This paper intends to explore the relation between the concept of Golah, or "exile", with precarious social conditions of Galician Jewry in Shmuel Yosef Agnon's novella VeHayah HaAkov LeMishor (known in English as "And the crook shall be made straight". Starting from the analysis of the novella provided by Yonatan Sagiv's Indebted: Capitalism and Religion in the writings of S.Y. Agnon, the argument is that the notion of "debt" central to the tale. Sagiv's analysis provides a starting point, as it draws directly from relevant Hebrew vocabulary employed by S.Y. Agnon in Ve 'Hayah HaAkov LeMishor. However, the study seems not to devote as much space to the word Golah, to describe the protagonist's begging outside his native town. Golah instead is generally meant to indicate "exile". The circumstances described in the novella add a pejorative sense to the meaning of "exile", as here it indicates a precarious economic situation. As opposed, the word used to indicate other Jewish communities across the region where the story is based is Tfutzah, which can be translated as "dispersion". The ordeals of the protagonists in the novella reflect the social reality of Galicia, of which S.Y. Agnon is a native. Moreover, as the son of a fur merchant, S.Y. Agnon describes meticulously the economic conditions under which Jewish shopkeepers operate. As he is one of the most prominent narrators of Galician Jewry in Modern Hebrew, this paper argues that the use of the word Golah seems linked with destitution and misery, highlighting the sense that economic modernisation has made the life of Jews in Eastern Europe miserable. After the analysis of the two above-indicated terms, Golah and Tfutzah, the paper explores the the novella, based in Galicia during the 19th century, in the context of European Jewish social and political thinking of the time as well as S.Y. Agnon's adhesion to Zionism.