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David Horovitz: In a Land Too Near Chelm

Jerusalem Report Editorial Assistant Yael Kliers has just published a slim volume of stories from Chelm, retelling the familiar tales of self-defeating silliness from the mythical Jewish town whose elders contrived ever more absurd schemes for rendering straightforward tasks impossible.

As I read the collection, "The Wise Men of Chelm" (Sefer Ve Sefel Publishing, Jerusalem), with its accounts of the Chelmers� unexpectedly successful wall-building to keep out the cold, their subtle plan to keep thieves from their charity box, and most especially, the final tragedy of their bid to rid themselves of an insatiable cat, it brought to mind the unhappily similar escapades of another people -- energetic and creative, yet constantly trusting its infinitely more foolish elders to act intelligently on its behalf.

One such escapade concerns the time when, surrounded by enemies, this people began to build a protective fence around their land. So far, so sensible. But then, they remembered those of their fellows who had been sent over the years to live in the neighboring lands. What would become of them? As ever, they consulted with the wise men, who conceived a brilliant solution: The route of the fence would be altered, even at great cost to their meager resources, to encompass not only their own land but many of those neighboring towns and villages as well. Building proceeded apace. A great barrier swiftly rose -- a towering obstacle that surely no enemy, however fiendish, could breach.

But alas, when it was done, and their money was all spent, they found that their fence ranged so far and wide, many of their enemies were now within it, rather than without, and the threat had not receded. Never mind, the elders counseled their dismayed subordinates, who were immediately heartened, the Lord will guard us.

Yet enemy attacks were so frequent that the wise men, consulted again by the now rather fearful people, convened again to seek a remedy. And this time they emerged with a truly wonderful plan. It could not fail. Emissaries would be despatched to meet with the powerful rulers of foreign countries, to explain their plight and seek assistance. With great fanfare, and at great expense, some of the wisest men set out on the arduous journey.

But alas, when the moment came to state their case, they found that they could not do so. They could not describe the woes that were befalling their people for they had neglected to learn the languages of these remote capitals. Others, back home, had mastered such complex tongues, but the elders, in their wisdom, had left them behind.

Alas, too, the delegations in those distant cities came upon emissaries from the lands of their enemies, who were fluent in these strange dialects, and who were now mischievously filling the heads of foreign leaders with falsehoods, mendaciously suggesting that it was their people who were being attacked, rather than the other way around.

Troubled and afraid, the grand delegations headed home. Rather than plunge the people still deeper into despair by relating what had occurred, however, the emissaries wisely chose to pretend that all had gone well, and that support would soon be forthcoming. After all, they consoled themselves, the Lord would surely come to their aid.

Then there was the year when, at harvest time, the elders came to the farmers with a tremendous idea: Across the oceans, they had heard, were robust laborers who would bring in the crops so quickly, and sought so little by way of payment, that the public coffers would be swollen to new heights. And so boats were dispatched, and hundreds of thousands of these distant yeomen gathered. And indeed, at first, everything went well.

But as the harvesting gathered pace, the wise men saw that many of their own people, who in years past had earned money to feed their families by picking the crops, had no work this year, and their wives and children were going hungry. And so the wise men took the gold that had accumulated in the public coffers from the harvest to buy bread and milk for these unfortunates. And when the harvest was over, they had to spend more of their funds for the boats to return those of the workers who could be found to their remote lands, and yet more money to seek out those who did not wish to go back, because this land was, after all, so pleasant a place to live.

And thus, in the end, not only was all the extra money yielded from the harvest used up, but the entire treasury was empty. Have faith, the elders counseled their now penniless townsfolk, cheering them immediately, the Lord will provide.

There are many more of these little tales, warming in their consistently sweet-natured naivety: The year when, money as ever in short supply, the wise men gave the last remaining coins to the very richest of their people, trusting that the rich would spend it on the poor. Of course, the rich did no such thing -- they just got richer, while the poor were plunged still deeper into penury. Or the terrible year when life became so difficult that the local chroniclers felt certain many people must surely be fleeing for easier climes, and wrote dramatic texts exaggerating this exodus, thereby creating still more unrest and more departures.

It had been the case that, however dark the hour, and however absurd their ideas, the wise men had always managed to regain the trust of their people. But, with time, even these most hardy of people became gloomy, and lost confidence in their elders. Some even began to wonder whether their very nation was outnumbered and doomed, and, foolishly, whether it might not be better to dismantle it altogether, and merge with the neighbors -- neighbors who had been such bitter enemies for so long. They would no longer have a land to call their own but, they declared optimistically, they would live in a larger country, might prosper, could possibly put all those neighborhood disputes to an end. And in any case, they tried to reassure themselves, the Lord was watching lovingly over them.