The long saga of black-Jewish relations in America is complicated territory, fraught with animosity and blessed with friendship.
For every positive chapter, it seems, that a negative counterweight rears its head.
Jews were among leaders of the movement to abolish slavery; many died fighting for the Union in the Civil War.
Other Jews owned slaves or assumed leadership positions in the Confederacy.
Jews marched alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. — always a steadfast ally of American Jews — and other leaders of the Civil Rights movement; they were among those murdered by supporters of the Ku Klux Klan.
While recognizing the value of this alliance, some black community leaders have charged Jews with economic exploitation of blacks, especially in such sectors as real estate.
Many blacks today revere the words of Louis Farrakhan and his Nation of Islam, long purveyors of hateful anti-Semitic canards.
Many Jews openly expressed support last year for the Black Lives Matter movement, even as wings of that movement adopted stances that were not only virulently anti-Zionist but bordered on anti-Semitic.
Clearly, for blacks and Jews to get along as time goes on — and to continue to find common cause on issues that affect both minority communities — such frictions need to be openly faced and discussed. If members of both communities wish to make progress and heal wounds, that dialogue will have to be honest and based on mutual respect.
That will depend, in large part, on education.
The governing question for this article, then, is this: What are Jewish educators doing to prepare young Jews to navigate the complex terrain of black-Jewish relations?
The Intermountain Jewish News recently communicated with two Denver Jewish educators in local Jewish high schools — with significantly different religious characters — to inquire what their curricula covers when it comes to this relationship, and how they cover it.
While coexistence, tolerance and racial harmony are certainly part of that matrix, not everything is unicorns and rainbows, rather like the black-Jewish relationship itself.
At Beth Jacob High School of Denver, a venerable West Side institution with a solidly Orthodox orientation, students are regularly exposed to the complex dimensions of race relations, specifically those between Jews and blacks.
Esther Melamed, Beth Jacob’s principal of general studies, put it succinctly in a recent exchange with the IJN: “With regard to the following topics — race, racism, American slavery, institutional racism, the Jim Crow laws and Black Lives Matter — I submit the following:
“Beth Jacob High School of Denver covers most of those events, some in more detail than others. We focus on Dr. Martin Luther King and his inspirational messages and contribution to the fight for civil rights for the black people. We embrace his vision of an America where, to quote, ‘I have a dream that one day my children will live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but the content of their character.’”
The girls’ high school history curriculum includes discussion of the Ku Klux Klan and other hate-oriented movements, Melamed says, in the conviction that instruction on such historical “mistakes,” as uncomfortable as such teaching might be, is essential to a balanced and reality-based education.
“We teach our history courses with an emphasis on primary sources and critical thinking about events of the past, based on the best and most accurate version of history we have available,” Melamed says.
“We do not believe in whitewashing historical mistakes of the past nor do we believe in eliminating them from our history. We focus on how to learn to improve on the events of the past.”
A similar philosophy governs Beth Jacob’s approach to race relations as an issue in the US, circa the 21st century.
“We do discuss current events and how to understand the debate about race relations in the United States today.”
Acknowledging present-day racism in America, however, does not necessarily equate with the pre-supposition that the US is an inherently racist culture, Melamed says.
“In general, my perspective is that while America is not perfect it is also not a racist country, but a bastion of freedom and opportunity,” she says, pointing to her own familial history as a source for this conviction.
“My family and I came to America as immigrants from Romania when I was 12 years old. Both my parents were Holocaust survivors who lost, together with millions of other Jews, their entire family in the Holocaust. They went back to look for any family survivors and were not able to leave. To get a visa out of there and come to America was a long and arduous process.
“The memory of arriving in the US as immigrants and traveling to Cleveland, where we had family, remains a warm memory. We would finally be able to practice our religion freely and be able to attend Jewish schools instead of being at risk of losing our very lives for practicing our religion.
“The day we became citizens was appreciated greatly as we could contrast our lives before, when we lived under communism, and life in the US.”
Melamed firmly believes that America’s freedom and “opportunities to improve one’s situation with hard work and determination” are available to all its citizens, regardless of race or circumstances.
“Many times, my students ask me as we discuss the current events of our time how come people do not remember and learn from the mistakes of the past, for example about socialism and communism,” Melamed says.
“How much death and destruction can be attributed to those governments, and now people want to bring [such governments] to America. Many of our students are also from immigrant families and cannot understand how people do not appreciate our freedoms and opportunities here in the US.”
The principal attributes such attitudes to the Black Lives Matter movement, indicating that this recent chapter of current events is not cast in a very positive light at Beth Jacob.
“The Black Lives Movement aligns itself with destroying our society and replacing it with alien ideas in the name of bringing about more opportunities for black people,” Melamed says directly.
“Theirs is a mistaken vision of anarchy and hatred of the US, instead of peacefully working together to bring about positive change and improvements for all.”
Denver Jewish Day School, whose educational and religious perspective is considerably less conservative than its West Side cousin, approaches the black-Jewish relationship through a significantly different lens.
Jason Snyder, the school’s upper division principal, explains to the IJN that while race relations are not necessarily considered a high priority in the DJDS curriculum, the subject is broadly and openly addressed when it is appropriate in the context of a particular area of study.
“DJDS neither prioritizes nor does not prioritize race when teaching race in social studies,” Snyder says. “We teach race when appropriate within the content for that particular class.
“For example, it would be impossible to teach US history without significant attention being paid to race. Other content areas have their own unique history which may or may not have a racial component. In any case, all social studies classes pay attention to marginalized groups in different areas around the world.”
The long and troubled history of black people in America is definitely a part of those discussions, Snyder says.
“Jim Crow, the Ku Klux Klan and the American civil rights movement, including such diverse figures as Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and the Black Panthers, are all real parts of the American historical narrative. Any study of American history would be incomplete without significant coverage of the above.”
Like any good history instruction, the DJDS approach is to contextualize the past as it relates to the present, Snyder says.
“We endeavor to take a critical look at all parts of American history (and all history) and use that examination as way for students to both understand where we are in contemporary America and understand their agency to affect change.
“This examination certainly includes the above topics, but we do not address American racial history any differently than we do the rest of American history.”
In light of the fact that his school is geared specifically for Jewish students, Snyder adds: “We do discuss the fact that many American Jews helped facilitate the American civil rights movement.”
Present day race relations are definitely part of the mix, he adds, including the Black Lives Matter movement and its implications for American Jews.
Snyder says it’s important to note that Black Lives Matter is both an organization and a movement, and that the difference is crucial.
“The organization has certain stances that are anti-Israeli and anti-Zionist, and we teach that,” he says. “There are also many who believe in that ‘Black Lives Matter’ irrespective of the stances of the specific organization. And we teach that.
“It raises an interesting question: Can you support one part of an organization even if you disagree with some of the things the organization does or says? If you say that you are a Republican or a Democrat, must you support all things for which those parties stand? These are complex questions that we examine with our students.”
Beth Jacob and Denver Jewish Day School agree on at least one thing: Neither has any plans to teach the subject according to what is commonly referred to as “Critical Race Theory.”
The theory, which originated in the 1970s, has recently become a political football, with some legislators seeking to formally ban it from public education, while others insist it’s hardly being applied at all, at least in high school and lower levels of education.
Wikipedia broadly defines the theory, often called “CRT,” as “a body of legal scholarship and an academic movement of civil rights scholars and activists in the United States that seeks to critically examine US law as it intersects with issues of race and to challenge mainstream American liberal approaches to racial justice.”
The basic tenets of CRT, according to Wiki, “include that racism and disparate racial outcomes are the result of complex, changing, and often subtle social and institutional dynamics, rather than explicit and intentional prejudices in individuals.”
DJDS’ Snyder says that the school has never adopted a “defined position” on CRT.
“We present students with several perspectives which have framed racial discussions for decades. Our endeavor is for these perspectives to challenge students’ understandings and allow them to better make sense of our world.”
Beth Jacob’s position, in the view of Melamed, is considerably more detailed, and much more critical, of the theory.
While Beth Jacob also has never taken a formal position on CRT, “we do feel that it is revisionist history and that it is based on ideas many reputable historians have argued are inaccurate and have no place in schools,” Melamed says, expanding on her comments critical of the Black Lives Matter movement.
“Critical race theory seeks to indoctrinate students with only one perspective and stifle examination of competing, valid views. At our school, we have always focused on developing critical thinking skills in our students, and we endeavor to present them with evidence that they then evaluate logically and with an open mind. “
Melamed says that the idea that all American institutions and systems are racist by nature is, in the end, “detrimental to the very people they are trying to help.
“Poor black people need to have the same opportunities as all Americans to get a good education, to live in safe communities and to be able to improve their situation and benefit from the great opportunities available here in the US,” she says.
“Students attending failing public schools and not having options, as well as living in dangerous neighborhoods where gangs proliferate and police are defunded, is not the way to help them be able have a more positive vison of their future.”
CRT, Melamed adds, is “dangerous” in the sense that it pits Americans against one another.
“It does not unify them to work together to improve life for all Americans, and especially for black people who have suffered these difficult and often tragic events in their history.”
Chris Leppek may be reached at IJNEWS@aol.com.
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