"MIRACLE RABBI."

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 224, 21 September 1929, Page 10 (Supplement)

"MIRACLE RABBI."

BUDAPEST POLICE ON TRAIL FORMER MUSEUM FREAK. VICTIMISES CREDULOUS FOLK. A bogus rabbi to whom for two weeks thousands of pilgrims, rich and poor, Jews and Christians, flocked to ask his advice and implore "miracles," has just I been exposed in Budapest. It has been discovered that he never was a rabbi, but a freak at Barnum's in Hamburg. Last summer is was reported in Budapest newspapers that a "miracle" working rabbi had arrived in the city. Crowds who flocked to see him found a man named Abraham Ovich, scarcely 3ft in height, with a body scarcely able to support bis bulky head. His long hair and beard, reaching almost to his waist, made him look like a wise old man in spite of his thirty years. His caution was so great that to almost all complaints he gave but one stereotyped answer: "God will help you." So responsibility w"as shifted to the Deity. If someone asked whether he should emigrate, he was asked whether he had a livelihood. If the reply was affirmative, he was advised to stay. Despite the unoriginality of his counsel, however, Ovich was able to earn great

sums and pay two secretaries and several servants. According to police records, a few years ago he was a freak at Barnum's in Hamburg. Later somebody bought him to make a "miracle rabbi" of him. Ovich soon established himself and started work on a large scale. He deceived people with a few quotations from the Talmud, and he was reputed to be almost a hundred years old. After disappearing from Budapest he emerged in Vienna and Berlin. To cure souls he distributed Hebrew prayer books, and to those with bodily complaints he gave pills. When he returned to Budapest this season his fame had been almost universally established. Even anti-Semite politicians passed his threshold of the small house in one of Budapest's suburbs. People waited

hours to be admitted to his consulting room. Police attention was also attracted to him. He became aware of the impending danger, and vanished with his whole retinue from Budapest. He told the "New York Times" correspondent he was going on a trip to Germany and the United States, but omitted to say whether as a miracle rabbi or a freak.