“Michoel, just because your first eight baby boys all had their brisim on time, doesn’t mean that your ninth son’s will also be on time. It’s not the end of the world. Remember the story of your great-uncle Shneur Zalman who had his pidyon haben before his bris? Didn’t stop him from becoming famous for his tremendous ahavas Yisrael and globe-trotting chesed endeavors.”
But my son Michoel wasn’t convinced.
On the morning of the day before the expected bris, he reluctantly cancelled the shul hall and catering when the baby’s bilirubin count shot up to 18. The mohel tried to comfort him and suggested he take the baby again for a test in the afternoon to see if the numbers were going down. But they weren’t.
At 6:00 the next morning, the seventh day of Chanukah, he took the baby again for a test. The news at 8:00 a.m. was that the numbers went down slightly, but not enough. The mohel suggested Michoel test the baby again at 2:00 p.m. If the numbers were right, they could still make it. By this time the mohel was just as determined as my son to get this baby’s bris done on the eighth day if humanly possible.
But the nearby lab had closed early so that all the employees could beat the traffic and get home before sunset to light Chanukah candles.
“Michoel, enough already! How many times are you going to prick my poor little grandson? He’ll be anemic from loss of blood while you are obsessed with his bilirubin count!”
Politely indifferent to my well-meaning ranting, a determined Michael contacted the mohel who sent him to a private lab to perform the test.
At 3:45 p.m. Michoel still had no answer from the lab. Sunset was at 4:44.
I changed into comfy slippers and stuck the trays of petit fours I had prepared, just in case, back into the freezer. My husband finished setting up his menorah and was heading for a short nap when the phone rang.
The bris was on! Could we make it from Har Nof to Kiryat HaYovel by 4:15 p.m.?
My husband rattled off the orders. “Leave everything, Zelda, and just get down to the car now! But where in the world are those car keys? Who had them last? Oy, Benny borrowed our car to pick up one of his kids from kindergarten. Get him over here right now!”
Fortunately, our son Benny lives nearby. He zoomed over as I tripped down three flights of stairs in slippers, petit fours in tow. My husband was waiting with Benny in the car, furtively phoning the rest of the marrieds to tell them to head over to Michoel’s house for the bris.
Seconds after we hit the road and before I had fastened my seatbelt, Benny slammed on the brakes. I lurched forward, valiantly trying to balance the petit fours on my knees. Benny had spotted my daughter Shira, who lives down the street, parking her van after having picked up her son up from cheder.
“Don’t park,” my husband shouted to her as he rolled down the window.” The bris is on!”
So my usually elegant Shira retreated back into her van, adorned in her tichel and running outfit, shoved her son back in, and sped off after us.
Miraculously, there was little traffic in Givat Shaul – probably everyone was already home, preparing for the last candle-lighting. Benny raced down Farbstein Street, and as he took the corner on two wheels, the big orange-red ball of fire in the sky was dropping down over the hills and came into view.
“Please, Hashem! Please, hold that sun up in the sky a little longer like You did in the time of Yehoshua so that we can get to our grandson’s bris on time.”
“Abba, Imma – I’ll find parking while you two run for it,” my son Benny insisted.
So we raced down the path and soared up to the fourth floor in time to see the mohel opening his toolbox. The front door was open and the brothers of the new baby trickled in from their cheders, backpacks still on their backs. Two of our daughters rushed in followed by three sons-in-law – but no sign of our oldest son Yitzchak, the designated sandak. He was stuck in traffic on the Begin Highway, and Waze gave him three more minutes to go.
The mohel’s eyes darted from his watch to the window where we could all view the ominous sinking sun.
“Kvatter!” he announced, as two neighbors ran in to complete the minyan.
“Where is the sandak?” the mohel asked.
“He’ll be here in less than three minutes,” Michoel pleaded. He really wanted to honor his older brother.
“Can’t wait. Take someone else.”
The oldest son-in-law received the honor and barely caught the baby as he was thrust into his arms. Yitzchak arrived two minutes later in time to give the brachos and the name, Ariel.
The hungry participants gobbled down the petit fours as I dashed over to the mini-market down the block to buy pitot, humus and pickles. The seudas mitzvah of little Ariel’s bris was the most authentic and memorable of all the brisim that I had ever participated in.
The mohel sighed in relief as we all drank a l’chaim, and related to us where he had been when he received Michoel’s phone call.
“I was in the Shaarei Zedek hospital nearby performing a circumcision for an Arab boy. In the afternoons I have many Arab patients. When my phone rang and I saw Michoel’s number, I picked up and left, instructing someone else to finish off the job. A mitzvah must not be delayed! A bris is a mitzvah, and circumcising a non-Jew is not. I rushed out of the operating room, leaped into a taxi – and am as grateful and elated as the family is, that HaKadosh Baruch Hu enabled us to perform this bris on time.
And now, when we go home and light the eighth and last of our Chanukah candles, we can truly identify with the mesiras nefesh of our fellow yidden for the mitzvah of bris milah in the time of the Maccabbees,” enthused the mohel to our grateful family. And as they danced around the modest table, Michoel threw me a wink.
