by Katz, Yoram
Then Guillaume throws his hands up again and cries to his men, “I'm not running away; I am dead. Here is the blow.” And now Philippe and the rest can see it. The end of an arrow is visible, stuck in the left armpit of the Grand Master, exactly at the opening in the armor, with most of the arrow buried deep in the flesh. Guillaume collapses… At that moment, the rain of arrows intensifies. As more soldiers fall to the ground, the momentum of the attack is broken and courage gives way to despair. The offensive fizzles out, and the knights start withdrawing. Philippe throws away his shield, kneels down, loads his mortally wounded commander on his shoulders and starts running.
* * *
Philippe felt the package pressed against his heart and quickened his step. The solemn stone walls were now rapidly passing by. Somewhere ahead he saw a glimmer of daylight and minutes later he found himself on the eastern side of the tunnel. The guards greeted him with a nod, and he stepped out into the bustling port of Acre.
6. Pulsa Denura - Jerusalem, January 5th, 2010 (Tuesday)
It was a few minutes before midnight. The few passers-by in a quiet street of Jerusalem’s German Colony neighborhood, gazed curiously at the strange group of people standing on the pavement in front of one of the one-story houses. This was Jerusalem, where eccentrics and weirdoes are no uncommon sight, but the TV van parked nearby drew some attention, and a small crowd of curious spectators was slowly gathering to see what was going on.
The group which drew all this attention comprised ten bearded men wearing black robes and black hats. This was the typical dress of the Jewish Hassidic[viii] ultra-religious Haredi[ix] community. Nine of them were deployed in a straight line on the pavement, facing their leader, an old man whose body was covered in a black silk robe and whose head was adorned with a huge white skullcap. As church bells from the old city stroke midnight, the leader raised his hand.
“You all know why we are here,” he proclaimed. “In the opposite house lives Jonathan Bennet, an evil and wicked gentile. He is a foreigner who came as a guest to Holy Jerusalem and works for that blasphemous institution which calls itself the Hebrew University. He has been constantly abusing his welcome with words of heresy and libel. Time and again, we have warned this hard-headed man to cease this sacrilege, but his pen keeps producing poisonous words. He fabricates and spreads wicked lies about things holy to the people of the Torah[x], presenting his words as enlightened truth from Jerusalem.
“Since he refuses to heed our warnings, we have taken counsel with the sages and have been instructed to assemble you, a group of righteous men, to plead with the Almighty to send a curse upon the head of this man. Here, in Holy Jerusalem, we shall pray for the death and destruction of this evil blasphemer. We shall pray that no branch of the tree of life may touch him, and thus we shall bring a blessing to the world.”
The nine members of the group facing him nodded gravely in agreement. The leader then pulled out from under his robe a stack of paper sheets, which he proceeded to distribute to the others. “The words we are about to recite,” he declared, “are based on verses from the Holy Book of Zohar and were compiled by the holy Kabbalist, Rabbi Eliezer Pinchassi.” He then started reading ceremoniously in a mix of Hebrew and Aramaic, with his nine comrades solemnly echoing every line.
“Here we stand in this day and age,” he commenced.
“Here we stand in this day and age,” answered the nine in chorus.
“In purity of thought…” “In purity of thought…”
“On the spring and fountainhead…” “On the spring and fountainhead…”
“From where the prayers emerge…” “From where the prayers emerge…”
“And beg the Master of the heaven and the earth…”
“That He will pass judgment upon this evil man…"
“Who hath advocated apostasy…”
“And hath libeled the sages of Israel…”
“And hath fouled the Holy Torah and Kabbalah…”
“Whose name is Jonathan; son of Angela Bennet…”
“And each and every one of us, born of a woman…”
“Hath the right to call the guardians above…”
“And we are permitted in this place…”
“To demand from the angels of destruction, to put their sword unto him…”
“God shall not wish to forgive him…”
“In his lies and deceits and in his falsehoods, he shall die…”
“And in crimes he hath committed, and in sins he hath sinned, he shall die…”
“In this day and age…”
“As is said in the scriptures…”
“The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance…”
“He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked…"
“So that a man shall say…”
“Truly, there is a reward for the righteous…”
“Truly, there is a God who delivers justice upon earth…”
“Because he hath hardened his heart and cursed God and King…”
“And because he hath preached his evil falsehoods…”
“God’s anger and wrath shall be terrible…”
“Upon the head of this man…”
“And may all curses written in the Torah cling to him…”
“And God shall blot his name from under the heavens, and may he die immediately…”
“Because he spoke ill of the one God, our Lord…”
* * *
The TV announcer looked amused. “We have with us in the studio our correspondent for religious affairs, Yair Eshel,” he said to the camera and then turned to address the young man at his right. “Yair, will you please explain to us the nature of the ceremony we have just witnessed?”
“Well, Yaron,” replied the young man, “this is a Kabbalistic ritual called ‘Pulsa Denura’.”
“Can you explain to us what ‘Pulsa Denura’ means?”
“‘Pulsa Denura’ is an Aramaic phrase meaning ‘a stroke of fire’. In this ritual, people gather with the intention of casting a curse upon another man, hoping to cause or expedite his death.”
“Where does this custom come from?”
“This practice is mentioned in the Talmud and in the Book of Zohar, which is considered the most important Kabbalistic scripture. It is an application of Practical Kabbalah, administered with wording based on verses from the Zohar. Custom requires a Minyan - ten god-fearing, righteous Jewish men, over the age of forty, in order to deliver the curse and mortally hurt someone who has been conspiring against the Jewish people.”
“Is this for real, Yair?” asked the announcer with a smile. “It looks like a voodoo ceremony or an excerpt from a B-grade horror film…”
“Oh, this is real, all right,” the correspondent’s expression was grave. “The ceremony takes place in the late hours of the night, after all participants have fasted for a day. Before the ritual, they bath in the Miquve - the Jewish ceremonial bathing place, and then they dress in black and light candles.”
“So how does this work?” wondered the announcer. “Can anybody just get up one morning and decide to cast a curse against someone he does not like?”
“Well, it is not that simple. The Kabbalistic tradition forbids casting this curse for someone’s personal gain. It may be used only when a great evil threatens the people of Israel.” The correspondent paused for a few seconds for effect. “But this is believed to be an extremely hazardous business. According to Kabbalah, if the target of the curse is unaffected, the curse shall bounce back upon the people who have cast it. This may happen if the man does not truly deserve to be cursed, or if the curser is not pure himself. The curse, once cast, must be fulfilled either with the cursed or with the curser, and we are talking about a curse of death.”
“Death?”
“Yes, Yaron, death or at the very least a terrible catastrophe, which is to arrive within a year from the day the curse was cast. As I have explained, all participants attend the ceremony only after havin
g bathed in a purifying Miquve. This purification symbolizes the preparation for death, as the participants are to accept death, in case the curse bounces off its object.”
“I see. And what is this fuss all about, Yair? Who is the person these men were cursing?”
“There is a bitter dispute between this community and a certain academic scholar, who occasionally publishes articles that these Kabbalists consider blasphemous.”
“Who is this scholar? What are his claims?”
“He is Professor Jonathan Bennet of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Professor Bennet, an Evangelical Christian, is a renowned scholar of Christian history and publishes articles discussing links between Kabbalah and early Christianity. The Kabbalists find these articles offensive. A recent article he had published in the international press turned out to be too much for some of them.”
“Interesting. Can you tell us about similar incidents in the past?”
The correspondent looked at a sheet of paper he was holding. “There were quite a few; I will mention several of them.
“In 1959, a group of rabbinical judges in Jerusalem held a ‘Pulsa Denura’ ceremony directed against Gershon Agron, Mayor of Jerusalem, who died two weeks later.
“A ‘Pulsa Denura’ was cast in early 1995 by Haredi Jews against Eyal Ragonis, the architect of the ‘Andromeda Hill’ construction project in Jaffa. They claimed that the project was to be built on the site of an ancient Jewish cemetery. A few months later, Ragonis died of a sudden heart attack."
The camera caught the incredulous face of the announcer.
The correspondent pressed on. "On October 2nd, 1995, a ‘Pulsa Denura’ ceremony took place in front of the home of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in Jerusalem. Rabin was murdered a month later, and many have argued that this ceremony contributed to the atmosphere of incitement, which had paved the way for his murder.
“On July 19th 2005, a ‘Pulsa Denura’ was held by right-wing extremists in the cemetery of Rosh Pina, against Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who was at the time leading the Israeli unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Sharon, as we remember very well, suffered a stroke and entered a state of coma in January 2006, a state from which he has not recovered.”
“It seems that Professor Bennet has a good cause to be alarmed.” The announcer sounded less amused now. “Isn’t this a criminal offense? Can’t the perpetrators be sued in court?”
“Not really, Yaron. To quote from a statement of the state prosecution, which is based on former verdicts of the Supreme Court, this ceremony by itself is not enough to establish evidence of incitement to violence. The Public Prosecutor's office firmly believes that this is a reproachful form of expression, yet it addresses God, not men, and a prayer for the death of a human being, while being unworthy, is not considered incitement for murder and falls within the domain of freedom of expression.”
“Did you manage to get Professor Bennet’s response?”
“Professor Bennet directed us to the Hebrew University’s spokesperson. I have here the University’s formal reply.”
A slide appeared on the screen and was read by the announcer. “The university regrets that primitive rituals of this type are being used in certain circles to intimidate and threaten academic freedom in a society which upholds the independence of academic research. While the university is the first to acknowledge that there may always be room for controversy on any subject, this is definitely not a proper way of expressing it.”
7. On the Galley - May 18th, 1291
Philippe looked around. Acre’s port was in total chaos. Crowds blockaded the piers with people desperately trying to find a vessel to deliver them and their families from the inferno. Some were offering all their worldly possessions for the privilege of boarding one of the ships. A few young women offered themselves to the sailors for a place on board, to avoid the worse-than-death fate of falling into the hands of the Saracens. Quarrels broke out among the hard-pressed people, and their shouts were deafening.
Philippe recognized the Patriarch’s galley[xi] and made his way towards it. Many civilians crowded the pier where it was docked, trying to board it and trampling over each other in the process. Philippe raised his sword menacingly and cleared a path for himself.
The Patriarch was standing on board, looking solemnly at the multitudes overflowing the pier. When he noticed Philippe approaching, he turned to an officer standing next to him, whispered something in his ear and pointed at Philippe. The officer gave an order and two sailors hurried down the gangway and helped Philippe climb aboard. A few minutes later he was standing at Patriarch Nicholas’ side. The Patriarch extended his hand to him, and Philippe got down on his knees and kissed it.
“Arise, my son,” said the Patriarch. “I am glad to see you alive and well. De Severy asked me to take good care of you. The terrible news about Grand Master de Beaujeu has caused me much pain. He was a good Christian and a brave man whom we all admired and respected. May our Lord bless his soul.”
“Forgive me your holiness.” It was the Captain who came scurrying. “The galley is already packed beyond capacity. We must raise the gangway and sail immediately. We cannot board more people without risking our lives.”
The Patriarch looked at the crowded pier. Many people were standing there, pushing and shoving in their desperate attempts to climb aboard. Some raised their small children above their heads, trying to invoke pity in the hearts of the armed sailors, who were blocking their path to the gangway.
Tears came to the holy man’s eyes. “Every additional man on board is one more soul saved,” he said. “Board twenty more and give priority to families with children. Immediately after that, raise anchor and set sail.”
“But your holiness, we are risking the lives of all passengers!” Philippe heard the alarm in the veteran seaman’s voice. “This galley was not built for such a load. A storm, even the smallest one, will drown us all!”
The Patriarch gazed at the sea. It was smooth almost as a mirror, with a light breeze blowing. “Grow strong in your faith, my son,” he said. “Surely the Lord will extend to us some grace and mercy on this day of hardship.”
The Captain shook his head in desperation, mumbled something and was gone. Soon, the gangway opened for a few minutes and twenty fortunate people with many children among them, climbed aboard. The galley, its hull submerged very low in the water, started on its way. The vessel moved slowly away from the pier, leaving in its wake a mass of wretched humans wailing and crying. The swarm of people now started flowing in the direction of the other ships still at anchor, which were all already packed to full capacity.
The Patriarch shook his head in anguish. “God is punishing us for our sins. For years we have been occupied with hatred and strife. Genoese, Venetians and Pisans fighting each other … Venetians inciting the heretic Sultan against their Genoese brothers… Knights of the Hospital opposing their Templar brethren… No wonder the heathens are gaining the upper hand now.”
Philippe nodded morosely. The Patriarch was right. The ongoing quarrels among the various communities and military orders were the cause for the fall of Jerusalem a century before, and were now the cause of the disaster of Acre and the pending fall of the whole Kingdom of Jerusalem. They could have used the time made available by the distraction of the Mamluk Sultans of Egypt, who were busy fighting the invading Mongols, to prepare for war. However, the Christians had not learned the lessons of their defeat at the hands of Saladin a century before, and kept on quarrelling among themselves. Their inability to rise beyond pettiness and face reality was now being fully repaid.
A thought flashed through Philippe’s mind. There was one man in Acre who understood all this and offered solutions, but he never succeeded in convincing the others. This was the Grand Master of the Knights Templar, de Charney’s revered idol - Guillaume de Beaujeu.
* * *
Even before the fall of Tripoli, two years back, de Beaujeu forewarned the leaders of that city from Qalawun, the Ma
mluk Sultan of Egypt, in whose court he had planted spies. But the people of Tripoli trusted the pact they had with the Sultan and when Qalawun appeared in front of the city walls at the head of a 10,000-strong army, it was too late. Tripoli fell, its treasures were plundered, its men were massacred and its women and children were shackled and sold into slavery.
In Acre, people were shocked. They counted on their good trading and business relations with the Saracens to protect them, and now they realized they were in mortal danger. King Henry, from his residence in Cyprus, sent an urgent cry for help to Pope Nicholas IV. The Pope obliged him but the army he sent was an assortment of unemployed, prisoners and other sorts of rabble. A few weeks after arrival, this riffraff army started riots, which led to wholesale massacre of Saracens. The Sultan used this incident as an excuse for resuming the struggle against the infidels and vowed revenge. De Beaujeu wanted to compromise, but the leaders of the various Acre communities accused him of treachery and cowardice.
Meanwhile, Qalawun suddenly died in Cairo, but Al-Ashraf Khalil, his son and successor, carried on his father’s work. In the spring of 1291, the army of the Sultan, 60,000 horsemen and 100,000 foot soldiers strong, left for Acre. They were accompanied by engineers, rams, catapults and other machines of siege. The military force in Acre facing them numbered 1,000 knights and 14,000 sergeants, soldiers and able-bodied men. The leaders of the Acre communities, who had not too long ago accused de Beaujeu of faint-heartedness and treason, now begged him to use his connections with the Sultan. De Beaujeu, with the permission of King Henry, who had just arrived from Cyprus with 2,000 soldiers, sent two of his officers, Guillaume de Villiers and Guillaume de Caffran, the latter a fluent Arabic speaker, to try and reason with the Sultan.
