A Tour for Gur
A fascinating experience for everyone
Six groups of Gur Chassidic kids came to The Biblical Museum of Natural History for tours today. But of our five wonderful guides, one got married yesterday (to our receptionist), one is the father of the guide who got married, one was just called back to army reserve duty, one fell down the stairs last night and can't walk (I seem to recall that this is the second time this has happened), and one is female and unacceptable for Gur.
And so the administration staff hauled me out of my office, where I spend most of my time hiding from museum visitors, and it landed upon me to do all six tours. While it was pretty tiring, I have to say that it was very rewarding. We host many different kinds of charedi and chassidic groups, and each has its own character. The Gur kids were incredibly polite and well-behaved. They looked adorable - nearly all wore identical checkered shirts that were either red, blue or green. And the rebbeim were extremely appreciative.
This was one of the rare occasions that my embarrassingly sub-par Ivrit, with which I had to struggle to shed an accent from growing up in a yeshivish environment in Manchester, served me well. I quickly realized that instead of talking about the Torah I needed to speak of the Toyreh, and I was comfortably able to switch back to pronouncing various Hebrew terms the way I grew up saying them.
The museum is already set up to be sensitive to charedi requirements - there are no dinosaur skeletons, no evolution exhibits, no “controversial” material. There is a sharp distinction between the kind of things I talk about on this blog and the kind of things we talk about at the museum. And we host tens of thousands of charedi visitors who are very happy with every aspect of the museum. But for Gur, there were other adjustments that had to be made. Every video in the museum had to be switched off. And all our Bnot Sherut, who usually help with the animal handling part of the tour, had to disappear.
There were some other cultural curiosities with the Gur group. Instead of referring to our (stuffed) wild boar as a "chazir" they would only refer to it as a "dovor acher." (I am curious to know what happens when they read the pesukim that mention it - do they say it in a hushed tone, and do they try to avoid it?) And one of our animal care staff told me that when he was showing them an animal that he told them was born in the museum, the kids’ rebbe quietly told him not to talk about anything relating to reproduction.
Some people object that we should not cater to demands from such groups to change the museum experience and keep our female staff out of view. I understand the objection, but we have an educational mission and it’s pointless to stick to principles if people won’t show up as a result. This is a cultural sensitivity that we can and should accomodate.
Meanwhile, if anyone would like to train as a guide for the museum, please send your CV to the office! Applicants must be confident at public speaking, able to impart enthusiasm, fully bilingual, and not prone to falling down the stairs.
Administrative note: For various reasons, I needed to more fully split off Rationalist Judaism from the Torah and Nature Foundation, which funds the Biblical Museum of Natural History. While I will still be working on both, the finances have been separated just as the missions are separate. This means that paid subscriptions to this blog - which are much appreciated and invaluable in making it possible - are no longer directed to the foundation/ museum and thus will no longer be tax-exempt. Unfortunately, when I implemented this change in the system, the platform cancelled all the subscriptions for paid subscribers! And so paid subscribers need to re-subscribe, but I will be offering additional bonus material for you. (I will figure out who made an annual payment and provide a complimentary paid subscription for the remainder of the year.) If you prefer, you can instead support the Biblical Museum of Natural History donation page, which then enables a tax deduction. Thank you so much for your support of either project!
As we all know, in Gur they don’t reproduce the way everyone else does it.
Rabbi Slifkin: your cultural sensitivity has enabled you to bridge a considerable gap in the Jewish world, and give impressionable young Chassidic children an opportunity to learn about the natural world in a way they might not have ever been exposed to before. Because you are respectful of Boundaries in their cultural world view, you are able to navigate a complex discussion in a manner that does not cross a red line they cannot tolerate. With repeated sensitive exposure, and sometimes with legal secular structure, perhaps we can continue creating more bridges. Thank you for presenting ALL sides of the equations needed to bridge major gaps in the Jewish traditional world.