#golems

I've recently finished rereading Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett, & it's a very good story about personhood if I do say so myself.

The book is about Golems, & a few of the names of the Golems are derived from Yiddish words so obviously there's a lot of Jewish influence but how Jewish is it?

Rating: Jew-ish

First of all, everyone should go read Feet of Clay because it is a fantastic book. Second, golems are always Jewish the way that leprechauns are always Irish— they come from Jewish folklore (look up “the Golem of Prague”) and cannot be truly separated from that context. Third, the golems in Feet of Clay are also definitely fantasy-Jews. 

From my perspective, the golems in Feet of Clay are a good example of cultural appreciation as opposed to cultural appropriation. By giving the golems Yiddish names, Pratchett explicitly recognizes the origin of golems in Ashkenazi Jewish culture, unlike various RPG golems where they are simply co-opting the word to mean “construct” or “fantasy robot,” and where the creator is usually evil. (Don’t get me started on what DnD does with “phylactery.”) It’s fundamental to the golem folktale that it is originally intended for protection, and while the golem of legend does go off the rails, it begins with the best of intentions— which Pratchett pays tribute to in the plot of Feet of Clay. 

One of the in-world broadly known facts about Pratchett’s golems is that they occasionally have holy days on which they won’t do any work but no one else really knows when those days are, which, as I carefully hoard my vacation time to make sure I’ve got enough to take the holidays off, I find hilarious. 

Another moment in Feet of Clay that felt extremely Jewish to me (under the cut as this as it is at the end of the book)

On Emet-Selch, Golems and מת vs. אמת

Contemplating various things here and there has made me wonder if the writers of FFXIV considered Jewish history and lore when writing and naming Emet-Selch. 

If you translate Emet-Selch''s name, the 'Emet' part in Hebrew, אמת, means 'truth.' Selch doesn't directly equate to a word, but I've read things saying it could be 'shelkha' (your) or 'selach' (forgiveness). So you would either have "forgive the truth" or "your truth." 

That's telling enough for our erstwhile frenemy, but then you get to other places the word 'emet' appears in Jewish lore: golems.  There's a lot to be said about golems and I am not always particularly happy with the name being used in video games and fantasy, but the word means something different now than it originally did and stories change over time and all. So we're not going to get into that here. What we are going to talk about is how a mainstay in a lot of golem lore is that they have the word 'emet' inscribed on their foreheads or on their chests. What if you need to deactivate the golem, temporarily or permanently? You take away the first letter, the א (yes, remember in Hebrew one reads right to left, so that is the first letter of the world) and that gives you 'met', מת, Which means 'dead.' 

The golem in many stories, like the Golem of Prague, started out as a protector and defender, but eventually caused so much carnage he had to be stopped. So roll that over in your mind again: Emet-Selch is the Convocation member in charge of the underworld. He later has a 'third eye' on his forehead, sort of like a golem mark. In Shadowbringers he seems to vacillate between cruelty and protectiveness. And, we learn in Endwalker, he missing a very crucial part of his memories that were deliberately taken away. 

End result...the Hades/Emet-Selch in Elpis becomes an Ascian who commits countless acts of mass murder and other atrocities. Truth turns to death. At the end of Shadowbringers, the Warrior of Light and Scions have no choice but to stop him.

ANGHAMMARAD.

Anghammarad looked at his hands. There was nothing there except heat, furnace heat, blasting heat that nevertheless made the shapes of fingers.

ANGHAMMARAD, a hollow voice repeated.

"I Have Lost My Clay," said the golem.

YES, said Death. THAT IS STANDARD. YOU ARE DEAD. SMASHED. EXPLODED INTO A MILLION PIECES.

"Then Who Is This Doing The Listening?"

EVERYTHING THERE WAS ABOUT YOU THAT ISN'T CLAY.

"Do You Have A Command For Me?" said the remains of Anghammarad, standing up.

NOT NOW. YOU HAVE REACHED THE PLACE WHERE THERE ARE NO MORE ORDERS.

"What Shall I Do?"

I BELIEVE YOU HAVE FAILED TO UNDERSTAND MY LAST COMMENT.

Anghammarad sat down again. Apart from the fact that there was sand rather than ooze underfoot, this place reminded him of the abyssal plane.

GENERALLY PEOPLE LIKE TO MOVE ON, Death hinted. THEY LOOK FORWARD TO AN AFTERLIFE.

"I Will Stay Here, Please."

HERE? THERE'S NOTHING TO DO HERE, said Death.

"Yes, I Know," said the ghost of the golem. "It Is Perfect. I Am Free."

So I just started working in a yeshiva/Jewish day school. And what do I wear on my first day but my golem sweater? Basically it's a sand-colored sweater by this Etsy artist named AtaraZev that has little three golems on it: a white one holding a blue flower with a yellow center, a grey one looking at a blue and green butterfly, and a brick-red one with an orange cat on its head.

So. I wear this to my first day of work, where part of what I'm doing is Kriya (learning to read Hebrew letters and vowels/nekudot). And the second graders I'm working with are like, what's that on your shirt? Ima? To which I internally responded "Do I LOOK like your ima?" and externally responded, "No it says 'emet.'" I then proceeded to explain what golems are and how you make one.

THEY. ARE. OBSESSED.

Every day I go in they crowd around my table for kriyah, which is usually only limited to five students in a group at a time. They call golems "Emets" and keep saying how they tried it at home, asking if I've ever made one, and do they speak, and what do they eat, and if they have ears and if not how they can hear, and how can they understand you, and are they little or big, and can they do work for you? When I explained that they can be any size and that generally they protect communities, one of them was like "Like firefighters?" and proceeded to act out a tiny golem with a fire hose.