2016年CRI 'We Believe Deeply In Lox And Bagels': What It Means To Be A Secular Jew

 

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

The Jewish High Holy Days are upon us beginning with the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashana, which ended last night. For many people, this is a time of celebration and spiritual renewal¹. But for some, it might be a challenging time, especially for people who might have a more ambivalent² relationship with their faith - people who might identify as culturally Jewish rather than religious.

Bob Garfield is such a person. You might know him from his long career as an NPR features correspondent and as co-host of WNYC's On The Media. But now he has written and stars in a new one-man show called "Ruggedly⁴ Jewish." It wrestles⁵ with some of those thorny⁶ questions about identity and belonging.

Bob Garfield takes the show on the road later this year, but we caught up with him just before his initial performance in Philadelphia last weekend. And I started our conversation by asking what made him want to rethink his Jewish identity at this moment in life.

BOB GARFIELD, BYLINE⁷: Well, I've been running from the religious part of my religion for my entire adult life. And, you know, without sort of stepping on the joke of where "Ruggedly Jewish" inexorably leads at the end of the show, the answer is the current political moment. And, oh, what the hell, I may as well just give it all away here. I'm just giving it up.

MARTIN: (Laughter) Just giving it up.

GARFIELD: I finally stopped struggling when I realized that it's not necessarily just up to me to decide who I am. Other people have some thoughts on that subject, and a mess of them are Nazis⁸. So I realized that I am not the sole arbiter⁹ of my identity and that just kind of got me to thinking.

MARTIN: When did you make the decision that you would give yourself permission, say, to step away from being Jewish?

GARFIELD: When I was an obnoxious¹⁰ teenager. You know, there's this whole large category of secular¹¹ Jews. And they're often, you know, called in the pejorative¹², self-loathing Jews. There's this bizarre, sometimes hostile ambivalence¹³ about the religion and the culture from which we spring.

You know, it's a big part of the American-Jewish community. We are - the best way I can put it to you is this, Michel, we don't read much Torah, but we've read every word Philip Roth ever wrote. And we don't necessarily even believe in God, but we believe deeply in lox and bagels. So we, on the one hand, are not really participants in the spiritual part of our religion, but we are as Jewish as can be.

MARTIN: You talked about the fact, in the play, which I got to read a little bit of, that you realized that in a lot of your reporting as a correspondent for NPR that you'd spent a lot of time talking with other people who have been in search of identity, who've been thinking about, you know, who they are.

GARFIELD: Sure. You know, I went on the road for ALL THINGS CONSIDERED for 12 or 15 years before I did On The Media. And I was on the hunt for oddball feature stories, American idiosyncrasies. But what tied them all together was that the people who I was pursuing were themselves pursuing identity.

They were in pursuit of the American dream, sometimes with kind of belly-flopping results. And that's - I was mining the humor of failure for the most part, but I also found in that something noble. And it's something peculiarly American. And I kind of began to rethink the freak show aspect of my body of work and look at it more along the lines of people pursuing their birthright.

MARTIN: It sounds to me that you kind of feel like you speak for a lot of people trying to figure out, you know, who they are and where they fit in to this big kind of American story. How does that loop back to your kind of meditation¹⁴ about what it means to be Jewish?

GARFIELD: Because it's all about identity. And this is what dawned on me as I'm trying to process what's happening with Trumpism. I spent 15 years chasing around people who ultimately were in search of their identities, self-actualization. And you don't do that by sticking with the status quo. It was all about escalating¹⁵ your station in life.

And now contemporary politics are about the identity of people like me, Jews, and not to mention Latinos and Muslims and African-Americans. I mean, we are in the crucible¹⁶ right now. And at the same time, the people who are bedeviling us, what Hillary Clinton called the deplorables, have found their identity. And had - they found it in their very rage, in their very frustration¹⁷.

So these are various threads of identity that, in the show, "Ruggedly Jewish," I kind of weave together like a Boy Scout¹⁸ lanyard, hopefully, to have, you know, achieve some useful result.

MARTIN: Why ruggedly?

GARFIELD: It's a joke.

(LAUGHTER)

MARTIN: Oh, OK (laughter).

GARFIELD: We haven't actually met. But there is nobody who has ever met me and walked away going, wow, he is a rugged³ Jew. No. It's - that's just silly.

MARTIN: OK (laughter). Well, that's Bob Garfield. He's co-host of WNYC's On The Media. He is the author of and the star of "Ruggedly Jewish." It's a one-man show. It is going on tour to various cities around the country later this year. He was kind enough to speak to us before Shabat at WHYY in Philadelphia. Bob Garfield, thanks so much for speaking with us.

GARFIELD: Thank you very much, Michel.

(SOUNDBITE OF DAVE BRUBECK QUARTET'S "KATHY'S WALTZ")

1 renewal   

adj.(契约)延期，续订，更新，复活，重来

参考例句：

• Her contract is coming up for renewal in the autumn.她的合同秋天就应该续签了。
• Easter eggs symbolize the renewal of life.复活蛋象征新生。

2 ambivalent   

adj.含糊不定的；(态度等)矛盾的

参考例句：

• She remained ambivalent about her marriage.她对于自己的婚事仍然拿不定主意。
• Although she professed fear of the Russians,she seemed to have ambivalent feelings toward Philby himself.虽然她承认害怕俄国人，然而她似乎对菲尔比本人有一种矛盾的感情。

3 rugged   

adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的

参考例句：

• Football players must be rugged.足球运动员必须健壮。
• The Rocky Mountains have rugged mountains and roads.落基山脉有崇山峻岭和崎岖不平的道路。

4 ruggedly   

险峻地； 粗暴地； （面容）多皱纹地； 粗线条地

参考例句：

• Ruggedly good-looking in a manly-man sort of way. 从男子气概来说，乍一看长得不错。
• It is known that the Lifan 620 media activities are circling ruggedly four sides mountain hold. 据了解，力帆620媒体活动在崎岖盘旋的四面山举行。

5 wrestles   

v.（与某人）搏斗( wrestle的第三人称单数 )；扭成一团；扭打；（与…）摔跤

参考例句：

• The book also wrestles with the idea of individualism. 书中也与个人英雄主义的观念进行搏斗。 来自互联网
• He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. 和我们搏斗的人锻炼了我们的勇气，磨练了我们的技能。 来自互联网

6 thorny   

adj.多刺的，棘手的

参考例句：

• The young captain is pondering over a thorny problem.年轻的上尉正在思考一个棘手的问题。
• The boys argued over the thorny points in the lesson.孩子们辩论功课中的难点。

7 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

8 Nazis   

n.（德国的）纳粹党员( Nazi的名词复数 )；纳粹主义

参考例句：

• The Nazis worked them over with gun butts. 纳粹分子用枪托毒打他们。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The Nazis were responsible for the mass murder of Jews during World War Ⅱ. 纳粹必须为第二次世界大战中对犹太人的大屠杀负责。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 arbiter   

n.仲裁人，公断人

参考例句：

• Andrew was the arbiter of the disagreement.安德鲁是那场纠纷的仲裁人。
• Experiment is the final arbiter in science.实验是科学的最后仲裁者。

10 obnoxious   

adj.极恼人的，讨人厌的，可憎的

参考例句：

• These fires produce really obnoxious fumes and smoke.这些火炉冒出来的烟气确实很难闻。
• He is the most obnoxious man I know.他是我认识的最可憎的人。

11 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

12 pejorative   

adj.贬低的，轻蔑的

参考例句：

• In the context of ethnic tourism,commercialization often has a pejorative connotation.摘要在民族旅游语境中，商品化经常带有贬义色彩。
• But news organizations also should make every effort to keep the discussion civil and to discourage the dissemination of falsehoods or pejorat

13 ambivalence   

n.矛盾心理

参考例句：

• She viewed her daughter's education with ambivalence.她看待女儿的教育问题态度矛盾。
• She felt a certain ambivalence towards him.她对他的态度有些矛盾。

14 meditation   

n.熟虑，（尤指宗教的）默想，沉思，（pl.）冥想录

参考例句：

• This peaceful garden lends itself to meditation.这个恬静的花园适于冥想。
• I'm sorry to interrupt your meditation.很抱歉，我打断了你的沉思。

15 escalating   

v.（使）逐步升级( escalate的现在分词 )；（使）逐步扩大；（使）更高；（使）更大

参考例句：

• The cost of living is escalating. 生活费用在迅速上涨。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The cost of living is escalating in the country. 这个国家的生活费用在上涨。 来自辞典例句

16 crucible   

n.坩锅，严酷的考验

参考例句：

• The alliance had been forged in the crucible of war.这个联盟经受了战争的严峻考验。
• Put the required amount of metal into the crucible.把适量的金属放入坩埚。

17 frustration   

n.挫折，失败，失效，落空

参考例句：

• He had to fight back tears of frustration.他不得不强忍住失意的泪水。
• He beat his hands on the steering wheel in frustration.他沮丧地用手打了几下方向盘。

18 scout   

n.童子军，侦察员；v.侦察，搜索

参考例句：

• He was mistaken for an enemy scout and badly wounded.他被误认为是敌人的侦察兵，受了重伤。
• The scout made a stealthy approach to the enemy position.侦察兵偷偷地靠近敌军阵地。