Curt Leviant - Kafka's Son

“…and then the golem takes one breath and then another breath into his lungs and life is in him because the shem with God’s Ineffable Name, the name that the Kohen Gadol , the High Priest, says once and only once in one and only one place, in the Holy of Holies, in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, the Holy City, on one and only one day, the holy day of Yom Kippur, pronouncing the now lost pronunciation of the letters that make up the Tetragrammaton, the Shem Havaya , the Shem ha-Meforash , the Ineffable Name, the holy four-lettered name of God, first the yud and then the hey and then the vov and last the hey , and life is in him because the shem , the shem is under his tongue and now he can live and walk and hear and obey. But talk he cannot, no, he cannot talk because he is not a full human being, for he is created not by God but by man. And since he is created by man and not by God he does not have the God-given gift of speech. And that is how the golem is made alive.” The shamesh inclined his head and torso forward. “I am finished with my presentation.”

He opened his eyes, took a deep breath, and sighed again. From somewhere he uncovered a glass of water and drank.

“Thank you,” I said. “That was very beautifully done. You told the story like an actor with great dramatic flair.”

“You filmed me?”

“Yes. Didn’t you know that?”

“I wasn’t aware. For a while I was in the sixteenth century. And anyway, I thought you were going to only film me talking about people asking me about the golem.” And he mimed showing me the mirror, as if it were a secret between him and me and he didn’t want to share it yet with the microphone that wasn’t on.

“That’s next. But let’s go outside, like last time. Start by telling me about your reaction when people beg you to show them the golem.”

Outside, he said, “You filming me?”

“Yes, soon as you begin.”

He put his hand into his jacket pocket—

I stopped him.

“No, no. Don’t take out the mirror yet.”

“Not the mirror,” said the shamesh. “This.” He took out his comb and combed the little hair he had. “Now I will begin.”

“Fine.”

“Ready?”

“I am,” I said.

“I begin.” The shamesh cleared his throat. “Everyone wants to see the famous goylem of Prague. The famous goylem of the Altneushul. They come up to me, for I am the shamesh, you know, and they look this way and that, as if spies were watching.”

The shamesh’s broad hand gestures and facial miens made him look odd. He was hamming and I told him so, of course not using that word. I suggested he look natural. “Speak like you did last time.”

He took a deep breath.

“Everyone wants to see the famous goylem of Prague. The goylem of the Altneushul. They come up to me and secretly say to me, ‘Please take me to the attic. All my life I’m dreaming of seeing the goylem. It is my life’s wish. Please. I beg you.’ They offer me money but I refuse. I don’t take a penny. Bribe? Me taking bribes? Of course I refuse.”

I stopped the camera again.

“That’s not what you said last time.”

“What I said last time?”

“Last time you said you do take a five- or ten-dollar bill but the twenties you give back.”

“Last time I wasn’t being filmed.”

“You say one thing to me and another to the camera?”

“I don’t know. I never been in a movie before. Can I see it before it goes to Hollywood?”

“So which is the truth? What you said last time or now?”

“Both.”

“How can both be the truth?”

“We’re in Prague, my boy.”

I sighed. I couldn’t argue. He had already given me precious, unexpected footage.

“Please continue. What do you do when they insist that you show them the goylem?”

Hearing the word pronounced the way he said it, the shamesh brightened.

“They say to me, they insist, ‘Show me the goylem, show me the goylem. Please! I beg you! I have been waiting for this special moment all my life.’ Finally, I say, ‘All right. I’ll show you the goylem.’ Their faces are in rapture, as if they’re seeing God’s holy presence, the Divine Shekhinah at Mount Sinai. And they don’t know the surprise that’s coming.”

“You actually show them the goylem?”

“You know I don’t…”

I stopped filming.

“…I told you already the last time what I do,” the shamesh said.

“Of course I know. But for the film I’m pretending that it’s the first time I’m hearing the story.”

“Aha! You mean the film is pretend. Not real.”

“Both,” I said. “We’re in Prague.”

He raised a finger, shook it once, as if conceding a point.

“You right.”

“So we’ll start again, from the moment I say, ‘You actually show them the goylem?’”

“I actually do. I promise and I keep my promise.‘I promised to show you the goylem and you will soon see the goylem,’ I tell them. ‘In a moment.’”

Here the old shamesh put his hand inside his jacket once more and withdrew the little pocket mirror. He held it not in front of my face but in front of the camera lens.

“‘Nah! Here! Look!’ is what I tell them. Here in front of you, in front of all of you who are meshugge to see the goylem. Here, now you see der emesser goylem , the true, the real, the authentic goylem… You. All of you. Every single one of you has now seen him. Look in the mirror. Know. Realize. See! The goylem. See the goylem. Nah! You’ve seen him. The goylem!” and like a pro he hesitated a moment, “Is you!”

And the shamesh, laughing delightedly, put the mirror back in his pocket.

I stopped filming.

“How did I do?”

“Marvelous.”

“You caught me saying what I was supposed to?”

“Yes.”

“Now we continue?” the shamesh said.

“Yes. Now I want to ask you a question. And film your answer. You told me how the golem is vivified. But I know that according to the golem myth he also died. How?”

The shamesh seemed pleased with my question. He rested one lip on the other. He looked satisfied. Gone the sadness. Did he have a wife? Children? He never spoke of them. I didn’t ask. Maybe, like other survivors, the Germans had killed his entire family and he went through life alone. Alone, yes. But not defeated. Like other Jews, he climbed back to life.

“The golem didn’t die,” was his answer. “He was made unalive. You understand the difference? I’ll tell you how they did it. I quote from the memoir of the holy Rabbi Yitzchok HaCohen Katz, son-in-law of the Maharal, the Chief Rabbi of Prague, the rabbi of this very shul: ‘And the Maharal took all three of us who had been present when the golem was formed, when life was breathed into that creature of dust and loam and clay, and he took us to the place where the golem lay sleeping in the attic of the great synagogue…’ In other words, right here in the Al-tnigh.”

“But you just said there is no attic.”

“Wait. I’m still quoting from Rabbi Katz’s book. ‘And just as we had stood at the golem’s feet and faced his head when he was created and we walked around him seven times from right to left, as the holy Hebrew tongue is written from right to left, and just before the seventh circuit, the most potent circuit of them all, we placed under his tongue the shem , God’s holy name on a tiny piece of parchment, and then completed the seventh circuit and he began to breathe and stir — so now, to undo the creation, to bring him back to clay and loam and dust, we stood at his head and faced his feet and walked around him six times from left to right, as though the holy Hebrew alphabet were written backward, and just before the seventh circuit, the most potent circuit of them all, the Maharal bent down and removed the shem from under the sleeping golem’s tongue, and we finished the seventh circuit and the life spirit of the golem was gone. He breathed no more.’”