Patchwork Project: Chaviva Edwards

How do Jews-by-choice contribute to Jewish identity?

Jews-by-Choice, thrust by their neshamas into the fold of Jewish identity, bring with them new languages, family traditions, cultural quirks, recipes, desires, and visions of what it means to be Jewish. The beauty of Judaism, I think, is the diversity within it. Everyone comes to the fold with some different story of how they got there — whether through a realization of former family ties to Judaism, after falling in love with a Jew-by-birth, a connection to the lost family of the Shoah, or through a personal calling that is so strong it can no longer be denied.

One of the first things I was told when I began my journey to conversion so many years ago was that I cannot and should not forget where I came from. Converts are told that once they are converted, it is as if they were always Jewish, because a convert is said to have been born with a Jewish soul. But Jewish soul or not, the shaping of the Jew-by-Choice’s contribution to Jewish identity begins at birth.

I think the perspective of a Jew-by-Choice is often unique. For some, having traversed every inch of the religious spectrum, a Jew-by-Choice can contribute a unique world view, a perspective of community wholeness across the religious communities of the world. In my mind a Jew-by-Choice has the opportunity to contribute a perspective of the “outside world,” a world in which many Jews-from-Birth do not experience. The lens of a Jew-by-Choice is unique not only to the world in which they come from, but it also is unique to the world in which they are going.

The Jew-by-Choice, in a way, is an ambassador to the outside world, bringing in experiences, stories, traditions, and perspectives that otherwise would not find their way into the Jewish identity, broadening the spectrum of what the Jewish community even understands to be Jewish. Since the beginning, Judaism has been a religion, a people, a way of life of converts. For generations, Jews-by-Choice have opened the eyes of the Jewish identity to new ways of living, singing, dancing, and experiencing ages-old traditions.

In essence, Jews-by-Choice contribute a unique world view to Jewish identity, opening Judaism and Jewishness to a world it otherwise might persist without. The beauty of this contribution is that Jews-by-Choice are essential in weaving the tapestry of the Jewish identity, they are the threads that tie together the various patches and perspectives of the continuum of Jewish identity.

Born and bred as a Midwesterner, Chaviva Edwards can be found hunched over a pile of books somewhere in Connecticut, where she is a graduate student in Judaic studies. She has been blogging since the late 1990s and has been at kvetchingeditor for more than three years. Her journey to Judaism and from Reform Judaism to modern Orthodoxy can be found in the archives there, among many other entertaining quips about doing Judaism. You can also find her on Twitter (@kvetchingeditor) and anywhere else her moniker is found.

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