Once a year, Elimelech Ehrlich travels from Jerusalem to Lakewood, N.J., with a cash box and a wireless credit-card machine. During the three weeks he typically spends in town, Ehrlich â?? a white-bearded, black-suited, black-skullcapped, wisecracking 51-year-old â?? haunts the many local yeshivas, schools where Jewish men, mostly in their 20s, study the Talmud and other texts. Sometimes he loiters around the condominium complexes where students live with their young wives and growing families. Some days he hires a driver to take him to the houses of local ashirim, rich men. Throughout town, he greets old friends, asking after marriages made since his last visit and new babies. And at every stop along the way, he asks for money.
Ehrlich is a full-time beggar. His strategy is one part humor, one part not taking no for an answer. He gives you levity; he expects money in return. â??I say rhymes, I say all kinds of jokes!â? Ehrlich told me in June, on a break from begging. â??I say: â??If you donâ??t have anything, at least give something! Better than not giving at all!â?? I ask them, â??Give me 100 dollars, Iâ??ll give you back 99 shekels!â?? â? (A comically bad deal â?? even if his offer were genuine, a shekel is worth about 30 cents.) â??They give a dollar or two, sometimes they give five,â? Ehrlich said. Students who give maaser â?? the 10 percent tithe recommended by the Talmud â?? are more generous, he said. â??They give 36, or 20.â? Thirty-six is a multiple of 18, which represents life or good luck in Jewish numerology.
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