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The Magic Mirror Of Rabbi Adam

Now Rabbi Adam possessed a magic mirror that had once belonged to King David, which permitted him to see things that took place all over the world, and he made it his task to watch over his fellow Jews in that mirror. One day Rabbi Adam looked into this magic mirror and saw that a Jew in a certain city was in mortal danger, although he had done nothing to deserve the fate that awaited him. When he saw this, Rabbi Adam resolved to do something to help this Jew, and he mounted his horse and pronounced a spell, so that the hooves of the horse flew along the ground without touching it, and before an hour had passed Rabbi Adam had arrived in the city of the Jew who was in danger. As soon as he arrived, Rabbi Adam walked through the city, and saw its streets and markets, and they were crowded with man and beast like sand on the seashore. Rabbi Adam spoke to a man in the marketplace and asked: Why are so many people all crowded together here? And the man replied: Throughout the year the city ...
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The Golden Tree

One of the Emperors of India had five wives. Four of them each bore him a son, but the fifth, the youngest and most beautiful of all, was childless. The other wives took every opportunity to insult her because of this, and to incite the Emperor against her, so that she might be banished. For a long time they did not succeed, because the Emperor greatly loved this wife. But in the end they harped on it so often that his resistance broke down, and he agreed to their demands. So he banished his youngest wife, and sent her from the palace alone, without providing her with any silver or gold or the least amount of food or water. In great shame the queen left the capital of that kingdom, and walked wherever her legs carried her. In this way she came at last to a dense forest. She roamed there a whole day without food to eat or a drop of water to drink, and in the evening she began to be afraid. With the last of her strength she climbed a tall tree in order to protect herself from beasts of p...
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The Witches Of Ashkelon

Long ago, in the city of Ashkelon, the people were plagued by a coven of eighty witches who lived in a cave at the outskirts of the city. Those witches were sworn enemies of the people of Ashkelon, and saw to it that spells were cast that brought harm to them in ways large and small. Not only did they play nasty tricks, such as turning wine into vinegar, or causing the fire to go out, but they also brought about grave dangers, casting spells which kept the rain from falling, and causing the cows to go dry. And sometimes the vengeance of the witches was directed at one person, as when they caused a rabbi to become a bird, and his wife, a butterfly. Now it happened that there were three witnesses to this foul deed, the three children of the unfortunate couple. They had seen the witches approach their parents and strike them with their magic wands, transforming their father into a bird and their mother into a butterfly, both of which had flown away and not been seen again. And after this ...
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