guide to the jewplexed


A Jew in the Box No More

Get out your squeegees and glass cleaner. In Berlin, Jews are being put on display in a transparent box, and you might want a clear view.

Called "Jews in a Showcase," the exhibit, which invites a Jew to sit and answer questions, is part of a new exhibition called "The Whole Truth... everything you always wanted to know about Jews," that opened at the Jewish Museum Berlin on March 22.

"At selected times, a Jewish guest will take a seat in a showcase and will - if desired - react to visitors' questions and comments," says the museum's website.

The museum is confident questions about Judaism and being Jewish will be asked: "The FAQs, the difficult questions, the funny questions, the clever questions, and the questions that really have no answer."

Perhaps, in this setting, it's too much to expect answers to the imponderables. But would an answer to, "How much chocolate syrup does it take to make a decent egg cream?" be out of the question?

Museum visitors searching for the "Whole truth, says the site, now have the opportunity to "confront their confused feelings about Jews."jew in a box berlin

Of course, by this point you are probably experiencing "confused feelings" about whoever thought this up--but leaving that aside for a moment--can you imagine what it might be like sitting in that box?

According to Fox News, several of the volunteers for the exhibit, including both German Jews and Israelis living in Berlin, said "The experience in the box is little different from what they go through as Jews living in the country that produced the Nazis."

"With so few of us, you almost inevitably feel like an exhibition piece," volunteer Leeor Englander said. "Once you've been 'outed' as a Jew, you always have to be the expert and answer all questions regarding anything related to religion, Israel, the Holocaust and so on."

Sound familiar?

At times, many of us have already found ourselves uncomfortably put on the hot seat as the office, school, or even neighborhood "Jew," and I am wondering if ritualizing the exchange by adding a confined space is really that far from our experience.

People do sometimes try to box us in.

"Do Jews celebrate Thanksgiving?" I was once asked in a publisher's office. "Why don't Jews believe in Christ?" I recall being asked by a friend in high school. "Is that hut you're building in your backyard for a luau?" I recall being asked by a neighbor who had seen me put palm fronds on the roof of my sukkah.

Understandably, within days of the opening, the show which some have begun to call "Jew in the Box," had a lot of people asking questions--none of them funny.
"Shame! How would you like an exhibit in the U.S. called 'German in a box' or 'Christian in a box'?" asked Jeri Roth Fink on Facebook.

Added Simon Mendlow: "As the son of 2 Holocaust survivors I know that my parents would agree with me that this form of disseminating information about Jewish culture is tasteless and offensive. I agree with your goal but totally disagree with your methodology!"

According to a museum press release, in response to the criticism that using Jews as "exhibition objects" is unethical and voyeuristic, the organizers of the exhibition "Are taking up the gauntlet that critics of Jewish museums have thrown down at the feet of the museums' founders."

In their defense the museum makes the point that "The Jews in Germany, who have played a prominent role over the past few decades and are seen by many as a symbol of the millions murdered in the Holocaust, are already treated as specimens under glass."

Since I too sometimes feel like a Jewish specimen, I wondered if the next time I knew one of those "Jewish questions" was coming, if imagining sitting in a glass box could help finally help me to escape it.

"Is there a reason why Jews are the people of the book?" I might be asked, seated in the  Jewish glass box.

"Yes, we write and win awards for so many of them," I might answer, cleaning the window with a shpritz of Windex, the better to eye my questioner.

"Do Jews drink?" I might be asked as a follow up.

"Why, did you bring me something?" I would respond, typically, with another question.

"Are all Jews rich?"

"Rich in seeing the possibilities of most every situation," I would answer.

"Why are Jews so bent on repairing the world?"

"We are well-equipped for the job," I would answer, pulling out a hammer.

Back to Jewplexed Main

Edmon J. Rodman has written about making his own matzah for JTA, Jewish love music for the Jerusalem Post, yiddisheh legerdemain for the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, a Bernie Madoff Halloween mask for the Forward, and what really gets stuck in the La Brea Tar Pits for the Los Angeles Times. He has edited several Jewish population studies, and is one of the founders of the Movable Minyan, an over twenty-year-old chavura-size, independent congregation. He once designed a pop-up seder plate. In 2011 Rodman received a First Place Simon Rockower Award for "Excellence in Feature Writing" from the American Jewish Press Association."