Two Scholars Who Were in our Town and other Novellas Read online

  38.

  Our story is approaching its end and what is more the end of our rabbi is fast approaching. On the Sabbath he had it announced that he would be giving a eulogy for Reb Moshe Pinchas on the anniversary of his death. And when the beadle announced that the sage would be delivering a eulogy for Reb Moshe Pinchas, the entire town prepared itself to hear it, both on account of the one being eulogized and the one giving the eulogy. Back in those days, two or three generations ago, people were not yet awash in sermons. If a scholar came and offered to sermonize, everyone wanted to hear. Due to the cold weather, the sage agreed to give the eulogy in the old study house because in the large synagogue there was no furnace. And all who came to pray there were in the habit of donning their tefillin in the old study house for they could not expose their arms because of the cold. And because the study house could not accommodate all of the people, it was announced those who had warm clothes would stand in the courtyard, and those who didn’t have warm clothes would stand inside. And the whole matter was a bit peculiar - could it be that the rich and the mighty would end up standing outside at a distance, while the paupers and beggars would be close up?

  Meanwhile the sage had taken ill and his cough was ripping up the walls of his chest. His blue eyes had reddened and his beautiful face had puffed up. But he consoled them and said, “It’s merely an illness and I will get over it.” The anniversary of the death Reb Moshe Pinchas arrived. However, when the sage arose from his sickbed his strength abandoned him, his head spun and his throat was hoarse. Also, he had no strength in his legs. When he had completed his prayers, some while sitting and some while in bed, he looked at the timepiece and said, “The day is still young and the mercy of God, may He be blessed, has still not waned.” He began to gargle and to imbibe honey and sweet tea, and allowed himself to utilize some of the curatives mentioned in the Gemara, although one does not use the curatives in the Gemara any longer because the nature of the body has since changed. He poured himself a concoction consisting of one-third wine, one-third vinegar and one-third oil and drank it. And when he drank it, it seemed that he was returning to health. And as the time for the afternoon prayers drew near, he rose from his bed, pulled on a fur cloak over his clothing and on top of that the same overcoat he had worn on his journey. Reb Shimon Eliyah and his wife, the lady of the house, tried to prevail upon him not to go, for the doctor had said that if he went outside he would be endangering himself. The sage nodded his head as if to agree with them, but he went anyway. He had not arrived at the study house before having to return. And he did not return on his own two feet; rather they carried him in their arms.

  That whole night long he mumbled feverishly. It is told that many times they heard his lips whispering, “A bukher makht kidesh af a groyp.” The town’s nobleman, who was very fond of the Scheiner family, sent his own personal physician. The doctor examined him and said, “There is nothing to worry about here. After three or four days the patient will recover, but he needs to be watched as this illness tends to recur. And if the patient isn’t careful enough, he is liable to endanger himself.”

  In addition to all of the physiological treatment, they also undertook spiritual healing. In all of the synagogues and study houses they recited Psalms, in addition to eighteen psalms selected by the sage Noda BeYehudah, which are tried and true healing remedies. Even the tranquil women neither rested nor were calm and they drifted from one holy place to another and opened the Holy Ark to pray for the ill one. And on Thursday when the Torah was being read, they added to his name the name Moses, for the act of adding the name Moses to that of a true scholar who is ill was capable of healing him, as we had seen when the glorious sage Reb Meshulam Igra had fallen ill and they had added the name Moses to his, and a few days later he had returned to health. After that they gave charity in the ritual for the redemption of the soul, and said what they had to say. And there’s no need here to list every single word, because it is all spelled out in the book Tikkun HaNefesh.

  39.

  And now let us recount the end of the righteous one. When he realized that the hour of his passing from the world was drawing near he said to those responsible for seeing to his burial, “Bury me next to Reb Moshe Pinchas.” And then he instructed them to hand him the second volume of the Shulhan Arukh Law Code and he studied the rules relating to the process of dying. After that he blessed those close to him, including the male and female servants who attended him. Afterwards he blessed the townsfolk. And then he performed the ritual hand washing and recited the final confession prayers. After which he uttered the “Hear O Israel” prayer. Once he had arrived at the verse “And you shall love…” his pure soul departed.

  I have already related how in those days the snow was falling nonstop. In our town, when the snow starts to fall it doesn’t stop falling until the beginning of Passover. And so the snow falls and falls, and all of the roads are covered with snow, especially those roads where no one comes and no one goes. Like heaps upon heaps the snows remain piled there, snow on top of snow. But the two head gravediggers, may they be remembered for good, tall Chaim who was nicknamed Long Life, and short Kaddish Leib, who was called Half Kaddish, went up to the cemetery and trudged through the deep snows to dig a grave for our rabbi the sage, may his memory be blessed.

  We had hoped that he would guide us in the ways of life, but instead God took him suddenly to the bright light in the prime of his life. All that remained to us from the righteous one were his holy remains, which were laid out on the ground. Until it was time to give him over to the earth, they stood over him and recited verses, hymns and entreaties. Suddenly a frail, bird-like voice was heard and Reb Pinchas the Elder was seen leaning over the deceased reciting the Song of Songs. Immediately everyone present began to chant the Song of Songs, verse by verse, the same way they had when the sage Reb Pinchas Ba’al Mofet had been laid out on the ground before being brought over to his resting place. It has been the legend in our town from the time of our ancestors, who rest in Eden, that when our rabbi’s forefather, the sage Reb Pinchas Ba’al Mofet, had been laid to rest, the whole town had stood before the deceased and recited the Song of Songs. All that night not a soul went to bed and from the edges of town came the sound of old men and women lamenting for the righteous one. The snow came down and a pure light illuminated the night. The snow by its very nature is pure, and that night it was purer than pure. We heard from reliable sources that snow like that had not been seen before, or since. And yet, every heart was filled with darkness and gloom.

  When daylight dawned the entire town came out, the young and the elderly, children and women, to escort our rabbi to his eternal resting place. No man kindled his furnace, no woman cooked her meals, not an infant remained in its crib, no sick person stayed in his bed. Rather, all came out to follow the coffin with eyes overflowing with tears, the tears freezing then melting then freezing once again. And not a person complained, “I’m cold,” and not a sound was uttered, except by the beadle who was walking and reciting, “Righteousness shall walk before him.” And so they walked on behind the bier of the righteous one until they arrived at the great synagogue. And when they got there, they set the bier on the ground and circled it seven times according to custom, and all those who had been involved in the purification of the body and in the circling of the coffin immersed themselves in a pure ritual bath. Afterwards, they proceeded to the cemetery and buried him in the grave that they had dug for him. When the snows had melted and the esteemed wife of the great sage, may his memory be blessed, came to weep over his grave and a few prayer quorums of ten men accompanied her, they observed that he had been laid next to his ancestor Reb Pinchas. Perhaps you are thinking that the gravediggers had erred, but in reality the elder sage had claimed the younger for himself. How great righteous ones are even in their death, inasmuch as on the our rabbi was buried a hundred years and one day had passed since the death of his righteous ancestor, who had stipulated with the town that no one be buried next to him u
ntil after the passage of one hundred years and that the deceased be of his own seed. And verily Reb Moshe Pinchas had also had a hand in this, because he had never made peace with Reb Shlomo and had not wanted him as a neighbor. And just as our Reb Shlomo had been a lover of peace and had always given in during his lifetime, so too did he acquiesce in death.

  In recounting all of this, I did not intend to give an example of an exemplary man or to tell about the zeal of Reb Moshe Pinchas. Rather, I have merely told the tales of two scholars who were in our town two or three generations ago, at a time when Torah was the glory of Israel and all of Israel walked in the paths of Torah, which is the delight of the Lord our Fortress until the coming of the Redeemer at the end of days. At which time we will be privileged to hear God’s Torah directly from the lips of our righteous Messiah, who will sit and study Torah with all those of Israel who have studied Torah with love.

  Translated by Paul Pinchas Bashan & Rhonna Weber Rogol

  Annotated by the Translators with Jeffrey Saks

  Annotations to “Two Scholars Who Were in Our Town”

  Title: Two Scholars Who Were in Our Town / Cf. Sota 49a: “Two scholars who reside in one town, yet cannot abide each other in matters of Torah law – one will die and the other will go out to exile.”

  Enhanced wisdom / Cf. Isaiah 28:29.

  Wisdom calls aloud… / Proverbs 1:20.

  Hoshen Mishpat / The essential work of Jewish financial law, codified in R. Yosef Karo’s 16th century Shulhan Arukh code of law.

  Kloyz / A small house of study and prayer.

  Fifteenth of the month of Av… / The Kloyz, in other words, was open for study and prayer around the clock, with the exception only of the month-long period of mourning (in mid-summer) for the Temple, from the fast day of the 17th of the month Tammuz until the 15th day of the following month of Av, when study did not take place in the evenings.

  Joy of the Lord… / Cf. Nehemiah 8:10.

  Gemara / Rabbinical analysis and commentary on the Mishnah, together the two comprise the Talmud.

  Not a birthright… / Cf. Mishnah Avot 2:12.

  Kosher for Passover / Since there can be no trace of leavened bread on Passover, the rabbi would have to ensure that the millstones were properly cleaned before the Passover flour for baking matzah could be ground.

  Horeh Gaver on Yoreh De’ah / Reinush and his Horeh Gaver are fictitious, but cf. Job 3:3 from which Agnon takes the name of this rabbinic work, purported to be a commentary on a section of the Shulhan Arukh.

  Kiddush and Havdalah / Kiddush is the benediction over the wine at the onset of the Sabbath; Havdalah is the ceremony at the end of the Sabbath separating it from the secular week.

  Three parsas / A Talmudic measure of itinerant distance: one parsa is about four kilometers, approximately the distance a man can walk in 72 minutes.

  Mikveh / A bath used for the purpose of ritual immersion to obtain purification.

  Shemoneh Esreh / “The Eighteen” blessings, so called in reference to the original number of constituent blessings (there are now nineteen), is the central prayer of the Jewish liturgy, recited three times a day. It is also known as the Amidah (or, “Standing” prayer).

  “Myriad are the needs of your people”/ Opening line of a short prayer recited during times of imminent danger or extreme stress; see Berakhot 29b.

  Reb Mordechai Yafeh / Called “Ba’al (author of) HaLevushim” after the series of halakhic (religious law) works he authored, an important scholar and posek (legal arbiter) (1530-1612, Poland).

  Horowitz the Holy Shelah / A Hebrew acronym for Shnei Luhot HaBrit (“The Two Tablets of the Covenant”), a book written by the revered rabbi and kabbalist R. Yesha’ayahu Horowitz (1560-1630), usually referred to as the “Shelah HaKadosh (the Holy).”

  Ba’al Mofet / A saintly man or man of wonders.

  Reb Moshe / Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786), German Jewish philosopher, considered the father of the Haskalah (Jewish Enlightenment), had translated the Hebrew Bible into German.

  Rabbi Wolf / R. Binyamin Zev Wolf Hindenheim (1757-1832), a grammarian and translator of the siddur to German.

  Samuel II 6:16 / “And [as] the ark of the Lord came [into] the city of David, Michal the daughter of Saul peered through the window, and she saw the king David hopping and dancing before the Lord; and she loathed him in her heart.” – for her criticism of her husband King David, it is implied that Michal died childless (compare v. 23)

  Tallit / Prayer shawl traditionally worn only by married men.

  Hatan Bereishit / The “groom” of the Book of Bereishit (Genesis), is the term used for the person called up for the first reading from the Book of Genesis on the holiday of Simhat Torah. This high honor is reserved for a respected member of the community.

  Gabbai / Treasurer.

  Forbidden to alter the interior space… / See Deuteronomy 12:4: “You will not do likewise to the Lord Your God,” which prescribes the destruction of idolatrous spaces, but proscribes doing the same to Holy space such as the Temple, and by extension synagogues (cf. Megilla 29a). The specific case, boarding up a space in the synagogue to block a draft, which does then reduce the “volume” of “holy” synagogue space, is discussed in the rabbinic commentaries, and is left as a difference of opinions between various authorities. The sources under question are outlined in E.E. Urbach’s important Hebrew essay on this story, “Shnei Talmidei Hakhamim Shehayu Be‘Irenu – Mekorot uFerush” in LeAgnon Shai, Urbach and D. Sadan, eds. (Jerusalem: Jewish Agency Press, 1959), pp. 9-25.

  A bukher makht kidesh af a groyp / Yiddish: “An unmarried boy makes kiddush on barley grain.”

  Ketzot HaHoshen / Important commentary on Jewish financial law authored by Rabbi Aryeh Leib HaCohen (1745-1812).

  Rabbi Meshulam Igra / A master sage who became the Chief Rabbi and Rosh Yeshiva of Pressburg, Hungary (1742-1801). R. Igra was a native of Buczacz, Agnon’s Galician hometown, which is never named explicitly as the “our town” of this story, although this seems apparent.

  Chapter 200 / Volume 1 of the Ketzot HaHoshen is a commentary on the first two hundred chapters (simanim) the Shuhan Arukh’s 427-chapter section on financial law, the Hoshen Mishpat.

  Chariot / As depicted in the vision related in Ezekiel, chapter 1.

  Yehudah ben Teimah in tractate Avot / Mishnah Avot 5:23: “Yehudah son of Teimah said, Be bold as a leopard, light as an eagle, swift as a deer, and strong as a lion to do the will of your Father in heaven.”

  Deliverance came from another place / Esther 4:14.

  Shabbat Shuva or Shabbat HaGadol / The Sabbaths before Yom Kippur and Passover, respectively, on which rabbis traditionally deliver the major sermons of the year.

  Ternopil / Major city of Eastern Galicia (today, Western Ukraine), about 70 km. north of Buczacz.

  Perl / (1773-1839), major figure of the Galician Haskalah.

  Sheheheyanu (“Who has given us life and sustained us”) / A blessing said to celebrate special occasions, especially in thankfulness for new and unusual experiences.

  Rav Alfasi, Maimonides, Rosh / The major medieval commentaries on the Talmud and halakhah.

  Reveling in his own distress / Cf. Prov. 17:5.

  Maharshal, Bach, Rav Alfasi / R. Shlomo Luria (1510-1573); Bach – R. Joel ben Samuel Sirkis (1561-1640); Rav Alfasi - Isaac ben Jacob Alfasi (1013-1103) of Fes – all three engaged in determining the accuracy of the Talmudic text. Unable to access these rarer editions of these volumes (on which Reb Shlomo based his lecture), Reb Moshe Pinchas launched his attack on the incorrect text from the commonly available volumes.

  Panie / Polish meaning “Mister”; i.e. Reb Moshe Pinchas is calling him “Mister” instead of “Rabbi” Horowitz.

  If scholars battle / Cf. Bava Metzia 59b.

  Shema / Recitation of the Shema (“Hear O Israel”) prayer, traditionally recited twice daily, as well as upon going to sleep.

  Permissible to arrange divorces there / In Gittin (Jewish divorce document
s) the name of the town has to be spelled out in Hebrew characters, a cause of dispute about the proper spelling of certain town names in Europe, and subsequently the ability of divorces to be executed in those towns.

  God’s precepts are straight / Psalms 19:8

  Torah protects and the Torah rescues / Cf. Sotah 21a.

  Kav HaYashar / “The Just Measure”) authored by Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch Kaidanover, first published in 1705. Shevet Mussar – “The Rod of Admonition”, authored in Ladino by Rabbi Elijah HaCohen, in 1863.

  Tosefta / A compilation of the Jewish oral law from the period of the Mishnah.

  Kra / R. Zvi Hirsch Kra (1740-1814), served as rabbi in Buczacz from the departure of R. Igra in 1794 until his death.

  Maharam of Rothenburg / Meir of Rothenburg (c. 1215-1293) was a noted German rabbi, poet, and author of Tosafot commentary on the Talmud.

  When on the road / Gen. 45:24 as interpreted in Taanit 10b.

  1648 / The year of the calamitous Khmelnytsky pogroms, wherein Cossacks decimated eastern European Jewry.