Bibi

“ And yet Colonel Deschanel-Mauret told me that you—ahem—" He coughed, wrinkled his forehead in thought, studied the apache from head to foot as he might some exotic and loathsome beetle, and then shook his head.
"Can't make it out," he went on, half to himself. "You don't seem like a—you certainly don't look like a—"
"Like a what?" demanded Bibi.
"Like a German spy."
"I am not, bourgeois!" ”

“ Here's one apache who—"
"Aisy, me lad! Aisy turns the thrick!" cut in Fitzgerald's smooth, silken voice, and Bibi was so utterly surprised at the fact that the plain-clothes man's blackjack was not thudding down on his head that he lost his garrotte hold and the German ran away and down Thirty-Fifth Street, leaving no trace behind him except a handful of blond hair that was clinging to Bibi's grip. ”

“ I want to show those bourgeois what an apache can do."
"Patriotism," suggested the other.
"Patriotism?" echoed Bibi. "No! Je m'en fous—I mock myself of it! What have I to do with your fat pig of a monopolist government? It is—ah"—a strange expression eddied up in his bold eyes, oddly changing what was brutal and ignoble to something almost heroic, almost beautiful—"it is the quartier, Eloi l'Michet, and Pierre l'Rongeur, and all the others. My own people. They kill out there, in Picardy, hein? And why, then, should not I kill, too? I, who am Bibi l'Tueur! Put me in a uniform," he begged. ”

“ And then she smiled, and opening the old blue gate in the garden wall, looked out over Beaucourt.
“There’s the old world—everybody’s past. We are beginning all over again, old Durand—you—I—even Bibi. But Bibi will be just the same as ever, and after all there is so little for Bibi to find out. You are just an Englishman who chose to stay in France.”
“I’m a deserter,” he said. “I suppose they would call me that. Beckett—the man buried over there would not have grudged me the chance; he was the sort of fellow who never minded risking his head. ”

“ We'd throw up our hands in horror at the very idea. We are what our friend the waiter calls dirty bourgeois."
With which remarks they passed out of the restaurant, out of Bibi's life, leaving nothing behind them except a generous tip, the memory of an aristocratic German name, and yet another sharpening in the apache's heart of that class consciousness which is akin to patriotism—and, by reverse English, causing Judge Moses C. Mandelson, when Bibi entered his office early the next morning accompanied by Fitzgerald, to break into enthusiastic speech. ”

“ There is a woman in the fort who could, I feel sure, tell a great deal more about Premi than I am able to do. Has the Mem noticed an old bibi with one eye who goes about in the zenana?”
Robin translated the question to Alicia, who replied, “I remember well an old woman with one blind eye: she is always talking; she interrupted me every minute.”
“That bibi was the first to carry in the white little girl,” observed Kripá Dé. “That Jai Dé has said strange things about Premi; they are coming back to my mind. ”

“ That the invader is overrunning your country? That France is calling all men capable of bearing arms to the colors—to defend the motherland?"
Bibi scratched his head. To be sure, he had heard vaguely about this war. But the news had made no impression on him. Less important it had seemed than his daily drinks and cigarettes, and he wondered what the judge meant by dragging in such an outside subject.
"Yes," he replied, a little surprised, "I know that there is war."
"Very well." The judge spoke as if giving judgment. "You will enlist in the French army. ”

“ For he was Bibi l'Tueur—and the short Apache knife was his red hand of Ulster.
But New York was snobbishly democratic, even in crime. And businesslike.
A native-born burglar who felt sorry for him and lent him twenty dollars explained it to him. Tried to, rather.
"Don't you see, Frenchy?" he said. "If I have to croak a guy to save my own pelt, I do it. Sure Mike. But I hate like hell to do it. Killing ain't a business. ”

“ And since never before in all his life had he done a stroke of what the world, rightly or wrongly, calls honest labor, since the animal instinct of self-preservation taught him that here, on board this tight, workaday ship, Bibi the Killer had to be Bibi the Stoker, or—by Gawd! ”

“ In view of the fact that he often proclaimed himself a socialist, this seemed to bear some colour of probability; but against it argued the circumstance that of the members of that little clan of Russian refugees which inhabits the southern borderland of the Latin Quarter, not one would have aught to say to Bibi. They gave him the widest of wide berths, and when questioned as to their motives, would only shrug their shoulders, and answer that he was a disgraceful old person, a drunken reprobate, whom, the wonder was not that they avoided, but that any decent people could tolerate. ”

“ The interior of the synagogue was half-empty. The people dispersed slowly and silently, as if they were seized by a great sorrow and doubt. The poor and rich, until now great admirers of the Rabbi. There was the rustle of the belated women in the gallery, and then everything was quiet and deserted.
As in times of yore, Joseph Akiba was coming back in the moonlit night, to his shepherd's hut, so Meir pale and trembling approached the house of his fathers. ”

“ Heavens, how stern and pious a Jew this Rabbi Akiba was! Scarcely his peer to be found in all Judea.
He devoted all his days and all his nights to the Holy Law, studying it himself and expounding it to others. The number of his disciples was a veritable army, and whoever heard the Torah from his lips felt that he drank from the very source of life.
Not only did he teach the Torah’s word, but also how to live its very spirit, how to purge oneself of gaiety; for laughter, play and mirth all led to sin. ”

“ Four of the Rabbis wept; but Akiba laughed aloud.
"Akiba," said the others to him, "wherefore laugh? These heathens who worship idols live in peace, and are merry, while our holy city lies in ruins; weep, do not laugh."
"For that very reason I laugh, and am glad," answered Rabbi Akiba. "If God allows those who transgress His will to live happily on earth, how infinitely great must be the happiness which He has stored up in the world to come for those who observe His commands."
Upon another occasion these same Rabbis went up to Jerusalem. ”

“ And as they listened a message came from the rich man, who had not joined in the common crowd of welcome. He desired to consult the famous Rabbi, whose visit was an event and an honour to the place. This rich man must have been one of those Jews who call themselves Jews in their heart; he evidently was not a Jew in his actions or his interests, or he would have surely heard that Akiba was something more than a distinguished stranger. However, Akiba went to him, and found that his advice was wanted. The rich man told the Rabbi of the vow which he had made never to see or help his daughter ”

“ So hath the mind of your beloved cousin. Already I know full well that, with holy courage, ye are ready for the trial. The flames of a fiery furnace must fail to frighten a true Israelite from the worship of the God of his fathers. Past favors are not to be repaid by proving traitors to the God of Israel. We are the temporal subjects of the King of Babylon it is true, and in anything that interferes not with the command of Jehovah, we are happy to render him willing obedience: but with us obedience to the higher law is paramount to all other considerations. ”

“ MARKING THE WITHDRAWAL OF CERTAIN ABUSES IN CONNECTION WITH THE JEWISH TAX.
CHAPTER XXVIII. AKIBA. Love and Law.
The man who now came to the fore was of a different mould—the famous Rabbi Akiba. He was born in Palestine in the year 50 C. E. that is, some 20 years before the Temple fell. Many a pretty legend is woven around his life. Have you ever realized that it is only around great men that legends most luxuriantly grow? Imagination does not seek to picture incidents in the lives of the commonplace. Not only poor, but ignorant, Akiba despised scholars and scholarship. ”

“ The Governor Turnusrupis once asked Rabbi Akiba, "What is this day you call the Sabbath more than any other day?" The Rabbi responded, "What art thou more than any other person?" "I am superior to others," he replied, "because the emperor has appointed me governor over them."
Then said Akiba, "The Lord our God, who is greater than your emperor, has appointed the Sabbath day to be holier than the other days."
When man leaves the synagogue for his home an angel of good and an angel of evil accompany him. ”

“ Towards the end of the third century this correspondence between Judea and Babylon became even more active. Abitur and Abin often wrote concerning legal decisions and the doings of the schools, and thereby the intellectual activity of Judaism maintained its solidarity despite the fact that the Jewish people was no longer united in one land. In the Talmud we frequently read, "they sent from there," viz. Palestine. Obviously these messages were sent in writing, though possibly the bearer of the message was often himself a scholar, who conveyed his report by word of mouth. ”

“ Then spoke Rabbi Eleazer, the son of Azoria:—
"Thou art better to Israel," said he, "than father and mother to man. They bring him into the world, but thou, my teacher, showest him the way into the world of Immortality."
Then said Rabbi Akiba:—
"It is well that man should be afflicted, for his distresses atone for his sins."
"Does the Bible make such an assertion, Akiba?" asked his teacher.
"Yes," answered Akiba. "'Twelve years old was Manassah when he became king, and fifty-and-five years did he reign in Jerusalem, and he did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord' (Kings) . ”

“ And the words of the men of Judah were fiercer than the words of the men of Israel.
10:020:001 And there happened to be there a man of Belial, whose name was Sheba, the son of Bichri, a Benjamite: and he blew a trumpet, and said, We have no part in David, neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse: every man to his tents, O Israel.
10:020:002 So every man of Israel went up from after David, and followed Sheba the son of Bichri: but the men of Judah clave unto their king, from Jordan even to Jerusalem. ”

“ Rabbi Akiba was usually a very pleasant companion at table. He was in the habit of telling amusing anecdotes and making witty remarks in the course of the meal, and it was his invariable custom to discourse learnedly on some theme of the law before the blessing of the food was pronounced, in order to fulfil the rabbinical precept, “a man shall always speak words of the law over his table” ”

“ The sin towards God, the Day of Atonement atones for; but sins toward man, the Day of Atonement cannot atone for till the neighbor has been appeased.
Said R. Aqiba: Happy are ye, O Israel. Before whom do ye cleanse yourselves, and who cleanses you? Your Father who is in Heaven. For it is written [Ezek. xxxvi. 25] : "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean"; and it is also written: "The Migveh (hope, or legal bath) of Israel is the Lord." As a legal diving-bath purifies the unclean, so does the Holy One, blessed be He, cleanse Israel. ”

“ The problems also are those of the Judean community. The class to whom the prophet addresses his messages is evidently the same as that to which Haggai and Zechariah speak. Jerusalem, not a Jewish colony in Babylon, is the constant object of the prophet's appeal. Babylon is only one of the distant lands of the dispersion. It is from Jerusalem that the prophet ever views the world. Thus in 43:5,6 he declares in the name of Jehovah:
Fear not, for I am with thee. ”

“ On Jer 51:4, cf. Jer 50:30 and Jer 49:26. The suffix in "her streets" refers to Babylon.
Verses 5-14
Because of the righteousness of Israel, Babylon is to be irretrievably destroyed. Jer 51:5. "For Israel is not forsaken, nor Judah of his God, of Jahveh of hosts; but their land is full of guilt because of the Holy One of Israel. Jer 51:6. Flee out of the midst of Babylon, and save ye every one his life: do not perish for her iniquity; because it is a time of vengeance for Jahveh; He renders to her what she has committed. ”

“ As there had been a very large and learned class of Jews in Babylon from the Captivity to the time of Christ, there was also a corresponding number of very important schools in several cities on the Euphrates and east of it. These also gathered a Talmud, with its Mishna and Gamara; but this—called the Babylonian Talmud—was of later origin than the Jerusalem Talmud. ”

“ At crucial moments you remember that you are the great-grandson of Rabbi Akiba Friedländer. With pride I recall that our great-grandfather, Rabbi Eliezer, with one of his sons-in-law,—I think it was your father, Mrs. Benas,—was given an audience by Frederick William III in order to discuss the colonization of the Jews in Palestine, and to beg his protection. So long ago as that, and he an old Rabbi from the province of Posen! What crops out in me as a practical interest in colonial schemes, and what makes you, my friend, so deeply devoted to the cause, may be the legacy of our ancestry. ”

“ Rabbi Chanania, the son of Akashia, said, "The Holy One, blessed be He, was pleased to make Israel worthy; wherefore He gave them a copious Torah and many commandments, as it is said, 'It pleased the Lord, for his righteousness' sake, to magnify the Torah and make it honorable.'"
CHAPTER II All Israel have a portion in the world to come, and it is said, "And thy people shall be all righteous; they shall inherit the land for ever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I may be glorified".
1. Rabbi said, "which is the right course that a man should choose for himself? ”