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Children of the Ghetto: A Study of a Peculiar People, a novel by Israel Zangwill |
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Book 1. Children Of The Ghetto - chapter 18. The Hebrew's Friday Night |
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_ BOOK I. CHILDREN OF THE GHETTO CHAPTER XVIII. THE HEBREW'S FRIDAY NIGHT "Ah, the Men-of-the-Earth!" said Pinchas to Reb Shemuel, "ignorant fanatics, how shall a movement prosper in their hands? They have not the poetic vision, their ideas are as the mole's; they wish to make Messiahs out of half-pence. What inspiration for the soul is there in the sight of snuffy collectors that have the air of _Schnorrers_? with Karlkammer's red hair for a flag and the sound of Gradkoski's nose blowing for a trumpet-peal. But I have written an acrostic against Guedalyah the greengrocer, virulent as serpent's gall. He the Redeemer, indeed, with his diseased potatoes and his flat ginger-beer! Not thus did the great prophets and teachers in Israel figure the Return. Let a great signal-fire be lit in Israel and lo! the beacons will leap up on every mountain and tongue of flame shall call to tongue. Yea, I, even I, Melchitsedek Pinchas, will light the fire forthwith." "Nay, not to-day," said Reb Shemuel, with his humorous twinkle; "it is the Sabbath." The Rabbi was returning from synagogue and Pinchas was giving him his company on the short homeward journey. At their heels trudged Levi and on the other side of Reb Shemuel walked Eliphaz Chowchoski, a miserable-looking Pole whom Reb Shemuel was taking home to supper. In those days Reb Shemuel was not alone in taking to his hearth "the Sabbath guest"--some forlorn starveling or other--to sit at the table in like honor with the master. It was an object lesson in equality and fraternity for the children of many a well-to-do household, nor did it fail altogether in the homes of the poor. "All Israel are brothers," and how better honor the Sabbath than by making the lip-babble a reality? "You will speak to your daughter?" said Pinchas, changing the subject abruptly. "You will tell her that what I wrote to her is not a millionth part of what I feel--that she is my sun by day and my moon and stars by night, that I must marry her at once or die, that I think of nothing in the world but her, that I can do, write, plan, nothing without her, that once she smiles on me I will write her great love-poems, greater than Byron's, greater than Heine's--the real Song of Songs, which is Pinchas's--that I will make her immortal as Dante made Beatrice, as Petrarch made Laura, that I walk about wretched, bedewing the pavements with my tears, that I sleep not by night nor eat by day--you will tell her this?" He laid his finger pleadingly on his nose. "I will tell her," said Reb Shemuel. "You are a son-in-law to gladden the heart of any man. But I fear the maiden looks but coldly on wooers. Besides you are fourteen years older than she." "Then I love her twice as much as Jacob loved Rachel--for it is written 'seven years were but as a day in his love for her.' To me fourteen years are but as a day in my love for Hannah." The Rabbi laughed at the quibble and said: "You are like the man who when he was accused of being twenty years older than the maiden he desired, replied 'but when I look at her I shall become ten years younger, and when she looks at me she will become ten years older, and thus we shall be even.'" Pinchas laughed enthusiastically in his turn, but replied: "Surely you will plead my cause, you whose motto is the Hebrew saying--'the husband help the housewife, God help the bachelor.'" "But have you the wherewithal to support her?" "Shall my writings not suffice? If there are none to protect literature in England, we will go abroad--to your birthplace, Reb Shemuel, the cradle of great scholars." The poet spoke yet more, but in the end his excited stridulous accents fell on Reb Shemuel's ears as a storm without on the ears of the slippered reader by the fireside. He had dropped into a delicious reverie--tasting in advance the Sabbath peace. The work of the week was over. The faithful Jew could enter on his rest--the narrow, miry streets faded before the brighter image of his brain. "_Come, my beloved, to meet the Bride, the face of the Sabbath let us welcome._" To-night his sweetheart would wear her Sabbath face, putting off the mask of the shrew, which hid not from him the angel countenance. To-night he could in very truth call his wife (as the Rabbi in the Talmud did) "not wife, but home." To-night she would be in very truth _Simcha_--rejoicing. A cheerful warmth glowed at his heart, love for all the wonderful Creation dissolved him in tenderness. As he approached the door, cheerful lights gleamed on him like a heavenly smile. He invited Pinchas to enter, but the poet in view of his passion thought it prudent to let others plead for him and went off with his finger to his nose in final reminder. The Reb kissed the _Mezuzah_ on the outside of the door and his daughter, who met him, on the inside. Everything was as he had pictured it--the two tall wax candles in quaint heavy silver candlesticks, the spotless table-cloth, the dish of fried fish made picturesque with sprigs of parsley, the Sabbath loaves shaped like boys' tip-cats, with a curious plait of crust from point to point and thickly sprinkled with a drift of poppy-seed, and covered with a velvet cloth embroidered with Hebrew words; the flask of wine and the silver goblet. The sight was familiar yet it always struck the simple old Reb anew, with a sense of special blessing. "Good _Shabbos_, Simcha," said Reb Shemuel. "Good _Shabbos_, Shemuel." said Simcha. The light of love was in her eyes, and in her hair her newest comb. Her sharp features shone with peace and good-will and the consciousness of having duly lit the Sabbath candles and thrown the morsel of dough into the fire. Shemuel kissed her, then he laid his hands upon Hannah's head and murmured: "May God make thee as Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Leah," and upon Levi's, murmuring: "May God make thee as Ephraim and Manasseh." Even the callous Levi felt the breath of sanctity in the air and had a vague restful sense of his Sabbath Angel hovering about and causing him to cast two shadows on the wall while his Evil Angel shivered impotent on the door-step. Then Reb Shemuel repeated three times a series of sentences commencing: "_Peace be unto you, ye ministering Angels_," and thereupon the wonderful picture of an ideal woman from Proverbs, looking affectionately at Simcha the while. "A woman of worth, whoso findeth her, her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband trusteth in her; good and not evil will she do him all the days of her life; she riseth, while it is yet night, giveth food to her household and a task to her maidens. She putteth her own hands to the spindle; she stretcheth out her hand to the poor--strength and honor are her clothing and she looketh forth smilingly to the morrow; she openeth her mouth with wisdom and the law of kindness is on her tongue--she looketh well to the ways of her household and eateth not the bread of idleness. Deceitful is favor and vain is beauty, but the woman that feareth the Lord, _she_ shall be praised." Then, washing his hands with the due benediction, he filled the goblet with wine, and while every one reverently stood he "made Kiddish," in a traditional joyous recitative "... blessed art thou, O Lord, our God! King of the Universe, Creator of the fruit of the vine, who doth sanctify us with His commandments and hath delight in us.... Thou hast chosen and sanctified us above all peoples and with love and favor hast made us to inherit Thy holy Sabbath...." And all the household, and the hungry Pole, answered "Amen," each sipping of the cup in due gradation, then eating a special morsel of bread cut by the father and dipped in salt; after which the good wife served the fish, and cups and saucers clattered and knives and forks rattled. And after a few mouthfuls, the Pole knew himself a Prince in Israel and felt he must forthwith make choice of a maiden to grace his royal Sabbath board. Soup followed the fish; it was not served direct from the saucepan but transferred by way of a large tureen; since any creeping thing that might have got into the soup would have rendered the plateful in which it appeared not legally potable, whereas if it were detected in the large tureen, its polluting powers would be dissipated by being diffused over such a large mass of fluid. For like religious reasons, another feature of the etiquette of the modern fashionable table had been anticipated by many centuries--the eaters washed their hands in a little bowl of water after their meal. The Pollack was thus kept by main religious force in touch with a liquid with which he had no external sympathy. When supper was over, grace was chanted and then the _Zemiroth_ was sung--songs summing up in light and jingling metre the very essence of holy joyousness--neither riotous nor ascetic--the note of spiritualized common sense which has been the key-note of historical Judaism. For to feel "the delight of Sabbath" is a duty and to take three meals thereon a religions obligation--the sanctification of the sensuous by a creed to which everything is holy. The Sabbath is the hub of the Jew's universe; to protract it is a virtue, to love it a liberal education. It cancels all mourning--even for Jerusalem. The candles may gutter out at their own greasy will--unsnuffed, untended--is not Sabbath its own self-sufficient light? * * * * * * * * * *
Hannah took advantage of a pause in their conversation to say in German: "I am so glad, father, thou didst not bring that man home." "What man?" said Reb Shemuel. "The dirty monkey-faced little man who talks so much." The Reb considered. "I know none such." "Pinchas she means," said her mother. "The poet!" Reb Shemuel looked at her gravely. This did not sound promising. "Why dost thou speak so harshly of thy fellow-creatures?" he said. "The man is a scholar and a poet, such as we have too few in Israel." "We have too many _Schnorrers_ in Israel already," retorted Hannah. "Sh!" whispered Reb Shemuel reddening and indicating his guest with a slight movement of the eye. Hannah bit her lip in self-humiliation and hastened to load the lucky Pole's plate with an extra piece of fish. "He has written me a letter," she went on. "He has told me so," he answered. "He loves thee with a great love." "What nonsense, Shemuel!" broke in Simcha, setting down her coffee-cup with work-a-day violence. "The idea of a man who has not a penny to bless himself with marrying our Hannah! They would be on the Board of Guardians in a month." "Money is not everything. Wisdom and learning outweigh much. And as the Midrash says: 'As a scarlet ribbon becometh a black horse, so poverty becometh the daughter of Jacob.' The world stands on the Torah, not on gold; as it is written: 'Better is the Law of Thy mouth to me than thousands of gold or silver.' He is greater than I, for he studies the law for nothing like the fathers of the Mishna while I am paid a salary." "Methinks thou art little inferior," said Simcha, "for thou retainest little enough thereof. Let Pinchas get nothing for himself, 'tis his affair, but, if he wants my Hannah, he must get something for her. Were the fathers of the Mishna also fathers of families?" "Certainly; is it not a command--'Be fruitful and multiply'?" "And how did their families live?" "Many of our sages were artisans." "Aha!" snorted Simcha triumphantly. "And says not the Talmud," put in the Pole as if he were on the family council, "'Flay a carcass in the streets rather than be under an obligation'?" This with supreme unconsciousness of any personal application. "Yea, and said not Rabban Gamliel, the son of Rabbi Judah the Prince, 'it is commendable to join the study of the Law with worldly employment'? Did not Moses our teacher keep sheep? "Truth," replied the host. "I agree with Maimonides that man should first secure a living, then prepare a residence and after that seek a wife; and that they are fools who invert the order. But Pinchas works also with his pen. He writes articles in the papers. But the great thing, Hannah, is that he loves the Law." "H'm!" said Hannah. "Let him marry the Law, then." "He is in a hurry," said Reb Shemuel with a flash of irreverent facetiousness. "And he cannot become the Bridegroom of the Law till _Simchath Torah_." All laughed. The Bridegroom of the Law is the temporary title of the Jew who enjoys the distinction of being "called up" to the public reading of the last fragment of the Pentateuch, which is got through once a year. Under the encouragement of the laughter, the Rabbi added: "But he will know much more of his Bride than the majority of the Law's Bridegrooms." Hannah took advantage of her father's pleasure in the effect of his jokes to show him Pinchas's epistle, which he deciphered laboriously. It commenced:
Reb Shemuel was already poring over a Pentateuch in his Friday night duty of reading the Portion twice in Hebrew and once in Chaldaic. Hannah sat opposite him, studying the kindly furrowed face, the massive head set on rounded shoulders, the shaggy eyebrows, the long whitening beard moving with the mumble of the pious lips, the brown peering eyes held close to the sacred tome, the high forehead crowned with the black skullcap. She felt a moisture gathering under her eyelids as she looked at him. "Father," she said at last, in a gentle voice. "Did you call me, Hannah?" he asked, looking up. "Yes, dear. About this man, Pinchas." "Yes, Hannah." "I am sorry I spoke harshly of him,'' "Ah, that is right, my daughter. If he is poor and ill-clad we must only honor him the more. Wisdom and learning must be respected if they appear in rags. Abraham entertained God's messengers though they came as weary travellers." "I know, father, it is not because of his appearance that I do not like him. If he is really a scholar and a poet, I will try to admire him as you do." "Now you speak like a true daughter of Israel." "But about my marrying him--you are not really in earnest?" "_He_ is." said Reb Shemuel, evasively. "Ah, I knew you were not," she said, catching the lurking twinkle in his eye. "You know I could never marry a man like that." "Your mother could," said the Reb. "Dear old goose," she said, leaning across to pull his beard. "You are not a bit like that--you know a thousand times more, you know you do." The old Rabbi held up his hands in comic deprecation. "Yes, you do," she persisted. "Only you let him talk so much; you let everybody talk and bamboozle you." Reb Shemuel drew the hand that fondled his beard in his own, feeling the fresh warm skin with a puzzled look. "The hands are the hands of Hannah," he said, "but the voice is the voice of Simcha." Hannah laughed merrily. "All right, dear, I won't scold you any more. I'm so glad it didn't really enter your great stupid, clever old head that I was likely to care for Pinchas." "My dear daughter, Pinchas wished to take you to wife, and I felt pleased. It is a union with a son of the Torah, who has also the pen of a ready writer. He asked me to tell you and I did." "But you would not like me to marry any one I did not like." "God forbid! My little Hannah shall marry whomever she pleases." A wave of emotion passed over the girl's face. "You don't mean that, father," she said, shaking her head. "True as the Torah! Why should I not?" "Suppose," she said slowly, "I wanted to marry a Christian?" Her heart beat painfully as she put the question. Reb Shemuel laughed heartily. "My Hannah would have made a good Talmudist. Of course, I don't mean it in that sense." "Yes, but if I was to marry a very _link_ Jew, you'd think it almost as bad." "No, no!" said the Reb, shaking his head. "That's a different thing altogether; a Jew is a Jew, and a Christian a Christian." "But you can't always distinguish between them," argued Hannah. "There are Jews who behave as if they were Christians, except, of course, they don't believe in the Crucified One." Still the old Reb shook his head. "The worst of Jews cannot put off his Judaism. His unborn soul undertook the yoke of the Torah at Sinai." "Then you really wouldn't mind if I married a _link_ Jew!" He looked at her, startled, a suspicion dawning in his eyes. "I should mind," he said slowly. "But if you loved him he would become a good Jew." The simple conviction of his words moved her to tears, but she kept them back. "But if he wouldn't?" "I should pray. While there is life there is hope for the sinner in Israel." She fell back on her old question. "And you would really not mind whom I married?" "Follow your heart, my little one," said Reb Shemuel. "It is a good heart and it will not lead you wrong." Hannah turned away to hide the tears that could no longer be stayed. Her father resumed his reading of the Law. But he had got through very few verses ere he felt a soft warm arm round his neck and a wet cheek laid close to his. "Father, forgive me," whispered the lips. "I am so sorry. I thought, that--that I--that you--oh father, father! I feel as if I had never known you before to-night." "What is it, my daughter?" said Reb Shemuel, stumbling into Yiddish in his anxiety. "What hast thou done?" "I have betrothed myself," she answered, unwittingly adopting his dialect. "I have betrothed myself without telling thee or mother." "To whom?" he asked anxiously. "To a Jew," she hastened to assure him, "But he is neither a Talmud-sage nor pious. He is newly returned from the Cape." "Ah, they are a _link_ lot," muttered the Reb anxiously. "Where didst thou first meet him?" "At the Club," she answered. "At the Purim Ball--the night before Sam Levine came round here to be divorced from me." He wrinkled his great brow. "Thy mother would have thee go," he said. "Thou didst not deserve I should get thee the divorce. What is his name?" "David Brandon. He is not like other Jewish young men; I thought he was and did him wrong and mocked at him when first he spoke to me, so that afterwards I felt tender towards him. His conversation is agreeable, for he thinks for himself, and deeming thou wouldst not hear of such a match and that there was no danger, I met him at the Club several times in the evening, and--and--thou knowest the rest." She turned away her face, blushing, contrite, happy, anxious. Her love-story was as simple as her telling of it. David Brandon was not the shadowy Prince of her maiden dreams, nor was the passion exactly as she had imagined it; it was both stronger and stranger, and the sense of secrecy and impending opposition instilled into her love a poignant sweetness. The Reb stroked her hair silently. "I would not have said 'Yea' so quick, father," she went on, "but David had to go to Germany to take a message to the aged parents of his Cape chum, who died in the gold-fields. David had promised the dying man to go personally as soon as he returned to England--I think it was a request for forgiveness and blessing--but after meeting me he delayed going, and when I learned of it I reproached him, but he said he could not tear himself away, and he would not go till I had confessed I loved him. At last I said if he would go home the moment I said it and not bother about getting me a ring or anything, but go off to Germany the first thing the next morning, I would admit I loved him a little bit. Thus did it occur. He went off last Wednesday. Oh, isn't it cruel to think, father, that he should be going with love and joy in his heart to the parents of his dead friend!" Her father's head was bent. She lifted it up by the chin and looked pleadingly into the big brown eyes. "Thou art not angry with me, father?" "No, Hannah. But thou shouldst have told me from the first." "I always meant to, father. But I feared to grieve thee." "Wherefore? The man is a Jew. And thou lovest him, dost thou not?" "As my life, father." He kissed her lips. "It is enough, my Hannah. With thee to love him, he will become pious. When a man has a good Jewish wife like my beloved daughter, who will keep a good Jewish house, he cannot be long among the sinners. The light of a true Jewish home will lead his footsteps back to God." Hannah pressed her face to his in silence. She could not speak. She had not strength to undeceive him further, to tell him she had no care for trivial forms. Besides, in the flush of gratitude and surprise at her father's tolerance, she felt stirrings of responsive tolerance to his religion. It was not the moment to analyze her feelings or to enunciate her state of mind regarding religion. She simply let herself sink in the sweet sense of restored confidence and love, her head resting against his. Presently Reb Shemuel put his hands on her head and murmured again: "May God make thee as Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah." Then he added: "Go now, my daughter, and make glad the heart of thy mother." Hannah suspected a shade of satire in the words, but was not sure. * * * * * The roaring Sambatyon of life was at rest in the Ghetto; on thousands of squalid homes the light of Sinai shone. The Sabbath Angels whispered words of hope and comfort to the foot-sore hawker and the aching machinist, and refreshed their parched souls with celestial anodyne and made them kings of the hour, with leisure to dream of the golden chairs that awaited them in Paradise. The Ghetto welcomed the Bride with proud song and humble feast, and sped her parting with optimistic symbolisms of fire and wine, of spice and light and shadow. All around their neighbors sought distraction in the blazing public-houses, and their tipsy bellowings resounded through the streets and mingled with the Hebrew hymns. Here and there the voice of a beaten woman rose on the air. But no Son of the Covenant was among the revellers or the wife-beaters; the Jews remained a chosen race, a peculiar people, faulty enough, but redeemed at least from the grosser vices, a little human islet won from the waters of animalism by the genius of ancient engineers. For while the genius of the Greek or the Roman, the Egyptian or the Phoenician, survives but in word and stone, the Hebrew word alone was made flesh. _ |
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