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My Father's Quest

Copyright 2003 © Phyllis B. Grodsky, Ph.D.

In the late 1940's, the custodian of an Orthodox synagogue in the South Bronx led me down rickety stairs and along a dark, musty hallway. We reached a classroom in a remote corner of the basement, and paused. I was about to enter a domain usually reserved for boys. But boys studied Hebrew to be a Bar Mitzvah, and that ceremony was not open to me (a Bat Mitzvah for girls is not held in Orthodox synagogues). Even so, my father wanted me to go to Hebrew school. I didn't understand why he wanted me to master a language he hardly remembered. But at the age of nine there were many things about adults I couldn't understand.

On the High Holy Days, the only time we went to synagogue, I squirmed in my seat. Whenever I looked down from the balcony where the women sat, my father looked lost; another man, someone else's father, was always showing him the correct place in the prayer book.

My father seemed to have few wants, but he was adamant about sending me to Hebrew school, and said he would speak with the rabbi. One day he came home early, took off his faded workman's clothes, and changed into the good suit and tie he only wore on special occasions. He seemed to develop an air of bravado, layer by layer, with each item he donned. Then, he left the house as if on a mission. When he returned, he looked relieved: the rabbi had agreed to his request. He said nothing about how he pulled off this feat. Instead, he shed his suit and tie so quickly that it looked as if he was ridding himself of something too heavy to bear.

I wasn't interested in learning prayers I didn't understand for a coming-of-age ceremony I couldn't have. Still, I wanted to please my father, who only seemed to notice me when I did well in school. Every time I showed him my report card, he rubbed his hands with glee and said that I had a good head, which he called a "noodle."

The custodian opened the door to the classroom. He did an abrupt about-face, and left. Inside, the teacher was pacing back and forth in front of a chalkboard. He wore a long black suit that looked as if it could slide off his small, pinched frame. Without looking at me directly, he motioned to an empty chair in the back of the room. I dutifully sat down and saw the other students fidgeting and looking everywhere but at the chalkboard.

The teacher pointed a long wooden ruler at Hebrew letters that seemed to be written with a shaky hand. He was excitedly reciting Hebrew words in a sing-song voice when someone threw a pencil and the jeering started. As the squabbling grew louder, he tapped the ruler and cried: "Sha! Sha!" ("Quiet! Quiet!"). Suddenly, he began swinging the ruler wildly, looking half crazed. He struck one boy and then another, but still didn't get their attention. They shuffled in their seats and seemed to be waiting for the class to end so they could race out of the synagogue and play stickball on the not yet mean streets of the South Bronx. To block out the din, I silently rehearsed my part in the upcoming school play.

Today, I would guess the teacher was a survivor, only two or three years out of the camps. But at the time, I could only see him as a scary figure. I told my father that he beat the boys with a stick, and besides, I didn't learn anything anyway. I said I wasn't going back. He didn't argue with me; instead, he gave me a student's pamphlet so I could learn Hebrew on my own.

Sometimes my father would come home from work on Sunday and open a large book called "The Guide for the Perplexed." It had a heavy leather cover embossed with a mysterious pattern. My father said it was written by an ancient philosopher named Maimonides -- known as the Rambam -- and all the secrets to life were in that volume. He said there was another book, "The Kabbala," but he heard that reading it could drive you mad if you were under forty, and he was thirty-five.

The Rambam's tome collected a thick layer of dust from sitting on his desk untouched for long periods of time. Whenever I saw fingerprints in the dust, I wondered if my father felt confused and consulted the age-old text for guidance. After all, wasn't that what the title promised?

On that long ago day, perhaps my father hoped Hebrew school would put me on a path to finding answers that eluded him. Did he want the young student to become the teacher -- his teacher? But I was no Yentl, the Isaac Bashevis Singer character who dressed like a boy in order to study Talmud. Far from it. I never did learn the prayers or even any Hebrew. If my father was disappointed, he didn't show it.

The ancient scholar's text remained on his desk, surrounded by an ever- growing collection of papers and ledger books. I always noticed when new fingerprints appeared on its dusty cover.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PHYLLIS B. GRODSKY has a Ph.D. in Social/ Personality psychology, and has previously been published in The Jewish Magazine. See:
"An Accidental Lunch: When Chinese Worry Met Jewish Angst",    
"On Chametz and Haggadahs: A Passover Story,    
"In the Presence of the Rebbe",    
and    "Making Amends"