Craig Dershowitz is an ardent Zionist. He doesn’t eat pork or shellfish, runs a profitable nonprofit and plans to maneuver to Israel subsequent month. However for the tattoos that cowl his whole physique besides his face, palms and the underside of his ft, he’s what your bubbe may name “the right Jewish boy.”
Dershowitz is the co-founder and president of Artists 4 Israel, a company that works to stop the unfold of anti-Israel bigotry by means of artwork and goals to assist communities and other people affected by terrorism and hate. The nonprofit was created throughout 2009’s Operation Forged Lead, or the Gaza Battle, when Dershowitz was alarmed by “anti-Israeli forces utilizing trendy modern artforms, significantly in marginalized communities, to speak about Israel in a unfavorable gentle,” he mentioned.
When he met with leaders of assorted Jewish legacy teams to elucidate there was an antisemitic downside in artforms like hip-hop and graffiti, he mentioned, “they laughed us out of their places of work.”
So, Dershowitz, a Brooklyn-born, Los Angeles-based Jew, launched Artists 4 Israel, bringing graffiti and road artists to color murals on bomb shelters in Israel. The venture discovered its place, he mentioned, by collaborating with non-Israeli artists on humanitarian assist tasks.
“That turned the entry level for them to study and advocate for Israel,” he mentioned.
In 2016, Artists 4 Israel launched one other, extra controversial, venture — Therapeutic Ink, which supplies free tattoos to cowl the scars of survivors of terrorist assaults, and of IDF troopers injured in fight. Dershowitz mentioned the tattoos assist survivors reclaim their our bodies and proceed to heal bodily and mentally.
On Oct. 3 and 4, Artists 4 Israel is bringing Therapeutic Ink to Pittsburgh, providing free tattoos to these affected by the bloodbath on the Tree of Life constructing. Roughly 15 totally different Pittsburghers will obtain tattoos on every of the 2 days. The placement for the occasion is but to be introduced, however tattoo artists could also be obtainable to go to somebody’s residence ought to a person desire to obtain a tattoo privately.
Contributors don’t need to be Jewish, however they have to apply for a tattoo prematurely. Along with members of the Jewish neighborhood, Dershowitz mentioned he has a mushy spot for first responders and a ardour to assist them.
Sharon J. Serbin is a longtime member of Congregation Dor Hadash, one of many three congregations attacked within the Tree of Life constructing. She has deep roots on the congregation, together with as a trainer in its non secular faculty, and though she wasn’t in shul on Oct. 27, 2018, she mentioned the assault impacts her tremendously.
“I knew a few of the individuals who died and others who had been injured,” Serbin mentioned. “I used to be in that constructing each week, educating my college students the enjoyment of being Jewish. This was private. This was residence. This was an invasion and assault on my neighborhood.”
Serbin wrote in her Therapeutic Ink utility that she was stunned to find that she continues to be traumatized by the bloodbath.
“I knew how I felt for the primary yr after it occurred, however I assumed I had boxed it up and moved ahead,” she mentioned. “I hadn’t.”
The Pittsburgh venture will use native artists in addition to a number of “heavy hitters” within the tattoo world, Dershowitz mentioned. All of the artists donate their time.
Regardless of his confidence in the advantages of Therapeutic Ink, Dershowitz, 44, understood the venture would have its critics. Previous to launching the initiative, representatives from Artists 4 Israel spoke with a number of Conservative and Orthodox rabbis and the group has featured conversations with varied rabbis about tattoos and Jewish custom on its Fb web page.
In line with Jewish legislation, tattooing is “unacceptable,” mentioned Rabbi Danny Schiff, the Jewish Federation of Higher Pittsburgh’s Neighborhood Basis scholar.
The prohibition towards tattoos, Schiff mentioned, may be present in Leviticus 28: “You shall not make a laceration for the lifeless in your flesh. And the imprint of a tattoo you shall not place upon you. I’m the Lord.”
“Putting everlasting markings within the flesh is forbidden and the inverse of holiness,” Schiff mentioned.
Our our bodies, he added, don’t belong to us, subsequently we have now an obligation to maintain them entire, unblemished and intact.
Rabbi Alex Greenbaum, a Conservative rabbi and the non secular chief of Beth El Congregation of the South Hills, agreed with Schiff that tattoos are forbidden in accordance with the Torah — and nonetheless a “no-go” within the Conservative motion — however famous that there’s a false impression that somebody with a tattoo can’t be buried in a Jewish cemetery.
“We bury folks that eat cheeseburgers, and we bury folks that have tattoos,” Greenbaum mentioned.
Regardless of the positions mentioned by Schiff, Greenbaum and different rabbis, Dershowitz got here to a distinct conclusion. He recalled the Talmud principle, “Whoever saves a life, it’s thought of he saved the entire world.” In his opinion, that salvation isn’t strictly bodily.
“We knew we had been coming into provocative territory, however we mentioned, if this can be a therapeutic modality that may assist, who would have the chutzpah to inform somebody that jumped on a terrorist bomber as he entered a public house that he can’t get a tattoo if it’s going to heal him?”
“We’re not on the market with a gun defending individuals from terrorists, however we’re saving them,” he mentioned. “They’re popping out of their homes — a few of these individuals haven’t left their homes alone, they haven’t worn shorts, as foolish as which may sound, in 10 years. They’ll’t maintain their youngsters due to PTSD, they’re afraid they’ll drop them in the event that they hear a loud sound. These tales are horrific. I don’t need to appear conceited, however I’m proud that we’ve helped flip peoples’ lives round.”
In some methods, Dershowitz sees Therapeutic Ink as a non secular calling.
“I really feel like I’m doing the very best work I’m able to and the group is doing as near God’s work as we will discover,” he mentioned. “Once we stand up to the Pearly Gates, I don’t assume anybody goes to doubt what we did and that our intentions had been proper.”
Anybody excited by making use of for a tattoo by means of Therapeutic Ink can achieve this at healingink.org. PJC
David Rullo may be reached at [email protected]
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