Acts of Faith

  “Congratulations, Deb.”

  Danny had come to celebrate her bat mitzvah.

  39

  Deborah

  “Deborah. Telephone for you.”

  “Who is it, Mama?”

  “I should know,” Rachel shrugged. “He said his name was Steve.” She quickly added the all-important question, “Is he Jewish?”

  Deborah could not keep from laughing. “If it’s who I think it is, he’s a rabbi, Mama.”

  “What kind of rabbi calls himself ‘Steve’? He can’t be one of ours. Still, if he’s … suitable, invite him for Shabbes.”

  “He’s married, Mama,” Deborah casually remarked, as she went to the phone.

  “Oh,” said Rachel, her enthusiasm rapidly evanescing. “Since when does my daughter come to be telephoned by married rabbis?” Looking heavenward, she added, “Father of the Universe, why must You concentrate Your tribulations on my children?”

  “Hi, Deborah. I actually watched till I saw four stars in the sky to make absolutely sure it was after Shabbat.”

  “That’s fine, Rabbi,” she replied.

  “Please,” he insisted. “The only people who address me as ‘Rabbi’ are the congregants who object to the content of my sermons. Anyway, my wife and I were wondering if you could come to brunch tomorrow. Just bagels and lox—and a little proselytizing.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked with surprise.

  “I’ll tell you after you have your bagel,” the rabbi answered good-humoredly. He gave her his address and hung up.

  “What was all that about, may I ask?” Rachel eyed her sharply as Deborah strolled back into the living room.

  “Nothing,” Deborah replied breezily. “Only bagels.”

  The moment Esther Goldman opened the apartment door, Deborah felt a sharp pang, for she and her husband were each holding a baby—twins.

  Deborah suddenly missed her son desperately.

  Steve Goldman thought he could read the emotion on Deborah’s face. “Babies are not all joy, I assure you,” he explained, as he led her into the dining room. “They’re wonderful, but not in the middle of the night.” He pointed to a well-laden table and commanded, “Have a bagel.”

  As promised, the rabbi did not engage in serious conversation until Deborah had nearly finished her second bagel.

  “I’m curious about something—and please tell me if this is none of my business. But I find you quite an enigma.…”

  “Well, I’ve been called a lot of things but enigmatic’ is a first. What mystifies you?”

  “I’m sure you know,” Steve answered amiably. “I mean, the Silczer Rebbe’s daughter lives on a kibbutz so vehemently secular that they work the fields on High Holy Days. Then she comes back to Brooklyn and attends what her family surely would regard as a heathen service.” He paused to let his prefatory remarks sink in and then said, “I can only conclude that you’re searching for something.…”

  “You’re right,” she conceded, “and I hope this doesn’t sound pretentious. But I think what I’m looking for is a better relationship with God.”

  “That’s what our movement’s all about,” Esther spoke up, “and not everything we do is newfangled. Calling women to the Torah used to be common practice back in Talmudic times. It was the frummers themselves who ‘reformed’ it.”

  “Frankly it offends me that your people look down on me because I won’t accept the idiosyncratic ways they’ve interpreted the Bible.” Fervor mounting, Steve slapped the table and said, “But the Torah belongs to every Jew. God gave it to Moses on Mount Sinai, not to some rebbe in Brooklyn who thinks he has the franchise on holiness.”

  Deborah nodded. “Steve, a lot of the things you’ve just said sound exactly like my brother, Danny. He’s just dropped out of the seminary. It looks as if my father’s going to be the last of the line.”

  “I’m sorry,” Steve remarked. “Are you upset?”

  “For Papa yes, for Danny no. And, to be brutally frank, I’m not sure we need a Silczer Rebbe in a world where Silcz no longer exists.”

  “But that doesn’t mean the line of Luria rabbis has to die out as well,” Steve interposed dramatically. “Have you ever thought of becoming one? My seminary has already started ordaining women.”

  Deborah was caught off balance. She could only reply, “My father could probably give you a thousand doctrinal reasons why females can’t become rabbis.”

  “And with due respect,” Steve replied, “I could give him a thousand and one why they can. Have you got time for a lecture?”

  “I’m listening.” Deborah smiled.

  “To begin with,” he enumerated, “for centuries rabbis have insisted that the Bible’s use of the masculine pronoun in phrases like ‘Man doth not live by bread alone’ implicitly suggests that God’s laws are a kind of male prerogative. But a more accurate translation of the word ‘man’ in this case is ‘human being’ or ‘person.’

  “In fact, as we sit here, there’s an interfaith team updating the Revised Standard Version of the Bible. They still use ‘He’ to refer to Jesus and God, but they render sayings like Deuteronomy 8:3 as ‘One does not live by bread alone.…’ ”

  Deborah’s eyes lit up. She quickly quoted the words that had been a lifelong thorn in her side. “Don’t you remember Rabbi Eliezer’s famous objection to letting girls learn Torah?”

  “What about Ben Azzai?” Steve countered. “A sage who was just as much a heavyweight. He said that a man is required to teach Bible to his daughter. In fact—and I’ll bet anything you didn’t hear this at school—the Talmud says that God actually endowed women with greater understanding than men.”

  “You’re right,” she said with a wry smile. “They never told us that.”

  “It’s in Tractate Niddah 45B,” Esther interjected. “In case you want to look it up.”

  As Deborah marveled at his wife’s learning, Steve continued enthusiastically, “You, Deborah, of all people, a descendant of Miriam Spira—”

  “Who?”

  “Let me show it to you in black and white.”

  He spun around to a bookshelf and pulled out a volume of the Encyclopaedia Judaica, quickly leafing through it.

  “Would you mind reading that aloud, please, Deborah?” he asked, indicating a spot on the page.

  “ ‘Luria—well-known family, traceable to the fourteenth century.’ ”

  He pointed to the paragraphs below. “Continue, please.”

  “ ‘It is related that the founder’s daughter Miriam—circa 1350—taught Jewish law from behind a curtain in the yeshiva.’ ” Deborah looked up in amazement.

  “You see,” Esther smiled. “You wouldn’t even be the first.”

  After another second to let it all sink in, her husband asked, “Now don’t you think it’s about time that the Luria women came out from behind the curtain?”

  There was a moment of uneasy silence. At last Deborah murmured, “But I have no college degree.”

  “Did Moses?” the rabbi grinned. “Did Christ? Did Buddha? The entrance test for Hebrew Union College is in Torah, Talmud, and the Hebrew language. I bet you could pass it now.”

  Deborah hesitated for a moment. “This really throws me for a loop. I don’t know what to say.”

  “Just promise you’ll give it serious thought.”

  “I can certainly promise that,” Deborah conceded.

  “Fair enough,” Steve responded. “Now it’s time for cosmic things. Wait till you taste Esther’s strudel.”

  As the rabbi’s wife began to cut the pastry, Deborah felt embarrassed at having addressed so few words to her. So she came up with the polite query, “Tell me, Esther, how does it feel to be married to a modern rabbi?”

  “You should ask me that question,” Steve interrupted.

  “Why?” Deborah asked.

  “Because Esther’s a rabbi too.”

  Danny was the only person she could turn to.

  “Hey, I’m really sorry to burden you at
a time like this.”

  “C’mon, Deb. If a crisis came when we expected it, it wouldn’t be a crisis. I mean, just because I’m screwed up myself doesn’t mean I can’t be objective about you.” He paused, then added warmly, “And proud as hell.”

  “But, Danny, let’s suppose I do get accepted. Are the B’nai Simcha going to pay my tuition the way they paid yours?”

  Danny’s enthusiasm was not dampened. “Well, maybe you’ll do so well in your exams, they’ll give you a scholarship.”

  “Okay, let’s say they’re crazy and they do. Now tell me under which tree in Prospect Park your nephew and I are gonna pitch our tent.”

  Danny was silent for a moment, thumb and index finger on his forehead, as if he were squeezing his brain.

  “Be honest, Deb,” he said in a tone that suggested he was convincing himself. “You know how desperate Mama and Papa are to have you back. And the prospect of having a new grandson—in his own house—would really give Papa the will to live.”

  “But what about when he finds out what I’m doing?”

  “Who says you have to give him a detailed job description? ‘Rabbi’ means teacher. Just say you’re studying to be a teacher. It isn’t a lie—it’s just not the complete truth.”

  Danny folded his arms and beamed with satisfaction. “Now, you can solve all my problems,” he joked.

  But Deborah remained solemn.

  “Hey,” her brother chided. “What’s the matter now?”

  “I can’t lie anymore,” she said softly.

  “About being a teacher? I told you—”

  “That’s not it, Danny!” she shouted. “And when you hear what I’ve been hiding, you’ll probably wish I were dead too. I’m going to explode if I don’t tell somebody.”

  She paused, waiting for Danny’s signal to open the floodgates.

  “Go on, Deb. I’m listening.”

  “Eli isn’t Avi’s son. That’s just a story I cooked up to hide the truth. Somehow at the beginning it seemed so simple.…”

  “Deb,” her brother responded. “Who cares who the kid’s father is? You obviously loved him. Whatever you did won’t change the way I feel about you or Eli.”

  “Yes, it will.” She took a deep breath, stared at Danny, and blurted, “It’s Timothy Hogan.”

  For a moment he sat frozen with disbelief.

  Not shocked. Not outraged. Totally numb.

  The next moments passed in slow motion—even the tears that trickled down her cheek seemed to be scarcely moving.

  Finally he murmured, “I thought he was a priest by now. I mean, that he was studying in Rome.…”

  “Danny,” she said. “Rome is only three hours away from Israel.”

  Then she told him everything.

  “Does Timothy know any of this?”

  Deborah shook her head, and even as she did, conjured up an image of her child’s father the last time they had made love, his blue eyes gazing at her with ineffable tenderness.

  Long ago she had sought comfort in believing that she had spared Timothy the pain. In truth, she had also denied him the joy. Now, with unmistakable regret, she said to her brother, “He’ll never meet his son. He’ll never even know he has one. Oh God, Danny, what can I do?”

  “Well, for starters,” he said, trying to cheer her, “you’ll have a drink. Where does Papa keep his booze?”

  “I couldn’t—”

  “C’mon, Deb, remember Ecclesiastes: ‘Wine maketh glad the life.…’ ”

  “Okay,” she acquiesced, wiping her cheeks. “I could use a little gladness right now.”

  Rav Moses Luria’s liquor cabinet was modest to say the least: a few bottles of sacramental wine, some schnapps, and—eureka! “Slivovitz?” Deborah exclaimed, as Danny withdrew their father’s special Passover decanter of plum brandy. “I hear that stuff’s a bomb in a bottle.”

  “Well,” said Danny, eyeing the label. “It’s a hundred proof. If it were any stronger, you could drive your car with it.”

  He set down two small cut-glass tumblers and filled them with the potent, almond-smelling liquid. A mere whiff made Deborah blanch.

  “I think this occasion deserves a blessing,” said Danny as he raised his glass and spoke in Hebrew, his voice trembling with emotion. “Blessed art Thou, Oh Lord our God, King of the Universe, Who hast kept us alive, sustained us, and brought us to this wondrous moment.” He added, “If I had a ram’s horn, I’d blow it too,” and, looking with affection at his sister, he began a toast. “To you, Deborah—long life, health, and good luck to Eli—”

  His vocal cords were suddenly paralyzed.

  “My son has a real last name,” she pleaded.

  Danny hesitated for a moment. And then confessed, “I know. But I just can’t say it.”

  40

  Daniel

  I waited in vain for a dramatic bedside call from my father. But it never came.

  By now, the term had ended. The rabbis—all but those who’d fallen by the wayside—were anointed. I had to come to terms with the fact that by not taking my finals, I not only failed to receive the laying on of hands, but also didn’t get a Bachelor’s Degree—which can spell the difference between owning a limo and having to drive one.

  Fortunately, I still had a few friends. Two, to be exact. Beller—who offered me the study in his apartment. And Ariel—at whose place half my wardrobe was already stashed. She agreed to let me and my books move in with her. She even invited me to stay for the summer while she accompanied her “keeper”—as I mockingly referred to him—on another European spree.

  How I would eat, after consuming all the delicacies in her refrigerator, was another matter.

  Beller also proposed the guest cottage at his place in Truro—the psychiatrists’ summer refuge on the Cape. But I had to stay in the city and help Deborah prepare for the special entrance exams the seminary had arranged for her.

  After lending her money for books, I concluded that the two hundred and sixty-one dollars left in my checking account would probably last all of six weeks—provided I only ate one meal a day.

  I didn’t confide my impending bankruptcy to Ariel. Yet before she left, this strangely amoral creature sat me down for a heart-to-heart. Apparently, as a change from the Riviera, Charlie Meister had this year rented them a villa and yacht on the Caspian, where presumably they could cruise the world’s largest lake and get caviar and sturgeon at the source.

  “I’m worrying about you being here all alone, Danny,” she said. “I wish you’d go and stay with Aaron. At least you’d have all those analysts to talk to.”

  “Shrinks don’t talk,” I countered. “They only listen. Besides, I’ll be tutoring my sister. And this is a perfect place for her to concentrate. I’ll be fine.”

  “C’mon, Danny,” she said in a surprisingly maternal tone. “You don’t have to put up a front for me. What are you going to do for money?”

  I was searching for some quip when I saw the concern in her beautiful eyes and was totally disarmed.

  “I don’t know, Ariel,” I confessed. “As soon as Deborah’s set I’ll have to get some kind of job.”

  “Would it dent your masculine pride if I offered you a loan?”

  How to respond to this—that I had no pride? Or, more candidly, that I had no money? I just shrugged.

  “Okay,” she said, leaning toward me. “Give me your account number, and I’ll have the funds transferred tomorrow—”

  “As long as it’s a loan,” I protested. “I mean, I’ll pay you back.”

  “Agreed.” She nodded so vigorously that some of her blond locks fell across her face. “Anyway, there’s no rush. I don’t really need the five thousand.”

  “Five thousand?” I was knocked off balance. “What the hell makes you think I’ll need that much?”

  “I just want you to have a good time while I’m away. Besides, maybe you could invest that money wisely and be a rich man next time I see you.”

  “But I don’t know
the first thing—”

  “Well, perhaps I can help. Charles is a kind of genius in wheeling and dealing. Sometimes I overhear little things.…” She suddenly broke off and thought for a moment before continuing in conspiratorial tones. “Danny, I shouldn’t be telling you, but this summer, the biggest bread will be made out of wheat. Think about it.”

  The only sense I could make out of Ariel’s generous words was a concern for my health and a warning to avoid bleached flour. I vowed to give it more thought when I got over the initial shock of my sudden wealth.

  The next morning Charlie’s Rolls stopped in front of the house to pick Ariel up. I was tempted to go downstairs with her and wave good-bye.

  But I could not bring myself to see his face.

  My sadness at losing her—something told me that we had parted without saying so—was somewhat mitigated when, at 9:30 A.M., my bank called (a first!) to inform me that my account was now healthier, thanks to a transfusion of a full five thousand dollars. I think the clerk was even more impressed than I was.

  Flushed with this largess, I went out to Zabar’s and bought mountains of whitefish, Nova Scotia salmon, whole wheat bread, and a few other delicacies, so I could feed my plucky sister when she showed up for her first lesson. As it turned out, we also celebrated my father’s release from the hospital.

  Deborah worked like a maniac. Years of academic frustration had built up a head of steam that drove her tirelessly. Not only did we study together from early morning to early evening, but God knows how long she stayed up each night to memorize the stuff we had gone through. In any case, she always knew it cold the next day.

  My prediction about Papa proved totally correct. His brush with death mellowed him, and he encouraged Deborah’s decision to become a “Hebrew teacher” and did not question her choice of academy. Of course, the time would come when she would have to break the news about his unknown grandson. But this could wait till he was a little stronger.

  On her first visit to Ariel’s pleasure dome, Deborah could not help asking just how the hell I, who had been kicked out of our own Eden, had landed in this one. So while we were drinking coffee at the end of the afternoon, I told her everything.