Keeping the Faith

A few months ago, I took to the streets of New York to produce a short film for United Jewish Communities with my Pavement Films colleague Simon Weaver and the Jewishrobot. The subject of the film was heroes–specifically Jewish heroe–and we began the day outside Lubavitch headquarters in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. We must have spent at least a couple of hours on the street, talking to passing rebbes and worshippers. Sure enough, before long, I was asked whether I would put on tefillin.

I went to a Jewish middle school, in Leeds, so this wasn’t my first tefillin time. I used to own my own set, and I even have a vague memory of laying tefillin on Masada just after sunrise, when I was about 13 years old. But it had been an awfully long time – almost 20 years – since those leather straps and that odd, slightly heavy box, had been placed atop my head and on my arm. The tefillin reminded me of school, of being young and believing in, and being somewhat comforted by, religious practice.

Once the tefillin were on, it was time to say the Shema – a prayer I have probably uttered a half dozen times in the past decade. Thankfully, I acquitted myself quite well, remembering the blocks of phrases, the intonation, even the meaning of many of the words. It felt strange to be standing in the middle of the street, in Brooklyn, facing a fellow Jew, with whom I have a shared past and yet such an utterly different lifestyle.

The majority of my contact with the Lubavitch in New York is being accosted on street corners in the run up to Jewish holidays to be asked whether I would like to hear the shofar or shake the lulav, or to stare in disbelief from the back of a taxi as they hurry, shtreimels perched atop their heads, through Williamsburg. So, it was a real pleasure to just hang out for a couple of hours, discussing their heroes, their families and their community. Plus, they were a lot more friendly and open than I expected.

The remainder of the day was spent in Union Square, Washington Square Park and on the Upper West Side. (You can’t make a film about Jewish heroes without asking a few questions outside Zabar’s.) I think we interviewed about two dozen people who, sadly as ever, had to be edited to squeeze into a 60-second film.