My Parents

My father, Yisroel, was born in Polish Tchechonovitz, by the River Bug. At eight or nine years of age he was left an orphan. He raised himself in the Houses of Study and the Rabbinical colleges, surviving on the charity of the kind-hearted women who couldn’t bear to turn their backs on a pitiful orphan. The House of Study became his home; the hard bench - his bed; a sack filled with straw - his pillow. And he paid for his "lodgings" with hard work: helping the beadle; carrying water from the hand-pump; chopping wood; firing the stove; polishing the brass candlesticks on the great candelabra; He swept and cleaned the "House of God" and otherwise served the Students of Wisdom as they sat day and night and studied..

When he was still young, he was married to a settler’s oldest daughter - my mother. My grandfather, the father-in-law, a devoted disciple of the Hasidic Rabbi of Kotsk, was a blacksmith, a tavern-keeper, and also an "worker of the earth". From the very first, there arose between the son-in-law and the father-in-law numerous dis-agreements: the grandfather, who was a learned man, wanted simply that his son-in-law, the student with the sharp mind, should sit day and night in front of the Torah and study. But the young son-in-law, who had passed his entire youth in the confines of places of learning, now had absolutely no desire to be sitting in front of books. He was now drawn towards the world of the outdoors, from the fields and pastures to the green rolling hills, where the sheep and cattle grazed...for all these things, his appetite was insatiable. He had no desire to spend any more time in the service of the Torah.

In the meantime, he had discovered in himself new strengths, that he had not previously been aware of. From one side he was strongly drawn to the pounding of the hammer of the blacksmith’s forge, where a piece of iron would be, in the grandfather’s hands, transformed into an axe, a knife, or a scythe. And from a second side he was drawn to the fields, to the plow and the scythe - to be able with his own hands to plow, to sow, to cut and to thresh. And then there was the feeling of being on the back of a young horse, holding on to its neck, and gallopping over the rolling hills, and letting all the Gentiles see, "that a Jew can also practise this skill..."

The grandfather was bitterly opposed to the idea that his son-in-law should turn his back on the Holy Torah... that rather than sitting in front of the Talmud, studying from the "Yoreh De’a", or the "Khoshen Mishpat"...instead he spends his whole day in the forge, where he sharpens an axe or a knife, and fools around with pieces of iron! My grandparents would shout, argue, plead, or threaten, but the "seed of evil" of his (Lord have Mercy!) could not be driven out of him.

Finally help came from the president of the congregation, who used to go around from town to town, from settler to settler, collecting money for worthy causes such as bail money, funds for the community school, for anonymous charity....he concluded an agreement between my grandfather and my father on the following terms: Every day, according to a schedule, the son-in-law should sit and study, and once he had finished his daily readings, he was free to go off to the forge and sharpen his knives, or to head outdoors to his peasant’s work. And so there was "peace and tranquility". Soon the one-time yeshiva-boy was once again standing with his hammer at the forge, helping with the grandfather’s work, or out in the fields behind a plow.

Every summer, just before harvest, hundreds of peasants from the neighboring villages used to come to the grandfather to make a new scythe and to sharpen the old one; because my grandfather had a reputation throughout the whole region as the finest artisan. But it wasn’t long before the peasants, the grandfathers "disciples", started to ask that the younger "Rabbi" should sharpen their blades instead, because they had started to notice that it was my father who had the truly blessed hands. In those hands there was somehow a a blessing of good luck...from each blade that he sharpened and made true there came forth a song that could be heard by the fields and hills! And while my grandfather had to fight all the harder to keep my father to his daily studies, at the same time it pleased him that his business, the blacksmith’s trade, had aquired a new "asset"...

When the young son-in-law was first able to move out on his own, he used his dowry to rent from a neighboring landowner an "estate"...and became a farmer in his own right. For the first time, he was in charge of his own life. By himself, he built stalls for his sheep and cattle...planted trees...weaved fences from twigs and branches, borders for his fields. He workedday and night. He soon became known as the most capable property manager in the whole district. He was also a favorite of the Polish landowner, and he quickly taught himself to speak "Gentile"...the White-Russian of the peasants, and the Polish of the aristocracy. On the long winter evenings, he would pass time with the local landowners and priests, carrying on long discussions and arguments over the eternal question of "our God" vs. "your God". From time time time he also liked to steal a glimpse into the secular books, the literature of the Enlightenment, which he used to used to quietly borrow from the local free-thinkers, his good friends.

But it was sadly not ordained that he should be allowed to dwell peacefully on his "property". The Tsarist regime had undertaken to drive Jews from the "holy" towns. The expulsions would apply first to the newcomers, who had only recently moved into the towns. My mother rushed to see her landlord, and fell to her knees before the Russian priest... my grandfather, on the other hand, went to his Rabbi. But no matter what they did, nothing helped: the decree was soon carried out. From all my father’s holdings, with all his accumulated possessions, there was nothing left. With my mother and four or five children sitting on a big wagon, loaded with housewares, my mother’s spinning wheel, and all the household furniture and effects, with various animals tied to the back of the wagon, they rode off to the nearest village...Zastavia, which lay all of seven kilometers from the village.

And so ended my father’s days as a settler...no homestead, no workshop...all was lost, as though it had never been anything more than a beautiful dream. All that remained to him from that short, happy time was the name: "Reb’ Yisroel Luskeler", from the name of the village - Luskela.

For some time, father wandered about the village in despair...confused, lost, and broken. He wanted to go to work for the local blacksmith...this wish was not motivated so much by the thought of earning a livelihood for his wife and children, but rather the need to work with the knife and the plow, and so be re-united with the life he left behind in the village. But mother, who wanted no more than that her children should grow up to be such fine scholars as her husband, would not hear of it. She argued, cried, pleaded with him, that he should not shame her in front of people, before her family, and not let her children grow up to be simple village blacksmiths. She assured him the she was prepared to eat nothing but a dry crust of bread, once a day, so long as her children should be able to sit and study. She argued tirelessly, and enlisted the help of the "leaders of the community"...the president of the congregation, the slaughterer, and other such students of wisdom, until they convinced father that he should earn his livleihood from the Torah - by becoming the village Gemorra-teacher...

At first, it was not easy for him to sit and teach children. Like a caged bird, he longed for the outdoors. He used to sometimes abandon his classes, sneak off into the small garden behind our rented house, and throw himself into his "work of the soil". Before long he was digging potatoes, piling up little mounds of soil for the little cucumbers, tying up the beans to stakes, here and there pulling out a wild grass or a weed - until mother would run out screaming: "Yisroel, Yisroel, your students are tearing apart my house!"

And even in class, his hands never stopped working. With his small, beloved pen-knife, he would carve a little spoon from a bone, a tobacco-box from a piece of wood, or a little present for a good friend...once he made a beautiful little chest with drawers, and a little key to lock it up....another time, he made a little cage complete with little windows and doors from braided willow-branches. We hung it on our straw roof, it should be a nest for the little birds. In those days there was no end to his satisfaction...even his lessons with the children were not so hard to take.

Every Friday, after the lessons, in his free "in-between hours" before Sabbath, he would unlock his toolbox, take out his hammers, his saws, his files, his brace and drill, and set to work. He would make a little table, a bench; a little cupboard for books, a breadboard on which to make matzos for Passover; a gadget, a washboard; Hannukah candelabra or a noisemaker and a Haman-knocker for the children. My mother used to argue with him sometimes, and warn him that he was wasting his time in sinful pursuits, that better he should spend some time with a book in hand teaching his own children, rather that playing with his "childish toys". But der tateh paid no attention...for him, it was enough that the children were close by, helping him to hold onto a piece of wood or a board that he was sawing or drilling. When it was the Eve of Succoth everybody in the village would bring him their palm branches, he should braid the rings and make up the special holders on each side, one for the willow-branches and one for the myrtle-branches. He also had already a ritual, to go to his good friends, to the president of the congregation, and to the slaughterer, to build for them their tabernacles. And his own tabernacle was the most beautiful in the village, so that people used to come and look at it in wonder.

If someone in the village was God forbid struck down with a serious illness and needed a pack of ice to be laid on his head, my father would run off to the neighboring brewery and bring back a heavy sack full of ice. If the sick one had to be wrapped in wet sheets, my father was ready to do it. He had absolutely no fear he should catch something, because he himself had never been sick a day in his life...he was always strong and healthy as an oak tree. More than once, he used to compete in feats of strength with the strongest neighboring Gentile.....which one could wrestle the other to the ground, who could lift more. Sometimes he liked to show off his "feats of strength" by bending a nail with his bare hands, or by lifting with one hand the heaviest weight, and other such demonstrations and showings-off.

Summertimes, on the Sabbath-day "between hours" between evening prayers and sundown, he would take us children for a walk out in the countryside. He would look out at the Gentile grain-fields, seeing how high they grew, seeing whether this year would be a good harvest. And standing face-to-face in front of the tall corn, the waving wheat fields, we children grew silent as his eyes filled with a burning fire and he stared off in the faraway distance....

On these long walks he also used to show us all the plants and wild-flowers, calling each one by name, noting which one of them was a cure for this or the other sickness. And he spoke of them with such certainty, such spirit, and such love, as a mother speaks of her child. In those moments our father grew exceedingly tall in our eyes...it seemed to us children that he himself had a role in the everlasting; that he himself had helped to create and make grow all these various grasses, herbs, and many-colored flowers which peeked upwards with loving eyes towards heaven...

And when father noticed that from above, from the half-darkened sky, there looked down as though with a blinking eye a tiny star, which told us that our beloved Holy Sabbath was over and that the grey weekdays had returned...he would stand in the middle of the field, with his face to the east, recite the evening prayers. He prayed with purpose, with feeling, and with a bittersweet, longing melody which was altogether different from what we were used to. In those moments we felt for him a special affection, and at the same time a sense of pity, although none of us could have put into words the reason why.

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My mother was a small, thin, frail Jewess, who since childhood had limped on her right leg. It happenned, as she used to tell us often, from the cold tavern in the village, where she caught cold and contracted rheumatism. They went to every "charlatan" in the area, they tried every remedy on earth, but nothing helped. "It must be," she used to say with a sniff, "that it was ordained from above that I should forever walk with a limp". But when they first brought my father to the village to meet her, she had hardly limped at all, so "the groom" had not even noticed that "the bride" had a limp. From this it was plain that the spirits of her ancestors must have been helping her....when she talked about it, she smiled and turned red like a schoolgirl...

Mother was one of God’s chosen....there was nothing she couldn’t do, and her hands were never at rest. She knew all the motherly skills. For her, a walk of five of six kilometers was a mere cat’s leap. If someone had trouble with the authorities, she would go on his behalf to the highest official...she knew how to speak almost all of the Gentile languages...Ukrainian, White Russian, and Polish, so well that you would hardly know that it was daughter of Israel who was speaking. And inded, more than one neighbor, a poor settler, used to come all the way to town to ask she should speak on his behalf in the "high windows" of the county; before the mayor, the deputy or even to the judge, to appeal a sentence against a poor Jew burdened with children.

And she also liked to demonstrate her blessedness by the fact that she had givenmy father twelve children. She used to joke about it, saying she had accomplished a greater feat than Our Father Jacop: because Our Father Jacob had twelve children by four wives, "while her husband, he should live to an old age, had had twelve children, sons and daughters, by one wife!" Indeed, exactly half of these the Lord, blessed be He, had taken back for himself...but after all, that wasn’t her fault.... because "the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away". Even in this it could be seen that the Master of the Universe had taken pity on the poor, frail little mother, that she shouldn’t be burdened with so many children...and also perhaps by these means, He meant to do kindness, whether it be to those he had taken back, or whether it be to those He had left in the care of the mother...who knows?

And mother’s burdens were indeed very heavy. She would be the first to rise, when God himself was still asleep; and she would sit up until late, by the light of a small gas-light sewing shirts from cloth she bought in the town, putting new patches on the old, worn-out clothes which were passed on as inheritances from the older children to the younger; darning old socks and making new ones from the bits of wool that her former friends, the Gentile peasant women from the village, used to bring her from time to time in return for her cures and remedies, such as warding of an "evil eye", casting out an "evil spirit", or for prescribing this or that water-grass for a tooth-ache, for a stomach ache; for taking care of "women’s troubles" and other kinds of sicknesses, God forbid that you should hear from such things in any Jewish home; in short, my mother was an "expert" whose opinions and diagnoses, like those of her mother and her mother’s mother, were respected throught the whole region...they used to say that none other than the Angel Raphael must have been standing by her side...

In those early quiet mornings, and in those late evenings, she truly felt like a queen in her castle...because all day long, the tiny house, crowded to the rafters with her own children and those attending my father’s class, "raged and boiled like the (legendary river) Sambatyon"; frequently, her head would be "splitting open", she would be going about "like a lunatic", she "couldn’t stand it a minute longer", it was "a miracle she could boil a pot of potatoes and some thin soup".

Indeed, that small rented shack often felt more like a prison cell than a home, consisting as it did of one room and a kitchen, which had the only entranceway to the house. In one corner stood the large oven with all its implements...the bread-pan, the khalleh-pan, the shovel for shovelling out the hot coals and ashes, and other such necessary implements. In the other corner, hanging on the wall there was a two-sided cupboard, one side for the dairy dishes and one for the meat dishes. It might have been more accurate, if we had called them both "neutral" (neither dairy nor meat) but mother was adamant that we shouldn’t God forbid mix them up. Below the cupboard on a little bench stood the bucket for drinking water, and not far from that...the slop-bucket.

The so-called "living room" served several puposes...it was my father’s classroom, where there stood a long table surrounded by long wooden benches, where ten or twelve students could sit and read their gemorras. It was also the "dining room" which at night was transformed into a "bedroom". On one side stood a sleeping bench which was stuffed with straw. By day, it served as an ordinary bench to sit on, but at night when you needed a place to sleep, it magically opened up into a wide spacious bed where you could put two or three children. On the other side stood my mother’s bed, with a high mountain of blankets and pillows that all but reached the ceiling. Besides, this, we would also use the classroom benches for a third bed.

Besides the dozen studentswho lived there from early in the morning until late in the evening, we still had with us five or six children of our own, big and small, including (forever, so it seemed) one more suckling child with a pale face, swinging in a small cradle which hung off the porch. The tumult and noise in the house was abolutely unbelievable. The jabbering of the students was mixed together with the squawkings of my mother’s own hungry children, who stared enviously at the food the "rich kids" brought from home: this one a bagel with butter, that one fresh-baked bread with a piece of pickled herring; another with a tasty roll that was enought to take your breath away. My father, sitting at the table with his students, did not fail to notice the whimpering from his own hungry children, and in those moments his heart was torn in little pieces. He would then unleash his bitterness on his students with their "thick heads" who couldn’t grasp the plain meaning of the Talmudic lesson "Tagrei Lod", and who failed to see the obvious difference between a "shtut mi-l’guf" and a "shtut mi-l’bar" (Ed. note: lessons and concepts from the Talmud). Mother, meanwhile, would be sitting by the warm oyven, her hands busy peeling a potato or knitting a sock, and her foot rocking the cradle. She was alarmed by my father’s rage, and feeling pity for the beleaguered children, would let loose from her corner a string of Gentile words which we didn’t understand but whose general drift was clear: it was a signal, a warning to the "Rabbi", that one dared not strike a child of the well-to-do, because his few rubles of tuition fees might be sorely missed come next Sabbath.

My mother had a wonderful gift of being able to put together a whole meal - a tasty soup, or a thick borsht, from practically nothing. In the same way she also took care to see that her children should God forbid not have to go naked. And she did it all in her quiet hours, the early mornings when in was pitch dark outside, and in the long winter nights, sitting by the weak glow of the small gas-lamp, stitching away with her needle, until her tired, weak eyes would fall shut, her tired head drop to her breast, and the needle slip quietly from her hand.