Book Club Discussion
The Hasidic Rebbe’s Son
Boca Raton writer Becks Ruchinsky is stunned when her son, Gabe, asks her to hide an ultra-Orthodox friend he’s brought home from college. Menny Tannenbaum fled his Hasidic community in Crown Heights, NY and fears that a stranger seeking him on campus plans to kidnap him. Becks is grateful that Gabe, whose Asperger’s Syndrome prevents his making friends, has a companion and agrees to shelter the boy. Six days later, his body is found floating in a canal.
Police rule the drowning an accident but Becks isn’t buying. Menny seemed too frightened by the sudden appearance of the stranger at his dorm. Despite the objections of her husband Daniel, who’s returned home after a trial separation, she resolves to persuade police to investigate.
A journalist who abandoned her career to focus on her son’s special needs, Becks identifies South Beach nightclub proprietor Sid Fox as the owner of a BMW seen leaving a kosher market with Menachem the night he disappeared. She learns Fox employs Hasidic young men to transport illegal drugs. Becks also suspects the nightclub owner was involved in an educational funding scam at a yeshiva where Menachem tutored. While visiting the small village where the yeshiva is located, Becks learns Shimon Haziz, the rabbi of a South Beach synagogue Fox attends, was expelled from the village.
After returning to Florida, Becks’ car is run off the road and she receives threatening phone calls but continues to investigate. Events come to a head when Gabe’s dorm advisor reports the boy missing. Drawing on hints left by Gabe during a brief, frenetic phone call, Becks and Tootsie track him to an abandoned mikveh, or ritual bath, where he’s being held at gunpoint by Rabbi Haziz. Becks, who understands Hebrew, overhears Hazis’ phone call to Fox and realizes the rabbi killed Menachem and kidnapped Gabe to prevent the boys from disclosing he sexually molested children at the yeshiva in New York.
After an altercation at the mikveh that nearly costs Gabe’s life, the rabbi makes a getaway. Following a car chase across South Beach, Becks shoots the rabbi and calls in the police.
The story closes with Becks and Gabe visiting Menny’s parents for Hanukkah. Becks husband is livid about the dangers to which she exposes herself and Gabe and refuses to join them. As she leaves the Hasidic community, Becks realizes her need for independence and refusal to live the settled life her husband prefers may mean the end of their troubled marriage.
1. Does it seem unreasonable for Becks to resent her husband for giving up her career to become Gabe’s primary caretaker? Do you view Daniel’s affair as rubbing salt into a wound?
2. Is Daniel overstepping a boundary by insisting Becks refrain from investigating Menny’s death? How would your partner react if you took on a risky investigation?
3. Have you been following reports of pedophilia in isolated Hasidic towns? Why do you think it’s so under-reported?
4. Are you familiar with the concept of Mesira—the Talmudic prohibition against a Jew informing on another Jew to non-Jewish authorities? Why do you suppose Jews historically insisted on handling problems internally? Is it appropriate today?
5. How do you feel when a member of the religious or ethnic group to which you belong is found to be corrupt? (Madoff, for example)
6. Hasidic television shows, documentaries and movies have become popular lately? What do you think sparked interest in this community?
7. How is Menachem different from most fictional Hasidic (or other orthodox) characters that left their communities?
8. Can you picture yourself living in a Hasidic community and following all the rules and regulations that govern life?
9. Why do you think so many people are happy in that environment?
10. What do you think of Rabbi Tanenbaum’s threat to sit shiva for Menachem?