the privileges of the Jews in Poland by King Casimir. As we shall see, folk tradition uses the legend to explain why King Casimir expanded the Jews’ privileges; in the words of the sixteenth-century chronicle Zemaḥ David, by David Ganz: “For her sake the king granted the Jews great privileges.” Local folk traditions make use of the legend to explain place names, the establishment of synagogues, and more.

The story of Esther and King Casimir the Great, in Yiddish and Polish written literature, has been studied extensively by Chone Shmeruk (1981, 206–280). In his fascinating work, Shmeruk shows how a folk legend that circulated orally became the theme of many literary works in both languages, and he uses the story to examine the points of contact between the two literatures. In this chapter I will consider folk versions of the legend of Casimir and Esther that Shmeruk did not study, as well as Agnon’s “Heart and Eyes.”

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