Modern Hebrew partial scholarship: (Headphones are recommended)
The Hebrew Poetry of ASMR
When we watch YouTube videos or search online for different video we are often looking for information, recipes, music, gossip, news, any number of different types of content, but what about just trying to relax?
One of the newer online sensations is videos designed to help us relax, allowing us to experience a quiet tingling sensation spreading through our body, triggered by specific videos and sounds. This is called ASMR: autonomous sensory meridian response. So what does this really mean? It describes a certain feeling of serenity that is achieved by listening to specific soothing sounds, designed to lull you into a state of relaxation.
There are many different themes to these videos of ASMR; it can be anything from the soft rustling of office papers, footsteps in the snow, and ambient bird calls, to waves breaking on the beach and soft whispers. The visual of these videos can also be very different; everything from beauty videos to artistic creations or various everyday actions such as brushing hair or flipping pages of a book.
The purpose of these videos is to trigger a certain reaction in the listeners. Typically, it begins with a tingling in the scalp which moves down the arms and legs to the rest of the body, leaving you with a feeling of complete relaxation. For this reason, ASMR videos can also be used as a way to combat insomnia.
This ASMR video is of a Hebrew poem, written in 1927, by Rachel Bluwstein, who in Hebrew was also known as Rachel the Poetess. Born in Russia at the end of the 19th century, she came to Palestine in 1909 for the first time where she and her sister first lived in Rehovot, before moving to the shores of the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee). She later moved to France to study agriculture and then went back to Russia during World War I when she could not get back to Palestine. After the war she managed to get back to Palestine, where it soon become apparent she had contracted tuberculosis, which was at that time an incurable disease. Rachel lived in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv before finally succumbing to the disease in 1931.
Rachel started writing poems early in life in Russian and later continued in Hebrew. Her poems, published weekly in a newspaper called Davar, have various themes; often speaking of missed opportunities, or being set in Israel’s pastoral countryside. Her poems are characterized by their simple language and deep emotion and several of them have been set to music and are included in the mandatory curriculum of Israeli schools.
This poem, Kinneret, focuses on the landscape of Israel, the natural world, and the changes that take place over time. The first stanzas of Rachel’s poem, describe the shores of the Kinneret, their proximity to the Golan mountains, the palm trees at the shore and the winter flowers. In the last stanza, she speaks to the Kinneret in second person, directly addressing it, which has the effect of transforming this moment into an ever present event.
The last words of Kinneret are “And this first kindness / Could I forget?”. This phrase, referring to the beauty of the environment, is a biblical quote from Jeremiah, where God remembers the kindness of Israel’s youth. In Jeremiah, nature serves as a background, but in her poem, Rachel brings the environment to the foreground as the agent of kindness.
This ASMR poem is read with great emotion and expression that brings to mind the quiet beauty of the Kinneret. In the background, are the faint sounds of water trickling, which paint the perfect picture of the peace on the shores of the Galilee, allowing you to relax as you call to mind an image of the tranquility of Rachel’s Kinneret.
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