On Shoulders

Dear Harvard Hillel community,

Hello! I’m Elana Farbiarz, a Freshman at Harvard College. It is a tremendous privilege to write to you all. I’m originally from New Jersey, live in Thayer Hall, and serve as the Education and Israel Chair on the Harvard Hillel Student Board. I’m also involved in the Egalitarian Minyan on campus where I pray on Friday nights. Those prayers have become an anchor of my week – and a true joy.

This past Wednesday night, I had a deeply exciting and enriching experience that I’m excited to share: Harvard Hillel hosted the first installment of a series of alumni community conversations and I had the chance to participate. Professor Jason Furman moderated a conversation with Ambassador Jack Lew and author Sarah Hurwitz about what holds the Jewish people together across difference, across time, and across growing polarization. The conversation was fascinating! I was invited to reflect on the conversations and share with alumni some of what it has looked like for me to be a Jewish student here at Harvard.

Watching hundreds of alumni join in this conversation and show their commitment to what Hillel gave them is powerful – and it’s humbling. I feel an immense gratitude for those who came before me and built the Jewish life that I am so lucky to participate in. We are standing on the shoulders of you – those who built the community that I hold dear.

Reflecting on the conversation, I was deeply struck by the continuity of Jewish experiences. Ambassador Lew spoke about navigating Shabbat observance at the highest levels of government – and his gratitude for the colleagues who supported him. I saw – albeit much smaller – echoes in my own Shabbat observance as I think about how to proudly and authentically represent my Judaism to new and dear friends. Sarah Hurwitz remembered the complexity of creating Shabbat dinner where Jews of many backgrounds felt welcome. The question of balancing different community members in such big and vibrant pluralist communities resonated with me. We’re still talking about those questions! Jewish life at college is still that special – and rare – intersection of Jewish identities.

Their stories are different but feel deeply familiar. There’s an enduring continuity to Jewish experience; getting to peer at it was gratifying.

I’m only six months into my college career but I can share that Jewish life right now has been a pillar for me thus far. Deeply rich and cozy, Hillel is a way to lean back from the intensity of Freshman year. The density and rich texture of my Jewish upbringing has given me both the confidence and the tools to cast a wide net into the world of Harvard – and to invest deeply in Jewish life here.

I think a lot about why college students – why I – want and need spaces like Hillel. For me and many of my classmates Jewish life is a way to tap into something lasting, something with tried and true sticking power. I live in a dorm with three girls I met six months ago. I share a communal bathroom. There’s something temporary about it. But the friendships I have made here – with people from all backgrounds – are deep and lasting. Bringing those friends into the most important part of my life – my Judaism – has been a real source of meaning. In response to the temporality of college, Judaism gives me – gives us – a chance at something deep, rich, and true. College thus far has felt like a chance to articulate my values and execute on them; Jewish life at Hillel grounds me in that mission.

There are so many more opportunities coming up to join in this creative, intergenerational community: Hillel will be hosting another online alumni conversation in April – details coming soon. And for those of you in the Boston area, an eight-foot public art installation, a beautiful interpretive seder plate where each panel tells the stories of members of Harvard’s Jewish community, will go up on the Science Center Plaza next week. There’s going to be a space for conversation about Jewishness – in college, at Harvard, in this fraught and fleeting moment – and I hope many of you will come and experience it for yourselves.

And in the meantime, I want to wish all of you a very happy Passover! Passover is always special for me but especially this year. As I leap out into the bigness of college, I relish in these moments of deep closeness – of cousins and grandparents and aunts and uncles. May you all have such moments of layered and close community.

With wishes for a healthy and very happy Shabbat,

Elana Farbiaz ’29
Education and Israel Chair