Loew's Creation
#1 of Der Golem en Prague!
One anti-Semitic indignity after another had befallen the friends and family of Rebbe Judah Lowe ben-Bezalel- whetehr or not the Prince professed a respect for the city's Jewish minority was irrelevant as private citizens would insult, hurt, rape and in extreme cases, kill the city's Jews with impunity. A lion of considerable wisdom and with great knowledge of the mystical practice of Kabbalah within Judaism, Loew knew full well the spiritual maturity that any aspiring rabbi or scholar would need to properly study the Zohar, that compendium of wisdom written largely by Isaac Luria 400 years prior. Yet this lion was determined to see an end to the onslaught of attacks, the destruction of property within the Judenstadt of Prague and if it meant delving into the secrets of Kabbalah to do so than he would spare no expense. His friends could take no more of the abuse from the soldiers and officers whose job it was to patrol the Judenstadt, habitually abusing their authority and pushing the residents around. Negotiations had failed and now the time for desperate action had come.
In the attic of the synagogue, Rebbe Lowe wiped the sweat from his phylactery-covered forehead for what would be a long night. The lion had spent the entire week before gathering clay from a nearby river and carefully molding it to form a crude representation of a soldier and over the week he waited for the clay to harden before preparing the ceremony which would give his golem the ability to protect the ones who the lion held must dear. In addition to building the soldier in his own image, he had spent some time decorating the golem with a Mogen David on its chest to represent the people whom it would protect- the Jews of Prague and a moving hinge in its mouth that would serve much more than a decorative purpose.
In the attic, he took his lifeless statue which he would create life for into the attic with the Tree of Life, its ten Sefirot inlaid on the walls of the attic, each one a distinct attribute of G-d. It was representative of the creation of the universe when G-d said "Yehi-or"- 'Let there be light!"; it would also bear witness to an act of creation within the walls of the temple that very night. The lion cleared his throat before nervously reciting the incantations that would bring the stone soldier to life. For the better part of an hour, the lion tried to use the divine sparks of energy in him and in the atmosphere around him to give life to the soldier. Finally, he succeeded- the eyes of the soldier opened, its stone tail swooshed and ears perked up. The next thing that Loew would need to do was write on its forehead the word "emet" in Hebrew- the word "truth" which would give him movement and allow him to take orders. If the golem got out of hand, the erasure of the aleph in "emet" would result in the word "met"- 'no' causing the golem to return to dust.
"Seven characteristics are in an uncultivated person, and seven in a learned one", the lion said aloud, reciting his favorite line from the Pirkei Avot, or "Ethics of the Fathers", a treatise written by 2nd-century scholars contained in the Mishnah, a collection of commentary on the Torah. These particular writings concerned the differences between the wise and foolish- "seven" is of course, the number interchangeable with many in the ancient world, indicating that there were many ways one could tell a foolish man from a sage or kadeshim. And no one could be more foolish than this golem, who in spite of his strength, was a slave and would not ever even want his freedom, for he lacked the all-important freewill that caused people to aspire to do great things. Instead, the beasts of the field would have more autonomy over what they were doing than this soul-less automaton, this robot created by Loew to guard his friends.
Taking a quill from a table in his paw, Loew carefully wrote out the first order to his creation- the complete and total obedience of this golem, this slave of immense strength who would do the bidding of his master. Since he was not a creation of G-d he lacked the freewill to do anything other than what his master told him to do- in this case, Loew would be the master of this creature. How exactly would this lion go about controlling a hulking yet ultimately dumb (after all, the golem would have no freewill to do anything other than what it was commanded) creature of stone?
The lion wrote on a piece of parchment the things it wanted the golem to do, the first of which were the words "Obey me as your master!" in Hebrew. The second thing he wrote- "My charge to you is to protect the people of the Judenstadt of Prague. Use appropriate force when you deem necessary. Seek to teach those would oppose my friends and family respect but do not kill them." The lion grabbed the two pieces of parchment in its paw, opened the jaws of the mighty golem and placed the two orders in its mouth- this way, the golem would receive the orders telling him what he was to do.
Immediately, this clunking robot of hardened clay animated by arcane Kabbalistic rituals placed his forehead on the ground before Rebbe Loew, indicating that he was a slave and nothing more. Furthermore, his very existence was the result of Loew's Kabbalistic training that had culminated at this exact moment- the time would soon come that this training would be put to the test. He knew very well that this stone mockery of an anthropomorphic lion would have to protect the Judenstadt soon and the people within it. Now, this was the opportunity for the Jews in Prague to live under protection thanks to a mighty servant who would deflect the blows of the anti-Semites who lived there.