I am Jewish AMA

[Bells3032]

Following answering some Q&As on a thread about the programme Unorthodox thought i'd do an AMA here. I have looked and don't think there's been one since like 2018.

I am a traditional/modern orthodox Jew so not Hasidic like the show but I actually do talks on Judaism as part of my job and I so my knowledge is fairly good and I am rarely embarrassed or offended by questions.

So go ahead AMA

Yes, ponczki/paczki are doughnuts.

Mmm, doughnuts. I also grew up not eating pork. I didn’t eat pork till I moved to Poland in the 1980s, and it was a case of eat pork or go hungry.

My family changed their surnames, and anglicised their first names, which is not uncommon, but caused difficulties when my elderly aunt died. She had changed her name several times, and also had a stage name, so there was some confusion about what to put on her death certificate.

without any interest in discussing or approaching any understanding of a different point of view

That is exactly what I would like to do. Unfortunately there is nobody to discuss this with IRL. Elladisenchanted's post was helpful.

Despite this being an AMA, circumcision is one subject I won't engage with OL. Every thread on Judaism ends up being derailed by people attacking circumcision.

Circumcision gets attacked by the woke army anytime it's raised. My son had it done to correct a minor birth defect in his penis called a cordee. Even if he hadn't had the birth defect we would have done it to reduce the risk of STI's (that's why the AAP recommends it) and because it was my husband's preference to do it.

Hi all, I'm back. Thanks to all of you who've picked up this post in my absence. What a wonderful thing to do to educate people about our amazing and complex religion. Thanks so much for your input and it's also really interesting for me to see others view points and things even I didn't know about.

The conversation seems to have moved very much onto circumcision. As mentioned earlier it's not a rational reason we do it (though there has been proven health benefits to it).

There are small dissenters to it within the community but they generally don't get much traction. Mainly because most people have fathers, brothers, husbands and friends who are circumcised with no issue and no mental effects. in some ways its much easier to do on a child that will forget the trauma it may cause someone who has it later in life. You don't remember being 8 days old. I have also never known anyone who has had any issues with it either short or long term. You occasionally hear stories from media but it's a small community and I've yet to hear it happen even to a friend of a friend of a friend. Most mohels (the people who conduct it) are medical professionals and carefully trained. Instruments are thoroughly disinfected and parents are given strict instructions on caring for it afterwards. I am sure most mothers don't like the idea of doing it but I've yet to hear of a single person who outright objected.

I also, interestingly, did my research on it and compared it to attitudes towards female circumcision and they are quite different. The aim is not to reduce sexual satisfaction for men and rarely does so and issues of infections and further complications later in life are extremely rare.

I don't think there will be a move for it to end within the community as it is considered one of the most important aspects of the religion and has been performed even in some of the most horrific circumstances.

Obviously if the child's health is at risk it should be either delayed or not performed (but this would be rare eg they had a bleeding disorder such as haemophilia) as the most important thing is someone's health and life and we'd never advocate something we thought was that risky.

Respect to you op - seems an awful lot to remember!!. Very interesting to learn so much on this thread!

There's a reason we're called The People of the Book, and why learning and questioning are so respected!

but the Christian Bible is shockingly inaccurate in regards to anything Jewish related.

Do you mean the Old testament or the New? You do know there are many scholarly translations, all from the original languages, with hundreds of commentaries?

When I was at school I remember we were learning about different religions and a Jewish lady came in to tell us about Judaism. My abiding memory was that it's about following lots and lots of rules. When asked 'why' her main response seemed to be 'because that's the way we've always done it.' As someone who questions things, I found it strange.

I believe some of the othodox schools in London have none Jewish heads and teachers. How are they guided, does it make any difference?

Also, how come the Jewish mums I look after from Gateshead never have Geordie accents? 😃 what is in Gateshead that a lot of young women go to after school studies? Do the Orthodox females do formal exams? The young aunts Ive met all take for granted that the will go to Gateshead at 16 then go to Israel then come back and get married. Without fail they are excited by this. Like really young women. Im not sure where they would find the time to to have high flying careers. In my mind they go up north to some kind of finishing school and get paired off soon after.

I suppose Im asking are some Orthodox groups more ambitious for their girls than others? I cant honestly say Ive met a mum in my care who has not been a full time mum or teacher. They dont complain they thrive off it and my hat goes off to them.

@EachandEveryone my sister in law is orthodox (shomer shabbat, keeps kosher). She is doing a master's degree in a Russell group university. But I don't think she would call herself modern orthodox even though the synagogue she belongs to is modern orthodox. She went to hasmonean in North london (which is rated outstanding by Ofsted, ranks in the top 10% of state schools, so actually the girls are better off academically than most non Jews). There is such a wide spectrum within the orthodox communities. The orthodox girls in Hendon I know generally go to uni. My sister in law said that the average age of marriage for their classmates is 21-22 ( but I went to law school and also married at 22 and wasn't born Jewish so I wouldn't say this is terribly abnormal either, perhaps only unusual by Mumsnet standards!).

Also it depends on what you mean by 'orthodox'. Schools like JFS and Hasmonean are modern orthodox but teach national curriculum and are top state schools so most of the boys and girls go onto university.however at the other end, there are the Chasidic schools where there isn't much secular education.

@EachandEveryone also most of the orthodox Jewish women I know went to Cambridge/Oxford. Probably not reprensentative, I think it was because my mother in law's first synagogue (which has now closed) had a hippie intellectual vibe and attracted a lot of converts/baalei teshuva (secular Jews who found religion). I think I read somewhere converts are more likely to be middle class due to the expense of converting and the intellectual demands, no idea if that is true. I am sure in more mainstream circles, there are likely to be as many qualified women. I know a Harvard economist who is a rebbetzin (rabbi's wife). Most United synagogue rabbis are from good universities and their wives seem to have had similar backgrounds (in addition to 6-7 children).

*ex Harvard economist

Yes it sounds like a wide spectrum indeed. There is a posh Jewish restaurant in Hampstead well, it looks expensive and the Orthodox women I see going into it look really expensive. Really dressed up to the nines yet still modest. The men all suited and booted. Nothing like the families I see in Edgware. Then you go to Borehamwood and its different again, full of young professional families. Who wouldve thought Borehamwwod would be sort after?😀 it certainly was not when I first moved there 25 years ago.

My husband was circumcised for health reasons at the age of 8 and he remembers it as boring (hospital stay) rather than traumatic. He's never seen it as a big deal.

When asked 'why' her main response seemed to be 'because that's the way we've always done it.'

That's a Fiddler on the Roof answer. Ie "I don't know". There are always reasons, even if the reasons seem bewildering.

Not all Jewish education is equal, any more than secular education. Maybe she was never taught the reasons, maybe it never occurred to her to ask why. My personal experience of a Modern Orthodox Jewish education, both for myself and for people I have known, is that it was very academically rigorous across both Jewish and secular subjects. But not all students are interested in studying, either.

@EachandEveryone Borehamwood is sought after because Hendon is getting expensive, £400K for a 2 bed flat, at least £700k for a 3 bed terrace. Finchley isn't much better. And in terms of jewish facilities, i can't really think of anything that Hendon has that Borehamwood doesn't, it was different 20 years ago. They also have Yavneh College there(which is also Modern orthodox) so younger, less frum families are more motivated to move there. Edgware has some fairly religious schools, there is a bais yaakov in colindale; more religious families would naturally not look as fancy with 6-7 mouths to feed.

there are rich jews in every community from reform to modern orthodox to chasidic. The difference is that with non Jews, you would never come into contact with them. A janitor is not going to meet Jacob Rees Mogg socially. However with Jews, they tend to live together irregardless of socioeconomic class and often go to the same synagogues (there are billionaires who belong to my synagogue as well as very poor people who cannot afford the synagogue fees). Therefore the bar mitzvahs can be interesting ( nice way of saying it), there are literally people who drop £50-100K on a one day bar mitzvah while some don't even have the cash to cater for some small nibbles for the congregation to enjoy, which is not very nice for the kids to see. The orthodox are more sensitive to this and are better to dealing with it- this frum girl told me that her school set limits on how extravagant the bat mitzvah party can be so that no one would feel disadvantaged, which I thought was lovely.

Please could you tell me if Jewish people generally prefer to be referred to as "Jewish people" or "Jews"?

I've heard before that the use of "Jews" is often pejorative (Nazis, some Trump supporters etc), although it seems perhaps more acceptable in the US than UK. So I've always corrected the children if they say "Jews" (mainly in discussions of Anne Frank etc), but I've noticed here that some of you refer to yourselves as "Jews" rather than "Jewish". Or is that like "queer" etc where it's ok to say if you are part of the community only?

Thanks! I'd never want to upset someone by using the wrong term.

Yes I have a colleague who recently went to one at the Savoy ££££. And my friend who is religious hired a bar in Hendon and that in itself was dear because of the catering. She did have a free bar though😄 you see, thats something we dont really do. Free bars.....

She also said that JFS is a nightmare when it comes to Bat Mitzvah’s as its so competitive no matter how religious you are as its peer pressure.

@eachandeveryone some groups are definitely more ambitious. It's not really a feminism split though. The sections of community that don't want the girls to go to university equally don't want their boys to as well. They live a more insular life and minimise contact with the outside world. You'll find actually as a whole the girls even in the more hasidic communities its the girls who have higher education and the the boys who are in yeshiva /kollel (religious talmudic colleges). My friend in New York is hasidic, she works as a nurse while her husband learns Torah.

In gateshead there are seminaries (for girls) and yeshivos for boys. They are definitely not finishing schools. The girls also learn Torah studies (although generally not the Talmud) and they do college course as well. They also do cheesed (volunteer work) with the families locally. I don't know many girls that go on to israel but there are also seminaries there also doing intensive Torah study.

The norm is to marry young. I was married at 19, and had my first baby at 20. My husband was in uni for the first few years of marriage and I did part time jobs and a part time OU bachelors degree. I have worked a wide range of jobs since then. My husband also worked sunday/part time jobs while in uni to support the family.

Each community works a little differently and even in Manchester there are so many different communities. You generally attend the shul (synagogue) and schools that best suit your approach.

The idea of having different paths in Judaism is not a problem by the way. Judaism recognises that we are all individual and as long as you are keeping halacha there are lots of different approaches.

@WeirdlyOdd the term itself is not offensive in itself at all and I have no problem personally with anyone using it. But if someone is saying something like all you Jews are rich then yeah it's offensive. (yeah had that one before) so I guess if the person uses it makes it into an insult then it can be offensive of that makes sense?

My friend in New York is hasidic, she works as a nurse while her husband learns Torah.

We had a truly terrible outbreak of measles here in New York last year, and some of the hasidic communities were very hard hit because of low vaccination rates. I know one of the orthodox nurses who worked in this group to deal with the misinformation that was circulating. She's my hero.

Jewish nurses debunk anti-vaxxer misinformation as measles spreads in NYC ultra-Orthodox community

@missconduct my friend would be yelling with you at the anti vaxxers!

Absolutely fascinating thread.
Can the Eruv be extended? So as the jewish population of an area grows could the Eric line be made wider to include more households?

Also, do the men who study for a living get paid anything?

Do all Jews know the intricacies of the other sects? I appreciate you're particularly knowledgeable due to your job OP.

Can jewish people go on holidays to places that mightn't have mikvehs and synagogues in the area? Could you go camping for two weeks in the north of france for example.

@pondypandy I believe the men who study for a living get a small stipend from the kollel. It is definitely not enough to feed a family and the wife has to work in most cases, but I also heard its a thing for parents to support their young married couple for a year or two (this may be more US centric).

I know more about the orthodox way of life because i lived with my DH's family who are frum. I wasn't Jewish when i started but by the time I moved out after 3 years, I was Jewish (though I did seek out a liberal synagogue to do my conversion). I was very immersed in the Jewish way of life, celebrating all the festivals, I was there every shabbat dinner, helped out with passover cleaning. I had to learn all the laws of kashrut and shabbat. My hebrew is a lot better than most reform jews because there was no transliterations in my MIL's house, you learnt hebrew or you sunk. I was like a orthodox Jewish child, except that I had to learn it in my 20s. So I have insights into both denominations. I think its an unusual situation to be in.

Camping holidays are actually a good option for the orthodox Jew. The main problem is not the synagogue service (as you can pray at home, esp if you are a woman). The main issue is kosher food. If you have a kitchen or small camp stove, you can buy fresh food and cook. Or bring instant noodles. And of course you can't travel on friday and if you are on holiday over shabbat, you can't really go sightseeing on saturday. my MIL prefers hostels/Airbnb over hotels for that reason as hostels generally have kitchenettes. But I imagine for stricter orthodox jews, the fact that the kitchen hasn't been kashered may be a big issue. There are chabad houses and kosher hotels that cater to this. Also most major cities (LA, Hong Kong, Singapore, NYC, Paris) have kosher food delivery. I am not strict, and actually I enjoy going to synagogues whenever I am on holiday. I had an amazing time over christmas with the reform synagogue in barcelona (they invited me to eat chinese food with them cos they wanted to be like the New York Jews lol), and I also went to a service in Singapore. The reform synagogue in Jerusalem was also lovely, they invited me and my husband to hold up the scroll (which is a honour) even though it was my first time there.

@Elladisenchanted was your marriage arranged i.e. shidduch? Did you enjoy the shidduch dating process and would you recommend it? I never dated (married my uni boyfriend), and i find that most people seem disappointed by secular dating, particularly of the online variety. Do you think having an arranged marriage is easier because you don't need to go through all that and can rely on third parties to check whether the person is a good match?

The reform synagogue in Jerusalem was also lovely, they invited me and my husband to hold up the scroll (which is a honour) even though it was my first time there.

I had a similar experience just last weekend. I'm an Episcopalian, which is the American Anglican denomination. We broke from the Church of England after the American revolution. It's a very progressive, liberal denomination.

I changed churches just before Christmas last year, which is always a hard thing to do. I was very involved at my old church. I served on the vestry, which is a leadership group that runs the church along with the priest. So it was unsettling to have to start over with a whole new congregation. The priest at my new church, Mother Jenny, has been very welcoming and I have really made an effort to meet people and help out. We're now doing Zoom church services because of lock down.

Last week she asked me to do one of the scripture readings during the service. This is a huge honor and really made me feel like not just a member, but part of their parish family. I was a bit nervous but it went fine and it was just lovely to be included like that.

I think the reason I'm so drawn to this thread is that I take my religious faith and spiritual life very seriously. I really try to live it everyday, and that's something I've always greatly admired about my Jewish friends and colleagues, and now you ladies too.