On Being a Jew in the Divinity School
Aug. 13th, 2008 10:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theyellowhobbitYesterday night was Greek Night OutTM for our Greek class, where we met at a Greek restaurant in Porter and people shared appetizers and our professor provided the drinks. Of course, I couldn't eat anything since nothing was kosher, but I did get a ginger ale. And I had planned on not being able to eat anything, but was there more for the company.
When the main course came, I was asked to say Grace, since I had "the most theological training" of the group (the other students there were all first years). Unfortunately, I had to decline, since you can't really make a blessing on food that you're not eating, and it would have just been Baruch ata Hashem Elokeinu melech ha olam...[specific blessing for specific food(s)] which translates to "Blessed are you, ruler of the universe, who made such-and-such food." Not so profound. It's the blessing after the meal which has actual substance. Not that I can say it in English from memory, since I can't. But I can say it in Hebrew.
I like the way that Judaism has a short blessing before eating and a long[er] one afterwards, (different blessings for different foods, and they vary in length) when you're done eating and aren't going crazy waiting for food. It avoids being put in the uncomfortable situation of not having eaten in 5 hours and the person saying the blessing goes on a 10-minute rant about the glory of God or something. (Though there was one time at JitW where the person saying hamotzi thanked the people who grew the wheat and the people who processed it and the people who transported it, etc. It was about 10pm, and I hadn't eaten since noon, and was in physical pain. I was about ready to either fall over or throttle someone. But that's the exception and not the rule. And technically that might be too much of a break between washing and the blessing that you're not allowed to do that. I'm not sure.)
Also, people were asking me a lot of questions about Judaism. I mostly had answers for them. ("Do you still identify as Reform?" "No. Definitely not." "You're not training to be a rabbi, are you?" "No, I'm the opposite of a rabbi, if there is such a thing. The anti-rabbi.") There was a discussion on bar and bat mitzvahs, and intermarriage and egalitarianism and kashrut and all sorts of things. There's another religious Jew in the class, but she wasn't there last night, so I really was the only one who could answer such things. Also, I get the feeling she doesn't really like talking about her Judaism in terms of answering basic questions and stuff.
And people felt bad about the fact that I couldn't eat anything, even though I told them that I do this all the time and that I knew I couldn't eat anything.
When the main course came, I was asked to say Grace, since I had "the most theological training" of the group (the other students there were all first years). Unfortunately, I had to decline, since you can't really make a blessing on food that you're not eating, and it would have just been Baruch ata Hashem Elokeinu melech ha olam...[specific blessing for specific food(s)] which translates to "Blessed are you, ruler of the universe, who made such-and-such food." Not so profound. It's the blessing after the meal which has actual substance. Not that I can say it in English from memory, since I can't. But I can say it in Hebrew.
I like the way that Judaism has a short blessing before eating and a long[er] one afterwards, (different blessings for different foods, and they vary in length) when you're done eating and aren't going crazy waiting for food. It avoids being put in the uncomfortable situation of not having eaten in 5 hours and the person saying the blessing goes on a 10-minute rant about the glory of God or something. (Though there was one time at JitW where the person saying hamotzi thanked the people who grew the wheat and the people who processed it and the people who transported it, etc. It was about 10pm, and I hadn't eaten since noon, and was in physical pain. I was about ready to either fall over or throttle someone. But that's the exception and not the rule. And technically that might be too much of a break between washing and the blessing that you're not allowed to do that. I'm not sure.)
Also, people were asking me a lot of questions about Judaism. I mostly had answers for them. ("Do you still identify as Reform?" "No. Definitely not." "You're not training to be a rabbi, are you?" "No, I'm the opposite of a rabbi, if there is such a thing. The anti-rabbi.") There was a discussion on bar and bat mitzvahs, and intermarriage and egalitarianism and kashrut and all sorts of things. There's another religious Jew in the class, but she wasn't there last night, so I really was the only one who could answer such things. Also, I get the feeling she doesn't really like talking about her Judaism in terms of answering basic questions and stuff.
And people felt bad about the fact that I couldn't eat anything, even though I told them that I do this all the time and that I knew I couldn't eat anything.
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no subject
Date: 2008-08-14 12:45 pm (UTC)How many Jews would you say there are there? At YDS, last year anyway, there weren't any Jews (to my knowledge) beyond a few Jewish-Christian hybrids like me. (We had a fun time leading a Purimspiel in the spring, though!) PhD students and professors, yes, but no MDIVs or, I think, MARs. I wonder if it's because of the impression I've gotten that YDS is a little more overt than Harvard about connecting academic learning to (Christian) spiritual development.
no subject
Date: 2008-08-14 05:40 pm (UTC)I think Harvard is the least Christian of the divinity schools in America. They used to have a more Christian curriculum, but in recent years have moved away from that, and you could actually go through the MTS program without taking a single course in Christianity, though you do have to take at least 2 courses in 2 religions (but those 2 religions could be Buddhism and Islam, for example).
The MDiv program is more Christian-centric, I think.