this semester has been nothing short of hellish. i started out with six classes, five classes and one independent study. I dropped intermediate Hebrew because i wasn’t impressed as to where the class was going, and hated having my grad based on arbitrary vocab quizzes for which i had no use for beyond quizzes. plus, a hebrew dinner conversation made me realize that i can’t learn around people who want to say shit like “i think i want to be chinese so that i can speak chinese to my boyfriend’s grandma”, and not meditate on how the most obvious and less racist answer would be to use that 50,000 a year education and just fucking take a chinese class.
yeah, that was definitely the final straw that broke an already pretty banged up camel.
then, i took on being a community council representative for the multi-cultural community (we call it SOURCE- students of under-represented cultures and ethnicities), and realized that I deeply resent being one person to represent 23% of 1,600 students. i didn’t see how it was adequate, especially given that our community council seemed to know shit from shinola as to how the SOURCE community operates let alone how it affects them. I also realized being in a room full of white people who don’t give a shit about SOURCE, the spiritual life community, or anything which doesn’t perpetuate a very limited view of the typical Hampshire student was a blood vessel waiting to pop.
I’m glad that my position might be absorbed into another committee which is about more direct action and bringing things to the table instead of merely sitting at it and being “present”.
Most importantly, I watched my spirituality and religious views evolve in a new and exciting way. Coming to understanding Islam after years of reading Rumi and the occasional Osho was deeply unexpected. I was trained by my parents to read theological and philosophical texts at a very early age. my mother, a classically trained philosopher, continues to warn me against the dangers of dogmatic thinking no matter what i discover and subsequently take up in life. I’ve read pagan, tibetan buddhist, hindu, and Jewish theological texts. And while i admire their beauty, i noticed such labels didn’t slip off the tongue. Their texts are beautiful, and i continue to draw wisdom from them on how to live a mindful life. But i didn’t find myself drawn to those spiritual communities. I love tibetan buddhist theology, and i still read it today because it informs my psychology of mind. But at the same time i didn’t want to be a lofty spiritual wanderer anymore, mish mashing religions and practices, i also didn’t want to be a buddhist, didn’t want to be a hindu, tried to be a pagan and realized all white spirit circles worshipping african deities made me itch for reasons i can now explain-cultural appropriation.
As for being Jewish, that’s a line I’ve finally come to understand i will never cross. As I’ve continued to meet people via my Jewish Studies related experiences, I’ve heard the refrain “Oh your name is Ariel Shahar. You have a Hebrew name, you grew up in a reform Jewish suburb, and you’re doing Jewish studies. Maybe it’s your destiny to become Jewish.”
Usually i just nod politely, smile a strained smile and say “whatever helps you sleep at night homie”, without really disclosing that while i respect Judaism i personally don’t think its right for me.
Lately, as I count down the days where i might actually get to meet Imam Daiyee Abdullah and have him give me shahadah, i think about what answer i’m going to provide to the statement “oh this is your destiny to become Jewish”. I think about whether i want to signal to the world my religious beliefs through actions and words, or do i want to maintain the level of privacy I currently enjoy throughout the Five College Jewish Studies department.
I remember talking to thenoisecomplaint about it, and she pointed out that right now i live a double life keeping my beliefs a secret and continuing to do Jewish Studies. I’ve definitely wrestled with this very problem and started to ask myself why I’m keeping this under wraps.
Coming back to Evanston helped me find the answer- I don’t want to be the poster child for anything. I go out of my way to avoid being the non-Jewish of color poster child for Jewish Studies, flying so so low under the radar. I hate how when i enter a room for a lecture people will bring up colorful comments about the historic black-Jewish connection, which i think is a huge joke by the way, but more on that for another day. In no way, shape or form do i want my religion and my major to signal to some half wit that things are okie dokie betwen muslims and Jews so they can drop their attempts to actively work toward being anti-Islamophobic.
My other worse nightmare- I become the emotional outlet for all colourful comments about tensions between Jews and Muslims. If hearing my colleagues colourful stories about their interactions with African Americans weren’t painful enough, listening to how they know a “super cool Muslim who totally understands them and do you know that person……blah blah blah” would probably send me over the deep edge big time. {this has definitely happened to me before with respect to being African American on a couple of occasions and lets just say i don’t give myself enough credit for being patient).
For right now, my faith is between me, god, my close friends who i have discussed it with in depth, and tumblr. Maybe when i take shahadah i will feel differently. I have been working towards a level of modesty that doesn’t make me feel like a crumpled up brown paper bag- still gotta have swag y’all. I bought scarves to try out hijab styles.
Yet do i think the pioneer valley is really the best place for me to live out my new religious identity, especially when my support system is mostly online or at home in Chicago- probably not.
do i feel like having that conversation with people who i may never see again after leaving that patch of corn come next spring- not in the slightest.
We will see, we will see. I have five weeks before i return to the valley with a new lens to put on the camera that i call my life, and at some point i gotta decide when and where i wanna start taking pictures.
