The Hole In A Beigel

: TASHRAK

When I was a little Cheder-boy, my Rebbe, Bunem-Breine-Gite's, a learned

man, who was always tormenting me with Talmudical questions and with

riddles, once asked me, "What becomes of the hole in a Beigel, when one

has eaten the Beigel?"



This riddle, which seemed to me then very hard to solve, stuck in my

head, and I puzzled over it day and night. I often bought a Beigel, took

a bite out of it, and immedia
ely replaced the bitten-out piece with my

hand, so that the hole should not escape. But when I had eaten up the

Beigel, the hole had somehow always disappeared, which used to annoy me

very much. I went about preoccupied, thought it over at prayers and at

lessons, till the Rebbe noticed that something was wrong with me.



At home, too, they remarked that I had lost my appetite, that I ate

nothing but Beigel--Beigel for breakfast, Beigel for dinner, Beigel for

supper, Beigel all day long. They also observed that I ate it to the

accompaniment of strange gestures and contortions of both my mouth and

my hands.



One day I summoned all my courage, and asked the Rebbe, in the middle of

a lesson on the Pentateuch:



"Rebbe, when one has eaten a Beigel, what becomes of the hole?"



"Why, you little silly," answered the Rebbe, "what is a hole in a

Beigel? Just nothing at all! A bit of emptiness! It's nothing with the

Beigel and nothing without the Beigel!"



Many years have passed since then, and I have not yet been able to

satisfy myself as to what is the object of a hole in a Beigel. I have

considered whether one could not have Beigels without holes. One lives

and learns. And America has taught me this: One can have Beigels

without holes, for I saw them in a dairy-shop in East Broadway. I at

once recited the appropriate blessing, and then I asked the shopman

about these Beigels, and heard a most interesting history, which shows

how difficult it is to get people to accept anything new, and what

sacrifices it costs to introduce the smallest reform.



This is the story:



A baker in an Illinois city took it into his head to make straight

Beigels, in the shape of candles. But this reform cost him dear, because

the united owners of the bakeries in that city immediately made a set at

him and boycotted him.



They argued: "Our fathers' fathers baked Beigels with holes, the whole

world eats Beigels with holes, and here comes a bold coxcomb of a

fellow, upsets the order of the universe, and bakes Beigels without

holes! Have you ever heard of such impertinence? It's just revolution!

And if a person like this is allowed to go on, he will make an end of

everything: to-day it's Beigels without holes, to-morrow it will be

holes without Beigels! Such a thing has never been known before!"



And because of the hole in a Beigel, a storm broke out in that city that

grew presently into a civil war. The "bosses" fought on, and dragged the

bakers'-hands Union after them into the conflict. Now the Union

contained two parties, of which one declared that a hole and a Beigel

constituted together a private affair, like religion, and that everyone

had a right to bake Beigels as he thought best, and according to his

conscience. The other party maintained, that to sell Beigels without

holes was against the constitution, to which the first party replied

that the constitution should be altered, as being too ancient, and

contrary to the spirit of the times. At this the second party raised a

clamor, crying that the rules could not be altered, because they were

Toras-Lokshen and every letter, every stroke, every dot was a law in

itself! The city papers were obliged to publish daily accounts of the

meetings that were held to discuss the hole in a Beigel, and the papers

also took sides, and wrote fiery polemical articles on the subject. The

quarrel spread through the city, until all the inhabitants were divided

into two parties, the Beigel-with-a-hole party and the

Beigel-without-a-hole party. Children rose against their parents, wives

against their husbands, engaged couples severed their ties, families

were broken up, and still the battle raged--and all on account of the

hole in a Beigel!



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