The Books of Jacob

Nahman visits Elisha Shorr, whose daughter Hayah studies him carefully. He brings Shorr letters concerning the search for the Messiah, and, with the old men, he shares his experiences. He speaks “glowingly” (786) about Jacob Leybowicz, trying to present Jacob as both familiar and an outsider. On the eve of his wedding, Nahman explains, Jacob was told the “powerful” (784) secret of the Raza deMehemenuta. Later, Shorr encourages Nahman to bring “this Jacob” (782) to Rohatyn.

Nahman met Jacob in Smyrna, an international Ottoman town with a sinful reputation. Many of the Jews in Smyrna “openly [proclaimed]” (781) a man named Sabbatai Tzvi to be the Messiah. Nahman heard about Jacob from the students of a local religious leader named Isohar of Podhajcel; Jacob was a student of Isohar with a dubious and divisive reputation. Many of the local Jewish people complained about the way in which taxes in Smyrna were unfairly levied against the Jewish population in contrast to the Christians. Nahman developed a reputation as a skilled debater who could “beat anyone” (774) in theological arguments. The victors in these debates won food, wine, and money. Nahman exaggerates the mystical nature of his first meeting with Jacob.

Nahman’s story is interrupted by a brief outbreak of violence between the divided Jewish community in Rohatyn. Other people resent the Shorr family housing a gentile runaway peasant who has been affected by frostbite, both physically and mentally. They throw rocks at this supposed “golem” (771). The man performs chores around the house “in exchange for food and board” (770), even though sheltering the man is illegal.

Later, an inebriated Nahman stumbles into the room where Yente is asleep. He knows that she may be Jacob’s grandmother and he falls asleep on the floor beside her bed. With the “new vision” (768) provided by her out-of-body experience, Yente studies Nahman with amusement. She begins to perceive time differently, more like “skirts whirling in a dance” (764) than linearly. From this new perspective, she sees the young Jacob running away from home after being beaten by his father (Yente’s son). He is found in a dark cavern. When Jacob is 14, he argues often with his father.

On the day after the wedding, Shorr enters Yente’s room to retrieve his amulet. He cannot find the words he wrote to delay her death and begins to panic. Telling Hayah, he realizes that the old woman has eaten the magic spell and now she “won’t die” (759). Hayah can only laugh. Yente is in a state of “dying and not dying” (758). News of this miracle spreads, and Asher Rubin suggests half-heartedly that Yente is essentially in a coma. Yente’s grandson Israel places her on a cart and takes her home.

In January 1753, Father Chmielowski writes again to Druzbacka. He defends his use of Latin over “clumsy” (755) Polish and promises to send her the latest entries from the new editions of his encyclopedia.

During Yente’s childhood in the 1600s, the “slaughters” (753) of Jewish people across Europe became so bad that people become convinced that the Messiah must arrive imminently. Christians blame Jews for bad harvests and many other problems; pogroms and slaughters drive Yente’s family (and many other Jewish families) to flee their homelands as refugees. Many desperate Jews come to believe that Sabbatai Tzvi is the promised Messiah, and they try to travel to Turkey to “bear witness to these final days” (750).

Before she was born, her hesitant father joins the pilgrimage. To his shock, he arrives in Istanbul to find that the sultan of the Ottoman Empire has thrown Sabbatai Tzvi in prison. However, this prison is actually a lavish courtyard where the supposed Messiah can host visitors. He plans to replace traditional Jewish holidays and laws with “some other, still-to-be-articulated” (747) alternative of his own design. Yente’s father and his friends return to Poland in “a strange and solemn mood” (746). A short time later, they receive news that Sabbatai Tzvi has agreed to convert to Islam under threat of execution. Gradually, people convince themselves that their Messiah is acting deliberately, waiting for a “better time” (745) to reveal himself and save them.

Looking back at this period, Yente wonders whether her newfound powers might allow her to influence or change events. She sees her mother being raped by three Cossack soldiers; this is how Yente was conceived. Her father never knew and her mother died, keeping the truth about Yente’s conception a secret. She is raised by her father and learns about the Torah and Kabbalah from him. He teaches her that her thoughts “must be concealed” (741) and—many years later, in her coma-like state—Yente thinks she has succeeded.

In Smyrna, Nahman studies at Isohar’s school. As well as numerology and Kabbalah, they learn meditation techniques. Jacob often tells outlandish stories and, one day, Nahman challenges him on the truthfulness of one such story.

Nahman takes a job as a translator and meets a Polish nobleman named Count Kossakowski who asks Nahman “all about Poland” (736). During Isohar’s lessons, Nahman listens to debates with a wise man named Tovah about the Christian trinity and Messianic figures such as Sabbatai Tzvi. He takes notes “with a joyous sense of satisfaction” (734). Eventually, Nahman and Mordechai propose that Jacob marry Tovah’s daughter, Hana, to make him a “respectable man” (732). They host a religious ceremony to celebrate, and Jacob enters into a shocking trance.