return to Art of the Four Children Gallery #4 
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Tanya Zion: Israeli Society, 1994
This drawing by a religious Zionist school girl aged 14 reflects her view of Israeli society in 1994 at a time when the internal religious divisions are as great as the secular-religious conflict.
    The Wise Child.  The wise child — a religious Zionist adolescent — asks her question not about the Pesach rituals but about the appropriate mix of religion and Israeli patriotism: (1) The National Religious Party, whose followers have settled the areas conquered in 1967, has a visionary map of the whole land of Israel. Its youth movement, B'nai Akiva, has an insignia showing the Ten Commandments (Torah) and agricultural work (Avodah) . (2) The religious scouts movement uses the international symbol of "Be Prepared" with the Magen David. Their politics are moderate and non-ideological. (3) At the bottom are the symbols of the left-center religious movements of Meimad and Netivot Shalom that view territorial compromise in exchange for peace as a real possibility. (4) In the bottom right corner Habad (Lubavitch) is represented in their "Messiah Now" symbol of a rising sun representing the late rebbe Rabbi Menachem Schneerson as the messiah, (Habad has opposed any territorial compromise for peace).
    The Wicked Child.  The "wicked child" belongs to the "Kach" movement of Meir Kahane (J.D.L.), which plays a vocal and bloody marginal role in Israel. Kahane's followers derive their "moral" authority from their interpretation of the Holocaust and the Torah. They insist on the way of the fist, their symbol, in restoring Jewish dignity and Divine honor. In the drawing their oversized knit kipah sits astride a gun, in a pool of blood. The symbol of the fist is identified with a Nazi swastika. In the corner is written "B'siyata d'shmaya" — "with the help of God". This drawing was completed after Dr. Goldstein, an American oleh and a Kahane representative in the Kiryat Arba municipality, massacred thirty Arabs on Purim in Abraham's Cave of the Machpelah during the Moslem holy month of Ramadan. (Another "wicked child" is the religious Zionist fanatic who, on November 4, 1995, murdered Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin because of his peace initiatives).
   The Simple Child.  This teenager, a secular Israeli is (dressed less modestly than a religious girl) who is swept up by MTV. Still she asks: do I have a place at the seder table? Do I fit into Jewish tradition?
   The Child Who Does Not Know How To Ask.  The small tallis, worn as an undergarment, and the black hat represent the group least alienated from Jewish tradition and most knowledgeable regarding ritual observance. This ultra-orthodox youth, however, is taught NOT to ask critical questions about his relation to Zionism, to Western culture or to Torah.