!632: Joseph Hanauer Read online

  "Joseph," Samantha interrupted, from the top of the stairs. "We need to move the stove back."

  By the time Yossie and Samantha had the heavy stove in place, Rafael had figured out what it was that he'd dragged out from under the stage. It was a folding table. There were also folding chairs, and as Yossie came upstairs, Basiya, Gitele and Chava were unpacking their picnic dinner on the table.

  Yossie ended up seated with his sister across from Rafael Abrabanel and Moische's cousin Shlomo.

  "Who are you again?" Rafael asked, in English.

  "Yosef Hanauer," he said.

  "Not American?"

  "I'm from Hanau," Yossie said, taken aback. His shirt and jeans were indeed American, from the Value Mart, but he had never expected to be mistaken for an American.

  Rafael shifted to strongly accented German. "How long have you been here?"

  "Since Shavuos," Yossie said, unwrapping his sandwich. "Over three months."

  "Almost as long as my uncle Balthazar. So you've become a real expert on these Americans?"

  Yossie shook his head. "No. I think that would take a lifetime. I can tell some stories, but I am no expert."

  "What's that you're eating," Rafael asked, looking curiously at Yossie's sandwich.

  Yossie spent a minute explaining the American custom of packing an entire meal between two slices of bread.

  "You see?" Shlomo said. "He's more an expert than he'll admit. He's a guildsman too."

  "Who are you again?" Rafael asked.

  "Kalman Gomprecht," Shlomo said, using his German name. "From Frankfurt."

  "Merchant?"

  "I suppose," Shlomo said. "My cousin Moische sent me a good list of things to buy and sell on the road here. Thanks to that list, I'm better off now than I was in the Rothschild house. You came from Amsterdam?"

  "Yes," Rafael said, turning to Yossie. "A guildsman?"

  "I work at the coal mine as a smith," he said. "The American idea of a union is not exactly a guild. The UMWA is . . . "

  "You are a member of the UMWA? Michael Stearns is guildmaster?"

  "He is president," Yossie corrected.

  "But he leads the UMWA. I heard that the UMWA has a powerful militia. Are Jews part of that?"

  "Yes," Yossie said. "The Americans want every strong man to be ready to fight. They don't care if you are a Jew."

  "That battle last week, outside of Leipzig," he said. "I hear that the Imperials were badly defeated. That is not far away. If the Swedes or the Imperials come here next, will you be able to hold them off?"

  "The UMWA held off an imperial tercio at Badenberg, but I wasn't there."

  "Have you been in any battles?"

  "Not really."

  "Yosef," Basiya said. "Don't be modest. Tell him about your trip north."

  Yossie spent the rest of the meal telling the story of his trip to Magdala with Thomas. It was not a story he minded telling, particularly within earshot of Gitele.

  As he and the others from Deborah walked home that evening, they discussed their encounters with Grantville's American and Sephardic Jews. Rabbi Yakov, of course, was fascinated by the puzzle of accommodating their diverse traditions. Yossie, on the other hand, was puzzled by the young Abrabanels he'd met.

  The Abrabanel family was as powerful as any Jewish family in the world, yet Rafael had seemed almost shallow. When Yossie asked Yakov about that, Yakov answered with questions.

  "How much did he learn about you? How much did you learn about him? Could a truly shallow man learn so much while telling so little?"

  Rosh Hashanah II, 5392 (September 28, 1631)

  "Tekiah gedolah," Dunash Abrabanel called, early on Sunday afternoon.

  His cousin Rafael blew the long final blast on the shofar for the Rosh Hashanah morning service, and then Jason Gotkin led them in singing the response. The melody was unfamiliar but this was their third repetition, so many of them joined in singing the ancient Hebrew words.

  "Today the world is conceived. Today all creatures stand in judgment, whether as children or as servants. If as children, have mercy on us as a father has mercy on his children. If as servants, our eyes turn to you to judge us with grace, revered and holy One."

  The interplay of Sephardic, Ashkenazic and American elements in the service was fascinating but also distracting. The Abrabanels and the Americans spoke Hebrew with an accent Yossie found harsh. At times, it verged on being incomprehensible. Many of Dunash's chants seemed monotonous, while Jason's chanting was the opposite, turning prayers into songs.

  Yossie was not surprised by the contrast between the different liturgical styles. He'd spent several hours with Yakov pouring over Jason's and Dunash's Machzors the previous Wednesday evening. The differences were plain enough even without melodies.

  The real surprises came from other quarters. The first surprise he should have expected after living among Americans all summer. The American women, particularly Samantha and Eve, expected not merely to be counted toward a minyan but to actually sit in among the men. Frau Roth was more flexible, but her husband was unhappy with the idea that they might not end up sitting together.

  Jason Gotkin had spent some time describing, as well as he could, the different American positions on the role of women. Yossie was still confused by the distinctions Jason had described between Reform and Conservative Jews, but he and the other men had agreed to something of a compromise.

  They had arranged the chairs in their new synagogue in three rows. Two east-west rows for the men faced inward toward the reader's table in the middle. A third row along the west wall was set aside for the women. The stage on the south wall was completely ignored, since the front of the room had to face Jerusalem to the east. The arrangement was not as good as a properly screened women's gallery, but that would have to wait until they had time to remodel the interior of the synagogue. Decency was preserved because everyone would be facing east at the times when a man should not be distracted by a woman's presence.

  As the Friday night services began, the entire congregation had been surprised by the arrival of two additional men. Yonatan Bacharach and his companion were refugees. They'd left Halberstadt in the spring, but had only recently arrived in Grantville after spending the summer just outside of Jena. With those two, they had fourteen men in the congregation that evening.

  There had been other even more unexpected faces in the room for the first evening of Rosh Hashanah. Four American men had come. They sat in back, in some of the seats that had been set out for the women. One of them was Pastor Green, a Protestant minister Yossie remembered meeting when he'd first come to Grantville.

  The pastor recognized Yakov, and before the service, he'd introduced his friend Joseph Jenkins. It turned out that both Americans knew some Hebrew and hoped to follow at least part of the service.

  Toward the end of the service, Balthazar Abrabanel had introduced the other two Americans, giving each a chance to speak. One was the mayor of Grantville. He spoke briefly in English to welcome the new congregation, but it was a confusing speech. Yossie had no idea what to make of "enriching Grantville's cultural diversity."

  The other man Balthazar had introduced was an American Catholic priest. His welcoming speech was also a puzzle. He spoke in English and broken German, but with occasional Hebrew words. He quoted some papal document named Nostra Etate, about "the spiritual patrimony common to both Christians and Jews." Then he quoted a Cardinal named Ratzinger, saying that although there were many religions, there was only one covenant, and that there was only one will of God.

  Yossie had attempted to make sense of this, but the primary message was clear without words. An official of the Catholic Church was present and approved of their synagogue. When Yossie and Yakov spoke about this later, Yakov pointed out that the priest's approval was not that unusual. "The synagogue in Fürth was built with Church approval," he'd said, and then he'd added a warning. "That wasn't enough to protect it when Mansfeld's army came to town."

  * * *
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  "In the book of life, blessing, peace and well-being, remember and inscribe before You, us and all your people the house of Israel for a good life and for peace."

  As Dunash led the closing prayer for peace, his chanting departed from his usual monotone. It was almost melodic.

  The ancient prayer for peace was strongly felt by everyone in the room. A large portion of Grantville's militia had recently left for Jena. Splinters of the recently defeated Catholic army were ravaging the countryside south of Leipzig, and Jena had asked for help. Yossie had no doubt that the Grantville militia would succeed, but he feared for the safety of those he knew who'd gone north. Several Americans from the mine were among them. To Yossie's astonishment, even Gayle Mason had gone.

  For the moment, peace seemed assured for the small Jewish community within the Ring of Fire, but only if the miraculous arms of the Americans could keep the war at bay. The prayer was not just for personal well-being. It was not just for the local community. It asked for peace for all God's people, specifically for all the house of Israel. The situation in many German cities was precarious, and wherever the war touched, disaster was sure to follow.

  * * *

  "None are like our Lord. "None are like our Ruler. "None are like our King. "None are like our Savior."

  The service continued with Jason leading a song. His tune for the ancient Hebrew poem was almost the familiar Ashkenazic tune, and by the end, even the Sephardic Jews in the room were singing along.

  Yossie had concluded that Jason's knowledge of the liturgy was rather shallow. He knew interesting tunes for the common elements of the service and the highlights, but couldn't handle the motifs for the longer chanted passages. Nonetheless, Jason's knowledge outstripped that of Morris Roth.

  Yossie would have expected Morris, as the senior American Jew, to lead major parts of the service, but he didn't lead anything, and in fact, he came late and didn't even attend the final section of the Saturday morning service. Sunday morning, when Yossie had chanted the Torah portion, Dunash had called Morris to the Torah using his Hebrew name, Moische ben Chiam. Morris hadn't responded until Jason had whispered "Morris, that's you."

  Yossie had been surprised to be asked to chant the Torah reading for the second day of Rosh Hashanah. None other than Balthazar Abrabanel had chanted the first day's portion, and Yossie thought that both Yitzach and Yakov were better readers. It was, however, a straightforward reading. The passage about Abraham's near sacrifice of Isaac was one he'd practiced chanting many times while living with Yakov. Yossie's primary difficulty was with the complex melody for the High Holy Day Torah readings. He knew it, in theory, but he'd never chanted it in public before.

  * * *

  It was Jason's turn to lead them in the final hymn of the service. The tune he used was totally unfamiliar, but the Americans obviously knew it. They all joined in loudly. It wasn't long before Yossie joined in.

  "He is my living Lord and savior, my rock when grief or trials come. "He is my banner and my refuge, my full cup on the day I call."

  * * *

  After the service, as the men put away the prayerbooks and took off their large prayer shawls, the women came up with plates, pots of food, and round loaves of bread. Soon, what had been a prayer hall was a dining room.

  Yossie and the others from Deborah had been living in the Odd Fellows Hall since Friday. Deborah was far enough away that walking that distance would be improper on the Sabbath. For the evening meals, most of the Grantville residents had gone home to dinner, but many had stayed for the afternoon meal on Saturday, and more stayed on Sunday. Uriel Abrabanel, in particular, stayed. He and Moische fell into deep conversation about Grantville's mapmaking efforts and the notes Moische and his father had accumulated about the roads from Frankfurt to Magdeburg.

  After the meal, Yakov invited Yossie for a walk around the center of Grantville. "It's not good for a man to be alone," he said, quoting the Torah. He paused as they walked up the hill toward the middle school. "Have you thought about marriage?"

  Yossie nodded. "Who am I fit to marry? I'm an orphan of no stature."

  "Don't underestimate your stature," Yakov said. "Since I took you into my house after your parents died, I've known that it would be my job to find a match for you and your sister. Both of you have been of marriageable age for several years. Your stature as orphans in the care of a poor teacher has been low, but no longer. You are, if not a guildsman, a respected UMWA member, and all of our investments in Yitzach's mercantile ventures have paid well."

  "So why are we talking about this now? It is still Rosh Hashanah, no proper time for doing business."

  "Because someone else has asked about you, and there is no business to conduct, at least not yet." Yakov said. "Tell me. Is there anyone you have admired. Someone you would want to be interested in you."

  Yossie hesitated to answer. He was afraid that speaking of his hopes might shatter them. They walked past the entrance to the school and turned the corner before Yakov spoke again.

  "I won't push you to say anything. Dreams can be fragile things. But what would you say if Yitzach and I spoke about a match for you?"

  "Gitele?" Yossie said, surprised.

  "In Tractate Kiddushin, it says that a father shouldn't marry off his daughter until she is grown and says who she wants. That is how it is."

  "And you, you and Yitzach approve?"

  "You must talk to him about that," Yakov said, smiling. "I think, perhaps, that I will turn here, but you may want to go back to the bridge over Buffalo Creek. Yitzach said he would be there with his family doing Tashlich."

  Yossie grinned. "A good year, Rav Yakov!"

  "A good year, and may you be inscribed in the book of life," Yakov called, although it wasn't clear that Yossie heard him, he was walking away so quickly.

  * * *