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Chapter Six Nahum ish Gamzo and R. Hananiah ben Teradyon Nahum ish Gamw, who lived at the end of the first century and the beginning ofthe second, apparently in Gimw, in central Palestine, affords us an opportunity oftracing some ofour motifs through an interplay with more mainstream rabbinic views. It was said about Nahum ish Garnzo that he was blind in both eyes, that he had lost his hands and feet, and that his whole body was covered with boils, and that he was lying in a shaky house and the legs of his bed were standing in cups of water so that ants should not crawl up on him.l Once, his bed was placed in a shaky house. His students wanted to take his bed out and afterwards to take out the furnishings. He said to them, "My sons, take the furnishings out and afterwards take out my bed, for you can be assured that as long as I am in the house it won't collapse." They took out the furnishings and then took out his bed, and the house collapsed. His students said to him, "Rabbi, since, then, you are a completely righteous person, why did this happen to you?" He said to them, "My sons, I brought it upon myself: Once, I was going on the way to my father-in-Iaw's house and I had with me three loaded donkeys; one with food and one with drink and one with various delicacies. A poor man came along and stood in my way and said to me, 'Rabbi, feed me.' I had not yet finished unloading the donkey when he breathed his last breath and died. I went and fell on his face and said, 'My eyes, which would not spare your eyes, should be blinded; my hands, which would not spare your hands, should be hacked off; my legs which would not spare your legs should be severed'; nor was I calmed until I said, 'Let my whole body be covered with boils'." They2 said to him, "Alas for us that we see you llS 116 The Binding ofIsaac and Messiah so!" He said to them "Alas for me if you saw me not so." (BT Ta'anit 21a)3 Nahum's students see a righteous, suffering man. But more indelibly imprinted on Nahum's vision is the scene where he becomes what he is. He is pushing ahead on the road to his father-in-Iaw's home, laden down with worldly refreshment, anxious to proceed, when a poor man stands in his way obstructing his progress. The poor man is hungry and asks, almost curtly, that Nahum feed him. Nahum is forced to make a stop here; he asks the man to wait while he unloads the donkeys and thus prepares for camp. All this is a rich man's rigmarole, in the eyes of the pauper. By the time Nahum is finished with his preparations the poor man has collapsed with weakness and is beyond saving. The terrible shock is a revelation for Nahum. Suddenly he hates his way ofliving. He wants desperately to be a different Nahum, immediately. He wants the road of the past, which he walked mindlessly, to disappear; and all thoughts of continuing, laden with goods, to his father-in-Iaw's home are trivial now, nonsensical. The very future becomes vague for him; all that matters is his passionate need for immediate and complete atonement. He has become like the poor man desperately seeking-not bread but salvation-in the moment. Only when the enterprising Nahum is destroyed, leaving a helpless and repulsive Nahum, is he at peace with himself. Dying has been his salvation. He has acted out a martyrdom and he reiterates his readiness for that martyrdom constantly anew. Rather than the the pitiful old man his students saw, Nahum is a heroic embracer of his own dread fate, giving it an immanent meaning rather than mourning it as a fall from a better past. The Talmud continues immediately the story of Nahum as follows: And why was he called Nahum ish Gamw?4 Because at everything that betdl him he said, "This, too, is for the good." Once the Jews wanted to send a gift to Caesar's court. They said, "Who should go? Nahum ish Garnzo should go because he is accustomed to miracles." They sent with him a bag full ofprecious stones and pearls. He set out and stayed over...

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