Image via WikipediaI did not convert to marry another Jew.
I did not convert to be cool.
In fact, I was raised in the Bible Belt, and converting to Judaism was about the most socially "uncool" thing I could have done. I was raised in a Baptist Church, but my father had a complete set of the Blackman Mishnah, a set I now possess. He had a few of the Torah Anthologies, he had a Haggadah and a Machzor, even though we didn't celebrate Pesach or the High Holy Days. Yes, I know for a fact I have no Jewish ancestry. Even if I felt like I did.
It wasn't a "shotgun" conversion. I started trying to get a Orthodox rabbi to assist in my conversion in 1988. It took two years until my Jewish chaplain, also Orthodox (US Army), would even address the issue. For obvious reasons, he was not very cooperative. I was determined.
I received a milah l'shem giur in 1991. I was, of course, nervous, but it wasn't that bad. However, there were two more parts left, and I was re-stationed to another state. I had to begin all over again convincing the local rabbi to convert me, arguing the point, and after realizing I had already begun the process, we continued until I was immersed in a mikvah that no longer stands, and in the presence of a Beit Din named Yehonatan ben Avraham Vasseira.
A woman in my shul had just completed her conversion as I was coming into the synagogue to continue mine in 1992, and she had chosen the name "Vasseira" as her legal name. It comes from the standard phrase of a ger, "[name] ben Avraham v'Sara" (son of Abraham and Sarah). I asked her if I could use it as my name when I finished conversion. She said she would be honored. "We're related as Jews anyway, I think it's a great idea!"
This is the way things were where I came to convert:
Friday night, all of the "money people" came to the temple, your local doctors, lawyers, the social group. Shabbat morning was poor folks, those who only had a change or two of clothes, the ones that didn't fit the standard stereotypical vision of the American Jew. You know the one: "My son's a doctor, he's a lawyer, business is very well..."
We came because of our faith and our love for Hashem, and each other. We would enjoy Shabbat hospitality with each other. I was in the Army, as I've stated, but my mentor had a log cabin he built with a dirt floor. Another had a house with no running water and an electric generator. But we were Jews, and it means something deep and pure. Our rabbi, Harry, is without a doubt one of the best men I have known.
Even with a proper, halacha sound conversion, my last name caused me trouble the moment I arrived back in the States. I discovered that not only did my own mother tell me delightful things like, "You're going to burn in Hell forever and ever!" and "I would have rather you told me you were gay than Jewish..." but the local Jewish scene was not as I was used to.
My dad saw me for the first time in years as I awoke on their couch, still in full Chassidic garb. He giggled and rubbed my beard. He was so happy to have me home. My friends said I looked like Grizzly Adams. I had no support, and the local Jews I found all shaved and couldn't understand why I didn't.
My attempts to re-connect with this joy of yiddishkeit I had before began to evaporate. I did not make a Jew that fit this new, unfamiliar vision. I tried Conservative, Reform, an Orthodox, and several varieties. In most cases, with a few personal exceptions, I was just some guy who passed through that "thinks he's Jewish. He can't be Jewish. XXX is not a Jewish name!"
I didn't have enough money. I couldn't afford to be a member. My car wasn't nice, I didn't have a college degree, and I had a goy last name. I was a Jew, I didn't believe in Jesus, and I was now a "weirdo". I had a people by faith and a people by blood, and neither wanted me around.
I floated, I hid, I wished I could be more observant, but knew I would be alone.
Enter the Rebbe. When no one else wanted me, wanted to assist me, wanted me to be what Hashem set me out to be, the works of the Lubavitcher Rebbe made it clear that Hashem did.
Who's got the ability to rubber stamp G-d?
I was well aware of the Rebbe, I was in Manhattan when he took ill and chassidim filled the streets to overflowing outside Beth Israel. I knew the shliach in my former area who was a wonderful fellow, but as useful as a football bat the second he heard my name and where I was from.
The differences between what I read of Chassidus written by the rebbes, and what I saw with my eyes were night and day. However, if I were alone with another Jew, all was usually okay. I would be exempted from the inquisition. I find, as a general rule fellow chassidim to be the warmest, gentlest, true to earth people one can know. Mitnagdim, not so very much.
Between that and people like Rabbi Tzvi Freeman and Rabbi Zalman Schmotkin, I truly claim the Rebbe as my Rebbe.
I am now old enough and wise enough to tolerate the position I am in. I believe that a Jew is a Jew is a Jew. When I speak about specific groups, I speak in general, and while some individuals uphold the various complaints I have, there are always individuals who do not, and that is a very good thing.
For example, I am considered too Orthodox for Reform. I wrap tefillin, I have a mezuzah on my door, the first thing you see on entering my house is a picture of the Rebbe smiling back at you. My wife is conscious of tzinus, and that gets us stares from time to time. We would not fit in with Conservatives. We don't live within an eruv, we don't know any other Jews in our city, and the others we have tried to contact have basically ignored us.
I believe in the Rebbe's work and philosophy, and well as the thoughts from the Baal Shem Tov forward, and I support Chabad. As far as supporting me outside of 770 as a local, concerned synagogue, I will stop beating that dead horse.
I fall in more closely with the Renewal Movement. I'm not too into the happy poetry and singalong time I am told exists, but I have never been in a Renewal service, either. From what I have gathered, they are chassidic without judgement. That fits me. I can handle a bit of leniency. Once it begins to look like a Jesus rally, I'm out.
One thing those born Jewish do not realize is that I have yet to meet a convert that had a family delighted that they converted. Usually, we lose our entire families. We are cut out of wills, exempted from the birthday card list, the whispers about how "bad" we are go on behind our backs, or behind closed doors. Eventually, as I am now discovering, we will end up changing our names.
We become wanderers, just like the Jews we are. We walked into this knowingly, and there is pain involved. But there is also the richness of knowing we did the right thing. Many of us also learn from being on the other side of the fence, that poking a ger or a ba'al teshuva is painful for that person. It is nothing different than being a bully.
We know we were born different. We know we weren't born Jewish. We invested everything into it. Personally, I have no desire to see conversion processes laxed. It is fine the way that it is, and I understand why it is made difficult for the prospective convert. It's a realistic notion, and necessary.
What is not necessary is rubbing it into a convert's face that they weren't born like you, or that because their family intentionally blocked Jewish heritage in order to escape persecution, that you have the right to question, malign, or abuse them.
Apparently the self-righteousness does not limit itself to the ger. Perhaps some converts become the aggressor. I don't know. I just know that I share a common faith and destiny. I am Jewish. You might not like my name. You might be confused about my teeth. You can even puff out your chest and tell me I'm not a Jew, even though my conversion process meets Orthodox standards.
You can even pat yourself on the head and say something degrading and crass to the effect of me being an anti-Semite trying to be a Jew (yes, this just happened to my wife yesterday...). I would love to try some of that stuff you are smoking, because it hasn't been a picnic. I came into this knowing it wouldn't be.
In the end, you can say I'm still a goy (although I'm not), but listen here...
The goy see me as a Jew. I am a Jew. And if they decide to come kill you for being a Jew, they aren't going to check my universal papers and give me a pass for my name. They are going to waste no time killing me, too. I checked into the Yiddishkeit Hotel knowing this and accepting it.
Because, like I've said a hundred times (say it with me... all together now!) I'm a Jew. I am making aliyah because I belong, and I have a divinely instituted right to do so.
The Rebbe basically says that labels are for shirts. I agree.
Here's my take:
So you say you converted. Okay. Need anything? Want to know how to wind tefillin? Okay, I'll help.
So you're Jewish and you're gay. Okay, so what? Sure, I know what Torah says. My business is to interpret and follow my own covenant, not to be the Jewish Mitzvah Police. I'll even count you in a minyan.
You're a woman, and your title is Rabbi? Okay. Who am I to claim all of your study and work is worthless. You did the study, you know what you're talking about. They now have a Hebrew word for a female rabbi, and there is a sitting Orthodox female rabbi. Good enough for me.
Want to talk Torah? Philosophy? Kabbalah? Need someone to say Tehillim for a sick friend or relative? Okay. What do you mean he is a Reform convert? Why does that matter?
My job is not to police. It is to be a good Jew. The Rebbe makes it very clear that a convert is a gentile that had a Jewish neshama all along. Who am I to argue? My job is to fulfill 613 mitzvot. My job is to study those mitzvot, and everything attached to them.
It is also to try to be like the Rebbe, and accept people for who they are, and if they like how I live and choose to emulate me, fine. If they don't, fine.
I am not allowed to judge and poke at anyone else anymore than those who have, in a misguided fashion, labelled me from the hip. But I will report on what I have experienced. If you don't like how it sounds, then change it. You are the only one who can.
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