By Barrett Holman Leak in San Diego
There are moments when you feel a great sense of affirmation in life; affirmation that you have been on the right track, doing the right thing, acting with integrity, and that your hard work is truly valuable. That feeling filled me as I watched the first installment of the new four-part PBS series “Black and Jewish: An Interwoven History.
Because I live in the intersection of being both Black and Jewish, I have learned about my identity over the years, both through experience, stories handed down to me, education, and reading. Over the last nearly four years, I have poured this knowledge and expertise into the Playing Together Project, especially the educational boards we have created as a mobile civil rights exhibit. We have continued to share it at the annual Juneteenth Freedom Festival in San Diego, at JPride at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center, at the House of Israel lawn program as one of our federation’s Jewish organizations, and at other places.
The information on these exhibit boards came alive in this first installment of the series. Using archival footage and pages of both writings and artwork) from books and other documents, it shows the horrific, deadly pogroms that Jews endured in Russia and elsewhere, the banishments and exile from so many countries, and the flight to the United States of America. It also details the Transatlantic Slave Trade and its kidnapping and enslavement of 12 million African people to build what became the United States of America after white Europeans stole the land on which Indigenous First Peoples (Native Americans) lived, then colonized the land. From there, it covers the links between Black Americans and American Jews that could be so clearly seen by 19th century Jews and Africans.
Prof. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. presents to viewers the philosophy of the Jewish brothers Arthur and Joel E. Spingarn, both founders and early leaders of the NAACP: that no one in America was free until the Black man was free. The Spingarn brothers were instrumental in framing the fight for Black civil rights as a universal moral imperative. Joel Spingarn hosted the Amenia Conferences at his estate to unify diverse leaders. His core argument was one we are hearing today: that American democracy was a “sham” as long as any citizen was denied rights based on race. He believed the freedom of white Americans (and he was including Jews) was spiritually and legally compromised by the oppression of Black Americans. As early leaders of the NAACP, the Spingarns pushed the idea that racial justice was not a “charity” for Black people, but a necessary condition for the freedom of all Americans. Jews would never be free of antisemitism until Black Americans were free from racism and vice versa. I think it still rings true today.
Woven throughout the film was a Shabbat dinner that included people I personally know or have met (such as Nate Looney of the URJ, Rabbi Angela Buchdahl of Central Congregation in New York City, Susannah Heschel and excerpts from their conversations about how Black Jewish lineage going back centuries in the United States and beyond was joyful. It makes me want to get some recipes from my copy of the KosherSoul cookbook by Michael Twitty, who was also present.
This was exciting, and I was so very happy to view it as part of a watch party AND get to discuss it for more than an hour after the program. I do not know what Part 2 will bring, but I am ready. Clearly, as usual, Dr. Gates and his team do thorough research and craft it together well in a solid story. It is a story that all Americans, but especially American Jews and African Americans, need to hear. It dispels a lot of myths, presents facts, and shows that Blacks and Jews are stronger together and more closely tied than some people think, but not in the way some people think.
If you want to be part of next week’s watch party on Tuesday, February 10, at 6:00 PM PT, send an email to info@playingtogether.org
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Barrett Holman Leak is a freelance writer based in San Diego.
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