tuluum's Diaryland Diary

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The Marriage Question (article)

Someone really needs to remind these fools that Hebrew came out of AFRICA. Moses came out of AFRICA. Moses was married to a NUBIAN. Solomon had lineage out of SHEBA. ANd that the mixed multitdes who assembled at Sinai were not a casting call for "ARYAN NATION"...

Forward from Shirley:

http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/studentwork/race/2001/judaica_kordova.shtml

The Marriage Question

Non-White Jews Wonder If They Will Find Spouses

By Shoshna Kordova

The first time an acquaintance set up Tashia Moore, 25, with a man 13

years older than her, she figured she would give it a try. It didn't

work out. "I mean, he was old!" said Moore, an assistant account

executive for a jewelry wholesaler.

Sh was even less excited when the same acquaintance, an Orthodox

Jewish man she had met through her previous job, called again to tell

her about a 37-year-old man who had previously been married and had a

child living in Israel. "I kept thinking, why does tis guy think I

can date these older guys?" she said. She has a point -- one

part-time matchmaker refuses to set up any man with a woman more

than 10 years younger. "It's just very interesting who people set up with

me," she said.

Moore, who recently move from the Upper West Side to Flatbush,

Brooklyn, is an Orthodox Jew. She is also black. Jews such as Moore,

whose external features differ from the Eastern European, or

Ashkenazi, Jews who make up the majority of American Jewry, are often

forced to defendtheir religious identity. The limits of acceptance

of non-white Jews into the white Jewish community are most severely

tested when it comes to that ultimate arbiter of social inclusion --

marriage.

White Jews may be reluctant to date those who look diffeent, said

Rabbi Daniel Wolff. He works with converts at Ohab Zedek, an Orthodox

synagogue on West 95th Street, where he is the assistant

rabbi. "There is something to the idea of a certain American look, a

white American look," Wolff said. "I think race i still a dividing

line for a lot of people."

Traditional Jewish parents generally rate the religion of their

child's spouse as more significant than the race, said Chaim Waxman,

a sociology professor at Rutgers University. But sometimes the

surrounding wite culture into which American Ashkenazi Jews often

assimilate, to varying degrees, trumps the identity of Judaism as an

ethnicity separate from race. "If it were a choice between a white

Jew and a non-white Jew, I think probably, as in the larger white

ommunity, there is some prejudice - call it preference for one's own

kind, however you wish to phrase it - so that a non-white person

would probably have a more difficult time than a white person,"

Waxman said.

Discrimination on the part of white America Jews, then, may well be

an extension of a broader racist attitude that continues to persist.

But there is at least one significant practical difference. While

non-Jewish minorities can date other people of their own ethnicity,

non-white American Jews comitted to their religion are faced with a pool

of mostly white people who may be reluctant to bring them home to mom

and dad. This is especially relevant in the Orthodox community, in

which marriage and family are highly valued. Although some Orthodox

Jewsfind people to date by meeting them at parties or in synagogue,

others date only after being set up with a suitable partner through a

mutual friend or a matchmaker.

Partly because of their small numbers, non-white American Jews are

often a curiosity. Accrding to the 1990 Jewish Population Survey

(the latest numbers available) 3.5 percent of Americans who identify

as Jewish also identify as black; 1.9 percent identify as Hispanic.

Several Jewish organizations and matchmakers in New York said they

have exprience with few if any non-white Jews. At Ohab Zedek, 25

people have converted over the last four years, about one-third of

whom are not white. Among those, there is about an equal mix of

black, Asian and Hispanic converts, Wolff said. These numbers are

hgh compared to other synagogues, especially those outside of

Manhattan, he said.

Abbie Yamamoto, 22, is often asked if she grew up Jewish. "I feel

somewhat defensive about it," said Yamamoto, a Barnard College

senior. The child of a white secular Jewish other and a non-Jewish

Japanese father, Yamamoto, who has a round face, glasses and straight

brown hair that stretches down her back, grew up in Japan. There, her

study of Hebrew made her increasingly interested in the Jewish

heritage with which she had lng identified. But when Jews in America

and in France -- where Yamamoto studied French for two summers -- see

her face, they sometimes appear to doubt her identity. "I'm tired of

being questioned about how authentically Jewish I am all the time,"

she said

One of the reasons Yamamoto thinks people question her is that her

idea of Jewish culture does not correspond with that of American

Ashkenazi Jews. Like the Jews who came from Spain, Portugal and

Arabic countries such as Iran and Syria, Yamamoto does no fit into

the bagel-and-lox New York Jewish stereotype popularized by such

performers as Woody Allen and Jerry Seinfeld. "I definitely don't

associate chicken soup with being Jewish," she said.

Yamamoto has found Orthodox Jews to be the most accepting ofher

non-white appearance because, she said, they place a high value on

halacha, or Jewish law. For many Orthodox Jews, religious observance -

- including resting on the Sabbath and not eating meat with milk --

is a more significant index of Jewishness tha the ethnic affiliation

that developed among Ashkenazi Jews in America.

Since Orthodox halacha dictates that the child of a Jewish mother is

Jewish, Orthodox Jews, said Yamamoto, are least likely to question

her identity once they know her lineage. "Peopl who see Jewishness

as more of a cultural or racial thing tend to give me more of a

problem and tend to be more insulting to me."

Yamamoto decided to become more observant because it was much easier

to do so in New York than in Japan, where school is hel on Saturday

and kosher cheese - which Yamamoto brings back with her on short

trips home - is nowhere to be found.

For two years Yamamoto led a women's prayer group at Barnard. She

attends Orthodox services at several Manhattan synagogues, but she

said, he hasn't yet managed to get a date. "I feel like it was kind

of unnatural how I've never been asked out on a date the entire time

I've been here," she said.

Despite her difficulties, Yamamoto said she felt lucky she did not

have to convert to Judaism tobe considered Jewish. The element that

makes Yamamoto's Jewishness most palatable to the Orthodox -- her

Jewish lineage -- is the same element that creates difficulty for

converts. For people of color who convert to Judaism, religious and

racial issues ofen overlap and make it difficult for them to know

exactly why they are being treated as outsiders. This social hardship

occurs despite the explicit injunction of the Torah that forbids

discrimination against converts.

Of all non-white converts to Judaism blacks may have it the hardest,

said Adam Resnick, who has taught the conversion class at Ohab Zedek

for the past four years. White congregants will often ask Resnick

about a particular student if they are romantically interested. But

they generally don' ask about the black students.

There are cultural differences between Ashkenazi Jews and other

ethnic groups that converts from all backgrounds have to overcome,

Resnick said. But some groups fit in more easily than others, both

visually and culturally. If you're with someone who's Asian, they're

going to be accepted," he said. "If it's someone who's Hispanic,

Latino, fine, they can fit in. But if it's someone who's African-American,

they're going to stand out. Unless it's someone who really

doesn't mindbeing different, they're not going to go out with an

African-American." Resnick added, "The darker you are, the more

difficult."

When Tashia Moore first became interested in converting to Orthodoxy,

she had been much more positive about her dating prospets than she

is now. She has had a hard time finding what she called her "perfect

soulmate" -- a black Jewish man. According to the 1990 Jewish

population study, about 2,500 men aged 20-24 were converts, compared

with about 7,000 women. In the 30-34 age rage, about 5,000 men and

four times as many women had converted. At Ohab Zedek, whose

conversion class Moore attended, all but five of the last four years'

converts have been women. One rabbi attributed the high percentage of

female converts and "ba'alei tshuva" -- Jews who become more

religious -- to the Talmud's description of women as having an extra

spiritual intuition. Whatever the reason, the gender imbalance is one

more hurdle for Moore to face.

Moore, whose father converted to Reform Judaism when he was 5, spent

her childhood in Winston-Salem, N.C., attending Hebrew school and

celebrating such Jewish holidays as Passover and Chanukah. After she

moved to New York in 1999 to find more single Jews, Moore, who is 5

feet 7 inches and usually wears her air in a bun behind her head,

began attending Jewish education classes run by Manhattan Jewish

Experience, an Orthodox institution. She started learning more

Hebrew, then tried a class on spirituality and God. Soon, she began

considering conversion to Ortodox Judaism, partly because she wanted

her future children to be considered Jewish by all denominations and

partly because then she would have no problem being accepted as a Jew

in Israel -- which only accepts Orthodox conversions -- should she

choose tolive there. Ethiopian Jews have been a common sight in

Israel since 1997, when about 26,000 Jews were airlifted from

Ethiopia to Israel in Operation Solomon, according to the Israeli

Ministry of Immigrant Absorption and the American Sephardi

Federation. A of March 1999, there are about twice as many.

As she tried to decide whether she wanted to convert, Moore contacted

a white Jewish friend of hers from North Carolina who had become

Orthodox. The friend told her explicitly that it would be difficult

for oore to date within the Orthodox community because she was

black. But even when the wife of a rabbi whose family Moore was

visiting told her the same thing a little later, Moore refused to let

her optimism flag.

"I wouldn't turn down Orthodoxy because peple aren't nice," Moore

said. "It's more of a personal journey, not because the group is

really happening. You can't really keep kosher with the group, you

have to choose by yourself."

Once Moore began learning more about Orthodoxy, the religious habits

he developed became "innate," she said. As a Reform Jew, Moore said,

she hadn't been satisfied by religion. Now, she prefers the Orthodox

prayer service - longer than the one she was used to - and enjoys

saying a blessing before she eats as a way of thankng God for the

food. Moore also wears skirts as an expression of modesty and does

not touch unrelated men. "It just made sense," Moore said. "It's not

something that I feel is burdensome or anything. It's fulfilling."

Now, though, she wonders if the naysyers were right about the dating

trouble she would encounter. "I sometimes feel like somebody's not

going to be interested if they do meet me, so I usually just strike

my own self out," Moore said. "If someone says I have someone I want

you to meet, I'll ay, 'Oh, I don't know.' "

Moore still feels different from other American Jews. "The first

thing is if I say, 'Yes, I'm Jewish,' they're going to say, 'How?' "

she said. "I don't think people are mean. They just want to figure

out, wow, how is this perso Jewish and they're not white?"

Although Moore said she rarely, if ever, encounters overt racism from

other Jews, specific incidents occasionally make her realize that

some racial presumptions may still abound. One man she knows said he

thought FUBU -- te black-owned company that sells clothing geared

toward blacks and whose initials stand for "For Us By Us" -- was

really owned by Jewish people in the background. "To me it was kind

of a statement that said, 'I don't think black people can own their

own bsinesses, only Jewish people can,' "

Moore said. She told him she thought the company was owned by blacks.

The statement was probably not meant to be racist, said Moore, but it

bothered her to hear what the man was thinking. And it was a reminder

that sh wasn't exactly like him.

Connie Singman, 40, also feels her difference from other Jews more

often than she would like. The black mother of three grew up

"church-hopping" with her family in Brooklyn, practically attending a

different religious service evry Sunday. She didn't come to Judaism

until after she had married Noah Singman, a white secular Jewish man

she met when they were both at Brooklyn College, and given birth to

her oldest child. "It seemed like I needed a basis of, how do I put

it, an ethicl way to raise your child," she said. She started

attending classes in Judaism and eventually underwent an Orthodox

conversion.

As with Moore, part of the attraction Orthodoxy held for Connie

Singman was its universal acceptability regarding her and her

hildren's Jewish status. "I believe that Orthodoxy is the

mainstream," she said. "It's the benchmark. That's what you shoot

for. If you go Orthodox, then everybody accepts it." She now sends

her children to yeshiva day school near the family's home in Wes

Orange, N.J. Her husband is financially and emotionally supportive of

her decisions, although he chooses to remain apart from religion.

Connie Singman said she was glad she was already married by the time

she decided to convert. "I sometimes wonder," shesaid. "If I hadn't

been married" -- before the conversion -- "would I ever have been

married?" Answering her own question, she said, "I don't know. I

don't feel positive about it." She may have reason for her concern.

At Oheb Zedek, all those who converte over the last four years and

are married came to the conversion classes already dating someone,

Resnick said. All those who came in without anyone still don't have

anyone.

Sometimes Connie Singman is denied the casual niceties that American

Jews take fo granted, such as exchanging Sabbath greetings. When she

first began attending an Orthodox synagogue in West Orange, the woman

sitting next to her refused to acknowledge Singman as a Jew. "I would

say 'good Shabbos' and she would say 'good morning,' " Sinman

said. "Eventually she moved her seat because she didn't want to sit

next to me anymore."

Although Singman said some people have welcomed her into the

community, "I get more of a sense of not belonging -- like there's

this undercurrent of 'What's she oing here?' sort of thing."

"There's just always that feeling of not quite good enough, not quite

accepted, just not quite," Singman said. And she worries about her

biracial Jewish children: Logan, 15, who is himself a convert because

he was born before hs mother had converted; Ian, 12; and Brenna, 10.

Connie Singman recalls one time when she sent Brenna off to a Jewish

camp. "The children on the bus told her that I couldn't be Jewish

because my skin was brown," she said. "And I want to know, how did

the come up with that concept?" More specifically, she is concerned

about their future. "Will they get married in a community where

things are sort of open, but in the back of my mind I'm

thinking, 'Would you let my son marry your daughter?' That's what the

eal proof is for me."

Have you checked out my Tarot Site lately? :)

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10:33 a.m. - Thursday, Jul. 17, 2003

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