The Jewish community needs to gain some self-confidence. We are like the beautiful teenage girl who looks in the mirror and only sees blemishes and imperfections when in reality everyone turns to look at her because she is so pretty. We are no longer a despised minority.
Take a look at two items from popular culture that made the rounds of Facebook posts and Twitter last week. The first is a series of costumes that Walmart is selling so that children can dress up like “A Jewish Rabbi” or “A Jewish High Priest.”
My Jewish friends were amazed that Walmart, the great American retailer would sell such a niche product to the Jewish community. But they are not selling these to the Jewish population of the US, but to the greater American population. The average American, and in particular evangelical Christians, will buy up these costumes. To dress as a Jew is cool. In his book about religion in American, American Grace, Robert Putnam quotes a statistic from his research that Judaism is one of the most favorably viewed religions in the US today. This is hard for many Jews to accept since we grew up in a post Holocaust Era thinking that everyone hates us. We see only blemishes where others see beauty.
Then look at this clip from a new TLC reality show, Sisterhood, about 5 wives of Atlanta pastors. The clip is of a conversation between Pastor Brian, and his wife Tara and their plans to have a Christian Bar Mitzvah for their son. I watched this clip with a combination of horror and fascination. At first glance, I see why Jews might be offended. Pastor Brian grew up Jewish and converted to Christianity. His actions and comments in the clip are the most jarring. He almost seems to make fun of his Jewish heritage by singing Hava Nagila and playing with a tallit, the prayer shawl. But his African- American wife is taking this bar mitzvah very seriously. She has done her research and knows they must have a cake in the shape of a Torah as part of the party. (Yes, I laughed out loud at that.) She honestly wants to honor her son’s Jewish heritage. She is proud of this part of her husband’s past. At the same time, they both want to affirm their Christian faith in the context of the bar mitzvah. They are accurate when they call it a “Christian Bar Mitzvah.”
The more I reflected on this clip, the more I realized that instead of being offensive, this clip show how much Christians like and admire Judaism. Isn’t imitation the sincerest form of flattery? They want to use a Jewish ritual to add meaning to their lives, to mark a lifecycle moment in their son’s life. Isn’t that the root point of a bar mitzvah, to celebrate a child’s movement in to adolescence?
We live in a time now where people are mixing and blending religions in new ways. As Jews, we should not be afraid of this. We need to make the great wisdom and rituals of our tradition open and accessible to all. Yes, we may not like how someone else uses them. But that doesn’t mean we should hide them away as we have been doing in an effort to protect ourselves. Americans love us. Think about it, at what other period in Jewish history did people want to be like us, dress like us, and use our rituals? This is amazing! We need to look in the mirror and see how beautiful we really are. We can use our beauty to share what is inside. We have great teachings about how to take care of the world, feed our bodies, and mourn the dead to name just a few. Let’s use this moment to shine.
bar mitzvah
Pronounced: bar MITZ-vuh, also bar meetz-VAH, Origin: Hebrew, Jewish rite of passage for a 13-year-old boy.
Hava
Pronounced: KHAH-vuh, Origin: Hebrew, Eve, who according to the Book of Genesis, was the first woman.
mitzvah
Pronounced: MITZ-vuh or meetz-VAH, Origin: Hebrew, commandment, also used to mean good deed.
Torah
Pronunced: TORE-uh, Origin: Hebrew, the Five Books of Moses.
