Two Scholars Who Were in Our Town and Other Novellas Read Online Free PDF Page A

would bless themselves and say, “May we be worthy to have sons like him.”
    8.
    Here it should be told that at that time his mother’s income from leasing the mill had run out. And with the end of the mother’s income came the end of the son’s sustenance. However, relief anddeliverance came from another place. Residents of the town began bringing him their sons and paying him tutoring fees. It’s been said that Reb Shlomo had dropped a hint that people ought to seek wisdom from such a scholar. Reb Moshe Pinchas selected three or four talented pupils and taught them Talmud and its commentaries, earning enough for his own needs and even enough to give to his mother. From this time on he no longer had to go to the village and didn’t have to waste time on traveling back and forth. And where did his mother hear Kiddush and Havdalah? Thank God, even in villages there are Jews, and a Jew’s door is always open to all who want to hear hallowed words.
    Moshe Pinchas found lodging in a certain tailor’s house, and the tailor even made him a new suit, not of fine silk like that of Reb Shlomo, but nonetheless sufficiently respectable. The other artisans saw this and were envious of the tailor. The milliner went and made him a new hat and the cobbler made him shoes. One Sabbath eve, when Moshe Pinchas went to the bathhouse, they took his hat and shoes and replaced them with the new ones they’d made. Moshe Pinchas was dressed in new clothes, new shoes and a new hat so that his entire appearance was transformed. His pupils, who recognized his erudition in Torah, began to referring to him as Rabbi Moshe Pinchas, and it goes without saying that the tailors and the rest of the artisans were very proud of this great scholar who had ensconced himself in their house of prayer. And every artisan who had a daughter used to gaze upon him and say “May it be God’s will that he become my son-in-law.” Mercifully, one affluent man beat them to it. Reb Meirtche, the son of Shaindele the Righteous. Reb Meirtche had a fabric store and an only daughter. He lavished upon his daughter a dowry of one hundred and fifty coins of pure silver, thereby landing Moshe Pinchas. And from this we can learn that all the idle talk of the gossip mongers was unfounded, because when the time comes for a man to marry. his match will surely be found.
    Once Reb Moshe Pinchas was married he was able to stand with the great ones and discourse with the Torah elders like all the other tallit wearers. And yet he didn’t leave his place or alter his customary behavior. Since his father-in-law took care of his every need, he dismissed his pupils and returned to solitary study, and didn’t budge from his studies except on Sabbath eve. And even on the eve of the Sabbath he didn’t stay home all night. Even before the sun rose, he would return to his place of study. In summertime he would study in the Tailors’ Synagogue and in the winter, when there was no lit stove there, he would move himself over to the old study house. The simple folk and even some of the students began to refer to him as Rabbi Moshe Pinchas even when not addressing him. Reb Moshe Pinchas didn’t pay attention to this honorific. His entire sense of worth derived from sating himself on Talmud and rabbinical Codes.
    9.
    About Reb Moshe Pinchas there isn’t much to tell for the moment. He was invested heart and soul in the Talmud, its commentators, and the commentaries on the commentators. He would complete one Tractate and immediately embark upon another.
    But about Reb Shlomo there is what to tell. The Emperor’s troops arrived in the town’s environs for training exercises, with the Archduke in command. It occurred to the community elders that should the Archduke come to town he would surely visit the Great Synagogue to bestow honor on the Jews. And here there was no one who knew how to give a proper sermon, particularly not in the vernacular. For in those days our town languished without a