The Books of Jacob

by Olga Tokarczuk

Within the human body, the word splits in two: substance and essence. When the former goes, the latter, formlessly abiding, may be absorbed into the body’s tissues, since essences always seek carriers in matter—even if this is to be the cause of many misfortunes.

A reasonable notion, since of course there were fruits in paradise; given the apple hanging from the tree, it must indeed have been autumn . . . There is a logic to it. But right away another thought occurs to him: What kind of reasoning is this? Could not Almighty God create such paltry fruits at any time of year?

there’s the baker whose last name is Loaf, which always delights the vicar forane because it suggests a sort of hidden order that—were it more visible and consistent—might lead people to live more virtuous lives.

There are many women merchants besides, those who have suffered the misfortune of widowhood or who are married to drunks; they trade in oil, salt, linen.

How many times have the Jews been told not to sell things having to do with the Church.

Poverty is nondenominational and has no national identity.

The signs of proximity to paradise are the four rivers: Gihon, Pishon, Euphrates, and Tigris. There are authors who, unable to locate paradise on earth, put it in the air, fifteen cubits higher than the highest mountain. But this strikes the priest as extremely silly—for how could that be? Wouldn’t those living on Earth be able to glimpse heaven from below? Could they not make out the soles of the saints’ feet?

one cannot agree with those who try to spread false claims, such as the notion that the Scripture on paradise has mystical meaning only—in other words, that it ought to be understood in some metaphysical or allegorical

The priest believes—not only because he’s a priest, but also from his deep conviction—that everything in the Scriptures must be taken literally.

who is examining sheepskins with grim attention; farther back, he sees the whole market absorbed in itself—no one returns his gaze, for the market is all-consuming. Hustle and din.

the priest recalls that according to Athanasius Kircher, the Jews write the words Adam hava, hutz Lilith on the walls when a woman is due to give birth, to ward off witches: “Adam and Eve may enter here, but you, Lilith, you evil sorceress, must leave.” That’s what those symbols must mean, he thinks. A child must have been born here not long ago.

that this was a question of heresies, and that while the Jews generally liked to pretend they didn’t suffer from that problem, it did seem that for this one particular heresy they made an exception, hating it head-on.

Bewildering are the determinations of the Lord.

In its center, there is a broad table with a book open atop it, and next to it, in several piles, some others—the priest’s eyes prowl their spines, trying to make out their titles.

Her dark eyes shine, large and seemingly bottomless, and her overwhelmingly white skin is instantly covered in a flush.

It is something, a priest in a Jewish home! Exotic as a salamander. But so what? Isn’t he seen by a Jewish doctor? And are not his medicaments ground by another Jew?

He reaches for what he thinks will be his ticket into the fold of Israel and carefully sets the book he’s brought before Shorr.

He slides the book toward Shorr as if presenting his own beloved wife.

“Kircher demonstrates that the Tower of Babel, the description of which is contained within the Bible, could not have been as tall as is commonly thought. A tower that reaches all the way to the moon would disrupt the whole order of the cosmos. Its base, founded upon the Earth, would have had to be enormous. It would have obscured the sun, which would have had catastrophic consequences for all of creation. People would have needed to use up the entire earthly supply of wood and clay . . .” The priest feels as if he is espousing heresies, and the truth is he doesn’t even really know why he is saying all this to the taciturn Jew. He wants to be regarded as a friend, not as an enemy.

If people could read the same books, they would inhabit the same world.

If he, the priest, were king, he would decree that there be one day each week reserved for the peasants to read; by urging all peasants to engage with literature, he could instantly change the Commonwealth. Perhaps it also has to do with the alphabet—that there isn’t only one, that there are lots of them; each produces its own type of thinking.

too valuable to consult on a daily basis.

“The rabbi is listening to the voices of his elders,” whispers the interpreter, and the priest nods knowingly, although in fact he still does not know what is going on. Perhaps this Jew really is in some sort of magic contact with assorted demons—he

He hopes he has not exposed himself to infamy.

“No reason for you to concern yourself, good Father,” says Hryćko cheerfully. “God created man with eyes in the front, not the back of the head, and that means we’ve got to think about what’s to come, not what has been.”

You think alcohol is worse than other wares? People need to drink, life is hard!”

Elżbieta Drużbacka, being a woman of a certain age, scarcely tolerates this. She complains of indigestion, no doubt because every meal gets jolted around in her stomach by the motion of their carriage, like cream in a butter churn.

where Szymon Łabęcki is the starosta;

The two women concealed inside this vehicle on leaf springs with the Potocki coat of arms painted across its doors are borne across the choppy waters of the multilingual, business-frenzied crowd as if protected by a priceless seashell.

The smell of malt and dung, the odor of damp, decaying leaves.

the reason is most likely the way young girls are brought up on these nobles’ estates, in musty manors, without any physical exercise. The girls sit hunched over their embroidery hoops, embellishing their priestly stoles. The diet in such places is heavy, meaty. Muscles get weak.

How many such bloodstains does a woman see over the course of her lifetime, wonders Drużbacka.

It’s a light, cheerful pattern, which suits Kossakowska’s slightly darker skin and dark hair. Now bloodstains have flooded these joyful little flowers, their ominous, irregular contours completely swallowing up any ordered pattern. As if malicious forces had escaped from somewhere, surfacing here.

the science of coaxing out bloodstains. For centuries it has been taught to future wives and mothers.

Childbirth, menstruation, war, fights, forays, pogroms, raids—all of it sheds blood, ever at the ready just beneath the skin. What to do with that internal substance that has the gall to make its way out, what kind of lye to wash it out, what vinegar to rinse it with?

her breathing sets the delicate lace around her throat in motion, like anemones in a temperate sea.

Predators, even after falling into dire straits, such as into the grips of a poacher’s trap, lick their wounds and go back into battle. Kossakowska has animal instincts, like a she-wolf in a pack of males.

Drużbacka has grown accustomed by now to hearing somewhat different types of Polish around the different Polish estates, so these Latin interjections merely amuse her.

True, the Koran prohibits drinking wine, but it says nothing about vodka.

printed pages inspire in him an instinct that is difficult to master: the need to seize and not let go before getting a good look—if only a fleeting one—at the whole.

He is interested in what we see when our eyes are closed, and where that thing we see comes from.

the idea that all of that arises out of his own mind is both terrifying and alluring in equal measure. What if we’re imagining all of it? What if each of us sees everything differently? Does everyone see the color green the same? Or is “green” maybe just a name we use as if it were a paint to coat completely distinct experiences in order to communicate, when in reality every one of us is viewing something different?

there are the heretics, the renegades, toward whom, deep down, Asher feels an even greater aversion, for they are primitive, superstitious, with their muddy, mystical prattle, clanging their amulets, smiling their secret cunning smiles,

Sins get written on the human body like on parchment. The parchment differs little from person to person. Their sins are surprisingly similar, too.

Moshe is an honorable man, very learned; he studies Kabbalah, knows the whole Zohar by heart, and can “grasp the mystery,” whatever that might mean to Yehuda.

with sunken cheeks that hold the shadow of the rooms where they station themselves most often. It’s a shadow they wear on their faces wherever they go.

When telling the future, Hayah goes into a trance, and during her trances, she plays with little figures made of bread or clay, which she sets out on a board she has painted herself. And then she prophesies.

They call this prophesizing “ibbur,” which means she is inhabited by a good and sacred spirit that gives her information that would ordinarily be unavailable to humans.

in the semidarkness and the throng of guests, all names seem somehow fluid, interchangeable, secondary. After all, no mortal holds on to his name for very long.

They have wrapped her up in wolf hides up to her neck. They believe that wolf hides restore heat and strength.