Another chorus of voices flooded in from outside, bringing with it a jubilant song mixed with laughter and ecstatic shouting. More than two hundred Hasidim, smelling of alcohol and tobacco, followed by robust women and their children, made their peasant boots echo in the lecture hall. The glow from their torches chased away the shadows, and the gray walls became golden. A warm air dissolved the clouds emanating from the open mouths of the rabbis, who were paralyzed by this sacrilege.
The euphoric horde was led by a small but muscular old man crowned with a huge fur hat. Smoking a pipe and staggering, he stopped opposite the Vilna Gaon, waved his arms around, guffawed so loudly the pews shook, rolled back his eyes, and, leaping up, made a kick that sent several of the coffin boards flying.
“Enough with this comedy, Elijah! Through my mouth the voice of Israel Ben Eliezer, the Baal Shem Tov, he who knows the secret name of God, speaks to you! I can do nothing; he can do everything. Riding on me, his mount, he has come to show you that you’re mistaken.”
This possessed man raised his hands: the coffin rose in the air and stuck to the ceiling. The peasants applauded, but a painful sigh shook the rabbis. The chief of the drunken mystics paid no attention whatsoever to them and went on hectoring the dead man.
“You anathematized us by having the horn wail as you put out the candles in your school so that our spiritual life would be extinguished along with them. You decreed us cursed by day and night, when we retired and when we got up, when we entered and when we left. You asked God not to pardon or know us. You asked Him to erase our names from the Earth. You forbade people to speak to us or write to us, to help us, or to live under the same roof with us. You insinuated that we should be denounced to the Christian authorities so they could eliminate us. You forgot that we were brothers. You locked the windows and submerged yourself in cold and sleeplessness. You murdered the language of dreams. You gained intelligence, but you lost love. For a month now, you’ve been lying here pretending to be dead. You don’t rot because you are alive but overcome by boredom. Breathe again! Awaken and come dance with us! Joy! Joy! Joy!”
The coffin fell from the ceiling onto the floor and shattered. The Vilna Gaon opened his eyes, looked at his audience, suffered an attack of laughter, stood up, and ran to give his daughter a long embrace, gave Salvador another, blessed them both, danced with the old man and his Hasidim, dragged the rabbis by the beard and made them join in the round. Violins and tambourines were played. Vodka moistened throats. The women brought a white veil and the men a tent and a velvet hat. They covered Salvador’s head with the hat and Luna’s with the veil. The Gaon, seconded by the drunken old man, paused in front of the couple and offered the Bible to the future groom.
“I cannot deny the feelings consuming my daughter. Show us you’re worthy of the bonfire. Tell us what you see in the seven words of the first sentence of Genesis.”
Arcavi, bathed in sweat, trembling from head to toe, opened the Holy Book. He did not know how to read Hebrew and had no knowledge. In his soul, full of love for Luna, there was no room for God.
The old Hasid whispered with the voice of Baal Shem Tov, “The first and last letters of the Torah form the word heart. There is no greater knowledge than Love. You can do it. Be daring. You are a lion tamer, and each letter is a lion.”
Salvador stopped doubting. With the same concentration his ancestors employed staring at the lions, he fixed his eyes on the letters without trying to guess what they said. They were beings, not signs. The first word began with a descending arc, a horizontal base, and a period: B. He observed the form emptying itself of itself, allowing his eyes to see without the interference of his person. Slowly, the arc and the line transformed into an open jaw and then, within it, the period vibrated like the roar of a beast, a total, generative scream.
He focused his attention with such force that the small stain grew and acquired depth to become an endless tunnel, an insatiable throat that began to swallow all the other letters. Finally, all that remained on the page was that enormous, deep period. Salvador felt that its voracious center was absorbing him, extracting him from his body. He let himself be swallowed with no fear, and his soul entered that dark passageway. He felt he was dissolving, but with faith he went further and further.
At the far end, an immense sphere of light awaited him, a sun that did not burn. Entering into it, he began to lose his memory, but the beats of his heart continued repeating: Luna. His chest was a golden temple with an altar of living flesh at its center. Above him was a cup of fire filled with holy water. He knew he would never be thirsty again, that his mouth was the arc, the line, and the period, a divine fountain, and he allowed love to overflow and experienced a pleasure that was the explosion of his cup. And the water flooded the world, and he awoke preaching in Spanish or Yiddish or Hebrew (he never found out) among the rabbis who wept, the Hasids, who danced ecstatically listening to him, and the women, who kissed his hands and placed them on the heads of their children so that they might be blessed.
The great Vilna Gaon kneeled before him, and with a voice like a deep river sang to marry him to his daughter. When he finished the ceremony, he handed over the keys to the school, asked forgiveness for his errors, bade farewell to everyone, and set out on a trip to Palestine. Luna never learned another thing about him. Sadness was forbidden. Solemn meetings became festivals, where thanks to God was shown by offering Him continuous joy. Salvador and Luna had the same trances and visions, which they shared with the poor. Together they cured a multitude of sicknesses.
For the first time in the history of the Arcavis, a girl was born. Since she was the fruit of a year of matrimonial happiness, they named her Felicidad. They did try to have a boy so he could be baptized Salvador according to custom, but two years later another girl was born. She was named Sara Luz, a combination of her luminous gaze with the name of Luna’s deceased mother. Now, she was a saint who one day suffered an attack of fervor and devoured a complete volume of the Talmud. Unfortunately, she was incapable of digesting the thick sheets of parchment and died with the swollen stomach of a pregnant woman.
The first girl was given Abravanel’s red shoes as a talisman and the second, the violet leather bag containing the Tarot. Thirteen years went by. The two little women, despite the difference in their age, had their periods on the same day, at the same hour. Luna woke them at midnight and led them out of the house while Salvador pretended to be asleep. A group of ladies was waiting for them. Their mother ordered her daughters to remove their nightgowns, and then she undressed as well. Other women who were also menstruating joined them. They began to dance among the recently made furrows in the fields so their blood would flow down their legs and make a good crop of wheat grow.
They were having the time of their lives, beating drums and singing, when they saw in the distance a group of husbands waving torches. They quickly put their clothes back on and anxiously waited. Until then that feminine ceremony had never been interrupted by men.
Pale, Salvador spoke to the women: “We’re very sorry, but you have to return to the village immediately. There’s been a fresh outbreak of anti-Semitism. Over in the next village, they first raped Rabbi Scholomo’s widow, then cut her into pieces and burned down her shack.”
As they all ran to lock themselves inside their houses, Felicidad said to her mother, “Papa should take up a collection so we can buy weapons!”
“Weapons? How can a daughter of mine talk like that? God will punish you! If we deserve to be defended, He will do it. The sacred commandments forbid Jews to spill human blood.”