CLAL on Culture Archive
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The Way to Open Conversation
By Steve Greenberg
On October 24th, Trembling Before G-d, an unprecedented feature
documentary about the lives of gay Orthodox Jews, began its theatrical run at the Film
Forum in New York City. The film won
numerous awards at film festivals during the past year and now has broken box office
records in its first week of commercial release. The
phenomenon of “gay Orthodoxy” is surely sensational enough, but the filmmaker
tells these stories in a compelling and understated style.
The film
is built around extended interviews that the director Sandi Dubowski conducted with six
men and women who know, from the inside, what it means to be gay and Orthodox. Three of the six were willing to show their faces
on camera, and the others were silhouetted to protect their identities. The film also includes interviews with
rabbis who do their earnest best to defend the Orthodox status quo, and interviews with
one Orthodox rabbi who argues that Orthodoxy must find a way to include a legitimate place
for gay Jews. This reporter happens to
be that rabbi.
The Jews who stand
at the center of the film have been rejected by religious leaders and, more poignantly, by
their families. The stories they share are
filled with anger and pain, but they are also suffused by irony, humor, and resilience. Their debate with the Jewish tradition is intimate
and personal; for them it is an intensive family quarrel even if there are many on the
other side that would like to throw them out of the family entirely. The film was shot
over five years in Brooklyn, Jerusalem, Los Angeles, London, Miami, and San Francisco, and
captures a wide array of ways of being Orthodox and gay.
When the film ends, a quote from the Talmud appears on the screen --
“Blessed are You Lord, knower of secrets” – and the members of the audience
understand that they have been granted a rare opportunity to look behind the veil of
secrecy and to discern something of the divine life that lies hidden beneath.
As striking as the film is, even more striking is the effect it is having on the Orthodox world where it is generating lively public debate on the issue of homosexuality. On November 4th, two weeks after the film opened, eight Orthodox synagogues co-sponsored an evening at the theatre followed by an open discussion of the issues raised by the film. Rabbi Haskel Lookstein of Kehilath Jeshurun participated in one of these discussions and offered to bring the film to his synagogue and to the Ramaz School’s sex education class. (Ramaz is the leading modern Orthodox day school in New York City.) A few days later, the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale became the first Orthodox synagogue to screen the film and to host an open forum on the issues it raised for the rabbis and the community. Six hundred people showed up for this event.
Given that for most Orthodox Jews
the topic of homosexuality and Jewish law begins and ends with the injunction in Leviticus 20:13 that a man who lies with another
man as one lies with a woman is an abomination and ought to be put to death, the
increasingly widespread interest in engaging with the issues the movie raises is quite
remarkable.
Dubowski’s genius may be part
of the reason. He provides a portrait of
Orthodoxy that does justice to its virtues and profound depths even as it unflinchingly
illuminates the suffering that Orthodoxy brings to gay and lesbian Orthodox Jews. In the discussion periods that have
followed many of the screenings of the film, someone inevitably asks: Why would any sane person remain Orthodox if he or
she were gay? Aren’t there other Jewish
communities that welcome gays and lesbians? What
sort of madness is it that makes them stay? The
answer, of course, is the madness of love. Marc
and David, Devora and Malka (four of the individuals profiled in the film) -- all love
their Orthodox Jewish lives too much to leave. Yes
there are other venues in the Jewish world that are more tolerant of gay Jews than are
most modern Orthodox shuls, but for these Orthodox Jewish gays these venues are not
attractive, as they lack the “sweetness of traditional Jewish life” that they
find so powerful and affecting. There is
something paradoxical and poignant in the figures cut by these Orthodox gays and lesbians
who are in every other way Orthodox, but who would be shunned by the community to which
they want so much to belong if they should dare to be honest about their sexuality.
Dubowski has also created a film
that tells stories and offers no answers. This
is perhaps what is the most frustrating about the film for those who desperately seek a
resolution of some sort to the predicament. Dubowski,
however, refuses easy answers and instead forces us to encounter the painful realities. But by so doing, Dubowski has begun a process
that gives many of us reason for hope. The
Orthodox community -- or at least the Modern Orthodox community -- has already
demonstrated by its response to the film a willingness to listen to the testimonies of
those who have been silent for so long and a readiness to grapple with the hard questions
that these stories of suffering steadfastness pose for the Orthodox community. It is a very exciting time indeed.
To view other articles by Steve Greenberg, click here.
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