To make a long story short—why should I go on?—I had to be stronger than iron that night, lying under the blanket, to hold myself in and not burst into laughter. Blessed be God that He did not make me a woman—a woman remains a woman. The very next day we held the engagement party and soon afterward the wedding. The couple, blessed be His name, is living happily. He is a tailor, goes around Boiberik from one dacha to the next picking up work, while she is busy day and night cooking and baking and washing and scrubbing, carrying water from the well, barely a piece of bread in the house. If I didn’t occasionally bring her some milk and cheese, sometimes a few groschens, it would be very bad. I talk with her, and she says she is happy as can be as long as her Motl is healthy.
Nu, can you argue with today’s children? It turns out, as I told you in the beginning: I have nourished and brought up children—you labor for your children’s sake, knock your head on the wall, and as Isaiah says: They have rebelled against me—they say they know better. No, say what you will, today’s children are too smart!
But I have a feeling I’ve filled your ear more than I usually do. Please forgive me, be well, and have a good life!
HODL
WRITTEN IN 1904.
Are you wondering, Pani Sholem Aleichem, why you haven’t seen Tevye lately? Doesn’t he look like he’s suddenly aged, turned gray? Ah, if you knew what troubles, what heartache Tevye carries with him wherever he goes! How is it written—Man is but dust and dust is all that remains of him—a man is weaker than a fly and stronger than iron. That describes me perfectly! Wherever you find a misfortune, a problem, an affliction—it is not permitted to bypass me. Do you have any idea why this is so? Maybe it’s because I am by nature an overly trusting simpleton. Tevye forgets what our sages told us a thousand times: Respect him and suspect him—in Ashkenaz that means a man can’t trust his own dog. But what can I do, I ask you, if that’s the way I am? As you know, I am a trusting soul and never complain about the ways of Him the everlasting. Whatever He ordains is good. Just try it the other way around and do complain. Will it do you any good? As we say in the Slichos during the High Holiday prayers: The soul is Thine and the body is Thine—what does a person know and what worth has he?
I always argue with my Golde: “Golde,” I say, “you are sinning! We have a midrash—”
“Who cares about a midrash?” she says. “We have a daughter to marry off, and after that daughter, kayn eyn horeh, there are two more, and after the two—three more, may no evil eye befall them!”
“Ah, don’t worry your head about it, Golde! Our sages also prepared us for that. We have a midrash on that too—”
She doesn’t let me speak. “Grown daughters,” she says, “are midrash enough.” Try to argue with a woman!
Anyway, from what I was just saying, you can see I possess goods to choose from, one prettier than the other, kayn eyn horeh, may I not be sinning with these words. It isn’t proper for me to praise my children, but I hear what everyone calls them: “Beauties!” Especially Hodl—the eldest after Tzeitl, the one who fell in love with the tailor. Hodl is beautiful, believe me. As it is written in the holy Megillah: For she was fair to look on—pretty as a picture! And to make it worse, she has a head on her shoulders, writes and reads Yiddish and Russian, devours books like dumplings. You will ask, How does Tevye’s daughter come to books when her father deals in cheese and butter? Listen, that’s what I ask those fine lads who don’t own so much as a pair of trousers, begging your pardon, and all they want to do is study. As we say in the Haggadah: We are all wise, we are all learned—everybody wants to learn, everybody wants to study. Ask them: “What are you studying? Why are you studying?” They know the answer about as well as goats know why they jump into other people’s gardens! Especially when they aren’t even allowed to look at a book. Guard the cream from the cat! Still and all, you should see how hard they study! And who are they? Workers’ children, children of tailors and shoemakers, may God help me! They go off to Yehupetz or to Odessa, they sprawl in attics, they live on the ten plagues of Egypt, and for months on end they never see a piece of meat. Six of them can dine on a single loaf of bread and one herring, and as it is written, Thou shalt rejoice in thy feast—live it up, you paupers!
One of that crew made his way into our corner of the world, some shlimazel who didn’t live far from us. I knew his father, he was a cigarette-maker; there are no poorer. Well, I don’t blame the young man for that, because if the great rabbi Yochanan Hasandler could sew boots, why should this young man be above having a father who rolled cigarettes? There’s one thing that bothers me: why should a pauper be eager to study, to learn? True, to give him credit, he has a good head, a very good head on his shoulders. Perchik is his name, the shlimazel, but we called him Fefferl in Yiddish, and he actually looked like a little pepper. You should see him—like a little squirrel, small, dark-haired, homely, with a quick sharp tongue, but bursting with confidence.
Well, one day I was riding home from Boiberik, having sold my wares, a whole wagonload of cheese, butter, sour cream, and greens. I was deep in thought about man and God, about this and that, of course not leaving out the Yehupetz rich folks, how well they live, kayn eyn horeh, and about Tevye the shlimazel and his horse, who becomes more wretched every day. It was summer, the sun was hot, the flies were biting, and the world was in every way pleasant, ample. You felt like flying in the air, swimming in the river!
I raised my eyes—and saw a young man trudging along the path with a bundle under one arm, sweating profusely and panting heavily. “Rise, O son of Reb Yuckel ben Fleckel!” I said to him. “Sit down up here and I’ll give you a lift. I have plenty of room. If you come across your friend’s donkey it is written: Thou shalt surely help him and not abandon him—then why not a fellow human being?”
He laughed, the shlimazel, and didn’t need to be asked again before hopping onto the wagon. “Where is a young man like you coming from?” I said.
“From Yehupetz.”
“What,” I said, “is a young man like you doing in Yehupetz?”
“A young man like myself,” he said, “is preparing for his entrance exam.”
“What,” I said, “is a young man like you studying?”
“A young man like myself,” he said, “doesn’t know yet what he is studying.”
“If so,” I said, “why is a young man like you bothering your head for nothing?”
“Don’t worry, Reb Tevye. A young man like myself,” he said, “already knows what he has to do.”
“Then tell me, since you know who I am, tell me who you are.”
“Who am I? I am a person.”
“I see you’re not a horse. I mean whose are you?”
“Whose should I be? I am God’s.”
“I know,” I said, “you are God’s. It is written: All creatures and all cattle. I mean where do you come from. Are you one of ours or maybe from Lithuania?”
“I come from Adam, the first man,” he said, “but am from around here. You know me.”
“Who then is your father? Tell me already!”
“My father was called Perchik.”
“Damn!” I spat. “Did you have to string me along all this time? So you are Perchik the cigarette-maker’s son?”
“I am,” he said, “Perchik the cigarette-maker’s son.”
“And you are taking classes?”
“And I am taking classes.”
“Well, well, very nice,” I said. “A man and a bird and a duck all try to move ahead in this world. Tell me, my young rascal, what do you live on?”
“I live on what I eat.”
“Aha, that’s good. But what,” I said, “do you eat?”
“Everything,” he said, “that they give me.”
“I understand,” I said, “you aren’t fussy. If there is enough to eat, you eat, and if there isn’t enough to eat, you bite your lip and go to bed hungry. But it’s worth it so long as you are studying. You’re comparing yourself,” I said, “to
the Yehupetz rich folks. As it says in the morning prayers: All are beloved, all are elect.” I quoted a portion to him, as only Tevye can.
Do you think he took this lying down? “May the rich not live to see the day when I compare myself to them! Let them all go to hell!”
“You seem all worked up about the rich folks. Have they divided up your father’s inheritance among themselves?”
“You should know,” he said, “that you and I and all of us have a large share in their inheritance.”
“Let your enemies talk like that,” I said. “I see only one thing, that you are not a hopeless young man and that you know how to use your tongue. If,” I said, “you have time, why don’t you come to my house tonight, and we’ll talk some more and, while we’re at it, have a little supper?”
You can be sure I did not have to repeat the invitation. He arrived exactly at the moment the borscht was on the table and the cheese knishes were baking in the oven. “You have perfect timing. Everything is all set for you,” I said. “You can wash your hands or not, it’s up to you. I am not God’s watchman and will not be punished in the next world for your sins.” As I talked with this young fellow, for some reason I felt drawn to him. Maybe it’s because I like a person with whom I can talk, with whom I can discuss a biblical commentary, have a philosophical argument, speculate about life, on this, on that, and who knows what else. That’s the kind of person Tevye is.
From that time on, my young friend began coming to my house almost every day. After he was finished with his tutoring job, he would come for a rest and a visit. You can imagine how little he earned from that tutoring when you realize that the richest man in town would pay him eighteen kopeks an hour for teaching his sons while also helping him read telegrams, write addresses, and even run errands. And why not? As the passage goes: With all thy heart and with all thy soul—if you eat bread, you have to pay for it. Luckily he ate at my house, and in exchange he tutored my daughters. As it is said: An eye for an eye—a slap for a slap. He became like a member of our family. The children would bring him a glass of milk, and my wife made sure he had a shirt on his back and a pair of mended socks. We started calling him Fefferl, the Yiddish version of the Russian Perchik, and it is safe to say we all loved him as one of our own because he was by nature a fine person, simple, outgoing, a down-to-earth man, and generous, what’s mine is yours, what’s yours is mine.
But there was one thing I did not like about him: he kept disappearing. He would suddenly get up and leave, and as it is written in Genesis: The child is not there—Fefferl was gone! “Where have you been, my dear fly-by-night?” I would ask when he came the next day. But he was as mute as a fish. I don’t know about you, but I hate a person with secrets. I like a person who talks to you and tells you things. But he did have this virtue: once he started talking, it was a passionate, unstoppable stream, like fire and water. What a tongue—not to be stopped! He spoke out against God, against the Messiah, and against injustice, conjuring up wild schemes, all upside down, all crazy. For instance, a rich man, according to his backward reasoning, was less worthy than a poor man, who to him was a jewel. A man who was a worker was beyond estimation because he worked.
“That’s all well and good,” I said, “but will that get you any money?”
He became angry and tried to convince me that money was the root of all evil. “Money,” he said, “is the source of the world’s falsehood, and everything not done in the world out of a sense of justice.” He gave me a thousand examples and illustrations that made no sense to me at all.
“Then according to your crazy way of thinking,” I said, “it is unjust to milk my cow, and for my horse to pull my wagon?” That’s how I would confront him after every foolish statement, and I challenged his every opinion, as only Tevye can! But my Fefferl could also argue, and did he argue! I wish that he didn’t argue so well. If he has something to say, he speaks up!
One evening we were sitting in front of my house talking about philosophy. Fefferl said to me, “Do you know, Reb Tevye, that you have very capable daughters?”
“Is that so?” I said. “Thank you for that news. They have whom to take after.”
“One of them,” he went on, “the eldest, is really very bright, very mature.”
“I know that without your telling me,” I said. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” My heart swelled with pride, for what father, I ask you, does not love it when someone praises his children? How was I to have been a prophet and known that from that praise would spring a passionate love affair? May God protect me! You must hear this.
In short, and there was evening and there was morning, as it says in Genesis—it was between day and night when I was making my rounds of the Boiberik dachas with my wagon when someone stopped me. I looked and saw Ephraim the matchmaker. Ephraim, you must know, is a matchmaker like all matchmakers and makes matches. When Ephraim saw me in Boiberik, he stopped me and said, “If you please, Reb Tevye, I have to ask you something.”
“Of course, as long as it’s a good question.” I stopped the horse.
“You have,” he said, “Reb Tevye, a daughter!”
“I have,” I said, “seven, may they be well.”
“I know,” he said, “you have seven. I also have seven.”
“So together,” I said, “we have fourteen.”
“Let’s not joke,” he said. “This is what I want to talk to you about. As you know, Reb Tevye, I am a matchmaker, and I have a bridegroom for you, but a groom without compare, the cream of the crop!”
“Really?” I said. “What do you mean by the cream of the crop? If he’s a tailor or a cobbler or a teacher, he can stay where he is. Enlargement and deliverance shall arise for the Jews—I will find my equal in another place, as the midrash says.”
“Ah, Reb Tevye,” he said, “you’re starting in again with your midrash? To talk to you, one has to be well prepared! You scatter the midrash everywhere. Better listen,” he said, “to what a match Ephraim the matchmaker has to offer you. Just listen and be quiet.”
Ephraim proceeded to rattle off all the virtues of this groom. Quite impressive, he comes from the best of families, not just anybodies, and that is most important to me, because I myself am also not just anybody. In my family there are all kinds, as they say: ‘streaked, speckled, and spotted’—we have ordinary people, laborers, and property owners. In addition this groom is a learned man who understands what’s in the small print in the commentaries, and that’s not a trivial thing for me. I hate a coarse young man more than I hate pork. To me an ignorant person is a thousand times worse than a hoodlum. You can go without a hat and even walk upside down, if you like, but as long as you know what Rashi is about, you are a man after my own heart. That’s the kind of Jew Tevye is. It turns out the young man is also rich, stuffed with money, and drives a carriage with two spirited horses that leave a cloud of dust behind them! All right, I thought, that wasn’t his worst fault. Better a rich man than a poor one. As it is said: “God Himself must hate a poor man, because if God loved a poor man, the poor man wouldn’t be poor.”
“Well then, what more do you have to say?” I asked.
“I must tell you, he wants me to arrange a match, he’s dying for it,” he said. “He’s so eager—not for you but for your daughter Hodl. He wants a pretty girl.”
“Is that so?” I said. “Let him keep dying. Who is this treasure of yours? A bachelor? A widower? Is he divorced? What’s wrong with him?”
“He is a bachelor,” he said, “a little elderly, but he’s never been married.”
“What is his name?” He wouldn’t tell me.
“Bring her to Boiberik,” he said, “and then I’ll tell you.”
“What do you mean, I should bring her? You bring a horse to the market, or a cow to sell.”
As you know, matchmakers can talk you into anything. It was decided that after Shabbes, God willing, I would bring Hodl to Boiberik. All sorts of good, sweet thoughts came to my mind, an
d I was picturing her riding in a carriage pulled by a pair of spirited horses, and everybody envying me, not so much for the carriage and the horses as for the favors I would be doing for everybody through my daughter, the rich man’s wife. I would help out the needy with a loan of twenty-five rubles, or fifty rubles, or maybe a hundred—they have souls too. So I was thinking as I was riding home before nightfall, whipping my horse and having a little talk with him in his own language: “Go on, my little horse, giddyap! If you move your legs a little faster, you’ll get your oats sooner because, as it says in the Pirkei Avot, If there is no flour in the bin, there is no Torah—if you don’t work, you don’t eat.”
And as I was chatting with my horse, I saw emerging from the woods a man and a woman, their heads close together, whispering to each other affectionately. Who could they be, I wondered, and peered through the bright rays of the sun. I could swear it was Fefferl! With whom was he walking so late, that shlimazel? I shielded my eyes from the sun with my hand and looked closer. Who was that woman? Oy! I thought. Hodl? Yes, it was she, as I am a Jew, it was she! So that was the way they were studying grammar and reading books! Oy, Tevye, what a fool you are, I thought.
I pulled up the horse and called out to them, “A good evening to you. What news do you hear about the war? How do you come to be out here?” I said. “What could you be looking for out here?”
Hearing that welcome, my couple remained standing, as it is said: Not in heaven nor on earth, which means neither here nor there, but embarrassed and awkward. They stood speechless for a few moments, lowered their eyes, and raised them and looked at me as I looked at them. Then they looked at each other.
“Nu?” I said. “Somehow you are looking at me as if you hadn’t seen me in a long time. I am, I imagine, the same Tevye as always, not changed a hair.” I said this half-jokingly and half-annoyed.
Tevye the Dairyman & Motl the Cantor's Son Page 11