Pictured here is the title page of a Rosh Hashanah (New Year) prayer book titled Machzor Sharey Ratzon (“Gates of Grace”), published in Jerusalem in 1930. Displayed in The Temple-Tifereth Israel Gallery of the Museum, this single graphic page speaks volumes about the Jewish people’s longstanding connection to the land of Israel. Inspired by the curving lines and natural forms of the Art Nouveau movement, the illustration features the “seven species” of fruits and grains that the land was blessed with and that the people brought as gifts to the ancient Temple. (Close examination reveals pomegranates, olives, grapes, dates, figs, wheat and barley.) Also depicted are various pilgrimage sites: Rabbi Meir’s grave in Tiberias, the Western Wall in Jerusalem and the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.
From what we know, the seven species have always grown in Israel, and spiritual seekers from a variety of faiths have prayed at sacred places in the Holy Land for centuries. But I would like to think that the unknown artist who created this piece was inspired by the modern Zionist movement and the renewal of Jewish life that followed in its wake. The lush imagery makes the fruit seem as though it could burst off the page. And the realistic depiction of legendary sites beckoned Diaspora Jews of the mid- 20th century, showing them that these places of their imagination actually existed and could now be experienced. The holiday of Rosh Hashanah promises that the life of the individual can be reimagined and renewed. This picture might suggest that a nation can be reborn after centuries of exile, perhaps fulfilling the ancient Biblical promise “. . . the Lord your God will bring you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths, springing forth in valleys and hills, a land of wheat and barley, and vines and fig-trees and pomegranates, a land of olive-trees and honey . . .” (Deuteronomy 8:7-8).
— Mark Davidson, Manager of School & Family Programs
