How to Run a Traditional Jewish Household Read online

  Also by Blu Greenberg

  ON WOMEN AND JUDAISM

  Copyright © 1983 by Blu Greenberg

  All rights reserved

  including the right of reproduction

  in whole or in part in any form

  First Fireside Edition, 1985

  Published by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  New York, New York 10020

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  FIRESIDE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Designed by Eve Metz

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  25 27 29 30 28 26 24 Pbk.

  Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

  Greenberg, Blu, date.

  How to run a traditional Jewish Household.

  Bibliography: p. 503

  Includes index.

  1. Judaism—Customs and practices. I.

  Title. BM700.G734 1983 296.7’4 82-19702

  ISBN 0-671-41700-2

  ISBN 0-671-60270-5

  ISBN-13: 978-0-6716-0270-3

  eISBN-13: 978-1-4391-4760-3

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  There is a great deal of personal material in this book. Since I refer to members of my family quite often, let me describe them briefly: my husband, Irving Greenberg, is an Orthodox rabbi. In the book, I refer to him as Yitz, which is short for his Hebrew name, Yitzchak. His contribution to this book goes far beyond his sustained encouragement, his corrections and suggestions on each and every page, his taking up the slack in running this traditional Jewish household as I immersed myself in work. Among other things, he has been my mentor and dearest friend for over two decades. For all this—and much more—words seem inadequate.

  Also, my children, to whom this work is dedicated: Moshe, David, Deborah, J.J., and Goody. Each helped in the completion of this manuscript in his or her own way, but more important, they have provided much of the anecdotal material in this book—as in my life.

  In the work below, I also describe my beloved parents and parents-in-law, Rabbi Sam and Sylvia Genauer, Rabbi Eliahu Chaim Greenberg of blessed memory, and Sonia Greenberg. They are the primary links in our chain; without their teachings and their commitment to tradition, none of this would have been possible. Regarding this immediate work, I am especially grateful to my father, for his innumerable halachic contributions; and to my mother, for teaching me most of what I know about running a Jewish household.

  There are many others to whom I owe a debt of gratitude. For an entire year, the Bellin family of Riverdale, New York, provided me with everything I needed: a quiet room away from home, where I could work in isolation for several hours each day; a tree-lined pond beneath my window, where I could find a moment’s serenity and calm after a stretch of writing that produced nothing but anxiety; and eight-year-old Hudi Bellin, who worked with Charlotte Sheedy in pacing me. Upon her return from school each afternoon, starting with Day One, Hudi would ask, “Did you finish your book yet?” And special thanks to my friend from high-school days, Rosalind Bellin, who not only offered me space, quiet (and lunch)—but whose common sense and wisdom influenced this writing in many places.

  I want to express my great gratitude to the klei kodesh, the religious leaders of our synagogue, the Riverdale Jewish Center, and to the teachers, principals, deans, and roshei yeshiva of our children’s schools. The shul and the yeshiva schools are an integral part of our family’s life. They are always there for us, and while we sometimes tend to take our community and its institutions for granted, we well know how important they are to us, how they help us to raise our children and enable us to live as Orthodox Jews. That the names of all the people involved are too numerous to mention here is a symbol of how much work goes into giving over the chain of tradition from one generation to the next.

  There are many others who had a direct hand in this work and to whom I am most grateful: Dan Green, publisher at Simon and Schuster, whose creative imagination sparked this entire project; Charlotte Sheedy, my literary agent, who gently but persistently nudged me toward completion; Francine Klagsbrun, who generously recommended me for this work; Vivian Oleen, who forced me to clarify for her, and by extension, the unknown reader; Moshe Greenberg, Roslyn Siegel, and David Szonyi whose editorial skills were widely used and much appreciated; Deborah Greenberg, who carefully constructed the Glossary. Sophie Sorkin, director of copyediting at Simon and Schuster, who gave me wise counsel throughout; and Dan Johnson, my editor at Simon and Schuster. It was Dan with whom I worked most extensively throughout this project. I came increasingly to rely on his kindness, humor, patience, and good judgment.

  And to many other teachers and friends whose paths I have been fortunate to cross throughout these years—my deep gratitude. No woman is an island; this work, except for its mistakes, is theirs, too.

  Sivan 5742

  Spring 1982

  TO MOSHE, DAVID, DEBORAH, J.J., AND GOODY

  Who fill our lives with love and laughter, wisdom and goodness, humor and spirit. To me they are sufficient proof of a benevolent and loving God.

  Hebrew has a guttural sound that does not appear in English. It is the consonant ch pronounced as in the German ach. Whenever ch appears in a Hebrew word, it is pronounced as a guttural and not like the English ch in chapter.

  CONTENTS

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  PREFACE

  Part I THE JEWISH WAY

  1 Shabbat

  2 Kashrut

  3 Taharat Hamishpachah: The Laws of Family Purity

  4 Daily Prayer and Blessings

  5 Parenting and Education

  6 Dress

  7 Speech

  8 Mezuzah: Symbol of a Jewish Household

  Part II SPECIAL STAGES OF LIFE

  9 Marriage

  10 Birth

  11 Abortion and Birth Control

  12 Bar Mitzvah—Bat Mitzvah

  13 Divorce

  14 Death and Mourning

  Part III CELEBRATION AND REMEMBERING

  15 Jewish Rhythm

  16 Elul, the Month of Repentance

  17 Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur

  18 Sukkot, Shemini Atzeret, Simchat Torah

  19 Chanukah

  20 Purim

  21 Pesach (Passover)

  22 Yom HaShoah—Holocaust Remembrance Day

  23 Yom Ha’Atzmaut—Israel Independence Day

  24 Shavuot

  25 Tisha B’Av and Other Fasts

  AFTERWORD

  RECIPES

  GLOSSARY

  SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR A HOME LIBRARY

  INDEX

  PREFACE

  Traditional Jews come in a wide variety of types in America today. Chasidic Jews number their ranks; so do some right-wing anti-Zionists; left-wing profeminists; middle-of-the-road conventional modern Orthodox; “born again” ba’alei teshuva; spiritual neo-Kabbalists; the sectarian yeshiva crowd; some havurah Jews; some Conservative rabbis; and so on. Twentieth-century American Jewry being what it is, the institutional frameworks in which most of the above would locate themselves are the institutions of Orthodox Jewry; and the self-label they would be likely to choose is—Orthodox Jew. Hence, my use of the terms “traditional” and “Orthodox” almost interchangeably throughout the text.

  Despite the great diversity within traditional or Orthodox Judaism, however, the basics are essentially the same for all: an underlying belief that there is a personal God, Who revealed Himself in history, Who gave us the Torah, Who commanded—and commands—us to live in a certain way. That “special way” includes, among o
ther things, observance of the Sabbath and the holidays, daily prayer, kosher food laws, a well-defined code of morality and sexual ethics, and a very high value placed on Torah learning and education of the young. It is these very things, these modes of behavior, that make the traditional Jewish household so overtly different from any other.

  But that is only part of the picture. Other differences exist. Perhaps they are less obvious or less open to tabulation and quantification, but they are persistent characteristics, nevertheless. In great measure, they are linked to the special ritual life of an Orthodox Jew.

  One is the strong commitment to community. Orthodox Jews understand that without sturdy communal structures, most of the observances—such as kashrut, Torah education of children, Sabbath and holidays, daily prayer—would be infinitely more difficult to carry out.

  Another feature of traditional Jewish households is the cohesiveness of the family unit. Much of “family time” is organized around the required observances. A typical Orthodox Jewish family is quite likely to celebrate together home rituals, synagogue life, and community events.

  An unspoken but underlying assumption of all this is that individual needs will at times be subordinate to the claims of family and community. I would even suggest that one of the subtle side effects of required ritual is that children are taught in a natural way to respect their parents and respect authority. The matter-of-fact attitude that parents must assume in teaching ritual to children has, I believe, broader implications for the general task of parenting.

  Moreover, the content as well as the practices of Orthodox Judaism provide some measure of insulation against the overwhelming force of contemporary values. Because traditional Jews have not been deracinated, they remain anchored to a moral system of another era in human history. In such matters as drugs, premarital sex, extramarital affairs, pornography, and alcoholism, the views and practices of a typical Orthodox Jew would be considered old-fashioned. And he/she would take this as a compliment.

  One more characteristic of Orthodox Judaism—one which gives it all meaning—is an overarching sense of history and tradition of, say, the past thirty-five hundred years....

  Having briefly defined the essence of Orthodox Judaism, I hasten to add that, even within the basics, there is considerable room to maneuver. For example, some Orthodox Jews believe that every last ritual we observe was given in one form or another at Sinai, while others subscribe to a theory of human initiative in rabbinic interpretation of divine law. For the former group, this latter view borders on heresy. For the latter group, the fundamentalist view allows no room for coming to terms with new realities, such as Israel reborn as a nation-state without intervention of a supernatural messiah.

  Nor are the differences restricted to theology alone. When my cousins from the Lakewood (New Jersey) Yeshiva come to visit, I buy special milk for them, for unlike me, they will not drink brand-name milk. Thus, they would reject the definition of kashrut in this book; yet another Orthodox Jew would think that what I have said below is much too strict.

  To simplify the tasks at hand, however, and because this is the universe I know best, throughout this book I have generally limited myself to a discussion of the modern Orthodox. So let us take a moment to examine this group more closely.

  By simple definition, modern Orthodoxy sounds like an anomaly. How can one be modern and Orthodox at the same time? Certainly, no one would deny that Orthodoxy was established in the nineteenth century as a defense against those modern secular values that gave rise to the more liberal Reform and Conservative movements.

  The answer lies in a historic redefinition of the term “Orthodoxy.” In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, certain traditionalist rabbis began to reassess the fruits of Emancipation. And they found its social and ethical values not so wanting. Individualism, liberalism, and universalism—the hallmarks of modernity—turned out to have some redeeming social value, for traditional Jews as much as for anyone else. The goal of this new orthodoxy, then, was to somehow integrate these modern values, yet do so in a manner that would not diminish the authority and integrity of the tradition. Thus, in the mind of its standard-bearers, “Orthodox” came to be synonymous with “authentic bearers of rabbinic tradition,” rather than with “defenders of a beleaguered faith.” One can hardly underestimate the difference in psychological valence between these contrasting self-views.

  Modern Orthodox Jews can—and do—live squarely in two worlds: one of traditional Judaism, the other of modern Western society. One can lead the religious life and still be a “modern” man or woman.

  The key element in the whole process is the nature of halacha. Halacha is the means whereby we understand the details of that “special way” I spoke of earlier. The word halacha, in fact, means “the way.” It is the corpus of Jewish law and ethics, revealed at Sinai, elaborated by the Rabbis of the Talmud, further developed in the medieval codes and commentaries, and explicated continuously through the generations until this very day. It is halacha that defines one as a member of the covenantal community. Acceptance of the authority of halacha—that’s a shorthand way of defining an Orthodox Jew.

  Yet, for the modern Orthodox Jew, embracing halacha doesn’t rule out membership in the broader society. Nor does it imply flat rejection of modern Western values or a modern style of life. Joseph Soloveitchik, the leading theologian-halachist of modern Orthodoxy, argues that confrontation between contemporary human norms and Torah values can be positive. It can lead to mutual enhancement. Rabbi Soloveitchik speaks with a passion of the modern “man of faith” who feels a dialectical tension between the pull of the covenantal community and the socioethical responsibilities of modern life. Interaction, and not withdrawal, is the creative response.

  What distinguishes modern from “right-wing” Orthodoxy, then, is its attitude to modern culture and, by extension, to all groups beyond its own periphery. At times, the signals are almost imperceptible; at times they are as blatant as the clothing one wears. For example, unlike Chasidic Jews whose garb clearly says to the world, “I am not one of you,” the modern Orthodox will fine-tune the Jewish codes of dress so as to be more or less in step with the fashions of the times.

  How else does modern Orthodoxy manifest itself in the lives of its practitioners? Not necessarily in global affirmations of this sort or that, but rather in the various choices Orthodox Jews make as they synthesize Torah and contemporary culture. For example, an Orthodox Jew refrains from work on the Sabbath, doesn’t drive his or her car to the synagogue, spends the day in prayer, study, feast, rest, leisure, community, and family time. But on Monday, he or she may work as a lawyer in a large Chicago law firm, or a teacher in a Philadelphia public school. Modern Orthodox Jews will educate their children in religious schools, but also will be more than happy to help their sons and daughters through Harvard Medical School, expecting that these very same offspring will continue to keep kosher, pray daily, “pick up a sefer” (study a religious text) on a regular basis, and date only Jewish women or men. A modern Orthodox Jew will cooperate in certain endeavors with Conservative and Reform Jews, the very denominations to which Orthodoxy once set itself in opposition. This is in contrast to right-wing Orthodox Jews who are not informed by this same spirit of coexistence or cooperation.

  As I write these words, my sixteen-year-old son has just entered the dining room from the kitchen. He asks for thirty dollars to pay for his karate lessons this month. What distinguishes J.J. from his more traditional counterpart at this moment is not the yellow-sashed white gi he wears so handsomely on his tall, slender frame (although the other might consider karate a form of avodah zarah, idolatry). What distinguishes J.J. from another sixteen-year-old karate fan is not the finely crocheted maroon kepah that covers his head. No, at this moment, what is different about J.J. is that as he walked through the door separating kitchen and dining room, eyes aglow with thoughts of a coveted green belt he will test for next month, his hand automatically reached up
to touch the mezuzah affixed to the doorpost. The mezuzah, in this case a brass cylinder, contains a parchment inscribed with several sacred passages from the Torah. There is one on every doorpost in our house. In a brief instant, J.J. has brought his fingertips to the mezuzah and then back to his lips to kiss. I know his mind is on other things right now, yet some part of his soul is informed by the ancient Biblical passage “and these words that I command you this day shall be in your heart … and you shall inscribe them on the doorposts of your house …” (DEUT. 6:4-7). Modern Orthodoxy includes many things. But in 1982, it also includes gi-clad mezuzah kissers.

  To generalize, one can live a distinctive life, one can eat, dress, pray, marry, have sex, celebrate rites of passage, raise children, study, think, relate to others, and mark holy time all in a special way, yet still not find oneself terribly at odds with contemporary culture. Of course, there are conflicts in being a citizen of the world and a member of the convenantal community, conflicts in embracing universalist and particularist values almost simultaneously. But the tensions are quite bearable and the impasses are generally negotiable.

  Still, I must say it one last time. As the reader will see below, even within modern Orthodoxy, there is great range—both in attitude toward society and in personal practice. Despite others’ perception of Orthodoxy as lockstep, there is considerable room for individual style, personal nature, and each person’s unique world view.

  All this diversity in such a small group! The story is told of a Jew who was shipwrecked many years ago. He had swum ashore to an uninhabited island and had somehow managed to subsist all those years. Finally he is found. Overjoyed at the arrival of his rescuers, he takes them on a tour of the islands: the little hut he built for himself, a comfort station, and—two shuls! “Why two shuls?” they ask him. “After all, you’re the only person on the island.” He points to one and says, “This is the shul where I pray every day. And that shul? I wouldn’t go into it if you paid me!”