Heavens, how stern and pious a Jew this Rabbi Akiba was! Scarcely his
peer to be found in all Judea.
He devoted all his days and all his nights to the Holy Law, studying
it himself and expounding it to others. The number of his disciples
was a veritable army, and whoever heard the Torah from his lips felt
that he drank from the very source of life.
Not only did he teach the Torah’s word, but also how to live its very
spirit, how to purge oneself of gaiety; for laughter, play and mirth
all led to sin.
He, too, dwelt in all simplicity, renouncing every earthly pleasure.
He was deeply in love with his wife, the beautiful Rachel, the wise
and learned daughter of Kalba-Sabua. But in order to belong entirely
to the Torah he even parted from his sweet beloved and became an
ascetic.
This was a sore burden to him. He longed deeply for his wife, and he
was still a man in the very prime of life. In order not to weaken,
and to make sure of maintaining this separation and his pious
seclusion, he made a vow to himself that he should not return to his
wife until he acquired twelve thousand disciples. This he did because
he held that an oath was as a wall around holy retirement. He would
have to keep his word and his absence from his wife would thus be
ensured.
This fortitude, however, caused him to be unrelenting toward
every one else. What he could do, all must be able to do. And he
demanded of all the strictest abstention from the sins of the flesh,
excoriating with barbed words the desire for women in the hearts of
men.
Whereupon the weaklings—those who could not withstand the woman-lust
in their hearts and were wracked by the sins of the flesh—spoke thus
of Akiba:
“Merely because he was able to part from his wife is no proof that
he is above temptation. Let Satan but approach him in the form of
a naked woman and lust will suddenly befall him like an enemy from
ambush, and rob him of all his senses, even as a thief robs his
victim in the night.”
And they added to their prayers an entreaty that God should lead the
Rabbi into such temptation. And, to their own punishment, God heard
their prayers.
* * * * *
When Rabbi Akiba left his wife he also left the city in which she
dwelt. This he did, not so much from personal choice, lest the
proximity of his wife allure him, but rather for her sake, lest his
nearness too much affect her. And in order that his wife, in her
feminine weakness, should not follow him to the new place in which
he intended to settle, he did not for a long time establish himself
anywhere, journeying from city to city and from land to land.
And once, in his peregrinations, he came to a land in which
remarkable customs and manners prevailed. One of these customs was
to sweeten the nights of the honoured guests with the company of
women.
And it happened that when the ruler of this land learned of Rabbi
Akiba’s arrival and the importance of his guest, he sent to him for
the night two beautiful damsels, the most beautiful in his realms. In
the manner of women both beauties did their best to heighten their
charms and increase the power of their attraction. They freshened
themselves in the bath; the enchanting odour of their youthful bodies
they rendered more intoxicating than ever with rare perfumes; they
arrayed themselves seductively like brides on the wedding night.
And they came to Rabbi Akiba in radiant half-nakedness, with an
inviting smile upon their cherry lips, with the fire of passion and
voluptuousness in their sparkling eyes.
They knew that they were going to a highly honoured guest, but they
did _not_ know that they would encounter a very handsome man of
gigantic stature. When they beheld him their passion flamed still
higher, and each tried to display before him the most enticing
allurements of her person.
“Come to me,” said one.
“Come to me,” invited the other.
And they passed close to him with their naked bodies, and each
praised her person and its charms, and the pleasures it afforded.
“My body is as white as the full moon.”
“And my body is as rosy as the rising sun.”
“In my embrace you will lie as softly as in warm down.”
“And in my arms you will feel the tender warmth of newly-shorn lambs’
wool.”
“The kiss of my lips is like the wine of Damascus.”
“And my lips are like the round grapes in which the sunbeams have
chosen their home.”
And thus they continued,—the firmness of their breasts, the velvety
softness of their skin, the ravishing delight of their legs, and the
intoxication of their tenderness. One wrapped him about with her
dark hair; the blonde tresses of the other likewise enmeshed him.
And with the passing of the hours their lust increased; their naked
bodies turned and writhed, wracked and tortured by rising desire.
“Come, take me!” implored the one.
“Come, take me!” panted the other.
But Rabbi Akiba sat between them and—spat. For a whole night he sat
between them and spat, looking neither upon one nor the other. He did
not try to distract his mind with Torah thoughts, for he did not wish
to bring the Torah into the company of two naked women. He simply
tried to work himself into a feeling of repulsion, to rouse within
him a powerful resistance.
And thus he sat and spat—more vehemently, more impatiently than ever,
with rising disgust, with increasing aversion. At last, however, he
became calm, indifferent, ice-cold.
At first the two beautiful damsels looked at him in astonishment.
Why was he spitting so? Why did he not touch them? Was he a fool?
Was he crazy? Were they not beautiful enough? Not young enough? Not
passionate enough?
They questioned him; he vouchsafed no reply. Then they were on
the point of leaving him, when they looked at him again and saw
how handsome he was, and gazed once more into his eyes and saw
wisdom itself beaming out of them. Then they forgot his remarkable
behaviour, disregarded his incessant spitting, threw their nakedness
and the fire of their bodies upon him, and pleaded and begged and
groaned, calling to him in their intoxication.
“Take _me_!”
“Take _me_!”
The whole night passed in this way. In the morning, weary and
exhausted, they went to the ruler and complained to him against Rabbi
Akiba. In despair, they cried out, “Sooner death than another time
with that man!”
The ruler sent for Rabbi Akiba and questioned him.
“Why did you not act toward the women I sent in to you as the sons of
man act with women? Are they not beautiful? Are they not human, like
you? Has not He, who created you, likewise created them?”
If Rabbi Akiba had replied that, in spending the night with them in
the manner of the sons of man with woman, he would have committed a
sin, then the ruler would surely become angry. Did his hospitality
then lead to sin? Was his hospitality an incentive to wrong-doing?
Rabbi Akiba’s wisdom saw this at once, and with an altogether
innocent expression he replied, “What could I do? Before they came to
me they must surely have eaten impure things, and the odour from them
was that of carrion-meat, impurities, reptiles.”
And Rabbi Akiba quickly left this land with its remarkable
hospitality, happy in the consciousness that he had overcome the
greatest of temptations,—filled with thanks to God for having so
wonderfully given strength to his heart.
As the number of his disciples at this time had reached to twelve
thousand, and as the wall that separated him from his wife thereby
crumbled, he went back to her. As he came to the door of his house
he heard a strange woman say to his wife, “Are you happy that your
husband is returning after having acquired twelve thousand disciples?”
“I should be still happier,” answered his wife, “if he returned with
twenty-four thousand.”
And Rabbi Akiba did not open the door of his house, nor did he go in
to his wife. Once again he imposed upon himself separation from his
mate, and erected a new wall about himself, with a vow that he should
not approach his wife until he acquired four and twenty thousand
disciples. And again he left, to wander through cities and lands, to
spread the word of God and assemble disciples.
From now on he became more severe than ever in his religious demands,
and his condemnations grew harsher. One who, like him, had triumphed
over such great temptations, had full right to demand similar
continence and willpower on the part of others. And he was wont to
mock, jeer and jest at all who committed a sin.
He had forgotten the saying: “Believe not thyself until the day of
thy death.” And in Heaven it was decreed that he should be reminded
of it.
* * * * *
One day his travels led him to a beautiful spot, through woods and
fields. It was a wonderful day. The sun, midway in the sky, did not
burn, but laughed and sang of the splendour of existence, pouring out
joy upon the entire land, upon wood and field, upon tree and grass.
All the birds and beasts and insects laughed and sang together with
it. Rabbi Akiba, filled with the great gladness, forgot the passage
of the Torah that was running through his mind and across his lips
but a moment before, and could not remove his glance from the sunny
splendours that surrounded him.
Suddenly it seemed as if some one had thrust him backward. But it was
nobody. It was his own blood, and the blow that he had felt was the
throb of his own heart.
Were not his eyes deceiving him? He opened them wide and looked
again, intently.
No. His eyes saw clearly. A wondrously beautiful naked girl at the
top of a palm tree.
He could not believe his eyes, but there was the girl looking down at
him, smiling at him so enticingly, intoxicating him with the pearly
whiteness of her teeth.
She was so beautiful and entrancing that the sun had forgot its
wedding-procession. It had stopped in its path—this shining star—and
had enfolded the maiden’s naked body in its rays, colouring it a rosy
red and filling its veins with red wine.
Rabbi Akiba, too, stopped in his path, unable to move from the
spot, unable to tear himself away from the dazzling vision. His
heart palpitated, his body burned, his tongue became dry. He stood
dumbfounded, and could not himself hear how he barely managed to
utter, “Who are you?”
And the vision upon the tree laughed seductively down to him.
“Come up and I will tell you.”
“What are you doing there?”
“Come up, and you shall see.”
“Are you gathering dates?”
“What need have I of them? I feed myself and feed others with my own
sweetness. Do you not wish to taste it?”
“Why are you naked?”
“So that the sunbeams may enjoy me, and the wind, and the hills, and
the valleys, and the heavens, and God.”
“How can you lie there so?”
“I have a couch here made of leaves and branches,—a soft couch for
me and for those whom I invite to enjoy me. Soft is my bed and
fragrant,—but even softer and more fragrant am I. Will you not feel
us?”
And in utter forgetfulness, filled with a single intense desire,
Rabbi Akiba approached very close to the tree and scarcely had breath
to ask, “How can I get to you?”
The glorious vision uttered a magic laugh.
“Were you, then, never a little boy? What did you do when a tempting
apple nodded to you from among the branches of an apple-tree? You
removed your clothes, made yourself as light as possible, and climbed
up the tree after the beautiful, ripening fruit. Am I less than the
fruit? Is it not worth while to climb up after me? Or are you old,
and have your bones become hard, and is climbing now beyond your
years and your strength? Take off your clothes; you will have no need
of them in any case, up here. Make yourself light, and with all the
youth that has now been born anew in you, climb up to me....”
Enchanted and intoxicated, as hastily as possible, whipped on by
driving impatience, Rabbi Akiba cast off his clothes and seized the
trunk of the palm tree, beginning to climb aloft. With his naked
hands and feet around the shaggy bark, with his burning eyes riveted
upon her above, drinking in her beauty, sucking in the warm ruddiness
of her veins. He did not notice that his skin was being scratched
and torn by the bark of the tree, and that blood was beginning to
flow over his body. He climbed higher, ever higher.
And her magic eyes drew him on as if with ropes and her fascinating
voice was as a guide to him. From between her pearly teeth it poured
forth like wine that robbed the senses.
“Come! Co-o-ome! Co-o-ome!”
But when he had climbed half the height of the palm he suddenly
came to himself. It was as if a cold wind had icily bedewed him
and had blown something away from before his eyes, making him see
the complete ludicrousness and unworthiness of his position. He,
the renowned Master, teacher and judge among the Jews, climbing,
half-naked, up a tall tree, driven and goaded on by lust! He threw
himself down, rather than descended, from the tree, rolled himself
into a ball at its foot, and burst into bitter tears.
A malicious, mocking voice spoke above him:
“Had it not been decreed in Heaven that you and your Torah should be
protected, your life at this moment would not be worth a straw.”
Rabbi Akiba wept more bitterly than ever, striking his breasts and
beating his head.
He dressed and continued on his way. The sun no longer shone; heaven
and earth were veiled in greyish fog, and the laughter and song of
the surrounding scene now ceased. Or perhaps it merely seemed so to
him because his heart was bitter and his soul grieved; he looked
neither to right nor to left and his ears were deaf to the outer
world.
He felt ashamed and debased. And he knew that henceforth he would not
mock those who had committed sin.
Now he understood the weakness of man, and how plentifully life was
strewn with dangers, and his lips muttered acridly, “All of us here
below are even as criminals who are released on bail, and a net of
transgression is spread over all existence.”