You have to close your eyes, and you have to go into the darkness, because it’s only out of the darkness that you see clearly, Nahman thinks to himself, taking Hayah’s breast into his mouth.
How Gershon caught the heretics
Later they will say it was Jacob himself who ordered the windows to be covered so carelessly—so that people might see. Now the onlookers run quietly back to the village, to the rabbi, and in a flash a group has gathered, armed with sticks.
Gershon is right—he first has them glance through the crack between the curtains, and then when they break down the door, for a moment they see a naked woman trying to cover herself with some piece of clothing, and people fleeing along the edges of the room. Gershon roars. Someone jumps through a window, but is caught by those outside. Someone else successfully escapes. The remainder are tied up, still a little tipsy, with the exception of Hayah, and Gershon orders they be taken to the rabbi. Acting on his own authority, he requisitions their carriages, horses, books, and fur-lined overcoats, after which he goes to the local magnate’s estate. But Gershon doesn’t know that it’s Carnival, and that the lord has guests. Furthermore, the lord does not wish to wade into Jewish problems—he owes them money—and cannot determine exactly what the situation is, which of them are mixed up in it and which aren’t. So he calls his steward, Romanowski, being far too engaged with the delectation of his cornelian cherry liqueur to go himself. The courtyard is lit, and the smell of roast meat seeps out, along with the sound of music and ladies’ laughter. Curious flushed faces peek out from behind the lord. The steward Romanowski puts on his long boots and pulls down a rifle from the wall, calls some farmhands, and together they go through the snow. Their righteous indignation, Jewish and Christian, brings to their minds unquiet images of some great sacrilege, a pervasive, extradenominational blasphemy. When they get there all they see are freezing men, tied up two by two, with no coats, shivering. Romanowski shrugs. He doesn’t understand what’s going on. But just in case, he puts them all in jail in Kopyczyńce.
The Turkish authorities soon learn about what’s happened, and by the third day, a small Turkish division comes to demand that Romanowski release the prisoner Jacob Frank, subject of the High Porte, a demand with which Romanowski is happy to comply. Let the Jews or the Turks deal with their own heretics for once.
People say that over the course of the three days he spent in jail in Kopyczyńce, before the Turks came to get him, Jacob once more received the Holy Spirit, the ruah haKodesh, and shouted strange things, like that he would convert to the Christian faith and take twelve of his brothers with him, as confirmed later by Reb Schayes and another man from Korolówka who was confined to the same cell. When the Turks did liberate him, they gave him a horse at once, which he mounted, heading straight for Chocim, on the other side of the Turkish border. The spies reported to Rabbi Rapaport in Lwów that, as he left, he said in Hebrew, clear as a bell: “We will be taking the royal road!”
Of the Polish princess Gitla Pinkasówna
Lovely Gitla is the only daughter of Pinkas, secretary to Rapaport, rabbi of Lwów. There’s something wrong with her—her mind is not altogether sound—and she’s caused her father no end of trouble, which is why he sent her to be raised by his sister in Busk, so that she might take in the healthy country air there and cease making scenes back in Lwów.
Her beauty is a concern, though it’s a trait that often pleases parents. She is tall, slender, with a dark, oval face, prominent lips, and dark eyes. She walks around in an unfaltering state of disarray, always wearing eccentric clothing. All summer she traversed the damp meadows outside town, reciting poems, going to the cemetery by herself, always with a book in hand. Her aunt thinks that’s what happens when you teach a girl to read. Gitla’s careless father did as much, and this is the result. An educated woman is the cause of many misfortunes. And in a way, here is proof of this. What normal person spends her time in a cemetery? The girl is nineteen, she should have been married long ago, and while boys and men are attracted to her, no one wants to get married to somebody like that. They say she let some boys feel her up. They did that just past the cemetery, where the road enters the forest. Who knows whether it led to anything more?
Gitla’s mother died when the girl was just a few years old. For a long time, Pinkas was a widower, but a few years back he took a new wife who could not stand her stepdaughter. The feeling was mutual. When the stepmother gave birth to twins, Gitla ran away from home for the first time. Her father found her in a tavern on the outskirts of Lwów. Young as she was, she was sitting and kibitzing with the card players. Yet they did not take her for a traveling whore. She spoke good Polish and was obviously well-educated and well-mannered. She said she wanted to go to Kraków. She was attired nicely, too—in the finest dresses—and she behaved as if she were waiting for someone. The tavern keeper thought she was some great lady who had found herself in a dire situation. She told everyone she was the great-granddaughter of the king of Poland, and that her father had found her in a basket lined with swan’s down, and that a swan had even nursed her with its milk. Her listeners laughed more at the swan’s milk than at the basket. When her father burst into the tavern, he slapped her hard, in front of everyone. Then he dragged her to his cart, forced her into it, and drove off in the direction of Lwów. Poor Pinkas still hears the echoes of the guffaws and bawdy jokes he heard in the tavern that day. That’s why he decided to find his daughter a husband as soon as possible, to marry her to the first man who might want her, while—so he hoped—she was still a virgin. He hired the best matchmakers, and soon there were willing candidates from Jezierzany and Czortków. Then she started going into the hay with the boys, so that everyone could see. She did it on purpose so that there wouldn’t be a wedding. And there was no wedding. Both suitors retracted their proposals, the one from Jezierzany and the one from Czortków—news traveled fast. Gitla moved into a room in an annex to the main house, like a leper.
In the winter of that disastrous year, however, Gitla got lucky, or maybe unlucky, who knows. A caravan of sleighs appeared at the inn, and the newcomers dispersed across the town. Gitla’s aunt, who was also hosting Gitla’s stepmother with the twins, two boys, voracious and hirsute as Esau, locked the whole family inside, closed the shutters, and told them all to pray so that the voices of the heathen might not reach their innocent ears.
Gitla, ignoring her stepmother’s admonitions, threw on the little Hutsul sheepskin coat her father had given her and went out into the snow. She stomped through the village to the redheaded Nahman’s home, where the Lord had stopped in for a bit. She waited by the door with the rest of them, their faces covered by the clouds of vapor from their breath, shifting from one foot to the other to keep warm, until the Lord known as Jacob finally exited with his entourage. Then she grabbed his hand and kissed it. He tried to wrest it from her grasp, but Gitla had already uncovered her thick, beautiful hair, and now she said what she always said: “I am a Polish princess, the granddaughter of the Polish king.”
The others burst out laughing, but it made an impression on Jacob. He looked her up and down and then stared straight into her eyes. What he saw there no one ever learned. But since then, Gitla has never left his side, not for a moment. People say the Lord has been exceedingly pleased with her. They say that his strength has increased on account of her, and that she, too, has been granted great power from heaven, has felt it in herself. When once some tatterdemalion came to attack the Lord, she used that power to take the rogue down, throwing him into the snow so forcefully that he couldn’t get up for a long while. By Jacob’s side, she has been like a she-wolf, right up until that calamitous night in Lanckoroń.
Of Pinkas and his shameful despair
As Pinkas toils for Rapaport, he tries not to stand out, flitting sideways, huddling over his writings; now, as he copies out documents, he can barely be seen. But the rabbi with the eternally narrowed eyes can see better than even most young people. He seems just to be pa
ssing by, but Pinkas can feel his gaze on him as though he were being stung by nettles. Finally the moment comes—Rapaport calls for him when he’s alone. He inquires about Pinkas’s health, his wife, the twins, politely, mildly, as is his wont. Finally, he asks, not looking at his secretary:
“Is it true that . . .”
He doesn’t finish, but nonetheless Pinkas feels flushed, as if a thousand infernal white-hot needles pierced his skin.
“I’ve met with some misfortune.”
Rabbi Rapaport simply nods his head sadly.
“Do you understand, Pinkas, that she is no longer a Jewish woman?” he asks mildly. “Do you understand that?”
Rapaport says that Pinkas should have done something a long time ago, back when she started saying she was a Polish princess, or even earlier, when everyone could see something was going wrong with her, that some dybbuk had possessed her and turned her dissolute and mouthy and vulgar.
“When did she start behaving strangely?” asks the rabbi.
Pinkas thinks for a long time. Since the death of her mother, he says. Her mother was a long time in dying, in agony, from a tumor in her breast that spread throughout her body.
“It’s very understandable that it would have happened then,” says the rabbi. “Around dying souls gather many free dark spirits. They seek a vulnerable place they might break into. Despair weakens people.”
Pinkas listens, his heart tightening. He knows the rabbi’s right, for the rabbi is wise, and he, Pinkas, understands this logic and would say the same to someone else—when one piece of fruit has started to rot, it must be thrown out before it spreads to the rest of the basket. But when he looks at Rapaport, so self-assured, albeit sympathetic, closing his eyes as he speaks, Pinkas thinks of blindness—that maybe there is something that even this great, wise man might not see. Maybe there are some truths that elude the capacity of reason, maybe not everything can be contained within the Scriptures, maybe a new entry needs to be created for his Gitla, something about people like her. Maybe she actually is a Polish princess, in her soul . . .
Rapaport opens his eyes. Seeing Pinkas bent over like a broken stick, he says to him:
“Cry, brother, cry. Your tears will cleanse the wound, and it will heal quickly.”
But Pinkas knows that wounds like these will not heal, ever.
14.
Of the Bishop of Kamieniec Mikołaj Dembowski, who doesn’t realize he is merely passing through this whole affair
Bishop Dembowski is convinced he’s an important man. He also thinks he’ll live for eternity, for he considers himself righteous and just, perfectly in tune with the teachings of Christ.
Looking at him through Yente’s eyes, it would seem that in some sense, he is right. He hasn’t killed, betrayed, or raped anyone, and, every Sunday, he gives alms to the poor. Sometimes he gives in to corporeal desire, but it must be acknowledged that he puts up a valiant struggle, and, whenever it gets the better of him, he quickly leaves the incident behind and never returns to it in his mind. Sins get stronger when you think about them, when you fret about them and revisit their unfolding—when you give in to despair. And the instructions are clear: Do your penance and move on.
The bishop has a bit of a penchant for luxury, but he justifies this to himself by remembering his fragile health. He would like to be of great service to the world; he is therefore grateful to God that he was able to become a bishop—that was a lucky break.
He sits at the table and writes. He has a round, fleshy face and big lips that might be called sensual were it not for the fact that they belong to a bishop. He has fair skin and fair hair. Sometimes, when he gets overheated, he turns beet red, looks cooked. He has put on a warm woolen mozzetta over his rochet, and his feet are warming in fur slippers the women have sewn for him, since his feet get so cold. His Kamieniec home is never quite heated enough; all warmth escapes from it, and there are drafts though the windows are small; it is always dark inside. The windows of his office overlook the little street outside the church. Now, as he looks out, he sees some elderly beggars arguing, and after a moment one of them attacks the other with a stick. The injured man shrieks and whimpers, and the other beggars rush into the fight, and soon the din has grown into a full-blown assault upon the bishop’s ears.
The bishop tries to write:
Sabbaticians
Saspatians
Sabbsciples
Sabbitists
Sabbadabbas
In the end, he turns to Father Pikulski, that slight man in his forties with gray hair that looks as if it’s been glued to his head, sent here especially by Bishop Sołtyk as an expert in this very matter, currently working just outside the cracked door, the light of his candle making his big head cast a long shadow on the wall.
“How was it written, once more?”
Father Pikulski comes over to his colleague’s desk. His features have sharpened over the last couple of years, since we last saw him having lunch in Rohatyn; he’s just been shaved, and there are cuts on his prominent chin. What barbarian did that to him? the bishop thinks.
“It would be better, Your Excellency, to write ‘Contra-Talmudists,’ since they speak out against their Talmud—that’s the one thing we really know. It’s safer that way for us, not to get into all their theologies. But people call them Shabbitarians.”
“What do you think of all this, Father?” asks the bishop, pointing to the letter lying before him on the table. It’s a request from the elders of the kahal of Lanckoroń and Satanów for some intervention in the matter of a certain dissent from Mosaic law, the besmirching of the most venerated traditions.
“I think they are out of their depth.”
“Is it about the iniquities those people were performing in some tavern? Is that the reason?”
Pikulski waits for a moment, looking like he’s making calculations in his head—and perhaps that is what he’s doing. Then he puts his hands together and says, without looking at the bishop:
“I think they want to show us that they do not want anything to do with those heretics.”
The bishop clears his throat, impatiently wiggling a slippered foot, and Father Pikulski understands that he is supposed to keep speaking.
“Just as we have the catechism, so, too, do they have the Talmud. It is, to put it succinctly, a commentary on the Bible, but a specific one that has to do with how to observe the Mosaic laws and commands.” Father Pikulski becomes more animated, pleased to be able to show off the information he’s been collecting so scrupulously all these years; he looks down at a nearby chair and raises an eyebrow. The bishop gives a barely visible nod, and Father Pikulski pulls the chair up close to the bishop and sits down. He has a musty smell—the poor man has his rooms on the ground floor—as well as the lingering scent of lye from the barber who made such a horrendous mess of his morning shave.
“It was written by their rabbis many hundreds of years ago, and in it they explained all things—what to eat and when, what is allowed and what is not. Without it, their entire complicated structure would collapse.”
“But you told me all the laws were in the Torah,” the bishop interrupts him gruffly.
“But after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, once they were in exile, it was hard for them to obey the Torah—in a foreign country, in a different climate. Besides, those laws are very specific, relating to their old, pastoral lifestyle, and the world had changed, and thus there was the Talmud. Just remember, Your Excellency, the fourth book of the Torah, what it says about trumpets and armies, tribal heads, tents . . .”
“I suppose . . . ,” sighs the bishop.
“And this Frank has been saying it is all a lie.”
“That’s quite a serious accusation. Does he say this of the whole Torah?”
“The Torah does not bother him, but his holy book is the Zohar.”
“I am aware of that. So what is it exactly that these others want?”
“They want Frank to be punished. The Tal
mudists of the village of Lanckoroń drove out these heretics, brought a suit against them that centers on the so-called sin of the Adamites, and put a curse on them. What else can they do? That’s why they’ve turned to us.”
The bishop looks up.
“Sin of the Adamites?”
“Oh, you know . . . ,” says Pikulski, suddenly flushing and repeatedly clearing his throat, but the bishop, in some spontaneous act of mercy, allows him to not finish the sentence. Nonetheless Father Pikulski soon resumes: “They had to let this Frank out of jail, but now he’s operating out of Turkey. During the Jewish fast he was riding around in his carriage proclaiming to his followers that since theirs was the true God, and they believed in him completely, why would they hide? He said: ‘Come, let us reveal ourselves and show them all. Let them see who we are.’ Then, in the midst of the fast—this strict Jewish fast—he poured everyone vodka and served them pork and pastries.”
“Where did they come from, so suddenly, and in such a quantity?” the bishop wonders, wiggling his toes inside their furred slippers. He had already heard about how some Jewish heretics have been defying the Torah’s rules, convinced they’d been invalidated by the arrival of the Messiah. But what does that have to do with us? thinks the bishop. They are foreigners, and their religion is bizarre and convoluted. It’s an internal dispute—let them go after each other. But now he’s hearing other things as well: that apparently they’ve been availing themselves of curses and spells, that they’ve been trying to coax wine out of walls, using the mysterious powers described in the Book of Creation. Apparently they meet at out-of-the-way bazaars and recognize one another by means of a range of secret signs—for instance, by inscribing the initials of their prophet, S.T., on books, stalls, and even on their wares. And furthermore—this the bishop made sure to make note of—they do business with each other and support one another in closed societies. He had heard that when one of them is accused of shady dealings of some sort, the others all testify to his integrity, putting the blame on someone outside the group.
The Books of Jacob Page 32
