I'm annoyed by the saying attributed to Rabbi Nachman
from Bratslav, "The entire world is a very narrow bridge". The
words that follow, "What is important is to have no fear", strike
me as even falser. It seems that Rabbi Nachman, who was
chronically ill, never grew very old. I can't accept that this
is how he painted his life, and I especially can't accept that his
is how he portrayed his old age: as a deep, narrow abyss veering between
two wondrous banks, the first a happy childhood awash in colors and
the other, the life beyond life, life after death or the eternal life
prophesied in a land of the resurrected dead.
My idea of the bridge is completely the opposite of what he said.
In my mind's eye, the narrow bridge of his saying is actually a delicate
link between two chasms, the void that he has left and the void to
which he is coming. Only a trace of our brief life in the physical
world of suffering forms a link between these two yearned-for voids.
We know that Rabbi Nachman's life was short and grief-stricken.
We know also that he yearned all his days for another life, free of
suffering. That's why I believe that he understood neither the
bleakness of old age nor the sorrow of slowly taking leave of life.
I don't agree with the pious rabbi's words, if they're really his.
First of all, I don't believe in the world to come or in the next
life. Nor do I believe that we inherit good and happiness in
the next world. Would believing that I'm on my way to the next
world make it easier for me to go through my illness? Even if
I were to recite to myself, lying in bed every tormented night, that
the point of life is to have no fear, would I be able to master my
terrifying fears? And if that is the point of life, where do
we get our gnawing hunger for what comes after life?
No one has ever come back from that curtained world. Even the
suffering pious man had no informants who returned after fulfilling
their mission there. How could he be absolutely positive that
fearing nothing is the right guide for life, that it would lead him
and his followers to a world where all is good? And how would
they be brought there? by the shortest, fastest rout or, rather, by
long, twisting journey racked with grief and pain, at least as prolonged
in the hidden world as in the known?
For myself, I was summoned for just one quick peek at the realms beyond
life. It was so fleeting that I don't feel qualified to report what
I saw. I can only wonder at the courage of those who decide to bear
witness. On the other hand, the doctors tell me that I was lucky
that my peek didn't last too long. If you don't come back from there
right away, you aren't likely to come back at all. "How long is that?"
I asked the doctors. "One hour? half an hour? Less than that?" "Something
less", said the doctors before hurrying on to the patient in the next bed.
"Better yet, don't peek there at all. It's a greedy, grasping place;
anyone sneaking a look is bound to get hurt".
For weeks, I was tormented by the thought that I had caught something during
my brief glance. Had I really come back one hundred percent?
I lay in my bed and tried to read in the faces of friends and relatives
whether they had noticed anything that I couldn't see. Where
trying to hide something from me? My wife said there was one
thing that I hadn't lost during my trip there and back, my sick man's
suspicious mind, she said. That was because I hadn't felt that I was
going over a very narrow bridge, that I was crossing from one void
to another brought yet a third. I hadn't seen the bank I stood on,
or made out the opposite side, or found the pylons of a bridge close
by. Was I destined to meet someone on the narrow bridge?
Was I called to an important rendezvous on the span? Had I missed
my mission?
There is still another fallacy in the proverb ascribed to the holy
man, an irritating flaw that teaches more about what his followers
said than about his words themselves. If he really did say that
the whole world is nothing but a narrow bridge, and that the important
thing is not fear crossing to the other side, just what did he mean?
That there is something on the other, longed-for side worth the struggle
to tame our fear, worth staggering over the narrow bridge, going over
the deep chasm dizzy and faint from fear but not stopping, staying
the course, continuing towards the other side of life. It's
a shame he didn't say whether there are other routes connecting one
void to the other. Are there other narrow bridges within our
reach? Might there be a bridge, one not so narrow or frightful,
that can be crossed in safety? Or is it the one only passage
in all the world, what soldiers here call a "necessary crossing"?
If there are other ways, I would be the first to pick one of them.
I would reserve the pious rabbi's bridge crossing for people better
and more faithful than I, just as I would leave the conquest of fear
to those who are braver. I would even go further and ask, who
really? If the adage attributed to the holy man is correct,
there is no one w ho can answer my question. There isn't anyone
on the bridge or walking on the banks on either side of the void.
One can only go crazy from this cold, surrounding isolation.
But let's suppose that there had been a wise old man sitting on the
opposite bank, smack in the middle of the route leading from the suspension
bridge, and that I had talked with him, exchanging a few words. I
would have asked him straight off, "Of all the billions now living
on the earth, why me?"
When I try to answer the questions that I myself have raised, I quickly
tire. What little strength I have desert me. Minute after
minute, I reconsider the issue, turning over the possibilities.
One can take Rabbi Nachman's saying as a prayer meant to relieve the
soul's anguish. One can find in these words a call to quiet
faith and trust in him, but this requires that I concede certain prior
assumptions that result in a destination that I find distasteful and
therefore must immediately reject. On the other hand, one can see
the bank up close, free and happy, easy to approach and oh so attractive.
And there is a deep realm that precludes compromise. this is a realm
of the same type that haunts me even in my dreams at night.
If I flee from it, it pursues me. There is no escape, I must confront
it at night. So why don't I pluck up the bit of courage still
left me in the hospital, lengthen my stride and simply march across
the rough planks of the bridge? For if I continue the argue
with myself as I have till now, I'll wake up gasping for air one morning.
And then, even if I should want to, even if I beg and convince the
doctors to help me, I won't find the strength to cross the narrow
bridge. Do I really yearn for that bank?
If I don't accept the maxim attributed to the holy man, that isn't
to say that I don't cherish the melody to which its sung. Why,
just the opposite. The pretty tune has a captivating charm.
It's a cool drink that refreshes the afflicted heart and the downcast
soul. Sometimes, when the cleaning lady walks me in the little
room from the bed to the armchair and then back from the armchair
to the bed, the transistor radio on her cleaning cart chirping the
whole time, I can't help hearing the pleasant tune. But I'm
unable to free myself suddenly from the agonizing bonds of illness
and join in the words pouring from the radio in a soothing stream,
for I no longer have the strength to sing.
Yes, it definitely would be easy to accept these sweet lies. No one
among the healthy, who go about their business unaware of the unseen
illness lurking for them, rejoices in singing that the world actually
is nothing but a very narrow bridge. And if that sad expression
weren't enough, there would still be some hope for man, the frantic
rush to the gloomy entrance. True, the world before us is nothing
but a very narrow bridge, but waiting for us beyond the bridge are
realms of everlasting radiance, sweetness and joy, health and absolute
freedom from sickness. And what do you think? You need to make
some effort, to gird yourself a little and take a deep breath.
If I were a boy, I would now take my mother's ephemeral hand, clamp
my eyes shut, hold my nose, shut my mouth and jump across the abyss.
One two three. Just as I used to leap across the little swamp
on the slope of the wintry path leading to the Kibbutz children's
house.
And on opening my eyes, I'd already be planted on the coveted bank
on the other side. It would be the best and longest triple jump
in the world. Just three steps, the faltering steps of a sick man.
But what a vast distance I've covered. What a gaping abyss I've
crossed. What's important, though, is that I have obeyed the mandate
attributed to the pious rabbi. I had no fear, I tore from my
heart all fright and terror. Maybe I'll return and again leave that
huge building, the regional hospital, which imprisons me in its great
concrete walls. Just grab my mother's slippery hand, plug my
nostrils and, just as when I was a boy, cheer myself on. Hoop-la,
one two, now we're across. Sprawled in my sick bed, I have the
satisfying feeling that, at this moment, I've taken the first small
steps to getting well.
When the young doctor, always hurrying, came to draw blood from me,
I met him with a weak smile. As in some long-past children's
show, I heard him humming to himself the pleasant melody played earlier
on the cleaning lady's miniature radio. The entire world, the
entire world, is a very narrow bridge, a very narrow bridge, verynarrowbridgggge.
The important thing - he wraps the rubber tourniquet around my arm
- the important thing is tohavenofearrr. "Why so happy, doctor?" I
asked him. "What's made you so happy this morning?" he doesn't even
bother to answer me. He unwraps my forearm and bends it.
Then he affectionately slaps me on the back and, although I can't
bend over and look, I'm ready to bet that he's wearing the latest
sneakers. I feel sure that his greenish back pack, not a woeful
doctor's bag, hangs in the physician's room. And when he moves
towards the nurse's station, a syringe of my blood in his hand, I
imagine hearing him dancing joyfully. "What's important, what's important,
istohavenofearrr".
