"Entering the "Tent of Abraham

Fraternal Ritual and American-Jewish Identity, 1880-1920

Bibliographic Data

ID4517441
AuthorsDaniel Soyer (corresponding author)
Year1999
Volume9
Issue2
Pages159-182
Publication date1999-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueReligion and American Culture A Journal of Interpretation (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1052-1151 • E-ISSN: 1533-8568
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1525/rac.1999.9.2.03a00020
OpenAlexW4248355158
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited51

One evening in 1893, a young Jewish immigrant named William Bakst joined the New York mutual-aid association made up of his compatriots from the Lithuanian town of Oshmene. The strange ceremony that marked his induction made a deep impression on him. He found especially striking the regalia that seemed utterly to transform the presiding officer, whom Bakst knew by his familiar old-country nickname. “When the inside-guard led me to the president,” Bakst later recalled, so that I could give the oath that I would never, God forbid, reveal the secrets of the society and that I would be true to its goals, when I set eyes on Gershke Yankls with a red sash across his chest, Standing there giving three strong raps of the gavel, and all those present responding by standing, I became so scared that I didn't even know what they were telling me to repeat. The “regalia” that the president wore frightened me most of all. For me, a greenhorn just out of the yeshiva who had never in his life attended a meeting, the red sash gave the impression of a high government official

Aesthetics · Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Ceremony · Evening · Immigration · Judaism · Lithuanian · Oath · Officer · Political science · History · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Jewish Identity and Society · Law · Philosophy · Psychology · Religious studies

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