(1890–1931), known as 'Rachel the Poetess', asked his opinion about whether she should go overseas to study, an idea that was anathema to most of the Zionist leadership, he encouraged her to do so. Gordon's moods alternated between enormous frustration and great hope for the future. He believed that an idealistic new generation of creative Jews would emerge in the Land of Israel, with a high sense of morals, a deep spiritual commitment, and a commitment to their fellow human beings. Toward the end of his life, however, he preferred to isolate himself in nature. From a letter he wrote to Rachel the Poetess, it seems that he grew more and more frustrated with people's petty squabbles and selfish interests. Although formerly an Orthodox Jew, Gordon rejected religion later in his life. Students of his writings have found that Gordon was greatly influenced by Russian author Leo Tolstoy, as well as by the Hassidic movement and Kabbalah. Many have also found parallels between his ideas and those of his contemporary, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the spiritual father of Religious Zionism. Central to Gordon's philosophy is the idea that the cosmos is a unity. This notion in which man and nature are one and all men are organic parts of the cosmos is reflected throughout his thought, including political issues, the role of women in the modern world, and Jewish attitude to the Arabs. He believed the central test for the reborn Jewish nation would be the attitude of the Jews to the Arabs. The Biblical principle regarding "the stranger that sojourns in thy midst" guided his thought on this matter. In his statutes for labor settlements, which he drew up in 1922, Gordon included a clause that said that land should be assigned to Arabs wherever new settlements were founded, to ensure their welfare. He believed that this principle of good neighborliness should be undertaken for moral reasons rather than tactical advantage, and that it would eventually lead to a spirit of universal human solidarity. A summary of his thinking on Jewish-Arab relations can be found in his work Mibachutz, where he wrote: "Our relations to the Arabs must rest on cosmic foundations. Our attitude toward them must be one of humanity, of moral courage which remains on the highest plane, even if the behavior of the other side is not all that is desired. Indeed their hostility is all