All Who Go Do Not Return

by Deen, Shulem

  At one point, I wondered if a rock concert might do it. My mother would eventually tell me of her experiences as a teenager listening to Bob Dylan and the Beatles, of being at Woodstock, and the intensity of those experiences, to which she would later credit her religious awakening. I’d heard from Grateful Dead fans who described their experiences as being similar to what they would later feel at a tisch. But when I sought out such events, they evoked nothing at all.

  At Rainbow, however, the energy was palpable, and I wondered if, finally, I had found it.

  Hai yana, ho yana, hai ya na, the crowd sang as a small group sat on the ground and banged on their bongo drums. The steady rhythm of percussion instruments of various shapes and sizes attracted a growing crowd, until the group of three or four turned into several dozen. Across an enormous meadow, several thousand people in circles like this one waved their hands and shimmied their hips to the cacophonous symphony of drums, rattles, tambourines, and every other conceivable noisemaking device, conventional or improvised.

  Hai yana, ho yana, hai ya na, the crowd kept repeating, and after every repetition, they chanted a line or verse about the elements of nature, the trees, the mountains, the rivers, the sun, the moon, and the sky. A barefoot young woman, olive-skinned with delicate features, wearing a flowing white sleeveless dress, led the chanting:

  The rivers are our sisters, we must flow with them,

  The trees are our brothers, we must grow with them.

  And the crowd swung back to the refrain: Hai yana, ho yana, hai ya na! Hai yana, ho yana, hai ya na! It was a mantra both incomprehensible and mesmerizing, and I stared at those around me, each of them smiling at no one in particular, some closing their eyes and shaking their heads to the rhythm, waving their hands in the air, back and forth, back and forth. One man sat on the ground in the circle’s center, swaying like a Hasid in prayer. Most others were standing, shifting their feet in a shuffle dance. Suddenly, all I wanted was to join this circle and be part of it, to dance with these people, to feel what they were feeling.

  We are one with the infinite sun, forever and ever and ever.

  Hai yana, ho yana…..

  But I was no longer thirteen, no longer able to embrace such experiences without feeling cynical or detached. Though I wanted to join them, I kept wondering: “We are one with the infinite sun”? “The rivers are our sisters”? What do these things even mean? The concepts didn’t work for me, even on the level of metaphor. As touching as the sentiments were, I wasn’t sure what I would do with them once I got back to Brooklyn, to alternate-side parking, to my cable bill, and to the perpetually unreliable G train. I now lived deeply and fundamentally suspicious of any hint of dogma or ideology, of subjective values presented as Great Truths. While I wanted to care more about the sun and the rivers and the sky, about loving my fellow humans radically, and about finding the sacred within our universe, I found that I was not moved enough to give these issues further thought.

  And so I watched those who sang and danced, and when night fell, I crept back to my tent, where I could still hear the sounds of the drums, the crackling of a nearby campfire, the laughter of the dozen or so people near our tent who called themselves “Goat Camp,” a motley group of freight-train riders who picked up every stray dog and cat along their travels and ended up encamped in the woods next to our group of ex-Hasidim.

  Soon I was back in Brooklyn, no longer squatting over a ditch in the woods to relieve myself, no longer bathing in the stagnant water of a shallow creek, no longer smelling unwashed bodies in a cramped tent, and, over the days and weeks that followed, I thought often of that weekend. I wondered about that circle of hippies and my odd attraction to them, and I realized, after a time, what it really was: what I longed for was not the tisch of my past but a return to a time and place when ideas moved me even if they didn’t make perfect sense, a time when I allowed myself to be fired up with passion for something, anything, because it held a “truth” that had made itself evident during a moment of inspired consciousness.

  Sometime later, I accepted the invitation of a friend to attend a non-Orthodox Sabbath service at a synagogue on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. I thought I had prayed enough to last me a lifetime, but I had never before experienced a musical service, and when the congregation sang the “Song for David,” I found myself unexpectedly moved. When the crowd rose to dance for “Come, My Beloved,” I recalled the dancing at the rebbe’s tisch, the endless circle snaking around the large shul for hours.

  The congregation quieted down for the Amidah, the silent prayer into which each worshiper disappears into his or her private meditations. It had been years since I had recited it, and I found myself tripping over some of the words, surprised at my loss of fluency, however minor.

  Atah kidashta. You have sanctified the seventh day for Your Name … the end goal of Creation … blessed it of all days, and consecrated it of all times, as it is written in Your Torah. Vayechulu….

  I imagined a primordial world in which God, Adam, and Eve had only one another for company, and the two solitary humans looked at the sun and the rivers and the trees and the sky, and declared, as the Talmud tells us they did: Mah rabu ma’asecha Adonai, how wondrous are Your works, O Lord.

  And for the loss of my faith, for being unable to fully embrace the mythic beauty of those words, for my detachment from all those things that I once held dear, I let the stream of tears fall over the open pages of my prayer book.

  Epilogue

  Akiva and I sit on a couple of large rocks near a shallow stream, the water cascading over tangles of branches and fallen tree trunks. Akiva has a sandwich that Gitty packed for him and a water bottle. I have a hot dog and a container of sautéed chicken liver from Mechel’s Takeout in Monsey.

  Hershy was supposed to come, too, but this time he isn’t with us.

  Six times a year, I come up from Brooklyn to see the boys. Earlier this morning, I took the train from Penn Station to Suffern for my single summertime visit. A friend picked me up and loaned me his car for the afternoon, and before heading to New Square, I stopped at a photo store in Monsey to print photos we’d taken on our previous outing, during the intermediate days of Passover, at Bear Mountain State Park. Outside the store, while I smoked a cigarette and waited for the photos to be printed, Shragi appeared, out of nowhere.

  “Amazing to meet you here,” he said. “I’d been meaning to call you.” He’d meant to but didn’t, for unspecified reasons. “I wanted to tell you, just so you’d know, that Hershy doesn’t want to come today. I thought you might want to make other plans, but, well, you’re here already, so I guess it doesn’t matter.”

  Doesn’t matter?

  “Why doesn’t he want to come?” I asked, the message like a blunt knife scraping against my skin, causing a minor bruise, annoying but bearable. It is what I’ve come to expect.

  “I’m not sure,” he said, avoiding eye contact. “Does it matter?”

  I felt a rising sense of fury. Does it matter? It was eight weeks since I’d last seen the boys. Several years since I’d seen Tziri and Freidy—and even Chaya Suri stopped coming soon after I moved to Brooklyn, after she turned thirteen. I wonder often what their lives are like, whether their interests have changed, whether they look different, but I can barely imagine it. My calls and letters continue to go unanswered. The cell phones I bought them must never have been charged, always going straight to voice mail, my messages unreturned. In the beginning, Akiva would call on occasion, but now, even he no longer does. I can sense, with each visit, the growing distance between us. Soon, I am all too aware, the boys, too, will turn thirteen.

  I suggested a hike in the woods, to see the waterfalls a mile up the Pine Meadow Trail, off Seven Lakes Drive. Walking along the trail, Akiva eagerly pointed out the blazes of red circles on white rectangles that marked our way, jumping over knobby tree roots, which, because of the erosion of soil, rise inches above the ground. It is one of the most popular trails in the park.

/>   Now, as we eat, I explain the history of the trails, the early hikers who mapped out the hundreds of miles of crisscrossing paths. I answer Akiva’s questions about who puts the blazes on the trees, builds bridges over streams, cuts away fallen tree trunks that block the trails. I make him sit still and listen to the sounds of the forest, the chirping of birds, branches swaying in the wind, the rustling shrrrip shrrrip of a deer taking off at the sight of us.

  He doesn’t ask about my life now, and I don’t offer much, although I want to. Whenever I do mention something—my apartment in Brooklyn, my new friends, the articles that I write—he goes silent. I know that inside him must be a mountain of turmoil; yet I feel powerless to do anything about it. All I can do is show up and pay attention.

  We trek back the mile or so to the parking lot, where a soda vending machine stands. “I want to buy a soda,” I say, and he regards the machine with hungry curiosity.

  “Can I put the money in?” he asks.

  I hand him a dollar bill, but it doesn’t take.

  “It’s spitting it out.” He laughs.

  I give him another bill, a crisp one. This one takes, and he pushes my hand away when I reach in to make my selection.

  “Let me press it,” he pleads. A boy for whom a soda vending machine is a novelty.

  As we drive home on the Palisades Parkway, he speaks eagerly about school trips and neighborhood news. He notes the speed on the speedometer, 70 mph, and then the 55 mph sign. “Farchap yeneh car,” he says, and points to a blue Honda Civic ahead of us. He grins as I switch lanes and press down on the gas, and I wonder if I’m setting a bad example.

  The light after the exit ramp is red, and I take the Fotomat envelope lying near the gearshift. “I want to look at these again,” I say, and he leans over, stretching his seatbelt to look at them with me. We laugh at the silly poses he and Hershy had struck for the camera, until the light turns green, and I shove the photos into my lap.

  “Are you going to look at the rest at the next light?” he asks. The next light is the last before we turn into New Square.

  “If it’s red,” I say.

  He points to an empty parking lot at the side of Route 45. “Or maybe you can turn in there.” He says it as though he’s trying to be helpful, but his concern is obvious. He doesn’t want me lingering in front of the house. I tell him I’ll pull over near the bus garage, right after the turn, and I sense his relief as he nods.

  “Where should I drop you off? At the Brauns’ or at home?” The Brauns are cousins who live a block away. Sometimes he asks to be dropped off there, for reasons he won’t elaborate on.

  “Doesn’t matter. Wherever’s easiest.” After a moment, he says, “Near home, you know, at the corner is fine.” As if he doesn’t want to trouble me to go all the way.

  I sense his unease as we approach, his eyes shifty and alert. A group of women stand at the corner, mothers in turbans and housedresses with baby carriages and young children at their sides, and I see his glance fall on them, anxiety all over his face.

  “Better at the house,” he says, and I hear a nervous tremor in his voice.

  At the house, I lean in to hug him, kiss him on his yarmulke, but he’s already grabbed his lunch bag and is fumbling for the car-door latch.

  “Here, take the photos,” I say, and he grabs the envelope quickly.

  “Bye,” he says without turning, his eyes scanning warily for passersby. He closes the car door and steps onto the curb, then turns back briefly, unsmiling. I wave to him, then watch him run up the pathway. The door to the apartment slams shut behind him.

  I pull away, stepping lightly on the gas. Just then, I notice a familiar blur passing behind a parked car. It is Hershy on his bike, zooming down Reagan Road with all the energy of an eight-year-old, oblivious to my presence. I think to honk, but before I have the chance, he’s already zoomed past. I can see him in the rearview mirror, still going full-speed down the road.

  I drive ahead a short distance and make a U-turn. Then, coming back down Reagan Road, I look for the familiar round shape of his head, his payess trailing behind, his arms in that outward swagger I’d seen so many times before. He is not outside the house, nor do I see his bike at the door. At the corner, a group of boys of various ages rest on their bikes and huddle in conversation. I scan their faces for Hershy, but he isn’t among them. He was here a moment ago, and now he is gone.

  Author’s Note

  Each of us has a story to tell. Rarely, however, are our stories ours alone; typically, we share them with family, friends, colleagues, and so on. And yet, our subjective experiences remain unique. This is true of everyday events, but even truer of contentious moments. When we feel aggrieved, we stew in the passions of our own righteousness, our very experiences often leading us to see only what we want to see. In shaping our narratives, we select facts to our advantage, even if only unconsciously.

  Throughout the writing of this book, these thoughts were never far from my mind, hovering like a gray cloud in the middle distance, reminding me that my truth was not the only truth. I am all too aware that some people in this book, either individuals or groups, might offer details and perspectives that I have surely missed. I think particularly of my ex-wife, with whom I shared nearly fifteen years of marriage and who doubtless has a compelling story of her own to tell, perhaps even an altogether different story of our marriage.

  Additionally, there are people described in this book who behaved in ways that are, to my mind, less than admirable. And yet, laying blame and casting stones is an ugly business, especially when dealing with people who were once dear to you. However, this story could not be told without a measure of castigation, overt or implied. I have taken pains to describe characters in this book fairly even when I didn’t feel entirely inclined to do so. I offer this not to absolve myself of the responsibility to offer an accurate telling of events, or to excuse any errors of fact that have slipped in, but to acknowledge the very real challenges in trying to present a fair and honest portrayal of deeply painful events.

  Memoir, of course, is not history, nor is it, strictly speaking autobiography. More than simply a collection of facts, it is a rendering of personal history along with an attempt to find meaning within that history, to weave together narrative threads that might, both to the writer and reader, illuminate aspects of the narrator’s life, and by so doing, impart something of value to the reader. That was my sole objective.

  A Very Brief Reading List

  This book describes a crisis of faith that unfolded over a number of years, a largely internal process of inquiry and examination. I relate here mostly the external, more demonstrably dramatic aspects of that process, and the observable effects upon me and those close to me. My intellectual and philosophical journeys, however, while internally dramatic, do not lend themselves to narrative form in the same way. By necessity, therefore, they have been offered only in collapsed form within the book’s main narrative. Furthermore, this book is not intended as an argument against Orthodox Jewish belief and practice broadly, and should in no way be seen as such.

  I am aware, however, that some readers might want to further explore some of the faith-related topics presented in this book. I offer the list below as a modest attempt at sharing some of the works that have contributed meaningfully to my own intellectual journey, in the hope that others might find them useful.

  This list includes a variety of works, both in favor of and against aspects of religious faith, from popular works to recent classics. Most of them are accessible and illuminating even to non-scholars. They are presented here in the approximate order in which I encountered them, and correspond loosely to the trajectory of my own journey.

  The Nineteen Letters of Ben Uziel: Being a Special Presentation of the Principles of Judaism, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch

  Permission to Believe: Four Rational Approaches to God’s Existence, Lawrence Kelemen

  Permission to Receive: Four Rational Approaches to the Torah’s Di
vine Origin, Lawrence Kelemen

  Genesis and the Big Bang: The Discovery of Harmony between Modern Science and the Bible, Gerald Schroeder

  The View from Nebo: How Archaeology Is Rewriting the Bible and Reshaping the Middle East, Amy Dockser Marcus

  God against the Gods: The History of the War between Monotheism and Polytheism, Jonathan Kirsch

  The Religion of Israel: From Its Beginnings to the Babylonian Exile, Yehezkel Kaufmann

  How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture, Then and Now, James Kugel

  Who Wrote the Bible?, Richard Elliott Friedman

  The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts, Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silverman

  What Did the Biblical Writers Know and When Did They Know It? What Archaeology Can Tell Us about the Reality of Ancient Israel, William G. Dever

  The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe without Design, Richard Dawkins

  Acknowledgments

  Phin Reiss has been a better pal than any man deserves to have—or, at any rate, has paid for more glasses of Johnnie Walker Black than any man deserves to drink. I remain forever grateful for his friendship, his wisdom, and his generosity.

  From Netanya to Cape Town to Williamsburg, Jill Schulman has heard it all many times, and still continues to listen. Her insight, humor, and compassion have been invaluable to me. Much love.

  I am indebted to Ricki Breuer, Zalmen Labin, Y. M. Schwartz, and Itchie Lichtenstein, without whom this book would not have been possible. Also, those who can be known only by their noms de guerre: “Shtreimel,” fellow blogger, friend, inspiration. “Mendy Chossid,” baal chesed extraordinaire. “Hoezentragerin,” for giving me the strength when I felt depleted. Thank you, Avi Burstein, Emily Cercone, Meghan Bechtel Lin, Frieda Vizel, Judy Brown, Samuel “Ushy” Katz, and Eve Singer for your many forms of assistance.