Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Aliyah in Question

ARZA (Zionist branch of the Reform movement) recently asked me to prepare a short reflection on the issue of Aliyah as a person who has visited Israel many times but thus far decided not to move my life to Israel. I struggled with the prompt. I had a hard time coming up with the Jewish/Zionist/Israel inspiration to really present anything too profound. I tried.

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Questions, and the search for their answers shape liberal Jewish identity.

Some of the significant questions include, “How will I celebrate Shabbat? Will I celebrate the second day of Rosh Hashana or Sukkot? Will I wear a yarmulke? A Tallis? These decisions define Jewish observance and practice.

And then there are the big questions- on which ideas, lifestyle, and identity are founded. Did God write the Torah? What does God want from me? Why is there such suffering in the world? And after my first visit to Israel, a semester-long program at the age of 16, I began asking new questions- about Israel and Aliyah.

Should I make Aliyah? How can Israel be “home” if I reside abroad? How can I be a Zionist if I don’t agree with some of the actions of the Israeli government? Can I make Aliyah, and become truly “Israeli” without serving the required term in the army? Can I exist fully as a Jew living outside of Israel?

Experiences inform my grappling with the answers.

I delayed starting college for a year to spend a year experiencing Israel- learning the language, culture and country of the Jewish people. I attended the enormous memorial ceremony honoring Israel’s champion for peace, Yitzchak Rabin, in the Tel Aviv square now named after him. The songs and desperate cheers for peace poured forth from Israel’s youth. I too raised their banners demanding, “Peace Now!” I also attended an Orthodox Zionist youth movement retreat featuring an impassioned lecture by the famous “refusenik” Natan Sharansky. I grew to love my Druze roommates’ hospitality, personalities and delicious cooking. I prayed in Jerusalem, swam in Eilat, floated in the Dead Sea, perspired on the Kinneret, partied in Tel Aviv, and learned that in Haifa’s downtown market, if you don’t speak Hebrew fluently, English won’t help you, but Russian or Amharic will. My Israel-acquired high on Jewish life and learning carried into my first months in college and still remains. The possibility of Aliyah comes to mind often and occasionally provokes some online exploration of the logistics; a perusal of Aliyah resources on the Jewish Agency’s webpages.

Grounded in a constantly challenged and evolving identity as a Reform/Progressive Jew, my “Aliyah?” question looms large. For now, I remain at home in the US, longing still for home in Eretz Yisrael.

I identify with Yehuda HaLevi’s lamentation, “Libi B’Mizrach V’Anochi B’Sof HaMaarav.” I read author David Grossman’s eulogy for his son Uri, killed in battle during Israel’s war in Lebanon in 2006, and share in the grief of his family and his country, even from ocean’s away. I hear Naomi Shemer’s voice, “Hazarnu el borot Hamayim laShuk v’la kikar” and see Jerusalem’s splendid stones, bustling alley-ways and abundant street vendors. I listen on, “Shofar kore bhar habayit b’ir ha-atikah”, and hear simultaneously the shofar's blast from before the kotel and the imam’s to prayer from just beyond it. Israel captivates my soul.

I aspire to vacation on Israel’s beaches of the Mediterranean rather than on the popular party beaches of Cancun. Checking The New York Times morning headlines always follows a look through Haaretz or The Jerusalem Post online, or both. Emails about Israel speakers, events and advocacy flood my inbox. Israeli artists dominate my music collection. I’ve accumulated a modest and yet diverse library of Israeli literature, history and politics. Israel is part of my consciousness.

And still, I’m not sure I’m ready to serve in the army. I’m not sure I’m ready to leave my family so far behind and to make the inevitable adjustments. I’m not yet committed to building my life and future in Israel rather than in the states. But, perhaps someday sooner or later I will be. It certainly remains a question.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Welcome to Limmud NY

Welcome to a one-of-a-kind conference of Jews. Welcome to a Jewish model helping to revolutionize the Jewish world across the country and around the globe.
Limmud NY 2007 didn't feature big screens or high-paid performers. Participants' badges didn't display a dozen boastful add-on ribbons and name tags didn't indicate your college or profession, whether you went to Harvard or SUNY, or worked at a clothing store or were a high-up at Goldman and Sachs. You didn't know who you were talking to or what your fellow participant had accomplished, or what high paying, status indicative title they held in their day-to-day life. You had to talk to them first. All you knew, until you ate lunch with, sat in a session next to, or stopped to chat in the halls with a fellow program-goer was that they probably cared. You don't go to Limmud unless you care.

A weekend full of sessions and workshops included URJ educator Jan Katzew's articulation of religious reform throughout Jewish history, Yitz and Blu Greenberg's stories of inter and intra religious dialogue as Orthodox Jews, and Joel Grishaver's cartoon telling of Berachot 27a and b and more. Shabbat offerings ranged from a thoroughly energetic renewal service with a guitar and bass to a traditional davening with mechitza. The evenings featured performances by little-known Jewish musicians from around the city and a black Hassid rapper named "Y-Love". The trans-generational "Late Night Shake Down" brought dozens- college students and grandmas; orthodox, conservative, reform, recontructionist, renewal and various combinations of the above at once- to the bar and then the dance floor to release after grueling days of debate and discussion on the past, present and future of the Jewish people.

If you're at Limmud you probably don't fit the typical New York Jewish stereotypes. You don't pay multiple thousands of dollars to belong to a Reform or Conservative synagogue where you mingle in the multi-million dollar, newly renovated lobby on the one or two holiest days of the year. And you certainly don't prance around in a holier-than-thou black suit or slightly too tall fidora. At the conference, many Limmud-ers went to Shabbat services while others went to a documentary film on the Jewish community of Morocco. Some woke up early to put on tefillin and a few professed their devout atheism. Some wore a kippa and tzizit and some didn't. Some flipped on their lights on Friday night, and others kept the bathroom light on. All came searching for a community which would inspire them and challenge them to try something new, think outside their box and ultimately nourish their appetitite for Jewish learning and life.

So what does it take to put on a Limmud NY? What's the formula for creating such a communtiy? It's not millions of dollars, posh offices and dozens of directors. It's a cadre of volunteers, activisits and motivated leaders giving of their time and energy for the sake of the Jewish people. Limmud only has two full-time professionals! Remarkable.

Limmud-ers see Judaism's challenges ahead and take them on. They recognize the diversity of the Jewish community and embrace rather than slander it. Growing to 2500 strong in the UK, 800+ in NY and spreading to cities like Paris, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Istanbul, Limmud brings together much that is too often divided in our Jewish community; stressing Talmud Torah as if it answered to a Soloveitchik and promoting "I-Thou" relationships as if it were fashioned after Buber. It's not a substitute for synagogues, religious schools and JCC's, but rather a network for those seeking to re-energize them- those willing to join forces to build a sustainable Jewish community which will meet the needs of our times and remain relevant in our world.

I'm in. Are you?

( limmudny.org; limmud.org)