Is it the fringes?

With this project, I explore the embodied religious practices and cultural values of Judaism, as facilitated by personal systems of belief. These personal belief systems can be built by one’s own relationship with God, with religion, with their family, with the way their family made them be religious as a kid, or any other plethora of influences that we encounter in our lives.

Particularly, I wanted to take a peek into various people’s relationship with owning, wearing, keeping, and sanctifying their tallit, a Jewish religious garment typically worn around the shoulders of a b’nei mitzvah (One who has had a b’nei mitzvah ceremony, which is a coming-of-age ritual where the Jewish newly-13 year old is called to read the Torah as an adult.). I believe wearing a tallit is a choice one makes, a ritual one chooses to take part in, and a conscious act of embodied belief.

However, the tallit is not, in religious tradition, presented as a choice. Instead, this practice originates in the Torah as a mitzvah, a commandment to wear fringes and thus remember the commandments given by God.

Thus, the biblical religious practice is pretty simple, and explicit: wear fringes to remind oneself of the commandments of God.
However, many people that I have encountered in my life practice different iterations of tallit-wearing. Tallitot are gifted to the b’nei mitzvah and in Reform Judaism, often carry unique designs– each tallit is a work of art made with different colors, symbols, and textiles. A person’s tallit is, in a way, at once an expression of the self, and an opportunity of physically signifying a place of belonging within a larger culture.

And so, in considering the sanctity of this religious object, I ask, “Is it the fringes?” Or is there something more: a personal, individual connection between a person and their tallit?