Enigmatic Member

One of my congregation's few intriguing members expired at age 79.  I never got to know him well, probably never spoke to him for more than a prolonged greeting, only learned about him from appearance and written snippets, until his passing and funeral.  Yet he fascinated me in life.  In a congregation of mostly perfunctory handshakes with little exchange of minds relative to the immense capacity of the minds that floated around, this fellow, while also perfunctory, had a uniqueness that I let slip by.

I'd not seen him in a few years.  He was an infrequent Jew of Color, though until his funeral not quite sure which color.  I thought he was South Asian, perhaps one of those Jews of India who mostly migrated to Israel after both India and Israel achieved independence in proximity to each other.  Yet he had an Eastern European surname, which I eventually learned was derived from a German town, not a place in The Pale.  His first name was not shared with anyone I knew, I assumed Asian or maybe North African.  And I knew he saw patients professionally, some form of non-physician practitioner.

He came to shul with some frequency, though far less since our congregation sold its building.  I could count on him at Holy Days, nor would it have been unusual to have him among us a few shabbatot each year, at least while we had our own building.  He had been invited to give a presentation not that many years ago on Jews of Color at our annual AKSE Academy series, but weather pre-empted the winter evening allotted for this.  When he came it was always alone.  I knew nothing of his family.  He seemed invariably gracious, perhaps taciturn.  He had his own large tallis which he kept in an embroidered royal velvet bag.  

The funeral proved my assumptions wrong on most counts.  While the origins of his surname were never disclosed, we as an African-American, a native of our state, who in his younger years received appointments as an assistant to high state officials for which African-Americans had not been considered prior to the early Civil Rights era.  He did live in Asia for a while, Sri Lanka and Lebanon to pursue some of his studies.  He lived in other parts of America, Georgia and metro DC for a while, though I thought I had known him through my synagogue as long as I had been there.

His wives, and he had more than one in his lifetime, were African American, resulting in eight children.  He had converted to Judaism, his final wishes to be buried in the Jewish cemetery arranged by the Jewish funeral director.  He had chosen his own Jewish name, with the convert's ben Avraham v'Sarah following the name he had chosen.

At the funeral, the Conservative Rabbi wove together the American Black traditions of the survivors with the Jewish culture as best he could, while keeping the ceremonial aspects classically Jewish.  My congregation was amply represented, as was his family, though we seemed to keep separate from each other.  And there was no mention of what prompted him to seek a place among our Jewish community, particularly the most Jewishly observant of the local congregations.  

So a dignified closing to the life of a very pleasant though maybe subdued personality, some mystery disclosed, other still hidden.