See you in heaven...if you get there
After my customary procrastinory interlude (see below) i wanted to share a fascinating tell from my time communting to teach in essex before pesach.
Picture the scene if you will. Im walking down the stairs onto the platform at redbridge tube station after a long day of teaching, with the not so exciting prospect of a 1 hr 20 min journey back home ahead of me, when a voice from behind me says 'Shalom"
'Hello', i say hesitantly back - ive been spotted cos of my new-found kippah wearing antics-
'Shalom' comes the same voice again. Now, the owner of the voice, a man seemingly of African lineage is walking parralel with me on the starcase.
A conversation insues. He found 'Jesus' ten yoears ago or so. He seems excited to have identified me as a Jew, a fellow believer in Yarweh - (his word) and proceeds to take from his large back sports bag a Bible, the inner folios of which are marked up in all manner of flourescent pen/pencil colours. From his Bible he is quick to read me several passages from the Christian Bible which explain that saviour comes through the Jews.
Realising im somewhat cornered i slip a polite enquiry into the conversation. 'Which is your stop?' My friend, politely informs me hes getting off at stratford a mere 6 stops away. 'Phew' i think to myself, i can tolerate this for 6 stops.
We get on the train together as he continues to tell of his theological insights and personal religious journey. It occurs to me i know enough to argue with him and potentially undermine his claims - a milder, if more blatant one being he saying that the Ark of the Covenant was currently in the possession of the Israeli government - go tell harrison ford, buddy! I decide against, after all if hes gonna have no impact on me i cant expect that whatever i say is gonna see him rushing to the nearest mohel for an emergency procedure having realised his error. After all, i thought, this man has faith, which gives him strength and its not for me to undermine that for him.
After a few minutes on the train, he pulls from his bag - which i now notice has the word 'Jesus' emblazened across it in big white letters (if i recall correctly) a series of mocked up newspaper headlines and stories aswell as phototographs of a similar ilk.
Stratford station comes and goes.
These he explains are images and stories of how the world will be once the words of the Book of Revelations come to be fulfilled. By this stage, my participation in the conversation has discentigrated to an intimate 'Right', 'Yes', 'Aha' or some such...
'Wasnt that yout stop?'
'Its OK, I can go a bit further.'
'Crap', i think to myself, im stuck with this guy all the way to Ruislip (still over an hour away) how am I going to shake him off?'
Just as i am about to put an alternative route plan in action by changing trains, he gives up on me and decides to leave.
'Pleasure meeting you Ben', he says. 'Be sure to read those quotes from Revelations wont you'. Well, Ben I hope we'll see eachother again...Hopefully we'll see eachother in heaven. But, remember if you wont to get there you'll have to get yourself baptised. Bye'.
That was quite a parting shot. As i sat in my seat, now thankfully able to mind my own business 2 thoughts occured to me:
1. Wouldnt he of been better off picking on someone less obviously committed to Judaism or any religion for that matter. I was wearing a Kippah for goodness sake. It marks me out (thats after all how he conttoned on to me) as a religioudsly committed person. He'd be much better pickingon unwitting jo-shmoh, with no clear religious convictions and pick on them. Surely this would be a more successful way of attracting followers/converts.
2. All this was caused by me wearing a kippah, not something i had erstwhile done in public outside of synagogue or israel. There was a large part of me that thought bloody- hell if only iwasnt wearing this, it would have saved me this whole experience. This was my first confrontation with what it really means to advertise your judaism and the realitty of wearing a kippah in non-Jewish socieities. I have no cheesy corny message to leave you with about how much this reinforced my desire to wear a kippah and be obviously Jewish to the outside world but it just got me thinking about what the true implications of it can be.
Picture the scene if you will. Im walking down the stairs onto the platform at redbridge tube station after a long day of teaching, with the not so exciting prospect of a 1 hr 20 min journey back home ahead of me, when a voice from behind me says 'Shalom"
'Hello', i say hesitantly back - ive been spotted cos of my new-found kippah wearing antics-
'Shalom' comes the same voice again. Now, the owner of the voice, a man seemingly of African lineage is walking parralel with me on the starcase.
A conversation insues. He found 'Jesus' ten yoears ago or so. He seems excited to have identified me as a Jew, a fellow believer in Yarweh - (his word) and proceeds to take from his large back sports bag a Bible, the inner folios of which are marked up in all manner of flourescent pen/pencil colours. From his Bible he is quick to read me several passages from the Christian Bible which explain that saviour comes through the Jews.
Realising im somewhat cornered i slip a polite enquiry into the conversation. 'Which is your stop?' My friend, politely informs me hes getting off at stratford a mere 6 stops away. 'Phew' i think to myself, i can tolerate this for 6 stops.
We get on the train together as he continues to tell of his theological insights and personal religious journey. It occurs to me i know enough to argue with him and potentially undermine his claims - a milder, if more blatant one being he saying that the Ark of the Covenant was currently in the possession of the Israeli government - go tell harrison ford, buddy! I decide against, after all if hes gonna have no impact on me i cant expect that whatever i say is gonna see him rushing to the nearest mohel for an emergency procedure having realised his error. After all, i thought, this man has faith, which gives him strength and its not for me to undermine that for him.
After a few minutes on the train, he pulls from his bag - which i now notice has the word 'Jesus' emblazened across it in big white letters (if i recall correctly) a series of mocked up newspaper headlines and stories aswell as phototographs of a similar ilk.
Stratford station comes and goes.
These he explains are images and stories of how the world will be once the words of the Book of Revelations come to be fulfilled. By this stage, my participation in the conversation has discentigrated to an intimate 'Right', 'Yes', 'Aha' or some such...
'Wasnt that yout stop?'
'Its OK, I can go a bit further.'
'Crap', i think to myself, im stuck with this guy all the way to Ruislip (still over an hour away) how am I going to shake him off?'
Just as i am about to put an alternative route plan in action by changing trains, he gives up on me and decides to leave.
'Pleasure meeting you Ben', he says. 'Be sure to read those quotes from Revelations wont you'. Well, Ben I hope we'll see eachother again...Hopefully we'll see eachother in heaven. But, remember if you wont to get there you'll have to get yourself baptised. Bye'.
That was quite a parting shot. As i sat in my seat, now thankfully able to mind my own business 2 thoughts occured to me:
1. Wouldnt he of been better off picking on someone less obviously committed to Judaism or any religion for that matter. I was wearing a Kippah for goodness sake. It marks me out (thats after all how he conttoned on to me) as a religioudsly committed person. He'd be much better pickingon unwitting jo-shmoh, with no clear religious convictions and pick on them. Surely this would be a more successful way of attracting followers/converts.
2. All this was caused by me wearing a kippah, not something i had erstwhile done in public outside of synagogue or israel. There was a large part of me that thought bloody- hell if only iwasnt wearing this, it would have saved me this whole experience. This was my first confrontation with what it really means to advertise your judaism and the realitty of wearing a kippah in non-Jewish socieities. I have no cheesy corny message to leave you with about how much this reinforced my desire to wear a kippah and be obviously Jewish to the outside world but it just got me thinking about what the true implications of it can be.
posted by Ben at 11:31 pm
1 Comments:
Baseball caps. Will and I conducted some experiments here in sunny Southampton - sometimes he'd wear a kippah, sometimes a baseball cap. A lot more "little accidents" happened to him with the kippah - getting shoved, getting short-changed, getting pushed to the back of the queue - than did with the cap. It's all very well advertising your Jewishness, but sometimes it's more trouble than it's worth.
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