I learned much from Pinhas Aryeh’s conversation. He was acquainted with most of the pious men of the day and familiar with the leading Jews of Poland and Lithuania. All the time I was walking with him he used to tell how clever they were, and how highly regarded by the Gentile ministers, how Rabbi So-and-so had over-borne a leader of the Mizrachi, and what the zaddik from So-and-so had replied to a Zionist rabbi. I would not say that his stories were gratifying, but through them I came to know what figures are popular with this generation.
Shortly before his departure I met his new wife, a tall and comely blonde, her head covered with a silken kerchief, and a single curl peeping out in memory of her beautiful hair. Her forehead was broad and her chin narrow, like half a Shield of David slightly rounded. I heard that she was the daughter of a rich Hasid from a large city in Poland, and that she had studied in Gymnasium. Her husband boasted of her to me, saying, “I am sure you will find her conversation pleasant.” Of all her conversation I remember only that she asked in a languid voice, Isn’t there a café here?”
On the evening the festival ended I found Pinhas Aryeh sitting in my hotel. I thought he had come to say goodbye before leaving, and I went and sat down beside him. Then he revealed that he had come to inquire into the character of Babtchi, the innkeeper’s daughter, with a view to a match. The principal, that is to say the girl, was an intelligent young woman and, as his wife told him, she was good-looking. The main thing was that his son had seen her last year and had a certain liking for her. But the prospective in-law, Babtchi’s father, was something of a question mark.
I asked Pinhas Aryeh if his son was a member of Agudat Israel. He smiled. “In any case, he is not a Zionist,” said he. “Does he keep the commandments?” If he kept the commandments he would be a member of Agudat Israel,” he replied.
As he spoke he sighed. “Let me tell you a story a friend told me,” he said. “Once the talk between us turned on the worries of bringing up children. My friend said, ‘I can forgive my sons and daughters for not following the way of the Torah, but I cannot forgive them for their spitefulness. I admit,’ says my friend, ‘that a young man sometimes has to go to a theater, and I have already agreed, unwillingly, that he should go there on Sabbath eves, for then he is free from work. When he goes to the theater he shaves, so as not to look untidy. I do not inquire whether he shaves with paste or with a razor. Today, when even yeshiva students shave their beards, a man turns a blind eye on his son and does not ask whether he shaves his beard by permitted or forbidden means. But what annoys me is that, when I come back from the synagogue and chant “Peace unto you, O ministering angels,” my son is standing there shaving. I ask him, “Why do you have to have in the living room and not in the bathroom?” And he, “My sister is having a bath and I can’t go in.” I say, “A girl who is going to the opera needs to have a bath first, but what made her take a bath at the very moment when her father is going to recite the Sabbath Kiddush?” I do not suspect her, heaven forbid, of stoking the stove on the Sabbath, but I find it hard to bear.’” Here a sigh broke from Pinhas Aryeh’s heart, and I knew that his friend’s trouble was his own.
Pinhas Aryeh returned to his town and I returned to my Beit Midrash. Again I sit and study the Torah and no one hinders me in my study. If I said that Pinhas Aryeh was a new man in Szibucz, I should add that this is truly so, for there is no one like him among those who grew up in the town. Elimelech Kaiser, for instance, keeps the commandments; though not for love — and sometimes he does so in anger, like those grumblers who serve their master because they cannot free themselves from his service. Or Daniel Bach: he believes in the Creator, although he does not keep His commandments. Because of the evil things that have befallen him, he is of the opinion that the Holy One, blessed be He, does not want to be worshipped by him. If his life had been normal he would have served God like his father and the other faithful sons of Israel. Or Nissan Zommer: he keeps the commandments of God honestly and faithfully; for him, whatever the Holy One, blessed be He, does is right. “The precepts of the Lord are just, rejoicing the heart.” It is good for a man to put aside the cares of the hour and rise to recite the Afternoon and Evening Services. Better still is the Sabbath day, which was given for sanctity and repose; and even better are the festivals of the Lord, on which a man puts away his cares and clears them out of his heart. To sum up, whatever the Holy One, blessed be He, does is good, so long as men do not come and spoil it. How goodly were the days when the world was conducted according to God’s will, until men began to offend, and made wars, and disturbed the order of the world — and their offense still continues. In his simplicity, Mr. Zommer mistakenly believes that God and man are two equal powers, acting and activating against each other, but that God is the good power, while man, on the other hand, is the evil power. Nevertheless, we may classify Mr. Zommer among the simple servants of God who serve their Creator without affectation, although their faith is not pure. Or Hanoch, may he rest in peace, who bore the yoke like a horse and the burden like an ass, whether it was the commandments he was commanded to do by the Creator or things commanded to him by men. Or all the other sons of Szibucz, who serve their Creator, some with a broken heart and some in deep dejection. And even if they commit various offenses, they rely on His blessed mercy to turn a blind eye to their bad deeds and see their broken hearts. There are some who know not what they do, and their lack of knowledge makes them as happy as free men, because they do not examine their acts, and believe that they too come from the will of the Almighty, for if He did not will them He would not make them perform them.
Pinhas Aryeh is not like any of them. He does not grumble like Elimelech Kaiser; nor does he repudiate the commandments like Daniel Bach; nor is he humble like Hanoch, may he rest in peace; nor does he rejoice in the precepts of the Lord like Mr. Zommer. He divides the universe in his mind, not between God and men, but between man and man — that is, between those who favor Agudat Israel and those who oppose it. True, he likes to be in the company of people who have nothing to do with Agudat Israel, sometimes out of weakness and sometimes in the hope that he will influence them. He does not regard the licentiousness and heresy that have come into the world as things to be lamented, but as things that can be used to make propaganda against the Zionists. Troubles of the many and troubles of the individual, the ills of the world and the ills of the time — all can be dispelled, in his opinion, if Israel will walk in the way of the Torah. But this Torah, which Pinhas Aryeh and his faction preach — may heaven protect us — is the Torah that is preached at their meetings and in their newspapers, and we shall not go far wrong if we say that all these factions like Pinhas Aryeh’s — even if their motives are for the sake of heaven — are not approved from heaven, for the Holy One, blessed be He, does not want to be employed as a means, even for the sake of a desirable end. I have already gone on more than enough about Pinhas Aryeh, and that surely is enough.
The Passover festival has ended, spring has come. The sun shines every day, the nights are warm and pleasant. The earth brings forth grasses and the gardens adorn themselves with flowers. The world has put off one appearance and put on another. Men, too, have put off their heavy rags, and a pleasant fragrance, like the fragrance of warm millet boiled in honey, has begun to fill the town.
Our old Beit Midrash also has put on a new appearance. Grasses covered the facing hills, and when I opened the window their pleasant fragrance entered my heart. But I did not follow the fragrance. More than ever before I devoted myself to Torah. Between one session and another I would say to myself: Now the town forest is new again and it is worth while going there — but I did not go, not even to the fields near the town. I sat alone in the Beit Midrash. Of all those who used to come to the Beit Midrash in the cold days, I alone was left. One went after his business in the town and one went out to his business in another town, while those who had no business preferred to walk about in the marketplace and chat with their friends. Ever since the day after the festival there had been no prayers in the Beit Midrash.