a wondrous niggun,
a niggun without words,
a niggun that neither the Besht
nor anyone else
has ever sung before,
a niggun that
confers
hidden powers and privileges
that even angels and seraphim
do not possess;
he sings, the Besht,
and his face is shining,
for he is sure
that,
with this song,
he will be able
to break the chains
of evil
and malediction.
But
woe unto him
and woe unto us,
his niggun
is but a song of weakness,
a cry for help,
and not a weapon.
I know why this is so,
says the Besht
to the rabbi in the ghetto;
I know why
my powers have left me,
I know why:
my heart is heavy with pain,
too much pain,
and God dwells in joy—
in joy alone.
Help me,
young brother—
aren’t you a rabbi in Israel,
the way I was?
Help me drive my sadness away,
and you will see,
you will see what can be
accomplished
with joy,
help me bring joy
into my heart!
But
the rabbi in the ghetto,
overcome by sadness,
is unable to help the Besht.
Well, says the Besht, then
I shall do it alone.
Let us start from the beginning.
I want to be joyous,
exuberant,
I want to sing in ecstasy
and dance,
and dance with all my being,
and shout my happiness
of being Jewish,
of being God’s creature
participating in His work
and occupying His thought,
I want to open the gates of joy
and make it flood
the world below
and the world above,
and then
the murderer will be stopped
and the murder averted.
He tries, the Besht,
oh yes,
he tries hard,
he sings with all his strength,
he sings
and dances,
and calls for joy
to come
and take him
and free him
and us—
but
woe unto him
and woe unto us,
joy refuses to enter
his heart
and refuses to penetrate
his song.
Then the Besht,
his gaze extinguished,
admits his failure:
Forgive me
my young brother—
you are so near
and yet so far—
forgive me:
I am unable to help you—
someone does not want me
to help you.
Am I then to give up?
shouts the rabbi
in the ghetto.
No, says the Besht.
I must give up,
not you.
Be stronger than I am,
you are more needed
than I.
Nearing despair,
the rabbi knocks
at the gates
of the Besht’s neighbor
and friendly rival:
Rabbi Eliyahu,
he says,
you help me!
My community has appointed me
its judge—
and I am helpless.
And so the Gaon Eliyahu
closes his books
and breaks his isolation,
and looks at the rabbi.
The light in his eyes
is the same
as that which enveloped Sinai
long ago:
Who are you? he asks.
I am a rabbi.
Where do you come from?
To what book do you belong?
I live in a ghetto,
says the rabbi.
I have a question
which no one is ready or able to answer—
perhaps this is a question
to which there is no answer.
Impossible, says the Gaon of Vilna.
All questions have answers!
Have you looked well?
Have you consulted
the proper sources?
Have you studied the Poskim
and their rulings?
Have you scrutinized the right texts?
And found nothing?
No sign,
no hint?
No?
Well—let us see,
let me think…
Ten names,
you said
the enemy demands
ten names,
right?
Yes, I see,
wait,
I see what is to be done,
wait—
here is the answer,
take it!
And the Gaon Eliyahu of Vilna
hands him
a piece of paper;
and the rabbi of the ghetto
takes it
and reads it,
incredulous,
and reads it again
and again:
one name,
always the same,
written ten times—
Eliyahu,
Eliyahu,
Eliyahu of Vilna,
ten times,
as is written
his own name, ten times…
Shattered and moved,
the rabbi whispers:
Thank you,
thank you
for showing me the way.
Now the rabbi is happy,
almost happy,
but suddenly
he hears someone calling him
with a caressing voice. It is Levi,
Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev.
I do not like that solution,
says the Berditchever Rebbe;
it pushes you into solitude
and this displeases me.
A Jew is never alone,
you ought to know that.
Even when he dies,
he does not die alone.
Self-sacrifice is not the answer,
my young brother
and peer.
When a Jew thinks he is lost,
he must find himself
within the community of Israel;
it must be strengthened
by him
and not divided;
if the enemy wishes to kill,
let him kill—
and do not tell him
whom to kill.
Your role,
my young brother and colleague,
the role of rabbi
is to be with his Jews,
not facing them.
Should they be summoned
by God
or the enemy,
should they choose
to respond,
do as they do,
walk with them,
pray with them
or for them,
howl with them,
weep as they weep;
share their anguish
and their anger
as you have shared their joy;
see to it
that the sacrifice
imposed by the enemy
unites his victims
instead of separating them;
as rabbi,
there is only one call
you must issue:
Jews stay together,
Jews
stay together
as Jews.
And so,
the next morning,
the rabbi receives
the eldest of the ghetto
and solemnly
informs them
of his decision:
the enemy will kill—
but his victims
will not be
our victims;
we shall remain
together
and together
we shall confront the enemy
as one person
linked by the same breath.
A few hours later
the word goes around
the sick streets
of the ghetto
somewhere
in the East
under hostile
and cruel skies.
And shortly before dusk,
at the hour when,
on the other side,
Jews everywhere gather
in their houses of study
and prayer,
to recite with gratitude
the miraculous events
surrounding Mordechai
and Esther
and their Jewish friends,
the enemy drives the inhabitants
of the ghetto
into the courtyard
of the old synagogue,
where the oldest of the old Jews
is ordered to make his decision known:
Who are the ten martyrs?
Who shall live, who shall die?
Taking one step forward,
showing no fear,
his entire being reflecting
dignity,
the oldest of the old Jews
declares firmly:
None of us
deserves
more than the other
either to live
or to die.
He waits a moment,
a long moment,
as though he wanted
to add
an explanation,
but changes his mind;
he takes one step backward
and is already
surrounded
by friends and allies.
Is the enemy disappointed?
Impossible to tell.
He moves his sleepy gaze
over the inhabitants
of the ghetto: young and old,
learned and not,
men and women,
children and their teachers,
all are here.
Is the enemy satisfied
that no one is missing?
Impossible to tell.
He looks at his victims
and says
simply,
coldly:
In one hour,
exactly one hour,
you will all be
dead.
And all the Jews,
in a single movement,
turn toward their rabbi
as though to ask for confirmation:
Is it true?
Is it a dream perhaps?
A nightmare? A farce?
Some cry,
others smile,
staring into emptiness.
Let us be ready,
says the rabbi.
He does not say
ready for what;
everybody knows.
Let us recite the Vidui,
all together,
and then
Sh’ma Yisrael,
all together;
let the Almighty hear our appeal,
perhaps He doesn’t know
what is happening here below.
Therefore,
my friends,
my brothers,
we shall sing
loudly,
louder and louder,
do you hear me?
We shall sing so loud
that our song will fill
heaven and earth…
Some look at him
but do not understand;
others understand
but do not dare
to look at him;
there are those who wonder:
Sing?
You want us to sing,
rabbi?
Here? Now?
Yes! Now!
commands the rabbi.
I want you to sing now!
I am going to teach you
a song,
a niggun
that I have learned today—
a niggun meant
for this day!
And he begins to teach them
the niggun
that the Besht,
with his desperate fervor,
had sung for him
hours earlier.
And suddenly
the rabbi notices,
with joy mixed with anguish,
that the community,
his own,
is larger than he had thought.
From everywhere
Jews have come
to join it.
From Babylon
and Spain,
from Provence
and Morocco,
they have left the Talmud
to come here;
they have left the Tosafot
to come here;
they have left history
and legend
to be here,
present at this
upheaval of history;
they have left
their resting places
to come into this ghetto
to sing and dream
with these Jews
who are walking to their death.
Akiva and his disciples,
Bar Kochba and his warriors,
the sages
and the rebels,
the beggars and the princes,
the Holy Ari and his companions,
the Maggid and his disciples,
and the Gaon of Vilna,
strange,
he sings,
the Gaon of Vilna
sings the Besht’s niggun,
as does the entire community,
as does the Besht himself,
while weeping
and dancing,
and celebrating
the Jew’s loyalty
to his people
and to his song.
The enemy begins the massacre
but the niggun escapes him;
the slaughterer slaughters
but his victims,
one minute before their death,
aspire to immortality
and achieve it
with their song,
which does not,
cannot weaken,
cannot die:
it continues
and will continue,
until the end of time
and beyond.
Glossary
AKIVA (c. 50 CE–135 CE): One of the preeminent rabbinical scholars of the Mishnaic period (approximately the first two centuries of the Common Era) in the Land of Israel during its rule by the Roman Empire. He was executed by the Romans for refusing to stop teaching Torah to his students.
BAR KOCHBA (??–135 CE): Nom de guerre of Simon ben Kosevah, the military leader of the Judeans’ final, ultimately unsuccessful revolt against the Roman Empire’s rule; he kept the Roman Army at bay from his fortress in Betar for three and a half years. His nom de guerre, which means “son of a star,” was given to him by Rabbi Akiva, who at one time believed him to be the Messiah.
BESHT (c. 1698–1760): Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, also known as the Baal Shem Tov (“master of the good name”) or Besht (its acronym). A mystic born in what was then southeastern Poland (now part of Ukraine), he was the founder of Hasidism, a sect of Judaism that emphasizes the spiritual, mystical, ecstatic, and populistic aspects of Jewish religious philosophy and practices.
BNEI BRAK: A city in ancient Israel, believed to be northeast of what is now Tel Aviv. Initially mentioned in the biblical Book of Joshua, it was known as a center of biblical scholarship in the Mishnaic period. Also a city in Israel today, founded in 1924.
ESTHER (fifth century BCE): The eponymous heroine of the biblical Book of Esther. The Jewish wife of Ahasuerus (believed to be Xerxes I), a fifth-century BCE king of the Persian Empire, she famously and dramatically saved the Jews of the empire from government-mandated genocide by revealing her Jewish origins to her husband in the presence of Haman, the king’s vizier and anti-Semitic architect of the genocidal decree. Established the holiday of Purim with her cousin, Mordechai. See also HAMAN, MORDECHAI, and PURIM.
GAON OF VILNA; RABBI ELIYAHU (1720–1797): Rabbi Eliyahu ben Shlomo Zalman was the Lithuanian-born preeminent biblical scholar, Talmudic commentator, and decisor of Jewish law in eighteenth-century Europe. His scholarship influenced generations of rabbis who came after him.
HAMAN (fifth century BCE): The anti-Semitic vizier of the Persian king Ahasuerus and the villain in the Purim story, as narrated in the biblical Book of Esther. Haman was the driving force behind Ahasuerus’s decree of genocide against the Jews of the Persian Empire; his plot was foiled by Esther, the king’s Jewish wife, and he and his ten sons were hung on the gallows he had prepared for Mordechai. See also ESTHER, MORDECHAI, and PURIM.