Attendance at synagogue during Pesach often does not seem a priority. After the effort of Spring Cleaning, menus, invitations, shopping, exchanging dishes, and pulling off an elaborate festive Seder, many feel over-extended. Services need to take place. People get assigned portions to perform, forcing them to appear. Many others, myself among them, judge the schlep to shul and the hours that people can redirect to cleanup or chilling as anti-climactic. I stayed home the first festival day, attended Chabad instead on my own shul the second as I allocate that day to them, and to my own congregation for Shabbos. Some registered as obligation to support those with bimah activity, but not enthusiastic affirmation to seek out my favorite people who will also attend. Few people appear, often one male or two on either side of the required ten.
As we move five years past the pandemic, which took much American worship online, a few residual outcomes remain. Many people who regularly attended their place of worship lost the obligation to show up. People sampled other churches online, or now by streaming. They could partake of places not available to them in person, megachurches, places with celebrity clergy, resources that bridge spirituality with entertainment. Judaism has its parallel options, which I sampled generously for myself this Pesach. The experience generated a lot of practical lessons, some a better understanding of me, some a different perspective of what Jewish worship could be, and some limitations, even false impressions, that watching another place's pews on a screen can impose.
To stream a synagogue service live requires a few things. It excludes Orthodox congregations who judge Sabbath and Festival broadcasting to be a violation of Jewish Law. Mine does not simulcast, either by Zoom or public streaming, for this reason. That leaves primarily Conservative and Reform synagogues to do this, with a few Messianics thrown in for the very curious to partake of all that might exist. Since these sanctuaries become exposed to anyone with YouTube access, the congregations that opt to do this are places that can display a flawless product. Professional video, articulate Rabbi, lyrical Cantor. In effect, places with the financial and talent resources to do this. As a consequence, my streaming brought me to two Jewish cathedrals on Manhattan, parts of a lesser one on Manhattan, one near the UCLA campus made convenient to me by a time zone difference, another in an upscale suburb of LA where stars and moguls buy mansions, and a much more modest synagogue, though impeccably appointed in Florida, though not a place that screams We Have Money as loudly as the others did.
Jewish wealth has to be taken into context. Some sage applicable advice came my way indirectly. As a young careerist, mid-1970s, I read John C. Molloy's best-seller, Dress for Success. Not really needing a corporate, expensive wardrobe as a young professional, I sought out basics at the time. He recommended purchasing quality, which usually meant expensive. The people who could promote you could tell the tailoring difference, even if I could not. He understood that plunking down two weeks' pay on a suit would not be acceptable to folks like me. Instead, he compromised on what to actually own, advice that got me through cars and homes and high end purchases of various types. He advised looking at the best stuff. Cadillacs, even if I would buy a Ford. Identify features that the higher price allows, personal musts. Those must appear in final purchase. Other items that add to a high cost do not need duplication in the final purchase. He called it shopping down.
As I watched three days, maybe ten services, of tony congregations, I found it easy to pick out what appealed to me, irrespective of whether my synagogue could duplicate this. I also identified things about those places where my preference diverged from what I saw. For better or worse, longstanding membership scripts people to look at their congregation as the assessment point. My congregational experience has some predictability, most favorable, a few irritating. Some worthy of learning from someplace else, others not.
What I saw on the streamed services was a lot of hired talent. My congregation depends on its own members davening, chanting, sometimes speaking. The Rabbi does a few specialized things that others cannot. My first service on screen began with a Torah reading. Five volunteers read one festival aliyah each. All proficient. For short festival readings, our volunteers usually learn more than that, often the entire morning's reading. The people receiving aliyot ascended to the Torah as families. Couples with late teen daughters. All seemed to know the names of their tailors and who they insist on styling their hair. Not a single running shoe. Men in suits that they would wear to their law offices or hedge funds. Daughters who would have tennis lessons and summers at the finest camps that a family focused on Jewish affiliations could secure. Not a single polyester white with blue stripes Conservative Bar Mitzvah tallis among them. I did not resent this, nor did I admire this. As social institutions, it has been places of worship have mingled people of different economic backgrounds, second only to universities. I saw an ascendance of entitlement, one that offered me my own flashback. As a young adult, I served as High Holy Day Torah reader. Aliyot were sold as fundraisers, generally claimed by people like those I had just seen on TV. As these men, and at the time they were all men even though egalitarianism was official policy, these guys offered each other a generous handshake if not a hug. I got two handshakes out of seven. As I watched on the screen this workday morning, I could only assume that some nurses, school teachers, civil servants, also sat in the sanctuary. But the camera captured Beautiful People in their finery approaching the open Torah scroll. Because they ascended as families, their names were not announced, only their number in the morning's sequence of five. Once done they returned to their seat.
We get called up by name, blessed by name when done, and remain at the scroll until the person after us has completed his portion. The LA congregation maintained the tradition. It seems less processed. The Reform congregation, among America's largest, reads Torah on Friday nights, as does the Reform congregation near my home that I periodically attend. One Aliyah, often a fragment of an Aliyah. This Erev Shabbat, they also had a Daughter naming.
The other services seemed less starkly elite. Indeed, at the Florida shul, men wore running shoes just like they do at my congregation. The women wore simpler attire, purchased on Amazon or the Outlets. Hair neatly combed but styled at home. At the California synagogues, places in a different time zone that allowed me to watch their morning services in the afternoon, the ostentation seemed more in the worship environment than in the people worshiping. All places can hire Rabbis experienced at public presentation. All sermons thoughtful, but so are those at my shul, whether delived by our Rabbi or monthly by an assigned congregant. We have more of a grass-roots culture, something I much prefer
I expect instrumental music at Reform Jewish worship. Its foundiing in Germany, imported to America with the first large wave of Jewish immigration, adapted styles from Western Europe. The much larger immigration of Eastern Europeans, my ancestors, numerically overwhelmed those of German heritage, so most American congregations adapted the traditions of Eastern Europe. These prohibit instrumental music on Sabbath and Festivals. To my surprise, all those I watched, except the Florida synagogue, had small bands playing multiple instruments. Sometimes they accompanied the Cantor, sometimes they played music for its own sake. At some point, the leader strummed a guitar. The LA congregation engaged a professional choir, maybe five or six voices, sitting in a corner, adjacent to the instrumentalists.
Despite these variations, the content of the services remained very traditional. On one morning, the annual Prayer for Dew occurs. I found it over the top ornate with the Cantor dressed in a rather tailored version of the kittel or white robe that the leader wears, not to mention a puffy hat whose gold braid front gave it a Papal look. And they did not read the longer prayer silently first, then include Dew as part of the repetition. But he sang a stirring, fluent melody of a difficult liturgical section.
Attendance on these days lags. My congregation ekes by, Chabad, where I attended, attracted a few more. These very large synagogues did not do much better. Two worshiped in secondary chapels instead of the main sanctuary. As the Torah processional occurs, some focus one of their cameras on the pews. Not at all crowded, considering the congregational membership. And the one where everyone seemed dressed to impress, the people in the pews also wore stylish dresses and hairstyles. Every place has its local customs, as does mine.
Perhaps I can visit some of these. Hotels on Manhattan are expensive, but within my means. Bus or train on Friday afternoon and late Saturday. Reform mega shul with celebrity Rabbi on Friday, Conservative upscale on Saturday, hopefully one without a Bar Mitzvah. Macherlands? Or maybe a very engaging experience. TV screens let us see what the directors and cameramen want us to see. In person, though, the visitor gets a snapshot, not the album or the movie. Maybe not everyone shops at Armani. The purpose of places of worship is to blend people. Maybe they do it better than the streaming conveyed to me.
Visit or not, synagogues come in all varieties. I've traveled enough to attend many. It's reassuring that when my own congregation finds me too weary, uninterested, and on occasion cynical, a change of experience needs only a few clicks on a remote control.
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