Rabbi Bergman and The Cheder Dog: Stories of the Rebbes

by Rabbi David

This all happened in Rochester, New York, second half of the second millennium. Rochester is where people go for excitement, or because they immigrated to the United States and had a cousin in Upstate. Or because they thought Kodak would last more than twenty years.

These kids were growing up in Rochester in the 1920s. Kids grow up in Rochester. People get bigger in Rochester too. Their father, Rav Simcha Tillim, wanted them to learn from Rav Yechiel Meir Bergman, a Tzadik. So, he walked his kids an hour each way every day to learn at the Tzadik's Cheder. Why Rav Tillim decided to buy a place as far away from Rav Bergman as possible is another story. It only took a half hour to get from one side of Rochester to the other. Yet, Rav Tillim understood Lfum Tzara Agra. According to the pain is the reward. He wanted to instill that pain in his children. Which is known as Chinuch and why we make kids go to school.
Rav Tillim, himself loved exercise, and it turned out he wasn't getting his steps. Back in those days you tracked your steps by shouting out numbers. The conversations with his children on their way to Cheder, Jewish school, made it all the way up to twenty thousand.
Rav Bergman was a rav and a Tzadik, and we know this, because he had an Eastern European accent.
After a day of this exercise and getting in his steps, the father decided the kids should walk by themselves. He already got in the twenty thousand steps. That was enough. He also realized that he already knew the Aleph Bet. To quote, "Lama Ani Holech LCheder. Ani Kvar Yode'ah HaAleph Bet vAni Tzarich LShalem LaZeh. FuFuFuFu."

The Tillim kids came home crying that first day after walking by themselves, as people were pulling their Payis. "Pulling my Payis" is not a Jewish euphemism for joking around with you. I have never heard a Frum Jew say, "Stop pulling my Payis," to somebody who is not a Nazi. I am not saying Jew haters don't have a good sense of humor. I wouldn't want to offend them.
Dad wasn't around, and the children learned real quickly that antisemitism exists when you're not with your parents. As anti-Semites truly hate children. They didn't complain about the two hour walk. And this has me wondering why they didn't take a bus.
As a child in the early 1900s you got beat up every day on your way to Cheder. Why did they beat them up? Because they were Jewish. It was American tradition back in the early 1900s. You see a Jew anywhere outside of the Lower East Side, you beat them up. It was a fun activity. Something to do. Movies weren’t that good back then. Bad graphics. It was a Jewish educational tool as well. You get beat up on the way to school to prepare you for the rest of your life, where people will be trying to kill you. 
These kids were getting beat up two hours a day. Cheder was three hours. Thus, we now have five hours a day of Jewish education.
Why they kept going to Cheder? I don't know. Was there a different route? Yes. But that route would've taken an extra three minutes. 

They told their rebbe, Rav Yechiel Meir Bergman, about the anti-Semites. To which Rav Bergman insisted they invite them to Cheder, so the kids would listen. Yard sticks and rulers weren't working in those days. After getting whacked by those a good hundred times, it doesn't bother you anymore. And many educators were sick of pulling out the spiked ball chain flail to help kids learn language. An anti-Semite standing in Shiur, the kids would listen and learn some Torah.
Their rebbe told them, “Come to Cheder and you will be protected every day.” It might have been the dad, Simcha Tillim, who said it, trying to get the kids out of the house so he could enjoy himself and the ice cream he brought home. I believe he purchased vanilla ice cream that day, and it was going to melt in twenty minutes. Back then, you had to eat ice cream real fast. Most families didn't have freezers. You picked up the ice cream from the grocery and you had eight minutes to eat it. So, you had to run home with spoon in hand and kick the kids out before it melted. Otherwise, you would have to share with them. And this is why parents also hate kids. In the early 1800s, before they developed freezers, you had to go all the way to Iceland to get ice cream, hoping a glacier didn't fall on you while you were putting on the sprinkles. That was the development of industry in Iceland. A global hankering for ice cream.
Anyhow. The children walked to Cheder and a dog escorted them every day. Never again were they attacked. I might have got that story wrong. But there was antisemitism. They didn’t even call it antisemitism back then. They called it interfaith dialogue. The Christians would say, “We hate you. You caused the black plague.” And then, to continue the conversation, they would physically assault you. That was only if the government didn't sanction them killing us.

For a year and a half, the dog would walk the kids to Cheder and then back. The dog would wait at the Cheder till it was over and then walk them home. The dog became proficient in Hebrew. It began saying, "Hav Hav." Rav Bergman was an amazing teacher and a Tzadik. At a year and a half the dog stopped escorting them. They finally gave the dog a treat.
For a year and a half, the dog was wondering why they hadn't given him anything yet. When he finally got the biscuit, he said, "I got what I came for. I can go now." Which was translated as "Hav Hav." Or maybe the kids just found a different route.

How the Cheder Started
Rav Bergman was fired. That's usually how Cheders start. He was teaching at a Hebrew day school and he taught kids that you have to listen to your parents, unless if they tell you to not keep Shabbis. Big mistake. Never tell Jewish kids in Jewish day school about Mitzvahs, especially when you're teaching Mitzvahs. When you're teaching the Ten Commandments, The Aseret HaDibrot, you're supposed to teach how to drive on Shabbat with your parents. Any rebbe that wants to keep his job in a Jewish day school knows that.
The principal heard this, closed the Chumash and fired him. I believe the quote was, "You don't teach Torah when you're teaching Torah." The principal understood how to run a Torah institution the right way. The way the Rochester community likes it.
That principal's hands were paralyzed for the rest of his life. So, we know it wasn't the principal that was pulling the Payis.

Lessons of What Followed
Nobody messed with Rabbi Bergman again. A Tzadik and a miracle worker, he had many jobs and nobody fired him.
It was years before anybody closed a Chumash again. People in Rochester would walk around with open books, in fear that they would die or get hiccups if they closed it.
The Smith brothers of Rochester later got a reputation for being guys you don't mess with. But they never closed a Chumash.

Jews started taking up boxing just to get hit in the face, as part of their Chinuch.

Rav Bergman was not seen as a Tzadik by the board of the Jewish day school, because the board of the Jewish day school was made up of a bunch of heretics. And it has thus been tradition in Rochester ever since to fire good rabbis who teach Torah. I'm sorry. I was fired for teaching Torah at a Jewish day school in Rochester, and I'm not even a Tzadik. I had to get it out somewhere. They should've kept me. I am extremely not devout.

The kids found a shorter route. Turns out Rav Bergman lived a block away. Their father just never showed his kids the shorter way.  To quote the father, "The most important part of honoring your parents is staying away from them." 
The kids stopped getting reward for suffering extreme pain. They had to find another way to get to Olam Haba, so they started pinching each other.

Why the anti-Semites were scared of a Maltese Poodle, I do not know.
Nobody knows the dog's name. They say it was a Gilgul, a reincarnation of somebody who wanted to educate children. Probably a Gadol HaDor, the greatest rabbi of their generation, a couple hundred years back, who got fired for teaching Torah to kids in Rochester. 

People come from all over to Daven at Rabbi Bergman's Kever, and they visit Rav Tillim as well. To this day, nobody in Rochester appreciates him. And now kids in Rochester take buses to the Jewish day school and learn arithmetic.

***I probably got the story wrong. See Nechama Burgeman's (September 21, 2010) notes in https://kevarim.com/rabbi-meir-yechiel-bergman/ for something that might be more correct.