Mila 18 - Leon Uris

In the bedroom, Stephan lay on his stomach studying the Haftorah, a reading from the Prophets, in preparation for the coming bar mitzvah. He always remembered the sound of music from his mother and sister. It had a magic quality of transcending him beyond all harm and all ugliness. Rachael stumbled on a passage, then fingered her way through the next bars.

Stephan automatically stopped reading and rolled off the bed and walked to the window. They had just moved to this new place in the big ghetto. He had to share a bedroom with Rachael, and it was a pretty run-down place but far better than most people had. Just across the street stood the old post office building where the Civil Authority had been housed since the Germans closed the place on Grzybowska Street. His father worked in there. In front of the large square, columned structure stood the only tree and plot of grass in the ghetto. It felt cool and soft to roll in.

The music stopped.

Stephan walked back to his bed and flopped on his belly, waiting for Rachael to begin playing again so he could resume his studies.

He had always had an unspoken communication with his sister. They wanted to talk to each other now. She sat on the edge of his bed and mussed his hair. He rebelled slightly.

“How can you read that chicken scratch?” she said, referring to the Hebrew text.

“It’s no worse than the chicken scratch you read at the piano.” Stephan closed the book, “I wish Wolf would get back and help me with my lessons. Rabbi Solomon—well, we have to be perfect. He’s tough.”

“Stephan?”

“Yes?”

“Wolf told me you tried to get him and Uncle Andrei to let you distribute the underground paper.”

The boy did not answer.

“Is it true?”

“I guess so.”

“Does Momma know?”

“No.”

“Don’t you think you’d better tell her?”

He spun off the bed, away from her inquiries.

“What would we do if anything happened to you?”

“Don’t you understand, Rachael?”

“With Wolf and Uncle Andrei doing their work, I can’t lose all of you.”

“If only Poppa—” Stephan stopped short. “Nothing.”

“You can’t make up for him, Stephan.”

“I’m so ashamed. For a long time I tried to believe what he was telling me.”

“Don’t be too hard on Poppa. No one knows how much he has suffered. You must be kind.”

“How can you say that? If it weren’t for Poppa you and Wolf could marry.”

“He’s still your father, Stephan, and I know that Rabbi Solomon would be the first to tell you to honor him, always.”

“Rachael ... Momma and Poppa don’t love each other any more, do they?”

“It’s only because of the times, Stephan.”

“That’s all right. You don’t have to try to explain.”

She changed the subject quickly. “So, you’re going to be a real man next week. Well, let me see if you have a hair on your chin yet.” Rachael wrestled him to the floor. He gently allowed himself to be pinned down. Her fingers dug into his ribs and he squirmed, half angry, half laughing.

“Quit it, Rachael! I can’t wrestle with you any more.”

She bared her claws. “And why not?”

“Because you’re a girl and I may grab something by mistake.”

“Well! Stephan Bronski! You are becoming a man!”

In a moment she went back to the andante movement Stephan slipped beside her on the bench and rested his head on her shoulder. Rachael put her arm about her brother and kissed his forehead.

“It won’t be much of a bar mitzvah for you, will it?”

“Just taking the oath to live as a Jew is important,” he answered.

“You are a little man.”

“Don’t be afraid, Rachael. Wolf will be back. I heard you cry last night. Don’t be afraid. Rachael, I think I understand everything about you and Wolf and I want you to know I’m very glad because next to Uncle Andrei he’s the finest man who ever lived. He has explained lots of things to me ... about being a man ... like things Poppa should have explained ...”

Rachael blanched, then smiled. “I wish he would come back. I wish he would come back. ...”

“He said he’d get back for my bar mitzvah. He will, Rachael.”

Alexander Brandel's office was converted into a makeshift synagogue, just as a million other places had been converted for illicit worship for two thousand years. Rabbi Solomon donned the ancient vestments of the rabbinate and opened the Torah scroll and chanted to the room where Ervin Rosenblum and Andrei and Alex and three Bathyrans stood near what represented an altar. Beyond Alex’s desk, Rachael and Susan and Deborah and many of Stephan’s friends jammed together. The shell of the man who was once Dr. Paul Bronski was alone by the door.

Stephan Bronski fidgeted slightly as his mother brushed her hand over the tallis which had belonged to her own father. Since no new shawls had been made since the occupation, the rabbi ruled it fitting for the boy to wear this symbol of one generation passing a tradition to another. Stephan’s months of study were coming to a culmination.

He looked about toward the door, hoping that Wolf Brandel would come through it in the last moment, but all he saw was his father. He smiled slightly at Rachael.

Rabbi Solomon faced the assemblage. Another boy was ready to accept his duties as a son of the commandment, a guardian of the Laws, and take upon himself the terrible burden of Jewish life. Only a week earlier there had been another bar mitzvah. The son of Max Kleperman had reached the age of thirteen. He was given the symbols of manhood in a large hall at the Big Seven headquarters amid gluttonous revelry. The old man wanted to turn his back on Kleperman’s mockery and walk away, but he didn’t, for he was merely the administrator of God’s will and not its judge.

His thinning high voice asked the candidate to step forward.

Stephan took a last sigh and felt his mother’s hand squeeze his shoulder. He walked forward to receive his new social status. The boy was slight and small like his father.

“Bless the Lord Who is to be praised.”

“Praised be the Lord Who is blessed for all eternity,” the men in the room answered.

“Blessed art Thou, O Lord our God, King of the universe, Who didst choose us from among all the peoples by giving us Thy Torah. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, Giver of the Laws,” Stephan chanted.

The boy and the old man turned to the Torah scrolls which lay on Alexander Brandel’s desk. With the tassels of the shawl, Stephan touched the Torah, kissed the shawl, and read from the Laws of Moses. From the benediction he went to the climax of his studies, the chanting of the Maftir Aliya from the Book of Prophets, one of the most difficult of all Hebrew readings.

Stephan faced the room and chanted from memory. His voice was small and high, but it carried with it that cry of anguish born of the oppressions of many Pharaohs in many ages. The room was awed as the lad displayed the full mastery of his accomplishment. Even Solomon delved into memory to try to recall when a young man had read the Haftorah with greater authority, grace, and musical perfection.

When the closing benediction was done, the Torah scrolls were closed, to be taken and hidden from desecration by the Germans.

Stephan Bronski faced the room. Uncle Andrei winked. Stephan looked about, hoping that Wolf might have come in, but he hadn’t. He cleared his throat. “I would like to thank my mother and father,” he said in the traditional opening of the valedictory, “for bringing me up in the Jewish tradition.”

The pronouncement seldom failed to bring tears to women. Deborah and Rachael proved no exception. But in the rear of the office the words struck Paul Bronski like a stiletto. He lowered his eyes as his son continued.