Saturday the Rabbi Went Hungry

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

The Reverend Peter Dodge stood framed in the door-way, one hand resting on either doorjamb like Samson about to collapse the temple.

“Why, look who’s here, David,” Miriam said. “Come in.”

His handsome head instinctively lowered to enter. “I heard you were a bit under the weather, David, and decided to include you in my pastoral calls.”

“That was thoughtful of you, but it was just a touch of the virus. I’ll be going to services tomorrow.”

“Your trouble, David, is you don’t get enough exercise. I wouldn’t recommend anything strenuous, but you ought at least to arrange time for a nice long walk every day. It will firm up your muscle tone. Now every evening without fail I take a regular walk over a regular route. It’s exactly four and six-tenths miles, and I do it in just over an hour, depending on whether I meet anyone. And most afternoons when I can manage it I get in a couple of sets of tennis.”

“Where do you play?”

“We have a court back of the Parish House. Any time you want, just give me a ring and we can volley for a while. It would do you good.”

The rabbi laughed. “How do you think my congregation would feel if their rabbi went to the Episcopal Church to play tennis?”

“About the same way my people would feel if I came down to your temple.” He hesitated. “I hear you have been having a spot of trouble with them lately.”

The rabbi and his wife both showed their surprise. Dodge chuckled. “You’re from New York, aren’t you? And I’m from South Bend. We’re city folks, so I don’t suppose we’ll ever get used to how fast news travels in a small town like Barnard’s Crossing. I was chaplain in a federal prison for a little while, and the grapevine there is the only thing comparable-”

“What did you hear, Peter?” asked Miriam.

Dodge became vague. “Oh, something to the effect that poor Ike Hirsh had committed suicide and you weren’t supposed to have buried him. It didn’t seem to make much sense to me, because how could David know he was a suicide, especially when the official police finding was death by accident? Surely your congregation can’t expect you to play detective every time someone passes away.”

“You knew Hirsh?” asked the rabbi. “Of course you did-you were at the funeral, weren’t you?”

“Hirsh? Oh, yes. He was in the movement.”

“What movement?”

“The Civil Rights movement. He made a small contribution and I went to see him. I try to make a personal visit to anyone like that-you’d be surprised how often they kick in with more. Besides, I pass by the Hirshes’ street on my regular walk, so I took a chance and just rang the bell. Well, talk about a small world, who should come to the door but Mrs. Hirsh who turns out to be Pat Maguire. We went to school together in South Bend. After that, I made it a habit to pop in from time to time, and had dinner there once.”

“What sort of man was Hirsh?”

“Oh, a very decent sort. I thought at first he was motivated more by his dislike of the South and Southerners-he had lived there for a while. But later, when I got to know him better, I felt he had a genuine sympathy for the oppressed. Once he even said something about going down to Alabama to join the demonstrators, but I don’t think he was really serious. It’s the sort of thing wellintentioned people say.”

“Were you recruiting demonstrators for Alabama?” asked Miriam.

“Oh, that goes on all the time. But right now, Miriam, I’m really involved. I am in charge of MOGRE for the entire North Shore.”

“Mogah?”

“M-O-G-R-E, Rabbi-Men of God for Racial Equality. It’s made up of ministers of all faiths. Although mostly Protestant, there’s a Greek Orthodox priest, and we’re negotiating with the Archdiocese for a contingent of Catholic priests and we’ve got several rabbis.” He said casually, “Interested, David?”

The rabbi smiled.

“Think it over.” He hitched his chair closer. “I’ll bet it might even solve your little problem here with your congregation.”

“How would it do that?”

“Well, as I heard it, you have forbidden them to build a special road, and they’re going ahead anyway. If you stand by and do nothing it’s going to be pretty embarrassing. But if you’re down there, obviously you can’t do anything. Then when you come back, you’ll have got a lot of prestige which ought to give you more bargaining power with your congregation.”

“If he comes back.”

“What’s that, Miriam? Oh, I see what you mean. You’re thinking of the danger. Actually, there’s less than you might think, for our group at least. All of us will be clearly identified as ministers, men of God, my bunch and the Catholics and the Lutherans-we’ll have our clerical collars, and, as I understand it, the rabbis are planning to wear the skullcap-what do you call it?”

“Kipoh.”

“That’s right, the rabbis will be wearing the Kipoh and, I believe, the prayer shawl.”

“The tallis?”

“That’s it. Even if they don’t recognize the regalia they’ll sense it has something to do with religion. Oh, there’ll be incidents, I suppose. But compared to the opportunity to demonstrate for the sake of the Lord-”

“I thought it was for the sake of the Negro.”

He smiled to show he was aware that he was being twitted and that he could take a joke. “Same thing, David. For the glory of God manifested in man, in all men, black as well as white. What do you say?”

The rabbi shook his head.

“You’re not feeling up to it yet? The group is not leaving for a couple of days.”

Again the rabbi declined.

“Oh, you’re thinking of Miriam. It should be pretty soon now, shouldn’t it?”

“It’s not so much that either,” said the rabbi. “You see, Peter, I’m not really a man of God, at least no more so than any other man. And what would I say? We don’t go in much for petitionary prayer. If I prayed in Hebrew, who would understand? And if I recited any of our regular prayers in English, the Shema or the Kaddish or the Shimonesra, they don’t really apply. No, I’m afraid I couldn’t go down there as a rabbi. I could as an individual, of course, like the college students; but you don’t want that.”

“Well, of course we want you as a rabbi. There are rabbis who are coming down with us, and many have already been down and borne witness.”

The rabbi shrugged. “We have no hierarchy to promulgate belief. This is my view of the situation; other rabbis see it differently, I suppose. Some feel it their duty as spiritual leaders of their congregations-a habit of mind they picked up from you people, incidentally, or perhaps it was the congregations who then forced it on them. And others are so moved by the plight of the Negro that they don’t care to balance their attitudes as men and citizens against their attitudes as rabbis. Frankly, that may be just as well.”

“Now you’ve lost me completely.”

“People differ: there are the quiet ones and those who storm barricades. I’m afraid I’m one of the quiet ones, but I must admit that the other, the aggressive ones, are probably the ones who bring about changes in the world. I respect you for what you are doing, Peter, and I respect the others; but I don’t feel an urgency to thrust myself personally and physically into the battle any more than I feel an urgency to go to South Africa to help the Negro there. So if I did, it would be for some secondary reason like the one you suggested-to give me prestige in the eyes of my congregation-and that would be hypocritical.”

“But this is more than just helping the southern Negro, David. It’s a new feeling, a new spirit that’s developing in the church, your church as well as mine, and we mustn’t let it die out. The church is coming out of its traditional shell. It’s burgeoning with new life. It’s giving up its self-satisfied praying and smug psalm singing to go out into the highways and byways of men to serve them, to help them to fulfill themselves. The Civil Rights movement is not for the Negro alone; it’s also for the church itself. And that’s why her ministers, priest and rabbi and pastor, are all involved.”

“It’s not new to us, Peter,” the rabbi said softly. “We’ve been doing that for several thousand years, in fact, ever since we accepted Deuteronomy and the commandment, ‘Six days shalt thou labor… but the seventh day is the Sabbath in honor of the Lord; on it thou shalt not do any work, neither thou, nor thy son, nor servant, nor thy ox, nor thy ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gates; in order that thy man-servant and thy maid-servant may rest as well as thou.’ You people parted company with us a couple of thousand years ago when you fixed your eyes on Heaven. A little suffering here on this earth didn’t matter much to you, because compared to the infinite time in the next world, life here was a snap of the fingers, a blink of the eye. But we’ve always been involved with life on this earth and its many injustices. So I suppose you could say that we’ve been in the Civil Rights movement from the beginning.”

“But haven’t you missed something in the process, David?”

“Such as?”

“Such as the inspiration of the blessed saints. Such as the inspiration of lives devoted to Heaven and God. Such as the handful of people who by their example brought mankind a little closer to the angels.”

“Yes, I suppose we have, but we thought it was worth it. And now, it seems as though you people are beginning to think so, too.”