Bubbe's Place: Stories

Genizah of Livoc

"Look at this name," I said, pointing to a worn inscription that read Genizah of Livoc. "It's odd."

"That's because it isn't a person's name," replied Papa.

Genizah is a Hebrew word. It means 'hiding place.' And Livoc was a shtetl near Koshovato..."

"Hiding place? Wow! What did they hide, Papa? Gold? Cash? Villagers? Tell me more."

Papa shook his head, ignored my remarks, and continued to explain. "...Sometimes a genizah is a room, sometimes just a container. In Livoc it happened to be four burlap bags. Hidden in the genizah are worn out Torahs, prayer books, or religious commentaries. Since they have G-d's Holy Name in them, they must be treated with respect. They can't be torn up or, G-d forbid, burned. So they are hidden and saved-usually in the synagogue. When the genizah is full, the community buries the contents in the Jewish cemetery. In a few cases~a Cairo synagogue and a Crimean synagogue I heard about-the genizahs were never buried. They were just sealed and allowed to disintegrate over time."

"That's very interesting," I said, "but it raises another question for me. How does a genizah from Livoc, in the Ukraine, wind up in the Koshovato Landsman Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York, U.S.A. ?"

Papa looked at Mama. She nodded back, "okay."

Then Papa turned towards me. "It's a long meise, story, Flo. We better sit down while I tell it."

In a town named Livoc, not far from Koshovato, there lived a poor family of three. The Tateh, father, was Abe. The Mama was Sari. The child was a boy named Ben. In the beginning, they were happy. Sari was a capable woman who made the major decisions in their family. She decided what they would eat for dinner and what Abe needed to do each day. Abe was a simple man, who loved to play games with his little boy. Abe never saw a man or woman he didn't like. He never saw or made problems. And he was always ready to help others-as long as they explained carefully what they wanted him to do.

Livoc had only one synagogue. The Rov, Rabbi, gave Abe a job. Abe was the shoymer, guard, of their genizah. Only the Rov and Abe knew where the genizah was hidden. The synagogue had neither cellar nor attic, so it couldn't be hidden there. It was hidden in the attic of the Rov's house! Abe's job was to watch over and protect this genizah till the community could bury it in the cemetery.

Abe took his job seriously. Every few days, he checked that no human or, G-d forbid, mouse or other foraging animal, had disturbed the precious genizah. Life was wonderful for the little family. No boy had a more playful father. But things began to change, as they always do, when Ben grew older. He saw that his father seemed different from other fathers. When Ben started cheder, primary school, he discovered that Abe did not know his aleph-bet, his alphabet letters. It was Sari who helped Ben learn to read. Abe did not know how to read! Ben wanted to know why, of all the men in Livoc, only Abe was illiterate. He no longer cared that Abe could whistle better than anyone else in town, or that he was the only father who never lost his temper. He wanted his father to be able to read.

At seven, Ben was ashamed of his father. He pretended to his schoolmates that Abe was a family friend, not his Papa. By nine, Ben lied outright about his paternity. "I'm a mamzer, bastard," he claimed. Better a mamzer than the son of a nahr, fool. He taught his classmates to call Abe a kuni-lemel, simpleton. He urged them to chant, "Kuni-lemel! kuni-lemell" when they saw Abe near them.

At ten, he was angry with his mother. "How could you marry him, Mama?" he would cry. "How could you let him touch you?"

She replied, "Look at me, Ben. I was ugly, poor and without a dowry. No one else would have me. But he wanted me. I wanted a child...we have you! Nothing is wrong with you. See how lucky? Stop looking at his one fault! So what if he can't read? Try to see his good points. He is kind and gentle. He isn't lazy. He's willing to work-even without pay! He is dependable. Our house is filled with his laughter, his whistling, his singing."

Ben was too young to accept what his mother told him. His shame and anger darkened their little hovel and made it seem even more miserable than it really was. He loved his mother. But he hated his father. And he hated Livoc, where everyone knew his father for a kuni-lemel.

At twelve, he ran away to America. In America, Ben made himself into a somebody. He started as a peddler. Then he became a store proprietor, like so many others. Now he owned a warehouse, and was a distributor of seltzer, sodas and beer. He married and fathered two sons. They were American boys, Sidney and Murray~not Solomon and Moishe! His sons were smart and good readers

His wife thought it was odd that Ben always told loving stories about his mother, but never mentioned his father. She decided his father must have been cruel. She didn't ask about him, hoping to spare Ben painful memories. Ben did write to his mother once a year at Rosh Hashanah, and every month he sent money. In this way, he was a good son.

Meanwhile, back in Livoc, things had gone from bad to terrible. Twice, Cossacks had attacked the vulnerable Jewish community, and Cossack sympathizers lived in the town. These people wanted Livoc to be free of Jews. They felt it was good if Jews died on the points of Cossack swords. And if the Jews ran away, well, that was almost as good!

The younger Jews understood their enemies all too well. They left, to build again in a safer place. But the older people clung to Livoc. It becomes harder and harder for the elderly to leave what they know.

Again, there was a pogrom. This time it happened too quickly to hide. Many older people died, including Sari-perhaps from a blow, or from heart attack or stroke. The next day, the remaining Jews buried their dead. The Eovand the shul's elders packed up the Torahs, the Holy Books, the Eternal Light, the candelabra. And the Jews walked out of Livoc.

In the mass exodus, two were forgotten. Abe was overlooked, because Sari was gone. She would have taken care of him. Everyone else was so farnimen, preoccupied, with his own family and meager possessions, that the townspeople forgot their kuni-lemel

Also overlooked was the genizah. Abe wandered, disoriented, through the Jewish quarter. He found no one. The synagogue was empty. Nothing familiar remained. Slowly, he moved to the Rov's house. Some dishes remained on the table but the candlesticks, the kiddush cup and the menorah were all gone. Frightened, he raced up to the attic. There, he sighed in relief as he saw that the genizah was still there, undisturbed! He looked in the burlap bags. Everything was still in the bags. The genizah was safe.

Abe was not able to read, but he knew that books and Torah are the Jewish lifeline. Now he realized why he had been left behind. First the Eovand now G-d had chosen Abe to guard these bags. So Abe left the Rov's house schlepping, dragging, the bags with him.

In Livoc lived a righteous Christian, appalled by the pogrom. When he saw Abe wandering with his bags he decided to act, to save this Jew. He hitched his horse to his wagon and urged Abe into the wagon with his bundles. He drove to the nearest town with a Jewish population. Danken Gott, thank G-d, it was the town where Sari's brother lived. And it was dershvoger, the brother-in-law, who took charge of Abe and his burlap bags. Sari's brother took up a collection to buy a ticket for Abe to travel to America.

Then, he sent a telegram to his nephew Ben: There has been a terrible pogrom in Livoc. The Jewish part of town no longer exists. The Jews are dead, or exiled. Your mother Sari is dead. As you know, Abe is unable to manage on his own. So Abe is on his way to America-to you, his kaddishel, the son who will one day say Kaddish for his father.

Ben was beside himself! His beloved mother dead, his father on his way to America...The man was retarded! He didn't want his family to meet him. He'd die if his American friends learned that his father was a fool. ..He would put his father in a nursing home. Yes! somewhere, where he would be cared for, but hidden from family and friends...The old man would be safe and Ben's secret would be safe, too. The home would have to be far away, not where parents of any of his friends might be. He wouldn't want to run into anyone he knew while visiting his father...

He started to look for such a residence right away. Ben was out visiting and inspecting homes the day his wife, Anne, received a phone call from Ellis Island. An old man named Abe Wachter was asking for his son Ben Wachter, of the Bronx. It was imperative to locate the son immediately. There was some question about Wachter Senior's current mental status. America did not accept the feebleminded: they might be unable to support themselves. On the other hand, if the son claimed the father and intended to support him, then in that case he might not be feebleminded, just unable to understand English.

If Mr. Ben Wachter or representative did not claim the man by five o'clock that evening, he would be sent back to Europe like an empty, old carpetbag.

Anna asked two questions: What was the name of Abe Wachter's wife? And, what town was Mr. Wachter from? The answers were Sari, and Livoc, Ukraine. Anne couldn't reach Ben, so she rushed to Ellis Island herself, to save her father-in-law. She knew her husband would thank her for acting so quickly on his father's behalf.

In Ellis Island, Anne met a man with four big burlap bags. He was smaller than she imagined Ben's father to be. His clothes were little better than rags, while Ben always dressed impeccably. Ben was always in control of his emotions, and always spoke English, while this little man cried, hugged her, and chattered in Yiddish, which she understood. Obviously, the two were very different.

The old man, her shvehr, father-in-law, asked her again and again, "Where is Ben?" He apologized for being so much trouble. He sobbed inconsolably as he told her about the pogrom and Sari's death, about the closed synagogue and the exodus of Jews. This tattered, innocent messenger from the Old Country touched Anne's heart deeply. She tried to lead him to a bench where they could sit down, but he wouldn't leave the four bags.

"From Livoc shul," he said. "Jam der shoymer, the guardian."

She found herself crying with him, for all the people and things he had lost.

"Now," she told him in Yiddish, "things will be better. You'll be with your son and grandsons. Of course the genizah comes with us. You're safe and home, at last!"

Anne, Abe, Ben and the genizah all arrived home at the same time. They met on the front stoop. Ben was shocked to see his father with Anne. This wasn't what he'd planned. He would have to explain, and that wasn't part of his plan either. Abe, on the other hand, was overjoyed. He kept trying to hug Ben and repeated, "Are you really my little boy, my little Benji, grown up?"

Ben became annoyed at this display of emotion, finally shouting, "Enough already, Papa!" Inside, Anne served tea and mandelbrot to the whole family. The grandsons peered shyly at their Zayde. Abe thanked everyone profusely as he slurped his tea from the glass he had requested. (Shtetl Jews were unaccustomed to cups and saucers.)

Only Ben sipped in silence, until he noticed the four burlap bags. He got up and looked into them. Then he confronted Abe, growing more and more upset as he spoke.

"What kind of junk did you drag from Russia, Papa? It's so dusty, it'll give us allergy attacks for sure! G-d only knows what kind of bugs or bacteria you schlepped from there in these crummy sacks! Why the hell did you come, anyway? To infect Murray and Sid? You~you kuni-lemel, you! Idiot! Jesus, he comes to America with four bags of disease~of cholera, maybe...! First thing tomorrow, that crap goes to the dump! We'll burn it! 'No, don't talk to me, don't hug me, just drink your tea and~and go to bed, for G-dsakes! I can't look at you!"

Ben stormed out of the room. The einekles, grandsons, took their Zayde, grandfather, tenderly to the guest room.

But they could all hear Ben shouting, "Halfway across the face of the Earth this kuni-lemel drags trash~and calls it treasure..."

That night, when the house was quiet and everyone else asleep, Abe stole out of the house with the four burlap bags. He must not let Ben burn these Torahs and Holy Books. That would be a great sin. He, Abe, must run away with them where Ben couldn't find him. But where? Who did he know? He shrugged his shoulders. Schaa, it didn't matter. G-d would have a plan. G-d would help him.

He wandered up one street and down another. A woman, having trouble sleeping, heard a noise. She opened her window and looked down. She saw a man dragging four large sacks along the pavement below. Her intuition told her this was a robber escaping with loot. She opened her window wider, stuck out her head, and shrieked, "Gonif, thief! Gazlehn, robber!"

Windows slammed open everywhere. Soon, everyone was shouting and pointing at poor, bewildered Abe. Tse tumlehn, raucous noise, he thought. But where is this robber they're screaming about?

The police arrested Abe. When they got to the station house they searched Abe and Abe's bags. They hoped to find coins, bills, candlesticks, flatware. But all they turned up was a handkerchief, old Torahs, a few dusty, worm-eaten books. They changed the charge from robbery to vagrancy and schnorring, begging. The police tried to get his name and address, but Abe didn't understand their English and they didn't understand his Yiddish. In the morning and again at lunch, Abe refused food. He drank only water. When the sergeant questioned his officers, they reported the old man sobbed continuously until they placed his trash bags in the cell with him. At mealtimes, he had acted as if they were trying to poison him~pointing at the food and saying something like, "kisher."

"He's saying 'kosher,' you dopes!" the sergeant exploded. "Jesus! If that old Jew starves, we got a riot on our hands. This is a very Jewish area. They'll say we force-fed him a ham sandwich and he choked to death! Get him out of here! Call a Rabbi, .wait, call a Rabbi from a little synagogue, one of those storefronts, not a fancy Jewish Temple! They'll send a lawyer, and then we're in trouble! Get on it right away! The sooner we get rid of this guy, the better."

A Rabbi from a congregation with little more than a minyan, quorum often, spoke with Abe in Yiddish. Abe refused to give his surname or his son's name, but he named the shtetl of Livoc. And when the Rabbi looked in Abe's bags, he knew immediately that this was Livoc's genizah. He promised Abe that they would bury the Torahs and the religious books in the Koshovato cemetery, just as it would have been done in the Old Country. At last, Abe could relax. The police thanked the Rabbi for taking Abe away. They were so grateful they gave the Rabbi, Abe, and the bags a ride to the shul. There, Abe and the Rabbi talked for a long time.

Abe told the Rabbi in bits and pieces about his relationship with his son. The Rabbi understood everything. He knew Abe could not read, yet he treated him with respect and invited him to pray with the minyan. "Sometimes, Abe," said the Rabbi warmly, "deeds are more important than scholarship." He also took Abe into his home. Abe had always had better rapport with women than with men.

After a few weeks, he asked di rebbetsin, the Rabbi's wife, to send a note to his schneer, daughter-in-law. He didn't want Anne zorgn zich, to worry herself, about him. Di rebbetsin's note arrived before dinner. Anne shared it with Ben, who, not being a bad man, had also been worried about his father, as well as riddled with guilt. Early the following morning Ben presented himself at the Rabbi's study, and after morning prayers tried to explain the situation.

But the Rabbi stopped him. He wanted Ben, instead, to speak of himself. "I am a self-made man," Ben began. "I came to America at twelve. Today I own a big warehouse and distribute soda all over the Bronx. My wife is wonderful, my two boys are brilliant, they love to read--"

The Rabbi interrupted. "Ben. Do you keep a Jewish home?" Ben's laugh was embarrassed. "You know the saying, Rabbi...heh-heh...'Hello America, goodbye G-d.' That about sums it up for me. I never was Bar Mitzvah. I don't have a Jewish home. I have an American home!"

The Rabbi replied gently, "I'm not sure your father would be comfortable with a family that doesn't keep kosher."

"I thought about that too, Rabbi," said Ben. "Abe's too old to change, and frankly I'm not about to turn my life upside-down for him, you know? When I heard the old man was on the way, I started looking for a place to put him. I was planning to put him in the best old-age home I can find. Maybe you can recommend one?"

The Rabbi and Ben sat silently for more than a few seconds. At last the Rabbi sighed.

Then he spoke again. "Actually I can't, Ben. Look, I know you can read English. I know your dad is illiterate. I'm sure if I asked you to read the Ten Commandments you would read them to me perfectly. But you don't understand them yet. For instance, the Fifth. The one that says, 'Honor your father and mother.' That doesn't mean, 'Pay money to warehouse pop.' We both know your dad is not bright. That doesn't mean you should hide him. Look instead at his strengths, how he loves you, how he was faithful to his duty, how he showed love for Torah! 'To honor,' that means to show respect for him just the way he is, and to love him the way he loves you~or anyway, to try. Your father's whole life expresses respect: for Livoc, for your mother, for his Rov, for the Holy Books, for his job... What a mensch!

"So here's my idea. Let him continue to live with us, where people-excuse me for putting it this way-value him. Come here and visit with him. He can visit with you, too. When you learn to honor your father, let's talk again."

Papa stood up abruptly, with a small growl of approval for the Rabbi's speech, and moved down the path between the two rows of graves.

So. Did the Rabbi really say these things? Who knows? Papa said he did...Did my parents feel the least sympathy for the son, Ben? No, that compassionate they weren't. They were bound by the rules of mitzvot, as well-the children honor the parents, not the other way around. As for me, I know I was blessed, to have no trouble loving Sonya and Menashe. After Mama died, I wanted Papa with us as long as possible. This wish was, thank G-d, granted. Never did I have to learn to love either of them out of a sense of duty. They were just... easy to love! Could you ask for better luck than that?