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June 11, 1999/27 Sivan 5759, Vol. 51, No.37
Lesson from Memphis: three shuls, one people
LEO LIEBERMAN
Jewish Times of South Jersey
My Uncle Max lived for most of his adult life in Memphis and came north to visit on a periodic basis. We kids were always a little bit in awe of him. After all, he lived far away and yet seemed equally at home in the Bronx or Manhattan and, no doubt, Memphis as well.
He used to laugh whenever he walked with us on the Grand Concourse. "Here in the Bronx," he said, "you have more synagogues on one street than we have in the entire city where I live." (Oh how times have changed! The synagogues have been replaced with video stores, pizza parlors, Chinese restaurants and an occasional Baptist church.) Those were different days.
When we asked the good uncle about the synagogues in Memphis, he told us that they had three - a Reform, a Conservative and an Orthodox.
(I remember that we pre-adolescents, the know-it-alls of the neighborhood, used to refer to the Reform temple as the "Protestant shul." We used to peek into the windows because it had been rumored that the men didn't even wear yarmulkes! Hard to believe.)
"Which one do you belong to?" I asked rather timidly, unsure if I should discuss religion. But Uncle Max had no problem in telling me.
"Why, all three," he said. "They all need my support and help."
I later learned that he went to the Reform temple on Friday nights because, he said, "they had the best onegs (socializing and refreshments) following services." He worshipped in the Conservative synagogue on the High Holidays because that's where his best friend went. And when he had a yahrzeit, anniversary of a death, he attended the Orthodox synagogue.
The Orthodox house of worship was more than a shul, synagogue. It was an imposing structure. What a building! And it had a name to match: the Baron De Hirsch Synagogue.
Then I had to ask, "But which is the real synagogue? The best one, I mean."
It was then that I was given a lesson that has stayed with me. I learned that we needn't worry about which path is the real one, which road leads to Sinai. I was told that it was time that we Jews should stop worrying about which synagogue is the most holy, or which prayer book contains the best prayers. Instead of worrying about what separates and divides us, better we should be concerned about what brings us together.
The message didn't come from Mt. Sinai but from Memphis, even though I didn't fully understand the impact of mu uncle's words until many years later.
"Believe me boychik (little boy)," Uncle Max said, "if you are worried about who is a 'real' Jews, don't let it bother you. There will be plenty of people, and I don't mean Jews, who will be quick to point out who is Jewish and who is not."
It was several months later, in Germany, that the world learned this lesson that I was taught by an uncle from Memphis, Tenn.
Professor Leo Lieberman's column "Chalk Dust" appears weekly in the Jewish Times of South Jersey.
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