Джеймс Миченер - The Source

Having nothing better to do Volkmar wandered over to the newcomers, who had set up a dyeing plant which produced handsome fabrics, and began chatting with them in French. To his surprise one of the men, thin and with a dark beard, showed a willingness to talk—even an eagerness—and Volkmar lounged against a pillar and tried to discover why the Jew and his friends had adventured into Acre.

“This is our homeland,” the Jew explained.

“Where were you born?”

“Paris.”

“I should think Paris would be your homeland,” Volkmar suggested.

“This is the land of the Jews,” the bearded one said, tapping the stones of Acre.

Volkmar laughed. “It’s the land of the Italians, that much we know. And the Franks. And the Germans …” He hesitated.

“And the Arabs,” the Jew added laughingly. “They seem to own more of it than anyone else.”

“In spite of this, you call it home?” Volkmar continued.

“Yes. All during my life in Paris we said each night, ‘To next year in Jerusalem.’ So one day I decided to come.”

“What is a Jew?” Volkmar asked, in sudden concern.

The dyer looked up from his work, wiped his hands and came to the knight. “Maimonides says …”

“Who’s Maimonides?”

“A great thinker … lived here in Acre in the last century.”

“Were there Jews in Acre … then?”

“Of course. Maimonides came here after fleeing from Spain.”

“Were there Jews in Spain?”

“Of course. After they were driven from the Holy Land they went to Spain.”

“Who drove them from the Holy Land?” Volkmar asked. He knew that his ancestors had killed enormous numbers but he had never heard …

The Jew ignored the question and said, “Maimonides drew up a list of thirteen marks which identify the Jew. They are …”

“Why do you remember the rules? Are you a priest?”

The bearded Jew looked at the knight and smiled. For two centuries this Crusader’s family had lived in the Jewish homeland, yet he did not know that Jews no longer had priests. The Jew made no comment, but returned to his list, ticking off the marks on his fingers: “A Jew believes in God. That He is one alone, has no physical form, and is eternal. Only God may be worshiped, but the words of His prophets are to be obeyed. Of these prophets Moses our Teacher was greatest, and the laws which came to him at Sinai came directly from God. The Jew obeys this law of Moses. He believes that God is all-knowing, all-powerful. He believes in reward and punishment, both in this world and hereafter. He believes that the Messiah will come and that then the dead shall rise.”

“I believe most of that,” Volkmar said. “Where’s the difference?” The Jew looked hesitantly at the Catholic church of SS. Peter and Andrew and was inclined not to reply lest he offend the knight, but Volkmar sensing this said, “Go ahead. I’m not a priest.”

The Jew moved closer, wiped his hands again and said, “You believe that God is three, that in the body of Jesus He took human form, and that in such form God can be worshiped. We don’t.”

Instinctively Count Volkmar drew away from the Jew. Blasphemy had been spoken in his presence, and he suffered at the utterance of the intemperate words. He was at first tempted to leave the man, run away, and then he, too, saw the church at which he and Muzaffar had prayed, and it seemed strange that the Christians could share a church with Muslims, whom they were fighting to the death, but could not possibly do so with Jews, from whom Christianity had sprung. He stemmed his impending flight and asked, “Why do we hate you Jews so deeply?”

The bearded one replied, “Because we bear testimony that God is one. We were placed among you by God to serve as that reminder.”

The discussion continued for some time, after which Volkmar walked thoughtfully to his room in the Venetian fonduk. He sought out Muzaffar, and they went together to pray, after which they ate in a house run by Italians from a town near Venice. During the meal Volkmar asked, “How do Muslims treat Jews?”

“Muhammad was very just in his attitude,” the old trader answered, throwing the end of his turban back as he prepared to drink wine. “You know, of course, that Muhammad had a Jewish wife.” The conversation continued with truths and half-truths and Damascus folklore. It was Muzaffar’s opinion that much Islamic teaching had been borrowed directly from the Jews.

Acre grew increasingly hot, and each morning Volkmar said, “Today I must go home,” but he found excuses for discussing military matters with the leaders of the religious orders, and there was the constant invitation of the Circassian girl, long-legged and vibrant in bed, and he remained in the city, always hiding from himself the real reason for his delay: he was finding intellectual pleasure in his random conversations with the Jew at the dyeing vats. Of all the residents of Acre in that vital, doomed summer only this Jew seemed to be contemplating the universal problems of life and death, of God and the humility of man; and Volkmar wanted to talk about these things.

“Do the thirteen rules of your Maimonides keep me from heaven?” he asked one day.

“Oh no!” the Jew cried eagerly. “While he was living here in Acre, Maimonides said plainly, ‘God is near to everyone who turns to Him. He is found by anyone who seeks Him and turns not aside.’”

“You are more generous than we,” Volkmar replied.

“Maimonides also said, in a letter to a man much like you—a non-Jew who loved God—that this man was as much the charge of God as any Jew. He wrote, ‘If our descent is from Abraham, your descent is from God Himself.’”

“Do you believe that?” Volkmar asked.

“I believe that you are the personal child of God, even though you spend your nights with the Pisan whore.”

Volkmar was tempted to strike the Jew, but he spoke with such authority that to molest him would be a sin. “How do you know these things about me?” the knight asked.

“Because I have wondered who you were, what trouble haunts you,” the Jew said.

“Acre haunts me,” Volkmar replied. “How long shall you and I be here?”

“Not long,” the Jew said. “And when the Mamelukes storm through the gates”—he looked at the small stone gate leading into the deserted caravanserai—“you may perhaps escape. Not I.”

“Then why don’t you flee Acre now?”

“Because this is my homeland,” the Jew replied.

That day there was no more talk, but on the next morning, as Volkmar wandered back from the Pisan fonduk, the Jew remarked, “You and I look upon death with such different views that I wonder if you would care to see one of my manuscripts?”

It was a peculiar question, for the two halves did not seem to correlate, but Volkmar, having nothing better to do, assented and the Jew led him to a mean hovel which the Genoese had deserted at the beginning of their war with the Venetians, but the meanness was only external. Inside, the Jew’s wife had made a clean, good home, along whose farthest wall rested a collection of manuscripts which even in that day were practically beyond price. The bearded Jew took down one and showed its pages to Volkmar, parchment leaves on which not Hebrew but Arabic letters had been beautifully written from right to left. Pointing to a special page the Jew said, “These words are for you and me in this hot summer.”

Volkmar took the folio and read the remarkable passage in which Maimonides considered the case of Rhases, the cynical Arab who had written down a list of every evil thing in the world: war, famine, lust, betrayal, the Arab had listed them all, and at the end he had concluded that evil in the world outweighed good, that hope was irrational and that it would have been better if man had not been created. Volkmar laughed and said, “Seeing the anarchy in this city I would agree with Rhases.”