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How to Use a Sharp Mind
David Small is young, married and there are children. He is not tall, not athletic – no passion for sports. He is a scholar loving to read manuscripts, any old texts, grab a subject, write about it … David Small is a rabbi and so he is busy with Jewish texts. Parallel to his passion he has a congregation to be cared for. Rabbi Small is also busy with devotions and prayers, marriages and lots of personal rituals, organization of festivities on Jewish holidays. His wife always supports him when caring for the congregation.
So living as a rabbi with a small or even larger congregation seems to be like heaven on earth … maybe – if there aren’t the leaders of the congregation present in the board. The rabbi is an employee of the congregation and the board decides about his contract, his salary … and much more. In short: there is always some dark clouds on the blue sky.
Rabbi Small likes to ignore anything coming from the board and just to forge ahead however he feels comfortable with his assignments and his studies. Every now and then the group of leaders or some of them or some influential congregants like to manifest their discomfort with the actions of the rabbi. Some would prefer a rabbi caring more about his congregation and special festivities, some would like a rabbi more sociable – a scholar interested in deep interpretations of holy scripts leading to sermons which most of them don’t really enjoy is not a prospect for active businessmen or their socially positioned wives.
So there are always and regularly discussions about rabbi Small and the renewal of his contract, his salary and pay raise, his performance of any Jewish rituals and festivities. As far as rabbi Small gets to know about it he doesn’t care too much. However, there is crime …
Even in a small, nice town like Barnard’s Crossing in Massachusetts with well-to-do inhabitants there is crime. It starts one day when the corpse of a young woman is discovered who was obviously strangled. She worked as an au pair girl for a family with children, the parents mainly occupied by managing their profitable nightclub business. The husband seems to be find of young girls …
The corpse is found in a corner on the car park of the synagogue. When checking the place the police discovers a handbag which belongs to the victim. It’s rabbi Small’s car where the handbag lies under the seat … and soon it is established that the poor girl was also strangled in this car. Furthermore … the autopsy shows that the victim was pregnant … without any boyfriend or fiancee or whatever around …
Rabbi Small doesn’t know anything about all this mess, but the congregation is troubled. The police interrogates rabbi Small, but … without any final findings. There is some social escalation … In short: rabbi Small analyses the case and shares his insights with the head of the police department …
What does rabbi Small do?
He traces the last steps in the life of the victim … and suddenly some pieces fall into the picture. There is no wild car chase, there are no rows, there is no shooting – rabbi Small simply concludes with his brain trained in Talmus logic what really happened and why the victim behaved … somehow odd.
The novels always present on one hand the private life of rabbi Small, on the other hand the assiduous life of the congregation and all the machinations in this small world as well as a crime case which is solved by rabbi Small and his sharp mind.