Golem

They had been in haste, that was Shira’s lasting memory of those times, those days. Two years had passed since her first blood, barely two years since the morning when her mother had noticed a stain on her night shirt, raised her eyes to whisper a short blessing, and said with affection: “Look out,” then slapped her in the face before adding: “Now you are a woman, may you always be rosy-cheeked, like blood and milk.” They had hastened, because now the blood was flowing within her in harmony with the moon, and this brought her into the sphere of both adult and sacred, mysterious matters. Her mother and father had hastened, because a daughter is indeed a gift from the Eternal, but also a burden; they had hastened, although, or maybe because, there was no lack of devout young Jews in the neighbouring towns whose family merits, whether books of responsa and moral works written by fathers who were rabbis, or the healing powers and prophetic visions of fathers who were tsaddiks, or the shtibls and yeshivas funded by fathers who were merchants, and above all the fortunes they’d amassed, had secured them seats of honor by the eastern wall of the synagogue, and from almost the time of her first blood, as if they had heard about it from somewhere, as if they had learned about it from the rising and setting of the moon, they had been sending their offers to Nachman, the Liściska matchmaker, for after all, the daughter of the saintly Reb Gershon, who as a tsaddik lived modestly, but was famous for his wisdom and righteousness, was a splendid match. They had hurried, all those rabbis, tsaddiks, and merchants, the fathers of frail boys, who had only just relaxed following their bar mitzvahs and begun to put on tefillin, only just managed to sprout their first moustache, had not yet entirely forgotten the pain in their backs and rears from the lashes of the melamed’s birch, and were already on the market for marriage.

Also in haste was the rival family that Nachman praised the most ardently, singing genuine paeans in its honour, as a matchmaker should, though in fact he was only doing it in keeping with time-honoured tradition, because Reb Gershon was well acquainted with Reb Eliezer Golan ben Akiva, a wealthy tsaddik from Zasławie, the father of six children, and when his offer came, he did not hesitate to accept it. Fourteen-year-old David must have been hastening too, Reb Eliezer’s second-to-youngest son, whom they had decided that Shira would marry. In fact the haste did not concern the wedding, which could wait, so much as the engagement, which would be harder and worse to break off than the marriage, so another two years went by before they first set eyes on one another. During this time, all she could do was imagine him, and so she did, thus conquering the impassable distance separating her from her betrothed, only a three-day journey by britzka, but also several hundred years of tradition, which forbade them to meet. She listened out for rumors from Zasławie, with flushed cheeks she tried questioning her mother, sister, and brothers, and approached visitors who came from there to ask if perhaps any of them was familiar with David, if they had seen what he looked like, heard how he spoke, and knew if he was handsome, wise, and godly. She would glance bashfully for comparison at the young Hasidic boys milling around the yard. She wore the silver ring that David had sent her, and when one of his brothers arrived, she asked him to read her the letter that came with this prenuptial gift, which must have been dictated to the Zasławie scribe, for not even a tsaddik’s son would be able to write easily in...