46B
Friday, September 28, 1984
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Continued from Page 44
found myself shokeling during the
Amidah, the service began feeling
familiar and Hebrew stopped seeming
completely foreign and impossible.
After many weeks, I could even sing
part of Adon Olam.
My parents found it curious and
perhaps threatening. For me, each
step seemed progress away from the
terrible religious void of my past. For
one who knew nothing, doing and
understanding the prayer over bread
is a rich achievement. Honoring the
holidays, lighting Shabbat candles,
feeling my way has been slow, not al-
ways certain. I have never gone faster
than felt comfortable — my "conver-
sion" has been gradual —I wear a kipa
when I read from a siddur or Chumash
outside of services and kiss these holy
books when I close them, not because I
suppose I identified with
ews to some degree
felt no deep
connection. I was only
ally Jewish no matter
ow much history I read.
— Lev Raphael
think I should, but because I have cho-
sen to acknowledge them as sacred and
the act itself is beautiful. The impulse
comes from deep inside where a sense
of reverence has been growing in me.
Almost every service I attend gives me
more knowledge, more beauty, more
belief. Prayer, a once-foreign act, now
enriches my life.
I never bothered learning my full
Hebrew name until my year in the
Co-op. I was a Levi, my father said:
Reuven Lev ben Shlomo ha-Levi. Up at
the bima, saying the blessings, I have
felt the march of Jewish time, have felt
myself a part of it.
ordechai Nisan, a visiting Israeli
scholar at MSU for a week,
lodged in Hillel's guest room and dined
with the Co-op. He spoke movingly one
Shabbaton of Shabbat in Israel involv-
ing everyone, being a differend kind of
time. As he spoke, I remembered the
Shabbat prayer, "Be pleased with our
rest." At dinner I'd told him about my
background, or lack of it, and stumbl-
ing through Birkat HaMazon (the
grace after meals), I felt him consider-
ing me. When he left two days later, he
said, "I hope you find what you're look-
ing for."
Too Much
. BY GERSHEN KAUFMAN
he Beginning.
T
As a young boy, I sat in the Or-
thodox synagogue we always went to
which stood among decaying buildings
on Old Broadway, in New York City. I
remember the long dark sanctuary
hall with its rows of silent wooden
benches waiting in witness. I re-
member the vaulted ceiling stretching
to meet the upper gallery where the
women sat, where my mother gazed
down at me, smiling when I kissed the
Torah or frowning when I wasn't pay-
ing attention. I remember the musty
smell of old books and old wooden
benches. Even when I was much older,
shivers ran along my spine whenever I
stepped inside an old shul. I remember
the . ancient-looking men, their faces
care-worn, their shoulders heavy from
many burdens carried. They had come
over from Germany during the war,
my father had told me. They were ref-
ugees who spoke only Yiddish, a lan-
guage I did not understand. I had re-
fused to learn.
I remember watching the men
who gathered there to pray on the
High Holy Days — that's when we
went there. Yom Kippur Jews, I guess
they would call us now, though my
parents professed to be more. I re-
member watching the old men da-
wn chanting their prayers in an an-
cient language I felt estranged from. I
wondered what it all meant, what they
were doing, why we were there. We
were Jewish, I had been told — that's
why we were there. That was all the
explanation given. Jews were doing
this for 2,000 years.
The men would chant silently or
loudly, would sway as they prayed,
some with their heads hidden beneath
an embroidered tallis. I remained
silent, ever watchful.
The words were strange to me.
Even later when I could read English, I
still did not understand the meaning of
what we did there.
I wanted to go outside to play with
the other children but often my father
insisted that I sit beside him. My place -
was there; he spoke the words harshly,
his jaw clenched. I sat and felt resent-
ful.
When the Torah was carried
around, my father made me go up and
touch it, but I did not know what
touching this ancient scroll meant..
Outside, we passed a candy store
and I wanted money to buy something.
My father told me that we could not
carry money or buy anything because
it was Rosh Hashanah. But my
father's laundry and cleaning store
remained open for business. I could not
understand the contradiction. Being
Jewish only confused me.
Being Jewish was a collection of
rules, both prescriptions and proscrip-
tions, which made no sense to me. I felt
no connection through them with
either the Jewish people of yesterday
or of today. I was Jewish in a non-
Jewish world and I felt alien in both.
I remember one day walking to
shul with my father. He handed me his
tallis and siddur to carry for him. Feel-
ing uncomfortable, I gave them back.
He ordered me to carry them, saying it
was an honor. But I felt embarrassed
and hoped no one would see me.
I remember once as a very young
boy how the rabbi, dressed in gleaming
white robes and a tall rounded hat,
stopped and spoke to me in Yiddish.
Soon, I would begin cheder or so I
gathered from him. The important
men accompanying him towered about
me, smiling knowingly, while my
father beamed. I cowered in fear of
them.
I remember one Yom Kippur play-
ing a table game at home with my
older brother during the afternoon
break from services. When my father
came home and discovered us, he
scolded me for violating that holy day
but said nothing to my brother. Being
Jewish made no sense to me but in-
stead filled me with a deepening re-
sentment.
F riends.
I grew up in the shadow of an-
other world, another time. I listened,
attentive, to their stories of the old
country. The beatings. The horrors.
What life was really like for a Jew in
Eastern Europe. How grateful I ought
to feel, to be living in America. When
they were hardly older than children
they had come here to make a new life.
I was that new life.
But I was torn between their
world and this one. I was born here. I
was an American — or was I?.
Why hadn't they kept more of the
traditions, the observances? I would
ask to understand. My father's busi-
ness was the reason, I was told. He had
to keep the store open, so I never ex-
perienced the meaning of Shabbat, a
Sabbath unto the Lord.
I wanted to be American. They
wanted me to be Jewish. I wanted to
belong somewhere. Who I was, was
thrown into conflict.
When I brought friends home to
visit, the only important question ever
asked was, Are they Jewish?" That's
all that mattered to them. And I re-
sented it.
I could only taste their old world. I
could not belong to it. I was of this new
world. My destiny lay here, not there.
Being Jewish was a perpetual con-
flict.
GERSHEN
KAUFMAN
was educated
at Columbia
Unitiereity and received his
Ph.D. in Clinical
Psychology from the
university of Rochester.
Professor in the Counseling
Center at Michigan State
University, he is the author
of Shame: The Power of
Caring and also Dynamics
of Power: Building A
Competent Self which was
written in collaboration with
Lev Raphael.
Passover.
i'
What few traditions we did ob-
serve as a family remain with me as
joyous memories. When Passover was
coming, excitement filled me. The get-
ting ready was like an expectancy soon
to burst. I loved the holiday foods and
helped my mother cook them. In the
years we gathered at my grand-
parents' home on the Lower East Side
of Manhattan. I remember climbing
up the high stairs, almost racing.
Upon entering, I was greeted with a
kiss from Bubbeh and a knish to eat.
Zaydeh led the Seder; it was done,
Orthodox-fashion, all in Hebrew. We
sat about the great table and I felt ex-
. cited to be there. Though I knew no
Hebrew and spoke no Yiddish, I still
felt somehow a part of it all. And steal-
ing the afikomen was always the high-
light of the evening. Later, when I was
older and could read Hebrew as well as
understand the meaning of what we
did, I participated just a bit more. It
was always a happy time for me, made
happier by the wine which eventually
sent me off into slumber.
When I was older, the second
Seder was at my aunt's house. The
family and children all gathered there.
It was a bright, festive time with
knishes for everyone. Yiddish songs
were sung. Laughter and gaiety filled
our hearts. And I played with my
cousins until the wine swept us away.
On Passover, being Jewish was a
joy.
Then there was Chanukah. We
always traveled to • my grandparents'
for the traditional lighting of the can-
dles on the first night. And I was prom-
ised Chanukahgelt by Zaydeh, which I
never received because it was a holi-
day, or so he claimed. But on the other
nights we lit candles at home and ate
latkes and father gave me Chanukah
gelt. That was all the observance we
made. Still, I liked that festive time of
year, looked forward to the holiday's
approach, and remember it fondly.
Passover and Chanukah we ob-
served. And we went to shul on the
High Holy Days. That was how we
lived our Jewishness.
It wasn't enough somehow, or
maybe it was too much.
,
H ebrew
School.
In third grade, I began cheder.
The Jewish boys in our school went to
study with the rabbi of our old shul. I
felt afraid of him. I couldn't under-
stand what he said in his mixed Yid-
dish and broken English. I remember
sitting beside him as he swayed
rhythmically in his seat. Slowly, he
taught me to read in Hebrew from the
-siddur, but no one taught me the
meaning of those ancient words, those
Entrances to Holiness.
What I learned there I learned to
do by rote. No one taught me the mean-
ing of prayer.
Two years later my parents
enrolled me in formal religious school.
Now I would be going to Hebrew
school four days a week after public
school and also on Sunday.
I learned' about Jewish history
and the Bible, about the holidays and
festivals. We studied Hebrew and
memorized letters and names and
events and rituals. We learned the
rules and observances imbedded in
being Jewish but I did not learn how to
approach the Holy One. They taught
us to recite prayers, but not how to
pray. They taught us what being
Jewish was about, but not how to enter
the Jewish experience of God.
I had to attend that school. I had
no choice. I remember one Sunday
when my sister surprised us all with a
visit: She and her husband had moved
to Texas the previous year. It was
Sunday morning and I pleaded with
my parents to let me stay home just
this once. I had always felt close to my
sister. They refused and off I went.
Standing at the street corner waiting