Oppression, Conversion & Fitting In
Always amuses and fascinates me how synchronist life is if you pay attention. I was just talking with someone about how, as a convert - I find myself being shunned by Jews. I used to get teased, taunted and beat up as a kid all the time - so I am right 99% of the time when I sense I am being talked about. Things like I will never be a REAL Jew or I am a wanna-be. Or they question my reasons for converting. And today I opened my email and read the article below.
In my life I have faced issues like not feeling like a REAL woman because of my infertility and endocrine disorder.
Or because I never dated a lot nor pursued men like other girls.
Or how I am not a REAL mother because I had 12+ years of infertility treatment to get pregnant; despite 2 abortions when I was younger.
Or I will never be a REAL NYer - even tho I have lived here more than 1/2 my life and never felt more comfortable or at home in place in my life, from day one.
In my late-marriage - I was not allowed to have a strong opinion. I had them but I couldn't speak them or share them. Once in a while, with someone I trusted, it would come out. When I started this blog I refused to blog about politics - I just didn't want to go there. I usually went with the prevailing tide and kept my tongue around people with stronger & louder opinions than myself. Those days are over as are the days of feeling bad about my interest in Judaism simply because my ex-husband was against anything I was for and I was trying to maintain Beit Shalom by repressing who I was a person in order to survive.
Reality is a relative term in my book and I won't get into a long tome about the nature of reality. Suffice it to say I spent a long time feeling uncomfortable in my own skin but I do feel comfortable in Judaism. The music is something I have known for a long time but I am still learning the steps.
I believe what is important is what is in your heart & soul, not what other people think.... though I admit it does make me uneasy sometimes.
Embracing The Stranger
As Madricha Ruchanit (Religious Mentor) at an Orthodox synagogue, I work with many individuals in the process of converting to Judaism. One of the biggest obstacles these prospective converts face is an often unexpressed but tangible sense of rejection by the community they seek to join. Perhaps they look different, or they cannot keep up with the choreography that regular shul-goers take for granted.
Why did this man known only as the Ben-Isha Yisraelit (son of a Jewish woman) instigate a fight with another Jew? The Midrash [Leviticus Rabbah 32:3] presents a vivid picture of the events preceding this altercation. The Ben-Isha Yisraelit, whose father was Egyptian and whose mother was from the tribe of Dan, attempted to pitch his tent in the quarters of Dan. He is rejected by his presumptive tribesman and told that since tribal affiliation is determined through the father, he has no place amongst the tribe of Dan. Even though the Ben-Isha Yisraelit clearly saw himself as Jewish, others were unwilling to accept him. In fact, according to Rashi, he was the first child of intermarriage in Jewish history. The Ben-Isha Yisraelit takes his case to Moses, thinking that perhaps because Moses also grew up as an outsider in Egypt, he will have empathy for his predicament. However, Moses ruled in favor of Dan, and the Ben-Isha Yisraelit, angry and dejected, responds by blaspheming God’s name.
Imagine his utter disappointment in humankind. He had a religious crisis, and lashed out with a religious response. As a sympathetic reader, I cannot help but feel disconcerted by this narrative. I am not excusing his crime — after all, the Ben-Isha Yisraelit violated the prohibition of desecrating God’s name, a law stated explicitly just a few verses earlier. I am unsettled, however, by the community’s seeming lack of compassion. And in fact, as the careful reader of this narrative will note, the Torah seems unsettled by this as well.
In announcing the punishment of the Ben-Isha Yisraelit, God commands Bnei Yisrael, the Israelites: “Let all those who heard [the blasphemy] place their hands upon his head, and let the entire congregation stone him.” Generally, the placing of hands, smicha, is a symbolic gesture whereby one transfers sin onto another. Such is the case with sacrifices: “He shall place his hands upon the head of the burnt sacrifice, and it shall be accepted from him, to atone for him” [Leviticus 1:4].
Similarly, on Yom Kippur, the High Priest places both his hands on the head of a live goat — the scapegoat, transferring the iniquities of Bnei Yisrael onto its head, before it is sent to perish in the desert [Lev. 16:21-22]. The parallel is striking. The people who witnessed the blasphemer, most likely the very people who banished him from their midst, were obligated to atone for their lack of compassion by means of smicha. The Ben-Isha Yisraelit died for his transgression, but he also became the scapegoat, sent to his death because of the sins of his neighbors.
That the community was at least partially responsible for the sin of the Ben-Isha Yisraelit is further evidenced by the juxtaposition of this story to the upcoming parshiot that describe our responsibility to help integrate the lonely and downtrodden. The Torah emphasizes our obligation to take care of the impoverished, the stranger, the widow and the orphan.
The Ben-Isha Yisraelit the paradigmatic outsider. He is someone who does not fit in, someone out of sync with societal expectations and with the natural rhythms of life. The story of the Ben-Isha Yisraelit reminds us that our community can be a harsh place for anyone who looks out of place, who speaks a different tongue, or whose family structure is not traditional. Perhaps if the community had embraced the Ben-Isha Yisraelit, rather than pushed him away – if they had welcomed him, sat next to him in shul, shown him the correct place in the siddur – he might not have been compelled to blaspheme God’s name.
In my life I have faced issues like not feeling like a REAL woman because of my infertility and endocrine disorder.
Or because I never dated a lot nor pursued men like other girls.
Or how I am not a REAL mother because I had 12+ years of infertility treatment to get pregnant; despite 2 abortions when I was younger.
Or I will never be a REAL NYer - even tho I have lived here more than 1/2 my life and never felt more comfortable or at home in place in my life, from day one.
In my late-marriage - I was not allowed to have a strong opinion. I had them but I couldn't speak them or share them. Once in a while, with someone I trusted, it would come out. When I started this blog I refused to blog about politics - I just didn't want to go there. I usually went with the prevailing tide and kept my tongue around people with stronger & louder opinions than myself. Those days are over as are the days of feeling bad about my interest in Judaism simply because my ex-husband was against anything I was for and I was trying to maintain Beit Shalom by repressing who I was a person in order to survive.
Reality is a relative term in my book and I won't get into a long tome about the nature of reality. Suffice it to say I spent a long time feeling uncomfortable in my own skin but I do feel comfortable in Judaism. The music is something I have known for a long time but I am still learning the steps.
I believe what is important is what is in your heart & soul, not what other people think.... though I admit it does make me uneasy sometimes.
Embracing The Stranger
As Madricha Ruchanit (Religious Mentor) at an Orthodox synagogue, I work with many individuals in the process of converting to Judaism. One of the biggest obstacles these prospective converts face is an often unexpressed but tangible sense of rejection by the community they seek to join. Perhaps they look different, or they cannot keep up with the choreography that regular shul-goers take for granted.
Whatever the reason, finding a comfortable place within our community is difficult, and the pain that converts feel at being denied acceptance is acute and often goes unnoticed.The frustrations of those on the fringes of Judaism are not a modern-day phenomenon. It is a dilemma as old as Moses himself. Take the disturbing narrative of “the blasphemer” as recounted in this week’s Torah portion: “The son of an Israelite woman went out, and he was the son of the Egyptian man among Israel.” This man, for reasons unstated in the text, gets into a heated argument with another Israelite and blasphemes the name of God. He is brought by witnesses to Moses for adjudication, after which God instructs the people to “lean their hands on his head,” commanding the entire nation to stone him to death.
Why did this man known only as the Ben-Isha Yisraelit (son of a Jewish woman) instigate a fight with another Jew? The Midrash [Leviticus Rabbah 32:3] presents a vivid picture of the events preceding this altercation. The Ben-Isha Yisraelit, whose father was Egyptian and whose mother was from the tribe of Dan, attempted to pitch his tent in the quarters of Dan. He is rejected by his presumptive tribesman and told that since tribal affiliation is determined through the father, he has no place amongst the tribe of Dan. Even though the Ben-Isha Yisraelit clearly saw himself as Jewish, others were unwilling to accept him. In fact, according to Rashi, he was the first child of intermarriage in Jewish history. The Ben-Isha Yisraelit takes his case to Moses, thinking that perhaps because Moses also grew up as an outsider in Egypt, he will have empathy for his predicament. However, Moses ruled in favor of Dan, and the Ben-Isha Yisraelit, angry and dejected, responds by blaspheming God’s name.
Imagine his utter disappointment in humankind. He had a religious crisis, and lashed out with a religious response. As a sympathetic reader, I cannot help but feel disconcerted by this narrative. I am not excusing his crime — after all, the Ben-Isha Yisraelit violated the prohibition of desecrating God’s name, a law stated explicitly just a few verses earlier. I am unsettled, however, by the community’s seeming lack of compassion. And in fact, as the careful reader of this narrative will note, the Torah seems unsettled by this as well.
In announcing the punishment of the Ben-Isha Yisraelit, God commands Bnei Yisrael, the Israelites: “Let all those who heard [the blasphemy] place their hands upon his head, and let the entire congregation stone him.” Generally, the placing of hands, smicha, is a symbolic gesture whereby one transfers sin onto another. Such is the case with sacrifices: “He shall place his hands upon the head of the burnt sacrifice, and it shall be accepted from him, to atone for him” [Leviticus 1:4].
Similarly, on Yom Kippur, the High Priest places both his hands on the head of a live goat — the scapegoat, transferring the iniquities of Bnei Yisrael onto its head, before it is sent to perish in the desert [Lev. 16:21-22]. The parallel is striking. The people who witnessed the blasphemer, most likely the very people who banished him from their midst, were obligated to atone for their lack of compassion by means of smicha. The Ben-Isha Yisraelit died for his transgression, but he also became the scapegoat, sent to his death because of the sins of his neighbors.
That the community was at least partially responsible for the sin of the Ben-Isha Yisraelit is further evidenced by the juxtaposition of this story to the upcoming parshiot that describe our responsibility to help integrate the lonely and downtrodden. The Torah emphasizes our obligation to take care of the impoverished, the stranger, the widow and the orphan.
The Ben-Isha Yisraelit the paradigmatic outsider. He is someone who does not fit in, someone out of sync with societal expectations and with the natural rhythms of life. The story of the Ben-Isha Yisraelit reminds us that our community can be a harsh place for anyone who looks out of place, who speaks a different tongue, or whose family structure is not traditional. Perhaps if the community had embraced the Ben-Isha Yisraelit, rather than pushed him away – if they had welcomed him, sat next to him in shul, shown him the correct place in the siddur – he might not have been compelled to blaspheme God’s name.
Each individual has immeasurable potential, and oppressing the outsider crushes potential human greatness.In the words of the Rabbi Naftali Zvi Yehuda of Berlin (the Netziv):
“Never underestimate the human potential of the stranger. Never forget that he or she could also be destined for greatness and, hence, never be responsible for the suppression of another’s potential. Rather, open your heart to the stranger in love so that you can enable him to flourish and realize his potential.”Sara Hurwitz is Madricha Ruchanit (Religious Mentor) at the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale.
Comments
One day, when Eliyahu comes, things will be very different and many will be red faced with shame for what they have done to others, far more Jewish at heart than they could ever be.
I totally agree with you.
As much as society gives a lot of lip service to being non-judgmental - the actions speak differently.
Hashem knows my heart and heart of other comments. Let people question my motives, in my case - I don't care what they think... though, like I said, I would be lying if I said it didn't make me uncomfortable.
Shabbat Shalom!