In March 1949, as the guns of the Independence War were falling silent, Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion held a meeting with some forty Hebrew authors, poets and intellectuals to discuss the shaping of the young state's spiritual image, as well as the absorption of the huge immigration waves and other fundamental issues. This meeting was followed by another one, held in October 1949.

Detailed minutes of the two meetings were published by the Government Printer, shortly after each meeting, titled Divrei Sofrim (Writers' Words: alluding to biblical scribes or adjudicators). These two booklets document an ideologically charged encounter between the Hebrew Republic of Letters and the nascent state. At the same time they shed light on the key role Hebrew authors used to have—and may still have today—in Israeli society, perhaps much more than their counterparts in other Western societies.