Reporting On God. Wading Through A Sea of Torah and Jews.
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Israel: Brokenness and Beauty
Updated March 14
I love loveliness and Israel offered very much loveliness as well as so much brokenness. This is my favourite picture. And so are the rest that follow.
I actually thought this was a guide to the restrooms.
Naaah, they were directions for the mechitza, intersecting the Rambam's (Maimonides) Grave.
What? Are they all taking crazy pills??????
I wonder if running a massive fence across the length of his itty bitty grave has left a lot of people, including the Rambam's ghost, rather perplexed.
I notice that, online, people identify their "Judaism" with a laundry list of things they do (or say they do, or say that others should do). It validates them as Jews, or perhaps more correctly, real Jews, I suppose.
I also notice a growing trend amongst bloggers who are not O and take their Judaism seriously, to trot out laundry lists of what they do in order to justify their existence and validate their religious life as authentic. Recent posts by some non O bloggers suggest that the problem is not with O who will always be exclusive and triumphalist, but with the fact that there are those of us who actually care about what O thinks. And I mean the people, not the Torah or halacha or G-d.
I normally don't comment on other people's posts but this issue is close to my heart. Naomi Chana of Baraita gives reasons for not choosing Orthodoxy. And she doesn't understand why Jews other than O are still kowtowing to Orthodoxy as if it were the summit of the Jewish religion. I totally agree with her nice and reasonable observations and would like to add a few of my own, less measured though they are :
I think this hypervigilant consciousness of Orthodoxy is partially due to good PR. Just start a blog and if you, as a Jew, are remotely interested in O "observance", many will descend upon it to help you get over that "conversion" hump. If you are looking to convert, they will also descend and happen to forget to inform that Judaism encompasses more than just Orthodoxy. That plus the fact that if something is repeated a gazillion times, you too will believe. Then add to that the real PR juggernaut of outreach groups (I was sucked in by them at first), and a certain ideology gets a stranglehold and begins to dominate. It's enough to destabilise or disorient someone who may not be too sure of their choices or has just gone along with the way they were raised. Even if what they are being fed is not true!
This always reminds me of evangelicals preying on elderly, sick, lonely, uneducated and vulnerable Jews. Like the evangelicals, they "love bomb". Most of us need to belong to a community, and often we feel alienated, possess a fragile sense of belonging; when someone offers you a close-knit community, and gives you lots of attention, why would your heart not flutter a little?
Intellectual intimidation is common. Most Jews have not gone to yeshiva, most Jews will never know the ins and outs of halacha, are not professors of Judaism, most Jews don't argue for the sake of argument, a la the Talmud. Most Jews have trouble not being intimidated by services when there is Hebrew present. So, given those factors, and when the message pounded into you by O at every turn is that O is the only authentic Judaism, it is very easy to push that agenda. That brand of Judaism, sold through this sort of intimidation or bullying (sometimes inadvertently) guarantees that the other will crumble before your eyes and give in or give up. Or at the very least, be gripped with uncertainty and a huge sense of inferiority. It's a destabilising tactic, nothing more, nothing less, whether it is conscious or not. It's like being hypnotised, and people succumb. It works.
And then there is the biggest weapon of all- if you do not have confidence in your choices then it is easy for O to bring out the ultimate Holy Laundry List- that checklist of outward behaviour that includes or excludes you- keeping Shabbat and kosher scrupulously. It then becomes no longer about the religion, but about the lifestyle. And that's when Judaism becomes about Jews and not Torah, or G-d. It elevates tradition and lifestyle to a religion, at the expense of Jewish unity, and at the expense of humanity and common human decency. Often, I find myself asking if everyone is taking crazy pills. Wow, this is not the religion I signed up for.
In rebuttal, Out of Step Jew, whose blog I highly respect, tries to bridge some of the gap by ascertaining, since nc seems so "special", that is, meets a lot of the requirements set out by the Holy Laundry List, that she be treated like an honourary member and well, like a religious Jew worthy of respect. Clearly she has what it takes in terms of whatever combination of factors that allow for that respect . Even if she is not Orthodox. Wow. What does it take? To me it comes across as a little bit condescending even though I know the writer's heart was in the right place. Heck, if I were nc I would definitely take him up on his invitation to visit! But to me it is a symptom of the very concrete gap in realities- huge cognitive differences. One person's graciousness is another person's condescension. From my view, it's a nice attempt at rapprochement but totally on the writer's terms.
Until we get beyond communicating and, therefore, relating in the language of "observance" and "holy laundry lists" there is no way to bridge that gap, because we respectively speak a different language altogether. It is definitely not the language of true respect for a fellow Jew who takes their Judaism seriously. It is a grammar of requirements, in which speaking (living) the language of faith and Torah and striving hold little sway if the requirements are not stringently met or pursued.
Observance neither necessarily makes one a serious Jew or "religious".
...just because one is observant and keeps all of the ritual laws, that doesn’t make one a religious human being. A religious person is one who observes both the ritual and moral laws. Ritual observance alone doesn’t make one a religious individual. R' Muskin, Jewish Journal
I have met a lot of Jews serious about their religion in all movements. So, like nc who doesn't get why Jews in streams other than orthodoxy think O is the cat's pajamas, I don't get how anyone can take seriously the idea that there are so few serious religious Jews who happen not to be Orthodox. Perhaps it is because no serious Jew judges another on their level of "observance" or realness? Perhaps it is because that kind of loshon hara is not prevalent in non-O synagogues and so there is no telling, no list? I would hope that all "religious Jews" would be defined in terms of their pursuit of the mitzvot, in both observance and morality, and not in terms of some spurious authenticity. And to take it one step further- to recognise that while one cannot be "religious" without striving in observance neither can one be "serious" without being moral. Now that is a complete language we can all understand.
Both Z of JewView and Shira of On the Fringe have written a series on dealing with the consequences of having a disabled child. It is clear from their exchange in comments and from reading the posts, that though they come from differing perspectives, they complement each other. I think that the word "holiness" tends to trip off our tongues way too readily, but when I read about their struggle, I see holiness described.
We all get so involved in petty minutiae, whether it is ritual, or material, or politics (deserving of its own wacky planet)-the arguments are so gratifying that we tend to forget what really matters, what really is a Kiddush Hashem. Their stories really brought me down to earth and also bring heaven down to earth. I am just blown away by their love and their strength.
I think that you need to read them both to get the whole picture. As far as I know, this is the first account of a tag team wrestling with G-d in the style of Yaakov/Jacob that has been reported since Biblical times!
Acco Prison- Courtesy of my tour group- Israel Tour Connection, aka, Israel Torture Connection.
I did not want to do the political/war tour. I was on a pilgrimage. I ended up there, nevertheless. Don't use Israel Tour Connection as your tour organisers. Using them resulted in major unpleasantness, anger and frustration. The tour guide was clueless. And I am left with memories of wars above all else. (For more information, email me.)
Acco prison is the place where some brave Irgun resistors died. Their statements in court are beyond eloquent. Their escape was dramatically revived in the film, Exodus.
Frankly, all I care about is the Mediterranean. I am so ignorant that I had to ask my rabbi if it was, indeed, the Mediterranean. He was kind.
Nevertheless, the Mediterranean rules! Oh my, it was ....well, I am without words. Oh, and Herod built his showplace here. A port, a resort, the place to be.
The first time my gaze lit upon The Shrine of the Book, I went, "Huh?!"* Yet it stands in quiet and striking contrast to the terraced boxes of the Israel Museum about which I have written earlier. The museum's interior offers, among other things, a sumptuous panoply of Jewish artefacts on the walls, on the floor and under glass. For people like myself, starved of such abundance gathered under one roof, it is gratifying to both the mind and the senses. Meanwhile, entering the hushed and softly lit interior of the room housing the central showcase of the Shrine is like entering the Sanctuary, spare with offerings, bits of parchment cobbled together in the cases round about.
But ooooh, those offerings! The room is like one great big Ark! I suppose this is as spiritually and historically close as we can get to the Holy of Holies for the time being (though this Gate in the Tunnels may lead to it:)
It is not just the one long parchment that girds the walls of the central casing (disappointingly it was meant to be from the book of Isaiah, but had been removed and replaced with a copy) that is breathtakingly affecting. It is also all the little bits of religious living in found objects such as amulets and tefillin. It is in the greatness of devotion by the scribes. It is in the wondrous penmanship by one such scribe whose letters were shaped with such clarity and spare elegance, that it surprises and amazes- and this, all on a scrap of scroll from some impossibly tiny tefillin.
We took this side trip with our rabbi, who was able to answer our questions and fill in the gaps. My huge discovery was in learning about and seeing, in the skin, a book, circa early 10th century, called The Aleppo Codex:
The Aleppo Codex is the earliest known Hebrew manuscript comprising the full text of the Bible. It is also the most authoritative, accurate, and sacred source document, both for the biblical text and for its vocalization, cantillation and Massorah.
For me it was like discovering the Rosetta Stone, only infinitely more exciting. As I understand it, previous to this time there is no known codification of vowels and of cantillation. I learned that the codification came much, much later, long after the Torah was written down. This is A Big One.
I was also pleasantly surprised to discover that the jars which held the scrolls found at Qumran were quite pleasing in shape, spare yet elegant and smooth surfaced. I always imagine ancient clay artefacts to be without grace. I stand corrected.
Torah suffuses the atmosphere, alive. The Shrine of the Book satiates the soul. Like a kiss, it is most gratifying. And all its ways are pleasant. And all its paths are peace. Indeed, there is peace in Jerusalem.
I don't want to write about Yad Vashem. While I was standing there, emotionally obliterated by some trees, others tried to soothe me by telling me the memorials at Auschwitz or Washington were worse. And all I could think, was, 'dearest G-d, can it get any worse'?????"
I have always been an emotional coward about memorials to the Shoah. It took me forever to watch "Schindler's List". When I did, I burst into tears at the instance when the chidren's children walked past the graves of the survivors. I found it all insupportable.
Throughout my history growing up I had heard stories, from my grandmother(obm) especially, of my great uncles, her brothers, who had been Polish partisans. I had heard stories, so matter-of-factly told, of my mother and father who had respectively ended up in Siberia and the Gulag as children, in the Russian labour camps. My father and granny and grandfather and other relatives had sojourned in Arkhangelsk. I could not watch a simple film such as "Dr. Zhivago" without noting the cattle cars, and the boiled potatoes, straight out of my granny's remembering. I could barely watch it. And my mother had told me about being transported to Siberia in the cars, and of the people who died in them, the events, and she spoke of it just once. I remember that she played barefoot in the snow.
My family lived in Poland and the Russians came in the night and took everything, their farmland and possessions and animals away from them. I have never known most of my family because they died, either through battles, or through the tragedy of being in the wrong place at the wrong time or for simply being, inconvenient. I have always thought that that was even more humiliating than being targetted as a Jew- to be so insignificant and disposable, to die only for convenience's sake. Just, in the way. To not matter. They became DPs- Displaced Persons.
My granny used to talk of "the war" (WWII). Once in a while, she would speak of her brothers, my great uncles. A younger brother, a partisan. The older brother, who was so bitter because often no one would listen to him, i.e., the Jews- during that terrible time. He was a partisan leader,and my family lived close to Treblinka. They were peasants, they were farmers, they knew the lay of forest and land.
Understand. In my family, rescuing Jews was a footnote in the family history. It was always spoken of casually. And I took it that way- casually. No big deal.
I remember stories from my family about the early days- it was a given that growing up you would stone the houses of Jews and you would harrass; it was a way of life. A given. Yet when it came to rescuing Jews from Treblinka, my great-uncles' answer was: they are human beings.
I heard from my granny that her eldest brother, back in Poland, remained bitter (till the day he died). Remained bitter because there were so many Jews that they tried to rescue before Treblinka who did not believe the partisans. They rescued some but it could never be enough. There is no documentation but I know it to be true, because I grew up with stories way before there was documentation, and even now, my parents don't know about legitimising it, and in a way, why would they want to?
I entered Yad Vashem, the "Avenue of Rightous Gentiles" and I lost it. I looked down at a plaque beneath a fresh tree and dissolved into tears. I could not go farther and did not though I made it into the building, remarked the wall-sized photos of Jews on their hands and knees scrubbing a street while everyone else looked on. I took pictures, waited for the others, and listened to their experience of the Children's Memorial and broke down anew. I don't understand how anyone can bear it. I know that the 'Avenue of Righteous Gentiles' reminded me of the denouement of my family's life, of my great-uncles' stand, of my great-uncles' bravery and bitterness. Of my history.
When Yizkhor comes around, I remember it all. But especially, I am convinced that it is due to the merit of my great-uncles, whom I never knew, that I became a Jew, me who had always felt displaced. I was rescued also. It is a fact.
Brokenness and Beauty
Mines and Thorns
Life In Tzfat
Life in Jerusalem
From the Heights
Where the Ark Stood, Qasrin
On the Road
Ravaged
Cold Comfort
Young Ezra on the Heights
Dancing Trees
Serenity
View From Tzfat
Illumination, Caro Shul
Mama
Josh
Han
Emet
Sammie
Marly
Tan Guy
Socks
Big Daddy
Chaplin
Coffee
Dove
Bosco
Zena
