Содержание → Chapter 7 → Часть 9
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Часть 9
I Saw Danny nod his head. www.o-collecting.ru
'Nu, what is it? '
'It is written in the name of Rabbi Yaakov, not Rabbi Meir;' Danny said quietly, in Yiddish. '
A whisper of approval came from the crowd. I glanced around quickly. Everyone sat staring at Danny.
Reb Saunders almost smiled. He nodded, and the long black beard went back and forth against his chest. Then I saw the thick black eyebrows arch upward and the lids go about halfway down across the eyes. He leaned forward slightly, his arms still folded across his chest.
'And nothing more? ' he asked very quietly.
Danny shook his head – a little hesitantly, I thought.
'So Reb Saunders said, sitting back in the leather chair, 'there is nothing more. '
I looked at the two of them, wondering what was happening.
What was this about Rabbi Yaakov and Rabbi Melr?
'The words were said by Rabbi Yaakov, not by Rabbi Melr, ' Danny repeated. 'Rabbi Yaakov, not Rabbi Melr, said, "He who is walking by the way and studying, and breaks off his study and-'"
'Good, ' Reb Saunders brokein quietly. 'The words were said by Ray Yaakov. Good. You saw it. Very good. And where is it found? '
'In Pil'ltei Avos, ' Danny said. He was giving the Talmudic source for the quote. Many of the quotes Reb Saunders had used had been from Pirkei Avos – or Avot, as my father had taught me to pronounce it, with the Sephardic rather than the Ashkenazic rendering of the Hebrew letter 'tof'. I had recognized the quotes easily. Pirkei Avot is a collection of Rabbinic maxims, and a chapter of it is studied by many Jews every Shabbat between Passover and the Jewish New Year.
'Nu, ' Reb Saunders said, smiling, 'how should you not know that? Of course. Good. Very good. Now, tell me-'
As I sat there listening to what then took place between Danny and his father, I slowly realized what I was witnessing. In many Jewish homes, especially homes where there are yeshiva students and where the father is learned, there is a tradition which takes place on Shabbat afternoon: the father quizzes the son on what he has learned in school during the past week. I was witnessing a kind of public quiz, but a strange, almost bizarre quiz, more a contest than a quiz, because Reb Saunders was not confining his questions only to what Danny had learned during the week but was ranging over most of the major tractates of the Talmud and Danny was obviously required to provide the answers. Reb Saunders asked where else there was a statement about one who interrupts his studies, and Danny coolly, quietly answered. He asked what a certain medieval commentator had remarked about that statement, and Danny answered. He chose a minute aspect of the answer and asked who had dealt with it in an altogether different way, and Danny answered. He asked whether Danny agreed with this interpretation, and Danny said he did not, he agreed with another medieval commentator, who had given another interpretation. His father asked how could the commentator have offered such an interpretation when in another passage in the Talmud he had said exactly the opposite, and Danny, very quietly, calmly, his fingers still playing with the rim of the paper plate, found a difference between the contradictory statements by quoting two other sources where one of the· statements appeared in a somewhat different context, thereby nullifying the contradiction. One of the two sources Danny had quoted contained a Biblical verse, and his father asked him who else had based a law upon this verse. Danny repeated a short passage from the tractate Sanhedrin, and then his father quoted another passage from Yoma which contradicted the passage in Sanhedrin, and Danny answered with a passage from Gittin which dissolved the contradiction. His father questioned the validity of his interpretation of the passage in Gitthi by citing a commentary on the passage that disagreed with his interpretation, and Danny said it was difficult to understand this commentary – he did not say the commentary was wrong, he said it was difficult to understand it – because a parallel passage in Nedarim clearly confirmed his own interpretation.
This went on and on, until I lost track of the thread that held it all together and sat and listened in amazement to the feat of memory I was witnessing. Both Danny and his father spoke quietly, his father nodding his approval each time. Danny responded. Danny's brother sat staring at them with his mouth open, finally lost interest, and began to eat some of the food that was still on his plate. Once he started picking his nose, but stopped immediately. The men around the tables were _ watching as if in ecstasy, their faces glowing with pride. This was almost like the pilpul my father had told me about, except that it wasn't really pilpul, they weren't twisting the texts out of shape; they seemed more interested in b'kiut, in straightforward knowledge and simple explanations of the Talmudic passages and – commentaries they were discussing. It went on like that for a loog time. Then Reb Saunders sat back and was silent.
The contest, or quiz had apparently ended, and Reb Saunders was smiling at his son. He said, very quietly, 'Good. Very good. There is no contradiction. But tell me, you have nothing more to say about what I said earlier? '
Danny was suddenly sitting very straight.
'Nothing more? ' Reb Saunders asked again. 'You have nothing more to say? '
Danny shook his head, hesitantly.
'Absolutely nothing more to say? ' Reb Saunders insisted, his voice flat, cold, distant. He was no longer smiling.
I saw Danny's body go rigid again, as it had done before his father began to speak, The ease and certainty he had won during the Talmud quiz had disappeared.