Saturday the Rabbi Went Hungry (29 page)

Goralsky’s lined face broke into an old man’s smile. “Rabbi, Rabbi, this time you got it. The same design, maybe a little smaller, this would be a nice building for the cemetery. And even a fence, I would be willing to put it in, and flowers and maybe trees. The Hannah Goralsky Memorial Cemetery. It could be like a garden.” Then his face fell. “But my vow, Rabbi. I made a promise for an addition to the temple here in Barnard’s Crossing. In my own mind, I even saw Morton Schwarz’s building –”

“But did your vow concern this particular arrangement of buildings? You made a vow to donate a building to the temple, a memorial to your wife –” He stopped as the old man shook his head.

“Look, Rabbi, you think I made a vow like I was swearing before a notary? I, Moses Goralsky, do hereby promise… No. Was going through my mind all kinds of pictures, feelings, ideas – not so much words, you understand. But I know what I promised,” he added stubbornly.

The rabbi nodded thoughtfully. Of course the old man did not verbalize his vow. And he was old enough and rich enough to hold himself to its strict observance, even though he was also shrewd enough to realize that the alternate plan, the cemetery chapel, would be much more useful and appropriate. The rabbi rose from his chair and began to stride up and down the room, while Goralsky waited with the patience of the very old.

The more the rabbi thought of it, the better the plan seemed. No less than Marvin Brown, he realized the importance of the cemetery to the congregation. And it would give Morton Schwarz his building – not exactly as he had planned it, but near enough. And it would permit the old man to set up a lasting memorial to his wife’s memory. The problem was, how to permit Mr. Goralsky to do what he actually wanted to do.

He paused in front of the bookcase and his eyes wandered over the large leather-bound tomes that comprised his copy of the Talmud. He selected a volume and took it over to his desk. He leafed through the pages until he found the passage he wanted and swiveled around to face Goralsky.

“I told you at the beginning that if your vow involved doing something wrong, that you were absolved. Do you remember?”

“Of course. Nu, so is putting up Schwarz’s building a sin?”

The rabbi smiled. “For this one particular case, Mr. Goralsky, I shall rule that the law of shatnes applies.”

“Shatnes? But isn’t that about clothing – that you shouldn’t mix linen and wool?”

“That’s the way it’s usually construed. But the regulation is mentioned in two places in the Bible, in Leviticus and in Deuteronomy. Why in two places? When the Bible says the same thing twice, it can mean either that the regulation is very important or that it can have another significance. In Leviticus the regulation is joined with an injunction against letting cattle of different kinds breed together and also an injunction against sowing with mingled seeds. In Deuteronomy the regulation is joined with an injunction against sowing a vineyard with different seeds and an injunction against plowing with an ox and an ass together.”

His voice took on the Talmudic chanting intonation. “Now if the two passages were exactly the same, you could argue that what is intended is that the regulation is important and should be strictly applied. But where the rule is given, and in each case accompanied by two other rules, and the two from Leviticus are not the same as the two from Deuteronomy, we can interpret this to mean that the precept is intended to forbid various mixtures of two things of different kinds.”

He leaned back in his chair. “So you will say, where does it stop? We use many mixtures of diverse things: shoes made of leather and rubber, houses of wood and stone. If we go beyond the specific regulations, then we must have some kind of a test. What then would be a logical test? Why, obviously, if it seems wrong to you. For what other purpose did God give us our intelligence if not to use it? Your initial objection to Schwarz’s design was that the two buildings were of two different orders, and it seemed wrong to join them together. It bothered you from the very first. So my ruling is that this is an example of shatnes, and hence forbidden.”

The old man scratched his head. Then his wrinkled old face cracked into a smile and he beamed in fond admiration at the young rabbi. “And in the cemetery would be all right – it’s separate. It’s a pilpul, but you know something, Rabbi? Suddenly, I’m feeling all right.”

About the Author

Born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1908, Harry Kemelman was the creator of perhaps one of the most famous religious sleuths: Rabbi David Small. His writing career began with short stories for Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine featuring New England college professor Nicky Welt, the first of which, “The Nine Mile Walk,” is considered to be a classic (the Welt stories were later grouped into a collection with the same title). The Rabbi Small series began in 1964, with Friday the Rabbi Slept Late. It went on to become a bestseller, and won Kemelman an Edgar for “Best First Novel” in 1965. Kemelman died in 1996.

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