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 By Al Rosenberg
My grandfather drove a taxi in New York City for40 years and my grandmother was a secretary.Sorry, I was telling about our ancestor. What wasa day like for him? Naked he shakes his clothes forfear of spiders, scorpions and snakes. Shoring up hissandals, his fingers tying a series of small knots in theleather fringe, two sides holding the front closedkeeping the thickest part on the bottom for protectionamid rubble on the flinty paths and walks around TheHoly City, here shard of clay more course thanfarmland. Farms and the royal city both smell of fireand dung.A small man, our ancestor, he is always hungry,wearing a form fitting loincloth and a short shirt. Hisshirt only protected him from the sun above, theground too is hot and treacherous. A man’s stationwas told by the length of his shirt until it dragged onthe ground and was covered by a robe. Our familywas almost naked. The Jews having been lead toEgypt, the land of the pyramids, by their own peoplethey served beneath the lowest in Pharaoh’s city. AJew can not own Egyptian land. In Egypt one of themain jobs for Jews was removing dung from streets.If he found a buyer, perhaps an overseer’s plump wifewho wanted it carried home for her, that could mean afew coins to spend for more food, beer and wine. Mostoften dung remained on the roadside where he placedit until common Egyptian women took it for cooking
 
fires.Our ancestor, a young Jew, rises with the sun tothe sound of the priests’ who constantly chant theunending attributes of Pharaoh; a clear voice risesabove the others and begins the Egyptian call toprayer. Our ancient ancestor is a young man and feelsfit descending the hillside path, called by oneseductive voice and then another he would visit with afew girls before getting to edge of the market to standon line for work and a morning meal.In the Jewish hillside settlement there are littlekikes everywhere, it is never quiet, a baby is alwayscrying. Many of the children are weak and sickly andhalf of them likely to die before age five when theycan enter school.Everywhere the police kept a watch, they are theeyes of Pharaoh, regardless of a Jew’s age or healthhe’d use his club which was carved like a snake with arock in its wide mouth. And if his blow left that rock inyour head, that was surely fatal.Our ancestor grew up healthy but he watchedmany playmates, friends and more than one littlebrother die. After so much death his thoughts becameheavy. He closed his eyes and prayed to the unseenGod so that he might continue living and to ease thepassage of Jews who died. At age twelve he wasfinished with Hebrew school and ready to work.As a child he pushed lumps of dung with a stiff palm frond, rolled into a ball he takes a pot shard andgouges eyes and a mouth into the manure ball andcompletes the image with his fingers. A templepoliceman points him out to the overseer who lazilyextends his whip with one arm, its mere touch knockshim off balance, it reddens and swells like a spider‘ssting. As a Jew serving Pharaoh, his identity was hisconstant humiliation. Now they tell us we can’t leave.Under this Ramses, a number two Pharaoh, Jews were
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