Comix Friday: Talmud Comics? Yes - they exist!

Talmud Comics: Did you ever think you'd see those two words together? I certainly didn't - until I stumbled upon the website of Canadian artist (and female Talmud scholar) Yonah Lavery.

According to the site, Lavery uploads a new comic page every two weeks. There are over 40 of them now, mostly illustrating sections of the tractate Berachot. And they...are amazing.

Talmud Comics can be a little (okay, a lot) out-there - kind of like its source material. Being a Jewish day school girl, I'm moderately well-versed in what the Talmud is all about - meaning that I know enough to know how nutty it can be. For people who have never studied the text, this stuff is going to be a bit bizarre.

Lavery uses an English translation of the talmudic text and puts the words right in her characters' mouths; thus, you have a modern-looking guy in a hat gazing intently at the reader and saying, "R. Simeon, Yachai's son, said, 'It is forbidden to fill one's mouth with laughter in this world, as it is said, "Then will our mouth be filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing."'" (It's not all Talmud-speak, though; some characters use more modern vernacular.)

Lavery's drawings don't really explain the esoterica of the Talmud - it's more like an illustrated version of the original text. But that's what I love about Talmud Comics - it's a visual representation of a text that retains the beauty of the ancient wording, and doesn't try to make it overly hip or dumb it down for a modern audience. Very refreshing!

The best part, though, is the illustrations, which are moody and haunting, and often just plain exquisite. Lavery is simply WONDERFUL at shading. Some of my favorites (click for a larger image):

Well done, Yonah!

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Comix Friday is published in the Art Scene blog every Friday, and focuses on Jewish comic artists and Jewish-themed comix. If you know of anything I should be blogging about in Comix Friday, let me know!

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