In today’s excerpt from Prague Unbound , we take a look at Rabbi Loew and the legend of the Golem…

Judah Loew ben Bezalel, religious leader, scholar, mystic, and statesman, was one of the most important figures in Rudolfine Prague. Though in his time Jews were forbidden to travel outside the walled enclosure of the ghetto, the learned Rabbi Loew earned the friendship and respect of Tycho Brahe and Johannes Kepler, and famously won audience with the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II in 1592. Its said that Rudolf II was chiefly interested in learning from the Rabbi the secrets of the Kabala, and would thereafter regularly have Loew secreted across the river in the dead of night so as not to arouse the ire of the Jesuits, who already suspected the sovereign of heresy and even necromancy.

Many supernatural acts have been credited to Rabbi Loew – during one crossing of the Charles Bridge to visit the Emperor, bystanders recognized him as a Jew and began pelting him with stones, but just before the rocks hit him they magically transformed to rose petals. On another occasion, a strange plague descended upon the ghetto that killed only children. Each night the dead children would rise from their graves in the Old Jewish Cemetery to create havoc and spread mayhem and fear. The Rabbi captured one of the ghosts by removing its burial shroud. The spirit then revealed the cause of this odd plague – a woman in the ghetto had killed her own child and gone unpunished, and until she was brought to justice, the plague would claim more children and their ghosts continue their nightly revels. The Maharal tracked down the woman, and when she was tried and executed the plague ceased and the spirits were quieted.

But of the many legends associated with The Maharal of Prague the most famous is surely that of the Golem, a homonculous the Rabbi created from the mud of the Vltava River and animated by writing the secret word “emet” (truth) on a slip of paper placed under the creature’s tongue. The massive Golem protected the ghetto from anti-Semitic attacks at night and worked as a servant to the Rabbi during the day, albeit one whose slavish following of orders created problems. When the Rabbi’s wife asked him to fetch some water for her bath, the Golem emptied half of the Vltava and flooded the ghetto, causing many residents to drown. Another time, when asked to fetch some apples, he ripped down three trees and carried them on his back through the narrow streets, causing much damage along the way.

The situation came to a head when Rabbi Loew forgot to remove the animating slip of paper from Golem’s mouth during the Sabbath so that the creature could rest as commanded by Jewish law. The Golem ran amok, smashing windows, tearing up cobblestones from the streets and hurling them at anyone in his sight, kicking holes in buildings and generally terrifying the people of the ghetto. The Rabbi eventually lured the creature to the attic of the Old New Synagogue, where he removed the slip of paper. With the monster pacified, Rabbi Loew erased the “e” from “emet” written on the paper, changing the word to “met” (death). When he slipped the paper back in the Golem’s mouth, the creature dissolved into the mud of its creation.

Though Rabbi Loew was rumored to have some hand in designing the infamous Rudolf Complication, we can tell you with supreme confidence he had nothing to do with the watch whatsoever. The Rabbi was far too wise to involve himself in such nefarious schemes.

(Image in public domain)