Hadassah Read online

  “Hadassah,” he said, “there is a great deal I have not told you. You see, I did not seek employment at the Palace and residence in Susa merely for the pay or the prestige of the position. I also went there with the intention of discovering more about who killed our families. I believed that if I could find that out anywhere, it would be here.”

  “And did you find anything?” I asked, my eagerness giving my voice a high, girlish lilt.

  He nodded yes. But his eyes did not express joy.

  “I found out some. I gained access to the royal archives and found, for one, that they were not Persian soldiers. There has never been an order for any unit of the Imperial army to kill Jews. However, permission had been given for a punitive raid mentioned in records against Babylon. But it was to be a politically motivated and politically targeted attack. It had no mention of focusing on civilians, let alone Jews. No, the murders were carried out by an outside mercenary force. A private squad under the protection of the Empire. I have a suspicion they may be Amalekites, for the records I saw keep mentioning a man called The Agagite, a name that refers to an ancestor of the Amalekites. This worries me greatly.”

  “Who are the Amalekites?”

  “Well, Hadassah,” he replied, his voice growing soft and contemplative, “you know that our people once had a homeland in a faraway place called the Promised Land, also called Israel. As a matter of fact, many of our distant relatives left here to return some years ago, when Emperor Cyrus gave his cupbearer, Nehemiah, leave to return there and rebuild our temple.”

  “Yes, of course, Poppa,” I answered with a slight chuckle. “I know of this land, Israel. You speak of it all the time.”

  He ignored my jibe with no more than a patient dip of his eyelids, his usual reaction, and continued. “Well, many, many years ago, when our people were still a band of wandering former slaves, we passed through the land of the Amalekites right before settling in Israel. And they were very cruel to us. In fact, without our having done anything to them, they set out to kill and torture as many of our ancestors as they possibly could.”

  “Why?”

  “Because they were servants of the Evil One, the spirit who hates G-d. And not only does that spirit hate G-d, but because we are His chosen people, he hates us very fiercely, too. And the Amalekites worship either him or one of his foulest spirits.”

  “But, Poppa, what can you possibly do to them once you do find them, these Agagites—or Amalekites, whatever they’re called?”

  He laughed. “Hadassah, you are so perceptive. The answer is, I don’t know. I only know that I have this overwhelming feeling that G-d wants me to find them.”

  And in Mordecai’s recent state of mind, that settled it. Any edict attributed to G-d in our household was not to be questioned, not for a moment. I myself did not possess the maturity to distinguish His voice from the multitude of childish choruses going off in my head, but I grudgingly admired Mordecai’s unwavering certainty that he could hear it clearly. And I must admit: at this point in our lives he could lay as strong a claim to hearing G-d’s voice as anyone I could think of.

  You see, Mordecai had begun to take in traveling or itinerant Jewish brothers and sisters. He still had not relented to the local high priest’s insistence that we join the temple, but their impasse had calcified into a sort of grudging respect. The cause of harmony had been helped when Mordecai had put out the word that any Jewish person seeking shelter, for reasons clandestine or otherwise, could knock seven times on our door and receive a hot dinner and a place to sleep as long as he or she needed it.

  The procession of takers for our offer started slowly at first. I remember our inaugural visitor, a teacher. He immediately began a tradition of our guests sitting with Mordecai around the dinner table for hours, even on into the small hours of the morning. I think my cousin began to think of it as a nominal price of lodging for our guests to sit and pass along every piece of gossip or legitimate intelligence they could possibly remember. We learned a great deal that way. And Mordecai would never forget to eventually throw in the perennial question: Do you know anything of a band of Empire-sanctioned mercenaries riding around with this emblem and killing Jews?—and at that he would carefully unfold a cloth upon which he had traced their vile insignia, then fold it hastily before the person even had the chance to respond. I had learned only many years after my own first traumatic glimpse that Mordecai, too, had seen the broken cross on a fleeing back that horrendous night.

  Mostly he heard rumors, for the legend of these killers had apparently spread far and wide, especially among Jews. Perhaps Mordecai’s own constant badgering was responsible for some of that. But these entreaties never produced much information of value.

  Yet Mordecai did learn a great deal about the realm at large during his frequent visits to the Palace. After all, as the capital of a huge empire, Susa was visited by merchants, travelers and dignitaries from all over the known world. From Mordecai’s careful ears as well as the accounts of our visitors, I learned of a huge athletic contest known as the Olympian games, for instance. Local boys were gathering in the land of my empire’s enemies, Greece, to revel in the excellence of sport. I learned that Greece was ablaze with all sorts of ideas about people being equal to one another and that they explored these freedoms through elaborate stagings of these readings called theater. Of course I learned endless tidbits about the labyrinthine machinations of Persian Palace life—the jealous Princes of the King’s Face, the scheming generals, the wrathful Mothers of the King. I also learned who was impaled that week and who beheaded.

  And then from our exhausted traveling visitors would come news from that place Mordecai usually called the Promised Land. A strange expression would overcome him when such things were spoken of. It was a wistful look, almost as though he were on the verge of tears. And his voice would rise and adopt a breathy, almost feminine tone.

  “Tell me, have they finished rebuilding the temple?” he would ask. “Have they resumed the sacrifices? Has the Shekinah, the presence of G-d, returned to the Holy of Holies?”

  10

  There was one visitor in particular who, my young Queen candidate, became the prime reason for my relating this whole part of our lives. He was a wiry old man, slow of foot and even slower of speech. His coming to us had been wreathed in an unusual frenzy of preparations and high security. He was a very important man, we were told in cryptic terms, but nothing more. He had been brought to our door by a small group of muscled young Jewish men who declined Mordecai’s invitation to enter and promptly disappeared into the night.

  I remember my first sight of him. He wore a torn and heavily stained canvas robe tied at the waist by a length of twine. He had a nose longer than any I had ever witnessed on a person and a straggly beard that must have seen fuller, thicker days. He fixed a rheumy yet sincere gaze upon Mordecai and extended his hand, which was bony and nearly the size of a small dog.

  “Mordecai. May our Lord YHWH bless you for your hospitality.”

  “Thank you, Revered Priest,” he replied. “Please consider this your home in Susa. We are honored by your presence, Jacob.”

  The old visitor shakily sought out the nearest chair and sank into it with a loud exhaling of breath that I fleetingly mistook for the creaking of bones. In the process, I must admit that he also expelled a burst of flatulence, which caused both Mordecai and me to examine our sandals with wry, wavering smiles. And he did not smell like spring flowers anyway, our visitor. Evidently he had traveled a great distance with only camels and Bedouins for companionship. In fact, the sight and smell of him made me wonder if our open-door invitation had not led us a little too far afield.

  But while devouring a pot of my lamb stew and gulping draught after draught of our best Persian wine, he also began to speak, and I soon learned that Jacob had just come from Jerusalem, where he had been one of the first priests to offer sacrifices in the newly rebuilt temple. He had traveled to Persia to receive an offering from Susa’s Jewish co
ngregation and return with it to Jerusalem. He told us, excitement coloring his voice, that King Xerxes also was making a contribution. Mordecai had told me this newly ascended Persian ruler had received the throne from his father, Darius, and had previously been the Crown Prince of Babylon. In Hebrew his name was “Ahasuerus.” I thought of all this as our ancient guest was talking about the Persian king’s gift.

  In a moment all Jacob’s elderly idiosyncrasies were forgotten. He began to speak of temple life and of Jerusalem as the undisputed seat of G-d’s presence, in a voice that grew stronger and more emphatic by the second.

  And then Mordecai asked the fateful question. “What was it really like to enter the Holy Place, the dwelling of the Almighty?”

  The old man turned to his host and raised his eyebrows high. I could not tell whether he was giving Mordecai a quick reappraisal or glaring at him for his impudence. Then I saw that his eyes were watering. As he was completely motionless at that instant, I wondered if he was suffering some sort of internal breakdown.

  But then he looked away, and two large tears rolled over the creases below his eyelids only to disappear in the sparse hairs of his beard. No, I could tell he was not angry at Mordecai for asking the question. He was merely preparing his reply with all the strength he could muster.

  “Ah yes, the perennial question. Or at least it once was. Ah, my son . . .” and he trailed off. Then he turned around quickly, with a surprising ferocity in his eyes. “It’s not just what you think, you know. Everyone thinks it is all fear and trembling. And some days it was. Especially in my early years. But I will tell you the truth. The memory that keeps my heart strong and my head clear is the thought of days when my heart was pure before Him. When I had spent time reading the Sacred Texts, preparing myself beforehand, had sung His praises, asked for forgiveness of my sins, I would enter the temple and suddenly be engulfed in His presence. . . .”

  At that moment he jerked his head back and stared into the ceiling as if he were seeing some opening into heaven itself. He made a small keening cry, like that of a newborn child. Then he looked down and his gaze was turned so inward he seemed to have forgotten we were even present. Several more tears fell from his cheeks onto the table. Finally he looked up again, not quite back to the ceiling but just over our heads, as if meeting our gaze would have simply been too much at that moment.

  “G-d really does have a presence, do you know?” He asked it almost petulantly, as though his proximity to tears was due to some skepticism on our part. “My whole being would throb with this awareness of His person. I thought I could feel His heart. And at such times I was glad everyone else kept their distance, because often I would dance and laugh and weep and sing and shout all at the same time because my chest felt like it would truly, truly burst if I did not. I felt—I felt . . . well, have you ever seen a young child greet a beloved father after a long absence? The little arms pumping, the little legs churning, the leap into his arms, the tears in the father’s eyes? I felt like that. A child so overcome with joy at His return that all I wanted to do in this world was to leap as high into His bosom as I could. And I could feel His tears, too. That’s the wonder of it, don’t you see? I could feel His Spirit being fed, His heart gladdened, His pain—yes, His pain—being healed somehow.” He halted his speech and looked down into his lap somberly. Then he said very quietly, almost a whisper, “I could feel G-d’s pain. In fact, I thought of it on my journey here whenever I looked out at the eternity of the desert. G-d’s pain because of sin and evil and heartbreak was vast and endless and searing. I can still feel its weight upon my soul.”

  He looked at me with a glance that had suddenly grown edgy and piercing. Then he shook his head, obviously disappointed. “That’s only a tiny part of it, don’t you know?”

  He threw up his hands in a gesture that spoke of futility and allowed them to fall back limply onto his lap. “I also felt struck by lightning. I tingled with a knowledge that I stood in the presence of the Being who created the universe, who created me. And that anything could happen. I could be ushered into glories unspeakable. I could be granted the kingship of Israel. I could be struck dead. Who knows? When you are in the presence of the King of Kings, destiny—not just your own, but the world’s—can change in the twinkling of an eye.”

  And I began to stare, even at my young age, for I was almost certain that I could feel it myself at that moment. A sensation like when someone stands behind you and you feel their eyes upon you, and the hair begins to tingle across the back of your neck. You feel their presence. My heart began to race, my cheeks to flush. Something wonderful was happening.

  Now, maybe you are a more holy person than I. I make no pretensions of great righteousness. But for me, this was the first time. In fact, I had spent the previous years angrily denying to myself that G-d could actually exist. After all, I had reasoned, if we were His chosen people, why did my whole family die? Why did my tender mother, my quiet, freckle-faced brother, my brave and handsome father have to lose their lives to the blades of men for whom the taking meant less than to kick a dog? Why did He not protect them—after all, they were chosen people, too! Why did so many others have to die horrific and tortured deaths? The whole attack had felt like the acting out of an evil intelligence, a foul intention. Not the will of a good and loving G-d.

  You can imagine how jarring it was to feel G-d’s Spirit fill our dining room and our hearts to bursting that night. The sensation seemed to increase even as the old man continued to speak.

  “I always believed,” Jacob continued, “that the catalyst for these times of blissful closeness to Him was that I had focused my attention on Him, not on myself. Not on the fact that the Master of the Universe, may His name be blessed, stood in my presence, and I in His at that moment. I could not even think of such a thing, although I suppose it was true. No, like that little child, I was completely enraptured by His arrival and His presence, and my own part in the matter was completely forgotten. Then, of course, as He surrounded me and wrapped me like an infant in those Abba arms, it became even more impossible to turn a thought unto myself. What caused His joy was not my puny righteousness—my holiness, which would have been like filthy rags to Him had He chosen to examine it. In that moment His charity—His favor—was far too great to scrutinize my fault. Again, it was not about me. Not about me at all. What caused His joy was seeing my rapture at His presence and the communion that it sparked. That is what gladdens His heart. Often I have to remind myself that the example of parenthood is not accidental. He is our Father. He is many other things, too, of course. But He is every bit as much a Father, and more, than any man whose heart has ever ached at being separated from his little ones.”

  Jacob took one last gulp of stew and leaned back on the bench, wiping his pathetic beard with an edge of his filthy tunic. “I never forget those moments with the King of Kings, not ever. Today, I suppose I am the most expendable person you could imagine. An old, infirm man. One good whack of a bandit’s sword would do me in. Yet I remember, without vanity I hope, that I have stood in His presence and found favor with Him. And no one can ever take the joy, the knowledge, the certainty of that away.”

  11

  My dear young maiden, you might still be wondering what could be the significance of this latest anecdote. And so I will tell you this. In ways that I can only attempt to explain to you, Jacob’s words were the reason, at least the earthly reason, for everything that came next. Although I didn’t truly realize it at the time, it laid the foundation for decisions that wound up saving my life, and yours, as well, if you’re a Jewess as I suspect. Please be patient with me and I will show you why.

  You see, Mordecai’s life was not the same after that night, and neither was my own. Without speaking of it to the other until much later, we both began to feel in the days that followed an unmistakable inner urge to regain the sense of His presence we had felt during the old man’s visit.

  We responded to that urge in vastly different ways.
r />   Jacob left our home two days later, and we never saw him again. Word came some time later that his caravan had been beset by bandits while returning to Jerusalem with his offerings, and he had died of his injuries in the desert. Mordecai bowed his head and whispered a prayer upon hearing the news. I simply turned away and walked out into the courtyard.

  Once again, I told myself, G-d had failed to protect His own. But I couldn’t help but ask myself what Jacob would say about it. Somehow the memory of his description of the Presence, at least for the moment, won out over my accusations against God.

  The visit had caused Mordecai to renew his fervor toward G-d. He began to pray alone, for no official reason, and take his religious life far beyond the mere dictates of tradition—even though tradition had once been of supreme importance to him. He began to study his scraps of Torah in the morning before leaving for work and before retiring to bed in the evening. He began to pepper his speech with mentions of the Lord and His will. He grew more purposeful and enthusiastic in his observances of Jewish holy days. Needless to say, each of these newfound habits annoyed me more intensely with every passing year.

  I, on the other hand, turned the other direction. Realizing that G-d was real, palpably so, actually filled me with a fresh resentment that I could barely contain within my reserved demeanor. Somehow, dealing with my anger toward Him was easier when He had been simply a relic of tradition, a remote institution of my ethnic heritage. Knowing that He was real and approachable, and that I could personally experience those realities, made Him the perfect arm’s-length target for my rage.

  And yet, fearful of angering this newly real G-d, I also kept these emotions to myself and made a pretense of following Mordecai’s inner renewal. I prayed with him, sat obediently during the chants and rituals. We kept the weekly Shabbot, well—religiously.