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285  fifty-five The Parade of Families Rosh Hashanah Joshua Lesser My family tended to arrive at Rosh Hashanah services early. We usually were not early enough for the red velvet cushioned seats, which were probably held for major donors anyway, but we were always in time to snag prime seats for the Rosh Hashanah catwalk. I used to call it the “Parade of Families.” We did not belong to one of the more posh synagogues in Atlanta, but we still had what seemed like a fashion show every year on this one day when every family in the community would be in attendance. Contrary to the spirit of the holiday, we would make fun of outrageous outfits, especially the rare few who would show off their furs in the Indian summer of Georgia autumn. As I got older, what became more interesting were the comments that would be made about families entering the sanctuary. People seemed inclined to disregard that the Yom Kippur contrition was only ten days away. I heard the juiciest gossip when tuning out the chazzan and listening really closely to those around me. “Silverman, there, is filing for bankruptcy, and his wife next to him will certainly be leaving him soon, poor bastard.” “Jane hasn’t been able to give birth. I think they are going to try adoption. So sad.” “Alex is here with the boys; Barbara left him for her OBGYN.” “Amanda and Ilan have their hands full; their twin girls are out of control.” Predictably, there was commotion over one couple’s daughter coming out as a lesbian , and sadly people spoke with false sympathy about the grieving parents whose son was one of the first to die of AIDS in the Atlanta Jewish community. It dawned on me that it was unlikely that anyone was spared the parade critique, including my own family. It was at Rosh Hashanah as much as anywhere else that I learned a sense of shame and a need to hide what might not be normative about our family. Even if we were not a perfect Jewish family, I was determined that we could look like one in this parade. Ironically, in the background of the Rosh Hashanah liturgy is the introduction to “the First Family of Judaism.” Abraham, Sarah, and their miracle-child, Isaac, were introduced to me as an idealized Jewish family early on in my Orthodox upbringing . Our patriarch and matriarch were presented through midrashim, stories, and explanations, as the pinnacles of faith, hospitality, wisdom, goodness, and generosity . To question anything about them was heresy. This picture of perfection that was 286 Joshua Lesser ingrained in me was so compelling that it took many years before I was able to deconstruct these messages and connect to what the text actually says about them. I was taught that Abraham was the “perfect tzadik,” the exemplar of righteousness, or so claimed Rashi in his commentary on Parashat Noach, when he compared Abraham’s righteousness to Noah’s righteousness. This idea was continuously expanded upon by rabbis and leaders in my Jewish world. Growing up in day school, I was taught messages such as the following weekly e-teaching called Parsha Parenting: Such was the path of Avraham Avinu. He succeeded in saving not only his family, but brought tens of thousands of people to knowledge of HaShem, not through polemics or politics, but by following the ways of HaShem through abundant and abiding chessed (kindness). Therefore, he and Sarah are seen as true partners of HaShem in creation, as the Torah states, hanefesh asher asu beCharan, the souls that they made in Haran. This is true righteousness, which serves all of humanity.1 But once you read Genesis more closely and with open and critical eyes—particularly the portions that lead up to the dramatic Rosh Hashanah readings—you find a complex family set with challenges. Abraham and Sarah have, using contemporary terminology, a non-normative family structure. For queer people this is promising. By letting the text speak for itself, rather than single-mindedly seeking evidence to prove what incredible spiritual parents Abraham and Sarah were, interesting and surprising models for family and parenting emerge. Before I detail those models, I want to shed light on how the text is misread in the first place. Conservative theologians often accuse their progressive counterparts of the self-indulgence of “eisegesis,” particularly in the Christian world. In James White’s book Pulpit Crimes: The Criminal Mishandling of God...

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