The 13th Tablet

I thought of the discussions we had had with my holy master only weeks before on Ramban’s commentaries on miracles and free will. We were all part of The Holy One, Blessed be He’s, plan. All was written from all time, and Nature is both illusion and one form of reality. There was no contradiction between our having free will and being the instruments of His Holy Will. Had I wanted to answer to Rabbi Tammim, I would have reminded him that The Holy One, Blessed be He, was justice. I had also noticed that when Rabbi Tammim spoke…’

‘A name is crossed out again’ said Eli, ‘I think it is the same person. Clearly he must have done something very wicked for his name to have been obliterated in this way.’

‘[XXX] stirred. He had not spoken a word for more than a year, since the time he had, in youthful exuberance, and against all the forewarnings of our master, tried to unravel the Zohar’s teachings. He was no longer glassy-eyed. It was as if the conversation he was witnessing had brought back his soul from the depth of madness to the tip of his tongue. He did not speak. Had I only known what would come to pass, I would have tried to speak to him then, but we were all so confused and focused on Tudela’s letter and how to find this magical tablet that I did not pay any attention to him.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Eli, ‘the next passage is illegible.’

‘… but the blessed Ari spoke: ‘As it is written “as in water, face answers to face, so the heart of man to man”. If we decide to act to save lives, this action is just. As it is written, “whoever saves one life saves the entire world”.’

His last words still hung in the room, as prophetic beams of light. He hummed to himself in the surrounding silence, and his hands waved gently over the table. He then opened his eyes, and very matter-of-factly said: ‘these mabuls will not occur in our times. I will send a search party to Jerusalem. If they find the tablet, we will conceal its existence until the time is right.’ I think we all silently interpreted his vision in the following way: if the simple people knew of the mabul before it happened, humanity would turn to chaos, and we all shared the wisdom of his words.

By now night was upon us, and my holy master considered the matter concluded. He left Tudela’s letter on the table overnight for us all to meditate upon His Holy Will. I dared not touch it, not even to put it in safekeeping back in the archive. When I woke up the next morning, I returned to the study. The letter had disappeared.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Eli, ‘the next passage is illegible.’