A Jew Must Die (6 page)

But a voice will not be silent in the old man-child’s dream.

“So that was before? And it is now?”

Arthur Bloch, the wandering Jew, because he knows no rest beneath the slab that reads
Gott weiss warum.
Arthur Bloch, who at this moment knows, the absolute God who knows, while we do not know. Arthur Bloch of the dark barrier under the snow. Or under the ashes of time. Because of insults, contempt, the gas chambers, the swastika, the desolation of the hills of Auschwitz and Payerne, the shame of Nazism at Treblinka and in the pig towns on the Broye. It is all a wound. It is all Golgotha. And redemption is so remote. But can there be a resurrection? Pity, God, by the pink of the open belly. Pity by the crown of thorns and the barbed wire of the camps. Have pity, Lord, on our crimes. Lord, have pity on us.

 

First published in the United Kingdom in 2010 by

Bitter Lemon Press, 37 Arundel Gardens, London W11 2LW

 

 

First published in French as
Un juif pour l’exemple
by

Bernard Grasset, Paris in 2009

 

Bitter Lemon Press gratefully acknowledges the financial assistance of Pro Helvetia, the Arts Council of Switzerland

© Editions Grasset & Fasquelle, 2009

English translation © W. Donald Wilson, 2010

 

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission of the publisher.

 

The moral rights of the author and the translator have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988

 

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

 

eISBN : 978-1-904-73857-2

 

JF Print Ltd, Sparkford, Somerset