The Jew in the Brambles (based on the tale of the same name by the Brothers Grimm)

Content warnings: physical violence, anti-Semitism

Long ago, when my grandfather’s grandfather was a boy, in a shtetl in Lithuania there lived a merchant named Eliezer. He was a kind man and a hard worker, and if he was proud of the money he made and his ability to support his family, why should he not be? Plenty of people have liked the taste of money for worse reasons. 

One day, Eliezer was going to make a trip to sell his wares at the great market in the next town over. As he kissed his three daughters goodbye, he said to them, “My girls, with the help of God, I will make enough money to buy each of you a little treat at the market. Tell me, what would you like?” 

“Oh, Tata,” his daughters said, “we only want you to return to us safely.” 

“No, no, my girls,” Eliezer said. “Since your mother, may her memory be a blessing, left us, you are the joy of my life. Let me make myself happy by making you happy.” 

“All right,” his oldest daughter, Tova, said. “If you happen to find a farmer who is selling flower seeds as well as vegetable seeds, I would like some of those, to plant in our garden in spring.” 

“If you insist,” the second daughter, Freyde, said, “if you happen to find a farmer who is selling wool, I would like some, to make my sisters and me new shawls and you a new scarf for the winter.” 

“And what about you, my little Shayna?” Eliezer asked his youngest daughter. 

Shayna bit her lip. “It is foolish, I know,” she said, “but if you should happen upon anyone selling birds at the market, I would like a little songbird.” 

“If that is what you want, then that is what you shall have,” Eliezer said, “from my mouth to God’s ears.” He kissed each of his daughters again, and then he went on his way. 

Eliezer had great success at the market, and indeed managed to make a little more money than he needed. He found a farmer selling seeds and bought flower seeds for Tova, and he found another selling wool and bought some for Freyde. But though he looked everywhere, he could not find a songbird for Shayna anywhere. 

“Ah, well,” he said with a sigh. “We can’t have everything in this world. My Shayna is such a good girl, she will never let me know she is disappointed, but I will find a way to make it up to her next time I come to town.” He could not linger any longer now, for the sun was hanging low in the sky. He must hurry home if he wished to make it before dark. 

Whistling to himself, he made his way along the road through the woods. Suddenly, he heard someone else whistling along. He stopped where he stood, he looked in front of him and he looked behind him, but he could not see anyone else on the path, and still the whistling sound came from…above his head? He looked up, and in the tree directly above his head was a little bird, chirping the very tune he had been whistling. 

What a miraculous thing! How happy such a bird would make his Shayna! But how might he capture it? If he climbed into the tree after it, it would just fly away, and he was no hunter. 

As he stood there, pondering, along the road, headed for the town, came a young Gentile man. In one hand he carried a gun and in the other a violin. He seemed to be a merry soul, for he too was whistling a tune which the bird took up, so Eliezer decided to ask for his help. 

“Hello, my friend,” he said in his best Russian. “You seem like a clever enough fellow. I have been standing here trying to think how I might get that bird out of that tree, as a present for my youngest daughter. Do you have any advice for me?” 

The Gentile laughed and said, “If that’s all you want, I’ll bring that bird down in no time!” 

“Oh, thank you, thank you!” Eliezer said. 

The Gentile smiled and raised his gun. He shot it, and the bird stopped singing and tumbled out of the tree into the brambles below. 

“You hurt it!” Eliezer cried. “Why did you do that?” 

The Gentile did not answer. Still smiling, he said, “Go get that bird for yourself now, you dirty Jewish dog.” 

Eliezer knew now that he had been very wrong to trust this man, but he got down on his knees and crawled into the brambles, for he thought it might still be possible to save the bird. As soon as he saw it, though, he knew that it was dead. The Gentile had shot it right through the heart. 

“You killed it!” he cried, standing up. “Shame on you! You know that was not what I asked you for!” 

“How should I know that?” the Gentile replied. “Perhaps a dead bird would be just the sort of present a Jewish bitch would like.” And then, that horrible smile still on his face, he put down his gun and picked up his violin and began to play. And as he began to play, Eliezer began to dance. He did not want to, but he had lost all control of his legs. His body whirled around and around, scratched and scraped by the brambles. 

“What is with all this fiddling?” he cried as he danced. “Please stop!” 

The Gentile laughed his cruel laugh again. “You’ve skinned people to the bone plenty of times, you money-grubber. Now it’s my turn to skin you.” 

“No, please,” Eliezer begged as he continued to dance in and out of the thorns and they continued to tear at his flesh. “Please, have mercy. I have three young daughters at home. I am all they have in the world.” 

“Well,” the Gentile said, after a long, drawn-out chord that had Eliezer spinning like a dreidel, “if you’ll give me that whole sack of money, I’ll stop fiddling.” 

Oh, what a fool I have been! Eliezer thought. He had been so concerned for the bird that he had not stopped to think of anything else. The sack with all his hard-earned money, as well as the seeds for Tova and the wool for Freyde, was lying right at the Gentile’s feet. But what else could he do? If the Gentile killed him, he would have the sack anyway, and then his daughters would never know what had happened to him. So he agreed, and the Gentile took the sack and continued along the road toward the town. 

Eliezer crawled back out of the brambles and sat on the ground for a moment. He was covered in mud and blood, his clothes were torn, and he had lost all his day’s earnings and his gifts for his daughters. The only thing left to him was the poor dead bird. 

He dug a hole and buried it, and as he was doing so, he found himself growing angry. He had been too shocked to be angry before, but now he was. That beer-hall fiddler had tortured him and stolen from him and his daughters, and he thought he was going to get away with it? Not if his name was Eliezer. And so, instead of continuing on the road that would take him home to his daughters, Eliezer turned and followed the Gentile back toward town. 

He met the judge as he was leaving the courthouse for the day. He hurried up to him. “Please help me, Your Honor! A wicked man robbed me on the road. Look what he did to me! I have scrapes and scratches all over my body, and he took my paltry assets, which I was taking home to my daughters. In the name of all that is good, throw the rascal into jail.” As he spoke, he saw the fiddler appear around a corner. “Look,” he exclaimed. “There he is!” 

“Come here,” the judge called to the fiddler, who did so at once. “Tell me, did you beat and rob this man?” 

The fiddler smiled at the judge, as though they were old friends sharing an inside joke. “I didn’t touch the Jew,” he said, “and I didn’t take his money. He gave it to me of his own free will so that I would stop my fiddling, which he just couldn’t stand.” 

“You’re lying through your teeth!” Eliezer shouted. “You played your violin and forced me to dance in the middle of a patch of brambles. You said you would kill me.” 

The fiddler burst out laughing. The judge looked from one to the other. 

“From a logical perspective,” he said to Eliezer at last, “you must admit, your tale is significantly more fantastical than his. You truly expect me to believe that he could force you to dance by playing his violin?” 

“It is the truth, Your Honor,” Eliezer said. 

The judge looked from one to the other again, then shrugged. “Even if it is,” he said, “more than likely you stole the money in the first place. I know all the tricks you dirty Jews play. Now get out of my sight, unless you wish to be beaten again, and shown less mercy this time.” 

Eliezer had no choice but to give up. Angry tears in his eyes, he returned to the road and began making his slow, painful way back toward home. 

It was long past dark by the time Eliezer made it to his doorstep. When he stumbled in the door, all three of his daughters were at his side at once. 

“Tata, where were you?” Tova exclaimed. 

“We were so worried!” Freyde said. 

“Tata, you’re bleeding!” Shayna cried. 

While his daughters cleaned and bound his wounds, Eliezer told them the sad tale of what had happened to him. “I am so sorry, my girls,” he said. “I had such high hopes for today, and I lost your gifts, and all the day’s earnings as well.” 

“Tata, don’t worry,” Tova said, pressing a kiss to his forehead. 

“We’ll earn back all we lost,” Freyde said, hugging him, gently, so as not to make his wounds ache. 

“And even if we don’t, it’s all right,” Shayna said, resting her head against his knee. “Remember, Tata, we told you, all we want is for you always to return to us safely.” 

“Oh, my girls,” Eliezer said, reaching out his arms in spite of the pain to hold all three of them. “I may have lost a little money today, but as long as I have you, I will always be the richest man in the world.”