Year-End Spread

The concluding excerpt to my year-end column this week in The Jewish Journal: 

Of course, Judaism has plenty to offer — it’s one long buffet full of wonderful delights: morality, prayer and Torah, yes, but also centuries of history, philosophy, poetry, music, literature, theater, mysticism and humor, among other things.

The problem is that individual groups or movements have attached themselves to one section of the buffet, ignored the others, and said, “Here! This is Judaism!” Torah-observant Jews might ignore history and literature. Cultural Jews might ignore Torah and prayer. Spiritual Jews and tikkun olam Jews might ignore both, and so on. Yet each one will claim, “This is Judaism!”

Rarely will any group present the whole buffet or cross outside of their comfort zones (Limmud being a notable exception). I’ve spent twenty years in Orthodox shuls, for example, and I think I can count on one hand the classes or sermons that have dealt with Jewish poetry or literature.

By the same token, many of my friends who are “cultural Jews” have written off Torah study as being outdated and irrelevant.

My point is this: Jews would be a lot more interested in exploring their Judaism if they saw it as a buffet full of different delights, rather than a restaurant with one or two items on the menu — especially if those items are predictable servings of morality.

We focus so much on the obvious virtues — honesty, faith, compassion, integrity, humility, generosity, etc. — that we seem to forget the one virtue that makes us feel the most alive: curiosity.

Yet curiosity is the virtue that not only can entice disconnected Jews to explore their Judaism, it’s also the virtue that can bring Jews closer together. What is real love if not the desire or curiosity to get to know — rather than judge — the Other?

Unfortunately, there’s no money in curiosity. It’s not easy to control your flock when you encourage them to spread their wings and sample the many delights of their faith. Who knows where they might end up? Falling for Jewish literature or history? Becoming more Torah-observant? Joining another Jewish community?

Ironically, for Judaism to thrive in the next century, we will need to violate the first rule of marketing: finding your niche and promoting the hell out of it. We’re niching ourselves to death. Whichever niche you’re in, whichever section of the buffet you’re promoting, it would behoove all movements of Judaism to mix it up and add a few more items to their menus.

Think about it. If you see a beautiful spread with an array of choices, you might criticize one of the choices, but chances are you won’t criticize the whole buffet. Judaism deserves nothing less.

Happy New Year.