Video in Italian: Emmanuel Levinas talks about his Master Monsieur Chouchani – an amazing Genius
Lévinas si sofferma inoltre sulla sua infanzia, segnata dall’ebraismo. Decisiva fu la personale scoperta del Talmud fatta sotto la guida di Chouchani, maestro di esegesi biblica. “Un uomo – ricorda Lévinas – che poteva attraversare un gran numero di idee, senza sentire l`obbligo di portarle a un esito conclusivo”.
Chouchani: a Genius, a Bum, a Legend
If you are curious and eager to know more, you may be interested in a lecture about M. Chouchani in English, Hebrew or French. Feel free to contact us: contactfilm@chouchani.com
We have already been invited many times to give lectures and tell the story of this amazing unique character.
We then show exclusive video interviews and reveal concealed parts of the documentary movie we are working on.
New book in Italian by Haim Baharier with Monsieur Chouchani’s spirit:
In Italian, again! Miriam Camerini talks about her theater play Monsieur Chouchani (or Shoshani)
http://www.lechlecha.me/mounsieur-chouchani/
In the Belgian Jewish Newspaper in Dutch “Joods Actuel”, an article by Henri Jakubowicz.
Groups are visiting Shoshani’s grave in Uruguay all the time. Here a picture taken in August 2014
שליחי “תורה מציון” באורוגוואי באזכרה על קברו של חכם שושני ז”ל, הגאון המסתורי, תלמידו של הראי”ה קוק זצ”ל. אוגוסט 2014 – התשע”ד
“Ses disciples d’un an ou d’une nuit me disaient : “Le Juif errant dans votre livre, c’est bien Rav Shushani, n’est-ce pas?”
Je pensais avoir exagéré à dessein ; pourtant j’ai à peine décrit la vérité. Oui, il avait visité des pays exotiques et contrées lointaines ; oui, il semblait intemporel sinon immortel ; oui, il se comportait comme un des Lamed-vavnik qui entrent en exil et choisissent l’anonymat avant d’offrir le salut à leur semblables ; oui, il avait des pouvoirs ; oui, il fascinait, il exaltait, il troublait, il humiliait, il accomplissait en vous, pour vous, des changements dépassant l’entendement.”
Elie Wiesel dans “Paroles d’étranger”
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“Translation” by Elie Wiesel himself:
“His disciples of one year, or one night, took pains to tell me they were not fooled: “The Wandering Jew, in your book, is Rav Shushani, isn’t it?”
I myself thought I had exaggerated; yet I had told the truth. Yes, he did visit faraway countries; yes he did receive unusually high fees for his lectures, fees he then gave to charity; yes he did behave like one of the hidden Just Men who enter exile and anonymity before offering salvation to their fellow men; yes, he was greater than the legend surrounding his person.”
Prof Jacques Goldberg says about his Master Shoshani:
“[That's] how he started teaching me Torah when I was ten, not without quoting that the same method was used over the years, for Bible, Mishna, Talmud … and maths. Because he found me serious and motivated, he just very quickly gave up the requirement of writing, verbal was sufficient.
I would first read the next verse, never more, in Hebrew.
I would then copy the verse, in Hebrew, in my notebook, over two blank pages per verse, and draw columns lines word after word.
In each column I would write down all possible meanings of each individual word without consideration to the neighbor columns.
I would then start a loop in a loop in a loop etc… to build statements meaning by meaning. Most could quickly be discarded as making no sense.
Among those still making sense, I had to select the best, and convince Monsieur Shoshani why I was convinced that this was the best understanding.
And then I only had to convince him that the contrary could as well be correct… before starting the next verse.”
How to understand the Talmud – according to Monsieur Chouchani
“The fundamental principle is reported by Levinas in the name of his teacher, Chouchani: “One does not have to construct nor speculate abstractly, but through imagination.” On this are based the following assumptions:
1. Reading Talmud requires sensitivity to images, ideas, reactions, random thoughts, even distractions, that occur in the process of reading.
2. Reading Talmud requires asking questions, permitted or not.
3. The Talmud should be read aloud to approximate an oral tradition.
4. The Talmud is to be taken as a whole.
5. The Talmud is part of the story of the encounter between Israel and the “Nameless Being.” This encounter precludes a sensibility of oppression.
6. Although historical and scientific information is essential for a proper reading of the Talmud, such information must be subject to the same images, ideas, reactions, random thoughts, even distractions and – especially – questions as the text.
7. The mention of “Israel” means human being. As Levinas wrote:
Each time Israel is mentioned in the Talmud one is free, certainly, to understand by it a particular ethnic group which is probably fulfilling an incomparable destiny. But to interpret in this manner would be to reduce the general principle in the idea enunciated in the Talmudic passage, would be to forget that Israel means a people who has received the Law and, as a result, a human nature which has reached the fullness of its responsibilities and of its self-consciousness… the heirs of Abraham are all nations; any man truly man is no doubt of the line of Abraham.”
In “Reading Levinas/Reading Talmud: An Introduction”
By Ira F. Stone