Begelman said to Og, “Next thing you know they will want a Temple.” Og suspected what they would ask for next, but said, “I believe we must redesign the forcefield to keep the Unds out of the cultivated areas. Perhaps we have enough components in Stores or I can learn to make them.”
He had been Scouting for Unds every fourth or fifth day and knew their movements. They had been avoiding the Station in fear of Og and the malfunctioning forcefield but he believed that they would attack again when the place was quiet, and they did so on the night of that day when the Cnidori took names. The field had been repaired and withstood their battering without shocking them; their cries were terrible to hear, and sometimes their bones cracked against the force. They fell back after many hours, leaving Og with earthworks to repair and two of their bodies to destroy.
In the morning when he had finished doing this he found Begelman lying on a couch in the Common Room, a book of prayers on his lap, faced by a group of ten Cnidori. All eleven spoke at once, Begelman with crackling anger in his voice, the Cnidori softly but with insistence.
Begelman cried out when he saw Og, “Now they tell me they must have surnames!”
“I expected so, Zohar. They know that you are ben Reuven and they have accepted your language and the names of your people. Is this not reasonable?”
“I have no authority to make Jews of them!”
“You are the only authority left. You have taught them.”
“Damn you! You have been pushing for this!”
“I have pushed for nothing except to make you well. I taught nothing.” Within him the Master of the Word spoke: This is true, but is it right?
Begelman in anger clapped shut his book, but it was very old and its spine cracked slightly; he lifted and kissed it in repentance. He spoke in a low voice, “What does it matter now? There is no surname they can be given except the name of convert, which is ben Avraham or bat Avraham, according to the gender of the first name. And how can they be converts when they can keep no Law and do not even know God? And what does it matter now?” He threw up his hands. “Let them be b’nei Avraham!”
But the Cnidori prime, who had taken the name Binyamin, that is, Son of the Right Hand, said, “We do not wish to be b’nei Avraham, but b’nei Zohar, because we say to you, Og ha-Golem, and to you, Rav Zohar, that because Zohar has been as a father to us we feel as sons to him.”
Og feared that the old man might now become truly ill with rage, and indeed his hands trembled on the book, but he said quietly enough, “My children, Jews do not behave so. Converts must become Jews in the ways allowed to them. If you do not understand, I have not taught you well enough, and I am too old to teach more. I have yielded too much already to a people who do not worship God, and I am not even a Rabbi with such small authority as is given to one.”
“Rav Zohar, we have come to tell you that we have sworn to worship your God.”
“But you must not worship me.”
“But we may worship the God who created such a man as you, and such teachings as you have taught us, and those men who made the great Golem.” They went away quickly and quietly without speaking further.
“They will be back again,” Begelman said. “And again and again. Why did I ever let you in? Lord God King of the Universe, what am I to do?”
It is right, Og told the Master of the Word. “You are more alive and healthy than you have long been, Zohar,” he said. “And you have people who love you. Can you not let them do so?”
He sought out Binyamin. “Do not trouble Rav Zohar with demands he cannot fulfill, no matter how much you desire to honor him. Later I will ask him to think if there is a way he can do as you wish, within the Law.”
“We will do whatever you advise, Golem.”
Og continued with his work, but while he was digging he turned up a strange artifact and he had a foreboding. At times he had discovered potsherds which were the remnants of clay vessels the Cnidori had made to cook vegetables they could not digest raw, and this discovery was an almost whole cylinder of the same texture, color, and markings; one of its end rims was blackened by burn marks, and dark streaks ran up its sides. He did not know what it was but it seemed sinister to him; in conscience he had no choice but to show it to Zohar.
“It does not seem like a cooking vessel,” he said.
“No,” said Begelman. “It does not.” He pointed to a place inside where there was a leaf-shaped Cnidori scale, blackened, clinging to its wall, and to two other burn marks of the same shape. Strangely, to Og, his eyes filled with tears.
“Perhaps it is a casing in which they dispose of their dead,” Og said.
Zohar wiped his eyes and said, “No. It is a casing in which they make them dead. Many were killed by Unds, and some have starved and the rest die of age. All those they weight and sink into the marshes. This is a sacrifice. They have a god, and its name is Baal.” He shook his head. “My children.” He wept for a moment again and said, “Take this away and smash it until there is not a piece to recognize.”
Og did so, but Zohar locked himself into his room and would not answer to anyone.
Og did not know what to do now. He was again as helpless as he had been on the loading dock where he had first learned to use his logic.
The Cnidori came to inquire of Golem and he told them what had happened. They said, “It is true that our ancestors worshipped a Being and made sacrifices, but none of that was done after Zohar gave us help. We were afraid he and his God would hold us in contempt.”
“Both Zohar and his God have done imperfect acts. But now I will leave him alone, because he is very troubled.”
“But it is a great sin in his eyes,” said Binyamin sorrowfully. “I doubt that he will ever care for us again.”
And Og continued with his work, but he thought his logic had failed him, in accordance with Zohar’s taunts.
In the evening a Cnidor called Elyahu came writhing toward him along the ground in great distress. “Come quickly!” he called. “Binyamin is doing nidset!”
“What is that?”
“Only come quickly!” Elyahu turned back in haste. Og unclipped his scoops and followed, overtaking the small creature and bearing him forward in his arms. They found Binyamin and other Cnidori in a grove of ferns. They had built a smoky fire and were placing upon it a fresh cylinder: a network of withy branches had been woven into the bottom of it.
“No, no!” cried Og, but they did not regard him; the cylinder was set on the fire and smoke came out of its top. Then the Cnidori helped Binyamin climb over its edge and he dropped inward, into the smoke.
“No!” Og cried again, and he toppled the vessel from the fire, but without violence so that Binyamin would not be harmed. “You shall make no sacrifices!” Then he tapped it so that it split, and the Cnidor lay in its halves, trembling.
“That is nidset, Golem,” said Elyahu.
But Golem plucked up the whimpering Cnidor. “Why were you doing such a terrible thing, Binyamin?”
“We thought,” Binyamin said in a quavering voice, “we thought that all of the gods were angry with us—our old god for leaving him and our new one for having worshipped the old—and that a sacrifice would take away the anger of all.”
“That confounds my logic somewhat.” Og set down Binyamin, beat out the fire, and cast the pieces of the cylinder far away. “All gods are One, and the One forgives whoever asks. Now come. I believe I hear the Unds again, and we need shelter close to home until we can build a wider one.”
Then the Cnidori raised a babble of voices. “No! What good is such a God if even Zohar does not listen to Him and forgive us?”
It seemed to Og for one moment as if the Cnidori felt themselves cheated of a sacrifice; he put this thought aside. “The man is sick and old, and he is not thinking clearly either, while you have demanded much of him.”
“Then, Golem, we will demand no more, but die among the Unds!” The shrieking of the beasts grew louder on the night winds but the Cnido
ri drew their little knives and would not stir.
“Truly you are an outrageous people,” said Golem. “But I am only a machine.” He extended his four hinged arms and his four coil arms and bearing them up in their tens raced with them on treads and wheels until they were within the safety of the forcefield.
But when he set them down they grouped together closely near the field and would not say one word.
Og considered the stubborn Zohar on the one side, and the stubborn b’nei Avraham on the other, and he thought that perhaps it was time for him to cease his being. A great storm of lightning and thunder broke out; the Unds did not approach and within the forcefield there was stillness.
He disarmed himself and stood before Zohar’s door. He considered the sacrifice of Yitzhak, and the Golden Calf, and of how Moshe Rabbenu had broken the Tables, and of many excellent examples, and he spoke quietly.
“Zohar, you need not answer, but you must listen. Your people tell me they have made no sacrifices since they knew you. But Binyamin, who longs to call himself your son, has tried to sacrifice himself to placate whatever gods may forgive his people, and would have died if I had not prevented him. After that they were ready to let the Unds kill them. I prevented that also, but they will not speak to me, or to you if you do not forgive them. I cannot do any more here and I have nothing further to say to you. Good-bye.”
He turned from the door without waiting, but heard it open, and Zohar’s voice cried out, “Og, where are you going?”
“To the storeroom, to turn myself off. I have always said I was no more than a machine, and now I have reached the limit of my logic and my usefulness.”
“No, Golem, wait! Don’t take everything from me!” The old man was standing with hands clasped and hair awry. “There must be some end to foolishness,” he whispered. “Where are they?”
“Out by the field near the entrance,” Og said. “You will see them when the lightning flashes.”
The Holy One, blessed be His Name, gave Zohar one more year, and in that time Og ha-Golem built and planted, and in this he was helped by the b’nei Avraham. They made lamps from their vegetable oils and lit them on Sabbaths and the Holy Days calculated by Zohar. In season they mated and their bellies swelled. Zohar tended them when his strength allowed, as in old days, and when Elyahu died of brain hemorrhage and Yitzhak of a swift-growing tumor which nothing could stop, he led the mourners in prayer for their length of days. One baby was stillborn, but ten came from the womb in good health; they were gray-pink, toothless, and squalled fearfully, but Zohar fondled and praised them. “These people were twelve when I found them,” he said to Og. “Now there are forty-six and I have known them for five generations.” He told the Cnidori, “Children of Avraham, Jews have converted, and Jews have adopted, but never children of a different species, so there is no precedent I can find to let any one of you call yourself a child of Zohar, but as a community I see no reason why you cannot call yourselves b’nei Zohar, my children, collectively.”
The people were wise enough by now to accept this decision without argument. They saw that the old man’s time of renewed strength was done and he was becoming frailer every day; they learned to make decisions for themselves. Og too helped him now only when he asked. Zohar seemed content, although sometimes he appeared about to speak and remained silent. The people noticed these moods and spoke to Og of them occasionally, but Og said, “He must tend to his spirit for himself, b’nei Avraham. My work is done.”
He had cleared the land in many areas around the station, and protected them with forcefields whose antennas he had made with forges he had built. The Unds were driven back into their wilds of cave and valley; they were great and terrible, but magnificent life-forms of their own kind and he wished to kill no more. He had only to wait for the day when Zohar would die in peace.
Once a day Og visited him in the Common Room where he spent most of his time reading or with his hands on his book and his eyes to the distance. One peaceful day when they were alone he said to Og, “I must tell you this while my head is still clear. And I can tell only you.” He gathered his thoughts for a moment. “It took me a long time to realize that I was the last Jew, though Galactic Federation kept saying so. I had been long alone, but that realization made me fiercely, hideously lonely. Perhaps you don’t understand. I think you do. And then my loneliness turned itself inside out and I grew myself a kind of perverse pride. The last! The last! I would close the Book that was opened those thousands of years before, as great in a way as the first had been … but I had found the Cnidori, and they were a people to talk with and keep from going mad in loneliness—but Jews! They were ugly, and filthy, and the opposite of everything I saw as human. I despised them. Almost, I hated them … that was what wanted to be Jews! And I had started it by teaching them, because I was so lonely—and I had no way to stop it except to destroy them, and I nearly did that! And you—” He began to weep with the weak passion of age.
“Zohar, do not weep. You will make yourself ill.”
“My soul is sick! It is like a boil that needs lancing, and it hurts so much! Who will forgive me?” He reached out and grasped one of Og’s arms. “Who?”
“They will forgive you anything—but if you ask you will only hurt yourself more deeply. And I make no judgments.”
“But I must be judged!” Zohar cried. “Let me have a little peace to die with!”
“If I must, then, Zohar, I judge you a member of humanity who has saved more people than would be alive without him. I think you could not wish better.”
Zohar said weakly, “You knew all the time, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Og. “I believe I did.”
But Zohar did not hear, for he had fainted.
He woke in his bed and when his eyes opened he saw Og beside him. “What are you?” he said, and Og stared with his unwinking eye; he thought Zohar’s mind had left him.
Then Zohar laughed. “My mind is not gone yet. But what are you, really, Og? You cannot answer. Ah well … would you ask my people to come here now, so I can say good-bye? I doubt it will be long; they raise all kinds of uproar, but at least they can’t cry.”
Og brought the people, and Zohar blessed them all and each; they were silent, in awe of him. He seemed to fade while he spoke, as if he were being enveloped in mist. “I have no advice for you,” he whispered at last. “I have taught all I know and that is little enough because I am not very wise, but you will find the wise among yourselves. Now, whoever remembers, let him recite me a psalm. Not the twenty-third. I want the hundred and fourth, and leave out that stupid part at the end where the sinners are consumed from the earth.”
But it was only Og who remembered that psalm in its entirety, and spoke the words describing the world Zohar had come from an unmeasurable time ago.
O Lord my God You are very great!
You are clothed with honor and majesty,
Who covers Yourself with light as with a garment,
Who has stretched out the heavens like a tent,
Who has laid the beams of Your chambers on the waters,
Who makes the clouds Your chariot,
Who rides on the wings of the wind,
Who makes the winds Your messengers,
fire and flame Your ministers …
When he was finished, Zohar said the Shema, which tells that God is One, and died. And Og thought that he must be pleased with his dying.
Og removed himself. He let the b’nei Avraham prepare the body, wrap it in the prayer shawl, and bury it. He waited during the days in which the people sat in mourning, and when they had gotten up he said, “Surely my time is come.” He traveled once about the domains he had created for their inhabitants and returned to say good-bye in fewer words than Zohar had done.
But the people cried, “No, Golem, no! How can you leave us now when we need you so greatly?”
“You are not children. Zohar told you that you must manage for yourselves.”
“But we ha
ve so much to learn. We do not know how to use the radio, and we want to tell Galactic Federation that Zohar is dead, and of all he and you have done for us.”
“I doubt that Galactic Federation is interested,” said Og.
“Nevertheless we will learn!”
They were a stubborn people. Og said, “I will stay for that, but no longer.”
Then Og discovered he must teach them enough lingua to make themselves understood by Galactic Federation. All were determined learners, and a few had a gift for languages. When he had satisfied himself that they were capable, he said, “Now.”
And they said, “Og ha-Golem, why must you waste yourself? We have so much to discover about the God we worship and the men who have worshipped Him!”
“Zohar taught you all he knew, and that was a great deal.”
“Indeed he taught us the Law and the Prophets, but he did not teach us the tongues of Aramaic or Greek, or Writings, or Mishna, or Talmud (Palestinian and Babylonian), or Tosefta, or Commentary, or—”
“But why must you learn all that?”
“To keep it for others who may wish to know of it when we are dead.”
So Og surrounded himself with them, the sons and daughters of Avraham and their children, who now took surnames of their own from womb parents—and all of them b’nei Zohar—and he began: “Here is Misha, given by word of mouth from Scribe to Scribe for a thousand years. Fifth Division, Nezikin, which is Damages; Baba Metzia: the Middle Gate: ‘If two took hold of a garment and one said, “I found it,” and the other said, “I found it,” or one said, “I bought it,” and the other said, “I bought it,” each takes an oath that he claims not less than half and they divide it …’”
More Wandering Stars Page 3
