CHAPTER V
Rabbi Isaak Todros' appearance, and also his spiritual development, perhaps, were expressive characteristics of several centuries of long sojourn of his ancestors in Spain.
Wandering people, although astonishingly perseverant and conservative of marks distinguishing them from other nations, still by the inevitable influence of nature, draw here and there something from the different skies under which the lot of the exile scattered them.
Among the common characteristics of Israelites, however, there can be seen great differences. There are among them people but recently arrived from the South and West, and again there are others over whose head a pale sky has stretched and a cold wind has blown for centuries. There are among them phlegmatic natures, and also ardent mystical ones, and others redolent of reality. Some of them have hair black as the darkest raven wing--others have eyes the colour of the sky. There are among them white and also swarthy foreheads; strong, hardy natures, and others nervous, quivering with passion, imbued with dreaming, and consumed with fanciful ideals.
The swarthiest among the swarthy faces, the darkest of dark hair, the most passionate among the fiery spirits belonged to Isaak Todros.
What precise position did he occupy in the community, and on what was it based? He was not a priest; rabbis are not priests, and perhaps there is no other nation, as distant by its nature from theocratic government as are the Israelites. Neither was he the administrator of the community, because the members of the kahal took charge of its civil affairs; rabbis, while being members of the kahal, possessed only the role of warden of religion in respect to its rules and rites. He possessed a dignity higher than that, however. He was the descendant of an old princely house and among his ancestors he counted many scholars, pious and revered rabbis, and he was perfectly pious himself--consequently cadek and hahamen, ascetic, almost a miracle-worker, and a deeply, supernaturally learned man. Of course, saying that he was a learned man refers only to religious erudition, but in the eyes of the community of Szybow this was the only learning.
This scholarship embraced the incomparable knowledge of sacred books; Torah or the Bible, as little as possible--more of the Talmud, and most of Kabala.
Isaak Todros was the most able Kabalist of modern times, and it constituted the corner-stone upon which was built his greatness.
Someone not familiar with the faith of the plebeian Israelites would suppose that the population of Szybow was a branch of a numerous gloomy sect of Hassid, which puts at the head of all religious and secular learning, the Kabala. No; the inhabitants of Szybow did not consider themselves heretics. On the contrary, they were proud of being orthodox Talmudists and Rabbinists. But they belonged to those, numerous in the lowest stratum of Talmudists, who joined Kabala to the Torah and Talmud, recognised it as a holy book, and became passionately fond of it, setting it in the shadow of the two first books.
And then Hassidism touched the Hebrew population of Szybow and left deep traces. In fact the greater part of the population was Hassidish without knowing it. Tradition said that Isaak Todros' ancestor, that Reb Nohim who had waged a battle of ideas with Hersh Ezofowich, was for some time a pupil of Besht, the founder of that curious sect. He saw him often, and although he did not join the sect entirely, he grafted some of its ideas into the community of which he was the spiritual leader.
The principal characteristics of the sect were: a boundless respect for Kabala, an almost idolatrous worship of Cadeks and a deep, pious and unshakeable aversion toward Edomites (foreign nations) and their lores.
These principles multiplied and branched out under the teaching of Nohim's son, Baruch, and his grandson Isaak seized the dignity held by his ancestors during the period of their rule. Therefore the religion of the inhabitants was neither Mosaism, nor Talmudism, nor Hassidism, but it was a chaotic mixture of all three which prevailed for the space of a number of miles around Szybow, and the highest expression of which was found in the person of the Rabbi of Szybow.
Rabbi Isaak had a swarthy forehead, furrowed deeply by lines of strained thought in trying to penetrate the mystery of Heaven and earth by a combination of letters, composed of the name of God and the Angels. Therefore in his coal-black eyes were gloomy lights which sometimes became ecstatic when they contemplated the incomparable delights of the supernatural world. His back was bent from the continual reading of books, arid his hand shook with excitement caused by the perpetual state of emotion in which his mind was kept; his body was thin from spiritual torments and physical mortifications.
Celibacy, fasting and sleepless nights were written in the dark face of the man, as well as his mystical ecstasies, secret dread and merciless hatred of everyone who lived, believed and desired differently from himself.
When he was young he had married--or rather they had married him--before the slightest sign of a beard had appeared on his cheeks, but he soon divorced his wife, because, by her continual bustling activity she troubled his pious thought and spiritual raptures. His three children were brought up in his brother's house, and he himself lived the life of an anchorite in the little cabin--a life of fancy strained to the utmost, of passionate prayers and unfathomable mystic contemplations. Such was his spiritual life.
His physical life was sustained by gifts sent him by his zealous admirers. But those gifts were small and common. Rabbi Isaak did not accept great and costly presents--he even refused to accept remuneration for the advice, medicines and prophecies which he gave to the faithful who came to him.
But every day before sunrise some bashful figures glided through the school-yard, and placed on the wooden bench standing near the window of the house some earthen dishes with food--slices of bread or holiday cake.
At that time the Rabbi usually recited his morning prayers, for it was that moment at which white could be distinguished from blue, which is the time that every faithful Israelite should recite the morning Tefils and Shems.
Then he opened his window and contemplated the pink glow of the dawn.
In one direction was the far Orient, Jerusalem, the invisible ruins of Solomon's Temple, Palestine weeping for her sons and the withering palms of Zion.
Sometimes the fire shining in the Rabbi's eyes was quenched by a tear, cooling his cheeks which burned with the heat of interior fires. Sometimes they were cooled also by the cold winds and misty fogs, but Isaak Todros looked every morning through the mists and fogs, toward the Orient. Then he bent and took from the bench the food prepared for him by pious hands. He did not eat it alone. He broke the bread and cake into crumbs and threw it in handfuls to the birds which came to his window in great flocks. Some of them seized the food and carried it to their nests, chirping joyfully. Others after having eaten enough flew in through the window and perched on the bent shoulders of their friend. Then the Rabbi's dark face grew a little less dark, and sometimes--though very seldom--a smile played about his close shut lips. He was very well known, not only to the birds living in the town, but also to those who filled the birch grove.
Isaak Todros often went to the grove, and sometimes penetrated the neighbouring pine forest. What did he do there? He fed the birds, who, on seeing him, immediately flew to him, and accompanied him in his walk. Sometimes he prayed in a loud voice, raising his trembling hands, and awakening by the sounds of his passionate cries the choir of wood echoes. He also gathered different herbs and plants, which he brought in great bunches to his hut. These plants possessed curative properties, whose knowledge was a heritage in the Todros family. All the members of this family belonged to that class of primitive physicians with which the Middle Ages was filled, and who learned their art of healing not from academies, but from wild nature, studied more with fantastical inquiring, than with learned thought.
One of Isaak Todros' ancestors was, however, a very learned physician in Spain at the time when there was a short interval in prosperity in the bad fortunes of the Hebrew nation, and they were permitted to draw with the other nations all possible good from every source.
However, the interval was but a short one, and after it the world-famous and really scholarly Hebrew physicians disappeared from the world; but one, by the name of Todros Halevi, transmitted his knowledge to his sons, and so it passed from generation to generation.
Isaak Todros searched for diligently, and gathered carefully, these precious plants of the ancient knowledge and traditions of his family. He carried them with him, and laid them on the dirty floor of his cabin in order to dry them.
On this account the air of his cabin was saturated during the summer and fall with the pungent, choking scent of drying herbs and wild flowers.
His cell was a vivid reminder of the bare cells of anchorites and hermits. Its only furniture consisted of a hard bed, a white table, standing near one of the windows, a couple of chairs, and a few planks fastened to the wall piled up with books. Among these books were twelve enormous volumes bound in parchment. They constituted the Talmud. There were also the "Ozarha-Kabod," a work written by one of Isaak's ancestors--that Todros Halevi who was the first Talmudist to believe in the Kabala; "Toldot-Adam," an epic poem, telling the history of the first man and his exile; "Sefer-Jezira," (Book of Creation), telling by pictures of the origin of the world; "Ka-arat Kezef," in which Ezobi warns the Israelites against the pernicious influence of secular science; "Schiur-Koma," a plastic description of God, instructing the reader regarding his physical appearance--the gigantic size of the head, feet, hands, and especially God's beard, which, according to the book, is ten thousand five hundred parasangs long. But the place of honour was occupied by a book showing much thumbing. It was the Book of Light--Zohar--the greatest, and, at the same time, the deepest dissertation on Hohma-Nistar (Kabala), which was published in the thirteenth century by Moses Leon, in the name of Symeon-ben-Jochai, who lived several centuries before.
Such was the library of Isaak Todros, in the reading of which he spent his nights, drawing from it all his learning and wisdom, consuming in its perusal all the forces of his body. From that library emanated an odour which intoxicated his mind with mystical emotions and the bitter, sharp venom of aversion to everything which was a stranger to, or bore ill-will to the world, shut up in those books, filled with supernatural lights and shadows. In reading them, he exhausted many hours a week--even holy days and nights. But through the holy nights there sat at his feet his pupil and favourite, Reb Moshe, the melamed, who snuffed the yellow candle, for a pious man reading Holy Books during holy nights was not permitted to snuff the candle, and he must have beside him some attentive person to perform this office.
During the holy nights the Rabbi read Schiur-Koma and Zohar, and the little man, sitting beside him, raised himself from time to time in his low chair, reviving the flame of the dying candle, and with his round eyes looking into the face of his master, waiting for the moment when his hand would arrange a word from the names of God, Notarikon and Gomatria, which would perform great miracles, and disclose to the people all the secrets of the heavens and of the earth.
Returning home after sunset one day with a big bunch of herbs, Isaak Todros found his faithful worshipper seated in a corner of the dark hall, plunged in deep thought.
"Moshe," said the Rabbi, passing swiftly and quietly through the hall.
"What is your order, Nassi?" humbly asked Moshe.
"Go at once to old Saul, and tell him that Rabbi Isaak Todros will visit his house to-morrow."
The cramped, gray figure in the dark corner jumped as though moved by a spring, and rushed across the square to the house of Saul. Passing quickly the piazza and long hall, the melamed opened the door, and, thrusting his head into the room, he exclaimed triumphantly:
"Reb Saul, a great honour and happiness is coming to you! Rabbi Isaak Todros, the perfect pious, and the first scholar in the world, will visit your house to-morrow!"
From the depths of the large parlour the voice of the old merchant, dried by age, but still strong, answered:
"I, Saul Ezofowich, my children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren will await Rabbi Isaak's visit with great joy and great desire in our hearts. May he live a hundred years!"
"May he live a hundred years!" repeated the dark figure, and disappeared.
The door was closed. Old Saul was sitting on the sofa, reading from Zohar, but he could not understand its deep explanations in spite of the utmost mental strain, for his mind was accustomed to secular business affairs. Suddenly his wrinkled forehead became gloomy and uneasiness shone in his eyes. He turned to his elder son, Raphael, who sat at a table near by, balancing his books, and asked:
"Why is he coming here?"
Raphael shrugged his shoulders, as a sign that he did not know.
"Has he any reason for picking a quarrel?" asked the old man again.
Raphael, raising his face from his books, said:
"He has."
Saul shivered.
"Nu!" he exclaimed, "And what reason can he have? Has someone of the family sinned?"
Raphael answered shortly:
"Meir."
The faces of both father and son grew sad and disquieted. Isaak Todros visited the members of the sect very seldom--only when there was a question of some important religious matter or transgression of rules. And even such rare calls were only paid to the most prominent and influential members of the community. Poor people surrounded the Rabbi's cabin, ready to rush in at a sign from him in inexpressible joy or fear.
Rabbi Isaak Todros was an ascetic and he despised mammon, but he did not reject all possible signs of respect the people desired to show him, and they who were familiar with his thoughts and sentiments knew that he was very fond of these signs, and would even demand them imperiously in case anyone thought to dispense with or diminish them.
For that reason all the poor population, and everyone who wished to win his special favour, called him "Prince," addressing him as "Nassi." Therefore his passage through the town on all occasions was an important and curious event for the population, and was performed with quiet, dignified ceremony. A couple of hours before noon Saul Ezofowich, standing before the window of his parlour, looked with a certain amount of trouble at the retinue passing slowly across the square. All the members of his family, robed in holiday dresses, with a solemn expression on their faces, looked also, holding themselves in readiness to welcome this high dignitary of the community at the threshold of their residence. Through the square, from the school, a throng of people dressed in black advanced toward the house of the Ezofowich. In the middle, bent as always, in shabby clothes, with his rough shirt unbuttoned showing the yellow neck, marched Isaak Todros, with his usual swift, noiseless quiet pace.