The second, the kitchen-maid, is shredding macaronifor to-morrow noon. She, too, looks sleepy. The superintendent is counting meal tickets distributed by the committee.
There is no one else visible. I cast a look under the tables—no trace of the little boy. I am too late!
"But at least," I think, as I leave the kitchen, "nobody saw me!"
Suddenly I remember that I have been walking the streets for several hours.
Whatever is the matter with me? I mutter, and begin to pace homeward.
I am quite glad to find everyone asleep.
I throw off my goloshes in the entrance, steal up to my room and into bed.
But I had a bad night. Tired out, chilled, and wet through, it was long before I ceased coughing and got warm—a continual shiver ran through my bones. I did not get really to sleep till late in the morning, and then my dreams began to torment me in earnest.
I started out of sleep bathed in cold perspiration, sprang out of bed, and went to the window. I look out; the sky is full of stars—the stars look like diamonds set in iron—they roll on so proudly, so calmly, and so high.
There is a tearing wind blowing at the back—the whole house shakes.
I went back to bed, but I slept no more, I only dozed. My dreams were broken, but the little boy was the centre of them all.
Every time I saw him in a new place: there he lies asleep out in the street—there he crouches on some steps in an archway—once, even, devils are playing ball withhim—he flies from hand to hand through the air—later on I come across him lying frozen in a rubbish-box.
I held out till morning and then I flew to the soup-kitchen.
He is there!
Had I not been ashamed, I should have washed the grime off his face with tears of thankfulness. Had I not been afraid of my wife, I should have led him home as my own child. He is there—I amnothis murderer!
Well!
And I held out a ten kopek piece.
He takes it wondering; he does not know what a kindness he has done me.
Long life to him!
And next day, when he begged me for another groschen, I didnotgive it him, but this time I uttered no word of reproof—what is more, I went away ashamed, not satisfied with myself.
I can really and truly not afford it, but my heart is sore: why can I not afford it?
———
My grandfather, on whom be peace, was not so far wrong when he used to say:
"Whoever is not pious, lives in sorrow of heart and dies without consolation."
A big underground lodging room full of beds.
Freude, the tatterdemalion, has been asleep for some time on her chest, in her corner between the stove and the wall.
To-day she went to bed early, because to-morrow is fair-day in a neighboring town, and she will have to be astir betimes in order to drive there with the grease. But she lies uneasy—there is trouble and worry in store.
She had arranged with the driver to take her, Freude, and thesmallbarrel, and now, just as she was going to sleep, it occurred to her that it would be better to take the big one.
She tosses from side to side on her couch.
"Plague take a woman's tongue!" she mutters then, exclaiming against herself:
"Thesmallbarrel! Whatever for? To please the driver? Driver be blessed! Can't he give his horses a few more oats for once?"
Grumbling thus over the stupidity of a woman's tongue, she has just managed to doze off. From beneath the counterpane appears a red kerchief that falls dangling round about her face and her pointed red and blue nose.
She breathes heavily, and presses one bony hand to her old heart. Who knows what she is dreaming? Perhapsthat the driver has broken his word, and she is left for a whole year without Parnosseh.
The opposite corner belongs to Yoneh the water-carrier.
The wife and two children sleep in one bed, and Yoneh with the elder Cheder boy in another.
Now and then a sigh issues from the beds. Here also people have lain down in sorrow.
The little Cheder boy has been crying for money to pay the rabbi his fee.
And the eldest daughter was left without a situation. She had been doing well, as servant to a couple without children. Suddenly her mistress died. So she came home—she could not stay on alone with the widower.
There were a few rubles owing to her in wages—they would have been just enough to pay the rabbi—but the widower says it is no concern of his, his wife never mentioned it, and he doesn't know—he never mixes himself up with the affairs of women.
They quarrelled a little before going to sleep. The mother advised going to the Jewish court, the daughter was in favor of writing a petition either to thenatchàlnik[1]or to themirovòi.[139]
Yoneh will not hear of doing one or the other.
The widower will take his revenge, and get Yoneh a bad name among the householders: "He has only to snap his fingers and there's an end of me!" How many water-carriers are there already loafing about with nothing to do since they started the new water-supply?
Beril, the porter, all by himself in an upper bed, issnoring away like a broken-winded horse. The two children sleep together in another place. His wife is a cook, and this evening she has a wedding supper on hand.
Here, too, rest is broken.
Beril has an ache going through his bones, one after the other, and the eldest son sighs frequently in his sleep. He works in a lime-kiln and has burnt his foot.
Further on lies another snorer alone in a bed: Tzirel, the street-seller. In the second bed sleep all three children. Her husband is a watchman. No sooner hashecome in thanshewill go out, with bread and fresh rolls.
We are already in the third corner, where stands another—this time an iron bedstead.
A flushed, unhealthy-looking woman's head is set off by a bundle of rags that serve as pillow.
Her prematurely parched lips open frequently, and a heavy sigh escapes them. Her husband's profession is a hard one, and he has no luck. Last week, at the risk of his life, he conveyed away a copper kettle and buried it in the sand outside the town—and it was discovered. Who knows what he will bring home to-night? Perhaps he is already in jail. It is three weeks since she set on to boil so much as a kettleful of water—and they are clamoring for the rent.
"A hard life and no luck!" sigh the parched lips. "And one has to be on one's guard against neighbors. They are always asking: 'What is your husband's trade? What keeps him out so late?'"
Over all the beds flickers a pale light from the centreof the room. It rises from between four canvas walls that bound the kingdom of a young married couple.
Treine, the young housewife, is still awake. She has only been married two months, and she is waiting for her husband, who will presently return from the house-of-study.
The oil lamp is burning and throws pale patches on to the blackened ceiling. A few feeble rays come through the rents in the canvas walls and dance upon the beds with the poor, worn-out faces.
In Treine's kingdom all is brighter and cleaner.
Between the two beds, on a little white table, lies a prayer-book flanked by two little metal candle-sticks, her wedding gifts. Wedding garments hang on the wall, also a Tallis bag with the Shield of David embroidered on it.
But there are no chairs in the kingdom. Treine sits on one of the beds, making a net to hold the onions which are lying beside her, scattered over the sheet. The soup for supper is keeping hot under the bed-clothes.
The door of the big room opens softly. Treine's cheeks flush, she lets the net fall out of her hands, and springs off the bed. But then she remains standing—it would never do before all the neighbors. One of them might wake, and she would never hear the last of it. The neighbors are bad enough as it is, especially Freude. Freude cannot understand a wife not beginning to scold her husband the very next day after the wedding. "Just you wait," she says, the old cat, "you'll see the life he'll lead you—when it's too late." Freude leaves her no peace.
"A husband," she says, "who is not led by the nose is worse than a wolf. He sucks the marrow out of your bones, the blood out of your veins!"
It is ten years now since Freude had a husband, and she has not got her strength back yet. And Freude is a clever woman, she knows a lot.
"Anything that he has a right to," she says, "fling it out to him as you would a bone to a dog, and—"
Treine has time to recollect all this, because it is some minutes before Yössele manages to steal on tiptoe past all the beds. Every step he takes echoes at her heart, but as to going out to meet him—not for any money. There—he nearly fell! Now he is just outside the partition walls. She breathes again.
"Good evening!" he says in a low voice, with downcast eyes.
"A good year to you!" she answers lower still. Then: "Are you hungry?" she asks.
"Areyou? Wait."
He slips out between the partitions and returns with washed and dripping hands.
She gives him a towel.
On a corner of the table there is some bread and some salt and the now uncovered soup.
He sits down on his bed, on the top of all the bed-clothes, she on hers, with the onions.
They eat slowly, talking with their eyes—what about, do you think?—and with their lips about the way to earn a living.
"Well, how are you getting on?"
"Oh," he sighs, "three pupils already!"
"And that is all we have to depend on?" she asks sadly.
"Ma!" he answers with gentle reproach.
"God be praised!" she is consoling herself and him together.
"God be praised; but that only makes one hundred and twenty rubles," he sighs.
"Well, why do you sigh?"
"Add it up," he answers; "one ruble a week rent, that's twenty-six rubles a season. And then I'm in debt—there were wedding expenses."
"What do you mean?" she asks astonished.
He smiles.
"Silly little thing! My father couldn't afford to give us anything more than his consent."
"Well, what do they come to altogether?" she interrupts.
"Altogether," he goes on, "twelve rubles. That makes thirty-eight. What remains over for food?"
She calculates:
"Eighty-two, I suppose."
"For twenty-six weeks."
"Well, after all," she says, "it's over three rubles a week."
"And what," he asks sadly, "what about wood—and candles—Sabbaths and holidays?"
"Ett, God is faithful," she tries to cheer him, "and I can do something, too. Look, I have bought some onions. Eggs are very cheap. I will buy some eggs, too. In a week or so, perhaps, five dozen eggs will yield a little profit."
"But just calculate," he persists, "what we must spend on firing and lights."
"Why, next to nothing. Perhaps one ruble a week. That leaves us—"
"And Sabbaths and holidays! Child, what are you thinking of?" And the word "child" falls so softly, so kindly, from his lips, that she must needs smile.
"Come, say the Blessing, quick!" she says, "and let other things be till to-morrow. It's time to go to sleep."
Then she feels ashamed, lowers her eyelids, and says as if she were excusing herself:
"You come so late!" with a yawn that is half a sham.
He leans toward her across the little table.
"Silly child," he whispers, "I come in late on purpose, so that we may eat together, do you see? For a teacher, you know, it's not the thing."
"Well, well, say the Blessing!" she repeats, shutting her eyes tighter. He closes his, hewantsto say it seriously. But his eyes keep opening of themselves. He presses down his eyelids, but there remains a chink through which he sees her, in a strangely colored light, so that he cannot do otherwise than look at her. She is tired—he feels sorry for her. He sees her trying to sit further back on the bed and letting her head rest against the wall. She will go to sleep like that, he thinks.
"Why not take a pillow?" he would like to say, almost crossly, but he cannot—ahem, ahem—
But she doesn't hear. He hurries through the Blessing, finishes it, stands up, and there remains, not knowing what to do next.
"Treine," he calls, but so low, it could not wake her. He goes up to her bed and bends over her.
Her face smiles, it looks so sweet—she must be dreaming of something pleasant—how beautifully she smiles—it would be a shame to wake her! Only her little head will hurt—öi, what hair she must have had—he has looked at her curls, long, black hair—all shorn now[140]—her cap is a thin embroidered one, with holes—sheisa beauty! He smiles, too.
But she must be woke. He bends lower and feels her breath—he draws it in hastily—she attracts him like a magnet—half-unconsciously he touches her lips with his own.
"I wasn't asleep at all!" she says suddenly, and opens a pair of mischievous, laughing eyes. She throws her arms round his shoulders and pulls him down to her. "Never mind," she whispers into his ear, and her voice is very sweet, "never mind! God is good and will help us—was it not He who brought us together? He will not forsake us. There will be firing and lights—there will be enough to live on—it will be all right—everything will be right—won't it, Yössele? Yes, it will!"
He makes no reply. He is trembling all over.
She pushes him a little further away.
"Look at me, Yössele!" it occurs to her to say.
Yössele wishes to obey, and cannot.
"Poor wretch," she says gently, "not accustomed to it yet—ha?"
He wants to hide his head in her breast, but she will not allow him to.
"Why are you ashamed, wretch? You can kiss, but you won't look!"
He would rather kiss her, but she will not allow him.
"Please, look at me!"
Yössele opens his eyes wide, but not for long.
"Oh, please!" she says, and her voice is softer, "silkier" than ever.
He looks. This time it isherlids that fall.
"Just tell me," she says, "only please tell me the truth, am I a pretty woman?"
"Yes!" he whispers, and she feels his breath hot on her cheek.
"Who told you?"
"Can't I see for myself? You are a queen—a queen!"
"And tell me, Yössele," she continues, "shall you be always just as—just the same?"
"What do you mean by that, Treine?"
"I mean," her voice shakes, "just as fond of me?"
"What a question!"
"Just as dear?"
"What next?"
"Always?"
"Always!" he is confident.
"Shall you always eat with me?"
"Of course," he answers.
"And—and you will never scold me?"
"Never."
"Never make me unhappy?"
"Unhappy? I? You? What do you mean? Why?"
"Idon't know, Freude says...."
"Wa—the witch!"
He draws nearer to her. She pushes him back.
"Yössele?"
"What is it?"
"Tell me—what is my name?"
"Treine!"
"Phê!" the small mouth makes a motion of disgust.
"Treinishe," he corrects himself.
She is not pleased yet.
"Treininyu!"
"No!"
"Well then—Treine my life, Treine my crown, Treine my heart—will that do?"
"Yes," she answers happily, "only—"
"What now, my life, my delight?"
"Only—listen, Yössele,—and—" she stammers.
"And what?"
"And when—if you should be out of work any time—and when I am not earning much—then perhaps, perhaps—you will scold."
The tears come into her eyes.
"God forbid! God forbid!"
He forces his head out of her hands, and flings himself upon her parted lips.
———
"Plague take you altogether, head and hands and feet!" a voice comes from beneath the partition. "Honey-mooning, as I'm alive! There's no closing an eye—"
It is the husky, acidly-spiteful voice of Freude, the tatterdemalion.
(Between the Rabbi of Brisk and the Rebbe of Byàle)A Simchas Torah TaleTOLD BY AN OLD TEACHER
Of course you have heard of the Brisk Rabbi and the Byàle Rebbe, but it is not everyone who knows that the holy man of Byàle, Reb Nòach'ke, was at one time the Brisk Rabbi's pupil, that he studied a good couple of years with him, then disappeared for another two, and finally emerged from his voluntary exile as a distinguished man in Byàle.
And he left for this reason:
They studied Torah, with the Brisk Rabbi, only the Rebbe felt that it wasdryTorah. For instance, one learns about questions regarding women, or about "meat in milk," or else about a money matter—very well. Reuben and Simon come with a dispute, or there comes a maid-servant or a woman with a question of ritual, and that very moment the study becomes a delight, it is all alive and is there for a purpose.
But like this, without them, the Rebbe felt the Torah, that is, the body of the Torah, the explanation, what lies on the surface, is dry. That, he felt, is not the Law of life. Torah must live! The study of Kabbalah bookswas not allowed in Brisk. The Brisk Rabbi was a Misnagid, and by nature "revengeful and relentless as a serpent;" if anyone ventured to open a Zohar, a Pardes, he would scold and put him under a ban. Somebody was caught reading a Kabbalah-book, and the Rabbi had his beard shaven by Gentiles! What do you think? The man became distraught, fell into a melancholy, and, what is more wonderful, no "good Jew" was able to help him. The Brisk Rabbi was no trifle, I can tell you! And how was anyone just to get up and go away from his academy?
Reb Nòach'ke couldn't make up his mind what to do for a long time.
Then he was shown a dream. He dreamed that the Brisk Rabbi came in to him and said: "Come, Nòach, I will take you into the terrestrial Garden of Eden." And he took his hand and led him away thither. They came into a great palace. There were no doors and no windows in this palace, except for the door by which they came in. And yet it was light, for the walls, as it seemed to the Rebbe, were of crystal and gave out a glittering shine.
And so they went on, further and further, and one saw no end to it.
"Hold on to my skirt," said the Brisk Rabbi, "there are halls without doors and without number, and if you let go of me, you will be lost forever."
The Rebbe obeyed, and they went further and further, and the whole way he saw no bench, no chair, no kind of furniture, nothing at all!
"There is no resting here," explained the Brisk Rabbi,"one goes on and on!" And he followed, and every hall was longer and brighter than the last, and the walls shone now with this color and now with that, here with several, and there with all colors—but they did not meet with a single human being on their way.
The Rebbe grew weary walking. He was covered with perspiration, a cold perspiration. He grew cold in every limb, beside which his eyes began to hurt him, from the continual brilliancy.
And there came over him a great longing, a longing after Jews, after companions, after All-Israel. It was no trifle, not meeting a single soul.
"Long after no one," said the Brisk Rabbi, "this is a palace for me and for you—you will also, some day, be Rabbi of Brisk."
And the other was more terrified than ever, and laid his hand against the wall to help himself from falling. And the wall burnt him. Only not as fire burns, but as ice burns.
"Rabbi!" he gave a cry, "the walls are ice, simply ice!"
The Brisk Rabbi was silent. And the other cried again:
"Rabbi, take me away hence! I do not wish to stay alone with you! I wish to be with All-Israel!"
And hardly had he said it when the Brisk Rabbi disappeared, and he was left alone in the palace.
He knew of no way, no in and no out; a cold terror struck him from the walls; and the longing for a Jew, to see a Jew, if only a cobbler or a tailor, waxed stronger and stronger. He began to weep.
"Lord of the world," he begged, "take me away from here. Better in Gehenna with All-Israel than here one by himself!"
And immediately there appeared before him a common Jew with the red sash of a driver round him, and a long whip in his hand. The Jew took him silently by the sleeve, led him out of the palace—and vanished. Such was the dream that was sent him.
When he woke, before daylight, when it had scarcely begun to dawn, he understood that this had been no ordinary dream. He dressed quickly, and hastened toward the house-of-study to get his dream interpreted by the learned ones who pass the night there. On his way through the market, however, he saw a covered wagon standing, and beside it—the driver with a red sash round the waist, a long whip in his hand, and altogether just such a Jew as the one who had led him out of the palace in his dream.
Nòach (it struck him there was something behind the coincidence) went up to him and asked:
"Whither drives a Jew?"
"Notyourway," answered the driver, very roughly.
"Well, tell me anyway," he continued. "Perhaps I will go with you!"
The driver considered a little, and then answered:
"And can't a young fellow like you go on foot?" he asked. "Go along with you,yourway!"
"And whither shall I go?"
"Follow your nose!" answered the driver, "it's not my business."
The Rebbe understood, and now began his "exile."
A few years later, as before said, he emerged into publicity in Byàle. How it all happened I won't tell you now, although it's enough to make anyone open his mouth and ears. And about a year after this happened, a Byàle householder, Reb Yechiel his name was, sent for me as a teacher.
At first I would not accept the post of teacher in his house.
You must know that Reb Yechiel was a rich man of the old-fashioned type, he gave his daughters a thousand gold pieces dowry, and contracted alliances with the greatest rabbis, and his latest daughter-in-law was a daughter of the Rabbi of Brisk.
You can see for yourselves that if the Brisk Rabbi and the other connections were Misnagdîm, Reb Yechiel had to be a Misnagid, too—and I am a Byàle Chossid, well—how could I go into a house of that kind?
And yet I felt drawn to Byàle. You can fancy! The idea of living in the same town as the Rebbe! After a good deal of see-sawing, I went.
And Reb Yechiel himself turned out to be a very honest, pious Jew, and I tell you, his heart was drawn to the Rebbe as if with pincers. He was no learned man, himself, and he stared at the Rabbi of Brisk as a cock looks at a prayer-book.[141]He made no objections to my holding to the Byàle Rebbe, only he would have nothing to do with him himself. When I told anything about the Rebbe, he would pretend to yawn, and yet I couldsee that he pricked up his ears, but his son, the son-in-law of the Brisk Rabbi, would frown and look at me with mingled anger and contempt, only he never argued; he was silent by nature.
And it came to pass on a day that Reb Yechiel's daughter-in-law, the Brisk Rabbi's daughter, was expecting the birth of her first child—well, there is nothing new in that, you say? But "thereby hangs a tale." It was well known that the Brisk Rabbi, because he had shaved a Chossid, that is, caused him to be deprived of beard and ear-locks, was made to suffer by the prominent Rebbes. Both his sons (not of you be it said!) died within five or six years, and not one of his three daughters had a boy, beside which every child they bore nearly cost them their life.
Everyone saw and knew that it was a visitation of the great Rebbes on the Brisk Rabbi, only he himself, for all his clear-sightedness, did not see it. He went on his way as before, carrying on his opposition by means of force and bans.
I was really sorry for Gütele (that was the name of the Rabbi's daughter), really sorry. First, a Jewess; secondly, a good Jewess, such a good, kind soul as never was known.
Not a poor girl was married without her assistance—a "silken creature!" And she was to be punished for her father's outburst of anger! And therefore, as soon as I heard the midwife busy in the room, I wanted to move heaven and earth for them to send to the Byàle Rebbe—if only a note without a money-offering—after all, it wasn't as ifheneeded money.
The Byàle Rebbe never thought much of money.
But whom was I to speak with?
I try it on with the Brisk Rabbi's son-in-law—and I know very well that his soul is bound up with her soul, that he has never hid from himself that domestic happiness shone out of every corner, out of every word and deed—but he is the Brisk Rabbi's son-in-law, he spits, goes away, and leaves me standing with my mouth open.
I go to Reb Yechiel himself, and he answers: "It is the Brisk Rabbi's daughter. I could not treat him like that, not even if there were peril of death, heaven forbid!" I try his wife—a worthy soul, but a simple one—and she answers:
"If my husband told me to do so, I would send the Rebbe my holiday head-kerchief and the ear-rings at once; they cost a mint of money; but without his consent, not a copper farthing—not a tassel!"
"But a note—what harm could a note do you?"
"Without my husband's knowledge, nothing!" she answers, as a good Jewess should answer, and turns away from me, and I see that she only does it to hide her tears—a mother—"the heart knows," her heart has felt the danger.
But when I heard the first cry, I ran to the Rebbe myself.
"Shemaiah," he answered me, "what can I do? I will pray!"
"Give me something for her, Rebbe," I implore, "anything, a coin, a trifle, an amulet!"
"It would only make matters worse, which heaven forbid!" he replied. "Where there is no faith, such things only do harm, and she would have none."
What could I do? It was the first day of Tabernacles, there was nothing I could do for her, I might as well stay with the Rebbe. I was like a son of the house. I thought, I will look imploringly at the Rebbe every minute, perhaps he will have compassion.
One heard things were not going on well—everything had been done—graves measured, hundreds of candles burnt in the synagogue, in the house-of-study, and a fortune given away in charity. What remains to be told? All the wardrobes stood open; a great heap of coins of all sorts lay on the table, and poor people came in and took away—all who wished, what they wished, as much as they wished!
I felt it all deeply.
"Rebbe," I said, "it is written: 'Almsgiving delivers from death.'"
And he answered quite away from the matter:
"Perhaps the Brisk Rabbi will come!"
And in that instant there walks in Reb Yechiel. He never spoke to the Rebbe, any more than if he hadn't seen him, but:
"Shemaiah," he says to me, and catches hold of the flap of my coat, "there is a cart outside, go, get into it and drive to the Brisk Rabbi, tell him to come."
And he was evidently quite aware of what was involved, for he added:
"Let him see for himself what it means. Let him say what is to be done!"
And he looked—what am I to say? A corpse is more beautiful than he was.
Well, I set off. And thinking, I thought to myself,if myRebbe knows that the Brisk Rabbi expects to come here, something will result. Perhaps they will make peace. That is, not the Brisk Rabbi with the Byàle Rebbe, for they themselves were not at strife, but their followers. Because, really, if he comes, he will see us; he has eyes in his head!
But heaven, it seems, will not suffer such things to come to pass so quickly, and set hindrances in my way. Hardly had I driven out of Byàle when a cloud spread itself out over the sky, and what a cloud! A heavy black cloud like soot, and there came a gust of wind as though spirits were flying abroad, and it blew from all sides at once. A peasant, of course, understands these things, he crossed himself and said that the journey, might heaven defend us, would be hard, and pointed with his whip to the sky. Just then came a stronger gust of wind, tore the cloud as you tear a piece of paper, and began to blow one bit of it to one side, and one to the other, as if it were parting ice-floes on a river; I had two or three piles of cloud over my head. I wasn't at all frightened at first. It was no new thing for me to be wet through, and I am not alarmed at thunder.
In the first place it never thunders at Tabernacles, and secondly, after the Rebbe's Shofar-blowing! We have a tradition that after the Shofar-blowing thunder has no power to harm for a whole year. But when the rain suddenly gave a lash across the face like a whip—once, twice, thrice—my heart sank into my shoes. I saw that heaven was against me, driving me back.
And the peasant, too, begged, "Let us go home!"
But I knew there was peril of death. I sat on thecart and heard through the storm the moans of the woman and the crack of the husband's finger-joints: he wrings his hands; and I see Reb Yechiel's dark face with the sunken, burning eyes: "Drive on," he says, "drive on!" And we drive on.
And it pours and pours, it pours from above and splashes from below, from underneath the wheels and the horse's feet, and the road is swamped, literally covered with water. The water frothed, the cart seemed to swim—what am I to tell you? Besides that we lost our way—but I lived through it!
I brought back the Brisk Rabbi by the Great Hosanna.[142]
I must tell you the truth, that no sooner had the Brisk Rabbi taken his seat in the cart than it grew still! The cloud broke up and the sun shone through the rift, and we drove into Byàle quite dry and comfortable. Even the peasant remarked it, and said in his own language: "A great Rabbi! a powerful Rabbi!"
But the main thing was our arrival in Byàle.
The women who were in the house crowded to the Rabbi like locusts—they nearly fell on their faces before him and wept—the daughter in the inner room was not heard, either because of the women's weeping, or else because she had no strength left to complain—Reb Yechiel did not see us, he was standing with his forehead pressed against a window-pane, as though his head were burning hot.
The Brisk Rabbi's son-in-law did not turn round togreet us, either. He stood with his face against the wall, and I could see plainly how his whole body shook, and how his head knocked against the wall.
I thought I should have fallen. Anxiety and terror had taken such hold on me that I was cold in every limb, I felt that my soul was chilled.
Well, did you know the Brisk Rabbi? That was a man—a pillar of iron, I tell you!
A tall, tall man, "from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people;" he cast awe round him like a king.
A long white beard, one point of it, I remember now, had tucked itself under his girdle, the other point quivered over it. His eyebrows were white, thick, and long, they seemed to cover part of his face. When he raised them—Lord of the world! The women fell back as though they were thunderstruck, he had such eyes! There were daggers in them, glittering daggers! And he gave a roar like a lion: "Women, be gone!"
Then he asked in a lower and gentler voice:
"And where is my daughter?"
They showed him.
He went in, and I remained standing quite upset: Such eyes, such a voice! It is quite another sort another world! The Byàle Rebbe's eyes are so kind, so quiet, they do one's heart good; he gives you a look, and it's like a shower of gold—and his voice—that sweet voice—soft as velvet—Lord of the world! it goes to your heart and soothes it and comforts it—one isn't afraid ofhim, heaven forbid! The soul just melts for love of him, she desires to escape from the body and uniteherself tohissoul—she is drawn as a butterfly (lehavdîl) to a bright flame! And here—Lord of the world, fear and trembling! A Gaòn, a Gaòn of the old days! And he has gone in to a woman in child-bed!
"He will turn her into a heap of bones!" I think in terror.
I run to the Byàle Rebbe. And he met me in the door with a smile:
"Have you seen," he said to me, "the majesty of the Law? The very majesty of the Law?"
I felt relieved. If the Rebbe smiles, I thought, all will be well.
———
And all was well. On Shemini Atseres[143]she was over it.
And on Simchas Torah the Brisk Rabbi presided at table. I would have liked to be at table somewhere else, but I did not dare go away, particularly as I made up the tenth man needed to recite grace.
Well, what am I to tell you? How the Brisk Rabbi expounded the Torah? If the Torah is a sea, he was Leviathan in the sea—with one twist of his tail he swam through ten treatises, with another he mixed together the Talmud and the codes, so that it heaved and splashed and seethed and boiled, just as they say the real sea does—he made my head go round—but "the heart knoweth its own bitterness," and my heart felt no holiday happiness! And then I remembered the Rebbe's dream—and I felt petrified. There was sun in the window andno want of wine at table, I could see the whole company was perspiring. And I? I was cold, cold as ice! Over yonder I knew the Torah was being expounded differently—there it is bright and warm—every word is penetrated and interwoven with love and rapture—one feels that angels are flying through the room, one seems to hear the rustle of the great, white wings—aï, Lord of the world! Only, there's no getting away!
Suddenly he stops, the Brisk Rabbi, and asks:
"What kind of rabbi have you got here?"
"A certain Nòach," they reply.
Well, it cut me to the heart. "A certain Nòach!" O, the flattery, the flattery of it!
"Is he a wonder-worker?"
"Not very much of one, one doesn't often hear about him—the women talk of him, but who listens to them?"
"Then he just takes money and does nothing wonderful?"
They tell him the truth: that he takes little money, and gives away a great deal.
The rabbi muses.
"And he is a scholar?"
"They say, a great one!"
"Whence is he, this Nòach?"
Nobody knows, andIhave to answer. A conversation ensues between me and the Brisk Rabbi:
"Was he not once in Brisk, this Nòach?" he asks.
"Was not the Rebbe once in Brisk?" I stammered. "I think—yes!"
"Ah," says he, "a follower of his!" and it seems to me he looks at me as one looks at a spider.
Then he turns to the company:
"I once had a pupil," he says, "Nòach—he had a good head, but he was attracted to the other side[144]—I spoke to him once, twice—I would have spoken to him a third time, to warn him, but he disappeared—is it not he? Who knows!"
And he began to describe him: thin, small, a little black beard, black, curly ear-locks, a dreamer, a quiet voice, and so on.
"It may be," said the company, "that it is he; it sounds very like!"
I thanked God when they began to say grace.
But after grace something happened that I had never dreamt of.
The Brisk Rabbi rises from his seat, calls me aside, and says in a low voice:
"Take me toyourRebbe andmypupil! Only, do you hear? no one must know!"
Of course, I obeyed, only on the way I asked in terror:
"Brisk Rabbi, tell me, with what purpose are you going?"
And he answered simply:
"It occurred to me at grace, that I had judged by hearsay—I want to see, I want to see for myself, and perhaps," he added, after a while, "God will help me, and I will save a pupil of mine.
"Know, rascal," he said to me playfully, "that if your Rebbe isthatNòach who studied with me, he may some day be a great man in Israel, a veritable Brisk Rabbi!"
Then I knew that it was he, and my heart began to beat with violence.
And the two mountains met—and it is a miracle from heaven that I was not crushed between them.
The Byàle Rebbe of blessed memory used to send out his followers, at Simchas Torah, to walk round the town, and he himself sat in the balcony and looked on and had pleasure in what he saw.
It was not the Byàle of to-day: it was quite a small place then, with little, low-built houses, except for the Shool and the Rebbe's Kläus. The Rebbe's balcony was on the second floor, and you could see everything from it as if it all lay in the flat of your hand: the hills to the east and the river to the west. And the Rebbe sits and looks out, sees some Chassidîm walking along in silence, and throws down to them from the balcony the fragments of a tune. They catch at it and proceed on their way singing, and batches and batches of them go past and out of the town with songs and real gladness, with real Rejoicing of the Law—and the Rebbe used not to leave the balcony.
But on this occasion the Rebbe must have heard other steps, for he rose and came to meet the Rabbi of Brisk.
"Peace be with you, Rabbi!" he said meekly, in his sweet voice.
"Peace be with you, Nòach!" the Brisk Rabbi answered.
"Sit, Rabbi!"
The Brisk Rabbi took a seat, and the Byàle Rebbe stood before him.
"Tell me, Nòach," said the Brisk Rabbi, with lifted eyebrows, "why did you run away from my academy? What was wanting to you there?"
"Breathing-space, Rabbi," answered the other, composedly.
"What do you mean? What are you talking about, Nòach?"
"Not for myself," explained the Byàle Rebbe in a quiet tone, "it was for my soul."
"Why so, Nòach?"
"Your Torah, Rabbi, is all justice! It is without mercy! There is not a spark of grace in your Torah! And therefore it is joyless, and cannot breathe freely—it is all chains and fetters, iron regulations, copper laws!—and all higher Torah for the learned, for the select few!"
The Brisk Rabbi is silent, and the other continues:
"And tell me, Rabbi, what have you for All-Israel? What have you, Rabbi, for the wood-cutter, for the butcher, for the artisan, for the common Jew?—specially for the simple Jew? Rabbi, what have you for theunlearned?"
The Brisk Rabbi is silent, as though he did not understand what was being said to him. And still the Byàle Rebbe stands before him, and goes on in his sweet voice:
"Forgive me, Rabbi, but I must tell the truth—your Torah washard, hard and dry, for it is only the body and not the soul of the Law!"
"The soul?" asks the Brisk Rabbi, and rubs his high forehead.
"Certainly, as I told you, Rabbi, your Torah is for the select, for the learned, not for All-Israel. And the Torahmustbe for All-Israel! The Divine Presencemust rest on All-Israel! because the Torah is the soul of All-Israel!"
"AndyourTorah, Nòach?"
"You wish to see it, Rabbi?"
"Torah—seeit?" wonders the Brisk Rabbi.
"Come, Rabbi, I will show it you!—I will show you its splendor, the joy which beams forth from it upon all, upon All-Israel!"
The Brisk Rabbi does not move.
"I beg of you, Rabbi, come! It is not far."
He led him out on to the balcony, and I went quietly after. "You may come too, Shemaiah," he said to me, "to-day you will see it also—and the Brisk Rabbi will see—you will see the Simchas Torah—you will seerealRejoicing of the Law!"
And I saw what I had always seen, only I saw it differently—as if a curtain had fallen from my eyes.
A great wide sky—without a limit! The sky was so blue! so blue! it was a delight to the eye. Little white clouds, silvery clouds, floated across it, and when you looked at them intently, you saw how they quivered for joy, how they danced for Rejoicing in the Law! Away behind, the town was encircled by a broad green girdle, a dark green one, only the green lived, as though something alive were flying along through the grass; every now and then it seemed as if a living being, a sweet smell, a little life, darted up shining in a different place; one could see plainly how the little flames sprang up and danced and embraced each other.
And over the fields with the flames there sauntered parties and parties of Chassidîm—the satin and even thesatinette cloaks shine like glass, the torn ones and the whole alike—and the little flames that rose from the grass attached themselves to the shining holiday garments and seemed to dance round every Chossid with delight and affection—and every company of Chassidîm gazed up with wonderfully thirsty eyes at the Rebbe's balcony—and I could see how that thirsty gaze of theirs sucked light from the balcony, from the Rebbe's face, and the more light they sucked in, the louder they sang—louder and louder—more cheerfully, more devoutly.
And every company sang to its own tune, but all the different tunes and voices blended in the air, and there floated up to the Rebbe's balconyonestrain,onemelody—as though all were singingonesong. And everything sang—the sky, the celestial bodies, the earth beneath, the soul of the world itself—everything was singing!
Lord of the world! I thought I should dissolve away for sheer delight!
But it was not to be.
"It is time for the afternoon prayers!" said the Brisk Rabbi, suddenly, in a sharp tone; and it all vanished.
Silence ... the curtain has fallen back across my eyes; above is the usual sky, below—the usual fields, the usual Chassidîm in torn cloaks—old, disconnected fragments of song—the flames are extinguished. I glance at the Rebbe; his face is darkened, too.
———
They were not reconciled; the Brisk Rabbi remained a Misnagid as before.
But it had one result! He never persecuted again.
Great people have been known to do great wonders; witness the time when they attacked the Ghetto in Prague, and were about to assault the women, roast the children, and beat the remainder to death. When all means of defense were exhausted, the Maharal[145]laid down the Gemoreh, stepped out into the street, went up to the first mud-heap outside the door of a school-master, and made a clay image.
He blew into its nostril, and it began to move; then he whispered a name into its ear, and away went the image out of the Ghetto, and the Maharal sat down again to his book. The image fell upon our enemies who were besieging the Ghetto, and threshed them as it were with flails—they fell before him as thick as flies.
Prague was filled with corpses—they say the destruction lasted all Wednesday and Thursday; Friday, at noon, the image was still at it.
"Rabbi," exclaimed Kohol, "the image is making a clean sweep of the city! There will be no one left to light the fires on Sabbath or to take down the lamps!"[146]
A second time the Maharal shut his book; he took hisstand at the desk and began to chant the psalm, "A Song of the Sabbath Day."
Whereupon the image ceased from work, came back to the Ghetto, entered the synagogue, and approached the Maharal.
The Maharal whispered into its ear as before, its eyes closed, the breath left it, and it became once more a clay image.
And to this day the image lies aloft in the Prague synagogue, covered up with cobwebs that stretch across from wall to wall, and spread over the whole arcade, so that the image shall not be seen, above all, not by the pregnant women of the "women's court." And the cobwebs may not be touched: whoever touches them, dies!
No man, not the oldest there, recollects having seen the image; but the Chacham Zebî, the Maharal's grandson, sometimes wonders, whether, for instance, such an image might not be included in one of the ten males required to form a congregation?
The image, you see, is not forgotten—the image is there still.
But the name with which to give it life in the day of need has fallen as it were into a deep water!
And the cobwebs increase and increase, and one may not touch them.
What is to be done?
(ALL WORDS GIVEN BELOW, UNLESS OTHERWISE SPECIFIED, ARE HEBREW.)
CHANUKAHFeast of Dedication, or Feast of Lights, commemorating the victory of Judas Maccabeus.
CHASSIDÎMSeeChossid.
CHEDERPrivate religious school.
CHOSSID(pl. Chassidîm). Briefly, a mystic.Seethe article Hassidîm, in the Jewish Encyclopedia, V.
DAYANAssistant to the rabbi of a town.
DREIER(Ger.). A small coin.
ESROG(pl. Esrogîm). The "fruit of the tree Hadar," used with the Lulav on the Feast of Tabernacles.SeeLev. xxiii. 40.
FELDSCHER(Ger.). Assistant army surgeon; the successor to the celebrated Röfeh of twenty or thirty years ago.
GEHENNAThe nether world; hell.
GEMOREHThe Rabbinical discussion and elaboration of the Mishnah.SeeTalmud.
GEVIR(pl. Gevirîm). Influential rich man.
GROSCHEN(Ger.). A small coin.
GULDEN(Ger.). A florin.
GÜTERYÜD(Ger., "Good Jew"). Chassidic wonder-worker.SeeRebbe.
HAVDOLEHDivision; the ceremony ushering out the Sabbath or a holiday.
HEKDESHFree hospital.
KABBALAHA mystical religious philosophy, much studied by the Chassidîm.
KADDISHSanctification; a doxology. Specifically, the doxology recited by a child in memory of its parentsduring the first eleven months after their death, and thereafter on every anniversary of the day of their death.
KEDUSHAHSanctification; an important part of the public service in the synagogue.
KISSUSHSanctification; the ceremony ushering in the Sabbath or a holiday.
KLÄUS(Ger.). House of study; lit., hermitage.
KOHOLThe community; transferred to the heads of the community.
KOPEK(Russian). Small Russian coin, the hundredth part of a ruble.
KOSHERRitually permitted.
LÀMED-WÒFNIK.One of the thirty-six hidden saints, whose merits are said to sustain the world. Làmed is thirty; wòf is six; and nik is a Slavic termination expressing "of the kind."
LEHAVDÎLLit. "to distinguish." Elliptical for "to distinguish between the holy and the secular." It is equivalent to "excuse the comparison"; "with due distinction"; "pardon me for mentioning the two things in the same breath"; etc.
LULAV(pl. Lulavîm). The festal wreath used with the Esrog on the Feast of Tabernacles.SeeLev. xxiii. 40.
MAARIVThe evening service.
MASKILAn enlightened one; an "intellectual."
MINCHAHThe afternoon service.
MINYANA company of ten men, the minimum for a public service.
MISHNAHA code of laws.SeeTalmud.
MISHNAYESPlural of Mishnah; specifically, the volumes containing the Mishnah.
MISNAGID(pl. Misnagdîm). One opposed to the mystical teaching of the Chassidîm.
MOHELThe one who performs the rite of circumcision.
PARNOSSEHMeans of livelihood; sustenance.
RABBITeacher of the Law; the religious guide and arbiter of a community; also teacher, as at a Cheder.
REBMr.
REBBEThe acknowledged leader of the Chassidîm, usually a wonder-worker; called also "Güter Yüd." and Tsaddik.
REBBITZINWife of a rabbi.
RÖFEHJewish physician.
RUBLE(Russian). Russian coin worth about half a dollar.
SECHSER(Ger.). A small coin.
SHOCHETRitual slaughterer.
SHOFARRam's horn, used on New Year's Day, etc.SeeLev. xxiii. 24.
SHOOL(Ger., Schul'). Synagogue.
SIMCHASTORAH.The Festival of Rejoicing in the Law, the ninth day of the Feast of Tabernacles.
SLICHESPenitential prayers. Applied to the week, more or less, before the New Year, when these prayers are recited at the synagogue.
STÜBELE(Ger.). Chassidic meeting-house.
TAKI(Russian). Really.
TALLISPrayer-scarf.
TALMUDThe traditional lore of the Jews, reduced to writing about 500 of the present era. It consists of the Mishnah and the Gemoreh.
TALMUDTORAH.Free communal school.
TEFILLINPhylacteries.
TIKERINAssistant at the women's bath.
TORAHThe Jewish Law in general, and the Pentateuch in particular.
TOSSAFOTAn important commentary on the Talmud, composed chiefly by Franco-German authorities.
TSADDIKLit. "righteous man"; specifically, a Rebbe, a wonder-worker, a "Güter Yüd."
The Lord Baltimore PressBALTIMORE, MD., U. S. A.
Changes made in the text(not of the etext transcriber):staid longer=>stayed longer