“It’s time,” said Mendelevitch to Rabbi Aaron, “that you’ll begin to study reading and writing in Russian systematically. It’s not so difficult. So, when you really want to write to Stalin a second time, you’ll need me only for checking your spelling and styling. Am not I right?”
“Yes,” said the Rabbi, “and taking into account that I have Known Kyrilic Alphabeth since teenage, that is a good idea. When I was a fourteen, I had a friend, Vadim Vilkomirsky. He volunteered to Kolchak’s army and has fallen in a battle. A nice Goy (Gentile) he was.”
“There is a noon course for Russian, that opens on Monday in the Party’s cellar. It is free of charge.”
The Rabbi began studying on account of the Gallery’s time. He did not wonder that the painter was generous to him. They had known each other for long. Now Rabbi Aaron learned in two months how to spell and read most of the words that he had been familiar with and used to talk with Russian gentiles during the years.
However, from now on - painter Mendelevitch had begun to talk mainly Russian with the Rabbi all along the day. Onky when Aron did not aunderstand at his sentence he would explain in Yiddish.
“Tyalkin like a Goy(gentile),” he told the Rabbi, “would not be considered by God as a sin, Be sure of that.”
While taking the course, Rabbi Aaron did not think about its contribution to his work. Mendelevitch had implied that, while he urged him to take that course, but Rabbi Aaron thought about his future letters to the Soviet leader. Then he would not bother the painter a lot; he would write by himself, and only ask him to elaborate the style or proofread and correct mistakes.
The Rabbi thought also about trying to write in Russian - to Natalya in Siberia! He received a postcard from her. She wrote, that in Tomsk the weather was fine, though cold had already begun. With God’s help everything will become in order. She waited for his immediate answer, she wrote. Despite knowing that he had no writing knowledge in Russian, she was sure that somebody would be ready help him in reading and writing. (she had not known yet about Mogid’s arrest, and maybe she thought about him as the Rabbi’s writer assistant.) She even suggested that Rabbi Aaron would try to write first in Yiddish. Maybe the Gepau have a translator-censor, and would deliver it to her ‘as is’:
“My prisoner - friend, Sophie, can translate from Yiddish to Russian, if they allow that- as my Yiddish is poor. So, please write.”
But from the beginning - Rabbi Aaron preferred to write to Natalya in Russian. That was in accordance with an advice he had received from the great Rabbi Hofets Haim in Poland. That Rabbi wrote to Aaron, (as an answer to his questioning letter to Poland) that his relationshiop with a daughter of a Jewish woman (who had therefore been Jewish, as the Wise Rabbis decided in Talmud) would be fine. But preferably he would make a ‘change’ – and write to her at first in Russian. Rabbi Aaron should not be too much courteous to that woman, nor display deep emotions toward her. That type of restrained writing will be difficult for him to do in Yiddish, that he knows well: He might be tempted to write too much and too emotionally. Therefore he ‘should use the thuosand words in Russian’ that he owns and knows how to use. “that would surely make your letter look like an ‘official Letter’”, determined the great Rabbi, “and not include excited heart wishes, poetic hints, like those in ‘Solomon’s song of songs’, that talks about words of love and a woman’s beauty, our Wise man decided it to be words of love between God and his beloved nation Israel. ..and so on. Then - if you discover by her words of fond that she was mocking at your ‘Judaism’, or that her correspondence with you had been either just for entertainment and fun’s sake, for ‘filling her idle time’, then… You should stop all that. Behaving in this way is the proper dealing with this matter, dear Rabbi Aaron Hittin.”
Minsk, 12 September 1928 (Letter from Aaron to Natalya)
To Natalya Besarobina.
I am writing this letter in bad Russian, as you see. I’d like to tell you that some changes had taken place here since you left. My deformed little son is taken care by Blooma, as you remember. But now he should be at her home. The new Wellfare department representative, comrade Davidovna - had agreed to that. For your information, my neighbor , Mrs. Blooma Borovitsky, that you had known, has just born a baby, and my son is enjoying his society. I am with the Gallery as usual, and as you see I have studied some Russian. Please, write more about your life in the re-education place. Sorry to have arrived to the postcard edge. With God’s help, please keep your health and God will make you strong in body and spirit. Rabbi Aaron Hittin.
Tomsk, Siberia, 12 December 1928:
To the respeced Rabbi Aaron Hittin,
To the man I adore so much: Thank you for your first letter, which I have enjoyed to read in Russian. Has not comrade Mendelevitch help you in that? … You have certainly wondered why I have started to write you a few months ago. I think that in the first opportunity, when I am back in our native town- I shall change my life and become a Kosher Jewish kitchen keeper. I’ve really become a real God believer. I am quite in love with you, Rabbi. How should I explain that? If you could love me, even through our correspondence, I’ll have about who to long and about what to think, and where to return. Your proudly uncompromising figure always follows my mind, wherever I go or stay. I’ll be excited to see you again. I have a kind of remorse that I had not dicovered all that before. Without meeting you and knowing your qualities and amazing personality - my life would have been a long curse. ..I know that you will either laugh at me in your heart- or rebuke me, reading all that. But if I can have the slightest chance of not deluding myself, please write to me again. If not- please, I will suffer very much; then the best for me is not to forget you, but hope that God will take my soul soon back to him, as that is the punishment I shall deserve for my sins during my short life. Yours, treading on your toes and bothering your soul - Natalya.
Minsk 12 January 1929.
To Natalya Besarobina.
I am frightened by your letter. I can’t feel responsible for an awful and gloomy future for yourself - as you described in your previous letter. Here – no special news. I wonder, that you have not asked about Blooma’s child and who is his father. You should know that there was a man here, who travelled to your direction lately. If you had understood that, very well. His name was Ferkert, or I am mistaken.(Ferkert is a Yiddish [German: verkehrt] word for ‘the opposite’. Jewish people had known, that if it appeared in a letter- they have to understand that its contents is a lie).
He had learned with me- and with other friends of mine – in a Jewish school, that was allowed by the regime at those remote days. God help you, and my best wishes also to your friends in the camp. I know it’s a healthy place and fresh air there, in your town. I remain your good acquaintant– Aaron…
CHAPTER 22