The Case of the Missing Tallit Bag

Last night, in the grand tradition of hashavat aveida (returning lost objects), Facebook user Michael Levitian of West Palm Beach, Florida, embarked on a monumental quest to find the owner of a lost tallit bag. After an unsuccessful appeal to the police, Levitian went the 21st century route: social media.

On his Facebook page, Levitian relayed the story of how he came to acquire the lost article when he decided to purchase it from a “petty thug” in New Jersey, to avoid its potential desecration. (Normally, he doesn’t buy random objects from random sellers on random streets). Levitian’s post was shared over 380 times (and still counting), including in the Jewish genealogy Facebook group “Tracing the Tribe.” Three hours in, the presumable owner—Meyer Emanuel—whose name is embroidered in Hebrew on the front of the ritual bag, joined the conversation. Soon enough, Emanuel posted on Levitian’s Facebook thread that his luggage had been stolen from the Newark Airport; the bag was in fact a gift from his grandfather.

Amid promises to Levitian of “a celestial seat at the table,” permissions to eat bacon until Yom Kippur, and an obligatory quotation of Deuteronomy (where the commandment to return lost objects appears), all of this culminated with a blessing for “abundant goodness” from “Meyer’s mom.”