"Do you know the story of the great Rabbi Haim-Gedalia of Upshpitzin?" he asks me another evening. "He interceded with God in favor of an innkeeper who was notorious for his many sins. 'Very well, I forgive him,' said the Almighty. Whereupon, pleased with his success, the Rabbi began to look for sinners to defend in heaven. Only this time he could not make himself heard.

Overcome with remorse, the Rabbi fasted six times six days and asked heaven the reason for his disgrace. 'You were wrong to look for sinners,' a celestial voice told him. 'If God chooses to look away, you should do the same.' And the Rabbi understood that some things must remain in the shadows, for the shadows too are given by God."