Thus answered Reb Avròhom, but our people, the Rebbe's followers, shut his mouth before he had made an end, and had the Rebbe not held them back, they would have torn him in pieces on the spot.
"Leave him alone!" he commanded the Chassidim.
And to Reb Avròhom he said:
"Avròhom, you have sinned!"
And from that day forward he was called the Sinner, and was shut out from everywhere. The Chassidim kept their eye on him, and persecuted him, and he was not even allowed to pray in the house-of-study.
And I'll tell you what I think: A wicked man, even when he acts according to his wickedness, fulfils God's command. And who knows? Perhaps they were both right!
ISAAC DOB BERKOWITZ
Born, 1885, in Slutzk, Government of Minsk (Lithuania), White Russia; was in America for a short time in 1908; contributor to Die Zukunft; co-editor of Ha-Olam, Wilna; Hebrew and Yiddish writer; collected works: Yiddish, Gesammelte Schriften, Warsaw, 1910; Hebrew, Sippurim, Cracow, 1910.