The Tefillin and the Etrog: A Hasidic Parable by MC Complete

(This story is based on a story of Rebbe Nachum of Chernobyl.  See “The First Year of Marriage” by Rabbi Abraham J Twersky, MD, in the chapter on “Anger”.)

Once upon a time, there was a Hasid who was very poor.  He lived in a small, two bedroom apartment with his wife and five children (they only had five because they couldn’t afford any more).  They never had meat and fish except for Shabbos, when the Hasid’s wife bought a pack of chicken necks, which she split between the soup and the cholent.  The Hasid worked 10 hours a day 6 days a week and he had many debts.

The Hasid did have one treasure.  From his father, he had inherited the tefillin of the Kotzker.  He laned the Kotzker’s tefillin for Shacharit every morning, and he could almost feel the holiness of the Kotzker himself.  Rich men often approached the Hasid with large monetary offers for the tefillin, but he refused to part with them.

One Tishrei, the Hasid was shopping for Arba Minim.  This time of year was always very depressing for him.  He couldn’t avoid seeing many beautiful etrogim, but he could never afford any but the simplest etrog.  As he walked through the shuk, expensive etrogim winked at the Hasid, sang to him, bombarded him with gravitons of desire.  “Buy me,” they said.  “You know you want to.”

“I can’t,” the Hasid replied.  “I don’t have any money.”

Finally, he found an etrog that he could afford.  With a heavy heart, he reached into his pocket for change, when he suddenly heard an etrog voice: “How can you appear before the King of Kings with such a shoddy etrog?  Why, it’s barely kosher!”

The Hasid turned around, and saw, in the adjacent shot, the most beautiful etrog he had ever seen.  In fact, he couldn’t believe his eyes.  It was an etrog beyond his wildest dreams.  At once he decided: “This etrog is for me.  I will bench with it this Sukkot.”

“How much do you want for this etrog?” the Hasid asked.

“If you have to ask, you can’t afford it,” the merchant said.

“Yes I can,” the Hasid said.  “In this talis bag, I have the tefillin of the Kotzker.”

“The Kotzker?” asked the merchant.  “Let me see.”

The merchant looked at the tefillin and frowned.  “I am selling this etrog for $100,000,” he said.  “The Kotzker’s tefillin will fetch, at most, $90,000.  Do you have any other tefillin?  The Baal Shem Tov’s, perhaps?”

“No,” said the Hasid.  “Just the Kotzker’s.”

“Very well,” said the merchant.  “I like you and I will give you a discount.  Give me the tefillin and you may have the etrog.”

The merchant brought in his lawyers, drew up a contract, took the tefillin, and gave the Hasid the etrog (along with the deed to the etrog).

The Hasid was ecstatic.  He was drunk with happiness.  He sang and danced all the way home.  He opened the door and met his wife.

“My dear wife!” he exclaimed.  “You won’t believe it!  Wait until you see our beautiful etrog!”

His wife frowned.  “Please tell me you didn’t sell the Kotzker’s tefillin to buy an overpriced etrog,” she said.

“But my dear wife,” the Hasid said, “that’s exactly what I did.”

“For all these years, we’ve been struggling and hungry.  You work 10 hours a day and you’re up to your ears in debt.  We never have fish or meat.  We never have money for clothes or furniture.  To support your family, you never even considered selling the tefillin.  I was supposed to wallow in the mud while you laned your tefillin.  You are selfish and foolish.  Give me that etrog right now.“

“Give you the etrog?” the Hasid asked.  “Why?”

“It’s secondhand now.  You probably just lost us 10%.  But I’m sure I can find someone to take it off our hands for a good percentage of what you paid.”

“Sell it?” the Hasid said.  “I’m not selling my etrog for anything.”

“Give me that etrog,” the Hasid’s wife said, “or get out of my house.”

Devastated, the Hasid left, etrog in hand.  He went straight to the house of the Rebbe.  He knocked on the door.  There was no answer.  So he went to the bais medrash.  “Where is the Rebbe?” the Hasid asked.

“He’s at home,” the Rebbe’s lieutenant said.

So the Hasid went back to the Rebbe’s house and knocked again.  There was no answer, so he knocked again.  Finally the Rebbe came out.  He gave the Hasid “the Rebbe look” (as if his eyes were laser beams tearing the Hasid into pieces) and then he said, “Please wait here for one minute.”

The Hasid waited for a minute, and then the Rebbe returned.  “Sorry about that,” the Rebbe said.  “I was having tea with the Rebbetzin.”

The Rebbe led the Hasid into his home and they both sat down at the table.  The Hasid told the Rebbe what happened.

“Nu?” the Rebbe said.  “Let’s see the etrog.”  The Hasid took the etrog out of its box and showed it to the Rebbe.  “Wow,” the Rebbe said.  “That is the most beautiful etrog I have ever seen in my whole entire life.”

“You see?” the Hasid said.  “And she wants me to sell it!”

“When Rebbe Elazar ben Azaria was appointed president of the Sanhedrin, what is the first thing he did?” the Rebbe asked.  “He consulted his wife.  $100,000 is a lot of money, especially for a poor man like you.  Why didn’t you consult your wife before making such a purchase?”

“I was afraid that if I took the time to go home, someone else would have taken my etrog,” the Hasid said.

“Nu?” the Rebbe said.  “And so what?  So someone else would have benched with this etrog on Sukkot.  Is that such a bad thing?  Did you ever ask your wife what she thought about the offers to buy the tefillin?”

“No,” the Hasid said.

“Why not?” the Rebbe said.

“Because I didn’t want to sell the tefillin,” the Hasid said.  “I wouldn’t have listened to her anyway, so what would be the point of consulting her?”

“Don’t you think she should have a say in the finances of her own household?” the Rebbe asked.

“Yes, I suppose so,” the Hasid said.

“What you did is a terrible, terrible thing,” the Rebbe said.  “You betrayed your wife’s trust.”

“So what should I do?” asked the Hasid.

“Obviously, you should give her the etrog, so she can sell it,” the Rebbe said.  “But you must do more than that.  You must apologize for what you did.  And to show that you mean it, you must bring her flowers.”

“Can I bring the flowers tomorrow?” the Hasid asked.

“No,” said the Rebbe.  “You must have the flowers in hand when you get home.”

“But Rebbe,” the Hasid said, “it’s 8PM.  All the flower shops are closed by now.”

“You’re right,” said the Rebbe.  “I hadn’t thought of that.  Wait here for a minute.”  The Hasid waited for a minute and then the Rebbe came back with a bouquet of fresh red roses.  “I told the Rebbetzin the story, and she agreed to donate these roses to the cause,” he said.  “I’ll replace them tomorrow.  Just don’t tell your wife where you got them.”

So the Hasid returned home and gave his wife the etrog and the flowers.  “I’m sorry I traded the Kotzker’s tefillin without consulting you,” the Hasid said.

“You just lost us a lot of money,” the Hasid’s wife said.

“I know,” the Hasid said.  “I will try to always consult with you in the future.”

The Hasid’s wife smiled.  “It’s OK, my dear husband,” she said.  “What’s a few thousand dollars anyway?  The important thing is that we have shalom bayis.”

Give Statistics a Chance: A Platonic Dialogue by MC Complete

Steven Pinker’s “Our Better Angels: Why Violence has Declined” is a must read.  Or, in other words, you must read it.

It is a brilliant work of history and psychology: the history of violence and the psychology of violence.  

And then there’s the evidence.  So, so much evidence.  It’s like somebody finally turned on the lights in a dark room.

Since “Better Angels” is such a required book, I have invited Steven Pinker -- that is, a fictional representation of Steven Pinker -- to my blog for a Platonic Dialogue.

Daniel: You know, Steven, when I mention your book to people, they’re always incredulous.

Steven: Well, of course they are.  I’ve revealed History’s Best Kept Secret.

Daniel: Yes, but it’s not just that.  People are incredulous for a very specific reason.

Steven: You mean Hitler?

Daniel: Exactly.  Hitler, Stalin, and Mao.  The two World Wars and the Fascist/Communist genocides.

Steven: So tell them to read my book, which will stun them with the inescapable conclusion that violence has declined despite the best efforts of Hitler and Stalin.

Daniel: But I read your book.  You throw a lot of logic, math and data at the Hitler argument, and it’s all very brilliant, but when it’s all said and done, I can’t say what the bottom line is.  I feel like you’ve pulled a fast one.

Steven: Hitler, Hitler.  Why are people so obsessed with Hitler?  Why can’t they focus on Kruschev and Gorbachev?  Look, things may have been bad in the first half of the 20th century, but since World War 2, things have been unprecedentedly peaceful.  Some people aren’t aware of this, but my book proves that it is so.

Daniel: You mean the Pax Americana?

Steven: Please don’t use that term!  It’s called “The Long Peace”.  During most of it, there were two superpowers, one of which was an “Evil Empire”.

Daniel: But maybe that was just a run of good luck.

Steven: Really?  What about the World Wars and the Holocaust?  Maybe they were just bad luck?

Daniel: Maybe.  We can’t really say, can we?

Steven: All I am saying is “Give Statistics a Chance”.  If you analyze the 20th century statistically relative to historical trends, you can show that the World Wars are statistically insignificant, whereas The Long Peace is statistically significant.  In other words, the World Wars seem to be a run of bad luck, but The Long Peace is *not* just good luck -- it’s a game changer.

Daniel: I guess so.

Steven: Anyway, why are people so obsessed with war?  My book is about so much more than that.  Human violence is about so much more than that.  Just to give one example, murder rates are about 1/30 of what they were Medieval Europe, due to a (more or less) consistent decline over the centuries.  And murders have always killed more people than wars, even the World Wars.

Daniel: Yes, you’re absolutely right.  Your book would be just as impressive if we just skipped Chapters 5 and 6 (“The Long Peace” and “The New Peace”).  In fact, maybe even more impressive.

Steven: Don’t skip them!  They’re very important!

Daniel: You know what other chapter we could skip?

Steven: Don’t skip any chapter!  That’s cherrypicking!

Daniel: Chapter 1, where you bash the Torah.

Steven: Oh, you were offended by that, were you?

Daniel: Well, to be perfectly honest, I actually wasn’t offended.  But most of my friends, who happen to be Jewish Fundamentalists, would be very offended.  There’s no way they’ll keep reading after Chapter 1.

Steven: Well, I’m sorry, but as a pacifist, the Torah just makes me mad.  It makes my blood boil.

Daniel: Look, I understand, but Chapter 1 is really not necessary.  You could remove it from the book and barely notice its absence.  All that is accomplished by Chapter 1 is writing off a section of your potential audience.  It may not be a large section of your audience, but it’s a section of your audience that means a lot to me...