When I was an early intervention provider in Chicago, I had the privilege to work with many families in the Orthodox Jewish community.  There’s a thriving and insular neighborhood in Chicago’s North side where many devout Jewish families live. I remember the first Frum family I worked with- a young family with three kids under three.  At the time, I knew nothing about Orthodox Judaism but that women had to cover their heads and dress modestly. While I had friends who went to reform temples, I’d never met or interacted with anyone Orthodox before.  It was a hot summer day, and since many of my EI clients didn’t have air conditioning, I was wearing a sleeveless top and carrying a full iced chai from Starbucks.  I rang the bell and was greeted by the children’s father, Aron.  He politely said hello. I held out my hand to shake his. Without taking my hand, he immediately turned away from me and called out to his wife, Esther, that “the EI lady is here.”  Esther called back for me to come into the kitchen.  Aron disappeared to another part of the house.

I walked into the home, took my shoes off as I would in my house (exposing my bare feet- it was summer, after all), and walked back into the kitchen.  As I introduced myself to Esther and her infant twins, she went to hand me one of the babies.  Without a thought, I set my teacup down on the kitchen counter, sloshing some of the liquid over the edge so I could take the baby from her.  Esther eyed the counter where I’d spilled and went on with her morning routine of feeding the babies.  We talked about her sons and the developmental concerns she had for her son, Levi. As we spoke, I picked up my drink a few times.  When it was time to leave the kitchen, I went to set my drink down on a counter in the other part of the kitchen. “Wait! Don’t put that there!” Esther exclaimed, “That’s my Fleishig counter!”

I stopped immediately, Starbucks cup hand suspended in midair.  “Oh! I’m sorry, “ I replied, “but I have no idea what that means.” Esther patiently explained to me that she kept a kosher kitchen.  The counters on this side of the kitchen were for meat only.  If I had spilled even a tiny drop of my tea on that counter, she would have had to re-kasher the whole kitchen before she could cook dinner. I felt terrible that my ignorance had almost led to a huge amount of work for her. I was embarrassed by my lack of knowledge about this family and wondered if our relationship could recover from my gaffe.  After all, Levi was only four months old.  There was a significant chance that this family and I would be working together for the next couple of years (that is, if they didn’t fire me for trying to de-kosher their kitchen on my first day).

Once we got into the living room, I tried my hardest to be charming and engaging to build rapport with Esther.  I even asked if Aron wanted to join us as we played with Levi and his twin brother.  “He would,” Esther said, “but would you mind putting on a sweater first? Modesty is important to us.” I looked down at my bare arms and then at Esther’s long-sleeved, high-neck dress and head covering. “Of course,” I replied, “I’ll make sure that I am better prepared next week.”

Questions for Reflection

1. This is a real life example of me almost making a careless mistake (putting dairy on a kosher meat counter) that would have violated Jewish laws and created a lot of additional work for a family before they were able to use their kitchen. What could I have done differently prior to the home visit to prevent this from happening?
2. After this session, what advice would you give me to help me move forward with this family? What could I do to repair the harm I may have done to this relationship?
3. In your work with families, is there a specific cultural group in your community that you don’t know much about that you are either working with now or likely to work with in the future?  What can you do to learn about this group’s ways of being before you make a mistake like the author’s?
4. In addition to the inappropriateness of bringing a nonkosher beverage into a kosher home and not dressing modestly, I also tried to shake Aron’s hand when we first met.  According to Orthodox Jewish laws, Aron is not allowed to touch women who are not in his family, even to shake hands.  While Esther did the work of telling me about her other gaffes, this one was not mentioned.  In this situation, was there a way that the author could have discovered this error and addressed it moving forward? If someone does not tell you that you’ve done something outside of their cultural norms, how might you find out?

To learn more about the nuances of Jewish Orthodox Life

Literature

The Jewish Book Council sponsors the National Jewish Book Award and provides book reviews and book lists.

Fiction

Ragen, N. (20112). The Sisters Weiss. MacMillian

King, R. (2004). Seven Blessings. MacMillian

Scheier, L. (2022). The Last Words We Said. Simon & Schuster

Rossner, R. (2018). The Sisters of the Winter Wood. Hachette

Nonfiction

Twitty, M. (2023). KosherSoul, Harper Collins

Stolzenberg, N. & Myers, D.N. (2022). American Shtetl. Princeton University Press

Children’s Books

PJ Library provides books about Judaism to children and maintains book lists about Jewish life for young children.

Reul, S. L.(2022). Bubbie and Rivka’s Best-Ever Challah. Abrams Books

Florian, D. (2021). Shabbat Shalom. Penguin Random House

Social Media

Moses and Zippora- American Orthodox Jewish Family posts about their life on Tiktok @mosesandzippora

Miriam Malnik-Ezagui- An American Orthodox Jewish woman posts about her life on Instagram

@Miriam.ezagui

Television and Movies

Shtisel- A Haredi family living in an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Jerusalem reckons with love, loss, and the doldrums of daily life.

Jewish Matchmaking- A reality show that follows Aleeza Ben Shalom, an orthodox Jewish matchmaker

Many Jewish Orthodox people choose not to watch television and movies.  There are not many television shows or movies about Orthodox Jewish characters. Many portrayals of Jewish Orthodox characters and stories available in the United States are created by people outside of the Orthodox Jewish community or those who have left the Orthodox community.  Watch with care.