Sholem Aleichem - Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son

I.

You must think that no one spits on the street in America and that it’s as clean and neat as Antwerp. You’re mistaken. They spit and clear their noses plenty here. America is a free country, except maybe on Fifth Avenue, where the millionaires live. Millionaires don’t spit. Only people who are badly off spit. The rich man is well off, so what does he have to spit about?

A.

In America it’s a custom to move. People pack up and relocate from one dwelling to another and from one business to another. Everyone has to move. If you don’t move of your own accord, they force you to move. If you don’t pay your rent, for instance, they come and throw you out, which means you are moved out. So don’t be surprised if they ask you, “When are you moving?” And if they ask you, you have to answer. For refusing to answer, my brother Elyahu receives a talking-to from a customer who gets matches from us. Every week he gets a little box of matches for free. Here you don’t have to pay for matches or even wait to get them. You can just go over and take them yourself.

B.

The customer I’m speaking of is a strange person. Who he is and what he is we don’t know. Where he lives and what his business is we also don’t know. He’s apparently not a rich man — you can tell by his shabby coat, which he never changes, his crumpled hat, and his patched shoes. But he’s a very punctual man. He comes by every day at the same time to the minute. He picks up the morning paper, scans the first and last pages, looks quickly at the center page, and puts the paper back. He’s never bought a single thing from us. He just takes a free box of matches from us every week and reads the paper every morning. This irritates my brother Elyahu. Once or twice would be all right, but not every day.

One day my brother Elyahu decides to say something. “It costs a penny.”

The customer goes on doing what he usually does, reading the first and last pages of the paper.

My brother raises his voice: “It costs a cent!”

The customer glances at the center page, folds the paper back up, and puts it back in the exact place where he found it.

C.

[At this point Motl the Cantor’s Son is cut short. “We Move” was the last chapter, the last lines that Sholem Aleichem wrote lying on his deathbed. He wrote the letter c, but after the c nothing follows except empty white pages. A few days later he left us. The nameless “customer” remains unknown, and all further sketches of the Jewish-American ghetto life that so stirred the imagination of our great writer remain locked away and sealed forever from Yiddish literature.]

allrightnik —pompous boaster

ashrei —a psalm attributed to King David

bima —raised platform in a synagogue from which the Torah is read

bris —circumcision rite of eight-day-old baby boys

Bubbe, Bubbe’nyu—grandmother; affectionate term for a little old lady

Castle Garden—immigrant depot of nineteenth-century New York, in present-day Battery Park; predecessor of Ellis Island

cheder —religious elementary school where boys are taught Hebrew prayers and the Bible

dachnik —summer cottage dweller

Eretz Yisroel—Hebrew name for Israel

erev —the night before; eve

gehennam —hell, inferno

Gemorah—the part of the Talmud that comments on the Mishnah

haftorah —lesson from the Prophets read in synagogue

Haggadah—the story of Passover, read at the seder

havdalah —ceremony marking the end of Shabbes

kayn eyn horeh —knock wood, “no evil eye”

Kol Nidrvei—prayer sung to usher in Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year

kvass—frothy sour brew made from fermenting rye flour, malt, and sugar

l’chayim —“To life!”

londsmon —friend from the Old Country

mazel tov —“Congratulations! Good luck!”

Megillah—the story of Purim

Menashe’che—Menashe’s wife

mezuzah —a rolled-up piece of parchment inscribed with biblical passages placed in a small container, attached to doorpost of Jewish homes and holy places

midrash—a body of post-Talmudic exegesis, either a book or a passage

Mishnah—here, a particular verse and its interpretation.

nudnik —pain in the neck, nuisance, nagger

Pani—“Mister,” in Russian

Purim—joyous celebration of the Book of Esther

Rambam—Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, the thirteenth-century philosopher also known as Maimonides

Reb—“Mister,” in Yiddish

Rashi—author of eleventh-century commentaries on the Bible and Talmud

Shabbes—Sabbath

shalach-mone s—gifts of pastries and fruit distributed at Purim

shlimazel —clumsy person, misfit, bringer of bad luck

shmaltz —chicken or duck fat

shmone esre —Eighteen Benedictions recited in three daily prayers

shochet —ritual slaughterer

shofar —ram’s horn blown at the end of the High Holiday services

sholem aleichem —traditional greeting, “peace to you”

shul —synagogue

slichot —High Holiday prayer

Succos—fall harvest festival

Targum Unkles—Aramaic translation of the Old Testament

tefillin —small boxes filled with scripture that men over bar mitzvah age strap to the forehead and left arm for morning prayers and on holidays; also known as phylacteries

U’netaneh tokef —Yom Kippur prayer asking for another year of life

yaaleh —prayer

yahrtzeit —anniversary of the death of a close relative, commemorated by prayer

yeshiva—institution of higher Talmudic learning, orthodox Jewish all-day school

yontiff —holiday