Rena Newman is from Evanston, IL. She finds meaning and joy by expressing herself in many creative forms, including writing, visual arts, and piano.
Like most things in this city, it was just a short ride away from our residency at the youth village. We piled into the bus, some of us reading the article by our next speaker, others still chatting about that last study session, and still others trying to get some sleep – a rare and prized commodity on the Fellowship experience. After a brief journey, we arrived at the Jerusalem Open House, marked by a single rainbow flag above street level.
The Jerusalem Open House is an LGBTQ+ community center, with the mission of welcoming both the queer community and allies alike. The space was covered in pride flag decals, a many-colored hand-print mural on the wall, and tons of art, ranging in tone from celebratory to solemn to risqué. Here we were meeting Rabbi Steve Greenberg, the first openly gay rabbi in Orthodox Judaism.
Rabbi Greenberg was an enthusiastic speaker, commanding our full attention. We gathered around on couches and chairs, some of us cross-legged and others squeezing to fit on the arm of a lazy-boy as he walked us through a well-thought out, totally Talmudic interpretation of the dreaded ‘man shall not lie with man’ Leviticus passage, which is constantly used as an excuse to shame and disrespect same-sex love. His thought process was intricate and really, pretty ingenious. The printout of Mishnaic and Talmudic texts for his explanation will stay in my notebook til the end of time.
He spoke bluntly, positively, and openly about sex and sexuality – two particularly relevant (and unfortunately taboo) topics for Fellows of our age. Our cohort, an incredibly kind and open group of people, was eager to applaud Greenberg’s affirmations of identity and equality. The group seemed to agree with him at every turn. But as he fielded our questions, there was a slight but definite shift in the conversation.
Any conversation about sexuality is going to involve gender. You can’t step around it. Whether it’s about misogyny and sexism or about the gender binary itself and issues of transgender and genderqueerness, these conversations will absolutely take place. In the LGBTQ+ community, these conversations are constant and necessary – which is why I was so surprised at some of the topics that followed Rabbi Greenberg’s speech.
If we’re talking about gender in a Jewish context, the Mechitza (the divider between sexes) comes immediately to mind. Inevitably, a fellow raised her hand and the Mechitza entered the conversation via question (Bronfman’s specialty) and so too did the notion of full and total gender equality. She asked him if he thought it was possible to truly get there, and how it could be reached in more conservative circles.
When Rabbi Greenberg responded to the query, he was littered with caveats: yes, he believed in equality of course, but total equality (the taking down or amending of the Mechitza, perhaps) seemed ‘naïve’. That it was possible that there were too many biological differences for this to ever really be a reality. An unsettled dynamic drifted into the room.
Then, I posed a question about what is to be done for Jews who identify as “nonbinary” or “genderqueer”, meaning people who identify somewhere between or outside of male and female. As someone with many friends who struggle with their gender identities, and myself having some personal thoughts on it as well, the question mattered to me. I asked him how the LGBTQ+ Jewish community responds to the needs of these people.
He told me that he wasn’t sure. He told me that the option of a “Tri-Chitza” (a three-sectioned Mechitza with one section that is unlabeled) was unrealistic. He told me that the only feasible solution that caused the least discomfort for everyone else in the community was a small section in back, behind the Mechitza, away from the arch and bima, a sort of gray no-man’s land where those individuals wouldn’t disturb the rest of the congregation. There, as far away as possible, they could stand.
His answer was perverse to me – here was a man from a faith which demands its people know what it means to be a stranger in the land of Egypt. Here was the rabbi of a community who has historically been ‘othered’ by the greater Jewish world – and he was saying accommodating this other social identity was impossible. His words tasted of defeat – it sounded like he gave up on them, or never even started to try. Though he was an excellent representative for one portion of the LGBTQ+ community, he was no spokesperson for everyone within the movement.
Within Judaism, who are we as a culture if we cannot accommodate and give dignity to all of those of our kin? What happens to our ethics when we qualify some social identities, such as gayness in this case, but reject or ignore others, like transgender or genderqueer individuals? We must be aware and inclusive. If we aren’t, we have forgotten what it means to be have been strangers ourselves.
In the past couple weeks, we’ve been encouraged to go to synagogues outside our comfort zones. For me, this means going to a shul with a mechitzah. It also meant going to the Kotel and feeling so out of place that I was forced to go to the small egalitarian section, far away from the main portion of the wall. These experiences have forced me to think about how Judaism either includes or alienates people of less common identities, particularly those of gender and sexuality. Fortunately, it’s not a struggle I’m having alone.
It’s warming when I hear the rest of the fellows using inclusive language. We grapple with these issues together. More and more often I hear people re-examining their choices in phrases – my friends are careful about being consistently conscientious, even if there’s no one of the identity-in-question present. If there’s one thing to remember, it’s that we never really know who is in our midst or who we ourselves are becoming. Because of this, our attitudes and language must ethically align with our community. As Jews, we have an obligation to make everyone feel welcome at all times.
I think it’s worth mentioning that it takes a certain kind of program to decide that going to an LGBTQ+ community center was something that aligned with its values. Exploring Jewish pluralism cannot be done fully without pluralism of all facets of identity – from ability status, to gender or sexuality. Though many issues and ideas regarding the LGBTQ+ community are new, the 2015 Bronfman Cohort are adaptive, capable, and most of all, kind. I see it daily through words and actions and I am so grateful for it.
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