The Short Vort
Good Morning!
Today is Tuesday the 25th of Menachem-Av 5781 and August 3, 2021
Returning the Lost Object
Yesterday my son Meir and I were walking down a pleasant street in Yerushalayim. We walked past a bus stop and noticed a woman with a child in tow.
The woman asked my son if he could read English.
When he replied in the affirmative, she said, pointing to a small suitcase at the bus stop, “Someone must have left their bag at the bus stop. There is a name tag. However, it’s in English, and I can’t read it.”
I immediately asked, “Do you mean to say you found this here when you arrived?” She nodded.
I said, “It’s a cheifetz chashud- ( a suspicious object) perhaps there is a concealed bomb in it? Let’s call the police!”
The woman waved me off and said, “Don’t worry, I already checked it out, there’s no bomb in there.”
She did not look like a police sapper to me, so I asked, “How do you know there is no bomb in there?”
She calmly answered, “Oh, I opened up the bag and checked it out. There is no bomb in there.”
I looked at her, somewhat stunned. However, she continued to ask my son to read the English writing.
We were able to make out the name of the family and that they lived in Beitar.
However, we had a difficult time reading the name of the street.
Was the name “HaBanim”? Or was it “HaGanim” or was it “HaNeviim”? Or perhaps it was “HaBonim”?
The woman was not to be deterred, and before we knew it, she was calling “information” asking about the Freedman (name changed) family in Beitar who either live on HaBanim, HaGanim, HaNeviim, or HaBonim street,
Suddenly, her bus arrived, and grabbing her child and the suitcase, she made her way to the bus.
I called out after her, “Why are you taking the suitcase? This bus does not go to Beitar?”
She turned to me and said, “I should give up on the Mitzvah of Hoshovas Aveida (returning a lost object)? My sister lives in Beitar, I’ll give it to her, and she will find out who it belongs to. I am not going to let this Mitzvah of Hoshovas Aveida slip through my hands!”
And with that, she boarded the bus to Kiryat Sefer, and as the bus sped off, I turned to my son and said, “Mi K’Amcha Yisroel?” (Who is like the Jewish people?)
“If Not Now, Then When?”- Hillel
Ron Yitzchonk Eisenman
Rabbi, Congregation Ahavas Israel
Passaic, NJ
