In its youth, when it was still a light greenish color, the fish had already made a name for itself among the lords of the waters. Fish both great and small were in awe of it. Before it reached them, they glided toward it and entered its mouth alive. Fish that float on their bellies and those fish that swim on their ribs, left-handed ones and right-handed ones — they all came on their own to be his food. Not to mention snouty fish and those with eyes in their heads. Our fish, whose heart was close to its cheeks, let no rings be put through its gills and opened its mouth to dine upon them. Indeed, never in our lives have we heard that a fish like this one was to be found in our rivers, but because of its power and might, the others exaggerated, saying that even the fish in the sea were its subjects.
Cruising mighty waters, dreaded by fin and scale,
Here minnows gulping and there large fish devouring,
When it holidayed, ah, then did its foes all quail.
When it sallied forth with legions noble, scouring
The enemy’s scales. Then did they savage and blast
The vanquished adversaries’ heads. One day it called
For banquet and gluttony, then declared a fast.
Sometimes it did fierce battle, other times it brawled.
Now it crammed its huge mouth with seaweed’s denizens,
Now it bloodied streams but swam not all the long day.
Now it tripped and capered with the Leviathan’s
Daughters, now like a groom, having with them its way.
Here passed it hours in banqueting and pleasure,
Dining with counselors, the shellfish sagacious,
Now crowning players and singers at leisure,
Discharging advisors when feeling pugnacious.
Every white-fleshed fish to its pointed teeth fell prey,
Until done eating, never calling for a pause,
Ruthless, killing whatever swam into its way,
In secret and in public view, by its own laws.
Its dread voice withered the Dniester’s watery flora,
Earning it a blessing from everybody’s mouth.
For it saved the carp from Sodom and Gomorrah.
You know that carp are lazy fish and quite uncouth.
Hounding and hunting them without surcease, it saved
Them from death by indolence. Hardly lovable,
We might well say — as of those whose life’s path is paved
With splendid fortune — that all it lacked was trouble.
After traversing the Dniester and surveying its length and breadth, the fish wanted to see the rest of the waters and to know its relatives, for there is no river in Europe without members of this fish’s tribe. This is not a matter of merit or of blame but simply the way things work out, sometimes one way, sometimes another.
Thus, after surveying the Dniester, the fish betook itself to the place where the Strypa falls into the Dniester. It did not stop and return to the waters of the Dniester, but rather it said, “I shall go and see what there is in the Strypa.”
We cannot know whether this took place in the Strypa at the village of Khutzin or in the Strypa at the village of Kishilivitz. In any event, the fish did not remain there. For it coasted with its fins all the way to the Strypa of Buczacz, that is, Buczacz that sits upon the River Strypa.
It arrived at Buczacz and said, “Here I shall dwell, for this is my desire.” The other fish of the Strypa saw it and were alarmed. Never in their lives had they seen such a large fish. They erred in thinking that it came from the seed of Leviathan, from those who were born before the Holy One, blessed be He, castrated it and killed the female and salted it away for the righteous in the future. Some paid tribute to the fish and brought it presents. There were so many presents that the waters of the Strypa began to empty of fish. Though we are not dealing with history, this most likely transpired in 5423 or 5424, for in those years the fishermen raised the price of fish exorbitantly, and the whole city came to the head of the rabbinical court and asked him to ostracize anyone who bought fish until the fishermen lowered the price.
Thus the fish swam in the waters of the Strypa, and all the fish of the Strypa in Buczacz accepted its dominion over them and paid it ransom for their lives, one delivering its brother, another handing over its friend, and yet another, its relative.
With high hand did it rule in the Strypa’s waters,
Eating every fish, the parents, sons, and daughters,
Serene, consuming water folk, it put on flesh,
A delight to the eye, comely, speedy, and fresh.
Everyone scurried like slaves to do its bidding;
Before it knew, its will was done. So, from eating
And drinking in excess its will was lost.
The fish
Believed that everything they told it was his wish.
As its willpower faded, so increased its fame:
All the Strypa’s wisdom was spoken in its name.
The fish lived in the lap of luxury and lacked for nothing.
One day it rained. Although fish grow in water, they greet a drop that falls from above as thirstily as though they had never tasted water in their life. Our fish, too, floated up to snatch a drop.
After slaking its thirst from the upper water, which is the best water, for it irrigates and quenches and enriches the body and gives it purity, the fish lay contentedly with its fins relaxed, like a fish with a mind in repose.
At that moment those who sought its favor stood and pointed to it with their fins, swishing their scales. If I may transpose their gestures to human language, this is approximately what they said: “It sees what is between the upper and the lower waters, and apprehends the higher wisdom from which all other wisdom derives.”
5
A Day of Grief
People have a saying that it is good to fish in muddied waters. That day the water of all the rivers and streams and lakes was turbulent because of the rainwater, which drew with it tangled weeds, dirt, and mud puddles. All the fishermen went out and set traps in the great and small rivers, in the brooks, the ponds, and lakes, in the Weichsel and the Dniester rivers and in the Prut, the Bug, the San, and in the Donets and the Podhortsa and in the Strypa River, and in all the rivers of their countries and towns. In the Strypa at Buczacz, too, the fishermen let down their nets, even though at that time none of the Jews would leap to buy fish, except for one man. Since we have already mentioned him elsewhere, we shall not mention him again.
Thus a fisherman cast his net in the waters of the Strypa. Our fish had never seen a net of that kind, for in its home waters, that is, the Dniester, the fishermen’s nets are different from those in the Strypa. Every river follows its own custom.
The fish glided up toward the net and wondered: If this is a mountain, since when has a mountain grown up here? The fish had happened by there many times and had never seen a mountain. And if it is a reef, when was it brought here, and who made it full of holes? Or perhaps it is a kind of animal, and these holes are its eyes. If so, what is it, so full of eyes? Perish the thought that it might be the Angel of Death, whom everyone dreads. The fish, too, began to feel dread, and it raised one of its fins to flee. Once it saw that no one was in pursuit, it said, “Not even the Angel of Death wants to kill me.” Once its terror departed, the fish returned to find out who that creature was and what it was doing here.