Hi all!
I’m a Jew by birth (that was 42+ years ago) & an orthodox Jew by conviction for the past 19 years.
I moved to Israel in November 1986. That’s when I became observant , i.e. orthodox. My dual decision to come to Israel & become orthodox was very sudden. I tell people, half-jokingly, that a bolt of (Divinely-tossed) lightning fell on my head. (My family is not even remotely close to orthodox, not involved in Jewish community at all & rather assimilated.)
I got my BA from GWU in the spring of 1985. I was getting ready to go back to GWU & start working on my MA in the fall of 1985. I quickly realized that if I did that, I’d go stark raving bonkers very quickly. I needed some time off. The Dean was very cool. He gave me a leave of absence for 1 year. I was admitted, but my actual registration was deferred to the fall of 1986.
I worked at my summer job (bartending) in Ocean City, Md. until the restaurant closed for the winter at the end of October. There is nothing more therapeutically head-clearing than being in a bustling seaside resort AFTER Labor Day, when things start winding down. I am convinced that that period helped clear my head & lay the sub-conscious groundwork for my bolt-out-of-the-blue decision. (See Song of Songs 5:2, “I was asleep but my heart was awake.”)
For November & half of December, I went back to Pittsburgh & vegetated. Just before Xmas 1985, I went back to DC & crashed with friends till I found a flat (in a group apartment). I then found a job (waiting tables in Falls Church, Va) & figured that I’d work until it was time to go back to class in the fall of 1986.
Or so I thought. I went back to DC one day after Xmas. I still had friends on campus, my bank was there, etc. The corner of 21st St & Pennsylvania Ave. (now a parking lot, Grrrr…) then housed the Circle Theatre, which showed old movies. That day it was showing “Fiddler on the Roof”. I saw it once when I was a little kid (parents dragged me). I had time to spare & nothing else to do, so I bought a ticket & went in.
Near the beginning of the film, Tevye the dairyman talks about “tradition.” He said: “Because of our traditions, each one of us knows who he is and what God expects him to do.” I reeled. That hit me for such a loop; I really went flying. It was like getting hit in the head with a puck. I had never thought about it that way before. I had no clue who I was and that God a) knew I existed, b) cared, and c) actually wanted me to DO something was something utterly, utterly new to me. I was in shock. I watched the rest of the film in a semi-trance & then at the end, after the pogrom, when all the Jews have to leave the village, the old matchmaker comes up to Tevye’s wife & tells her that she is going to (the Land of) Israel.
WHACK! That was puck-to-the-head #2. I went reeling again. I left the theater in quite a state. I took the Metro back home & decided then and there that I had to become orthodox (keep kosher, study scripture, keep Shabbat, pray regularly, the works, etc., etc,) and come to Israel.
My parents (whom I didn’t tell until I had occasion to go back to Pittsburgh in April 1986 for Passover) were absolutely shocked. By then, I had already registered for a special Hebrew-language school here in Israel (where I met my Cape Town-born wife) & sent in a non-refundable deposit. I worked in Falls Church until mid-September. I arrived here in early November.
I have never regretted my decision(s) and never looked back. I believe that God Himself decided that if He had to wait on me to come to Him, He’d probably still be waiting, so He decided to come to me, via the movie “Fiddler on the Roof.” (He talked to Moses from a thorn bush, didn’t He?) He called to me & I have been answering Him ever since.
What am I doing
here? Beyond the fact that I’ve always been interested in other faiths (this goes back before my movie theater epiphany), I think that Roman Catholicism & orthodox Judaism (despite our rather obvious differences) have much in common. Our views on many ethical & moral issues are similar. But beyond that, ours are faiths with rules, with authority & structure & with discipline. Ours are
not make-it-up-as-you-go-along faiths & never have been (I suppose Protestantism & Reform Judaism are like that); i.e. we’re not cafeteria faiths. Rather than mold the faith to fit the individual, I think that we believe that it is the individual who must mold him/herself to fit the faith. The late former Chief Rabbi of the British Commonwealth, Lord Immanuel Jakobovitz (of blessed memory) once said that a faith which demands nothing is worth nothing. To be an orthodox Jew demands a great deal & I have learned that to be a Roman Catholic is similarly very demanding.
Howzat?
Be well!
ssv
