I remember being in a Hebrew school class when around 11. To say the least, I hated, and I mean hated, being there, which I will get into more later. My present interest in languages had not emerged, although I knew I had a capacity for it if I desired to learn (I rarely desired anything strongly back then) and all learning that wasn't random and perhaps unimportant had little interest for me either. A lot of other factors come into play, mostly though, that I found it objectional to have religion shoved down my throat.
I knew everyone in the class, having grown up with them. I'm sure I knew the teacher that day too, probably one of the Temple members, although I cannot precisely recall him. It was a man, middle-aged, and I can vaguely visualize him. I think I remember his name, but it's not a strong memory, nor important, so I'll leave it out.
We were learning some prayers in this particular class, which was itself particularly galling to me. Or, the class was learning. I really didn't participate. Except, there was one prayer I decided to learn to recite super-fast, just to befuddle the teacher as to why I couldn't seem to learn anything else.
In any event, we were having a contest. There were two teams, and though I don't remember this part, I'm pretty sure that whoever got me on their team would not have been happy about it. It was hard enough to keep me awake, and my lack of interest in things Jewish was hardly unknown in the school.
As best as I can recall now (this happened roughly 40 years ago), I was asked to say something in Hebrew from one of the prayers. Worse, it would decide the game. Just happened to be my turn. On other occasions, I might have just said "I don't know," or passed, or did something so that the teacher would just leave me out of it. But, I thought I knew the answer, so I answered. Let's say, for argument's sake, the answer was "Blah blah bleh blah."
So I said "blah blah bleh blah." Or maybe I said "blah blah blah blah." To my shock, pandemonium* broke out. There was a dispute as to whether I had said "Blah blah bleh blah" or "blah blah blah blah." The teacher looked at me, unsure himself. So, he asked me what I had said.
I've always loved the word "pandemonium," originally "Pandæmonium," coined by John Milton about 300 and some odd years ago in his Paradise Lost, as the capital of Hell and home of all demons.
In my memory, everyone is looking at me and I wanted to disappear, not wanting to be the center of attention or decide who won the game. And, in my memory/imagination, some seconds passed in dead quiet. I was pretty sure I knew what I had said, though I doubt I could have sworn to it even then. Now, of course, I can't remember any of the words involved. I do remember the dispute was over one vowel though, which I guess had importance in what word I had used. So, I said what I thought I previously stated, being pretty sure, but not completely.
"Blah blah bleh blah."
Which, it turned out, was the right answer. Or, at least it was the correct one for the contest, anyway.
More uproar. Have the class determined that I was lying, half telling the truth. Guess how it was determined whether I was telling the truth or not? I know you know - it depended exactly on what team they were on.
The important thing for my little story is that it is the first time I remember as an adult looking back, thinking - oh, whether you tell the truth or not, people are going to believe you or not according to their own interests. Maybe I didn't think it in such a sophisticated-sounding fashion. Nevertheless, it's a valuable lesson, and maybe I was slow to learn it. I tried to pass it on to my kid. I'm sure she doesn't remember my saying it, but, she seems to have internalized it, and that's the important thing. I had the lesson reinforced for me not too long after that when playing ball in the street with the neighborhood kids. My teammates got mad at me for admitting I had been "out" at first base. It had been close, but I was definitely out. One kid, who, frankly, was a jerk most of the time, said, "Oh, your sooooo mature, David." Trust me, if you think that might read like a compliment, when laced with sarcasm, it was clearly not. And, again, obviously stuck with me.
Back to Hebrew school, the same class sometime later that year, I had another experience, even worse. But, first, I have to explain why I hated Sunday/Hebrew school so much. I had been an atheist for about four years, i.e., since I was 7, which might make you laugh, thinking about a kid with theological views. But, I had them and they were important to me. At least, they were important to me if someone was trying to impress religion on me. I always joke that I was religiously discriminated against by my own family, but in a way it's true. My parents didn't care what I thought. I was their kid and they had sent the other four through Sunday and Hebrew school before me. There was no reason for them to think I shouldn't go too. So, though very shy and well-behaved in regular school, I was not that well behaved in Sunday School at all, although that came later.
But, in this class, I still felt shy. One day, the teacher decided that we were going to sing a prayer, one at a time. Now, maybe that's normal for kids to do, particularly in Hebrew school. I guess it is, but those kids probably grew up singing. Not me. It wasn't in my family's playbook. We did have one sibling who sang, but she was an anomaly. I wasn't about to sing for anyone for any reason. I didn't know how to and I didn't want to. The only time I remember singing in school was some time early on in grade school where we were asked to sing a song we knew - and I didn't know any songs. So, I tried to sing Happy Birthday and wasn't sure of the words. No, really. I can imagine that sounds impossible . . . but. . . .
Worse, the mere fact of being in Sunday/Hebrew school already troubled me greatly, and though I could recite a prayer if asked and I knew it, singing seemed to be an emotional investment I wasn't prepared to make. I mean, it was bad enough my feelings about religion were ignored, but by singing, I would be participating in a way that seemed . . . well, I guess like I was participating. Worse - that I believed in God, which I didn't get at all. And it really upset me. So, when the teacher got to me I just didn't sing. I didn't say anything. I just sat there. He didn't just move on to the next kid either. He insisted. Probably he thought it was the right thing to do, that I was shy - which I was - but that had nothing to do with it. After a few really awkwardly painful moments, tears started coming out of my eyes. Finally, he said - "Ok, you can leave the room for a few minutes." He wasn't being mean - he was probably thinking - What the F' is this about? and perhaps was a little traumatized himself. As an adult, I know I would feel bad if I made a kid cry, even if I thought it was for their own good.
Here's the weirdest part. I can't put my finger on exactly what emotions I was feeling, although there was definitely resentment and shame involved. All I needed to say was - I don't know it. The problem was, I did know it and it seemed to me even more shameful to lie than the shame of being forced to participate in a religious way against my will. I was not pleased that I had to put up with religious education at all. You can see that I will probably get a few beatings in the coming re-education camps.
How did I handle it? I just refused to leave the room. As far as I was concerned, the teacher could sit there and move on to the next kid knowing that I was sitting there with tears in my eyes because I wasn't budging and wanted him to know how I felt.
Honestly, I did not have a lot of traumatic moments in my young life. Whatever unpleasantness, bullying, etc., occurred, wasn't that bad. I was really lucky to sail through life with few traumatic instances. But, obviously, that instance bothered me, or I'm sure I wouldn't remember it to this day.
Something else happened (I think the year before, maybe the year after - not sure) in Hebrew class which was always Wednesday afternoon after public school. We had a reader, a short book which I think had pictures and not that many words - but in Hebrew. It was, of course, not an advanced reader as we were just learning. We did a page a day, I think. One night, not sleeping as usual, I started looking at the book I had been ignoring. Within a few hours, I had memorized the entire book, Hebrew and all. That's when I discovered I either had a capacity for language or it was really easy. It could be that other kids could do that too, but, for some reason, they weren't. I don't think I gave that any thought then. However, when we went to Hebrew school that Wednesday, I told my instructor that I had memorized the book. What happened? Nothing. He didn't believe me and, in my usual way at the time (and sometimes still), I didn't try to prove it to him.
However, it soon became evident that I understood more Hebrew than everyone else and someone, maybe my teacher trying to get rid of me, wanted to put me in the next class - sort of skipping a grade. Well, let's just say the politics of it were not pretty, even in a middle-class, Jewish neighborhood. Other kids told me that it was they were going to be promoted instead of me and older kids did not want me in the class. I wasn't alone. There was another boy, whose name I think was Dean, a friend of mine, who went with me. I don't know why they promoted him as though he was an intelligent kid, I didn't see that he had learned what I had.
In our new class - the first session we attended - it was clear the teacher was hostile to our being there. She pretty much said so. Then, she tested Dean, by asking him to conjugate a word. I knew how to conjugate it - he didn't. She immediately said we weren't ready to be advanced. I was shocked that she would do that without asking me - so Mister "I'm not participating" suddenly said, "Can I try?" to her. And she said "No." I was shocked at her behavior. Looking back on it, I probably didn't have a clue as to the politics going on behind the scenes. Still, it had an impact. If I didn't care before - I definitely would not care at all anymore about learning the language. Wouldn't do a lick of work. Of course, that was true in regular school too, where I was on my way to being thrown out of all the honors classes. There were lots of reasons for that, I think, predominantly physical exhaustion from almost never sleeping, but our psychological reasons are too complex to easily pick apart and say this caused this and that caused this and that. Still, I had experienced, not just in Hebrew school, but, in my own family, in public school, and even previously at summer camp, hostility, probably jealousy, to any achievements I was capable of by other kids and sometimes their parents. It definitely scarred me in some way and I rarely want people to know what I can do or know.
While I didn't change behavior in public school, during the next year or two, I transformed myself in religious school. As our bar mitzvahs neared, I became more offended by being put through it. The thought of standing up in front of the temple and "becoming a man" by reading a service horrified me, as it would seem a full public acceptance of the religious beliefs, despite my internal rejection of religion. I couldn't be that hypocritical. I'd like to think my parents wouldn't want me to be a hypocrite. I was wrong about that, but we will get there.
So, I started to become the Bart Simpson of my Sunday School. Even still, I was not a bad kid, and my misbehavior was relegated to talking in class, not participating in what other kids took for granted as their duty and I guess wanted, and some pranks. Still, I was not exactly wanted by teachers. I recall some time in the next few years walking into the first class of the year and the teacher looking at me and saying, "Oh no, not you."
I told my parents that I did not want a bar mitzvah. They tried to bribe me with the gifts I would get, which offended me more - I asked my mother if she wanted me to be a hypocrite just to get presents. She said yes. She said I could give a sermon on anything I wanted. I said, could I say that the whole thing was a fraud and I didn't believe in it at all? No, she said, not that. So . . . .
My mother was a very good and accomplished person. This isn't the post where I will go into her life in detail - maybe someday. My father was by far the more difficult of the two from a child's perspective. But, my mother was the one who was much more insistent on my having a bar mitzvah, which I knew could never happen - I simply would not have said a word even if they had forcibly led me up to the altar. It would have been a repeat of the school story above, except I think I was past getting choked up. After seventh grade, I rarely got choked up until my 30s after my daughter was born.
To my surprise, my father, who was almost absent in child-raising except to be punitive, said, "Let him decide." I'd like to think he just wanted me to have the choice. Perhaps he thought, given the freedom to make a choice, he will do what we want. But, we really never had personal conversations, even when I was grown and she had passed, so I don't know.
The agreement I reached with my mother was that I actually had to take all the lessons for a bar mitzvah and then I could decide. So, I took the lessons, or, in my way. I don't really remember anymore what I learned or not, but, my gut tells me that I did not try hard enough so that I would have been successful - probably not by a long shot. After all, I knew it wasn't happening. As we neared the planning stage, my mother said I had to make my choice. I told her I couldn't. She stared at me. I never saw my mother behave like that before and it was, in my memory, one of the most traumatic moments of my life (I know you might be thinking - that's the worst? But I did say, I was lucky and didn't have a lot of trauma).
So, she told me to call the rabbi in front of her and tell him. I had already had a couple of conversations with the rabbi and he was not empathetic to my feelings about religion. I remember once I was sent to him and he played the game where he wanted me to speak first. After listening, he said - "Do you think you are smarter than us?" I did not give him the right answer. I said - "About this I do." I did think I was smarter when it came to religion.
After my mother and I stared at each other for a few seconds I think I reached for the phone with dread in my heart. I could care less about what the rabbi thought, but I knew I was deeply hurting my mother and I didn't want to do it in front of her. I wasn't a cold person at all. I was very empathetic and hated the thought of hurting people, not least my own mother who had always been good to me.
Suddenly, she said, "Never mind. I'll do it. You can go." Maybe she was testing me. Maybe she was hoping I'd change my mind. We did talk about it once more. On her deathbed. Maybe it was months before she actually died, as the conversation took place in the hospital and most of her family had gathered to be with her. She said some nice things, saying that everyone always said that I was her favorite (true). Not that she was directly saying it - but I think she was strongly hinting at it. Ask my brothers and sisters. I think they'd all say I was the favorite. She also said that she knew it was difficult for me coming to see her like that in the hospital (it was). But, the one thing she couldn't forgive me for - I knew before she finished the sentence - was refusing to get a bar mitzvah. I just nodded, I think. I didn't feel guilty. I thought she was wrong to feel that way, but I was not about to tell a dying woman, "Yeah, well, too bad."
I guess as a punishment for not having the bar mitzvah disguised as needing to be religiously educated more, I was required to continue to go to Sunday school until I was 16. This was not a good thing for the school as my misbehavior increased with every passing year. One teacher took me aside and told me I was a leader and asked me to be a positive one. The next class, when I was anything but a help to him, he said I disappointed him. I said, believe it or not - nicely, that he had disappointed me by trying to use praise to get me to behave in a place where I felt I was being punished. Probably he was right in trying. Why not? I've had sort of similar talks with students as an adult and at least once, it worked spectacularly.
On one occasion the principal of the school, who we called Woody because of his name (Woodman?) substituted for our teacher. He, of course, sat in front and I sat among the circle of desks, to his left, the opposite side of where the door was. Every time he turned around, I quickly stood and silently moved a few chairs towards the door. Naturally, no one in the class said a word. And then, whoosh, I was out the door when his head turned again. I went out of the building, up the stairs and sat down directly above where the door was. A few minutes later he popped his head out the door and I looked down on his head, literally. But, he never looked up. So, when class ended, I just went to my mother's car and escaped.
On another occasion, I remember being sent to the principal's office for some misbehavior, probably just for talking. Can't remember. My mother happened to be coming to the Temple for her own reasons at that moment that I was sitting outside his office. When she found out what happened she slapped me in the face, one of two times in my life that had happened. The first time was justified, though I was 4. This time, I'm not sure. Maybe it was. I don't think I should have been forced to go at all but I should not have been disrupting a class.
On still another occasion, I had to go on a bus to a weekend retreat with the other kids. I was really not pleased with this. It became obvious that the teachers were trying to install in us what it would have been like to have been in a concentration camp. It was so stupid. Unless they were going to torture or kill us, it wouldn't have much effect. I don't remember much about that weekend except my non-participation and some other kid getting mad at me and expressing himself by saying that I was a hypocrite for wearing a shirt outside and a coat inside. He didn't really know me (to this day I feel relatively colder indoors than out - I just do - I think it's something about expectations), and I knew he was just taking out his frustration about my behavior. I ignored him.
And on another occasion, we took a field trip to NYC to see a temple. I had already been going to the city by myself at that point for a couple of years and felt pretty comfortable there. Bored to tears walking around the Temple, I and another mischievous fellow named Adam snuck off for an hour or so and walked around Central Park. Apparently, the teachers and parents in charge were terrified at our absence. When my mother found out she insisted that I write a letter of apology. I absolutely refused and asked who was going to apologize to me for insisting I go. I'm not saying that I was right about these things, but, I was unhappy about having to go and that's how I showed it.
I'm sure lots of other stuff happened. But, these are my strongest memories and they were not the most pleasant. I can't say they were all that unpleasant either. Occasionally I had fun (like stealing out of class or hightailing it to Central Park). I've heard some real horror stories of kids who did not meet their parents' or teachers' expectations in religious schools, particularly Catholic ones, including a lot of violence and far more traumatic sounding punishments than my once getting slapped in the face.
And, I'm not bragging about any of this either. That's how I felt and what I did. In terms of affecting my life, it is dwarfed by other aspects, such as no one recognizing that my constant state of exhaustion needed to be addressed (they didn't have sleep centers back then) and my family's own particular brand of dysfunction which leads us all to joke as adults that we were raised by wolves.
For reasons such as the above stories, which I don't mind sharing, there are some people who think I'm actually anti-Semitic. I'm not at all. My whole life, probably at least half of my friends have been Jewish, including some of my closest. I detest anti-Semitism as I do any virulent prejudice. And, I support Israel, although not the way some Jewish people do. I support them because they are our ally and one of the best of them. And because they have been surrounded by a sea of hostility their whole existence and because nations worldwide seem to have the anti-Semitic bug. And Jews, worldwide, have a truly magnificent record of accomplishment, which I'm sure they are proud of (and others hate) and I guess I would be if I identified more with it. Still, like with our own country, I do not approve of everything Israel does and don't hesitate to say it when I think they are wrong. But, I don't dislike anti-Semitism more than other prejudice just because of the accident of birth that I was born to a Jewish family.
As to whether I consider myself Jewish, when asked, if I believe what the questioner really wants to know is whether my parents were Jewish, I just say yes. If I think they want to know what my beliefs are, then I say they are secular, or I'm not a believer and I don't consider myself Jewish that way (and, ask ten Jews what it means to be Jewish, you might get 10 different answers). I'm obviously biologically Jewish (whatever that means exactly) and culturally. I was raised on the holocaust and Marx Bros. Recently, I purchased a copy of a decades-old The Encyclopedia of Jewish Humor because I wanted the same one that sat on my parents' coffee table when I was growing up.
Well, that's my story. L'chaim.
