Philip Roth, you’re no longer needed. With the arrival of Shalom Auslander, a man of immense talent, Jews have a new writer they can feel guilty about loving so much.
“Beware of God,” Auslander’s debut collection of short stories, is a riotous affront on ritual and a direct challenge to Orthodoxy. The characters in these 14 stories are confused, if not driven batty, by the burden of believing (and not believing) in God.
As the title suggests, one should be cautious around Auslander’s God. This is a God who is fickle and tricky, arrogant and pesky, a strain on marriages and bank accounts, a deity who deserves nothing more intimate than a cattle-prod handshake.
In the story “They’re All the Same,” the Almighty shops Madison Avenue for an advertising agency to boost his world appeal. When an executive remarks on what a beautiful day it is, a Palm Pilot-obsessed God answers loudly: “I made it myself.”
And in “Prophet’s Dilemma,” God is an outright nuisance. He needles an unobservant man named Schwartzman to slaughter goats, construct an ancient Babylonian temple and build an ark in his back yard, much to the dismay of his wife and neighbors. Why does God bother Schwartzman? Because God’s a stalker, according to Schwartzman’s psychologist.
“Every time you respond, you’re positively reinforcing his behavior. Every time you answer him, he’s getting what he wants.”
Auslander was born into a distinguished American family of Orthodox rabbis. After a go as a juvenile delinquent, he was sent to Israel to become a better Jew, one who knew more about the Five Books of Moses than the five-finger discount. The experience backfired, providing his devious mind with an ample supply of comic sketches.
In “Beware of God,” Auslander takes many a potshot at religious scholars, portraying them as Tweedle Dees and Tweedle Dums caught in the long-windedness of talmudic debate. This is some of his most incisive material. It works best in the Kafka-inspired “The Metamorphosis.”
Overnight the body of yeshiva student Motty transforms into a tattooed, dexterous and muscular construction worker. Motty’s reaction: “Awesome.” The rabbinate does not respond with equal enthusiasm. They debate whether Motty deserves the same religious rights, now that he’s 90 percent non-Jewish. It’s a debate that ties them in knots — a position they seem to enjoy, for it allows them to debate further.
Rejected and despondent, Motty hangs himself in the shower, but not before remodeling his father’s house.
Nothing is sacred in this writer’s imagination. Not the Kabbalah, not the work of the Anti-Defamation League, not even the Bible itself. The irreverence takes a wrong turn in “Holocaust Tips for Kids,” a story about a child scared senseless by the factoids from World War II. He develops a way to fight the Nazis (Molotov cocktails and homemade nunchucks) and escape the concentration camps (hitch-hike to the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami) should the SS come knocking in New York.
The death, sex and violence in these stories (and there’s plenty of it) are cartoonish imitations of the real thing. Primarily, this is a book about getting the inside joke of being religious. Because there is one. Because the decrees of Judaism can be befuddling and deserve a good poke.
Auslander’s debut is a meaningful addition to Jewish American literature, though at times “Beware of God” brinks on being religious pornography. If you must, take it off the bookshelf and stuff it under the mattress.
“Beware of God,” by Shalom Auslander (195 pages, Simon & Schuster, $19.95).
Shalom Auslander will speak at the Koret Jewish Book Awards 8 p.m. Saturday, April 9, at the Jewish Community Center of S.F., 3200 California St. The event is free.