Jan Miklas-Frankowski, University of Gdansk
Sexual transgression in Olga Tokarczuk’s novel ‘The Books of Jacob’
My paper will be an attempt at representing the literally vision of sexual transgression of Frank’s heresy in Olga Tokarczuk’s ‘The Books of Jacob’
According to Tokarczuk a change of the perception of the religious order is at the same time a challenge against all human order. The heresy undermines the obviousness of current law, and leads to a rebellion. Jacob Frank started his mission in Smyrna from a discussion about the dark side of God. The thought of God’s imperfection or absence or disinterest in the Creation changes the view of the world and of the other people. It also changes the accountability for disciples’ actions. “Jacob Frank (…) taught that the world had been created by an evil force that enslaved men by unjust laws and blocked the way to the hidden “Good God”. The road to the divine was through the rejection of all religions and morals and the performance of ‘Strange Deeds’ that violated the accepted standards of purity and decency (Sharot, 2010)”. In Frank’s concept sexual transgression was a very important part of Strange Deeds. For Frank and his followers it was a way to purification, a new mikvah, which fastened the revealing of the God.