"You have come from a far country, indeed, if you do not know that Isaak Todros does not take payment. If I do good to my brethren, I ask only for one reward: that the Almighty may increase by one drop the wisdom I possess already, but of which I can never have enough."
The old man looked with admiring eyes at the sage, who, so full of wisdom, yet wished for more.
"Rabbi," he sighed, "allow me to kiss your benevolent hand."
"Kiss it," said the master gently, and when the old man bent his head covered with white hair, the Rabbi put his arm round him and kissed him on the forehead.
"Rabbi!" exclaimed the old man, with a burst of happiness in his voice, "you are good--you are our father--our master and brother."
"Blessing upon you," replied Todros, "for having preserved your faith until your old age, and the love for our fatherland which makes you prize a handful of its soil more than gold and silver."
Both their eyes were full of tears. It was the first time they had ever met, and yet their hearts were full of brotherly love and mutual sympathy.
Reb Moshe, who sat in his usual corner waiting for the end of the interview, also had tears in his eyes. When Isaak Todros was alone be still waited a little, and then said in a low voice:
"Nassi!"
"Hah?" asked the sage, who was already buried in mystic speculation.
"There is great news about the town."
"What news?"
"Meir Ezofowich has found the writing of his ancestor, the Senior, and is going to read it to-day before the assembled people."
The Rabbi was now fully awake, and craning his neck towards the melamed, exclaimed:
"How did you come to hear of it?"
"Ah! the whole town is full of it. Meir's friends since early morning have been among the people spreading the news."
Todros did not say a word; but his eyes had a keen, almost savage expression.
"Nassi! will you allow him to do this?"
Todros was silent. At last he said in a determined voice:
"I will."
Reb Moshe gave a convulsive start.
"Rabbi!" he exclaimed, "you are the wisest man that ever was, or will be on this earth; but has your wisdom considered all the consequences, and that this writing may detach the people from you and the covenant?"
Todros looked at him sternly:
"You do not know the spirit of the people if you can speak and think like that. Have not I and my fathers before me tried to mould and educate the people and make them faithful to their religion? Let him read the papers--let the abomination come forth from its hiding-place, where it has lain till now; it will be easier to fight against it and crush it down, once and for ever. Let him read it: the measure of his transgressions will then be full, and my avenging hand will come down upon him!"
A long silence followed upon these words. The master was absorbed in thought, and the humble follower looked at him in silent adoration.
"Moshe!"
"What is your will, Nassi?"
"That writing must be taken from him and delivered into my hands."
"Nassi! how is it to be taken from him?"
"That writing must be taken and delivered into my hands!" repeated the Rabbi decisively.
"Nassi! who is to take it from him?" Todros fixed his glaring eyes upon his follower. "That writing must be taken from him and delivered into my hands," he repeated for the third time.
Moshe bent his head.
"Rabbi!" he whispered, "I understand. Rest in peace. When he reads the abomination before the people such a storm will break over his head that it will lay him in the dust."
Again there was silence. The Rabbi interrupted it:
"Moshe!"
"Yes, Nassi!"
"When is he going to read that blasphemous writing?"
"He is going to read it in the Bet-ha-Midrash after sunset."
"Moshe! go at once to the shamos (messenger) and tell him to convoke the elders and the judges in the Bet-ha-Kahol for a solemn judgment."
Moshe rose obediently, and went towards the door. The Rabbi, raising both arms, exclaimed "Woe to the headstrong and disobedient! Woe to him who touches the leper and spreads contagion!"
Saying this, his whole face became suffused with a wave of dark, relentless hatred. And yet, a quarter of an hour ago the same face was full of brotherly love; the same mouth spoke gentle and comforting words, and the eyes were full of tears.
Thus gentleness and wrath, love and relentless hatred dwelt side by side in the same heart; virtues and dark crimes flow from the same source. Charity goes hand in hand with persecution and neighbour often stands for enemy. Man, who tended to human suffering and healed the sick, with the same hand lit the stakes and prepared the instruments of torture.
What mysterious influences rule such dual lives?--asks the perplexed student of human nature.
But for these mysterious undercurrents which lead human brains and hearts into awful error, Rabbi Isaak might have been a great man.
Let us be just. He would have been a great man but for those that raised the weapons of fire and sword, and the still more deadly weapons of scorn and contempt, against his brethren, and thus confined them in the narrow, dark,--a spiritual and moral Ghetto!
The sun had set, and the earth was wrapped in the dim light of a summer evening. The large court of the synagogue swarmed with a crowd. The interior of Bet-ha-Midrash was already full of people.
There could be seen heads of old men and fair locks of children, long beards, black like crow's wings and blonde like hemp. They all moved and swayed, necks were craned, beards raised, and eyes glowed in anticipation of some new sensation. Everything appeared in shadow.
The large room was lighted by a small lamp, suspended at the entrance door, and a single tallow candle in a brass candlestick, which stood on a white table; this, with a solitary chair close to the high and bare wall, constituted the platform from which the speaker was wont to address the people. In Israel, everybody, young or old, and of whatever social position, had the right to speak in public, according to the democratic principles prevailing in the ancient law. Every Israelite had the right to enter this building, whether for the purposes of praying, reading, or teaching.
The people who crowded outside the building looked often in at the windows of the room where the elders and judges held their conferences. In the entrance hall the lamp was being lit, and burning candles were placed upon the long table. Presently people well-known to the inhabitants ascended, the steps of the portico. Singly or in twos arrived the judges of the community--all of them men well on in years, fathers of large families, wealthy merchants, or house owners.
There ought to have been twelve in number, but the bystanders counted only up to eleven. The twelfth judge was Raphael Ezofowich. People whispered to each other that the uncle of the accused could not sit in judgment against him; others said that he would not. After the judges arrived, the elders, amongst whom was Morejne Calman, with his hands in his pockets and the stereotyped, honeyed smile on his lips, and Jankiel Kamionker, whose face looked very yellow, and whose eyes had the hunted look of a criminal. The last, but not least of them, was Isaak Todros, who glided in so swiftly and silently that scarcely anybody in the crowd noticed him.
At the same time, from the depth of Bet-ha-Midrash, a clear, resonant voice reached the ears of the surging crowd without:
"In the name of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, hear, O Israel!"