I stood in awe of him when I was a little child. I knew he was a man of God, one of the greatest authorities in the Law, whose advice was sought by the whole world.
I knew also that he inclined to leniency in all his decisions, and that none dared oppose him.
The sight I saw that day in Shool is before my eyes now.
The Rabbi stands on the platform, and his black eyes gleam and shine in the pale face and in the white hair and beard.
The Additional Service is over, and the people are waiting to hear what the Rabbi will say, and one is afraid to draw one's breath.
And the Rabbi begins to speak.
His weak voice grows stronger and higher every minute, and at last it is quite loud.
He speaks of the sanctity of the Day of Atonement and of the holy Torah; of repentance and of prayer, of the living and of the dead, and of the pestilence that has broken out and that destroys without pity, without rest, without a pause—for how long? for how much longer?
And by degrees his pale cheeks redden and his lips also, and I hear him say: "And when trouble comes to a man, he must look to his deeds, and not only to those which concern him and the Almighty, but to those which concern himself, to his body, to his flesh, to his own health."
I was a child then, but I remember how I began to tremble when I heard these words, because I had understood.