Page:Jewish Fairy Book (Gerald Friedlander).djvu/69

Rh "Now, good Rabbi, please tell me a little more about this lamp."

"Your Majesty's will is my pleasure. Now before I explain the nature of my lamp, I think it my duty to assure your Majesty that the Jewish religion is utterly opposed to magic and witchcraft. What we are, however, permitted to do — nay, we are even commanded to do it — is to study nature and to subdue it. Man is the King of all things in the universe. If my lamp can give light without oil, it is because nature has provided a substitute. People have imagined that I have this magic lamp because I do not buy oil. They do not pause to think and to ask themselves. Can we obtain illumination by any other means? The whole purpose of the Kabbalah is to teach man the duty of studying nature, and how to wrestle with it till we discover its secrets."

"I am greatly obliged to you," said the King, "and I shall be glad to see your lamp one day."

The Rabbi was then dismissed and returned to his home. The King was not entirely satisfied with Jechiel's explanation. If anything the royal curiosity was increased by what the Rabbi had said. The King determined to call on the Rabbi one evening and to take him by surprise in order to see what sort of lamp he really used.

In the good olden days of which we are speaking, there were not a few people in France who were far from being friendly to the Jews. This hostility