Term Paper

The Faith of a Slave
Isaac Bashevis Singer’s novel The Slave follows the life of a Polish Jew named Jacob, who after surviving a Cossack massacre is sold into slavery and falls passionately in love with his owner’s daughter, Wanda. The retelling of Jacob’s struggles with God and his fellow man along with the string of horrifying events that mark his life set the stage for his intellectual and spiritual enlightenment. In his novel The Slave, Singer traces the evolution of Jacob’s faith with multiple allusions to the Bible, starting with his blind following of Jewish law, to the questioning of religion and God as a result of the acquisition of knowledge.
Rather than focusing his astonishing loyalty and faith on the God he fears and worships, Jacob at the beginning of the novel concentrates on the laws established by religious men to guide a Jew’s daily life. He begins each day with a prayer: “‘I thank thee’ a prayer not mentioning God’s name therefore utterable before cleaning oneself” (11). It is interesting that the narrator should mention that the prayer itself does not include the name of God, for Jacob’s morning routine is just that; a routine that is mindless and automatic, not necessarily glorifying the God that inspires the action. One would assume that faith is an internal phenomenon, not affected by a lack of outward symbols, but Jacob’s preoccupation with Jewish decorum during his life of slavery remains present throughout the narrator’s description of him: “He was without prayer shawl and phylacteries, fringed garment or holy book. Circumcision was the only sign on his body that he was a Jew. But heaven be thanked, he knew his prayers by heart, a few chapters of the Mishnah, some pages of the Gemara, a host of Psalms, as well as passages from various parts of the Bible” (13). Why is it that, while amongst pagans recently converted to Christianity, who know nothing of the Jewish faith, does Jacob remain so concerned with keeping up the appearance of a faithful Jew?
One of the most important laws in the Jewish faith are concerned with dietary laws and keeping the Sabbath day holy. Throughout the Bible in the books of Leviticus, Isaiah, Galatians, 1 Thessalonians, and Colossians the issue of cleanliness as it relates to holiness is addressed in dietary law, starting with God’s edicts to Moses about what makes an animal clean or unclean. Leviticus 3:17 states that "It shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings, that you shall not eat either fat or blood." Jews are to eat only animals that have divided hooves, chew their cud, live in the sea and have scales, or fruits and vegetables. To Jacob, this means that he must live off of plants and bread because the farm he dwells in has only animals seen as unclean in the eyes of Jewish law, causing him to become emaciated in his state of bondage. Jacob did not think that God would understand the special circumstances or else he would have eaten what he could to keep his strength for when he was forced to work as a cowherd.
His determination to follow Jewish law extends to his obedience as a slave as well for he refuses to work on the Sabbath. The Talmud not only prohibits Jacob from completing his duties, but forbids him as a Jew to exert any kind of effort on the holy day. His owner’s daughter, Wanda, brings him food and milks the cows for him out of compassion for his situation. This compassion among other things causes Jacob to develop strong feelings for Wanda.
As time progresses, Jacob’s mind is free to wander. He thinks of Wanda, of his slaughtered community, and of his religion. Eventually he realizes that he is beginning to forget the laws and prayers he so firmly clung to at the beginning of his time as a slave. In an effort to retrieve them, he engraves them into a rock near his barn: “The Torah had not disappeared. It lay hidden in the nooks and crannies of his brain” (44). The exact words of the Talmud and the Gemara are not what define the Jewish faith, yet Jacob chooses to focus on remembering quotes and prayers rather than the God that spared his life when the Cossacks killed his entire village. He does all of this for fear of temptation and fear of corruption by the people he is surrounded by, but if he had confidence in his faith he would not be afraid for his God would help him regardless of how many psalms he can recite.
A majority of the plot of The Slave revolves around the relationship between Jacob and Wanda. Jacob believes than Wanda does not act on her own volition but is rather an agent of Satan sent to tempt him into fornication. Often Jacob quotes the Bible to himself in hopes of extinguishing his desire for her. Their love for each other is both passionate and intense. One could even say it is sent by God. But Jacob refuses to believe that his love for Wanda can possible be anything other than a disaster, for a Jewish man is forbidden to marry a Gentile. If not for this law that is enforced by men and organized religion, he is inhibited from marrying the woman he loves.
Wanda becomes interested in Judaism and seeks to understand the religion that is so important to her beloved Jacob as well as be converted in order to run away with him. Jacob attempts to explain the many laws that dictate his life and through Wanda’s questioning of the reasoning behind them, Jacob himself begins to wonder why these laws are so important. He explains that she must cleanse herself and that she is unclean and they must not touch anything when she menstruates as is stated in Leviticus. When they consummate their love, he forces her to immerse herself in freezing cold water in order to cleanse herself after their act. Wanda says that “I have done this for you.” But Jacob says “No, not for me. For God” (68). While Wanda understands that what they have just done is between the two of them and a product of their love, Jacob is still preoccupied with Jewish law and despairs over having had relations with a Gentile woman. He sees her immersion as compensation for their sin.
After completing all of the rituals necessary for conversion, Wanda changes her name to Sarah and goes with Jacob to a Jewish village where she must feign being a mute in order to keep the secret that she is a Gentile woman. The fact that she has gone through so much for Jacob, including leaving her home and family as well as learning about the Bible is not enough for the Jewish community. When Sarah dies in childbirth she reveals she is a Gentile and is denied burial rites. They would rather follow a law that excludes Sarah based on her heritage than let a devoted woman die with respect and dignity.
Ecclesiastes says that with much knowledge comes much vexation. This is true for Jacob because while in the Jewish village he and Sarah sought refuge in, he gains access to religious books and scholars. With the death of his beloved Sarah, his forced exile from the village and the birth of his son, Jacob is finally prepared to question his religion and his faith in a God that allows such horrible things to happen. Jacob’s theodicy leads him to the same crisis shared by many people of faith including Job and Hannah of the Bible. Why, if God is omnipotent and all-knowing, does he allow for innocent suffering? Jacob finds no comfort in the law books and religious texts but accepts that as a human he cannot possibly understand God’s reasoning. With this knowledge Jacob changes his perspective on life and the role of religion and law inspired by it.
The story of The Slave gains its power through its ability to relate to real life despite the extreme circumstances experienced by its characters. The process of following Jacob’s life allows for the reader to reflect on his or her own life and the aspects of faith in their lives. Jacob’s suffering and the suffering of the innocent villagers and Sarah is the root of basic crises of faith from which questions about God stem. This crisis is outlined by Jacob’s life and his progress from blindly following laws rather than the God who enforces them, to teaching the elements of his religion to an outsider, sparking his first curiosities concerning the logic behind its edicts, to finally questioning God himself, all the while quoting the Bible as means for credibility in his argument for Judaism. All of these factors make Isaac Bashevis Singer’s novel powerfully emotional while thought provoking and moving.