Harry Kemelman
Monday the Rabbi Took Off
THE CREATION OF RABBI SMALL
I was born and grew up in a Jewish neighborhood in Boston. We moved several times, but always to a Jewish neighborhood, that is, one which had enough Jews to support a Jewish butcher shop and a Jewish grocery where you could buy herring and hard-crusted rye bread rather than the wax-wrapped loaf advertised as "untouched by human hand" (understandably) that was sold in the chain stores. These had to be within walking distance of one's home. Few people had cars in those days, and even those were stored in a garage for the winter since streets were not plowed, only sanded. Any area that could support these two was also able to support a shul or a synagogue.
I stayed out of school for every Jewish holiday. accompanying my father to the synagogue, mumbling the required passages as fast as I could but never as fast as my father. He would recite the Amidah and sit down before I was halfway through, even though I skipped a lot. During the High Holidays, when the synagogue was jammed, I would say I was going up to the balcony to see my mother, and then skip out and play with the other youngsters, and later when I was a teenager, stand around and flirt with the girls.
Although everyone in the congregation recited the passages in Hebrew, only a few knew the meaning of the words they were saying.
We did not pray, at least not in the sense of asking or beseeching. We davened, which consisted of reciting blessings expressing our gratitude, reading passages from the Bible and the Psalms. What petitionary prayers there were, were for the land of Israel and for the Jewish nation as a whole. It is perhaps simplistic, but nevertheless indicative, that our equivalent of "Give us this day our daily bread" is "Blessed art thou. O Lord, for bringing forth bread from the earth."
Fifty years ago. I moved to the Yankee town that I have called Barnard's Crossing in my books, where the few Jews in the area had decided to establish a synagogue. Of necessity, since there were so few of us, it was set up as a Conservative synagogue so that the few older members who were likely to be Orthodox on the one hand and the Reform on the other, would not feel the service too strange. In point of fact, most of them knew little or nothing of their religion. They were second and third generation Americans; their parents had received little from their immigrant parents and passed on even less to their children. Only one or two of the older Orthodox members kept kosher homes.
They knew about religion in general from their reading or from the movies they had seen, but little or nothing of the tenets of Judaism. Typical was the reaction of the young lawyer who had asked the rabbi they had engaged to bless the Cadillac he had just bought. He was surprised and hurt when the rabbi refused and said he did not bless things. The friends in the synagogue whom he told of the rabbi's refusal felt much the same way.
I was fascinated by the disaccord between the thinking of the rabbi and that of the congregation, and the problems it gave rise to. So I wrote a book about it. My editor. Arthur Fields, thought the book too low-keyed and suggested jokingly that I could brighten it up by introducing some of the exciting elements in the detective stories that I had written. As I passed by the large parking lot of our synagogue it occurred to me that it was an excellent place to hide a body. And as a rabbi is one who is learned in the law and whose basic function is to sit as a judge in cases brought before him. it seemed to me that he was the ideal character to act as an amateur detective by searching out the truth. Thus was born Rabbi David Small.
Chapter One
From the sofa in the living room where she was immersed in the Sunday paper. Miriam heard the door between the breezeway and the kitchen open and close. She called out. "David?" and when her husband came into the room. "Mr. Raymond called just after you left. It sounded important."
Rabbi David Small nodded, rubbing his hands from the cold. He crossed the room to stand in front of the radiator. "I saw him at the temple."
"You didn't wear your coat?" she said.
"I just had to walk from the car to the vestry door of the temple."
"And you've been having colds all winter."
"Just one cold—"
Although in good health. Rabbi Small was thin and pale and had a kind of nearsighted, scholarly stoop which made him seem older than his thirty-five years. His mother was always urging Miriam to coax him to eat.
"But it's lasted all winter. Was it about the contract he wanted to see you?"
He shook his head. "No. it was to tell me that the board had voted not to hold the congregational Seder this coming Passover."
She could see that he was disturbed. "But it's not far four months yet."
"Four and a half months," he corrected her. "But there's nothing like being beforehand. He told me so that as superintendent of the religious school I could inform the principal not to start coaching the children for their part in the service. That's called going through channels, like when I was a chaplain in the Army, I had to tell Pastor Bellson anything I wanted rather than talk to the colonel directly."
She could not fail to notice the bitterness in his tone. "Did he say why they decided not to hold it?"
"Not until I asked him. He said the last two years we lost money on the affair."
She looked up at him. "Does it bother you?"
"It bothers me that I wasn't invited to discuss it with the board. I’ve got over being bothered about not sitting in on board meetings. Although after six years where each new board invited me to attend, the failure of this board to ask me is rather pointed. But this question of the Passover is so peculiarly within the area of the rabbi's jurisdiction, you'd think they'd want to know my views. If I am not to pass on matters of this sort, then what is my function here? Am I just a functionary in charge of ceremonials? Do they think—"
"But are you sure it was intentional. David?" she asked anxiously. He was so irritable of late. She tried to mollify him. "They're new at the game; maybe they just don't realize—"
"New at the game! They've been in office for three months now. And if they are in doubt about what is proper, there are people they can ask. No. it's their entire attitude. They're in control, and I'm just an employee. Take the matter of my contract—"
"Did he mention it?" she asked quickly.
"He did not."
"And you didn't either?"
"I mentioned it when it was due to expire." he said stiffly., "and that should be sufficient. Do you expect me to keep asking them? Am I supposed to wheedle it out of them?"
"But you're working without a contract."
"So?"
"So they could fire you. They could give you a month's notice telling you that your services were no longer required."
"I suppose they could. And I could do the same to them. I could notify them that I was leaving." He smiled impishly. "I'm rather tempted."
"Oh, you wouldn't."
He left the radiator to pace the floor.
"Why not? It might be a good idea, now I think of it. What would I lose? The few months to the end of the year? If they haven't given me a contract so far, it can only mean that they have no intention of reappointing me next year. Why else haven't they talked to me about it? Why else haven't they asked me to attend board meetings? And this today—just telling me that they're not going to hold the community Seder. Yes, I'm sure that's what they have in mind. I am supposed to go through the motions for the rest of the year— marrying people, making little speeches at Bar Mitzvahs, giving my sermons on Friday night services— then they'll notify me that for next year they are planning to make a change. Well, why not beat them to the punch?"