Although his family was Jewish, Kafka's Jewish education was minimal, and amounted to a few visits to synagogue a year. Yet, in 1911, having been enchanted by a Yiddish theatre performance, he took up the study of Yiddish language and literature; as a consequence his interest in Judaism was aroused. During the early 1920's, Kafka started studying modern Hebrew. Under the influence of his last lover, Dora Diamant, who came from an Orthodox Jewish family, Kafka even showed interest in the Talmud. It was during that time, when they were living in Berlin, that Kafka took classes in Judaism.
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KAFKA'S HEBREW BOOKLET
Beginning in 1917, Kafka spent time learning Hebrew, first by himself, and later with various teachers. This is one out of five booklets filled with vocabulary by Kafka and the only one kept at the National Library of Israel.
In his last years he studied with Pu'ah Ben Tovim, a young student from Jerusalem, who came recommended by his good friend S.H. Bergmann, and was staying as a student in Bergmann's mother home in Prague. Kafka and Ben-Tovim were reading the Hebrew novel Breakdown and Bereavement by Y.H. Brenner, and there are testimonies that he was able to speak and even to write simple letters in Hebrew.
Some of the words included in this booklet very much remind us of the imaginary world of the author: passion, cockroach, escape, illusion etc.
Kafka's Hebrew Booklet, circa 1917, NLI -
KAFKA AND ZIONISM
Although initially Kafka viewed himself as a Socialist and rejected the Zionist views of his childhood friend S.H. Bergmann, he deliberated several times - with four separate partners - whether to immigrate to Palestine. A short while before his death he wrote to Bergmann, who had been in Palestine since 1920, of his plan to visit. The plan never materialized, as Kafka's health deteriorated rapidly.