The Smoothest Way Is Full of Stones (Historical Context)

Historical Context

Hasidic Judaism

In the story, the Adelsteins appear to be Hasidic Jews. The Hebrew word "hasid" (or "chasid") means "pious." Hasidism is a subdivision of Orthodox Judaism and was founded by Rabbi Israel ben Eliezer, known as Bal Shem Tov (1700 – 60) in Ukraine. The epithet Bal Shem Tov means "master of the good name." Rabbi Israel wrote no books but promoted the ideal of simple piety by the use of parables and stories told to the uneducated masses. He believed that sincere devotion to God was preferable to scholarly knowledge of the Talmud (the authoritative body of Jewish teachings on civil and religious law, dating from in the early centuries of the Christian era).

Hasidism quickly spread throughout Eastern Europe, and its leaders developed the doctrine of the zaddik (the Righteous One), who was believed to be the intermediary between God and man. Rebbe Nachman of Bratslav (1772 – 1810), mentioned as an authority by Uncle Shimon in the story, was the great-grandson of Israel Bal Shem Tov, and was a revered but controversial zaddik. He is remembered in the early 2000s for his allegorical folk tales about princes and princesses, beggars and kings, demons and saints, which reveal spiritual truths. Rebbe Nachman saw himself as a messianic figure who would redeem the Jewish people. Some of his followers revered him so much that on his death they refused to acknowledge any successor. This branch of Hasidism is still in existence as of 2005 and is known as the Bratslav Hasidim.

In "The Smoothest Way Is Full of Stones," the Adelstein family appears to belong to the branch of Hasidism known as the Chabad-Lubavitch movement. There are strong Lubavitcher communities in Brooklyn, New York (numbering at least fifteen thousand people), and in upstate New York towns such as Kiryas Joel and New Square.

The Chabad-Lubavitch movement was founded in Russia by Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liady (1745 – 1812) in the mid-eighteenth century. His son established the sect in Lubavitch, a small town in what subsequently became the independent state of Belarus. In Russian, the word Lubavitch means "city of brotherly love." The word "chabad" is a Hebrew acronym for the three faculties of chachmah (wisdom), binah (knowledge), and da'at (understanding).

The Chabad-Lubavitch movement rapidly spread throughout Russia and the wider Jewish world, becoming especially strong, in modern times, in Israel and the United States. The movement was led by a succession of leaders known as rebbes, each descended from the previous leader. The sixth rebbe, Joseph Isaac Schneersohn, was living in Poland when World War II broke out. He escaped the Nazis and arrived in New York in 1940. His son-in-law, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, arrived in New York from Paris the following year, and on the death of his father-in-law in 1950, became the seventh Lubavitcher rebbe. It is this rebbe whose photograph hangs on the wall of Esty and Rebecca's bedroom in the story. Rebecca notices his "long steely beard and his eyes like flecks of black glass." She notices the photograph again when she is about to accompany Esty to meet Dovid ("The dread eyes of the Lubavitcher Rebbe stare down at me from the wall"). Between the death of Rabbi Schneerson in 1994 and 2005, no other rebbe had been appointed.

The Hasidim are distinctive in their dress. Men wear black coats, white shirts, a black hat, and a long beard with peyos (sidecurls). Sometimes the peyos are worn in front of the ear, or they can be tucked back behind the ear. In the story, Dovid Frankel has prominent peyos, "luxuriously curled, shoulder-length." Hasidic women, like Esty and Rebecca in "The Smoothest Way Is Full of Stones," dress modestly, wearing long skirts with long-sleeved shirts. In some Hasidic groups, married women sometimes shave their heads, and many wear wigs.

Relations between Hasidic men and women are more formal than in mainstream American culture. Hasidic men and women do not shake hands or touch each other in any other way unless they are married, and then only in private.