Jewish Community Hosts Swanky Soirée

A brief account of last week's Fifdom Shabbat dinner, in the style of an old-fashioned society column for some reason

A charming dinner-party was held Friday last in the home of Rabbi and Mrs. Boruch Sufrin of Long Beach, Calif. Drolly styled “Fifdom Shabbat” in honor of special guest and belle of the ball Matthew Lee Welch of Brooklyn (late of Czecho-Slovakia, if the rumors be correct, though he rarely speaks of the matter), the event began promptly at seven p.m.; this correspondent, however, was treated to a behind-the-scenes view of the preparations for the evening’s festivities.

Our more snobbish readers might wonder at our interest in kitchen drudgery and such-like vulgar concerns. These readers might well alter their views were they to witness the amusing mock circumcision performed on Mrs. Sufrin’s distinctly phalliform challah. Though the queer ritual is (one assumes) common practice in the traditional households of our Hebraic brethren, this correspondent was nonetheless taken aback by Miss Yael Bar tur’s reckless knife-wielding and hazy familiarity with male anatomy.

All the challahs, however—irrespective of shape, mutilated or intact—exceeded our high culinary standards, as did the sundry dips and salads with which they were served, after the traditional Hebrew incantations had been intoned and accompanying Talmudic rituals performed.

As the main-course of roasted chicken was served and the meal progressed, all eyes were fixed on the dashing figure cut by Mr. Welch, who regaled the assembled company with his unrivaled erudition and knowledge of politics. It would have been worth any statesman’s money to hear him discuss the news of the day, or the recent history of Central Europe, or the career trajectory of close personal friend Margaret Sullivan.

But even that distinguished gentleman was nearly upstaged by the dynamic duo of Mrs. Sufrin and Miss Bar tur, truly the Grover and Frances Cleveland of Judaism, who tirelessly kept the atmosphere lively and gay. Once Mrs. Sufrin had exhausted her favorite topics of conversation—the Holocaust, Tom Brady, whether Tom Brady would have saved her from the Holocaust—she suggested a parlor-game. Each guest was to introduce himself and choose a famous person with whom he wished to lunch. Answers ranged from Joan of Arc to Robert Allen Zimmerman, the Jewish Minnesotan chanteur.

Surely the pinnacle of the evening’s pleasures was the arrival of Rabbi Abba Perelmuter, father of the lady of the house, who graced the gathering with a fashionably late appearance shortly before this diverting game began. (He would, as he informed his surprised and bemused fellow-revellers, share a midday meal with any member of “Guns N’ Roses,” evidently a musical ensemble of some repute.) The venerable rabbi lent the affair a certain gravity, a soupçon of respectability—tempered, however, with his down-to-earth levity and humor. Rabbi Perelmuter bestowed his wisdom on his captivated auditors long into the evening, patiently bearing the questions and interruptions of all those privileged to attend the impromptu symposium.

Of course, as at any symposium worthy of the name, the liquor flowed freely. Those wishing to indulge in intoxicants of an herbal nature did not hesitate to do so with gusto.

The crowd dispersed around half past eleven, not without the occasional “French good-bye” to which Mr. Welch is so famously partial. All attendees departed happy, sated, perhaps slightly drunk, and ready to rise the next morning to attend synagogue or to pursue their secular, sinful lifestyles.