PunkTorah is proud to announce Steampunk Torah: The Jewish Steampunk Miniseries, written by Raven. Every week, Raven will take the weekly Torah portions midrashim (legends) and transform them into a piece of Steampunk art.
From the author…
Steampunk is part Victorian novel, part science fiction or fantasy. It takes place in an alternate sort of world, where things developed a different way after the Industrial Revolution. Victorian sensibilities were preserved, and steam power still reigns. Survival depends on extreme innovation, but in this alternate version of history, many things we would call “old-fashioned” still hold sway.
Sound familiar yet?
With Steampunk Torah, I’m going to take midrashic explorations of each Torah portion (what happens in the “white spaces.” for instance: what did Moses say to his sons? How do you explain all these rules? what the heck are the rules for, anyway?) I’ll distill a lesson or metaphoric journey from it, and I’ll explore it in a steampunk setting. In being not-completely-Victorian, but adapting the past to suit her needs for survival in the present, my protagonist is representing the struggle Judaism is fighting in order to define what we are NOW. The tension between the past and the present is fascinating and rich with possibility.
Each week, we will be posting an excerpt from the series, as well as download links to each chapter. We’re kicking off this series with three chapters today: Parshat Emor, Behar and this week’s parshah, Bechukotai.
Chapter One: Parshat Emor
When Mari met the Great Archivist for the first time, she was simply trying to
preserve her life. Her entire being had condensed down to a simple animal awareness.
She was sensation only. She could hear her breath rushing in her ears, and her heart
pounding; she was aware only of trying to be as small as possible, protect herself as
best she could with her arms, and draw another breath…and another. Each breath she
took in made her aware of the precious gift that is the ability to breathe the sweet air, the
knowledge that right now she was alive. The certainty that she might die in the next few
moments ran through her body in an almost audible shock: a thrum of awareness that
took away her usual quick-thinking and quick-acting presence, and made her into a
small animal, just trying to hold off the attack…
Click here to download this chapter.
Chapter Two: Parshat Behar
Mari scrambled to catch up with Ismael, so many questions racing around her
head that she remained silent; one hand clamped her kippah firmly on her head, and in
the other she clutched a great handful of her skirts so she wouldnʼt trip over her hem on
the uneven cobblestone street. The road they were walking up was the broadest road
on the Mountain; it wound its way up, curving back on itself, making its way eventually
to the building at the top which housed the Archives. Mari had only heard of this place;
she had never thought she would see it, let alone be on her way up there with the
Archivist himself.
Click here to download this chapter.
Chapter Three: Parshat Bechukotai
Ever afterward, when Mari tried to recall her first feelings upon seeing her new
home, all she could bring to mind was the memory of deep shock, followed quickly by
disappointment.
Ever since she had left home, all the time she spent scrambling to acclimatize
herself to the Mountain society, attempting to “fit in” and not seem too foreign quickly
giving way to a more focused determination simply to survive, she had not been aware
of forming a mental image of what the Archives would be. Nonetheless, there it was; in
every whispered exchange she caught the end of, in every rumor and half-heard tale,
she formed another piece of a collage in her imagination. The Archives. In her mind it
was palatial, perhaps of marble; elegant, towering, breathtaking as befit a building
housing the precious manuscripts that somehow made travel possible, made change
possible, made building and shaping society possible.