At First There Was Darkness
by Jenny Gross
In the beginning there was nothing. There was no Torah, or spirituality, or community, or even education. Nothing Jewish ever hummed through our home. We were, however, a perfectly assimilated American Jewish family. As those quintessential secular Jews on the corner of the block in Miami, life was good. It didn't reach such depths, life at those times. Being raised in south Florida, with a storybook neighborhood, the beach, modeling and acting through junior high. When I wasn't booking catalogs, I was busy working on my fast pitch. The gifted school I attended was on Tuesdays and Fridays. I was an all-star kid by everything the secular world would value as such. It was around this time when I came to know that my existence had more weight than just modeling, or anything I could respectively match as passionate activities, for adults too.
Our ethnic backing is some mix of Romanian and Polish. My great grandparents, first generation Americans, still had the customs and beliefs Judaism held, but by the time my grandparents formed homes of their own, it was gone. Needless to say, my Mom and Dad didn't have a flicker of it. 1982 rolls around as I arrive on this planet- at this point in time the idea of being Jewish meant nothing more than Seinfeld and bagels. Besides these two monumental contributions to society, what made me different from the rest of the world? Mom and Dad spent years ranting over the necessity of marrying someone Jewish. My thinking was, why should I- to sustain this "Jewish culture"which didn't seem so cool to me anyhow? Only later did I realize what really stood behind the idea of Judaism, something even Cosmo Kramer couldn't have fathomed.
It took me some time to come to grips with the fact that being Jewish was okay. This was enough to attend a Bnai Brith Youth Organization meeting soon after we moved to Boca Raton. I was then fourteen. My first meeting involved Jon Raskin telling Carly Green to tell me that he would, "scam with me." Not only did I not know what that entailed, I was scared to death and never returned to BBYO. As it turns out, living in Boca isn't the hardest place to meet Jews. And soon, I not only had Jewish kids driving me to school, but I was studying with them, kissing them and gossiping with them. The summer after freshman year, while I worked at the J.C.C. camp with some good friends, other friends of ours were on summer programs throughout Israel. I guess you could call me impressionable because once they went, I decided I wanted to go to Israel, as soon as possible. The Alexander Muss High School in Israel, also known as H.S.I. had two month long programs to Israel during the academic year. I wasn't clear how I felt about Israel. Although, I got to miss a term of chemistry in the process and it seemed a good way to diversify my global portfolio. At age seventeen, Israel could not have been better; being silly, drinking, smoking, friends, the Beatles, Britney Spears, dorms, traveling, falafel, guys, people from everywhere. The time was spent doing exactly what I wanted, and exactly what I needed, then.
High school ended and college began as I got another opportunity to go back to Israel. A conservative Rabbi, out of South Florida, led the Jewish Leadership Institute, or J.L.I. (keep up with the acronyms). I went with twenty contemporaries to Jerusalem for nearly a month at the end of summer 2001. As I hoped for another wild H.S.I., what I got was even wilder; it was a spoonful of living. This trip really made things click. I could smell it and almost taste it, but it wasn't yet mine. Specifically, this program exposed me to Shabbat, it also taught me to read Hebrew, and it was during this time that I ended a relationship with a Catholic boyfriend I once thought might be my husband. I realized I wanted to live a Jewish life, but what did that mean?
Life after J.L.I. changed things for good. I was accepted, sophomore year, to an important school in the District. Washington has henceforth provided a welcoming and tolerant outlet to practice Conservative Judaism, soon to be some Orthodoxy, even some Hillel involvement. I am at a point now, where I prefer to just say Shomer Mitzvot (observant of the commandments/mitzvahs). I launched my growth in Israel, but soared in DC. The growth meant practicing Judaism at its core, using the blueprint for living, the Torah.
Here it is, G-d at the seat of it. Not that I would have told you G-d didn't exist, back in the days of modeling or softball but I just had no connection with what the idea could have been. Somehow, G-d has managed a pretty bad rap among the secular world. According to my research, the term alone is terrifically uncool. The way to understand G-d is not as ‘some almighty guy, playing chess with our lives', rather as one Force by which our universe is fueled. We aren't aimlessly wandering through a haphazard world. This One Force sustains a perfect universal flow -this force is called G-d. There is a reason the events in my life led me to all these different places, to then align myself in this path, of brilliance, of fruitfulness. How is it that a girl like me, from a place like mine, from point a, to point b, to point c, would be here? To recognize our existence has such a sheer and valid purpose. It's the most real thing I've ever known.
I've come to conceive that we all view our brief lives with two rooted precepts. The first is the idea that we are ourselves. There is very little in this existence that has been proven at once and never disproved or questioned. Everything is subject to change and interpretation. You see, I can "think I know"every element of my blanket; components, its purpose, but these are simply things I've been told, so my belief is only as far as I trust the sources that tell them. Alternatively, what each of us do know with entire proof is that we are us; our heart, our leg, our mind. It's really quite incredible when you think about it. The second precept is our false sense of permanence to this life. The only thing we know for sure about every person that was on this earth is that they have since died- having now been removed from this earth. And, we don't know where they've gone. This is a scary thought- a humbling one, one that should limit our egocentric indispensability. The idea needs to get us off our feet and fuel our search of- what is our contribution? How do we achieve it?
In this world there is more going on than what we see with our naked eye. Our five senses are purely physical; so don't blame them for not taking in all that exists in reality. There is a commonly held scientific notion what we experience with our five senses is really only 4-7% of what really exists on this Earth. Meaning, when I look around my room and see my bed, clock, laptop, roommate, my senses limit me from recognizing some 95% of what really makes up all the life within my room, we're talking meta-physical here. Too bad for me, I can't see it; only learn of its existence.
In order to do this, let's first identify the tools we have been given to guide us through this crazy world. We're all equipped with one body and one soul. Well, as you may be aware, your body is always letting you know it's around; feeding it, keeping it clean, attractive, fit, properly clothed, etc. Your body doesn't allow you to miss its existence or upkeep- you never miss a day of, say, going to the bathroom or sleeping, hopefully. We are most easily in touch with our physical selves. Now it gets trickier- soul, our souls are the reason we're here in this life. The soul will never give you a headache from dehydration or body odor in fact, your soul won't even bother you in the slightest unless you tap into it. Souls come in many forms with different spiritual influences on the universe. Ultimately, B.B.Y.O, H.S.I. and J.L.I. left me ill prepared to deal with the enormity of what it means to have a Jewish soul.
The Jewish soul is something unique. In a nutshell, it has great access to spiritual sustenance. How? Through the use of one neatly compiled text, illustrating and explaining the methodology, the Torah, authored by none other than "thee Force". This book is an instruction manual, coded and deep beyond our knowledge to aid us in the achievement of life's greatest, lasting pleasures. It is made clear in this book that the Jewish soul is afforded chosen-ness. This chosen-ness can be explained through the Jewish people's still thriving existence among the grandest racism and persecution of all time, in every point in time. It might also be explained through our make up of .01% of the total world population and acquiring over 30% of Nobel peace prizes. What gives?
When you believe there is more going on in this world than what we can see, congratulations, you have a deeper understanding than most of society. Our Torah proves this existence of spiritual energy in this universe and in our lives. Further, it explains the methodology to acquire it. The Torah was written by G-d, relayed to Moses, given to the Jewish people some 4000 years ago and we still have got it. The wars and odds, persecution and anti-Semitism, it's too much of a miracle even to contemplate, but the bottom line is that this text is within our grasp. The Torah and its 613 mitzvot (aka ways to connect with our Creator) cover all we'll need, as Jews, all we could ever ask for to satiate our lives to the fullest. Our great grandparents knew it and a few thousand years of their ancestors did too. Something has occurred in the past 50 years in America where this secular nation has offered a most comfortable way to escape the truths to life, and in essence, the Torah.
Consuming ourselves with the physical desires of this life obstructs our journey along the spiritual 95% of reality within our grasp. The idea is to moderate all physical things so they do not consume us. This can be instilled through our most sacred gift, the Torah, or instead, ignored by way of society's ideals. Those values of society, surely instill 'being a good person', but not as the foundation, as a tagline. It was evident to me back in Miami; the foundation is all about the physical- excel in academia, athletics, looks and personality to ensure the optimal life. The list, of course, would soon turn into something like; career, attractiveness, fitness, wit, charisma and you're bound the winning ticket to life. What the secular world doesn't want you to know is that that isn't true; our world is not fueled by stock options and BCBG.
The system of this world, runs in harmony with the positive aspects we all possess; sharing, kindness, giving, humility, loving. The system's malfunction occurs with those attributes inspired by negativity; ego, selfishness, pride, hatred. There are so very many proofs to this reality. The Torah encompasses this system. It gets it. It explains it. It goes so far as to spell out how to conduct our lives, ensuring us the most fruitful reward. It is perfectly crafted in application to each one of our existences to deliver optimal happiness.
This brings me to my last Israel adventure. Last month Aish HaTorah led a program called, with no zesty acronym, The Hasbara Fellowships, with an agenda to teach college kids everything there is to know about the current political situation and further psych them up to go home to their campuses and sing Israel's praises. Now look, I've always been a supporter of Israel- who was there in 1999 to help me escape the Bunsen burner? Who provided millions of Jews to celebrate Shabbat in 2001? But this 2004 trip struck a different chord. It was experientially clear to me this is a place where the epitome of spiritual existence resides, where our world operating system is clear and one. Here is the mainframe database. There's no glamorizing or denying the terror and hardships this nation experiences daily, only to suggest something "special" is going on when a nation-state smaller than the size of New Jersey has more controversy than the largest nations or empires our planet Earth has come to know. Being in Israel with the right consciousness allows one to tap into this spiritual purity. This I cannot tell you. This you must experience. Last month Israel proved to me what fool's paradise we can choose to live, or conversely, with what clarity we can come to know this place.
A friend once told me, if you don't check it out, then the secular world has you brainwashed. It took me nineteen years of sleepwalking through this life to get that, and somehow in this whole process I have. It's right at my fingertips, and not only at my fingertips, but in my heart and as my soul. I now work on developing my soul with the guidance of our Creator and his manual. Each day I explore the depths to which this will take me. After a couple decades devoid of Torah, I woke up.
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