List College at The Jewish Theological Seminary is where Amram Altzman found one of his many communities. | Supplied via Wikimedia Commons

Two years ago, I wrote my first blog post for New Voices. I invited young Conservative Jews, unhappy with the current situation within their movement, to enter into conversation with me and the many other young Jews I know who grew up Modern Orthodox. We, too, were discontented with what we perceived as our movement’s shortcomings.

That post marked the beginning of a process that occupied much of my writing during the first half of my college career. I threw labels on and off — I saw the value in them, and then denounced them as too prohibitive — as I sought to find a community that combined what I wanted. I wanted everything: a commitment to tradition, a commitment to progress, a commitment to halacha, and also a desire to innovate, to create new traditions and rituals while preserving the old.

Each time, I fell short.

Each time, I thought I’d found a community which had finally met all of my criteria, and each time, I was surprised and disappointed when it did not match my laundry list of criteria for a perfect Jewish community.

I don’t want this to turn into a sappy blog post where I realize that it’s all okay, and that the community I’ve found myself in is a perfect one for me. At the end of the day, I have a vision for a Jewish future that I’m still searching for. I’m still looking for a derekh to replace the one I left when I left the Orthodox community. I’m still hopeful for a future where I find a Jewish community which meets my list of criteria, which fits my specific niche.

Although I’ve found pockets where that might exist, and although I’ve found a Jewish community on campus where I do feel comfortable, part of me is always searching for more, for the next and newest thing to add to my practice. Each time I do, I look back, often nostalgically, to my upbringing, to a time and a community where being on a derekh was so easy.

Further complicating this was the realization that I exist — and can be comfortable in — multiple communities, all over the spectrum of religious observance. I can be comfortable in my Conservative community on campus, the queer Jewish shabbatonim that I staff, and my parents’ Orthodox community — none of which are my ideals, but all of which I can be comfortable in, and in which I can find community.

This, ultimately, is what confuses the concept of the derekh for me. It’s not the fact that there is one derekh on which I find myself, but the fact that I am on multiple roads, all at the same time. On each of those, there are spaces where I find myself in varying levels of visibility. I often find myself invisible or sacrificing my observance in spaces that are less observant, and find myself invisible as a queer person in Orthodox spaces.

Through the first half of my college career, I realized that the being off the derekh is not just about getting a free pass out of Orthodoxy (as I discussed after Rosh Hashanah), but I’ve also realized that being off the derekh means that I can never be complacent in my Jewish community. I will always be expecting more from all of the Jewish communities with which I affiliate. Being off the derekh is why I continue to write and think about the ways in which Orthodoxy needs to make its spaces more queer-affirming, or the ways in which Modern Orthodoxy’s insecurities feed into the growing divide between Orthodoxy and its Modern counterpart. It’s the reason that I think critically about the ways in which the Rabbinical Assembly provides a problematic model for creating new and innovative Jewish ritual.

Being off the derekh, for me, means not only accepting that I’m off the original path I was once on, but also accepting the fact that I will never be fully comfortable in any singular space, nor will I ever be a part of just one community. If anything, entering college has made my Jewish identity messier, not clearer. Being off the derekh, and coming to terms with this part of my Jewish identity, has meant accepting the fact that my Judaism is made up not of one community, but a patchwork of communities which I have found a way to call my Jewish home.

Amram Altzman is a student at List College.

A mosaic depicting the priestly blessing, performed as part of the Yom Kippur Neilah service, which asks God to give the worshippers peace. | Supplied by Kleuske [CC BY-SA 3.0]

There is a saying I have heard when people talk about the Holocaust: “In Judaism we forgive, but never forget.” This is because anger and hate don’t damage the perpetrator, but instead eat away at the survivor. The past three years there have been anger, hate, and shame deep within me that have prevented me from moving on from that horrible night. On Yom Kippur, I ask God to forgive me for giving my attacker power over me. For allowing him to cause me to lose myself and be replaced with a frightened, skittish, angry girl who often times just wants to disappear.

This year, the rabbi’s sermons largely focused on the concept of shame. This is a topic I can relate to. I feel ashamed for my anger. I feel ashamed for “allowing” myself to be taken advantage of. I feel ashamed for not fighting back hard enough. I feel ashamed of being raped. As the rabbi spoke, I began to realize that I was not alone in my shame. I was suddenly overwhelmed with emotion. I’d always viewed my rape as something that isolated me from others. That set me apart, making me feel like a leper. I felt like no one could ever understand how I felt. The truth is, though, everyone at Yom Kippur services understood.

At the end of the closing Neilah service, as I was hitting my chest and listing my sins, I didn’t repent for not being able to forgive my rapist. By the end of the service, the feelings of hate I’d had toward the man who raped me had been diminished, replaced by a feeling of connection to my fellow Jews. I thanked God for opening my mind and my soul in order to give me the opportunity to reflect on my feelings and change my point of view.

Being raped will always be something that I have to deal with, but I don’t have to deal with it alone. I have a whole community of people who may not be connected to me by similar experience, but are connected to me by similar emotions. Shame thrives in silence. This year I have vowed not to allow my shame to thrive anymore.

The scary fact is that 1 in 5 women will be raped or sexually assaulted at some point in their college careers. I want those women to know that they are not alone in their shame. I want them to know that being raped does not make them a leper. It does not make them a failure or an object. It makes them a survivor.

Jourdan Stein is a student at the University of North Texas.

Aribert Kempner, taken in 1943. | Supplied by Alexa Kempner

Imagine that you’re 14 years old. It’s December 1936. Today, and for a while now, you’re focusing on the fact that you are leaving home. Possibly forever.

Your parents bring you to the local train station with your medium-sized black suitcase, and the three of you await the arrival of the next locomotive. All you can think about is your journey: you’ll take this train to a harbor city, where you’ll then board a ship. This ship will then take you to a foreign country, where you don’t know the language. In fact, besides your older brother, who took this journey the year prior, you don’t know anyone there.

The train flies into the station with several ear-piercing screams. It’s time to leave. You turn to your parents and give them the tightest hugs you have ever given them. Before you have a chance to shed a tear, you rush on to one of the cars, taking a seat by the window facing the platform. The train exits the station almost as quickly as it entered, and your parents and the platform blur into the retreating horizon. A million thoughts race through your head, but one continues to return: Will I ever see them again?

This was the beginning of my grandfather’s Holocaust story. In 1936, when my paternal grandfather, Aribert Kempner, was only 14 years old, his parents sent him away from his home in Berlin, Germany to Baltimore, Maryland, where he was taken in by a Jewish family. From approximately the time he left Berlin to almost the end of World War II, Aribert received and kept about 150 letters, written nearly exclusively by his family, most of whom were still trapped in Nazi Europe. Once he became of age, Aribert joined the United States Armed Forces in order to fight the Germans, but ended up being a radio operator in the Pacific Theater.

Unfortunately, the day he left in December 1936 was the last day he ever saw his parents. Roughly 30 members of his family perished at the hands of Hitler and his Nazis.

For the past five years, I’ve been working on a book about Aribert’s story. My dad and I had always talked about compiling the genealogical and Holocaust research he worked on in his spare time into a book — for not only future generations of our family, but future generations at large, who will not have the opportunity to hear about the atrocities of the Holocaust firsthand. This idea stuck with me and became reality when I was offered a spot in an independent research program at my high school. Students had to specially apply to participate in this class, and only 60 to 70 kids, out of more than one thousand students that attended my high school, were accepted to study whatever topic they desired, within reason. From there, the rest is history — no pun intended.

Studying the Holocaust in-depth, way past what you learned in Hebrew or regular school and at the young age of 15 or 16, is tough. To say that this project has been easy would be inaccurate. I’ve definitely felt quite overwhelmed at times, even to the point that I nearly quit altogether. (Word to the wise: Don’t take two Holocaust-heavy courses in one semester, as interesting and helpful for your research as they may be.) But I don’t think I could live with the feeling that I let down not only my grandfather, but also the memories of his family members who died. For them, I keep working on my book.

Memory isn’t the sole reason I keep writing. I started this because my dad and I wanted to share my grandfather’s experience with my generation in order to keep the message and events of the Holocaust alive. From personal experience, I feel that our generation possesses a concerning level of indifference and/or ignorance towards the Holocaust. It’s just another moment in history that the school system forces students to learn about. As a result, students do not take the Holocaust seriously.

In my sister’s high school freshman history class, the teacher brought in a Nazi flag that he’d inherited from his American war veteran uncle while they were covering the era. One of her classmates took a picture of the flag, and posted it on Facebook with the caption “Best history class EVER.” It got a considerable number of likes and comments — even from people who were not in the class! One boy wrote, “ummmmmmmm….i thought you stopped doing that kind of stuff” — which may or may not have been a joke, but the bottom line here is that both the photo and the comment were inappropriate, and showed these students weren’t treating the Holocaust seriously.

In my sister’s English class that same year, after reading Eli Wiesel’s Night, a boy placed a piece of tape on her arm and claimed that “she was his slave,” suggesting the tape represented the numbers tattooed on the Nazi prisoners. If students only slightly younger than me are acting this way toward the Holocaust, I truly hate to think how following generations will do.

I haven’t experienced that level of disrespect and hostility, but I usually get one of two responses from people when I tell them about my project: they either become ecstatic and impressed, or look hesitant and uncomfortable. Since I’ve come to college, the former is more common, but I still see the latter quite often.

I currently have a rough draft of my book, and I intend to have at least a partial second draft at the end of this semester, as I’ve been given the opportunity to work on it for credit one-on-one with the director of the Judaic Studies Program at my school, University of Maryland, Baltimore County. My goal is to publish my book before I graduate in two years for a few reasons. As we advance into the 21^st century, we are slowly losing survivors to old age, leaving us with only material versions of their memories. While books and documentaries remain crucial tools of remembrance, they can’t compare to hearing a survivor recount their story. I also hope that the younger I am, the more likely others my age will perhaps listen to what I have to say. I hope that I can help alter this pervasive and ignorant attitude to some degree, so that the Holocaust will not become another chapter in history textbooks.

I will neither forget my grandfather, who has since passed, nor his family that perished — but it is on us to make sure the victims’ memories stay alive.

Alexa Kempner is a student at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

The Ohio State University marching band came under fire for a 2014 songbook that contained lyrics referencing the Holocaust. | Supplied by Prayitno Hadinata [CC2.0]

OSU Hillel Executive Director Joseph Kohane told New Voices via email that the administration issued two statements condemning the songbook in response to a recent Wall Street Journal article.

Kohane told New Voices that, less than 24 hours after the Journal article was published, the OSU Hillel was already working closely with the school’s administration to educate the marching band about the Holocaust and “its continued meaning and grave significance to the Jewish community today.”

According to the Journal, the marching band’s 2014 edition of the songbook included a song with references to furnaces used in concentration camp crematoria and the trains that deported Jews to concentration camps. In the book was a song called “Goodbye Kramer,” sung to the tune of “Don’t Stop Believin’” and including the lyrics “searching for people livin’ in their neighbor’s attic” and a “small town Jew … who took the cattle train to you know where.”

“The program will take place at Hillel and will draw from many sources including the experience of Hillel staff and students in facilitating reflection and discussion around big questions and sensitive topics,” Kohane said.

He added that the program will include “presentations by Holocaust survivors and children of survivors, and of currently enrolled Jewish students who can articulate the immediacy of the [H]olocaust to them, 75 years removed from the end of the war.”

An introduction to the songbook stated that while some of the songs could be offensive, students should disregard the vulgarity and “act like you got a pair and have a good time singing them.”

Joely Friedman, a student and president of the Society of Professional Journalists at Ohio State, said she doesn’t feel the vulgarity can be disregarded.

“I am disappointed in my classmates,” she told New Voices over Facebook message. “Their actions are not representative by any means of the amazing student body at Ohio State, and it’s a shame that they felt the need to behave in such an unnecessary and foolish way.”

Friedman, who is Jewish, said she plans to use this incident as a learning opportunity for journalists at the school and “bring in speakers to campus to talk to us about how reporters should approach writing negatively about something they are connected to.”

She added that local journalists will be invited to speak to student journalists about dealing with what could be perceived as a conflict of interest, such as writing about the university incident while an enrolled student.

“It’s important that good journalists can write truthfully about what is going on, even if it means that they are negatively portraying their own affiliations,” she said.

“As good journalists, we have a responsibility to share the news with others, even if that news casts a bad light on ourselves.”

Wendy Cohen, who graduated from Ohio State in 2012, told New Voices via Facebook message that she never felt uncomfortable as a Jewish student.

“I know a few Jewish students who were in the band and hadn’t heard about it when I was on campus. I haven’t spoken to any friends about it,” she said.

“But I can tell you OSU has a great Jewish community on campus and although there were some minor incidents here and there, I never felt uncomfortable being openly Jewish.”

Correction: This article previously stated that Joely Friedman is not Jewish. She is.

New Voices regrets the error.

Jackson Richman is a student at The George Washington University.

Where do you go when you go off the derekh? | Supplied by the Archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York

As a child, my rabbis and Judaic studies teachers cautioned me against straying “off the derekh,” which almost literally translates to off of the Orthodox straight-and-narrow. If we did, though, then the High Holidays were a time when we could return to once again being on the straight, singular path that Orthodoxy provided.

As a child, I bought into that idea. I davened with special intentionality, I sat through my rabbi’s sermons in synagogue (which I, as a child, rationalized as necessary for proper repentance), and I tried to struggle — as much as a child could — on evaluating myself and my actions over the past year.

Almost two years ago, I wrote my first piece for New Voices, which detailed some of my struggles leaving the Orthodox community in search of a Jewish community which aligned more closely with my values. If anything, the two years I’ve spent writing with New Voices so far have been a chronicle of my journey in finding conversation — and ultimately community — with non-Orthodox Jews as I entered college. As I cross the halfway point in my college career at the beginning of this school year, I’ve had the chance to reflect on the religious changes that I’ve gone through as the Jewish New Year approaches.

When I first arrived on campus in 2013, I saw myself as off the derekh. I wasn’t Orthodox, nor did I particularly want to be at that point. Within Orthodoxy, it’s very easy to distinguish between those who are in and those who are out, those who are right and those who are wrong. Indeed, the derekh is a uniquely Orthodox concept because of Orthodoxy’s rigid guidelines that outline all aspects of one’s life. Orthodoxy dictates not only the liturgy one uses to pray, but also the type of community in which one lives — Orthodox Jews, by necessity, need to live close together to form the communities that allow them to live their lives as Orthodox.

The idea of being on the derekh or off the derekh is one that has continued through my life and the changes in my religious practices. At any given point, I was either on it or off it — and I was usually the latter.

And then came the time when I was told that I, as a queer person, had no derekh, no road map, to follow in the first place — and because I as a queer person do not exist in substantive ways in Orthodox communal and ritual spaces, I realize this is completely true.

But I’ve come to realize that the entire conception of being on a specific derekh or being off that derekh is a term and view that stems from the privilege or having to never question your place in a community, to never have to think of that your religious beliefs might be radically different than your community’s or your family’s, and that you can envision yourself living the life that your parents had taught you to live.

Moreover, being off the derekh gave me the get-out-of-jail-free pass that I needed to claim that I was a “Bad Jew,” to justify the sacrifices that I had to make to find a Jewish community in which I am comfortable. But the term also brought with it guilt: even if I felt comfortable in my new Jewish surroundings outside of Orthodoxy, it felt wrong to be comfortable. Part of me felt comfortable in the fact that I was doing something radically different than that which I had grown up with, but the other part of me felt guilty for doing that which felt wrong because it felt unfamiliar.

Slowly, I began to rebuild my derekh, but the derekh had changed. It didn’t have the security that came with being on Orthodoxy’s straight and narrow, but I knew at the outset it might be impermanent. One day, I could leave this derekh, this road, and find another one.

Going “off the derekh” comes with guilt, with shame, and with the knowledge that I don’t fit into the Orthodox world of my childhood in the way that, growing up, I’d thought I always would. But the shame comes from the outside, from the world that told me that the way that I live my Jewish life is inherently less than Orthodoxy.

So, two years later, for the beginning of the new Jewish year and the second half of my college career, I resolve to reclaim the term “off the derekh.” Leaving Orthodoxy need not be a source of shame, of guilt, of fear — for me, or for others who make that decision for whatever reason they choose to leave the Orthodox world.

We formerly Orthodox Jews should not use it as a pass to leave behind commitment to the Jewish world entirely. Instead, it should be a source of pride: I — we — have found the power to leave the Orthodox world, to make the conscious decision to pursue the derekh that we find most compelling.

With that pride comes not a pass, but a challenge to forge a new path for ourselves in the Jewish community. It’s in that challenge, in that process, that we can begin to build a new vision for the Jewish community, to find a new space in which we can align our values, our theologies, and the immense tradition which we have been handed down. This New Year, I hope that we formerly Orthodox Jews can find not fear and shame in the process of building a new road, but pride and hope.

Amram Altzman is a student at List College.

Photo by Chloe Sobel

This short story contains racial and ethnic slurs.

“When’s that kike getting here?”

“I wish you wouldn’t use such language, Henry.”

“Why not? You’ve read the Protocols, same as me. They can’t be trusted, Gerry.”

Gerald Thompson fiddled with his pocket watch that was always a minute behind. He glanced at his business partner, who was taking another swig of whiskey. Gerry was unsure of the origin of Henry’s misplaced hatred for Harold Bernstein. Perhaps it was the way Harold kept himself, always clean-shaven and in the embrace of a perfectly tailored pinstripe suit, while Henry practiced an unkempt look of stubble and untucked shirts. Perhaps it was Harold’s money and influence. Or, maybe, it was just the resilience of his people when it came to surviving.

Each day brought more news of European Jewry overthrowing their German captors. A different camp was being liberated every minute, not by the advancing Allied forces but by the prisoners within, tired of going to their deaths like — as a captured Goebbels put it so eloquently before making himself a cyanide-flavored egg cream — cows in a slaughterhouse. Thompson had heard that when the Americans and Soviets finally did arrive, there was nothing left of the guards except a few teeth and some tufts of hair. With Himmler and Goering taken out by the underground resistance, it was said that old Adolf himself was running scared. Berlin had fallen.

Thompson glanced at the newspaper on the table and the three big headlines it contained:

AUGUST 6, 1945

1 MILLION AMERICAN CASUALTIES RESULT FROM INVASION OF JAPANESE MAINLAND

FDR DECIDES TO SEEK FIFTH TERM AS TRUMAN RESIGNS VICE PRESIDENCY; STIMSON SET TO REPLACE HIM

ALLIED INVESTIGATORS DELVE DEEPER INTO CHURCHILL ASSASSINATION

Violence, bloodshed, and loss, all to make the world safe for democracy, Thompson thought, sighing as Henry hiccuped and poured himself another drink. A summer breeze rolled in through the cellar window with the sounds of New York traffic. Dust fell from the ceiling. One floor above, men traded their week’s pay for lowered inhibition. The stylings of Glen Miller crackled from a phonograph somewhere outside the room. The horns of “In the Mood” swelled as Henry swallowed his glass of whiskey in one gulp.

“Where is that shifty son of a b—”

His slur was cut off by a knock at the door. Thompson sat up straight, correcting his purple knit tie that hung level with the bottom of his breast pocket. “Come in,” he said, in the professional voice he always used when in the company of clients.

The wooden door creaked open, revealing Harold Bernstein, the richest and most influential Jew in the United States.

Harold was the man who had singlehandedly paid for the bombing of German train tracks when no one else, not even the military, would go through with the operation. The death camp revolts all across Europe had started a wave of Jewish pride across the world, especially in America. The concept of the “Invincible Yid” had begun a campaign for the election of a Semitic president, with Bernstein as the front-runner. Still, all this came with a healthy dose of backlash: people rioting, burning Jewish literature, painting swastikas on storefronts even though their country was fighting so hard against that fascist symbol just across the pond. The world is full of paradoxes, thought Thompson.

Harold was in his usual custom suit with a fedora perched comfortably on his head, both a navy blue subtly marked with white pinstripes. The carnation in his breast pocket was a deep shade of red. He wore the smile that made him endearing to so many people. Gerry had often heard individuals refer to him as the “Jewish Humphrey Bogart” for a few reasons: his rugged good looks, his slight New York accent, and, of course, his money and notoriety.

Behind Harold was a man of immense build, wearing a navy suit of his own. He reminded Gerry of a strongman he’d once seen at a circus as a young boy growing up in Illinois. The expression on the man’s face was a curious mix of utter sadness and complete apathy. Gerry could make out a faint scar on his forehead that looked something like this:

Probably from some gruesome knife fight, Gerry thought.

Harold stuck out his hand, and Gerry shook it enthusiastically.

“So nice to see you gentleman,” Harold said in the slow, measured voice that made so many women want to line up and fuck him. ‘You’ came out as ‘Ya.’

“I hope this wasn’t an inconvenient time for you, Harold,” Gerry said. “I know how busy you are, with the election and all.”

Harold swiped the air with his hand in a don’t-mention-it sort of way. “Of course not, Gerry. I always have time for old friends. Besides, it’s such a nice night for a drive, I was already planning on exploring the city before you rang.”

He sat down opposite the two men, removing his hat and placing it on the right side of the warped wooden table. The hulking gentleman took a lurching step so that he stood right behind Harold, staring at the other end of the room. Gerry couldn’t help but feel a sense of unease from the strange man’s presence, and found himself staring absentmindedly at him until Harold brought him back to his senses.

“Where are my manners? Gerry, Henry, this is Samson. My associate — of sorts.”

“N-Nice to meet you, Mr. Samson,” Gerry stuttered. Samson did not answer, and continued to stare into the far end of the cellar, which was covered in a darkness even the Manhattan marquee lights outside could not penetrate.

“He doesn’t speak. Not unless I give the command, anyway,” Harold said with a slight chuckle, like he was making a joke the other two men couldn’t have hoped to crack.

“Why the fuck not?” barked Henry. He snapped his fingers at Samson, attempting to provoke a response from the behemoth.

“Samson isn’t like other men, Henry,” said Harold with a twinkle in his eye. “Now, shall we get down to business?”

Unsatisfied with this response, Henry grumbled something about Harold’s large nose that could smell a dime from a mile away and poured another drink as Gerry placed his hands on the table and began to speak.

“As you know, with the Pacific War cooling off, there’s talk of Americans beginning to buy automobiles from the Japs. From what we hear, their factories are practically sweatshops run by un-unionized workers, slaving away night and day for pennies on the dollar. People aren’t stupid, Harold. Soon they’re going to wise up and want cheaper cars. The American auto industry can’t take a hit like that. We can’t take a hit like that.” He lit a cigarette and sucked in deeply. The smoke escaped his nostrils like a clever dragon guarding a precious treasure.

“The fuckin’ slanty-eyed bastards got the drop on us and they know it,” burped Henry. “We’ll be ruined.”

Harold reached into his pocket and took out a fat cigar and a book of matches. The outside flap read: Leipzig’s Delicatessen “You Gotta Be Meshugge Not to Eat Here!”

As he lit the cigar, the glow in Harold’s eyes brightened. So many of the ignorant mistook this glow for greed, but Gerald Thompson knew better. It was ambition. Harold Bernstein had more money than he knew what to do with. No one was really sure how he’d gotten that rich, but that didn’t stop the rumor mill from cranking out tall tales faster than Babe Ruth could hit home runs.

Some said he’d been the one behind the bank robberies of the Depression; that gangsters like Dillinger and Nelson were working for him (and that he’d simply faked their deaths at the hands of the FBI, setting them up with comfortable lives in Cuba so they’d never feel the urge to snitch on their boss). Others said he’d won his riches fixing games in the casinos of Atlantic City and some city out west called Vegas. Some newspapers went so far as to call him a “Messiah for the Modern Age,” but that phrase was mainly said by his own people and adoring fans — his enemies mostly just wanted him dead.

Whatever his origins, guys like Bugsy Siegel and Mickey Cohen checked for Harold Bernstein under their beds before going to sleep every night. In short, he wasn’t a guy to be fucked with — but he was also a guy who could help a fella out.

Harold took a few puffs of his cigar before speaking. “So, you came to me for help.”

Gerry put out his cigarette. The crackle of swing music droned on from the other room.

“Please, Harold,” Gerry said. “People come to you when they’re in jams. We’ll pay you whatever it takes — with interest, of course.”

Henry hiccuped in agreement.

“Our business is going to go down the tubes if we don’t do something about this competition,” Gerry continued. “All this rationing has left the public with more money in their pockets than the ‘20s. We need to be the ones on the other end of the demand, not the Jap rats. I mean — we put them into camps in the middle of the God-damned desert like—” he almost said “like Jews”, but caught himself— “crush their spirits, but they still manage to encroach on our territory. First Pearl Harbor, now the economy. Next thing you know there’ll be a Japanese Secretary of State.”

“That’ll be the day a Negro becomes president!” Henry blurted, which gave him and Gerry something to laugh about. Harold remained impassive.

Gerry lit another cigarette. “I heard rumors about a super weapon, but Roosevelt was too cowardly to use it on them,” he said. “They say that’s why Truman resigned, the two had a big disagreement over it. I don’t believe all this spending-more-time-with-his-family nonsense. If only they’d used it, we’d have the upper hand.”

Harold still said nothing, but Gerry suspected the Jew/gangster/philanthropist/presidential hopeful knew more about the secrets of the American government than most. He pressed on:

“So whad’ya say, Harold? Will you give us a hand here?”

Harold flicked the ash from his cigar and placed it back in his mouth. “I think I have just the answer to your little dilemma.”

At this, Gerry’s face brightened, and his nerves relaxed. Harold reached into his suit jacket and brought forth a black, leather-bound book. Placing it on the table, he slid it to Gerry, who picked it up and began to leaf through it. Each yellowed page was dog-eared and filled, corner to corner, with strange markings and runes. Henry made no attempt to look on, but stared at Samson.

Although he didn’t understand a word of it, Gerry had the strangest feeling that the book was something not to be held for more than a few seconds, like putting one’s hand on a hot stove, or looking at one of his father’s dirty magazines when he was a kid, something tempting and forbidding all at the same time. Putting it back on the table, he slid it to Harold, whose cigar was now a smoking nub resembling the barrel of a recently discharged firearm. Harold’s smile was knowing, but his eyes were still gleaming with enigma and determination.

“I— I don’t think I understand,” Gerry said, a little annoyed. Was Harold pulling his leg?

Harold leaned in and lowered his voice, his smile never wavering. “Are you gentlemen familiar with the story of the Golem?”

Another breeze slipped in through the window, chilling Gerry to the bone, despite it being August. The merry music of the phonograph had stopped dead.

Henry slurped down another glass of whiskey. “The hell you talking about, Bernstein?” he demanded.

“The Golem, my dear gentlemen,” Harold began, “is a being made from the earth inscribed with the holy name of God — the Jewish God, course,” he added, smiling. “They’re meant to be the protectors of my people when the going gets rough for us — help create a level playing field, so to speak.”

He really is messing with us, thought Gerry.

Harold must have seen the thought on his friend’s face, because he continued, “I’m talking about a robot, a drone, an automaton. Something that will do your bidding, no questions asked. In other words: free labor, no strings attached. I can provide you two with a workforce of unsleeping, uncaring, undying factory workers. No unions, no strikes, no pay. 100% profit.”

Gerry’s eyes had moved from Harold to Samson.

“That’s right, Gerry,” Harold said. “Samson here is a Golem. Made from nothing but the dust of my attic. He feels no pain or emotion. Only follows my instructions. Like a toy.”

Samson’s gaze remained unyielding. Gerry pointed to the black tome on the table: “So that book…”

“Is a cookbook of sorts, yes.”

“How…? Where…?”

“The Nazis unearthed a great many things during their occupation — some things that could have won them the war if their minds hadn’t been so clouded by hatred and power,” Harold said. “They could have used the very weapons my people created to wipe us out indefinitely. My only regret is that we couldn’t use it against the sons of bitches.”

Anger flared for a moment in his eyes, briefly replacing the mystery.

“Once the revolts ended,” he continued, “it was just a matter of finding out what valuables the Krauts had stolen and getting the items to the States. As you know, I have a way of getting what I want.”

Gerry thought of all the Jewish refugees who arrived in America and Palestine every day by the boatload. The European homelands in which they had lived for hundreds of years had forsaken them. The world had forsaken them. They’d left behind murder and death for new beginnings. As they walked down the gangplank, Gerry imagined, they carried with them items in their suitcases and coat pockets that held value to the religion as a whole, previously plundered items that were now back in the possession of their rightful owners — though many would undoubtedly be lost to the annals of history. The images of golden angels and candelabras flitted suddenly into Gerry’s head — clear and bright as day — and were gone before he could remember where he had seen such things. Had he ever seen such things?

Henry snorted. “What Jewish hocus-pocus are you trying to pull here, Bernstein? You expect us to believe that crock of shit?”

The whiskey bottle was empty, and only a few sips left in the cup. Henry raised the glass to his lips, only to start dry heaving. He ran to the wastebasket and relieved his stomach and liver of all the whiskey he had consumed. Gerry crinkled his nose as the stench of vomit filled the room. Harold didn’t seem to mind, simply smiled. Samson had not reacted and continued to stare.

“Still hitting the bottle pretty hard, I see, Henry,” Harold laughed. The drunken man staggered back to the table, using it to balance himself. “Please have a seat and we’ll negotiate the details of our agreement.”

Henry plopped into his chair, wiped the corner of his mouth, and was silent. Yellowish chunks of his last meal clung to the lapels of his tweed jacket. Gerry had removed a pad of paper and pen from his pocket. “So how much are we talking, Harold?”

“It’s not money I want, Gerry.” Harold leaned in again. “It’s votes. You’ve seen the riots. Sure, they’re small now, but just wait. It could happen again here, you know. I’m sure of it. First come the restrictions, then the segregation, then…” Harold Bernstein’s smile faded for the first time during the meeting. Sitting back in his chair, he continued, “I know I can do some good if I’m president — keep the peace, ya know? I already have dozens of Samsons tracking all the escaped Nazis. Most of them are in the jungles of South America — including the one who shot Churchill in his bed. Maybe even Hitler and that pretty little bride of his. Fucking cowards. I want their heads. Every single one. An eye for an eye. Never again will my people be the scapegoats for mankind’s wrongdoings. It’s a crazy world we live in, gentlemen, and I hope to be the bright beacon in such a world, make this country a nation on a hill or whatever the hell Winthrop called it…”

Silence next. Gerry had been clinging so tightly to Harold’s words that he nearly toppled out of his seat when his partner spoke next.

“You’re going to be six feet under in a bog somewhere.” Henry’s snub-nosed revolver was pointed squarely at Harold’s chest. “I don’t want to hear another word out of you, dog. You and your shifty kind can’t be trusted. I’ll be damned before I see a Jewish president in office.”

Harold’s blank expression remained unchanged. “Henry, trust me, you don’t want to do this. Samson would be all too delighted to squash your head in like a rotten pumpkin. You’re drunk. Now put the gun down.”

“MAGGOT!” Henry screamed as he pulled the trigger. Gerry whimpered and shut his eyes as the shot rang through the cellar. The sounds of New York traffic, Benny Goodman, and drunk men were muted by the roar of the gun. Gerry imagined a dark red stain beginning to spread across Harold’s pristine white shirt, his eyes wide with shock as he slumped forward onto the table, the myth of the Invincible Yid shattered with a single bullet. The stain will probably match his carnation, Gerry thought stupidly.

Upon opening his eyes, however, he beheld Harold Bernstein with a bemused look on his face, like that of a chess player deciding their next move. There was no stain on the white shirt.

Henry looked utterly baffled, staring at the smoking barrel of his gun, mouth agape. “How—?”

Harold shook his head, disappointed. “Samson?”

The colossus uncurled his hand to reveal a bullet in his massive palm, totally intact and slightly steaming.

“You know what to do,” Harold said calmly. There was some sadness in his words.

Samson moved away from Harold. With one giant step he stood next to Henry, who was still attempting to comprehend how his gun had failed to assassinate the Jew across from him. One swoop of the hand, and Henry’s head was encased in the left paw of Samson the Golem. There was no scream, only a crunch as the bigot’s skull caved in, submitting to the drone’s unnatural strength.

Samson moved back behind Harold as Henry’s lifeless body slumped forward, bits of brain and skull falling onto the table. Blood gushed from the wound like a busted sewer pipe. Gerry’s eyes were wide with fright, wider than an owl’s. “Hen— Hen— Hen—” But in his shock he could not speak the name of his fallen partner.

“I’m sorry, Gerry,” said Harold. “It really pains me to have done that.”

For the first time in all the time that he had known him, Gerald Ford Thompson finally locked his unimpressive brown eyes with the luminous blue ones of Harold Jonathan Bernstein. A pair of eyes that could lead a nation. Hell, he probably will.

“But you didn’t. Samson did,” whispered Gerry in his shock.

Harold nodded his head in solemn agreement. “Like I said: My people will no longer be the butt of everyone’s jokes. As long as I live and breathe, I’ll see to it that it never happens again.” He looked down. A tear rolled down his cheek. “Not now, or ever again.”

After a minute or so, Harold composed himself and straightened up, retrieving the book before it became sullied by the blood that was quickly spreading across the table, filling the little splits and nooks of the wood. He flipped through it until he found the desired page, and began to read aloud.

To Gerry, it sounded like Harold was speaking backwards, as if a record was being spun in the opposite direction; it was like nothing he had ever heard and it shook him to his very core. As Harold finished reading, Samson, the Golem, the strong man who wasn’t really a man at all, began to shrink and wither, like a punctured child’s balloon at a carnival. Like someone emptying an overfilled dustpan, Samson returned to the dirt of the earth from whence he came.

Softly, Harold said: “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”

He swiped his hat from the table and perched it on his head. “Well, Gerry, it really was a pleasure seeing you and—” He gestured to Henry’s corpse.

Gerry had removed the pocket watch that was always one minute behind and begun to fiddle with it. Harold had one foot out the door when Gerry found his voice.

“Just tell me one thing, Harold. You never were going to help us out, were you? You only agreed to see us so you could get at Henry.”

Harold’s eyes flashed with mystery at the question, but his lips did not answer. Instead he asked a question of his own:

“Tell me, Gerry. What’s the name of the bar upstairs?”

Although confused, horrified, and bewildered, Gerry Thompson answered, “Delilah’s, I think.”

With a smile and a nod, Harold was out the door as a final summer breeze whistled in through the window, scattering the dust on the cellar floor.

Josh Weiss is a student at Drexel University.

Amna Farooqi speaking to J Street U students outside the national headquarters of Hillel. March 2015. | Moshe Zusman for J Street

For Amna Farooqi, the newly elected president of the J Street U student board, what was once the elephant in the room has now become her job.

Farooqi, a first-generation Pakistani-American, has been making headlines across the Jewish world as the board’s first Muslim president. She was elected to the position at the Aug. 17 J Street U Summer Leadership Institute.

The reaction to her election has largely been positive, she told New Voices, though she finds it “kind of bizarre”: “I really haven’t done anything other than be who I am,” she said.

There are people who aren’t happy with her election “on both ends,” Farooqi added, but she’s still excited to continue her work on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Farooqi grew up in Potomac, Md., where she described the conflict as being the “awkward elephant in the room.”

“Growing up, sharing about it in the community, but also knowing at home that we were more sympathetic to the Palestinian narrative — that made me certainly curious about learning more,” she said.

When she got to the University of Maryland, where she’s now a senior, she did learn more — by joining the Israel Studies program and J Street U.

She’d heard about J Street while volunteering the summer after graduating from high school. In her first year at Maryland, after trying and failing to find the campus chapter, she ran into Benjy Cannon — last year’s student board president — at an event she was covering for the school newspaper.

“Chris Wallace had come to talk about Israel and I actually ran into Benjy Cannon there, who was co-chair of the Maryland chapter,” Farooqi said. “We became friends quickly, and I got involved.”

Last year, she served as the student board’s southeast representative. This summer, she interned for J Street U in Jerusalem. She described her experience with the organization as “amazing.”

“J Street U was really the place where I felt that I could be the most productive and actually do things to try to one, understand the conflict better, but also make a difference in it — specifically, a place that could support Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, and also work to end the occupation,” she said.

People have always been curious about why a non-Jew would get involved with J Street U, Farooqi said, but she’s had a good experience there.

“J Street U really is a place for anyone who is pro-Israel and pro-peace to do this work,” she said.

As president, Farooqi plans to continue with the off-campus work started after the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations collapsed last year. The work she has in mind includes holding American Jewish organizations accountable to the community’s values — which she believes support a two-state solution.

“I really do think the majority of American Jewish students and community support a two-state solution and want peace, and I think that there is a lot of right-wing donor control over that that infringes on that,” Farooqi said.

For example: the ongoing rift between J Street U and Hillel International that began when Eric Fingerhut pulled out of a speech he’d agreed to give at the J Street U conference last March. At a speech at the Summer Leadership Institute, Fingerhut took full responsibility for his decision, but J Street U director Sarah Turbow told New Voices previously that students have been hesitant to discount the role that donors play in Hillel.

“I’d guess that it will come up again in different dynamics,” Farooqi added, “but really I think that many American Jewish organizations are not accountable to the people that they are supposed to represent, and so I think that dynamic is probably something we’re going to run into time and time again.”

Chloe Sobel graduated from Queen’s University and is editor in chief of New Voices.

Eric Fingerhut’s decision not to speak at the J Street U conference in March triggered a march to Hillel International headquarters and exposed the rift between Hillel and J Street U. | Photo by David A.M. Wilensky

As the rift between J Street U and Hillel continues to widen, J Street U members remain dissatisfied with Hillel’s efforts to close the gap.

On Aug. 17, Hillel International CEO and president Eric Fingerhut addressed J Street U in D.C. to apologize for declining to speak at the J Street U conference in March. Fingerhut withdrew from the conference — having already accepted the invitation to speak — because other speakers invited had previously made inflammatory marks about Israel.

Earlier this summer, on June 10, Fingerhut and Hillel board members met with J Street U — a meeting that left J Street U and its supporters feeling like not enough was being done to move forward.

“If I have done anything to cause personal hurt or pain in this past year to anyone in this room, I ask that you forgive my transgression,” Fingerhut told the students at the JSU Summer Leadership Institute, according to the Forward.

Fingerhut’s apology was met with mixed reactions.

“I appreciate that Eric Fingerhut apologized for causing hurt, but what you will notice is that he did not apologize, as far as I can tell, for his actual action of pulling out from attendance,” said Lex Rofes, Brown University ’13.

Rofes, who supports J Street U and is a former Hillel board member, was not present at the Summer Leadership Institute.

In the past, Hillel has spoken at conferences organized by AIPAC and Christians United For Israel, both political organizations, but Fingerhut told the students at the Summer Leadership Institute that “it’s not about endorsing an organization’s political agenda because Hillel doesn’t do that,” according to the Washington Jewish Week.

“He said that — since Hillel doesn’t endorse political organizations — that he could not appear and speak, yet he has appeared at conferences convened by other organizations,” Rofes said.

Others felt Fingerhut acted in the best possible way.

“Fingerhut is a great leader, and his outreach to students really shows that,” said Holly Bicerano, Boston University ’15 and a former member of Open Hillel.

She added that Fingerhut said there was “nobody responsible for any hurt that was caused in March besides” him, meaning that Hillel donors had nothing to do with his decision.

“Ultimately, Mr. Fingerhut is in charge,” said Hillel member and Safe Hillel cofounder Daniel Mael, Brandeis ’15.

“He had the decision. He lives with the consequences.”

Still, according to J Street U director Sarah Turbow, students are hesitant to discount “the role donors play in Hillel and the Jewish community.”

The meeting ran just over an hour. J Street U students were happy to have met with Fingerhut, but Rofes said he felt that more could have been done in terms of forming concrete solutions.

“As long as he merely states his thanks for J Street U’s anti-BDS work without stating in clear terms that he appreciates any of their other work as well, while extolling the virtues of right-center and right-wing groups that range from ambivalence to explicit condemnation of J Street, there will be no bridging of the gap that he says he wants to close,” Rofes said.

Whether or not students found Fingerhut’s answers satisfactory, Turbow said, “this was an important step.”

“This was an opportunity to begin the conversation,” she added.

Moving forward, J Street U members still hope to overcome their differences with Hillel in order to work together as supporters of Israel.

“To be effective on campus, Zionists have to maintain a big tent,” Bicerano said.

“That means recognizing that we all care about ensuring Israel’s future as the Jewish state, even while we have disagreements about specific policies and tactics.”

Clarification: This story has been updated to clarify that Lex Rofes was not present at the Summer Leadership Institute.

Nicole Zelniker is a student at Guilford College.

That’s why, after the June 17 shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church that left nine dead in Charleston, S.C., several rabbis from across denominations came together and determined they had to do something to support the black community.

“It couldn’t just be a press release,” said Rabbi Stuart Weinblatt of Congregation B’nai Tzedek in Rockville, Md. “It had to filter down to the … Jewish community.”

The resulting Shabbat of Solidarity was pulled together in less than two weeks, and saw participation from congregations of all denominations, from Reform to Orthodox.

The organizers included Weinblatt; Rabbi Steven Wernick, CEO of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism; and Rabbi Denise Eger, head rabbi at Congregation Kol Ami in West Hollywood.

On June 26 and 27, Jewish communities across the country invited African Methodist Episcopal Church members to their temples for Shabbat. On Sunday morning, they all attended services at AME churches.

Temples from Los Angeles to Long Island participated in the event, which was sponsored by 18 national organizations, including the Central Conference of American Rabbis, Hillel, and the American Jewish Committee.

“I had heard from rabbi[s] all across country,” Weinblatt said. “There was a great deal done in terms of outreach.”

Weinblatt spent the weekend at a Baptist church in Silver Spring, Md. There were over 600 people in attendance.

Chelsea Yarborough, Guilford College ’15, said real solidarity is more than just social media activism.

“Standing in true solidarity with one another is more than a hashtag or a repost,” Yarborough said. “Standing in true solidarity looks like unlearning our privileges [and] funding each other’s work.

“We may all grow from different branches, but the roots of our oppression are connected.”

Amelia Grabber-Lipperman, a junior at Boston University, echoed this idea.

“Tragedy brings people together,” she said. “If you want people to hear you, you need as many voices as possible saying the same thing.

“Two groups of historically oppressed people standing together is going to make people listen.”

Her hope is that the weekend formed new connections and friendships.

“Even if what you share on the most superficial level with another group of people is a history that is really marred by violence and acts of injustice, at least you have that connection, and the empathy is really real and genuine,” Grabber-Lipperman said.

Hannah Roach, a junior at Mount Holyoke, said although many Jews experience white privilege in America, the experience of anti-Semitism leads to this solidarity.

“Many [Jews] are white and therefore come from a place of relative privilege, but we also understand how it feels to be marginalized, belittled, and subject to acts of violence,” Roach said.

Now, people are thinking about how to move forward.

“Let black folks lead,” Yarborough said. “The church is more than a church, it’s a pillar of the community, a sacred place, a safe place.

“Support community organizers/community organizations in their efforts. Go to a meeting. Ask them what they need.”

Nicole Zelniker is a student at Guilford College.

The Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade in 2005. The ultra-Orthodox man who stabbed six marchers at yesterday’s event had recently finished serving a 10-year prison sentence for attempted murder after stabbing participants at the 2005 parade. | Supplied by Pato12seg [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

That is an alarming message to receive time after time. Orthodoxy is still to blame for the attack at Jerusalem Pride.

The Orthodox Jewish establishment can wash its hands of the man who stabbed six people, and claim that he does not speak for Orthodoxy, but the fact of the matter remains: This man is a product of the Orthodox establishment. This man is not a lone fox, an outlier in the Orthodox world. To say that he doesn’t speak for Orthodoxy is a cop-out. It frees the Orthodox establishment from blame.

But Orthodoxy needs to be held culpable for the monsters that it produces.

Orthodox rabbis can claim to be allies who support LGBTQ rights. They can support the Supreme Court’s decision to expand marriage equality to all 50 states, but then they stop just short of performing those marriages themselves. The message is clear: LGBTQ inclusion is all well and good until it rubs up against what they see as good and traditional. And this attack, just like moments we’ve seen before, is rife with the same hypocrisy. You can be an ally to the LGBTQ community up until the point at which it inconveniences you, the point at which it challenges the gendered bedrock upon which you build your communities.

So, to the Orthodox leaders out there, I want to say: Stop it. Stop pretending to be allies by washing your hands of this senseless hatred and violence. Take ownership of it. Cry and pray for healing along with the other queer Jews who are hurting and recovering. Remember the queer Jews who grew up — or continue to live — in Orthodox communities. Remember that however affirming you might be, you continue to work within the very same system that produced the attack on six lives at Jerusalem Pride. Saying that this is not Orthodox Judaism, or even Judaism at all, is escaping culpability and removing yourself from the situation right when you are needed as an ally the most.

It is high time that we — queer Jews in general, and queer Jews who have some connection to Orthodoxy in particular — end our complacency with the small, disparate pieces of acceptance from Orthodox rabbis who condemn this by telling us that this one attacker does not speak for Orthodoxy. We should not be satisfied with being merely let into the door or given an Aliyah (for those of us in Orthodox communities who are men). That will not change the systemic inequality we face in the name of Orthodox legal tradition.

We forget about systemic inequality sometimes, but we should do our best to remember that if Orthodoxy can produce senseless violence against queer people, then there’s still much more work to be done. We should not be complacent with a few Orthodox rabbis’ efforts to try and divert attention from that. Being an ally to LGBTQ people doesn’t just involve supporting marriage equality or washing your hands of violence. It means accepting that LGBTQ people are still not seen as equals — not just because some radical man stabbed six innocent people at a Pride parade, but because you, also, have not yet finished your work as an ally. If we want to truly correct the tragedy that one man wrought, then the Orthodox community needs to take responsibility for the violence it causes by implementing substantive changes to its communities and community policies.

I can be welcomed as a queer person in Orthodox communities, but I will still be fundamentally unequal if the rabbi of my Orthodox congregation refuses to officiate my marriage. I still have to find specifically LGBTQ spaces to be treated as fully equal. I will still struggle to find an Orthodox religious court to convert the children I want to adopt one day. Finding an Orthodox day school will be an uphill battle. That is separate, not equal.

No number of condemnations will make right the wrong that was committed against us queer Jews at Jerusalem Pride. No declarations against senseless violence will give young queer Jews who grew up Orthodox hope that there is a future for themselves in Orthodoxy. This attack at Jerusalem Pride has shattered the hope I had for a better future. If we want to give young queer Orthodox Jews a better future, then we need to take this as an opportunity upon which we can build substantive change for the better.

This attack happened on the afternoon before the fifteenth of the Jewish month of Av, just six days after the fast of the Ninth of Av, when we mourn baseless hatred as the reason for the destruction of the Temples. The Fifteenth of Av is an historic celebration of love. Today, I want to love, but all I can do is cry.

I hope that one day soon, Orthodoxy can genuinely cry with me. And when it wipes the tears from its eyes, I hope that Orthodoxy is ready to get back to work.

Amram Altzman is a student at List College.