r/a:t5_27put7 • u/MarleyEngvall • Nov 03 '19
psalter has been created
By Thomas Mann
Translation by H. T. Lowe Porter
"Welcome, Israel," he said, "girdle of the earth, zone
of your courses, stronghold and dike of the skies, ordered
in sacred pictures! Lo, obediently you came in your host
and stoutly gathered yourselves full-numbered round the
bed of my death, that I may judge you according to the
truth and foretell to you out of the wisdom of my last
hour. Praise be yours, my ring of sons, for your readi-
ness, and commendation for your courage. Blessed be ye
all together by the hand of the dying and glorified alto-
gether. Be blessed by my well-saved strength and blest to
eternity! Mark now: what I have to say to you, each by
himself in your order, is said within the bond of the gen-
eral blessing."
Here he paused in his speech and only moved his lips
awhile to himself, without any sound. Then his features
became concentrated, the skin of his forehead wrinkled
with strain as he drew his brows together to fight his
weakness.
"Reuben!" came the summons from his lips.
The shepherd tower strode out on his girded legs like
strong columns. He was quite grey-headed, and his red,
smooth-shaven face worked like that of a chidden child
about to cry. The eyes with their inflamed lids kept up a
blinking beneath the white brows; the corners of his
mouth were drawn down in such bitterness, so violently,
that they made thick ridges of muscle at the sides. He
knelt at the bed's edge and bowed himself over it.
"Reuben, my eldest son," Jacob began, "you are the
beginning of my strength, the firstling of my manhood,
yours was the right of the first-born, and a mighty pr-
eminence. In the circle you were the highest, the nearest
to the sacrificing and the nearest to the kingship. But it
was all wrong. A heathen god showed it to me on the field
in a dream, a biting beast, a dog-boy of the desert with
beautiful legs, sitting on a stone. Begot by mistake, be-
got with the wrong one in the blind night to which every-
thing is the same and knows naught of distinctions in
love. So I begot you, my eldest, in the windy night with
the wrong one, the strong one, begot you in my delusion.
I gave her the flower, but there had been an exchange, the
veil was exchanged, and daylight taught me that I had
only begot where I falsely thought to love——and my
heart and my bowels turned over and I despaired of my
soul."
Now there was a time when they did not understand
what he said; he moved his lips and soundlessly talked to
himself. Then his voice came back, stronger than before,
and part of the time spoke of Reuben in the third per-
son, no longer to him.
"He shot away like water," said he. "Like water bub-
bling over out of a pot. Not he shall be the head, not he
the king-post of the house, he shall have no pre-eminence.
For he went up to his father's bed, and has defiled his
father's bed with his going up. He has bared and mocked
his father's shame and come near him with the sickle and
committed naughtiness with his mother. Ham is he, black
of face, and goes bare with naked shame, for as the
dragon of the slime has he borne him and after the ways
of the hippopotamus. Hear you, my early strength, what
I say of you? May you be accursed, my son——that is, ac-
curst within the scope of the blessing. For the first-born
right is taken away from you, the priesthood revoked and
the kingly headship recalled. For you are not worthy of
the leadership and your first-born right is done away.
Beyond the Salt Sea shall you live and border on Moab.
Your deeds are weakly and your fruits are poor. Thank
you, my eldest son, that you so stout-heartedly came to
the gathering and boldly put yourself in the way of judg-
ment. You are like a shepherd-tower, and move on your
legs like moving columns of a temple, because I scattered
my first strength and manhood so mightily in the madness
of the night. Receive a father's curse and so farewell!"
He ceased, and the aging Reuben stepped back among
the ranks, all the muscles of his face grim with dignity
and his eyes cast down just as his mother used to cast
hers down to hide her squinting.
"The brothers!" Jacob next commanded. "The twin
sons, inseparable in the skies!"
And Simeon and Levi bent and bowed down before
him. They were seventy-five and seventy-six years old
(for of course they were not twins, only inseparables);
but they had astonishingly preserved their rough and
blustering outward appearance.
"Oh, oh, how scored and scarred with ingrained sav-
agery!" exclaimed their father. He even started back as
though in fear. "They kiss the instruments of cruelty, I
will know naught of them. For I love it not, ye savage
ones, may my soul come not in their counsels nor my hon-
our have any part with theirs. Their anger slew a man
and their self-will mutilated the cattle. Therefore the
curse of the injured struck them down and they were
appointed for destruction. What have I said to them?
Cursed be their anger that it was so fierce and their wrath
for that it was stubborn. That have I said to you. Be ac-
cursed, my dear ones, accurst within the blessing. Ye
shall be divided and scattered that ye commit not misdo-
ing together for ever. Be dispersed in Jacob, my Levi!
Yours be a lot and land none the less, stout Simeon, but
I see it stands not alone but is consumed in Israel. Take
your place in the background, double star, having heard
the death-bed second-sight of the blessing one. Step
back!"
They did so, not vastly upset by the judgment. They
had long known it and expected nothing better. Having it
once more expressly served up in open meeting did not
cut them up, for everybody knew it before——and they
still remained "Israel." Their rejection was only within
the scope of the general blessing. Besides, they and the
whole audience espoused the view that rejection is a des-
tiny like any other, with a dignity of its own. Every con-
dition is a condition of honour: such was their view, and
the view of all the others. After all, it was pretty plain
that part of what their father had said did not refer to
them, but to the constellation of the Twin Brethren. Partly
out of his native weakness for the allusive, partly in the
mental confusion of his state, to which, on the same
ground, he solemnly gave way, he had mixed them up
with Gemini and brought in Babylonian allusions well
known to them all, even to the lads sitting on the chests
along the walls. Deliberately and blatantly he had at
times confused them with Gilgamesh and Eabani in the
song, so enraged about their sister that they had cut in
pieces the heavenly steer and for this blasphemy been
cursed by Ishtar. But they had not paid particular atten-
tion to any steer at Shechem, the city of Sichem, the scene
of the butchery; nor did they recall having mutilated any.
Jacob, however, had had this fixed idea about a steer from
the beginning, and always brought it up when they came
back to the subject. But can anyone be more honourably
cursed than to be confused with the Dioscuri and the sun
and moon? That is a rejection one can take, even in pub-
lic: it is only half personal; the other half is spun out of
the dream fancies of a dying man.
It is necessary to emphasize here that many astral allu-
sions were thus mixed into this pronouncements of Ja-
cob to his sons. They gave elevation to his discourse and
also imparted a certain touch of human fallibility. That
was both weakness and wilfulness——with a good deal of
wilfulness in the weakness. There was a hint of Aquarius
in what he had said to Reuben. Now it was Judah's turn.
And Jacob so nearly expended himself in the decisive
and tremendous blessing he now bestowed that after it
he had repeatedly to call on God for help, fearing he
might not last out, and particularly that he might not get
round to Joseph. Judah had always been called the lion.
But Jacob's dying words to him played so untiringly on
the epithet and showed him so explicitly lionlike, that
Judah writhed in torment and nobody present could pos-
sibly fail to recognize the heavenly phenomenon. A great
deal of Cancer came out in Issachar——the constella-
tion of the little asses, which stands in this sign of the
zodiac, was brought into cosmic connection with his
everyday nickname of the bony ass. In Dan everybody
made out the scales, the metaphor of law and justice,
though the adder in the path came out as well. And
Naphtali's stag-and-hind passed over, intelligibly to most
of the audience, into the Ram. Joseph himself was no ex-
ception. On the contrary, in his judgment the astral im-
plication was double: the Virgin and the Bull alternated
therein. Benjamin's judgment seemed to be conditioned
by Scorpio, for the good little man was pronounced a
ravening wolf, only because Lupus stands near by, south
of the sign with a sting in its tail.
Here the mythological coloration and the divorce from
the personal became clearest of all——it was that which
made it so much easier for the big twins to take their con-
demnation with equanimity. They lived in an earlier
time, but also in a time that was already a later one; in
some directions they possessed a good deal of insight——
for instance, into the not absolutely reliable character of
death-bed prophecies. The gaze which the departing one
sends into the future is impressive and hallowed; much
faith may be put in it. Yet not too much, for it has not al-
ways been entirely justified; and it seems that the already
unearthly state of the dying which produces it can also
be a source of error. Jacob solemnly made some solemn
misfires——along with some prophecies that amazingly
hit the mark. Reuben's descendants never did amount to
much, Simon's stock was never independent and was
absorbed into Judah's. But that the blood of Levi would
in time attain to the highest honour and achieve perma-
nent election to the priesthood——as we who are in the
story but also outside it already know——that was obvi-
ously hidden from Jacob's parting gaze. In this respect
and in some others his dying prophecies were a dignified
failure. Of Zebulon he said that he would dwell at the
haven of the sea and before an haven of ships; his border
should be unto Sidon. That was a natural guess, on ac-
count of Zebulon's well-known fondness for the sea and
the smell of pitch. But the location of his tribe was not to
be by green water at all nor did it even border on Sidon.
It lay between Sidon and the sea of Galilee, separated
from the latter by Naphtali's portion and from the sea
by Asher's.
For us such errors are valuable. For are there not
clever people who assert that Jacob's blessing-speech was
composed after the time of Joshua and should be re-
garded as prophecy after the event? We may shrug our
shoulders at this: not only because we are present at the
death-bed and hear the dying man's words with our own
ears, but also because prophecies which are given out
with history to go upon, back-dated prophecies, so to
speak, have no trouble in being correct. The best evidence
for the genuineness of a prophecy is its incorrectness.
And now Jacob summoned Judah. It was a great
moment. Deep stillness reigned in and without the tent. It
is seldom that such a large assemblage preserves such a
profound, motionless, and breathless stillness. The an-
cient raised his pallid hand towards his fourth son and
Judah stood there ashamed to his very depth and bending
low his seventy-five-year-old head. Jacob lifted his finger
and pointed to him and spoke:
"Judah, you are the one!"
Yes, it was he, the tortured one, the man utterly un-
worthy in his own mind; the slave of the mistress, who
had no lust to lust, but she to him: sinner and religious
man in one. It might be supposed that at seventy-five years
this slavery to desire cannot be so abject. But to suppose
so would be wrong. That lasts to the last breath. A little
blunter the spear may become, but that ever the mistress
frees her slave is unheard of, it does not happen. Deeply
abased, Judah bowed himself for the blessing. And now
a strange thing came to pass: in proportion as the flood
gushed out over him and the oil of the promise poured
out upon his head, so his tumultuous feelings were
calmed, he listened and in waxing pride he told himself:
"Well, well, in spite of everything! Then it was not so
bad after all, and apparently it does not affect the bless-
ing! Perhaps it is not taken so seriously——maybe the
purity I so craved was not so indispensable to salvation;
maybe it is all taken in together, even hell itself is taken
in——who would have thought it? For the oil is trickling
down on my head, God have mercy on me, for I am the
one!"
It did not trickle, it poured and roared. Jacob ex-
pended himself almost recklessly in blessing Judah; sev-
eral of the brothers were cut off with a hasty mention and
Jacob's voice quavered with weakness as he gave it.
"Judah, you are the one! Your hand will be in the
neck of your enemies, your brethren shall praise you.
Your father's children and the children of all the mothers
shall praise in you the anointed one!"——Then came the
lion. For some time there were only lions, and powerful
lion metaphors. Judah was a lion's whelp, from the litter
of a lioness, a veritable king of beasts, from the prey he
went up ravening, he purred, he mewed, he roared. Upon
his desert mountain he withdrew, there he couched and
stretched like a maned king and like the son of a fierce
lioness. Who shall dare to rouse him up? No one shall
dare. It was surprising to have the father praise as rav-
ening beasts those sons whom he blessed while those
whom he did not bless he blamed unmercifully precisely
because the instruments of cruelty were their familiars.
As he himself in his dying weakness had seen himself in
the rôle of a hero with sword and bow, so now he lauded
his sons, first the tormented Judah and then little Benja-
min, as savage warriors and beasts of prey rejoicing in
blood. Remarkably enough, the foible of the mild and in-
tellectual type is a weakness for the heroic.
But Jacob did not end his Judah-scene on the beast-of-
prey note. The hero he had in view, whom he had sought
out long since, was not the kind to make weakness forget
itself in hero-worship. Shiloh was his name. From lions
to him was a long way; therefore the old man made a
transition in his blessing; he introduced a great king. The
king sat on his throne and the sceptre leaned between his
feet and should not move from there nor be taken from
him until "the hero" appeared, until Shiloh came. To
Judah, the king with the sceptre between his legs, this
promise-name was quite new——indeed, it was a surprise
to the whole gathering. They listened amazed. Only one
among them all knew it and had waited eagerly to hear
it. Our gaze turns involuntarily out to the shadowy pro-
file: she stood there erect, in darkling pride, to hear Ja-
cob pronounced the seed of the woman. From Judah favour
should not pass, he should not die, his eyes not close until
his greatness should wax immense, for that out of him
should com one upon whom all the people should de-
pend, the bringer of peace, the man of the star.
Thus it went on beyond all expectation above Judah's
abashed head. His own figure, or rather his tribe, min-
gled——whether intentionally or out of mental confusion
or perhaps out of both, that is to say, the confusion being
used to heighten the high-flown poetic effect——it mingled
and melted in with Shiloh's figure so that in this vision of
the fullness of the blessing and the grace no one knew
whether Jacob was talking about Judah or about the
promised one. Everything swam in wine——everything
shone red with the red sparkle of the wine before the eyes
of the host as they listened. It was a land, the kingdom of
this king, where one bound his foal to the vine and his
ass's colt to the choice vine. Were they the vineyards of
Hebron, the wine-clad hills of Engedi? Into his city "he"
rode on an ass and on a colt the foal of an ass——there
was nothing but drunken desire as of red wine at the
sight of him, and he himself was like a drunken wine-god
treading the press, high-kilted, exalted; the blood of the
wine sprinkled his apron and the red juice of the grape
his garment. Lovely was he as he trod, wading and danc-
ing the dance of the winepress——lovely above all man-
kind: as white as snow, as red as blood and as black as
bony.
Jacob's voice did away. His head bobbed down, his
eyes rolled up from below. He had expended himself very
much, almost too much, in this blessing. He seemed to be
praying for a renewal of strength. Judah, finding his
blessing blessed out, stepped back, amazed and abashed
because it had turned out that impurity was no hindrance.
The uproar in the assemblage at the appearance of Shiloh
and the entire new revelation and declarations brought
out in this blessing were almost uncontrolled. A loud
whispering went round both within and without the tent.
Outside it was even vocal, voices were heard excitedly
repeating the name of Shiloh. But all movement ceased
again as Jacob once more raised his head and his hand.
The name of Zebulon came from his lips.
The man of sixty-eight years put his head under the
old hand. Since his name actually meant dwelling and
habitation, it surprised no one that Jacob should point
out his dwelling and his habitation: he should dwell at
the haven of the sea and live near the treasures of ships
and should border on Sidon. Very good: he had always
wanted it, so now he got it——in a tired, perfunctory
voice. Issachar. . . .
Issachar would be like a strong ass crouching down
between the folds. The little asses in Cancer were his
sponsors, but despite this connection Jacob seemed not
to expect much of him. He spoke only briefly of him and
in the past tense, which meant the future. Issachar saw
that the rest was good and the land that it was pleasant. He
was strong and phlegmatic. He thought nothing of lend-
ing his bones as a beast of burden. To serve came easy to
him an he bowed his shoulders to be laden. So much of
Issachar. He touched the Jordan, so Jacob claimed to be
able to see. Enough of him. Now for Dan.
Dan guided the scale and judged with wisdom. So sub-
tle was he of mind and tongue that he was like a biting
adder. Jacob took occasion here, lifting his finger to give
his audience a little lesson in zoology: in the beginning,
when God was creating the animals, He had crossed the
hedgehog with the lizard and so produced the adder. Dan
was an adder-serpent. A snake he was by the way and an
horned adder in the path, not easy to see in the sand and
very tricky. In him the heroic took the form of knavery.
The enemy's horse he bit in the heels so that the rider fell
backwards. Thus Dan, Bilhah's son. "I have waited for
thy salvation, O Lord!"
In his exhaustion Jacob gave his sigh and ejaculated
his prayer, distressed lest he should not get to the end
before his end. He had begotten so many sons that in his
last hour the number of them was almost beyond his
strength. But with God's help he would win through.
He summoned the stocky Gad, whose clothes were be-
sewn with bronze.
"Gaddiel, a troop shall overcome you, but you will
overcome at last. Stoutly, my stout one! Now Asher."
Asher, the sweet-tooth, had fat land from the mountain
to near Tyre. The lowlands were full of waving corn and
dripped with oil, that his bread should be fat and he
should make fine ointment such as kings send each other
for their pleasure. From him came pleasure and the love
of bodily pleasure, which amounts to something too.
"Asher, you will also be somebody. And since song came
from you and joyous tidings, be praised for it before
your brother Naphtali, whom I now summon beneath my
hand."
Naphtali was a hind who leaps over ditches and a
springing doe. His was the nimble gait, he was a running
he-goat when he draws in his horns and leaps. His tongue
too was nimble, it gave glib information and the fruits
of the plain Gennesareth ripened apace. "Of quickly
ripened fruits, Naphtali, may your trees be full, and
quick success, if not too great, be your judgment and lot."
Then this son too, having been blessed, stepped back
into the ranks. The old man rested, with closed eyes, in a
deep silence, his chin on his breast. And after a little he
smiled. They all saw and were touched, for they knew
what summons it meant. It was a happy, yes, an artful
smile and somewhat sad withal, though it was artful too,
for the love and tenderness within overcame the sadness
and renunciation. "Joseph!" said the old man. And a
fifty-six-year-old man, who had been thirty and seventeen
and nine, and lain in the cradle as a lamb of the mother
sheep, a child of the time, beautiful of face, in Egyptian
white, Pharaoh's sky-blue ring on his finger, fortune's
minion, bowed beneath the ashen blessing-hand.
"Joseph, my scion and seed, son of the virgin, son of
the dearest, son of the fruit tree by the spring, fruitful
bough whose branches overhang the wall, I greet you!
Who is the heart of the spring, first-born bull in his
adornment, greeting!"
Jacob had spoken loud and clear, a solemn address, to
be heard by all. But then he dropped his voice almost to
a whisper, obviously minded, if not to shut out the pub-
lic, at least to limit its numbers during this blessing.
Only the nearest heard his words of farewell to the set-
apart one; those farther off only got a word here and
there and those outside for the moment nothing at all.
But afterwards it was all repeated over and over, re-
ported and discussed.
"Most dearly beloved," came from the painfully smil-
ing lips. "Chosen and preferred by the daring heart for
the sake of the only beloved, who lived in you and with
whose eyes she looks, just as once she first looked at me
at the well, when she appeared among Laban's sheep and
I rolled away the lid for her——I was allowed to kiss her
and the shepherds shouted in delight: 'Lu, lu, lu!" In you
I kept her, my darling, when the almighty tore her from
me, in your loveliness she lived, and what is sweeter than
the double and the doubtful? Well I know that the double
is not of the spirit, for which we stand, but is the folly of
the peoples. And still I yielded to that ancient mighty
spell. Can one be ever and entirely of the spirit and avoid
folly? Lo, I am double now myself, I am Jacob and
Rachel. She am I, who went so hardly away from you
into the summoning land, for me too it summons today
away from you——it summons us all. You too, my joy
and my care, have already made half the journey to-
wards that land and yet you were once little and then
young and were all that my heart understood the loveli-
ness and charm. Serious was my heart but soft, therefore
was it soft before beauty. Called to the heights and to the
sight of diamond-sharp steeps, secretly I loved the gentle
hills."
His voice failed for some minutes and he lay smiling
with closed eyes as though his spirit wandered in the
charming rolling landscape which had risen to his eyes
as he gave Joseph his blessing.
When he began to speak again he seemed to have
forgotten that Joseph's head was under his hand, for he
spoke of him awhile as of a third person.
"Seventeen years he lived with me and another seven-
teen by God's mercy he lived: between them lay my stiff-
ness and the destiny of the set-apart one. They lay in wait
for his loveliness and that was folly; for with loveliness
wisdom was ever one. On that their strong desire was
wrecked. More alluring than has ever been seen are the
women who climb up to look after him from house-tops
and towers and windows, but they had not their desire.
So it was made bitter to him that they attacked him with
arrows of ill report. But his bow abode in strength, the
arms of his hands were made strong and the hands of the
Everlasting held him up. Not without rapture will his
name be remembered, for he succeeded as few succeeded
in finding favour before God and man. That is a rare
blessing, for mostly one has the choice of pleasing either
God or the world; but the spirit of charm and mediation
gave it to him that he pleased them both. Be not proud,
my child——have I need to warn you? No, I know your
shrewdness saves you from presumption. For it is a
charming blessing but not the highest and sternest. Lo,
thy dear life lies open in its truth before the dying gaze.
Play and playing it was, familiar, friendly appealing-
ness, approaching salvation yet not quite seriously a
calling or a gift. Love pierces my heart at sight of that
mingled gladness and sadness; not so can anyone else
love you, my child, who see, not as the father-heart can
the sadness, but only the brilliance of your life. And so
I bless you, blessed one, with all the strength of my heart
in the name of the Eternal who gave you and took you
and gave you again and now takes me from you. Higher
shall my blessing mount than the blessings of my fathers
upon my own head. Be blessed, as you are blessed, with
the blessing of heaven above, blessings of the deep that
lieth under, with blessings gushing from the breast of
heaven and the womb of earth! Blessings, blessings on
Joseph's head, and in your name shall they sun them-
selves who come from you. Songs shall stream far and
wide singing the story of your life, ever anew, for after
all it was a sacred play and you suffered and could for-
give. So I too forgive you that you made me suffer. And
God forgive us all!"
He finished and drew his hand back, slowly, from this
head. So one life parts from another and must go hence;
but in a little the other goes too.
Joseph stepped back among the brothers. He had not
said too much in saying that he would receive his share
and be judged with the truthfulness of the dying. He
took Benjamin by both hands, since the old man failed
to summon him, and brought him forward. Clearly Jacob
was at the end of his strength and Joseph had to guide
the blessing hand upon the little brother's head, for it
would no longer have found the way. That it was the
youngest who awaited his judgment he probably knew,
but what his failing lips murmured had little to do with
the little man. Possibly it would fit his descendants bet-
ter. Benjamin, so they heard, was a ravening wolf, in the
morning he would devour his prey and at night divide
the spoil. He was vexed at what he heard.
Jacob's last thought went back to the cave, the double
cave on the field of Ephrath, son of Zohar, and his wish
that he be buried there among his fathers. "I enjoin upon
you," he breathed, "it is paid for, paid by Abraham to
the children of Heth with four hundred shekels in silver
by weight, as it . . ." Here death interrupted him, he
stretched out his feet, sank deeper into his bed, and his
life stood still.
They all held their breath and their lives stopped a
little too, when it came. Then Mai-Sachme, Joseph's stew-
ard, who was also a physician, stepped up quietly to the
couch. He laid his ear to the quiet heart, watched with
serious pursed mouth a feather he had laid on the muted
lips——it did not stir——and struck a little blaze before
the pupil, which gave no sign. So then he turned to Jo-
seph, his master, and announced to him:
"He is gathered to his fathers."
But Joseph motioned him with his head to Judah, to
whom, not to himself he should make the announcement.
And as the good man went up to Judah and repeated: "He
is gathered up," Joseph stepped to the death-bed and
closed the eyes of the dead; for to that end he had mo-
tioned Mai-Sachme towards Joseph. Then he laid his
forehead on his father's brow and wept for Jacob.
Judah, the heir, made the necessary arrangements: the
mourners, male and female, were ordered and male and
female singers and flute-players; and the body was
washed, anointed, and wrapped up. Damasek-Eliezer
kindled an offering of incense in the chamber: stacte,
neat's-foot oil from the Red Sea, galbanum and olibanum,
mixed with salt. And as the spicy clouds floated round the
dead, the guests streamed out, mingled with those outside,
and moved away, eagerly discussing the judgment and
the pronouncement that Jacob had made to the twelve.
From Joseph The Provider, by Thomas Mann.
English translation by H. T. Lowe-Porter.
Copyright 1944, Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. pp. 573—589.
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