I was a guest last Friday night.
Two older women at the table started talking very casually about a number of "converts" in the community very openly. They were talking about these people fondly, not saying a thing negative. But something about it made me feel really uncomfortable. One person said how amazed she was hearing the path that many of these converts had taken to get to where they were. The other seemed to think that conversion simply involved doing 2 years of study. Neither seemed to know that it is a heart-wrenching process.
And for some reason this made me really defensive.
And I got a little carried away.
I didn't say a word until someone said, "I heard that in _____________ it doesn't take as long." and someone else said, "Oh, those aren't Orthodox conversions." They simply didn't know what actually happens in a Beit Din.
So I jumped in and don't even remember all that much of what I said except that sometimes it takes years and years. I said I'd known people who waited for 5 years and had done everything the Beit Din said but they still weren't converted and didn't know why. I complained about how some rabbis simply lose their calendars and so conversions take way too long.
I said a bunch of other stuff too.
I don't know why I did. I could have stayed quiet. I don't think anything I actually said served a purpose and I'm not even sure how much of it was true. If anything I might have cautioned them not to talk about converts behind their backs, even lovingly.
Clearly I've got some stuff to work through here.
At some point it would be really good to have a long and candid talk with a good down-to-earth rabbi who believes in the process but who is willing to hear stories from "the other side." From a sincere convert's perspective.
I'm still too stuck in my own issues to think about the reasons a beit din operates the way it does.
Sunday, July 17, 2005
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Disclosure
Yesterday I disclosed to a very good friend the fact that I went through a conversion process. I gave her the whole rundown you see in my introduction. For all the weight that accompanies the experience I went through, disclosure tends to be anticlimactic. This isn't the first time with me. For all the fear I have about someone "catching" me and discrediting who I am again, friends respect me for who I am regardless of whether I was born with all the right "paperwork" or not. She wasn't surprised or shocked. And I was almost disappointed. I think I'm on the brink of seeing this whole identity/experience differently now that I see it's not such a big deal to some people. Maybe in some ways I've blown it up bigger than I can deal with.
Does the fact that her lack of surprise surprises me mean that I personally view converts differently?
I don't know. I have many friends who are very commmitted Jews who converted in. And once I'm convinced (it doesn't take long) that they are living (or trying to live) an observant lifestyle, I consider them kindred.
A discussion for another time, but most of the converts I've known, I've felt in my heart were Jewish even before they finished the necessary (and potentially beautiful) step of mikveh. There are the odd ones who don't really care so much about mitzvot. I don't feel kindred with them. And I suppose I feel threatened by the fact that they are able to convert in. It makes things confusing and hurts the reputation of gerim in general.
(On the other hand, that non-observant conversion could be one step towards growing towards an Orthodox one. IF that's the right thing. IF the beit din doesn't ask so much that the person no longer wants to be Jewish. Is it fair to ask baalei teshuvah to go slow and take one step at a time, but that converts need to go all or nothing?)
There are a million tracks this entry could take me down, but I'm going to stop here and leave them for another time.
Does the fact that her lack of surprise surprises me mean that I personally view converts differently?
I don't know. I have many friends who are very commmitted Jews who converted in. And once I'm convinced (it doesn't take long) that they are living (or trying to live) an observant lifestyle, I consider them kindred.
A discussion for another time, but most of the converts I've known, I've felt in my heart were Jewish even before they finished the necessary (and potentially beautiful) step of mikveh. There are the odd ones who don't really care so much about mitzvot. I don't feel kindred with them. And I suppose I feel threatened by the fact that they are able to convert in. It makes things confusing and hurts the reputation of gerim in general.
(On the other hand, that non-observant conversion could be one step towards growing towards an Orthodox one. IF that's the right thing. IF the beit din doesn't ask so much that the person no longer wants to be Jewish. Is it fair to ask baalei teshuvah to go slow and take one step at a time, but that converts need to go all or nothing?)
There are a million tracks this entry could take me down, but I'm going to stop here and leave them for another time.
Monday, July 4, 2005
Welcome
The following entry has been slightly edited. The contents of this blog used to be shared with a friend, but we seem have to lost touch with each other and, as much as I miss our interactions, I want to have a little more control over the format and content of the blog. Please also be sure to read this "switchover" entry.
At the same time, I really want to invite dialogue with other people who have anything to do with Jewish conversion. Today's actual date is September 30, 2007. The entry below, with a few omissions, was originally written on the date associated with its posting:
(Please forgive the length of this entry!)
In this entry I want to tell you as briefly as I can (no easy feat) who I am and my impressions of the purpose of this site.
What’s up with the name NotBat? Well, I was born Jewish, raised Jewish, and brought further and further Judaism to my family from a young age. When I was born we were Reform, and as the years went by we became more and more interested in becoming more observant. When my parents sent me to a Conservative Jewish summer camp I learned how to daven and came back to teach them how to bentsch after meals. In future years, with other influences, I became observant in other ways as well that affected my family. When I stopped turning on and off lights in my room on Shabbat during my high school years, my parents picked up on it too and eventually we were, without question, living an observant, almost even Orthodox Jewish lifestyle.
In college I continued my religious path, learning how to learn and considering whether or not to take on Kashrut full-time, both in my home and out. I was a leader in my community, one of about 3 to be cornerstones in bringing traditional Friday night services to a place that had eclectic and creative services with little consistency.
So it was a shock when I was told that I was not Jewish. It was a hard time in my family, about a year after my graduation. My father, my half-brother and his ex-wife had all three been diagnosed with cancer. My mother went to our rabbi for comfort and was confronted with the fact that she had never had an Orthodox conversion. As a result, neither she nor I were technically Jewish. (And I will say firmly here, and in future entries, that I agree with the accuracy of this discovery. That does not minimize the depth of the soul-searching it forced upon both of us.)
Hence a long and painful process began of questioning my own identity, living up to a beit din’s vague and inconsistent expectations with little regard for the awesome leaps I had always taken in my personal growth with Judaism. When finally the conversion was complete, I was bitter that the document they gave me said the standard, _____ Bat Avraham. My father was Jewish, and having always known myself to be Jewish, saw no need to adopt a new father, even if the father of all Jews. Hence my identity on this site, NotBat. I am Not Bat Avraham. I am the Bat of my own father.
This name choice is not meant to discredit the thousands of Jews, including my mother, who are bar or bat Avraham, but is instead intended to highlight my own unique situation.
As for this site…
Recently I had the privilege of having a long and soul-searching conversation with Ger-Alicious (my previous partner on this site). A few weeks before I had a very uncomfortable conversation with someone else, also on the subject of conversion, and I observed how much pain I still feel about the process I endured. Yet I am also grateful that I went through it. I know without question it was a cleansing process sent to me by Hashem.
Regardless, the baggage from it is tremendous, and I realize I have few safe places in which to discuss it. Usually when I talk about my “conversion” it is with others going through the process, often quite painfully amongst people who don’t understand. Hence, the necessity of this blog.
I have wanted to tell my story for so long (5 years), and yet have never known where to begin, who to tell or where to tell it. My storytelling will be choppy and sometimes I may say things that contradict, or show my own vulnerabilities, or seem judgmental to those who may not understand or agree with the harshness halakha sometimes brings.
But it will be my story.
And you will tell yours.
Welcome.
At the same time, I really want to invite dialogue with other people who have anything to do with Jewish conversion. Today's actual date is September 30, 2007. The entry below, with a few omissions, was originally written on the date associated with its posting:
(Please forgive the length of this entry!)
In this entry I want to tell you as briefly as I can (no easy feat) who I am and my impressions of the purpose of this site.
What’s up with the name NotBat? Well, I was born Jewish, raised Jewish, and brought further and further Judaism to my family from a young age. When I was born we were Reform, and as the years went by we became more and more interested in becoming more observant. When my parents sent me to a Conservative Jewish summer camp I learned how to daven and came back to teach them how to bentsch after meals. In future years, with other influences, I became observant in other ways as well that affected my family. When I stopped turning on and off lights in my room on Shabbat during my high school years, my parents picked up on it too and eventually we were, without question, living an observant, almost even Orthodox Jewish lifestyle.
In college I continued my religious path, learning how to learn and considering whether or not to take on Kashrut full-time, both in my home and out. I was a leader in my community, one of about 3 to be cornerstones in bringing traditional Friday night services to a place that had eclectic and creative services with little consistency.
So it was a shock when I was told that I was not Jewish. It was a hard time in my family, about a year after my graduation. My father, my half-brother and his ex-wife had all three been diagnosed with cancer. My mother went to our rabbi for comfort and was confronted with the fact that she had never had an Orthodox conversion. As a result, neither she nor I were technically Jewish. (And I will say firmly here, and in future entries, that I agree with the accuracy of this discovery. That does not minimize the depth of the soul-searching it forced upon both of us.)
Hence a long and painful process began of questioning my own identity, living up to a beit din’s vague and inconsistent expectations with little regard for the awesome leaps I had always taken in my personal growth with Judaism. When finally the conversion was complete, I was bitter that the document they gave me said the standard, _____ Bat Avraham. My father was Jewish, and having always known myself to be Jewish, saw no need to adopt a new father, even if the father of all Jews. Hence my identity on this site, NotBat. I am Not Bat Avraham. I am the Bat of my own father.
This name choice is not meant to discredit the thousands of Jews, including my mother, who are bar or bat Avraham, but is instead intended to highlight my own unique situation.
As for this site…
Recently I had the privilege of having a long and soul-searching conversation with Ger-Alicious (my previous partner on this site). A few weeks before I had a very uncomfortable conversation with someone else, also on the subject of conversion, and I observed how much pain I still feel about the process I endured. Yet I am also grateful that I went through it. I know without question it was a cleansing process sent to me by Hashem.
Regardless, the baggage from it is tremendous, and I realize I have few safe places in which to discuss it. Usually when I talk about my “conversion” it is with others going through the process, often quite painfully amongst people who don’t understand. Hence, the necessity of this blog.
I have wanted to tell my story for so long (5 years), and yet have never known where to begin, who to tell or where to tell it. My storytelling will be choppy and sometimes I may say things that contradict, or show my own vulnerabilities, or seem judgmental to those who may not understand or agree with the harshness halakha sometimes brings.
But it will be my story.
And you will tell yours.
Welcome.
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