The Ashkenazi Revolution

117Why are the Jews a “degenerate people”? This is difficult to understand.Also, why did Bialik gnash his teeth? Did he give them a path that theyfailed to follow? Here we have before us a typical case of pathologicalhatred by a Jew who is bitter over personal matters, but pours out his hatredupon all the Jews in his vicinity. Jews of curses, such as this, can be foundeverywhere. But there is no doubt that Bialik is the greatest of them.Another example is “On Your Heart That’s Barren”:In the ruins of your hearts the mezuzah is disqualified,Therefore the demons there will leap and bleat,And the sect of clowns, the children of emptiness and idlenessThere they make merry and create a ruckusBe afraid, for an ambush awaits behind the doorWith a broom? This is the groundskeeper of destroyed temples –Dispair! It comes – and the joyful sectWill be swept away and banished: “Go forth oh boisterous ones!”Then will the spark of your last fire be extinguished,And your temple is silenced and forgotten are the masses;And upon my innards is your ruined alterThe cat of the ruins wails and yawns.This is an unmistakably sadistic poem. Perhaps among the most praised ofits class in the world, this poem has strong ties to sadism, Satanism anddiabolism. But what does it have to do with nationalism? Nationalism,like religion, is essentially hope; hope that seethes and bubbles constantlywithout end. Bialik said “Dispair!” but it was not enough for him to usethis word by itself so he went ahead and added, after it, an exclamationmark as if celebrating victory. Bialikesque sadism is not only found in thispoem. It is spread over the breadth and width of this poet’s work. It standsout in poems such as “Upon my return” and “The Jewish street”. But itseems to me that it reaches its apex in “On Your Heart That’s Barren”, inwhich he leaves his normal boundaries of sadism and becomes a wild anddiabolical man who goes forth dancing in victory. Bialik also wrote poemsof hope, which were primarily intended to be national poems, “The