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SAM RUBINSTEIN

 

My Stories:

 

THE CHEDER

 

There stood Mr. Marcus, looming over me authoritatively. "Show me where we're reading." I indicated - And God said to Abraham - "You are my chosen people." "Gutta yingele, you are paying attention."

That merited a pat on the head. However, if my eyes began searching, roaming over the entire page the words of doom descended. "Point to it. Show me with your finger exactly where we're at."

Hesitantly my fingers followed my eyes and that's when catastrophe struck. Down came the ruler across my knuckles. "You're not paying attention." That was seventy seven years ago.

At the age of seven I was sitting on a well worn bench that bore the reminders of generations of youthful Jewish scholars who had sat there before I did. I was in a class at the neighborhood Cheder (Jewish religious school).

Getting rapped across the knuckles was not a reportable incident when you came home. Child abuse had not reached the sophisticated status it has today. The prevailing philosophy was simple: if the teacher punished you, you deserved it.

Usually that admonishment was followed by a stern lecture, occasionally by some stronger measures. So when my father asked me, "What did you learn today?" "I learned that we are the chosen people." I did not amplify any further precisely the reason why I was chosen on that day.

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