Apprentice

by Maggie Anton

  “Of course, they don’t receive the final payment until we’re delivered to our destination,” Timonus added.

  Their answers did little to calm my anxiety. “How do we know they won’t slit our throats in the desert somewhere and run off with our money?”

  “These tribes have been guarding winter travelers between Bavel and the West for generations,” Father replied. “They recognize that such problems would become known, resulting in an immediate loss of business.”

  Timonus nodded. “They also recognize that good service will be well compensated and recommended to others.”

  “What happens to those who don’t hire these so-called guards?” I asked. “The road seems straightforward enough, and it shouldn’t be difficult to carry sufficient supplies for a journey of three weeks.”

  “Those foolish enough to reject the Saracens’ protection will quickly find themselves in need of it,” Timonus replied.

  “So we bribe the nomads to keep them from attacking us,” I said with disgust.

  Father shrugged. “If we wish to cross their desert, we must pay for the privilege. That’s their business.”

  Timonus gazed at the goat turning on its spit and licked his lips. “They do provide us with ample provisions and comfortable accommodations.”

  . . .

  That was certainly true. The Saracens set aside a large tent for us, complete with soft rugs and warm, clean bedding that was carefully inspected for scorpions at bedtime. During the day, I rode close to Father, and thus I was able to listen as, over two weeks, his teachings covered a complete description of the Temple service as explained in Tractate Yoma, followed by details of various kinds of sin offerings from Tractate Horayot, and concluding with Tractate Arachim’s procedure on how to vow or consecrate people and property to the Temple’s treasury.

  I also learned that camels were the world’s most irritable and annoying beasts, which would bite people and one another without provocation. Yet without them, desert travel would be impossible. Besides going weeks without water, they could live off the rare scrawny, thorny plants that passed as vegetation in the desert. Plus they had an uncanny ability to find oases.

  I came to appreciate the nomads’ knowledge of the desert. Though the path seemed to disappear at times, they always led us back to it. Aware of our need for haste, and undoubtedly eager to be paid as soon as possible, they had us travel at night once there was sufficient moonlight. Winter was the busy, and lucrative, season for them, as few travelers would chance crossing the desert in spring or fall when the east wind could, and did, whip up sandstorms without warning. Only the most desperate would brave the summer heat.

  As our third week of travel drew to a close, the desert gave way first to scrubland and then, as we gained elevation, to high forested hills that smelled quite different from Bavel’s farmland. Yehudit was more alert now, and I could spend half an hour or more exchanging smiles with her between naps. I knew we’d be traveling in midwinter, but I had not realized how cold it would get. In truth, I had never experienced such bitter weather in my life. The Saracens distributed woolen cloaks, which I looked forward to replacing as soon as possible.

  Approaching our destination didn’t mean that our journey became less dangerous. To avoid strenuous climbs, the Saracens led us along wadi, trails following dry streambeds that could, without warning, become raging torrents if rain fell upstream. It being winter, rain was likely to fall sometime. If the stars favored us, we would never see a flooded wadi, and if we had average luck, we would merely have to avoid them. Our guides cautioned us to listen closely and be prepared to run from the streambed at the slightest sound of rain or rushing water. I clutched my amulet tightly and repeated the protective prayer whenever we crossed a wadi.

  Either our amulets and Heaven protected us, as it protects those occupied with performing a mitzvah, or perhaps our stars were lucky, because we reached a broad, verdant plain without difficulty. The camels, sensing water nearby, increased their pace, until we stood overlooking a wide valley below.

  I gasped with delight, for in the middle of the valley was a giant lake. I had never seen such an enormous body of water.

  “Father, do you think this is what Moses saw when Elohim allowed him to view Eretz Israel?”

  Father wiped away some tears before he replied, “If not this exact view, then something like it.”

  The head Saracen pointed down. “That is what you call the Sea of Tiberias. We should reach the city of that name in time for your Day of Rest.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  SECOND YEAR OF KING NARSEH’S REIGN

  • 295 CE •

  Thank Heaven the rain held off until we reached Tiberias. We were met by Rabbi Assi and Rabbi Ami, leaders of the Beit Midrash, which was what remained of the Great Sanhedrin. Informed that Rav Huna had arrived, they had raced out to honor him despite the downpour, only to sag with disappointment upon learning that it was Rav Huna’s body that had come to Eretz Israel, not the living master.

  Their chagrin dissipated upon meeting Father, who was immediately pressed into teaching during his stay. Rav Huna must have anticipated this response, which explained why he’d insisted that an accomplished scholar like Father accompany his body. The rabbinic burial cave was located too far away to travel to that afternoon, and since the next day was Shabbat, Rav Huna’s funeral was scheduled for First Day.

  There was no lack of hosts for Father and Rabbah bar Huna, but my presence with an infant and two female slaves complicated matters. Eventually a woman arrived to take me to where we would spend Shabbat, and thus I made the acquaintance of the widow Yochani, daughter of gladiator-turned-rabbi Reish Lakish. Yochani actually resided in the nearby city of Sepphoris, but she often spent Shabbat with her son Eliezer’s family in Tiberias. Unlike most cities in Eretz Israel, she told me proudly, these two were populated with more rabbinic Jews than am-ha’aretz.

  Yochani was around Mother’s age, a cheerful little bird of a woman. She won my admiration by admitting that no matter how her son pressed her to move in with him, she knew his wife would be happier with a mother-in-law who only visited once a week. Eliezer’s children were long past the toddler stage, and his family would be delighted to have a cute, smiling baby with her own nurse in residence.

  After so many days seated on a camel, my legs wobbled as I followed Yochani to her son’s home. “Perhaps I could walk around Tiberias a bit until my legs get used to supporting me again,” I suggested.

  Yochani looked shocked. “You’ve been traveling for weeks and tonight is Shabbat. You must come with me to the bathhouse before the women’s side is closed.”

  “I don’t need to immerse,” I said. “I’m a widow.” As the words came out, my eyes filled with tears.

  Yochani patted my arm sympathetically. “The bathhouse is not a mikvah. I’ve been a widow for twenty years and it hasn’t stopped me from bathing. Indeed, we have all day tomorrow to walk around town.”

  Reluctant to offend anyone on my very first day in Eretz Israel, I agreed to go. Memories of how Tachlifa had praised the bathhouses in the West came back to me, and I grew curious to undergo the experience. So I left Yehudit with Nurse and Yochani’s grandchildren, unpacked my Shabbat clothes, and brought them with me to wear after I was clean.

  The streets of Tiberias, paved with large stones, would soon be slick with rainwater. But the sidewalks were sheltered by the buildings’ second floors, supported with tall colonnades. As we walked I marveled at how different the stone buildings here looked from Sura’s brick-and-plaster dwellings. Yochani, whose two slaves accompanied us, had me stop at a clothier’s to buy winter cloaks for both Father and me. All the while she questioned me with such gentle thoroughness that by the time we reached the bathhouse she knew more about Rami’s death and my difficult bereavement than anyone in my family.

  “Once inside, you must put away all unhappy thoughts,” she told me. “Allow yourself to be pampered like a queen.”

  I nodd
ed and reassured myself that, though I’d never been to a bathhouse before, there was nothing to worry about. I would watch what the other women did and emulate them.

  But my good intentions were thwarted immediately, as I had no small coins to pay the doorkeeper and had to borrow them from Yochani. We passed through a corridor to an unheated room with benches and niches for patrons’ clothes, where we quickly undressed. One of the slaves pushed open a heavy wooden door to a steamy room, and I hurried in to enjoy its warmth.

  I imitated Yochani and sat down on a bench away from the door, feeling surprised and confused at the absence of pools or tubs. How did one bathe if there were no baths? I had little time to consider this, because immediately one of the slaves began soaping my hair and body. I closed my eyes and relaxed as she scrubbed my scalp, trying to recall how old a child I was when Nurse had stopped bathing me.

  When Yochani stood up, I cautiously followed her into the next room, letting out my breath in awe when I saw all the women soaking in the large pools ahead. With soap dripping down my legs making the wet floors even more slippery, I held tight to the slave attending me as she led me to the nearest pool and helped me in. Despite all the steam, the water was disappointingly tepid, but I sat patiently while the slave rinsed away the soap.

  When I opened my eyes, Yochani was waving at me to join her in a different pool. Leery of falling, I let the slave assist me in. But I stopped in shock when my foot touched the water.

  “Ha-Elohim!” I burst out. “You could cook a chicken in here.”

  Yochani laughed at my distress. “Take as much time as you need, child. You’ll soon get used to it.”

  I briefly considered returning to the tepid bath, but then realized that my feet were no longer burning. Slowly I made my way down the stairs, until with a final motion I sank into the water up to my neck.”

  “Ah.” I sighed as the heat penetrated my body and my tight muscles relaxed.

  “Let me introduce Hisdadukh,” Yochani said to the women on either side of her. “She’s just arrived from Bavel.”

  The one on her left raised a brow questioningly. “Hisdadukh?”

  “It’s Persian for Hisda’s daughter,” I replied, wondering how many times I would have to explain my name in the West.

  The women nodded to each other as if this were what one would expect from those strange Jews in the East.

  I was just dozing off when Yochani addressed me loudly. “Come out now. It’s time for your massage.”

  I looked up to see a bath attendant waiting for me with a towel. “It’s too bad it’s raining,” she said. “Otherwise you could enjoy the gardens.”

  Impressed that there were gardens too, I followed her to the room’s edge, where a row of marble slabs lined the walls.

  The attendant held out a tray containing small glass vials. “What fragrance do you prefer?”

  I sniffed each vial—roses, balsam, myrrh, lotus, musk, and several unfamiliar scents—before choosing jasmine, a Persian flower for a Persian woman. Then I lay down on the warm stone. Next came the greatest physical pleasure I’d enjoyed since Rami died. Muscles tight from weeks atop a camel softened with the masseuse’s expert ministrations, and I realized how much I missed the touch of another human being’s hands on my body.

  I sighed and was thinking what a shame it was that there were no such bathhouses in Bavel, when suddenly an audacious thought intruded—what if I didn’t go back? Then I wouldn’t have to give up Yehudit.

  The idea of remaining in Eretz Israel was less appealing the next day, as a cold rain fell for all of Shabbat. Despite the miserable weather, Yochani honored her promise to show me around Tiberias. This turned out to be not as unpleasant as I’d anticipated, since besides the covered walkways carefully placed stones enabled us to cross the street high above the torrential flow of water that rushed along the pavement.

  Wrapped in my warm, waterproof woolen cloak, I felt a kinship with Yochani, who spun stories of growing up within a rabbinic family that boasted the great Rabbi Yohanan’s sister as mother and Reish Lakish as father. She too had passionately loved the husband of her youth and been devastated by his death, though she had not been widowed at quite so young an age. With a wink, she admitted that she’d been less fond of her second husband than of the ketuba she’d received at his death.

  Preferring to avoid the subject of second husbands, I indicated my desire to see Rabbi Akiva’s wife’s tomb. Yochani pointed out that the cemetery was located on a steep hillside above the city, and thus not an appropriate excursion for a rainy day. She suggested seeing the lake instead and guided me to a sheltered spot with a good view of the water’s wide expanse. There was nothing like this in Bavel, and I watched, fascinated, as the rain pelted the lake’s wind-whipped gray waves. Yochani’s mention of her ketuba reminded me that I had not yet received mine, and that I should talk to Ukva about it when I returned.

  We joined Father for the evening meal, where he thanked me publicly for the cloak. He also announced that, rain or not, we would leave at dawn for the city of Beit Shearim, in whose burial caves Rav Huna would be entombed. Since there would be no time to return to Tiberias that day, we would spend the night in Sepphoris. Yochani lost no time in inviting me to stay with her.

  Thankfully, the rain had stopped by the next morning, although there were enough gray clouds above to be worrisome. Instead of camels, we rode donkeys to Beit Shearim, an uphill journey through groves of what Yochani identified as olive trees. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I looked back at the lake and saw a tall white-tipped mountain behind it. Yochani greatly enjoyed explaining snow to me, telling me that if I were lucky, some might fall during my stay.

  When we reached the city, and waited while Father and the local rabbis discussed burial arrangements, she directed me to a spot where I could admire the view from its heights. No sooner had I climbed the hillock than clouds parted and rewarded me with an enormous rainbow. How different this land was from Sura—where we had no mountains, no olive trees, and almost never any rainbows.

  Once it was decided that Rav Huna would be interred in Rabbi Hiyya’s crypt, the coffin bearers led us downhill to the burial site. Again I could scarcely believe my eyes, for doors cut into the hillside revealed a multitude of caves. Yochani informed me that they contained hundreds of sarcophagi, including that of Rabbi Judah haNasi, who’d compiled the Mishna. Rav Huna would not be alone, for pious Jews from throughout the Diaspora had tombs in this giant necropolis. Strange, but there was no demonic presence like I’d felt in Sura’s cemeteries. Perhaps all the holy rabbis buried here kept the ruchim away.

  When we reached the entrance to Rabbi Hiyya’s crypt, the problem arose of who was worthy of bringing Rav Huna’s coffin in. Father demurred because of his priestly status, and Rabbah bar Huna, always humble, declared himself unworthy of entering the great rabbi’s tomb. After some discussion, Rav Chaga, one of Rabbi Hiyya’s students, was judged least likely to disturb his teacher’s rest.

  Rav Chaga was only in the catacomb a short while before he raced outside, his face a mask of terror. “The fire, the fire,” he whimpered. “I barely escaped with my life.”

  His clothes looked singed, and the rabbis gathered to comfort him.

  “What happened?” Father had to raise his voice to be heard. “Were you able to bury Rav Huna?”

  Rav Chaga was so frightened that he could barely speak. “When I found Rabbi Hiyya’s tomb, I saw that his sons Yehuda and Chizkiya were lying on either side of him, with no room for Rav Huna,” he whispered. “I was trying to decide what to do when Yehuda rose up and told his brother to move, that it was shameful for Rav Huna’s burial to wait.”

  The collective intake of breath from his audience, including myself, was so alarming that Yehudit began to cry. Though I remembered Abaye’s tale of how Rav Tuvi had grabbed the beard of the Magi who’d tried to exhume him, I was no less shocked than the others. By the time I calmed Yehudit, the rabbis were demanding to hear what had happe
ned next.

  “So Chizkiya also rose.” Rav Chaga shuddered at the memory. “And when he did, a pillar of fire ignited alongside him.”

  “Ha-Elohim!” several of the men gasped in awe.

  Rav Chaga was shaking so hard it was difficult to understand what he said next. “I shoved Rav Huna’s coffin between me and the flames and ran out as fast as I could.”

  I cringed when Father bellowed, “You left Rav Huna’s coffin behind, standing up in the fire?”

  “This is intolerable,” Rabbah bar Huna declared, bounding toward the catacomb’s entrance.

  The other rabbis hurried to stop him. “Rav Chaga barely escaped with his life,” Rabbi Assi warned.

  “Bar the door so no one else may enter,” Rav Ami said.

  In my view, they should have done that long ago if the crypt was so dangerous. As for who would be brave enough to seal its entrance, Yochani and I left that terrifying place in such a hurry that I never found out.

  Yochani was a gracious hostess. She lived with several slaves in a walled courtyard on the Street of Leatherworkers, just off one of Sepphoris’s main roads. The front dwelling was rented to a leather craftsman whose shop on the lower level opened to the street, while his family’s living quarters occupied the second floor. A third apartment, smaller and adjoining Yochani’s, was empty, which she ascribed to a lack of suitable tenants. Although it smelled musty from disuse, it would be perfect for Yehudit and me once it was aired out.

  The day’s events had left us too agitated to sleep, so Yochani and I talked late into the night. I came to the conclusion that she was a lonely woman eager for someone to listen to her stories of life in the old days. But her tales were new to me, and she told them well, so I gladly accepted her offer to stay as long as I liked.

  On the way to synagogue the next morning, Father had me walk with him apart from the others.