REB ON THE WEB

WELCOME TO TEMPLE BETH SHALOM'S REB ON THE WEB

BY RABBI IRA ROTHSTEIN, MANALAPAN, NEW JERSEY

 Week of  March 8, 2010- 22 Adar 5770

The goal:  To Educate and to encourage discussion among family members and congregants.  Questions and comments are always welcome.  E-mail me at Rabbiira@aol.com.  Do not simply click the reply button.

WE CAN BE MORE

            Nowadays there are web sites devoted to helping people find out more about their roots.  Geneology.com, ancestry.com, familysearch.org.   Just Google genecology and you can find a dozen sites to help you find your past.  It occurs to me that we want our children to ponder their potential and their future.  But we should also want them to ponder their past.  Children should know their roots.  They should know if their great grandparents came from Russia or from Poland.  They should know if their grandparents lived in squalor in some tenement building on the lower East Side. They should know if their family name was Americanized at some point because it was easier to fit in.

            Why is it so important for our children to know such things?  The answer is more than just curiosity.  It is possible that the voices we use everyday in the world are the composite creations of the voices of our past – even the voices we have never directly heard. Would it change our children at all to know that they had relatives who came to America without a penny in their pockets, yet they managed to raise families by working six days a week from dawn until late at night?  Would it change our children to know that they had relatives who knew poverty and depression and yet they managed to overcome every challenge?  Sometimes the voices of our ancestors can inspire us to be more. 

            A recent article in the New York Times tells the story of a Polish skinhead named Pawel.  Pawel grew up in Warsaw in a sterile, cold, concrete jungle of apartment towers.  He and his friends embraced anti-Semitism. They shaved their heads, carried knives and greeted one another with the raised right arm Nazi salute.  Their days were filled with drinking liquor and beating up Jews.  Pawel married a fellow skinhead and life, at least as they defined it, was glorious – filled with hatred and darkness.  Then one day Pawel’s wife, on a lark, went to a genealogical institute, only to discover that her husband Pawel, the skinhead, was Jewish.  She found out that Pawel’s grandmother survived World War II by hiding in a monastery, protected by a group of nuns.  His grandfather had seven brothers and sisters who were gassed by the Nazis.  The news turned Pawel’s life upside down and inside out.  He confronted his parents, only to have them breakdown in tears and admit to the “terrible” truth.  Yes, Pawel was a Jew.  Pawel cloistered himself away from friends and family for two weeks in order to ponder his future.  Lost and adrift in the world, Pawel, the skinhead, consulted with a Rabbi who said to him, “The voices of your ancestors are calling out to you.”  Something inside Pawel clicked.  He had found his voice and all of a sudden he realized that there was more to him than he ever imagined.  How Pawel looked at himself and his world changed overnight.  Within two years he chose to be circumcised.  Today, he and wife are raising two children in a Jewish home.  As a skinhead Pawel carried a knife.  As a Jew Pawel is today studying to become a Shochet – a ritual slaughter of animals.  Says Pawel, “I'm good with knives.”  By the way, Pawel now calls himself Pinchas.

            Our voices are a composite collection of all those voices who have come before us.  If we're willing to listen slowly and carefully, we will hear their voices echoing within ourselves and their message will be clear.  If we choose, we can be more.

THE NEXT ISSUE OF REB ON THE WEB WILL BE OUT THE WEEK OF  March 22, 2010