Community and Society Archive
Welcome to Community and Society where you will find the latest thoughts and reflections by CLAL faculty and associates on the changing nature of community and society in America today. What are the challenges and opportunities these changes represent for the Jewish people in America at the dawn of a new century?
To access the Community and Society Archive, click here.
In Defense of Babel
By David
Kraemer
On a recent
afternoon—bright, clear, and deceptively cheerful—I got out of the subway at
28th Street in Manhattan and headed east. The
throngs that populate the sidewalk along those blocks are international in the extreme,
though Spanish-speaking and Arabic-speaking people seem to dominate. As I listened to the sounds of Arabic conversation
surrounding me, my attention was drawn upward by a commercial jetliner, flying extremely
low over midtown. My imagination suddenly got
the best of me. What if the plane was headed
toward the Empire State Building, just a few blocks away?
What if, at the hands of Muslim hijackers, it was all happening again?
The plane quickly
passed, and the Empire State Building continued to stand tall. But my imagination continued on its course. What
if there was another such attack? What sorts of steps to assure security would I be
prepared to support? Forbidding all Arabs to
fly in the United States? Expelling all
non-citizen Arabs from the country? I was not
proud of my thoughts, but I couldn’t help thinking them as I continued to walk east. If the security of my home were at risk,
wouldn’t I have to support extreme measures?
I was on my way to
the office, though as it happens, my immediate destination was a Pakistani grocery on
Lexington Avenue. I wanted to stop in there for some tri-color couscous, an ingredient in
a recipe I’d spotted that morning in The New
York Times and wanted to try. As I walked into the grocery, I was greeted by the
colors and smells of foods and spices from India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and other
near-Asian countries. It was hard not to love
the richness of it all. The store transformed my mood. I walked out feeling happy.
As I looked along
that small block of Lexington Avenue, with its signs in Indian, Arabic, and other
languages I could not recognize, I thanked God for the variety of peoples and cultures
that is New York City. Here, the traditions
and collected wisdoms of all of the world’s nations gather. They thrive in peace and, mostly, in respectful
mutual recognition, knowing that no one of them can claim general hegemony. Each contributes to the swirl of competing ideas
that is contemporary America, and together they make this city a place of unparalleled
richness. How lucky we are, I thought, that
we can enjoy the fruits of this variety. How
much poorer would we be without the babel of languages that meets us, challenges us, and
welcomes us every day.
As my joy dispelled
the bigoted anxiety I had experienced earlier, I was ashamed of the path along which my
imagination had led me. The greatness of this
society in which we live and thrive is in the tolerance and openness that makes it so
complex. There has never been a society where
so many different kinds of peoples can live and thrive side by side, as neighbors if not
always as friends or lovers. And the richness
of our lives is unparalleled precisely because of the openness we have been able to
create. As we have recently been reminded,
there will always be those who are threatened by our openness and hate our tolerance. They will be suspicious of a society where there
is no single right and wrong. They will
resent a society that, by virtue of its freedoms, achieves a standard of living that is
without peer. Indeed, they will hate us for
not hating those they hate. And, because of
the very openness we have created, they will always have an opportunity to strike at us
without our expecting it. That is the price
we pay.
We must remember
that we are vulnerable because of our strengths, strengths we would never want to give up. Were we to become too strong where we are
vulnerable, shutting tight our open doors, then we would be much weaker where we are
strong, and our society as a whole would suffer. So
if we err in one direction, it must always be in the direction of tolerance and openness. Such an “error” is the only assurance we
have that America will remain America, great precisely because it refuses to erect strong
boundaries.
I have no doubt
that the risk is worth it. This is clearest to me when I imagine walking through this city
that is so familiar and important to me, with all its different neighborhoods. It is true that when I think of Ground Zero, still
smoldering, I get angry. I imagine the
buildings that used to be there, and I think I’d like to shut down our borders, keep
out everyone if only it would keep out those who want to commit such crimes. But then I imagine walking up to Chinatown, and
then through Little Italy; through the Asian communities along Lexington in the 20s, and
back west through Korea town. When I imagine
traversing these neighborhoods, or the hundreds more both like and not like them, I do not
feel the need to protect myself from foreigners. Instead,
I want to praise God for the variety of humanity and its creations. The city and its wealth of neighborhoods and
inhabitants make me want to recite the ancient rabbinic blessing: “Blessed are You,
Lord our God, who made variety in those who were created.” Because diversity is a blessing.
It is our most powerful assurance that we will see beyond ourselves. Hence, it is a provocation for imagination. And from imagination comes wisdom. It is to wisdom that we ultimately strive.
To read additional articles by David Kraemer, click here
To join the conversation at Community and Society Talk, click here.
To access the Community and Society Archive, click here.
To receive the Community and Society column by email on a regular basis, complete the box below:
