Tuesday The Rabbi Saw Red

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

That afternoon, when he returned home from the memorial service, he finally got around to telling Miriam about the sitdown strike in his class the previous Friday.

She listened without comment until he finished and then said. "Weren't you being a little stuffy, David?"

"Well, I— yes. I suppose I was,” he said gloomily. "It's not like you,” she commented.

"It wasn't just that they sat on the floor, you understand. It's everything; I resent having only a third of my class show up on Fridays."

"But don't the same ones come every Friday?"

"What of it?"

"Then why resent them and not the others, the ones who stay away?"

"Well, of course, but— yes. I see what you mean. I shouldn’t have let out my frustrations on those who show up faithfully. But..." his shoulders drooped disconsolately. "I'm disappointed in the whole business," he said quietly. "It's not what I expected. I can't help feeling that they're not getting anything out of the course, they come in, open their notebooks, and all I see of them during my lecture is the tops of their heads as they write down my precious words of wisdom."

"At least it shows they're interested."

"It shows they're interested in passing the examination in the course, that's what. If they were truly interested in the subject matter, they wouldn't write, they'd listen, and occasionally, a face would light up so I'd know I was getting through to them and they were learning."

"Don't any of them ever ask questions?"

"A few, but they're not so much questions as challenges." He shook his head. "They're not looking for information, just for an argument— I suppose to make the time pass quicker, they don't know anything, but they're full of opinions, there's Henry Luftig, the representative of the Radical Left, he is deeply concerned for the oppressed— the blacks, the Arabs, everyone except the Jews, and his sidekick. Harvey Shacter, a nice-looking young man who doesn't seem concerned about anything but who always seconds Luftig, more out of loyalty than conviction. I suspect, and there's a girl. Lillian Dushkin, who appears to side with them, perhaps because she's interested in the Shacter boy. It wouldn't surprise me if she came from a traditional home and knew a lot more about the subject than she lets on, but she conceals it, as though she's ashamed of it."

"She's rather plain, I suppose."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because a pretty girl can develop naturally; a plain one has to look for a role to play, and until she finds one, she never feels quite sure of herself."

The rabbi nodded. "Yes. I guess she is on the plain side, although it's hard to tell because she's so heavily madeup with all that stuff on her eyes, like a raccoon. But if she's looking for a role to play, I guess I am, too."

She gave him a sharp look. "You never felt sorry for yourself before, David."

He laughed shortly. "I suppose it sounds that way, and maybe it's true. Whenever I had doubts of my ability as a rabbi of a congregation. I always thought of teaching as a possible alternative. I always thought I'd make a good teacher, well, now it appears that I'm no better as a teacher than I am as a rabbi, that's rather disquieting."

"What makes you think you're not a good teacher?" she demanded. "Because so many stay away on Friday afternoons? Would it be any different for any other teacher of any other subject?"

"Perhaps not."

"You think you haven't succeeded in interesting them, well, maybe you're not giving them what they expected to get.»

«They expected to get three easy credits,” he said scornfully.

"That's what they expected, and when they found they weren't going to get them—" He stopped as she shook her head.

"No, David, that's not the reason students take a snap course, at least not the only reason. When I was in college. I occasionally elected a snap course, and I imagine you did, too, But it was because I was interested in the subject, and the easy credit was frosting on the cake. I remember there was a music appreciation course that almost everybody took, maybe a few did so because the prof was an old softy who passed everyone, but most of us were there because it was interesting and something we felt we ought to know, there was also a course in something called research methodology where no one ever got less than a B, but the professor could never manage to get more than ten to sign up for it, that's because he was dull and the course was dull."

"Then maybe my students just aren't interested in the history and development of fundamental Jewish ideas,” he said bitterly.

"Probably not,” she said amiably. "But how can they be interested in how our concepts of charity and justice and all the rest developed if they don't know what they are? Don't you see. David, most of them probably never received any religious instruction at home or went to a religious school. It just wasn't fashionable when they were growing up. But there's been a change in recent years, especially since the Six Day War, they always knew they were Jews and somewhat different from their Gentile friends and neighbors, but they and their parents tended tominimize the difference. But now they're of an age when the differences are important: they're dating seriously and thinking of marriage. I'll bet most of them signed up for your course to find out just what those differences are and whether they were something to be ashamed of or proud of."

"But college students—"

"They're not college students. David, at least not just college students, they're Jews. You tell them what they want to know, and believe me, they'll be interested."