I had an appointment not too long ago. It might have been with a lawyer, a dentist or a tax preparer. It doesn’t really matter. There was a receptionist there who clearly regretted how long I had to sit in the waiting room, and she began a conversation. She had identified me as “an Orthodox person,” and, looking for something to say, told me that she had recently been to an Orthodox synagogue. I think she said she had attended a bar mitzvah. She made some polite comments about having enjoyed it, about how it had been her first time in such a place. She said, by way of explanation, “I’m Reform.”
“You’re Jewish,” I answered.
She was clearly startled. “What did you say?”
“I said, ‘You’re Jewish.’ You choose the synagogue that speaks to you, but that doesn’t define you. You and I are equally Jewish.”
She started to cry. I am not making this up. There were actual tears on her face. She said, “I didn’t think you would see it that way.”
And so, dear reader, we come to the beginning of this article.
What has she heard in the past, and from whom? How do we – “those Orthodox people” – talk to other Jews, and why? Can we do better, and do we want to?
Every year we move through the seasons of the Jewish year and certain themes recur. One is achdus or Jewish unity – our ability to feel that we are truly “k’ish echad b’lev echad.” This year in particular, we heard cycle after cycle of shiurim inspiring us, begging us, reminding us, beseeching us to harness our shared sorrow and fears, our shared hopes and prayers, as constructively as possible. We know that overlooking this value in the past was not trivial; it led inexorably, painfully, to the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash. We immersed ourselves in the heat of the summer, mirroring the burning that lasted through the 10th of Av. We cried, we still cry, for what is missing, and for our ongoing emptiness in still being without it. We want to commit ourselves to a future without sinas chinam.
This year we have followed events in Israel with increasing concern and isolation, watching the world’s reaction with trepidation, finding that our confidence in “things getting better” can be weaker than we wish. While we know that we can rely, truly, only on the One in Charge, we also feel deeply and profoundly that members of the Jewish community need to rely on each other.
We read, yet again, the story of Kamtza and bar Kamtza. We learn the lessons, and know that we wouldn’t have said, or done, or not said, and done, what the characters in the story did. Do we know what we would have said or done instead?
We are approaching the Yamim Noraim with their attendant themes of fresh beginnings, personal goals and improved behaviors. We look back at our shortcomings and hope they will not trap us. We prepare ourselves for a day of Divine judgement, and know that we will be assessed in the same way we look at others. We want to learn to set a better pattern in our interactions bein adam l’chaveiro.
What especially do we wish to say to Jews like the receptionist, who may not even be able to imagine that we are truly interested in dialogue?
I have been thinking about some possible ways to get the conversation moving forward. If you are interested in that goal, I hope you will read further.
In a conversation, all participants have contributions to make. We in the frum world certainly have much to teach those who are not yet here, but let us not confuse “outreach” with truly “reaching out.” If our message is one-sided, and has only to do with what “we” can offer “them,” we are not showing achdus –we are showing condescension. Let us get better at asking to learn from others. The non-frum world, for example, has a great talent for political awareness and social action. Are these skills we might wish to acquire, even if the issues we support are not always identical? Can we move past the message that “I want to show you a real Shabbos,” and begin to be open to hearing that there may be important areas in which we can grow?