A personal essay in the Jerusalem Post, Uncomfortably Jewish in the Deep South, mentions conversion briefly but it brings up a good point. Some Jews who see Judaism as a “Ashkenazi ethnicity” have a hard time understanding those of us who buy into Judaism as a religion to which we can, literally, convert.

Snippet from the piece:

“Oh, guess what? ‘Kate’ is converting,” I said.

“Really? And then she’ll be a Jew? Just like that?” he snapped his fingers.

I thought about it – is there a moment that one suddenly becomes a Jew… a second that one is infused with some essential Jewishness?

I started to tell Boaz, “I guess so. I mean, according to rabbinic law… ”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. It seems weird to me. You can’t just become Jewish.”

“Well, technically, you can. We do accept converts, you know.”

“Yeah, but what? Poof, just like that, and she’s Jewish?”

As the writer goes on to note, no, it’s not “poof, just like that.”

Converts, like born Jews, struggle with their Jewishness always working to build a solid (sometimes quaky) Jewish identity. Most of us are not “bagel and lox” Jews. We buy into the notion of Jewish peoplehood, Jewish values, Jewish traditions, the Jewish religion but the gefilte fish is totally optional.