May Your Strength Increase

Periodically (okay, not so periodically...I have a knack for bringing it up out of the blue), I find myself explaining Jewish law, lore, and customs to the non-Jewish teachers with whom I work. In the course of a month and a half, I have explained the mechitzah (the divider keeping men and women apart in an Orthodox synagogue), the difference between a rabbi and other types of Jewish educators, the plight of patrilineal Jews in Russia and Israel, and why the rabbis care whether shooting a baby as it is plummeting from a rooftop to its inevitable death is an act of murder.

One aspect of Jewish life that comes up not infrequently is the diction of being a Jew--or, at least, of being a certain kind of Upper West Side, lox-eating, Jewish Week-reading Jew. I get to explain what is meant by a "Jappy" girl from Long Island, why "yad" is a real word that should be acceptable in Scrabble (it's a small item used in synagogue readings from the Torah scrolls), and when it is appropriate to use the greeting, "Nu?"

So far, however, I have yet to delve into more complicated aspects of the Jewish leixcon. But to make headway in this--several of my fellow teachers have become regular readers of my blog--I felt I would start with one of the more common Jewish greetings, Yasher Koach (may your strength increase).

This greeting may be said to anyone who is known to have recently done something meritorious, but it is most commonly said to someone who is returning to the congregation from having given a bracha (blessing) over the Torah.

I think about this phrase a lot lately, as I think about the situation of interfaith families in the Jewish community, and of patrilineal Jews in particular. Where, I wonder, are the opportunities for us to give each other a big yasher koach? What have we done lately that merits our saying, "may your strengh increase?"

It's true there is a lot to be thankful for with respect to the interfaith family community these days. A website, interfaithfamily.com, provides articles and allows many of us to know we are not alone in grappling with the "December Dilemma", the hostility of those within the Jewish community who are opposed to outreach, and in making sense out of our relations with Jewish and non-Jewish relatives. Synagogues across the country provide programming for the intermarried. Two years ago, a woman with whom I am much in touch, and who has commented on this blog, launched a website, including a message board, aimed at the half-Jewish community.

We have achieved a lot. But when I look at what we have increased, I see how far we have to go. Patrilineal Jews are hopelessly under-represented and unheard in the very bodies within the Jewish community that decide their fate and their identity. Interfaith families and patrilineal Jews have the majority of the Jewish community, both here and in Israel, on our side, but we seem unable to galvanize that moral majority into any sort of action on our behalf. We fail to exert any backbone when dealing with a hidebound Orthodox rabbinate that still, far too often, sets Jewish communal policy in Israel and the religious agenda of affiliated Jews in America.

We have found each other, but have yet to find our voices. We have learned we are not alone in not wanting to sit on the back of the bus, but we have yet to organize any bus boycotts. We are not heard in JTS, in the Knesset, or in any body that might do anything to address our concerns or give us the equality and dignity we crave and deserve.

I myself have been guilty of this. Emunah Avot (http://emunahavot.net) exists but has yet to attract much attention from anyone. I have done little to publicize its existence or to network with other patrilineal and non-patrilineal Jews who are eager to fight entrenched discrimination within the Jewish community. Even when I had the time, during my Kansas lay-over between Taiwan and Russia, I failed to act on the opportunity to do more about this issue.

Elul, the month before Rosh Hashanah when Jews begin to examine their own consciences and prepare for the hard task of repentence and renewal, is fast approaching. And so with that in mind, I ask the interfaith community to reflect on our past sins and forge a new path ahead.

We need to kvetch less and do more.

We need to do less navel-gazing and exploring of our own unique or "unique" paths and start working toward real equality within the Jewish community. We do not need another support group to give vent to our feelings about segregation; we need to end that segregation.

We need to stop accepting half-hearted measures aimed more at making the wider Jewish community feel it is doing something progressive with regard to our issues and start insisting on measures actually designed to solve our real problems and concerns.

We need to refuse to be divided along lines of denomination and descent. Matrilineal and patrilineal, Reform, Reconstructionist, Conservative, or secular, we all have a clear interest in forging a Jewish community that sees us as souls to be nurtured, not a problem to be solved.

We need to stop being silent about what is going on with respect to our brothers and sisters in Israel, who face discrimination from the official rabbinate and hostility even from wider secular society.

And most of all, we need to remember that our problems are not emotional but systemic, not personal but political.

May our strength increase.