Birthright for Frummies

I almost lost it.

January 2, 2000. I’d like to blame the 3-hour delay at JFK airport on Y2K (there must be a Jewish law somewhere about judging airlines favorably). I was on my way to Israel for a 3-day trip to greet the thousands of college students arriving as part of the “Birthright Israel” program. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision. If I could get a quick ticket and be back home for Shabbat, I’d go. I got it and I was going ­ with an agenda.

I wanted to meet some of the collegiates and tell them that I was proud of them. Proud that they chose to spend their semester break touring Israel instead of frolicking in Florida. To say to them that this card-carrying frummy (slang for a fundamentalist black-hatted haredi zealot) loves you ­ just because you’re my brother and sister, and respects you despite our differences, and hopes you have a great visit and that you’ll come back for more.

I wanted to confront a couple of the program’s many critics and say: “Phew on you! These are Jewish kids and they’re coming back home. So what if it’s only for a couple of weeks. Papa still loves them. He misses them terribly ­ and would rather have them for a couple of weeks than for no time at all.”

I also wanted to shlep some fellow black-hatters along and have them mingle with the participants and the organizers. To say hello to them, to find out what motivated them to get involved, and to find out what can be done to improve our relationship. To tell them that what we share in common is more significant than what divides us. I know. I’m a dreamer.

As I painfully inched along the seemingly endless check-in line, I became deeply enmeshed in the pandemonium of frustrated passengers. I no longer cared about going to Israel or about my fellow Jews about to embark upon a potentially life-changing experience. The only pleasant thoughts I could muster up were Excedrin and a full refund. I’d settle for 50%, or even a cab-ride back home. Engrossed in planning my escape route, it took a second nudge from the guy behind me to let me know that I was next.

With the possibility of a refund rather bleak, I grudgingly fumbled for my ticket and passport. The pleasant African American gentleman at the check-in counter, however, caught me off guard: “Would that be ‘standard’ or ‘mehadrin’ seating?” he gently asked. Not wanting to appear religiously ignorant, or indifferent, I fixed my tie and boldly said, “Mehadrin, of course.”

Now, I was familiar with the term “mehadrin” (or, preferred) in connection with food preparation, suggesting a more rigorous standard of Kashrut. Surely this was not what he had in mind. (I had already come to terms with airline food tasting like cardboard, but having a seat cushion for breakfast was going a bit too far.) I then figured that the Rabbis discovered some fibers of questionable origin, possibly a forbidden mixture of wool and linen threads in the seat cushion, and that the airline was good enough to accommodate us by replacing some of them with aluminum seats. How considerate.

Eventually I learned that “mehadrin seating” referred to a section of the airplane designated as a “movie-free zone”. Parents who are uncomfortable about exposing their children to a particular movie and the many Orthodox Jews who consider movies, as a whole, detrimental to their own and their children’s spiritual well-being, now have the option, on certain airlines, to choose mehadrin, or “preferred” seating.

As I waited in yet another line, longing to rest my aching body on the coveted mehadrin cushion, I pondered the “price” of this novel amenity. The idea of sheltering oneself or one’s children is offensive to some, but not to me. Live and let live. But I was afraid that the message, albeit an unintentional one, that this respectful accommodation may send out, will add more fuel to the fire separating Jew from Jew. Many, I fear, will misinterpret this aspiration for spiritual protection as a further rejection of other Jews. “They consider us so impure that now they won’t even sit next to us!” Or, “A shtetl in the sky! What will these haredim think of next?”

But for me, there was an even greater concern. By plopping myself down in an all-religious section, I would be depriving myself of what has become a highlight of my previous trips to Israel, my own little “birthright” ­ interacting for several hours with fellow, though secular, Jews.

Here was an opportunity to learn from one another. To exchange ideas, thoughts, questions, answers, and yes, telephone numbers. To skip all the rhetoric and earnestly hash out what we can do to work together in stopping the plague of ignorance and indifference. But alas, I was flying mehadrin.

Unenthusiastically, I searched for seat 53a. When I finally reached my destination, there was a little surprise waiting for me: 53b, occupied by a thirty-something fellow with long hair and an earring ­ completely oblivious to the sanctity of the cushion beneath him. My birthright, restored.

It was going to be an interesting flight after all.