"Rabbi!" he exclaimed, "have you ever counted the intellects you and your forefathers crushed with your despotism; all the souls eager for knowledge that you thrust into darkness and suffering?"
"Rabbi!" said a youthful almost childish voice, "will you and those that stand by you always keep from us all knowledge after which our minds are yearning?"
"Why do you not, Rabbi, teach the people to use their intelligence as a sieve, to divide the grain from the chaff, and the pearls from the sand? Rabbi! you have made us to eat the pomegranate with the bitter rind; we begin to feel the acrid taste of it and it causes pain."
"Unhappy, misguided youths! Reprobates!" shouted Todros passionately.
"Did you not see with your own eyes that the people hated him, stoned him, and marked his forehead with a red scar?"
Proud and scornful laughter answered his speech. "Do not agree with everything the people say," and one voice continued: "The curse you pronounced against him has softened many hearts and opened many eyes."
"Malicious promptings stirred up hatred against him; but to-day all hearts are full of compassion, because with your curse you have killed his youth."
"It is worse than death, Rabbi; for amongst the living he will be like one dead."
"And is it not written in the statutes of the great Sanhedrim: 'The tribunal which once in seventy years pronounces a sentence of death will be called the tribunal of murderers?'"
"In the Sanhedrim, did not childless and stony-hearted men sit?"
"Who soweth wrath, reapeth sorrow!"
Such and similar were the sentences which fell like hail around the Rabbi, accompanied by threatening looks and indignant gestures.
Todros answered no more. He remained quite motionless and, with his mouth open and eyebrows raised, presented the picture of a man who does not understand what is going on around him. Suddenly, the melamed rushed from the crowd, jumped over the balustrade, and spreading out his arms as if to shield the beloved master, confronted the people and shouted in angry tones:
"Woe! woe! to the insolent who does not reverence those who serve them before the Lord!"
Eliezer replied:
"No wall is to be raised between the Lord and his people. We appointed men from amongst us to study the Law in order to teach it to the ignorant. But we did not, tell them: 'We deliver our souls unto you in bondage'; because every Israelite is free to search for the Lord in his own heart and to explain His words according to his intelligence."
Others exclaimed:
"In Israel there are no higher or lower grades. We are all brethren in the eyes of the Creator; no one has the right to fetter our will and intellect."
"The false prophets have lost us, because they separated us from other nations, that we are even as prisoners in the dark, left in loneliness."
"But a time will come when Israel will shake off his fetters, and the blind and proud spirits shall fall down from their heights and the imprisoned souls will regain their liberty."
Isaak Todros raised his hands slowly to his head, as a man who tries to rouse himself from sleep; then he leaned again on the balustrade, raised his eyes, and sighed deeply:
"En-Sof!" he said in a dreamy whisper.
It was the kabalistic name of God which whirled across his despairing mind. But as if in protest against the doctrines which had encumbered the pure Mosaic faith, a chorus of voices answered:
"Jehovah!"
The melamed's body shook as in a fit of ague. With violent speech and gesture he called upon the people to stand up for their beloved sage, and punish the audacious rebels. But the more he spoke, the more amazed he grew. Nobody moved. The rich and prominent of the community sat silent, their foreheads supported on their hands, their eyes riveted to the floor. They were in deep meditation. The bulk of the people remained motionless and mute.
The melamed understood at last that all efforts to rouse them were useless. He became silent, but his eyes opened wider in great wonder; he could not understand why they did not listen.
But through the misty brain of Isaak Todros passed a ray of light, and he got a glimpse of the terrible truth. Something whispered to him that in the young breasts all the dormant desires and aspirations of which the excommunicated man had been the interpreter, had stirred into life. The young man was, then, not the only one; but he was bolder, more enterprising and proud. He heard another whisper. The young heads whose fearless attitude bad made him powerless to-day, had been touched by the wings of the angel of Time, which, as he perceived in a dull, indistinct way, was full of rebellion and upheaving and would break down the barriers he had raised between them and the highest truth. And he heard again why the people had not stood up for him, because the angel of Time, who carries with him rebellion, and battle, also brings charity and forgiveness, and sweeps away curses and hatred with his powerful, yet soft, wings.
All this Todros heard in a dim and vague way; but it was enough, to benumb his heart, full of petrified faith and pride.
"Bat Kohl," he whispered.
The voice of his own conscience he took for the mysterious voice said to be heard in great crises by the lawgivers and priests of Israel.
"Bat Kohl," he repeated with trembling lips, and turned his gaze around the building.
The interior of the synagogue was half-empty. The people dispersed slowly and silently, as if they were seized by a great sorrow and doubt. The poor and rich, until now great admirers of the Rabbi.
There was the rustle of the belated women in the gallery, and then everything was quiet and deserted.
As in times of yore, Joseph Akiba was coming back in the moonlit night, to his shepherd's hut, so Meir pale and trembling approached the house of his fathers.
He went there, but without the intention of entering it again. He knew that he would have to go away, to pursue in loneliness and misery the great aim he saw in the far, far distance, and which was so difficult to reach. He wanted to see the house once more, but did not intend to cross its threshold. Among the many darkened windows, he saw one where a light glimmered. He stood still and looked at it.
Through the window he saw the motionless figure of his great-grandmother in her easy chair. A wave of moonlight made the diamonds sparkle.
Meir slowly ascended the steps of the porch and touched the door latch. It yielded to the pressure; contrary to the usual custom the door was unlocked. He entered the narrow passage and stood at the door of the sitting-room, which was wide open. The whole house was wrapped in darkness and silence.
Was everybody asleep? Not likely; but not the slightest noise was to disturb the last farewell between the great-grandmother and her great-grandson and drive him from her knees. It was the last time he rested under the roof of his fathers.
"Bobe," he said softly, "Elte Bobe!"
Freida slept peacefully as a child: the rays of the moonlight played on the wrinkled face like childish dreams.
"I shall never see you again, never any more."
He pressed his lips to the dear old hand that had given him the treasure which was his salvation and ruin, life and death.
Freida's head moved gently.
"Kleineskind!" she whispered, without opening her eyes.
Meir lost himself in thought. His forehead resting on his great-grandmother's knees, he said farewell to everything and everybody around.
At last he rose and slowly left the room.
In the dark passage he suddenly felt two strong arms closing around him, and a heavy object was put in his pocket.
"It is I, Ber. Your grandfather looked around the family for a courageous man who would give you a handful of money on the way; and found me. Everybody in the house mourns for you; the women have taken to their beds, crying; your uncles are angry with the Rabbi and the elders; the grandfather is almost beside himself with grief--but nobody will see you any more. It is thus with us; reason drags one way; the old faith the other. They are afraid. But Meir, do not grieve! You are happy. I envy you! You have not been afraid to do what I did not dare to do, and you will win. To-day your friends stood up for you, and the people were silent and did not defend the Rabbi. It is the beginning; but the end is still far off. If you showed yourself to-morrow before the people, their wrath would flare up again. Go! go into the world. You have youth on your side and courage; life is before you."
"Sometime you will come back and put an end to our sins and darkness.
We have many diamonds, but they want sifting. Go forth now, to conquer. Be like Baale Tressim, armour-clad like our ancestors; and my blessing and the blessings of those who, like me, wished, but could not--longed, but did not obtain what they longed for--be with you."
They exchanged farewells, and Ber disappeared as silently as he had come. The deep silence of the whole house seemed to bid the excommunicated youth to go hence.
When he left the house it had begun to dawn. The market square and the adjacent streets were asleep. The whole town was wrapped in the gray mist of an almost autumnal morning.