Lech Lecha and building bridges

Here’s the third of four topics discussed during my meeting with the Bet Din on May 2, when my conversion to Judaism was formalized.

It’s actually been a really interesting experience for me posting these topics on this blog, as I get the sense that these entries may leave readers thinking I’m much more religious or observant than I truly am. I’m not a religious person, not really, but I am spiritually focused. Or maybe I’m just feeling a bit paranoid in the immediate wake of having watched Bill Maher’s Religulous.

This is the essay that I wrote out for myself the night before the meeting, to help me get my own thoughts organized around this particular section of Torah, Lech Lecha (in which Abraham is called by God to leave his country, home and family) and how I personally relate to it here and now.

So here goes….

When I was ten years old, my grandfather made the trip down from Fredericksburg, Virginia, to Richmond to present me with my very own King James Bible — black leather binding, my name embossed in gold on the cover, “words of Christ in red.” It was a gift he traditionally gave to all of his grandchildren on their tenth birthdays, and I was thrilled. (I’ve always been a book nerd.)

I remember sitting in my room, reading the Bible. I started at the beginning with the intention of reading all the way through it — quite ambitious for a ten year old — but I never really made it past Joseph going to Egypt in Genesis. That part wasn’t all that compelling to me, so I’d page back earlier — not to the beginning of the book, because I wasn’t terribly interested in Creation or in Noah, either. I’d start over with Abraham. Then I read through to Joseph heading off to Egypt, and would go back again to Abraham.

Even as a young child, the idea of leaving behind everything you’ve established in your life to heed this call to a radical new beginning was mesmerizing.

(Assuming that Abraham was the only one to hear God’s voice, that was also a huge leap of faith for Sarah, following her potentially mentally ill — hearing voices! — husband away from family, friends and home to go forth into parts unknown.)

In the midrash, there’s a focus on the order of the commands that God issues to Abraham:

“Get thee out of thy country, and from thy birthplace, and from thy father’s house.”

If this were merely a physical journey that Abraham was embarking upon, the order should be the exact opposite — it’s kind of difficult to leave your country before you’ve even walked out the front door of your dwelling (unless you’ve got an international border running through your house, in which case you might need to present your passport on your way from the living room to the kitchen or bathroom).

This order of commands instead emphasizes the deeply spiritual nature of Abraham’s quest.

In terms of how we identify ourselves as individuals, we might say that we’re American, that we’re Jewish or Hindu or Muslim, that we went to a particular university or have membership in several clubs or organizations. But when you think about your most intimate and honest relationships, your family is (generally) right at the heart of who you are as a human being. Familial ties are the deepest and truest bonds that we typically have in life.

So the commands to Abraham spoke of disconnecting himself — entirely — from his former life and his former identity. He was instructed to leave behind his country, and his membership in that region. He was to leave behind the city of his birth and his identification with where he was from. But most importantly, he was to leave his father’s house, forsaking his heritage and family ties to strike out into the unknown.

Even today, that’s a huge and deeply rattling idea.

I’m a Southerner. I come from a place and a culture where the city and state of your birth are exceptionally important. Being a Virginian, and being from Richmond — which figured in the American Revolutionary War, and later was the Capitol of the Confederacy during the Civil War — is more than noteworthy and is a significant part of my heritage and identity.

But diving in even deeper, I come from a family that is extremely proud — and knowledgeable — of its own history. We have family trees and genealogies that go back hundreds of years and include ancestors who fought in battles, led armies, crafted policy and legislation, grew commerce and literally helped to found this country.

In short, I come from a place where my family name carries no small amount of weight. My first name may be common, but my last name is immediately associated with doctors, lawyers, judges, scientists, librarians, philanthropists, professors, historians and more. When making introductions back East, I’ve scarcely spoken my own name before the people I’m talking to already know all about me, because they know my family. And I’m proud to be a Willis.

I’m not sure I could do what Abraham did, although uprooting myself from Virginia and driving cross-country, alone, to settle here in the Pacific Northwest — where my family name doesn’t mean much of anything — to build a new life for myself was, I imagine, a rather similar experience.

I believe this Torah passage is particularly appropriate for conversion, since the convert is fulfilling a similar role to Abraham — daring to step away from the past to embrace and build a new tradition.

I also come from a historically religious family. My grandmother’s father and grandfather were both ministers. My father’s father had a Bible study radio program that ran every Sunday for 40 years. My father is an adjunct professor leading Education for Ministry courses through Sewanee, and he’s very active in his church and has even gone on a mission trip to Rwanda.

And don’t forget that Pat Robertson is my second cousin, once removed.

However, I am not disconnecting myself from “my father’s house.” My past life and familial history up to this point is a necessary foundation of who I am and the life that I continue to build and create. Rather than wholly turning my back on my family history — and the traditions, memories and joys that we share — I’m bringing all of that with me into Judaism, to blend with Jewish history and Jewish tradition as a living and breathing practice and culture.

Personally, I think that this reaffirmation and recreation is a significant part of what Judaism needs in order to survive, and it’s one of the reasons I’ve chosen the Reconstructionist branch as my community.

I think it was around this point in the conversation that Rabbi Joey asked me how I feel about Jews who are cultural in their affiliation — the “bagels and lox” Jews who aren’t observant or who haven’t studied or found personal meaning within their own heritage — and this is where I got to draw on my background in interfaith ministry.

Simply put, far be it for me to judge someone else’s choices or path. My way is just that: my way. It’s not going to work for anyone else, just as I’m likely not going to have a whole lot of success trying to adopt someone else’s path. And this more open and inclusive attitude is a big part of what I bring to Judaism. We’re living in an increasingly diverse world — not just in terms of faith — and we need to find almost a new vocabulary to be able to address both our commonalities and our differences.

I’m one of the people who’s willing to try to do that, and my background in religious studies and interfaith seminary training and my Baptist/Episcopalian/Lutheran family of origin combine with my personal spiritual pursuits and my alliance with Judaism to attempt to bridge these chasms that have traditionally been so problematic.

If I were to do as Abraham is said to have done, and would turn my back on my former life and my family, I wouldn’t be able to do that. And that would be both a tragedy and a waste.