Backfilling and Front-filling My Jewish History

I’ve spent the last 50 years building a Jewish identity since I slowly reverted from a Southern Baptist adolescence in Mission, Texas, back to my ancestral Judaism. I’ve studied Yiddish and Hebrew, visited Israel twice, and have a happy partnership with a Jewish woman. My son had a bris, I daven weekly at Chabad, and I do enjoy a wee nip o’ Slivovitz.

Still, I am intensely aware of the yawning gap dividing my childhood and those of friends who had more typical Jewish upbringings with seders, Hanukkah, bar and bat mitzvahs, and extended families in urban centers from Brooklyn to Brookline. I have no memories of Yiddish-speaking relatives and no ideological allegiance to FDR and New Deal liberalism. Family history put me in the small town near the Rio Grande where my mother grew up and returned to after she divorced my father. She left religion to our devoutly Christian landlady. Culturally, I knew more about the Alamo than Masada, ate tamales rather than matzoh ball soup.

Let’s skip the convoluted path from First Baptist to Chabad of Bedford, NY. Despite emotional turmoil, as a teen I weaned myself from evangelical Christianity and groped toward Judaism. Scraps of Jewish identity gave me a bedrock of what could be: our mother taught my brother and me the Sh’ma, and we had a menorah and a Union prayer book. Mom loved to cook traditional Jewish delicacies of tongue and liver (both of which I still enjoy, to the horror of my vegetarian partner Naomi).

As I get older, I am backfilling elements of what I never experienced. I’m using what helped me then to bolster the Jewish identity of others—a name, a book, stories of ancestors, anything counts. What my mother retained of Judaism still has a tremendous meaning for me, and I want to do the same for others.

Most important, I have become the Giver of Hebrew Names. I carried on, in my modest human way, a long tradition in the Torah. Notable personalities in the Torah get new names: Abram to Abraham, Sarai to Sarah, Hoshea to Joshua. The all-time champ of multiple identities was Moses’s father-in-law, Jethro (Yisro). A Midianite priest, Jethro was also known as Yeter, Jethro, Reuel, Chovav, Keini. The sages say he and his family ultimately converted to Judaism. Had he lived now, Jethro clearly would be slamming on social media with his satchel of identities.

I’m Jewish but I never had a Hebrew name. I didn’t even know that was a thing until I became an adult more involved in Judaism. I like this explanation of why Jewish names matter:

Names are more than convenient labels; going by your Jewish name is a statement of pride in your Jewish heritage. The Jews of ancient Egypt, tradition tells us, kept their Jewish names. That’s one of the ways they remained a cohesive people and merited redemption.

There’s more: Your Jewish name is the channel by which life reaches you from Above. In fact, the Kabbalists say that when parents name a child, they experience a minor prophecy—because, somehow, that child’s destiny is wrapped up in the combination of Hebrew letters that make up his or her name.

My first step was a Hebrew name for my son  at his bris in the 1990s: his mother and I selected Reuven Yisroel, honoring a late dear friend, Rena, who escaped Berlin for London in 1938, and my paternal grandfather, Edwin, a/ka/ Isidore a/k/a Hymenik from Vishnivitz, Ukraine.

I also needed a Hebrew name for myself when called to the bima for an aliyah. What to use in this act of self-definition? In no way can “Van”—taken from the British race car the Vanwall, a moniker that tickled my car-obsessed father—be connected to any Jewish name I know of short of kabbalistic letter juggling. “Navi,” or prophet, works, but that sounds too much like “Feliz Navidad,” or Merry Christmas in Spanish. I immediately gravitated to “Ze’ev,” wolf, as punchy as Van with a feral energy. My father was originally Marvin, which he changed to the more neutral Mark, and his Hebrew name was Moshe, so Ze’ev ben Moshe was the first iteration.

Lately I wanted a Hebrew middle name. The focus swung to my German-born maternal great-great-grandfather, Heinrich “Chayim” Schwarz, renowned as the first ordained rabbi in Texas. He moved there in1873, bringing with him s’micha, or ordination, from the scholar-rabbi known as the Malbim. R’ Schwarz is an ideal ancestor to honor, so I now use Ze’ev Chayim ben Moshe v’ Shira.

My Hebrew namesake, Rabbi Heinrich “Chayim” Schwarz

Wait, who’s Shira? Did my mother, Shirley Elizabeth, have a Hebrew name? She never mentioned one and was very taciturn on Jewish matters, not that I knew enough to ask before she died in 1984. Well, I was going to remedy that absence. Shirley Elizabeth glided into the lyrical Shira Elisheva. With her parents bearing pre-Flood names of Jared and Eva, she became Shira Elisheva bat Yared v’ Chava.

On a roll, I created a name from my brother Cooper, also named after a car. He’s insightful and a leader, so I see him as Caleb, one of the two of 12 spies who lived to enter the Promised Land (along with Joshua). Cooper is also a talented handyman and appreciates art, which brings to mind Tabernacle artisan Bezalel, so Calev Bezalel ben Moshe v’ Shira Elisheva it is.

Lately, I’ve wondered whether my hometown was as devoid of a Jewish presence as I assumed. Could I backfill a communal Jewish identity that nobody talked about? Mission was primarily Catholic, owing to the majority Hispanic population. As an adult, however, I learned about crypto-Jews: those who fled to the New World from the Spanish Inquisition. Many settled in northern Mexico and their roots spread across the Rio Grande into the3 Southwest, including Texas. What if, I mused, crypto-Jews who retained awareness of their roots or had names associated with Iberian Jews—Rodriguez, Gonzales, Garcia, Flores,3 Castro and Leon, for example—lived in Mission? Did I walk among them and never even suspect? I’ve been in touch with friends who, in fact, identify with that background and I’ve shared details about Judaism with them, when asked.

In one touching cross-cultural example of nicknames, one friend calls me “Carnal,” Mexican slang for pal or brother, and I call him “Landsman,” Yiddish for somebody from the same town, which is true, and for me it also connotes deep connection.

I’m now turning to front-filling, to coin a phrase, the Jewish lives of the next generation. I recently wrote and led a baby-naming ceremony for Naomi’s grandson, Elliot Robert, working with the parents to name him Eliyahu Reuven, honoring his late great-grandfather Eric and late grandfather Robert. As a gift I got him an Israel bond.

Next, I’m buying Israel bonds for young relatives in Texas for Hanukkah. They have a Jewish heritage if not a Jewish identity. For the joy of combining words and identity, I may create Hebrew names for them. I’m getting a sense of their personalities, so I can play with Hebrew and Yiddish names to find their alternate, historical identities for their minor prophecies. Someday it may mean something for them. A little spark of Yiddishkeit can go a long way, as I learned from the Sh’ma and Mom’s menorah.

Front-filling means I bear witness for Jewishness and Judaism. Having decried myself as the simple son at the seder, I know how empathy and role modeling can have long-term impact in helping transition to a more informed image. I provide Hebrew phrases to relatives who want to know what to say to Jewish co-workers, like “chag sameach,” I explain Jewish concepts when anybody asks.

I especially want to quietly support young people and be a role model. Maybe they’ll be curious about the Israel bonds or Jewish books or Hebrew names, maybe or maybe not for another 50 years, but nothing happens unless I create the potential for their souls to connect with their heritage spanning from Sinai to here.

As Rabbi Tarfon said, “It is not your duty to finish the work, but neither are you at liberty to neglect it.” I’ll take on the task of front-filling and let time reveal what sprouts from that.