During the fall semester at Dickinson, as part of our preparation for this trip to Buenos Aires the research team took a class taught by Professor Shalom Staub entitled, “Ethnography of Jewish Experience.” In this class we focused on boundaries between Jews and the communities in which they live. What we only began to scratch the surface on was the topic of boundaries within the Jewish community itself. Here in Argentina the dynamics are fascinating and ever-changing. There are divisions between Orthodox and Reform (or what they call here Conservative), Sephardi and Ashkenazi, rich and poor. Yet the community remains together as Jews.
On the second day of our trip in Buenos Aires we ventured to the Camargo Temple, and orthodox Sephardic establishment. To a trained eye it became obvious almost immediately upon entering that we were not in your average Ashkenazi shul. The El Paso Temple, which we had visited the day before, was a model of European grandeur with gold decorations and very elaborate carvings on columns lining the sanctuary. Camargo had a very different feel. Many of the patterns were more geometric in design except for the stained glass windows depicting the twelve tribes of Israel. The most striking difference came with the Torot. Both shuls had a good number of them (33 at El Paso and 14 at Camargo) but their appearances were completely different. In Paso the Torot were dressed in maroon and gold cloth covers, elaborately embroidered. At Camargo there was a greater variety. A number of the Torah scrolls were dressed in white with silver embroidery and had very elaborate crowns. There were two or three other scrolls that were stored in the more traditional Sephardic silver cases. In a synagogue the Torah is one of the most holy objects. It is more or less the reason to have a synagogue. Jews can gather anywhere to pray but with the synagogue they have an established place to store the community’s holy objects (including the torah scrolls which are especially heavy and hard to transport).
Despite these clear physical differences in places of worship there tends to be a sense that Sefardim and Ashkenazim are all part of the larger Jewish community. While talking to young university students at Macabi (a Jewish retreat facility) the girls commented that it never even occurred to them to ask their friends if they were Sephardi or Ashkenazi. Rabbi Sacca of Camargo Temple phrased it very nicely. He spoke of the more physical customs: food, dress, decorations of the synagogue, as the “clothing” of Judaism. Everyone dresses their Judaism in a way that makes them comfortable with what is underneath, with the essence of it. If we view different strains of Judaism this way there is no way to feel a separation amongst the Jewish community. As human beings we may judge people by the clothes they wear and use them as keys to see what is underneath, but we never question the essence of the human being because of how they choose to cover themselves.
When talking to the students at Hillel one of them made a remark which unfortunately rings just as true. Gaston’s commented that the biggest divisions among Jews come from arguments over who is a Jew. Is it a question of birth? A question of self-identification? And if it’s either of those or something else how does the community regulate it?
Among the people that we talked to in Argentina the definitions varied greatly. At Macabi, which is a secular Jewish establishment (you can order ham and cheese at any of the restaurants and it runs the majority of its activities on Saturday), the general attitude seemed to define Jews as anyone who defines himself as Jewish. There were no questions asked when people rented a bungalow or signed up for sports teams. Moving along the spectrum, Hillel uses the Israeli Law of Return’s standards to define who can participate in their programming. The Law of Return basically states that if any one of your grandparents was Jewish, so are you. There are groups in Argentina (such as Chabad or Menorah (the youth group associated with the Camargo Temple) that go with the more traditional halachic definition of your mother needing to be Jewish.
The Argentinean Jewish community speaks well about the plurality and unity of the community. Everyone we’ve talked to seems to say that the community works well together and that divisions are only really noticed when it comes time to pray. Yet from an outsider’s perspective it is easy to see that this is not true. A person who keeps kosher would not be able to spend time at Macabi because the facilities would not accommodate their dietary restrictions. There are many more orthodox organizations that would not consider people who only have a Jewish father to be Jewish and exclude this group of people from their activities. The people at Hillel stated about the Jewish attitude about Israel, “to a non-Jew we feel we must always represent Israel in a positive light and be supportive, but amongst the Jewish community we can criticize Israel’s actions as much as we like.” This attitude is the same for the Argentina Jewish community and the divisions among it. To outsiders the community wishes to appear unified and loving, as a big Jewish Argentinean family. But when it comes down to the reality, amongst the community there is a lot of bitterness and arguments about how one should express their Judaism and even who should be counted in the Jewish community.

Over the years, I have had many conversations with my Jewish friends about the holiday season, which have made me realize how the contrast between Jewish culture and the majority Christian population of America becomes much more distinct during this time.  Although Christians obviously don’t suddenly abandon their Jewish friends or vice versa, there is still an element of separation that really cannot be avoided.  There are many more times that the two are physically separated, because both parties want to be spending their own holidays with those who also celebrate them.  Because those who celebrate Christmas are in the majority in America and because Hanukkah is not as important a holiday for Judaism as Christmas is for Christianity, Christmas is certainly more in-your-face than Hanukkah is.  As a result, the divide has more impact on everyday life during this time.  Visually, it is immediately apparent who is Jewish and who is not.  This difference in decorations during the holiday season in particular is what has caused an ongoing argument with one of my Jewish friends and me.

We refer to this argument as the “Hanukkah wreath” argument, and though it is just a light-hearted disagreement we like to play around with, I think that the discussion reveals a lot about the boundary making between Jewish culture and American culture, especially during this time of year.  The basis of the argument is the idea of whether it is necessarily fair to say that certain holiday decorations associated with Christmas, such as the wreath, is exclusively Christmas-related.  It started out because I wondered out loud if there could be such thing as a Hanukkah wreath, but my friend adamantly opposed the idea.  She said that she doesn’t think that Jews should ever have Hanukkah wreaths because the wreath is a Christmas decoration.  However, as far as I’m concerned, there is nothing specifically symbolic of Christianity inherent in the wreath.  We casually looked it up at one point and it seems that though there is one interpretation of a wreath as symbolizing “the never-ending love of Christ”  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wreath), the concept of wreath actually began in Roman and Greek times and had absolutely nothing to do with Christianity.  In fact, I know many households that keep seasonal wreaths up that have no religious connotation at all.  I do agree that perhaps now the “winter wreath,” made with pine needles and pine cones and ribbons (even those ribbons that colors other than red) are associated with Christmas, but I can’t help but wonder why this means that Jews should not be able to decorate a wreath in a Hanukkah style.  Like Christy questioned in her previous blog, I too wonder how different the holiday season would be if Jews were in the majority in America.  Would this type of evergreen wreath, made with supplies commonly found in winter, be associated with Hanukkah more than with Christmas? Would Christians be less inclined to put up wreaths with Christmas decorations on them if they were perceived as strictly Hanukkah decorations? As we discussed after reading Jonathan Webber’s “Lest We Forget!” people as a whole take elements of their culture, even grief, and become fiercely protective of it; in order to remain fiercely protective, there must be something else to protect against, to push away.  So by pushing away anything that is even vaguely associated with the culture in question, one feels as if they are being more loyal to their own culture.