Sotah (3 page)
F
aigie Reich opened the door to her daughters’ room carefully. This was odd for her. She was a big, almost overpowering-looking woman, given to large, decisive gestures: pot lids were lifted and lowered with a clang; rugs were beaten with whomping vengeance; and erring young bottoms received righteous whacks that boded no room for shilly-shallying or idle dreams of reprieve.
Yet without her being aware of it, a new softness born of doubt had crept into Mrs Reich’s disciplined, staunch, and unflinching vision of life ever since Dvorah’s wedding six months before. Perhaps it was the devastating vision of every mother of the bride: the tiny creature suddenly heart-breakingly beautiful and pure under the wedding canopy encircling a strange man who would now be her whole life. You lost a daughter, whatever they said about gaining sons. Dvorah’s husband would be her life now. And you hoped—you so hoped and prayed!—that she would be happy with that life.
So many things could go wrong.
That was why she and other
haredi
mothers raised their daughters with such discipline—harshly, many would say. There was school eight to ten hours a day, then homework, and household chores that lasted several more hours. They had to be steel once they reached that canopy, tempered steel beams that could uphold the whole Jewish people. Let’s face it. The men did all the learning, all the praying. They could tell you if a chicken’s lungs were kosher or the exact moment to light candles on Friday night or how to search for crumbs before Passover. But who made it all happen? Who turned an ordinary day into a holy day, where the house shone from cleanliness and the boys and men wore spotless white shirts and prayer shawls? Where the Sabbath and holiday table groaned from the heavy platters of steaming meats and succulent chickens and kugels and a hundred delicacies fit for a king? And who made it possible to buy the food and clothes, when the husband and father spent all day learning, as was his rightful role? As much respect as Rebbetzin Reich felt for her husband, and all scholars like him, she admitted to herself that the men were all theory. Their learning, their piety, could only exist because of the protective cocoon their women wove around them, allowing them some distance from the harsh realities of buying, earning, saving, cooking, cleaning, and giving birth. As high as the men floated near the heavens, so must the women plant their feet firmly on the earth. And in her heart of hearts she faced the truth that as weak as the men were, so must the women be strong.
In this matter she had taken her cue directly from G-d. After all, how many concessions did the Torah make to man’s weak nature? In war, for example, if an Israelite man captured a beautiful woman, it was expected that he wouldn’t be able to resist her. Even the best men (those who left the desert and came into the land of Israel with Joshua were considered extremely pious,
tzadikim
, men who had passed the terrible trials of wanderings, the loss of faith that had their parents building golden calves: a perfect generation) weren’t expected to have an ounce of willpower, hence all the laws concerning the captive woman. Oh, you could take her home, the Torah conceded (you probably will, won’t you, even though she’s a pagan and will bring her idols with her and probably drag you down). But once there, she had to take off her finery and put on mourning; she had to cut her long nails and be allowed to weep for her dead family a month. Only then could the man “go in unto her” and take her for a wife. The Torah in its wisdom was so wonderful, so wise, Rebbetzin Reich thought. For after she took off the finery, cut off the long, painted nails, and cried for a month, let’s face it, how good was she going to look? And thus the Torah goes on to say that if the man changes his mind, he can’t keep her but must send her off free, because “you have humbled her.” That was man’s nature.
Faigie Reich had raised her daughters as she had been raised: to accept this world as it was and to enter it on its own terms. And she had been rewarded. Dvorah had married well. Indeed, thrillingly well. Thank G-d! She had prayed so hard and so long ever since the girl was seventeen that G-d find a good
chassen
for her. It had taken a long time, but G-d had his ways. Yaakov Klein! Such a fine boy from such a wonderful family! Now, only two more girls to go.
She padded softly into the room, which seemed almost empty now. How fast they grew up and left. She sat a moment on Dvorah’s empty bed and watched her two daughters.
Chaya Leah was sleeping deeply. She couldn’t help smiling in triumph at the child’s bigness. The only one who took after her. A pleasure to have such a daughter and a joy to have such a wife. Big strong hands, wide hips, firm, strong thighs and calves. Some man would be blessed. She would make his life a paradise. His home would be scrubbed, filled with healthy children. There would always be an income. She expected to bring Chaya Leah into the business full-time in a year or two. The little store selling balls of yarn and crocheting thread that had put food on the table and paid the mortgage and helped marry off one daughter would just have to provide enough for two. She could already imagine the girl behind the counter, carrying in the big boxes of yarn from the delivery trucks, arranging the storeroom into neat piles, balancing the books.
Then her gaze shifted to Dina and her smile turned sad. She could never envision Dina in the knitting goods store. She was such a flower, she would fade in the shadows of the boxes, the sunless cold storerooms. Her hands were so small, childishly tender. She was a lovely piece of china, the kind you received as a wedding gift and never used except once, for once-in-a-lifetime events: engagement dinners, fiftieth wedding anniversaries.
She was bright. She could always finish the seminary and teach. Rebbetzin Reich twisted her simple gold wedding band around her large, gnarled finger as an uncomfortable, almost sacrilegious thought came to her, a thought she would never even be able to share with anyone, least of all her husband: Dina must marry well. Someone who could support her. Someone who could take care of her. She was not cut out to be a
kollel
wife, supporting her husband through years of study. There was sadness as Rebbetzin Reich admitted this to herself, frustration, and a sense of failure, too. After all, being married to a boy who would rise in the yeshiva rung by rung was what every
haredi
mother hoped for her daughter. As the Talmud teaches: Marry your daughter to a scholar. It meant fulfilling the highest vision of womanhood. But who knew better than the rebbetzin that it also meant endless years of sacrifice. It meant there would never be any money. It meant scrimping on food, on clothes. It meant walking instead of taking a bus; buying tomatoes going soft and watermelons ready to rot. It meant one chicken for the Sabbath and perhaps another during the week. And it meant no help, ever, with the children, the housework. Chaya Leah was built for that. But Dina, beautiful little Dina. Faigie Reich’s heart ached.
Already Chaim Garfinkel had been to see her. He had been to Dvorah’s wedding, of course. The
shadchen
was always invited to the wedding and at the end was given his fee. It was considered very bad luck for the young couple to underpay or (G-d forbid!) withhold payment from a
shadchen.
As Reb Garfinkel had taken the money-filled envelope, he had stroked his long, thin beard and returned Rabbi Reich’s enthusiastic handshake. “I have someone in mind for Dina,” he’d whispered. “A fine boy. A scholar.”
Rebbetzin Reich had found herself lying awake nights hearing those words. She’d resisted her husband’s suggestions that they begin the long, involved process of finding Dina a husband, and Rabbi Reich had put off talking about the subject for a month or two after Dvorah’s wedding, indulging what he believed was his wife’s reluctance to contemplate the loss of yet another daughter’s willing hands around the house so soon. Yet as time went by, the pressure was mounting. The
shadchen
was calling more often, hinting that there were opportunities that shouldn’t be casually lost; hinting that “we wouldn’t want Dina to wait as long as her sister did, would we? It would be a bad precedent. Bad for the family name. It would only make things more difficult for Dina. For Chaya Leah.”
The rebbetzin sighed. She was going to have to deal with it. Time was racing. Dina was almost seventeen. Her friends were getting engaged. She leaned over Dina and hesitated. It actually hurt her to shake Dina awake. She—mother of eight, who mercilessly routed five reluctant boys out of bed with cuffs and harsh words, who pitilessly berated her daughters for everything from not saying the morning prayers on time to wearing stockings without seams—actually hesitated to touch Dina, to shake her from her sweet sleep. But it was Dina’s turn to do the morning shopping, to bring back the three loaves of bread, four milk, and two margarine needed for breakfast. She thought of the heavy plastic baskets that would cut into the tender flesh of those childish palms and hesitated, tempted to ask Chaya Leah instead. But she stopped herself. In her life Dina would carry many heavy baskets. To spare her now would mean to leave the flesh tender when she as her mother should be helping to provide those calluses that would eventually protect her from more pain.
It was getting late. If she didn’t hurry, the boys would miss their bus to the yeshiva or go without breakfast. She thought of her five little sons with something like awe. After three girls, after almost giving up hope, and then five circumcision ceremonies!
Ezra, the oldest, was going to be Bar Mitzvah in two months and had already memorized an hour-long Talmudical discussion as well as the entire Torah reading. He was a quiet boy, refined, an excellent student. Asher, eleven, was the opposite. Loud, rambunctious, with no
zitzfleisch
to sit in one place and memorize. Still, she shook her head indulgently, he had a good head, quick and sharp. She had faith that the yeshiva would whip him into shape eventually.
Though infinitely more difficult, this same faith held for eight-year-old Shimon Levi, his sisters’ scourge, his teacher’s bane. She couldn’t help smiling. What a healthy rascal he was, G-d bless him! Always full of high jinks, always full of scrapes and cuts and bruises … But underneath the bravado, she knew, there was this sweet little boy who secretly allowed his mother to kiss him good night, hugging her around the neck.
Six-year-old Benyamin was next. She had a soft little spot for Benyamin, the only one of her children who had been born with a physical disability, a small heart murmur that had been corrected by an operation at age two. He was a pale, delicate child whom the other children instinctively protected. He had a soft heart like his father and couldn’t stand to see any of his brothers punished. He had gotten into the habit of taking responsibility for all their wrongdoings, knowing that the blows that would fall on him would be easy ones.
Then there was the baby, not a baby anymore: Duvid. Her last child, born right before menopause. He had turned three last year and they had cut his hair for the first time, as custom stipulated. Something had cried inside her as his blond curls fell to the ground with heartbreaking finality. Her last baby.
She looked up with guilty haste. It wasn’t like her to brood. There was no time. Reb Reich was long gone; having prayed with an early
minyan
at the synagogue at four A.M., he was already at the yeshiva studying his daily Talmud portion before his tiny students began arriving at
heder.
He instructed three- and four-year-olds and had great satisfaction in teaching them their first words of Torah. It was a responsibility that often made him tremble. After all, their whole attitude, their whole lives, might be based on the feelings he instilled in them when their minds were clean slates and their hearts pure soft clay that would hold forever the imprints of these early experiences. He loved these little boys like a father and worried over them more than their own parents.
More than he did over his own children, Rebbetzin Reich sometimes perceived resentfully, a feeling that sent her praying for forgiveness every Yom Kippur. She wouldn’t see her husband until the evening, until after he’d eaten dinner at the yeshiva, said his evening prayers, and then learned his daily portion of the
Mishnah.
But how could she dare complain? His day was full earning merit for them both in the World to Come. And hers was dedicated to getting them through the mundane paces of the lowly, material world that was.
She had gotten up at four-thirty, said a shortened version of the prayers her husband said, put up a load of laundry and hung it out to dry, prepared a kugel for Shabbat (four days away) that she would freeze, and put up a whole chicken in broth that would be their afternoon meal. When the boys were dressed and fed, she would finally dress herself and hurry to Mahane Yehuda to open the store.
She had no pity on herself. I’ll rest when I’m in the grave, she told herself whenever exhaustion made her doubt her blessings. There will be more than enough time then. And I’ll be sorry for every mitzvah I didn’t do when I had the chance. So in between her housework and her work at the store, she managed to cook meals for neighbors who were in mourning and couldn’t cook for themselves; prepare Sabbath meals for women just after childbirth; visit the sick in hospitals. And in those rare moments in the store when no customers demanded her attention, she managed to knit sweaters for the pious elderly, whose thin cracked walls—and even thinner flesh—did little to keep out the penetrating cold of Jerusalem’s winters.
She leaned over and turned down the covers. Dina’s nightgown, a too big hand-me-down, had slipped off her shoulder. Her mother touched the naked skin, and the contrast between its lovely, fragrant youthfulness and her own harsh, onion-smelling wrinkles awoke a strange compassion in her heart that almost frightened her. She felt a wave of pleasure and a sharp stab of foreboding.
“Dina,” she whispered, shaking her gently. “Dina,
maideleh.
It’s time to get up.”