Members of the Tribe (38 page)

Later, at home, Julie and Alan pondered what they had heard at lunch. They are well-informed and deeply involved in the Jewish community, and yet they reacted to Phillips’s and Mirsky’s statistics with something like shock. They feel an obligation to pass along their Jewish heritage and they talked about taking measures—parochial schools, a summer in Israel, something …

Julie and Alan are concerned Jewish parents. But for them, and tens of thousands like them, their children’s Jewish future is not quite the first priority. If they lived in a place with bad schools or unsafe streets, they would move; they are committed to getting their sons, safe and sound, into good colleges and well-paid professions. Preserving their children’s Jewish heritage is important to them, too—but not important enough for them to sacrifice their American life-style. Naturally they hope for the best, but they are emotionally reconciled to the possibility—unthinkable even two generations ago—that their own grandchildren may not be Jews.

And yet, beyond the statistics and the projections, beyond the loss of culture and literacy, beyond the evidence of decline and the logic of demise, lies a great imponderable. America has formed
the minds and lives of its Jews, but it has not quite changed their hearts.

All across the country I met people with American lives and Jewish hearts—Macy B. Hart, obsessed with the dying Dixie diaspora; Harvey Wasserman, the Buddhist with Jewish parental karma; Jody Kommel, who lives in Grosse Pointe with a Jewish star around her neck; a woman in Jacksonville who made her Christian husband buy a home in a Jewish neighborhood because she doesn’t feel comfortable around gentiles; the man in Florida, married to a Mennonite woman, who is raising his small son to speak Yiddish; the inmates of Graterford Prison, who raise money for orphans in Netanya; the yuppie mystics in the Hollywood midrash class; the young leaders of the UJA who can’t understand their love for Israel; Marty Gaynor, the Jewish cop with a yarmulke under his crash helmet.

As Americans, these people have nothing in common; but as Jews, they share something they often cannot articulate, even to themselves. It is an emotional tie—to places they have never lived, a history they barely remember, other Jews they have never met. For some this feeling is an intense and constant flame; for others, an occasional and mystifying flicker. But when it occurs it is undeniable and powerful, a reminder that even in America, in the promised land of personal freedom and individualism, they are still, somehow, Members of the Tribe.

Aliyah
Literally “ascending.” The Hebrew term for immigration to Israel.

Ba’al tshuva
A newly orthodox Jew.

Bikur Holim
In Hebrew, literally “sick visit.” Such visits are considered a religious obligation.

Bocher
The Hebrew and Yiddish word for boy.

Bris
The Yiddish term for the circumcision ceremony (in Hebrew, “Brit” or “Brith”).

Chabad
A Chasidic group, also known as Lubavitcher Chasidim.

Chai
In Hebrew, “life.”

Chanukah
Jewish Feast of Lights, commemorating the victory of the Maccabees over the Greeks.

Chasid (plural Chasidim)
A member of a Chasidic group.

Chavura movement
A movement in the late 1960s and 1970s by young Jews trying to establish smaller, independent, more egalitarian and more participatory Jewish congregations, either independently or within synagogues.

Cheder
Literally “room,” a cheder is a primary school for observant Jewish children.

Cholent
A traditional Sabbath dish usually made with meat and beans.

Eretz Israel
Hebrew for “the land of Israel.”

Felafel
Fried chick-pea balls common in Israel and the Middle East.

Glatt
An especially strict form of kashrut.

Hadassah
American women’s Zionist organization.

Halacha
The body of Jewish law and commandments.

Havdalah
The prayer service that marks the end of the Sabbath and the beginning of the week.

Humos
A chick-pea dip common in Israel and the Middle East.

Kaddish
The Hebrew prayer for the dead.

Kashrut
(also spelled
Kashruth
) The Jewish dietary laws.

Klezmer music
Eastern European Jewish music, often played at weddings or other festive occasions.

Kotel
The Western Wall of the Temple in Jerusalem, also known as “the Wailing Wall.”

Kreplach
Jewish ravioli.

Lag B’Omer
The twenty-third day of the counting of the omer; the only day between Passover and Pentecost on which observant Jews may marry.

Latke
A potato pancake usually eaten at Chanukah.

Le’hitraot
In Hebrew, “see you again.”

Makher
Yiddish for “big shot.”

Marrano
An underground Jew. The term is usually associated with Jews forcibly converted to Christianity during the Spanish Inquisition.

Mazel
Luck.

Midrash
A body of literature containing rabbinic interpretations of biblical texts.

Mensch
A Yiddish term for an honorable and decent person.

Meshuggeh
Crazy.

Mikvah
Ritual bath.

Mincha
Afternoon prayers.

Minyan
Hebrew term for the ten-man worship quorum (Conservative and Reform Jews count women as well).

Mitzvah
In Hebrew, literally a commandment. A mitzvah is a religious obligation.

Ner tamid
Hebrew for “eternal light”; a light that hangs over the ark in synagogues.

Nosh
In Yiddish, a snack.

Payes
The Yiddish pronunciation of “payot” or sidelocks worn by Chasidic Jews.

Purim
Holiday commemorating the salvation of the Jews of ancient Persia from a genocidal enemy.

Reb
A term of respect that may be applied to any Jewish male.

Rebbe
The leader of a Chasidic group.

Schnapps
An alcoholic drink.

Seder
Ritual Passover service.

Shabbes
Yiddish pronunciation of “Shabbat,” the Hebrew Sabbath.

Shema
A Hebrew prayer of divine affirmation.

Shikseh
Yiddish for gentile female.

Shmooz
Yiddish for “shoot the breeze.”

Shonda
Yiddish for “a shame.”

Shtetel
A Jewish village in Eastern Europe.

Shul
Yiddish term for synagogue.

Simchas Torah
(also spelled
Simchat Torah
)—The Rejoicing in the Law, a holiday celebrated shortly after the Jewish New Year.

Strimel
The fur hat worn by Chasidic Jews.

Succah
A boothlike structure decorated with agricultural produce in which Jews take their meals during the holiday of Succot.

Succot
(also spelled Succoth)—The Feast of Tabernacles.

Ta’am
Hebrew and Yiddish for “taste” or “flavor.”

Tallis
Yiddish pronunciation of the Hebrew “tallith” or “tallit,” prayer shawl.

Talmud
The commentaries on the Torah.

Tanya
A book of eclectics written by the first Lubavitcher Rebbe and studied by his disciples.

Tisha B’Av
The ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av, on which the destruction of the Temple is commemorated.

Tzaddik
(plural
Tzaddikim
) The Hebrew term for a righteous man.

Tzedaka
The Hebrew word for charity.

Tzitzes
Yiddish pronunciation of “tzizit,” the fringed garment worn by observant Jews.

Yeshiva
School where Orthodox Jews study Talmud; higher yeshivot offer rabbinical ordination.

Yidden
The Yiddish word for Jews.

Yiddishkeit
A Jewish heart or, more generally, subjects pertaining to Jewish life.

Yahrzeit
The Yiddish term for the anniversary of a death.

In the course of writing this book, I spent nearly six months traveling in America and Canada. During that time I visited more than thirty states and provinces, and in almost every place I found old friends or new ones who extended hospitality, provided logistical and moral support, and shared insights with me. Thanks are due to:

Joe Colten, Gary Baumgarten, Steve and Carla Schwartz, Harvey Wasserman, Macy and Susan Hart, Carol and Ricka Hart, Tom Dine, Minette Wernick, Lori Posin, Christine Rimon, Dale Ackerman, Joe and Linda Chafets, Julie and Allan Grass, Stuart Shoffman, Roberta Fahn Shoffman, Harry Wall, Arthur Samuelson, Warren Feierstein, Abe Foxman, Rabbi Dan Syme, John and Diane Carbonara, Joseph and Betty Miller, Winston Pickett, Valerie Shalom, Yossil and Dora Friedman, Michael Stoff, Rabbi David Maharam, Rabbi Yoel Kahn, Isaac Lakritz, Scott Galen, Rabbi Eric Yoffie, Mike Hall, Roger Simon, Marilyn Miller, Gary Rosenblatt, Jerry Countess, Rafi Rothstein, and John Broder.

Thanks are also due to a number of people who read all or parts of this book in manuscript form and made valuable suggestions. They include Liora Nir, Barry Rubin, Michal Chafets, and again, Joseph Colten, Rabbi Dan Syme, and Harry Wall.

As usual, I am grateful to Esther Newberg of International Creative Management for her professional help and guidance.

Thanks are also due to Margot Levin of Bantam Books for her tireless and efficient efforts throughout the project.

Finally, I would like to thank my editor, Steve Rubin, who believed in this book from the start and played an invaluable role in its completion.