S. Agnon - A Guest for the NIght

At first they used to wonder at Reb Hayim: a scholar, whose lips once never ceased to study, sits in silence and does not open a book. Some said that he had long since forgotten his learning through no fault of his own, or that he had achieved a new conception of the Torah and had no need of books, while some said that he was denying himself the Torah because through it he had given rise to quarreling. And how was it possible that one who had spent all his time on the Torah should sit idle without studying? But this was not the only case of its kind. There had been a previous case before the war, when a man had happened to come here who was thoroughly expert by heart in both the Talmuds, forward and backward, and no one had ever seen him holding a book, except for one volume of The Defenders of the Faith , which he used as a pillow for his head. There had also been a man who came to the Beit Midrash and said: “I can reply to any question standing on one foot,” and he never opened a book either. And then there was Rabbi David, son of the great sage Zvi, who acted as a rabbi all his life, and in the end came to a place where no one knew him, and was employed as a beadle. He hid his achievements and did not reveal who he was until his passing, and when he died they engraved on his tombstone, “Alas for the great servant whom the world has lost.”

Reb Hayim sits in our old Beit Midrash with his hands clasped. His head is bowed toward his heart, like one who wishes to sleep, but from his eyes you can see that there is no sleep in store for him. Sometimes he puts his hand to his beard and pulls it, or adjusts his hat on his head, and then clasps his hands again as in sorrow. I watch Reb Hayim, who used to set the whole town in a turmoil as if the whole town were his, until he was dislodged from his place, an exile and a wanderer, and the two pictures mingle with each other. I lower my eyes and say to myself: And now he sits here. Man’s goings are of the Lord; how can a man then understand his own way?

Since the day Reb Hayim has been staying in the Beit Midrash, Hanoch’s work has been easier, for Reb Hayim fills the basin with water, trims the candles, and fills the lamp with kerosene, and on Sabbath eve he sweeps the floor — everything except light the stove, which I do myself. Not because of any symbolism, for I have already said that I do not like things that are done as a kind of symbol, but because I have become used to this work and because learning together with labor is a good thing.

So I said to myself: I must pay Reb Hayim for his work, in addition to Hanoch’s pay. When I wanted to pay him he pulled back his hand and shook his head from side to side, as if to say: I do not want it, I do not want it. I wished to help him in some other way. But how could I discuss it with him when he shut himself off from all talk? And if he was asked anything, he shook his head from side to side or nodded it up and down, according to his intention. These were his ways of answering yes or no.

Once I came up to him suddenly and said, “Reb Hayim, perhaps you need something. Why are you silent all the time, sir?” He fixed his eyes on mine and looked at me for a while, and said, “A man to whom evil things have happened had better be silent than speak, lest he say something that is not proper.”

“Read a book, sir,” said I, “and you will distract yourself a little.” Said he, “I have forgotten my learning.” “Is it possible for a great scholar to forget his learning?” “Since the day I was exiled from here,” he replied, “I have not had a book in my hand or chanced to hear a word of the Torah.” Said I, “Here is a book. Try, sir, and read.” Said he, “I have already tried.” “And was the attempt not successful?” I asked. He shook his head from side to side like a man who says: Certainly not. “Why?” “The eyes do not take in the letters, and the mind does not take in the matter,” said he.

From that time forth I did not bother him with words, and needless to say he did not bother to say anything to me. Every day he came in with me and went out with me, brought water from the well to fill the basin, trimmed the candles, and filled the lamps with kerosene. When he had finished his work he sat down in the north-west corner beside the calendar on the wall, his head bowed and his hands clasped together. From his way of doing things it was clear that he was accustomed to labor. Apparently he had learned many things in the land of his captivity. I wanted to know something of what had happened to him, and therefore I told him something about the Land of Israel, thinking that perhaps his heart might be aroused and his lips opened. But his silence silenced me. We sat together in our old Beit Midrash, like two beams that support the ceiling and bear the weight of the whole building, but one beam does not speak to the other.

On the day the locksmith made me the key I decided not to let it out of my hand. When I saw Reb Hayim coming early to the Beit Midrash and leaving late, and found him every day standing and waiting for me in front of the door and sitting with me at night until I left, I wanted to give him the key, so that he should not depend on me, but he would not take it. Why? After several days I found out his reason: he was afraid he might sleep in the Beit Midrash. And where did he sleep? In the woodshed. Why not in the women’s section? Because there is no women’s section in our old Beit Midrash; a woman whose husband prayed in the old Beit Midrash used to pray herself in the women’s section of the Great Synagogue — and no one could sleep in the Great Synagogue because of the cold.

The great frosts for which our town is famous have arrived in full force. Awaking early one morning, we saw that the sky had darkened and the ground was frozen; the cold exuded from below and above, from valleys and gorges, mountains and hills, from the stones in the street and the clouds in the sky. A cold like this, my dear, you have never seen in your life, and I hope you may never see it. It is only in the lands of the Gentiles, on whom the Holy One, blessed be He, looks as it were with an angry eye, that such a cruel cold can grow so overpowering.

Later, toward twilight, the snow began to fall — at first little by little, in small flakes, like soft feathers, and then in great flurries, like thick wool. By the time we had returned from our evening prayers, the whole town was covered with snow, and it was still falling. In the morning all the houses were deep in snow, and still the snow kept falling. As it fell, it produced offspring like itself. At the very same moment in which it was born, it also conceived, and also gave birth to new offspring. And they too produced offspring without a stop.

The snow is beautiful to the eyes but wearisome to the body. You go out to the market and sink in the snow. You try to make your way home again but cannot find any traces of your footprints in the snow. And as you try, your blood freezes and your bones crack.

This man who came to this place is not troubled by the cold, because he has a warm coat and spends nights and days — and nights that are like days — in the Beit Midrash. When he returns to his hotel, he finds a warm stove and a warm meal and a boiling samovar. But the houses of most people in the town are full of snow and frost up to their very bedposts.

The cold rises upward. There is no bird in the heavens above nor any dog or cat on the earth below. All the birds have left for the warm countries: perhaps a pair of them are pecking at the roof of my house in Jerusalem — the house that was destroyed; perhaps they are twittering to their sisters, as they used to twitter from the roof of our old Beit Midrash.

All the roads in the town are covered with snow, and the houses are sunk in snow up to the windows. Sometimes it seems to you that the windows have sunk, and sometimes you think the ground has reached up to them. Because of the snow and frost and ice, the rags in the broken panes are covered over, and even those windows that are not broken are sealed with ice. In the past, when we were little, the winter used to trace flowers on some of the windows in the town, but now it heaps formless ice upon them. In the past, when most of the houses were heated and only a few were not, the winter was free to draw beautiful shapes; now that most of the houses are not heated, it is not free to do so.