Judy Gruen - The Skeptic and the Rabbi

Copyright 2017 by Judy Gruen

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, digital scanning, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please address She Writes Press.

Published 2017

Printed in the United States of America

Print ISBN: 978-1-63152-302-1
E-ISBN: 978-1-63152-303-8
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017938479

For information, address:
She Writes Press
1563 Solano Ave #546
Berkeley, CA 94707

Cover design Julie Metz, Ltd./metzdesign.com
Formatting by Katherine Lloyd/theDESKonline.com

She Writes Press is a division of SparkPoint Studio, LLC.

Names and identifying characteristics have been changed to protect the privacy of certain individuals.

ALSO BY JUDY GRUEN

Till We Eat Again: A Second Helping

MBA Admissions for Smarties: The No-Nonsense Guide to Acceptance at Top Business Schools (with Linda Abraham)

The Womens Daily Irony Supplement

Carpool Tunnel Syndrome: Motherhood as Shuttle Diplomacy

This book is dedicated to the memory of my grandparents

Rabbi Bernard Cohen, PhD

Ethel Goldman Cohen

Herbert Theodore Rosenfeld

Cecelia Rosenfeld, MD

THERES A COMMON TALMUDIC TERMNogaya BDavarthat ought to disqualify me immediately from attempting an appropriate foreword for Judy Gruens fine book.

A Nogaya BDavar is an interested party, a concerned individual with an unmistakable stake in some enterprise or dispute. If youre Nogaya BDavar you cant pretend to be impartial and I cant possibly feign impartiality to the events and arguments that Judy describes so vividly in these pages.

My wife Diane and I played a small personal role in Judys journey toward Orthodox Jewish commitment, and we participated in the frenzied celebration of her fairy tale (or frummy tale) wedding some quarter century ago. Her husband Jeff succeeded me as president of the California congregation I co-founded, and he counts as one of the most honorable and universally admired individuals Ive ever encountered. The pride I feel in Judys eloquent description of her spiritual and intellectual development is as much personal as it is professional.

Yet even those who have never met the Gruens will come away from this reading experience with the sense that you can now number them among your intimate friends. Through the intimacy and force of her writing, Judy presents family members and friends that I dont know personally with the same vivifying affection with which she describes characters Ive known for many years.

This marvelous book should connect with the widest possible readershipferociously religious or fervently secular; Jewish, Christian or humanist; baby boomer, Gen X-er or Millennial. Unlike other conversion stories, Judy stresses the fact that making a religious commitment need not involve a transformation that is immediate or total. A spiritual awakening, a sense of adventure, and a near idyllic romance may have led her to a new life as a religious Jew, but they never created a wholly new, unrecognizable personality. The old Judy is still very much there, capable of looking with bemused skepticism at the fulfilling Orthodox existence she establishes for herself and her family.

Her example makes a crucial point for all people of faith, and for those friendly doubters or deniers with a sincere desire to understand them. When an individual pursues a new religious path, she may hear angels singing or bells ringing, but its the beginning, not the end, of her most important story. Any seeker who longs for a climactic resolution of all doubts and divisions, capped with the words and they lived happily ever after, wont find such trite conclusions in religious congregations of any denomination. Thats especially true for Jews, who take seriously the teaching that our forefather Jacob earned the name Israel by wrestling with God. Like so many serious Jews of recent generations, Judy keeps alive within her household the spirit of both sets of grandparentsthe cheerfully disbelieving secularists alongside the philosophically rigorous religious believers. Most Jewish families in the United States can identify relatives or ancestors who felt the powerful claims of religious observance, as well as others who preferred to devote their Friday nights to Woody Allen movies or sweet-and-sour pork at Cantonese restaurants.

To an undeniable degree, Judys relationship with Judaism comes across as a serious romance, but one that raises as many new life questions as it settles. The call to rules, rituals, and restraint that she associates with Rabbi Daniel Lapin, her teacher (and mine), dont bring an end to thinking and choosing but provide a means to think more deeply and choose more richly.

In reliving this story through these pages, Im reminded of the immortal epigraph to the 1910 novel, Howards End, by the supremely eloquent English, non-Jewish novelist E. M. Forster. Only connect, the great storyteller exhorts his readers, and Judy Gruen hopes to encourage the same sort of connections: between romantic partners, family members, present and distant generations, believers and scoffers, logic and passion, author and readers and, ultimately, unavoidably, between God and his people.

I WAS JUST SECONDS FROM A CLEAN GETAWAY.

I ducked out early from a weekend writers conference on Saturday night, right after Shabbos ended. My daughter was leaving for camp the next morning, and I drove back to L.A. from Ventura County to help her finish packing. Just as the hotel elevator doors began to close, a long arm thrust itself forward, wrenching them open again. Another conference attendee entered. With one swift glance, he assessed my belongings on the luggage cart.

I braced myself. I knew what was coming.

Most of my items were unremarkable: a small suitcase, cooler bag, and a book bag. But the cart also held a tall red and white cardboard box, printed with the peculiar description KOSHER LAMP, in nearly marquee-sized, bold, capital letters. You didnt need a journalism degree to have to wonder about that.

What is a kosher lamp? my fellow traveler asked, one eyebrow arched. His tone was slightly mocking, and I was pretty sure that we were members of the same tribe. I groaned inwardly. It was impossible to offer an instant and satisfying answer to his completely reasonable question. I felt like the famous Jewish sage Hillel, who had once been challenged by a skeptic to explain the entire Torah while standing on one foot.

The lamp has a movable cover so you can close or open the light over Shabbos, I explained, already falling way short of the Hillel standard. And what was taking this elevator so long to descend two floors? Was it stuck or something? This way I can use the light without turning on any switches.