Summary
Summary of Yiddish Tales
Yiddish Tales at a glance
Summary: 8 min to read
- Reading time
- About 9 h 15 min7 h 20 min fast, 11 h slow
- Length
- 131,500 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
- First published
- 1912by Various; Helena Frank (translator)
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
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Key ideas
Key idea 1
A rabbi sets out against wealth
Reb Nochumtzi has never gone four ells beyond his town, but he believes he can cure the world of wealth. Earning five Polish gulden a week himself, he plans to spread the misfortune of the rich among the poor. His hungry congregation gathers money, and he sets off for Wilna in a peasant's cart.
This opening brings together the collection's warmth and sharp humor: people living with very little try to make sense of their lives through belief, imagination and practical hopes.
Key idea 2
A homeland should sustain the living
A narrator who once tried to sell the world to come now decides to buy earth from Palestine.
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Key idea 3
Hunger enters the room of prayer
In A Woman's Anger, a wife knits and rocks a cradle while her husband studies the Talmud.
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Key idea 4
A name can hold a faith
Six-year-old Yüdel follows the expelled Schpol Grandfather into the wood and sees him singing beneath a green tree.
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Key idea 5
Weddings reveal dignity and belonging
Reb Yitzchok-Aizik invites the poor to his daughter's wedding, but the wagons return without them.
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Key idea 6
Conscience asks more than ritual
On Yom Kippur, Berel Tzop tries to pray, but thoughts of trade crowd his mind.
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Key idea 7
Shared danger unsettles inherited hatred
Maxim Klopatzel and Israel Friedman, called Struli, inherit hostility from their fathers.
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Key idea 8
Learning opens arguments within faith
Children and scholars keep asking questions that custom cannot easily settle.
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Key idea 9
Ordinary lives carry questions of belonging
From the study table to the marketplace, and from the shtetl to Mukden and Manhattan, these tales follow people trying to keep what matters.
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Who it’s for
Readers who enjoy short stories rich in humor, warmth and keen observation will love this collection, especially tales of village rabbis, mothers, children and life in small towns.
What this book is
Picture a rabbi who has never gone four ells beyond his town, and who decides to cure the world of wealth. Reb Nochumtzi, the Rav of Pumpian, earns five Polish gulden a week, yet he plans to divide the misfortune of the rich among the poor. His hungry congregation collects a few rubles, and he sets off for Wilna in a peasant's cart.
That is the first tale in Yiddish Tales, a collection by many writers of the Yiddish and Hebrew tradition, put together around 1912. They come from Lithuania, Poland, Bessarabia and New York. You get water carriers, scribes, a cantor who fears for his voice and mothers counting every kopek. The stories are warm, sharp and often very funny.
In this summary
- 1A rabbi sets out against wealthFree
- 2A homeland should sustain the living
- 3Hunger enters the room of prayer
- 4A name can hold a faith
- 5Weddings reveal dignity and belonging
- 6Conscience asks more than ritual
- 7Shared danger unsettles inherited hatred
- 8Learning opens arguments within faith
- 9Ordinary lives carry questions of belonging
A rabbi plans to share out riches
Reb Nochumtzi, the Rav of Pumpian, has never traveled beyond his small Lithuanian town. He earns five Polish gulden a week. Yet he knows the world through the holy books.
From the Torah and the Gemoreh he learns that riches are a misfortune. A rich man cannot give his misfortune away, because nobody would be mad enough to take it. Then poverty comes into his own house. His Sabbath cloak is threadbare, six children need clothes, and his wife Dvoireh begs him to think of something. He finds that poverty is a misfortune too.
His plan is to divide each rich man's unlucky wealth among many poor people. Both sides would gain. He rides to Wilna in a peasant's cart, rehearsing his speech, and the president of the community answers him with courtesy and a clever offer.
Sincere logic built only on books can walk straight past the real world.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
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Check yourself
Why does the town turn against the narrator who wants to buy earth from Palestine?
Right. “The town loved a Palestine for the dead and hated one for the living.”Not quite. “The town loved a Palestine for the dead and hated one for the living.”
What does Yüdel preserve when army life makes him forget his earlier religious world?
Right. “In Russia he forgets his father, the Sabbath and every prayer, but he holds on to his name.”Not quite. “In Russia he forgets his father, the Sabbath and every prayer, but he holds on to his name.”
Why does the Rabbi tell the congregation to eat on Yom Kippur?
Right. “Real holiness sometimes means bending a law to save a life.”Not quite. “Real holiness sometimes means bending a law to save a life.”
Go deeper: the whole of Yiddish Tales
About 9 h 30 min to read.Start freePaperback, hardcover and large print, printed for you at cost, are on their way.Email me when it is printed
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 131,500 words
- Reading timeAbout 9 h 15 min
Questions about Yiddish Tales
What is Yiddish Tales about?
It is a collection of short stories about Jewish life in small towns of Lithuania, Poland and Bessarabia and in New York tenements. They cover rabbis, workers, mothers, children, weddings, Sabbaths, Passover and Yom Kippur, with humor and tenderness.
Who wrote Yiddish Tales?
The stories are by many different writers of the Yiddish and Hebrew tradition, including Eliezer David Rosenthal, David Frischmann, David Pinski, S. Libin, Hirsh David Naumberg, Meyer Blinkin and Löb Schapiro.
What do words like Rav, Shool and Gemoreh mean?
A Rav is a rabbi. A Shool is a synagogue. The Gemoreh is the Talmud, the great collection of Jewish law and teaching. A Gass is a street, and Cheder is the traditional boys' school.
Are the stories true, and when are they set?
They are fiction, drawn from the lives of people the authors knew. Most are set in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, in Eastern European towns and New York, and some look back to Safed in earlier times.
Is Yiddish Tales easy to read?
Yes, in the sense that each story stands alone, with a clear scene, a lively voice and plain details of home and street. Short pieces make it easy to read one tale at a time.
Cite this edition
Yiddish Tales. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/yiddish-tales.
Yiddish tales. (2026). Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/yiddish-tales (Original work published 1912)
Yiddish Tales. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/yiddish-tales.
@book{anonymous2026yiddish,
title = {Yiddish Tales},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/yiddish-tales},
note = {First published 1912}
}
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