On Being Jewish

[taffimai]

versaphile just posted an entry on Jewish history, and I needed to quote this:

It was all barbed wire and skeletal figures in striped pajamas and frightening lighting, and the message was they want you dead. They want you dead and you must remember this, because it's happened before, and it will happen again, and you're going to see barbed wire from the wrong side if you don't watch out.

Because, yes, that's it exactly. That's the tension that lives in the gut of every Jew in America and Europe and everywhere that's not Israel. Any educated Jew knows this at a visceral level.

I'm going to compare it to my experience of being gay, because that's all I've got with which to compare it. I worry that I won't get a job or an apartment just as much as a gay woman as I do as a Jew. I worry that some hate-ridden homophobe is going to decide to make an example of me just as much as I worry about skinheads and neo-Nazis. But when I think about being rounded up and imprisoned or executed for being gay, it doesn't really hit me. I know it could happen, and I know that there are places in the world where it does happen, but there's no real emotion associated with it. But as a Jew? Bone deep terror and an absolute certainty that it's only a matter of time.

That's what I want people to understand about being Jewish.

Comments

[yasminke.livejournal.com]

I'd add just one comment: *every* Jew, even those in Israel.

[taffimai.livejournal.com]

Really? I felt so much safer when I was there, and my brother and friends have said the same. Which is strange, since we were probably in more actual danger there, given all the suicide bombings. But the terror of the government turning against us was gone.

[yasminke.livejournal.com]

Oh, I felt safer as well. Even with Sharon as PM.

But after an extended period of living there, you start to internalize the fact that you are surrounded by nations who want you dead, and who do not/will not distinguish between Jews and Zionists. The manner in which you *must* carry on daily life becomes so ingrained that you don't realize its depth until you're back in the US, UK, where ever. The first time you unconsciously open your bag before you enter a store, when look under your seat on public transport, or when you catch yourself wondering why that person is wearing such a bulky coat (because everyone knows leather is cool even in summer, right?) -- stuff like that.

I remember sitting in the Columbus with a friend who had been my boss in Jerusalem. One of the first things we said to each other was "how weird is it to not have to look around, to know that that tension has been lifted?"

[taffimai.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I get that. But, to me, it's a different thing. Awful, yes, but different. I cried for weeks when we lost Koby, but it wasn't the same feeling.

[yasminke.livejournal.com]

I get what you mean. I suppose since I've lived under both umbrellas, I merge them into one universal threat.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_usakeh_/]

This entry is very intense. I have never experienced these feelings despite my 3/4 Jewishness (on all the wrong sides!), but you express yourself so eloquently I can almost feel it by proxy, just from reading this. I'm sorry that you feel unsafe this way.

[taffimai.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you've never had to feel it. I hope you never do.

[viola-jen.livejournal.com]

I find Jewishness in general very interesting. I'm not Jewish at all (I am gay though...) but I can totally see what you mean about the fear. We live in a scary, scary world.

[taffimai.livejournal.com]

Jewishness is a bit unique: it's a religion, an ethnicity, and a culture all rolled up into one. And people experience it and relate to it so differently. Partly because we're an invisible minority and have the luxury of it not having to define us the way that other minorities are forced to, but partly because of the complexity of it.

If you're ever interested in learning more, thee are some good books out there.

[viola-jen.livejournal.com]

I had to learn some stuff about Jewish culture to write my dissertation (which was to do with Aaron Copland and identity issues) and I'd love to learn more. Maybe I should read books :) Which books should I read?

[taffimai.livejournal.com]

Here are a few good ones to start out with, depending on your level of knowledge:

Jewish Literacy
Cultures of the Jews
A Historical Atlas of the Jewish People
Living Judaism

Let me know if you have questions or want to chat, k?

[viola-jen.livejournal.com]

Yay! Things to learn :)
I'm out of the habit of random learning because everything for the last few years has been either part of my degree or guilt-ridden degree slacking! Now am I free to read many books. And will absolutely question and chat in due course :D

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

a religion, an ethnicity, and a culture

wow, this is such a great way to summarize being Jewish, especially in America.

[taffimai.livejournal.com]

It's amazing, isn't it? I'm always fascinated by the levels at which American Jews experience their heritage.

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

Yet they come in all shapes and sizes as well, from the strictest torah jew, wearing long sleaves, tallit, kippah, etc who keeps kosher and davens every day to the tank top wearing, punk haired reform jew who eats bacon cheeseburgers and never goes to temple. Both consider themselves Jewish. And they both are.

My temple was vandalized a few years back (with anti-Semetic and homophobic (the Rabbi is a lesbian) graffiti.) It was scary. And you do have to watch out.