You Shouldn’t Sit There

There are some places where you know not to sit. We learn this very early on, when our grade school teacher got a big desk with adult chair. And even when vacant, we did not sit in it. It was hers, a place of honor off limits to the students. At the doctor’s, he got the chair with wheels. We sat atop crinkly paper the texture of matzoh to our partially clothed bottoms, upon a padded table with a Naugahyde cushion. At synagogue, the Rabbi had a designated chair on the Bimah, a designated place of honor that stayed vacant during his absence. The congregational president also got his spot on the bimah in a high-backed chair, one that appeared less comfortable than where everyone else sat, exclusive to his use while in office. On special Holy Days, the most desirable seats fetched the best price. Usually they were visually accessible to the proceedings, while my parents sat on folding chairs toward the sanctuary’s rear, maybe with a glimpse of the Torah during its processional, but full auditory capacity from amplifiers placed on the bimah. As a teenager, I did not even merit a seat in the sanctuary. In years when the congregation rented a movie theater for parallel services, teens like me forked over $5 to sit in the movie’s balcony. I did not mind, as the air conditioner worked better in the theater, I was with my friends, and during the World Series, the custodial staff relayed the scores to the Rabbi, usually a hired back-up for those too unimportant to be accommodated in the sanctuary, who announced them at the next convenient prayer break. After our new wing became functional, I lost the cushy digs in favor of folding chairs set up on the basketball court that housed overflow worshipers. Teens paid the least, maybe not at all those years, but the main sanctuary, which by then had installed pews sold to the more prosperous, was not where we entered.

Nor did I sit in Box Seats at the stadium or on the lower level at a symphony. I knew my place. At the University or the movies, I could sit anywhere, at synagogue almost except on the days when people rented seats assigned by row and number. And reaching some measure of professional prominence, I valued my own special chair, spending a little extra to have something pleasing to me but off limits to everyone else. And I never had to chase anyone away for usurping my designated place, the best chair in the room with swivel and recline settings. Knowing where it is permissible to sit shows the acceptance of status, something virtually never challenged.

Alas, the implicit sanctity of designated seating had one of its rare failures these past High Holy Days. My congregation developed as a conglomeration of several traditions. Two traditional synagogues merged in the 1950’s, growing large enough by the merger and demographics of that era to justify customizing its own large space the following decade. While we were an affiliate of the Orthodox Union, at the time the parent did not challenge our well- established custom of mixed seating. Our Rabbi, who would lead us for forty years, was mainstream Modern Orthodox in training and in his assessment of rules, reinforced by his national prominence within the Orthodox community. The sanctuary designers created a semi-circular placement of fixed pews. Most people opted to sit in those that allowed them to face forward towards the bimah. On each side were pews facing the center of the congregation three rows deep, preferred by others, though tiered upwards requiring a few steps to the back row. On the side placements, sections of three gender-designated rows were placed closest to the bimah. Men furthest from the entrance, women on the side of the entrance. These were sparsely utilized, but almost never not utilized. The Rabbi Emeritus had a plaque with his name in the front row. Nobody other than him sat there during his lifetime, and only his visiting son after his passing. And we had a few men, rarely more than four on any Saturday morning, that felt that section their personal preference. Our Women’s section also had its regulars, the Rabbi’s widow and a few other women who adopted separate seating as their norm. And eventually, believing that the gender designated area should never be left vacant if only as a matter of respect for the decision to have it, I assigned myself the default occupant when nobody was sitting in the Men’s Seats when I arrived.

Expectations have a way of changing, creating a tension over what should be maintained and what is better footnoted congregational history. Two key events took place, the first abrupt, the second more insidious. Our umbrella affiliation, the Orthodox Union, revoked our grandfathering for absent mechitzah. A discussion took place where we as a unified synagogue decided to not comply with the OU ultimatum. No Mechitzah in our shul. And we disappeared from the roster of OU affiliates. And really no opposition to this from within the congregation. We affirmed what we are, and at least for the previous forty years, what we had been and anticipate remaining into our future.

This posed some difficulty finding a successor to our retiring Rabbi, as not many Orthodox Rabbis, required certification in our by-laws, would want to risk their careers in defiance of Orthodox Union policy, but we secured a Rabbi acceptable to our membership majority. Time brings demographics, for us contraction, and new Rabbi’s bring their preferences. For very understandable reason, as Shabbos morning attendance atrophied in parallel to paid membership, the Rabbi declared he would rather preside in a room where those in attendance seemed less scattered. Thus, services moved to our chapel, a tastefully appointed room where our daily minyanim took place. While much smaller, the first two rows had been labelled gender restricted, men to the left of the aisle, women to the right. Only the Rabbi and Cantor customarily sat in the front row, at least to make a statement on gender restriction. Occasionally the women’s rows would find a man seated there on weekdays, though never in the presence of a woman who claimed it as her turf. As the room became the location of Shabbos and yontif worship, the restricted rows remained, fully respected, or almost so, to the best of my recollection, though no woman asserted those seats as her rightful privilege or ever evicted a male interloper.

Shrinking membership runs parallel to shrinking revenue, which makes a building customed designed for the needs of its day a white elephant, though a very salable one, when less space is needed. Building sold, cash rich, some allocated to rental space. We secured use of a chapel at a neighboring, and in another day competing congregation. No longer did we have signs for restricted men’s and women’s seating, or if we did, I did not notice them. For Holy Days when attendance exceeding the seating capacity of the chapel, and for which our landlord needed that room, we rented a larger auditorium, this time with the designated seating nominally restored, though not obviously labelled and sparsely used if at all. After two years, we rented space we could more accurately assert as our own. By now, for designated Shabbos services with expanded women’s participation, separate seating returned, this time mandatory with a velvet theater rope dividing the seating from front to back. But during other services, Shabbos and others, no signage appeared. As a practical matter, only men sat in the first row, clergy primarily and a special needs congregant. Their presence spanned the entire row.

No women’s section reappeared, or at least not labelled as such, until the Holy Days. Our chapel could be fully occupied on a Saturday morning for a special event, about half occupied most weeks. But Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur have become showcases for most American synagogues, ours among them. Our landlord, a Protestant Church, offered us use of their large room, a mostly cavernous space that would easily accommodate any attendance that our congregation might attract. Chairs of perhaps assembly style, not folding chairs, were placed across the breadth of the auditorium. A generous aisle able to accommodate a couple walking together or a wheelchair moving alone defined two halves, with another negotiable aisle at either edge. All seating faced the front with two exceptions. The Rabbi sat up front facing the congregation. And seating designated for and labelled Men’s and Women’s in block letters was placed between the Rabbi and the front row of non-designated seating. These chairs, however, faced the middle aisle and each other, perpendicular to the large assemblage of chairs. People sitting in these would require a right-face if female, left-face if male to put the Ark in front-sight, something required a few times during traditional Jewish worship. While I only attend on Yom Kippur, nobody occupied either the men’s or women’s section. Probably the only person still left who felt, out of respect for our origins those gender assigned places should never be totally vacant, I excused myself to the men’s section for Kol Nidre and part of Yom Kippur. Nobody queried me as to why.

The Women’s Section remained devoid of takers, at least of appropriate takers. It was also the section nearest the High Holy Day Choir, for whom only male voices are acceptable. When the choir goes on recess, where do they sit, in the nearest empty chairs, those labelled Women’s Section. Shmendriks? Perhaps, but also our Baalebatim at their most lofty titles. As the Cohanim prepare to bless the congregation, all men, where do they place their tushes? In the designated Women’s Chairs. And where is the Rabbi’s line of sight when this occurs? Directed at the Women’s Section. Does anyone even notice? Just me, or maybe more that I don’t know about. While photography is verboten on the Holy Days, perhaps our landlords can install a continual security camera for later review. Or we could go the route of propriety. Nobody who could sit in the seats does. Those who shouldn’t think nothing of violating the designations. Eliminate the designations.

Traditions are a strong part of Judaism. Each community, including ours, has elements of commonality with the rest of global Judaism. Each community is particular in its own way, establishing its norms, establishing its predictabilities. Once they are no longer respected as heritage, though, it may be better to not allow such easy violation. Those who sat there probably did not realize their faux pas. But we also have a negative commandment to not put stumbling blocks before the blind, generalized to not enable people to transgress when they lack the needed sensitivity or discernment. Those chairs were never vacant when we had ownership of our space. Now they are. Better absent than vacant or occupied by unwitting gatecrashers.