Chapter VII

His warmth toward Zionism had disappeared. That is to say, his attitude toward Zionism had not retained a single ounce of anything positive, although on the other hand, at this point nothing negative had yet sprouted. As a result, he felt even more desolate and gloomy than he would have if he had been ready to declare his opposition.

He also had to bear the disagreeable experience of being bombarded from all sides with questions—with demands that he account for his sudden transformation.

But it was difficult for him to explain, because in fact the unpleasant things he had witnessed provoked his withdrawal from Zionism only indirectly. It was as if a single bullet had been fired, which in and of itself would not have caused much damage—but that single bullet flew right into a powder keg, where it set off a catastrophe. Just so, his direct encounter with the empty spectacle of the Zionist functionaries and their entire party apparatus, had torn open a sealed chamber in his heart full of hidden feelings—his innermost “I”—which was not in the least attuned to the Zionist ideal, and which rendered the bond which had bound him to the Zionists for a short while, unnatural.

As time passed, his own worldview would crystallize—in complete opposition to Zionism. But as of yet, all was still murky. He was visited by a sudden presentiment, which muttered to him that relief for the Jews would not be found in Zionism—but he could not articulate this to others, and as a result fell into despair for quite a while after the London Congress. He felt impotent and could not concentrate on anything.

He was also quite downhearted about the fact that he had previously attacked the Orthodox opponents of Zionism, including the most senior big-city rabbis. He had needlessly provoked their rage—the rage of the Orthodox world’s greatest authorities. He also began to feel a prick of conscience: Who knows? Perhaps these rabbis were more perspicacious than he, and had immediately recognized the problems which had taken him longer to grasp….

The Sensitive Rabbi traveled to a nearby city, one of the centers of Orthodox opposition to Zionism, in order to find out to what extent his onslaught against the Orthodox had been unfounded: had he attacked the innocent? However, once there, his doubts were laid to rest. These Orthodox hadn’t the faintest idea about the truly repulsive aspects of Zionism that he himself had uncovered. When it came to Herzl’s dog-and-pony show—his “audiences with royalty”—they too were quite impressed. Even here in B. they were smacking their lips over the lunches he had eaten with the Sultan in Constantinople. As a result, they did not dare speak against Dr. Herzl himself, and primarily cast their fire and brimstone upon the local Zionists for their lack of piety. For these Orthodox, everything boiled down to their obsession with pointing fingers at the “sinful” . . .

This discovery relieved him of his prick of conscience. He returned home much encouraged, and once again capable of constructing his spiritual vision, in which the fight against human evil occupied pride of place.

Chapter VIII

He understood then, however, that he would not be able to throw in his lot with any party—that he would not find his place in any of the movements currently in existence, even though they supposedly shared his goal of repairing the world.

Even when it came to the socialist movement, which at first glance was more in accordance with his views than any of the other parties because of its emphasis on freedom and equality—he nevertheless could not devote himself to it because of its three enormous faults: First, its dedication to the tactical principle that “the ends justify the means”—the movement did not forswear violence. Second, it set aside the sacred—the main quality which renders a person noble and his life sweet—and laid everything at the feet of coarse materialism. Third, it operated in service of “special interests” rather than ideals. The members of the movement testified to this trait with their endless refrain, “We the proletariat,” and their ever-present plaint in response to any social ill: “After all, that could cause injury to the working class . . .”

The latter fault, by the way, was endemic to all the parties, which, like the notorious missionaries, went around searching for ways to capture as many souls as possible for their own camp. Whom else could the parties consist of, if not the “interested”? After all, it’s not as if a simple man of flesh and blood, who one minute earlier was going around looking for a morsel to put in his mouth and jabbing his elbow into the ribs of any fellow he encountered on the road, could turn into an idealist the minute he was sprinkled with the party paintbrush. ^{3 3} See part 1, footnote 25.

Thus, having recovered somewhat from the disappointment of London, the Sensitive Rabbi withdrew entirely into himself and began to orchestrate a singular “liberation campaign” from the Torah-Jewish perspective—a perspective which knows nothing of “class,” of “politics,” of “cultivating social organization” (busying oneself endlessly with combing out society’s tangled locks)—but knows, rather, of the cultivation of the human heart, the rectification of the human character—as a natural result of which society’s locks will not become tangled in the first place . . .

The words “as a natural result” are emphasized here because according to the Torah-Jewish perspective on freedom, “society” is a matter of secondary importance: the central matter is the liberation of the individual. And thus the urgency of the rectification of the heart—because the liberation of the individual depends on the refinement of his moral-ethical sense. Having a clear conscience, scorning evil utterly, means—being a free person.

The greatest specialist ^{4 4} i.e., Hillel the Elder. of Jewish moral literature, of the Jewish perspective on freedom, justifies his prozbul reform in the Mishna ^{5 5} A legal reform that weakened the Biblical requirement to forgive all debts in the sabbatical year, which increased the willingness of creditors to lend money to the poor in the latter years of the sabbatical cycle (see Mishna Gittin 4:3 and Shevi’it 10:3). not by pointing out that it enables the needy to obtain loans—but rather with the warning that “thine eye be evil against thine needy brother, and thou give him nought.” ^{6 6} Deuteronomy 15:9, rendered here simply in Yiddish: “People will become cruel, and not wish to do favors.” Tamares probably raises this here (and points out Hillel’s concern about the effect of generosity, or the lack thereof, on the giver rather than the receiver) in order to emphasize that morality is in the best interest of the moral person himself, and to underscore his emphasis on the well-being of the individual, rather than the benefit for society.

Chapter IX

From the London disappointment onwards, the Sensitive Rabbi dedicated his full attention to the matter of “liberation via the development of disdain for evil.” He sat cloistered in his private corner, secluded from the world, and authored books on the subject. From time to time he also came out with passionate newspaper articles. These were prompted by impure incidents which affronted his moral-aesthetic sensibility and his yearning for the Jewish world to be ethically immaculate.

Through this work, he became the theoretician of the “moral approach” to the fight for freedom.

For the world, i.e., for others, he was no more than a theoretician—but for himself, for the purposes of his own liberation, he gradually became an experimentalist as well. Over time, he carved out for himself thorough autonomy in his conduct. He became a truly free man in all of life’s endeavors.

His process of self-liberation was greatly assisted by the location of his residence: the little town with its beautiful pinewood forest. It was in the forest (where he spent most of his time during the summers)—in the company of his most intimate friends, the beautiful evergreen trees, and under the open skies—that he perfected his own training in the theory of morality and freedom: he penned most of his work in the forest. And the small town in which he lived left him free to conduct his life according to his principles.

The gentle stream of life in a small town, with its modest population, negligible wealth, and distance from high society, did not have the power to compel him to conform to local custom—in contrast to the big city, with its rushing river of people who, however negligible they may be as far as “quality” is concerned (and in fact each one is generally worth much less than the average townsperson), are nevertheless quite a hit on the social stage: “aristocrats,” “politicians,” “dignitaries,” and the like. And to break free of their influence is an enterprise unto itself.

At home in the small town, he could live his life like a regular freewheeler. Not only did he fling off the societal customs and fashions that did not accord with his ideals, but he even refused to bother with objectionable matters that supposedly fell under his purview as the local rabbi.

A few telling examples: When a couple of fellows came to him for a din-Torah, ^{7 7} Din-torah: a religious court case (here, as a means of resolving a business dispute). he would tell them the ruling straightaway according to the Choshen Mishpat ^{8 8} A field in Jewish law (in particular, the eponymous sections of legal tractates Shulchan Aruch and Arba’ah Turim) having to do with business transactions and financial ethics. —who was the winner and who the loser. But if the winning party started up with demands that the Sensitive Rabbi use his rabbinic position to compel the losing party to fork over the penalty, he categorically refused further involvement, based on his principle that a rabbi should not act as a policeman, particularly in financial conflicts, in which justice is not necessarily on the side of the party in whose favor the case is decided.

And once, a young, childless man who lived in the town collapsed and lay at death’s door. The young man’s wife’s uncles and aunts, accompanied by a whole gaggle of local do-gooders, rushed to the rabbi to demand that he order the invalid to give his wife a bill of divorce. ^{9 9} Probably in order to release her from the obligation of levirate marriage or halitzah after his death (see Shulchan Aruch, Even HaEzer 145). But he dismissed their suggestion out of hand. He had no intention of pursuing such a “gallant” act—what, he should berate a dying man, saying “Since you’re dying anyway, set your wife free so that she can marry someone else”?!

Another time, a group of “god-fearing” householders came to him to suggest that it was time to replace the local ritual slaughterer, considering that he was elderly and there was reason to suspect that his hands trembled. ^{10 10} i.e., during the act of slaughtering animals, which raised suspicions that he was not able to fulfill his role in accordance with the laws of kashrut. The Sensitive Rabbi answered them saying, “It’s better to eat defiled meat than to defile the livelihood of one of our own kosher citizens . . . ”

On account of his attachment to the autonomy that he enjoyed in the small-town environment, he refused the frequent invitations that he received to apply for rabbinic posts in big cities. But the main reason he rejected such opportunities was that he was a villager by birth, and he was drawn to his roots, to the wild lap of nature. That wish was fully satisfied for him in the pinewood forests of Milejczyce, which by the way had become almost like a hometown to him, considering that he was married there at the tender age of seventeen and proceeded to live there for the rest of his days. As far as he was concerned, life in the boiling kettle of the metropolis with its stifling air would amount to pure hell.

In the year 5672, ^{11 11} 1911 or 1912. when the Rav Tza’ir ^{12 12} Chaim Tchernowitz, 1871-1949. was on the verge of moving to Berlin from Odessa (on account of the persecution he was suffering there at the hands of the mayor), he sent letter after letter to the Sensitive Rabbi begging him to move to Odessa to assume the leadership of the yeshiva he had founded and operated there for several years. The Sensitive Rabbi was not easily won over. But in the end, he did not dare to snub the Rav Tza’ir, who implored him in his last letter to come to Odessa to take a look, at the very least: “Perhaps you will unexpectedly develop enthusiasm for the prospect.”

So he agreed to go. Halfway through the journey, he had to change trains. He boarded the second train, and found himself in the same compartment as a madman who was being transported somewhere by a couple of attendants. The madman sat and sang, drawing the attention of the entire compartment. As soon as he caught sight of the Sensitive Rabbi, he started shouting, “A rabbi, a rabbi!” and raised a ruckus in an attempt to get the rabbi to sit next to him. In order to placate the madman, which by then all the other passengers were begging him to do, he was compelled to stand up from the seat where he was already settled and reseat himself next to the madman. But the madman’s corner was right next to the little furnace which glowed hot and spat fumes, and the “Sensitive Rabbi” suffered greatly from the poor air quality. While he was sitting there, he wondered whether this experience mightn’t be symbolic of his visit to Odessa in general . . .

He arrived in Odessa and stopped off at the residence of the Rav Tza’ir, who invited the gabbaim from the yeshiva to come over to get acquainted with the guest-candidate. However, the latter announced immediately upon entering that he was only there for a temporary visit, for the sole purpose of explaining to Rabbi Chaim Tchernowitz and his attendants his reasons for turning down the position.

And that is exactly what he did. For the entire ten days of his visit (the other purpose of his trip was to hurry along the “Moriah” press, which was in the process of publishing one of his works), various parties—the Torah scholars as much as the literati—campaigned for him to move to Odessa and scolded him endlessly, saying, “How is it right for a person to hide himself away in a small town for all of eternity?”

The Sensitive Rabbi paraded various excuses before each of them. He told one person that the condition of his health would not permit such an undertaking; that is, living in the big city and teaching a yeshiva class. To one of the yeshiva-gabbaim who would not leave him alone, he said, “You tell me how to convince myself to accept a change in my circumstances. In Milejczyce, every wall of my house contains a window through which the broad blue heavens peek in at me. Here in the yeshiva, on the other hand, three out of four walls are windowless, and the one and only window in the fourth wall offers a view of nothing but the soot-covered ramparts of the building opposite.” But the gabbai, a prominent banker who owned many estates in the city as well as a luxurious summer villa in the country, made a laconic and logical reply (the kind of logic that underpins the Procrustean beds into which such fellows magnanimously invite the poor): “Tsk! So the big city is full of tumult. What do you care? You will dwell within the ‘four cubits of halacha.’” ^{13 13} See Talmud Bavli, Berakhot 8a. “And in this crowded city, I’ll be forced to dwell within four cubits of physical space, too,” thought the Sensitive Rabbi to himself.

To “Grandfather Mendele” ^{14 14} Mendele Moykher Sforim (Sholem Yankev Abramovich), 1836-1917. (who also tried to persuade him to move to Odessa) he told the story of the encounter with the madman on the train, saying that he was certain that the incident was a kind of mystical omen about the meaning of his visit: “Madmen have latched onto me and want me near them, even though I will suffer a lot here and find it crowded and boring . . . ” “Grandfather Mendele” was quite taken with the fable, even though the joke was on him. But nevertheless, he didn’t let up in his pursuit.

Only one person, Bialik, who was also originally among the agitators, eventually decided to leave him alone. On Bialik he tried the tactic of rebuke. “You too?” he asked. “Even you have no sensitivity to the soul of your fellow?” This reproach silenced Bialik on the spot. Had the Sensitive Rabbi chosen the right words to awaken empathy in Bialik’s poetic heart for his own aching soul? Or perhaps it was Bialik’s internal “natural man” (Bialik was also born in a village) who raised a sudden protest from his secret hiding place: “Listen up, you! Why are you bothering the country bumpkin? Is it not enough that you yourself betrayed the forests and fields, and fled to the big city to stare at the sooty walls and rub shoulders with the rich and famous? Must you also press him to do the same?”

But the rest of his recruiters refused to relent. By the end of his visit, he was nearly ill from the rain of reproof showered upon him for “hiding himself away in a small town” by those who wanted to make him “a man among men”.... He escaped from Odessa with difficulty, and fled home to his beloved friends, the trees of the forest. Good people had tried to tear him away from them, and he cast himself upon them with even more love than before.

Chapter X

As time wore on, The Sensitive Rabbi further developed his principle: instead of repairing the world, it was better to focus on repairing the individual—polishing the faculty of discernment between good and evil. And if the essential goal was to repair the individual—why, that in and of itself was no small task. And the individual whom he had on hand at all times in the forest—that is, his own “I”—was, needless to say, a world unto itself . . .

He dedicated himself primarily to improving his own spiritual well-being—finding his way toward full freedom of conscience, so that he would not be towed under by the vagaries of fashion or unduly influenced by the mainstream.

However, his withdrawal into his internal world was not an indication that he had despaired of tikkun olam, or believed that the world was a lost cause. On the contrary: he believed that the redemption of the world, its rebirth in a better form, was bound to come. But at the same time, he was firmly convinced that the renewal of the world would not come at the hands of sly politicians or a clever rearrangement of society—but rather through the refinement of moral-aesthetic taste, a sense of discernment between good and evil. And because that approach was rooted first and foremost in the individual “I”— in order to be a freedom-fighter it was not at all necessary to live in a central city among the cramped masses, or to carry out demonstrations in the street. Rather, one could dwell in the tiniest village, or even in the forest, and still pursue the liberation of the world.

And indeed, the Sensitive Rabbi dwelt in his small village among his friends, the trees of the forest, and fought in his own way for human freedom. Day by day, he sharpened his commitment to integrity and his revulsion toward depravity. He also strove to cultivate a morally pure atmosphere in his immediate circles. Occasionally he burst out with attempts at “disinfection,” sometimes even venturing farther afield: whenever a rumor about a case of persecution made its way to him from somewhere else in the region—in particular when he heard that one victim had been beset by a whole gang of tormentors—he would whip up batches of fierce letters condemning the hooliganism . . .

But his primary occupation was writing books whose theme and purpose was to arouse integrity and discourage evil conduct. He also frequently published articles in the press. This he did whenever an incident which took place in the world struck a chord in his heart. ^{15 15} Author’s footnote: “See in the omitted portion.” (See Luz p. 13 n. 16: “It appears that the author intended to add here a footnote containing particulars about his articles, but ultimately did not do so.”)

In the year 5664 ^{16 16} 1903 or 1904. he printed a pamphlet entitled “Judaism and Freedom,” in which he laid out a sharply sarcastic critique of a “nationalism” that was empty of any Jewish content, and stemmed merely from a slavish desire to imitate the goyim. The same pamphlet ridiculed the Zionist dog-and-pony show, with its sensationalization of Herzl’s success at clawing his way up to “audiences” with “all the king’s horses and all the king’s men.”

In 5672 ^{17 17} 1912 he published “The Ethics of Torah and Judaism,”a collection of sermons which he had delivered on various occasions, elaborating his particular worldview and the ample spiritual and ethical resources which serve as the foundation of Judaism. The sermons depicted the Torah as a source of illumination, and reprimanded those who sullied and crippled the Commandments of the Torah by exploiting them for their own debased ends.

That same year, he published his book Correct Piety and the Religion of the Masses, ^{18 18}HaEmunah HaTehorah vehaDat HaHamonit, Odessa. which treated the same theme as the sermon collection, but in a literary form. The ideas discussed in the book prompted a massive protest against the plans that were underway at the time in certain Orthodox circles to collaborate with the Czarist government and other Russian reactionary forces for the sake of hizuk hadat. ^{19 19} Hizuk hadat: “Strengthening of the faith”—in this case, meaning that Orthodox leaders hoped to induce the Czarist regime to back policies that would counter the trend toward secularization in the Jewish community, and in return, the Orthodox leadership promised to support the regime’s crackdown on revolutionary activity, among other things. See Vladimir Levin, “Orthodox Jewry and the Russian Government: An Attempt at Rapprochement, 1907–1914,” East European Jewish Affairs, 39(2),187-204, especially p. 191, as well as p. 189, where Levin points out that there was even an Orthodox political party called Mahzikei Hadat.