A Book that Was Lost

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Agnon’s stories over a thirty year period combine a sense of personal confusion with a more pervasive sense of existential dislocation. These narratives find their starting point within the psyche, but their effect quite often is to blur the distinction between inner and outer worlds. Most striking is their use of culturally specific terms to create dramas of impulse and inhibition, desire and constraint, longing and isolation. But these are versatile narratives that can also be read as responses to crises of Jewish modernity from the Emancipation to the present day. Through a focus on individual dilemmas, they draw us into narrative situations that carry resonances on multiple levels of experience.

Among these stories are some that have been described as Kafkaesque, a label Agnon always resisted and some of his critics have decried. These stories may remind one of Kafka’s tendency to portray the impotence of the individual in a world he or she cannot completely decipher. However, Agnon’s stories always retain suggestions of an identifiably Jewish frame of reference, along with lingering suggestions of possibilities of redemption. These dimensions are hardly ever to be found in Kafka’s universe.

The first two stories, “To the Doctor” and the well-known “A Whole Loaf,” were published in periodicals in the 1930s and form part of The Book of Deeds. Both place the protagonist in ostensibly mundane situations, but each offers the reader cues that suggest broader spiritual implications. The title “To the Doctor” opens the story to the possibility of a cure for unspecified ills. The story places the narrator between Mr. Andermann — a character whose name suggests a German rendering of the Sitra Ahra, the demonic “other side”—and a baal tefillah (one who leads communal prayer), who offers the protagonist the opportunity to participate in the collective confession of the Day of Atonement.

The Search for Meaning

Like “To the Doctor,” “A Whole Loaf” organizes itself around a conflict. The protagonist is caught between the desire to fill his belly after a day without food and the obligation to mail the letters entrusted to him by Dr. Yekutiel Ne’eman. The letters of Dr. Ne’eman carry with them the potential to bring words of cure to those who are ill, just as Dr. Ne’eman’s book is said to have improved the lives of those who read it. Thus, the request that Dr. Ne’eman makes of the narrator — to deliver his letters to the post office before it closes — carries with it the sense of a higher ethical mission.

It is a short interpretive step from the bearded sage Dr. Ne’eman and his letters of spiritual uplift to the figure of Moses and the giving of the Torah, a step that is supported by a reading of Dr. Ne’eman’s name. As the Israeli critic Baruch Kurzweil pointed out, Yekutiel — which means “listens to God”—is a name that has been applied to Moses, and the epithet ne’eman—“faithful”—is used to describe Moses as the faithful servant of God. Going further, we can note the dispute about Dr. Ne’eman’s book. Did he simply write it himself or was it, as he claims, dictated by an unseen master? That dispute brings to mind the split between those who view the Torah as the product of revelation and those who see it as the product of human inspiration. The story is replete with cues that invoke the broader framework of communal values and traditions, but in a way that makes them part of the situation of a modern everyman.

That everyman is a fellow who wants to sit down and enjoy a good meal but is impeded in fulfilling his wish by a commission that recalls him to a spiritual dimension he is in danger of forgetting. Imaginative participation in this conflict does not require any particular acquaintance with Jewish learning. Some awareness of what Agnon has packed into the text, however, gives the reader access to a kind of learned gamesmanship that the text conducts with rabbinic injunctions and midrashic tales. Agnon is a master of this kind of erudite fun, and nowhere is it better illustrated than in “A Whole Loaf.”

Consider the title of the story. What is this “whole loaf”? Is Agnon reminding us that the Sabbath blessing over bread may be recited only over a loaf that is whole, not cut? Are we meant to interpret the phrase in light of the rabbinic injunction to make a Sabbath blessing over two loaves? Or should we interpret the whole loaf as an indication of the greedy and egotistical nature of the narrator who will settle for nothing less than “a whole loaf”? Agnon is playing a particular kind of teasing game here, in which hints at rabbinic sources add an additional dimension to our reading.

Take the moment, late in the story, at which the protagonist finds himself sitting in the deserted restaurant amid the greasy plates and remains of others’ meals. He checks his watch and sees that it is half-past ten. “Half-past ten is just a time like any other, but in spite of this I began to shake and tremble.” Why shake and tremble? Critic Avraham Holtz tells us that Agnon may well be thinking of a famous midrash that recounts the story of Adam, from his creation to the forbidden fruit and expulsion from Eden, in the narrative framework of a twelve-hour day. At ten, according to the midrash, Adam sinned, and at eleven he was judged. Read in light of the midrashic narrative, then, Agnon’s protagonist is caught at a moment of spiritual reckoning. What Agnon’s story does is to take that moment and expand it into a kind of Chaplinesque comedy in which the fumbling protagonist fails to find either fulfillment or judgment.

In a different mode, “At the Outset of the Day,” published in the early 1950s, places the narrator and his daughter in a scene of postwar devastation, but it moves back in time immediately as they seek refuge in the Great Synagogue of Buczacz, the town that no longer exists. Like other stories in this volume—“A Book That Was Lost” and “On the Road,” for instance—“At the Outset of the Day” tells a story of destruction. But it also focuses on the dilemma of its narrator, who teaches his daughter to combine the letters of the prayer book to form av, the Hebrew word for “father,” and yet fails to shelter and clothe his child after her dress is consumed by flames from the memorial candle lit for the Day of Atonement.

The Search for Meaning

We can see in the young daughter a symbol of the soul, so that the narrator’s parental failure becomes an emblem of his spiritual state. Little wonder, then, that he seeks and does not find a covering for his daughter in the geniza, the part of the synagogue where worn-out fragments of sacred texts are stored.

The narrator seeks a home and a past that he has abandoned: he approaches a group of old people, among them Reb Alter, who circumcised him and brought him into the community he now wishes to recover. While Reb Alter offers a reassuring presence that suggests continuity of the generations, the signs of the disintegration of that community are manifest. The narrator thinks of his friendship with Reb Alter’s grandson Gad and remembers the account of a dream Gad’s wet-nurse had just before Gad disappeared. The dream image pictures Gad in what the critic Gershon Shaked has identified as a nineteenth-century student’s cap, with a plume that carries letters of the Latin alphabet, a hint that Gad has abandoned the traditional Jewish world for secular culture. The story thus responds not only to the destruction caused by “our enemies,” but to the erosion from within of communal values.

The ending of “At the Outset of the Day,” however, lends itself to varying and even opposing readings. From one angle, it can be argued that the story lifts both narrator and reader beyond the devastation it has recorded to achieve one of those moments of redemptive clarity that Agnon excels in creating. That concluding moment is achieved in this instance by virtue of the Torah scroll that the narrator himself inscribed, a writing that joins him to an ongoing tradition. On the other hand, the ending could be viewed as solipsistic, in the sense that the narrator can purify his soul after the destruction only by citing the scroll that he wrote for the souls of days departed. In this reading, the scroll constitutes his own body of work devoted to the world before the catastrophe.

In a different way, “The Sign” takes up the position of the writer in the world after the destruction of European Jewry. Published in 1962, this story uses shifts between past and present to communicate simultaneously a sense of the creation of a structure and of the impossibility of integration or wholeness after the Holocaust. Structure refers most obviously here to the narrator’s house. But his efforts to establish a home for his family in the Land of Israel are opposed by the news of the destruction of Buczacz, the town of his beginnings. The story thus marks the impossibility of regarding the building up of the Land of Israel as compensation for the loss of the European Jewish community.

The drama in “The Sign” hinges on the narrator’s emotional dilemma. Constricted emotionally, he is unable to weep for the destruction of his townspeople and at the same time afraid to face the enormity of his grief. Caught in this conflict, he finds himself unable to join in the celebration of the giving of the Torah, the holiday of Shavuot on which the story is set. Instead he absorbs himself in the physical setting of his neighborhood in Talpiyot, just outside of Jerusalem, where he feels the sea wind and the desert wind, and enumerates with love the flowers and shrubs that surround his house. Inevitably, however, he becomes the vehicle for powerful experiences of memory, which compete with ongoing ties to loved ones in the present. The attention of his imagination oscillates between past and present as he seeks the resolution that eludes him.

Working his way toward the expression of grief, the narrator recalls the coming of spring when he was a child in Buczacz: he remembers the recitation of Hallel at the New Moon, a moment that coincided with the thawing of the river. It is the interpenetration of these worlds that becomes the “sign” of the writing. The luminosity of the text is the result of grief transmuted into the activity of memory, which writes itself into the very landscape of Israel as the writer sees it.

In a bold gesture, Agnon summons up the figure of the medieval Jewish poet Solomon Ibn Gabirol to sanctify the memory of Buczacz and to signal its inscription in the heavens. The medieval payyetan (religious poet) who weaves his name into his poems promises the narrator a poem that will carry the name of Buczacz in its verses. The narrator’s soul melts in response to this memorializing gesture of the poet, which produces a heavenly writing to which he alone is witness. The poem “sings itself in the heavens above, among the poems of the holy poets, the beloved of God.” The dead of Buczacz now number among that heavenly company, while the writer remains below. He is the survivor, unable to evade the responsibility of memory, which animates his writing.

The Search for Meaning

To the Doctor

Father lay ill, and a moist cloth was bound about his head. His face was weary from illness, and a heavy worry dulled his blue eyes — like a man who knows his death is near but doesn’t know what will happen to his young sons and daughters. Opposite him, in another room, lay my little sister. Each was ill with a different illness for which the doctor had not yet given a name.

My wife stood in the kitchen and shelled peas from their pods. After she placed them in the pot she put on her wrap and went with me to the doctor.

As I was leaving the house, I stumbled upon some peas, for when my wife was busy preparing them for eating they had rolled out of her hands and scattered on the stairs. I wanted to sweep them away before the mice would smell them and come, but I was rushed; it was already past eight-thirty, and at nine o’clock the doctor used to visit his friends and drink with them all night, while at home there lay two sick persons who needed special attention — particularly my little sister, who used to caper and sing, exciting our anxiety lest she fall from her bed or disturb Father from his sleep.

Those peas began to bother me because they turned into lentils, and lentils are a food of trouble and mourning. It is easy to understand the sorrow of a man who has two sick persons at home, and things put this kind of thought into his heart.

It is not proper to tell that I was a bit resentful toward my wife and I thought to myself: What good are women? She had toiled to prepare a meal for us and at the end all the peas had scattered. When I saw she was running and knew why she was running, my resentment disappeared and love entered my heart.

On the way, right next to the black bridge, Mr. Andermann met me and greeted me. I returned his greeting and wanted to leave him. He held my hand and told me that he had just arrived from the city of Bordeaux in England and today or tomorrow he and his father would come to see our new house. “Ay, Ay, Ay,” said Mr. Andermann, “they tell all sorts of wonders about your house.” I contorted my face to give it a pleasing expression and reflected, Why does he say he will come with his father? Does Mr. Andermann have a father? And I reflected further: Couldn’t this excessive attempt to give my face a pleasing appearance leave an impression after it? I remembered the peas which had turned into lentils and I began to worry about retribution.

So that Mr. Andermann might not realize what was in my heart, I put my hand into my pocket and took out my watch; I saw that nine o’clock was near, and at nine the doctor used to go to his club and get drunk, while there at home lay two sick persons whose illness had no name. When Mr. Andermann saw I was in haste, he understood in his usual way that I was hurrying to the post office. He said, “The postal arrangements have changed and you don’t have to hurry.”

I left Mr. Andermann in his error and I didn’t tell him about the sick persons lest he bother me with advice and detain me.

There came a stately old man in whose house of study I used to pray on the High Holy Days. I have heard many cantors, but I have not heard a baal tefillah like him whose prayer is beautiful and clear even during his crying. I had wanted to speak to him many times, but I never could. Now he set upon me his eyes which were bleary from crying and looked at me affectionately, as if he were saying, “Here I am; let us talk, if you wish.” Mr. Andermann grasped my hand and didn’t let me go. Actually, I could have removed my hand from his and gone off, but on that very same day a dog had bitten me and torn my clothes, and had I turned my face from Mr. Andermann and gone he would have seen the tear.

I remembered the time when the old man stood before the reader’s desk during the prayer “And because of our sins…” and beat his head on the floor until the walls of the house of study quaked. My heart quaked and I was drawn toward him, but Mr. Andermann grasped my hand. I stood and twisted my face and tried to give it a pleasing expression.

My wife crossed the bridge and reached the doctor’s house, which was next to the post office and stood before the entrance of the house, her shoulders twitching from sorrow and waiting. I removed my hand from Mr. Andermann’s hand and went toward my wife. The black bridge quaked under my feet and the waves of the river swelled and rose, rose and swelled.

A Whole Loaf

1

I had not tasted anything all day long. I had made no preparations on Sabbath eve, so I had nothing to eat on the Sabbath. At that time I was on my own. My wife and children were abroad, and I had remained all by myself at home; the bother of attending to my food fell upon myself. If I did not prepare my meals or go to hotels and restaurants, I had to put up with hunger inside me. On that particular day, I had intended to eat at a hotel; but the sun had flamed like a furnace, so I decided it was better to go hungry than to walk about in that heat.

In all truth, my dwelling did not keep the heat from me either. The floor was as hot as glowing fire, the roof fevered like piercing fire, the walls simply burned like fire, and all the vessels simply sweated fire, so that it was like fire licking fire, fire of the room licking at the body, and the fire of the body licking against the fire of the room. But when a man is at home, he can soak himself in water if he likes, or take off his clothes when he wants to, so that they do not weigh on him.

Once the greater part of the day had passed, and the sun weakened, I rose and washed myself and dressed, and went off to eat. I was pleased to think that I would be sitting at a well-spread table with a clean tablecloth on it, and waiters and waitresses attending to me while I ate properly prepared food that I had not needed to exhaust myself about. For I was already tired of the poor food I used to prepare for myself at home.

The day was no longer hot, and a gentle breeze was blowing. The streets were filling up. From the Mahaneh Yehudah Quarter to the Jaffa Gate or nearby, the old men and women and the lads and girls were stretching their legs all the way. Round fur hats and caps and felt hats and turbans and tarbooshes shook and nodded, on and amid hairy and hairless heads. From time to time fresh faces joined them, coming from Rabbi Kook Street and from the Sukkat Shalom and Even Yisrael and Nahlat Shiva quarters, and from the Street of the Prophets which people have the bad habit of calling the Street of the Consuls; as well as from all the other streets to which the authorities had not yet managed to give names. All day long they had been imprisoned in their homes by the heat. Now that day was past and the sun was losing its strength, they came out to glean a little of the atmosphere of Sabbath twilight which Jerusalem borrows from the Garden of Eden. I was borne along with them till I came to a solitary path.

2

While I was being carried along, an old man knocked at his window to draw my attention. I turned my head and saw Dr. Yekutiel Ne’eman standing at the window. I hurried over with great pleasure, for he is a great sage, and his words are pleasant. But when I came there, he had vanished. I stood looking into his house until he joined me and greeted me. I greeted him in return, and waited to hear some of those great thoughts we are accustomed to hearing from him.

Dr. Ne’eman asked me how my wife and children were. I sighed and answered, “You have reminded me of my trouble. They are still abroad and want to come back to the Land of Israel.”

“If they want to come back,” said he, “why don’t they come?”

I sighed and said, “There’s some delay.”

“Verily the delay comes from a crooked way,” said he, rhyming on my word. And he began to scold me. “There’s some laziness about you,” said he, “so that you have not devoted yourself to bringing them back; and the result for you is that your wife and children are wandering about without father or husband while you are without wife and children.”

I looked down at the ground in shame and said nothing. Then I raised my head and turned my eyes to his mouth, in the hope that he would say something consoling. His lips were slightly open, and a kind of choked rebuke hung from them, while his fine, gray-shot beard had creased and grown wavy, like the Great Sea when it rages. I regretted having brought his wrath down on me and causing him to bother about such trifles. So I took counsel with myself and began to talk about his book.

3

This was a book about which opinions were largely divided. There are some scholars who say that whatever is written in it as from the mouth of the Lord (….) was written by Yekutiel Ne’eman, who neither added nor took away anything from His words. And that is what Yekutiel Ne’eman declares. But there are some who say this is certainly not the case, and that Ne’eman wrote it all himself and ascribed his words to a certain Lord whom no man ever saw.

This is not the place to explain the nature of that book. Yet this I must add, that since it first became known the world has grown slightly better, since a few people have improved their behavior and somewhat changed their nature; and there are some who devote themselves body and soul to doing everything in the manner described there.

In order to make Dr. Ne’eman feel more pleased, I began proclaiming the virtues of his book and said, “Everybody admits that it is a great work and there is nothing like it.” Then Yekutiel turned his face from me, let me be, and went his way. I stood eating my heart with grief and remorse for what I had said.

But Dr. Ne’eman did not remain annoyed with me for long. As I was about to go away, he returned with a packet of letters to be taken to the post office and sent by registered mail. I put the letters in my breast pocket and placed my hand on my heart as a promise that I would perform my mission faithfully.

4

On the way I passed the house of study and entered to recite the evening prayers. The sun had already set entirely, but the beadle had not yet kindled the light. In view of the mourning of Moses, the congregation did not engage in the study of the Torah, but sat discoursing and singing and taking their time.

Stars could already be seen outside, but complete darkness still held sway within the building. At length the beadle lit a light, and the congregation rose to recite the evening prayers. After the Havdalah ceremony, which brings the Sabbath day to a close, I rose to go to the post office.

All the grocery stores and other shops were open, and people crowded around the kiosks on every side. I also wished to cool myself with a glass of soda water, but since I was in a hurry to send off the letters, I kept my desire in check and did without drinking.

Hunger began to oppress me. I considered whether I should go and eat first. After starting, I changed my mind and said, Let me send off the letters and then I shall eat. On the way I thought to myself, If only Ne’eman knew that I am hungry, he would urge me to eat first. I turned myself about and went toward the restaurant.

Before I had taken more than two or three steps, the power of imagination arrived. What it imagined! What did it not imagine! All of a sudden it brought a sickbed before me. There’s a sick man somewhere, I told myself, and Dr. Ne’eman has been told about it and has written down a remedy for him; and now I have to hurry and take the letter containing it to the post office. So I got set to run to the post office.

In the middle of my running I stopped and thought, Is he the only doctor there is? And even if he is, does he promise that his remedy is going to help? And even if it does help, do I really have to put off my meal, when I haven’t eaten anything at all the whole day long? My legs grew as heavy as stone. I did not go to eat because of the force of imagination, while I did not go to the post office because of my reasoning.

5

Since I was standing still, I had time to consider my affairs. I began to weigh what I ought to do first and what I ought to do later, and reached the decision to go to an eating place first, since I was hungry. I turned my face at once to the restaurant and marched off as quickly as I could before some other thought should strike me; for a man’s thoughts are likely to delay his actions. And in order that my thoughts should not confuse me, I gave myself good counsel, picturing all the kinds of good food for which the restaurant was well known. I could already see myself sitting, eating and drinking and enjoying myself. The force of imagination helped me, producing more than an average man can eat or drink, and making good to my taste each article of food and drink. Undoubtedly the intention was for the best, but what pleasure does a hungry man have when he is shown all kinds of food and drink but is given no chance to enjoy them? Maybe he can find satisfaction from this in dream, but it is doubtful if he will do so when awake.

This being the case, I went back toward the restaurant, thinking over what I should eat and drink. At heart I was already happy to be sitting in a pleasant building at a spread table, among fine folk busy eating and drinking. Then maybe I would find a good acquaintance there, and we would spice our repast with pleasant conversation which satisfies the heart and does not weigh on the soul; for I would have you know that Dr. Ne’eman had weighed somewhat on my heart.

Remembering Dr. Ne’eman, I remembered his letters. I began to feel afraid that I might be so carried away by my talk with my friend that I would not send the letters off. So I changed my mind and said, Let us go to the post office first and be done with the job, so that afterward we can sit comfortably and the letters will not keep on burdening my mind.

6

If only the ground had moved along under me, I would have done my mission at once. But the ground stood still, and the way to the post office is hard on the feet, because the ground is broken and uneven with heaps of earth and stones; while when you do get there the postal clerks are not in the habit of hurrying but keep you hanging about, and by the time they finish whatever it is they are doing, all the food will get cold and you will find no hot dishes, so that you are bound to remain hungry. But I gave no thought to this and went to the post office.

It is easy to understand the state of a man who has two courses in front of him: if he takes one, it seems to him that he has to follow the other; and if he takes the other, it seems to him that he ought to go along the first one. At length he takes the course that he ought to take. Now that I was going to the post office, I wondered that I could possibly have had any doubt for a while and wished to give my own trifling affairs precedence over the affairs of Dr. Ne’eman. And within a short while I found myself standing at the post office.

7

I was just about to enter when a carriage came along and I saw a man sitting in it. I stood and stared in astonishment: now, when as much as a horseshoe is not to be found in town, a man comes along in a two-horse carriage. And what was still more surprising, he was mocking the passersby and driving his horses along the pavement.

I raised my eyes and saw that he was Mr. Gressler. This Mr. Gressler had been the head of an agricultural school abroad, but there he used to ride a horse and here he drove a carriage. When he was abroad he used to joke with the peasants’ daughters and the simple folk, and here in the Land of Israel he fooled about with anybody and everybody. Yet he was an intelligent and polite person, and although he was a fleshy fellow, his fleshiness was not noticed by reason of his wide learning.

This Mr. Gressler had something about him that attracted all who saw him. So it is not surprising that I was also affected. On this occasion Mr. Gressler sat leaning back in his carriage, the reins loose in his hand and dragging below the horses’ legs, as he watched with pleasure while people passed on either side and returned to the place from which they had run, and jumped about in front of the horses, the dust of their feet mingling with the dust of the horses’ hooves; all of them alike as cheerful as though Mr. Gressler were only out to please them.

This Mr. Gressler was my acquaintance, one of my special acquaintances. Since when have I known him? Possibly since the days I reached a maturity of knowledge. Nor do I exaggerate if I say that from the day I met him we have never ceased to have a liking for one another. Now, although all and sundry like him, I can say that he prefers me to all of them, since he has taken the trouble to show me all kinds of pleasures. When I used to tire of them he would amuse me with words of wisdom. Mr. Gressler is gifted with exceptional wisdom, of the kind that undermines all the wisdom you may have learned elsewhere. Never did he ask for any compensation, but he gives of his bounty and is happy to have people accept it. Ah, there were days when I was a lad and he went out of his way to divert me; until the night my house was burned down and all my possessions went up in flames.

The night my house burned, Mr. Gressler sat playing cards with my neighbor. This neighbor, an apostate Jew, was a dealer in textiles. He lived below with his wares, while I lived above with my books. From time to time my neighbor told me that there was no great demand for his goods, that all his textiles were like paper since they were made in wartime; now that the war was over, textiles were being made of proper wool and flax again, and nobody wanted to make a suit out of the substitute stuffs which wear through and tear as soon as they are put on, if he could get himself real material. “Are you insured?” Mr. Gressler asked him. “Insured I am,” he answered. While they were talking Mr. Gressler lit a cigar and said, “Drop this match in this rubbish heap and collect your insurance money.” He went and set his goods on fire, and the whole house was burned down. That apostate who was insured received the value of his goods, while I, who had not insured my possessions, came out of it in a very bad way. All that I had left after the fire I spent on lawyers, because Mr. Gressler persuaded me to take action against the municipality for not saving my home and, what was more, making the fire worse. That night the firemen had had a party and grown drunk, filling their vessels with brandy and beer, and when they came to put the fire out, they made it burn even more.

For various reasons I kept my distance from Mr. Gressler after that, and it almost seemed to me that I was done with him for good and all, since I bore him a grudge for being the cause of my house burning down, and since I was devoting myself to Yekutiel Ne’eman’s book. Those were the days when I was making myself ready to go up to the Land of Israel and neglected all worldly affairs; and since I was neglecting these worldly affairs, Mr. Gressler let me be. But when I set out for the Land of Israel the first person I ran across was Gressler, since he was traveling by the same ship as I was; save that I traveled on the bottom deck like poor folk do, while he traveled on the top deck like the rich.

I cannot say that I was very happy to see Mr. Gressler. On the contrary, I was very sad for fear he would remind me of my onetime deeds. So I pretended not to see him. He noticed this and did not bother me. Then it seemed to me that since our paths did not cross on board ship, they would do so even less on the land. But when the ship reached the port, my belongings were detained at the customs, and Mr. Gressler came and redeemed them. He also made things easier for me in my other affairs until we went up to Jerusalem.

Thenceforward we used to meet one another. Sometimes I visited him and sometimes he visited me, and I don’t know who followed the other more. Particularly in those days when my wife was away from the country. I had nothing to do at that time, and he was always available. And when he came he used to spend most of the night with me. His was pleasant company, for he knew all that was going on and had the inside story even before the things happened. Sometimes my heart misgave me, but I disregarded it.

8

Seeing Mr. Gressler in front of the post office, I signaled and called him by name. He stopped his carriage and helped me up.

I forgot all about the letters and the hunger and went along with him. Or maybe I did not disregard the hunger and the letters, but I put them aside for a little while.

Before I had begun talking to him properly, Mr. Hophni came toward us. I asked Mr. Gressler to turn his horses to one side, because this Hophni is a bothersome fellow, and I am afraid to have too much to do with him. Ever since he invented a new mousetrap, it has been his habit to visit me two or three times a week, to tell me all that is being written about him and his invention. And I am a weak person, I am, who cannot bear to hear the same thing twice. It is true that the mice are a great nuisance, and the mousetrap can greatly correct the evil; but when this Hophni goes gnawing at your brains, it’s quite likely that you would prefer the mice to the conversation of the trapmaker.

Mr. Gressler did not turn his horses away, but on the contrary ran the carriage up to Hophni and waved to him to get in. Why did Mr. Gressler think of doing this? Either it was in order to teach me that a man has to be patient, or because he wanted to have some fun. Now I was not at all patient at that time, nor was I in the mood for fun. I stood up, took the reins out of his hands, and turned the horses off in a different direction. Since I am not an expert in steering horses, the carriage turned over on me and Mr. Gressler, and we both rolled into the street. I yelled and shouted, “Take the reins and get me out of this!” But he pretended not to hear and rolled with me, laughing as though it amused him to roll about with me in the muck.

I began to fear that a motorcar might pass and crush our heads. I raised my voice higher, but it could not be heard because of Mr. Gressler’s laughter. Woe was me, Mr. Gressler kept on laughing, as though he found pleasure in dusting himself with the dust of the horses’ feet and fluttering between life and death. When my distress came to a head, an old carter came along and disentangled us. I rose from the ground and gathered my bones together and tried to stand. My legs were tired and my hands were strained and my bones were broken, and all of my body was full of wounds. With difficulty I pulled myself together and prepared to go off.

Although every part of me was aching, I did not forget my hunger. I entered the first hotel that came my way, and before entering the dining hall I cleaned off all the dirt and wiped my injuries and washed my face and hands.

This hotel has an excellent name throughout the town for its spacious rooms and fine arrangements and polite and quick service and good food and excellent wine and worthy guests. When I entered the dining hall, I found all the tables full, and fine folk sitting, eating and drinking and generally enjoying themselves. The light blinded my eyes and the scent of the good food confused me. I wanted to snatch something from the table in order to stay my heart. Nor is there anything surprising about that, as I had tasted nothing all day long. But when I saw how importantly and gravely everybody was sitting there, I did not have the courage to do it.

I took a chair and sat at a table and waited for the waiter to come. Meantime I took the bill of fare and read it once, twice, and a third time. How many good things there are which a hungry man can eat his fill of, and how long it seems to take until they are brought to him! From time to time I looked up and saw waiters and waitresses passing by, all of them dressed like distinguished people. I began to prepare my heart and soul for them, and started weighing how I should talk to them. Although we are one people, each one of us talks ten languages, and above all in the Land of Israel.

9

After an hour, or maybe a little less, a waiter arrived and bowed and asked, “What would you like, sir?” What would I like and what wouldn’t I like! I showed him the bill of fare and told him to fetch me just anything. And in order that he should not think me the kind of boor who eats anything without selecting it, I added to him gravely, “But I want a whole loaf.” The waiter nodded his head and said, “I shall fetch it for you at once, I shall fetch it for you at once.”

I sat waiting until he came back with it. He returned carrying a serving dish with all kinds of good things. I jumped from my place and wanted to take something. He went and placed the food in front of somebody else, quietly arranged each thing separately in front of him, and chatted and laughed with him, noting on his list all kinds of drinks which the fellow was ordering for his repast. Meanwhile he turned his face toward me and said, “You want a whole loaf, don’t you, sir? I’m bringing it at once.”

Before long he came back with an even bigger tray than the first one. I understood that it was meant for me and told myself, That’s the meaning of the saying: the longer the wait, the greater the reward. As I prepared to take something, the waiter said to me, “Excuse me, sir, I’m bringing you yours at once.” And he arranged the food in front of a different guest most carefully, just as he had done before.

I kept myself under control and did not grab anything from others. And since I did not grab anything from others I told myself, Just as I don’t grab from others, so others won’t grab my share. Nobody touches what’s prepared for somebody else. Let’s wait awhile and we’ll get what’s coming to us, just like all the other guests who came before me; for it’s first come, first served.

The waiter returned. Or maybe it was another waiter and, because I was so hungry, I only thought it was the same one. I jumped from my chair in order to remind him of my presence. He came and stood and bowed to me as though mine were a new face. I began wondering who this waiter could be, a fresh fellow or the one from whom I had ordered my food; for if he were a fresh waiter, I would have to order afresh, and if it were the same one, all I had to do was to remind him. While I was thinking it over, he went his way. A little later he returned, bringing every kind of food and drink, all for the fellows sitting to the right or the left of me.

Meanwhile fresh guests came and sat down and ordered all kinds of food and drink. The waiters ran and brought their orders to them. I began to wonder why they were being served first when I had been there before them. Maybe because I had asked for a whole loaf and you could not get a whole loaf at present, so they were waiting till they could get one from the baker. I began to berate myself for asking for a whole loaf, when I would have been satisfied with even a small slice.

10

What is the use of feeling remorseful after the deed? While I was bothering my heart, I saw a child sitting holding white bread with saffron of the kind that my mother, peace be with her, used to bake us for Purim, and which I can still taste now. I would have given the world for just a mouthful from that bread. My heart was standing still with hunger, and my two eyes were set on that child eating and jumping and scattering crumbs about him.

Once again the waiter brought a full tray. Since I was sure he was bringing it for me, I sat quietly and importantly, like a person who is in no particular hurry about his food. Alas, he did not put the tray in front of me but placed it in front of somebody else.

I began to excuse the waiter with the idea that the baker had not yet brought the whole loaf, and wanted to tell him that I was prepared to do without it. But I could not get a word out of my mouth because of my hunger.

All of a sudden a clock began striking. I took my watch out of my pocket and saw that it was half-past ten. Half-past ten is just a time like any other, but in spite of this I began to shake and tremble. Maybe because I remembered the letters of Dr. Ne’eman which I had not yet sent off. I stood up hastily in order to take the letters to the post office. As I stood up, I bumped against the waiter fetching a tray full of dishes and glasses and flagons and all kinds of food and drink. The waiter staggered and dropped the tray, and everything on it fell, food and drink alike; and he also slipped and fell. The guests turned their heads and stared, some of them in alarm and some of them laughing.

The hotel keeper came and calmed me down and led me back to my place, and he asked me to wait a little while until they fetched me a different meal. From his words I understood that the food that had fallen from the waiter’s hands had been intended for me, and now they were preparing me another meal.

I possessed my soul in patience and sat waiting. Meanwhile my spirit flew from place to place. Now it flew to the kitchen where they were preparing my meal, and now to the post office from which letters were being sent. By that time the post office doors were already closed, and even if I were to go there it would be no use; but the spirit flew about after its fashion, even to places that the body might not enter.

11

They did not fetch me another meal. Maybe because they had not yet had time to prepare it, or maybe because the waiters were busy making up the accounts of the guests. In any case, some of the diners rose from the table, picking their teeth and yawning on their full stomachs. As they went out, some of them stared at me in astonishment, while others paid me no attention, as though I did not exist. When the last of the guests had left, the attendant came in and turned out the lights, leaving just one light still burning faintly. I sat at a table full of bones and leavings and empty bottles and a dirty tablecloth, and waited for my meal, as the hotel keeper himself had asked me to sit down and wait for it.

While I was sitting there I suddenly began to wonder whether I had lost the letters on the way, while I had been rolling on the ground with Gressler. I felt in my pocket and saw that they were not lost; but they had become dirty with the muck and the mire and the wine.

Once again a clock struck. My eyes were weary and the lamp was smoking and black silence filled the room. In the silence came the sound of a key creaking in the lock, like the sound of a nail being hammered into the flesh. I knew that they had locked me into the room and forgotten about me, and I would not get out until they opened next day. I closed my eyes tight and made an effort to fall asleep.

I made an effort to fall asleep and closed my eyes tight. I heard a kind of rustling and saw that a mouse had jumped onto the table and was picking at the bones. Now, said I to myself, he’s busy with the bones. Then he’ll gnaw the tablecloth, then he’ll gnaw the chair I’m sitting on, and then he’ll gnaw at me. First he’ll start on my shoes, then on my socks, then on my foot, then on my calf, then on my thigh, then on all my body. I turned my eyes to the wall and saw the clock. I waited for it to strike again and frighten the mouse, so that it would run away before it reached me. A cat came and I said, Here is my salvation. But the mouse paid no attention to the cat and the cat paid no attention to the mouse; and this one stood gnawing and that one stood chewing.

Meanwhile the lamp went out and the cat’s eyes shone with a greenish light that filled all the room. I shook and fell. The cat shivered and the mouse jumped and both of them stared at me in alarm, one from one side and the other from the other. Suddenly the sound of trotting hooves and carriage wheels was heard, and I knew that Mr. Gressler was coming back from his drive. I called him, but he did not answer me.

Mr. Gressler did not answer me, and I lay there dozing until I fell asleep. By the time day broke, I was awakened by the sound of cleaners, men and women, coming to clean the building. They saw me and stared at me in astonishment with their brooms in their hands. At length they began laughing and asked, “Who’s this fellow lying here?” Then the waiter came and said, “This is the one who was asking for the whole loaf.”

I took hold of my bones and rose from the floor. My clothes were dirty, my head was heavy on my shoulders, my legs were heavy under me, my lips were cracked, and my throat was dry, while my teeth were on edge with a hunger-sweat. I stood up and went out of the hotel into the street, and from the street into another until I reached my house. All the time my mind was set on the letters that Dr. Ne’eman had handed over for me to send off by post. But that day was Sunday, when the post office was closed for things that the clerk did not consider important.

After washing off the dirt I went out to get myself some food. I was all alone at that time. My wife and children were out of the country, and all the bother of my food fell on me alone.

At the Outset of the Day

After the enemy destroyed my home I took my little daughter in my arms and fled with her to the city. Gripped with terror, I fled in frenzied haste a night and a day until I arrived at the courtyard of the Great Synagogue one hour before nightfall on the eve of the Day of Atonement. The hills and mountains that had accompanied us departed, and I and the child entered into the courtyard. From out of the depths rose the Great Synagogue, on its left the old house of study and directly opposite that, one doorway facing the other, the new house of study.

This was the house of prayer and these the houses of Torah that I had kept in my mind’s eye all my life. If I chanced to forget them during the day, they would stir themselves and come to me at night in my dreams, even as during my waking hours. Now that the enemy had destroyed my home, I and my little daughter sought refuge in these places; it seemed that my child recognized them, so often had she heard about them.

An aura of peace and rest suffused the courtyard. The Children of Israel had already finished the afternoon prayer and, having gone home, were sitting down to the last meal before the fast to prepare themselves for the morrow, that they might have strength and health enough to return in repentance.

A cool breeze swept through the courtyard, caressing the last of the heat in the thick walls, and a whitish mist spiraled up the steps of the house, the kind children call angels’ breath.

I rid my mind of all that the enemy had done to us and reflected upon the Day of Atonement drawing ever closer, that holy festival comprised of love and affection, mercy and prayer, a day whereon men’s supplications are dearer, more desired, more acceptable than at all other times. Would that they might appoint a reader of prayers worthy to stand before the ark, for recent generations have seen the decline of emissaries of the congregation who know how to pray; and cantors who reverence their throats with their trilling, but bore the heart, have increased. And I, I needed strengthening — and, needless to say, my little daughter, a babe torn away from her home.

I glanced at her, at my little girl standing all atremble by the memorial candle in the courtyard, warming her little hands over the flame. Growing aware of my eyes, she looked at me like a frightened child who finds her father standing behind her and sees that his thoughts are muddled and his heart humbled.

Grasping her hand in mine, I said, “Good men will come at once and give me a tallit with an adornment of silver just like the one the enemy tore. You remember the lovely tallit that I used to spread over your head when the priests would rise up to bless the people. They will give me a large festival prayer book filled with prayers, too, and I will wrap myself in the tallit and take the book and pray to God, who saved us from the hand of the enemy who sought to destroy us.

“And what will they bring you, my dearest daughter? You, my darling, they will bring a little prayer book full of letters, full of all of the letters of the alphabet and the vowel marks, too. And now, dearest daughter, tell me, an alef and a bet that come together with a kametz beneath the alef — how do you say them?”

“Av,” my daughter answered.

“And what does it mean?” I asked.

“Father,” my daughter answered, “like you’re my father.”

“Very nice, that’s right, an alef with a kametz beneath and a bet with no dot in it make av.”

“And now, my daughter,” I continued, “what father is greater than all other fathers? Our Father in heaven, who is my father and your father and the father of the whole world. You see, my daughter, two little letters stand there in the prayer book as if they were all alone, then they come together and lo and behold they are av. And not only these letters but all letters, all of them join together to make words and words make prayers and the prayers rise up before our Father in heaven who listens very, very carefully, to all that we pray, if only our hearts cling to the upper light like a flame clings to a candle.”

Even as I stood there speaking of the power of the letters, a breeze swept through the courtyard and pushed the memorial candle against my daughter. Fire seized hold of her dress. I ripped off the flaming garment, leaving the child naked, for what she was wearing was all that remained of her lovely clothes. We had fled in panic, destruction at our heels, and had taken nothing with us. Now that fire had consumed her dress, I had nothing with which to cover my daughter.

I turned this way and that, seeking anything my daughter could clothe herself with. I sought, but found nothing. Wherever I directed my eyes, I met emptiness. I’ll go to the corner of the storeroom, I said to myself, where torn sacred books are hidden away, perhaps there I will find something. Many a time when I was a lad I had rummaged about there and found all sorts of things, sometimes the conclusion of a matter and sometimes its beginning or its middle. But now I turned there and found nothing with which to cover my little girl. Do not be surprised that I found nothing. When books were read, they were rent; but now that books are not read, they are not rent.

I stood there worried and distraught. What could I do for my daughter, what could I cover her nakedness with? Night was drawing on and with it the chill of the night, and I had no garment, nothing to wrap my daughter in. I recalled the home of Reb Alter, who had gone up to the Land of Israel. I’ll go to his sons and daughters, I decided, and ask clothing of them. I left my daughter as she was and headed for the household of Reb Alter.

How pleasant to walk without being pursued. The earth is light and comfortable and does not burn beneath one’s feet, nor do the heavens fling thorns into one’s eyes. But I ran rather than walked, for even if no man was pursuing me, time was: the sun was about to set and the hour to gather for the evening prayer was nigh. I hurried lest the members of Reb Alter’s household might already be getting up to leave for the house of prayer.

It is comforting to remember the home of a dear friend in time of distress. Reb Alter, peace be with him, had circumcised me, and a covenant of love bound us together. As long as Reb Alter lived in his home I was a frequent visitor there, the more so in the early days when I was a classmate of his grandson Gad. Reb Alter’s house was small, so small that one wondered how such a large man could live there. But Reb Alter was wise and made himself so little that his house seemed large.

The house, built on one of the low hills surrounding the Great Synagogue, had a stucco platform protruding from it. Reb Alter, peace be with him, had been in the habit of sitting on that platform with his long pipe in his mouth, sending wreaths of smoke gliding into space. Many a time I stood waiting for the pipe to go out so I could bring him a light. My grandfather, peace be with him, had given Reb Alter that pipe at my circumcision feast. “Your grandfather knows pipes very well,” Reb Alter told me once, “and knows how to pick just the right pipe for every mouth.”

Reb Alter stroked his beard as he spoke, like one well aware that he deserved that pipe, even though he was a modest man. His modesty showed itself one Friday afternoon before sunset. As he put out the pipe, and the Sabbath was approaching, he said, “Your grandfather never has to put out his pipe; he knows how to smoke more or less as time necessitates.”

Well, then, I entered the home of Reb Alter and found his daughter, together with a small group of old men and old women, sitting near a window while an old man with a face like a wrinkled pear stood reading them a letter. All of them listened attentively, wiping their eyes. Because so many years had passed, I mistook Reb Alter’s daughter for her mother. What’s going on? I asked myself. On the eve of the Day of Atonement darkness is falling, and these people have not lit a “candle of life.” And what sort of letter is this? If from Reb Alter, he is already dead. Perhaps it was from his grandson, my friend Gad, perhaps news had come from Reb Alter’s grandson Gad, who had frequented the house of study early and late. One day he left early and did not return.

It is said that two nights prior to his disappearance, his wet-nurse had seen him in a dream sprouting the plume of a peculiar bird from his head, a plume that shrieked, “A, B, C, D!” Reb Alter’s daughter folded the letter and put it between the mirror and the wall. Her face, peeking out of the mirror, was the face of an aged woman bearing the burden of her years. And alongside her face appeared my own, green as a wound that has not formed a scab.

I turned away from the mirror and looked at the rest of the old people in Reb Alter’s home and tried to say something to them. My lips flipped against each other like a man who wishes to say something but, upon seeing something bizarre, is seized with fright.

One of the old men noticed the state of panic I was in. Tapping one finger against his spectacles, he said, “You are looking at our torn clothing. Enough that creatures like ourselves still have skin on our flesh.” The rest of the old men and old women heard and nodded their heads in agreement. As they did so, their skin quivered. I took hold of myself, walked backward, and left.

I left in despair and, empty-handed, with no clothing, with nothing at all, returned to my daughter. I found her standing in a corner of the courtyard pressed against the wall next to the purification board on which the dead are washed. Her hair was loose and wrapped about her. How great is Thy goodness, O God, in putting wisdom into the heart of such a little girl to enable her to wrap herself in her hair after her dress has burned off, for as long as she had not been given a garment it was good that she covered herself with her hair. But how great was the sadness that enveloped me at that moment, the outset of this holy festival whose joy has no parallel all the year. But now there was no joy and no sign of joy, only pain and anguish.

The stone steps sounded beneath feet clad in felt slippers and long stockings, as Jews bearing tallitot and ritual gowns streamed to the house of prayer. With my body I covered my little girl, trembling from the cold, and I stroked her hair. Again I looked in the storeroom where the torn pages from sacred books were kept, the room where in my youth I would find, among the fragments, wondrous and amazing things. I remember one of the sayings, it went approximately like this: “At times she takes the form of an old woman and at times the form of a little girl. And when she takes the form of a little girl, don’t imagine that your soul is as pure as a little girl; this is but an indication that she passionately yearns to recapture the purity of her infancy when she was free of sin. The fool substitutes the form for the need; the wise man substitutes will for need.”

A tall man with a red beard came along, picking from his teeth the last remnants of the final meal, pushing his wide belly out to make room for himself. He stood about like a man who knew that God would not run away and there was no need to hurry. He regarded us for a moment, ran his eyes over us, then said something with a double meaning.

My anger flowed into my hand, and I caught him by the beard and began yanking at his hair. Utterly astonished, he did not move. He had good cause to be astonished too: a small fellow like me lifting my hand against a brawny fellow like him. Even I was astonished: had he laid hold of me, he would not have let me go whole.

Another tall, husky fellow came along, one who boasted of being my dearest friend. I looked up at him, hoping that he would come between us. He took his spectacles, wiped them, and placed them on his nose. The whites of his eyes turned green and his spectacles shone like moist scales. He stood looking at us as though we were characters in an amusing play.

I raised my voice and shouted, “A fire has sprung up and has burned my daughter’s dress, and here she stands shivering from the cold!” He nodded his head in my direction and once more wiped his spectacles. Again they shone like moist scales and flashed like green scum on water. Once more I shouted, “It’s not enough that no one gives her any clothing, but they must abuse us, too!” The fellow nodded his head and repeated my words as though pleased by them. As he spoke he turned his eyes away from me so that they might not see me, and that he might imagine he had made up the story on his own. I was no longer angry with my enemy, being so gripped with fury at this man: though he had prided himself on being my friend, he was repeating all that had befallen me as though it were a tale of his own invention.

My daughter began crying. “Let’s run away from here.”

“What are you saying?” I answered. “Don’t you see that night has fallen and that we have entered the holy day? And if we were to flee, where would we flee and where could we hide?”

Where could we hide? Our home lay in ruins and the enemies covered all the roads. And if by some miracle we escaped, could we depend upon miracles? And here were the two houses of study and the Great Synagogue in which I studied Torah and in which I prayed and here was the corner where they had hidden away sacred books worn with age. As a little boy I rummaged about here frequently, finding all sorts of things. I do not know why, on this particular day, we found nothing, but I remember that I once found something important about need and form and will. Were it not for the urgency of the day I would explain this matter to you thoroughly, and you would see that it is by no means allegorical but a simple and straightforward affair.

I glanced at my little girl who stood trembling from the cold, for she had been stripped of her clothing, she didn’t even have a shirt, the night was chill, and the song of winter birds resounded from the mountains. I glanced at my daughter, the darling of my heart, like a father who glances at his little daughter, and a loving smile formed on my lips. This was a very timely smile, for it rid her of her fear completely. I stood then with my daughter in the open courtyard of the Great Synagogue and the two houses of study which all my life stirred themselves and came to me in my dreams and now stood before me, fully real. The gates of the houses of prayer were open, and from all three issued the voices of the readers of prayer. In which direction should we look and whither should we bend our ears?

He who gives eyes to see with and ears to hear with directed my eyes and ears to the old house of study. The house of study was full of Jews, the doors of the ark were open, and the ark was full of old Torah scrolls, and among them gleamed a new scroll clothed in a red mantle with silver points. This was the scroll that I had written in memory of the souls of days that had departed. A silver plate was hung over the scroll, with letters engraved upon it, shining letters. And even though I stood far off I saw what they were. A thick rope was stretched in front of the scroll that it might not slip and fall.

My soul fainted within me, and I stood and prayed as those wrapped in tallitot and ritual gowns. And even my little girl, who had dozed off, repeated in her sleep each and every prayer in sweet melodies no ear has ever heard.

I do not enlarge. I do not exaggerate.

The Sign

1

In the year when the news reached us that all the Jews in my town had been killed, I was living in a certain section of Jerusalem, in a house I had built for myself after the disturbances of 1929 (5629 which numerically is equal to “The Eternity of Israel”). On the night when the Arabs destroyed my home, I vowed that if God would save me from the hands of the enemy and I should live, I would build a house in this particular neighborhood which the Arabs had tried to destroy. By the grace of God, I was saved from the hands of our despoilers and my wife and children and I remained alive in Jerusalem. Thus I fulfilled my vow and there built a house and made a garden. I planted a tree, and lived in that place with my wife and children, by the will of our Rock and Creator. Sometimes we dwelt in quiet and rest, and sometimes in fear and trembling because of the desert sword that waved in fuming anger over all the inhabitants of our holy land. And even though many troubles and evils passed over my head, I accepted all with good humor and without complaint. On the contrary, with every sorrow I used to say how much better it was to live in the Land of Israel than outside the land, for the Land of Israel has given us the strength to stand up for our lives, while outside the land we went to meet the enemy like sheep to the slaughter. Tens of thousands of Israel, none of whom the enemy was worthy even to touch, were killed and strangled and drowned and buried alive; among them my brothers and friends and family, who went through all kinds of great sufferings in their lives and in their deaths, by the wickedness of our blasphemers and our desecrators, a filthy people, blasphemers of God, whose wickedness had not been matched since man was placed upon the earth.

2

I made no lament for my city and did not call for tears or for mourning over the congregation of God whom the enemy had wiped out. The day when we heard the news of the city and its dead was the afternoon before Shavuot, so I put aside my mourning for the dead because of the joy of the season when our Torah was given. It seemed to me that the two things came together, to show me that in God’s love for His people, He still gives us some of that same power which He gave us as we stood before Sinai and received the Torah and commandments; it was that power which stood up within me so that I could pass off my sorrow over the dead of my city for the happiness of the holiday of Shavuot, when the Torah was given to us, and not to our blasphemers and desecrators who kill us because of it.

3

Our house was ready for the holiday. Everything about the house said: Shavuot.

The sun shone down on the outside of the house; inside, on the walls, we had hung cypress, pine, and laurel branches, and flowers. Every beautiful flower and everything with a sweet smell had been brought in to decorate the house for the holiday of Shavuot. In all the days I had lived in the Land of Israel, our house had never been decorated so nicely as it was that day. All the flaws in the house had vanished, and not a crack was to be seen, either in the ceiling or in the walls. From the places where the cracks in the house used to gape with open mouths and laugh at the builders, there came instead the pleasant smell of branches and shrubs, and especially of the flowers we had brought from our garden. These humble creatures, which because of their great modesty don’t raise themselves high above the ground except to give off their good smell, made the eye rejoice because of the many colors with which the Holy One, blessed be He, has decorated them, to glorify His land, which, in His loving-kindness, He has given to us.

4

Dressed in a new summer suit and new light shoes, I went to the house of prayer. Thus my mother, may she rest in peace, taught me: if a man gets new clothes or new shoes, he wears them first to honor the holiday, and goes to the synagogue in them. I am thankful to my body, which waited for me, and did not tempt me into wearing the new clothes and shoes before the holiday, even though the old ones were heavy, and hot desert winds ran through the country. And — if I haven’t reached the heights of all my forefathers’ deeds — in these matters I can do as well as my forefathers, for my body stands ready to fulfill most of those customs which depend upon it.

5

I walked to the house of prayer. The two stores in the neighborhood were shut, and even the bus, which usually violates the Sabbath, was gone from the neighborhood. Not a man was seen in the streets, except for little errand boys delivering flowers. They too, by the time you could look at them, had disappeared. Nothing remained of them except the smell of the flowers they had brought, and this smell merged with the aroma of the gardens in our neighborhood.

The neighborhood was quietly at rest. No one stopped me on the street, and no one asked me for news of the world. Even if they had asked, I wouldn’t have told them what had happened to my city. The days have come when every man keeps his sorrows to himself. What would it help if I told someone else what happened to my city? His city surely had also suffered that same fate.

6

I arrived at the house of prayer and sat down in my place. I kept the events in my city, as they appeared to me, hidden in my heart. A few days later, when the true stories reached me, I saw that the deeds of the enemy were evil beyond the power of the imagination. The power of the imagination is stronger than the power of deeds, except for the evil of the nations, which goes beyond all imagination.

I opened a Mahzor and looked at the evening prayers for the first night of Shavuot. People outside the Land of Israel generally add many liturgical poems, especially in those ancient communities that follow the customs of their forefathers. Although I think of myself as a resident of the Land of Israel in every sense, I like these piyyutim, which prepare the soul for the theme of the day. Our teachers, the holy writers of the piyyutim, are good intermediaries between the hearts of Israel and their Father in heaven. They knew what we need to ask of God and what He demands of us, and they wrote hymns to open our lips before our Father in heaven.

The people who come to the house of prayer began to gather. Even those whom one usually doesn’t see in the synagogue came, to bring their children. As long as a child is a child, he is drawn after his father and draws his father with him. That is, he is drawn after his Father in heaven and draws with him the father who gave him birth. In my town, all the synagogues used to be filled with babes like these. They were good and sweet and healthy; now they are all dead. The hand of the enemy has finished them all. There is no remnant, no one left. And if a few of them do remain, they’ve been captured by Gentiles and are being educated by Gentiles. Let’s hope that they too will not be added to our enemies. Those about whom it is written “I shall bear you on the wings of eagles and bring you unto Me” are given over to others and are trampled under the feet of human filth.

7

Although on the Sabbath and festivals one says the evening prayers early, on Shavuot we wait to say Maariv until the stars are out.

For if we were to pray early and receive the holiness of the festival, we would be shortening the days of the Omer, and the Torah said: “There shall be seven full weeks.”

Since they had already finished Minhah and it was not yet time for Maariv, most of the congregation sat talking with one another, except for the children, who stood about in wonder. I know that if I say this people will smile at me, but I’ll say it anyway: The same thing happened to those children at this season of the giving of our Torah as happened to them when their souls stood before Mount Sinai, ready to receive the Torah the following day.

While the adults were sitting and talking, and the children were standing about in amazement, the time came for the evening prayer. The gabbai pounded on the table and the leader of the prayers went down before the ark. After a short order of prayers, including neither piyyutim nor “And Moses declared the festivals of the Lord,” they greeted one another and went home in peace.

8

I came home and greeted my wife and children with the blessing of the holiday. I stood amazed to think that here I was celebrating our holiday in my home, in my land, with my wife and children, at a time when tens of thousands of Israel were being killed and slaughtered and burned and buried alive, and those who were still alive were running about as though lost in the fields and forests, or were hidden in holes in the earth.

I bowed my head toward the earth, this earth of the Land of Israel upon which my house is built, and in which my garden grows with trees and flowers, and I said over it the verse “Because of you, the soul liveth.” Afterward I said kiddush and the blessing “Who has given us life,” and I took a sip of wine and passed my glass to my wife and children. I didn’t even dilute the wine with tears. This says a lot for a man; his city is wiped out of the world, and he doesn’t even dilute his drink with tears.

I washed my hands and recited the blessing over the bread, giving everyone a piece of the fine challot that were formed in the shape of the Tablets, to remember the two tablets of the Covenant that Moses brought down from heaven. The custom of Israel is Torah: if the bread comes from the earth, its shape is from the heavens.

We sat down to the festive meal of the first night of Shavuot. Part of the meal was the fruit of our soul, which we had turned with our own hands and watered with our own lips. When we came here we found parched earth, as hands had not touched the land since her children had left her. But now she is a fruitful land, thankful to her masters, and giving us of her goodness.

The meal was good. All that was eaten was of the fruits of the land. Even the dairy dishes were from the milk of cows who grazed about our house. It is good when a man’s food comes from close to him and not from far away, for that which is close to a man is close to his tastes. Yet Solomon, in praising the woman of valor, praises her because she “brings her bread from afar.” But the days of Solomon were different, for Solomon ruled over all the lands and every man in Israel was a hero. And as a man’s wife is like her husband, the women of valor in Israel left it for the weak to bring their bread from nearby, while they would go to the trouble of bringing it from afar. In these times, when the land has shrunk and we all have trouble making a living, bread from nearby is better than that which comes from afar.

9

The meal which the land had given us was good, and good too is the land itself, which gives life to its inhabitants. As the holiday began, Jerusalem was freed from the rough desert winds, which rule from Passover to Shavuot, and a soft breeze blew from the desert and the sea. Two winds blow in our neighborhood, one from the sea and one from the desert, and between them blows another wind, from the little gardens that the people of the neighborhood have planted around their houses. Our house too stands in the midst of a garden where there grow cypresses and pines, and, at their feet, lilies, dahlias, carnations, snapdragons, dandelions, chrysanthemums, and violets. It is the way of pines and cypresses not to let even grass grow between them, but the trees in our garden looked with favor upon our flowers and lived side by side with them, for they remembered how hard we had worked when they were first beginning to grow. We were stingy with our own bread and bought saplings; we drank less water in order to water the gentle young trees, and we guarded them against the wicked herdsmen who used to send their cattle into our garden. Now they have become big trees, which shade us from the sun, giving us their branches as covering for the sukkah, and greens for the holiday of Shavuot, to cover our walls in memory of the event at Sinai. They used to do the same in my town when I was a child, except that in my town most of the greens came from the gardens of the Gentiles, while here I took from my own garden, from the branches of my trees and from the flowers between my trees. They gave off a good aroma and added flavor to our meal.

10

I sat inside my house with my wife and little children. The house and everything in it said: Holiday. So too we and our garments, for we were dressed in the new clothes we had made for the festival. The festival is for God and for us; we honor it in whatever way we can, with pleasant goods and new clothing. God in heaven also honors the holiday and gives us the strength to rejoice.

I looked around at my family, and I felt in the mood to tell them about what we used to do in my city. It was true that my city was dead, and those who were not dead were like the dead, but before the enemy had come and killed them all, my city used to be full of life and good and blessing. If I start telling tales of my city I never have enough. But let’s tell just a few of the deeds of the town. And since we are in the midst of the holiday of Shavuot, I’ll tell a little concerning this day.

11

From the Sabbath when we blessed the new month of Sivan, we emerged from the mourning of the days of the Omer, and a spirit of rest passed through the town: especially on the New Moon, and especially with the saying of Hallel. When the leader of prayer said, “The heavens are the heavens of God, but the earth hath He given to the children of men,” we saw that the earth and even the river were smiling at us. I don’t know whether we or the river first said, “It’s all right to swim.” But even the heavens agreed that the river was good for bathing, for the sun had already begun to break through its coldness; not only through the coldness of the river, but of all the world. A man could now open his window without fear of the cold. Some people turned their ears toward the sound of a bird, for the birds had already returned to their nests and were making themselves heard. In the houses arose the aroma of dairy foods being prepared for Shavuot, and the smell of the fresh-woven clothes of the brides and grooms who would enter under the bridal canopy after the holiday. The sound of the barber’s scissors could be heard in the town, and every face was renewed. All were ready to welcome the holiday on which we received the Torah and commandments. See how the holiday on which we received the Torah and commandments is happier and easier than all the other holidays. On Passover we can’t eat whatever we want; on Sukkot we can’t eat wherever we want. But on Shavuot we can eat anything we want, wherever we want to eat it.

The world is also glad and rejoices with us. The lids of the skies are as bright as the sun, and glory and beauty cover the earth.

12

Now, children, listen to me: I’ll tell you something of my youth. Now your father is old, and if he let his beard grow as did Abraham, you’d see white hair in his beard. But I too was once a little boy who used to do the things children do. While the old men sat in the house of study preparing themselves for the time of the giving of the Torah the following morning, my friends and I would stand outside looking upward, hoping to catch the moment when the sky splits open and everything you ask for (even supernatural things!) is immediately given you by God — if you are worthy and you catch the right moment. In that case, why do I feel as though none of my wishes has ever been granted? Because I had so many things to ask for that before I decided what to wish first, sleep came upon me and I dozed off. When a man is young, his wishes are many; before he gets around to asking for anything, he is overcome by sleep. When a man is old, he has no desires; if he asks for anything, he asks for a little sleep.

Now let me remove the sleep from my eyes, and I’ll tell a little bit about this day.

Nowadays a man is found outdoors more than in his house. In former times, if a man’s business didn’t bring him out, he sat either in his house or in the house of study. But on the first day of Shavuot everybody would go to the gardens and forests outside the town in honor of the Torah, which was given outdoors. The trees and bushes and shrubs and flowers that I know from those walks on the first day of Shavuot, I know well. The animals and beasts and birds that I know from those walks on the first day of Shavuot, I know well. How so? While we were walking, my father, of blessed memory, would show me a tree or a bush or a flower and say, “This is its name in the holy tongue.” He would show me an animal or a beast or a bird and say to me, “This is its name in the holy tongue.” For if they were worthy to have the Torah write their names, surely we must recognize them and know their names. In that case, why don’t I list their names? Because of those who have turned upon the Torah and wrought havoc with the language.

13

I saw that my wife and children enjoyed the tales of my town. So I went on and told them more, especially about the Great Synagogue — the glory of the town — the beauty of which was mentioned even by the gentile princes. Not a Shavuot went by that Count Pototsky didn’t send a wagon full of greens for the synagogue. There was one family in the town that had the special rights in arranging these branches.

I also told them about our little kloyz, our prayer room. People know me as one of the regulars in the old house of study, but before I pitched my tent in the old house of study, I was one of the young men of the kloyz. I have so very very much to tell about those times but here I’ll tell only things that concern this day.

On the day before Shavuot eve, I used to go out to the woods near town with a group of friends to gather green boughs. I would take a ball of cord from my mother, may she rest in peace, and I would string it up from the roof of our house in the shape of a Star of David, and on the cord I would hang the leaves we had pulled off the branches, one by one. I don’t like to boast, but something like this it’s all right for me to tell. Even the old men of the kloyz used to say, “Fine, fine. The work of an artist, the work of an artist.” These men were careful about what they said, and their mouth uttered no word that did not come from their heart. I purposely didn’t tell my wife and children about the poems I used to write after the festival — sad songs. When I saw the faded leaves falling from the Star of David I would be overcome by sadness, and I would compose sad poems.

Once my heart was aroused, my soul remembered other things about Shavuot. Among them were the paper roses that were stuck to the windowpanes. This was done by the simple folk at the edge of town. The respected heads of families in town did not do this, for they clung carefully to the customs of their fathers, while the others did not. But since the enemy has destroyed them all together, I shall not distinguish between them here.

I told my wife and children many more things about the town and about the day. And to everything I said, I added, “This was in former days, when the town stood in peace.” Nevertheless, I was able to tell the things calmly and not in sorrow, and one would not have known from my voice what had happened to my town — that all the Jews in it had been killed. The Holy One, blessed be He, has been gracious to Israel: even when we remember the greatness and glory of bygone days, our soul does not leave us out of sorrow and longing. Thus a man like me can talk about the past, and his soul doesn’t pass out of him as he speaks.

14

Following the Blessing after Meals I said to my wife and children, “You go to sleep, and I’ll go to the synagogue for the vigil of Shavuot night.” Now I was born in Buczacz and grew up in the old house of study, where the spirit of the great men of Israel pervaded. But I shall admit freely that I don’t follow them in all their ways. They read the Order of Study for Shavuot night and I read the book of hymns that Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol, may his soul rest, composed on the six hundred thirteen commandments.

There have arisen many poets in Israel, who have graced the order of prayers with their poems and strengthened the hearts of Israel with their piyyutim, serving as good intermediaries between the hearts of Israel and their Father in heaven. And even I, when I humbly come to plead for my soul before my Rock and Creator, find expression in the words of our holy poets — especially in the poems of Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol, may his soul rest.

I have already told elsewhere how, when I was a small child, my father, of blessed memory, would bring me a new prayer book every year from the fair. Once Father brought me a prayer book and I opened it to a plea of Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol. I read and was amazed: Was it possible that such a righteous man as this, whose name was written in the prayer book, did not find God before him at all times and in every hour, so that he had to write “At the dawn I seek Thee, my rock and tower”? Not only did God make him seek Him, but even when the poet found Him, fear fell upon him and he stood confused. Thus he says, “Before Thy greatness I stand and am confounded.”

As I lie down at night I see this saint rising from his bed on a stormy windblown night. The cold engulfs him and enters into his bones, and a cold wind slaps at his face, ripping his cloak and struggling with its fringes. The Tzaddik strengthens himself to call for God. When he finds Him, terror falls upon him out of the fear of God and the majesty of His presence.

For many days that saint wouldn’t leave my sight. Sometimes he seemed to me like a baby asking for his father, and sometimes like a grownup, exhausted from so much chasing after God. And when he finally does find Him, he’s confused because of God’s greatness.

After a time, sorrow came and added to sorrow.

15

Once, on the Sabbath after Passover, I got up and went to the great house of study. I found the old cantor raising his voice in song. There were men in Buczacz who would not allow the interruption of the prayers between the Blessing of Redemption and the Amidah for additional hymns. Thus the cantor would go up to the platform after Mussaf and recite the hymns of redemption. I turned my ear and listened to him intone: “O poor captive in a foreign land.” I felt sorry for the poor captive girl, who must have been in great trouble, judging from the tone of the cantor. It was a little hard for me to understand why God didn’t hurry and take her out of captivity, or why He didn’t have mercy on the poor old man who stood, his head bowed, begging and praying for her. I also wondered at the men of my city, who were doing nothing to redeem her from captivity.

One day I was turning the pages of the big prayer book in my grandfather’s house, and I found those same words written in the prayer book. I noticed that every line started with a large letter. I joined the letters together, and they formed the name “Solomon.” My heart leaped for joy, for I knew it was Rabbi Solomon from my prayer book. But I felt sorry for that Tzaddik. As though he didn’t have enough troubles himself, searching for God and standing in confusion before Him, he also had to feel the sorrow of this captive girl who was taken as a slave to a foreign country. A few days later I came back and leafed through the prayer book, checking the first letters of the lines of every hymn. Whenever I found a hymn with the name Solomon Ibn Gabirol written in it, I didn’t put it down until I had read it through.

16

I don’t remember when I started the custom of reading the hymns of Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol on Shavuot eve, but since I started this custom, I haven’t skipped a year. It goes without saying that I did it while I lived in Germany, where they like piyyutim, but even here in the Land of Israel, where they don’t say many of these poems, I haven’t done away with my custom. Even in times of danger, when the Arabs were besieging Jerusalem and machine-gun fire was flying over our heads, I didn’t keep myself from the house of study, where I spent most of the night, as has been done everywhere, in all generations, in remembrance of our fathers who stood trembling all night in the third month after going out of Egypt, waiting to receive the Torah from God Himself.

17

My home is near the house of prayer; it takes only a little while to get there. You walk down the narrow street on which my house stands, and you turn down the wide street at the end, till you come to a little wooden shack which serves as a house of prayer. That night the way made itself longer. Or maybe it didn’t make itself longer, but I made it longer. My thoughts had tired out my soul, and my soul my feet. I stopped and stood more than I walked.

18

The world and all within it rested in a kind of pleasant silence: the houses, the gardens, the woods; and above them the heavens, the moon and the stars. Heaven and earth know that if it weren’t for Israel, who accepted the Torah, they would not be standing. They stand and fulfill their tasks: the earth to bring forth bread, and the heavens to give light to the earth and those who dwell upon it. Could it be that even in my hometown the heavens are giving light and the earth bringing forth its produce? In the Land of Israel, the Holy One, blessed be He, judges the land Himself, whereas outside the land He has handed this supervision over to angels. The angels’ first task is to turn their eyes aside from the deeds of the Gentiles who do evil to Israel, and therefore the heavens there give their light and the earth its produce — perhaps twice as much as in the Land of Israel.

19

I stood among the little houses, each of which was surrounded by a garden. Since the time we were exiled from our land, this area had given forth thorns and briers; now that we have returned, it is rebuilt with houses, trees, shrubs, and flowers.

Because I love the little houses and their blossoming gardens, I’ll tell their story.

A young veterinarian from Constantinople was appointed to watch over the animals of the sultan. One day he was working in a village in the midst of the desert sands. On his way home, he stopped to rest. He looked up and saw the Dead Sea on one side and the Temple Mount on the other. A fresh breeze was blowing, and the air was better and more pleasant than any place in the land. He got down from his donkey and began to stroll about, until he found himself making a path among the thorn bushes, briers, and rocks. If only I could live here with my wife and children, he thought. But to live here is impossible, as the place is far from any settlement, and there’s no sign that anyone lives here, nor is there any form of life, except for the birds of the sky and various creeping things. The doctor remained until it began to get dark and the time came to return to the city. He mounted his ass and went back to the city. A few days later he came again. A few days after that he came once more. Thus he did several times.

It happened that a certain Arab’s cow became sick. He brought her to the doctor. The doctor prepared some medicine for her, and she got well. After a while, another one got sick. She too was brought to the doctor. Again he prepared some medicine and she became well. The Arab heard that the doctor wanted to build a summer house outside of town. The Arab said to him, “I have a piece of land near the town. If you like it, it’s yours.” It turned out to be just the spot the doctor had wanted. He bought thirty dunams of land from the Arab, built a summer house, dug a well, and planted a garden and an almond grove. All the clever people in Jerusalem laughed at him and said, “He’s buried his money in the desert.” But he himself was happy with his lot, and whenever he was free from work he would ride out there on his ass and busy himself with planting. Sometimes he would take along his young wife and small children to share in his happiness.

The word got around. There was a group of people that worked for the settlement of the land. They went and bought a piece of land near his. They divided their section up into lots and sent messengers to other lands to offer Zionists the purchase of a share in the inheritance of the Land of Israel. A few among them bought.

The Great War came, bringing death on all sides, and destroying in one hour that which had been built up over many generations. If one was not hurt bodily by the war, it hurt one financially. And if neither one’s body nor one’s money was hurt, it damaged one’s soul. The war was harder for the Jews than for anyone else, as it affected their bodies, their money, and their souls. Thus it was in the place we are discussing. Turkey, which also entered the war, sent her legions to wherever she ruled. One legion came to Jerusalem and camped there, in this place, on the land of the doctor. The soldiers ripped out the almond trees to make fires to cook their food and to warm their bodies, and turned the garden into a lair for cannons.

From out of the storm of war and the thunder of cannons, a kind of heralding voice was heard — a voice that, if we interpreted it according to our wishes and desires, heralded the end of troubles and the beginning of good, salvation, and comfort. The war, however, was still going strong. Neither the end of the troubles nor the beginning of salvation could yet be seen.

Slowly the strength of those who had started the fighting wore out, the hands of war were broken, and they could fight no more. The bravery of the heroes had been drained, so they left the battlefronts. Behind them they left destruction and desolation, wailing and tears, forever.

20

After the war Jerusalem awoke, bit by bit, from her destruction. A few people began to think of expanding the city, for even if there were a few places left that had not been damaged by the war, they were crowded and overpopulated. Even before the war, when Jerusalem lay in peace and her inhabitants were satisfied with little, the air had become stifling. How much more so after the war. Even before the war there was little room left in Jerusalem; after the war, when the city was filled with new immigrants, how much more so.

People formed little societies to buy land in and around Jerusalem, and began to build new neighborhoods. These were small and far from town, and the sums owed were always great. People ran from bank to bank, borrowing in one place to pay off in another, paying in one place and borrowing in another. If it weren’t for the bit of peace a man finds in his home and garden, they would have fallen by the way.

21

That stretch of barren desert also had its turn. They remembered the lands the doctor had bought and asked him to sell them part of his holdings. He liked the idea, sold them a section of his land, and helped them to buy from others. The news got around, and people began to flock. They bought twenty-one thousand dunams, each dunam equaling a thousand six hundred Turkish pik, at the price of a grush and a half a pik. Some bought in order to build, and some bought in order to sell.

Now I shall leave the real-estate agents who held back the building of Jerusalem. If a man wanted to build a house, they asked so much money that he was taken aback and went away. And if he agreed to come the next day to sign away his wealth, it would happen that overnight the lot had been sold to someone else, who had more than doubled his bid. The agents used to conspire together. Someone would ask to have a house built, and either they wouldn’t build it for him or they’d build it in the wrong place. So his lot stood empty, without a house, along with the rest of the fields to which the same thing had happened.

The neighborhood was finally built, but its residents were not able to open a school or a post office branch or a pharmacy or any of the institutions that people from the city needed, except for two or three stores, each of which was superfluous because of the others. During the disturbances it was even worse. Since the population was small, they could not hold out against the enemy, either in the disturbance of 1929 or in the War of Independence. And between 1929 and the War of Independence, in the days of the riots and horrors that began in 1936 and lasted until World War ii began, they were given over to the hands of the enemy, and a man wouldn’t dare to go out alone.

Of the Zionists outside the land who had bought plots before the war, some died in the war and others wound up in various other places. When those who were fortunate enough to come to the land saw what had happened to the section, they sold their lots and built homes in other places. Of those who bought them, perhaps one or two built houses, and the rest left them until a buyer would come their way, to fill their palms with money.

22

Now I shall leave those who did not build the neighborhood and shall tell only about those who did build it.

Four men went out into the dusts of the desert, an hour’s walking distance from the city, and built themselves houses, each in one spot, according to lots. The whole area was still a wilderness; there were neither roads nor any signs of habitation. They would go to work in the city every morning and come back an hour or two before dark, bringing with them all that they needed. Then they would eat something and rush out to their gardens to kill snakes and scorpions, weed out thorns, level off holes in the ground, prepare the soil, and plant and water the gentle saplings, in the hope that these saplings would grow into great trees and give their shade. As yet there were neither trees nor shrubs in the neighborhood, but only parched earth which gave rise to thorns and briers. When the desert storms came, they sometimes lasted as long as nine days, burning our skin and flesh, and drying out our bones. Even at night there was no rest. But when the storms passed, the land was like paradise once again. A man would go out to his garden, water his gentle young trees, dig holes, and add two or three shrubs or flowers to his garden.

From the very beginning, one of the four founders took it upon himself to attend to community business: to see that the Arabs didn’t send their beasts into the gardens and that the garbage collector took the garbage from the houses; to speak with the governor and those in charge of the water so that water wouldn’t be lacking in the pipes, and to see that the bus would come and go on schedule, four times a day. What would he do if he had to consult his neighbors? There was no telephone as yet. He would take a shofar and go up on his roof and blow. His neighbors would hear him and come.

After a while, more people came and built homes and planted gardens. During the day they would work in the city, and an hour or two before dark they would come home to break earth, weed, pull up thorns, plant trees and gardens, and clear the place of snakes and scorpions. Soon more people came, and then still more. They too built houses and made gardens. Some of them would rent out a room or two to a young couple who wanted to raise their child in the clear air. Some of them rented out their whole houses and continued to live in the city until they paid off their mortgage. After a time I too came to live here, fleeing from the tremors of 1927, which shook the walls of the house where I was living and forced me to leave my home. I came to this neighborhood with my wife and two children, and we rented an apartment. Roads had already been built, and the buses would come and go at regular times. We felt as though this place, which had been barren since the day of our exile from our land, was being built again.

23

Automobiles still came but rarely, and a man could walk in the streets without fear of being hit. At night there was a restful quiet. If you didn’t hear the dew fall, it was because you were sleeping a good, sweet sleep. The Dead Sea would smile at us almost every day, its blue waters shining in graceful peace between the gray and blue hills of Moab. The site of the Temple would look upon us. I don’t know who longed for whom more; we for the Temple Mount, or the Temple Mount for us. The king of the winds, who dwelt in a mountain not far from us, used to stroll about the neighborhood, and his servants and slaves — the winds — would follow at his feet, brushing through the area. Fresh air filled the neighborhood. People from far and near would come to walk, saying, “No man knoweth its value.” Old men used to come and say, “Here we would find length of days.” Sick people came and said, “Here we would be free from our illnesses.” Arabs would pass through and say, “Shalom”; they came to our doctor, who cured them of their ills. The doctor’s wife would help their wives when they had difficulty in childbirth. The Arab women would come from their villages around us, bringing the fruits of their gardens and the eggs of their hens, giving praises to Allah, who, in His mercy upon them, had given the Jews the idea of building houses here, so that they would not have to bring their wares all the way into the city. As an Arab would go to work in the city, taking a shortcut through these streets, he would stand in wonder at the deeds of Allah, who had given the Jewish lords wisdom to build roads, mend the ways, and so forth. Suddenly, one Sabbath after Tisha b’Av, our neighbors rose up against us to make trouble for us. The people of the neighborhood could not believe that this was possible. Our neighbors, for whom we had provided help at every chance, for whom we had made life so much easier — buying their produce, having our doctor heal their sick, building roads to shorten the way for them — came upon these same roads to destroy us.

24

By the grace of God upon us, we rose up and were strong. As I said in the beginning, I built a house and planted a garden. In this place from which the enemy tried to rout us, I built my home. I built it facing the Temple Mount, to always keep upon my heart our beloved dwelling which was destroyed and has not yet been rebuilt. If “we cannot go up and be seen there, because of the hand which has cast itself into our Temple,” we direct our hearts there in prayer.

Now I’ll say something about the house of prayer in our neighborhood.

Our forefathers, who saw their dwelling in this world as temporary, but the dwelling in the synagogue and the house of study as permanent, built great structures for prayer and study. We, whose minds are given over mainly to things of this world, build great and beautiful houses for ourselves, and suffice with little buildings and shacks for prayer. Thus our house of prayer in this neighborhood is a wooden shack. This is one reason. Aside from this, they didn’t get around to finishing the synagogue before the first disturbance, the riots, or the War of Independence, and at each of those times the residents had to leave the neighborhood. It was also not completed because of the changes in its congregants, who changed after each disturbance. That’s why, as I’ve explained, our place of prayer is a shack and not a stone building.

Now I shall tell what happened in this shack on that Shavuot night when the rumor reached us that all the Jews in my town had been killed.

25

I entered the house of prayer. No one else was in the place. Light and rest and a good smell filled the room. All kinds of shrubs and flowers with which our land is blessed gave off their aroma. Already at Maariv I had taken note of the smell, and now every blossom and flower gave off the aroma with which God had blessed it. A young man, one who had come from a town where all the Jews had been killed, went out to the fields of the neighborhood with his wife, and picked and gathered every blossoming plant and decorated the synagogue for the holiday of Shavuot, the time of the giving of our Torah, just as they used to do in their town, before all the Jews there had been killed. In addition to all the wildflowers they gathered in the nearby fields, they brought roses and zinnias and laurel boughs from their own garden.

26

I shall choose among the words of our holy tongue to make a crown of glory for our prayer room, its candelabra, and its ornaments.

The eternal light hangs down from the ceiling, facing the holy ark and the two tablets of the Law above it. The light is wrapped in capers and thistles and bluebells, and it shines and gives off its light from between the green leaves of the capers’ thorns and from its white flowers, from between the blue hues in the thistles, and from the gray leaves and purple flowers around it. All the wildflowers that grow in the fields of our neighborhood gather together in this month to beautify our house of prayer for the holiday of Shavuot, along with the garden flowers that the gardens in our neighborhood give us. To the right of the holy ark stands the reader’s table, and on the table a lamp with red roses around it. Six candles shine from among the roses. The candles have almost burned down to the end, yet they still give off light, for so long as the oil is not finished they gather their strength to light the way for the prayers of Israel until they reach the gates of heaven. A time of trouble has come to Jacob, and we need much strength. Opposite them, to the south, stand the memorial candles, without number and without end. Six million Jews have been killed by the Gentiles; because of them a third of us are dead and two-thirds of us are orphans. You won’t find a man in Israel who hasn’t lost ten of his people. The memorial candles light them all up for us, and their light is equal, so that you can’t tell the difference between the candle of a man who lived out his days and one who was killed. But in heaven they certainly distinguish between the candles, just as they distinguish between one soul and another. The Eternal had a great thought in mind when He chose us from all peoples and gave us His Torah of life. Nevertheless, it’s a bit difficult to see why He created, as opposed to us, the kinds of people who take away our lives because we keep His Torah.

27

By the grace of God upon me, those thoughts left me. But the thought of my city did not take itself away from me. Is it possible that a city full of Torah and life is suddenly uprooted from the world, and all its people — old and young; men, women, and children — are killed, that now the city is silent, with not a soul of Israel left in it?

I stood facing the candles, and my eyes shone like them, except that those candles were surrounded with flowers, and my eyes had thorns upon them. I closed my eyes so that I would not see the deaths of my brothers, the people of my town. It pains me to see my town and its slain, how they are tortured in the hands of their tormentors, the cruel and harsh deaths they suffer. And I closed my eyes for yet another reason. When I close my eyes I become, as it were, master of the world, and I see only that which I desire to see. So I closed my eyes and asked my city to rise before me, with all its inhabitants, and with all its houses of prayer. I put every man in the place where he used to sit and where he studied, along with his sons, sons-in-law, and grandsons — for in my town everyone came to prayer. The only difference was in the places. Some fixed their places for prayer in the old house of study and some in the other synagogues and houses of study, but every man had his fixed place in his own house of prayer.

28

After I had arranged all the people in the old house of study, with which I was more familiar than the other places in town, I turned to the other houses of prayer. As I had done with the old house of study, so I did with them. I brought up every man before me. If he had sons or sons-in-law or grandsons, I brought them into view along with him. I didn’t skip a single holy place in our town, or a single man. I did this not by the power of memory but by the power of the synagogues and the houses of study. For once the synagogues and houses of study stood before me, all their worshippers also came and stood before me. The places of prayer brought life to the people of my city in their deaths as in their lives. I too stood in the midst of the city among my people, as though the time of the resurrection of the dead had arrived. The day of the resurrection will indeed be great; I felt a taste of it that day as I stood among my brothers and townspeople who have gone to another world, and they stood about me, along with all the synagogues and houses of study in my town. And were it not difficult for me to speak, I would have asked them what Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob say, and what Moses says, about all that has happened in this generation.

I stood in wonder, looking at my townspeople. They too looked at me, and there was not a trace of condemnation in their glances, that I was thus and they were thus. They just seemed covered with sadness, a great and frightening sadness, except for one old man who had a kind of smile on his lips, and seemed to say, Ariber geshprungen—that is, We have “jumped over” and left the world of sorrows. In the Conversations of Rabbi Nahman of Bratslav, of blessed memory, something like that can be found. He heard about a certain preacher in Lemberg who, in the hour of his death, gestured with his fingers and said that he would show them a trick. At that moment he passed from the world of sorrows. And the Tzaddik enjoyed those words.

29

Bit by bit the people of my town began to disappear and go away. I didn’t try to run after them, for I knew that a man’s thoughts cannot reach the place where they were going. And even if I could reach there, why should I prevent them from going, and why should I confuse them with my thoughts?

I was left alone, and I wandered back to former days, when my town was alive, and all those who were now dead were alive and singing the praise of God in the synagogues and the houses of prayer, and the old cantor served in the Great Synagogue, while I, a small child, saw him standing on the platform intoning “O Poor Captive,” with the old prayer book containing all the prayers and hymns open before him. He didn’t turn the pages, for the print had been wiped out by the age of the book and the tears of former cantors, and not a letter could be made out. But he, may God give light to his lot in the world to come, knew all the hymns by heart, and the praise of God together with the sorrow of Israel would rise from his lips in hymns and in prayer.

30

Let me describe him. He was tall and straight-backed; his beard was white, and his eyes looked like the prayer books published in Slavita, which were printed on blue-tinged paper. His voice was sweet and his clothes were clean. Only his tallit was covered with tears. He never took his tallit down from his head during the prayers. But after every prayer of love or redemption he would take it down a little and look about, to see if there was yet a sign of the redemption. For forty years he was our city’s messenger before God. After forty years he went to see his relatives in Russia. The border patrol caught him and threw him into prison. He lamented and begged God to take him out of captivity and return him to his place. God did not let the warden sleep. The warden knew that as long as the voice of the Jew was to be heard in his prison, sleep would not return to him. He commanded that the cantor be set free and returned home. They released him and sent him to our town. He came bringing with him a new melody to which he would sing “O Poor Captive.”

31

The first time I heard that hymn was the Sabbath after Passover when I was still a little boy. I woke up in the middle of the night, and there was a light shining into the house. I got out of bed and opened the window, so that the light could come in. I stood by the window, trying to see from where the light was coming. I washed my hands and face, put on my Sabbath clothes, and went outside. Nobody in the house saw or heard me go out. Even my mother and father, who never took their eyes off me, didn’t see me go out. I went outside and there was no one there. The birds, singing the song of morning, were alone outside.

I stood still until the birds had finished their song. Then I walked to the well, for I heard the sound of the well’s waters, and I said, “I’ll go hear the water talking.” For I had not yet seen the waters as they talked.

I came to the well and saw that the water was running, but there was no one there to drink. I filled my palms, recited the blessing, and drank. Then I went to walk wherever my legs would carry me. My legs took me to the Great Synagogue, and the place was filled with men at prayer. The old cantor stood on the platform and raised his voice in the hymn “O Poor Captive.” Now that hymn of redemption began to rise from my lips and sing itself in the way I had heard it from the lips of the old cantor. The city then stood yet in peace, and all the many and honored Jews who have been killed by the enemy were still alive.

32

The candles that had given light for the prayers had gone out; only their smoke remained to be seen. But the light of the memorial candles still shone, in memory of our brothers and sisters who were killed and slaughtered and drowned and burned and strangled and buried alive by the evil of our blasphemers, cursed of God, the Nazis and their helpers. I walked by the light of the candles until I came to my city, which my soul longed to see.

I came to my city and entered the old house of study, as I used to do when I came home to visit — I would enter the old house of study first.

I found Hayyim the Shammash standing on the platform and rolling a Torah scroll, for it was the eve of the New Moon, and he was rolling the scroll to the reading for that day. Below him, in an alcove near the window, sat Shalom the Shoemaker, his pipe in his mouth, reading the Shevet Yehudah, exactly as he did when I was a child; he used to sit there reading the Shevet Yehudah, pipe in mouth, puffing away like one who is breathing smoke. The pipe was burnt out and empty, and there wasn’t a leaf of tobacco in it, but they said that just as long as he held it in his mouth it tasted as though he were smoking.

I said to him, “I hear that you now fast on the eve of the New Moon (something they didn’t do before I left for the Land of Israel; they would say the prayers for the “Small Yom Kippur” but not fast). Hayyim said to Shalom, “Answer him.” Shalom took his pipe out of his mouth and said, “So it is. Formerly we would pray and not fast, now we fast but don’t say the prayers. Why? Because we don’t have a minyan; there aren’t ten men to pray left in the city.” I said to Hayyim and Shalom, “You say there’s not a minyan left for prayer. Does this mean that those who used to pray are not left, or that those who are left don’t pray? In either case, why haven’t I seen a living soul in the whole town?” They both answered me together and said, “That was the first destruction, and this is the last destruction. After the first destruction a few Jews were left; after the last destruction not a man of Israel remained.” I said to them, “Permit me to ask you one more thing. You say that in the last destruction not a man from Israel was left in the whole city. Then how is it that you are alive?” Hayyim smiled at me the way the dead smile when they see that you think they’re alive. I picked myself up and went elsewhere.

33

I saw a group of the sick and afflicted running by. I asked a man at the end of the line, “Where are you running?” He placed his hand on an oozing sore and answered, “We run to greet the rebbe.” “Who is he?” I asked. He moved his hand from one affliction to another and, smiling, said, “A man has only two hands, and twice as many afflictions.” Then he told me the name of his rebbe. It was a little difficult for me to understand. Was it possible that this rebbe who had left for the Land of Israel six or seven generations ago, and had been buried in the soil of the holy city of Safed, had returned? I decided to go and see. I ran along and reached the Tzaddik together with them. They began to cry out before him how they were stricken with afflictions and persecuted by the rulers and driven from one exile to another, with no sign of redemption in view. The Tzaddik sighed and said, “What can I tell you, my children? ‘May God give strength to His people; may God bless His people with peace.’” Why did he quote that particular verse? He said it only about this generation: before God will bless His people with peace He must give strength to His people, so that the Gentiles will be afraid of them, and not make any more war upon them because of that fear.

I said, “Let me go and make this known to the world.” I walked over to the sink and dabbed some water onto my eyes. I awoke and saw that the book lay open before me, and I hadn’t yet finished reciting the order of the commandments of the Lord. I went back and read the commandments of the Lord as composed by Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol, may his soul rest.

34

There was nobody in the shack; I sat in the shack alone. It was pleasant and nicely fixed up. All kinds of flowers which the soil of our neighborhood gives us were hung from the wall between branches of pine and laurel; roses and zinnias crowned the ark and the reader’s table, the prayer stand, and the eternal light. A wind blew through the shack and caused the leaves and flowers and blossoms to sway, and the house was filled with a goodly smell; the memorial candles gave their light to the building. I sat there and read the holy words God put into the hands of the poet, to glorify the commandments He gave to His people Israel. How great is the love of the holy poets before God! He gives power to their lips to glorify the laws and commandments that He gave to us in His great love.

35

The doors of the holy ark opened, and I saw a likeness of the form of a man standing there, his head resting between the scrolls of the Torah, and I heard a voice come forth from the ark, from between the trees of life. I bowed my head and closed my eyes, for I feared to look at the holy ark. I looked into my prayer book and saw that the letters that the voice from among the scrolls was reciting were at the same time being written into my book. The letters were the letters of the commandments of the Lord, in the order set for them by Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol, may his soul rest. Now the man whom I had first seen between the scrolls of the Torah stood before me, and his appearance was like the appearance of a king.

I made myself small, until I was as though I were not, so that he should not feel the presence of a man in the place. Is it right that a king enter one of his provinces, and he not find any of his officers and slaves, except for one little slave?

But my tricks didn’t help any. I made myself small, and nevertheless he saw me. How do I know he saw me? Because he spoke to me. And how do I know that it was to me he spoke? Because I was alone in the house of prayer; there was no one there with me. He did not speak to me by word of mouth, but his thought was engraved into mine, his holy thought into mine. Every word he said was carved into the forms of letters, and the letters joined together into words, and the words formed what he had to say. These are the things as I remember them, word for word.

36

I shall put down the things he said to me, the things he asked me, and the things I answered him, as I brought my soul out into my palm, daring to speak before him. (But before I say them, I must tell you that he did not speak to me with words. Only the thoughts that he thought were engraved before me, and these created the words.)

And now I shall tell you all he asked me, and everything I answered him. He asked me, “What are you doing here alone at night?” And I answered, “My lord must know that this is the eve of Shavuot, when one stays awake all night reading the Order of Shavuot night. I too do this, except that I read the hymns of Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol, may his soul rest.”

He turned his head toward me and toward the book that stood before me on the table. He looked at the book and said, “It is Solomon’s.” I heard him and was astonished that he mentioned Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol and did not affix some title of honor before his name. For I did not yet know that the man speaking to me was Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol himself.

37

Now I shall tell the things that transpired after these former things. The memorial candles lit up the shack, the thronged flowers that crowned the eternal light before the holy ark and the other flowers gave off their aromas, and one smell was mixed with another — the aroma of the house of prayer with that of the roses and zinnias from the gardens. A restful quiet was felt on the earth below and in the heavens above. Neither the call of the heart’s pleas on earth nor the sound of the heavens as they opened could be heard.

I rested my head in my arm, and sat and thought about what was happening to me. It couldn’t have been in a dream, because he specifically asked me what I was doing here alone at night, and I answered him, “Doesn’t my lord know that this night is the eve of Shavuot, when we stay awake all night and read the Order of Shavuot eve?” In any case, it seems a little difficult. Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol is the greatest of the holy poets. Why did he see fit to descend from the Palace of Song to this shack in this neighborhood to talk with a man like me?

38

I took my soul out into the palms of my hands and raised my head to see where I was, for it was a little hard to explain the things as they had happened, though their happening itself was witness to them, and there was no doubt that he was here. Not only did he speak to me, but I answered him. Maybe the thing happened when the heavens were open. But for how long do the heavens open? Only for a moment. Is it possible that so great a thing as this could happen in one brief moment?

I don’t know just how long it was, but certainly not much time passed before he spoke to me again. He didn’t speak with his voice, but his thought was impressed upon mine and created words. And God gave my heart the wisdom to understand. But to copy the things down — I cannot. I just know this: that he spoke to me, for I was sitting alone in the house of prayer, reading the commandments of the Lord as composed by Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol. For ever since I was old enough to do so, I follow the custom, every Shavuot eve, of reading the commandments of the Lord by Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol, may his soul rest.

39

I was reminded of the sorrow I had felt for Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol because God made him search for Him, as he says, “At the dawn I seek Thee, my rock and my fortress,” and when he finally found Him, awe fell upon him and he stood confused, as he says, “Before Thy greatness I stand and am confounded.” And as if he didn’t have enough troubles himself, he had to add the sorrow of that poor captive girl. I put my finger to my throat, as the old cantor used to do, and raised my voice to sing “O Poor Captive” in the melody he had written. I saw that Rabbi Solomon, may his soul rest, turned his ear and listened to the pleasant sound of this hymn of redemption. I got up my courage and said to him, “In our town, wherever they prayed in the Ashkenazic rite, they used to say a lot of piyyutim. The beauty of each piyyut has stayed in my heart, and especially this ‘O Poor Captive,’ which was the first hymn of redemption I heard in my youth.” I remembered that Sabbath morning when I had stood in the Great Synagogue in our city, which was now laid waste. My throat became stopped up and my voice choked, and I broke out in tears.

Rabbi Solomon saw this and asked me, “Why are you crying?” I answered, “I cry for my city and all the Jews in it who have been killed.” His eyes closed, and I saw that the sorrow of my city had drawn itself to him. I thought to myself, since the rabbi doesn’t know all of the people of my town, he’ll weigh the glory of all of them by the likes of me. I bowed my head and lowered my eyes and said to him, “In my sorrow and in my humility, I am not worthy. I am not the man in whom the greatness of our city can be seen.”

40

Rabbi Solomon saw my sorrow and my affliction and the lowness of my spirit, for my spirit was indeed very low. He came close to me, until I found myself standing next to him, and there was no distance between us except that created by the lowness of my spirit. I raised my eyes and saw his lips moving. I turned my ear and heard him mention the name of my city. I looked and saw him move his lips again. I heard him say, “I’ll make a sign, so that I won’t forget the name.” My heart melted and I stood trembling, because he had mentioned the name of my city and had drawn mercy to it, saying he would make a sign, so as not to forget its name.

I began to think about what sign Rabbi Solomon could make for my city. With ink? It was a holiday, so he wouldn’t have his writer’s inkwell in his pocket. With his clothes? The clothes with which the Holy One, blessed be He, clothes His holy ones have no folds and don’t take to any imprint made upon them from outside.

Once more he moved his lips. I turned my ear and heard him recite a poem, each line of which began with one of the letters of the name of my town. And so I knew that the sign the poet made for my town was in beautiful and rhymed verse, in the holy tongue.

41

The hairs of my flesh stood on end and my heart melted as I left my own being, and I was as though I was not. Were it not for remembering the poem, I would have been like all my townsfolk, who were lost, who had died at the hand of a despicable people, those who trampled my people until they were no longer a nation. But it was because of the power of the poem that my soul went out of me. And if my town has been wiped out of the world, it remains alive in the poem that the poet wrote as a sign for my city. And if I don’t remember the words of the poem, for my soul left me because of its greatness, the poem sings itself in the heavens above, among the poems of the holy poets, the beloved of God.

42

Now to whom shall I turn who can tell me the words of the song? To the old cantor who knew all the hymns of the holy poets? I am all that is left of all their tears. The old cantor rests in the shadow of the holy poets, who recite their hymns in the Great Synagogue of our city. And if he answers me, his voice will be as pleasant as it was when our city was yet alive and all of its people were also still in life. But here — here there is only a song of mourning, lamentation, and wailing, for the city and its dead.