Ask your average Jew what Shavuot is all about, and they might not have much of an idea, beyond cheesecake. Ask someone who has chosen to become a part of the Jewish people, like many of our Cornerstone students, and they would have a much clearer idea! One of the many things I will miss over the next 3 months of Sabbatical, which start this coming week, is learning with our Cornerstone class – who are a mix of members wanting to deepen their knowledge and people on their journey to becoming Jewish.
Journeying into Judaism with converts has been a passion of mine since I was a student rabbi. It was at EDRS that I taught my first conversion class, while Rabbi Kraft was on Sabbatical some 16 years ago, and discovered it was not only rewarding to teach a class so interested in something I care so much about, but that I learnt huge amounts through the conversations and questions in the class. I went on to coordinate the large conversion programme at my first pulpit, and then to co-write, alongside student Rabbi Eleanor Davis, the Reform Judaism conversion programme which teachers and Rabbis around the country can use, and we certainly do here.
Last Sunday the presenter on BBC Radio London and I got into a conversation about whether or not it is possible to convert to Judaism. Many seem to believe that it is impossible, because we are known as a faith that doesn’t proselytise. This wasn’t always the case, and if we look back at the history of ancient Israel conquests certainly involved mass conversions. Over time our sense of ultimate truth and the power of holding it has shifted, and today while we are delighted to welcome those choosing Judaism as their path, we don’t go out and seek converts because we don’t believe Judaism is the only way to access the afterlife or to be a good person.
Shavuot has also shifted over the centuries, as our Cornerstone class can tell you, it began as a harvest festival, and only after the destruction of the Temple did the Rabbis begin to reassess what Shavuot would mean to us when we couldn’t take offerings of grain and first fruits to the Temple. Instead Shavuot became a celebration of the receiving of Torah, and of entering into a covenant with God. Shavuot has also become the festival at which we most explicitly celebrate those who choose to enter this covenant. The Talmud (Shabbat 146a) tells us that every Jewish soul that would ever be born or would ever choose to enter the Jewish covenant was present at Mount Sinai, it knows that you aren’t just born a Jew, but there are many ways in, and all equal, because all were at Sinai.
One of the texts usually read on Shavuot afternoon furthers this celebration of being Jewish by choice, with the reading of the book of Ruth, a harvest story, in which the eponymous Ruth chooses to not only stay with her Mother in Law who is returning to the Land of Israel, but famously declares “Do not urge me to leave you, to turn back and not follow you. For wherever you go, I will go; wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God, where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried” (Ruth 1:16-17)
Ruth is thus understood as the first convert to actively choose to join the Jewish people, rather than be married into it or taken in as part of war-booty. She understands that to become a part of the people is to live a Jewish life, and to die as a Jew, God is a part of it but is certainly not the whole. And she is never belittled or rejected for it, but is celebrated as the ancestor of none other than King David. So while we may not go out and seek converts, those who actively choose to dedicate themselves as Ruth does should be celebrated and understood as a crucial part of forming the Jewish story.
Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, an American modern orthodox rabbi who has been a regular at Limmud over the years along with his wife, Blu, suggests that in the post-Shoah world, every one of us here today is a Jew by Choice. If we had known the Shoah would be part of the covenant, we would never have signed up, and so today it is up to each and every one of us to opt in to the covenantal relationship. Everyone who shows up to synagogue, who contributes their energies to Jewish life in its broadest sense, and who continues to turn the words of the Torah to find meaning in them today is choosing to make Judaism a positive force in their lives and in the world, just as a convert, or Jew by choice has done. Shavuot is a time to really celebrate those of you who are continuing to ensure that the Shoah is not the end of the story, but that Judaism continues its journey into the 21st century with meaning and connection for all of us, regardless of where our Jewish journey started.
For some, conversion is an affirmation of something that has been true for the individual for many years. For others they have fallen in love with the Judaism their partner has introduced them to. Often I meet students who want to reinstate a Jewish branch in their story that history tried to break. Every story is different, just as each of us brings all our individual life experience and learning to how we read Torah. Sometimes those stories are ours to be known, sometimes they are closely protected precious stories kept close to the holders heart. However we come to be here today, whether by birth, by choice, or often a colourful mixture of the two, we stand together once again at the foot of Mount Sinai, where of course there was also a mixed multitude from outside the Israelite tribe, who stood alongside us and supported us without becoming a formal part of the people. However you wish to opt in, we want to support and honour this and celebrate the Jewish journey you are walking, and the Jewish future you are helping to create. Chag Sameach – hope to see you all at Sinai again very soon.
