The Parable and Its Lesson: A Novella (13 page)

20
from the hollow of the sling
   The reference here is to the Babylonian Talmud, tractate Shabbat 152b, where the two parts of a biblical verse (1 Samuel 25:29) are cited and interpreted: “R. Eliezer said, ‘The souls of the righteous are ensconced beneath the heavenly throne, as it is written,
May the soul of my lord be bound up in the bundle of life in the care of the Lord
. But the souls of the wicked are perpetually confined [to the hollow of a sling] and an angel stands at one end of the universe and another angel stands at the other end of the universe and they sling the souls [of the wicked back and forth] to one another, as it is written,
But He will fling the souls of your enemies as from the hollow of a sling’
.”

21
Ari
   Acronymic name of Rabbi Isaac Luria (1534–1572), Jewish mystic and a major theorist of Kabbalah.

21
raising up the souls
   The four letters of the Hebrew word
mishnah
can be transposed to the word
neshamah
(soul).

23
the Kanah and the Peli’ah Sefer ha-peli’ah
   and
Sefer hakanah
are works of cosmogonic and theosophic speculation. Their authorship is uncertain, as are their date and country of origin. Some scholars place them in Spain of the late fourteenth century. Both works are marked by a strong antinomian strain.

23
will find the door open to him
   Babylonian Talmud tractate Menaḥot 29b and in other places with variants.

23
what will be in the end
   The allusion is to Mishnah Ḥagigah 2:1: “Whoever gives his mind to four things, it were better for him had he not come into this world: what is above, what is beneath, what was beforetime, and what will be in the hereafter.”

24
the superhuman sons of God
   See Genesis 6:1–4.

24
over the surface of the deep
   Genesis 1:2.

24
the domain of the qelipot
   Elhanan Shilo, in a private correspondence, notes that Agnon’s language here is citing Naftali Bacharach in his book expositing Lurianic Kabbakah,
Emek hamelekh
, 16:11.

24
induced its curse within him
   See Numbers 5:11–31, where the procedure prescribed for a woman suspected of adultery is detailed.

24
and an inner one Otzar hamidrashim
,
‘olam katan
, no. 4.

25
to sleep in one’s house all alone
   Babylonian Talmud tractate Shabbat 151b.

26
from transgression, says the Lord
   Isaiah 59:20.

27
his share in the world to come
   Babylonian Talmud tractates Bava Metziah 59a and Sanhedrin 107a.

28
than the flights of desire
   Ecclesiastes 6:9.

28
a compartment they call Tsalmavet
   The idea that Gehinnom is composed of different compartments is found in the Babylonian Talmud tractates Sotah 10b and ‘Eruvin 19a.

28
larger than Earth
   Job 11:9.

29
wrapped in silver-crowned talitot
   Exodus 12:37 and Numbers 11:21 report that 600,000 adult males went forth from Egypt. This number is made more precise in the censuses noted in Exodus 38:26 and Numbers 1:46, where the figure given is 603,550 adult males. Accordingly, when women and children are added, the total of those who left Egypt would be over two million. Thus the number of people implied here is astronomical.

29
chief rabbis and heads of yeshivot
   Chief rabbis or
Landesrabbiner
were regional head rabbis of districts and provinces in the countries of Central Europe. A Rosh Yeshivah is the head rabbi of a talmudical academy (Yeshivah).

29
Sabbath boundary
   The Sabbath boundary (
teḥum shabbat
) is the distance beyond the defined city limits that one is permitted to walk on the Sabbath, stipulated in rabbinic sources as two thousand cubits or about three-quarters of a mile.

31
has given to mankind
   Psalm 115:16.

31
Otem
   This name comes from the Hebrew root
‘atom
, to stop up, as in Proverbs 21:13
Who stops his ears at the cry of the wretched
.

31
what the living say
   Based on Babylonian Talmud tractate Berakhot 27b.

33
their own compartment of Gehinnom
   See Midrash Ecclesiastes Rabbah 3:9 for the idea that individuals of like profession or vocation are assigned to their own particular compartment of Gehinnom.

33
a candle of the Lord
   Proverbs 20:27.

34
whose transgression is forgiven
   Psalm 32:2.

34
forgives iniquity
   Exodus 34:6–7.

35
cross through your land
   Leviticus 26:6.

35
in accordance with Your word
   Psalm 119:28.

35
in rumbling hordes
   After the Khmelnitski massacres of 1648, there were serious invasions of Galicia by Tatars and Turks in the 1670s.

36
to get the atonement chickens
   The reference is to the
kaparot
(lit. expiations) ceremony performed by observant Jews on the morning of the day before Yom Kippur, in which the sins of an individual are symbolically transferred to a live fowl. The fowl—a rooster for a man, a hen for a woman—is swung around the head three times as biblical verses and a formula of vicarious atonement is recited. Money in the amount of the fowl’s value is often substituted for the fowl.

36
Book of the Angel Razi’el Sefer Razi’el hamalakh
, an early medieval book of instruction in magical lore and practices written in Hebrew and derived from the Jewish mystical tradition (Kabbalah). Its precise date and authorship are uncertain.

36
never asked anyone to get his staff for him
   Babylonian Talmud tractate Sotah 10a. The implication is that Samson not only did not take bribes
which blind the eyes of the wise
(Deuteronomy 16:19) but sought no favors of any kind from anyone.

36
recited the Torah blessings
   In the morning regimen, after the hands are washed and before the service proper, three short blessings concerning the giving and the study of Torah are recited, followed by readings from the Written Law (the Priestly blessing, Numbers 6:24–26) and the Oral Law (Mishnah Pe’ah 1:1) and the preliminary morning blessings.

37
who crowns Israel in glory
   One of the blessings preliminary to the morning service. The letters on the parchments inside the tefillin are, like those on the Torah scroll, typically embellished by the scribe with tiny filigreed crowns over them.

37
talmudic tractate Yevamot
   A key source for many of the laws pertaining to an agunah.

37
lasts for twelve months
   As stated by Rabbi Akiva in Mishnah ‘Eduyot 2:10.

37
worse than the heat of the sun
   These details of Gehinnom are drawn from various midrashic sources.

39
young men and women
   Psalm 148:12.

40
area forbidden to kohanim
   A
kohen
is required by Jewish law to remain in a state of ritual purity. Physical presence near a corpse or in a cemetery defiles him.

40
implored the Lord
   Exodus 32:11. On public fast days at the afternoon service, the prescribed reading from the Torah is Exodus 32:11–14 and 34:1–10. The
haftarah
(reading from the prophetic books of the Bible) is Isaiah 55:6–56:8.

40
to those already gathered
Isaiah 56:8.

41
resembled a silver goblet
Agnon is drawing here on the kabbalistic notion that the whiteness or the darkness of one’s hair reflects the nature and quality of the inner self. See Elhanan Shilo,
Hakabbalah biyetsirat Shai ‘Agnon
[The Kabbalah in the Works of S. Y. Agnon] Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University Press, 2011, Hebrew), p. 223ff.

42
there had been much persecution
   See above, note to page 16. Popular legend has it that Meir ben Isaac miraculously saved the Jewish community of Worms, and the
Akdamut
piyyut commemorates the event.

43
Tosafot note in tractate Gittin
   The talmudic tractate Gittin treats of the laws of divorce. Zevaḥim treats of the animal sacrifices offered in the Temple. The Rashi comment is found at Zevaḥim 45b. The Tosafot note is at Gittin 54b.

44
of My servant Moses
   Malachi 3:22.

44
in the Book of the Angel Razi’el Sefer Razi’el hamalakh
(Warsaw, n.d.), p. 22. Cited in Shilo,
Hakabbalah biyetsirat Shai ‘Agnon
, p. 321 note 107.

44
sacrifical offering in the Temple
   The
Tamid
offering, described in Numbers 28:1–8.

45
pray the whole day long
   Babylonian Talmud tractate Berakhot 21a.

46
standing here with me
   Deuteronomy 5:28.

46
shall a case be established
   Deuteronomy 19:15.

46
punishment for our transgressions
The reference is to Isaiah 40:2.

48
midrash on Songs of Songs
   Midrash Rabbah on Song of Songs 1:8. Some versions have a different numbering.

48
Midrash Tanhuma
   A collection of rabbinic midrash in several versions, dating uncertain.

49
It is prayer
   Babylonian Talmud tractate Ta’anit 2a. The biblical verses respectively are from Exodus 23:25 and Deuteronomy 11:13. The reference to Maimonides is a verbatim citation from his
Mishneh Torah
, the Laws of Prayer, 1.1.

49
mandated by the Torah itself
   Naḥmanides (R. Moses ben Naḥman, Ramban, 1194–1270) was a major Bible commentator and halakhist. Maimonides’
Book of the Commandments
(
Sefer hamizvot
) is a detailed catalogue of the 248 positive and 365 negative commandments on which Naḥmanides wrote critical glosses, this being among the most famous.

49
from the right earlock of the great teacher
   In Lurianic Kabbalah, the earlocks are metaphysical signifiers, the right one associated with the holy and the mystical, the left one with the mundane and the philosophical. Thus is Naḥmanides, a kabbalist, privileged over Maimonides. See Shiloh,
Hakabbalah biyetsirat Shai ‘Agnon
, pp. 226–228.

50
Gates of Light Sha‘arei ’orah
, a kabbalistic treatise by Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla (1248–ca. 1305), Fifth Gate, Sixth Sphere.

50
Midrash ha-ne‘elam
   The Esoteric Midrash—a kabbalistic text inserted into the main text of the Zohar.

50
Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer
   A late rabbinic midrash on Genesis, Exodus, and other parts of the Bible. It is ascribed to R. Eliezer ben Hyrcanus (late first, early second century) but is dated to the seventh or eighth century. The reference here is to the explication of Genesis 32:27ff. in chapter 37.

50
his fragrance rubbed off on my hand
   Talmudic tractate Zevaḥim 96b. The folk saying conveys the idea that one acquires luster through association with an eminent person.