The Eternal Jew’s Tale, #148, Batkol’s Journal, 4

In this episode Lilah tells us about a girl she re-named Reina, who, if you remember from earlier episodes, is the very same Reina who stumbled on Batkol in Mallorca a few years after these events.
Warning: there is some crude language in this episode.

The Eternal Jew’s Tale
Nineteenth Era, Part 4, ~1425 C.E., back in Genoa
Batkol’s Journal, part 4
The Lesser Yikhud,* hidden midrash in Nashim**

* Hebrew: union, divine or human; Kabbalistic term;
** one of the 6 orders of Talmud

“Speakin’ of womens who works the streets and be betters than any king or pries’, a young girl, too much abused — Reina Shirin been her spirit name — once come to me all bloody, beat up by some pries’ who ain’t heard of Magdalene, but thought he were wiser an Jesus himself. She wantin’ some poisons to drink and be done, or else she’ll jus’ take to knifin’ herself.

“ I says,
“‘Surely there’s another way to ease your sorrows. A Bible says, ‘*choose life, and reject this curse.*’ It’s talkin’ about you and your chile.’
*-* Devarim/Deut. 30:19

“She been aghas’.
“‘Prophetess, how you knows I been cursed and I’m with child?’
“And there she wailin’,
“‘I can’t go on. Yur Bible also talin’ of *Saul, Lor abandoned, he fall on his sword*. If you won’t prepares a potion for me, I’ll do to myself as that Saul done.’
*-* I Shmuel/Samuel 31:4

“‘Okay, chile. I’ll do as you say.’
“So I picks up my pestle and starts a grind bryony berries and mandrake root, but my mind be frantickin’; what to say, what to do to save this girl? So I starts a chatter,
“‘Seems you know that Bible. Where you learn sech things?’

“‘‘Father Jericho, our family pries’, him take a special likin’ on me, him sits me in his lap and read how them Jews conquers the Holy Land to perpare the way for the Christian Knight. And the more him readin’, the more him hand wandery on me and rub himself. And not so long him face all change, and him declare the wraths of God to strike us both if ever word or hint a word slips my lip. This were a holiness on jus’ us two. Later, of course, I innerstoods with all my shames and all my fears how I be outcas’ from the Lor by this befoulments I am cause. Him the first of filthy mens who lay their tongues and all their parts into the filthy whole of me. There nothin’ lef’ of me to save. I am become a corrup’ thing.’

“‘You know, there’s another Jericho, one in that Bible, corrup’ as well. And yet a woman, her been defile and shame, redeems that place and redeems herself.’
“‘‘There be no such woman! Don’t lie at me.’

“‘I declare, I speak the true. Rakhav her name. Holy to the Lor, and guardian of all us prositutes. I a conjure her from other sides where she salve souls as los’ hope.’

“She swipe her teary eye with her sleeve a-glare on me with she-wolve eye.
“‘Fuck you, bitch. I don’t need you talkin’ at me like some slime-hand pries’ to save* my soul. My soul long gone.’
“And she turn and stalk out the door.
* or did she say ‘enslave’?

“But I been grindin’ herb and root and tyin’ lavender, cypress, and sage into a smudge which be smolderin’ now. Its thick incense fullin’ the room as I bind her in a magic chant:

“‘Tzav Tzava’ot Adonai Tzava’ot, Adonai Tzava’ot Tzava’ot Tzav.
“‘Tzav Tzava Tzava’ot Yah, Yah Yah’ot Yah’ot-vah Tzav.
“‘Ad Adon Adonai Yah, Ay, Aynod Aynodu Hu.
“‘Hu Adonai Tzava’ot Shmo,

“‘Command your daughter, the holy Rakhav a rise thru the layers the inner Sephirot and speak thru the mow of Reina Shirin, and tale your tale in this Adam world.’
“And there she be, as if caught in the door; couldn’t run out and wouldn’t turn back, jus’ leant on the doorpost, head a-sag. Then like a chile, in a high-pitch squeal she begin a stutter, all hesitan’,

“‘Who be the cipher draggin’ my spirit over these jagged Adam shards? Yea, who be the cipher channel of me, bringin’ me back to my body of pain? Oh! You, Lilah bat* Eve. And who be this wisp of sorrow and shame which life and voice be in mine key?’
* Hebrew: daughter of; she recognizes the conjurer

“Now silence; that spirit be readin’ the sorrows etched in Reina soul. And then she voicin’ thru Reina again…

“‘I been a chile in Jericho, that ancient heap of clay and dung, the seventh daughter of the seventh wife fathered by a drunken carpenter. To pay his debts he sold me off, a servant play-thing for my master whims. But the same reason that I been sold, I been cast from my master house. Rebellous I been, disdainful and proud. I see I were smarter than any man; them be more dog than man to me. But who be marry a woman all proud with flower rent and dower spent? The squalid street become my home. Young and shapy and a tight-lock soul and knowin’ the ways to pleasure a man with fragrant oils and {deletion}, so my belly never swellt a-chile. I earnt the silvers to buy a place of my own, low in Jericho’s wall. So I become known — high-end goods — but alone my harden face grown crease with gall, and sick to death of life. And in them long, despairin’ nights, voice I heared, madness I feared, voice sayin’ a tribe be come, and Jericho be crumples to dust. Be I mad? Surely so, and yet that voice say I be chose, I alone, I be save. And now the rumors rip thru town, and now terrors, and now despairs, as a horde of Hebrews on a march to Jericho, with their awful God. And I, outcas’, I be chose for a new people in a new life. Now here come them Hebrew spies down street. I seen them firs’; I enticin’ them up to my room, onto my bed. I tales them what I learnt for them; I whisper news as we dally there. They, my savers; I their eyes. Open my heart and {deletion}. I never known such pleasures before. Their promisin’, which I believe, promisin’ they kep’ for me. And I, I marries Joshua, and becomes a happy mother of chile.’

“‘Daughter of sorrows, sister of shames, Reina Shirin, *pure of song*, follow that woman, her watchin’ you, back to Genoa, and sail with her. An island waits, and a new life.’
*-* translating her name

“And now that voice return to its deeps and that young girl, sittin’, tremblin’, sobs till she weept that old life out of herself.”

And I, Batkol, I took her away.

~~~~~~~~~~

In the next episode, the Ligurian hills beckon Batkol yet again.