The main ones are what is Gimpel's class in society, why did the people treat him as a "fool" and why did Gimpel choose to believe all the lies the people say to him? In trying to understand Gimpel's class in society, one must first look at the days when he is younger "I was an orphan. My grandfather who brought me up was already bent towards the grave"(96). Gimpel had no parents and he had to live with his grandfather until he dies, then moves on to live and work for a baker. In his older days, Gimpel manages to establish his own bakery: "I spent a fortune on her. I have forgotten to say that by this time I had a bakery of my own and in Frampol was considered to be something of a rich man" (103). Gimpel has been considered a middle class person who later becomes an upper class person. The people treat him as a "fool' because they find that they can trick him easily. "Gimpel, there's a fair in heaven; Gimpel the rabbi gave birth to a calf in the seventh month; Gimpel, a cow flew over the roof and laid brass eggs" (96). Gimpel knows none of this is true, but he chooses to believe them. "I believe .
3.
them, and hope at least that did them some good" (96). He thinks that the only way to get rid of them is to believe them, and it would make them stop telling him lies.
Gimpel is matched with a woman in his town, by the people, to get married. Once again, the town is making fun of him by fixing his marriage with someone that no one in .
the town would marry. He marries Elka and, she gives birth to a baby boy seventeen weeks after the marriage. Gimpel knows that the baby isn't his, but accepts her excuse anyway. Gimpel goes home one day and he finds his wife sleeping with another man. "I went up to the bed, and things suddenly turned black. Next to Elka lay a man's form" (100). Gimpel used the word "black" to describe his surprised feelings of another man in his place. He did not expect to see this and wishes he was wrong: "In the morning I went to the rabbi to get advice" (100).