Belonging

Jonah Rocheeld

Who do we become when we sacrifice our integrity for belonging?

This was a question that held great weight for me in my late teenage years. I grew up in a Modern Orthodox home, my life defined by the rhythms shared by thousands of others: attending synagogue, observing the Sabbath, and attending Jewish day schools. However, it was not until high school that the intellectual engine of that lifestyle—the rigorous study of foundational texts like the Talmud and Maimonides—became a central part of my own identity. I discovered I had a knack for tracking complex arguments and a work ethic that made me well suited for the Gemara. By the end of my high school career, I was winning awards for my learning, reciting Talmudic passages by heart, and celebrating the completion of several tractates before the entire student body.

These developments did not go unnoticed by those around me. Peers informally dubbed me “Rabbi,” seeking out “Rabbi Jonah” for insight on any number of topics, ranging from what blessing to say on a food item to whether they should attend a party that weekend. Mentors, especially rabbis, would single me out for private conversations about my future, assuring me that my future as a respected Jewish scholar was all but secured, should I choose to pursue it.

In my mind, my future was anything but secure. The more I studied the Torah, the more contradictions I uncovered, and the more my faith was shaken. I was being pulled in two different directions: on one hand, I wanted to satisfy the expectations of those around me and fit into the mold picked out for me by my friends. On the other hand, my deeply analytical mind would not tolerate contradiction or self-deception. And beneath it all, I feared the emptiness of a life untethered from faith: if my most basic beliefs were not true, what was left?

There is an idea in the Jewish faith of granting a certain measure of the benefit of the doubt. When one engages in Torah study, Jews are discouraged from characterizing contradictions as such; instead, one should view these apparent “contradictions” as evidence of insufficient understanding and as an invitation to continue pondering the concepts until the issue is resolved in one’s mind.

This idea of axiomatic coherence is expressed in multiple sources throughout the Jewish corpus. For example, the famous statement attributed to Rabbi Yishmael enumerating the thirteen principles of biblical exegesis counts as its final principle: “When two verses contradict each other, [the contradiction may be resolved] by a third verse that comes and reconciles them” (Sifra, Thirteen Hermeneutical Principles). Some commentaries, such as those of the Tosafists, were written in order to resolve any apparent contradictions across the entire Talmudic corpus. This tradition of learning has continued to this day and is perhaps most clearly embodied in the “lomdus” style of learning practiced in many institutions today, where contradictions are seen as merely an opportunity for a dialectic with the authors of the text.

In theory, this idea is meant to encourage adherents of the Jewish faith to study fervently and explore new horizons of religious inquiry. In practice, this was probably the most destructive notion of all for my developing mind.

As my study deepened, contradictions multiplied, and it became increasingly difficult to ignore my internal struggle. Instead of being energized by new ideas, I was brought down by renewed conflicts and contradictions. After all, this was not simply a matter of understanding a particularly complex sugya; it was a struggle to maintain my very way of life, everything I had ever known. Most unsettling was the growing suspicion that I simply wasn’t holy enough. I revered the sages whose works I studied precisely because they could see a larger whole where I saw only friction. I began to wonder: what was wrong with me? Why was I stuck in the “weak-mindedness” of my own heresy while they basked in the light of a greater divine truth?

Each new tenet of faith I discovered put me a step further from reaching the intellectual holy land I had been promised, where all contradictions would be resolved and I would bask in the eternal peace of a coherent worldview. I had proven to myself that my mind was a hotbed of forbidden thoughts. I learned to distrust the safety of my own mind.

I was missing a mirror—real proof that the issues I was facing were not individual but systemic. This would arrive in the form I least expected: a close friend and religious role model at my university. This was someone I admired for his unshakable faith, intention to pursue rabbinic ordination, and commitment to Torah study. There was just one caveat: he had not been submitting his homework for our Bible study class. Week after week, we would arrive in class, and week after week, he would delay our professor with apologies that he had not understood the assignment or had been unaware that one was due.

This strategy seemed to work at first, but by the end of the semester, our professor was fed up. He demanded that this student turn in all of the missing homework or fail the course. This friend reached out to me to ask for help with the homework. I told him I would be glad to assist him if we could set up a time to discuss it, but he had something else in mind.

He wanted to know if I was open to letting him copy the entire semester’s worth of homework. After all, he explained, he had a good reason for not submitting the homework: he was using that time to study Torah! Surely someone like me, who valued Torah as much as he did, could understand why he had deceived our professor; the professor simply did not understand the importance of Torah study.

It is difficult to express the depth of bewilderment I felt at this revelation. I had been plagued for months by inner tension, and here I was faced with the gap between the man of faith I had known and the man now asking me to compromise my ethics on his behalf. I was demanding self-erasure while others were content with compromise, even when that compromise went against the very values they claimed to support.

What his request exposed was not merely hypocrisy but a structure I had internalized: when the demands of faith seem absolute, people will contort themselves—or others—to survive those demands. He chose to compromise the ethics he preached. I had been compromising the part of myself that questioned them. His behavior showed me that the problem was not that I lacked piety but that I had mistaken self-erasure for integrity. Faith might guide us toward who we hope to be, but it cannot replace the person we already are.

This was only the first step in a much longer journey, but it was a significant one. I learned that the true nature of belonging is not simply conformity to the expectations of others; it is an embodied attitude of self-trust. I am not the person my rabbis or friends wanted me to be, but I now understand that the truest belonging cannot be granted by others; it arises when one’s integrity and identity no longer pull in opposite directions.

This awareness leaves me with a larger question about the cost of belonging: How many of us have mistaken self-erasure for integrity in the institutions we trust most?