A Tradition Unlike Any Other

     I just watched a video called "I am Jewish." This man, somewhere in his twenties, just read aloud a poem I assume he wrote himself about Judaism and what it means to be a Jew both religiously, historically, ethnically, and culturally in a matter of minutes. Every single thing he spoke, you could relate to, but the one thing that caught my ear more than anything was a line in which spoke about the ram's horn being blown on Rosh Hashanah and for the umpteenth time, it the final Tekiah Gedolah was blown for a congregation of Jews. In this one moment, in this one instant, in this one second, the passion of Judaism rushed back into me. 

     Tonight is Pesach in which Jews around the world celebrate the Exodus out of Egypt. I was with my Israeli family and here, four generations sat at the same table, yes FOUR. Two great grandfathers got to experience a seder with their great granddaughter and a great granddaughter got to experience a seder with not one, but TWO great grandfathers and in no time at all, she will remember experiences with her at least one if not both. How many of us can say that? How many of us can say that we ate with even one person who was our parents' grandparents? But that's not the point. The point is that on this day, in this year 2012, we still celebrate in the exact same way that our ancestors celebrated the Exodus of our people from bondage fifty years ago, two hundred years ago, a thousand years ago and even fifteen hundred years ago. Fifteen hundred years ago, the ancestors of the Jews today ate a hard boiled egg, maror, matzah, charoset, had a lambshank on the seder plank and told the story of the Exodus and sang Deyeinu. Do I know if this actually true? Of course not, but our traditions come from somewhere… 

     One of my roommates got into a semi-heated argument earlier in the semester about lineage. I said that in Judaism, your religion is determined by the mother so if your mother is Jewish then you are Jewish. If she is not, then you are not. Plain and simple. That is our tradition. My roommate said that the only reason that tradition was started was because back when Judaism was young, it was not possible to determine the father of a child, but it was possible to determine the mother of the child. Now that we have the technology of such things like paternity tests, that tradition is now flawed and negated and we should consider a person Jewish even if only their father is Jewish. I had a rare occurrence of ignorance in the matter as I asked him where he heard this and he told me "college." I immediately spat it away with sheer ignorance with the conception that a college professor could teach me about MY religion and MY traditions. But then it occurred to me that it didn't matter because even if that is true, we do not simply throw away 3000 years of tradition because certain technology exists. Our whole religion is based on tradition. Everything we do is based on tradition and we cannot lose that because technology in one country is further along than in others or technology is further along in this year than it was fifty or hundred or five hundred years ago. We lose our connection to each other today and we lose our connection to our ancestors when we let things like this interfere with our tradition. 

     I was once asked by two very passionate feminists and progressives why I do not speak the matriarchs in the Amidah prayer. They are both feminists in the modern world as well as in Judaism. In the Amidah prayer, in the conservative and orthodox chumash, one states the three patriarchs and the three patriarchs only: Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But in the reform chumash, the four matriarchs are added: Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Leah. While working at a Reform Jewish summer camp, during Tefilah, I chose to say the original Amidah and not the modified one (which includes changes to other words as well throughout the prayer.) When they asked why I don't say the matriarchs, I response with one simple word: tradition. The head of the Israeli staff on my Israel Study Tour trip had an issue with this when I asked. She said that she was constantly torn between being a feminist and keeping to tradition. The Amidah had existed as a prayer for around 2,000 years and all of sudden, we decide to change it? Who are we to change a tradition that is over two millennia old because we think it's offensive? 

     Jews throughout history have needed to assimilate to their surroundings and their environment for survival. Learning to dress the same as the goyim, to speak the language, to learn trades that were easily mobile, all for the sake of keeping the Jewish religion alive. Today, millions of Jews decide to not cover their heads, to not pray three times a day, to not keep kosher, and many other things for the sake of convenience. It is not convenient to be an Orthodox Jew I will admit, which is why I do not adhere to most of the rules of Judaism, but I am still a Jew. I choose my Judaism and I have assimilated in order to not be ostracized by my peers and my environment. Say what you will about the nonexistence of anti-Semitism, but recent events have obviously proven otherwise and I will not subject myself to that for the sake of looking modest and not eating shrimp or a cheeseburger. But changing a prayer? How does changing a prayer help Jews assimilate into the community better? How does changing a prayer, a tradition over 2,000 years old help keep the Jewish religion alive? It doesn't. It kills it. How does changing the law of maternal right vs paternal right progress the Jewish people? Well the obvious answer is if we consider people with Jewish fathers and non-Jewish mothers to be Jewish, we'd have more Jews in the world, but Israel already acknowledges them as Jews and those have a right to go to Israel as Jews. But Israel is separate from Judaism. To be Israeli is not to be Jewish and to be Jewish is not to be Israeli. The religion and the state are connected, but not intertwined to each other. 

     What next? What will the progressive movement do to Judaism next? I know I sound crazy, but Judaism is BASED on one simple thing: that Jews around the entire world are connected to each other by one thing: our common past… our tradition. And if we continue to change our tradition here in America because we believe to be progressive, well then we lose that connection. We're not all connected just because we're Jews. We're all connected as Jews because we share history. We share history of oppression, of persecution, of success, of peace, of struggle, of adversity, of patriotism, of culture, and tradition.