A Wandering Jew

Sometimes it takes a tragedy to achieve a profound understanding.  Sometimes we don't see what's right under our nose, until we are stripped of all that we keep close to our heart, but what prevents us from seeing the Truth.  And when we are left empty, but free, that's when the wisdom of God fills our heart and guides us to the greater understanding of our Selves.

The Wandering Jew by Marc Chagall

And so, I have received a revelation.

Ever since I moved to the US, I have struggled with my identity, not fitting in with the Russian, Jewish, or American culture.  I couldn't understand who I was, and I was fighting to determine where I fit in.  I didn't feel Jewish enough, for, as many people mistakenly assume, Jewishness is a religion.  But I wasn't religious, never having read the Torah, or Talmud, and never having stepped into a synagogue.  However, I always felt profoundly Jewish, and suffered for my identity being reflected in my last name and the size of my nose back in my home country.  Nevertheless, I couldn't fit in with the religious Jews, or American secular Jews, the stereotyped spoiled JAPs and ferklempt housewives of Long Island.  Neither would I fit in with the Jews of Israel, I've felt more and more, learning how much hostility they have among each group, and the close-minded primitive hatred a lot of them harbored against Palestinians.

In the first years of living in the US, I still felt strong ties with the Russian culture of my home country.  I listened only to the Russian music, closed off from the world by my Walkman.   I read mainly Russian literature, and wrote poetry in Russian.  As if I still desperately tried to hold on to the only identity I knew and felt comfortable in -  the Russian one.  Everything Russian was good, and everything American was evil and wrong.  I was secluding myself from the outside American culture, but try as I might, my knowledge of English and generally curious nature opened me up more and more to the culture of the country of my chosen refuge.

As the years passed, I've absorbed more and more the bits and pieces of American culture.  At times, I'm startled when people still refer to me as Lu from Russia, thinking they are talking about someone else.  I feel at ease in the world of directness and friendliness, which is the American Soul.  It hurts me greatly now to see this Soul be pillaged by financial troubles, and separation and fear brought on by senseless wars for "our freedom".  I have many American friends, of different faiths or no faiths at all, of different ethnicities and colors. But every once in a while, I am struck with the thought of how huge our differences are, and how many of them can't even comprehend a different life style or point of view.  (And why don't they salt their food??!!!?)

So here I was stuck in the limbo between different personalities of mine, and never quite fitting in any of them.  Until I shut off my obsessive depressive thoughts, and forced myself to calm down and let God take care of all the crazy things in my life.  I came across a powerful message in a great book, which is keeping me connected to the ultimate source of my people's belief's - Kabbalah.  The book "The God-Powered Life: Awakening to Your Divine Purpose" is written by Rabbi David Aaron,  who has studied Kabbalah most of his life and translated it for the laymen, like myself.  Rabbi Aaron recounts a famous Mark Twain's quote, "All things are mortal, but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?" According to Rabbi Aaron,


The answer to Mark Twain's question lies in God's instruction to Abraham, which is the secret of how the Jews would survive two thousand years of exile from their land. Because their identity never depended on the country they lived in, they survived as a nation even though they were scattered over the face of the Earth [my italics]. Because their identity was not confined to simple nationalism, they survived thousand of years of exile form their homeland.  And finally, because their identity even transcended familial attachments they survived the Holocaust when whole families were decimated leaving solitary survivors.  Jewish identity, as defined by the patriarch Abraham is founded upon identification with the immortal - [...] God  [my italics].



So what this all means, is that I am of Jewish nation, and I am of God, and I am of the whole world. I am not just confined to the restriction of the orthodox beliefs, or the walls of my temple.  The Temple is all around me and within me.  I am a Soul of the World.  That's why I have chosen to be an ESL teacher, so that I could connect from people of different cultures.  That's why I have chosen a husband of an "enemy" faith and birth country.  That's why when I communicate with the people of different cultures and beliefs, I don't just analyze or accept their traditions and culture, I ABSORB it into my Self, I become one with it.

I've always wondered how many Americans who traveled a lot, and consider themselves worldly, are in fact limited in their colonizing attitude, because they still remained closed inside their perception of the multicultural world around them, and stick to the belief that their own culture is RIGHT and SUPERIOR.  (Oh, all those natives, how cute and wrong they are about their uncivilized ways. Let's teach them our only correct American way).  And not only Americans, those are immigrants too, who are like me 18 years ago, are still trying to cling to their lifestyle from back home, and damn those Americans around them, who are trying to corrupt them.

I want to say to them, open your eyes, people, look at the rich world around you, and admire all the differences that we have. Accept them as no right or wrong, but as gifts that are bestowed on us.  If all of us were the same, the world would be a very boring place.

And so in the midst of a very stressful and trying time, I come back to my Self, and finally I feel at peace with my own identity.  I think that God has "chosen" us Jews, to be just that - the souls encompassing the whole world, absorbing it, and keeping it together, remaining at the same time distinct.