Image from theSOP.org
I was on my way to a story today (ok, it took me a few months to get around to posting this) when I had to defend my bacon. Pig farms do exist in Israel, but only on platforms, apparently so that the pigs’ feet don’t touch the holy earth of Israel (that doesn’t seem to prevent pigsty owners from dumping pig waste directly into Israel’s holy drinking water).
“I can’t believe they’re selling bacon! Can you believe they’re selling pig at this store? Real pig! Here in Jerusalem!” An elderly woman was almost hysterical while waiting for the light rail train. “Pig! Here in Jerusalem!” she told everyone at the light rail station.
I know, I know, what am I doing at a light rail station if I claim to bike everywhere? Having a sprained ankle means that I’m just injured enough to need to take public transportation everywhere, but not injured enough that work pays for all my travel by taxi. It’s been quite a drag, though I’ve gotten a new appreciation for the bus system in the city, which I never learned because I bike everywhere. Now I can empathize more with my complaining friends when I write about public transportation. It also means I’ve got lots of time when I’m just sitting around at bus stops waiting and watching people up close.
I knew I should have just kept my mouth shut – always keep your mouth shut in these situations. But perhaps because I was on my way to report on a protest from Women of the Wall, and they were protesting exactly that: a lack of tolerance, an inability to accept that people have different ways of living their lives and different practices.
“So what?” I asked her. “So what if they sell pig?” I didn’t really need to say anything, because then her nephew blew up at her. “Why are you making a big deal of this? You know I eat pig! You know I eat pig and that I like eating pig! If you ever want to see me again, you need to respect my decisions!” It was one of those confrontations that you know has many other dramas leading up to it. He stormed off.
Other people at the bus stop, intrigued by the family drama, joined into the conversation. “Is that your son?” asked a religious man next to me. “My sister’s son,” the woman replied. “You know, it’s really not a big deal that they’re selling pig,” the old religious man told her. “They’ve been there for years. They’re selling it for the Russians.”
“They had some trouble with the haredim at first, but they’ve been there fore about two years now,” said another religious man wearing a black kippah. “But here? In Jerusalem? This is the holy city?” the woman said.
“What does it matter if it’s the holy city?” I asked. “People in the holy city eat pig. I eat pig.”
“YOU eat pig?” the woman asked me, incredulous. “Are you Jewish?”
“Yes, I’m Jewish. I’m proud to be Jewish, and I’m proud to eat pig.”
“How can that be? You’re not being a good Jew,” she started to lecture me. “How can you eat pig in the Holy City? I was here before the establishment of the State. I was here when the British were here. I was here when they were shooting us for being Jewish. How can you eat pig here?”
“Because it’s my decision and it’s my right to be able to decide what to do,” I said.
“But I was here in Jerusalem when the British were shooting shells at us as we walked down the street,”
“Lady, what are you talking about? What do the British have to do with eating pig?” asked the man with the black kippah.
“We fought for this city. We fought for the holy city. And now people are going and eating pig here!” she said.
“Lady, people have been eating pig here since the British were here. People have been selling pig in Jerusalem and Rehavia for decades.”
“But how? How can you eat pig here, here in the holy city?” she asked again, starting to sound like a broken-hearted broken record. ”
“What, do your kids eat pig?” the woman asked the man with the black kippa. “You’re crazy,” the man answered, clearly offended. “Do my kids eat pig?!” he said to me. “What kind of question is that?”
The light rail came and we all got on at different doors. I wonder if the woman and her nephew made amends, or if the pig debate was a sign of deeper rifts in the family.
But what I wanted to tell her, if I had had the time, is that the British shooting you and my decision to eat pig ARE related. You’re right, crazy conservative lady. In America, I never ate pig. I kept kosher/vegetarian outside the house from age 8 until well into my 20s. Only when I moved to Israel did I stop keeping kosher.
I always figured that when I moved to Israel I’d become religious. Most of my friends here were religious, my adopted families were all religious, and I was moving to Jerusalem. It seemed the natural progression – me, too, I’d be religious as well. Instead, I found myself swinging to the vehemently secular side – a move that surprised me. But the more I think about it, the more it makes sense.
Living outside of Israel, I had to cling to something to set me apart and act as a physical manifestation of my Jewish identity. Here in Israel, I have nothing to prove. I am Jewish just by getting on the light rail or walking down the street, whether or not there are British munitions pointed at me.
At a recent music festival, I was thrilled when indie rocker Avi Adaki finished his set late on Friday afternoon and then led the crowd in a blessing for Shabbat. “This is so cool! This would never happen in America!” I enthused to my friend. He, along with most of the crowd, was pretty apathetic. But that, to me, was exactly the way I want to be Jewish: to have an electric-guitar accompanying me as I welcome the Shabbat, and then to spend the rest of my night of rest rocking out with my friends under the stars in an empty field in the Negev with copious amounts of alcohol. No pig at the festival, because we didn’t have a refrigerator, but last year we did see the Iron Dome in action on our drive home.
I assume that if or when I move back to the US, I might again become kosher. Here, I almost have something to prove in the opposite direction: that no one can tell me how to be Jewish. I will eat pig because I have to maintain my secular identity in the face of so much Orthodoxy forced on me from so many directions.
The interaction reminded me of my friend Ma’ayan’s argument in support of the haredim: if no one guards the Jewish traditions like they do, the traditions will eventually disappear. You may not like them, but the survival of Judaism depends on it. Sure, you can be all hippy dippy and be accepting of everyone and diversity, but eventually, within a few generations everything will be lost to assimilation.
Reluctantly I have to agree that there is some truth in what she says. I don’t like it, and I certainly don’t want to live my life in the haredi manner, but at least the haredim aren’t worried about assimilation and never will be.
But there’s also truth in my position: that because people have fought for Israel, fought and died to create a Jewish homeland, I no longer need to be bound by the traditions that set us apart. I can respect the traditions, but I’m no longer required to keep them as a prerequisite to the survival of Judaism. Because we have a country, Judaism will survive in some form or another. Because we have a country, there is space for a colorful range of Jewish practices, we are no longer all clinging to the same lifeboat amidst a sea of stormy anti-Semitism.
I got off the light rail and went to report on the “Global Shema Flashmob” – an initiative of Jews around the world saying “Shema” in solidarity with Anat Hoffman. The Women of the Wall’s issues with the police continue to amaze me. Only in Israel, have the police decided what constitutes a “female tallit” or a “male tallit.”
I do understand part of where Ma’ayan was coming from, and even where the conservative lady was coming from – why did we fight for this country if it’s going to become like any other place. If nothing sets it apart as Jewish, then what was the point of all the suffering and fighting? I have no answers. I just know one thing: bacon is delicious.
Diaspora Jews stand with Women of the Wall
Hundreds simultaneously recite prayer in flashmob event after arrest of Women of the Wall chairwoman Anat Hoffman.
Hundreds of people around the world on Monday simultaneously recited the shema prayer in a unique flashmob event, in response to the arrest of Women of the Wall chairwoman Anat Hoffman last week.
Hoffman was arrested during a late night event on October 16 while accompanying approximately 250 members of the Hadassah Women’s Organization to the Western Wall.
Notes in the Cracks 
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