When the Baal Shem Tov passed away, and his holy disciples after him, their disciples and their disciples’ disciples began to differ; each sect claimed that it was following the holy Baal Shem Tov and his holy disciples, and began to alter the prayers and the melodies. Some adorned their prayers with shepherds’ melodies, and said they were melodies handed down from King David, melodies that were carried into captivity among the worshippers of stars and constellations; some danced as they prayed, and clapped their hands and knocked their heads on the wall, in order to drive away strange thoughts that confused their prayers; others introduced into their prayer expressions that are entirely meaningless, and some of these are a clear interruption of prayer, like Tatte suesser, which means “Sweet Father” in the Yiddish tongue. And there are reliable witnesses who testify that they heard from their fathers and grandfathers, who heard from the old men of their generation that they heard that the men of the sect used to exclaim during the reciting of the “Hear, O Israel” “Dawaj pozar!” meaning “Give fire” in Polish, which is to say, “O blessed One, inflame my heart in Thy service.”
In our town of Szibucz there were also a number of people who followed this road, and the leaders of the generation arose and expelled them from the congregation. So they went and built a synagogue for themselves; this is the house of the Hasidim, which they call a shtibel, and the rest of the population call it the Leitzim Shilechel, the Scoffers’ Synagogue.
As the zaddikim, the wonder-rabbis, multiplied, so did the numbers of the Hasidim, their followers. Some followed one zaddik and some another. Finally the Hasidim of Kossov multiplied in our town and they built a house of prayer for themselves, the Kossovite Synagogue or Kossover Shilechel, in King Street near the King’s Well, and this is the well from which Sobieski King of Poland drank when he returned from his victorious war, and from which we draw our water for the making of matzoh.
When the Zaddik of Kossov died, his elder son took over his father’s chair and the younger went to Vizhnitz, where he established his residence. The Kossovite Hasidim were thus divided into two sects: one followed the elder son and the other followed Vizhnitz. The Kossovite Hasidim in our town did not produce offspring like themselves, and their sons followed neither one zaddik nor the other. Apart from the Sephardi rite, nothing was left with the sons except the customs of the Hasidim.
As time passed, new men came to Szibucz, some of them hasidic sons-in-law who came to live with their fathers-in-law, and others simply ordinary Hasidim. These went to pray in the Kossovite prayer house, because the services there were conducted according to the Spanish rite.
There was another place of assembly for Hasidim in our town, the new Beit Midrash, so called to distinguish it from our old Beit Midrash, and there our illustrious and righteous teacher, the rabbi of the town, used to pray. Besides his greatness in the Torah, he used to devote himself to the mystic wisdom of the Kabbalah; all the princes of the Torah used to rejoice with him in his novel interpretations of the law, and seekers after salvation used to come to receive a blessing from his lips. (The illustrious author of The Deliverances of Jacob said of him in jest, “Let us thank the Almighty that this illustrious scholar has left us and followed the way of Hasidism, for otherwise we would not have been able to find our bearings in the Beit Midrash; he would have overwhelmed all of us in arguments of religious law with his penetration and scholarship.”) This zaddik did not beget offspring like himself, and when he died his Beit Midrash became a house of prayer for the householders, who prayed according to the Sephardi rite like their forefathers, but did not favor Hasidism like them. This is the strength of Szibucz, that it outlives the new and returns to its old ways — except for the Sephardi rite, which has already taken root.
Although Hasidism disappeared from the Beit Midrash, a number of Hasidim remained there, but they were few and insignificant, and did not lift up their heads. If anyone was found dancing or clapping his hands during the prayers, he would be silenced with a rebuke and told, “This is a holy place and not a kleisel.” Once the townsfolk came to the Beit Midrash and found the bones of a goose, for the Hasidim had held a New Moon feast there during the night, and the whole Beit Midrash was in an uproar over this profanation of the Divine Name by people who turned the holy place into a tavern.
In those days the Zaddik of Ruzhin bought the estate of Potik, which is close to Szibucz, where he established the zaddik, his son, who later moved his residence to Tchortkov and became famous the world over as the Tchortkover. A number of people from Szibucz followed his leadership, and they hired a room for themselves. Some of the remnants of the Hasidim in the Beit Midrash came together and joined them. In time, the room was not enough for them and they built themselves a klois. This was the Tchortkovite klois, which had goodly men and goodly customs, for most of the worshippers were distinguished for learning, good manners, and knowledge of melody, and their prayers were sweet, not with shouts and cries like the rest of the Hasidim, and not with limbs frozen stiff, like the Misnagdim, their opponents, but like the Hasidim of Ruzhin, who know before whom they stand. And their appearance was as goodly as their prayer: they did not have disheveled earlocks and beards and bare necks like the Hasidim of Belz, but their earlocks were tidy, their beards in order, and their necks covered. And their speech was like their appearance, quiet and not noisy. They engaged in trade and studied the Torah; on festival days they would hold a feast in the klois with wine and nuts, dancing and singing, “Thou hast chosen us,” and so forth, and in winter, on the Sabbath eve after the meal, they would assemble and sit together, drinking brandy and eating chickpeas cooked with pepper, singing, “They that keep the Sabbath will rejoice in Thy kingdom,” and sweetening the occasion with pleasant tales and words of learning. When they celebrated the anniversary of the zaddik’s death they would make a great feast, with meat and wine, singing and dancing. The rest of the people also came when they heard the sound of the rejoicing, and looked on in surprise to see such God-fearing men dancing so freely. While they stood watching, a Hasid would come, take hold of one of them, draw him into the circle and dance with him, until his heart, too, would be caught up with their enthusiasm, and he would join the Tchortkovite Hasidim.
By no means did the whole of the klois follow the Tchortkover. There were certain Hasidim there who were followers of the zaddikim of Sadagora, Husiatin, Vizhnitz, and Otonia, and of others who did not take part in the well-known controversy. The Sadagora and Husiatin Hasidim were regarded in the klois as Tchortkovites, for their zaddikim were brothers of the Tchortkover. The Vizhnitz and the Otonia Hasidim were regarded as inferior to these, for although the Vizhnitz and the Otonia zaddikim were relatives of the Tchortkover, they were not approved by Tchortkov. Still lower were the Hasidim of the other zaddikim, who were not related to the Zaddik of Ruzhin; they were like stepchildren in the place. On festivals and solemn days, when everyone who was called up for the reading of the Torah regarded it as a sacred duty to call for blessings on the Tchortkover and all his offspring, and his brothers the zaddikim and all their offspring, the Tchortkovites did not permit blessings to be recited for the other rabbis, for the Tchortkover is of the seed of the House of David, and if the generation were deserving, he would be King of Israel, and it is not to a king’s honor that a commoner should be blessed together with him. And sometimes on the jubilation day of these other rabbis, the cantor did not refrain from reciting the Tahanun, the prayer of supplication that is not said on joyful occasions.