SOURCE: Abramson, Glenda. “Amichai's God.” Prooftexts 4 (1984): 111-26.

In the following essay, Abramson discusses the theme of faith in Amichai's poetry, concluding, “Amichai's God is like no other God in Hebrew poetry.”

One of the most noteworthy facts about the poetry of the first Israeli generation of writers, popularly called the Palmach generation, is its shift in religious orientation, the culmination of a process which had begun with the Haskalah. They demonstrate their own detachment from the past and abandonment of interest in parochially Jewish matters in lyric poetry which is predominantly secular in feeling and intent, by the imaginative use of Jewish religious symbols and imagery set in secular contexts and by reinterpreting the biblical and rabbinic sources to suit their modern environment. The recalled biblical or liturgical text serves as a springboard for wholly modern ideas, creating variations of inspiration on ancient themes. Yehuda Amichai excels in...