Mother came in to light the candles. The monks stood up, and in the selfsame movement walked out.
I got up to accompany them. In the street, one of them shoved me aside.
I was stunned. After all the honor I’d shown him, to be treated like that — while the other two, who saw him push me, didn’t even bother to rebuke him.
I didn’t want Mother to notice that something had happened to me, so I decided not to return home. And I didn’t go to the House of Prayer, because, by the time I could have washed myself from the touch of the monk’s hand, they would have already finished the prayers. I stood there like a man with nothing to do, neither here nor there.
Two young novices came along.
“Where did the Fathers go,” they said.
I was dumbfounded by what I heard. Men like that they call Father. Before I could rouse myself to answer, one of the novices disappeared. Vanished, right before my eyes. He left the other one behind.
I just stood there, shocked and speechless. For a while it was as if no one else existed. Then I glanced at him and saw that he was very young, about the height of a small youth, with black eyes. If it hadn’t been for the commandment that tells us not to show them grace, which also means not to impute grace to them, I would even have said that his eyes were graceful, and sweet. His face was quite smooth, without the slightest trace of a beard. He had the kind of beauty you used to be able to see in every Jewish town, the beauty of young Jewish boys who have never tasted the taste of sin. And beyond that there was something else about him that imparted all the more grace to his graceful features.
I began talking with him so that I could examine him more closely. As I talked, I laid my hand on his shoulder and I said to him, “Listen my brother, aren’t you a Jew?”
I felt his shoulders tremble beneath my hand; I felt his eyes tremble; he lowered his head on his chest and I felt his heart tremble.
“Tell me,” I repeated my question, “aren’t you a Jew?”
He raised his head from his heart: “I am a Jew.”
I said to him, “If you’re a Jew, what are you doing with them?”
He bowed his head.
“Who are you,” I said, “and where are you from?”
He stood in silence before me.
I brought my face close to his, as if to transfer my sense of hearing to my mouth.
He lifted his head, and I could see how his heart was shuddering, and my heart too began to shudder. I felt his black, sweet eyes upon me. He looked at me with such loving grace, with such tender faith, such glorious kindness, and above all with such grief — like a man trying to control himself before he finally reveals a long-kept secret.
I said to myself, What is all this?
As much time went by as went by, and still he said nothing.
“Is it so hard for you to tell me where you’re from?”
He whispered the name of a city.
I said, “If I heard you correctly you’re from the town of Likovitz.”
He nodded his head.
“If you’re from Likovitz,” I said, “then you must certainly know the Tzaddik of Likovitz, I was in his House of Prayer once on New Year’s Day, and the Tzaddik himself led the prayers. Let me tell you, when he came to the verse ‘And all shall come to serve Thee,’ I imagined that I heard the approaching footsteps of all the nations of the world who fail to recognize the people of Israel or their Father in Heaven.
And when he sang ‘And the wayward shall learn understanding,’ I imagined they were all bowing down as one to worship the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel…. My brother, are you in pain?”
He shook with sobs.
“What are you crying about?”
Tears flooded his eyes. He wiped them away. Still weeping, he said, “I am his daughter. His youngest daughter. The daughter of his old age.”
My heart thundered and my mouth fastened to hers, and her mouth to mine. And the purest sweetness flowed from her mouth to mine and — it is possible — from my mouth to hers. We call this in Hebrew “the kiss of the mouth,” and it must be the same in other languages too. I should say here that this was the first time I ever kissed a young girl, and it seems almost certain to me that it was her first kiss as welclass="underline" a kiss of innocence that carries with it no pain, but goodness and blessing, life, grace, and kindness, whereby a man and a woman live together till calm old age.
Notes
Agunot
39/ “It is said ” This first passage is an example of what Gershon Shaked calls a pseudoquotation, that is, a passage presented as a citation from classical sources but which is in fact made up by Agnon. This allegorical midrash about the relations between God and Israel evokes the midrash on the Song of Songs (Shir Hashirim Rabbah) but is not found there.
39/ “Behold thou art fair…” Song of Songs 1:15; “Strike me, wound me…” Song of Songs 5:7; “If ye find my beloved…” Song of Songs 5:8.
42/ Ben Uri In the Book of Exodus, Bezalel Ben Uri is the master craftsman called by God to build the tabernacle and fashion its implements.
44/ Her breasts — the Tables of the Covenant In the rabbinic interpretation of the Song of Songs, the female beloved represents the people Israel and the parts of her body different aspects of the Torah. The Tables of the Covenant are the tablets of the Ten Commandments.
Notes
49/ “Lo, thou are sanctified unto me ” The binding formula pronounced by the groom to the bride during the marriage ceremony. “Lo, I cast thee forth ” The formula pronounced by the husband to the wife at the divorce ceremony.
50/ He put the best possible interpretation on his dream…made good his dream A reference to a set of ritual practices suggested by the rabbis for neutralizing the predictive power of bad dreams.
51/ The “world of confusion” According to Jewish mysticism, the realm in which lost souls wander.
The Kerchief
61/ Lashkowitz fair A large annual trade fair in Galicia where merchants went to buy merchandise for the year.
62/ “She is become like a widow ” The figurative description of Jerusalem destroyed in Lamentations 1:1. In his gloss on this verse, Rashi, the great medieval commentator, softens the image by making the woman’s loss temporary; she is not a widow but only like a widow.
63/ Only yesterday he was binding his wounds In talmudic legend (Sanhedrin 98a), the Messiah is described as disguised among the beggars at the gates of Rome (the seat of impurity) awaiting God’s call to redeem the world.
63/ “Every man under his…fig tree ” Micah 4:4.
63/ Fringed garment A ritual undergarment with knotted fringes on each of its four corners.
66/ The dust of Abraham our father, which turned into swords Sanhedrin 108b.
67/ “Peace be unto you, angels of peace” According to legend, good angels and bad angels accompany the Jew home from the synagogue on Friday evening; if Sabbath preparations have been adequately performed, the good angels are vindicated, and vice versa.