S. Agnon - Two Scholars Who Were in our Town and other Novellas

Permissible to arrange divorces there / In Gittin (Jewish divorce documents) the name of the town has to be spelled out in Hebrew characters, a cause of dispute about the proper spelling of certain town names in Europe, and subsequently the ability of divorces to be executed in those towns.

God’s precepts are straight / Psalms 19:8

Torah protects and the Torah rescues / Cf. Sotah 21a.

Kav HaYashar / “The Just Measure”) authored by Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch Kaidanover, first published in 1705. Shevet Mussar — “The Rod of Admonition”, authored in Ladino by Rabbi Elijah HaCohen, in 1863.

Tosefta / A compilation of the Jewish oral law from the period of the Mishnah.

Kra / R. Zvi Hirsch Kra (1740–1814), served as rabbi in Buczacz from the departure of R. Igra in 1794 until his death.

Maharam of Rothenburg / Meir of Rothenburg (c. 1215–1293) was a noted German rabbi, poet, and author of Tosafot commentary on the Talmud.

When on the road / Gen. 45:24 as interpreted in Taanit 10b.

1648 / The year of the calamitous Khmelnytsky pogroms, wherein Cossacks decimated eastern European Jewry.

Maharshal / Rabbi Shlomo ben Yehiel Luria (1510–1573) of Lublin. The citation is to Responsa (Shut) Maharshal #101, dealing with a 1572 case of evidence in a case of marital engagement.

Bread dipped in salt / Cf. Mishnah Avot 6:4 (“bread in salt” is a rabbinic metaphor for minimum sustenance; akin to “living on bread and water” in English).

As he completed the Talmud, his life also ended / The theme of the Angel of Death waiting for his victim’s completion of a portion of study, or performance of some mitzvah , is found in Mo’ed Katan 28a, Ketubot 77b, and elsewhere.

Happy is he who arrives… / Moed Katan 28a.

Can an Enlightened one… / Cf. Psalms 14:2 (translated here out of context and ironically according to the narrator’s intention, the word “maskil” in the Biblical verse means “wise one” but here is applied to a follower of the secularizing Jewish Enlightenment movement).

Out of Asher / Genesis 49:20.

It is the only covering… / Exodus 22:25–26.

The Divine table /Cf. Mishnah Avot 3:3, “Rabbi Shimon says: Three who ate at one table, without saying words of Torah while upon it, are considered to have eaten from sacrifices to the dead [i.e., idols] as it is written (Isaiah 28:8): ‘All their tables are full of vomit and excrement, without a clean place’. But three who ate at one table and said upon it words of Torah are considered to have eaten from the table of God, as it is written (Ezek. 41:22): ‘And he said to me: This is the table which is in the presence of God’.”

Maimonides’s ‘Laws of Temperaments’ / Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot De’ot 6:2.

Teomim / (1814–1868) served as rabbi in Buczacz from 1853 until his death.

Bach / R. Joel ben Samuel Sirkis (1561–1640); a prominent halakhist who was known for various clashes with lay leaders.

The apportionment of charity… / Bava Batra 43a.

Sir Moses Montefiore / (1784–1885) English Baronet, financier and banker, advocate of social reform and great philanthropist.

Rabbi Elazar Rokeach / (1685–1741) Galician rabbi who was appointed to the Amsterdam rabbinate late in life, prior to emigrating to the Holy Land. This particular insight is found in his Arba’ah Turei Even commentary to Maimonides.

Fundamentals of Torah, chapter 7 / Maimonides, Hilkhot Yesodei HaTorah 7:1.

Kessef Mishneh / A commentary on Maimonides’s Mishneh Torah, written by R. Joseph Karo (1488–1575).

Lehem Mishneh / A commentary on Maimonides’s Mishneh Torah by Abraham Hiyya de Boton (c. 1560 — c. 1605).

Yavneh / The seat of the High Court after the destruction of the Second Temple in 7 °CE.

Tractate Yoma, page 37 / Three of the Talmudic citations in this passage are incorrect. The correct page numbers are: Nedarim 38a, Shabbat 92a, and Yoma 35b. Urbach, op. cit., p. 22, n. 16, insists that these were intentional errors inserted by Agnon, mimicking the common phenomenon of a sage mis-citing a specific page number when referencing from memory, as would have been this case in the learned discourse presented by Reb Shlomo. Urbach further points out that the thrust of Reb Shlomo’s presentation of the sources, and resolution of the question on Maimonides’s teaching, is that even Reb Moshe Pinchas, with all of his flaws, would have been worthy of receiving prophecy.

Tosfot Yom Tov / An important commentary on the Mishnah by Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller (1578–1654, Cracow).

Noda BeYehudah / Yehezkel ben Yehudah Landau (1713–1793), rabbi of Prague. His work, Tikkun HaNefesh (Healing of the Soul) prescribes 18 specific chapters of Psalms to be recited as merit for the healing of the sick.

Even the tranquil women / Cf. Isaiah 32:9.

And you shall love… / Deuteronomy 6:5.

Half Kaddish / Used to punctuate divisions within the prayer service. The nicknames of the gravediggers are plays on the meanings of their names — Chaim means life, since he was tall he was called “Long Life”; Kaddish was a name sometimes given to a child born to a couple in old age, as he would be the one to recite the mourner’s Kaddish when they die. Agnon is being playful in assigning these names to gravediggers.

Righteousness shall walk / Psalms 85:14.

Just before the first of the hasidim went up to the Land of Israel, a certain man named Hananiah found his way to their House of Study. His clothes were torn, rags were wound around his legs, and he wore no boots on his feet; his hair and beard were covered with the dust of the roads, and all his worldly goods were tied up in a little bundle which he carried with him in his kerchief.

Ye sons of the living God, said Hananiah to the comrades, I have heard that you are about to go up to the Land of Israel. I beg you to inscribe me in your register.

He Who will bring us up to the Land, said they to him, will bring you up as well. And they wrote his name in their list and assigned him a place to rest in the House of Study. He rejoiced in them because he would go up to the Land of Israel with them; while they rejoiced in him because he would complete the quorum, and they could pray as a congregation on their journey.

It can clearly be seen, said the comrades to Hananiah, that you have walked far.

True indeed, said he to them. It is not a short distance I have come.

Where were you? they asked.

Where was I? he answered. And where was I not?

Whereupon they began to question him on every side, until at last he recounted all his travels.

At first, said Hananiah, I went from my town to another town, and from that town to yet another. In that way I went from place to place until I reached the frontier of a country where no man is permitted to pass unless he pays a tax to the king. They took my money from me and stripped me naked, and left me nothing but a kerchief with which to cover myself. But the people of that town took pity on me, and clothed me and gave me all I needed, a tallit and tefillin and tzitzit.