Bewilderments - Reflections on the Book of Numbers (Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, 2015)

(311 pp)

Religion pretty clearly has been crucially important throughout history, and I need to know more about it.  On the Judaeo-Christian side - have pretty well made it through a re-read of the Old Testament (mostly skipping the wisdom literature), including the Pentateuch.  Saw a favorable review on this author's deep dives into the Old Testament; this one focuses on the Book of Numbers.

I didn't love it, and will take a break before picking up more of her work (if I ever do).  I expected to appreciate the deep dive aspect - but often it felt as though the author was straining to find meanings and subtexts, perhaps to fill out a book-length effort (actually a lecture series turned into a book)?  Or perhaps I just don't get it.

I was bewildered, so to speak.

The Book of Numbers takes place after the Jews have been delivered from Egypt; they are rather grumbly and some even express a preference to return.  The Spies check out the Promised Land but suggest great problems overcoming the locals.  God decides that the Jews will wander in the desert for 40 years - ensuring that all of the faithless will be buried in those sands - a new generation will finally reach the Promised Land.

Not including Moses - the 2x rock tap episode gets a lengthy, and quite different, treatment here (including speculation that he was supposed to "speak" to the rock in front of the people).

I learned something about Talmud and midrashic sources, which was interesting.

Miriam - song/dance.  Joshua. 

Swann's Way (Marcel Proust, 1913)

(462 pp)

Re-reading Remembrance of Things Past; this is the first volume.

I dearly love the passages where the author - as a youngster - spends time in Combray.  The descriptions of poor Aunt Leonie are perfect.  The sorrows of the author when sent to bed; the descriptions of the town and the church; Swann's visits at Combray.  Then a lengthy discussion of Swann and Odette (which I don't enjoy as much as the Combray scenes); Swann visiting the Verdurins.  Author meeting Gilberte.

Throughout - the author's effort to understand memory - at the end of this volume:  "The places we have known do not belong only to the world of space on which we map them for our own convenience.  None of them was ever more than a thin slice, held between the contiguous impressions that composed our life at that time; the memory of a particular image is but regret for a particular moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fugitive, alas, as the years."  Curious how that would come across in the original French. (Is "regret" the word here?  Maybe in the sense of "longing for what cannot be regained?")

The very first page refers to the rivalry between Francois I and Charles V, who else talks about this kind of thing.

Haven't decided how quickly I'll proceed, other than "not very."