I set before you this day a blessing and a curse. Deuteronomy 11.26
Scripture very appropriately mentions a blessing first, but I shall first speak of a curse, or, more accurately, a set of curses.
One day I was riding a public bus in Jerusalem. The driver offended an old lady by ignoring the fact that she wished to alight, and he sped past her stop. I suppose this can be a serious matter when you are old, but it did not seem to justify the string of blood-curdling curses which she invoked on the head of the unfortunate driver. Only in the middle east, I imagine, do people have such unbelievable expertise in cursing. I was distressed by what I heard, but the driver exhibited admirable sang-froid. Without turning towards the old woman, he said simply: "May all your curses fall upon the heads of your grandchildren." "Touché" I thought to myself. "She worked so hard to curse him, and he repeated the curses, and in effect made them much worse, in one brief sentence."
Let us turn to the pleasanter topic of blessings. Some years ago, I spent several weeks in Gibraltar. This tiny city and garrison is endowed with four synagogues. I used to attend the newest of them – built around 1820. They had there a man maybe fifteen years younger than myself, who used to read the sacred scrolls beautifully every week. This is no little achievement. The scrolls contain only the consonantal text of the Hebrew, and the melody, vowels, and sentence divisions must be supplied from the memory of the reader. And he is given very little leeway for mistakes. Of course, he gets no pay. It is a privilege for him to be the channel through which the congregation hears the words of Scripture, which, when properly enunciated, seem to rejoice as they fly through the air like living things.
As I was on my way to the airport to catch a plane departing from Gibraltar, I happened to meet this reader. I told him how much I had enjoyed his beautiful renditions, and expressed the hope that he would continue to do so in good health hasta los cien [until you reach a hundred years of age]. He smiled and said: ¡Usted que lo vea! [may you see it!]