Yasha's Pilgrimage Of Searching For Self-identity

Isaac Bashevis Singer is the most influential contemporary Yiddish writer and one of the most outstanding American Jewish writers in the 20th century. The long and profound Jewish culture and tradition provide Singer with rich, creative resources and inspirations. Literature comes from life, and reflects life. Singer's works are deeply rooted in the Polish Jews'culture and tradition, showing his profound Jewish complex. Literature is the memory of human beings. With a nearly dying language—Yiddish, Singer depicts a world of East European nation that has gone forever, expressing his sincere call for the return of Jewishness. The return theme finds its most thorough embodiment in Singer's masterpiece The Magician of Lublin.The Magician of Lublin was published in 1960 in America, but its setting was in Poland at the end of 19th century. Though at that time Singer had been excellent in English, he still insisted on writing in Yiddish. The long gap of time and space couldn't cut off Singer's strong passion for his Jewish past. Thus, the novel endows a distinctive theme of return to Jewishness. This unique theme is embodied mainly in three aspects: the return of Jewish identity, the return of Judaism, and the return of traditional morality. The Magician of Lublin mainly tells us a story of the return of the prodigal son. However, the protagonist's return to Jewishness is not reached in one step. It has gone through a long process from the lost of identity, wandering as an artist, the puzzlement of faith, to finding his self-identity through penitence. Meanwhile, Yasha's return is by no means a short moment's impulse. The innate Jewishness drives him to visit the synagogue for three times, which step by step brings him closer to his Jewish community. Having experienced a series of setbacks and conflicts, Yasha finally returns to his Jewish root and finds his spiritual quietness in the embrace of God.Yasha's experience is by no means an individual fate; it also reflects a nation's agonizing process of giving up their own tradition and turning to another culture for attachment, and the conflicting mentality during that process. The protagonist's identity crisis and spiritual puzzlement not only reflects the sufferings of the Jewish nation, but also reveals the common conditions of human kind. As a writer with strong social responsibility, Singer constantly concerns about modern people's spiritual crisis and existential predicament. In the novel, he points out a way out for people, the way of return. Singer regards that real redemption lies in the return to religious tradition and humanistic belief. Through the return of faith and identity, Yasha finally finds his spiritual peace. It gives enormous spiritual encouragement and revelation to people who have the same experiences.Singer is a great Jewish writer with a firm belief in Literature's power of bringing new horizons and new perspectives for human beings to resist nothingness and isolation. In his own way, Singer tries to solve the riddle of time and change, to find an answer to suffering and to reveal love in the very abyss of cruelty and injustice. The return theme of The Magician of Lublin not only reflects the writer's appraisal and treasure of the Jewish culture, but also shows his sincere consideration for the common predicament of human beings. Therefore, it has a far-reaching profound meaning.