Synagogue Life

A Study in Symbolic Interaction

Samuel C. Heilman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351487269
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Jewish Theology

Via a participant-observer approach, Synagogue Life analyzes the three essential dimensions of synagogue life: the houses of prayer, study, and assembly. In each Heilman documents the rich detail of the synagogue experience while articulating the social and cultural drama inherent in them. He illustrates how people come to the synagogue not only for spiritual purposes but also to find out where and how they fit into life in the neighborhood in which they share.In his new introduction, Heilman discusses what led him to write this book and the process of personal transformation through which he, as an Orthodox Jew, had to go in order to turn a disciplined eye on the world from which he came. Rather than using the stranger-as-native approach of classic anthropology, he had instead to begin as a native who discoverd how to look at a once-taken-for-granted synagogue life like a stranger. In the afterword, arguing for the efficacy of this approach, Heilman offers guidance on how natives can use their special familiarity and still be trained to distance themselves from their own group, making use of the disciplines of sociology and anthropology. Synagogue Life offers a fascinating portrait that has something to say to social scientists as well as all those curious about what happens in the main arena of Orthodox Jewish community life.

1
Background, Beginnings, and Definitions

Although officially a part of the metropolitan area of Sprawl City, Dudley Meadows remains somewhat distinct ecologically. Lying on the western edge of this great metropolis, it is bounded on one side by a mammoth park, on another by the city line, on a third by a six-lane expressway connecting the western suburbs with the center city, on a fourth by railroad tracks, and on a fifth by an area of row houses which have become part of a black ghetto. Unlike the row houses in what has come to be called “Upper Dudley Meadows,” the large and stately stone houses of Dudley Meadows are surrounded by large plots of land. A few high-rise, luxury apartment buildings and several garden-apartment complexes are fairly recent additions to the neighborhood.

To the uninformed observer, the Dudley Meadows area looks like a highly affluent neighborhood. Indeed, at one time it was, and it then served as one of the most exclusive areas in Sprawl City. Over the years, however, it went through many of the metamorphoses that have become common in American cities. Originally the meadows of Dr. Dudley, a respected physician of Colonial times, the area became the site of early country estates. In time it evolved into the neighborhood of the Sprawl City aristocracy. In the post-World War II period it started to become Jewish as the former citizens moved west and out of the city. These Jews made the area a middle-class one and in turn watched the construction of the row houses, which enabled their less affluent brethren to move in. Here people could live within easy commuting distance of the center city while experiencing few of the disadvantages of life in an urban environment.

In the late sixties the face of the neighborhood began to change again. Blacks began to move into the row houses, and, at the same time, Jewish whites began to flee, much as the earlier citizens of Dudley Meadows had fled when they, the Jews, had begun to move into the neighborhood. At the time of this study, from 1970 to 1973, the emigration was continuing, but at a somewhat slowed pace. The row houses had become almost completely filled by black middle-class families. The large stone houses were populated by both whites and blacks. The high rises remained white and primarily Jewish, while some garden-apartment complexes had become totally black and others remained totally white.

On Dudley Avenue, the main street of Dudley Meadows, there stands an old converted stone house that serves as a synagogue for approximately 130 men, women, and children. Its name is Kehillat Kodesh. These people are for the most part dispersed within the Dudley Meadows area, and only the shul (as the synagogue is commonly called in Yiddish)^* allows them a space where their hegemony is absolute. An overwhelming majority of its members identify themselves generally as Orthodox Jews. As such they are committed not only to Judaism as a religious affiliation but also to accepting all the precepts, imperatives, and doctrines of Jewish law or halacha (translated literally, “the way”). The shul is one of the absolutely necessary institutions for Jews who wish to practice their religion in an Orthodox fashion.

In addition to the shul, Orthodox Jews need a Jewish day school for their children of primary-school age, to ensure that the young will be schooled in Jewish law, lore, and tradition; a nearby source of kosher meat, to supply the basic staple of food according to the Jewish dietary laws; and a mikva, or ritual bath, in which a married woman must immerse herself seven days after the end of her menstrual cycle to provide for ritual purity in procreative activity. Although other Jewish institutions are also necessary and useful, these four are mandatory for the establishment and maintenance of any Orthodox Jewish community. A large number of these institutions and others, as well, reflects a strong Orthodox community which can maintain them. Yet, of the mandatory four, none but the shul can count on the simultaneous involvement—albeit at different levels of participation—of men, women, and children. For this reason and others that will become clearer as the study proceeds, the shul is the central large institution in the life of the Jews of Kehillat Kodesh.

As part of their adherence to halacha, Orthodox Jews observe the law against any travel other than by foot on Sabbaths and holy days. Accordingly, in order to participate in the religious services of the shul on such important occasions, these Jews must live within walking distance of it. All Orthodox Jews, therefore, live in the neighborhood in which their shul is located. Hence, to say that one prays at Kehillat Kodesh is to say that one lives in Dudley Meadows. A look at the membership list of any particular Orthodox shul thus enables one to get an idea of how many Orthodox Jews live in the immediate geographic area.

In addition to praying together, these same people are very likely to join together in other activities as well. Unlike Conservative or Reform Jews, who, because they do not adhere to the ban on motorized travel on Sabbaths and holy days, may live in one area, worship in another, and have little in common with their fellow worshipers besides participation in the same religious services, the members of an Orthodox shul additionally experience one another as neighbors and friends. Inevitably they share a complex array of concerns, including maintenance of the shul itself as a building and a community; religious values, and the problems involved in adapting those values to the claims of a secular American society; and, finally, a general Weltanschauung which comes in part from these other mutual concerns.

Except for the shul, use of the other Orthodox Jewish institutions listed above is not limited to people who live near one another, for they may be used on weekdays, when travel other than by foot is permitted. Thus, other Orthodox Jews may use such institutions; however, they do not necessarily have much in common with one another, as is the case with members of the same shul. Of course in certain communities where there is a large concentration of Orthodox Jews, all institutions are nearby, and the same people who worship together also send their children to the same school, patronize the same butcher and the same mikva, and indeed make up the entire clientele of all the Orthodox institutions in the area. Or, if the Orthodox community is very small, with but one shul, one school, one butcher, and one mikva, the same situation may obtain. Neither situation obtains in Sprawl City. Only two day schools exist there, and two reliable kosher butchers and one mikva, but there are quite a few Orthodox shuls. Thus, while all the members of a shul use many of the same other Orthodox institutions, not all users of the other institutions are members of the same shul. For that reason, and for the others suggested earlier, people tend to identify themselves by the shul to which they belong, which they attend on the average of once a week all year long.

Although the members of Kehillat Kodesh are considered Orthodox Jews, especially by outsiders, not all Orthodox Jews are alike. While all such Jews agree that an ideological commitment to the entire halacha is mandatory, there are differences among Orthodox Jews as to the minimum observances necessary for sustaining that ideological stance. At one extreme are those who are almost constantly involved with other observant Jews and for whom Orthodox Jewishness is defined by strict adherence to halacha, from minutiae to broad legal principles, with emphasis on the equal importance of both; at the other extreme are those for whom the actual practice of Orthodoxy means minimally: (1) Sabbath and holy-day observance, with their correlated laws; (2) kashrut, the strict observance of Jewish dietary laws; (3) use of a mikva, that is, maintaining family purity; and (4) praying in a synagogue which has the formal characteristics of Orthodoxy. However, most Orthodox Jews fall somewhere between these two extremes of halachic fulfillment.

For the purposes of this study, Orthodox Jewry may be divided into two groups, both of which have in the past been referred to as “Orthodox” Jews: modern Orthodox Jews and traditional Orthodox Jews. The first group is defined by a desire to adhere faithfully to the beliefs, principles, and traditions of Jewish law and observance without being either remote from or untouched by life in the contemporary secular world. The second group is relatively more isolated from contemporary secular society. It is in America but not of it, concerning itself almost completely with Jewish life and seeing such aspects of reality as secular education, English language, or occupations outside the Jewish community as infringements upon their life. The most prominent, but by no means the only, representatives of this group are the Chassidim, the sect of zealots whose entire lives revolve around Jewish observance.

Kehillat Kodesh is populated primarily by modern Orthodox Jews. Its members are “oriented significantly to the world outside” the Jewish one, and they regard themselves “as an integral part of that [outside] world.”¹ This cosmopolitanism may be seen, for instance, in the occupational profile of the adult males. Only about 5 percent have jobs, such as religious school teachers or kosher butchers, which allow full-time involvement and isolation within the Jewish community. Nearly 65 percent have careers in fields like medicine, law, university teaching, and the natural sciences, which require relatively long periods of training and initiation outside the Orthodox Jewish orbit ; and, as Hughes suggests, “In general, we may say that the longer and more rigorous the period of initiation into an occupation, the more culture and technique are associated with it, and the more deeply impressed are its attitudes upon the person.”²

These are people who, for the most part, use English as their everyday language and whose interests are not limited to matters of Jewish concern. Nor are their friends exclusively Orthodox Jews. Yet, at the same time that their occupations, interests, education, and friendships propel them toward cosmopolitanism, their commitment and strict adherence to the code of Jewish law draw them back. Such has always been the goal of halacha, whose imperatives cover almost every aspect of human existence, from the mundane to the ethereal, and frequently require the communal assistance of other observant Jews.

To the extent that Kehillat Kodesh Jews have ordered their lives according to halacha, they have remained “preoccupied with local [i.e., Jewish] problems… , strictly speaking, parochial.”³ The modern Orthodox Jew of Kehillat Kodesh is thus cosmopolitan in his desire for modernity and parochial in his commitment to Orthodoxy. When desires and commitments come into conflict, commitments must have primacy.

One member articulates the issue with reference to a conflict between his occupational demands and his Jewish constraints as follows :

When I first found out about my job transfer, I was afraid.

I thought that I’m going out of New York, and how will I find a place where I can observe my Jewishness. Now I would move anywhere, I don’t care—of course, providing that my Jewish needs were taken care of. I mean I wouldn’t have gone to Phoenix, Arizona.

Job transfers have to be accepted wherever possible, since careers are important. Nevertheless, Phoenix, an Orthodox Jew’s no-man’s-land, is out of the question. One gives up New York and its many Orthodox institutions for the career as long as the minimum of Jewish observance remains possible.

While the women in the shul are not generally involved in an occupational structure which pulls them out of the Orthodox community (about 63 percent have no paid jobs) and tend to be more strict in much of their halachic observance, they share the men’s commitment to the modern world through their interests, friendships, and education. The children remain more encapsulated in a Jewish world. Of the school-age children, only one attends a public school (and this is a school for the brightest of Sprawl City youth), while the rest attend Jewish day schools or, if they are of high-school age, a yeshiva (academy of higher Jewish learning). One might say that the young are not trusted to choose Jewish commitment in the face of modernity. They are perhaps also the conscience and vital symbols of Orthodoxy in the community. As one member put it, “I send my kid to yeshiva because I want to have the proper atmosphere in the house.”

The people of Kehillat Kodesh are primarily young. Although the age range of its members runs from infancy to past seventy, the median age of the male household heads (i.e., most of the men in shul) is about thirty-five, and the modal age is about thirty. The wives of course reflect this age structure, as do the children. This is, then, for the most part a young congregation.

Because Dudley Meadows is a neighborhood which is in the process of changeover from white Jewish to black, with a resultant decline in property values, many of the younger members of the shul (a minority of whom are Sprawl City natives) consider themselves sojourners and temporary residents of the area. Among homeowners, those who plan to stay, or who have already been in the community for an extended period of time, one finds few people under the age of forty. Among the younger group, most of those who plan to stay in Sprawl City eventually buy homes outside the Dudley Meadows area, though their choice of location is somewhat limited, since they wish to be near an Orthodox shul. Accordingly, much of the formal authority structure which has been built up over time at Kehillat Kodesh is in the hands of balabatim (a Yiddish term for community leaders and literally translated as “homeowners”) above the age of forty. Most of those in shul government and a majority of the board members are all over forty ; and this is true also of the three-member presidium of the ladies’ auxiliary. However, if the people most responsible for running the shul are older than the average member, authority is still shared with the young, who make up the lifeblood of the congregation.

Beginnings

The situation in Kehillat Kodesh was not always thus. In its beginnings, about twelve years ago, the shul was an offshoot of another Orthodox synagogue, situated just across the city line in the more affluent community of Happiton. The membership was then for the most part older and far less ready to share authority. Every member learns the story of these beginnings and can repeat its salient facts; indeed, the very knowledge of these facts seems often to be the best evidence of one’s membership in the group. The newer members repeat the story with the same assurance as the older ones. The freshness of detail makes a listener surprised to learn that most of the events under discussion happened between nine and twelve years earlier, before many of those telling the story were even members of the shul.

The story of the shul’s early history can be divided into two parts. The first deals with the original break from Happiton and the three early years, which were not easy ones in the life of the institution. They were marked by a poor turnout of participants, even on such important occasions as Sabbaths and holy days. One member recounts :

I remember how on the first shabbos [Sabbath] we could not get a minyan [according to halacha, the ten-male minimum necessary for community prayer] together, and how once on Shevuos [the Feast of Weeks holy day] we had to wait and wait until we finally got together a minyan. Yah, those early days were not so easy.

In addition to the difficulties of assembly, the first years were scarred by dissension. Another member describes the scene:

The atmosphere in the shul was like an inquisition. A lot of people had a holier-than-thou attitude. Those who had a position felt that they had to publicly express that position. They had to have special seats. So there were the “haves” and the “have-nots.” There was always quarreling—I mean much worse than it would ever get now.

People judged one another’s religious observance, relating power and authority in the institution to a proper exhibition of such observance. Yet only some people were doing the evaluating. These evaluations became translated into giving or holding back kib-budim, honors accompanying publicly assigned ritual performances during the synagogue service. Every kibbud (honor) required an investigation of whether the recipient measured up to the demands. In fact, many of these specifications were written into the first shul constitution, which proposed strict halachic adherence before anyone would be allowed to hold communal authority or receive any kibbud. The ones who met the demands were the “haves”; the others were the “have-nots”.

Any version of this first part of the story inevitably mentions these facts: the smallness of the group, its tenuous existence, and its atmosphere of altercation. With mention of the latter comes the second part of the story.

Ultimately, the dissension became too much for the group to bear. The new congregation remained precariously small, as potential members were put off by the atmosphere of contention. Consequently, after three years, a second schism occurred. Now the original rebels themselves became victims of an insurrection. Some versions of the story recount an “expulsion,” while others describe the “haves” being “voted out of office.” Whatever the method, the clear result was a change in authority. Some founders left the shul by moving out of the neighborhood. Others began walking great distances to join other shuls, where they reportedly engaged in further quarr...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction to the Transaction Edition
• Preface
• 1 Background, Beginnings, and Definitions
• 2 The Setting
• 3 The House of Prayer: The Cast of Characters
• 4 Shifting Involvements
• 5 Gossip
• 6 Joking
• 7 Singing, Swaying, Appeals, and Arguments
• 8 The House of Study
• 9 The House of Assembly
• 10 Final Words
• Afterword to the Transaction Edtion
• Notes
• Glossary
• Bibliography
• Index