“His first thought was to cross the street-a natural reaction, one that had been reinforced by years of beatings and taunts. He was walking alone on Manhattan’s West 185th Street, from Amsterdam Avenue toward the ice cream parlor he had discovered on Broadway, when he spotted the group of boys-strangers, not Jewish -approaching. In Fürth, such an encounter was sure to produce, at the very least, some small humiliation. He started to step off the sidewalk. Then he remembered where he was.” 

From Walter Isaacson’s, Kissinger: A Biography. Isaacson writes that many years later Kissinger recounted in a speech: “When I came here in 1938, I was asked to write an essay at George Washington High School about what it meant to be an American. I wrote that… I thought that this was a country where one could walk across the street with one’s head erect.” 

As German Jews, we have a reputation for paying special attention to kiddush Hashem. This also includes a special sensitivity- almost a fear of, “Ma Yomru HaGoyim?”  

Is it our strength or our weakness? I sometimes am of two minds on this. Whatever it is, we all have it. 

But this sensitivity comes out in different ways from different people. 

My father z’l, who grew up in Switzerland, had different ideas than I had as an American-born Jew. 

For instance, he did not like me wearing a yarmulka in the street, but didn’t mind when I wore a black hat in the street! As an American Jew, I have no qualms with walking in a Yarmulka. But in situations where I feel uneasy, I prefer a baseball cap (silly as it looks with a beard and white shirt…) 

My father and I were equally uncomfortable seeing Taleisim worn openly in the street, but Dad also resented the carrying of a tallis bag in the open! He always asked me to put it inside a plastic shopping bag! 

If Dad had to daven Minchah while on the road, there was always some way to conceal it. Usually, he would open the trunk of his car and pretend he was looking for something. I never felt self-conscious about this, mostly because the Moslems have broken the public-prayer taboo for us. 

Here is another generational difference between us. Dad z’l, and many of his generation- including non-Yekkes- would not wear a hat to shul with a Yarmulka beneath it. When wearing a hat, the Yarmulka was always in the pocket. On Shabbos he left the Yarmulka home, so the first thing we needed to do when returning from shul on Friday night was to finger through his night table in the dark for a Yarmulka.  

But here is where Dad was a Jewish warrior. My father was one of the best examples of a religious Jew in the blue-collar workforce I have come across. The bus depot was not an accounting office or a municipal building. It was a garage. His co-workers came from every nationality but were predominantly Black, Irish, and Italian. Although they never saw him in a Yarmulka, they all knew he was an orthodox Jew. From time to time they would ask him the reason for something we do and he had the most practical and logical reasons- (be they the real reasons or not.) Knowing how he loved to talk, his answers were probably long enough to discourage this type of questioning from reoccurring.  

But as great of an advocate as he could be, he wasn’t comfortable “fighting” for his religion. He liked to let things pass. So, for years my mother was angry that the Swiss-American society- whose events he loved to attend, would make every meeting and outing on a Saturday. And she would push him to complain about this. He wouldn’t. 

He also would not complain that in his 30 years at the Auxilary Police, he was always given promotions when, and only when, there was no one else to promote. Mom called it anti-Semitism and Dad called it a coincidence. These were the attitudes driven into the Jewish psyche during the thousand-year  Rhineland Golus. 

Then came my sister’s nursing “boards” (exam). It was given on a Shabbos. The State agreed to accommodate Sabbath observers by sequestering them over the weekend in a hotel room in order to take the exam on Sunday. My mother called one of the major Jewish organizations and they would not do anything to lobby for the Frum students. (Ma yomru HaGoyim?) Then my mother called Senator Daniel Patrick Moynahan’s office. The good senator was appalled and made several phone calls. The result was that the exam date was moved, and the calendar was permanently altered so it could not be given on Sabbath again. There are times that the Jew must walk with his head erect!