By the time the Jews left Egypt, the world was ready for salvation and everything was waiting, prepared—both down below and on high. It was unprecedented—the wind died down completely, the leaves did not move on the trees, the clouds in the sky drifted so slowly that only the most patient were able to discern their movement. It was the same with the water—it became thick as cream, while the earth went the other way, became flimsy and unreliable, so that it often happened that people fell into it up to their ankles. No bird chirped, no bee flew, there were no waves in the sea, people did not speak—it was so quiet you could hear the heartbeat of the smallest animal.

Everything stopped in anticipation of the new Law, and all eyes were turned to Moses, who was climbing Mount Zion to receive it directly from God’s hands. And so it was that God Himself engraved the Law on two stone tablets in such a way that it would be discernible to the human eye and comprehensible to the human mind. This was the Torah of Atzilut.

During Moses’s absence, his people gave in to temptation and indulged in sin. Then Moses, coming down from on high and seeing what was going on, thought: I left them for such a short time, and yet they were unable to persist in virtuousness. Thus they are unworthy of the beneficent and noble law God appointed them. In his great despair Moses shattered the tablets on the ground so that they broke into a thousand pieces and turned to dust. Then a terrible wind rose up and threw Moses against the rock and set the clouds and the water in motion and made the earth solid again. Moses understood that his people were not mature enough for the law of liberty intended for the saved world. All day and all night he sat resting against the rock and looking down at the fires burning in the camp of his people, and he heard their voices, their music, and the cries of their children. Then Samael came to him in the guise of an angel and dictated to him the commandments that from then on would keep God’s people enslaved.

In order that no one would know the true Law of Freedom, Samael carefully gathered the little pieces of the shattered Torah of Atzilut and scattered them around the world among many different religions. When the Messiah comes, he will have to pass over into Samael’s kingdom to collect the tablets’ shards and present the new Law in its final revelation.

“What was this lost Law all about?” asks Wajgełe, when she and Nahman climb into bed.

“Who could possibly know, since it has been dispersed?” he answers warily. “It was good. It respected people.”

But Wajgełe is stubborn.

“Was it the opposite of what we have now? The opposite of ‘Thou shalt not commit adultery’ would be ‘Thou shalt commit it.’ And the opposite of ‘Thou shalt not kill’ would be: ‘Kill.’”

“It’s not that simple.”

“You always tell me that—‘It’s not that simple, it’s not that simple . . . ,’” she mocks him. She pulls a pair of woolen stockings up over her skinny legs.

“People want easy explanations, and so we must simplify everything for their sake, and since it cannot be written down, it all becomes rather stupid . . . This or that, black, white—it’s like digging with a hoe. Simple is dangerous.”

“But I want to understand it, and I can’t.”

“Wajgełe, my time will come, and your time will come. That is grace. Sabbatai, the old Mosaic law, the one given by Samael, is no longer in effect. That also explains the conversion of our Lord, Sabbatai, to Islam. He saw that Israel, in obeying the Mosaic law, was no longer in the service of the God of the Truth. That is why our Lord gave up the Torah in favor of the Din Islam . . .” (The Books of Jacob)