I read an article on Tablet about a new sensation on Israeli Television. Patterned after the highly popular, all over the world, "competitions" for the best singer, dancer, performer, survivor, etc., this show is different. For one thing, all the songs are taken from our holy books. Only men perform and all are traditional. The contest is for the best singer of liturgical music, "the Paytan". Who has talent to bring out the deep spiritual wellsprings of our heritage and make it resonate with a new generation.

This is a recording of the very first show in the series. I read that it is catching on and getting more fans every week.  I am not a chazan, nor the son of a chazan and have no ability to judge music. But, I am an observer of the contemporary scene and I want to share my ideas of what this program indicates about Israel.

Israel, today, is going through a very "interesting' time. This is an old Chinese proverb and is meant as somewhat of a curse. Things are so topsy-turvy and so much is changing.  But, good can also come out of turmoil. It can lead people to re-evaluate their values and their fundamental philosophy of life. I think we are going through such a transcendental moment in time.

For centuries, our Sephardic brothers and sisters cherished their Piyutim, their sacred melodies. As one of the people on this video says towards the beginning, he remembers all the people singing "Kail Norah Alila hamtzeh lanu mechila ,b'shaat haneilah". Perhaps, even more than with the Ashkenazim, these pizmonim (we call them zemiros) expressed the deepest yearnings of the Jewish heart.

Then, there was Operation Magic Carpet and other such mass immigration of the Jews from all over the Arab lands to the new State of Israel. In those early years, the Polish secularists who controlled education, etc. wanted to transform our Sephardic brethren, and indeed, all of Am Yisrael, into modern, westernized, cultured people. They looked down on the heritage of the Jews from Arab lands with disdain. They openly stated that it was primitive    Read the stories of how P'eylim activists snuck into maabarot in the early days to try and save a few children from forced secularization.  That Yemenite babies were stolen from their mothers and given to childless Holocaust survivors is factual. The nurses and doctors who did this thought they were giving a child a chance to live a better,,i.e.. secular, western, socialist, life. They did not respect the values of Jews who were not like them. They were building a "new Jew’. 

For a long time, this led to a lot of unfortunate consequences. But, now, several generations later, there is a Sephardic Renewal, This television program is popular because these songs speak to their neshamot, they penetrate their souls. They awaken viewers who may not live the way their grandparents in Yemen, Morocco, etc. lived, and it connects them to their traditions. Unlike the Ashkenazic Chareidim who oppose having a television, computer, I-phone, etc. I gather that the Sephardic leaders accept that their people have all of the above and are using technology to bring the masses closer to their tradition.

In these very difficult times, it is a source of comfort and a measure of encouragement to have religious values and strong spiritual roots. Even if your Hebrew is not fluent, I think you will enjoy this program. To me, it is not the program, per se, that amazes me, but what it signifies. V’hashiv laiv avos al banim, v’lev banim al avosam. May Hashem hear the sincere prayers of these holy piyutim and pizmonim and bring tranquility and peace to Israel, speedily in our days.