JewsByChoice.Org

I’ve been meaning to post this for nearly a week, but last week just escaped me. So here I am, today, to share a thoughtful nosh posted up on A Simple Jew’s blog from last week. The blog post focuses on a Q&A with Rabbi Dovid Sears about the "spiritual marketplace" mentality and the ger/ba’al teshuvah. A Simple Jew references an e-mail that the rabbi once wrote in which he says that he thinks "most ba’alei teshuva and gerim, being independent-minded people, often have a certain ambivalence toward authority …" and ASJ asks the rabbi to elaborate on this idea.

I think there’s some truth to the statement. There have been many discussions about having a rav and not having a rav, who we study or don’t study with and why, and how to grow spiritually and how to study as Jews by Choice. Rabbi Sears says,

Obviously, to break away from one’s previous culture and/or religion takes a lot of will power and independent thinking. Most people pretty much follow in the footsteps (or skid marks) of their families and especially their peers. These powerful character traits of will power and independence run pretty deep in baalei teshuvah and geirim. But like all character traits, they have a positive side and a negative one. The positive side is the idealism, courage and strength it takes to pursue the truth, even if this entails making enormous changes in one’s life. The negative side is that the BT/ger often has a hard time relinquishing that fierce, independent spirit in submitting to a teacher and tradition.

Now, the next quote is sort of specific to the Orthodox Jew — though since I know most of us on here aren’t Orthodox (yet anyhow!), you have to read the statement as applying to all BT/gerim in any branch of Judaism. I’ve often been told that I wear my Jewishness on my sleeve, or that I’m "over"-Jewing it. But I think that as a JBC, it takes a certain amount of time for us to ease in and find our comfortable space as Jews to the point that we aren’t, as he says, wearing "a neon on sign" that shouts "I’M NEW HERE!"

Probably the hardest thing for most newcomers to frumkeit is finding their niche. We have to shop around first — there is no way around it. But the danger is that we may never really stop shopping. We’ll take one of these and one of those, and a few years later discover something else appealing on the religious shelf. This can be almost comical when it comes to things like dress and minhagim. The new BT may decide he likes a Satmar hat, a yeshivishe short jacket, sneakers, jeans and a knapsack. He might as well wear a neon sign on his back blinking on and off "Baal Teshuvah!" (Of course, this is an extreme example — but the same mentality in more moderate forms is not so rare.)

Rabbi Sears goes on to say,

Despite all of these challenges, though, as one gets one’s feet on the ground, reality begins to set in. We begin to see that to really make spiritual progress, we must submit to a mesorah and a derekh and a teacher. "Sit in the dust at their feet and drink in their words with thirst" (Avos 1:4), the Mishnah says of apprenticeship to the sages. Not only does this lead to normalcy — but to the tempering of the negative side of those personal qualities that were so useful in getting us to the front door. Now it is time to truly enter.

I probably haven’t done the post or Rabbi Sears’ thoughts justice, but I think the whole thing is worth a read, even if you aren’t aiming at being frum. I know that I don’t have a rav, but that I find my answers and guidance in books and Torah and through the gleanings of our sages. At some point, though, I will have to submit to needing a teacher, someone to help me stop putting off certain things (oh, I’ll start keeping kosher next week, and I’ll be shomer Shabbos soon, and okay, I’ll start doing this and doing that).

At the same time, Judaism is sort of an evolutionary process for the JBC, nu? Shopping around is part of the process, of course, but the rabbi makes some interesting and thoughtful points.

Shalom!