"I fear it is Meyer Shagarach's doing," murmured Silberstein.
"Not so," spoke Cohen, sharply. Though young, he seemed a leader. "Shagarach is lost to the fold of Israel, but does he chant with cracked voice out of a tattered hymn-book? Pretty soon we shall see Saul Aronson shivering in the waters of baptism, and then he will change his name to Paul, like that other traitor, the fire-brand of Tarsus?"
"Traitor yourself!" cried Aronson, stung by Cohen's irony.
The word has terrible force in Israel. The whole past of the race is vivid in the minds of the wanderers, and recollection of its sorrows makes a bond so strong that no temptation can break it. Aronson paused to think. The dim traditions, all tears and fire and blood—the exodus from Egypt, the Babylonian captivity, the burning of Jerusalem, the dispersion, the persecutions without number—could he forget all those, snapping ties so sacred?
"After all, I think Saul Aronson's heart is not with the gentiles," said old Barentzen, in a soothing voice. "Would he rather be buried when he dies under some idolatrous mound stuck with the symbol of him whom Judas righteously delivered——"
"There never was such a Nazarene," broke in Cohen impetuously. "It is all a fable and the text in Josephus was written in by the gentiles."
"I say the Christ was real and rightly condemned as a creator of sedition," said Rabofsky, with authoritative pomp. Like the misers of every race, he was both devotee and formalist.
"He is not mentioned in the talmud," argued Cohen. "Nor elsewhere, until the history of our race crosses the history of the pagans. It is all an invention."
Thereupon the two zealots wrangled and jangled till Aronson's ears ached. But his mind was dwelling upon old Barentzen's saying and sadly acknowledging its truth. His heart was not really with the Christians. What did he know of their teachings? He had been given a bible, but it was locked in his office drawer, unread. Besides, these were deep questions. Who was he to dispute the great doctors, like Moses ben Maimon?
"So be it, obstinate youth," said Rabofsky at last, waving his hands to end the discussion.