Clay Man

by Irene N. Watts

  JOSEF IS AT the ghetto gates, not quiet and watchful as usual, but pacing back and forth. He waves his arms and kicks at the wall. There is menace in his movements.

  On the eve of this Sabbath, Josef is fearsome to behold. He rattles and shakes the gates, which are locked, with such force that I am afraid he may tear them from their foundations. What has disturbed him?

  A small crowd gathers on the other side of the wall.

  “Look at the Jewish giant,” a man calls out.

  “He has gone mad,” someone whispers.

  “Will he destroy us all?” another shouts.

  “You’d better keep to your own side of the wall,” a workman says, putting down his bag of tools and rolling up his sleeves.

  The crowd is agitated and murmurs angrily.

  If only Father were here, he would know how to calm Josef down.

  “Josef, come home with me now,” I say, going to stand close beside him.

  The crowd jostles for a better view. Josef raises an empty cart into the air and brings it crashing down on the wall. It splinters into pieces. Josef brandishes two staves wrenched from the broken cart, hitting out at everything before him. The blows narrowly miss the fingers of the man grasping the edge of the wall. The man slinks away and the others follow, afraid of what Josef will do next.

  I am afraid too. What has made him behave like this? He was our protector and now he has become a stranger. I try again to coax him to leave.

  “Come home, Josef. Mother is ready to light the candles.”

  He loves to watch her, but today he shakes me off – unseeing, unhearing, running in circles before he turns down a side street, kicking walls and beating at doors.

  I run for home; I cannot make him stop. I do not have power over a golem bent on destruction. Only Father can help us.

  I collide with him outside the synagogue.

  “Jacob, my son, I was delayed. Your mother will be anxious. If we hurry, we can still reach home in time.”

  “No, Father, we cannot go home. Josef is possessed! You have to stop him! He will kill someone.” I take Father’s arm and we follow the terrible sounds of a wooden club thudding against doors and shutters. Father’s lips move in prayer.

  We approach Josef. He looms, a great shadow outlined against the last rays of the setting sun. Josef readies his cudgel to shatter a nearby window.

  Father raises his eyes to the sky. “The sun has set. I am too late. The Sabbath has arrived.”

  I seize the hem of Josef’s coat to distract him, but suddenly he lifts me high over his head. Will he smash me down on the cobbles – splinter me into pieces like the wooden cart?

  Father cries out: “Stop, Josef! Come to me.”

  Immediately Josef calms. He sets me gently on my feet. His arms drop to his sides.

  “Come, Josef, we are going home.” Father’s voice is steady, quiet.

  We walk on either side of Josef, our path lit by the flames of Sabbath candles shining through windows and cracks in shutters. Families are gathered around their supper table. Only we are late. Father has broken our law. For me? Not a word is spoken until we are inside the house.

  FATHER SAYS, “Sit down in your place, Josef,” and Josef sits.

  Mother serves the meal in silence. She has lit the candles and spoken the blessing without us. I find it hard to swallow my food.

  “To save a life, one may break a commandment. Will I break our Holy Law for a broken shutter, a window? No. But for my son, for a life in danger, it is permitted. Josef’s strength is that of ten men. I am to blame – I forgot to remind him of his Sabbath duties. Without any instructions to follow, he did not know what to do. He became a crazed being, unable to distinguish between right and wrong.”

  We struggle to finish our meal. I have never known a Friday night when we were not joyful to be together. Now we are saddened by what has happened. Even Rebecca understands that this Sabbath is different from any that has gone before.

  13. “HE IS ONLY SLEEPING”

  The Sabbath crawls by. Josef remains seated in the kitchen. We attend services in the synagogue as usual, but Father’s sermon and the familiar prayers are not enough to unravel the tight knot of unhappiness inside me.

  How can I forget the moment when Josef treated me as an enemy? I thought he understood that I am his friend. Father said he is not like us, and I didn’t want to believe him. I won’t believe him. It was a mistake, and we will go on as we did before.

  At the midday meal, Mother’s cholent – the stew of meat and beans she prepares for us before the start of the Sabbath – today tastes no better than ashes on my tongue.

  When everyone is out of the kitchen except for Josef, I stand facing him, hoping he will look at me. He will not, but continues to stare at the floor almost as if he were ashamed.

  I say, “Father is not angry with you, Josef. He said he was to blame. You heard him, didn’t you? Look at me, Josef. We are still friends, you and I.” He does not move.

  The sun goes down at last. Never before have I felt relief that the Sabbath is over. The sky is clear tonight. The first three stars appear one by one and now more, too many to count, as many as my questions that Father has not answered. How will I ever go to sleep?

  The house settles down for the night. Father is in his study. I hear him pulling books down from the shelf, sigh, turn the pages. Then a long silence. I go in to say good night.

  “You cannot sleep either, Jacob? It has been a difficult time for us all, but at last I have reached a decision. You and I and Josef will walk to the Old-New Synagogue. I will tell Josef he is to sleep there tonight. We will go now, quietly, so as not to disturb your mother.”

  I do not question Father, but wonder what decision he has come to.

  THE THREE OF US walk through the silent streets. Everything reminds me of that long-ago night when I followed Father to the river. I am no longer afraid of spirits and demons, but of something that is about to end.

  We enter the Old-New Synagogue through a side door, partially hidden by leafy branches. Father bolts it once we are inside. He lights a candle stub and we climb up the narrow winding staircase to the top. Father unlocks the door of an attic room under the gables. I have never been up here before.

  “Wait here, Josef,” Father says. He motions me to help him clear a heap of parchments, threadbare prayer shawls, and worn books that cover a narrow couch at the far end of the room.

  “Lie down, Josef,” Father commands. Josef obeys at once. Father removes the Shem, the small piece of parchment on which the name of the Creator is written, from Josef’s mouth and speaks to him: “The work for which you were created is finished. You have done well, Josef. You kept us safe from our enemies, and the danger to our people is past. We walk in safety now and sleep peacefully at night, thanks to you. Your time with us has ended.” He touches Josef’s forehead and on it appears a word: EMET. The letters glow briefly in the dim light of the attic.

  I have seen this word on his forehead before – the night when the clay man was formed. Father erases the initial letter, E, so that the word now spells MET, meaning “death.”

  Death? Is Josef going to die? Is this the decision Father has made? I am filled with terror.

  The letters of the word grow pale, fade, and disappear. Josef’s eyes close. I want to shout to wake him up, but know this is a sacred moment, one that I must not disturb.

  Father circles the couch seven times from left to right, reversing the way he walked before, when he created the golem from clay. Just like then, I do not understand the words he whispers.

  He bows to East and West, to North and South. Josef lies still.

  “It is finished,” Father says. He motions me to help him cover Josef with prayer shawls and parchments. When we are done, the attic room looks as it did when we entered.

  “Father, will you say a kaddish for Josef? He was my friend.”

  “Jacob, you know that the kaddish is a prayer of mourning spoken only for the dead. Jos
ef is not dead – he is only sleeping.”

  “How long he will he remain asleep? Will he ever awaken and return to the ghetto, Father?”

  “One day, when the Jewish people have great need of him, the golem may be called upon again. But, for now, Josef has returned to the earth from which he came.”

  This time Father’s words do not comfort me. In my heart, I know that I will not see Josef again.

  “Jacob, do I have your promise that you will never speak of what you have seen and heard here tonight to anyone?”

  “I promise.” My voice cracks unexpectedly. I am too old to cry.

  “If anyone asks where Josef has gone, you must say that he has returned to his home. And now it is time to go.” Father leads the way down the stairs. As he unlocks the door, the candle stub flickers and goes out. We step into the silence of the night. Two, when before there were three.

  14. “THE COURAGE TO SPEAK”

  My thoughts are of Josef, waiting up there in the dark … waiting for a voice to call him back to us.

  “Let us talk awhile, Jacob,” Father says and motions for me to sit with him at the kitchen table.

  I am glad not to have to go to bed yet, but I try not to look at Josef’s stool standing empty by the hearth. I shall miss him always.

  “Tomorrow I have been invited for an audience with the emperor. I have received word from an advisor at the palace that Emperor Rudolf will announce throughout his lands that the Jewish religion forbids the use of animal or human blood. He will proclaim, therefore, that the Blood Lie is false.”

  “Father, aren’t you happy? Now we will be safe forever.”

  “Yes, I am content. I pray the emperor’s reign may endure many years, so that we will continue to live in peace. It is what we all pray for. The Lie has haunted our people far too long. This is a golden age for us, Jacob.

  “David Gans tells me that he, too, has been invited to the audience. I am to answer questions on the mysteries of kabbala, and he will speak about his findings on mathematics and astronomy. The emperor is a man of learning and many interests. It is an honor for our community that both of us are to meet with him.”

  “May I walk with you, Father, just a little way, and wait for you?”

  “I have a better idea. Come with me right to the palace and walk around the gardens, which are magnificent. Who knows, you might even be permitted inside the great hall. I should like you to meet David Gans.”

  I think immediately of what I might say to him. I hear he is looking for a new apprentice. Has Father really invited me to go with him? I’m not dreaming, am I?

  “Thank you, Father. I never thought or hoped …” I stammer with excitement and will never be able to sleep tonight.

  “Good, that is settled then. Now, it is time you went to bed.”

  “May I ask a question before I go, Father?”

  “I like to hear your questions, Jacob.”

  “I don’t know how to begin, but it is something that puzzles me. That first morning when you brought Josef to live with us, I felt I knew him. I recognized him, or believed I did.

  “I had followed you the night you left the ghetto with Isaac and Uncle Samuel. I hid and watched you make a man out of clay. The night was so dark, even with the brightness of the torches and the moon. Everything I saw and remembered has become confused, mixed up with my own dreams of the clay figure I tried to make. Was it Josef you created, Father?”

  “Yes, my son.”

  “That night you spoke words I could not understand. Were they the same ones you spoke tonight, before Josef fell sleep?”

  “All these years you have waited to speak of this night to me. How can a boy keep such a long silence?” My father’s eyes are kind.

  “You knew I was there?” I am astonished. How could he know? “I was so sure no one saw me.”

  “It was your secret as well as mine,” Father says. “I waited for you to tell me. I am glad you have. The night of your dream, you heard me call out and you came into the study. I, too, had been dreaming. For many days, I had been seeking an answer to the problem of how to keep the ghetto safe during Passover. I prayed … searched the texts for answers. I fell asleep and, in my dream, the letters flew into the air from the pages of the Sefer Yezirah.

  “They formed and reformed into different patterns, and then it seemed a voice told me to make a golem in the likeness of a man – one of great strength, obedient only to me. A man created from the clay of the earth, unable to speak, an unfinished being without a soul.

  “Once I was awake, I fully understood the words in the book and realized that to make a golem, I would need the four elements: earth, fire, water, air. This is what you saw and heard.

  “Tonight, I spoke the words again, but in reverse order, undoing what had been done when I brought Josef to life. The golem’s work is finished. I have been reminded that without my instructions, without a cause, he has become a danger to himself and to us … I am to blame.”

  “But you stopped Josef in time. You are a magician, Father.”

  “No, Jacob, not a magician. I am a student, as you and Shimon and Isaac are. The scriptures contain the answer to my questions and will continue to guide me as long as I live.”

  Father has given me the courage to speak … to tell him what I have been afraid to tell him for so long.

  “I am not like you or Shimon, Father. What would you say if I told you that –” I fumble for the right words.

  “That you do not wish to become a rabbi?” Father’s question is so unexpected, I become as mute as Josef was.

  “Then I would listen, think a little, and have to agree with you – two rabbis in one family are enough! It seems to me that there are many ways to serve our people. A boy, a young man such as you are now, who knows how to keep a secret, who is a kind and honorable friend, and who asks questions, such a person can become anything he chooses to be.

  “Tomorrow you will embark, by daylight this time, on a journey to discover a world outside the ghetto. Who knows? You may find that all you have been searching for is right here. Good night, my son.”

  If Josef had never come, would all this have been possible?

  I fall asleep, grateful for the time Josef spent with us, and dream of tomorrow.

  AFTERWORD

  DOES THE GOLEM WAIT to be called upon again? Is he still asleep near the rafters of the Old-New Synagogue in Prague? No one knows for sure.

  The Jewish ghetto in the story, its inhabitants led by Rabbi Judah Loew, is gone forever. In 1890, the crooked houses, alleys, and courtyards were demolished and replaced by new housing. However, some important sites were saved.

  Rabbi Judah Loew (1520–1609) is buried in the Jewish cemetery, as is David Gans (1541–1613) – astronomer, writer, and mathematician. Mayor Maisel (1528–1601), who built the Jewish town hall, also has his gravestone there.

  The Old-New Synagogue still holds services for the Jewish community of Prague. The Pinkas and Klausen synagogues are now museums, showing important exhibits of Jewish history in Central Europe.

  The ghetto was renamed Josefov in 1784, not after the golem in the story, but in honor of Joseph II, who, like the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II (1576–1612), was tolerant of the Jews and granted them some measure of freedom.

  Although Rabbi Judah Loew did have a wife called Pearl, Jacob and his neighbors are imaginary.