Thoughts on the Color Red

  This week I had to encounter a dilemma that I never thought that I would have to encounter again, the question what makes a person Orthodox. From my days in yeshiva I discovered that modesty was the criteria that you were judged by. However when I asked my father he said that, one is considered Orthodox if he keeps the mitzvot as in Sabbath and kosher. However this ugly monster, has somehow found its way back into my life. It is obvious today that modesty has become the most important category for someone to be considered religious even if they do keep Sabbath, kosher and the other mitzvot.

 This story happened this week as I was sitting around in the Hillel before class. I heard a girl getting upset at a Bukharian man. The reason she got upset at this man was because he said that Orthodox Jews do not wear red, and that girl had a red coat. Being upset about this, I asked this man if he considered me religious. I was wearing my jeans, which I consider more modest for me than a skirt, because I tend to sit in an immodest fashion. He pointed out that I was wearing jeans, which is what I expected. However, I keep the Jewish holidays, Sabbath, and kosher. When I told him this he asked if I went to synagogue. I do not go to synagogue every Sabbath and Jewish holiday. The reason being is that I do not find prayer to be helpful and I feel the reason why people pray is because they were taught to, and because it is simply part of the social structure of Judaism, which I have trouble comprehending. People go to synagogue to make friends, I have not been so successful in that department. He said that I was not quite Orthodox because of that. Last time I checked, to be considered Orthodox one had to keep Sabbath and kosher, so this did not make sense to me.

   I later went to talk to the girl that the man had offended. I told her about my exchange with that man. She said that she would not take offense because he was not right in the head. She also said that the anti-red sentiment was from the time of the shtetles. That part she is mistaken about because, when I was in Balkany's school which was a Bais Yaakov, an ultra-Orthodox school the principal and teachers spoke violently against us wearing the color red. Last time I checked this was not during the time of the shtetles. The color red is banned throughout Boro Park and many other Yeshivish/Haredi neighborhoods. I seriously have issues with such dress codes. They tend to look down on those who do not follow it. The funny thing is that I have met women who I consider to be very religious but wear pants. When I stayed at one such woman's  house she  forced me to go to synagogue on Sabbath. The truth is that I like to sleep in, so waking up at 9 AM was a very big strain. The man in the story would have probably considered this family irreligious because the synagogue they went to was very Modern Orthodox.

   I somewhat envy this woman and her family because they are far away from the judgmental Jewish communities of New York. I had such an encounter when someone from my neighborhood said that her mother told her that my sister was not marrying a frum (religious) guy. Being outraged, I said that the reason that her mother said this was because she was a "narrow-headed frummie". I know that that was immature and ad hominem, but at the time it was less than two years since I graduated Balkany's school, and I was sick of people judging my religious devotion along with them judging other people's.

   These values being shoved down my throat is one of the factors that made me skeptical of the Jewish communities.I noticed that they cared more about modesty than the feelings of other people,. If I transgressed in the modesty category I got it over the head. I once faced public humiliation because I was spotted outside of school not wearing socks by a teacher. This teacher decided to announce to the whole class that she saw me dressed "immodestly". How about the saying "Love thy neighbor as if he were thyself" or "Hamalbim pinei chaveroh b'rabim ein lo chelek b'olam habah"? (The second saying means, "If you embarrass your friend in public then you lose your part in the world to come".) I guess that technically I was not a friend because I was a student, but I was taught the loose interpretation where "chaveroh" means a fellow Jew, which she obviously violated.

  I feel that many of the ultra-Orthodox people that I have met turned out to be hypocrites. Why do we judge people according to how they dress? A person can cover themselves from head to toe but still not be religious. The coat in question was a simple wool coat. I believe that this girl should have the right to wear a coat in the color of her choice without being judged.