Q:
If a man comes to your door and claims he has twelve children or thirteen children and he asks for some tzedakah, how can you tell if he’s honest?
A:
How can you tell how many children a man has? If a man comes and he is clean shaven, so you have a right to suspect he doesn’t have thirteen children because ordinary people don’t have it.
However, if he has two long peyos hanging down like this so it’s plausible. He probably comes from Williamsburg.
However, if you wish, you can take his address so you see if it’s a Williamsburg address. It says Ross Street or Hooper Street or Lee Avenue, it’s one of these places and he’s that type of a Jew then you can be almost certain that it’s true and so mail the money to him.
Just because you bothered him not to give him the cash, give a little bigger check. Even if he happens to be a childless Jew, which I doubt, he’s going to spend the money in the corner grocery store where there are thirteen children. You can be sure of that. He’ll spend the money among thirteen people so it goes for a good cause.
(March 1976)
