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JULY 20 • 2023 | 7

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“Scholar”continued from page 4

the highest level of tikkun 
olam? (By the way, I am told 
that some of my ongoing 
Jewish angst about home and 
office-related operations are 
“so last year” … I hope that 
is so!)
With every new term, I was 
privileged to meet and work 
with smart and talented board 
members. I confess that at 
times I rolled my eyes at yet 
another meeting notice, and I 
blocked my Zoom screen for 
an occasional snooze, but not 
too often.
Each year, my shared 
experiences with all of my 
comrades, both lay and 
professional, made me more 
committed to our beloved 
agency and our sacred work.
So, now I roll off knowing 
that JFS will continue to be 
a great place at which to 
volunteer and work, knowing 
that all of you will steward 
our JFS through good and 
challenging times in its service 
to the Jewish community. You 
will continue to ensure that 
JFS earns its laurels as Detroit’s 
flagship Jewish human service 
agency and as a reliable leader 
and partner to other area 
agencies. You will rock it!
 But, for all the time and 
volunteer work I may have 
given to JFS, of what I am 
most certain is that I received 
and learned even more than 
I gave. 
Thank you for that 
opportunity.
I will miss you.
I will see you around! 

Perry Ohren is CEO of Jewish Family 

Service.

“I changed my pronouns,” 
he said, “from ‘them’ to 
‘us.’”
In the midst of his 
conversion process, a 
professor had asked him 
to contribute a paper to a 
journal on Jewish ethics.
“I suddenly realized I 
wasn’t writing about Jewish 
ethics,” he said. “I was 
writing about my ethics. 
I was writing in the first 
person singular and plural, 
‘We have a point of view.’ 
That was the biggest signal 
for me; I made a shift to an 
internal perspective, not an 
external one.”
That shift informed how 
he thought about the rise 
in antisemitism. Smith said 
being part of the Jewish 
people actually made him 
less worried and less afraid.

REALISTIC OPTIMISM
Smith’s optimistic view of 
the state of Jews circa 2023 
does not, he emphasized, 
lack awareness of what 
antisemitism is and how it 
breeds.
“First of all, I don’t have 
any respect for antisemites,” 
he said. “Whether they are 
overt, angry ideological 
antisemites or whether they 
are under-the-table quiet 
types, I don’t respect them 
enough to waste my time 
on them.”
The communal impulse 
to hide or grow defensive, 
understandable as it is, is 
exactly the wrong one, he 
said.
“We need to be out 

in the world. We need 
to talk about the values 
of Judaism. We need to 
espouse what we have to 
offer to the world because 
it is beautiful. It’s good. It’s 
old, as in wise and old. We 
have nothing to fear and 
nothing to hide.”
Incorporating the word 
“we” in his language is 
no small thing for Smith. 
It’s the culmination of a 
journey he began at age 13.
“I have never felt safer,” 
he said. “I have never felt 
more protected. I have 16 
million new friends who 
understand the world the 
same way that I understand 
it.”
Smith, of all people, 
cannot be accused of 
underestimating the 
dangers.
“If we know one thing 
about antisemitism,” he 
said, “it can result in 
the genocide of Jewish 
people. We know that as an 
empirical fact. No one takes 
it more seriously than me.”
But what Smith found on 
the inside was a community 
well-positioned to fend 
off the threat. American 
Jews have democracy, civil 
society, free speech and 
open society on their side, 
he pointed out. They have 
a sympathetic media and 
education system.
“We have the ability to 
counter this,” he said, in 
ways that vulnerable Jewish 
populations could not. 
One key is not to circle 
wagons, “in a high-pitched, 

defensive way,” but to reach 
out and form connections, 
“even to those who we may 
not trust.”
I heard Smith deliver 
this message to a Muslim-
Jewish dialogue group, 
NewGround, last May, and 
he brought it to a Jewish-
Christian gathering in 
Indiana the month before.
There, he spoke to some 
300 people on a Thursday 
evening about the threat 
of white nationalism and 
increasing antisemitism.
A white nationalist 
group, he said, “couldn’t 
put a group of 300 people 
together on a Thursday 
night if it tried, and when 
they do turn up on a 
Sunday afternoon in a park, 
it’s 30 of them.”
Smith, in his quiet but 
firm English accent, said 
what I’ve long suspected: 
There is reason, even in 
light of the latest bad news, 
for optimism.
“I think we underestimate 
how strong we are. I think 
we underestimate how 
powerful our community 
is,” he told me.
“We’ll find that we have 
many, many more allies 
than we will ever have our 
enemies. And I’m saying 
that now as ‘we.’” 

Rob Eshman is senior contributing 

editor of the Forward. Follow him on 

Instagram @foodaism and Twitter @

foodaism or email eshman@forward.

com. This story originally appeared 

in the Forward (forward.com). To get 

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