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

Now in that country it is cold for the greater part of the year. At the Festival of Shavuot their houses stand in snow though it is May, while at the Feast of Sukkot a man cannot even hold the lulav to shake it on account of the cold; and they have no citrons for the blessing. So what they do is, all the congregations share a single citron, a slice for each congregation. They hallow the Sabbath over black bread instead of white wheaten loaves, and they mark the Sabbath’s end by drinking milk, for they have no wine. When I told them where I was going, they took me for an exaggerator, because they had never in all their days heard of any man who really and truly went up to the Land of Israel.

By that time I myself was beginning to doubt whether the Land of Israel actually existed; so I decided I had better leave them to themselves and went away. Better, said I to myself, that I should perish on the way and not lose my faith in the Land of Israel.

I do not remember how long a time I had been journeying or the places to which I came, but at length I reached a robbers’ den. The robbers allowed me to stay among them and did not do anything to me; but every time they went off on their business they would say to me, Pray on our behalf that we may not be caught. And most of them had their good qualities, and were merciful, and were a stay and prop to the poor in their need, and believed in the Creator; and once they took an oath by the Everlasting they would never go back on their word even if they were to lose their lives. And they were not robbers to begin with, but lords and nobles whose oppressors compelled them to give up their fields; and so they came to try their hands at robbery and pillage.

One of them I saw putting on tefillin. I made the mistake of thinking that he was a Jew, though he was not one; but the robber chief before him had worn tefillin, and when he was killed, his successor put them on.

Now this was the story of how that robber chief of theirs had been killed. He used to leave his booty with a certain Greek priest. But once the priest denied that anything had been left with him. The robber chief threatened to take vengeance on him; whereupon the priest went and denounced him to the king; the king at once ordered him to be killed.

When they took the robber chief off to be executed, they said to him, If you tell us where your comrades are, we shall let you go.

You do what you have to do, said he to them.

Well, they tied the rope around his neck and sent his soul on its way. When he died, he said, Alas for you, O my wife, and alas for my children, whom I leave behind to be orphans.

Once, continued Hananiah, the new robber chief wished to lead me to the Land of Israel through a certain cave. But the idea entered my heart that maybe it would not be His blessed will for a robber to be my groomsman. And since I was possessed by this idea, I did not go with him, for if it had been His blessed will that I should go with him, would He ever have let such a thought enter my mind? But I felt ashamed because I did not accept his favor, and so I went on to another country.

Now in this other country all their days are toil, so that they have neither Sabbath nor festivals; so that at last I forgot when it was the Sabbath. So whenever I went from one place to another, I never went farther than a Sabbath journey of two thousand ells for fear that that day might be a Sabbath or festival.

Once a gentleman met me on the way and said, Where are you going?

To town, I answered.

He invited me up into his carriage. When he saw that I was not getting up, he raised his voice and shouted, Shadai. Now he was speaking Polish and in Polish shadai means sit down, but I did not know it and thought that he was using the Holy Name of Shaddai; so up I jumped into his carriage.

It was the Yom Kippur; but I never knew it until we reached town at the time they were praying the Closing Prayer. At once I flung myself off the carriage, and took off my shoes, and entered the synagogue, and lay outstretched, and wept all that night and all of the day following. There I heard the Land of Israel being mentioned. So I gave ear and heard people telling one another how the men of Buczacz had decided to go up to the Land. At once I started off and came here to you; and since I went barefoot, my legs became swollen and it took a long time.

They went and fetched him boots, but he would not accept them. Rabbi Akiva, they reminded him, ordained seven things, and one of them was to be careful to wear shoes. To which Hananiah replied, These feet did not feel the sanctity of Yom Kippur; let them remain bare.

After Hananiah had told all this, he untied his kerchief, took out a Book of Psalms, and read until the time arrived for the Afternoon Prayer. Following the prayer, he took a candle and went on reading. Seeing that the lamp had grown rusty, he took his kerchief and made a knot in it. Next morning, when he took out his tallit and tefillin from that kerchief, he said to himself, What is this knot for? To remember that rusty lamp.

So he took the lamp and all the other vessels for light in the House of Study, and mixed sand and water, and went and sat him down behind the stove, and rubbed them and polished them until they shone like new. That day people said, the lamps in our House of Study are worthy of lighting before Him who hath light in Zion.

And Hananiah did something else; he made little hollow dishes for the lamps; for in the lands of Edom tallow candles are lit and thrust upright into the candlestick, but in the Land of Beauty it is the custom to light oil lamps, a dish being filled with oil and the wick placed within it. Therefore Hananiah went and set dishes under the candlesticks, that they might fill them with oil.

But it was not only the illuminating vessels that Hananiah rubbed and polished. He also took the washing basin and the pitcher and the holy vessels and all those vessels and implements within which the Shekhinah , the Divine Presence, conceals herself; and made them all shine. He likewise repaired the torn books, setting them in fresh boards and wrapping them up in fine skins. The day before, they had been torn and sooty, but that day they rejoiced as on the day they had been given to the children of Israel on Mount Sinai.

Are you a coppersmith? Hananiah was asked.

No coppersmith am I, said he to those who asked, nor yet a bookbinder; but when I see a defective vessel, I feel pity for it and I say, This vessel seeks its completion. Then the Holy One, blessed be he, says to me, Do this or do that, and I do it.

Here is a simple man, said the comrades. Yet every word he utters teaches a virtue. Wherever such a man may wander, God will be with him.

Perhaps, one of them asked Hananiah, you know how to make a box for carrying goods?

Perhaps I do, answered he.

After all, said this man, we are going a long way and we require things for the journey. Perhaps you can make me a box or trunk.

I can try, said he.

How do you try? said the other to him.

Hananiah went out to the forest and brought lumber, and sawed it into planks which he squared and planed and joined, and made into a box and painted red, which is a good color for utensils to be.

The other men who were going up to the Land saw how fine the box was and asked Hananiah to make boxes for them as well. So out he went to the forest, brought lumber and made the same sort of boxes for them. He also made a Holy Ark for the Torah Scroll which they were going to take up to the Land of Israel. He used iron nails to join all the boxes except the Holy Ark, which he joined with wooden pegs; so that if, God forbid, they should come to magnetic mountains which draw iron from vessels, this Ark would not fall apart.

Hananiah made boxes for all the travelers, but as for himself he remained satisfied with his kerchief.