Avraham Azrieli - The Jerusalem inception

“I’m fine.” Lemmy detached from her and entered the dining room.

Rabbi Gerster had an open book of Talmud before him. A white bandage was tied around his head, an oval stain showing through in the middle of his forehead.

“Where did you go?” Temimah asked. “You could have been killed!”

“Father, I need to talk to you.” Lemmy approached the table. “I saw-”

Rabbi Gerster got up and slapped him across the face. The blow knocked Lemmy off his feet. He heard his mother scream.

Getting up, he leaned on the table for support until the room stopped spinning. He slowly digested the fact that, for the first time ever, his father had struck him.

He heard the study door slam and went to the foyer. The left side of his face was burning. He banged on the door. “If you hit me again, I’ll tell people what a cruel father you are. And a cruel husband.”

His mother gasped.

The door opened, and Rabbi Gerster stepped out. He didn’t say anything. The oval stain on his bandage had turned red and moist.

Lemmy did not retreat. “I’ll tell your flock why my mother has no more children!”

Without a word, his father’s hand rose again, flying at his face. But Lemmy was ready, blocking it with his forearm. “One son is too much for you?” He wiped his tears.

“Obviously,” his father said.

“There’s a solution. He who repudiates his father or his mother shall be put to death. Exodus, twenty-one, seventeen-”

“Wash your hands and your mouth before you quote from the Torah. Behave as a God-fearing Jew, or else-”

“Or else what? You’ll call for a stoning?”

“Or else,” Rabbi Gerster said, “I’ll banish you from this community!”

On Friday morning, Rabbi Abraham Gerster did not go to the synagogue. In the afternoon, he failed to lead his men to the boulder overlooking the Old City to pray for Jerusalem’s reunification. On Sabbath morning, when the rabbi again didn’t arrive, the men crowded around Lemmy, but he had no answers for them. After the service, the whole community congregated in the alley under the rabbi’s apartment, and Cantor Toiterlich led them in recital of the prayer for the sick and infirm, followed by God is my Shepherd. Temimah sent Lemmy downstairs to thank the men and send them away, explaining that Rabbi Gerster needed rest to recover from his injury.

On Sunday, and on each of the following mornings, the rabbi did not come to the synagogue. On Thursday morning, Lemmy found a bundle of white envelopes on a chair by the door, each with a name written on it by his father. He took the envelopes to the synagogue and placed them in a pile on the lectern before his father’s empty chair. After morning service, the men collected their weekly allowances from the pile.

Thursday passed without Rabbi Gerster’s lecture. Lemmy and Benjamin labored together on the question of ownership of a cow that broke loose from its owner’s field to graze on public land, where it was found by another man. When time came for evening service, Benjamin closed his Talmud volume and kissed it. “I wish your father would return already.”

“I don’t.”

Benjamin knuckled Lemmy’s head.

“Hey!” Lemmy grabbed his hand and twisted it.

“Ouch!” Benjamin tried to pull free, and they struggled for a moment, laughing until someone shushed them.

Lemmy had not told Benjamin what had happened between him and his father, or about Redhead Dan and his mysterious box, or about Tanya. He felt guilty keeping secrets from Benjamin. But would their friendship survive such revelations?

The cantor struck the large table on the center dais, and all the men stood to chant the prayers.

A few moments into the prayers, Lemmy felt Benjamin’s hand on his shoulder. He glanced at his friend, who smiled while praying.

After the evening service, they walked together, resuming their argument about the cow’s ownership. Benjamin’s interpretation remained attached to the text, while Lemmy theorized that the cow, which wandered off its owner’s field, got lost, and was found by another on a public land, was really a metaphor for the Jewish people. “The original owner of the cow was God. The field was the Promised Land. The cow was the Chosen People-the Jews, exiled from the Promised Land, lost in the countries of the Goyim, the Diaspora. Therefore, as a lost cow, the Jews were sold for slaughter by the Nazis. And God, like the original owner of the lost cow, took the survivors back to his field-the Promised Land.”

“But a cow is not people,” Benjamin argued, “the Promised Land is not a field, and the Diaspora is not green pasture. The sages talked about business policy. Good-faith buyers must obtain incontestable ownership no matter if the vendors actually owned the merchandise, including a cow. Otherwise, the markets would be paralyzed with distrust. And anyway, the sages wrote this hundreds of years before the Holocaust and Israel’s establishment, right?”

When Lemmy argued that the Talmudic sages were unconsciously predicting the future, Benjamin laughed so hard that his laughter became contagious.

They were standing by the building where Benjamin lived with his mother in a one-room apartment. A group of men came from the direction of the synagogue, and Redhead Dan’s voice traveled down the alley, “We’re not alone! Others support us, and not only with words! We’ll do to the Zionists what they plan to do to babies. An eye for an eye! ”

O n Friday, Rabbi Gerster remained in seclusion. An hour into the afternoon study session, Redhead Dan mounted the dais and announced that he would be leading a group to the great boulder to pray in view of the Old City. He invited everyone to join. Within minutes, the synagogue was empty. Benjamin tried to convince Lemmy to go, but gave up and left without him.

Lemmy sat alone in the large hall, his book of Talmud open before him. Unable to concentrate, he closed it and left.

On the way to Tanya’s house he saw the group of secular teenagers playing in the parking lot. One of the boys noticed him and waved. Lemmy waved back. A girl in shorts and a ponytail beckoned him to join. He shook his head and kept walking.

A young woman in khaki uniform opened Tanya’s door. She looked at the black coat and hat and said, “We don’t give donations to yeshivas.”

He felt his face flush. “I’m here to see Tanya.”

Her blue eyes examined him as if she suspected he was lying. Unlike Tanya’s delicate constitution, she was attractive in a strong, robust way. Her light hair was cropped at shoulder length, and her nose was small and straight.

“You must be Bira.”

“Guilty as charged.” She offered him a hand. “And you are?”

“Lemmy.” He hesitated, and shook her hand.

Bira yelled, “Mom!”

Tanya hugged him and took his coat and hat. Bira disappeared into another room

They sat down, and Lemmy told her what had happened since he had left her house the previous week-the mysterious box, his father’s slap, and the anxiety in the sect.

“But I don’t understand. Why did he hit you? It makes no sense.”

“My father demands complete obedience.”

“He must be under enormous pressure,” Tanya said. “To lead a fundamentalist sect in these tumultuous times. A great deal rests on his shoulders. I’m sure he regrets hitting you.”

“I doubt it.”

“So you never actually told him about the objects in the box?”

“No.”

“Then I must pass the word to the appropriate people.” Tanya kissed him. “You should go home now.”

Bira appeared, carrying a duffel bag and an Uzi machine gun. “Time to head back to Tel Aviv,” she said.

Tanya hugged her daughter. “You two can walk together.”