The Oath Read Online Free PDF Page B

responsible for Kolvillàg. But I shall have to be careful not to go afield, not to trespass. I shall have to watch myself more than before, to be certain that in speaking of the dead, I shall not betray them.
    In his anguish, Azriel closes his eyes, only to see, almost immediately, a wide-eyed adolescent who questions: Where were you? What did you bring back from your explorations? Why this quizzical look? You are here, that is all that matters; the rest is commentary. As long as you respond to the call, everything seems possible. One day you will no longer come andI shall be alone, irrevocably alone, a lonely wanderer like you, often a stranger in my own memories, where all passers-by resemble one another, as I resemble you. One day you will no longer come and it will be the end. I will no longer call.
    He gropes through his recollections, divides them, chooses them; he questions familiar and strange faces and sinks deeper and deeper into the singed memory of a boy who finds himself in Kolvillàg, alone at first, terribly alone, and then surrounded by the living and the dead, and all rebuke him for having brought a stranger, an intruder.
    Quickly, let us leave. Not a moment to lose. Let us slip away immediately. Without asking for forgiveness, without even explaining that we entered inadvertently. Quickly, let us surface again.
    “I am cold,” says Azriel.
    The town was burning but he was cold.
    “I was younger than you. Sick, more than you. Alone, much more alone than you. I had just left my family, or rather, they had just left me. I had nobody to lean on. My possessions were few: a Book filled with symbols, a memory filled with images. Like you, I was adrift, floating in time …”
    Azriel pauses, bitten by remorse. Be careful! You are coming too close to the forbidden zone! And your oath, are you forgetting your oath? Do you want to get yourself excommunicated after so many years? Destroy everything now? Better to have done it right away. Anyway, that is what you wanted, wasn’t it?
    “Rebbe, what am I to do? Advise me, guide me. The night ahead of me is black and dense, it opens unto horror and ashes. Where do I fit in? What is my duty? To whom do I owe allegiance … Rebbe, I beseech you, don’t turn away from my plea!”
    We were alone in the room. Outside, in the antechamber, thirty-six followers were awaiting their turn to enter and pour out their troubles: health, family, business. Among them were those who, yearning for fervor, complained of their excessive serenity; then there were those who told of recurring storms that caused them to lose their footing, too often for their liking. Yes, he knew how to listen, Rebbe Zusia of Kolomey. You entrusted him with your soul and he gave it back to you assuaged. To him you could reveal what you tried to conceal from yourself: your fears and regrets, the temptations repressed and the sins already committed. I alone was unable to make him lend an ear. He gazed and gazed at me and I was shaken.
    But let me tell you about this Rebbe Zusia of Kolomey, who, to be sure, did not reside in Kolomey. Disciple of a Master blessed by the Seer of Lublin, he had steadfastly refused the rabbinical crown; all he wanted was to study and meditate. He used to say: “I am too weak, too poor to change mankind or even to help any community whatsoever; I am barely able to protect my own soul.” To the Elders arguing that they needed a Master, he quipped: “What about me? Don’t you think I need one too?” And he went on: “You may think that I have resolved my difficulties and disarmed my assailants. Or that I have reached the end of the tunnel, and sure of myself, am heading straight for the light of dawn. But no! Not at all! I am seeking, and seeking, and that is all I can do.” To which they replied somewhat shyly and only half seriously: “Precisely, Rebbe. We don’t even know how to seek.” In the end they crowned him against his will. “You will rule over us; such is