It was cold.   Night had fallen some time ago.  Reb Yudel had led the evening prayers.  It was his mother's yahrtzeit and in her memory he had brought a bottle of mashka for a little l'chaim.  The warmth from the mashka was now but a dim memory.

     I tried to sleep on the wooden bench but sleep eluded me.  As I lifted my head adjusting my eyes to the dark I saw you - again.  How often you visit me in the darkness, stepping from the shadows, inviting me in, drawing me into the comfort of the dark.  The others were asleep, their heads resting on books whose pages were softened by years of use. 

     It has been five years since we met.  I shall never forget the day.  How often I awake with a start, in a cold sweat, as I relive that moment time and time again.  I had violated each stricture.  I was neither forty nor married, nor, if truth be told, so erudite to deserve entry into your world.  But fear, the true protector, is often missing in youth and I ventured recklessly.  I fasted for forty days. (Not an exceptional feat for an orphan in those times.)   I waited each night till the others were asleep.  After sitting on the cold floor and beating my chest to mourn the destruction of our holy Temple, the footstool of the Lord, I snuck into the mikveh and immersed myself seven times seven times.  How cold the water was.  Shivering, I returned to the Beis Hamidrash and, laying prostrate before the Holy Ark, I prayed that each day I be elevated one level higher.  It is said that the Jews in Egypt had sank to the forty-ninth level of impurity one level above the fiftieth from which there is no redemption.  It took forty years to recover as it took Moses forty days to receive the holy Torah.  By the twentieth day I became immune to the hunger pangs, having accepted them as my friend -- as a welcome reminder of the progress I had made on my journey.  The demons began to swirl about me on the thirtieth day.  At first I had only heard their sounds and then I saw their movement.   You know how you can sometimes catch a glimpse of a demon out of the corner of your eye - detect his movement and nothing more?  From the thirtieth to the thirty-ninth day I saw the demons full on.  (Others would surely say that they were mere hallucinations.  That which we do not understand we explain away.)   As I sat to mourn our Holy Temple they mocked me.  Who was I, they asked, to mourn so - I, who had never seen the Temple.  In the mikveh they followed me with impure suggestions.  I was careful not to touch myself or think of the young brides who for the first time stripped naked to enter these very waters but hours before slipping into their marriage bed.  Upon returning to the shul, I stopped my ears with cotton and closed my eyes.  I was determined not to see the demons nor hear their taunts.   I began to daven.  Silently I chanted, splayed on the cold floor - fighting sleep.   Careful to rise up before the others roused.   In this manner, each of the gates but the last had opened for me.

     The fortieth night arrived.  As I sat down to mourn the destruction of the Holy Temple, the demons parted.  Before me were the great golden gates of the Temple.  I entered the courtyard and viewed the majesty of Solomon's work.   The great ramp to the Altar stood before me.   The sounds of the animals to be sacrificed to expiate our sins rose heavenward.  The Leyviyim sang as the Cohanim prepared and the people rejoiced.  No more could the demons mock me.  How wonderful to be in the Temple.  It was then that I heard your voice, "Hamehalech baderech u'mishaneh, chayav meesah." Tarry not, even here, the site of Hashem's terrestrial footstool.  How do I leave the Holy Temple whose loss we have mourned for 2,000 years and whose restoration will signify the Redemption?  Allow me at least to offer a sacrifice of expiation, to cleanse my soul of sins - an opportunity denied us for two millennia.  Again I heard your voice, only this time more insistently, "Hamehalech baderech u'mishaneh, chayav meesah."  At last I understood.  The demons had merely changed their tactics.  They had the audacity to use the Holy Temple to deter me.  The demons argued that if I had truly been transported to the Temple, how could I leave without the sacrifice required of me?  Worse still, if the Temple were only a hallucination, a so-called figment of my imagination, it meant only that the very existence of the Temple depended upon me.  Were I to cease the thought, the hallucination, the Holy Temple would again be destroyed - this time by my own doing.  But for you, I would have stayed and all would have been lost.  Slowly, in a reverential bow, I backed out of the Temple courtyard and found myself again in the cold, dark Beis Hamidrash.

     I quickly looked around. Everyone was still sleeping.  Reb Shmarya's breathing was labored.  Undoubtedly, he would make the journey before me.  Such is the result of poverty and piety.  Pirkei Avos states, "Im ayn Torah, ayn kemach."   It doesn't say, "Im yesh Torah, yesh kemach."  This poor vessel, Reb Shmarya, last ate on shabbes.  He did not fast to serve the Almighty.  To the contrary, as our sages direct, he ate to serve the Almighty - to elevate the food through brachos.  Unfortunately, in those days food was scarce and men had to find other ways to serve the Creator.  Many were ascetics by necessity not by choice.

     I knew that I could not make this journey alone.  The floor was cold.  Quickly, I ran to the mikveh.  The hour was late as I slipped into the cold rainwater.  As I entered, the water warmed, filling the mikveh with steam.  Again the demons swirled.  I stopped my ears with my fingers as I counted my immersions.  Seven times seven.  My eyes shut tight, I focused on the specific kavanah directed by the holy Ari for each immersion. Forty six, forty seven, forty eight, forty nine.  I lingered.  Did not the Holy Ari, expound on the virtue of the mikveh?  Was not this the portal?  Perhaps it is here that I shall merit the journey.   After all, the steam, the warming of the water, had not the unnatural occurred here?  Was this not a sign?  I looked about.   It was then that I noticed you.  Through the steam I could see your shape.  Though we had never met, I recognized you. Frankly, I was expecting Eliyahu but it makes sense that you should be the guide.   I climbed out of the mikveh, emerging dry.  There you stood before me.  You, the beloved.  Your nakedness embarrassed neither you nor me for you predated Eve's fall.  You stood as created, to guide me.  I now understood all that the holy Ari taught.  The gates began to open and the Glory was before me.  You took my hand as you had earlier grasped Adam's - fingers intertwined - five fingers and five fingers together making ten as the sefirot, we ascended. 

     Past, future, all melded together.  Time ceased its linear progression.  Instead, time was a labyrinth through which we must pass.  As we thus ascended and descended - as we viewed time, it made no sense.   

     I heard the familiar chant, as angel turned to face angel, "kadosh, kadosh, kadosh," except now I could hear each letter, each vowel, each serif.  I placed my feet together and began to respond, "Baruch kavod." when you grabbed me and quickly pulled me aside.  All of a sudden, there was a whirlwind, a beating of wings, the ophanim began their refrain.   I dropped to my knees, shaking, my forehead upon the ground.   Every pore of my body quaked. Had not King David warned us that Hashamayim, shamayim laHashem vehaaretz nason leevnei adam?  What right had I here?   I must return quickly, I thought.  Man has no place amongst the angels. But for you I would have turned back.  I was afraid to advance.  The beating of their wings, their fiery countenance, I could advance no further.    I hid my face. We have but one face and the Angels three.  I began to understand.  The absence of evil permitted multiple countenances while its presence mandated a single face.   How I wished for such purity of form.  In that moment, I forgot that it is Man [human—editor’s note] that is created in His image.  I was thus distancing myself from Him with these thoughts.  It was then that you dragged me, reproaching, "Hamehalech baderech u'mishaneh, chayav meesah."   Indeed, at that moment, the very spot where I had stood turned to ash.  I girded myself understanding that I could neither turn back nor tarry and I could advance only with your help.   

     This is what Adam did not understand.  Hashem created you as his guide yet he refused to be guided.  When at last he understood, you had already left and she was no guide.   He relied upon her as he should have upon you.  She complimented and completed him, allowing him to go no further than himself.  But you - you were complete without him and as such could take him beyond himself.

     So our relationship began.

Philadelphia, PA