Ha-hum!
So ive been visiting family and friends in London now for nearly 3 weeks As my comfort here increases I also sense my growing excitement at the prospect of returning home to Jerusalem, now a week and a half away.
Socially things have been uneven. By which I mean there are certain people from among my English-based friends that I have already seen 3 times during my visit, whilst there are others I only saw for the first, and likely only time, last night. There are still more I'm meeting up with for the 1st time tonight. So my hectic schedule of cricket watching eating and socialising and occasionally sometimes even a combination of all 3- wow!- has been, unsurprisingly, lovely- holiday well spent.
The focus then of todays post is the evening I spent last night with a selection of old school friends brought together in honour of his highness's visit by the one school friend of mine that I'm still actively in touch with in this crowd.
In the hour or two leading up to the get-together I was feeling uneasy, even a little nervous. There were people there I hadnt seen in maybe as much as 10-11 years. Honestly thats not the knub of the issue. The problem is the same old one with one subtle difference, its my having given into the 'dark-side'. 'the beardy-weirdies', 'The G-d Squad' - that, since i knew and was last close with these people I was not observant and now I am.
Of course, all but one of my british-based friendship circle are shomer mitzvot and knew me before I was myself traditionally observant. So on the surface it seems like the same problem irrespective of which friendship group I am socialising in, being school friends or otherwise....
As it turns out the difficulty, or my perception there of, is in fact very different.
Most of my closest friends are people I knew from youth movement days with whom I shared a year in Israel after finishing school. Not only are we still close but that experience encourages you and indeed promotes itself as a 'safe space' for considered and thoughtful exploration of ones Jewish and Zionist identity. Me being me I militated towards the ones of our group who were a touch more serious and took on to greater or lessor degrees some thoughtful introspection and generally questioning and desire for growth. I dont know whether all of my youth movement friends would call themselves serious Jews, but thay are certainly thoughtful and connected Jews, often strongly connected. That being the case, whilst we differ on our approaches and amount of practice and known of them are halachically observant and this can cause a degree of difficulty/ tension they do, howerver, understand the process that led me to where I am Jewishly as it was and is one that they engaged on, although of course it leads everyone to different places.
So my Youth movement friends more-a-less 'get it' or get me 'jewishly' we are products of the same world and i still feel comfortable around them and an ease in relating to them.
If my Youth movement buddies are Jewish positive, my school friends range from Jewish negative to luke-warm at best. This phenomenon was played out to some degree by the facts on the ground. Other than me, of the people present last night, one was married to a guy who converted to marry her, the girlfriends of two more are in the process of converting and the third has no interest in going out with Jews at all.
Yes, yes I know it sayas aomething important that my friends want their partners to have a conversion and ultimately be Jewish but the majority of these friends did not prioritise dating jewishly, they didnt see the value in it, which is the saddest part.
This of course is a shocking inditement of our school, the nominally Orthodox and long-since defunct boarding school Carmel College. Shabbat, as a primaryexample of Jewish life at Carmel was a repressive and largely unenjoyable experience. I left there after 5 years never having opened a Gemara, with minimal Jewish knowledge and infact it is true to say that a big part of the negative factors that pushed me towards a career in Jewish education, so frustrated at the paucity of my own education.
Unlike my school friends at the pub, I pursued other Jewish circles and experiences and found positive ones through my youth movement career. For them, their Carmel friends are there 'Jewish circle'. With their experience of Carmel being their predominant Jewish experience outside of homelife, it occurs to me that it is now surprise that they have little interest in being actively engaged Jews who attach dominant value to their Jewish identities- why would they having their school experience of institutionalised Judaism to look back on for inspiration!
Dont get me wrong I enjoyed my school days and they were certainly formative, but as a Jewish institution, Carmel College RIP! You will be missed?!
Socially things have been uneven. By which I mean there are certain people from among my English-based friends that I have already seen 3 times during my visit, whilst there are others I only saw for the first, and likely only time, last night. There are still more I'm meeting up with for the 1st time tonight. So my hectic schedule of cricket watching eating and socialising and occasionally sometimes even a combination of all 3- wow!- has been, unsurprisingly, lovely- holiday well spent.
The focus then of todays post is the evening I spent last night with a selection of old school friends brought together in honour of his highness's visit by the one school friend of mine that I'm still actively in touch with in this crowd.
In the hour or two leading up to the get-together I was feeling uneasy, even a little nervous. There were people there I hadnt seen in maybe as much as 10-11 years. Honestly thats not the knub of the issue. The problem is the same old one with one subtle difference, its my having given into the 'dark-side'. 'the beardy-weirdies', 'The G-d Squad' - that, since i knew and was last close with these people I was not observant and now I am.
Of course, all but one of my british-based friendship circle are shomer mitzvot and knew me before I was myself traditionally observant. So on the surface it seems like the same problem irrespective of which friendship group I am socialising in, being school friends or otherwise....
As it turns out the difficulty, or my perception there of, is in fact very different.
Most of my closest friends are people I knew from youth movement days with whom I shared a year in Israel after finishing school. Not only are we still close but that experience encourages you and indeed promotes itself as a 'safe space' for considered and thoughtful exploration of ones Jewish and Zionist identity. Me being me I militated towards the ones of our group who were a touch more serious and took on to greater or lessor degrees some thoughtful introspection and generally questioning and desire for growth. I dont know whether all of my youth movement friends would call themselves serious Jews, but thay are certainly thoughtful and connected Jews, often strongly connected. That being the case, whilst we differ on our approaches and amount of practice and known of them are halachically observant and this can cause a degree of difficulty/ tension they do, howerver, understand the process that led me to where I am Jewishly as it was and is one that they engaged on, although of course it leads everyone to different places.
So my Youth movement friends more-a-less 'get it' or get me 'jewishly' we are products of the same world and i still feel comfortable around them and an ease in relating to them.
If my Youth movement buddies are Jewish positive, my school friends range from Jewish negative to luke-warm at best. This phenomenon was played out to some degree by the facts on the ground. Other than me, of the people present last night, one was married to a guy who converted to marry her, the girlfriends of two more are in the process of converting and the third has no interest in going out with Jews at all.
Yes, yes I know it sayas aomething important that my friends want their partners to have a conversion and ultimately be Jewish but the majority of these friends did not prioritise dating jewishly, they didnt see the value in it, which is the saddest part.
This of course is a shocking inditement of our school, the nominally Orthodox and long-since defunct boarding school Carmel College. Shabbat, as a primaryexample of Jewish life at Carmel was a repressive and largely unenjoyable experience. I left there after 5 years never having opened a Gemara, with minimal Jewish knowledge and infact it is true to say that a big part of the negative factors that pushed me towards a career in Jewish education, so frustrated at the paucity of my own education.
Unlike my school friends at the pub, I pursued other Jewish circles and experiences and found positive ones through my youth movement career. For them, their Carmel friends are there 'Jewish circle'. With their experience of Carmel being their predominant Jewish experience outside of homelife, it occurs to me that it is now surprise that they have little interest in being actively engaged Jews who attach dominant value to their Jewish identities- why would they having their school experience of institutionalised Judaism to look back on for inspiration!
Dont get me wrong I enjoyed my school days and they were certainly formative, but as a Jewish institution, Carmel College RIP! You will be missed?!
posted by Ben at 1:48 pm
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