40 years later, a 'baal teshuva' looks back - opinion

Precisely four decades ago this past week, at the tender age of 16, I made a momentous decision, one that forever changed my life.

After months of careful consideration accompanied by a healthy dose of teenage intensity, I decided to take the plunge and observe Shabbat for the first time.

It marked a dramatic break from the relatively relaxed Conservative Judaism with which I had been raised, in which Shabbat was celebrated but not strictly observed in the Halachic sense.

And it ended up propelling me on a long and winding journey of discovery, expanding the boundaries of my religious and spiritual life to realms that I never imagined.

Looking back after all these years as a baal teshuva, I can still recall that chilly Shabbat morning when I made my way to synagogue on foot amid the lush colors of autumn.

To be honest, the walk to shul was anything but uneventful. I was gripped by doubt, avidly questioning myself and my decision, wondering if this was really for me.

“My entire family, all my friends, the whole flow and rhythm of my life, would be disrupted if I were to stick to this path,” I thought to myself.

No more Saturday afternoon street hockey games with friends who lived in neighboring towns. No TV, no video games. Nothing but long afternoons and lots of reading and thinking to do.

Adding to my uncertainty were the waves and whistles of acquaintances who drove by on their way to shul, looking at me with no small measure of surprise as I trudged along on the side of the road.

“Dear God, are You sure You want me to do this?” I wondered aloud, hoping desperately for a sign, an indicator of some divine comfort and reassurance.

After reaching the synagogue, I took my seat.

And then, as if in answer to my plea to the heavens, the person reading the Torah recited the opening verse of this week’s portion, when God tells Abraham to embark on a great journey to an unknown destination with two simple words: “Lech lecha,” which literally mean “Go to yourself.”

I shook in my seat as the words sank in, suddenly infused with a sense of certainty in the path that I had chosen, as well as with confidence that I wasn’t really giving up a part of who I was, but instead recovering my true inner self.

It was then that I knew that I would embrace the Sabbath and make it a key part of my life, a cornerstone in my relationship with the creator.

There were a number of factors that led up to that consequential moment, too many to mention them all here.

A key moment on Tisha B'Av

But a key turning point came a few months beforehand, when I went to Israel that summer as part of a non-religious tour group.

Having heard that Tisha B’Av eve at the Western Wall was a big social scene, I somehow convinced the group leader to take us there, even though it wasn’t part of the program.

As I made my way through the throngs of worshipers, there were two things that struck me. First, I noticed various groups of Ethiopian, Russian, Yemenite, and other Jews, all of whom appeared so different on the surface, with seemingly nothing in common to unite them. They spoke different languages, had diverse wardrobes, and ate dissimilar foods.

And yet, there was something so powerful about our people’s tradition that it was able to bring these disparate groups together, at the same time and in the same place, and for the very same reason. It was an eye-opening glimpse for me of the power of Jewish history and the pull of Jewish destiny.

Then, I saw a group of black-clad hassidim sitting in a circle reading Eichah, the Book of Lamentations. 

Never one to be intimidated by what could prove to be an interesting sociological experience, I went over and plopped down, oblivious to the fact that my outfit of jeans and T-shirt did not exactly align with theirs. 

Looking around the group, I noticed that several of the men were weeping, literally shedding tears, all because the Temple was destroyed some 1,900 years ago.

I shook my head in disbelief. After all, the newspaper is filled every day with human tragedies and natural disasters, most of which move readers far less than the outcome of the World Series.

“So why,” I thought to myself, “are these guys crying over a building that was felled two millennia ago? Is there something wrong with them?”

And then the answer hit me right in the mental equivalent of the gut: “No, Michael. Perhaps there is something wrong with you. Maybe these guys are the ones who ‘get it,’ and you are the one who doesn’t.”

Less than three months later, I was on my way, taking that tentative first step to attempt to “get it” by keeping Shabbat.

I wish I could recapture that extraordinary feeling I had when I heard the words “Lech lecha” that morning. Every year, when they are read in shul, I still get emotional, knowing the impact they had, not only on our patriarch Abraham and his progeny, but on me as well.

And every year, it is a reminder for me of the importance of tuning in to hear the call of the divine.

As the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote, “Hashem is calling on each of us, saying there is a reason why we are here because He has something for us to do, something that only we can do. 

The challenge is to make sure we are listening. 

The writer is the founder of Shavei Israel (www. shavei.org), which assists lost tribes and hidden Jewish communities to return to the Jewish people.