The young veterinarian from Magnesia

29.05.2012                      08.Siwan. 5772                    Isru Chag

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The young veterinarian from Magnesia

S.Y. Agnon’s story, The Sign, mentions a young veterinarian who saved pre-state Israel from cattle-plague. Who was he?

Rahel Elior’s essay, “Shmuel Yosef Agnon and the mystical tradition of the Shavuot festival,” which was published in Haaretz’s literary supplement on the eve of Shavuot (May 18, 2010), deals with Agnon’s short story, The Sign. This is the only one of Agnon’s stories in which the author dealt directly with the Holocaust as it occurred. Agnon describes a mystical experience that he had on the eve of Shavuot 1943 in the wake of the first reports about the destruction of his birthplace, Buczacz. According to Elior, Agnon’s description of the experience both imitates and continues the prophet Ezekiel’s description of the mystical revelation that he had on the eve of Shavuot, and similar experiences that prominent kabbalists such as Joseph Karo, Nathan of Gaza and Moshe Chaim Luzzatto experienced on the same date….