unusable buildings in which, besides the rooms where the students study and sleep, is found the apartment of the Rosh Yeshivah, who also performs other services in the
community, and of his assistant. The students pay no tuition and take their meals in turn with the various members of the community. Although these schools are based
on the most severely orthodox principles, it is precisely in them that apostate progress has its source: since young people from distant places come together here,
precisely the poor, the energetic and those who want to get away from their homes; since the supervision is not very strict and the young people are entirely thrown upon
one another, and since the most essential part of the instruction is common study and mutual explanation of difficult passages; since the orthodoxy in the various home
towns of the students is always the same and therefore not much of a topic for conversation, while the suppressed progressive tendencies take the most varied forms,
differing in strength according to the varying circumstances of the towns, so that there is always a lot to talk about; since, furthermore, one person always lays hands on
only one or another copy of the forbidden progressive literature, while in the Yeshivah many such copies are brought together from everywhere and exercise a
particularly telling effect because every possessor of a copy propagates not only the text but also his own zeal—because of all these reasons and their immediate
consequences, in the recent past all the progressive writers, politicians, journalists, and scholars have come out of these schools. The reputation of these schools among
the orthodox has therefore deteriorated very much, while on the other hand young people of advanced inclinations stream to them more than ever.
One famous Yeshivah is in Ostro, a small place eight hours by train from Warsaw. All Ostro is really only a bracket around a short stretch of the highway. Löwy
insists it’s no longer than his stick. Once, when a count stopped in Ostro with his four-horse travelling carriage, the two lead horses stood outside one end of the place
and the rear of the carriage outside the other.
Löwy decided, about the age of fourteen when the constraint of life at home became unbearable for him, to go to Ostro. His father had just slapped him on the shoulder
as he was leaving the klaus towards evening and had casually told him to see him later, he had something to discuss with him. Because he could obviously expect
nothing but the usual reproaches, Löwy went directly from the klaus to the railway station, with no baggage, wearing a somewhat better caftan than usual because it
was Saturday evening, and carrying all his money, which he always had with him. He took the ten o’clock train to Ostro where he arrived at seven the next morning.
He went straight to the Yeshivah where he made no special stir, anyone can enter a Yeshivah, there are no special entrance requirements. The only striking thing was
his entering at this time—it was summer—which was not customary, and the good caftan he was wearing. But all this was soon settled too, because very young people
such as these were, bound to each other by their Jewishness in a degree unknown to us, get to know each other easily. He distinguished himself in his studies, for he
had acquired a good deal of knowledge at home. He liked talking to the strange boys, especially as, when they found out about his money, they all crowded around him
offering to sell him things. One, who wanted to sell him “days,” astonished him especially. Free board was called “days.” They were a saleable commodity because
the members of the community, who wanted to perform a deed pleasing to God by providing free board for no matter what student, did not care who sat at their tables.
If a student was unusually clever, it was possible for him to provide himself with two sets of free meals for one day. He could bear up under these double meals so
much the better because they were not very ample, after the first meal, one could still swallow down the second with great pleasure, and because it might also happen