Episode Overview

Podcast: New Books Network – Jewish Studies Channel
Host: Rabbi Mark Katz
Guest: Rabbi Dr. Wendy I. Zierler
Book: Going Out with Knots: My Two Kaddish Years with Hebrew Poetry (Jewish Publication Society, 2025)
Date: November 18, 2025

In this deeply moving episode, Rabbi Mark Katz interviews Rabbi Dr. Wendy Zierler about her new book, Going Out with Knots, which intertwines memoir, mourning, modern Hebrew poetry, and translation. The discussion centers on how profound personal losses led Zierler to draw upon her literary scholarship—and the poetry of Hebrew women—to process grief and build communal meaning during two years of reciting the Kaddish. The conversation is rich with reflections on tradition, gender, translation, the healing power of literature, and the recovery of marginalized voices in Jewish canon.

Main Discussion Points and Insights

1. Genesis of the Book: Loss and Scholarship

• Zierler’s Personal Story: Wendy Zierler shares her experience with consecutive, devastating losses: her father, mother, father-in-law, and her mother-in-law’s decline, all culminating amid the broader trauma of the COVID-19 pandemic ([02:10]).
• Kaddish and Creativity: These losses led her to say Kaddish for 22 months. To cope, she leveraged her expertise in modern Hebrew poetry, weaving weekly poetry teaching into her congregation’s Kaddish journey. The book grew from these sessions ([02:10–03:28]).

2. The Meaning Behind “Going Out with Knots”

• Mishnaic Roots: The title draws from a Mishnah discussing sons leaving home wearing ‘knots’ from their fathers—a symbol of longing and connection. Zierler recounts her shock upon reading commentary asserting daughters do not miss fathers, prompting her to reinterpret and reclaim the ritual as a daughter desperately missing her father while wearing his tallit ([03:44–08:02]).
  • Quote: “There I was, terribly missing my father… being told that this experience that I was having was ritually emotionally invalid. And it was like a punch in the gut.” — Wendy Zierler ([07:35])

3. Healing Through Literature and Poetry

• From Speechlessness to Metaphor: Zierler describes loss as a “speechless” place, and poetry as the medium that restores agency and creates new meaning through metaphor and translation ([08:26]).
  • Quote: “Poetry … is a mark of, like, reasserting our sense of agency.” — Wendy Zierler ([08:44])
• Communal Healing: Weekly poetry readings and translations enabled communal healing and integration of grief ([10:21]).

4. Walking with the Poets

• Finding Kindred Spirits: Zierler relates to poets not just through their words but as companions on her mourning journey, especially Lea Goldberg and Yehuda Amichai ([11:36]).
  • Quote: “Each one was meeting me in a very specific way at various points in the journey.” — Wendy Zierler ([11:36])

5. Hybrid Structure: Memoir and Poetry Analysis

• Why Combine Genres?: The book alternates between personal narrative and close readings of poetry, with Zierler highlighting her own penchant for living “in two worlds” and valuing hybrid forms ([14:42–16:12]).
  • Quote: “That yoking together of things is very much my disposition… to be more than one thing at once.” — Wendy Zierler ([15:30])

6. Reclaiming Women’s Voices in Hebrew Poetry

• Historical Silence: Zierler discusses the long historical absence of Hebrew women’s poetry after the biblical period, her academic focus on this “booming silence,” and her ongoing quest to recover and foreground these voices ([17:56]).
• Rachel Luzzatto Morpurgo: Special attention to Morpurgo, the first modern Hebrew woman poet, and a model for Zierler’s own rabbinic and scholarly identity ([19:22–21:21]).

7. The Art—and Responsibility—of Translation

• Balancing Form and Meaning: Zierler details the negotiation between literalness and artistic fidelity in translation. She uses footnotes to mark interpretive decisions and emphasizes that, for certain poets, the form itself was crucial to meaning ([23:08–26:20]).
  • Quote: “I felt that just translating the words and not reproducing that would not give you the musical effect of the poem.” — Wendy Zierler ([23:58])

8. Why Modern Hebrew—and Israel?

• On Language and Canon: Zierler asserts that modern Hebrew poetry uniquely bridges ancient and contemporary Jewish experience. Its proximity to biblical and rabbinic Hebrew lets poetry “midrashically” reinterpret tradition ([26:44]).
  • Quote: “We can have access to Torah and bona fide Jewish theology through this repository of modern creativity.” — Wendy Zierler ([28:06])

9. Authorial Intention vs. Reader Interpretation

• Literary Methodology: Zierler discusses the limits of authorial intention in close reading, especially for poets long deceased. She balances textual evidence, biographical context, and intrinsic properties of the Hebrew language ([29:26–32:12]).

10. Studying Poetry in Community

• Communal Discovery: Contrary to the image of poetry as solitary, Zierler emphasizes the value of collective interpretation—particularly in a Kaddish minyan. Fresh insights emerge from dialogue and group study ([32:12–35:23]).
  • Quote: “Every time I presented a poem… someone raised their hand and told me something that I hadn’t thought about.” — Wendy Zierler ([34:03])

11. Coming Full Circle: Modern Feminist Midrash

• Ruhama Weiss’s Poem: The book closes by returning to the earlier Mishnah about knots, through the feminist re-reading by poet and Talmud scholar Ruhama Weiss. This poem interrogates the erasure of daughters’ longing—and resistance in the face of tradition ([37:00–40:35]).
  • Quote: “Family is a complicated thing. Jewish connection is sometimes a tenuous thing. And yet… you hope for the final, you know, requital of love, the satisfying of the longings.” — Wendy Zierler ([40:24])

12. What’s Next?

• Current Projects: Zierler is at work on several fiction manuscripts and continuing her weekly Hebrew poetry project, which, since October 7, 2023, has focused on poetry responding to Israeli trauma and resilience ([40:44–41:48]).

Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• On Being Excluded from Ritual Longing
  “There I was, terribly missing my father… being told that this experience that I was having was ritually emotionally invalid. And it was like a punch in the gut.” — Zierler ([07:35])

• On Literature’s Healing Power
  “Poetry … is a mark of, like, reasserting our sense of agency.” — Zierler ([08:44])

• On Poets as Companions in Grief
  “Each one was meeting me in a very specific way at various points in the journey.” — Zierler ([11:36])

• On Translation Choices
  “I felt that just translating the words and not reproducing that would not give you the musical effect of the poem.” — Zierler ([23:58])

• On Hebrew Poetry as Living Torah
  “We can have access to Torah and bona fide Jewish theology through this repository of modern creativity.” — Zierler ([28:06])

• On Community Study
  “Every time I presented a poem… someone raised their hand and told me something that I hadn’t thought about.” — Zierler ([34:03])

• On Cycles of Belonging and Hope
  “Family is a complicated thing. Jewish connection is sometimes a tenuous thing. And yet… you hope for the final, you know, requital of love, the satisfying of the longings.” — Zierler ([40:24])

Key Timestamps

• [02:10] Zierler’s grief journey and the origin of the book
• [03:44] Explanation of the book’s title and the Mishnah about “knots”
• [08:26] Role of literature and poetry in healing
• [11:36] Finding companionship with poets like Lea Goldberg and Yehuda Amichai
• [14:42] Why blend memoir and poetry analysis
• [17:56] Recovering women’s voices in Hebrew literature
• [23:08] The decisions and challenges of translation
• [26:44] The significance of writing, reading, and translating in Hebrew
• [29:26] Interpreting poetry: intention versus reader response
• [32:34] Studying poetry in a community setting
• [37:00] Full circle: Ruhama Weiss’s feminist midrash on knots
• [40:44] Zierler’s ongoing and future projects

Overall Tone and Takeaways

The episode is sensitive yet scholarly, personal but far-reaching. Zierler’s voice is both confessional and analytical, mirroring her book’s style. The interplay of ancient and modern, personal loss and communal tradition, and the reclamation of marginalized women’s voices offers listeners both intellectual insight and emotional resonance.

Ideal For: Listeners navigating grief, those interested in modern Hebrew poetry, Jewish tradition, feminist studies, and anyone seeking to understand the creative processes behind integrating literature and lived experience.