Have A Little Faith Part 4

Such ritual was a major part of the Reb's life. Morning prayers. Evening prayers. Eating certain foods. Denying himself others. On Sabbath, he walked to synagogue, rain or shine, not operating a car, as per Jewish law. On holidays and festivals, he took part in traditional practices, hosting a Seder meal on Pa.s.sover, or casting bread into a stream on Rosh Hashanah, symbolic of casting away your sins.

Like Catholicism, with its vespers, sacraments, and communions-or Islam, with its five-times-daily salah, salah, clean clothes, and prayer mats-Judaism had enough rituals to keep you busy all day, all week, and all year. clean clothes, and prayer mats-Judaism had enough rituals to keep you busy all day, all week, and all year.

I remember, as a kid, the Reb admonishing the congregation-gently, and sometimes not so gently-for letting rituals lapse or disappear, for eschewing traditional acts like lighting candles or saying blessings, even neglecting the Kaddish prayer for loved ones who had died.

But even as he pleaded for a tighter grip, year after year, his members opened their fingers and let a little more go. They skipped a prayer here. They skipped a holiday there. They intermarried-as I did.

I wondered, now that his days were dwindling, how important ritual still was.

"Vital," he said.

But why? Deep inside, you know your convictions.

"Mitch," he said, "faith is about doing. You are how you act, not just how you believe."

Now, the Reb didn't merely practice his rituals; he carved his daily life from them. If he wasn't praying, he was studying-a major part of his faith-or doing charity or visiting the sick. It made for a more predictable life, perhaps even a dull one by American standards. After all, we are conditioned to reject the "same old routine." We're supposed to keep things new, fresh. The Reb wasn't into fresh. He never took up fads. He didn't do Pilates, he didn't golf (someone gave him a single club once; it sat in his garage for years).

But there was something calming about his pious life, the way he puttered from one custom to the next; the way certain hours held certain acts; the way every autumn he built a sukkah sukkah hut with its roof open to the stars; the way every week he embraced the Sabbath, breaking the world down to six days and one day, six days and one. hut with its roof open to the stars; the way every week he embraced the Sabbath, breaking the world down to six days and one day, six days and one.

"My grandparents did these things. My parents, too. If I take the pattern and throw it out, what does that say about their lives? Or mine? From generation to generation, these rituals are how we remain..."

He rolled his hand, searching for the word.

Connected? I said.

"Ah." He smiled at me. "Connected."

The End of Spring

As we walked to the front door that day, I felt a wave of guilt. I'd once had rituals; I'd ignored them for decades. These days, I didn't do a single thing that tied me to my faith. Oh, I had an exciting life. Traveled a lot. Met interesting people. But my daily routines-work out, scan the news, check e-mail-were self-serving, not roped to tradition. To what was I connected? A favorite TV show? The morning paper? My work demanded flexibility. Ritual was the opposite.

Besides, I saw religious customs as sweet but outdated, like typing with carbon paper. To be honest, the closest thing I had to a religious routine was visiting the Reb. I had now seen him at work and at home, in laughter and in repose. I had seen him in Bermuda shorts.

I had also seen him more this one spring than I normally would in three years. I still didn't get it. I was one of those disappointing congregants. Why had he chosen me to be part of his death, when I had probably let him down in life?

We reached the door.

One more question, I said.

"One mooore," he sang, "at the doooor..."

How do you not get cynical?

He stopped.

"There is no room for cynicism in this line of work."

But people are so flawed. They ignore ritual, they ignore faith-they even ignore you. Don't you get tired of trying?

He studied me sympathetically. Maybe he realized what I was really asking: Why me? Why me?

"Let me answer with a story," he said. "There's this salesman, see? And he knocks on a door. The man who answers says, 'I don't need anything today.'

"The next day, the salesman returns.

"'Stay away,' he is told.

"The next day, the salesman is back.

"The man yells, 'You again! I warned you!' He gets so angry, he spits in the salesman's face.

"The salesman smiles, wipes the spit with a handkerchief, then looks to the sky and says, 'Must be raining.'

"Mitch, that's what faith is. If they spit in your face, you say it must be raining. But you still come back tomorrow."

He smiled.

"So, you'll come back, too? Maybe not tomorrow..." tomorrow..."

He opened his arms as if expecting an incoming package. And for the first time in my life, I did the opposite of running away.

I gave him a hug.

It was a fast one. Clumsy. But I felt the sharp bones in his back and his whiskered cheek against mine. And in that brief embrace, it was as if a larger-than-life Man of G.o.d was shrinking down to human size.

I think, looking back, that was the moment the eulogy request turned into something else.

SUMMER.

IT IS 1971...

I am thirteen. This is the big day. I lean over the holy scrolls, holding a silver pointer; its tip is the shape of a hand. I follow the ancient text, chanting the words. My teenage voice squeaks.

In the front row sit my parents, siblings, and grandparents. Behind them, more family, friends, the kids from school.

Just look down, I tell myself. I tell myself. Don't mess up. Don't mess up.

I go on for a while. I do pretty well. When I am finished, the group of men around me shake my wet hand. They mumble, "Yishar co-ach"- "Yishar co-ach"-congratulations-and then I turn and take the long walk across the pulpit to where the Reb, in his robe, stands waiting.

He looks down through his gla.s.ses. He motions for me to sit. The chair seems huge. I spot his prayer book, which has clippings stuffed in the pages. I feel like I am inside his private lair. He sings loudly and I sing, too-also loudly, so he won't think I am slacking-but my bones are actually trembling. I am finished with the obligatory part of my Bar Mitzvah, but nothing is as unsettling as what is about to come: the conversation with the rabbi. You cannot study for this. It is free-form. Worst of all, you have to stand right next to him. No running from G.o.d.

When the prayer finishes, I rise. I barely reach above the lectern, and some congregants have to shift to see me.

"So, how are you feeling, young man?" the Reb says. "Relieved?"

Yeah, I mumble.

I hear m.u.f.fled laughter from the crowd.

"When we spoke a few weeks ago, I asked you what you thought about your parents. Do you remember?"

Sort of, I say.

More laughter.

"I asked if you felt they were perfect, or if they needed improvement. And do you remember what you said?"

I freeze.

"You said they weren't perfect, but..."

He nods at me. Go ahead. Speak.

But they don't need improvement? I say.

"But they don't need improvement," he says. "This is very insightful. Do you know why?"

No, I say.

More laughter.

"Because it means you are willing to accept people as they are. n.o.body is perfect. Not even Mom and Dad. That's okay."

He smiles and puts two hands on my head. He recites a blessing. "May the Lord cause his countenance to shine upon you..."

So now I am blessed. The Lord shines on me.

Does that mean I get to do more stuff, or less?

Life of Henry

About the time that, religiously, I was becoming "a man," Henry was becoming a criminal.

He began with stolen cars. He played lookout while his older brother jimmied the locks. He moved on to purse s.n.a.t.c.hing, then shoplifting, particularly grocery stores; stealing pork chop trays and sausages, hiding them in his oversized pants and shirts.

School was a lost cause. When others his age were going to football games and proms, Henry was committing armed robbery. Young, old, white, black, didn't matter. He waved a gun and demanded their cash, their wallets, their jewels.

The years pa.s.sed. Over time, he made enemies on the streets. In the fall of 1976, a neighborhood rival tried to set him up in a murder investigation. The guy told the cops Henry was the killer. Later, he said it was someone else.

Still, when those cops came to question him, Henry, now nineteen years old with a sixth-grade education, figured he could turn the tables on his rival and collect a five-thousand-dollar reward in the process.

So instead of saying "I have no idea" or "I was nowhere near there," he made up lies about who was where, who did what. He made up one lie after another. He put himself at the scene, but not as a partic.i.p.ant. He thought he was being smart.

He couldn't have been dumber. He wound up lying his way into an arrest-along with another guy-on a manslaughter charge. The other guy went to trial, was convicted, and got sent away for twenty-five years. Henry's lawyer quickly recommended a plea deal. Seven years. Take it.

Henry was devastated. Seven years? For a crime he didn't commit?

"What should I do?" he asked his mother.

"Seven is less than twenty-five," she said.

He fought back tears. He took the deal in a courtroom. He was led away in handcuffs.

On the bus ride to prison, Henry cursed the fact that he was being punished unfairly. He didn't do the math on the times he could have been jailed and wasn't. He was angry and bitter. And he swore that life would owe him once he got out.

The Things We Lose...

It was now the summer of 2003, and we were in the kitchen. His wife, Sarah, had cut up a honeydew, and the Reb, wearing a white short-sleeved shirt, red socks, and sandals-these combinations no longer startled me-held out a plate.

"Eat some," he said.

In a bit.

"You're not hungry?"

In a bit.

"It's good for you."

I ate a piece.

"You liiike?" liiike?"

I rolled my eyes. He was clowning with me. I never thought I'd still be coming, three years after our visits began. When someone asks for a eulogy, you suspect the end is near.

But the Reb, I'd learned, was like a tough old tree; he bent with the storms but he would not snap. Over the years, he had beaten back Hodgkin's disease, pneumonia, irregular heart rhythms, and a small stroke.

These days, to safeguard his now eighty-five-year-old body, he took a daily gulping of pills, including Dilantin for seizure control, and Vasotec and Toprol for his heart and his blood pressure. He had recently endured a bout with shingles. Not long before this visit, he had tumbled, fractured his rib cage, and spent a few days in the hospital, where his doctor implored him to use a cane everywhere-"For your own safety," the doctor said. He rarely did, thinking the congregation might see him as weak.

But whenever I showed up, he was raring to go. And I was privately happy he fought his body's decay. I did not like seeing him frail. He had always been this towering figure, a tall and upright Man of G.o.d.

Selfishly, that's how I wanted him to stay.