"Have I Got a Monster for You!": Some Thoughts on the Golem, The X-Files and the Jewish Horror Movie

Conclusion

In the "Kaddish" episode of The X-Files, the idea of "abomination," specifically those abominations of the to'evah degree that signify offences against God that include magic and "impure" motivated rituals, negotiate the space of the monstrous within Ashkenazi Judaism. When those offences are further exacerbated by violations of the moral and ethical laws of Judaism, particularly those which govern women, the similarities between to'evah and Barbara Creed's "monstrous feminine" begin to take shape.

Ashkenazi legends are a fantastic repository of monsters--not only golems, but dybbuks and demons too. On their own, these narratives are not horror stories per se, but indicators of beliefs. Two separate, although not mutually exclusive, belief traditions need to fuse together for a Jewish horror story to take shape: the legends need to be mixed with the cultural prescriptions of cleanliness and purity.

Contrary to the position of some of the "X-Philes" in the newsgroup, whether one tells the story of the golem orally but with a strong conservative stress on the static (and largely literary) tradition, or mixes that narrative with contemporary discourses on gender and culture in a more popular medium like television, the golem still lives.

Notes

[1] This paper was originally presented in a panel entitled "Legend and Popular Culture" at the annual meeting of the International Society of Contemporary Legend Research in St John's Newfoundland, May 1999. The author would like to thank Mark Glazer, Simon Finger, Gillian Bennett, and the reviewers of this paper for their feedback, and, of course, all those participants on alt.tv.x-files for their comments and discussions about this episode.

[2] Ashkenazi are the Jews from Eastern Europe. There are golem traditions in the culture of the Sephardic Jewish, the Jews expelled from Spain in 1492 and dispersed throughout the Mediterranean region, but consideration of these falls outside the scope of the current study.

[3] The "mytharc" refers to the series' serial-like over-arching narrative about alien abductions, government conspiracies, shadow government agencies, and a plot to form alien/human hybrids.

[4] This view is also shared by Gershom Scholem, who sees the golem legends as meditations on the power of words. Scholem notes the golem legends are "connected ... with the magical exegesis of the Sefer Yezirah (`Book of Creation') and with the ideas of the creative power of speech and of letters" (Encyclopaedia Judaica 1971, 753).

[5] It is also worth noting, parenthetically, as Adrienne McLean does, "that the X-Philes were among the first to use cyberspace to create their own virtual fan culture and specialized interest groups ..." (McLean 1998, 3).

[6] The kaddish is the traditional prayer for the dead.

References Cited

Books and Articles

Ausubel, Nathan, ed. A Treasury of Jewish Folklore: Stories, Traditions, Legends, Humor, Wisdom and Folk Songs of the Jewish People. New York: Crown Publishers, 1953.