Written by Peter Luck
Of the wide range of activities we participated in during our first week of the Nachshon Project, the one that I found most meaningful was one led by Rabbi Todd Zeff. In our activities room on Kibbutz Shefayim, Rabbi Zeff handed each of us 21 fellows a large piece of butcher paper and two markers. Â With a blue marker, we were told to write the question, "How will you you foster a love for Jewish living?" The members of our cohort come from active Jewish backgrounds, whether it be camp, youth group, synagogue or all of the above, so naturally many of the answers to that question were geared toward our familiarity with Jewish living. With the butcher paper affixed to the wall, it was easy to observe responses detailing spiritual connection through music, giving back to the community through positions of leadership in camp administration or Jewish education policy, and foreign relations. Looking around the room, it did not surprise me to see how each response paired up well with the author's personality and ambitions. After answering that question, however, we fellows were asked to answer another. "Why?" This came as a surprise to most of us, having thought long and hard about our passions, heritage, and how to synthesize the two. It almost seemed burdensome to entertain the question, as if doing so would be a redundancy.
As we progressed with our writing, however, the opposite seemed to be true. Of the answers I observed, most were not written wholeheartedly and lacked any compelling substance of truth or conviction. I, myself, stopped writing half way through, totally unsatisfied with what I had to say. I began to write about how my experiences in Jewish living were meaningful to me and used that as a rationale for wanting to spread the benefits I received to others. I was ashamed relatively quickly, though, to have produced something that I felt was prosthelytizing. After a brief moment of confusion and worry that we had all gathered here without a realistic sense of purpose, I took solace in the fact that essentially none of us could truly answer that question of 'Why?' Not being able to answer that question at this moment in time only makes my, our, participation in the Nachshon Project that much more meaningful. It makes each future trip, conversation, class, cab ride, political frustration, cultural experience and meal have the potential for so much more than could be anticipated. The Nachshon Project isn't about career advancement or visiting Israel, but rather helping individuals, fellows, recognize their passion and ambition and challenge them to wonder why it moves them in hopes that a more thorough understanding of one's self fosters more impactful experiences that contribute to their personal story of Jewish living.
