Isaac Bashevis Singer's Short Friday

Isaac Bashevis Singer is a distinguished, highly renowned Jewish writer. Singer writes about meaningful Jewish practices, such as observing the Sabbath, going to synagogue, and keeping a Jewish home. These are stories in which G-d’s presence is truly felt by the reader and there is no doubt surrounding if the characters live their own interpretation of a religious life. In three of Singer’s most prominent work’s, G-d’s name is never mentioned: an observation too compelling to be surmised as coincidence or a mere mistake. Nobody refutes Singer’s status as an author who writes Jewish stories, insinuating that a Jewish author of stories who may or may not be religious is not obliged to write about G-d. This is indicative of the Jewish culture …show more content…
The end of the story is characterized by a tragic twist ending with their deaths. Shmul-Leibele and Shoshe have a love so powerful that they finish their lives together, lying side by side for eternity. Shoshe comforts with “it’s good that” she and her husband “are lying side by side” (133). Shoshe agrees by recounting a verse: “Lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided” (133). After sharing a profound life, teeming with Jewish experiences and sacred memories, their time had apparently come to be taken “into Paradise” (134), yet their love for each other and relationship they shared did not end with their souls withdrawing from their bodies. Rather, their love is eternal and infinite, beckoning G-d’s companionship, for it is a story that is simply too exquisite to indicate the absence of a higher power. The two chose to live their lives with devout observance to Judaism, constantly recognizing and praising G-d, and living in a manner in which they believed was their purpose. The spiritual, divine dramatics of this story impress a strongly felt sense of G-d to the reader in the immortal bonds these characters form with one