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Jewish World Review August 17, 1999 / 5 Elul, 5759
THE PHOTOGRAPH is still tear-wrenching, even days later. The string of tiny
children, arms stretched taut, holding hands as they are led by policemen
from the North Valley Jewish Community Center in the Grenada Hills section
of Los Angeles.
They look, of course, no different from any other street-crossing child-care
troupe. But something shaped like a human being had just shot five people
at the center, and tried to kill them all, for no other reason than that
they are Jews.
All decent people are appalled at the attack, appalled by Buford O. Furrow
Jr., who reportedly confessed to the crime, and to the subsequent
cold-blooded murder of a Filipino-American mail carrier.
And such evil is nothing new. Jews have been killed by Christians and by
Moslems, by Nazis and by Communists, by white haters and black ones. And
even today, when assertions that our matzos contain Christians' blood and
accusations of deicide have, at least for the most part, slid back into the
muck of ignorance that spawned them, Jew-hatred is still alive and all too
well.
Yet, amazingly, so many Jews today not only persevere but persist in holding
fast to their Jewish identity. Indeed, it is the contemporary Jewish
world's great merit that it refuses to run from - indeed, tightly embraces -
its religious identity, despite the ever-enduring dangers.
A very different approach, though, has been voiced by the eminent British
scholar and science writer Jonathan Miller.
"I just think," he continued, "it's the nobler thing to do, unless in fact
you happen to be a believer in Orthodoxy, in which case there are
self-evident reasons to keep doing it. But, if it's done for the sole
purpose of making sure that in the future you'll be able to say the prayers
for the dead when the Holocaust is finally inflicted again, then I think it
is a damnable device."
His logic would appear to be unassailable. No Jews, no anti-Semitism. And
all too many Jews, over the course of the past century, have followed Mr.
Miller's course, truncating their Jewish names, dropping Jewish religious
observance, marrying non-Jews, moving to the "right" neighborhoods, trying
in every possible way to pass as non-Jews themselves.
Interestingly, though, Jewish assimilation does not seem necessarily to
protect Jews. Among the most assimilationist Jews in modern times were those
who comprised much of German Jewry in the 1800s and the early part of this
century, who adopted many of the trappings, practices, beliefs and attitudes
of their surrounding non-Jewish neighbors. But when a leader who hated Jews
viscerally came to power, even those who had ceased to call themselves Jews
were unequivocally and tragically reminded of just who they were.
And so it is heartening that so very many Jews today feel an inexplicable
but powerful urge to stand firm in their Jewish identity. Even Jews who are
minimally observant, or non-observant altogether, often still refuse to
relinquish their connection to what is, after all, not a racial or even
ethnic but religious heritage.
But it does not defy prediction. In mere weeks, Jews the world over will
hear the weekly Torah-portion (Nitzavim) recount how, exiled to the
Diaspora, the Jews will drift away from observance of the Torah, pursue
foreign belief-systems and come to be targeted for destruction in the lands
of their sojourn. And, finally, return to G-d and His Torah.
Only then, the Torah continues, when we re-embrace our religious heritage,
will we be spared the hatred of those around us, and merit our ultimate
redemption. Jonathan Miller may think clearly and logically. But, the
Torah teaches us, he is dead wrong.
Buford O. Furrow was reported to have characterized his attack at the Jewish
Community Center as a "wake-up call" to other like-minded individuals to
kill Jews. We can only pray that his would-be imitators sleep soundly
through his hellish alarm. But his murderous rage and cynical smirk might
well indeed serve as a wake-up call for us Jews.
This past Friday, synagogues around the world began the month-long ritual
custom of blowing the shofar after morning services. The shofar's call,
according to Maimonides, hints at a message: "Awaken all you who slumber,
examine your actions, return and remember your Creator."
The way for us Jews to protect ourselves from the degenerates of the world -
and the way, more important, to fulfill our destiny - is to thank Professor
Miller kindly for his advice but to determinedly take the very opposite path
from the one he suggests. To, in other words, "invest and readventure and
reventure" ourselves not into assimilation and Jewish oblivion but into
vibrant, holy Jewish life and
observance.
Wake Up Call?
By Rabbi Avi Shafran
How, we ask, could anyone conceivably want to kill innocent people, even
children? And how could anyone want to kill Jews only because they are
Jews? Grant Furrow the madness he will likely claim in his defense; but
there are assorted nonviolent madmen, even perfectly pleasant ones, on the
streets of most American cities. For madness to so obscenely express
itself, it must have bottom-fed for years on evil.
"I feel," he once said, "that the Jew must constantly readventure and
reventure himself into assimilation. He owes it to himself and to humanity
to try and try again."
Some Jewish leaders, like Conservative Rabbi Harold Shulweis, insist on
viewing attacks like the recent one in a universalist mode, as, in his
words, "an American issue, not a Jewish issue." But heinous as racism and
xenophobia are, only Jews are hated even when they they are both white and
native born. Is it not odd that some haters hate blacks and Jews, others
hate Christians and Jews, and others still hate foreigners and Jews? There
is something about anti-Semitism that defies all logic, even racist "logic".
Rabbi Avi Shafran is American Director of Am Echad, an international organization promoting Jewish unity. He may be reached by clicking here.
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