The Oath (16 page)

Next day Reuven appeared at Moshe’s. “It’s wrong of me to disturb you, I know. Your time is precious, your attention sacred. It’s inexcusable, but this is an urgent matter. A matter of life and death. Almost. Anyway, there is this poor girl Leah who cannot find herself a husband.”

“And that is why you have pushed your way into my house?” Moshe shouted angrily. “What do you want? Money? I don’t have any.”

“I know, I know. Saints don’t need money. But this spinster Leah, she needs it badly.”

“But I don’t have any! Must I repeat myself? What do you want of me?”

“A miracle.”

“What?”

“A miracle, Moshe. Only a miracle can save the poor orphan.”

“I do not perform miracles, and I will not! I don’t believe in miracles, I don’t want them! Do you hear me? Mankind is not ready nor are the times! We no longer live in the days of Moses or Elisha! Miracles and spells are meant for fools, said Mendel of Kotzk! Go away!”

Reuven feigned consternation, despair. “Then it’s terrible … terrible … I don’t dare think of it. A tragedy, she’ll certainly do something terrible.”

“What is the matter with her, this Leah, that prevents her from marrying according to the law of Moses and Israel?”

“That’s just the point, Moshe. Leah, stricken by God, has nothing. And nobody.”

“Never mind, I’ll find a family that will adopt her, a rich Jew
who will provide a dowry—and you, off with you! Out of my sight! You are disturbing me!”

Reuven did not protest, instead he put on a worried, resigned face. “Very well, Moshe, I’m leaving. I shouldn’t have come, forgive me. I thought I was doing the right thing. Too bad for Leah. She should have known enough to be born into a wealthy, respectable family. She should have known enough to be born more beautiful, more graceful. Let her take it up with God. We had nothing to do with it. Why was the Creator so cruel? The fact is she is ugly, poor girl, terribly ugly … She repels even the matchmakers.”

“Nonsense! Physical beauty? Nothing but illusion. Nothing but dust.”

“Perhaps you’re right, Moshe. You probably are. Unfortunately, bachelors, widowers and divorced men all like illusion. Three have fled even while the canopy was being erected, even while the rabbi was ready to intone the first hymn!”

“What! They have done that?” Moshe jumped with indignation. “They insulted, humiliated a poor defenseless orphan? They dared break her heart in public? But who are they? I shall curse them, I shall damn their souls, I …”

“You have to understand them,” Reuven said sanctimoniously. “If you saw her, you would understand, you would be less harsh …”

“Never! To humiliate a poor, abandoned orphan is worse than sin, worse than crime—it is murder! Pure and simple murder! What sort of a community am I living in? Does nobody fear God? Is there nobody to decry this scandal? And take pity on this victim of heaven and earth? And that calls itself charitable and pretends to be a good Jew. That talks of generosity, compassion, and of obeying the laws of the Torah—ah, if you only knew how they despise us up there!”

And Moshe, who ordinarily could read other people’s thoughts, allowed himself to fall into the trap. Blinded by compassion, he failed to see the stratagem. The seer became dupe, instrument, prey: he ended up marrying Leah.

This is what my father wrote in his Book:

After the wedding the young couple settled in their own house, in the street behind the cemetery. To everyone’s surprise, Moshe proved to be a considerate, devoted husband. He was no
longer the same. He who had refused himself to the world, gave himself to Leah without reservation. He who had been so conscious of every wasted minute, spent hours in her company. Never had any woman been shown such tenderness. Determined to make her happy, serene, he covered her with honors and praise. He called her my queen, my Shabbat. And poor Leah, transfigured, came back to life. She began to think of her body without contempt or bitterness. She felt beautiful because Moshe saw her that way. Never had there been so grateful or so anxious a woman. She needed her husband, she needed to know that he was close, very close—so as not to slip back into humiliation.

And so Moshe tried to go away less often. There were times when he would pause at the threshold, glance back at his wife—and defer his departure. At other times he would put down the book he was studying, the despair in Leah’s eyes having brought him back to reality. He could gamble with his own suffering, but not with that of someone for whom suffering was not a game. He knew that nothing justifies the pain man causes another. Any messiah in whose name men are tortured can only be a false messiah. It is by diminishing evil, present and real evil, experienced evil, that one builds the city of the sun. It is by helping the person who looks at you with tears in his eyes, needing help, needing you or at least your presence, that you may attain perfection. Was his kindness the result of a deliberate decision? No one will ever know. He felt no need to explain his actions. And nobody dared ask him. People were satisfied that Reuven’s maneuver had succeeded so well. Better to thank heaven and turn the page.

Except that Moshe had not turned it, not quite. Though he settled down, he avoided mediocrity. He entered madness the way one enters religion. His madness helped him to hold fast.
As soon as he felt the flame go down, or its intensity diminish, he plunged back into the past. For hours on end he made speech after speech as he stood at his door or at the nearby cemetery’s gates. He made the beggars at the asylum laugh and sing. He transported the urchins into the eerie kingdom of his legends. In summer he would run through the streets, shouting: “I know who it is, I know who it is.” People would ask: “Who are you talking about?”—“About you, about me,” he would answer and burst into laughter. Other times his lamentations were enough to break one’s heart: “I know who it is, I know who it is, but he refuses, he refuses to know.”—“Who refuses, Moshe?”—“He, not I, not you, but he …” This would go on a few hours or a few weeks, particularly during the August heat waves, and then, abruptly, he became himself again, the tender husband of poor Leah into whose eyes he brought the song of sunshine in the middle of the night.

What did they live on? Leah took in laundry, washed floors in other people’s houses. Moshe tutored the boys of poor families. Rich parents preferred not to entrust their children to him: what if madness were contagious?

True, Davidov had offered him a regular subsidy. He had refused, saying: “You wanted me to be a Jew like the others, and so I shall earn my bread like the others, by the sweat of my brow. But I shall give of my time to the children; it seems that they need me.” Unfortunately, he turned out to be an inadequate instructor. He was too gentle, he lacked authority. The children did with him whatever they wanted. Never did he punish, never did he scold. All his pupils, even the most ignorant and noisiest, received their share of praise. Their teacher, he? Surely not. Rather, their holiday.

And then the parents decided this was leading nowhere; their children played too much and learned nothing. They took up a
collection to hire a genuine tutor from an adjoining village. Out of work, with nothing to lose, Moshe took charge of one single pupil, whom he elevated to the rank of disciple.

A moment that will remain graven in my memory forever: I saw my Master smile for the first time.

He did not see me, his thoughts were drifting elsewhere, into the uninhabited spheres of the mind; he barely breathed. That I was used to. For the last year I had trudged ahead, clinging to him, hour after hour, step by step, page after page. Frequently he became impatient with my slow pace and would abandon me on the way to dash forward, overturning obstacles, brushing aside dangers. All I could do was follow him with my eyes.

But I had never seen him smile.

There were times when he wept silently, like a child baffled by misfortune. Other times he hummed a song and his very body would overflow with joy. And still at other times, he trembled with rage, his fist hammering the table or lectern as though to break not the wood but the very laws of nature, the laws that restrain the body and keep it from flying away exalted and free at last.

I had observed him so long, I had learned to interpret the meaning of his flights. When he shed tears, it was to move the Messiah’s heart. When he danced, it was to persuade him. But at no time had the faintest smile ever lit his face. And so for me, it was a unique, privileged moment when I surprised him smiling.

It was winter. It was already dark outside. Leah was in the kitchen, tiptoeing so as not to distract us. An invisible hand was having fun drawing multiple icy pine trees on the windowpane. At times a rasping sound allowed me to catch the hand at work;
and then I tingled with joy. It was my Master who had taught me the art of tracking down the presence in our surroundings: all is life, all is symbol. Hold your hand before your eyes and you will hide the universe; take it away and you are re-creating it. Man’s secret is within himself and so is the world’s. Thence the strength of their bond, the violence of their parting.

Where is he? I wondered that night. He frequently left me like that. When his soul wandered in the high mountains whose peaks are joined together in seventh heaven, Moshe saw nothing and nobody. An instant, an hour—time no longer mattered, no longer moved. When the soul breaks loose from the body’s hold and rises toward its source, it forgets space and the slow plodding of the mind and pulse. It goes wherever it chooses, redescends whenever it wishes, and then, the time of a heartbeat, man resembles the half-awake prophet whose fierce and fiery eyes still retain the vision of sacred and luminous things—a vision he tries to detain, but his body rebels and reminds him of his human condition.

But I had never seen him smile before.

At a loss, I closed the book, kissed its cover; without Moshe, I could not go on. All I could do was watch him.

“He is beautiful,” I heard a voice say behind me.

Leah too had been watching him. I had not noticed her leave the kitchen. How long had she been standing there, between the door and the table, staring at us with wonder in her eyes?

“He is beautiful,” she repeated. “Isn’t it true that he is beautiful?”

She was right. His smile made him beautiful, and that too seemed new to me. I had never thought of him in terms of beauty. Only of truth.

He had ventured onto a new path, that was clear. I had, we had, but to await his return. In silence. An evocative, protective
silence. I had, we had, but to absorb it, make it our own to justify ourselves with regard to Moshe. And here he was, Moshe, at the end of silence, exhausted but happy. I felt the urge to mention it to Leah, but he was motioning me to come closer.

“I have just met my own Master,” he said, “the one to whom I owe much. He lived many, many centuries before us, but I consider him my Master. He said to me: ‘Like you, Moshe, I fought for truth, placed it beyond man and could not attain it; I lost my breath at the first try. You, however, will succeed; you did not know it before, now you know. That knowledge will either save you or crush you; therefore I both pity and envy you, but I should not like to be in your place.’ ”

Moshe was still smiling. Leah returned to the kitchen. Once again we were alone. I became uneasy when my Master stopped smiling.

“And now,” he said solemnly, “we must continue. Together. You and I. For before you didn’t know. Now you know.”

Davidov was shaking his head, so were the other councillors.

“You are interfering in matters that are not your concern,” said the president. “We are dealing here with the authorities, not with God. Mysticism is one thing; politics, another. It is good of you to want to help. Unfortunately, you are not the man we need.”

The voice of reason, of common sense. What was required was a murderer, not a martyr. What was required was a hoodlum like Yancsi, not a Kabbalist like Moshe.

“Go home,” said Davidov. “Take care of Leah …”

Moshe was still huddled in his corner, quiet and motionless. He waited until every councillor had stated an opinion. He had
not expected his proposal to gain immediate acceptance. Still, it had the advantage of being the only one.

“If somebody has a better idea,” said Moshe, “I withdraw mine. If not, I maintain it.”

Davidov and his colleagues exchanged glances. The argument was not without merit. Another idea? There was none. All avenues seemed closed. Sullen faces, rejections everywhere. Only the madman and his mad suggestion. How symbolic.

“But who would believe you?” someone asked.

“The enemy,” said Moshe. “The fanatics will believe me. Naturally. I am just what they want, I’ll make them happy.”

“They’ll want to know why, the motive …”

“That’s one question madmen are exempt from answering.”

“They will demand details … full particulars …”

“I’ll invent. I know how. My imagination has never let me down.”

The men were troubled, excited, desperate. Caught up in the game, they put themselves in the place of the prosecutor, raised questions and objections, tightened the examination, omitting no hypothesis, no contradiction. Moshe defended his position with extraordinary composure. His fabrication held fast. He had an answer to everything. Yancsi and his cruel games. Moshe and his fits of anger. From a madman you must expect the worst. Why not. The madman as avenger, the madman as dispenser of justice. A possible, plausible explanation. The impressed Community Council was about to give its sanction, when the Rebbe, who so far had not said anything, asked to speak.