May We Continue to Struggle Together

by Jill Maidhof

Would you go to a bank in which the employees will talk to you about your tennis game, your favorite
recipe, the car you drive and the age of your children — anything, that is, except money, because that’s
too personal, or too forward, or outside the bounds of polite conversation??

Contemporary rabbi Aryeh Ben-David says that’s the way Jews are when it comes to God-talk. He once
asked a rabbi: “How is your personal relationship with God?” Speechless, the rabbi’s face went white.
Then Ben-David asked, “When was the last time you were asked that question?” This time the rabbi
could answer: “Never.”

The Jewish people brought monotheism to the world…
now God is the one subject we don’t talk about.

Ben-David continues:
“I’ve raised this question countless times with rabbis over the past 10 years, hoping to hear something
different. And yet – rabbis who have been in the field for 10, 20, and even 30 years have all reacted the
same way… it’s Ironic!! The Jewish people brought monotheism to the world… now God is the one
subject we don’t talk about.”

I thought about these words during a recent Chai Mitzvah group exploring Aseret HaDibrot, The Ten Commandments. We’re a group in Overland Park, Kansas (Yes, there are Jews in in the heartland!!) sponsored by Beth Torah, a Reform congregation just west of the Missouri-Kansas border. We were discussing the first “commandment,” I am the Lord, your God and it was hard! As Ben-David says, we actually do talk about God, but in historical, academic and “from the neck up” terms.

Our shared Chai Mitzvah experience invited us to talk about what Ben-David describes as a “personal, in-the-kishkes, affecting-my-daily-life, playing-a-vital-role-in-who-I-am-becoming, God.” Did we believe what we were taught in Sunday school? Or what we read in the siddur/prayer book? Do
we pray and if we do, what are our expectations?

Needless to say, we left with more questions than answers, which was really frustrating. As one person
said, “We were really all over the place!” to which another, far more clever than I, retorted “so is God!”
Another reminded us that Chai Mitzvah forced us to live up to our name: Israel — one who struggles.
“I can read books to get more educated,” she said, “but hearing your stories and your doubts, and talking about faith and trust — that helps me become more authentic.”

What a great way to end the meeting – and the year. May we continue to struggle together in 2023!