And now Rabbi Mayer raised his voice and said, “No, not with intimidation would I banish the doubts you feel concerning my wife Beruriah. For after all, you will take refuge deep in your hearts, and admonish your thoughts never to dare rise to your lips. You will tell yourselves that you are right, but that because you did not wish to lose me, you pretended to be convinced. I wish, however, that all doubts truly cease,—that they be driven from your hearts and that your souls be cleansed of them.” The disciples sat still, as if considering how this might come to pass, and one among them who was not over careful, blurted out, “If _you_ will cease to doubt, so will we, too.” At first Rabbi Mayer’s face grew fiery red, but he uttered not a word, as if to refrain from speaking in great anger. Then his countenance turned ghastly pale, sunken and wan from surging, volcanic wrath. Then he spoke: “Woe unto him whose thoughts are those of a fool, but greater woe still if he master not his lips. Did you then doubt, at first, because _I_ doubted? Who of you will dare to rise and say that Rabbi Mayer doubted his wife Beruriah? But those doubts which you could not conceal within yourselves, and had to drool out and pour into others’ ears, even as venomous snakes, have become like the source of a plague, spreading pestilence to right and to left, near and afar. Even I have caught the contagion of your doubt, and, as you speak, so speak I now myself. ‘Perhaps Beruriah is true to me because no tempter ever sought her ear.’” Those of the disciples who had been first to sow the seed of doubt wished to lift their heads in triumph, but they refrained, content to smile within their hearts, and barely able to keep the smile from prancing to their lips. But the wise Rabbi Mayer had noticed the spark of triumph that had flashed in their eyes, and thundered forth in tones that scattered terror: “Never have I entertained doubt of my wife Beruriah. Nor has the slightest suspicion assailed me as to the purity of her heart. But your evil venom has corroded my being, and the stench of your words has grown foul thoughts within me. Now I tell myself, ‘The apple is wondrous fair, but who can say what passes in its heart?’ This have you wrought with the poison of your doubts: that Rabbi Mayer should feel uncertainty as to the virtue of Beruriah, his wife. Shall I not drive you from me with rods and curses? But no. I have determined otherwise. What does one do to learn whether the beautiful apple be sound at the core? He cuts it open. I, too, will cut open, will peer into, Beruriah’s heart; I will test her soul. And hear, now, what I have resolved upon: For thirty days I will not appear to her in Tiberias,—and thirty days, I believe, will be enough to test the power of a woman’s virtue, when her husband is absent from her. And you—choose from among you one who shall take it upon himself to be her tempter—.” IV