The legacy stops here
I was speaking to a friend of mine one time – a Jewish father of a grown boy. I asked him if he would mind if his son married a non-Jew and his response was, “He knows who he is.”
It had this omnipresent tone to it, even though in reality the man I was speaking to was pretty hip and although he was Jewish (almost obviously), his Jewishness never seemed to be top of mind with him or his wife when we gathered for a meal or celebration.
My brother insists on writing me about this re-circumcision and my obligation to give Tin the same legacy I inherited, Judaism, but I wonder about that. In 1985, my father died of a massive heart attack. I know now that if he had a stent installed like my two brothers have, he would have survived his heart problems. Nevertheless, I would go to the synagogue to say kaddish for him. This is the prayer that elevates your loved one closer to god (Jews don’t believe in hell, there is near god and absence of god). [I think I’ve told this story many times before but it bears repeating.] To say Kaddish there has to be what is called a minion – a gathering of 10 men – and there I was, maybe months into driving to the synagogue before work and school and going after work and school and then driving across the Causeway home and I arrive one night to nine men and me. No kaddish said aloud.
I said fuck it.
Then as I was thinking about raising my own child, I thought about having a boy, I thought about it a lot because of many reasons, the weird dynamics that I had seen between my husbands and their mothers, and because of all things in the world that I could not fathom it was my son ever saying in shul, “Thank you god for not making me a woman.” This prayer comes from a time when women were considered chattel. I ask you does this religion need refreshing? Amen.
So when I started going to reform synagogues after being raised orthodox, I thought I would find the new new Judaism that would fit my modern day mentality but I did not. Much like the Catholics who still prefer the mass in Latin, I longed for the books that opened backwards, I pined for the male cantors voice chanting the prayers in Sephardic melody no less, and I missed the Torah carrying and my father holding up his tallit to cover my and my sister’s heads. My father sang better than most of the cantors I’ve heard and Sephardic melody is something that goes to my soul especially sung by my grandfather from Turkey and my father’s Spanish/Turkish roots. I had a nostalgia for that old time religion that I was brought up in and so to me the reform synagogue had gone too many steps away from the tactile and rich traditions that are deep at the core of Judaism. And there I was adrift, no way to re-enter the religion.
As I’ve gotten older I’ve realized that Judaism is my legacy, but it’s not the tradition I care to hand down to my child. Tin will know what it means to be a Jew but he will be part of a new world spirituality that doesn’t see a hoary bearded wise man sitting on a stone throne who deliberates judgment – instead his cosmic understand, I hope, would be fluid and mysterious and universal, and Tin himself would not learn to sit in judgment on anyone else’s belief or cast aspersions on what one ought to be doing or how one ought to be believing.
October 9th, 2013 at 10:19 am
I go to a Reform Synagogue where the books open backwards and there is a (male) cantor chanting (athough most melodies are not Sephardic). The Torah is carried (at least on High Holidays and Simchat Torah). The synagogue is inclusive of interfaith, inter-racial, gay and lesbian people, and much more. Last year we held a four session course entitled “Do I Believe in God?” Reform Judaism is in constant flux as it attempts to honor history and and tradition while at the same time engaging with contemporary life.
October 9th, 2013 at 11:22 am
Thanks Anne – my only experience with a reform synagogue was when I married my first husband who converted from catholicism to judaism. As many things happen in life, things resonate with you depending on where you are in life. Having been brought up all my life in the comfort of being an Orthodox Jew, the youngest of six children, and being Sephardic, I was not ready to leave all of that aside. When I went with my then husband, it was for him to have entry because the men davening with a teffilin or my fathers and older brothers who wore tzizits was just a little too much for his sensibility. I was in the service for the high holidays with a female cantor and harpist playing and no one wearing yamulkas and I went into the bathroom and locked myself in the stall and cried.
Of course, now I know I would have a radically different perception. I would welcome a woman leading, chanting and where the LGBT community was not only welcome but included. My reservation in any synagogue right now is my son. I know of no other families in my area that have an African American child, and though I don’t know for sure, I doubt any of the congregations that I would be interested in going to – Gates of Prayer or Touro – have many people of color in them.
A lot of what I think about and write about (transracialparenting.com) is about race and parenting. My Black son comes home to a white mom who is going to teach him about religion and spirituality, but he doesn’t have to live out his young years in white spaces – school, temple – so everything we do is always looking to balance this aspect of our lives. And I’ve found sometimes culture comes before pedagogy, religion and even comfort.
I was very interested in what Rodger Kamenetz described in The Jew In The Lotus that I believe is now called ALEPH. I tried to find some aspect of it here in New Orleans but didn’t.
October 9th, 2013 at 2:12 pm
I have been meaning to read The Jew in the Lotus for many years. I wish I could reach up and pull it off my shelf, but most of my books are in storage right now. I myself am a convert to Judaism (from a nominally Protestant background). The reason I converted is that I had long felt that I belonged among Jews, and when I met my partner, that sort of clinched it. The synagogue I spoke of is University Synagogue in Los Angeles, which, for many years, was considered by many to be TOO secular. My partner is the music director there, so I tended to see it differently. My leanings are progressive Judaism and Buddhism (not unusual among progressive Jews). Our Rabbi Emeritus (Allen Freehling) now lives in New Orleans, and I believe he may be loosely affiliated with a synagogue there, and has taught a course at a Jewish Community Center in NOLA. He has always been very active in social justice pursuits, and is as liberal as they come. It is true that people of color are definitely in the jewish minority, even in progressive Judaism. But that is changing. I found this link that mentions a class in taught in New Orleans. http://www.crescentcityjewishnews.com/melton-adult-mini-school-announces-new-courses/
Personally, I believe that religious beliefs are a personal matter and should not be imposed. I know this may be quite different from what you grew up with. With my own children (from previous hetero marriage), I felt that they should experience more than one religion (which they have), and they should find their own spiritual path. My stepson, on the other hand, is in (Reform) Rabbinical School, and is, in my opinion VERY observant for a Reform Rabbi. People tend to assume that he was influenced by his mother (my partner) to be religious, which couldn’t be further from the truth. He just seemed to take to it, and would probably not agree with ME that children should not be expected to embrace a specific theology.
October 14th, 2013 at 8:35 pm
Anne – I never felt when I was growing up that I was being indoctrinated because as you now know Judaism is cultural as well as religious so it was just what we did and how we did it. Try to find that Jew in the Lotus – I think you will enjoy it and really gain some insights into Judaism that escaped me for most of my life. I want Tin to have a sense of it all as well – I don’t want to push Judaism on him, but I want him to be grounded in where these beliefs come from as well as open up an Eastern way of looking at God to him. As you said, this is a personal journey, but there is also the joy of sharing customs and rituals together which is what stands out for me in my Jewish upbringing. In hindsight, my father was an authoritative Jewish figure and I have watched some of my brothers follow the same path – it has made some of the family become more enmeshed around Judaism and some of us have run for the hills! Ha.
I will look up Allen Freehling and see if I can find out if he is affiliated with a synagogue here. Thanks for the information.
Appreciate your responses, R