Judaism should be strengthened by our diversity as a people, so why aren’t we growing stronger?  Remix Judaism, by Roberta Rosenthal Kwall makes the thought-provoking case that it is precisely the diversity of choice, or more specifically, the lack of Jewish choices being made, that is causing an extreme loss of Jewish tradition, literacy, and practice.  Many Jews today identify as Jewish by culture, but not by practice, as Kwall describes to the reader.  She passionately proves that regardless of which pathway one is coming from, cultural or traditional, Remix Judaism can help to rebuild and reenergize our entire Jewish collective. 

The pathway that I personally am coming from is a ‘remix’ of both the liberal and the traditional.  As a graduate student in Jewish Studies and a religious schoolteacher, I found Remix Judaism enlightening and an asset to my teaching.  It breaks down many questions of why we do the things we do, traditions, holidays, and rituals, with answers and options of how we can apply them to the realities of our hectic and complicated lives.  It helped me realize that to teach about Judaism, I need to create consistent and real connections to traditions and make these traditions as personally meaningful to my students as possible. 

With what feels like a constant metamorphosis of some kind or other in my own personal Jewish journey, I am sure that finding Roberta Rosenthal Kwall along this path recently was for a reason.  In the last six months, we lost my father-in-law and my own father.  Both losses were rather unexpected, and with their passing so closely to one another, I am sure one can imagine why it has caused me to feel a great soul searching and spiritual change like I have never experienced before. 

 I read this book after both had passed, yet it illuminated many things to me about the mourning rituals which are all so fresh to me, and many which I hadn’t even known about.  Reading about these traditions, shed light on many things I have been feeling but hadn’t had the literacy to define or articulate. 

Due to the pandemic, my mother chose to have only one day of Shiva for my father, and in my state of mind, I didn’t challenge it, nor did I have a larger sense of the purpose of that tradition at the time to ensure that we did have it.  Ultimately, this is an example of a gap in my knowledge, and had I had a richer understanding of these rituals, I could have benefited from the knowledge.  If I had a full 7 days of Shiva, I may not have felt such a desperate grief and loneliness on the day after the burial, with no Shiva, no formal prayers, no structure of familiar faces to hold me up.  Interestingly, I did feel compelled, without much background understanding as to exactly why, to say Kaddish for my father regularly at a nearby Orthodox shul, which has been incredibly comforting to me over these past few months.  Though this is an extreme example, it just showed me that building up a “thicker” knowledge and engagement of Jewish traditions as Kwall often advises, can only help one feel more at home in their Jewish culture.  

Kwall demonstrates her deep understanding of the contemporary Jewish narratives by applying a wide array of wisdom from Jewish texts, personal stories and even prayers to the realities of today’s diaspora Jews.  She makes the clear argument for “why” and “how” this Remix reality can help us all better participate in our Jewish lives, and she does it in a way that both educates and entertains.  Remix Judaism provides a fresh clarity to our often opaque and ever shifting moment in the Jewish American landscape. For me, Remix Judaism has become a resource, a place I can go to be fueled with knowledge so that I can make the choices that are meaningful to me, empowered and energized with my people’s traditions that are now my own too.  

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