Naftu?a nods.
“What will the goyim think now?” Moshko from Satanów asks. “To them we’re all the same. A Jew is a Jew, and it’s going to look to them like all Jews are like those. That all Jews treat the cross in such a sacrilegious way. That they abuse it so. We know what will happen, it’s happened before—before we can explain ourselves, they will have ushered us into the torture chamber.”
“Perhaps the matter should have been kept within the fold?” asks the dripping rabbi. “It could have been talked over quietly and handled prudently then.”
But there is no more “fold.” It is impossible to resolve anything with them, because they, too, insist with all their might. And they have the protection of such powerful persons as Bishop Dembowski (at the mention of this name there is an uneasy shuffling) as well as Bishop So?tyk (at this the majority of the rabbis stare down at the dark floor, and one of them sighs plaintively).
“So maybe it would in fact be better,” wise Rapaport goes on, “if we washed our hands of this filth altogether, let the royal courts roll around in the mud with them—from now on, we will maintain that we have nothing to do with those renegades. For are they even still Jews?” he asks dramatically.
There is a moment of tense silence.
“They are no longer Jews, since they are adherents of Sabbatai, may his name be erased for all eternity,” he concludes, and it sounds like a curse.
Yes, after those words, Pinkas feels relieved. He’s let out all the rotten air and is now taking in a big fresh breath. The discussion lasts until midnight. Pinkas, taking the minutes, listens closely to all the things that come between the phrases worth his writing down.
The herem is issued the next day. Now Pinkas has his hands full. The letter about the herem has to be copied out many times and sent as quickly as possible to all the kahalim. In the evening, he delivers it to the little Jewish printshop near the market square in Lwów. Late at night he returns home, where his young wife greets him with reproaches, being irritable as usual on account of the twins, who, she says, are sucking the life out of her.
Of the Seder HaHerem, or the order of the curse
The curse boils down to a few words pronounced in a certain order and at a certain time, all to the sound of the shofar. This occurs in a synagogue in Lwów, by the light of black wax candles, by an open holy ark. Readings from the Torah include Leviticus 26:14–46 as well as Deuteronomy 28:15–68, and then the candles are extinguished, and everything gets frightening, just as divine light has ceased to shine onto the cursed ones from this point forward. The voice of one of the three judges conducting the ceremony carries across the whole of the synagogue, disperses over the great crowd of the faithful:
“We hereby proclaim to all who are gathered here that we have long since been informed of the hideous views and acts of Yankiele Leybowicz of Korolówka, and we have made repeated attempts to bring him back from the path of evil. Being unable, however, to reach his hardened heart, and receiving every day some new bit of information on his heresies and activities, having witnesses to hand, the rabbinical council has determined that Yankiele Leybowicz of Korolówka must be cursed and cast out of Israel.”
Pinkas, who stands in the very center of those gathered and can almost feel the warmth of the bodies of the other men, shuffles uneasily. Why are they calling the cursed man Yankiele Leybowicz instead of Jacob Frank, negating, in a way, everything that has happened lately? Suddenly Pinkas has the worrying suspicion that in cursing Yankiele Leybowicz, they are leaving Jacob Frank unscathed. Doesn’t the curse go after the name, like a trained hunting dog told to fetch? What if the curse, addressed wrongly, doesn’t make it to the right man? Perhaps a person could, by changing his name, his residence, country, and language, escape the herem, that weightiest of condemnations? Whom are they cursing? The wayward troublemaker? Or the kid who seduced and pulled off petty schemes?
Pinkas knows that according to the Scriptures a person upon whom herem has been placed should die.
He sticks out his shoulders and pushes his way to the front, whispering all around: “Jacob Frank, not Yankiele Leybowicz.” Or the one and the other. At last, those standing nearest understand what Pinkas means. There is a slight commotion, and in the end the rabbi goes on with the herem, his voice growing more plaintive and more terrible, until the men who are listening hunch over, and the women in the women’s courtyard cry in alarm in the face of this horrifying mechanism called forth as though from the darkest cellar, a kind of soulless giant made of clay that now will be in force forever, impossible to revoke.
“We curse and condemn and cast off Yankiele Leybowicz, also known as Jacob Frank, with the same words with which Joshua cursed Jericho, with which Elisha cursed his children, as well as with the words of all the curses written in the Book of Second Law,” says the rabbi.
A murmur rises up all around, and it’s not clear if it is of regret or if it is of pleasure, but it is as though it has come not from people’s lips, but rather from within their robes, from the bottoms of their pockets, from their wide sleeves, from the cracks in the floor.
“Let him be cursed by day and cursed by night. Cursed when he goes to bed and when he gets up, when he enters his home and when he leaves it. May you never forgive him, Lord, and may you never recognize him! May your anger burn from here on out against this man, may you weigh him down with all your curses, and may his name be erased from the Book of Life. We warn all never to exchange a word with him, in conversation or in writing, never to grant him any favors, never to be under one roof with him, not to be within four cubits of him, and not to read any document dictated by him or written in his hand.”
The words die down, transforming into something almost solid, a creature made of air, an indefinable and enduring being. The synagogue is closed, and they all head home in silence. Meanwhile, far away, in another place, Jacob sits surrounded by his people; he is a little tipsy, and he doesn’t notice a thing; nothing around him has changed, nothing has happened, except, perhaps, an abrupt swoon of the candlelight.
Of Yente, who is always present and sees all