S. Agnon - A Guest for the NIght

O Holy City, for thee I’ll give–

Awake and dreaming all my joy,

My feast and Sabbath while I live.”

“Be silent, man, be silent,” I cried. Yeruham was not silent, but continued to recite:

“Though your King be gone and your people poor,

Eternal City, lofty Shrine,

The Lord has made thee all our hope,

From ancient days to the end of time.”

“If you are not silent I will leave you and go,” I said to Yeruham. He paid no heed but recited:

“And though the tomb may close me in

With all the dead beneath the ground,

In deepest pit thou art my strength,

O fortress city, world-renowned.

“I know you don’t like this poem,” said Yeruham. “Your taste has improved and you are sick of rhyming ‘God above’ and ‘Jerusalem’s love.’ But I tell you that this poem is not a good one for another reason, because it penetrates the heart and oppresses the soul.”

“When you came there and did not find me, was the Land empty?” said I to Yeruham. “If I was not there, surely many others were there in place of me. Is the Land of Israel nothing else but me? And surely, even of the people of our town several had already settled there, and no doubt they would have given you a hearty welcome.” “True, perfectly true,” said Yeruham. “Several of our townsfolk had settled there.” “You see,” said I to Yeruham, “if I was not there, there were a thousand like me.” Yeruham smiled and said, “A thousand like you, sir, and perhaps a thousand more. Some of them did as you; that is, they went abroad; and some of them became clerks and merchants and shopkeepers and speculators.” “And those who went up with you, were they all workers?” I asked. “Some of them fell sick with malaria and other diseases and died,” said Yeruham, “and their bones were scattered in all the graveyards of the Land. And those that did not die are as good as dead. Bowing to every minor official and imploring ‘Be kind and merciful to me; put me, I pray you, into one of the offices, that I may eat a piece of bread.’”

“And those who did not die or fall sick, where are they?” “Where are they?” said Yeruham. They are scattered the world over. More than remained in the Land of Israel you can find in every one of the five continents.” “And did you get no benefit from your stay in the Land of Israel?” “True, perfectly true,” replied Yeruham, “we got one great benefit from the Land, we learned the value of labor.” I held out my hands to Yeruham and said, “And do you think that is a simple thing?” “But labor is not simple,” answered Yeruham. And I said: “Is that the only thing that is not simple? Is there anything simple in the world? Now let us go back to what we were speaking of at first. You condemn me because I praised the Land of Israel. Was I the first to do so? Was I the only one to do so? There is not a single generation that did not sing the praises of the Land of Israel, and I have never heard anyone reproaching them. But all the generations that lived before us found in the Land what they found in the school books; so they loved the Land and loved the books that sang its praises. But you and your comrades sought in the Land not what your forefathers sought, and not what the books tell of it, and not the Land as it is, but a Land such as you demand, and that is why the Land did not tolerate you. ‘A land which the Lord thy God demandeth always,’ say the Scriptures — not as you demand it, and not as your comrades demand it, but as the Lord your God demands it. Now I am going. You are a day laborer, Yeruham, and I do not want to keep you back. This matter we have touched on cannot be explained in a few moments, and what we have left untouched today we shall explain tomorrow.”

Since the day I arrived here I have never heard anyone mention Yeruham Freeman, except that shopkeeper from whom I bought the cloth and Dolik Zommer, my host’s son, who mocked him in front of Rachel. Once I asked Daniel Bach about him and he put me off with nothing. “That Yeruham is in charge of repairing the roads,” he said, which told me nothing new. I wonder if there is anyone in the town of whom so little is spoken as Yeruham Freeman. Just as he does not speak to people, so they do not talk about him. So I was surprised when Rachel mentioned his name.

Why did Rachel have to mention Yeruham Freeman? This needs to be explained and I do not know how to explain it, so I had best tell when she mentioned him and in what connection.

For two days I had not left my room, because I was too lazy to rise and because I had a headache. When I came out on the third day, Rachel jumped up and said, “Yeruham Freeman asked about you.” Since I am not an inquisitive man, I did not ask her how she knew that Yeruham had asked about me, but since I have good manners I asked her how he was. And here I must add that out of one enigma there came two. First, what made Yeruham ask for me, when it seems he detests me? Second, how did his words reach her ears? And these two enigmas are nothing at all compared with the third, for when I asked Rachel how Yeruham was, she replied like one to whom all his secrets were open.

Any man may be wrong, and I more than any other man. I was wrong in thinking that Yeruham was unsociable; now I discovered that he was not. There is one person in the town, namely Rachel, who disappears from the house every day while her father is repeating the Afternoon Service, goes to Yeruham, and waits for him in his room until he returns from his work. That is why he washes in the river, so that he should come home clean.

From all that has been said, it appears that people do not mention Yeruham’s name; if so, why did they suddenly speak of him? But that fact, that Rachel the innkeeper’s daughter visits Yeruham, was the cause of them talking about him; from talking about her they came to talk about him.

I myself did not see Rachel going to his house. My own eyes are not capable of seeing by themselves. When I was young I used to see all I wanted to see; but when I grew a little older, my power of sight diminished and I saw only what I was shown. Now I see neither what I wish to see nor what I am shown. So how do I know things? A rumor springs from among the people and sometimes it reaches me. But still it is difficult to explain what Rachel, the innkeeper’s younger daughter, has to do with Yeruham, the digger of ditches. First, because… and second…

Why do I divide every statement into first and second? Is it because the men of Szibucz divide their words into first and second, or is it because I am given to two places: I live abroad and I dream in the Land of Israel.

The Land of Israel that shows itself to me in dreams is not the Land as it is today, but as it was years ago, when I lived in Neveh Zedek, which means “The Abode of Righteousness.” Today Neveh Zedek is a small suburb attached to Tel Aviv, but in the past it was a neighborhood unto itself, the best of them all. And little Ruhama lived there with her mother. I do not know whether Ruhama is alive or dead, nor — if she is alive — whether she is a violinist. In any case, her violin is dead, for she burned it herself, to roast a little fish for a certain young man.

Let us leave the young man who left Ruhama and return to Ruhama. Whenever she comes to me in a dream, she comes with her violin. Sometimes she covers her face with her violin and calls me by name and the violin echoes her; sometimes she plays my name with the violin and echoes it with her voice. So long as she behaved like this I said nothing to her, but when she began to play “Devotion Faithful unto Death,” I rebuked her. First, because I am tired of rhymes like “love” and “God above.” And second, because I have no mind for musical matters.