Keep On Smilin'

Upon my completion of high school, I spent 2½ years in Israel, studying at two Jewish theological seminaries. The first year-and-a-half of that period was spent in an institution in Jerusalem called Yeshivat HaKotel. The school is located in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem's Old City, just a few minutes' walk from the holy Jewish site known as The Wailing Wall, or, in Hebrew, as HaKotel, meaning simply "The Wall".

There were approximately 300 students in the Yeshiva, enrolled in various programs. Most of the Israelis ranged in age from 18 to 23 and were there as part of a five-year program known as Hesder, which is a combination of military service and religious study. There were also a few dozen students in their mid-20's in the Rabbinical program. And there were about 70 non-Israeli students, mostly from the U.S., who, like myself, were just out of high school. Most of them returned to their respective countries of origin after a single year at the Yeshiva.

Obviously, in an institution with a student body of that size, I didn't get to know the majority of the students. I made friends of varying degrees among both the Israelis and the non-Israelis.

But there was one student with whom I shared a very special friendship. He was an Israeli, a couple of years ahead of me, on the short side, with thick, long, straight black hair and a thick, long, wispy black beard. We would see each other only every few weeks. In all the time I knew him we never uttered a single word to each other.

But every time we would pass each other, typically in the large study hall, which was often by filled with the roar of 200-to-300-plus students engaged in Talmudic discussions, he would radiate towards me the most beautiful, beatific, beaming smile, not from his mouth, but from his entire face, and, it seems, from his entire body. I never ceased to derive enormous pleasure from these brief encounters, and I think I reciprocated very much in kind.

But although I always enjoyed these interactions with my cheshire friend, for some reason it never occurred to me to take the friendship to the next level and engage him in conversation. Indeed, I never even learned his name. I think that in my mind, and very likely in his as well, our silent relationship was so complete, in its total mutual expression of good will, that any words would have been superfluous.

Then one day a few months later, another Israeli student flashed at me a similar Mother Teresa smile. This student was younger, of average height, with thick straight fair hair and no beard. But this encounter began a new friendship which was identical in all respects to the friendship I had with my bearded ami. I found it both sweet and amusing that I now had not one but two special friendships of this kind.

One day, not long before the conclusion of my tenure at Yeshivat HaKotel, I learned somehow that my two mute best friends were brothers.